I am Doctor Lenkar Glitch, and I am very busy doing nothing.
I swiftly paced back and forth along the metal hallways of the massive complex, my mind buzzing with life. Ideas and images flashed through my mind, faster than anyone could process, yet slow enough to recall all of the intriguing details. Concept upon concept was created within the imaginative dreamscape, as I thought about a multitude of stories.
A young boy finds himself searching in the dead of autumn, and three heroes resting in their graves are remembered. A girl stumbles into a rabbit hole, and sees wonders that would drive the task-weary insane. A man begins working on a project, hoping to find a miracle unlike any other.
My mind turned to my recent employ.
Once this project is complete, we will go down in the history books!
I stopped still on my walk to look over the doors to the project me and Bill had been working on for the last several months. I read the sign above the door, featuring the project name in large, red, and bold print.
PROJECT ALIENO IMMUTO - AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY
With bated breath, I pushed open the heavy steel doors. What lay within was an amalgamation of machinery to most, but I saw it as a technological wonder. The two mechanical pods both looked like cylinders jutting from the floor, with many different wires and tubes connected every which way. The wiring and tubing all connected to a center modem, the block of hardware and software taking up a large amount of space between the pods.
The terminal on the front of the modem had a four-way fenestrated screen in order to allow multiple programs to be viewed and run at once, while there were four colorful keyboards attached as well, in order to allow each monitor to be used separately. The coloration was a color-coding system, for ease-of-access.
While the machine was a sight to behold, what was not a sight to behold was Bill resting in front of the device, asleep at the modem’s terminal. Not to mention Bill was snoring very loudly.
I strode over to Bill, and kicked the metal folding chair he was in a few times.
“Bill, wake up.”, I said, hoping that would awaken the sleeping researcher.
Sure enough, Bill stirred, lifting his head and slowly blinking the sleep out of his bloodshot eyes. He shook his head while mumbling something incomprehensible, and looked over at me.
“Wuh? What? Oh, hi there.” Bill rose from the chair, trying to regain his senses.
“Welcome back to the land of the living! I take it you were up all night working?”
Bill nodded. I leaned towards the terminal and typed into the rightmost keyboard. I ran a quick check of the systems, and it seemed Bill’s napping on the controls didn’t screw up anything. I sat down in the chair while Bill walked over to one of the pods.
“I’m going to go get some coffee, want a cup?”, Bill said, looking over the pod.
“No thank you, I already had one before I walked over here.”
Bill nodded and walked off through the double doors. I continued to prep the program for initial startup. I also checked the connection the modem had between it and Technus.
Technus is my Porygon2, who I had upgraded from a Porygon, the world’s first, if only, artificial Pokemon. Pokemon are powerful creatures, and their natural abilities are all divided into 18 types. These types are Normal, Ground, Fire, Fighting, Water, Flying, Grass, Poison, Electric, Psychic, Rock, Ice, Bug, Dragon, Ghost, Dark, Steel, and Fairy.
With so many typing choices leads to a number of wondrous and diverse species of Pokemon, but to say Porygon was mankind’s crowning achievement at finally creating life, would be an understatement. Porygon and its evolution, Porygon2, are both normal types.
Normal types have no real advantages in any of the other types, except Ghost types have no effect on Normal types and vice-versa. They are weak to Fighting types, though. What I’m referring to is type matchup, for instance Water beats Fire, Fire beats Grass, and Grass beats Water.
Simple as that.
What was not so simple was finding a way to contain such a motley collection of critters. That is where Bill came in. He created the Pokemon Storage System as a means of digitally storing Pokemon to prevent taking up room. You could store up to 1,500 of those powerful creatures in what Bill likes to call PC Boxes.
I should probably be saving these internal lectures for later…
I shook my head and continued typing the commands. Bill walked back in with a cup of coffee and I looked back towards him.
“Are we almost ready to begin?”, Bill said. He took a sip of his coffee.
“Almost, I just need to calibrate the pods to the modem. Now where is Technus?”
I stood up, and the chair screeched along the floor as it slid a little from my sudden rising. I typed in a command that would ping for Technus in the systems and give him a command to return. Not the move Return, because that would cause more problems than I need right now.
A blue beak slowly poked it’s way out of the screen.
Another highly interesting feature in the Porygon family is their ability to enter and traverse cyberspace, entering a computer or electronic device like it was a wall of water leading to another world. Which, in this case, it basically was.
“Pory?” Technus peeked into the room, his small red head looking around. As his little beady eyes surveyed the area, they came to rest upon me. The Virtual Pokemon leaped out of the screen, tackling me.
“Pory! Porygon!”
Now sprawled across the floor with Technus on me, I petted him across the back.
“Alright, alright, it’s good to see you too.” I chuckled.
Technus rose up into the air as I stumbled to my feet. I looked towards Bill who was enjoying the moment and sipping his coffee. I walked over to the terminal and sat down, Technus floating next to me. I began to collect the data the Porygon2 had collected in the system.
“Good work Technus, everything seems to be clear and ready for startup.”
Bill pumped a fist in the air. “YES! Excellent! We can finally start this baby up!”
To say Bill was excited would be an understatement. You could say the same for me as well. When it came to our work, we could be like a couple of kids at Christmas when their parents said they could go to the candy store and buy everything.
While we were excited, we both knew we still had to err on the side of caution. As I always say, “err or error!”
Ok, that pun was bad and I should feel bad.
Anyway.
Now that everything had been set up, all we had to do was activate it. The tension in the room was suddenly dense as a pivotal moment for the entire Project rested upon us. Bill pushed a button on the keyboard, and the pod doors slid open.
You see, this machine we have built uses the same principle as the Pokemon Storage System to send Pokemon as digital information along two points and into the system. This device was going to test if the same could be done for humans.
While a risky prospect, if it worked, then the science behind this entire system could be changed forever. Or until someone else makes a breakthrough. Whichever comes first.
Stepping towards the pod of the left, I looked back at Bill.
“Let’s hope this works.”
“Agreed. Have a nice time in there!”
I chuckled, and stepped into the pod. Bill began the startup procedure, and pulled a CD out of his jacket, not looking at what he pulled out. He slid the CD into the terminal.
Meanwhile, Technus was overlooking the entire display. Running different diagnostics in it’s system, it saw it’s owner step into one of the pods. It then saw Bill put a disc into the computer. The wrong disc. The red and blue bird flew into the screen Bill was looking at, startling him.
Bill fumbled over the keyboards, as the Porygon2 was trying to prevent the program from crashing. The system began to break down, and music began to play from the machine.
“Oh no, I inserted a music CD into the device?! Where’s the program disc?!”
[|||]
A red truck was driving down the street toward its driver’s place of business. Bill pulled out a CD from his pocket and inserted it into the disc slot on the dashboard. The CD failed to play any music. Bill shrugged and continued down the road toward the Pokemon Storage System Facility.
[|||]
“Oh yeah, I was wondering why that wasn’t working.”
I began slamming my fists into the glass.
“BILL, GET ME OUT OF HERE!” I yelled.
“Pory! PORY GON GON PORY PORY PORY!” Technus was shouting as well, although neither of the researchers could understand it.
Bill was furiously typing commands into the terminal, alternating between keyboards, trying to stop the breaking machine. The glass on the monitor began to crack, as the system was overheating. Electricity arced along the device, as the machine fulfilled it’s purpose in transferring me into pure information, along with Technus, before sending us out.
The machine suddenly caught fire, and Bill was forced to run out the doors as the entire machine exploded in a shower of metal and glass.
The music stopped.
[|||]
Twilight Sparkle was having a fantastic day.
She had already finished all of her daily studying, and was currently resting on a plaid blanket under an evergreen. Spike, her baby dragon assistant, was munching on a topaz. The rest of Twilight’s friends were also participating in the picnic, while Rainbow Dash kept the skies clear.
All was calm and pristine, Celestia’s sun was sending down it’s gorgeous rays across the crisp summer grass, and there was not a cloud in sight. Pinkie Pie was scarfing down her fifth cupcake, and Applejack was laying against the tree taking a nap.
Rarity was reclining on her fainting couch, because she really didn’t want to lay in the grass. Fluttershy was feeding a few rabbits nearby with some carrots, and occasionally petting them. They chatted animatedly about whatever came to mind, or came up in conversation.
Everything was going wonderfully, up until an explosion occurred in the Everfree Forest.
The boom was deafening, as the ponies were either knocked down or dove for cover as the shock wave from the blast rocked the surrounding area. Smoke billowed from the forest, and it was then that Rainbow Dash asked the question on everyone’s minds.
Twilight Sparkle was a pony who thought that, just because she had wings and a crown, she should not be treated any differently than before she became a princess. She never wanted to feel indebted to anypony. What she wanted to specify right then and there, was that included the universe.
She began a rant in her mind. I should be able to spend an afternoon with my friends relaxing for once instead of fighting some monster on the loose.
Twilight sighed as the six ponies stopped in their walk right at the edge of the Everfree.
Rarity looked at Twilight. “I wonder what could have caused such a large explosion.”
Twilight shook her head. “I’m not sure, but it was big. Even though it had absolutely no magical signature. It doesn’t make sense!”
Twilight stomped a hoof to the ground in frustration. She had gone over every spell she could think of to search for the source of the explosion, but was unable to detect anything at all.
Rainbow Dash flew over the tree tops. “I’m going to go see if I can find what caused it! Be right back!”
“Rainbow Dash, wait!”
The cyan pegasus was already flying off towards the billowing smoke. The other five looked at each other, and began to enter the forest. It was always dark in the Everfree, and saying it was a eldritch landscape of agricultural abominations would be an understatement.
They carefully paced through the woods, while Pinkie Pie pronked along behind them, still as vibrant as ever. A hissing sound was let out over to the left of the group. Everypony stopped in their tracks, and stared at the direction of the noise before continuing.
Abruptly, a grainy sound screamed from the area in front of them, and music began to play.
Everypony stopped to listen.
“What in tarnation is this racket?”, Applejack said.
Everypony looked around, while Pinkie Pie was bobbing her head to the music.
“I like this song! It’s catchy!”
Before Pinkie Pie could break out in dance, Twilight shushed them, and motioned her hoof in front of them.
“Come on, everypony, follow the music.”
The five ponies listened intently at the retraux sounding song, keeping vigilant of any creatures that might jump from the shadows. They followed the music, up until they reached a newly formed clearing.
This part of the forest looked warped and burnt, as if forcibly carved out of the landscape by dragon fire. A crater with smoke around it lay in the middle, while charred trees surrounded the impact site.
Rainbow Dash was at the crater’s edge, leering into the newly formed pit.
“Rainbow Dash, there you are! What did all this?”, Twilight said, looking around the ruined area.
“I don’t know, but I tried to clear the smoke away and this… music started playing.”
Rainbow Dash looked a little unnerved as she said ‘music’.
Twilight tilted her head. “Ok, so did you find anything in that crater?”
Rainbow Dash turned towards Twilight. “No, I couldn’t, there was too much smoke.”
Everypony looked into the crater as the smoke cleared bit by bit.
I moved my arm. It moved, but it was not an arm I knew.
I slowly opened my eyes, and all I saw was darkness. I rolled my eyes around, trying to obtain a clear view of my surroundings and myself, yet there was too much c21va2U= in the way.
I paused, and tried to say the word again.
c21va2U=.
My body suddenly woke up all at once.
Smoke. You crashed.
I thanked whatever deity that was above that I didn’t die from the Project overloading. I groggily picked myself up off the ground, and wondered why I felt so lightheaded. I looked around and noticed the smoke had cleared.
Examining myself, I turned my view towards my arms.
Let me set something straight here. I am a reasonable eighteen year old with green eyes that speak volumes of my mental intellect and ingenuity, but to say nothing of my memory. Yet that goes without saying.
Because as soon as I saw a blue flipper-like appendage rise in front of my face instead of a human arm, I was more than a little panicked, and may or may not have screamed like a computer about to vomit a compact disc like it was the plague.
I frantically looked over my body. I had no legs, in place of legs I had a single cyan tail, shaped like an elongated teardrop that connected to my torso. My torso had a blue ring around it, which was thicker around the front and back, while the rest was red.
I slapped an arm into my face, and was met with a beak. I went cross-eyed to look at my beak, before realizing I already was. My eyes were on either sides of my face, and I felt around my head a bit more to find an antenna-like protrusion on top. I felt around my torso a bit more before coming to a horrifying conclusion.
I HAVE NO NECK.
I panicked for a few minutes, then realized if I have no neck, then I don’t need to breathe. Or perhaps I do and it’s very complicated. I filed that under things to worry about later. Literally, it seems, as my systems had created a folder specifically for that purpose. Convenient.
My head was disembodied, floating about two inches above my torso, as if hanging in thin air. I tried to get up and stand on my tail, in which I received a face full of dirt in reward for my efforts. I tried to get up again, this time trying not to fall over.
I rose into the air, hovering a few inches above the ground.
One of Porygon2’s moves is Magnet Rise.
Though that was ridiculous to think, I couldn’t possibly be a Porygon2, could I?
Unless the machine that sent me here somehow merged me and Technus together…
I shuddered at the thought, and spun my floating head around to examine the environment. While me and Technus merging together was an interesting prospect it wouldn’t explain why I was this new creature.
The smoke wasn’t bothering me in the slightest, so I carefully hovered out of the crater, trying not to fall over, and ran right into something very soft.
“Hey, watch it!”
I shook my head and looked at what I ran into. It was a cyan pegasus with a rainbow colored mane and tail, it also had hot pink eyes that were trying to bore holes into my new form. It flew at me in a poor attempt at a Tackle, so I simply moved to the side.
It flew past me and crashed into the crater. I shook my head and turned towards the rest of them. A few were looking at me in pure terror, another was looking at me with scientific curiosity. Then there was the equine that was pink all over, and looked as if it wanted to jump on me for entirely different reasons, wearing a smile so large I thought it might fall right off it’s muzzle.
I looked over at another Pegasus in the group. It had a butterscotch coloration, and was looking at me in both terror and worry. I wasn’t quite sure about the second part. I looked her over a bit more, but my assessment of the situation was interrupted.
I was bucked in the back of my head by an angry Rainbow Dash. My head was sent careening into a nearby tree, where my beak was promptly lodged into the trunk of it. The pegasus then grabbed my headless body and swung it around in a circle before letting it fly into another tree opposite my head.
“Rainbow Dash, what did you do that for?!”
“I thought it was going to attack you!”
“Well it didn’t!”
With my head still in a tree and my body jammed in another, I spoke in a voice that sounded like a mixture of autotune and TV static.
“Yes, I’ll take those floppy disks to go, thank you miss…”
“Yes, I’ll take those floppy disks to go, thank you miss…”
Everypony turned to look at my head.
“It talked?!” Rainbow Dash put her hooves to her head in disbelief.
Fluttershy flew up in Rainbow Dash’s face and put a stern hoof into her front.
“It was just a confused creature, you didn’t have to hurt it! Now go help it out of those trees.”
Rainbow Dash, a little shaken up, zipped over to my head and began trying to dislodge it from the tree trunk.
While she was trying to remove my poor beak from the offending plant, Twilight spoke up.
“Well, everypony, let’s take this… whatever it is back to Fluttershy’s house and see what we can do. I’d really like to examine it’s inner workings!”
Fluttershy stomped a hoof on the ground. “I would like to make sure that it is cared for and rested after Rainbow Dash had attacked it, the poor thing.”
Twilight looked at the large crater.
What could possibly be so powerful?
“Hey, could I get a little help over here? This head isn’t budging.”
I slapped a blue arm onto my head, in an effort to facepalm.
I really hate that song.
Curse you Bill, and your old timey tunes…
I shook my head and slowly sat up. I took a gander at my surroundings, and noticed I was in a house. A proper house, kind of spacious, and Pokemon were everywhere.
Wait, what?
I did a double take, and sure enough, there were Pokemon in the household. They didn’t look like any kinds of Pokemon I recognized, though. I shook my head a bit more, and the song looped and started playing again.
Oh how I wish it would shut up.
I noticed a standing mirror over near a sofa, and hovered over to it. I began a good examination of myself. I had been bandaged in a few places, one of them being my beak. My torso had a few band-aids on it, but overall I looked okay.
Except I happened to see my eyes.
For a moment there, I could have sworn I was hallucinating. Yet there it was, a very odd pattern that made up my eyes. It looked like a black ring, then a yellow ring, then a black ring, then another yellow ring, and finally a black pupil. Like an elongated dart board.
I looked insane.
I shook my head and floated over to the collection of Pokemon over in the corner. A few of them were either cowering in fear of me, or ready to attack me at a moment’s notice. I slowly put a blue flipper in front of a rabbit.
It sniffed my arm a bit, then sat down. I started petting it, and it tapped it’s little foot into the floor in happiness. I chuckled at the adorable sight, and the critters relaxed. I heard a noise coming from another room, so I turned to see what it was.
The yellow pegasus had fluttered into the room, carrying a tray holding teacups and sandwiches. The whole display looked adorable. I blinked a few times before rising up. The rabbit hopped away.
“Oh, what are you doing up?”
The pegasus set a tray on an end table next to the sofa I had been resting in.
I spoke again, only to be met with a confusing, disturbing, and intriguing result.
“I have no idea where I am.”
My voice sounded like someone had taken a recording of my voice, put it through autotune, then played it back on a malfunctioning television. I was startled for a moment before regaining my composure.
The pegasus nodded.
“You’re in my home! I was looking after you, and I wanted to make sure you were ok. Um, I mean, you were hurt, so…”
She trailed off and was now looking at the floor in embarrassment.
Still adorable.
“May I ask, where am I, what are you, and what happened?”
I like to get to the point, but there’s a feeling that I just cannot get off of me. Like a feeling I’m being watched. I looked around a bit, and noticed a flower pot on the end table now had an eye staring at me.
While I was having a staring contest with the plant, I got the answers to my questions.
She giggled, and said, “You’re right outside Ponyville, Equestria. I’m Fluttershy, and my friend Rainbow Dash had attacked you. I’m so so very sorry about that. She can be a little rash at times.”
I nodded, not taking my eyes off the plant, nor it taking it’s red and yellow eye off me.
I glared at it.
“Alright Fluttershy, so what are you in terms of species, and why is your plant staring at me?”
Fluttershy seemed a bit confused at my second question, but answered anyway.
“Um, I’m a pegasus, have you not seen one before?”
She looked over at the plant.
“What do you mean… oh, hello Discord! I didn’t know you would stopping by!”
The eye split into two, and a mouth appeared on the pot.
“Yes, well, neither did I.”
There was a white flash, and a mix-and-match creature was in the place of the plant.
While I will admit that the creature before me wasn’t the most shocking creature I’ve ever seen, it was certainly up there on the list. There are countless Pokemon who are a conglomeration of parts, but this “Discord” takes the proverbial cake.
Literally, he was currently eating a cake with the word proverbial on it.
Discord sat down on the sofa and crossed his mismatched legs together. He then ate the cake, plate, fork and all.
“So, are you quite finished with your little examination? Because I’d like to get back to explaining my visit.”
Realizing he was referring to me, I blinked, and hovered back a bit. Discord reclined back and rested an arm on the armrest, giving me a very smug grin.
I crossed my arms and grumbled.
“Fine, continu-”
“WONDERFUL!” He jumped in the air, his wings flapping excitedly.
“So I was on my way here with some sandwiches,” he said, holding up some sandwiches shaped like butterflies for emphasis.
“When I overheard some commotion from the forest. There was a lot of power all at once, and I found it very strange, and then I thought, ‘who else would know better about strange events in the forest than my dear friend Fluttershy’, hm?”
He leaned over towards me, his neck stretching to make up the distance, while wrapping an eagle arm around Fluttershy.
I rolled my eyes.
“Alright. So how about I ask you the same things I asked her.” I motioned to the pegasus in Discord’s grasp.
Discord nodded and answered before I could get a word in.
“Discord, draconequus, Spirit of Chaos, very powerful, fun, mischief, chocolate, and purple.”
I floated there in stunned silence for a moment before trying again.
“Alright, so are there any-”
“No there are not.”
“Alright, so are you-”
“No.”
It was strange to see such a jovial entity suddenly seem very peeved. Almost like he was annoyed at my entire disposition. He was also staring at something. I followed his gaze, and he was staring at the top of my head.
“Now what’s this?”
He let go of Fluttershy, and floated in front of me. Putting a talon and a paw on my antenna, he started moving his appendages around, like tuning a radio.
In fact that may as well have been exactly what he was doing. As he put his head right next to mine with a look of pure concentration, he carefully moved his “fingers” back and forth. Different types of music were bursting forth from my antenna as he changed it.
I just kept my unamused expression on the entire time. I glanced at him with a dartboard eye.
“Are you about finished?”
Discord huffed.
“Yes I’m almost done, now float tight.”
He continued changing the songs every few seconds, and I just hovered there, remaining annoyed at his shenanigans. He repeated this for about ten minutes before stopping on a song.
“Oooooh, I like this one. Sounds like carnival music.”
I paused. I doubt Bill would ever have listened to this type of music. This was more along my kind of music tastes. Unless…
Unless it’s perfectly playing back the music from my memory.
“Well, while that’s just plain interesting....”
I slapped his grabby paws away from my head.
“I am not your personal radio!”
“What’s a radio?”
I paused, then just glared while pointing my flipper-arm at the Spirit of Chaos.
I shook my head and floated over to the sofa. I sat back and folded my arms behind my head. Discord chuckled and sat on the sofa next to me. He leaned his head in front of me and smiled.
“Why so serious?”
I swear, if everything this weird creature says makes me pause, I’m going to make a counter just to record how many times it happens. I looked around for Fluttershy, who I heard in the kitchen making… something.
I looked back at Discord. I pushed his head away from me.
“Because certain people don’t know the meaning of personal space.”
“Oh I do know, I have my own.” He then clawed at the air next to him, tearing a hole in reality.
Sitting there, staring at the threshold of space and time, I saw a house on a floating island. There were also other floating islands and a ridiculously diverse array of flora and fauna. The creatures that flew around throughout the chaoscape was quite something.
It looked like some kind of pocket dimension. I had heard of one trainer in the Sinnoh region who helped Cynthia with something in a pocket dimension, as it was all over the news. Seeing an actual one, though, was a bit more than I could handle in one sitting.
“You like it? I designed it myself.”
I stared at him, flabbergasted. If this entity sitting next to me had dominion over an entire realm…
I shuddered.
“Ah, it’s very lovely, thanks for showing me.” I shifted my eyes back and forth, hoping for an interruption.
“No problem at all. You know, I think you need something to calm your nerves, you seem a bit tense.” Discord pointed at my jittering self.
Yes I am terrified, how would you like it if the owner of a chaos realm was sitting next to you and could most likely turn your head into a grape if he felt like it? I thanked whatever deity not connected to the one next to me as Fluttershy walked into the room with some trays.
Fluttershy set the trays on the sofa, and Discord summoned a coffee table to set them on. I picked up a plate with a teacup on it and set it in my lap. I sat in relative silence while the the two of them talked, and I ran over my options in my head.
Alright, I have no idea where I am in relation to home, I barely have a clue what I am, and I’m currently guest to a pegasus.
I glanced at Discord.
Along with her friend.
I tried to bring the teacup up to my mouth, only for it to bounce off my beak. I nearly lost my grip on the teacup.
“Oh, right. No mouth.”
I looked over the teacup for a while, before giving up and just setting the teacup and plate back on the table. While Fluttershy was talking about some kind of pet adoption center, I continued my thoughts about the situation.
So, if I could find a ruler of some kind, maybe I can get the help I need there.
I looked at the teacup.
In more ways than one.
[|||]
Meanwhile, a few hours earlier in the towers of Canterlot, Princess Celestia felt a disturbance.
She rose from her throne and turned to the guard next to her.
“Day Court is postponed for today, something is amiss.”
“Yes, your majesty.” The guard saluted before returning to his usual stoic position.
As the Solar Princess wandered towards her office, she found herself gazing towards the Everfree Forest, only to see smoke coming from it.
She gasped, and quickened her pace. Reaching her office, she picked up a quill, dipped it in an inkwell, and began to write.
My Faithful Student,
I have felt an intense surge of power coming from the Everfree Forest. I would like you to investigate. Please write back to me whenever you can about this development.
Sincerely, Princess Celestia
She rolled the scroll up in her magic, put a cloth ribbon around it, and clamped it shut with her seal. Sending it off, she sat on her haunches and breathed a sigh of relief, hoping whatever caused such an explosion wasn’t malicious.
She could only hope.
[|||]
“Chaos is nothing more than a manifestation of ignorance, irresponsibility, panic, misfortune, and immaturity. You are nothing more than an impudent child with the powers of a deity.”
I finished my tirade by crossing my arms and making a very bored expression, trying to convey as much disinterest towards Discord as possible, even though the truth of the matter was exactly opposite.
Discord floundered for a moment before saying, “Yes, well, and so is your face!”
He snapped his fingers, and the word “impuddint” appeared on my forehead, written in pudding.
I grabbed a napkin from the table and wiped it off.
“You do realize you’re only proving me correct by doing that… wait a minute.”
I inspected the napkin a bit more closely.
“Is this vanilla?” I looked at Discord incredulously.
“Yes it is, because you’re being too boring for the chocolate kind.”
I squinted my eyes, spun my arm a bit, and flung the napkin into his face.
Clapping my arms against each other, I cleared my nonexistent throat, “Yes, well, so is your face.”
Discord pulled napkin off, and glared at me. We both laughed.
Fluttershy brought over some more tea, balancing the plates and cups on her wings.
“Oh, it’s so nice to see you two getting along. Would you like some more tea, um…”
Fluttershy trailed off, and I realized my mistake.
“Oh good gracious where have my manners gone?”
I decided to do an actual check of my systems on where my manners went. I found them in the recycle bin. No wonder.
“I don’t think I ever properly introduced myself. My name is Lenkar. Lenkar Glitch.”
Fluttershy titled her head. “Oh my, that is an interesting name, what does it mean?”
I looked towards the ceiling. “It means… uh…”
I searched my memory for the meaning behind my name, and found none. I knew someone had told me what my name meant before, but right now I just could not remember. I filed through everything, yet I could not locate the meaning of my own name.
“...I have no idea.”
Discord chuckled. “Ha! Mine does too!”
Discord sipped his tea, and I shook my head. “No, I mean I don’t remember, I think what sent me here has messed with my mind.”
I thanked Discord and Fluttershy for their wonderful hospitality, we waved our goodbyes, and I closed the door to the cottage as carefully as I could. As I hovered along the path away from Fluttershy's home, I realized I had nowhere to go. I shrugged, and continued to follow the cobblestone path.
I decided to take the scenic route, and it paid off. If one were to describe Equestria, it would be multiple forms of the word serene. The sun wasn't beating down nor letting up, but slightly shining across the luscious countryside. The emerald grass was perfectly trimmed, and every tree in sight only added to the marvelous view.
I floated forwards at an even pace. Usually on such long walks I would daydream, letting my imagination run wild, but here the world around me was too beautiful to miss. It was a good thing I was paying attention too, or I would have ran right into an apple cart in the middle of the road. Said apple cart was also lodged in a mud puddle.
Applejack was behind it, trying to push the stubbornly stuck cart. Luckily for the cart, Applejack was probably just as stubborn. I waved at Applejack, who had stopped to rest. She waved back, and I sidled up to the cart.
I sat down next to her. "Need some help there?"
Applejack shook her head, "No thank ya, I can get this darn cart out just fine."
Looking over Applejack, she appeared very fatigued. Wiping the sweat from her brow, she rose back up and started trying to remove the vehicle from the mud.
I doubt she could dislodge this cart, never mind pulling it.
I swiftly hovered over to the front and grabbed a hold of the reigns. I pulled back, and the cart budged slightly, knocking Applejack to the ground. She huffed and clambered to her hooves.
"Hey, careful now! What the hay are you doin'?"
I glanced over at her. "I'm helping!"
I pulled on the reigns again, and the cart moved forward slightly.
"I think."
I continued to drag the cart, until finally with a wet popping, the cart flew free of the puddle. It was about to start rolling off down the road, but I held tight to the ropes, stopping it in it's tracks.
"Whoaaa girl." I laughed.
Applejack walked over to the cart, inspecting it thoroughly over to make sure nothing was damaged. She nodded and tipped her hat.
"Well, thank you for the assistance, mister...?"
"Glitch. Lenkar Glitch."
Applejack paused and bore an expression of confusion of her face.
"Well that's a mighty strange name ya got there, Glitch. I'm Applejack. Still, I thank ya for helping with mah cart."
I nodded. "It was no problem. Where are you taking that, anyway?"
Applejack hooked herself up to the cart, and pointed an auburn hoof towards a small town. It looked similar to the medieval era-type structures, but with more vibrant colors. It was interesting to see such an old form of architecture, although I could only guess as to why they used it.
"I'm taking it to the market in Ponyville."
Wait, what?
"Ponyville? Really, now? That's the name of your town?"
Applejack looked back towards me and raised an eyebrow. Which I found odd considering ponies don't have eyebrows. Or at least most Ponyta don't. She attempted some form of a shrug and began trotting towards Ponyville.
"It's a fine name, doesn't bother me none. Why? Ya got a better name?"
As I followed next to her, I put an arm to my beak in thought. After coming up with no ideas on an alternative name, I shrugged as well.
"No, not really."
"Well alrighty then."
We both walked, mainly Applejack doing the walking, in relative silence. It was only when we reached the town did Applejack speak up.
"Well, here we are, welcome to tha' Ponyville Market."
It was a lot to take in.
Booths, tents, and carts were set up all over the town square. A multitude of diverse ponies, featuring all kinds of shades and colors. The whole place was positively bustling, like a sea of rainbows. I looked about the market, and saw an assortment of wares. Fruits, vegetables, and other produce had it's own section, while other knickknacks were sold in another area.
The noise of the crowd wasn't deafening, but it was certainly loud. Ponies were running back and forth, trying to obtain their items as quickly as possible. Some were taking it slower, buying whatever caught their eye. I noticed three types of ponies, and the strange currency they were using that looked like gold coins.
Applejack bucked the cart, and it somehow became an apple stand right on the spot. I wondered if Discord was up to anything, but when I went over to examine the stand, I noticed it had a hinge system in place for easy transport.
These ponies were ingenious!
"Whoo boy, we made it just in time for the lunch rush! Say, ya wouldn't mind helping me sell mah apples, would ya?"
I was momentarily taken aback by the question.
"Oh, uh, well I'm not sure I'm one for selling apples." I rubbed the back of my head.
"Oh come on now, you'll do fine." She cheerfully nudged me with a hoof.
I thought for a moment about this.
Well let's see, I helped get her cart out of a mud puddle, and I'd like to learn more about this world. Hmmmn...
I heard the clinking of coins nearby.
I guess I could start with the economy.
"Alright, I'll help."
Applejack nodded and put a jar on the stand. She turned to me.
"So, ya got any questions?"
I nodded. "Yes, actually. What is your currency referred to as?"
Applejack chuckled, "You have a lot ah fancy words there, mister! They're called bits."
She held up a coin. I picked it up out of her hoof, examining it closely. An idea occurred to me.
"Lock-On."
My vision was suddenly filled with information, telling me the material composition of the bit, or my "target" as the readout was calling it, and it was made of solid gold.
I stared at the small fortune in my limb with renewed awe. Applejack tapped me on the shoulder. At least I think it was a shoulder.
"Uh, hey, ya ok there? You've been staring at that for quite a while there."
I suddenly leaped into the air.
"I'M RICH! I'M RICH! I'M RICH! I'M--Oh wait." I remembered where I was.
Everypony was now staring in confusion at the weird blue and red bird hovering in midair holding a bit.
Sheepishly, I flew back down and held up the bit in front of Applejack.
"Applejack, this coin is solid gold. Back where I'm from, gold is worth a veritable fortune."
Her jaw dropped, shocked.
"Really now? How much we talkin'?"
I looked over the shiny gold coin in my arm. Lock-On had already worn off, so I tried to come up with an estimate.
"I'd say around a thousand or so."
I swear the farmer nearly fainted. She regained her composure and said, "I may not be very good with numbers, but golly, that is a lot o' money."
I spun the bit in the air, and it landed on the ground. I noticed an inscription on the bit. It looked like a sun, with strange lettering written in a circle around the edges of the coin. I flipped it over, and on the other side was a crescent moon with a slightly different variation of letters. I couldn't read either of the inscriptions, considering it was in a written language I had never seen before.
"Hey Applejack, what does this say around the edges?"
She handed a mint-green unicorn a few apples, and dropped the bits she received into the jar.
"Ah dunno, I never really paid much attention to that."
I picked up the bit and tried to pocket it; only to be met with no pants.
I tilted my head. "Do you know where I can buy some clothing?"
Applejack handed some more apples to a customer. "Sure do. Mah friend Rarity makes clothin' for a livin'. Although I doubt you'd like what she's got, it's kinda..."
Applejack motioned her hoof in a circle, looking for the right word.
"Frilly."
I chuckled a bit. "So it's kinda Frillish then?"
Applejack nodded, not catching my joke. She pointed at a large building near the center of town. It was a modest lavender shaded building, with pony mannequins decorating the exterior.
"The place is called Carousel Boutique, ya can't miss it."
I noticed the shape of the building resembled a tent, and I nodded.
"I agree with you there."
I glanced around, and noticing that the jar was nearly filled with bits, I slapped my forehead.
"Gah! I forgot to help you sell the apples, didn't I? All I've been doing is sitting here screwing around."
Applejack picked up the jar, which was quite full, and set it aside. She shook her head. "No, you did mighty fine. After your little scene, everypony wandered over to investigate the ruckus, and I sold more apples than I would have otherwise!"
She patted me on the back. "Ya' did fine. Now, run along to Rarity's, I can take care of everything from here. You were a great help."
I beamed. Or at least as well as I could with no mouth.
"Er, you're welcome Applejack. Anytime."
I flew over towards the boutique, as Applejack waved goodbye.
[|||]
Princess Celestia had just finished Day Court. The nobles were even more troublesome to deal with than usual, considering their panic about the explosion. The Solar Princess had yet to receive any news about the phenomenon from Twilight, and was fearing for her safety.
As if on cue, smoke wafted in through a window, and a scroll appeared in front of Celestia. Picking it up in her magic, she looked over the letter.
Dear Princess Celestia,
The explosion was caused by the entrance of a strange creature we found in the Everfree Forest. We haven't been able to talk to it yet, as it is currently staying at Fluttershy's house. Rainbow Dash had attacked the creature without warning, knocking it unconscious. It does not seem dangerous yet, but me and the girls will keep an eye on it just in case.
Sincerely, Your Faithful Princess
As Celestia reached the bottom of the bottom of the letter, she chuckled at how Twilight still kept true to form in her letters.
She rolled it up, and sent it to her office. Leaning back in her throne, she decided a moment's rest would do her good.
Right before there was a knock on the large doors leading to the throne room. Celestia sighed.
"Send them in."
[|||]
I knocked on the elegant door. No, really, it was very ornate. It had all kinds of patterns along the edges, and a heart shaped window with a pink border. The walls of the boutique were a pearly white, while the accouterments of the place were a pale blue, even if I had been mistaking them for purple from afar.
There was a sing-song voice from within. "It's open!"
I pushed open the door, and was met with quite a sight.
Rarity was taken aback at the request from The Pony of Pop. Not to mention she was asking for costumes from Rarity directly, and knew about her work. It was an honor, Rarity felt within herself, to do this for Sapphire Shores. Rarity was on the verge of fainting when there was a knock at the door.
"Oh my, would you excuse me a moment, Sapphire?" Rarity motioned towards the door.
Sapphire nodded. "No problem at all, hon."
Rarity turned towards the door, and hollered, "It's open!"
The door was pushed open to reveal a floating blue and red creature, that seemed to be hanging from the air itself.
"Oh, uh, sorry. Am I interrupting?" I folded my arms behind me.
Rarity shook her head, and motioned inward with her hoof. "Not at all, darling, step--er, flying right in. I think?"
Rarity tilted her head, while I shrugged. I hovered inside, shutting the door behind me, while Sapphire walked up to me.
"My oh my, I have nevah seen anythin' like you before!" The Pony of pop looked me over, while I just "stood" there patiently.
"Yes, well, the type of creature I am isn't very well known, or seen."
I thought back to the many trainers who had come to me about evolving Porygon2 into the ever elusive form of Porygon-Z. Certain conditions were required to be met, not to mention obtaining a mythical disc of dubious data that would supposedly evolve the Virtual Pokemon. Every time trainers would head towards my direction because I had a Porygon2, and I just shrugged, having to send them the other way due to my lack of knowledge on the matter.
Now that I was actually a Porygon-Z, it was a learning experience on how the last in the Porygon evolutionary line functioned. There had always been a trainer or two that had managed to acquire a Porygon-Z, yet could never quite discern how. All they knew was it required random chance and an error of some kind. Said error was apparently very deeply rooted in the creature's programming, possibly even taking up it's entire existence. I decided to worry about that later, storing the thought in my Things To Worry About Later folder.
Sapphire nodded in the sassy way only she could, "I don't really see why, you got some flair about you."
I suddenly had a flashback to the red suited scoundrels that nearly destroyed all life on Earth.
Team Flare.
I shuddered.
"Ah, yes, well thank you, miss uh...?" I motioned one of my arms in a circle.
Rarity answered for her, "That is Sapphire Shores, The Pony of Pop."
I paused.
Pop?
I bore a confused expression.
"As in the genre or the culture?"
Rarity and Sapphire shared a glance, before looking back at me and answering at the same time.
"Yes."
I glanced at both of the mares for a moment.
I like them. I like them a lot.
Sapphire turned her head to look at the clock. She gasped.
"Oh my, I'm gonna be late. See you later, Rarity. Hopin' to have those outfits in soon, alright?"
Rarity nodded, feeling very lightheaded. "Oh yes, of course, thank you for stopping by!"
Sapphire was about to open the door, but stopped and looked back at me.
"Say, what was your name again?"
I spared a glimpse at Rarity.
"I'm Lenkar Glitch, Ms. Shores. I'm a Porygon-Z." I said, trying to be as polite as possible.
Sapphire put a hoof to her chin. "Huh. Well alright, see ya later!"
After we had waved our goodbyes and Sapphire made her exit, Rarity walked up to me.
"I'd like to thank you."
I looked at her, and tilted my head in confusion.
"For what?"
"Well because you were so patient, and polite! I'm so glad you have that consideration. Now, is there something you need?"
The only reason I was polite and patient was because I finally fished my Manners.bat file out of the recycle bin. It keeps jumping back in there every thirty minutes, and I have no idea why. I'm going to have to fix that later.
I nodded. "Your friend, the farmer mare I think, pointed me in this direction. I also accidentally took one of her bits with me, but I'm going to return it later."
As I said this, I held the bit up in front of me, looking it over again. Nope, still can't read the writing.
Rarity nodded and strode over to her work bench. "Alright, so you wanted some clothing then? What do you have in mind?"
She picked up her measuring tape in her blue aura, bringing it over to me. "I'm also going to need your measurements. I've never made anything for your body type before, and I think we may forgo any ideas about pants."
She motioned towards my tail, and I noticed I would not be able to wear much without it either slipping off my body, or getting in the way. She levitated the tape around my figure, and I held my arms out to my sides, making my body look like a T with a head on top. As she got my measurements, I suddenly felt an urge.
It was a strange urge, but my body went ahead of my mind, and music began to play from my antenna as Rarity finished her measurements.
"So, what do you think? What kind of garment do you have in mind?", she asked.
I shrugged and floated next to her.
"Nothing too gaudy, just whatever white cloth you can find.", I looked over at the clock.
I paused, and noticed I had just sung a line, and rhymed with Rarity's. Rarity continued from there.
"Ah, I see, something practical and easy to use?", she said.
I nodded and she levitated over some paper.
I huffed. "Well, you certainly have the artist's muse." I motioned toward her dresses on display.
"With an eye for fashion like that, you have quite the knack.", I said.
I picked up a nearby pen.
"Though if you are to add any jewels, I'd like some of them black.", I sang.
I drew a circle, and carefully traced a line through the middle. I stopped at the center, adding another circle, then continued drawing to the other end of the circle. I added one last circle at the very center of it. Once I was finished with my sketch, I picked up a red pen.
"One more thing, my dear, is that you need to add some red gems along here." I filled in the top half of the circle with red.
"Ah, I see, you want me to add this design somewhere?" She levitated a pen over as well.
"Mainly on the back of the coat, I'm thinking of something out of a laboratory.", I mumbled, looking over the design.
Rarity finished drawing a lab coat, and tapped her hoof on it.
"I'll make something like this, then, so don't you worry!"
We both sang together, still drawing and designing the coat. I felt a warm feeling rise within me.
"Some nice designs,"
I added a red pocket with a blue stripe across it.
"A proper trim,"
She drew some decorative images along the bottom edge of the coat.
"Something soft,"
She started making a few notes on the side about the material.
"And not too dim~!"
I scribbled in a few more notes about the color.
"I'll get it done,"
She nodded.
"And I hope you'll have fun."
I winked.
"Something practical."
I made a small note about interior pockets for the coat.
"Something functional."
She drew a few more pockets in and around the coat design.
"Free of charge?"
I looked at her questioningly.
"No, yet not too large."
I deadpanned, but continued singing anyway.
"It'll be stylish too,"
She wrote in a few gem names to use for the Pokeball on the back of the coat.
"And a pleasure doing business with you!"
At the last word, we shook hoof and flipper-limb as the song ended. I let go of her hoof, letting it hang to my side. I stared at her, then to the lab coat design on the table, and finally to the rest of the room. I blinked a few times.
"What just happened?", I said in befuddlement.
Rarity laughed. "It's The Magic of Music, darling. You get used to it."
She levitated the drawing and rolled it up, carefully setting it on a shelf. She sighed.
I balked for a moment.
I'll ask again, WHAT IS THIS PLACE?!
"So ponies just randomly burst into song on a whim?! Whatever that weird magic, as you called it, was..."
I slapped an arm to my forehead and rubbed it. "It hijacked my head, and played music against my will. That is not okay."
Rarity trotted over and put a hoof on my back. "You'll be fine, darling, it happens to all of us. Besides, some of my best inspirations have come from those songs."
She levitated the design we just made. "It looks great, you see? I may need to make a few adjustments, but it'll work."
I nodded, still rubbing my head.
She patted me on the back. "You know what? Forget what I said about the pay. If it makes you feel any better, I won't charge you anything for the coat. I know you're recovering from arriving here in such a taxing manner. Is that alright with you?"
I folded my arms behind me and nodded. "Thank you, Rarity."
I chuckled. "Heh, taxing?"
Rarity paused, and smiled. "Oh."
We both laughed.
"Well, i guess I'll be going now, where should I go next?", I looked out the windows of the boutique towards the bustling town.
"You should probably try the library, my friend Twilight is the librarian there."
As she levitated the lab coat design over to the desk, I looked around for a library.
"What library, I don't see one. Also, which one is Twilight?" I continued to search for the library to no avail.
Rarity was concentrating on the drawing, but answered, "Twilight Sparkle, the purple alicorn. She lives in the town's library, it's the tall tree, you can't miss it."
I shook my head and looked over at, sure enough, a giant tree smack dab in the center of town. That was the library?
People call MY place of business excessive.
How do you even make a library in a tree anyway? This place...
I sighed, and said, "Alright, thank you so much Rarity, I'll see you later."
Rarity nodded and continued her work at the desk. "Anytime, darling."
I hovered over to the door, and exited the boutique, shutting the door behind me as quietly as I could.
I turned towards the tree in the center of town, and began my "walk" towards it.
Well, let's see what this 'Twilight Sparkle' is like, then...
It was a completely average day for Ponyville. The sun was shining, the birds sang their tunes, and the pegasi pushed the clouds. The ponies went about their day as they always did. So when a cyan, rainbow-maned pegasus suddenly shot out of the sky and crashed right into a red and blue floating bird, nopony looked twice. They just walked on.
Yes, completely normal.
"We have got to stop meeting like this." I groaned, after the pegasus had flew into me like a speeding Bullet Seed.
"Alright, what the hay are you doing here?" She interrogated, sticking her muzzle up against my beak.
I glared at her. "I was about to make a visit to your dear friend Twilight. Also, could you do me a favor and let me up?"
Rainbow Dash had me pinned by my arms and was holding me to the ground. It was then I got an idea.
An awful, awful idea.
I lidded my eyes into an attempted seductive gaze at her, "Even if I do like a girl on top of me, there's a time and a place, you know."
The prismatic mare dropped her jaw in shock, jumped into the air away from me, and twisted her face in disgust in one fluid motion. It was both amusing and interesting to see the amount of agility this one pony had. She crossed her arms and turned her head away from me.
"Sorry, but I ain't interested!" She denied, red in the face from what I just said.
I rose to the air, and laughed. It wasn't the usual good-hearted chuckle you have after a joke, it was a full on guffaw. I spun around in the air from my laughter, and was clutching my torso. This pegasus was just too much fun to mess with. I finally stopped my cackling to notice she was even more embarrassed.
I shook my head. "Calm down. I'm a semi-organic automaton with a floating head and no gender, there's nothing that statement could have meant besides 'get off of me'. Besides, you did buck me into a tree."
Rainbow Dash shook her head rapidly and looked back towards me in shock once more. These ponies were ridiculously expressive, and it was hilarious. I stifled more laughter and regained my composure.
Offering a blue limb towards her, I decided to try a better introduction. "I'm Lenkar Glitch, and you are?"
The cyan pegasus grasped my flipper with a hoof and shook. "Rainbow Dash, fastest flyer in Equestria. So, what are you?"
She lazily flew circles around me, looking at me from all sides. "I have never seen anything like you before."
"I'm a Porygon-Z. A species of Pokemon." I said, in a tone mimicking that of many Pokemon Professors from my world.
Rainbow Dash titled her head in confusion, "What's a Pokemon?"
I cleared my "throat" again, before realizing I may not have even needed to, and began the common speech usually reserved for trainers starting their journey into the world. Yet before I could get a word out, it seemed Rainbow Dash had recognized the way I was about to begin lecturing, and started waving her arms about in panic.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa! I don't need an egghead lecture, forget I asked."
I stopped, and nodded. She breathed a sigh of relief like she had just been saved from a life or death situation.
I shook my head at her antics, and said, "Alright fine. So, are you going to stop tackling me every time you see me? Because that needs to stop."
I crossed my arms in front of me, while Rainbow Dash folded hers in thought. Her face brightened as she got an idea, and threatening put her face in front of mine.
"How about a race?"
I squinted my eyes. I remembered most flying types would either attack the other flying type invading it's territory to knock it out of the air, or just race it. Whoever survived won. Considering this mare introduced herself as the fastest of her kind in the country, I'd really need to be prepared for such an event.
"Alright, why not?" I said, internally doing a run through of Porygon-Z's possible moves. I already knew Magnet Rise and Lock-On, so I added Agility to the mix for good measure. Rainbow Dash moved back, and we both shook on it.
"Awesome! I'm so gonna win. Catch you later!" She said, and energetically zoomed in a rainbow blur, blowing up a few clouds as she went.
Show off.
I chuckled, folded my arms behind me, and turned towards the library once more.
[|||]
Twilight Sparkle was not having a fantastic day.
Rushing left and right, the lavender alicorn was grabbing multiple books in her magic and sorting them along the shelves. She then ran over to her desk, dipped a quill into an inkwell, and wrote a letter at breakneck speed.
Spike just stood there with his arms crossed, watching Twilight rush to and fro with books, parchment, and any other number of supplies. She quickly wrapped up the scroll in a ribbon, put a seal on it, and dropped it in front of Spike, all in one motion.
"Sorry Spike I'm really busy could you send that for me?", she said at a rapid pace, still trying to organize her notes.
The purple and green dragon rolled his eyes and picked up the scroll. Holding it in front of himself, he blew his firey breath onto it, converting it to a magic smoke as it flew out the window towards Princess Celestia.
"Ok thanks Spike you're the best!" She shouted, as she ran upstairs.
Spike huffed, and was about to go make dinner when there was a knock at the door.
He grumbled under his breath all the way over to the door, and opened it.
"Yes how may I help..."
He trailed off at the sight of the being in front of him.
I chuckled at Rainbow Dash's stunts, folded my arms behind me, and started my miniature trek.
As I made my way toward the arboraceous library, I remembered the intellectual look of scientific curiosity that one purple mare had been giving me. I reached into my mind, and fished out the ever-increasing file I dubbed the Things To Worry About Later folder.
There were a ton of questions filling the file, and I doubted I'd be able to address them all in one go. As I searched through it, I came upon a few questions that I wanted to answer before I met Twilight. To anypony else seeing me as I headed to the tall tree, I'd be staring off into space, not paying attention to anything.
I began a mental Q&A session in my mind in preparation for the actual one awaiting me.
Alright, to begin, Q: Why am I a Porygon-Z?
I halted halfway between the library and the boutique.
A: Well, if I'm correct, the when I was transported here, I was merged with Technus, meaning I may just have his memories.
I closed my eyes, and delved into the pool of information at my disposal. I searched throughout the countless memories belonging to both me and the Porygon2, before resting upon a single file.
There it is.
Finding what I was looking for, I dragged it into view, and began playing the memory like a video. As it continued, I noticed Technus had caught Bill inserting a music disc into the machine instead of the proper program disc, but wasn't fast enough to stop him.
A disc containing dubious data, specifically, music.
The pieces fell together and clicked in my head. It all made sense.
That playlist became my very base programming upon the upgrade, the error was both the insertion of the disc, and me merging with Technus. Not to mention I was transported here by machine. All of those factors were the reason I became a Porygon-Z.
With that mystery solved, and in slightly higher spirits, I stopped short of the library door. As I knocked on the door, I still couldn't get the feeling something was very wrong.
The door opened, and what lay inside was a little confusing, to say the least. A small green and purple dragon was standing there, looking very grumpy. He was looking forward, not yet registering who was at the door.
"Yes how may I help..."
He trailed off, his emerald eyes slowly following my form, stopping at my crazed visage.
"...you?"
[|||]
Twilight held several books on powerful mythical beasts aloft in her levitation spell. Shuffling the books in alphabetical order, she carefully arranged them along her bookshelf. Taking the time to slow down, she picked up her note taking paper and quills, and began trotting towards the door.
Yes of course she has such supplies specifically for note taking. She'd be crazy not to, no matter what anypony would say otherwise.
The door adopted a purple glow, swinging open as if of it's own accord, and Twilight walked down the steps, supplies in tow. She nearly dropped them when Spike cried out.
"TWILIGHT!"
Twilight ran downstairs, moving past the table in the center of the library, all the way over to Spike. Setting the parchment and writing utensils on the table, she looked out the door to see a certain nonplussed Porygon-Z waiting in the doorway. Spike was on the ground, crawling backwards away from Lenkar, like he might snatch the young drake up and eat him on the spot.
The red and blue bird rolled it's eyes. "Hello, you must be Twilight, am I right?"
Twilight nodded, her eyes darting between me and Spike. She huffed, and gave me a pointed look.
I blinked. "Right, may I come in?"
Twilight nodded once more, and I slid through the air into the room. I couldn't smell anything in the room, but if I were to take a guess, it'd be books. Lots of them. The shelves covered the entirety of the walls, in all different colors, most of them faded from years of use. I noticed a stool sliding over to the table at the center of the room, cloaked in a purple aura.
I looked over at Twilight, just as her her horn ceased it's glowing. She motioned with a wing towards the stool, and sat on her haunches next to it.
I nodded, and floated over to the stool, maneuvering my tail so it wouldn't be crushed.
I folded my arms across my chest, and waited for her to finish organizing her materials. I did a mental check of my faculties, and found Manners.bat in the recycling bin once more. This time the slimy little bin had renamed itself Things To Worry About Later, as if mocking me.
My inner programs were both rebelling against me, and getting more clever by the moment. That was worrying on multiple levels. As a sense of dread began to rise within, Twilight moved herself to face me, a quill and pieces of paper levitating in front of her. She cleared her throat, and gazed at me with her large lavender eyes.
"Thank you so much for visiting! When Rainbow Dash attacked you, I was so worried that you wouldn't wake up or want anything to do with us and-"
I put up a blue flipper to silence her. "Now now, it's fine, I'm a forgiving individual. Now, I believe you have some questions?"
My attention was brought to the sound of clinking silverware. Spike had placed some tea with plates onto our workplace. Twilight thanked Spike, while I just silently stared at the cup, my arms resting in my lap.
Twilight picked up her tea, and took a sip. Titling her head, she moved it back to the plate.
"Oh, I'm sorry, do you not like tea?" She asked, a little worried she had done something wrong.
I was snapped out of my reverie, and swiveled my head to meet her view.
"No, I have no mouth, so I can't really eat or drink anything." I put a blue arm to my beak.
"Also, I may not even require the need to breathe, considering I am basically artificial."
I pushed the teacup towards Twilight, who picked it up in her magic. Setting it aside, she nodded, writing down everything she could on her notes. Taking another sip of her tea, she continued, "How interesting! So, what are you? Can you use magic? Are all of your kind like you? How are you artificial? How are you floating? Why do--"
A feeling struck it's way through my head. She was cut off by me clamping my arms over her muzzle. I laughed, and joyfully chided, "My, what spirit of enthusiasm! One question at a time, we have plenty of such, after all."
I let go of her face, and she breathed a sigh of relief. I found myself wondering a few things, and I thought I'd share my concerns with her.
"You are quite the scientific mind, so riddle me this;" I say, picking up a piece of paper. Twilight looked at me in interest.
"What would you say if I said I did not originally look like this?" I folded the piece of paper a bit more. I loved doing this as a kid, just take a piece of paper, and let the folds do the work.
"What would you say if I said I had the power to go faster than sound, analyze the composition of anything, and fly like a bird without needing wings?" I continued to fold my origami piece, moving on to the head of it.
"What would you say if I said a young man, working on a project to find a miracle unlike any other, was whisked away to a world he was not familiar with?" As I finished my origami of a Porygon, I set it on the table.
"What would you say if I said I, a Porygon-Z named Lenkar Glitch, were a doctor from another dimension that researched the very kind of creature I ended up becoming?"
As I looked into her eyes, I saw renewed awe at what I was saying. She remained in speechless wonder, so I continued.
"Now, what would you say if I said, that my current existence is due to a highly convenient stroke of error?" I picked up the Porygami I made, and tossed it in the air.
"Or perhaps, if I said that I was previously an alien unlike any you could ever imagine, only to merge my own being into my life long friend?"
The Porygami dropped to the floor with barely a sound. I grasped the stool, and leaned forward.
"Well?" I said, awaiting her reply.
She shifted her expression a bit, startled by the end of my one-sided conversation. She shook her, and she brought a hoof up to her face.
"What would I say to those short fables?" She inquire back, wondering what to even begin to think about what I said.
She put her hoof back to the floor. I just sat there, not conveying any emotion, awaiting her reply.
"Well, I can certainly tell you're very smart, you seem to know what you're talking about, and if I were to guess..."
She put a hoof to her chin, and looked at the ceiling in thought.
"You weren't always a Porygon-Z were you?" I blinked. I didn't expect her to realize that off the bat, though I guess I'm just underestimating her.
"Correct, I was previously a creature called a human, but that is no longer relevant. What is relevant is that you help me run a few tests on my new form. I wish to know both it's limits, and it's properties." That got Twilight excited. I swear her eyes were gleaming with energy at the prospect of being able to study a creature like me with permission.
While we were both trying to process everything that just happened, I thought back to what I said, and realized something.
I don't normally sound like that.
I was now beginning to panic. Quietly, of course. Keeping my external visage as neutral as possible, I picked up a piece of paper and a quill. Dipping the quill in a nearby inkwell, I began to draw, never taking my eyes off of Twilight. I didn't think of what I was drawing, I just drew, letting my arm take care of it for me.
Twilight was perplexed by my behavior, so I decided to fill her in on my issue.
"Twilight, what you just heard from me is not how I normally sound." I say, still drawing.
She titled her head. "What do you mean by that?"
I was still staring at her, and adding the finishing touches to my picture. "As in, ever since I became a Porygon-Z, my mind has been changing, and not for the better."
My arm stopped on it's own, so I set the paper on the table without looking at it. Twilight was about to look at it, but I held up an arm.
"No, don't look at it, that was a simple motor skill recognition test." I explain, still perturbed by the fact I did not have all my mental faculties in check.
I crossed my arms and leaned back a bit, my head staying level with the floor.
"Porygon-Z's are known to be inherently flawed. While that remains true for myself, I am deeply unsettled at the idea of losing myself to an error that is devouring my entire being. Not to mention said error may just have a mind of it's own."
I twiddled my blue limbs around each other, not taking my eyes off the mare in front of me.
"I may seem calm right now, but that is because I have no idea how to even begin to react to this. I am legitimately terrified."
I titled my head back, and performed something similar to a sigh.
"I knew this was too convenient. I was accustomed to my form on the first time out, I should have seen that as a warning sign."
I shook my head, and re-positioned myself on the stool. Twilight had remained silent through the whole thing, and to be honest, I never spoke that much before at any one time.
Twilight just sat there, slack-jawed. She stirred, and cleared her throat.
"Yes. Okay, well, I made a lot of interesting notes here." She motioned a hoof towards the pile of filled papers she had on the table.
I blinked at the sheer amount of work. "Wow, you got down everything?"
She nodded, and I whistled. "Impressive."
Suddenly, I was grabbed by her, as she began sobbing. She hugged me tighter, and I reciprocated the embrace.
She sniffed, and looked at me with tears in her eyes. "I'm so sorry for what has happened to you. I'll do everything I can to help you! I swear it!"
She punctuated her claim by stomping a hoof onto the floor. I sighed, and nodded.
"Thank you, Twilight."
We both sat in silence for a long time.
I glanced at my drawing, and saw what it looked like.
After I had agreed to take the tests, I followed her underground, to a laboratory deep beneath the library. It was not as impressive as any of the laboratories I had been in back on Earth, but it certainly had a charm to it. There were a few EEG machines, and other devices I had no means of identifying.
Twilight directed me toward a chair, with which I was promptly strapped in.
"Alright Lenkar, all I need you to do is talk." She walked over to the machine next to me, and lifted up a helmet in her magic. Putting the helmet on my head, I thought for a moment.
My arms and tail had been strapped to the chair, so the only thing I could move was my head.
"So, just continue where we left off then?" I turned my head towards her, and she nodded, calibrating the device.
"Yes, that way I can get better results. If we simulate a casual environment like what we were doing upstairs, it may mean we can locate what is going on with you easier." She turned a few more knobs, and pushed a button. The machine came to life, the red line on the graph paper moving up and down, with the long piece of paper being fed out of the machine at a steady rate.
"Sounds reasonable. Besides, I'm at home in a lab anyway." I chuckled.
The red line wavered a bit, but continued as it was. I seemed worried at that, but continued anyway.
"Well, I studied in a programming school for a while, before moving on to engineering. I got what I could out of both, which wasn't easy due to my dyslexia." As I talked, the red line on the paper was slowly becoming more and more erratic. Twilight was slightly alarmed and fascinated by the readings, but she didn't show the alarmed part.
"Alright, and?" She said, looking over the readout more carefully.
"Well, then I met the owner of the Pokemon Storage System, Bill. Bill was very passionate about his work, and so was I. We both met at a cafe in a town called Goldenrod and decided that I'd start working with him." I continued talking, while Twilight became ever more interested and worried.
"After that we started the project that sent me here, Project Alieno Immuto. We called it that because it's latin for 'Another Change'." I chuckled at the pun, considering what the project did to me after it had it's run.
Twilight was now examining the machine with anxiety, trying to remain calm over the fact I may be slowly having a mental breakdown without even realizing it. My head suddenly twitched faster than someone who wasn't paying attention could catch, but I didn't realize it. I was still busy talking.
"Anyway, then me and Bill decided to use my Porygon2 to help out. His name was Technus, but even though I keep calling it a him, the Porygon line has no actual or definitive gender differential. Maybe because we never added one. Did you know Porygon is the first, if only, artificially created Pokemon?"
While Twilight was still both shocked and intrigued at the information she was getting, she was about to have a heart attack over the fact my readings were going absolutely nuts.
"As for how I got Technus, well, that's a really strange story." I laughed, and spasmodically flopped my limbs in their restraints, while my eyes blinked at odd intervals. All of such were happening in under the blink of an eye.
"It's a marvelous tale, one almost as long as it is verbosely told." I said in a very cheerful yet sophisticated tone. I had subconsciously activated Agility, and my arm twitched faster than Twilight could see. It was freed from the restraint, and I brought it up to my beak in thought.
"Where do I even begin..."
As I said that, the machine next to me stopped working entirely, and the lamp above me started to flicker.
My body spasmodically convulsed, as I began to scream out in a buzzing tone. "ZZZZZZZZZ! ZZZZZZZ-ZZZZZ-ZZZZ!!!"
My limbs were twitching every which way, and Twilight was beginning to fear I was having a seizure. I may as well have, because that would have been preferable to my current situation.
My limbs strained against the chair I was strapped to, my one arm flopping all about. Electricity arched across me, and Twilight began to back away from my twitching form.
I let out one last cry of; "ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!!!"
A bright yellow light burst forth from my whole being, and I let loose a wave of power that caused every electronic device around me to go haywire. A few of the machines exploded on the spot from pure overload, and Twilight ran upstairs to escape the ensuing blast.
I laughed like a maniac as I let off more and more electricity, my head jerking all over the place.
Finally, I stopped emitting the energy, and pointed my beak towards the ceiling. I let out a wheezing laugh, and said, "Porygon-Z used Discharge!"
I cackled some more, before turning my head forward. "IT'S SUPER EFFECTIVE!"
With that yell, my body fell limp, and my head dropped like a rock. It landed on the floor with a resounding thunk.
The lamp on the ceiling shattered, showering me with glass.
I lay drifting in an endless expanse of pitch-blackness. As I awoke in the blank abyss, I gazed at my arm. It was still the blue flipper, yet I was unsure why, or what was happening. My head darted around, taking in the absolute wall of darkness. As I inspected my surroundings, they abruptly changed.
The entire dreamscape was slowly being warped, changing colors flashing before me, as the entire sky around me slowly pixelated. I looked behind me, seeing the sky behind me was still pitch-black. The assault on my senses was blinding, yet it was all beautiful in a way at the same time. I felt a chill run down my back, and my view was instantly drawn towards the shifting area in front of me.
A flashing rift was ripped open, and the area that lay beyond it was alternating between black and white. It was almost too much to look at. I shielded my eyes with my arms, as a strange shape emerged from the rift. It looked just as scrambled as the sky around me, and it had a backwards-L shape that was a little thick on the side.
I thought back to my drawing, and realized it was the same exact shape.
Trembling in fear, the shape gradually moved in my direction, the corrupted sky following it's form. The eldritch abomination tilted it's entire self to view me. The pixelated mess that was it's body shifted, the pattern looking like television static in the way it moved. I stayed still, not wanting to move, in case it tried to attack me.
Instead, it spoke up, it's voice like a thousand screaming computer sounds, "YOUAREANINTRUDERHERE."
As it spoke, my head flared, pain piercing through me like a hot soldering iron through my forehead. I screamed in pain, falling to the invisible ground, clutching my head. As I writhed on the ground in pure agony, the pixel creature floated over to me. It seemed to size me up, as if deeming me worth it's time or not.
It spoke again, it's words catching my existence on water and fire at the same time, "EXPLAIN."
I dragged my head over to look at it.
"I don't think I can take much more of this." I said, before realizing I had said that out loud instead of in my mind.
Unless I was in my mind.
I shook my head, groaning, and slowly rose up. I looked at the creature, and was unable to find anything resembling a face on it. I sighed, and spoke up, not wanting to anger it further.
"I am here by complete accident. I'm terribly sorry, I would leave if I could." I apologized, pouring as much of my sincerity into my words as possible.
I rubbed my forehead, and clenched my eyes shut, trying to rid my mind of the searing pain. I wasn't going to be getting any rest from it, it seems, as the pixel entity in front of me spoke once more.
I fell to the ground again, the burning feeling churning in my head. I watched as it turned around, and made it's way back into the rift. As the rift sealed shut behind it, the sky lost it's coloring, and I was left in the darkness once more. I collapsed to the floor, and curled up in a ball.
I rocked back and forth, with a million questions buzzing in my mind, but one was most forefront.
"Why is that thing in my head?"
[|||]
Twilight was sitting at her desk, resting on the smooth wood. Heaving a sigh, she lifted up her head, and picked up a quill in her magic. Levitating a parchment to the desk, she began to write. The cursive flowed across the page, the quill swiftly moving about the paper. As she wrote, Spike walked into the room.
Upon seeing Twilight at the desk, he shook his head. After that creature had nearly blown up the laboratory and set the tree on fire, he had worried Twilight was injured, but she continued to assure him she made it out without a scratch on her. The small dragon had just finished washing the dishes, and was ready to curl up in his basket with a good comic book.
Spike strode over and up the staircase, eyeing the bed at the top with uncertainty. He entered the bedroom above, and saw the being that had had a spastic fit earlier. It's red and blue form lay prone across the bed, yet not without some movement. It would occasionally jerk it's body, as if in pain, then relaxing itself again.
Spike wondered if it was having a nightmare, or if it even could have nightmares. Clearing his head of such thoughts, he sluggishly plopped himself into his bed, which was more of a basket than anything else. He reclined himself back, before reaching into the blanket under him, retrieving a new Power Ponies issue.
Flipping to where he left off, he let himself become immersed into the story, no longer caring for anything but the comic book.
Spike failed to notice the Porygon-Z beginning to stir.
[|||]
I was tired, that much was obvious. I groggily opened my dartboard eyes, feeling the weight of my body in full force. Activating Magnet Rise, I took a moment to see where I was. Spike was reading a comic book, not even looking up to meet me. I shrugged, and hovered over towards the stairs, only to find my balance was off from the pain I had to endure earlier.
I overcompensated on my tilt, sending me crashing into a wall. I lazily struggled, my torso embedded slightly in the wood. Giving up on my endeavor, I decided to just hang there until I got help. I took a glance at Spike, who was still oblivious to everything going on around him. Whatever he's reading must be very interesting.
I heard the rapid clopping of hooves. Twilight reached the top of the stairs as soon as I turned my head.
I motioned my arms out to emphasize my predicament.. "A little help here?"
She gasped at the sight of me stuck in the wall. I was a bit dazed from my strange visit in the dream, and hadn't quite gotten my bearings together. She grabbed me with a levitation spell, and pulled. My Magnet Rise was unexpectedly deactivated, causing me to fall to the floor in a pile of blue limbs.
"Every time..." I groaned, flying up into the air once more. Twilight looked a little worried, but I waved a dismissive flipper in her direction. Shaking my head, I made my way downstairs, trying to keep myself level and steady. Once I reached the first floor, I was met with book piles littering the library.
Twilight trotted down next to me, while looking a little sheepish, and explained the mess.
"Sorry, I was looking for some information about a box. I haven't found anything yet." She picked up a book, and began to flip the pages, analyzing every word to find what she was looking for.
I rubbed my sore torso, and tried to crack my neck, only to be met with nothing.
Oh, yeah, no neck. Well, that's one plus. No more stiff neck in the morning...
"Alright, so you're not worried at all that I just hurt myself?" I asked, tilting my head in confusion.
Twilight walked over to me, and looked me over, while I just floated in place. Her horn lit up, and the bandages--that I had forgotten about--were carefully unwrapped by her magic. She checked over my body, while I fidgeted, the urge to zoom around the place like a madman returning.
She chuckled. "You're perfectly fine! I see no signs of injury."
I imitated a sigh of relief, while Twilight continued to search through the books. Then, it finally clicked in my head about what she was researching about.
The windows in the library were open, letting a cool breeze draft through the tree. The smell of ink and paper was present in the air, and the sound of research was ever-present. I was engrossed in a book about pegasi anatomy, because I had clearly not done enough research as of late. While trying to keep my focus on the book, my mind kept thinking about the glitch present in my systems. To think I would be living up to my name in such a way was both hilarious and slightly mocking.
Reality has a strange sense of humor.
I flipped to the next page in my thirst for knowledge, while Twilight had a sea of books near her, still trying to look for anything about that mysterious box in the Everfree. I wasn't quite sure what to make of a sentient tree guiding the destiny of Twilight and her friends, whilst rewarding them with nothing more than a crystal box. Then again, we had Trevenants back home.
Spike was cleaning the place while wearing a frilly pink apron, a red heart stitched to the front of it. Because obviously wearing an apron is very manly these days. Twilight suddenly groaned, and threw a book at the wall in frustration, nailing Spike's feather duster in the process. Spike momentarily lamented the loss of the duster, then looked at Twilight with some worry in his expression.
"What's wrong, Twilight?" Spike asked, wondering why she was so annoyed.
Twilight huffed and rose to her hooves. Picking up a nearby book in her magic, she started flipping through the pages, while I glanced over at them in curiosity. Those two were quite vocal in their frustrations, so if anyone had anything to say on the matter, of course it would be Twilight.
"I've gone through every book in Ponyville, Spike, and there isn't a single mention of the mysterious chest that came from the Tree of Harmony, nor anything about keys to unlock it! But something tells me that opening it is pretty important. I hope Princess Celestia has some ideas. If the library in Canterlot doesn't have anything, I don't know where else to look!" She said, finishing her lengthy rant.
I took a once over of the tower of books she had made near Spike, then back over to her.
"Well, clearly it must be important if you're fretting so much over it. Think, Twilight. If the box just recently appeared, why would there be any information about it?" I reasoned, turning to the next page in the book I had.
"Books are records that others have made about their discoveries in the past. If such a thing only appeared recently, of course there won't be anything about it written anywhere. Because only you and a few others know about it so far."
Twilight sighed.
"I guess you're right, but it doesn't mean we can't keep searching." As she said this, she levitated a book out of the large tower of books, causing it to become unbalanced.
It collapsed in a book avalanche, covering Spike in hard-backs. He poked his head out of the pile and burped, a scroll appearing in his flame. The scroll dropped to the ground, and Twilight picked it up in her levitation to read it. I put a bookmark in my book and set it on the stool I had been sitting in, before hovering over next to Twilight.
I tilted my head to get a good look at the parchment. Twilight lifted the paper towards me, and I took it to read it aloud.
"Ahem. My dearest Twilight, while it would be perfectly lovely to have you in Canterlot once more, I have another option in mind much closer to Ponyville."
I moved the letter up a bit.
"As you know, the ancient castle that I once shared with Princess Luna lies mostly in ruins, deep in the Everfree Forest. But if you look carefully, you may find a book that could prove helpful to your research, hidden somewhere in what's left of the castle library."
I looked up from the scroll with a face of confusion.
"So, a ruin in the Everfree is a castle owned by the Princesses." I shrugged.
"Works for me." I handed the letter back to Twilight, and she placed it in her saddlebags. Hooking the saddlebags to her back, she made way for the door.
"C'mon, Spike, Lenkar! We're off to the Everfree!"
I rubbed my head, then sighed.
"More books. Yay."
[|||]
Don't get me wrong, I like research as much as the next scientist, but there's only so many times someone can hear the word 'book' before losing their ever-loving mind.
That being said, us three had set out for the princess' former castle right off. Let it be known that I'm continuously dragged off on these adventures at lack of consent.
I've been noticing that my inflection on events has become more and more disillusioned as of late, like I'm detached from reality while still trying to describe it. The third-to-first person whiplash is disconcerting, and finding the solid middle ground is even more confusing. It's like I'm watching the events play out before me while I'm just the passing observer, not an actual character in the events.
Besides my strange retronarrative issues, if retronarrative is even a word, I've also had issue putting my own emotions into my thoughts. This transformation may be sapping more out of me than I thought. That is not good in the slightest.
As me, Twilight, and Spike walked to the crumbling ruins, I noticed the Everfree was actually kind of pretty. It had it's own rugged charm to it, like an unkempt beauty shrouded in darkness and dread. The wild foliage surrounded the path we were on, the dirt road threatening to be swallowed by the vegetation around us.
Or perhaps I'm just ranting and waxing poetic at the same time.
We reached the bridge to the old castle, and stopped to fondly regard the building. We were shaken out of our reverie because my antenna started playing music again.
"Welp, guess we're listening to some songs while we work." I deadpanned, tired of everything going on so far.
I really need a break.
Twilight chuckled, while Spike agreed with tone internally, not wanting to get left behind in the forest due to a little snark.
We entered the castle, and holy hallways, Zubatman!
I know, I know, I'm well aware of the horrible pun of that name, but oh well. At least it wasn't that error pun.
The hallway was high above our heads, carved of stone that had seen it's years of wear and tear. At the end of the hall were two tapestries, hanging from the ceiling. Light shone in from above, where some of the roof had collapsed. I saw six similarly large openings branching off into different hallways. I was astounded by the view.
We gazed at the beautiful architecture in silence as we roamed the halls, heading towards the library. Once we reached it, Twilight pulled open the purple doors with her magic, being careful not to damage them. Once we had a good view of the library, we all gasped in shock at the sheer audacity of the room.
Good GRACIOUS that is a lot of reading material!
I looked over at Twilight, only to be met with an expression of glee frozen on her face. Her jaw was hanging open, and her eyes were stretching open somehow, making her face seem really large. While I was tempted to make a long face pun, I was kinda worried that wasn't healthy for her face muscles.
What? I'm a technophile, not a biologist!
Twilight gasped again in happy glee, jumping right into the air, and staying there with her wings. I had been so engrossed in... something that I forgot about her wings entirely. As she flew about the library, she called down to me and Spike.
"Look at all these ancient books! It's a veritable goldmine of information!" She landed near an overturned desk.
"I can't believe it! Woo-hoo!" She let out a holler of enjoyment, as she jumped head-first into a pile of books, before poking her head out of them.
I shook my head at her antics. "I'm not sure how you could be so happy about books."
While me and Twilight were bantering, Spike was wandering around, feeling very anxious over the creepy setting. He suddenly heard the scuttling of insects, and tripped backwards, rolling head over heels until he came to a stop under a statue. Letting out a groan of pain, he chuckled nervously, and spoke over to Twilight.
"Yeah... So, uh, Twilight. Uh, ready to head home?" He asked, inwardly pleading to get away from the unsettling decorum or the spooky creatures.
Twilight was far too enthralled in her knowledge pile to pay attention to Spike's scared tone.
"Are you kidding? This place is perfect!" She grinned, settling in a nest of books to read.
I floated over to Spike, and found him in a fetal position amidst a bunch of spiders. I was about to shoo them away from the frightened dragon, but I instead inspected them a bit more closely. While Spike was having issues with the spiders, I had none, considering I've worked with a Spinarak or two in my time.
I looked over the spider, and began to take in it's details. It had a dark blue, almost black exoskeleton that seemed to reflect the night sky. It's head had bright blue orbs for eyes, with one big one and five smaller ones in a row around the top. It had small grey pincers for fangs, and it had a single cyan star marked across it's back.
"Spike, calm down, they're not going to hurt you. In fact, these seem similar to the Bug Type Pokemon from where I lived." I said, trying to reassure the poor drake.
He looked at me, his fears damped, instead finding curiosity.
"Really? Huh." He shifted away from a star spider that had crawled near him.
I dropped the spider I was holding, and dusted off my flippers.
"Well, we're gonna be here for a while. Might as well make ourselves at home."
I turned away from Spike to leave, but he grabbed my tail before I could. He looked up at me with pleading eyes. I just rolled by eyes and sighed. Putting a limb to my head, I grumbled.
"Fine, you can help me look over the place. I wanna see what kind of technology these Princesses of yours used back in the day. Maybe it'll give me some insight on your culture." I said, resigned.
Spike beamed, and jumped onto my tail, holding on for dear life. I wobbled in the air a bit, trying to level myself to accommodate the new weight, and flipped my tail back so Spike could sit on it. With him in tow, we flew out the library and down the halls in search of ancient whatever.
[|||]
"Arceus dammit, Spike."
We both groaned in unison, as I rose into the air. We had both been searching a few rooms for artifacts or treasures when Spike had lifted a vase, triggering a wall trap that caused the floor to spring upward and at us, sending us flying out the strategically placed window. The place had it's fair share of tricks, for sure.
I would have used Magnet Rise to stay aloft, but the unexpected floor turning into a wall sort of prevents you from staying in the air. I rubbed my back and stretched a bit, the impact from the fall had certainly loosened a few things in my body. What things, I wasn't quite sure of.
I looked over at Spike, who was still prone on the ground, groaning in agony. I dusted myself off and looked up at the castle, which had a gargoyle statue resting on a perch above. It glared down at me, as if mocking me for trying to find it's secrets, so I just glared back. Finishing my staring contest with the statue, which I certainly won, I held my aching 'shoulder' and flew towards a nearby doorway.
I looked up and down the halls, and saw a few sets of armor on display, but nothing to tell me of where we had been flung off to.
"Oh, joyous day."
I sighed, and flew back over to Spike. I nudged him, and he just rolled over while groaning some more.
"Spike, get up. We need to find Twilight."
Spike shot up at that, while I laughed. I helped him up, and looked about the courtyard we had landed in. There were a few statues here and there, but there was one at the very back that caught my interest. I squinted at it, noticing it's bizarre snake-like form.
"On second thought, Spike, you go look for Twilight."
Spike gave me a look of both confusion and fright.
"Uh, I really don't want to go in there on my own."
I faceflippered, and turned towards him. Floating down to meet him at eye level, I rested my arm on his shoulder.
"You'll be fine, just use your fire breath on any of those creatures."
The poor baby dragon was rattled by the castle, but I gave him a reassuring push towards the doorway. He nodded, and began his trek into the castle.
I turned towards the statue that had garnered my notice, and flew towards it. I stopped right in front of it, stunned by what it actually was. As I sat there on the ground in awe at the creature before me, I looked at the inscription under it, and read it aloud.
"Zygarde, the Guardian of Order, Protector of Harmony. May you guide our lands to peace."
[|||]
I had been resting at the base of the frilled snake-like Pokemon statue for quite a while. Every time I looked up at the Zygarde statue, I cringed, and averted my gaze, fearing it might strike down at me for simply tainting it with my presence.
I was well aware of Zygarde. It lived in the mountainous regions of Kalos, inside a cavern known as Terminus Cave. The place was a cherished part of the mining community, and there were sometimes a few nature activists who would set up camp in the area, if only to feel the power radiating off of the cave.
I had once visited it myself, considering my brother lived in Couriway Town. Me and him would often visit either Terminus Cave to see the wonderful rock formations, or Anistar City and it's crystal sundial. We both often debated touring Kalos, our first stop being Geosenge Town, but those were put to rest when Team Flare popped up outta nowhere.
The world had seen many of those insane Teams come and go, each more crazy than the last, yet never without an equally devoted trainer from some small town there to stop them. It was an interesting occurrence that I had years spent studying, to no avail. Except for the one time I had visited Terminus Cave, and found a secret pathway within...
[|||]
...I tripped over a boulder.
I was in Terminus Cave, running across a bridge, when I tripped over a boulder that was sliced in half, only to fall off the bridge and scrape my knee. Holding my bloodied knee, I got up to my feet. There wasn't much damage, just a small cut. I limped onward down the corridor. After walking a few lengths, I stopped to rest, and leaned against the wall to the left of me.
The wall caved in. As it collapsed, I could hear the sound of my brother yelling my name. I was tossed about as I tumbled down the dirt and rock tunnel, before coming to rest in a large underground cavern. There was a hallway ahead of me, so I lifted myself up in pain, rubbing my various bruises. I limped even more now from my injuries, but continued forward.
I wasn't even sure where I was going, but the usually present force that blanked the cave was now drawing me towards it's source. As I reached a branching path, I noticed there were six paths around me. One behind me, one in front, and two on either side. I continued forward, as that was where the strange power was leading me.
I walked forward, my injuries now just a dull ache, as I came to a stop at the end of the tunnel. Inside lay a huge chamber, with steps that led up to a platform made of the very earth itself. I was in shock, not about the room before me, but what lay resting on the platform.
A green and black snake lifted it's head to view me, it's hexagonal patterned eyes judging me from afar. It rose to it's full height, the frills that spread from it's neck glowing in some sequence I could not discern. It's tail flowed behind it, the ground beneath me trembling in awe at the presence of their master.
Zygarde.
"Speak now, human. Why have you disturbed my slumber?"
As it spoke, I felt an overwhelming sense of need, an urge to fix something. Zygarde stared at me for the longest time, it's tail being the only feature betraying it's still visage. It nodded, it's scales aglow with power. The glow traced the ground, and formed a hexagon around me. I felt the pain in my body lessen, and my wounds began to heal.
I stretched a bit, then dusted off my lab coat. Looking up at Zygarde, I huffed and ruffled my dark hair. I spoke up towards the Order Pokemon.
"I was curious." I spoke the truth in the matter. I was a scientist first, and if it meant finding a Legendary Pokemon resting in this cave, then so be it.
Zygarde seemed to bristle, it's scales glistening brightly for a moment. It then relaxed, inwardly reasoning with itself. It spoke once more.
"Curiosity? How primitive." It remained in place, while I tried to keep calm and stiff. I did not want to anger this being.
"If there are answers you seek, I may impart them to you. You are a man of learning, are you not?" It spoke with amusement, and I could have sworn a bit of paternal pride.
I nodded, and folded my arms behind me, my green eyes betraying my firm face. I was afraid of Zygarde, but not without reason. I had heard of many people in the past who approached a Legendary without knowing what they were walking into, and they suffered for it. I was not going to take any chances.
"Then ask." It said, waiting for my questions.
I gulped down my fear, and stepped forward. Stammering a bit, I asked my first inquiry.
"May I learn about you?"
Zygarde froze. It turned it's head to gaze at the ceiling in thought. We both remained in silence for a while, the sound of water dripping from above being the only noise nearby. I was startled by it abruptly looking down at me, but my fears were alleviated when it spoke.
"You may."
It slithered up to me. I felt pure scrutiny cascading off it's entire body, as if deeming everything around it correctly placed or not. It looked me over, then moved past me. I followed it towards the center of the cavern. There, it stopped, as if lost in thought.
"I will tell you a story." I nodded, slowly lowering myself to the ground. Crossing my legs together, Zygarde began it's tale.
"Long ago, Dialga, Palkia, and Giranta had been created. Time, Space, and Antimatter. After them, Xerneas and Yveltal. Life and Death. Except one day, there was an accident. Pieces of raw matter had cancelled themselves out upon Xerneas and Yveltal's birth. A being that should not be was made. An abomination to reality itself by merely existing. Error incarnate."
I sat there diligently, hanging on every word. Zygarde continued.
"A missing number in the very building blocks of everything, it was thus named MISSINGNO."
When the name was spoken, the entire world shivered, as if everything was in agreement that it shouldn't exist.
"MISSINGNO. was seen as a defect by Arceus. It began to corrupt reality around it. Xerneas and Yveltal fought endlessly, while MISSINGNO. only caused more chaos. Thus, Arceus made the ultimate mediator."
I was still sitting there, drinking in the knowledge it gave me. Zygarde nodded.
"I was created, to keep order between the three beings. Yet even that was not enough."
Zygarde sighed, the land shaking in similar sentiment.
"MISSINGNO. was already loathed by Arceus, and so it was cast away into the Distortion World, where Giratina resided."
I put a hand to my chin in thought, while Zygarde shook it's head.
"Giratina hated MISSINGNO. the most, as it was an affront to it's existence. Time, Space, and Antimatter held a meeting. They all came into agreement that MISSINGNO. must be removed."
Zygarde lowered it's head. I folded my arms and exhaled deeply, in suspense for what it had to say. So far, the entire story was quite interesting. An entire Pokemon borne from an accident? Astonishing!
"So, they created a pocket dimension where MISSINGNO. could have free roam to corrupt, and no longer damage the world. It was sealed inside the dimension, never to be seen again."
I propped my head onto my arm, getting a little restless from sitting so long. Zygarde noticed, and thus sped up his tale a little.
"Though it did not last very long. Darkrai and Cresselia were created to make a balance within the dream world. It was then they both discovered an insanity had been spreading in the minds of both human and Pokemon."
Zygarde stopped while I shifted into a more comfortable position. Seeing he was waiting for me to stop fidgeting, I resisted the urge to cringe, and made a motion with my hand.
"Sorry, continue."
Zygarde chuckled a bit, and resumed his tale.
"The insanity was being caused by MISSINGNO. Darkrai and Cresselia had both begun their work at limiting MISSINGNO.'s influence within the dream realm. They were only so successful."
It eyed me again to make sure I was paying attention, and I was. I'm a sucker for lengthy exposition, and I will certainly not apologize for it. I'll take what knowledge I may be given, thank you very much.
"So, MISSINGNO. was allowed access to the dream realm, but only to those he had already corrupted mentally. Generations later, the insanity was still present, some more focused than most. These highly corrupted individuals formed together and gave rise to Teams, and these Teams were intent on corrupting the world, just as their corrupter once did."
My face showed complete bafflement at this revelation. MISSNGNO. was responsible for those crazy Teams?!
"Arceus devised a solution to such a problem. Whenever a Team would arise, he would choose a hero to stop them. Indeed, at every turn, this was true. The world continues in this cycle today, and I am the watcher of it."
I gaped in sudden reverence at what had been revealed to me. Zygarde slithered towards his chamber, but stopped behind me.
"What is your full name?"
I swallowed, and spoke in a croaking voice from fear.
"Vintage Lenkar Von EnGlitch."
Zygarde nodded.
"Thank you for listening, Vintage."
I blinked.
"Anytime."
[|||]
I was rustled from my nostalgic memories by the sound of screaming nearby. I rose into the air, worried by the amount of noise echoing out of the castle. I turned to the Zygarde statue, and rested a blue limb on it for a moment. I had no clue why it was there, but I was glad anyway.
"Thanks, Zygarde."
Having given my gratitude, I zoomed off into the halls, trying to find the ponies I had just recently met. I zipped throughout the hallways, using Agility to bolster my speed a bit. I halted in my tracks at the sound of an organ playing. I decided to follow that, and flew into a nearby hall. I reached the front entrance, and heard the pipe organ's haunting tune bellowing throughout the place.
I took note that it was coming out of the second doorway on my left, and flew into it. Hovering down the hall, I saw five ponies and a dragon ahead of me.
"Hey! There you all are!"
I had yelled to them, but the organ was far too loud. They kept walking. I stayed close behind them, not wanting to startle them in any way. We all came up to a doorway with a deep red-colored carpet. The carpet had white bars along the sides of it, with music notes in a pattern along it.
We all entered the room, and saw a cloaked figure sitting at the pipe organ. Twilight cautiously approached it, and tapped the pony with a hoof.
The pony suddenly flung it's cloak off, revealing...
"Hey, you guys! Did you know I can totally play the organ? Because I didn't!"
"PINKIE?!"
The pink pony giggled, and pointed at the large instrument in front of her.
"Check it out!" She played the organ, and I heard the distinct sound of the sports charge theme.
Rainbow Dash flew over next to her, while I lagged behind the crowd and out of sight.
"You're the Pony of Shadows?" The cyan pegasus said, incredulously.
Pinkie continued to play the organ. "The pony of what?"
I faceflippered at this nonsense. As everypony continued talking about Arceus knows what, Pinkie mashed a key on the organ, causing a trick tile to send Spike flying through the air. I only had a second to look up at him falling towards me, before I was sent crashing into the ground with a green and purple dragon on top of me.
"Spike. Get off." I said, annoyed at how many times I had been crashing into things.
Spike stumbled off me, and onto his feet. I heard everypony laughing while me and Spike just sighed.
[|||]
"...and then you're gonna get a nice big red and blue banner, OH! And maybe even a few dozen yellow cupcakes! I hope you like vanilla! Oh, and possibly a..."
Arceus, please save me from this pink pony. She's relentless.
I groaned as Pinkie Pie continued to ramble about the party I was sure as the sky was blue to get. I kept trying to tell her I wasn't one for social events, but she just kept going and going. I was suddenly reminded of those Energizer Buneary commercials. Then I was reminded of those Anistar Bars. Now I'm hungry. Dammit.
Wait, can I even eat? I know I can't drink anything, but...
As my thought trailed off, I noticed Pinkie had stopped talking. Finally. I hovered over to Twilight and Spike, sitting down next to the dragon to see what he was reading. I heard Rarity knitting the tapestry she had been trying to move in the front entrance.
"I swear, this is going right back where I found it just as soon as I've returned it to its former glory."
I looked over at Rarity.
"Of course you are. It belongs in this castle anyway."
She just hummed in response, while I glanced over towards Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, and Pinkie Pie. Fluttershy was talking with Angel Bunny, who I was certain was spoiled to the core.
"Now don't go running off again!"
Angel nodded, only to go hopping off in the direction of a carrot bowl sitting near Twilight. He grabbed a carrot and started nibbling on it, while Fluttershy sighed.
"Oh, I can't believe I was so frightened. Guess I let my imagination get the best of me."
Applejack shifted her hat. "I think we all did."
"I always let my imagination run away from me!" Pinkie said, with a grin that I feared may fall right off her face.
"Then it comes back... with cake!" She finished, before pulling a cupcake out of her mane and eating it in one bite.
I blinked at her craziness, and immediately thought the book Spike was reading was really interesting all of a sudden.
It's just a pony, you should really just relax.
I repeated the MST3K Mantra in my head a few times, and Twilight addressed the room.
"Well, it's good to know that whenever your imagination is getting away from you, a good friend can help you rein it in. And even though I didn't find anything out about the mysterious chest, I'm glad I was here to help all of you."
Rarity nodded. "You certainly did that, Twilight."
Rainbow Dash motioned towards Twilight. "Yeah! Why weren't you scared?"
Twilight lifted up the journal she was holding to show everypony. "Reading Celestia's diary made it hard to be afraid, because I knew what it was like when she and Luna lived here. Knowing something about the past made it easier to deal with my problems in the present, even the scary ones."
Everypony made various sounds of agreement, while I slapped a flipper to my head.
"Study history or find yourself repeating it! Welp, no wonder!"
We all laughed, and Twilight perked up at an idea that crossed her mind.
"I've just thought of a great idea!" But I just... Oh, Twilight...
"Why don't we keep a journal, just like the royal pony sisters?" Twilight suggested.
Fluttershy shuffled her hooves, and I crossed my arms. "All of us?"
Twilight beamed, and nodded. "Sure! That way we can learn from each other! And maybe some day, other ponies will read it and learn something, too!"
"What a splendid idea!" Rarity said in agreement.
My face twisted in confusion, while Applejack spoke up.
"I know what my first entry will be! 'Dear Diary, I'm glad Granny Smith's legend wasn't true.'"
My eyes shifted between Twilight and Applejack.
"Wait, you're trying to tell me you weren't doing this before?" I said, in disbelief they'd have just now realized they could do this.
Twilight shared my confused expression. "Of course! Normally I would write to the Princess, but I think this will be better!"
Rainbow Dash nodded. "Me too!"
Pinkie jumped in the air. "Me three! Because that means you two are still tied for Most Daring Pony!"
After Pinkie yelled that, I saw Rainbow Dash and Applejack glaring at each other competitively. I shook my head, and folded my arms behind me. Sighing, I looked at Spike.
"This sure has been an adventure alright."
Spike chuckled.
"Heh, Shadow Ponies... How ridiculous is that?"
I laughed with him. "Very."
I was about to get up, when I saw something move in the hallway. I could have sworn I saw yellow eyes sending their piercing stare at me from the darkness, but when I blinked it wasn't there.
Well, I figured out something very important about my biology. For one, Pokemon's abilities are always active. Always. The second factoid is that I have an ability, which is what's allowing me to adjust so damn easily. This aptly named ability I have is called Adaptability.
Adaptability powers up moves that are the same type as the Pokemon with it. For instance, if I were to use Tackle or some such Normal type move, it would be considerably stronger than usual. Except with the Porygon family, which is a little different, and can be used to a nigh-devastating effect.
This is due to the moves Conversion and Conversion 2.
I could use, say, Conversion and then Adaptability. Conversion would let me change my type into the same type as one of the moves I know, and Adaptability would power up that move, as long as it was the same type I became. I never really realized how powerful or useful these kinds of things were until just now.
Whew, my priorities needs fixing. Better run a diagnostics on that.
If you're wondering about Twilight, well, I've already explained all this as I found out about it. No one needs repetitive exposition, so I forewent such a thing. Anyway, right now I'm fixing multiple issues I've had in the past that had to do with both my perception, and my thought processes.
Because randomly spewing music helps no one.
Rainbow Dash and Applejack were currently having a hoof-wrestling match. Twilight was reading, you guessed it: A book. Pinkie Pie was keeping track of their score, and Fluttershy was petting Angel. Spike was reading a comic book, while I sat there staring off into space. I'm not being very eloquent at the moment because I'm still fixing a few errors.
Also because that pesky Recycle Bin is trying to eat my folder that contains my records on The Beatles.
NO, GET AWAY FROM GEORGE HARRISON! SHOO!
Ahem. Where was I?
Oh, right. I had analyzed my memory on those weird glowing eyes I had seen yesterday, yet I couldn't see much in the darkness. Even if I did see anything, I doubt I'd be able to identify it, mainly because there'd be no information in my systems to match it with.
Dammit, now the Recycle Bin's moved on to how smart cars are made.
Actually, I think I'll let that one slide.
I finished my diagnostics with an audible ding, and checked the results of the scan. My move set was still the same, although it could use some work both offensively and defensively. All my folders were in pristine condition, except for the ones eaten by the Bin, and that music playlist was still locked into my core programming.
Welp.
I got up from my seat, and floated over to Fluttershy. Angel saw me coming, and glared daggers at me. Instead of glaring back, I opted to fly right into his face while twitching slightly. He cringed, and hid behind Fluttershy's leg. While I enjoyed my victory internally, Fluttershy was dragging her hoof in a circle, averting her gaze to the stone floor.
I tilted my head.
"Do you need something?"
Fluttershy made this cute little 'eep' noise, and hid behind her mane. I began to wonder if my heart stopped from a cuteness overload, but I had found out my body was solid artificial material earlier.
Wait, didn't I say that?
Oh no, I don't think it's just the Recycle Bin eating up stuff in my systems...
While I was staring at her with a blank look, she peeked out from behind her mane.
"Um, yes. I mean, if you don't want me to pry, I won't..."
She looked at the ground sheepishly, waiting for my reply. Except I was too busy delving into my systems once more. There had to be some reason I kept forgetting everythi--WHAT THE HELL?
I had searched high and low, but what I found in my memory was maddening. A giant shifting blob of colorful pixelated corruption was sitting smack dab in the center of my digital mind. I saw another memory get absorbed by the increasing mass, this time it was about...
...wait. What WAS it about?
This is not good.
I flew up to the giant blob, and pointed a flipper at it.
"STOP IT!" I scolded, hoping that would at least slow it down.
Surprisingly enough, it stopped. It moved slightly, then molded itself into a giant sphere.
"WHATEVER FOR?" It boomed, nearly knocking me right out of the air.
At least I think it was air. I yelled back at it.
"YOU'RE RUINING MY MIND! LEAVE NOW!"
While I had a commanding tone to my voice, in actuality, I was downright terrified.
Every time this would happen. First it was Zygarde, then is was some weird pixel block that made my head hurt when it spoke, now there's this giant thing.
May I get a break, please? No? Okay.
The mass was silent for a while. When it spoke up, I had already gotten bored and was playing chess with my own CPU, so it startled me. Only a little bit, though.
"I AM A VIRUS. I NEED TO GROW." It said, confused as to why it was being commanded to leave when it was simply doing the only thing it knew.
I yelled at it again.
"FINE, BUT FIND AN AREA WHERE YOU CAN DO NO DAMAGE!" I yelled.
It stopped moving entirely. For a moment I thought it had refused, but instead it moved past me and out of my memories. It was headed towards who knows what, but at least it was gone. I turned around to assess the damage. There were files either absorbed into The Virus completely, or had chunks of data eaten out of them, like eating half a lunch and tossing out the rest.
I sighed.
I have a lot of mental work to do.
[|||]
The yellow-eyed drone peered at the strange red and blue creature from the darkness. The weird being noticed the drone, so the drone hid itself behind a wall, out of sight. It broadcasted a message into it's mind.
I have found the specimen.
[|||]
Well, it took a time span of forever, give or take five minutes. I finally finished reorganizing my system, slowly repairing the damage done by both the Recycle Bin and The Virus. I was currently keeping both trapped in a quarantine area of my anti virus program. I had no idea I even had it, yet it seems I was both damaged, AND dumb enough not to realize it was what I was using to scan everything in the first place.
Everypony was doing some random activity that I was too groggy to even figure out. My mind was still recovering from the multitude of problems in it and--wait.
"Recover."
White lights appeared around my body, and were suddenly absorbed into me all at once, slowly repairing me.
I'm an idiot.
I sailed into the air, nearly hitting the ceiling.
"I'M BACK INTO THE LAND OF THE LIVING!"
Everypony was startled by my outburst, but Twilight trotted up to me, giving me a worried smile.
"Oh good, we were worried about you. Fluttershy had thought she offended you." She motioned a hoof towards the yellow pegasus.
The poor thing was sniffling. Apparently spacing out to take care of virtual monsters means breaking a heart or two. I zoomed over to her, and hugged her tightly. She was shocked for a moment, but returned the embrace. After she stopped crying, I patted her on the head.
"Hey, it's okay. I was just busy." I said, trying to reassure her.
She stopped sniffling, and nodded. Rainbow Dash crossed her forelegs.
"Busy with what?" She gave me a disbelieving look.
I suddenly felt a tickle in my beak. A soft whirring noise was slowly rising in frequency.
"AH... ACHOO!" I sneezed, and some flashing pixels were splattered across the ground. Everypony backed up at the display, while Pinkie hopped over to look at the colorful gunk on the floor.
"Oooh! Pretty colors."
Rarity grabbed Pinkie's tail with her magic, and dragged her away from the pixels. While Pinkie was pouting, it was my turn to start sniffing.
"I got a virus. It's fine though, I'm working on getting rid of it." I said, not fully convinced I could do anything beyond contain The Virus.
Or that pesky Recycle Bin.
Rainbow Dash shrugged, and resumed her bizarre dares with Applejack. The two agreed on a race around the castle, and they wanted me to be the referee. At first I was reluctant due to just having dealt with The Virus and a large amount of mental degradation, but otherwise I agreed to watch their race.
Everypony filed out of the room, with Spike staying behind to read his comic book. I nudged him, waking him from his imagination. He ran to the group in a hurry, tripping a bit on his way out. We all were walking towards the front entrance when Rarity swatted to the side of her with a hoof. The white unicorn frantically looked about, while everypony stared at her.
"What's wrong?" Twilight asked, also looking around to see if there was anything to cause the unicorn distress.
Rarity huffed, and waved a hoof at Twilight.
"It was probably nothing, I just heard a buzzing is all."
Everypony continued walking, while I reclined in the air. I was hovering in circles around our little group, when a spear came out of nowhere. Everypony gasped or scrambled away from the spear as it narrowly missed my head, whizzing past me between my head and torso. Silently thanking my head for floating, I reached down to pick up the spear, only for it to shock me.
"Owch! What the..."
I inspected the spear a little closer. It had a long and finely crafted stick for a handle, with runes etched into the wood. The end of it had a stone point on it, with even more runes. The strangest thing was, the spear point was not attached to the stick with anything. I lowered myself to the floor, and didn't see a single way the stone could be attached, it was far too irregular.
As I was near the floor, I turned a dartboard eye towards the area the spear had been thrown from. I rose up slowly, trying not to alert anything to my presence any further. I whispered to the rest of them.
"Someone else is in here. I think it's a trap."
I pointed towards the front door. Everypony carefully tiptoed (hooved?) towards the front entrance, while I tried to lay low along the floor, occasionally hiding behind one of the ponies. Time had slowed to a crawl, as we sneaked in plain sight. I thought we were in the clear.
Of course we weren't.
Five more spears embedded themselves into the ground next to us, nearly impaling a few of the ponies. Everything went to Hell in a hand-basket as Rainbow Dash and Applejack galloped for the exit. Rainbow Dash kicked through the double doors, the crack of wood echoing across the forest. Everypony else made a run for it, all of them escaping but Spike and I.
I quickly picked up Spike in my arms, and threw him out the door. A yellow glow enveloped the double doors, dragging the closed. I gasped, and flew at my only route of escape. I punched the door a few times trying to break it open, but to no avail. I whirled around, and was met with a bug pony to the face.
"Hi there!" It said, with a jovial tone that betrayed it's appearance entirely.
I stumbled back from the creature, only to accidentally bump into the door. While I was recovering from getting locked in, five more of the bug ponies dropped down from above. I'm currently cursing my luck right now, but oh well. The six bug ponies were all nearly identical, with a few identifying features.
The one who had jumped in my face had a mane similar to the other mares I had seen in Ponyville, except it looked more like a membrane than actual hair. This bug pony was the shortest out of the group, and it's mane hung down over one of her eyes a little bit. All of the creatures in front of me had holes in their shell-covered hooves, horns protruding from their foreheads, and yellow wings on their backs that would buzz every so often. That was not the most unsettling part, be that as it may.
No, the most disturbing thing was they all had smiles that would give Pinkie Pie a run for her money. Their fangs glistened in the moonlight, the low lighting making them seem even more threatening. Their blank yellow eyes had a slight glow in place of pupils, causing their eyes to be the most visible thing in the room.
So that's what I saw...
Noticing that they hadn't tried to tear me limb from limb yet, I awkwardly began to float around the group of six.
"Okay, good. Magnificent. I'm just going to go now, bye."
I tried to make a break for the collapsed part of the ceiling, but I was caught in a yellow aura.
I am beginning to despise the color yellow.
The far-too-happy creatures were all dragging me back to the ground in unison, their horns lighting up the room. I was deeply afraid about being captured in such a manner, until I remember how much of an idiot I am.
Inwardly berating myself for my stupidity, I began to use Discharge. The electricity arched across me, while all the bug ponies just sat there and stared, still smiling.
"No, really, I think I need to go."
As I said this, I let loose the Discharge, the electric blast zapping everything in it's radius. I braced myself for the burnout, but nothing happened. I opened an eye, only to see the entire room was perfectly fine, bug equines included. Flabbergasted that my Discharge did nothing, I tried again.
The creatures keeping me in their collective grasp refused to go down. So, I thought about how to stop them.
Let's see, if electricity does nothing to them, then I'll have to try something else...
I searched my possible moves, and while I noticed everything after Lock-On was inaccessible right now, I selected Discharge to replace it with Psybeam. Yes I'm well aware that Psybeam is weaker, but I do not have a lot of options, and these bug ponies were sure giving me time to go over them.
I looked at one of them next to me.
"Hey, you. What's your species called?"
They all answered in unison, still far too cheerful.
"We are changelings."
[|||]
Princess Celestia had just retired to her quarters, snuggling up in sheets, ready to finally get some rest. Right as she laid her head down, a scroll appeared next to her. She frowned, and levitated the scroll into her vision. As she read further down the letter, her expression continued to darken.
She sighed at the prospect of losing sleep, but climbed out of bed anyway. Flinging on her regalia, Celestia rushed into the hall, alerting the guards. She turned to one of them guarding her door.
"Alert Captain Shining Armor and Princess Cadence, I have just been informed of a changeling sighting in the Everfree Forest."
The guard saluted, and ran off down the hallway, while the rest ran high-tail for the barracks. Princess Celestia turned back to her room, ready to start sending a message back to Twilight.
No, I am not being biased, this is a simple statement of fact.
The Porygon line is special, because they have the capability to adjust their move set at will. Normally, a Pokemon would learn a new move and forget one of the four moves they already know, and be unable to relearn it without assistance. With a certain few Pokemon, that is not the case. The possibilities are endless, but only within limit, ironically enough.
Porygon and Porygon2 can learn the moves: Recycle, Defense Curl, and Sharpen. Porygon-Z cannot learn any of those moves, and the only way it could was if it kept them after evolution. Now, considering I had kept Technus as my research assistant and friend during the time in the Project, I had to make sure it knew a few moves that would make our work easier.
Recycle is a move that does exactly what is says on the Technical Machine, it recycles objects and other TMs for further use. When I had been experimenting on Pokemon moves, and on which ones would be able to affect our transportation system, reusing items that we didn't have a large supply of was pertinent.
Yet when the Porygon2 became a Porygon-Z, AKA me, Recycle was carried to my move set. There is one problem with that, though. I forgot Recycle. Which means I can no longer use Recycle, nor can I relearn it. Recycle is not one of Porygon-Z's possible moves, which means it's blocked off entirely. That's what you get when you try and upgrade something haphazardly.
Anyway, my point here is that I could easily take out these changelings that are currently carrying me in their magic fields or some such throughout the castle. Except I'm not going to, because that would be counterproductive to learning about them and why they would want me, safety logic be damned.
I said it before, I'll say it again: I'm a scientist first.
"Hey! Hey, hey!" I said, trying to sound as annoying as possible.
The changeling 'mare' I had met earlier was to my left, while the rest were everywhere else surrounding me. I was being held in a yellow bubble-like shield, and it was showing no signs of breaking, no matter how many Psybeams I fired at it. They were momentarily shocked by my display of power, but the novelty wore off once they realized my abilities were akin to a moth in a jar against them.
The changeling mare, who I was trying to acquire a name out of, sighed. It seemed she was the only female, but I wasn't going to make assumptions just yet. Her left eye had started twitching after the tenth time I had asked her something. She hadn't responded yet, but her white glowing pupils in the sea of yellow were beginning to look weary.
Her smile was also beginning to fade, and I was beginning to think I was going a little far in my prodding. Nevertheless, I also noticed the other changelings were getting tired of my shenanigans as well. Only a little more, though, and...
"Have I ever told you the definition of insanity?"
I had, actually, told them repeatedly the definition of insanity for the past several minutes. In fact, I think I may have been actually performing it, if not for the sake of me getting somewhere.
Finally, the mare snapped.
"You're the definition of insanity."
Her voice had a slight buzz to it, but her tone was trying to gouge out my eyes from afar. While I jumped for joy and scored a victory internally, I kept my childish demeanor.
"I know, right?! How about I try something else?"
The changelings escorting me gave a simultaneous exhale of relief, while I just reveled in their exhaustion. Answers, here I come!
"So, are we there yet?"
I saw the larger of the changelings nearly collapse right then and there. He shot me a look that was intent upon maiming me in ways I doubt even my anatomy would have let me survive. The rest just groaned and/or facehooved. The mare next to me growled.
"Almost."
I could have sworn I heard her say 'yet not close enough' under her breath. While I just tittered, I failed to see the shield encapsulating me constrict. When I noticed my yellow prison had become smaller, I lowered my head slightly as to not bump my head on it. The changeling mare sauntered up to the shield, like a Liepard about to pounce on it's prey.
"Listen closely..."
She punched the shield, and lighting bolted throughout the inside of it, damaging me horribly. I sputtered and flopped about inside in agony, until she tapped the bubble again to turn it off.
"If you are not silent, you will be tortured until you are. Clear?"
She gave me that overly happy grin again, having gained peace of mind at my suffering. My head and body had fallen to the bottom of the shield in a pile, so I weakly pick up my head and nodded it. She smiled even more.
"Good."
Nothing more was said, so I just waited. In the mean time, I made use of the lack of attention to ready myself. I used Recover to heal my injuries, then swapped out Psybeam for Signal Beam, hoping that would actually do damage. I also checked to see if Magnet Rise, Recover, and Agility were still in my known moves. They were, so I picked out Recover and replaced it with Conversion 2.
Because Arceus knows it'll make me hurt less.
How about I explain. Conversion 2 is a move that changes the user's type so that they are resistant to the type of move that was used previously on them. For instance, say I have Conversion 2 activated. A Pokemon hits me with a Fire type move, thus Conversion 2 turns me into a Water type.
Simple as that.
What is not so simple is whether the magic being used to electrocute me would be recognized by Conversion 2 as an Electric Type move or not. I'm sort of thinking it would, but it would be a serious gamble. For now, I'm not going to push my luck.
My back was aching a little bit from being thoroughly zapped, so I just sat there and suffered. Recover can't heal certain kinds of injuries, and sometimes it's because if you don't know what you're healing, it won't get healed by Recover. Heal Pulse works better than Recover on that sort of thing, because it didn't give a damn if it knew what it was healing or not, which is why it's so widely used in Pokemon Centers.
My cage was rattled to bring my attention back to reality. We had arrived at the back of the castle, right at the edge of the forest. Two of the changelings stepped forward from our group, and lit their horns up. We were standing in front of a rock wall just underneath a large balcony, with a hedge maze behind us that had rotted from years of neglect. Several statues had also crumbled to dust, yet there was one pedestal at the center which looked as if a statue had been moved off of it.
The wall in front of us lit up with the same yellow glow, before bursting into flame. A large hole was revealed in the rock, with a staircase leading down it.
I had heard of Zoroarks using their powers of illusion to hide their liars, and this was quite similar. The changelings all carried me inside, closing off the entrance behind us. I was unceremoniously dropped to the floor when the shield disappeared. I had turned off Magnet Rise a while back so I wouldn't waste energy while I was being levitated anyway.
Now, though, I was experiencing a familiar feeling of deja vu and dirt. I quickly righted myself, and was met with several lighting-charged spears pointed at me. The mare pointed down the eerie tunnel, with several pockets of hardened yellow substance emitting a slight glow. At least they had mood lighting.
"Follow us. Try anything, and you will be tortured."
It wasn't just a command, or even an order, but a harsh statement of fact. A fact delivered through an icy smile and terrifying fangs.
Joyous day.
I hovered along, being careful not to accidentally move in a direction opposite where they were taking me.. I was tempted to just impale myself on one of their spears with Conversion 2 online, but decided against it.
As we walked through the underground area, I noticed it was of similar make to certain Vespiquen hives I had seen during those times in Eterna Forest. My memories were still recovering, and thus simplified of details, but there nonetheless.
My escorts and I reached the end of the tunnel, were a large sheet of goop slowly streamed like a waterfall into the ground below, with either areas of where the goo began and ended being a large slit in the rock. The yellow wall of gunk made a splattering noise as it dripped, causing me to be both disgusted and vaguely fascinated by the result.
Why they had a gooey waterfall for a doorway was anyone's guess, though.
The changeling mare approached an opening nearby that I hadn't noticed. There was a window installed over it, with no entrance to whatever was beyond it in sight. Another changeling drone approached the window from within, with the same dopey smile plastered across his face.
Wait a minute, I think that's a guard booth, like those you have to deal with at amusement parks or hospitals.
The drone in the booth nodded at whatever the mare had said, and his horn lit up. I was dizzied by the sound of a giant rock gutter flying out of the wall, and slamming into the wall opposite to it. The boom echoed, and if I had ears, I could have sworn they'd be bleeding. I resisted the urge to say anything, because I was trying to prevent myself from getting speared again.
I'm going to hold my Conversion 2 card for as long as possible.
The goo was now steadily draining into a hole on the other end of the stone gutter, preventing it from just overflowing. I was motioned at to go forwards, so I did. As the changeling mare joined up with our little group again, my attention was drawn to what lay ahead.
It was beautiful, in an architectural sense.
Otherwise, it was very strange.
The entire cavern was bathed in yellow light, with changelings of all different body and mane styles buzzing every which way. The entire hive had a sense of laxness to it, as if it were more a bar than an actual hive. I could have sworn I heard laughter, maybe even a few moaning sounds somewhere in the area.
I gagged slightly at such an image of changelings having-
OK, ENOUGH OF THAT.
There were a few couches made of stone scattered about, with yellow cushions on them, most likely made of that same goo from before. A couple of changelings were relaxing in the couches, either talking or just resting in general. I saw three drones airlifting a stone cart of cocoons through the room, with a pony in each one.
I was crestfallen to see them trapped in such a state, my heart panging with sympathy, before wondering if I was doomed to the same fate. As I watched the cart disappear into an adjacent room, the six changelings who had been guiding me disbanded, going in their own separate directions. Leaving me with the changeling mare.
Again, joyous day.
She sidled up to me, flashing a predatory grin.
"Well now, it's just you and me."
Her eyes gleamed with contempt. She slowly circled me, and I watched her as my head turned in kind, the fact it was floating separately allowing my head to turn in unnatural directions. My black and yellow eyes met her yellow ones in a staring contest of each contestant hoping one would drop dead before the other to just get it over with.
"You know, our Queen thinks you are our salvation."
Now I was just confused. Perhaps this is why they needed me, then?
Seeing my lack of understanding, she stopped right next to me, and glared.
"I know she's planning on making you her new heir, because she needs you. She'll replace me, and I'll just be stuck in my position forever."
She slammed a hole-filled hoof into me.
"I was meant to be her heir, not some ridiculous red and blue bird!"
She stomped her hoof to the ground, scowling. I backed up slightly at the display of aggression, but tried to not show any emotion about it. I responded with my thoughts on the matter.
"I don't want this. I would rather not have to run a society I hardly know about, or deal with creatures I can't sympathize with."
I pointed a blue flipper at the room where the cart went, anger showing on my face.
"You had ponies in cocoons, held against their will. What could possibly justify that?"
I crossed my arms, while she frowned. Her wings flared out.
"Those were ponies we saved from the Everfree Forest! If they weren't in those cocoons, they wouldn't recover from their injuries!"
I squinted at her, and thought that over. If that was true, then they may very well have done good, and I shouldn't mess with such. If they were lying, I'm getting played, and I'm also probably going to be stuck in a problem the size of Mount Coronet.
"Alright. I never really got your name by the way, miss...?"
I let my sentence trail off so that she could finish it, motioning my flipper towards her in a circle.
"Myriad."
Huh, a heir to a throne of countless changelings. Fitting.
I clapped my arms together, and gave her a grin through my eyes. Don't ask how, it just happened.
"Brilliant! I'm Lenkar Glitch, pleasure to meet you, even if such is a lie."
She just chuckled humorlessly at my lack of tact.
"Charming. So, are you ready to meet our Queen?"
I paused at that question, my eyes losing their previous emotion. I folded my arms again, putting a flipper to my beak.
Am I?
Well, the obvious answer would be either no, or hell no. Then again, maybe their Queen isn't that bad, because even though I had a tough time getting here that doesn't mean they're all in the wrong. Myriad in front of me just hates my guts, not that I have any, about me replacing her for being next in line to royalty. Also, the changelings with the heir had injured me a few times, but I was being a little difficult.
Heck, those guards were probably just doing their jobs.
I rubbed my 'temples', and cringed internally at the decision I was having to make. I was a scientist, dammit, not a diplomat!
"I don't really have a choice, so why the heck not?"
I found myself being forcibly dragged through the air, again. I looked over at Myriad, and saw she was carrying me.
"Do you mind?"
She rolled her eye, or at least I think she did.
"No, I do not. Now shut up until we get there."
I made a whirring noise that was trying it's hardest sound like a huff.
"Well excuse me, princess!"
[|||]
As the many corridors and rooms whizzed by, I took the time to think about the connection between the weird pixel block creature, and what Zygarde had told me about MISSINGNO. It was obvious the pixel creature had given me The Virus, which I was still trying to find a way to remove, and the Recycle Bin was just there because of a Porygon-Z's usual shtick of programming.
To be honest, I just threw them in quarantine and hoped they wouldn't produce offspring, which is highly ironic to my memory of the many Pokemon Daycares around the world.
While that line of amusement had me laughing internally, I pondered thoroughly what I had seen and remembered. A Pokemon who brogh corruption wherever it went. An infectious insanity plaguing the mind of whoever it visited. The answer was clear.
I had seen MISSINGNO. and made it out with my sanity.
The question now, was what do I do? This revelation was not to be taken lightly by any means, but if a Zygarde statue was in this castle, then maybe other Pokemon had been here as well. In turn, Zygarde may have told the story of MISSINGNO. again, which means someone may know how to contact Zygarde under such a scenario.
Perhaps these changelings could help...
My musings were put aside as Myriad and I arrived at two large, foreboding doors. The bright yellow would have looked wonderful in anywhere but here, because here it just looked unnaturally cheerful, just like the changeling's smiles. The doors featured two pictures on either of them, a picture of a sun on the left, and picture of a ladybug on the right.
Guarding the doors were two changelings, each wielding a spear. I cringed at the sight of the spears, but calmed myself when I remembered Conversion 2. Myriad motioned towards the door, and gave me a smile.
"Go in. If you're disrespectful to our Queen, you will regret it."
Myriad walked off, a rigidness in her step. Turning to the door, I hesitated, before strengthening my resolve. Apprehension gripped me as I cautiously opened the ornate doors.
The throne room of this hive was well designed, by all accounts. There were eight stained glass windows, four on either side, with murals on them. Each window let to nowhere but solid rock, but it was the pictures that counted. They all told a story, and I was fascinated. I would really like to know about each of the windows, if I lived that long, that is.
The windows were illuminated around the edges by the same goo I had seen all across the hive, lighting up the windows in a way that simulated sunlight. The ground also had the goo spread across it like lacquer, giving it a sheen that wouldn't normally occur on a rock floor.
There were four tapestries hanging from the ceiling, which had a design similar to the throne doors I had just opened. A sun on one, with a ladybug on the other. I looked closer, and noticed a throne was at the very back of the room, the bright yellowish-orange chair reminding me of a Bronzong's markings. The chair itself gave off a dim glow, making sure anyone who enters the owner's chambers knew exactly was at the top of the chain here.
Sitting atop the throne was the Queen herself.
I realized I had just been floating there with my head and body partially peeking into the room, so I entered fully. I let go of the door in the process, causing the doors to slide shut with a 'boom'. The sound was almost like a reminder that I had sealed my fate as soon as I had come in.
I folded my arms behind me at an attempt to regain my bearings, and hovered over to the Queen. I stopped a few feet in front of her, and bowed, sweeping my left arm in front of me as a display of respect.
"Your highness."
Myriad told me not to be disrespectful, and I had no idea what the even meant, so I did what came to mind. I was used to meeting creatures of power by now, considering my luck so far. Hopefully this wouldn't end horribly. I kept my pose, and I could hear the clacking of hooves across the floor.
I nervously looked up at the Queen.
She looked wild.
Her eyes had multiple shades of yellow, and her slitted pupils made her look more insane that mine did. Her mane was frazzled, like she had just but shocked by one of those spears outside, or perhaps rubbed a balloon all over it. She was tall and slender, her lithe form causing her movements to show off a little grace.
She had a plate on her back that was a gradient of yellow shades, and it was almost mesmerizing to look at. Her underbelly had a similar pattern, while the rest of her was covered in a light grey shell.
The Queen's tail was in the same shape as her mane, and it was at a very long length, as if it hadn't been cut in years. The crown resting on her head was comically tiny compared to the size of her unkempt mane, as it looked like it could be swallowed up in the mass of hair at any moment. Her horn was also crooked and warped, yet still had some shape to it, that shape being a lighting bolt.
What truly unnerved me, was her smile. I swear, it was even bigger than the other changeling's smiles had been. I think her mouth was also larger, with even more teeth as an added plus. She stalked towards me, as if coming in for the kill. I tried to stay still, but started shaking as soon as she stopped before me.
She laughed.
It was kind of hilarious, because the royal changeling in front of me had started up a giggle fit befitting a drunkard than an actual queen. Once her chuckling had died down, she put a hoof on my shoulder.
"C'mon now, no need for your grovelling."
I straightened myself immediately in fright. Her voice sounded like mine, but instead of static, it was more like the buzzing of an insect's wings times ten. Her voice also had a mature feminine tone, and it certainly outweighed my male yet high pitched voice. Actually, she reminded me a little bit of...
Oh.
"Uh, are you by any chance a musician?"
I immediately slapped my flippers over my beak. I hadn't meant to say that out loud, but the damage had been done. She gave me an expression I couldn't read, before bursting into laughter again. I waited for her to calm down, and she answered.
"My, you really are quite smart. Here I was thinking I had found some half wit creature like the ones I'd read about. Sure I'm a musician, how could you tell?"
I fumbled a bit at how accurate my guess was, and responded, rubbing the back of my head sheepishly.
"Well, you reminded me of guitarists from where I originate, and the lighting motif is a common theme for them."
I motioned towards the throne.
"It sort of gave it away."
I twiddled my flippers a bit, the folded them behind me.
"So, what's your name?"
She had a faraway look in her eyes, something I knew all too well, which then solidified. She struck a pose of... some sort, and flashed me a grin.
"Queen Sepia."
My face scrunched up a little.
"Wait a minute, doesn't that have something to do with ocean creatures?"
Queen Sepia tittered into her hoof, and stalked around me in a circle. Boy, aren't I just the center of everything?
"Yes, but it's the color sepia that I was named for. Now, how about your name?"
She halted in her looping, rubbing up against me in a complete violation of personal space. Sepia leaned her head into mine, her mane enveloping the rest of my vision. I shuddered.
"Lenkar Glitch."
The Queen squinted at me for a moment, and leaned in even closer. My head opted to slide back a bit in the air, except my body stayed in place.
"Full name."
If I had a throat, I would have either gulped or thrown up. Or both.
"Vintage Lenkar EnGlitch, ma'am."
It was her turn to have a scrunched up expression, before chuckling and draping a leg over me.
"Hah! Ma'am? Now you're trying to make me feel old. Really cool name you have there, it'd be interesting to see how far it can go."
Her eyes glistened, while I suddenly felt like I was trapped under a Pyroar as a small Deerling, ready to be it's next meal. She held me a little tighter.
"You see Lenkar, you're going to be my new heir. For some time, us changelings have had to make do with living in the shadows, but my hive and I have a tendency to attract attention."
I took in her view for a moment, and deadpanned.
"I can't imagine why..."
Sepia was taken aback by my sarcasm, but then just laughed it up. I... hold on.
Search inquiry: Synonyms of the word laugh.
SYNTAX ERROR: <Synonyms of the word>
Well crap.
Search engines are all junk anyways. No wonder my vocabulary is suffering.
The changeling Queen strode back over to her throne, and plopped into it lackadaisically. She motioned for me for to come nearer, so I did.
"So, my question is, what can you do?"
I tilted my head at the question, then it hit me that she was asking about my abilities.
"I can fly, move faster than most creatures could ever possibly go, among other things..."
Sepia seemed to brighten at this, and pointed her horn towards me.
"Well, how's about we put these other things to the test."
Her horn began to light up, as electricity arched across it. I saw what she was doing and immediately activated my trump card, Conversion 2. The yellow beam of energy fired out of her horn, and hit me dead on. I was flung back with such force I thought my head had lost electromagnetic connection with my body for a moment.
I skidded across the floor, spasming all over the ground. I finally went limp when my head dropped like a sack of rocks, and Conversion 2 got to work. A cloud of pixels fogged over me, and my type changed. My reds turned to tans, and my blue turned to browns, while my eyes stayed the same. I was now a Ground Type, making me immune to the Electric Type.
I would only stay a Ground Type while Conversion 2 was on, or until I was knocked out entirely. The Queen raised an eyebrow at my color change, but fired another bolt anyway. It impacted me, but I didn't budge. The electricity was harmlessly absorbed into me, and rerouted to the ground.
This is where it gets even more ridiculous and complicated than usual.
So, where was I?
Oh yeah, her.
Another yellow beam whizzed past my head as I sidestepped it. I slid to the right as two more nearly hit me. I wasn't going to use Agility, because that would be cheating, and also because I'm smart enough to calculate the beams beforehand. I heard a growl of annoyance as she outright blasted a beam of lighting at my head. I simply moved my head up and my body down, allowing it to seamlessly pass between the two.
"So, why am I your heir?"
After I had upstarted Conversion 2, Queen Sepia wanted to see what else it could do, so we devised a game. I dodge her magic, I ask questions, she answers. If I am hit, it's her turn to ask questions, except I'm still trying to dodge while answering. It's not like the bolts would hurt, because I still have Conversion 2 online, making me a Ground Type.
Huh, a floating Ground Type.
The irony.
"Because, when my mother introduced me to different research materials from the library above on your kind, I had to have such abilities for my changelings! Who wouldn't?"
I flung myself upwards as a few electric orbs scattered out of the changeling Queen's horn, right before the converged on where I had been, scorching the floor. Breathing a whir of relief, I began to do figure eights in the air.
"So you just want power? How cliche!"
I zipped to the side when she fired yet another beam at me, still sitting on her throne in concentration, but looking bemused at my comment.
"Not just power, defense! Queen Chrysalis revealed the changelings to the world when she foolishly attacked Canterlot. Due to my hive being close to a town in direct contact with that very same city, it stands to reason we'd need protection in case the Princess sent her wrath upon us!"
Sepia charged her horn, a yellow orb slowly growing at the tip. I had seen other Electric Types make the same mistake before when summoning an Electro Ball, but I digress. You shouldn't keep a move powered up for too long or too close to you, as it could backfire and explode in your face, literally. It's the same reason Energy Ball is a hard Grass Type move to master, along with Aura Sphere and the like.
I fired a well placed Signal Beam at the orb of energy, causing it to rupture and explode. I couldn't see anything for a few moments, but upon the smoke clearing, I noticed Sepia was still at her throne without a scratch on her or anything else. While I just stood and stared with wide eyes, the Queen guffawed like no tomorrow at my shock, if you will.
"Ohhh, your face! Priceless!"
She continued to laugh, while I immediately entered 'I am not amused' mode. Leering gaze, crossed arms, pouting expression. The whole nine yards. She calmed down enough so that I could speak.
"Yes, yes, make me worry that I blew you up. Hilarious."
I pointed a flipper towards her.
"How did you survive?"
She giggled, and tapped her horn for emphasis.
"Changelings are naturally capable of draining magic. Normally we feed on emotional magic, but I've conditioned myself for otherwise using the information I learned about your kind."
Sepia examined her hoof in a nonchalant manner, then looked at me with a glint in her eyes.
"I believe you call it Volt Absorb?"
Oh.
Clever girl.
Huh. I have a hypothesis, but I'm not sure if it's right. Let's put that to the test, then.
"You say changelings feed off of emotions?"
Sepia nodded.
"Alright, so you fed off of the electricity-"
"Lighting magic."
I huffed at being interrupted, but continued anyway.
"...lighting magic, thus allowing you to heal yourself and preventing damage to the surrounding area."
I hovered over to her, and poked her horn. She cringed, but I was in explanation mode.
"Meaning, you did indeed just execute Volt Absorb. One problem, though, is that a Pokemon Ability like Volt Absorb is always active."
She laughed and waved a dismissive hoof.
"Which it is. I heard you had tried to attack my guards who had been escorting you."
I rubbed the back of my head, remembering the futile endeavor.
"Oh, that. Yes, my Discharge failed to faze them at all."
She gave a smug look towards the throne room doors.
"That's my girl..."
I slapped my flipper to my forehead.
"That does not explain how you are generating electricity in the first place."
I held out my arms in front of me, and she just smiled.
"Static."
I promptly double faceflippered.
"What about the conservation of energy-"
"Magic."
With that, I grabbed my head from the air, and spun in a circle, then tossed it like a baseball pitcher straight through the throne room doors.
I screamed in frustration the whole time it happened.
[|||]
Once our little Q&A session was over with, and I was one hundred percent certain I hadn't forgotten one single thing, I headed down the hallway outside the throne room in the general direction of sound. Sepia was walking alongside me, except she had a little sway in her step, as if her pride had been strengthened considerably.
I was still fuming about the answers I had been given, and I wasn't quite sure why. I had absolutely no reason to be angry, nor did I require launching my head through a door, yet all of it happened. I rubbed my head, a migraine slowly hammering it's way into my head, while I wondered about what Sepia had said earlier.
"Uh, Sepia."
She looked at me while we walked.
"You said you feed on emotion. What kind of emotion?"
The changeling Queen laughed, and flipped her mane, the yellow fuzziness going everywhere.
"See for yourself."
We had reached the end of the hallway, and she opened the door with her yellow aura, the doors opening with a squeak. Upon seeing the room, at first I thought I was crazy, because I had just been in this lobby not even a few minut--an hour ago.
The changelings were all enjoying each other's company, chatting about their duties or some such. A few noticed their breaks were over, and begrudgingly exited the room. Sepia tittered as she watched a drunken drone stumble into a table, while a friend next to him just dragged the poor changeling off to a sick bay.
There was a changeling drone at a turntable, with a pretty good stereo system hooked up. Said changeling also had neon blue hair that was set up a fashion almost as crazy as Sepia's. I pointed at the DJ changeling.
"Uh..."
It suddenly hit me, all at once, exactly what this room was.
I was in the middle of an Arceus damn night club, for changelings.
...
SON OF A B-
[|||]
Sepia simply observed the Porygon-Z go through several different emotions in less than ten seconds. His head twitched a few times, until he finally just went limp, his limbs dangling loosely while his head hung in the air.
"Of all the things, it had to be this..."
The former human groaned, turning to the Queen for assistance. He indignantly pointed a blue limb at the party.
"What even IS this?!"
Sepia put a reassuring hoof on the red and blue bird's shoulder, hoping that would calm him down. Right before she wrapped him in a hug, and smiled devilishly, of course.
"Did I mention what we feed on?"
The Porygon-Z shook his head. Sepia just leaned right up against him, and whispered.
"Ecstasy."
[|||]
AN ERROR HAS OCCURRED. TO CONTINUE:
PRESS ENTER TO RETURN TO SILPH OS, OR
PRESS CTRL+ALT+DEL TO RESTART YOUR PORYGON. IF YOU DO THIS, YOU WILL LOSE ANY UNSAVED INFORMATION IN ALL OPEN PROCESSES.
ERROR: 0E : 016F : BFF9B3D4
PRESS ANY KEY TO CONTINUE _
...AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!
Oh.
Well, that's a thing, that exists.
I think I'm going to go see that bartender over there and find out some way to drink, physical limitations be damned.
As Sepia and I made our way to the bar, I started another Q&A session, along with a new headache.
"So, ecstasy. Still doesn't explain the night club."
Sepia ordered a white wine, while I asked for plain water, not wanting to become an alcoholic at any point. I don't care how many strange ideas I get, I'm never drinking the stuff. Ever.
"You see, there's actually a lot of changelings around Equestria in places similar to this."
She motioned a hoof around the room.
"Even if we can't feed off of each other, it's still all in good fun."
She giggled into her hoof, and I just groaned. I propped my head up on the table, not that it needed supports in the first place, and I looked at the rest of the changelings in the room.
"So is that why they're always smiling? An emotional high? Interesting."
While my mind began to run the implications of such through my head over and over, and changeling mare clambered over next to me, still a little tipsy. I debated on whether or not I should just Signal Beam her and run out of this insane asylum, but decided to let Sepia handle the drunk changeling.
Sepia strode over and carefully helped her subject to the bathroom, or at least I think it was a bathroom. I wasn't sure, because all of the rooms looked the same. My thoughts of the throne room and this club immediately sprung to mind after I thought that.
Okay fine, nearly the same.
[|||]
Meanwhile, near Ponyvill-
"HUZZAH! WE SHALL HAVE A WONDERFUL BATTLE, WORTHY OF OUR MAGNIFICENT GLORY! COWER IN FEAR CHANGELINGS, FOR THEE HAST MET THY END, AND IT IS THE NIGHT!"
Princess Luna had received word from the royal guard that changelings had been spotted in the Everfree Forest. She hadn't had a good fight in a very long while, and Celestia usually forbade her traditional sparring. Except with the soldiers, of course, because they needed as much combat help as they can get.
The Lunar Princess waded through the dark forest, while her thestrals guarded her at different areas. Although all this stealth was sort of pointless, considering Luna had just announced to the whole forest she was about to mow down changelings like cutting grass. The group weaved their way along the vegetation, before stopping right next to the bridge to her old castle.
Luna frowned, and tapped a silver clad hoof on the bridge lightly.
"How the mighty hath fallen..."
She gazed intently at the castle, a new form of anger ripping through her. She called out to her guards.
"Hark! If the changelings wish to defile Our old castle, then they shall pay for doing so tenfold! CHARGE!"
[|||]
As I sat at the bar with a glass of water next to me, still untouched, I was beginning to wonder if I should just give up and fight my way out of this situation, beak a' blazing. I huffed, and jut sulked in my self indecision. That was, until a changeling burst through the door.
"My Queen, I have important news!"
Queen Sepia had been dancing with reckless abandon, generally having the time of her life, but now the music stopped as the atmosphere went serious. She walked over to the scout and picked the drone up in her magic.
"Don't tell me you have news, tell me the news."
The changeling cringed in her grasp, but pointed at the door where he had entered.
"Our scouts had just seen a few thestrals headed this way, along with Princess Luna-"
The drone was cut off due to the fact he was now embedded in the ceiling. Queen Sepia stormed over towards me with a righteous fury in her eyes.
"We have no time."
She lifted me up, and dragged me out of the room, while every other changeling scattered. I flopped and struggled in her magical grasp.
"What's happening? One of the Princesses is here?"
I looked at her, and all she could give me was a solemn look of finality. I was dragged, very painfully I might add, to the throne room. Once I had been unceremoniously locked inside, Sepia shut and sealed the doors several times over. She cast a spell across the entire room, before collapsing on the floor, panting heavily.
I floated over to her, my body in a Y position.
"What is going on?"
The changeling Queen looked up at me, and I suddenly saw all of the years she had lived visible in her visage. She spoke darkly, and I had a feeling I was not going to like this at all.
Princess Luna stormed through the hive, hacking at changelings left and right. None were maimed, but a few were injured, Luna's blunt broadsword proving enough of a weapon to do the job. As the thestrals tied the changelings up, and a few of the Night Guard were trying to clean the sticky yellow goo on them from when they tried to go through the entrance, Luna was making headway.
She barged into the lobby, and was brought to a halt in her warpath by the sight of a typical night club. The changeling bartender was cleaning a table with a rag, humming merrily. Luna sheathed her sword, and trotted up to the bartender. He looked up from his work to see a very angry Princess that was ready to toss him to the moon in a heartbeat.
He shuddered, his old chitin making a clacking sound, but calmed himself enough to return to his usual demeanor.
"Eh, can't say I was expectin' a Princess 'ere in mah bar. Ah well, take wat'cha ken git ah suppose."
He shrugged nonchalantly, and returned to his post behind the ceramic table. Tapping a hole-riddled hoof, he chuckled lightly at the glowering alicorn.
"So, ya need sumthin' Princess? How's about some Moonshine? Ya had a pretty nice stock up'n 'ere--HURK!"
He was cut off by Luna lifting him into the air with her magic. While the bartender struggled to breathe, Luna hissed.
"Do not play games with Us. Now, vile creature, tell Us where thy Queen is, and perhaps we shall spare thee."
The bartender nodded, and Luna let go. The changeling collapsed to the floor, inhaling precious lungfuls of oxygen. At least he could now say he faced an angry alicorn and lived. He weakly pointed in the direction of the throne room.
"Fine. It be 'round three doors down on yer' left. Ya won't miss it."
He coughed a few times and laid down to rest himself. The Lunar Princess nodded, and headed off towards the throne room, while calling a few thestrals to her aid. The bartender watched Luna and her guards leave with a heavy feeling of guilt.
Forgive me, my Queen...
[|||]
Princess Luna knocked on the doors with enough force to knock a house down, yet they held fast. She motioned her head towards the hinged obstructions, and her guards flew up in the air to start ramming it. A shuffling sound was heard, and Luna noticed a piece of paper had been slipped under the door.
"HALT!"
The guards all lined up behind Luna, giving their salutes. She carefully walked over to the note, and picked it up. What it said confused her to no end.
I DIDN'T KNOW WHAT I WAS PLAYING,
UNTIL I LEARNED MY FATE.
SHE JUST KEPT ON SMILING,
AND TOLD ME, "STALEMATE."
[|||]
"What do you mean speed up your plans?"
Sepia just chuckled humorlessly at my naivety. She stumbled over to me, and jumped. As I was tackled to the floor, I thought she was hugging me, but then I noticed her sniffing me.
Welp...
She gasped, with a betrayed look on her face. She crawled away from me at a speed I didn't even know was possible for a quadruped. She cupped her muzzle in her hooves as tears began to stream down her face. She pointed an accusatory hoof at me.
"Unnatural."
I froze at that word, because it had awoken a thought process within me, and it continued to churn out it's path until it finally screamed the answer.
YOU'RE AN ARTIFICIAL POKEMON WITH NO GENDER, YOU CAN'T BE HER HEIR BECAUSE YOU CAN'T REPRODUCE!
I shuddered, realizing exactly how badly I was screwing this up for her, as well as everyone else.
Boy, I sure am the center everything.
"Sepia wait..."
"NO!"
Her yell nearly threw me into a wall, but I held fast. I rose into the air, and held up my arms defensively.
"Now, we can talk this out..."
"SILENCE! YOU NEVER TOLD ME OF THIS?! EVERYTHING I PLANNED FOR IS RUINED! MY HIVE IS FINISHED!"
As she angrily shouted at me, I saw something very disturbing show in her eyes, something I knew wouldn't let me walk out of this very easily.
She was ready to murder me right then and there.
Sepia lunged in a feral snarl as I used Agility to move out of the way. I was taken off guard by the fact everything slowed down around me, with the Queen's jump now having slowed to a crawl. It was like watching a video in slow motion, but instead this was actual time. I was moving really fast, then!
I carefully examined how quickly Sepia was moving in the air. It was getting faster and faster due to Agility slowly wearing off, so I had to act now, which wasn't hard at all in this situation.
I fired a Signal Beam at her horn, the pixelated beam engulfing her horn in rainbow data packets of pure nonsense info, and perhaps The Virus as well.
Okay fine, yes of course The Virus, I wanted that out of me badly. Besides, it gave me an excuse to sneeze out a Signal Beam!
Agility wore off, and all Hell broke loose. Sepia tossed and tumbled across the floor, her horn singed from the Signal Beam. When I saw she wasn't moving, I was getting a little worried. It was only then that I noticed her body was slowly being consumed by The Virus, the rainbow pixelated mess of a blob carefully engulfing the changeling.
I had never been more terrified in my life.
The now very corrupted Queen looked over at me and smiled.
"Stalemate."
Before I knew what was even happening, she exploded in a shower of pixels.
As I just hovered there, shell-shocked, I reflected on the fact that this hive just lost their Queen because of my carelessness. Grief struck me for the first time I had come here, because I just couldn't ignore it any longer. I cried silently, cradling my own head like a baby, rocking it back and forth.
I floated over to the Queen's throne, and saw a book resting soundly on it, as if everything that just happened hadn't even mattered at all to it. I glared at the book for mocking me, but realized that I should probably write something to remember Sepia by. With a heavy heart, I placed my head over my torso, and picked up the book.
I read the title aloud.
"Compositions For The Crown."
I looked around to see if there was any threat about to barge into the room. Waiting a while, I heard nothing, so I simply sat in the throne and opened the book. The first page after the cover had a note, which I read aloud as well.
"To my dearest Sepia, may you always follow that untamable song in your heart. Let it guide you, and your Heir of Light will be found. - Miasma"
I sniffled, except I didn't have the anatomy to actually weep. As I looked through the book, I saw the many songs she had made for Princess Celestia over the years while in disguise. I checked the author, but it was a different alias each time, until I realized something. Each one was the previous Queen, who had made a song for the Princess each time.
Luna looked over the note repeatedly, trying to make some sense of it, while the guards kept trying to break down the door. Finally, after one more hit, the doors came crashing open. As the throne room doors fell to the ground in shambles, Princess Luna and her guards swarmed into the room, pointing spears at the Porygon-Z holding a songbook.
Lenkar was far too emotional to even notice the guards, but he continued to shudder in his silent despair on the throne. He felt horrible. What wrong had he done to deserve this?
Luna noticed the poor creature was occupied with the book, so she calmly approached him.
"Hello creature, art thee owner of this hive?"
The Porygon-Z looked up from the book, and nearly fell out of the chair.
"N... no. I'm not."
He was completely still, but his head moved in a rigid fashion to look at where Sepia had been.
"The Queen is dead. I killed her."
He grabbed his beak, and shivered, silently cursing everything.
"Why..."
Everypony else in the room was taken aback. Luna glanced between the Porygon-Z and the rainbow pixel stain on the floor. Lenkar was now holding the book against his beak, as if fearing he might fell another if he dare remove it. Luna carefully stepped towards him, and rested a hoof on his tail.
"Tis' alright."
He shook his head.
"No, it isn't."
He sighed deeply, the mechanical whirring feeling just like what Sepia called him.
Unnatural.
He couldn't believe it. One moment he was fooling around with Sepia and her changeling, the next he had shattered her like glass without even trying.
Unnatural.
It was too much for the man. He was supposed to be a scientist, where the only thing he had to worry about was if the Project was going to blow up. Ironically, that's exactly how he got here.
Luna wrapped a wing around the red and blue bird, sitting next to him in the sizable throne. He leaned into Luna, silently and tearlessly sobbing. Holding the book close to him, he sung a few lines of the song to calm his nerves.
"Once did a pony who shone like the sun, look out on her kingdom and sigh."
Luna's attention snapped to what Lenkar was singing, not having heard of such a song before. A false happiness appeared in Lenkar's dartboard eyes as he sang the next part.
"She smiled and said, 'Surely there is no pony so lovely, and so well beloved as I.'"
Recognition flashed on the Lunar mare's features, remembering the fateful day all too well.
"So great was her reign, and so brilliant her glory that long was the shadow she cast."
He gazed up at Luna, with fear present in him.
"Which fell dark upon the young sister she loved, and grew only darker as days and nights passed."
Luna sniffed, having found herself crying. Wiping her eyes with a hoof, she lifted the songbook in her aura. As she saw the book, she noticed it was written so it sounded like Celestia was singing her to sleep. She saw the title of the music.
Lullaby For A Princess...
Luna looked down at the Porygon-Z, who had passed out from exhaustion, his head dropping a little before rising slightly again in sleep. Luna smiled softly, nuzzling Lenkar, and carefully lifted him into the air with her magic. She stopped in front of her guards, and levitated the sleeping Pokemon over to the thestrals.
"Take this one back to Ponyville, do not wake it."
She gave one more glimpse at the pixelated stain on the ground.
"It has had a rough day."
[|||]
Yet such is the way of the limelight, it sweetly takes hold of the mind of it's host.
And that foolish pony did nothing to stop, the destruction of one who had needed her most.
I groaned a little, my head and heart breaking at the same time. As I examined the featureless void, I held my head in my arms again. I was startled out of my sulking by a blinding flash.
A rift opened once more, as MISSINGNO. made it's way towards me.
I stayed where I was.
"I hate you."
A sound like a screeching alarm made of random beeping noises echoed throughout the blank black expanse. It seemed almost like MISSINGNO. was... laughing.
"YOUWOULDNOTBETHEFIRST, NORTHELASTTODOSO."
I cringed, bracing for the pain that came with it's speech, but nothing happened. I glanced around, only to see nothing. The sky wasn't a mess like it had been when it first visited. MISSINGNO. closed it's rift, and floated over next to me.
While I crossed my arms and sighed, MISSINGNO. shifted a bit, turning itself slightly toward me.
I can't handle this. I'm the wrong guy. I shouldn't be here. This never should have happened. Where did my bit go? Why did I have to be a Porygon-Z? Why did I even go along with Sepia's Heir idea? Why did I have to be sent to Equestria?
Why?
As I moped next to the embodiment of error, I felt like I had just been punched through four walls. My whole body ached with regret and guilt for something I had no control over. I knew I had no control over it, but my completely expected grief likes to show itself in unexpected ways. Namely, by poking MISSINGNO. repeatedly in an attempt to see what it's made of, while asking questions the same way a kid would.
In the most obnoxious way possible.
"So, you're really MISSINGNO. then? What are you made of? Why is it you inherently and passively corrupt? Why doesn't my head hurt when you speak any more? Why did-"
It yelled in frustration.
"ENOUGH!"
I immediately folded my arms and tail over my torso in an attempted Defense Curl, lowering myself closer to the unseen ground in pain and terror. MISSINGNO. sighed, and shook itself in sympathy.
I nodded, laying myself down amidst the pitch-black void, wallowing in my own self-pity. MISSINGNO. rested itself next to me, and a distorting tentacle snaked out of it's side, gently petting me on the head. I flinched at the bizarre texture of it that seemed to change rapidly, but paid it no mind as my thoughts rambled.
"NOW,HOWWOULDYOUSAYTHERECENTEVENTSMADEYOUFEEL?"
A hint of amusement coursed through me when I recognized how it phrased it's question.
"What are you, my psychologist?"
MISSINGNO. straightened it's form a moment, it's pixels moving wildly, but relaxed once it saw what I meant.
"PERHAPSNOT,BUTITWOULDBENEFITYOUTOCOMMUNICATE."
I turned my head towards it, my eyes having lost their luster hours back.
"Why are you being so supportive of me?"
MISSINGNO. slid backwards a small margin, as if flinching. When it spoke next, it's tone seemed to have a hint of bitter nostalgia etched into the Glitch Pokemon's voice.
I inspected the wavy tentacle rubbing my torso, then gave it a nod of approval.
"That is quite a comforting fact, thank you. I won't say I'm not angry at you for corrupting me, but I will forgive you because it was my mistake that I made. I won't hold you to it."
MISSINGNO.'s coloration literally brightened at this.
"THANKYOU."
I chuckled a little, something I had said a long time ago resurfacing.
"Anytime."
MISSINGNO. hesitated for a moment, but started it's story anyway.
"AFTER I WAS SEALED IN MY POCKET DIMENSION, I HAD ATTEMPTED TO EARN THE ACCEPTANCE OF THE WORLD THROUGH DREAMS. YET NO MATTER HOW HARD I HAD TRIED, ALL I WAS CAPABLE OF WAS SPREADING CORRUPTION AND PAIN. THE HUMANS FEARED ME, DRIVING ME AWAY LIKE A DEMON, WHICH FELT EVEN WORSE THAN WHEN MY OWN FAMILY HAD ABANDONED ME.
I CONTINUED TO TRY AND EXPLAIN MYSELF, YET LIKE MY SIBLINGS, THEY REFUSED TO LISTEN. I WAS LABELLED AN ABOMINATION, A BEING OF DESTRUCTION AND CHAOS. THEY RAN, SCREAMED, AND BEGGED FOR MERCY BEFORE ME IN TERROR OF ME. I WAS ASTONISHED AND INDIGNANT AT HOW I WAS BEING TREATED, YET FOR ALL I HAD DONE, IT WAS JUSTIFIED.
HAD I NOT CAUSED MEN TO LOSE THEIR MINDS? HAD I NOT TRIED TO HELP OTHERS IN THEIR NIGHTMARES, ONLY TO LEAD THEM TO A MENTAL HELL? I WAS GUILTY AS CHARGED, YET THERE WAS NOTHING I COULD DO. MY POWERS WERE NOT TO BE TAMED EASILY, AS I WAS FAR MORE RASH BACK THEN. I TRIED TO ORDER AND COMMAND MY ABILITIES TO STOP, TO NO AVAIL.
EVERYTHING THAT TRANSPIRED SIMPLY MADE ME MORE AND MORE FURIOUS, UNTIL I FINALLY SNAPPED. I BEGAN TO LEAVE COPIES OF MYSELF IN DREAMS, AS REVENGE AGAINST THOSE WHO SCORNED ME. THEY WERE VIRUSES, A PLAGUE ON THE MIND, WHICH WOULD SLOWLY DRIVE THEM MAD.
THEN MY CREATOR MADE TWO WARDENS OF DREAMS, AND I WAS ONCE AGAIN LIMITED. I COULD NO LONGER AFFECT ANY MORE MINDS, I COULD ONLY VISIT THE HORRIBLE DEEDS I HAD DONE. WHEN I REALIZED THE ERROR OF MY WAYS, I HOLED MYSELF UP IN MY DIMENSION TO PREVENT FURTHER DAMAGE. AFTER SEVERAL YEARS OF GRIEVING, YOU KNOW WHAT I DID?"
I shook my head in awed, yet pained silence.
"I STOPPED. I HAD ENOUGH OF WHAT I HAD DONE, AND MADE A RESOLVE TO FIX MYSELF. I BEGAN TO WORK ON MY ABILITIES, HONING THEM, AND AFTER SEVERAL AGES OF WORK I FINISHED. THE REASON YOU ARE NOT INSANE AT THIS MOMENT IS BECAUSE I CHOSE TO CONTINUE AND LEARN FROM MY MISTAKES, NOT CRY OVER THEM. I HAD TO LEARN AND MAKE DO WITH MY CIRCUMSTANCES, NO MATTER HOW LONG IT TOOK ME.
I KNOW IT MAY SEEM EVERYTHING IS AGAINST YOU, BUT WITH SOMETHING TO AIM FOR, YOU CAN MAKE GOOD THINGS HAPPEN."
I simply laid there, staring. What it had just told me stirred a feeling within me.
Princess Celestia sat next to the bed Lenkar was resting in. She had arrived after Luna had infiltrated the hive without her knowing, and so her sister was reprimanded, but not nearly as harshly as her soldiers that had willingly followed along. There were times where her sister's knowledge of modern day tactics was lacking, but barging into a changeling hive and not alerting Celestia was a bit of a blunder.
She had forgiven Luna though, as it had went off without a hitch, with one exception. Said exception was curled up under a blanket, it's disembodied head dropping onto the bed, then righting itself after a few sleepy attempts. It's limbs were folded against the Porygon-Z's body, causing it to look much smaller than before.
Celestia sighed at the thought of having to give the poor creature a stern talking to, but it was for the best. She had to admit, it was quite adorable how the red and blue bird was snuggling itself. It wouldn't last long, though.
Princess Luna slammed the door open, then closed it quietly with her magic.
"The Queen hath been felled, Sister."
Celestia took the news with a poker face, digesting the information while rewording the conversation she was planning to have with the Pokemon.
"I will try to talk some sense into him. That is all I can do."
Luna strode next to her sister, and sat down, wrapping a wing over her back in a hug. The two nuzzled, then returned their view back the sleeping Porygon-Z.
"Nay, Sister, it is all We can do."
Celestia basked in the reassurance she was given.
"I hope so."
[|||]
...ooooooh...
My whole body felt numb, and I was not wanting to get used to such a feeling.
...UUUUUUUUUUUAAAAAAAAAH...
Although my mental pain sounds could use some work.
I opened my eyes, my vision blurring. Rubbing my aching forehead, I took note that I was in Twilight's library again. While that was a relief, I nearly jumped through the ceiling when I saw the two alicorns towering over me.
"Gah! Don't DO that!"
I clutched where my heart would be out of reflex.
"Nearly gave me a heart attack!"
Celestia giggled, trying to bring some humor into the situation, but it died instantly when her smile returned to the sober frown.
"You, my sister, and I need to discuss what happened in the hive."
She cleared her throat while the two sisters shared a look. Luna spoke next, not wanting to drag the conversation.
"We have been reviewing the incident with mine Sister, and have come to the conclusion that thou requires atonement for thy acts."
I recoiled at that statement, but I was in higher hopes after my chat with MISSINGNO., so I took it with gumption.
"Alright, so what are you going to do?"
I twiddled my flippers nervously, and Celestia conjured a scroll in her golden aura, levitating it over to me.
"This form is an incident report. Fill it out truthfully, and I will review what you have written."
I grasped the paper in my arms, as Celestia floated a quill and inkwell next to my side. I picked up the quill and dipped it, trying not to spill any on the bed. It wouldn't be as clean as a pen, but oh well.
"Okay then."
I hovered to my side, avoiding the inkwell, to the end table on my left. I also picked up the inkwell and set it on the end table just to be safe, while placing the paper down. Dipping the quill again, because a bit had leaked, I began t--wait a minute.
I followed an ink trail all the way back to where I had first dipped the quill, as there was now a black splotchy mess on the bed and floor.
"Oh. Welp, I'm an idiot."
I cocked my head to the side, staring at the sisters questioningly.
"So, why didn't you two stop me?"
They were too busy giggling like schoolgirls to answer, so I just rolled my eyes and returned to the form.
I swear... confound these ponies, they drive me to ink...
[|||]
I had finally reached the bottom of the form, so I reread my answers just to make sure.
DESCRIPTION: Okay, so what happened was, I had a Virus and the Virus went into my beak. Then the Virus was sneezed through the Signal Beam move and then kaboom.
What? That was literally what happened. Not satisfactory enough?
Oh fine, I'll rewrite it. Let's see now...
Revise how she shattered, and I think I'm done.
Dotting the last period, and signing the bottom of the page, I handed it over to Celestia, who began to thoroughly comb through the report. As she read it, her face flashed with multiple expressions. First confusion, then anger, then finally amusement. Once that was done she set the page on fire, sending it to her office.
"Well, I believe that settles that. Now, I would like to know you, Mister...?"
I continued to stare off into space, my mind completely blank. I was usually like this when I either had nothing to think about, or had finished all my work. Sometimes both. I shook my head and wobbled it dizzily for a second.
"Woah, sorry. Got lost in... something."
Luna scrunched her face up.
"Tis' a strange name thee has."
I slapped a flipper over my beak, and waved my arms about.
"No, my name is Lenkar Glitch. I could have sworn that you would have learned it from Twilight by now."
I flipped my tail in irritation.
Maybe I should have Rarity add a name tag on my lab coat.
Luna coughed, and pointed her hoof at me.
"Quite. We had entered here just earlier and had not the time to converse with the Elements."
Celestia nodded, while I rose from the bed.
"Seems legit. Anything else?"
Celestia stood up, and began to walk around me, looking at me from every angle.
Why must everyone I meet do this?
"I have not seen a Pokemon in such a long time! I wonder how Zygarde is doing..."
She trailed off, lost in a memory, while I mentally slapped myself for not realizing the connection. It was stupidly obvious that Zygarde would have met Celestia if she had a statue of him!
While I wanted to let her know I knew Zygarde as well, a small voice within me urged me to keep quiet. Heeding it's words, I kept my beak shut. Celestia summoned a tea set, while Luna headed for the door. I sat down in front of it, and watched her exit.
"I wonder where she's going?"
Celestia took a test sip of her tea.
"Probably to chat with Twilight and her friends."
I picked up a cup, and began to think of ways to drink it. I tilted my head back, and poured the tea directly onto my beak. Much to my surprise, it went right in with no fuss at all. I finished the cup instantly, setting it back on the plate. Celestia had an eyebrow raised due to my peculiar drinking adjustment. I chuckled and tapped the ends of my arms together.
"Uh, sorry. Only way I can drink."
Celestia gave me a clever smirk, and winked. While I was left in the dark as to the meaning of the small gesture, Celestia poured me some more tea.
I feel like I need to ramble about something, else I go insane, so here: I can't drink out of the cup because solid, inedible matter not recognized as food will not pass through my beak. The cup was in the way, so I had to pour it as said earlier. It's a hassle, but at least I can in fact drink.
...oh.
Well, that wasn't a very long babble at all. I was expecting it to go on longer. Oh well.
Me and Celestia made up for my surprisingly short exposition by talking for what seemed like hours.
[|||]
Luna had an issue.
She was trying to decide exactly what punishment would be fitting for Lenkar. She certainly could not use the traditional methods, as they were far too barbaric for the modern day etiquette. She lamented about being unable to induce physical trauma while grumbling about Celestia making her country soft.
She and Twilight were also discussing on the matter of the changelings. With their Queen dead, and the only 'viable' heir horribly mutated, they had little options to go with besides throw them in a dungeon and get it over with.
Indeed, after the Porygon-Z had killed the Queen, Myriad had tried to use a royal conversion pod to elevate herself manually in revenge. Her plan failed, leaving her as half drone and half Queen. Her legs were uneven in height, her horn was twisted in ways that were awful even for changeling standards, her wings were elongated shreds of tissue, and she had been left blind in one eye because her royal eyes had only been converted partially. She was severely disfigured and on life support, while the doctors had done all they could to heal her.
Luna regretted having to put such a withered creature in a jail cell, so she only ordered for the remaining changelings to be imprisoned.
Although, she did have them kick the bartender a few times for stealing her Moonshine.
No one steals her Moonshine!
Now it was all up to Celestia, so she had left to check on the girls, in which she let her nose guide her to a batch of cookies on the table. Luna playfully ensnared one in her blue aura, the rainbow sprinkled dessert floating swiftly yet carefully to her, only to be snatched out of the air by Pinkie Pie. Luna scowled at the pink mare for eating her treat.
"Mmmm! Flying cookies taste great! Maybe I should make more like that!"
The ponies just regarded Pinkie in the usual fashion, and continued their activities. Rarity was inspecting the lab coat she had made for Lenkar to make sure it was absolutely perfect. With no seam or stitch out of place, it was a true masterpiece. She had been saddened at the fact she couldn't use more gems, but created genius anyway despite the limitations.
The lab coat was a sterile white, even whiter than Rarity or Princess Celestia, with an alternating red, blue, yellow, and black trim around the edges to show off the Porygon-Z's natural colors. The inside was a creamy tan color, and was luxuriously soft to the touch. The back had a Pokeball pattern, the capture device now immortalized in gems, the red on one half with the white of the coat on the other. The center had black gems with a white space left for the circular button, and the black gems also outlined the whole Pokeball so it stood out.
Rarity barely had a clue as to what it was from what she read in the notes, besides that it was called a Pokeball. She swiped off a bit of dust that had gotten on it from carrying it to the library, and neatly folded it onto the table in the center of the room.
The door upstairs opened, and a somewhat crazed-looking Lenkar zoomed down from above, twitching in a floppy manner.
"BOOKS."
Everypony just stared as Lenkar opened the door to the library, and exited while laughing like a madman.
Lenkar hovered right in front of a ponies face, then another, all while yelling.
"BOOKS! BOOKS! BOOKS! BOOKS! BOOKS BOOKS! BOOKS!"
He stopped in front of a mint-green unicorn, and flipped himself upside-down.
"BOOKS?"
The unicorn blinked, then smiled, waving at the crazy Pokemon.
"Uh, hi there!"
Lenkar froze, then spasmed wildly.
"BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOKS!!!"
He activated Agility, his body surging to life. With a boom, he took to the skies, blowing up a few clouds along the way.
A mare next to the unicorn whacked the mint-green pony across the back of her head for her troubles.
As he flew off at supersonic speeds, Rainbow Dash chased after him, finally getting that race she had been waiting for. Everypony just stayed where they were, while Celestia had one eye twitching, her jaw hanging open. Luna walked up to her, and closed the Solar Princess' mouth with a hoof.
"Sister, We think thee has broken Lenkar."
Celestia didn't respond, so Luna tapped her sister's forehead.
"Tia?"
The white alicorn remained motionless. Luna clutched her forehead, feeling another headache coming on.
Perhaps I should recount what happened before I start on my ever increasing string of expletives again.
During my meeting with Celestia...
[|||]
Luna had left the room, which was when Celestia began her casual interrogation. She calmly took a sip of tea, pondering what she would ask first. Considering the Porygon-Z had used his abilities to kill the Queen, she decided to use that.
"So Lenkar, what moves does your Species usually learn?"
Considering I had finished my tea twice already, I just left it as-is. I wracked my brain for all my possible moves.
"A full list, or...?"
Celestia nodded, and levitated a scroll next to her to begin writing.
"Well alright, uh..."
I reviewed the list of Pokemon moves Porygon-Z could learn, and began to recite them off one by one.
"Let's see, there's Trick Room, Conversion 2, Tackle, Conversion, Nasty Plot, Psybeam, Agility, Recover, Magnet Rise, Signal Beam, Embargo, Discharge, Lock-On, Tri Attack, Magic Coat, Zap Cannon, and Hyper Beam."
As soon as Celestia finished scribbling, she sent the letter to her office, and stood up. She stood back a ways and cast a shielding spell across the room, the walls glowing with gold energy.
"May I see one of those moves? My spell should protect everything in here, just be sure to aim safely."
I Magnet Rose--ba-dum, tssh--into the air, and nodded. Celestia was trying to see exactly what I was capable of, so I wasn't going to deny her the chance to. Of course I wasn't actually thinking that, I was just doing it.
I summoned Signal Beam, the rainbow cascade of information flowing into my beak, pooling at the front of it. I felt it almost read to be let loose, so I pointed my beak at the window. When I fired, the beam went out normally, the multicolored squares streaming in a line at the window. The shield reflected the beam back though, causing it to bounce every which way.
I ducked for cover as the beam continued to sail over our heads, up until it hit Celestia dead-on. Fortunately Celestia had a similar shield over herself in case of this situation. What wasn't so fortunate, was it bounced off of her and into me. I got about a sentence out before I was sent flying into a wall, with the added effect of Signal Beam scrambling my mind.
"Oh yeah, I forgot about tha-"
[|||]
Okay, I'm admitting it.
Princess Celestia is so beautiful, she has Serene Grace.
No, not serene grace, Serene Grace.
If you're feeling confused, I don't blame you. After Sepia had used her magic to simulate Volt Absorb, I'm a little indignant to say I'm surprised Celestia had Serene Grace as well.
Remember how I said Pokemon abilities are ALWAYS on? Well, I should have known her hair was wavy like that for some reason. When the Signal Beam hit her, it barely damaged her, but possibly left some trauma due to Bug types being super effective against Psychic types. Not to mention magic is similar enough to Psychic Type moves already.
Anyway, Serene Grace is an ability that boosts the likelihood of additional effects, like confusion with my Signal Beam. For example, Psychic will have a twenty percent chance of lowering the target's Special Defense stat instead of its usual ten percent chance, and Rock Smash will always lower an opponent's Defense, as opposed to having a fifty percent chance of doing so.
In this case, Signal Beam usually has a ten percent chance of causing confusion, but Celestia's Serene Grace made it twenty.
Meaning, someone flipped a really uneven coin and got lucky.
Technicalities aside, I went insane the instant I saw Twilight's bookshelf, because you know what I said about that.
There's only so many times someone can hear the word 'book'...
Move induced confusion aside, I was having the time of my life. I twirled and dodge around clouds, making corkscrews in the air. I nearly hit three pigeons and I think I accidentally broke someone's chimney. As I sailed through the air, I saw a rainbow blur form next to me. I moved to the left as a cloud passed between us, but didn't so much as flinch when a thundercloud zapped me.
Rainbow Dash practically screamed at me. The wind was whipping past us, making it hard to hear anything.
"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!"
I yelled back at her, spinning circles above her.
"RACING YOU! DUH!"
Rainbow Dash cringed a little at the intensity of my voice, her ears folding down in pain.
"WHAT WAS THAT THING ABOUT BOOKS YOU KEPT YAPPING ON ABOUT THEN?"
I floated in front of her while upside-down, and shrugged, crossing my arms.
"IT'S AN INSIDE JOKE."
Rainbow Dash tilted her head.
"WITH WHO?!"
I pointed to my torso.
"MYSELF!"
I chuckled, and bopped the cyan pegasus on the nose.
"RACE YOU TO THE MOUNTAIN AND BACK!"
She gave me a competitive glare and nodded.
"YOU'RE ON!"
She took off, flapping her wings as much as possible. I kept at my own speed, mock-yawning and checking a watch I didn't I have. I then got into a 'running' position, twirling my tail like a propeller, and took off. I used Agility over and over until my speed couldn't handle it any further. Everything blurred and stretched as I flew. I saw a very stretched out pony for half of a second as I passed Rainbow Dash, while going faster than was even possible for her.
I reached the sound barrier right as I neared the mountain Canterlot rested upon, and broke right through it. What I didn't realize, was that I had also broken the light barrier in the process, along with a few other barriers I had no idea could even break. The amount of speed I was using was ridiculous, and if weren't for how confused I was already, the G-Forces combined with vertigo would probably have crushed my brain.
Yet once the barriers were broken, I used Discharge, not knowing what that would even do. Sure enough...
Ding...
CRASH!
Reality broke.
[|||]
Rainbow Dash had slowed down enough to take a breather once Lenkar had left her in his dust. Panting heavily, she saw the Porygon-Z near Canterlot at speeds that would have ripped her to pieces. Dumbstruck, she followed his form until the red and blue blur stopped. The Porygon-Z had frozen in the air, going too fast for anything to even keep up. There was a bright blinding glow that shone from where he was for a moment, and then...
CRASH!
The sound could be heard for miles as the very fabric of space-time Rainbow Dash was looking at splintered like a destroyed window pane. The cracks in reality looked like Rainbow Dash's Sonic Rainboom, but were actual gaps in the dimension. She didn't really have the brain or time to wrap her head around it, so she sped forward towards the white and black flashing area.
I groaned, my head not wanting to put up with this crap any further.
"Yep. Just can't get enough of you."
I heard a chirp-like laughing.
"YOUCOULDHAVEATLEASTSENTMEAWARNINGFIRST."
I opened my eyes again, only for my poor dartboards to be assaulted, if not molested by the amount of strobe effect in my vision. My optical systems burned, screaming in agony at the alternating white and black sky. I averted my eyes to take a look at the starburst-shaped hole I had torn through time and space.
The Equeian sun beat down upon the pocket dimension, the rays of sunlight brightening the whole area, or would have if it weren't for the already glaring monochrome palette. I blinked a few times to remove the stinging, but it was clear I'd need time to adjust. MISSINGNO. had been hovering over me, yet it seemed to have a different feeling to it, though I wasn't sure what.
"I'm hoping you have insurance."
MISSINGNO. turned around to view the hole.
"IAMHOPINGCELESTIAHASINSURANCE."
I raised a proverbial eyebrow at that, but said nothing more about it.
Bouncing into the air, I nearly tripped over gravity itself as my Magnet Rise struggled to function.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, hey!"
I flipped head over tail, spinning in place while trying to balance myself. MISSINGNO. let out a sigh, and grabbed me with a few pixelated limbs. It righted me, then waved one of the appendages under my body.
I was taken off guard at the phrasing of his sentence, but it elaborated.
"ASISEVERYTHINGELSE."
It motioned a limb towards the location around us as I found the magnetic gravity well stabilized once more. Only then did I take note of exactly what was happening.
The ground I had been on was the same shaded black and white as the rest of the area, like a sketched drawing of a piece of ground. Although now it had spontaneously changed faster than I could even see, the 'tile' of grass now holding sand. The 'tile' next to it also shifted into one-fourths of a house, the piece of roof looking completely out of place.
I checked the rest of the area, and sure enough, it was one great big shuffling mess on a grid.
"MISSINGNO."
MISSINGNO. didn't move.
"YES?"
I rubbed my eyes to make sure what I was seeing wasn't just me being high on myself again.
"Where am I?"
MISSINGNO. floated over next to me, and wrapped a limb around my back.
"MYHOME,ANDMYPRISON."
I watched the landscape below me constantly move and change. Trees would appear and disappear, water would materialize under fences, and there was even a cave at the very back of the world the kept editing itself too.
I slapped a flipper to my head.
"My brain hurts."
MISSINGNO. chuckled.
"INDEED.WELCOMETOTHELANDOFGLITCHANDPOSITION."
[|||]
Rainbow Dash was at a loss.
She flew and zipped about the crack in reality, all while trying to see inside it without being blinded. The pegasus had already nearly crashed several times in her attempts at entering the hole, only to fail every time. She had finally been fed up enough to fly all the way back a few feet before bolting full speed at the hole.
She broke right through it, her wings abruptly giving up on keeping momentum or altitude, causing her to go careening into a tile of sand that was somehow seamlessly connected to a patch of grass. Spitting out the grains, she began her search for the silly Porygon-Z.
[|||]
BOOKS-
Wait, no. No. Stop it now.
Okay.
MISSINGNO. has a surprisingly thorough library.
While it was still possible for it to move about other dimension besides it's own, MISSINGNO. compiled research notes and historical documents from multiple planets and places. The amount of material here is extensive at best, and informative at least.
I'm currently sitting in the 'Guide Library', as the building is named, reading about a person from a planet called ROBLOXia.
Here, listen to this:
[|||]
X Report 1 Much of my time here has been dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge. That knowledge has guarded this planet well. Not a soul doubts that. I am blessed with people's smiles and respect. But though I am called a sage, there are things I do not understand. I believe darkness sleeps in every person, no matter how pure. Given the chance, the smallest drop can spread and swallow the script. I have witnessed it many times. Darkness...darkness of our being. How is it born? How does it come to affect us so? As the ruler of this region, I must find the answers. I must find them before this entire planet is lost to those taken by the darkness.
[|||]
Pretty interesting, eh? Alright, here's the next one:
[|||]
X Report 2 It is my duty to expose what this darkness really is. I shall conduct the following experiments: - Extract the darkness from a person's script - Cultivate darkness in a pure script - Both suppress and amplify the darkness within. The experiments caused the test subject's script to collapse, including those of the most stalwart. How fragile our scripts are! My treatment produced no signs of revival. I confined those who had completely lost their scripts beneath the castle. Some time later, I went below and was greeted by the strangest sight. Creatures that seemed born of darkness...What are they? Are they truly sentient beings? Could they be the shadows of those who lost their scripts in my experiments?
[|||]
Huh. Says here on the author notes he was named 100Miles. Weird name. Anyways, he seems quite enthralled in... whatever this is.
Uh, how about I keep reading?
[|||]
X Report 3 The shadows that crawl beneath the castle... Are they people who lost their scripts, or incarnations of darkness? Or something entirely beyond my imagination? All my knowledge has provided no answer. One thing I am sure of is that they are entirely devoid of emotion. Perhaps further study will unlock the mysteries of the script. Fortunately, there is no shortage of test samples. They are multiplying underground even as I write this report. These guests of my castle still need a name... I will call them the Scriptless.
[|||]
I can see a bad situation from a mile away. He's not exercising caution in these experiments at all, he's just letting them multiply like rabbits in spring!
Amateur.
[|||]
X Report 4 The Scriptless appear in groups, and are multiplying rapidly. I've provided them both living and nonliving samples. They've responded only to the living. They seem to multiply after absorbing something from the living creatures. Their prey vanishes without a trace. I believe the Scriptless are taking scripts. They are born from those who've lost their scripts, and thrive on scripts seized from others. The scripts taken by the Scriptless become Scriptless themselves. Though I lack proof, I am confident in this hypothesis. I must also study their behavorial principles. Though they lack emotions, they do seem to have some intelligence. How to communicate with them? It's just occured to me: Could they be the darkness in people's scripts?
[|||]
Okay, so what does he mean by 'scripts'?
Souls?
Hmn...
[|||]
X Report 5 To study the Scriptless behavior, I picked one out for observation. It wiggled and, as if sensing a target, headed deep into the castle. In the deepest part of the castle, it began vibrating, as if searching for something. Suddenly a strange door appeared. I'd never known of its existence. It had a lock on it, but didn't seem to be locked. So I opened it. What I saw on the other side mystified me. What was that powerful mass of light energy? That night I observed a great meteor shower in the sky. Could it be related to the door that I have opened?
[|||]
He probably shouldn't have opened that door.
Oh well, that's in the past.
I wonder how MISSINGNO. acquired this anyway...
Actually, you know what?
"Hey, MISSINGNO.! C'mere a sec..."
[|||]
X Report 6 A massive core of light energy beyond the door sought by the Scriptless. It may be the ultimate goal of the Scriptless. But what is that light energy? I have devised a hypothesis, based upon my observations of the Scriptless. The Scriptless feed on other's scripts, and they yearn for that light energy core. That thing beyond the door must have a script, too--the script of this universe. There is, again, no proof, but, having felt that immense light energy, I am certain. That was the script of the universe. The Scriptless are trying to take scripts not only from all living things, but from the universe itself. But what do they mean to do with the script of the universe?
[|||]
Welp.
MISSINGNO. may very well have had a heart attack once I showed it this. It said that was an old friend of it's that very nearly reached the same dimension I rest in. If it's anything to go on, 100Miles was indeed a curious character.
Sigh.
Curiosity killed the Espurr.
[|||]
X Report 7 I am studying material from the meteors that rained down that fateful night. What a find! The material is foreign to our world. It is elastic to the touch, and when two pieces are combined, they bond easily. None of the records even mention such a substance. Was it introduced to this world when I opened the door? I wonder how many other such materials drift through the atmosphere of this tiny world... I wish I could soar off and find out! Could there be uncharted worlds up there? My curiosity never ceases to grow. But I should stop speaking of such unrealistic dreams. For now, there is no way to venture outside this world. My people and I are all but prisoners of this tiny place.
[|||]
Yep.
This is exactly what I needed to get my mind off of all this crap that's been happening to me. I have had no shortage of mess-ups lately. Anyway, what's he doing next...
Oh, hello Rainbow Dash. Wanna read a BOOK?
[|||]
X Report 8 There is no doubt that the Scriptless are deeply connected to the people's scripts. Further study may unravel both their motivations and the mysteries shrouding the script. As a start, I have built a device that artificially creates Scriptless. By recreating the conditions that spawn the Scriptless naturally, I should be able to produce them artificially. This device is the culmination of all my research thus far. The machine's test run successfully created a Scriptless. This may be a step toward creating a script from nothing. The artificially and naturally created Scriptless showed nearly identical traits, but the two types remain distinct for the purpose of the experiment. So, I will mark the ones that are created artificially.
[|||]
Rainbow Dash says Miles here must be pretty stupid to make the Scriptless willingly. Still, if it's for science, who am I to say?
No, Dash, you may not cower in fear. That's just a friend, who is also an eldritch being that owns the place. It's name is MISSINGNO.
Of course we can have snow cones, there's enough static here anyway, isn't there?
[|||]
X Report 9 Simply astonishing! Today I had a guest from another world. He is a king, and his vessel is built of the material that composed the meteors. He called the pieces "astra blox" It seemed that my opening the door has opened a path to interworld travel. We talked for hours, but one story in particular caught my interest: that of something called the "Void Star". The Void Star is said to hold phenomenal power. One legend says the wielder saved the world, while another says that he wrought chaos and ruin upon it. I must know what this Void Star is.
[|||]
Oh now she's interested. Figures.
Seems this Daring Do deals with similarly dastardly demons and peculiar pieces of power.
Oh hey, alliteration!
Er, ahem, where was I...? Oh yes, snow cones.
Wait, there's a note... King Keinding.
Welp.
[|||]
X Report 10 Just as people have scripts, so do planets, and the universe. The same can be said of stars. And deep within each planet lies a door to its script. The Scriptless desire those scripts. Born out of darkness in people's scripts, they seek to return to a greater script. Yes, that's it. The Scriptless come from people's scripts, as does the darkness. Is the core of the planet's script the world of the Scriptless? I will pursue the answer there and become all knowing. My path is set. I shall seek out the wielder of the Void Star, and the script wielders. I must do this. I will plunge into the depths of darkness.
[|||]
This snow cone is tasteless, also I think both Dash and I are experiencing reverse indigestion. How that works, I doubt I'll ever know.
Anyway, I think the moral here is don't eat weird foods and don't jump into the unknown just being you need answers. You'll find nothing good there, I'll tell you that right now.
[|||]
X Report 11 Opening the door to the world's script causes its walls to crumble. These fragments are seen as shooting stars. This explains why these "astra blox" can travel freely to other worlds. I know the catalyst of the collapse, the appearance of the Scriptless. However, it will take time to search out the worlds' doors, and to retrieve each script. Furthermore, the doors can be locked using a Void Star making the script forever unattainable. I must take action before the wielder of this item appears in this world. If the script wielders and the Void Star are connected, they should resonate. I have chosen a girl. I don't know if she holds the script wielders' powers, but I will find out. She may lead me to the item bearer. I shall set her free and observe.
[|||]
There's a footnote at the bottom of the page that says the subject's name was Minish. Huh.
Oh, and MISSINGNO. is apologizing profusely for accidentally poisoning us. I already fired my sickness out using Signal Beam and Dash was given my recover treatment, so I think we're okay.
...
I think...
[|||]
X Report 12 The body is gone; the script should have returned to the Scriptless,and yet, nothing. This one is unlike any other. Its memories remain, and it has yet to take the form of a Scriptless. A close eye must be kept on the situation. Much is still unknown. To get to the Realm of Darkness, one must go through the doors of "kingdom hearts" Beyond this world is a place in which Darkness reigns. (Details shall be archived in a seperate report) There are many worlds in existence, some of which we know nothing about. The world in which we live. The Realm of Darkness. The Realm of Light. And the world in between. Wherein lies true nirvana?
[|||]
Very good question.
Dash, stop hitting my antenna. I don't know if there's any errant signals or songs in this dimension, but I don't wanna find out.
Wait, what are you-
[|||]
X Report 13 Where does the body go when it seperates from the script? If the soul remains within the body, is it still considered to be deceased? When the script returns to the Scriptless, the physical form disappears. But that is merely true in this world. Perhaps the body exists in another form in another world. If that is the case, then it is possible for one to exist in two worlds. A being that is neither darkness nor light; belonging nowhere; abandoned by its script; a mere shell of its former self. The relation between the script and the body is complex. However, I am certain that if your self exists here, then by definition the other cannot truly "exist" The other, the one which does not exist, shall be dubbed, "Anti Robloxian"
[|||]
That's it.
I grabbed Rainbow Dash by a hoof and slung her into a bookshelf. Considering the shelves rearrange themselves to repair damage, I didn't have to worry about it. Dash was a bit miffed at my sudden outburst, but oh well. I flew up to MISSINGNO.
"Hey um, may I keep this book?"
It put down the diagram on multidimensional suits it had been reading, and looked at what I was holding.
I hugged the Log Book, and examined the front cover.
'X-13 FILES BY 100MILES'
Wait a minute...
Oh, I see. Clever.
"Well, I'm not sure how much I could do with it, considering the bizarre properties of his world. Still, I will hold on to this."
MISSINGNO. nodded in agreement, and Rainbow Dash yawned, stretching all her limbs.
"I dunno about you two, but I'm beat. How's about we find a way to plug that hole in the sky and take a nap?"
I spun around in the air, and levitated towards the exit. What I forgot about was the tiles.
As soon as I went through the door, I crashed directly into a tree, then fell into the water below it. The tree was devoid of any roots, just a trunk and leaves floating right over the small pond.
"CRAP!"
I hopped out of the tile just in time for it to transfigure into sand and a small boulder. Rainbow Dash and MISSINGNO. both hurried to see if I was alright.
"Hey, you okay there?"
I shook myself like a dog to dry off, and inspected the Log Book for damage. Despite my expectations of it being ruined, not a single drop of liquid was on me or the book. I rubbed my head in confusion. MISSINGNO. caught on to my unspoken question, and answered.
"REMEMBER?HERE,PHYSICSDOESNOTWORKTHATWAY."
I nodded, then swiftly dodge to the side as a section of barn rose up out of nowhere. Rainbow Dash flew up above the mess and whistled.
"Nice one! So, now what?"
MISSINGNO. slid next to Dash.
"WEBEGINTOSEARCHFORWAYSTOSEALTHEOPENING."
I jumped a bit, my body showing off a Y-shape.
"Sounds like a plan! By the way, I'm really happy, wanna know why?"
I positioned myself next to Dash in an energetic manner. She shrugged.
"Because, I learned that I CAN EAT THINGS! YAAAY!"
My excited yell flung Dash back a few paces, and MISSINGNO. flipped. It made a beeping huff, and shook itself.
The sound of a page flip echoed throughout the silent library.
"Tote that barge, lift that bale..."
I sang Ol' Man River as I worked, the song brightening up the atmosphere of the dimension considerably. As I read the tenth log book out of thirteen in the set of them, I felt more at home than ever. Days just spent researching and casually fixing a device more advanced than anything ever seen rushed to the forefront of my thoughts.
As the nostalgia waved within me, I searched the notes for any more clues that could assist.
100Miles had been very thorough, yet vague in his work. He had compiled a whole of thirteen reports spread across thirteen books. Why he was so fixated on thirteen, I have no idea. What I did find in them was even more interesting.
It seems this 'Void Star' he mentioned several times has the ability to seal holes, portals, or gates between worlds. The 'obsidian spiked crown', as it was described, is a highly powerful artifact capable of negating those kinds of phenomena. There's even a possibility it could shut off all powers around it permanently, along with itself, except that was just a bit of speculation he had added.
There are, interestingly enough, thirteen Void Stars in existence. These Void Stars are all scattered across, you guessed it, thirteen different dimensions. Considering Equestria's magical properties, I wouldn't doubt a Void Star being there, but I digress. I believe we could mend the hole I had made using the Void Star, but there's a catch.
I mean, why wouldn't there be?
The catch is that this Void Star is corruptive, mainly because of a hive mind connected by the thirteen Void Stars. Each individual Void Star has a different facet of their personality, but they all corrupt. Some of them can be reasoned with, while other Void Stars simply drown you in it's influence. No, really, I saw a report where a guy actually drowned in dark energy.
Eugh.
Anyway, if we can find a Void Star, then we may be able to fix this mess. Or I could ask Discord and have it done faster than you can say 'hollabackat'ch-'
Wait a minute.
"DISCOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO-"
"You called?"
I nearly fell out of my chair in surprise, the drangonequus leaning against the table in a white suit with a bit of red splatter on it. I blinked a few times while slowly righting myself. I gave him a gleeful 'grin', then turned my attention back to the books in front of me. I hummed quietly while Discord ate an apple made of tin.
"He must know somethin', but don't say nothin'..."
Discord picked up the first book in the series of them, and flipped to a page. His eyes bugged out of his head, up until he swatted them with a newspaper so they could return to normal. I shook my head at his antics, and resume my reading, while Discord wrapped himself around my chair.
I struggled a bit, but sent a deadpan look his way while he smiled mischievously. Freeing my arms, I picked up the eleventh book and began reading.
Or I would have, if Discord hadn't plucked it from my grasp.
"Hey! I was reading that!"
He compared the two books he now had, appearing to come to a realization. He put his face next to me and leaned in darkly.
"Why are you looking for Void Star?"
Discord's voice came out low and threatening, but considering I'd had one too many run-ins with powerful beings, I wasn't too concerned right then.
I rubbed the back of my head, suddenly finding the floor very interesting.
"Well..."
[|||]
Me, Rainbow Dash, and MISSINGNO., had all gathered in front of the rift I had accidentally created. We all inspected every corner of the shattered area of reality, trying to think up a way to mend it. Meanwhile, I could not sit still, as I was zooming around MISSINGNO. like a fly on an annoyance mission.
"AREYOUTAKINGTHISSERIOUSLY?"
I paused halfway through my third lap around the pixel block. Putting a blue flipper to my beak in mock thought, I shrugged and continued flying.
"Probably not. I have no ideas on how to fix this, but..."
I held up 100Mile's log book so MISSINGNO. could see.
"If there are more of these books, then perhaps I could find something in them to aid us?"
MISSINGNO. shifted, it's pixels shuffling in disgruntled amusement.
I nodded eagerly, making a beeline for the library, while Rainbow Dash popped her head through the rift.
[|||]
Discord had been listening intently, and as I finished my recount, he snapped his claws. His white suit flashed, transforming into a brown overcoat.
"Listen carefully."
I folded my arms, paying attention now that I was torn from my work.
"A Void Star will only do harm for you. You may seal the portal, but what then?"
He snaked over to me, and rested a paw on me.
"Become consumed by darkness? Allow it's influence to roam free? Those are the only two choices it'll ever allow you, if it even gives them in the first place."
I sighed, observing the intense spectacle of bookshelves reorganizing themselves. Slapping away Discord's paw, I pointed at the books he was holding.
"I'm not going to use a Void Star, I was just wondering."
Discord brushed his arm off, then donned a pair of reading glasses, as in two glass cups within each other.
"Yes, but you really shouldn't-"
I cut him off with a smug look that hopefully said, 'I just got you'.
"Actually, I was planning on asking you to do it."
He froze, a few icicles hanging off of him, and pondered this for a moment. Once he thawed, the chaos being jumped into the air while squeeing for joy.
Yes, I know squeeing is not an actual word, but I've had to update my internal dictionary as of late. Sweet mother of lag...
"Oh this is simply marvelous!"
Discord all but jabbed a talon into my beak.
"I accept, but you, me, and Canterlot are having a prank war next week! I'll hold you to it!"
I stared off into space to process the information.
A prank war? Oh well, I've had worse in school. Can't be that bad.
...
What is this cold feeling of dread that grips me?
[|||]
Of course Discord was rubbing in his smug attitude all the way to the hole in the sky. I barely tolerated the bragging, my left eye twitching ever so often. I felt my dartboard pattern upgrade to optical illusion, my pupil collapsing in on itself multiple times over. Once we found Dash and MISSINGNO., I couldn't help but let out an extremely loud groan of relief.
I should have held my breath, because Discord and MISSINGNO. immediately were acquainted.
"OH,YOUAGAIN."
I knew it wouldn't be easy.
"Oh, hello Missy! How're you doing lately?"
Rainbow Dash was desperately trying to prevent from doubling over in laughter, and I was doing the same.
Discord stroked his goatee, looking over the starburst-shaped rift. He suddenly perked up, and snapped his talons again.
[|||]
Canterlot was in a frenzy.
The nobles were in uproar over the fact reality had been ripped apart just above their heads, and were demanding they speak with the Princesses. The hallway up to the throne room was negatively bursting with ponies, all wanting to give Celestia a piece of their minds. One alabaster unicorn stallion with a blue mane that had a perfectly groomed sheen to it, straightened his pale purple bow tie, and adjusted his monocle.
Fancy Pants had been strolling to a business meeting about the Hoover Dam near Trottingham, when the sky had been split open in a shock-wave that nearly knocked him off his hooves. He was one of the more reasonable nobles in Canterlot, but even he was anxious at the sudden appearance of yet another bizarre event.
To be honest, it was just another Friday.
Prince Blueblood, on the other hoof, was not so reserved in his feelings. He had practically barged through the crowd to the front using his title as leverage, but as soon as he reached the throne room doors, he had been rejected due to the Princesses not even being there in the first place.
While the Prince cursed the horrible luck of Celestia not being present while this was happening, he headed towards his quarters to simmer down.
As Bluebood approached the door to his room, he noticed a brown, battered box resting just next to it. Lifting it in his in cyan magic, the box seemed to rustle and pulsate for a moment, but went inert soon after as if nothing happened. The Prince nearly dropped the package, looking around the hall to see if he might spot who had left it.
He toted the box into his office, grumbling to himself.
Today was going to be a long day.
[|||]
The rift had been sealed, except what the problem was, is that it was now filled with styrofoam pellets.
I faceflippered, while Rainbow Dash simply looked on in confusion. MISSINGNO. huffed, and Discord used a napkin to wipe away a tear.
"It's beautiful."
MISSINGNO. nearly dropped out of the air.
"ONLYYOU,DISCORD.ONLYYOU..."
The dragonequus chuckled, and I abruptly received a feeling.
A feeling like something very bad was happening.
Which could only mean one thing...
"Gentlemen, we need to return to the library."
Dash gave me an incredulous look.
"What for? You just got here!"
With her waving her hooves around gesturing, I adopted the Y posture again, and ran a movement cycle. Wiggle tail, rise into the air while spinning slowly, return to original position at the end of the rotation.
"Because..."
Because I'm dubbing this little movement the Y-Twirl for no real reason.
As any self-respecting pony will tell you, Princess Celestia is a kind, caring ruler who would do anything to keep peace and harmony in Equestria.
Right now, though, she was borderline livid.
She was ready to give Lenkar a pass due to his experiences and considering the fact he had used self-defense against the Queen, but right now the chances of such happening had dropped considerably.
Astronomers and astrologists everywhere would be in eternal confusion for centuries to come as to why twelve solar flares had occurred within an hour, and probably would have a few books written on such a mystery.
Celestia had regained her mental faculties enough to relax herself with some tea, when an earth-shattering explosion took place, not unlike a Sonic Rainboom.
CRASH!
Everypony still present in Twilight's library immediately filed out into the open streets, with all the attention directed towards a large fissure just above Canterlot. It looked as if Discord had taken a piece of reality, turned it to glass, and thrown a rock through it. The alternating black and white within the rift was hard to look at, but the rainbow flashing coloration of the splintering cracks around it was even more of an eyesore.
The two Princesses jumped into the air, and headed straight for the hole at top speed. Twilight was about to head after them, but her friends advised against it. Fluttershy decided to return to her cottage, and see if it was Discord who had caused it.
They all knew exactly who was responsible, but they were still hoping it wasn't him.
[|||]
"We know thee art angry, Sister, but perhaps thou may be lenient with the poor creature? He hath been through so much."
Celestia sighed, flying neck-and-neck next to the Lunar Princess. She knew she was overreacting, but for good reason.
"Lenkar will never learn anything if it isn't ingrained into him."
She slowed to a stop, and gazed at the newly formed rift.
"I saw it, in his eyes. He may have felt sorry for what he did, but he didn't truly care about what was happening."
She huffed, shaking her head in pity. Luna could only look on in question. They both continued their flight, but Celestia seemed to have less energy behind her than before.
"I fear if he continues the way he is now, then there may be nothing stopping him from destroying everything around him."
Luna furrowed her brow, remaining silent. Celestia looked at her sister with a familiar recognition.
"Yet he will hardly even have to do a single thing. He will simply walk out of all these troubles without a scratch or care."
The both of them had finally reached the hole, stopping just a few feet before it. Luna cleared her throat, with a solemn tone in her voice.
"We are truly impressed thee could read Lenkar so readily, Sister. Yet I believe Lenkar has the best of intentions here. Thee were not present when We had found Lenkar in the throne room, weeping like a small foal."
They both simply hovered there, watching the otherworldly pattern the rift made flash, as it was almost beautiful to see.
"He has a sense of innocence to him, one that We cannot discern how ingrained it may be."
Celestia flew over to her sister, nuzzling her.
"I know, he tries his hardest to hide it..."
They both watched a cloud drift into the hole, right before it solidified into a blocky mess, and dropped like a stone.
"But the path to Tartarus is paved with good intentions."
Suddenly, in a flash of light, the entire hole was filled with styrofoam pellets. The two sisters simply floated there, unblinking, for several minutes. Celestia then yelled to the air.
"DISCOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO-"
[|||]
HOOOOONK!
Oh, sorry. I've been sneezing up a storm over here, although I had to convince Discord not to make it literal. I've been blowing my beak on these tissues, and all I've gotten is a weird light blue liquid with binary inside it.
Sweet Arceus, my life is bizarre.
I'm probably forgetting something important right now, but I'll figure it out later.
Discord sneezed, a bronze elephant statue erupting from him, sending it flying across the room. MISSINGNO. dodged it, then stared at the wall for a bit before turning to Discord. Discord shrugged and gave him an innocent smile.
"Oops?"
MISSINGNO. shook itself, and returned to it's book.
Discord pulled out a telescope, and pointed it in the direction of the now-styrofoam-filled hole. He cringed, and crushed the telescope, then whipped it out as it became an umbrella.
"Sorry about that Missy, but I really must be going."
He snapped his fingers, and summoned a black pork-pie hat on, a scarf, and a red handbag. He waved to us, while grinning.
"Ta-ta!"
He vanished in a bright flash. While I regained my visual senses, I went back to reading the books, and Rainbow Dash hadn't paid any of that to mind as she was too busy reading an Indiana Jones book. She had called it a ripoff a Daring Do at first, but soon became drawn into the storyline all the same.
Where she was busy with adventure, I was busy with information. The irony being, the books 100Miles had authored had more info on Equeia than Equestria's own libraries!
I could probably be sitting here forever just reading about all of the wonderful discoveries made, but I needed to leave the library at some point.
Right now, though, I'll settle for this.
I'll recap what I've learned about Equeia, just for clarity's sake. Well, I don't need to, but I will anyway. It's just too interesting!
Anyway.
Equeia is one of the two planets in it's solar system, the other being a similarly set up planet named Argon. Not a lot is written about Argon, but that's not important. What is important, is how they're set up.
Equeia has two moons, each of which are tidally locked in their orbit. This is solved by Celestia and Luna, obviously.
If you noticed what I've just implied, congrats! If not, I'll continue.
The normal moon, which is what Luna controls, is your average everyday moon. Except the other moon, the one Celestia controls, is the biggest conglomeration of crystals in the galaxy Equeia resides in. These crystals have the same properties the crystals on Equeia have, they conduct magic.
I'm talking to myself, but who cares, it helps me get everything organized.
Anyway, you're probably wondering how the crystal moon manages to act like a sun. Simple, it copies the actual sun it gets it's energy from.
Argon is five times smaller than Equeia, which is two times smaller than the sun they orbit. So, in all simplicity, Argon and Equeia both have two moons that are tidally locked and they both orbit a sun like a normal planet.
Confusing, right?
It gets worse.
The sun they orbit is powered by an ancient energy that saturates Equeia and Argon, and that ancient energy is the direct ancestor of magic. It's a power solely reserved for gods and deities, but due to the distance of the sun from it's planets, the energy is considerably weakened.
Said ancient energy is simply called Divine Power.
Artemena Erratica is the galaxy that houses Equeia, and it has a high concentration of Divine Power, more so than many other galaxies.
Moving on.
Divine Power is the most purest form of energy there is, and I mean THE purest. Of course it can be corrupted, thus leading to what is known as Dark Power. Usually these two Powers require objects or artifacts to inhabit, and allow their use, otherwise they simply remain inert.
Equeia's sun, on the other hand, is an entirely different story.
It's a giant ball of Divine Power that was put in a planet-sized bomb a very long time ago, and detonated. The resulting fireball ricocheted across Artemena Erratica, and thus gave birth to multiple different stars. One of the most apparent remnant of this detonation is the galaxy aptly named Flamefire Chaos, which consists of thirteen stars in a whirling vortex of destruction.
Hilariously there's a planet called Solaris that somehow manages to survive in such a grueling location of space.
I'm getting off topic.
The Void Star, along with 100Miles, both originated from a planet called ROBLOXia.
This planet is, how do I put it?
I can't even begin to think of a word to describe the solar system ROBLOXia resides in besides 'chaotic'.
The entirety of the solar system consists of several planets with varying, connected, and intriguing histories.
For instance, there's a planet named Harvestia, whose inhabitants are in constant nuclear warfare. The entire place is a desolate apocalyptic wasteland.
Fun and games there, eh?
Not to mention there's records of an entire planet being created from a sealed eldritch abomination, and a cabbage god fleeing it's own planet due to it's people being wiped out.
Seriously, this entire galaxy is a great big mess. No wonder all this crap happens here!
...I'm still rambling, but I don't care. I'll get to my point eventually.
My point is, if Celestia could use her ties to the crystal moon to gain energy from their true sun, she could seal the hole I made.
Because I'm damn sure styrofoam isn't going to hold it, even if it was Discord who made it.
...oh.
See, what'd I say? Eventuality is my invitation, and I am an excellent guest.
Er, ahem.
I'd like to continue blabbing about how ROBLOXia has an atmosphere that's bigger on the inside so it can hold shiny silver skyboxes with places in them all floating inside it that are owned by the inhabitants, or how there's a planet named Grand on the other side of Artemena Erratica across from ROBLOXia that is the most technologically advanced society in the galaxy, or how there's a planet called Puppyland with sentient dogs in a similar form to Equeia's ponies who have their own dog-shaped space station.
Although I digress.
I've sat here long enough talking, now I need to get moving.
I shut the thirteenth and final book 100Miles had written, and gathered them all up in a stack. I called out to MISSINGNO.
"Hey, do you have a backpack I can use?"
MISSINGNO. nodded, grabbing a green and blue backpack which he tossed at me. It whacked me in the face, and I rubbed my beak.
"Ow! What the heck?"
MISSINGNO. levitated up to me.
"THATWASFORBRINGINGDISCORDHERE."
I continued nursing my aching beak, and picked up the backpack.
"Alright, okay, it won't happen again. Terribly sorry."
MISSINGNO. huffed, and shook itself. I started piling the books into the backpack.
"WHATDOYOUPLANTODOWITHTHOSE?"
I finished filling the backpack, and zipped it up. Slinging it over my shoulder, I winked at MISSINGNO.
Prince Blueblood placed the strange package he had found next to his desk.
To be honest, the blond-maned stallion wasn't quite sure where it had come from, but he wasn't going to open it until he'd had it checked first. Being a pony in a position of authority meant he was a high priority target, and he wasn't about to take any chances.
While the Prince may not have been the most adept magic user in Canterlot, he was certainly up there due to his bloodline. His ancestors were all highly trained or experienced unicorns, most of them cartographers. His quarters was an organized clutter of maps, charts, and blueprints. Blueblood's most recent project was the Hoover Dam, in which he was supposed to meet Fancy Pants soon enough, in order to discuss the costs of such an endeavor.
Blueblood's office consisted of an oak desk, a few cork-made billboards with maps on them, and some bookshelves. He wasn't as library-fixated as most of the other magic users, yet if there was something that needed to be found somewhere, then anyone would begrudgingly say that Blueblood was the pony to see about it.
As the Prince sat down in his mahogany office chair, the velvet cushion offering some comfort in his stress, he picked up a quill to begin crunching numbers. As he continued, the box began to rattle, slowly vibrating it's way across the floor. The box shook ever-increasingly, which caught Blueblood's attention. He dropped the quill back in the inkwell, and rose from his chair.
"What in Equestria?!"
The box exploded.
Blueblood fell to the floor with a yelp, as confetti rained down. Music started playing, and a pegasus mare crawled out of a box that was far too small for her. The white stallion fumbled for a moment, then righted himself as the mare giggled.
"What in the name of Celestia?! Who are you, and how did you get in here?!"
The mare was now giggling in time to the music, and had started tapping her hooves in motion as well. She spoke up, with a bit of a lisp to her voice.
"o. hiloo, i am naked pigeon!"
Blueblood was taken aback for a moment, but looked over the bizarre pony to see exactly who it was that just barged into his room.
Naked Pigeon's coat was almost skin colored, indeed making her follow her namesake. Her mane was huge, and highly unkempt, the hot pinkish-purple pile tied up in a loose bun. Her tail was in the same boat, the large trail of hair tied so that it was split in two, not unlike a bird's tail-feathers. She was constantly smiling for absolutely no reason, so much so that it looked like it'd hurt, and her eyes were even freakier.
Her corneas were bleached white, and her pupils had no iris surrounding them. The pupils were also as small as pinpricks, adding to her insane image. Worst of all, was her cutie mark, which was a half shaven pigeon with scissors held around it's neck.
Blueblood balked at the pony's appearance, unable to form a proper sentence.
"What?"
Pigeon giggled again, and pulled a clipboard out of her mane.
"okay les't c here mk?"
The Prince was completely confused, and highly irritated at all the issues that were transpiring before him. He was about to unleash a tirade upon the pegasus, but she cut him off.
"o ya! here u r, bloobloo. i tink? i caunt tel. o wheel."
She shrugged, and threw the clipboard behind her, knocking a few books from the shelf. Blueblood sputtered, but regained the ability to speak soon after.
"No, my name is Blueblood! Now, what do you want from me?"
Pigeon's eyes crossed in thought, as she slowly tipped her head back. She fell over backwards and laughed like a drunkard, then got back to her hooves with a surprisingly agile flap.
"o ya. u see, i wuas kindo told tu kell u, an i b gettin payed n guud stuf hre."
She pulled out two bits for Blueblood to see, while the Prince just stared in both terror and indignation.
"liek omg. i got paid to bits. do u know how many gum balls i can buy with that?!"
She somehow grinned even wider, turning her head to one side so only one eye was visible. To say Blueblood was unnerved would be the understatement of the century. He gulped, a little worried this mare wasn't as incompetent as she acted.
"Uh... two?"
Pigeon flung her hooves into the air, and the bits landed in her mane. Her wings flapped excitedly.
"I NO RIHGT?! OGMZ!!!"
She hopped in place excitedly, while Blueblood began to slowly edge away towards the door. Pigeon stopped hopping, and tilted her head. In the blink of an eye, the pegasus had moved to the door, blocking the Prince's only exit.
"an were do u tink ure goin misster?"
Still grinning, her brow furrowed over her eyes in a leering glare. The white unicorn backed up against the wall in sheer horror.
"bcuz i aint gonna waste dese bitz. i meen, how elshe am i gona get mah gum balls, ya?"
Blueblood felt the blood drain from his face as the mare swiftly pulled an entire chainsaw out of her mane, and jump-started it. As the chainsaw buzzed to life, he quickly searched his memory for anything that could help him. She fluttered into the air with an out-of-place grace that really shouldn't belong to a chainsaw-wielding maniac.
"o, and i no ur judgin mi becuz inm not werin muhc. soo mez gotz sometin tu saiy tu yuo, miszter!"
She pulled the cord of the chainsaw again for emphasis, and landed in front of Blueblood. As she leaned in, the Prince carefully used a spell that he hoped would save him.
"nobby nobby noob."
Pigeon raised the chainsaw over her head, but never got the chance to swing it, as the spell Blueblood was using took effect.
The room was engulfed in light.
[|||]
Fancy Pants had given up entirely on trying to see the Princesses, so he instead was now trotting down the castle halls towards Prince Blueblood's office.
He passed by a few maids along the way, one of which had nearly dropped a tray she was holding when she recognized him. Fancy had warmly greeted her, and carried on.
Upon reaching the Prince's quarters, he adjusted his bow tie, and knocked on the door.
"Oh Prince Blueblood, it's me Fancy Pants! I'm here for my appointment!"
Fancy could have sworn he was hearing some strange carnival music behind the door, but didn't spare a thought to it. He took off his monocle and cleaned it with a hoofkerchief, becoming slightly impatient. He knocked on the door a bit more loudly, but stopped when he heard the sound of a chainsaw coming from the office.
"Blueblood are you alright in there? Should I bring one of the guards?"
He didn't get an answer, but blue light blasted it's way from underneath the door, nearly blinding Fancy. A high-pitched scream could be heard, then a thunk from within. Fancy stepped back from the door, ready to take desperate measures. He turned around, and bucked the door, the wooden barrier flying off it's hinges.
Fancy ran inside, and was met with an interesting display.
Confetti was littered about the room, along with all the maps, charts, and various other paperwork. The whole place was in disarray, but he saw movement in one corner, and trotted over to it.
Blueblood was curled up, weeping slightly. A skin-colored pegasus mare was knocked out at his hooves, and the Prince would every so often try to shuffle away from it. Fancy placed a reassuring hoof on Blueblood's shoulder and shook him slightly.
"Good goddess, stallion! What has happened in here?"
The white unicorn didn't move, still catatonic from the frightening experience. Seeing it was a lost cause, Fancy turned his attention to the mare. He took notice of her cutie mark, and was somewhat disturbed by the implications. When he saw the chainsaw she was asleep on top of, that only made it worse.
"Did this mare try to attack you?"
Blueblood was still whimpering, but nodded weakly. Fancy huffed, and stormed out of the room, headed for the nearest guard. He found one on patrol down the hall just outside the office, and flagged him down.
"You there! I need urgent assistance!"
The guard halted, his stoic mask not disappearing for a moment.
"What do you need, civilian?"
Fancy was slightly offended over the fact that he, one of Canterlot's nobility, had just been called a civilian. He remembered Blueblood's predicament in an instant, and banished the thought away. To the moon, preferably.
"Prince Blueblood has just been assaulted by a would-be assassin! I need your help immediately!"
The guard lost his stoicism, but only for a moment.
"The Prince?! Show me at once."
Fancy nodded, and guided the guard back to Blueblood's office. Once the two entered it, they found the mare struggling to rise, while Blueblood was on the opposite corner of the room, cowering in fear. The guard pointed at the pegasus.
"Stop, in the name of the Princesses! I order you to stand down!"
The skin-colored pegasus paid them no mind, as she resumed her murderous aim on Blueblood. Lifting her chainsaw, she opted to just make do with a blunt weapon.
"swiggity swoogity, im comin fer ur booty!"
She limped over towards the Prince, her expression frozen in a crazed state. The guard rushed at the mare, tackling her to the ground. He summoned some hoofcuffs, and cuffed her.
"You are under arrest for attempted assassination against a member of royalty and nobility."
He summoned some rope, and tied her wings together as well, then escorted her out of the room. The pegasus groaned.
"aawww darn. now i wont b getin me gum balls now."
The guard pushed her down the hall.
"Silence, prisoner."
[|||]
I exited the library, and adjusted the backpack. It had started to chafe my shoulder, so I put on both straps and buckled it to me. MISSINGNO. followed out behind me, and I gazed up at the styrofoam filled hole in reality.
"Hey MISSINGNO., you think something important is happening in Equestria right now?"
MISSINGNO. shifted it's pixels.
"PROBABLYNOT."
I let out a whirring sigh, and pulled out the first log book from the backpack. I ran a flipper over the brown leather cover, the black ink title glistening in the dimension's light.
"Yeah, I guess so."
Rainbow Dash flew up next to us, an Indiana Jones book in hoof.
"Hey! You two nearly left me in there!"
I laughed, and patted her on the back.
"Oh come on Dash, you know we'd never forget you."
I gave MISSINGNO. a certain look, and it returned the favor.
I shook my head, and zoomed forward, yelling to the two of them as I went.
When it said, "PROBABLY NOT", it was referring to my comment earlier about not taking this seriously.
Arceus dammit, MISSINGNO.
...
Oh well.
As I hovered in front of the styrofoam hole, I noticed a few of them had already began to fall out, or just disappear entirely. While I will say I flippin' called it, I'd also say that the barrier is actually doing pretty good.
I would describe more, but it's been a long day.
A very long day full of books and reading. Now I must do more reading. Someone knock me out already.
Yeah, I know I had energy earlier, but no one told me the tiles shifting meant it'd be nigh-impossible to fly anywhere in the place!
It took forever.
I ducked just in case something somewhere decided to grant my wish, and sure enough, Rainbow Dash whizzed past my head. She slammed into the wall of packing pellets, and the noise was muffled due to them being styrofoam.
I flipped through the pages in the book I had, the thirteenth one in the series, and started my research aloud.
"Let's see. Says here 100Miles had an issue with a portal. He needed to close it, but with no Void Star, it was a lost cause. Something something, I need caffeine, machine that will replicate the effects of a Void Star."
I paused, and turned the book upside-down, then right side up, just to make sure I was seeing the diagram on how to build it correctly.
"Okay, what even is this?"
ROBLOXia has some weird physics, and that is clearly shown by this machine. There's a couple of materials called Trusses, some average blocks found on the planet, and a disco ball or two.
I had a double take at that, but yes, disco balls are a component. The primary one, in fact, because it seems to act as a battery.
This is complete bullcrap.
My eyelids drooped slightly as I tried to memorize the picture. Rainbow Dash had already recovered from... from... hitting the... barrier... foamy...
You know what? The ground seems to be a pretty comfortable option right now.
I zipped open the backpack, and while fumbling with the book, put it back in. I closed it, then headed to the ground. Dropping it near a tree, I laid down to rest from all this crap that's been happening. Sure, I had been knocked out a few times, but it wasn't completely restful.
Rainbow Dash and MISSINGNO. both were flying down to me, with Dash showing a bit of worry, as I drifted off to sleep.
[|||]
"soo, cann i giet oiut now?"
The guards resisted the urge to walk into the cell, behead her, and get it over with.
Naked Pigeon had been asking the exact same question for the past hour or so, and it was becoming grating on their nerves.
The strange pegasus had tried to use her spacious mane full of items to escape several times, but the guards caught her in the act while she was doing so, mainly because of her singing. She was now sprawled out across her cell's cot, twirling her tail with a hoof in boredom. The barred door creaked open, and a royal guard beckoned her to follow.
Pigeon complied, but when she had attempted to fly out of her prison, she fell flat on her face. The guard simply picked her up with a levitation spell, while eyeing the mare with obvious distaste. Three more guards joined in the escort, and received a few looks from the maids as they carried their prisoner along.
Once they reached the throne room, which was simple considering every pony had been cleared out, the guards already present told them to halt. One of them walked up to Pigeon.
"Princess Celestia is currently in a meeting. If you wish to wait here, do so."
One of the escort guards tried to reason with him.
"This prisoner has been causing trouble, and we need to see the Princess at once!"
He leaned in near his fellow guard.
"Also, Iron Horn, we're still up for drinks later if you let us in."
The guard, Iron Horn, brightened up at this, and pointed a hoof towards the doors.
"Alright fine, but if Princess Celestia has a fit over it, it's on you."
The doors groaned open through aid of a magical aura, and the escorts plus one Pigeon entered the throne room.
In which Celestia was in the process of strangling Discord with a pool noodle.
[|||]
I swear, I just cannot have a normal night's sleep.
After falling to dream land for no reason at all, I woke up in the mindscape and found out it wasn't random at all.
I was laying on a grassy field, with a large weeping willow tree swaying in the cool breeze next to me. A certain blue alicorn was standing over me, the sky above her reflecting her irritation. The lunar Princess was glaring at me, and I just blinked a few times. She abruptly kicked me into the air, righting me immediately.
"Well, it appears thou hath been busy."
I rubbed the back of my head, not that I needed to, and groaned.
"Hello Luna, how are you doing?"
I went back to the Y-pose, and spun around.
"I'm guessing a lot of things have happened so far, am I right? Sorry I couldn't be there, really now, I just had my own problems to deal with."
I gestured behind me, while Luna scowled. I turned my back to her, and began hovering away.
"So, if you'll excuse me, I need to get an actually worthwhile rest here. Cya!"
I disappeared over the horizon...
...and ran right into an alicorn.
"OH COME ON!"
Luna snorted, and grabbed me with her aura. The day in the dream quickly became night, the moon acting as if it were an eyeball that was silently judging me.
"Thee cannot abscond from thy mistakes forever."
I sighed, going limp.
"I know, but there's just too much happening at once. I can't keep track of it all, nor deal with it."
I shrugged, and pointed at the moon.
"Besides, from my experience, these types of ordeals sort themselves out pretty nicely."
The moon shimmered, a gold hue forming on it's surface. Luna squinted, glancing between me and the moon.
"Despite appearances of events settling, tis' not an excuse with which to shirk thou's responsibilities."
The dream around us slowly began to fade into ones and zeros, the binary code ascending towards the heavens.
"Oh, believe you me, I've been busy alright. I've learned a crapton, and I'd love to share it."
Luna released me, as the various shades of light blue numbers became computer terminals and filing cabinets. I hovered over to a cabinet, and opened it. Rummaging around inside it, I retrieved the file, and threw it to the alicorn. She caught it in her magic, and rifled through the document. Her eyes widened at what she was reading.
I floated over to her, and wrapped a flipper around her neck.
"So, what'cha think?"
She didn't answer, instead opting to light up her horn. The room fell away, and we were now in the depths of space. I looked around, and saw she was on the page that contained information about Artemena Erratica and it's planets.
Luna was trying to recreate it.
"Uh, Luna, you might not want to strain yourself there. It's kind of complicate-"
Equeia was now in front of Luna, and it's true sun exploded into existence next to it. Luna's face held a perplexed look to it for a moment as Argon appeared nearby, and the planets began orbiting. Their moons also appeared, with Equeia's solar moon lighting up like a bulb. I watched the system take it's course like clockwork, the two moons providing day and night, whilst the true sun sustained the rest.
Luna and I were in awe at the magnificent beauty, the absolute genius of such a design. I broke the silence.
"It's amazing."
The alicorn was in silent agreement, as we both observed the turn of the planets. I then thought of something.
"Luna, we're in a dream, meaning I can edit it as well?"
Luna nodded, not taking her view off of her home planet for a moment. I pointed a blue arm at the true sun, and wanted. My pure intent directed at the star caused it to collapse, leaving the two planets in the dark and adrift. Luna was appalled I would do such a thing, but it didn't stop there.
The two planets suddenly started moving closer to each other, until Argon had started orbiting Equeia. Their moons had also began to orbit around both of the planets, each moon trading off to the other planet once they were in range, almost like an atom.
"Intriguing. At the loss of a star, a new kind of system takes it's place."
Both Luna and I simply floated there in the endless expanse as I played music, not wanting to move at all, lest we dare ruined the spectacle before us.
[|||]
A few minutes before Naked Pigeon's trial...
WHAM!
The clean ground of Canterlot's road had been mercilessly crushed and cracked under Princess Celestia's landing. Luna touched down just behind her, being close enough to calm her yet far enough to prevent getting involved. They both trotted through the streets, not answering any kind of reverence the ponies present had given.
Instead, they were heading towards the lawn chair with an umbrella over it. Within the lawn chair, was a sunbathing dragonequus. Celestia angrily stomped up to him.
"Discord."
Discord lowered the sunglasses he had on, and feigned surprise.
"Oh, Celestia! My, I didn't realize you'd be coming."
The chaos entity winked at her on the last word, while Celestia simply stood still, scowling. Discord saw this wasn't going to go anywhere but horribly, so he went for a different approach. He folded up his sunbathing mirror and snapped his talons. In place of the lawn chair and umbrella, there was a large inflatable pool.
Discord motioned to it.
"Care for a swim?"
Celestia was about to scold him, when she noticed a lack of weight on her body. She checked herself, as her regalia was now replaced by a blue swimsuit. The Princess glared at Discord with even more vehemence than before, and he cringed.
"Now, now, I think that swimsuit looks wonderful on you! How about we bring in a pool noodle too?"
He summoned a foam noodle, and tossed it into the water. Celestia was furious, steaming even, but Discord wasn't about to let up.
"Really now Tia, I think a bit of relaxation is just what you need to soothe those frayed nerves of you-GAHGHGHG!"
The spirit of chaos was cut off in both voice and wind pipe as Celestia had wrapped the noodle around Discord's throat, keeping him aloft in the air via her golden aura. She spoke sternly and evenly, like a mother telling her son he had screwed up for the last time.
"Discord. I have had enough games today."
The angry Princess pointed at the floating mass of styrofoam covering the dimensional rift.
"Now fix this."
Discord tried to gulp, but his Adam's Apple was stuck on the noodle, so he simply spat it out onto the ground. He felt the foam noodle tighten far more than a regular pool noodle should, and he was starting to get nervous at how Celestia was reacting.
"Tia, you flatter me, you really do. You've cleared stepped up your game since last time, but is this really how you should go about this?"
Discord carefully pointed at the crowd of ponies spectating their ruler strangling the dragonequus. Celestia looked at them, and felt a pang of guilt seep into her.
"I really don't think they'd appreciate it."
The white alicorn squinted, not moving for some time. Without warning, she cantered off, with Discord in tow. Celestia was headed for the throne room, and there was nothing that was going to stop her. Luna frantically tried to keep up, but failing that, decided to return to her quarters. She grumbled all the way there.
"Tis' too late in the day for this tomfoolery."
Meanwhile, the throne room doors were nearly blown off their hinges as Celestia stormed inside. She held Discord in front of her, like a kid eyeing a pinata right before he puts on the blindfold and swings.
The spirit of chaos knew he could simply teleport away from the alicorn, but he was far too amused to not see exactly where this would lead.
"Well Celestia, now that you're out of the judgmental eye of your precious populace, how's about we try that pool agai-HURK!"
The pool noodle tightened even further as to shut him up. Celestia hadn't stopped staring intently at him for the whole way, and was clearly in deep thought. She finally spoke in a low tone.
"I find your lack of faith disturbing."
Discord raised an eyebrow at that, and chuckled heartily.
"Ah, that's a good one, Tia! Maybe we could trade menacing lines! Oooh, now wouldn't that be fun? Here, listen to this!"
He struggled to clear his throat, but did so anyway, and spoke in a ridiculously gravelly voice.
"Twilight Sparkle, I am your father!"
He switched to a high-pitched voice.
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO-AUGH!"
The pool noodle, and Celestia, were still intent on trying to squeeze the life out of the chaos spirit. He rubbed his sore neck, and shrugged.
"Fine then, do with me as you will."
Celestia was about to toss Discord through one of the windows, but stopped as soon as she heard the throne room doors open.
