> The Weary Traveler
>  by The Psychopath
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> The metallic nightmare
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Celestia woke up from her long slumber, her mane and tail unkempt. Her face was drooping, her eyes underlined by dark bags, and her fur splitting all over her face. The mare flipped the covers off her enormous, circular bed and walked to her bathroom, grumbling along the way. As Celestia opened the door, she was engulfed by bright white lights created by blue crystals within the bathroom wall tiles and flinched away painfully.  It took her a moment to adjust.

"I need to brush my teeth first..." she mumbled and rubbed her eyes. "Or should I take a shower and brush my teeth while I do that?"

Shelves fell down along with the trinkets decorating them, producing loud shattering from glass and pottery. Her bed screeched along the stone floors, hurting the alicorn's ears and preventing her from focusing on keeping herself upright. She took care of the bed and the rest of her room's furniture by encasing them in her magic. Eventually, the tremors stopped, allowing Celestia to get back onto her hooves and rush out of her room. Unfortunately, she was interrupted by a guard doing the opposite and crashing into her chest in the process.

She frowned and looked at the guard. "Ow," she spoke flatly.

"Princess, there's something happening to the sky outside," one of the guards shouted.

The princess kept her head clenched under a hoof and looked at the guard through one eye. "What thing?"

"Um..." He rubbed his chin. "It looks like a haze distortion of some sort?" he explained with a flat expression.

Celestia stared at him silently for a moment. "Take me there," she ordered. 

While Celestia seemed serious despite her unkempt appearance, internally, she was crying about just waking up and only wanting a bit of cake. It was an unpleasant moment when one was attacked by a massive threat just minutes after awakening. The group exited through the castle's entrance upon a stone trail leading from the gates, and near its end was Luna. She was sitting in the short grass of the castle grounds and staring at the sky, but she quickly took notice of her sister's approach.

"Oh, sister!" she shouted. "I'm glad you're awake...and feel so good about yourself that you don't care what other ponies think about what you look like." She hid her mouth behind her hoof and audibly laughed at Celestia's expense.

Celestia responded by sticking her tongue out at her sister. "If you're done, I want to know what that is and how long it's been happening." She pointed to the sky.

Luna continued to grin at her sister despite the serious situation. She cleared her throat and regained a serious composition. "Well, it's been happening for a few hours now. It just never did much until now."

"Why didn't you wake me up?" Celestia noticed her sister making a face and felt her anger bubble inside her.

"Because it wasn't serious enough at the time. I could have taken care of it on my own if it wasn't causing damaging tremors." She couldn't help but grin at her sister's appearance ruining the situation.

"I s...STOP. MAKING THAT FACE!" Celestia shouted.

The distortion in the sky, creating a heat haze effect, let loose a thrum of energy and noise akin to a horn being blown. Everypony around fell to their knees, their minds becoming numb and their stomachs feeling sick. When the effect subsided, the ponies looked up to see that...nothing had changed. There was a long search for around an hour at and around the distortion in the sky, but it proved fruitless.

"Looks like it might have been a distortion of magic of some sort," Luna mused. "I guess we should return to our duties." She looked towards the sky to evaluate the time. "I think it's about time that you do your first round of duties. Leave the distortion to us. You have ponies to calm."

"And what would those duties be again?" Celestia asked.

An elderly stallion with a gray coat, trimmed mustache, and tuxedo walked up to the white alicorn and cleared his throat to get her attention. "You have audiences until lunch time, your highness," he explained. He eyed the mare with a judgmental gaze. "I would suggest you get yourself prepped up, first. You look like you just got out of bed."

Celestia leaned in close to him, creating a pressure that made him instantly nervous. "I did," she said.

"R-right..."

The white alicorn looked to her sister. "Luna, I want you to tell me everything about that distortion that you know of when my audience session is over, alright?" She straightened herself out and did her best to lessen the stress displayed on her face. "I need to reassure the populace as best as I can." Luna nodded in response. "Thank you," Celestia said.

The white mare sat upon her throne, trying to resolve any issues that came her way and expecting any news on the abnormality that occurred early in the morning. The amount of audience members from Canterlot were quite enormous, reaching upwards of a few hundred ponies outside the throne room. Most of their qualms came from minor damages caused to architecture and the city-wide dizzying effect caused by the abnormality that occurred recently.

"So it wasn't just confined to the castle," Celestia thought to herself. 

Although, while the throne room was filled to the brim with audience members and royal guards flanking them, not all were there for just those gripes. Some were just there to deliver boxes and letters from thankful citizens; Gifts, and Celestia loved to get them. One pony had brought a massive cardboard box to the princess' hooves, and after the guards checked it for any danger, gave it to Celestia. Many of them were just drawings by young foals, and seeing them made the mare audibly 'aw'. It was a nice moment of reprieve from the unknown object floating above the city, and she was grateful that the delivery service hadn't ceased its duties. It was another scenario that would help alleviate the people's concerns, she thought. She was about to set the box down on the three-step pedestal her throne sat upon when a disturbance occurred behind the massive doors the crowd had come through.

"What is going on?" Celestia asked. "Somepony check if it's a danger to the civilians here."

The doors were forcefully pulled open by the perpetrators of the disturbance. Two of the guards ordered them to halt, but they were casually tossed over the crowd and towards the other guards. The audience didn't move at first, and they didn't need to. The intruders pushed them to the sides of the narrow path set to them. Everyone who turned to look at the one pushing them displayed a form of displeasure ranging from mildly disturbed to abject horror.

"Who is it? What do you want?" Celestia asked in a steady tone.

Her serious expression lead way to wide eyes and furrowed brows. She had no way to process what was before her. Four intruders stood before her throne, the one answering being the one closest to her.

"That depends first," the visitor asked. "Are you going to attack us?"

"Do you plan on harming everypony here?" Celestia replied.

"The guards were thrown away as a means of self-defense," he answered casually.

Celestia raised a brow. "Then your aggression won't be a consistent behavior?"

"No," the intruder said dryly.

Celestia eyed him and relaxed herself. "If I may be so bold to ask, what are you?" she asked as she sat down. She was keeping a close eye on this intruder and a spell at the ready to tie him down should the need arise.

"A pony, just like you," the intruder answered.

Celestia blinked at the response. "This...perplexes me. You look nothing like us."

"DNA tests would show our genetic makeup to be one hundred percent identical." He shrugged. "That is, if we ignore the minor mutations every being acquires during gestation."

"I see..." She rubbed her chin. 

The visitor in questions had a bare, purple body devoid of any fur. His skin was soft and leathery, like a cephalopod. His hooves ended in hard blocks of darkened skin and preventing any of the sliminess of his skin to slide upon the ground. He had no tail. Instead, much like with his head, he had a slew of tentacles that her clearly controlled. His tail tentacles were wrapped around each other, creating a simulacrum of a spear that he flicked around from time to time. The tentacles on his head had white undersides with black circles, and the five of them wobbled around like snakes on the head of a medusa. He had five eyes, all of them with a black iris and a mulberry pupil. His mouth was very long and narrow, but still looked like a pony's rather than a beak.

Celestia felt disturbed by his claims and his clearly weary face. He had weathered quite a bit, she could see, but she wasn't sure to what extent. If anything, he appeared quite annoyed.

"And why are you here?" she asked him. "You must be related to the disturbance in the sky."

The cephalopony nodded. "Indeed I am. As for why I'm here?" He looked around at the audience and guards pointing their spears towards him and his companions. "To keep your kind from falling to the one thing that no civilization has survived up to this point."

Celestia raised an eyebrow, and a hushed brouhaha came from the crowd. "And what exactly would that be? If it is an enemy, we can certainly fight it."

Remaining static and seemingly apathetic, the cephalopony answered. "It is not an enemy with a physical body, but it still accompanies progress."

The alicorn leaned back in her throne and rested her head on a foreleg. "I'm not in the mood for riddles."

"I'm aware." The entity exhaled. "I'm here to accelerate pony progress to surpass 'decay'."

"Decay?"

"The one thing that prevents any civilization from reaching its ultimate existence, and I have witnessed them all." A tentacle scraped his right cheek. "I have also come to timelines similar to this one thrice before."

"Oh? And what happened."

"I destroyed them," he stated nonchalantly.

"You what?!" Celestia yelled at the top of her lungs.

The crowd started to panic after hearing that.

"Elaborate or I'll have you imprisoned at once!" Celestia shouted.

A 'mare' next to the visitor cackled in response. "Like that would be a deterrent," she mocked.

The 'pony' was as bizarre as the visitor. She was encased in a semi-transparent metallic armor. She had narrow, mischievous eyes and jagged lips imitating sharp teeth. Her mane was a clump of artificial hair glowing a faint neon yellow. Her body was very narrow and both of her legs had sharp barbs on their inner side. Additionally, her hooves were twice-cloven, giving her three toes, and she made a chittering noise akin to insects when she looked at Celestia. This wasn't lost to the alicorn who chose to ignore it for the time being.

"The first of the three attacked me immediately," he trailed off. "The second came to a good start. We managed a few thousand years of progress, but then they tried to backstab me and steal everything."

"We killed them all," the mare chuckled. "Painfully!" Her voice cracked with joy.

Celestia fumbled uncomfortably upon her throne. "And the last?" she asked.

"The last didn't go far. Spies from other kingdoms stole the technology I had imparted, and in but a hundred years, created a side-development, and the world destroyed itself."

Celestia put a hoof to her chin. "I see. And how can I believe you and your armored bodyguards just like that?" she gestured to the four.

"They aren't armored. Those are their bodies."

Celestia dropped her hoof down and required several takes before being able to formulate the right words in response to what the visitor said. "Excuse me?"

"Those are their bodies. Hyper-developed machinery by your standards. I put those few I befriended into them at their behest."

"Wh..."

"I will prove my sayings, but I require to speak with you and your sister; Luna."

Celestia leaned towards the elderly butler and whispered to him. "Get Luna. I don't trust this...'pony'...Tell her to keep a contingent nearby."

"Right away, your highness," he bowed and left in a hurry.

The alicorn reluctantly left her throne to follow the group outside, but was stopped by the thin, robotic pony.

"What do you want?" Celestia asked.

She sported a sinister smile. "So you're this timeline's 'Princess Celestia'?" she mused. "Always such a 'pretty thing', huh?" she growled through her 'teeth'. 

The pony walked towards Celestia, but as she did so, her body extended and stretched out multiple times, creating a metallic creature twice the height and length of the white alicorn. It had the appearance of a doll with its pieces placed on black, thin metal beams. The 'toes' of the metallic pony's hooves became sharp claws that were used to push the alicorn's head up to meet her own. Celestia looked at her, undaunted, while the robot smile gleefully with dark intent.

"I don't like you, Celestia. I never have."

"And?" the princess asked dismissively. She gestured her guards to stand down, as they were already approaching the robotic pony slowly to attack her by surprise.

The metallic pony's smile faded to a toothy frown. She eyed Celestia up and down. "Hmph. You change in appearance, but you're still the same deep down." She 'threw' Celestia's head back as best as she could, but the alicorn was stronger than she appeared and was only slightly bothered by the strength used. "I killed my Celestia, and I hope I will be able to do so again."

The robot reverted to her original form and followed the intruder, leaving Celestia to ponder about the dangers these visitors could bring to her and her people. Her nerves loosened slightly after the creature left her throne room.

"What in Equestria...?" Celestia stuttered.

She had come outside to witness a massive saucer floating above Canterlot. Its body was vertically pierced with multiple shapes,  the most prominent being rectangular.

"As you can see, I've been doing this for a very, very long time, and I have gathered much technology and knowledge for my dream." The visitor turned his head to look at the alicorn still gawking at the machine the size of a city. "I refuse to die until that dream is fulfilled." He also noticed in the corner of his many eyes, a certain robot mare glaring at Princess Celestia. "And if that mare gives you any trouble, do tell me." His tone became deeper. "I'll take care of her going out-of-line."
> Building confidence
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"What exactly is that thing?" Luna asked.

"My home, and what you should strive to obtain," the visitor said?

"Literally or metaphorically?" one of the guards blurted out.

"Neither."

"Huh?"

"What do you mean?" Luna asked. "Is this a form of riddle?"

The visitor shook his head. "No. This is no two-way solution many things get boiled down to. That is what you should strive for technologically." His tentacles twitched erratically. "With what I've seen of these timelines so far, your technological distribution is a mess." He looked around and huffed. "I have seen trains and wagons. I have seen computers -albeit primitive ones- and hoof pumps. It has no rhyme or reason."

Celestia stomped forward and stood tall in front of the weary visitor who did not bat an eye in her imposing presence. "Up until now you have appeared out of nowhere, with THAT thing in my skies." she pointed to the saucer. "A thing that engulfs the size of Canterlot city itself. You've threatened us and insulted us, and you expect us to believe that you're willing to help?"

"Whether you believe it or not is not really for you to decide. I'll be helping you progress beyond the sky and into the black void of space," the visitor said with hoof outstretched. He looked to the two princesses, and a brief smirk tarnished his perpetual scowl. "And you will hopefully attain the heights you had in my own timeline. I've only seen that occur fivce, and one didn't end well." He rubbed his chin and looked away.

"You okay there?" the second robot asked the traveler. "You thinking of that again?" The traveler nodded as a response. "There there," the robot comforted. "No need to think of that. It won't happen here. It only happened once, after all."

"What's he talking about?" Luna asked.

The robot turned to face her, his face prideful yet smiling. This one was drastically different from the angry mare. His mouth was a set of four mandibles covering a small beak, similar to that of a praying mantis. His four legs ended in sharp blades opposite each other with a massive gap between. It gave the impression that the pony was walking on a bizarrely fabricated pair of elevator shoes, although the elevators were extremely thin and horizontal to the body rather than vertical. His eyes were numbered just two, but the pupils were much different. They were an assortment of diamond shapes that moved independently of each other. Luna would twitch and try to look away whenever one of them would move, not to mention the indiscreet way she would shiver. The pony's mane was like a 'regular' pony's, but the tail ended in a segmented spear-like form with the ability to stretch out far beyond its proper reach, as attested to the pony booping Luna's crown with the end without needing to move around.

"It's not something that concerns you right now."

"So it will concern us eventually," Luna concluded with a frown.

"Ehhhh..." the pony twisted his hoof left-to-right.

"I see." 

"I would also like to apologize if you're disturbed by my appearance. My kind had evolved from apex predators, so we were primarily carnivorous."

"No harm done," Luna said. She pushed the stallion to the side and looked the visitor straight in the eyes. "My sister is correct. We have way of trusting you. This is becoming a circle of discussion, honestly."

"Then if I showed your current greatest minds the scientific knowledge I possess, would you prefer leniency over expediency?"

Celestia stepped forth and nodded. "I believe I can arrange for our best magicians to come here."

The traveler raised a hoof to protest, then came to a realization and lowered it almost as quickly. "That's true. Your magicians and wizards tend to double as scientists of various fields." He hummed with thought before resuming his conversation. "Fine. I agree to this, but I also want Twilight Sparkle here. I assume the Element of Magic, your student, is still in her tree library with that tiny reptile, yes?"

Celestia was baffled. She didn't know if she was more upset about how this stranger who came from nowhere knew Twilight Sparkle or that his information was so out-of-date. "She is no longer and Element of Harmony?"

"She was deposed?!" the metal mare shouted excitedly. 

The metal stallion grabbed her and pushed her away.

"No..." Luna interjected while watching the angry robomare thrash at her fellow 'machine'. "She is the Alicorn of Friendship, and...well. If you withhold information from us," Luna stated with a snobbish tone.

All five eyes of the visitor narrowed. "She is an alicorn now?" he repeated. "But she never became one nor its equivalent in any of the timelines I have gone to." He tapped his lower chin multiple times. "There's a disturbance within this temporal tangent, making it not a redundancy tangent but possibly it's own universe..." he mumbled.

"What are you talking about?" Celestia asked.

"Something that I will teach you in the future when you come to understand basic laws of physics, then quantum mechanics, and then the laws of reality, which are imperative in understanding time travel and dimensional breaking."

The robot stallion tapped the visitor's shoulder and mumbled something in his 'ear'. He nodded and waved him off.

"I forgot. When can you organize this reunion?"

"If messages go out right now, in about three weeks.  I would need to send out the invitations, receive the responses from those wanting to come and those refusing, and then preparing everything for the reception and well-being of everypony there."

"Uh-huh. Then I'll return to my home and wait for that long a time."

Luna teleported in front of him, blocking him with her body and an outstretched hoof. "I prefer that you remain here in the castle with your mac--Where'd they go?"

The lunar princess hadn't even blinked that the group of would-be saviors of ponies had vanished instantly. There was no trace of them, and the nearby guards were looking around to see where they had gone, yet nopony could see them.

"What was that?" Celestia wondered. She just stared at where the ponies had been with wide eyes. "He can use magic?"

"Maybe?" Luna answered. "None of those four had a unicorn horn."

"But they weren't anything like ponies we had seen before," Celestia stated. "He didn't fully specify his provenance or who they were, and I don't know if those metal ponies of his are to be trusted."

Luna frowned at the corner of her mouth. "I understand. That pony with the sharp hooves said that his kind evolved from apex predators." She gave a single laugh in response. "He expects me to believe pony kind was an apex predator?"

"I think that--"

"Here," a familiar voice said.

The two alicorns flew high into the after screaming in terror. The weary traveler was there again.

"How are you doing that?!" Luna yelled. "What is that in your...tentacles?"

"A vial of my blood. Give this to your scientists before I arrive and ask them to test it and determine what species it comes from. The dna will be identical."

Celestia took it in her magic and looked at it with great suspicion. "Thank you, I think."  She looked back to the visitor. "You know, you didn't actually introduce yourselves."

"And how did you just vanish...like...that." Luna's ears drooped in annoyance. "He did it again."

"Let's just do this thing he asks, but with some insurance," Celestia said. "We don't want this to be a trap of some kind."

"Agreed," Luna said. "Although..." she stared at the saucer in the sky. "I'm very curious about what kind of spell they used to vanish like that."

In the saucer, the weary traveler casually walked out of a room, leaving the doors to automatically close behind him. The robostallion laughed. "I bet they're thinking that the teleportation tech was a spell of some sorts."

"Because sufficiently advanced technology looks like magic to those only knowledgeable of more primitive tech," the traveler explained.
> Simulacrum
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Spike was looking at Twilight was a raised brow and a look of annoyance. The lavender alicorn was staring outside the window of the train they had taken to watch the landscape pass by, but Spike didn't understand the point.

"So why are we in a train instead of a personal carriage or you just teleporting or flying to Canterlot?" the little dragon asked.

"Because, Spike. I don't have a carriage yet, and I can't fly that far."

"Rainbow Dash can. Surely you can now since you know how to use your wings AND are a princess."

Twilight shook her head. "No, Spike. Rainbow has been doing that forever, so she has better stamina when it comes to flying. Me, on the other hoof, have only been doing it for about a year now."

Spike pondered the idea and shrugged. "Fair enough, but what about teleportation?"

"It takes a lot of magic and concentration to do it, and I'd probably collapse from exhaustion." She shrugged. "Besides, I want to have all my energy in order to study whatever this 'visitor' the princess talked about gave her."

Loud gasps and an increasing volume of voices attracted Twilight and Spike's attention. They got out of their cabin to reach the next car over where everypony was leaning on the right of the transport.

"What's going on everypony?" Twilight asked.

"O-oh! Princess Twilight!" one of the ponies exclaimed. "Come see!" The mare stepped back from the seat and got the others to do the same. "Look. There's something flying above Canterlot. Surely you know what it is or at least what to do about it."

Twilight rolled her eyes and smiled. "It's probably just a dragon or an airship. I'll be able to create something for them to belieeeeeeeeeeee..." Twilight's jaw dropped lower and lower when she saw the saucer in the sky. "What in Equestria IS that?!" she whispered loudly to herself. 

"No idea!" The mare started bouncing in place nervously. "I'm worried about the ponies there, and the princesses!"

"Calm down. If it was a threat, I'm sure the princesses would have dealt with it by now."

The ponies nodded in agreement, but retained their worry on their faces. There was nothing more that Twilight could do for the time being. She took Spike back to their cabin and waited inside until the next stop.

"That must be what the princesses were talking about," Spike noted.

"Definitely. Now we just need to know if they know anything about that...thing in the sky."

Spike peered outside the window, his little claws hanging onto the edges. "It looks like it's as big as Canterlot from here, too."

Twilight laughed the idea off. "That's just due to the perception of it from this distance and angle. It's probably closer to us than it is to Canterlot."

Spike raised an eyebrow. "Isn't it the notion that the smaller something looks from a distance, the bigger it actually is? In this case," Spike pointed at the saucer with his thumb. "that thing is enormous."

Twilight's laughter receded to worry and a nervous tapping of her hoofs on the cushions of the seats. When they finally arrived at the Canterlot train station, Twilight -with Spike in tow- bolted straight out of the train and flew directly to the castle, bursting through the massive doors and into the throne room. 

"Princess Celestia, what IS that thing?!" the lavender alicorn screamed.

Celestia braced at the sudden increase of volume. "Twilight, there's no need to yell."

"Then what is it? Is it a danger? Are you being held hostage?"

Princess Celestia held her smile. "Nothing of the sort," she explained. "But I also don't know what it is. I also wasn't expecting you to come here so early. I only sent out the invitation to know whether or not you were going to be here or not."

Spike crossed his arms. "She can't resist an invitation from you, your highness."

"No need for such formalities, Spike, and I'm glad to see you here as well."

"O-oh. Thank you, Princess."

Celestia passed a hoof through her mane. "Aaaaaaahhhhhh...that thing appeared just a day ago, and already it's driving everypony crazy, especially with what is within it structure."

Twilight tilted her head. "Within its structure?"

"There are strange beings from it that came to see us, saying he wanted to help us progress technologically and prevent use from reaching 'decay'. You who have read so many books, have you ever heard of this 'decay'?"

Twilight frowned and started to think. "I've read about many kinds of decay, and the definition, but without proper context, I have no way of understanding exactly what this character meant."

Celestia sighed and rubbed her face. "I suppose it was foalish of me to think there could have been an explanation somewhere, but...I have a little job for you."

The lavender alicorn's ears perked up. "Oh?!"

"Yes. I have a laboratory set up in the auditorum of my college for gifted unicorns. It was supposed to be set up two weeks from now, but my sister insisted on placing one for you." She chuckled. "I guess she knew your reaction better than I."

"And what do you want me to do?"

"The visitor gave me a vial of his blood, telling me to pass it onto you and the various other mages that I've invited."

"Why would he do that?" Twilight asked in a perplexed tone.

"Well, I'll tell you when you do the test with a regular pony's blood. I'll need you to test whether or not the dna is very similar or drastically different."

Twilight chuckled. "He does know that everypony has minor mutations that change their appearance and body functionality, right?"

"Yes, Twilight," Celestia sighed. "I believe he was looking for the dna that defines us as ponies."

"Oooooh. That's easy to find, then, but it will take me  few days to find the nitrogen bases in both after deconstructing the nucleotide."

"Then allow me to take you there myself."

"Oh, you don't need to do that," Twilight chuckled. "I know how to get to the college."

Celestia waved a hoof. "Tut tut! I'll be taking you there. It's the least I could do for my favorite student."

Twilight gave in and followed her teacher into the sky and higher up the mountain where a large assortment of thin, white spires were. The rest of the facility had been built into the safety of the mighty stone monument. A very long, very large staircase led up to the facility, one that students were reluctant to take for obvious reasons. The face of the building was clean and pure white, although half of the entrance was being given a paint of dark blue to represent Luna. Just above the large wooden doors was tinted glass depicting Celestia looking down upon her ponies and wrapping them in the embrace of her wings. The spires were decorated with golden rings to make them stand out, and their cone tips let loose various gentle trails of colorful magic, akin to an artificial aurora borealis.

"Wow. They've been redecorating it. I don't recall the college ever looking this fancy," Twilight said.

"They have been redecorating since last you came here, although I still think it lacks something to make it stand out."

Twilight looked at Celestia with a contemptuous gaze. "It's a giant set of white pillars with colors coming out of it and is set apart from the rest of Canterlot in the side of a mountain."

"Be that as it may, it lacks something for a true identity. This just comes off as a fancy costume." She scratched her chin and shook her head. "That's not important right now anyways. First we need to reach the laboratory in the auditorium."

Twilight prepared herself psychologically for the influx of ponies to come rushing towards them when they landed, but they never did.

The mare looked around for any signs of life and was worried when she found none. "Where is everypony?" she asked.

"Hiding in their homes, most likely." Celestia was worried, and she looked at the saucer, pondering the intents of its owner. "That...abomination has everypony scared witless, and many have been hiding in their homes. I haven't even managed to get them out myself despite warning them that it isn't a threat."

"You say that, but there's an adult dragon attacking it," Spike pointed out.

A large red dragon was currently flying angrily around the craft, letting loose torrents of flame along its surface and occasionally landing on it to try and destroy the hull with its claws.

"What's he trying to do?" Spike wondered. "If he's trying to destroy it, it'll take more than that, no?"

Celestia tilted her head. "The construct isn't even taking damage. It looks like the flames are bouncing off of something, but I'm not sure what. Plus, that dragon doesn't live in the mountains here. It lives in those further away."

A loud humming irritated the ponies' ears but made the adult dragon stop attacking and observe the actions of its prey. The saucer's ring border glowed a faint orange then ceased, leaving way for a large circle to form on the side and stare the reptile down. A deafening scream accompanied a spiraling beam of orange light engulfing the dragon in its entirety and going further on into the distance, just narrowly missing the top of the mountain of the college. The beam gradually dissipated, and the glowing circle it had come from was disappearing behind shifting hull plates, leaving the mares and dragon speechless.

They entered the college, attempting to make sense of the sheer destructive power shown to them. A massive statue of a featureless unicorn welcomed all the students. The walls flanking the entrance hall were covered in displays holding awards and special mentions. There were quite a few of the displays. The statue was in the middle of an enormous hollow column, with stairs following the shape of the walls. The first few steps lead to several doors leading to classrooms or other parts of the building. The next steps were enchanted to float above ground and started just behind the statue. They lead much higher to the second floor, then third, then fourth, and so on. Each time they would stop at a platform then resume, and would entwine with the statue as it rose ever higher.

"I...What was that?" Twilight whimpered. "Neither I nor Tirek had that kind of power..."

"And that came from a machine..." Celestia stammered. "I...Ih...If we had tried to attack him..."

The realization hit the white alicorn hard, and she started to sweat profusely, her pupils shrunk and body trembling. 

"P-princess?" Twilight called out.

The white alicorn was psychologically torturing herself over the scenario that could have played out.

"Princess Celestia!" Spike shouted. 

"Huh?"

"What's wrong?"

"Spike..." Celestia forced herself to walk. "I just saw an adult dragon disintegrated by something I do not comprehend. Something that could do what magic cannot in its current form..."

"Well, Twilight and I have seen--"

"Spike!" Twilight interjected. "That's not the same thing!" she trailed off.

"And what makes this so different?" Spike put his claws on his hips. "We've seen plenty of things that could have destroyed Equestria multiple times, and we defeated them! Just because this one is holding the princesses hostage doesn't mean we can't help them!"

"He's not holding us hostage," Celestia corrected. "He's just imposed himself to improve our technology and magic."

Twilight and Spike looked at the princess in disbelief. "What?" Twilight said.

"You mean..." Spike started.

Celestia nodded. "He refused to harm us. It's what I was saying earlier: He only wanted to help us." She took several deep breaths to calm herself. "I just wasn't expecting this...He refused to display any kind of technological or magical power...and then that."

"Well, if you had doubts, now you know..." Spike smiled sheepishly and twiddled with his claws.

"Let's go to the auditorum. I don't want to talk about this anymore for the time being," Celestia said.
> Deoxyribonucleic acid
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Celestia and the princess arrived in the auditorium, its size allowing for two floors of seats to look upon the wooden stage normally hidden behind white curtains accentuated with blue rope. The entire area had its walls painted a clean white while the seats were still a golden shade with red trims. Much of the school had no been fully 'repainted' for Luna. Sitting upon the stage were several monstrous machines thrice the size of a pony in both height and width. Twilight galloped up to them in a hurry, her excitement overflowing from her grin that reached ear-to-ear.

"Are these things from that pony you mentioned?" she asked Celestia.

The alicorn shook her head. "No, I'm afraid these are just from us. These were taken from a hospital where they were being developed. I was told about them and, thus, asked for insight." She scratched the back of her neck. "They wanted to lend them to us for this procedure, as long as you write down your reports on what you discover," Celestia explained. "The vial with the blood the stranger gave me and a vial from one of my guards should be in the rack there on the table. The cabinets behind you contain multiple chemicals I...didn't really have time to memorize.

Celestia noticed Twilight going on a tangent about all the machinery are chemical compounds present, overhearing something about dioxygen. Celestia had barely taken a single step when Twilight called to her.

"Uh, Princess Celestia?"

"Yes, Twilight?" the princess answered in her ever-patient tone.

"Do you expect this to be done today?"

Celestia shrugged. "I honestly have no idea how long that sort of work takes, so take your time, Twilight." She raised a hoof after remembering something important. "I almost forgot: Don't take too long. In three weeks, everypony who accepted the invitation will be coming here, and I was hoping to have this done by then."

Twilight nodded. "Okay. I'll work as fast as I can."

"Thank you, Twilight. I know you'll do fine, so don't worry."

"One more thing, though. Are you expecting some kind of grandiose difference?" Twilight exaggerated by waving her forelegs in the air.

"Honestly, I would be lying if I said no."

"Alright then," Twilight said.

Celestia returned to her room, having given the instructions to close the appointments for the day. She was quite exhausted from the events of these past two days. She crawled under the covers of her bed from the base and plopped her head on the large pillows. It almost disappeared in their fluffiness. In the comfy, soft embrace of both her comforters and pillows, the mare quietly drifted off to sleep, finally relaxed and at peace. After all, when you're asleep, you don't need to worry about the real world for a time, and there's no better moment of existence.

Yet her dreams were bothered. Disquieted by the screams of the burning and dying. She could see a murky image of her and her sister yelling at the pony and trying to imprison him. His face was so bright. So happy. He seemed to be so young despite being so old, and yet...The mares tried to imprison the stallion, but when they tried, he vanished, like he had the day before. And then the light. Equestria set ablaze and the whole world turned into a barren and dusty desert in a fit of rage and frustration. Everypony was dead because of him, and yet here he had stood, unbatting his many eyes at the prospect of potentially killing everypony again.

Another dream still after Celestia had calmed down, yet this one was more positive. Much happier. She could catch glimpses of it, where there were ponies like the traveler, within massive constructs in the vast darkness of space. So much progress and development, and creatures she had never before seen in her life. Then came a moment of brightness where almost god-like beings swam through space, seemingly embracing the crafts. It is then that she awoke to her sister staring at her from the other side of the bed.

"Did you see them?" Luna asked her sister.

The princess was still groggy. "See what? The weird dreams you gave me?" She wiped her eyes and noticed that night had set in. "How did you even do that?"

Luna rolled her eyes. "You know very well that the dream realm links all of time." She scratched her head. "Although I wasn't expecting it to transcend space." She looked back to her sister and took a deep breath. "I spoke with the residents in it despite them not liking me and discovered those few memories of our traveler. They're blurry and not very revealing, but they showed me quite enough that I thought you should see them."

Celestia blinked in disbelief. "So those were real?"

"I'm afraid so."

The princess leaned forward in her bed and dropped her head onto the sheets. "Do you know what I saw today?"

"Your former student being creepy as usual?" she asked with a cocked eyebrow.

"What?"

"I went to see her in the college. She was...enthusiastic, saying she had at least partially decoded both samples and found some similarities already, but she didn't have enough to formulate a proper presentation yet."

Celestia didn't seem that surprised and scrunched her face as a way of displaying 'What are you going to do?'. "That isn't what I had seen, however. It was something...worse..." she trailed off. The mare decided to levitate a pillow towards her and hug it. "That...thing disintegrated a full-grown dragon in not even a second, and whatever it used kept going like the creature had no substance."

Now it was Luna's turn to be in disbelief. "You mean the same dragons that are practically impossible to hurt with basic spells because of their scales and tough bodies?" Celestia nodded. "I see...That must have been something to behold."

"It makes you wonder," Celestia continued. "Does he intend to get rid of us or keep us?"

"Why would you think of something so horrible? I recall him mentioning something for us, and he wouldn't be able to take us on himself if we were prepared!" Luna pounded her chest once. 

Celestia glared at her sister from the corner of her eyes. "Luna, we can't believe anything he says. He's killed ponies, with no regrets."

The lunar princess looked down at her sister. "Our hooves aren't clean in that respect."

"But we didn't do it out of spite. We did it because we had no other choice."

"Then what do you propose we do?"

"Wait to see how everything unfolds," Celestia said. "Wait and see if progress takes us with it or if it abandons us and forgets we ever existed."

"Sister..." Luna said melancholically. "You shouldn't think that way. Don't let your fears get to you."

Several days had passed with Twilight still hard at work in her new lab, still adding substances to the blood and determining the sequences thanks to the machines that could analyze everything bit-by-bit, when at least she had come to a response.

"Huh. Aside from a few dormant mutations and active ones, there's no real difference between the two." Twilight looked at her notes again then tilted them to the side. "Well, that's disappointing. I wanted to know what exactly it was that the princess wanted to know." The lavender alicorn gathered up all of her notes and set to returning to Canterlot. "Er...maybe I should clean up first, "she chuckled to herself.

Celestia and Luna were busy discussing matters of state before going to the council chambers for more in-depth talks with the 'elected' representatives of the panicked ponies. They didn't get to finish thanks to Twilight interrupting them.

"Princesses, I'm here!" she shouted. She lowered a huge packet of paper and parchments with her notes on them. "I did the analysis, using two methods just to be sure, and aside from a few minor mutations, there weren't any real differences amongst the two samples that I was aware of." She sighed. "I was really hoping to find some grandiose discovery, but it's..." She scratched the back of her head. "It was pretty mundane, to be honest."

The alicorn sister looked at each other with wide eyes.

"Then he was telling the truth," Luna muttered. "That's not...But how?!"

Twilight was confused. "What's wrong? What's so special about this pony?"

"The visitor...He's...looks nothing like us," Celestia said in a calm and quiet tone.

"Uh huh..." Twilight hummed sarcastically.

"Twilight," Celestia started more calmly. "What I meant is that he looks nothing like pony-kind save for his body shape, and that's still stretching it?"

The lavender alicorn was doubting what she was being told. "Different how?"

"He almost looks like an octopus," Luna blurted.

"...What? But...then how is the dna practically identical? What does that mean for us?"

Celestia shook her head. "I do not know. It is also a disturbing thought considering the three machines in the shape of ponies that accompanied him."

"Yes," Luna added. "Allegedly they were real ponies put in those bodies. My sister initially thought them to be machines, as she put it."

"Well, that's too much for me to take in at once," Twilight stated meekly. 

"Say, wasn't Spike with you?" Celestia asked.

"He's at the college, watching the machines," Twilight explained. "But I wanted to know: Is this 'visitor' going to be here soon? I would like to meet him."

"In three weeks. Until then, you'll have to be patient," Celestia said. "Then you'll meet him and his...retinue," she spat.
> Many Sights
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Three weeks had passed, and many of Equestria's greatest alchemists and wizards had come to the auditorium, filling the room out completely. In fact, there were so many who had come that many were forced to stand on the sides, but they weren't angry about this. Far from it. Twilight peeked from behind the curtains to see the ponies rummaging through the papers they had been given about Twilight's experiment. There was quite the brouhaha in regards to it.

"Oh, I wasn't expecting this many ponies to arrive," Twilight mumbled nervously.

Celestia hummed in surprise. "There wasn't. The auditorium was supposed to be half-packed. Might have been last-minute arrivals on account of their colleagues telling them about the flying saucer floating above my city."

"When is it starting?" one of the audience shouted. "I want to know about the metal thing floating high in the sky!"

"We all do! You're nothing special!"

"Oh dear," Celestia said.

Luna huffed. "Sounds like they're about to start fighting." She looked towards Twilight and Celestia. "Perhaps we should start it now?"

Celestia tapped the ground a few times. "Right. Send the signal to the saucer. Twilight and I shall make the presentation."

Celestia, her stance and expression becalming; And Twilight, her gait and expression perturbed, made their way upon the stage. Every step brought about a sound that gradually quieted the auditorium and attracted every eye towards them.

"My most valued wizards and alchemists, I've called you all here to witness the arrival of that which you all seek an answer to: Who dwells in the saucer?"

Twilight stepped forward. "As you may have noticed, what you have within your hooves is a dna analysis I did between the visitor's blood and that of a royal guard of the princesses." She cleared her throat. "He claimed it, as per the princess' word, that they were identical, and...well, they were! Like you I'm also really confused as to the significance of this, but I--"

"Believe that he can handle it from here," a voice interjected.

"Wha-YAH!"

Twilight flew away several feet, and the sudden appearance of the visitor created a loud brouhaha in the room. The lavender alicorn looked at the pony with confusion, curiosity, fear, intrigue, and many other contradictory emotions. A massive metallic pony more ball than creature, stomped out from the hidden space behind the traveler. They were quite literally gigantic, easily towering over Celestia, but their pudgy face gave the impression of them smiling constantly. Apart from their bizarre shape and size, they had no visibly different forms to Equestrian ponies.

"What in Equestria is that creature?!" one of the audience members bellowed.

"I am a pony, like you," the traveler stated calmly. "Of whom do you think that blood belonged to?"

Another loud brouhaha, much angrier than before, erupted, drowning out any thoughts the princesses and the traveler had. One of the unicorns jumped forward from the second balcony, her horn thrumming with magic.

"We'll see if you're actually the one in control of that monstrosity in the sky or not!"

Those around her tackled the mare to try and stop her, but it was too late. She had already released a lightning bolt that grew and glowed in the air towards the cephalopony. The round pony appeared in front of the stallion, then its form warped instantly. Its round body become long and serpentine, and its stubby legs became long and accentuated by an inwards-curving nail. Its happy face became emaciated and mournful, with bags dropping below the eyes. Its mane sparked with magic as it caught the spell, dispelled it, then cast one of it own, freezing everypony in the audience and compressing them painfully downwards. It was only from the traveler tapping on its leg that it stopped and resumed its pudgy and jovial shape.

"What was that?!" Twilight whisper-yelled. She had lost her voice.

"It's just basic magic," the giant said in a happy tone. "There's nothing to awe at."

"WHAT?!" Twilight blurted. "You froze everypony in the audience and disabled their magic! That's NOT simple magic!"

The traveler looked over his shoulder. "I'm afraid it is, Element of Magic."

"Explain," an audience member demanded.

"Who here can explain to me how unicorns utilize magic?" the traveler asked.

"We have natural reserves of magic, the size depending on the pony, which we can call upon," a stallion answered.

"Correct."

"And unicorns can utilise that magic by focusing it through our horns."

"Incorrect."

"WHAT?! What do you mean?! This is information that we've known for centuries! You're here telling us to believe that what we know is a lie?"

The traveler rolled his eyes. "When you've made a mathematical theorem, and it has been tested by peers, is it not accepted?"

"In theory," a mare replied. "But what is the comparison you are trying to make?"

"Patience." The traveler scratched the side of his face with a tentacle and started walking calmly along the stage. "When you use a formula and time goes on, you end up discovering that the theorem is no longer valid. It is still going to work, but must be revised to encompass new information brought by 'physics defying' anomalies." He stopped and looked straight at the audience. "If it exists, then it is not an anomaly. It is the math that is faulty."

"So what does that mean with magic?"

"What I will teach your kind will not be able to be put into effect in your lifetime, but it will still see itself held by your descendants and successors." He tapped his forehead, pretending that a horn was there. "You use magic based on those thoughts, which means that you utilize the unicorn equivalent of 'brute strength' to use magic. Horns do not focus magic, they channel it. It is cleansed, passed through the spirals, then released accordingly to the magic taken from the pony and its environment." He gestured the round giant to bring Twilight forward. "Princess, if you would demonstrate."

"B-but I've never done--"

"Just focus and do as I say. Shoot a simple...beam of light by using the magic within you and try to filter a bit of that around you."

"Okay..."

Several minutes had passed with nothing happening, and the audience was getting antsy. However, just as they were about to yell, Twilight released a beam of light from her horn. It was so powerful it threw her back into the alicorn sisters and melted through the roof, leaving everypony in awe.

"This is just basic talent. You need to learn to control it next." The traveler huffed. "With technology we learned more about magic and understood it. With magic, we improved upon the technology and improved our lifestyles. There was no end to the progress!"

"So you would...share this knowledge with us?" a pony inquired.

"To an extent. I will be supervising to prevent any...incidents."

"What do you mean by 'incidents'?"

"You won't see later on. I'll make sure they don't happen, you can be sure of that."

"And what of your presence here?" another wondered. "You say you are like us, but we've never seen a pony of your kind. Are you some kind of ancestor or an alien?"

"I am neither. I am a pony from a different timeline, not too dissimilar from your own, save, of course, for the physically obvious. There are other things, but they aren't of interest."

"A different...what?" Twilight stepped forward. "I've used a spell that allows time travel, and I know of somepony else who knew it as well, but I never knew--"

"The spell you refer to is flawed. The other you refer to, I know not."

"Well, let's just say that it didn't turn out well with every' attempt' I made to stop it," Twilight grumbled.

The traveler tilted his head to the side and raised two brows. "A proper time traveling spell? Remarkable, considering you didn't figure out the reason behind you always changing timelines with every 'change'."

"Huh?"

He looked at the crows and shouted. "What happens if one travels through time and modifies something in the past?"

A loud mixture of answers came through, with the vast majority spewing rhetoric and theorems about modifying the future, erasing timelines, and so forth. The large pony leaned in, chuckling.

"Even here they're still going on about that."

"I know..." the traveler lamented.

"WRONG!" his voice exploded. "The first thing you will learn is the time and how to travel it. This requires quantum theorems of both mathematical and physical boundaries, and Reality Theorems." He shook his head. "But that is for another day. There is much to share, and I have technology to display to the general public first through way of the princesses."

The audience grew upset that he would not explain further about an aspect he had been aggrandizing , many outright ordering him to develop on the idea. While it was not part of his 'schedule', the traveler pondered the idea.

"Should we do it or not?" the colossal metal pony asked.
> Aggrandizing
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Fine..." the traveler reluctantly agreed. "I'll explain it, but we need a better, wider, and brighter area for this."

"We can always arrange for another place to be used for these," Celestia suggested.

"No need."

The cephalopony nodded one to his companion. The rotund pony returned to his thin form once more and released several bizarre items into the auditorium. They had the appearance of two, slightly convex bars of black metal interconnected by a semi-transparent film of night-blue. The yellow lines running along the angular ridges on the surface of the metal ebbed and thrummed with power, releases simulacrum of lightning in the air around them. They clung to the chamber's walls, including the backstage. The traveler pulled out a collar he hid in his tentacles, placed it around his neck, then pressed a few buttons. Everypony's vision became blurred for several minutes, then they found their eyes which had adjusted to the dim light of the auditorium were being assaulted by sunlight. 

The devices on the wall had changed the auditorium, making the space between seats wider, and the wooden floors into white marble covered by blue pillows. The back of the auditorium was accented by a 'crown' of marble pillars around its demi-circle shape. The ponies looked around, seeing more auditoriums and other buildings floating in a bright, blue sky. 

"What the..." Luna gasped. "What is this?"

Looking closely, the ponies present could see an undulating form of energy at the border of the metal plates. It was quite the cause for alarm.

"What is this?" an audience member screamed. "What's going on?!"

"This is 'displacement'. Very different from multiple other methods of temporal transportation." The traveler tapped the hard floor below him and nodded with confidence. "A very stable one at that."

"Wh-wh-what is thiiiiis?!" Twilight stammered.

The now-emaciated pony flew in front of the lavender alicorn. "Using my magic and the bits there, we've created a bubble which transports us and areas around us into the space of another timeline or moment in time."

"In this case," the traveler interjected. "I had us transported to a larger, more open area. It's basically like taking a picture and putting it over another."

"But there's floating islands!" an alchemist shouted."

"Yes. That's why it's another timeline but also its own universe. You can't do that here as elements are lacking for it. Too different, but it's still temporal."

The mare scratched her head in confusion. The traveler shook his head in disappointment. "Twilight Sparkle, you told me that your traveling into the past caused the future to change, am I correct?"

"Yes," the mare answered quickly.

"Then that would mean that your own was 'destroyed', yes?"

"I..."

"Don't get an existential crisis."

"W-well...in theory, yes. That's what happened."

"In another reality, you told me you had a brush with time travel before, with you repeating the actions your 'future' self was doing to warn you."

"Wait, how--"

"It's another timeline, Twilight. I assume it was very similar to this one," Luna sighed.

"Um...Well, yeah...Yes. I did repeat them all, but I learned that--"

"That's good enough for me. I don't need to learn about your lessons," the traveler interjected. Twilight appeared insulted. "There's two things that happened with what you mentioned: A paradox, and a time-curve. The first requires more details." He cleared his throat. "Were there any consistent elements with every trip?"

"Well...Spike, myself, and the Crystal Map."

"Hmmm." The traveler faced the audience. "I know you are still mumbling about this current event, but what would happen if you went into the past to change things?"

"You would change the future, thus you shouldn't touch anything," a stallion shouted proudly.

"Such vim and vigor," the traveler congratulated. "In being wrong," his voice dropped. "That's a paradox."

"How so?"

"For one, if you change the past, you warped the future."

"And?"

"That would mean that the you that changed the past no longer came to be, which means you couldn't have gone back in time, which means that you couldn't changed the past, yet you did."

"I...uhh..." the stallion slumped in his seat, his brain visibly overheating.

The emaciated robopony chuckled at the sight.

"The PRECISE MOMENT you're in the past, you've changed it, because you weren't present during that time originally."

"Then what are you trying to say?" another audience member asked. "That there's millions of repeating timelines and we can do whatever we want and it won't change anything?"

"I didn't say that, you imbecile, so sit down!" The traveler cracked his neck. "Redundancy tangents occur if you just travel in the past and do nothing. There's no notable difference to our own, but with every possibility comes a reality. That's why I can do things like this without a care: No matter what I do, the 'original' timeline will always exist." A tentacle waved angrily at the crowd. "You can't rivet a metal plate on a first generation hover tank with your 'imagination'!"

"Hover tank?"

"Is that what you meant by reality theory?" Celestia chimed in.

"Yes," the traveler said. "Knowing that the most mundane of things can create a new reality is the basis of that."

"But, when we did that, we always ended up in new timelines!" Twilight said.

"That's because you were responsible for its change."

"But the table--"

"Was likely a catalyst, and because you were linked to it -I imagine-, then it traveled with you. Since you created the new timeline, you became a part of it and were sent to that reality accordingly."

"But Starlight was nowhere to be found."

"Most likely she remained in the past or her actions were so minimal that she wasn't responsible for the changes."

Twilight pondered the saying, and her eyes shot wide with horror and realization. "Ooooohhh..."

"There's multiple different ways of manipulating time and space."

"But what about the time curve you mentioned? And shouldn't it be a 'loop' instead?"

"Mmmm...no. Curves and loops are different. A loop is an artificial impediment of time's natural progress. What you did was a curve, where time repeated itself for one event and didn't trap anyone. Since the events continued and nothing stopped them, no loops occurred. Just think closely about what the origin of the curve looked like."

"I...see..." Twilight mumbled. She didn't understand.

"But like I was saying: There are multiple ways to manipulate time."

"Wait wait wait. Hold on just a minute!" a stallion shouted.

"We can hold a minute," the robot mused.

The traveler exhaled loudly from his snout.

"How did they stay in time or travel it anyways? That's extremely difficult and can only be done for but a few seconds. Even the strongest of spell casters can't do it for long."

The traveler stared at the pony in question and looked around this timeline's appearance. "For the same reason that we aren't technically within this alternate reality and are only applying its physical existence here."

"Huh?"

"Think of a river. That's the analogy you use, right?"

"Yes." The stallion mimed a river flow with his hooves while he spoke. "Time can only go forward, and much like a torrential river: You can travel in the opposite direction as much as you want, but you'll eventually be swept away by the current."

The ponies around him nodded in agreement. The cephalopony, however, was not amused.

"And much like with a river, there's a thing that lies next to it that adds to the water's qualification of 'river'."

"And that would be?" the stallion asked smugly.

"A riverside." He walked up and down the stage. "All you did is walk on the riverside then jump at the spot you want to reach, and there you go. It's done. You go with the current." The traveler smiled sarcastically. "You didn't go against anything and followed the basic flow of time."

"But...the water still moves forward."

"Yes, but the water is not time itself. It is the flow of time. Additionally, the river bed would represent certain points of time. This is also part of why and how I'm easily capable of traveling through time."

"Would you teach us, then?" Twilight asked.

The traveler and the emaciated robot looked at each other for a moment but did not respond. The metal plates retracted from their positions and returned to the robot, causing the distortion to revert. The ponies yelled loudly when they hit each other due to the room shrinking.

"I'd rather share the mathematics and start introducing advanced technology to these ponies before delving into the complex functions of time and space." He scowled. "And yet...I find myself growing angry at the lack of knowledge I am imparting, but that is for the best. The plans must continue unimpeded."
> The first step
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

A loud, deafening hum terrified everypony in the auditorium, but without knowing the source, they could do nothing. Luna turned to Twilight and whispered to her.

"Did you call upon the other elements?"

"Yes. They'll be here shortly," Twilight whispered back.

"Hey boss, look what I found," a female voice shouted.

It was the mare robot that hated Celestia. She was carrying the other five elements, all knocked out, in a bag. She tossed them haphazardly at the feet of the cephalopony without a care. Twilight gasped and rushed to them.

The robot mare chuckled. "I caught them all, the weirdos," she congratulated herself. 

The traveler raised two eyebrows. "Did you kill them?"

"Did you want me to?" she asked with a hint of bloodthirst. "I can always resolve that issue." She smiled and looked down at her 'hooves'.

"Shut up, Scleretin" the visitor growled. "Your 'humor' is unpleasant."

Scleretin shrugged and stepped away from the mares, leaving the cephalopony to approach the unconscious mares and pull something out from his tentacles. Twilight jumped in front to protect them from further harm, however.

"Do be aware, Twilight Sparkle, that if I were really here to kill you, I would have done so easily seconds prior."

"But you hurt my friends! What else are you going to do to them?!"

"I did not hurt them." He turned and pointed to the robot mare that cared little for her actions. "She did. They have free will. I only give them orders, and this was not one of them." He crushed whatever was between three tentacles, creating a crackling sound not too dissimilar from crackers being turned into a fine dust. "If you do not let me to your friends, they're unlikely to awaken unhindered." He glared at Scleretin. "She has a way of almost killing everyone."

"That doesn't reassure me," Twilight replied.

The traveler shrugged. "That is why I always carry some medical supplies on myself at any given moment, and waiting here to discuss the validity of my actions will see your friends delve deeper and deeper into this 'coma'."

The lavender unicorn reluctantly stepped back, leaving the cephalopony to spread the medication on the ponies. It resembled a cloud of sand that filtered through their pores, and seconds after the medication was used, the mares bounced up, terrified and unaware of their location.

"What's going on?! Where are we?" Rainbow Dash sputtered as she darted in every direction.

"Rainbow, RAINBOW!" Twilight shouted. "It's okay. You're in Canterlot. With the princesses and I."

Rarity rubbed the back of her head and groaned in pain. "How did we end up here?"

"That would be the work of my companion," the traveler said.

Rarity looked towards the source of the voice, and her face gradually became gray in fear and fill with terror. She yelped and hopped behind Twilight, terrified of what she was seeing, clearly unaware of the crowd watching them all.

"Wh-what is that?!" she stuttered.

The traveler turned to face the crowd and continued his presentations. "Your technology and your magic are disjointed. As such, I have prepared basic technological levels that will use your magical proficiency as a way to train you in using both for your needed purposes. They are still easily used by non-unicorns, but I shall have the experiment first conducted in the city of Canterlot." A wooden frame holding copper-colored pipes snaking around it appeared out of thin air right next to him. "The start will be plumbing: The cornerstone of society in many cases." He walked to the side and tapped his hooves on the ground. "And when you've understood how the basic functions of self-cleaning pipes work, then we'll get to the interesting stuff."

"Twilight? What's going on?" Rarity asked.

Pinkie bounced into view. "I don't remember what happened, just that that metal meanie over there attacked us when we got here."

Scleretin waved a hoof and smiled mischievously at the mares. Her bizarre demeanor made Fluttershy cower and Applejack wretch.

Celestia stepped between the robopony and the elements, visibly annoying the metal mare. 

"She's a bad pony," Celestia started. "I would keep my distance from her since I think our guest has a very long leash on her."

The traveler stopped speaking and, in the same second, spun towards Celestia. His tentacles pushed something on his neck, and a bright light illuminated that dimly lit chamber. It was accompanied by the screams of pain of Scleretin. The nearest ponies backed away at the sight of the robopony writhing in agony on the floor while white lightning raced through her body and the nearby wood. The cephalopony casually strolled up to his companion. 

"S...Stop this...pleeeease!" Scleretin begged.

"Why should I?" the traveler asked. "You constantly disobey me when you're the one who asked to come with me. I told you all that you were free to accompany me during my one goal, and I gave you immortal bodies to do so." He scratched his beak-shaped muzzle. "You asked me for this, so why do you still try to kill everyone? You tried killing Celestia just now."

"What?!" the princess screeched.

"Yes. And nopony here noticed, because she's a crafty being," the traveler huffed. "So what will it be? This is the second time I've had to tell you to stop. Will you stop trying to kill everyone?"

Scleretin bared her teeth and glared at Celestia. The princess did not falter, but she never saw eyes fill with such hatred and malice. There was such rage in them. What exactly had her 'counterpart' done in her timeline that made this mare detest Celestia with such vigor.

"Not...her..."

The traveler shrugged. "Then you will die, your goals unfulfilled and your soul full of regret and doubt. I don't care."

The huge robopony put a hoof on the traveler and looked at the cephalopony with sadness. The traveler clicked his muzzle a few times and turned the device off, freeing the robomare.

"Go to Chinch'k Kuchuk. Now," the traveler threatened.

The mare struggled to get to her feet, slapping the helping hoof of the large pony away, making him whimper in the process. Scleretin limped away whilst cursing under her breath. Celestia couldn't help but feel some pity for the sad state her would-be assassin was in. While she was grateful that the traveler stopped her, she was also unsure of how to feel due to her not having all the pieces of this puzzle.

"What in Equestria was that?" one of the crowd asked.

"A demonstration that my companions are on a very short leash for things like this." The Cephalopony returned to his pipes. "This also is just to show you that I'm very observant of things, as is my job. I don't have five eyes just for show." He cracked his neck and resumed his demonstration.

"That was...awful..." Fluttershy whimpered.

"Ah gotta say that ah wasn't expectin' that either. But...just who is he?" Applejack asked.

The princesses explained the situation to the five mares, surprising them. 

"Applejack!" the traveler shouted. "You'll be part of the experiment for the agricultural process. You'll have 'Stairway Farms'."

"What."

"I'll show you later."

"How'd he know mah name?"

"I told you, Applejack. He's from another timeline."

"Ah gotta say, Twilight, that ah don't understand this fanceh science talk. Ya know ah was never that good with that kinda stuff."

"I'll explain to you when he's done with his presentations, like that I can make comparisons without interrupting or being interrupted."

"His plumbing is surprisingly simple yet complex for what it shows," Luna commented.

Celestia raised a brow and smirked. "Finding interest in what he has?" She put a hoof to her chin. "Perhaps having one of us with him at all times would allow us to properly determine what his true intentions are."

"But I thought he already mentioned them," Twilight said.

Luna looked at Twilight as though she were a naive filly. "Somepony with such power always has an ulterior motive. The stupid or impatient ones throw it around and get destroyed because they look down on anyone that isn't at their level, making it easy for them to be cast down." She looked back at the cephalopony explaining the interior of the pipes and the magic that is used within. "It's the crafty ones that remain passive and don't attack immediately that are the dangerous ones." The princess narrowed her eyes. "He probably wants to use his position of knowledge as a way to take over Equestria in our stead in a way that looks passive and normal."

Celestia stared at her sister with a baffled expression. "What ARE you talking about?" she asked.

"You'll see," Luna insisted.

A commotion happening next to the ponies led them to view what was irritating their eyes, and they realized that it was Pinkie and the giant ball of a robot pony who were doing a bunch of strange twirls, hoofbumps over and under, bizarre leg motions that went from simple bends to twisting up and down to crossing each other's forelegs together and sticking a hoof in their mouth. Pinkie was picked up and placed on the round pony's back

"Hey, he's a Pie, too!" Pinkie blurted out joyfully.

"Um, I'm not a 'he'?" The pony stated in a formal manner. He placed a hoof on his prominent chest. "I identify as a grape, because I'm plump, round, and juicy."

There was a long pause before the two burst out in laughter.

"I don't get it..." Rainbow sighed.
> The farmer's toil
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Everypony in the sloped, white cobbled streets of Canterlot shied away or fled from the metallic creature walking through the streets. Its 'elevator' hooves made it a confusing sight, as did its eyes. Anyone that got to close could see the microscopic pupils looking randomly in different directions, causing a plethora of disgust and fear. Every step creating a resounding 'tink' noise, and some of the more aggressive folk threw nasty looks or rocks at the metallic being, yet it did not react. It was looking all around, metaphorical sparkles in its eyes and a smile on its lips.

"I haven't seen this kind of life in millennia," he thought aloud. "It's so intricate." He placed his hooves upon a textile shop's outer brick wall. "And so well polished. What kind of artistic sculptry have they made here?" he mused joyfully.

His enjoyment was briefly interrupted by a familiar, grating female voice. "Chinch'k!" the voice cried out. "Boss Guy told me to go to you." She stomped down the descending hill and pushed away one of the rock throwers against a wall. "What are you doing?"

Chinch'k watched the aggressive behavior and shook his head. "Enjoying the artistic architecture of this city." He tapped the cobblestone road beneath his hoof and looked up to his comrade with a childlike sense of wonder. "Look! It's white! And it's extremely polished!" He looked back down and scraped it with his sharp hooves. "How does it remain smooth after such use? I don't sense any magic coming from it."

Scleretin rolled her eyes. "Yeah, and it's not covered in ash and soot." She looked to the horizon. "And I don't see giant warmachines of the Essence Conglomerate, the Sun Striders, or the Cracked Aristocracy stomping about, shooting each other down."

Chinch'k's mandibles twittered. "Is that a smile I see on your face?" he teased.

"No," Scleretin replied aggressively. "I just find comfort in a place where infighting isn't a common, every day thing."

"Soothing, isn't it?" 

"Maybe..." The metal mare looked around and gritted her teeth. "What do we do about them?"

Chinch'k tilted his head and wiggled his mandibles. "What do you mean? We do nothing. That's what he said. Only self-defense."

"Tch." The mare wiped her mouth as though she drooled. "Fine. I don't want to deal with these softies anymore anyways." She sat on her haunches and wringed her hooves menacingly. "I just want to find a way to kill this Celestia." She snickered evily to herself but was stopped by a painful slap on the back of her head, causing her to faceplant into the ground and scare the other ponies around.

"None of that, Scleretin." Chinch'k clicked. "Now I know why he sent you away." He scratched the back of his head, created a painful screeching as his 'hoof' dragged along the metallic surface. "Let's go in there!" he shouted. The pony was pointed to a store selling tiny wooden statues. "I want to see this timeline's version of sculptures."

Scleretin stared at him, her mouth agape and eyes squinted. "Are you supposed to watch me or I you?" she asked.

"YES!" The stallion ran off to the store, scaring the ponies in his way.

The Weary Traveler stood outside the city of Canterlot alongside a contingent of royal guards, the alicorn sisters, and the elements of harmony, and Spike. He was throwing a flat, circular apparatus in the air and catching it with his tentacles in a rhythmic fashion.

"Orange farm pony," the traveler called out.

"Mah name's Applejack," the mare corrected. She bore a scorned expression and didn't hesitate to poke and prod the traveler in the chest. "Ah'd appreciate ya being a bit more polite. You may have 'em all scared, but y'all ain't got me bothered nohow!" she announced loudly to the stallion.

The visitor displayed no changes in either physical behavior or facial. "Noted." He stared Applejack directly into her eyes and casually tossed his apparatus on the floor. "This is why I called you, farm pony," he emphasized.

"Ah TOLD you, ah--Wow." 

The mare started off angry, but her mood, while not changed towards the traveler, became drastically different. Twelve 'floors' of six domes on each appeared in front of everypony present. The domes were each spread out further than those below them, and each were separated more and more, creating gradually massive gaps between each dome. Everything was held up by large poles attached to what could be considered a facsimile of a clawed hand. Each pole also changes shape and form to adapt to the distance and angle needed.

Spike hesitantly approached the objects and passed a claw through them. With his worries subsided, he jumped through them several times and scratched his head in confusion. "What is this? It looks like what Princess Celestia would use to--"

"Yes yes. I'm aware of the magic of shapes," the traveler dismissed. "This is a hologram: A projection of light created by hundreds of microscopic bulbs emitting beams impacting each other in the air, creating intangible shapes."

"And what exacting is this s'posed ta be?" Applejack asked. Skepticism in her voice.

"A layered farm."

"A what?"

"It's a more...advanced stage." The traveler lifted the device and worked on a small screen along its rim, changing the display to only three floors. "It's a way to maximize farming efficiency for a surface. It was usually used within space stations in orbit for newly formed colony worlds." He looked to the side and hummed to himself. "Although that was a three dimensional environment. The spacing needed for this could be a problem, but, experimentation is the key to all progress."

Applejack looked at the display, her face distorting with every detail she found and deconstructed. "Judgin' by the form of the domes, ah reckon they're protected by some kinda shield, right?"

The traveler nodded. "A glass dome. Yes." He intercepted the farm pony's question with a quick answer. "Yes. They can retracted into the bowl itself. All per the farmer's discretion, of course."

"Ah see. And uh..." Applejack carried a dour, snarky expression. "How're we s'posed to replenish the soil? It ain't gon' turn itself over nor is it gonna get nitrogen levels balanced out, among other things."

The traveler snorted. "Like I said." He approached the mare and flicked dirt off her shoulder with his tentacle. "Everything is done at the discretion of the farmer." He started to slowly walk around the holographic display. "The farmers can use classic methods of hard work, use mainly the tech built into this, or both. The possibilities are..." He tilted his head briefly. "Well, not endless, but there are many."

Celestia was questionable about the whole thing and approached the stallion. Before she could speak, Luna butted in, surprising the alicorn and throwing her off-balance. "And what about the costs of such a thing? The infrastructure maintenance? How does one travel in it? It looks like it was made for pegasi." She narrowed her gaze at the stallion, as if interrogating him at a tribunal, all whilst clinging to her sister's legs. 

"First prototype will be of astronomical costs, but I am here to supervise and reduce those costs by the same adjective. The maintenance will be performed by parties that have followed engineering studies in this field, creating additional jobs and future geniuses that will innovate in their field." He scratched his cheek with a tentacle before resuming, using another tentacle to point at the base of the structure and slowly follow up the poles to a dome. "These are not just structural holders, but also tunnels to transport both ponies and materials."

Luna scrunched her lip up. "I'm impressed," she said. "You thought of everything." 

"Considering I'm not the one who invented them and merely improved upon the design, I suppose so."

Celestia was quite surprised at Luna's boldness and let it go on unhindered, both curious and glad at this sudden change in her usual, shy behavior. Unfortunately, where talk of tech and farming came as an interest to the local parties, it went unnoticed by the more...extravagant of pony society. Within what appeared as a humble house of Canterlot...well, as humble as one could get in the city of royalty, were seated several high-ranking nobles; Specifically those usually directly involved in royal affairs. The simple, clay-red stone exterior came as a massive contrast to the deep sea blue velvet carpets and table covers used as a decoration for the nobility to demonstrate their wealth.

Several bits of furniture, from exaggeratedly decorated shelves whose carvings depicted entire stories, to antique ovens and sowing machines and years long past, garnished the large room lit only by a single brazier dangling above the large table. The windows had been closed off by curtains and what used to be a place for nobility to share tales of their 'mundane' lives and show off their wealth had become a dark, depressing mire. Currently, only four ponies were present; each slumped in different postures.

One was an elderly figure, the color having long since left their mane and coat, but their overcoat, being a deep and vibrant orange, compensated for this. Their muzzle was crooked towards the left and their mane was a scraggly mess worsened still by a hoof resting within its confines. 

"What do we do? This threatens the balance of everything," they spoke in a crackled and hushed tone.

A second one spoke up. His voice was just as meek and depressing as their comrade, and their eyes -One blue and the other yellow- had no sparkle or life to them. They wore no overcoat, keeping to their natural sea-green coat and pine-green mane. "I...No idea. I have nothing."

"You have nothing? You always came up with ideas to keep us afloat and prevent the lesser ponies from climbing the echelon of status!" the stallion complained. "Where's the world coming to if Caramel Corn can't come up with a tricky plan.

A third twirled a spoon in their now-cold cup of tea. They had a large, handlebar mustache adorning their lips, with a black coat contrasting poorly with their pale, fog blue coat and gray mane. "I don't even have the energy to use my magic...We were on our way to loosening the grip the princesses had on the decisions we took administratively in the country..." The stallion swiped their cup to the side angrily, shattering it to pieces and splashing the contents all over the walls and carpet. "And then that THING comes out of nowhere to ruin it all, providing so much power to the princesses that we have no way of retaliating!" They dropped their head back on the table with a painful thud, the growing pain gradually reaching their face and causing them to turn their face inwards and groan inaudibly.

The fourth, finally coming into play, rolled their eyes. They were also graying but hints of a shade of purple in their coat and streaks of yellow in their mane could still be made out. They were slouched backwards in their chair, very different from the other three, and displaying their lack of their left foreleg. "Burnberry, your anger just gave me an idea. " Their face turned to one of concern and disgust when they watched him writhe a little more. "Also, you're no longer that massive stallion that could destroy everything in his anger. Please remember and stop hurting yourself."

Caramel chuckled at his colleague's pain and leaned in. "Listen to Wind Harp. He knows what he's talking about. You're not spry anymore."

Burnberry rotated his head and glared at Corn. "Shut up," he growled.

"So what's your plan, Wind?" the first stallion asked. 

"Well," Harp started. "This is a situation that we cannot confront directly. Instead of trying to fight them frontally, which we can't, we need to go around the sisters and attack their new source of power directly!" The stallion tapped the table.

The three others looked at each other worryingly.

"You're not suggesting we try to kill that weird thing?" the first stallion asked.

Corn sighed and let his eyes roll upwards briefly. "No, Cliff Pipes. He's suggesting that we try to make allies with the...thing." He trailed off and had an uncontrollable, brief spasm of sickness. "Gross."

"Partially. If we want him to side with us, we need to make him think that we still support the princesses, but that we're the best thing for Equestria's future. That way, not only are we assured to have an important part and replace the princesses whilst leaving them as simple icons, but we'll become the richest stallions in Equestria after filing patents for everything the traveler makes!" Wind Harp's smile appeared sinister to the other three, what with his creased lips and slanted, jagged eyes.

"I don't think he'll like that," Burnberry commented. "And I'm worried he might already know what we're up to."

Corn leaned against a hoof and took a deep breath. "Well, if he did, he would have already come to us and dissuaded it, so we're still potentially in the clear." 

Cliff sat up and regained his composure. "Where should we start and how can I help forward the plan?"
> Sculptures are fun for bugs
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The giant, spherical metal pony wandered the 'lesser' roads of Canterlot where the middle-class lived. In contrast to the white buildings and streets above, these houses were made with more classic materials and colors while still being interconnected. Wood, brick, imitation thatch over tiled roofs. Everything was used to imitate the past of Equestria.

"Or are these actually houses being maintained in this construction state?" the metal pony wondered.

His towering stature would have made him as terrifying as the other two, but his appearing like a ball brought more confusion as to how to feel about his presence. He bounced around the streets, a smile on his face, until he happened upon several young foals playing ball in the streets. Some ponies around were sharing tales, some over a pipe smoke, but everything stopped when the giant came down to the foals playing and smiled. There was a long pause while everyone present tried to evaluate the situation. 

Some twitched forward, in an attempt to try and grab the foals, but what if sudden moves would bring about the ire of the newcomer? Was it wise to judge based on appearance alone? Even the foals didn't know how to react, until a very tiny colt stumbled forward, his hooves barely the size of the round pony's ear.

"Hello?" it squeaked with a high pitched voice.

"Hello, teeny tiny pony," the metal pony responded.

"Do you want to play?" the colt asked.

"I'd love to!" The stallion stood up but became confused. "I don't know how, though." He looked to the foals then smiled. "Will you show me how?"



Chinch'k Kuchuk hummed pensively whilst deeply observing the statues in front of him. The store was quite large, easily able to accommodate more than sixty ponies all at once and have sufficient space for movement. Several display cases lined along the walls and corners held tiny statues made from wood of various colors -Reds and browns mainly- with various levels of detailing upon their surfaces. Some were so minutely detailed as to have miniature bits of wood carved off to simulate fur as best as it could, while other pieces of wood had just been casually cut into vague shapes of whatever it was the sculptor wanted to represent. The owner, on the other hoof, was hiding behind the counter, their hooves and eyes being the only things still sticking above their hiding spot. 

Other, much larger and more elaborate works were laid on the floor as any bit of furniture would not have been enough to hold them up without consequence.

"What do you think this piece is, Scleretin? It reminds me of that one timeline where most things had become artistically representative close to the decay."

The mare was disillusioned with her whole day and weakly mumbled in response to her companion's commentary. "I don't care..."

"I can see a fountain there." Chinch'k leaned in closer with his eyes to the tiny sculpture and gasped in awe. "That's so small. How did they do this without the use of microscopes or precision technology? The magic used for a spell of this caliber would be immensely demanding and exhausting."

"Uh huh..." 

The metal mare waddled about the store like a drunkard, her body refusing to stay straight and stable. Her meandering eventually got her to stand in front of a massive sculpture of wood representing Celestia standing tall with wings outstretched while a cloud of dust floated below her, ponies of all 'castes' saluting her and her sister standing above her, albeit slightly smaller. Luna stood atop her sister's raised head as though it were a balcony, and atop her back was a pony-size moon whilst the sun floated gently above, letting its wooden rays upon the saluting ponies below. The wooden rays were accentuated by white gems whilst the sun and moon were represented by a cluster of yellow and white gems respectively.

"What have you found there?" Chinch'k chittered quizzically to his colleague. He followed her gaze and was taken aback by the sight. "This view. This detail. This hard work!" He chittered loudly in excitement. "The crown jewel of this collection!"  He climbed around it, taking in every detail while Scleretin stared at it wide-eyed.

Everything that Chinch'k was saying fell onto deaf ears, as a hissing noise grew in the mare's head the longer she stared at the statues. Over time, she started to twitch. The twitching turned into shaking, which became a violent vibration of her body. It didn't go unnoticed by the metal stallion who stared at her.

"Scleretin? Are you okay?"

The mare stretched into the elongated form she threatened Celestia with and started to tear away at the statue like a rabid beast. The owner of the store hid behind the counter and quivered in fear while the metal stallion covered himself with his forelegs. Wood splintered and screams resonated through the walls and spilled onto the streets, attracting the attention of passer-bys who weren't aware of whom had walked about the streets minutes prior. Chinch'k couldn't put a word in, as his comrade tore away at whatever the splinters touched and went rabid on other effigies of Celestia she could find. She eventually burst through the front of the store, throwing glass shards and broken stone onto the street and revealing her other form to the terrified populace.

There was a moment of silence while the mare breathed deeply and quickly. Said silence was broken by a piece of wood detaching from the bent support beams of metal hanging above the streets. It was the head of Celestia, and when she saw it, the mare flew into another rage and started pounding the street angrily, cracking the ground and causing some lifting of ground plating. The vibrations created were strong enough to cause anyone around and further away, to at least two blocks of distance, to lose their balance and fall. When she finally stopped, her body was steaming, both in rage and effort spent to destroy absolutely everything of Celestia that she could find.

Kuchuk, on the other hoof, looked on in horror at the devastation she had caused and could only yell in response. "WHAT DID YOU DO?!"

While the store was being destroyed by a metallic pony, tales of the saucer evaporating an adult dragon did not go unnoticed by nearby realms, namely the griffons, minotaurs, yaks, and the prench. Others were not yet privy to such information, but fears were starting to form within courts and homes. Too many variables were now available, and without more information, nothing could be removed or refined. The griffon king gnawed on his claws from jealousy and frustration, pacing about his room and mumbling wildly to himself while his court watched on, unable to stop him. The minotaurs, on the other hand, snorted anxiously. None of them had anything but neutral scruples about the ponies and enjoyed open trade and free migration between each other, but now...What were they to do? They responded by putting their military on high alert, for if they were the ones to receive such an item of technological or magic power, they would use it to conquer the lands that interest them. A ruler doesn't take unnecessary property, after all. The yaks, on the other hand, had no proper experience with this kind of instance and approached it the same way they approached the ponies: Loud and obnoxiously.
> No cause for alarm
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"What do you mean they haven't said anything yet?!" the griffin king screamed at the top of his lungs.

He jumped out of his nest and paced about anxiously and nervously gnawing on his claws. His room was too small and dirty to be a throne room. Not much was even present, save for a large opening in the wall where he could fly out into the cold mountain air outside. His clawed feet kicked straw and hay everywhere in the room while his advisors stood around, waiting for his 'tantrum' to end.

"We haven't received anything from the ponies about the giant circle floating above..." The griffin put a claw to their chin. "Canlot? Cantinelot? Cantore..."

"Canterlot," the second corrected.

The first snapped his 'fingers' and pointed to her. "That's it. Canterlot."

The king glared at them, his white feathers fluffing up sporadically. "What, was the place destroyed?" The two advisors shook their heads in response to the question. "Then what? I it blocking everyone there? Can no messages leave or enter?" The king stared at the two for a moment and narrowed his aqua green eyes. "Wh...What is-What is this? What are you doing?" He imitated the two's wing movements mockingly. "What are you doing with your wings? What is this? A shrug?"

The first tugged at his green feathers. "Well, there's nothing much else I can say. We haven't sent anyone there to check on the--OW!" 

The griffin king had plucked a small rock from his nets and threw it at the advisor. "THEN SEND SOMEONE, YOU DOLTS!" He pointed and ordered them. "Prepare the army, if you have to. I don't want ANY chances left to...uh...chance..." He dragged a claw across his face and avoided the gaze of the advisors. "I really should have thought that through. Detracts from the weight of the situation." There was a long pause before the advisors left the room, leaving the king to marinate within his self-made 'awkwardness'. "Well...I'm never going to live that one down," he said to himself with a smile.



Applejack was still looking over the multilayer farms, the traveler approached the princess and tilted his head slightly.

"The dragons are likely to declare war on me, and by proxy you," he specified. "after I evaporated that one adult." His tentacled fumbled about beneath the layers of its similars. 

"What?!" the present party screamed together.

"Yes. You'll have to defuse it or I'll have to be more thorough in my plans."

"More thorough how?" Rarity asked.

The traveler tapped the ground a few times with one of his hoofs. "Multiple possibilities. The first is that you successfully defuse the situation," he explained. The ponies nodded in agreement to it being the best course. "That's the path of less resistance."

Fluttershy chimed in. "Less? Don't you mean 'least'?"

"No. That's them not caring." He shrugged. "Other outcomes are a brief skirmish with the angered parties acting on their own."

"And the worst outcome is all out war," Celestia spoke somberly. 

"Yes, in which case I will destroy the dragons, and Equestria will assimilate whatever is left over into its citizenry."

"Wh-what?!" Twilight was shocked and stumbled upon her words, her mouth unable to formulate coherent sentences.

Celestia and Luna, however, were not pleased, and they showed it.

"That's quite a lot of weight you've put upon our shoulders," Luna said. "You've brought more than 'gifts'," she spat.

"Yes," the traveler answered plainly. "Sure."

Luna was taken aback, disgusted by the pony's casual attitude to the situation. "How can you act so CASUALLY to such a thing? Saying that you're going to destroy an entire people?"

The traveler's eyes locked onto Luna's face, disturbing her momentarily. "Because I work for the betterment of ponykind and anyone who wants to follow us."

"But you speak like killing thousands is no big deal!"

Celestia stepped forward, head held high. "I agree with my sister. This is not just some 'game' and--"

"Of course it's not!" the traveler interjected angrily. His sudden change in tone surprised the sisters. It was more agressive, but not outright angry.

"Then why do you act like so many deaths mean nothing?!" the white alicorn shouted. "Please! Explain to us so we can understand. We don't want to have a fight with you AND with others!"

The cephalopony cackled. "I have the blood of trillions on my hooves. Maybe quadrillions" He pointed accusingly at everyone present. "Can YOU say the same?" He pointed to Fluttershy. "YOU, who cares for animals. There are always those who slip through the cracks that you cannot save, and they perish."

The mare's eyes started to water in response, and Rainbow Dash hopped in to console her. "That's REALLY mean!" she stated. "I don't think you want to sta--"

"And yet, through their deaths, you've learned how to protect the others from the same fate. The one death, although tragic, has helped save hundreds afterwards, no?" he added.

"I..." Fluttershy wiped her eyes and make a nasty gurgling snort. "It's true. Even though I haven't saved quite a few of my friends, I learned what they had and have saved more afterwards."

Rainbow looked at her friend with a pity face."Fluttershy..." she spoke softly.

"I've killed many. I've seen many get killed, and every time I learn a little more about how to approach a situation." He scratched his head with a hoof. "That's why I took a 'restraint' amplifier ring and improved upon it." He fumbled about his tentacles and pulled out a small silver ring with red and green stripes bursting through the surface. "I would have had it teleported from my ship, but I took with me before we went to the auditorium." He turned and looked to the ponies. "Any unicorn or alicorn want to try this? Preferably one who knows restraint magic?"

"I'll try," Twilight suggested. "But how do I wear it?"

"Twilight, are you sure?" Rarity protested. "We still don't know of his intentions!"

"Well...with this, we'll know if he means us direct harm." Twilight stood in place, letting the cephalopony wrap the rings around her horn and cause her some minor discomfort. She squinted and inhaled deeply through her teeth.

"Are you okay, Twilight?" Celestia asked.

Twilight nodded and relaxed her body. "Yeah. It's just...It felt weird, like I ate seven lemons all at once."

Pinkie gasped. "The ultimate sour challenge!" she whispered below her breath.

The traveler stepped to the side and looked to the sisters. "Can you two wrap yourselves in a bubble of magic?"

"Should we interweave them?" Luna asked.

The traveler shook his head. "This is a simpler version of the ring, and the enhancement will not work if you interweave your magic."

"Can it face us if we put all our magic strength in the bubbles?" Celestia queried. 

"No."

"...Very well then."

The two sisters flew a few feet off the ground and, with a gentle shine from their horns, wrapped themselves in a bubble of either blue or white.

The traveler stretched out his hoof in response. "Go ahead, Twilight Sparkle. Give it a try. Chain them, or constrict them, or use any other movement impairing spells you can think of."

"But...I don't want to hurt them," Twilight whined.

"Twilight Sparkle," Luna spoke with a commanding tone. "You will not hurt us. Now cast the spell."

"But I--"

"CAST IT!"

"OKAY! No need to yell."

The lavender alicorn's horn glowed with a bright light that, once reaching the ring, exploded into a blinding flash of light. Massive chains came into existence and wrapped around the orbs and rooting themselves deep into the ground. The bubbles were straining under the pressure cast by the spell until they eventually ceded, wrapped the alicorn sisters into a cocoon-like state, and pinned them to the ground.

"Woah," Rarity noted. "That was...stupendous." She bolted to the cephalopony, glitter in her eyes. "Do you have anything that improves fashion making?"

"Yes."

Rarity's face was almost engulfed by a smile, and she slowly backed away, leaving the traveler to walk towards Twilight and remove the ring during its usage and break the magic. 

Twilight squeaked in surprise at the sudden loss of strength in her spell. "Ow." She massaged her horn. "That was...wow. Where did the magic come from?"

"It's your magic, and that of the world around," the traveler explained.

Dusting herself off, Celestia rejoined the group filled with her own questions. "But wouldn't that drain the world of magic?"

Before the traveler could answer, Twilight practically threw herself to her teacher's hooves. "I'm so sorry about that, Princess! I didn't mean to!"

There was a brief moment where Twilight went on a tangent, trying to apologize and justify her apology while Celestia tried to interrupt her until Celestia finally raised her voice high enough for the panicking pony to notice.

"Are you done stressing out, Twilight Sparkle?" the traveler asked.

"Y-yes..." The mare smiled sheepishly and rubbed her foreleg, her face red from embarrassment.

"I don't even remember where I was...Oh right." The cephalopony waved a hoof in the air slowly and had his tentacles follow with different patterns. "Magic is something inherent to this world, although there were Equestrias where magic didn't exist. They used..." He glared at the three alicorns then blinked his five eyes. "Something else."

"I take it we don't want ta know what that 'other' thing is," Applejack said.

"Lost interest in the model?"

The mare shook her head. "Ah seen it plenty 'nough. Now how about explainin' more?" She gestured to the cephalopony to hurry along.

"Well, the world has magic inherent to it, and ponies, specifically unicorns, can take that magic in and change it into their own form of it." He pointed to the alicorns. "And alicorns have the largest 'containers' of magic and the strongest converters amongst ponykind."

"And that's why we can't use too much magic before the world replenishes itself," Twilight interjected.

"Wrong," the traveler quipped.

"What? That's how magic has always worked," Celestia explained. "We've never had any...new discoveries."

"Because you always looked without rather than within." The group looked at their own bodies then at each other, confusion still abound. The traveler sighed. "Our bodies produce magic naturally. When we take in magic from the outside, it's because our own bodies have a depletion in magic and need quick replenishment, but when you use spells, the magic is sent back out replenishing the natural balance and ADDING to it. Thus, ensuring that future generations have enough to survive on."

"Like breathing!" Twilight shouted joyfully. "M-minus the last part."

"Yes. This is the principal that this ring works on, along with compression, but that's tech that I need to teach." He looked at the ring and smiled. "The ring pulls in magic from the surrounding area, adds to its circuits through compression, then only activates when the natural magic of a unicorn's horn becomes active during spell casting. It then boosts the magic by adding its compressed magic into the horn and amplifying the spells." He frowned and tucked the ring back into his tentacles. "Although, it does have a certain strain on the user..." He shrugged then resumed speaking. "There's much more than just this ring, and with it, you could control the dragons if they declare war on you."
> New tech
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"While it is quite early, I'll need to make use of your railway system," the traveler said.

"What for?" Celestia asked.

"To upgrade your travel speeds." He scoffed at the idea. "One could say speed starts the process of spoiling a society."

"What?" Rainbow rushed in front of the cephalopony with a scowl on her face. "Speed is awesome! It's the best thing ever!"

"Yes, but ponies will want to get somewhere faster and faster until instant transportation becomes possible," the traveler retorted.

Rainbow rolled her eyes in response. The walk back to Canterlot from the far, hilly areas was an uneventful. That is, until a pegasus royal guard came rushing in and skid along the ground on his landing. His momentum would have led him to impact into the traveler had he not casually stepped aside, leaving the stallion to slam into Celestia's broad chest and hurt himself.

Celestia leaned down. "Are you okay?" she worried.

"Y-yes. I came here as fast as I could," the guard stuttered.

"Why? What's wrong?" Luna asked. "You rushing all the way over here means that there's an important issue at hoof." She scowled. "Unless..."

The guard partially shielded himself with a foreleg. "Y-yes." He jumped to his hooves and saluted the princesses. "One of the metal ponies is tearing up the second artisanal district in upper-Canterlot."

Traveler's apathetic expression quickly brightened in full fury. "WHAT?!" he shouted.

"Th-th--"

"Did it stretch out, becoming a spindly creature." He leaned in closer to the stallion's panicking face.

"Y-yes. There's another trying to control her or fight her. I'm not sure."

Traveler rushed off, cursing under his breath and inciting surprise from those present.

"Wow. He showed emotions," Rarity noted.

"This is no time for joking," Applejack scolded. "We need to rush to the city 'n see what we can do."

The group followed after her, eventually coming in proximity to the outskirts of Canterlot and the smoke billowing from behind the horizon of homes and buildings. The traveler cursed under his breath and turned to face the group.

"She's gone berserk again, but I have a solution. Prevent as much damage as possible while I get the 'restraint'," he rushed.

The cephalopony pulled a rectangular pad from his tentacles and started working on it while rushing to the streets, quickly followed by the others. They skid to a halt in front of a long trail of buildings that had collapsed, shards and pieces of wagons, tables, and other other wooden furniture were embedded into the street and somewhat intact walls all around. Several ponies -wounded or not- were cowering behind the debris whilst a tall, spindly creature was fighting against Chinch'k wearing a wooden pendant displaying Celestia's face. 

The creature's legs were long and thin yet accentuated by metal plates hanging over the joints and two plates on the hooves, giving an impression of having two toes. The tail was now a whip with the fibers wrapped around the central rod and lashing about at the surroundings in frustration. The body, just like the legs, had stretched and separated as well, creating a multi-jointed central form with separate, almost hollow sheets of bent metal moving from side to side like a centipede.

"What in tarnation is that?!" Applejack shouted.

Celestia narrowed her eyes and glared at the creature's back. "Where are my guards?"

Fluttershy looked around in response and frowned. "I can't see anypony, princess. Oh, we can't leave them all there," she worried.

"You're right," Celestia agreed with a nod. "I need you t--"

Twilight interrupted Celestia and bounced in front of her, surprising the alicorn. "Rainbow Dash. I need you and Fluttershy to get the wounded out of here as fast as you can." She pointed to Applejack and Rarity. "Rarity, you and Applejack need to get rid of heavy debris on anypony and lay them out for Rainbow and Fluttershy to grab." She then turned to Pinkie and took a deep breath. "Pinkie, I need you to set up a camp at the corner of the street using whatever cloths you can find." She looked to everypony and nodded. "The princesses and I will try to contain that...thing until the traveler gets the restraints he spoke of." The mare snorted angrily. "Let's do this!"

The group broke and bolted towards their respective goals, leaving Celestia speechless. 

Luna stepped forward, a smirk on her face and a brow raised. "Looks like the student has learned quite a bit from the teacher." She pointed at Twilight and covered her mouth with a hoof. "She's taking the reigns now." The alicorn chuckled.

The white alicorn couldn't find a complex response. She only muster up a few words. "So she is..." she noted despondently.

"Princesses, come on!" Twilight called out. "I need your help."

The three rushed forward towards the battle scene and created outward pointing shields of magic in order to slam into the creature and send it flying into a building just a few feet away. Chinch'k had shielded his face from the potential impact he could have taken, but upon seeing the carnage and then those perpetrated, he became furious.

"You idiots!" he berated them. "Why did you bring her?!" He pointed to Celestia.

"Celestia!" the metal mare screeched.

An elongated arm reached out from the shadows and slammed around a bubble of magic the white alicorn created at the last second. Tendrils grew out of what would be a hoof and were, for lack of a better term, 'claws'. Twilight and Luna latched onto the offending foreleg with their magic and pulled the leg off of Celestia...At least, they would have. The leg wouldn't budge. Instead, Scleretin waved her foreleg as much as possible to shake the two mares off of her.

"Gh! What is with this thing?!" Luna yelled behind clenched teeth.

"I've got it ready!" the traveler yelled.

A loud humming reached everypony's ears, bringing them great discomfort. The source came, as with most strange noises nowadays, from the saucer flying overhead, but it was now rotating slightly towards its left rather than just float in place.

"What's happening?" Fluttershy wondered.

A loud clank came from the craft, followed by silence, followed by whistling growing louder the closer it came. A massive, black, metal object crashed into several buildings and would have blown the alicorns away had they not had the wing strength to resist the strong gusts of wind and dust. The traveler stepped forward and gestured the alicorns to move to him, although they didn't obey. The traveler could do nothing about it, so he conceded and proceeded with his plan, using a broken, elevated support pillar of wood to get some extra height.

"Scleretin!" he hissed. "I knew I shouldn't have trusted you to come with me to Celestia."

"She started everything!" the metal mare yelled in response from her dark hideout. "She started the wars! All because her ego couldn't take sharing!"

Celestia was taken aback. "Wars? I would never--!"

She stopped when she saw the traveler raise a foreleg.

"This is not your world, Scleretin. This isn't THAT Celestia," he specified. "You never had these issues in a few of the timelines we went to before this one!" He gestured to Celestia with a foreleg. "Why are you doing that here?"

Scleretin stepped out of her shadows, showing her face to be stretched as well, revealing to Celestia weary and battered eyes and metal plates moving around the muzzle every time the metal mare spoke.

"She's just like her!"

With those words, the metal mare charged back at Celestia, prompting Chinch'k to jump forward, hook himself into the floor with his 'hooves' and swing around, tripping the mare into the floor. The traveler, on the other hoof, shook his head in disappointment and pressed a few buttons on his controller. The metal object that came from the saucer opened up, spewing compressed steam in all directions. 

Its form expanded and it grew taller, the creaking of gears and pistons unveiling a tall, bipedal, faceless machine. Its legs were long and possessed inverted knees, all of which were covered in interconnected, black plates of metal. Its 'feet' were four spades of metal acting as anchors in any ground environment. Its arms stopped halfway to where its knees would be, and its hands were decorated by four claws glowing a pale orange in contrast to the black of the armor. The torso, on the other hand, was thin and disheveled, but beneath the seemingly transparent black plating glowed several strands of orange that would change appearance with every subsequent dimming. Its head was an elongated and flattened raindrop shape with the 'face' being a bigger and longer area, allowing for several, different colored optics to brighten up behind its armor. The machine's form was slouched and beast-like, and while Scleretin stood twice tall above Celestia in her elongated form, the machine stood two heads above her.

It grabbed Scleretin by the throat and slammed her back into the ground, making its torso glow bright and its entire arm to run with angular forms of orange into the metal mare. The metal pony screamed in pain and struggled against her aggressor, eventually getting the upper hand by twisting her hind leg and kicking it in the head. The mare slashed at the machine's armor while it was still stunned, but to no avail. She couldn't penetrate its armor.

"I improved its armor since the last time you went on a rampage," the traveler taunted.

The machine readjusted itself and stared at the metal mare, a low-pitched humming coming from its internal systems. Scleretin gave pause then proceeded to attack it. The machine's arm-plating rolled to its outer-arm and linked together into small shields that it used to deflect the strikes directed at it. After a few strikes, it started moving forward, inch by inch, adding pressure and stress to the mare. 

"Enough of this toying," the traveler said. "Knock her out and disable her expanded form," he ordered. 

The machine hummed loudly in response and deflected a strike by its opponent, following by a punch into her neck and pinning her against a building.

"Oh, and I removed the spacing between the metal. You can't seep in there either," the traveler mused.

He watched while the machine 'took over' Scleretin's systems despite her obvious pain and protests. The traveler didn't care.

"What are you doing to her?" Twilight panicked. 

The traveler snorted quickly in response. "Suppressing her system options and locking them until a time I can trust her."

"But she's in pain!"

"Yup," the cephalopony answered casually. He turned to Celestia and apologized. "I'll repair the damages done to your city, leaving the current architecture intact, of course." The screams went silent and the traveler saw the machine holding the mare in its hand. "Good. Return to the ship. She's grounded."

The machine nodded and flew upwards, creating a blue trail from its back and feet along its ascending path. 

"Not much draft," the traveler noted. He wiped himself of dust and nodded. "Silent propulsion seems to be working on a smaller scale."

There wasn't much time for him to congratulate himself due to Celestia angrily grabbing his shoulder with a hoof and spinning him around to face her eye-to-eye. "What was that?!" she growled through her teeth. "Why did she do that when she saw me?"

"Yeah. Sure. I'm alright too," Chinch'k complained in the background. He was digging himself out of some debris, which Rainbow Dash and Applejack helped him with.

The traveler frowned and looked to the side, but Celestia refused the behavior. "Answer me, or you'll see another failure on your hooves."

The traveler's eyes widened. "...She has an acute form of PTSD."

Celestia and the remaining ponies were taken aback. Celestia could barely muster a single word. "What?"

"She has PTSD, and a severe one." The stallion bobbed his head left and right. "I thought I had taken care of the problem since she didn't have this with a few previous timelines, but..."

"What kind of PTSD? What did I do to her?" Celestia spoke with an almost motherly tone, but the traveler felt nothing from it.

"The more common kind. War-related."

"That's not common..." Twilight protested.

Celestia looked down pensively. "She was a soldier? Was it a long war?"

"I don't feel comfortable sharing the precise details of this incident with you." He turned his back and walked away. "But imagine having your life engulfed by war on three fronts with no moments rest, where society is broken and positions of nobility and peasantry have no more meaning. Three societies with different aspects and three people vying for supremacy." He looked up to the sun and nodded. "It's time I retreat for the day. I have...many things to get to."
> The fat one
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Celestia stared at the swarms of metallic bots deconstructing the debris and reassembling the walls, roads, and destroyed personal items of some of the victims. She and Luna were growing increasingly concerned with the presence of this individual and they're technology. The metal stallion left after checking for any other victims, but Celestia was sure that she was forgetting something but wasn't sure what. The elements were taking care of rescue efforts and watching for any other victims in the area, leaving Celestia and Luna to ponder everything together.

"Where were the guards?" Luna wondered. "I still haven't found them."

Celestia scratched the side of her head. "I overheard one of the wounded ponies saying that they couldn't harm the psychotic one, and so they hid away."

Luna raised a brow. "It has been many cycles since you last used words as inelegant as 'psychotic'." She frowned and looked towards the castle far away. "But that is an unacceptable excuse. We'll have to discipline them when we return." She looked around. "Preferably after we're done with overseeing rescue efforts in this section."

Celestia heaved a sigh and looked up. "What are we supposed to do? I don't want him to stay if it means this will happen to my ponies."

"True," Luna agreed. "But he has proved that he has the technology to improve everypony's lives." She kicked a piece of rubble, attracting the attention of the clouds. The mare twirled her hoof around the machines and giggled to herself. "So much like a dream."

"But is the cost worth it? What about the ponies under our care?"

"Nopony was killed," Luna defended.

"But ponies were hurt." Celestia stared her sister in the eyes, and the emotions behind the eyes of both rulers was drastically different. "A tower built on a foundation of bones will crumble instantly."

Luna frowned. "Quoting the Dynasties of the East, are we?"

Celestia stuck her tongue out at her sister in a side of foalish behavior, and Luna responded in kind by doing the same.

"Plus, he's shown us that he has the technology for WARmachines," Celestia specified. "Until he gives us the agricultural technology he demonstrated, I just don't..."

She exhaled loudly through her nostrils, and while she had the need to continue talking, loud thumps against the floor put both her and Luna on guard.

"What is that? Another threat?" the moon princess shouted.

Their eyes darted left and right, trying to discern any movement not coming from the aforementioned elements. Instead, they saw a round figure rising from the down-riding street. 

"Oh." Celestia relaxed. "It's the ball pony from the auditorium."

Luna relaxed as well and scrunched her eyebrows. "What's he doing here? I thought they all returned to the ship."

He spotted the princesses and waved to them, followed by quickly rushing forward and sliding at their hooves. "Princesses!" he chimed. "I'm so glad to meet you again after so long!" He stood up and engulfed the two in massive hugs, nearly crushing them.

"But...You saw us...earlier..." Celestia struggled to speak with what oxygen was left in her lungs.

The ball dropped them and waved a hoof dismissively. "Meh. He doesn't like it when I'm friendly." He imitated the traveler in mockery, keeping to his dull demeanor and apathy. "He prefers that I stay 'professional' and keep my joys to the ship."

Luna gasped and grunted like she was just rescued from drowning. "That's quite the formidable grip..."

"Thank you!" the pony said in a high pitch. He looked at them and the surroundings and pouted. "You two don't look like you're having a good time," he noted with a muffled tone.

"Your 'master', or whatever you call him, is the reason!" Luna shouted.

The ball scratched his head, then his face went flat. "Oh. I suppose Scleretin went on a destruction spree again because she saw you?" He pointed to Celestia.

"Y-yes," the white mare responded.

The ball rolled his eyes and facehoofed. 

"I take it this isn't the first time?" Luna noted. "Well, I mean, he did have his 'counter-measure."

The stallion lowered his hoof, displaying his squinted eyes slowly looking to the sides with a nigh inaudible screech in their movement. "Riiiiight...That thing," he spat.

"What? What is it?" Luna prodded.

"Ehhhh...Forget it. I won't talk about it, but it looks like you're getting worried." He rolled back and forth on his rear before resuming. "Maybe I could...help with that? Only if you let me," he shied away.

Celestia was baffled and couldn't find the right words to start talking with the ball pony. "Well, why does he keep Scleretin if she's like that? That's an inCREDibly unstable pony," she emphasized.

The ball scratched his head. "I'm not sure, really, but I think it's because she has a tactical mind or something." He shrugged. "I never understood her rage towards you and, to a lesser extent..." He looked to Luna but said nothing. "Even so, the traveler accounted for that which is why he sent these nanobot clouds to repair the damages done." The metal pony huffed and tapped one of the newly rebuilt walls with a hoof. "Just don't be surprised if there's an abnormality in the walls. They..." He puffed up his mouth and nodded.

"Tactical mind, you said?" Luna queried. The stallion nodded. "This traveler sure carries a lot of dangerous things with him," she stated with an aggressive tone.

The stallion didn't pick up on it. "Well, I heard that his first few tries almost had him killed because he refused to carry any military equipment." He looked up at the saucer. "And then he got THAT thing."

"Wait...so it wasn't his ship?"

"Not at the start...maybe. I don't know." The stallion scrunched up his lower lip, engulfing his upper. "I'm the third addition to his crew."

"Really now? So you don't know much?"

"I do know a few things, and I know the names of the other two." He counted on his hoof as though he had fingers. "The angry one is Scleretin, and the one with the tall hooves is Chinch'k Kuchuk." He smiled.

"And what is your name?" Luna asked.

"Bolbo Bonnivar Benitan Bollvi Bollibar Bonbony Berriman Bahaumptshire Bel Bor Batistany Buful Bufulva Bafulvee Bolol Bolohl Benziu Bifeevel Bvhelk Bvoanhson Bokunvan Bastan -or just Bolbo Bastan- of the House of Bastan."

"That's...quite a mouthful," the white alicorn wheezed. She looked to her side to see smoke trailing from Luna's ears. "You're royalty?" Celestia noted.

The stallion shrugged. "Dunno. Used to be. We were usurped by another family and lost it all, but I was still a newborn when it happened, so I don't know much of that life." He tapped his bloated chest. "I just like the idea of family history." He leaned in next to Luna and whispered loudly in her ear. "I also like the more negative members. Gives some 'pzazz' to the tree."

Luna pulled her head back. She looked insulted. "And why would you say that to me?!"

The stallion shrugged. "I could've said that to your sister. It would've made no difference."

"...Why not?"

"Because it's just a sentence?" He scratched his head. "I don't understand."

"Before we continue, I'd like to understand something." Luna straightened herself out and stared the stallion in the face. "What was that thing you did in the auditorum? When you became emaciated?"

"Oh. That. My kind become round like this when we absorb too much magic. We can store a LOT of it!" he laughed. 

"More than us?" 

"Yes," he answered flatly. "It's not like we can use all of it at once unlike you...buuuuut that's what the traveler did. That's why I became that thin, floating noodle. Let's me break through dimensional walls, too. The things we threw around were just to stabilize the spell.""

The two sisters stared at the stallion who was taking such an ability as 'fun'. 

"That is a very impressive ability," Celestia noted. "I know! Plus it helps when we end up in timelines where magic doesn't exist or is in short supply." He put a hoof to his chest. "Mine was overflowing with it." His bragging became doubt in less than a second, and he put a hoof to his lip in thought. "Although that might be why we can absorb so much. Never did understand that," he mumbled to himself.

"Focus," Luna insisted.

"Huh?"

The mare dragged a hoof across her face. "So he's one of those kinds of ponies. Great. I'm curious as to what your world was like. I want us both to know-" She gestured to herself and her sister. "-who we're working with."

"Oh. Well. That's easy," he chuckled. "Being from a world overflowing with magic, we had many things that would seem fantastical to you, like large waterfalls flowing upwards, streams of water trickling down from almost nowhere, spirits and portals to 'spaces between' as we called them. Colorful crystals growing out and creating beautiful fields. Then you had the more twisted stuff, and then stuff even *I* found weird, like the floating islands." He looked back at the sisters then made a realization. "No. The world you saw was not mine. Mine is more colorful and varied." He frowned. "Well. Was. We didn't even make it to space. All the politics and royalty-type stuff lost us to the weird disappearance of magic."

"Now that's peculiar." Celestia hummed sarcastically. "I thought the traveler was supposed to help stop that."

"He did. We just learned to get magic elsewhere, and we found a world several centuries later just like ours." Bolbo smiled widely. "We found another sapient species there, too." He closed his eyes and reminisced. "We both loved singing and creativity. Those were fun times."

"Sounds like you wanted to go back to those times," Celestia lamented. "Couldn't you do that with time travel?"

"Yes, but what for?" He booped her on the muzzle. "When we reminisce of the past, we think of how we felt back then." He tapped the ground playfully. "You can't recreate that emotion. It was unique at the time, so why waste your time trying to repeat it when you can make new ones in the future which you could think about just as fondly?" He tilted his head slightly.

Luna nodded. "He makes a fair point."

"And I know that the traveler is...blunt, and dangerous, but if you've spent literal billions of years working up your plans, then failing, then having to start back from zero yet again, I'm pretty sure you would have grown livid again."

"I see...Tell me," Celestia started. "You said you were glad to see us again. How were we?"

"Oh, very exciting, you and your brothers and sisters."

"What," Luna blurted out flatly.

"Oh yeah. You had several siblings. Don't you have some here?" he asked.

"N...Not directly," Celestia stuttered.

"Huh. Sounds...strange for royalty."
> A first step
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Caramel sat upon a tweed chair, revising several of the documents and blueprints given to him by the traveler. The noble and his colleagues had decided to fund the whole construction of the prototype step-farm, but no pony really understood how it worked...or what most of the construction material was. Most things were easily recognized, like bolts and tethers, but others were...even if the traveler said this was 'primitive', most of the supervisors had scratched their heads through to their brains in confusion.

"How do we even build these things? Most of the parts for this thing..." The supervisor grabbed the blueprints and flipped them over. "I don't even know what this 'tendon' is for in the building."

A loud, stretched out bawl came from one of the beams of light emanating from the saucer. Several crates appeared underneath one along with several of metal poles. The parts were carted off by the minotaurs and earth ponies whilst others brought in raw materials like metal and resin and deposited them in another beam of light. The same sound occurred, but the event worked in reverse this time.

Caramel ignored the event, leaned against his chair, and took in the outside air. "I got this gig from him, and he put his trust into us, so we need to do it, if not for the betterment of Equestria. And to line my pockets with his tech." He snickered internally.

"We need to talk about security, though." The bulky mare looked around nervously, her bang swishing around in tandem. "There's some spies popping up around here."

"And there could be some more aggressive ponies and people coming to see everything or steal from us," a stallion interjected. He checked a laminated card glued onto his fur displaying his face and black bars, and frowned. "Why do we even need this?"

Caramel flattened out the blueprints back onto the table and grumbled in annoyance when he noticed that they weren't doing what he wanted them to. "I don't know why. The traveler didn't explain it when he took our pictures. As for the security," he turned towards the mare. "I had the foremen take care of that," he spoke with an angered tone. He pointed to the distance to ponies and minotaurs wearing orange suits over their torsos and speaking with the gigantic, orb-like metal pony.

The mare rubbed the back of her neck. "We can't even estimate the full cost and time it would take for this." Her eyes shot wider as she realized a misgiving. "I mean...the cost of basic materials, yes," she shrugged. "The rest, though..."

A loud, single, increasing tone blared from the saucer, its scream reaching across the countryside. Everyone stopped whatever they were doing from the great startle they received, but nothing else was happening, leaving them confused. 

"What was that?" one of the supervisors wondered.

Caramel leaned forward. "Why are the foremen standing around like they're going to attack that ball?"

Too fast for their eyes to adjust to; Several objects had been shot from the saucer and slammed into the ground at various areas of the construction site. Two had landed between the ball pony and the foremen, and unlike the other objects, these ones rose instantly from the ground. They were eight-legged robots with a central body shaped like a cylinder with hexagonal faces. The legs took the form of massive, wide shields with a sharp stilt pointing inwards at the the bottom serving as the foot. The legs themselves were attached to a rotary ring at the top of the central body. The shields were a shining silver in color whilst the stilts were a deep red. Patterns on the central body followed suit, but they were spinning along the body of the machine inexplicably. They made no true sense.

"What is that?!" a supervisor shouted. "The security?!"

The machines screeched loudly, then the red patterns on the silver body stopped to form six, dna-spirals that surrounded the ring of legs. The top of the cylinder opened up, and the heads of missiles poked up while six of the legs swung forward, creating a large shield while the other extended back to create a recoil-stopper

"That's enough!" Bolbo shouted to the machines. "The test is over. Verify the perimeter and scan the badges."

The minotaur, with his bulk, was the easiest to see relax from the machines realigning their legs and stomping away into the distance. The round pony dismissed the foremen and hurried over to Caramel, a smile on his face.

"There ya go. We got our Hex units to patrol the building site and help with lugging around heavy weights when needed."

The supervisors stared at Bolbo slackjawed. "They can do that?" the bulky mare asked.

The round pony nodded excitedly. "Their legs can position however they need them to, so they can use six for walking around and two for lifting and pulling." His body digitally imitated the aspect of sweating, and pupils shrunk while he retracted his lips. "Among other things..."

Caramel looked down at his chest then bounced in sudden realization. "What are these things for?" he asked. "I understand they're badges, but we know who is coming and going from the site."

"You do, but-" Bolbo pointed to the spider-robots. "they don't. The symbols on the badges dictate who can and can't enter, the id is for good measure. Not the best of security." He scratched the back of his neck. "But considering your current technology, I suppose it's good enough. Even if someone steals the badge their face won't match."

"Then what happens?" a supervisor asked.

The round pony's answer was bring his hoofs together to his face then slowly spread them apart whilst imitating the sound of an explosion.

Applejack, on the other hoof, was talking with the traveler on the outskirts of the worksite. "Ya see this? The top 'o the dome needs ta be able to angle 'tself 'bout five degrees more ta the south. It'll pool any stagnatin' water down the crevices of the soil to the dry parts underneath." The traveler nodded and wrote down the details on a holographic notepad. Applejack looked at him then down at the notepad and frowned. "Ah figured you'd already known about all this if ya did it before."

Traveler didn't remove his many eyes from the notepad as he calculated the implications of the mare's requirements into the design. "Every reality had its own needs and instructions for its plantlife." He erased a calculation and corrected it. "What the mung fruit tree needed to grow fully was a large deposit of sulfur in its soil, or else its fruits would grow into highly toxic bombs, so to speak," he explained casually.

"Mung...fruit? What was it like?" Applejack asked with intrigue.

"Much harder to grow and maintain than an apple tree, it seems. With your plants, good soil and fungal prevention, among other things, and it's good to go."

"Would we be able ta...grow 'em here?"

Two of the traveler's eyes looked up to meet the farm pony's, and he stopped his calculations. "I don't think there wouldn't be a reason not to try...I have much plantlife garnered from the Equestrian ecosystems I visited over my lifetime." He tapped his cheek with a tentacle. "If this project works under your guidelines, I might introduce these plants, but in a controlled environment."

"Anythin' ta know beforehoof on what ta expect?"

"Work you were never adapted to," the traveler explained. "You know your plantlife, but this one comes from other worlds and have different requirements befitting the title."

Applejack grinned and pulled down her hat. "Sounds like a challenge, and I do love a good challenge."

The traveler didn't react and added more to his virtual notebook. "I have an idea on the best position for the apple trees in one of the three pods, but I need your input." He pushed down on the top cylinder of metal, shutting down the screen and locking the two pieces together before hiding it within the mass of his head. "Care to follow?"

"Sure thing, but ah'm quite sure yer gonna be wrong 'bout where ya want them put," AJ stated. She was quite cocksure of herself. 

"If you say so," the traveler answered flatly.

AJ became disconcerted and clicked her tongue. "Ah know this is pryin', but just what happened to ya that yer so...apathetic to everythin'?"

The cephalopony's eyes darting in multiple different directions while he thought, and AJ would have run away screaming if she weren't used to him by now. She was still running in circles within her own mind, however.

"I already mentioned it before."

AJ nodded. "Yes, the million years thing, but ah figured there'd be more to it than that." She smirked. "Ah know a thing or two 'bout my family 'n friends, so ah know when somepony is really hurtin' inside."

"A very astute observation." There was a short pause. "One that doesn't apply to me."

"What?"

"Let us avoid the prying." The travelers tentacles were jittering and bobbing erratically on his head. "But if you want to know why, ask your Princess Celestia what will happen to Twilight in the coming decades, and then you'll understand."

"What?" AJ repeated with an even more confused expression.

"Even *I* know that the faces they put on are masks to hide behind."

The farm pony stopped for a moment, pulled her hat off, and wiped her forehead. She used it briefly as a fan. "Can't say ah understand him," she said to herself. "Plum strange feller."

As for the sisters, they were lying down on the steps leading to their thrones, utterly exhausted. The guards were dismissed from the premises just so the sisters could have a moment of privacy to themselves.

"I can't deal with this anymore..." Luna complained. She wobbled around a bit, but couldn't get off of her back, and her legs were splayed about like a dead animal's. "I just want to sleep."

Celestia was lying on her belly with her head on a foreleg and left wing spread out over the floor. "You? Sleeping?" She snickered. "That's a first."

Luna puffed up her cheeks. "Don't make fun of me, sister."

The two stopped talking and were slowly dozing off, but they bounced in terror when the doors slammed open and Twilight Sparkle came rushing through with a letter in her magic.

"Ah! My everything!" Celestia whined.

"PRINCESSES! PRINCESSES!" Twilight screamed. "I got a letter from Cadence!" 

"You did?" Luna said. She turned to her sister. "Didn't we send for her at some point?"

Celestia looked in all directions then dragged her hoof across her face and dropped onto her rear. "I can't remember. Too much has happened in only a few days." She looked at Twilight with tired eyes accentuated by large bags. "What does it say, Twilight?" she asked between tired yawns.

"It says the whole Crystal Kingdom was engulfed in a dome of energy, and no pony can get out."

Luna dropped her head and groaned loudly. "Is it Sombra again?" she complained.

"SISTER!" Celestia scolded.

The lunar mare shrugged in response.

"No. It says that a huge thing flew above it, made the dome, then left."

"Not MORE problems with him!" Celestia groaned.

Twilight frowned. "I know he's been strange up to this point, but he wouldn't do something like that without reason." She shook her head at the sight before her.
> Domed
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

A loud 'bonk' sound responded to the scream. Several guards of the crystal empire bounced away and slid across the ground, most groaning in pain. 

"What if we tried using spells?" a unicorn asked.

"Worth a shot," a guard answered.

Several of them focused their spells into their horns, the appendages glowing bright in response. A variety of spells were released onto the dome surrounding them ranging from whips, to simple beams, to lightning bolts and drills. The shield reacted and threw them into the air via explosive feedback. One of the two captains on the side facehoofed and groaned in annoyance. The other, standing next to him, just heaved a sigh and stared at the void.

"What's going on? I heard explosions," Shining Armor said. He pushed through the crowd and looked at the guards and civilians in pain on the floor. "What happened?" he asked with worry.

"Bah! We can't get through that stupid shield, general!" the first captain said. "It's not even a normal shield spell. The damned thing won't react to anything we throw at it." He punched the dome angrily.

"Except for explosions," the second captain added in boredom. The first pointed at him and nodded enthusiastically to confirm. "We can always wait for the other princesses to arrive." He shrugged. "I don't know. Worth a shot, no? We're not going anywhere anyways."

Shining rubbed his chin. "Reminds me of when Sombra was roaming the tundra and Cadance put a barrier up." Shining stared at the barrier for a moment. "Have you tried focusing all your magic in a single area?"

Shining partially closed his eyes when the civilians and guards focused their magic into a white beam that pounded against the barrier, only to have it create another feedback that exploded in their faces and threw them everywhere.

"Now we have," the second captain noted. He yawned loudly.

The prince slowly blinked in response. "Have we had any news about the princesses?"

The first captain took off his helmet and scratched his head. "Well, the letter Princess Cadance sent is confirmed to have gone through, so it's only a matter of time before they arrive."

"Plus, there's the train station now," the second captain interjected. "So while they can't get through the dome, they can at least stop at the barrier."




"Why did you trap them?" Twilight asked the cephalopony. "I don't see ANY reason to do that!"

"You don't?" he replied with two raised brows.

"W-what? Is there a giant storm that's going to engulf them?" The traveler shook his head. "Is the ice the city rests on going to give in and cause the city to collapse?" The traveler shook his head in response to Twilight's question again. "Is it a monster attack? A magical calamity?"

The traveler locked a bolt in the foot of the multi-story farm. He stepped back and looked up, admiring the work already done thanks to his ship and the work of the many races present. 

"The support of the farms are coming along nicely." 

He wiped his forehooves then walked away, leaving Twilight to stutter angrily. 

"Why are you dodging the question? Why are you ALWAYS dodging questions?!" She teleported in front of the traveler, startling him for nary a microsecond, and glared at him straight in the eyes. "Is it because it'll affect the future?" There was a pause while the lavender alicorn's eyes darted back and forth between each of the cephalopony's. "You already established that that's not what can happen."

"I don't speak it not because of disinterest or an absurd stupidity such as that, but because every timeline is different."

"Then why dome the Crystal Empire? Hm?"

"Because timelines still have commonalities, and around this time, Sombra is slated to return."

Twilight's features softened, and she spoke with a gasp. "What? Wh-why didn't you tell us? We could have evacuated the--"

"They're part of the issue." The traveler dug into his mass of tentacles and pulled out what looked like a fractured, white mask made of cooked clay. The right side was destroyed, leaving an angry eye hole on the left and the top of an upper jaw. It had some sort of long fang sticking out of the far side. He looked at it longly and bounced it a few times. "This is souvenir from that time. One of my first attempts. Maybe." He handed it to Twilight who held it in her magic and spun it around, confusion on her face. "Interesting, no?"

"I sense dark magic coming from it. What is it?" 

"The skull of a corrupted pony." Twilight and dropped the mask. Her face was partially contorted, although with what concoction from a mixing pot one could not say. "That is what happens to the Crystal Kingdom. It could be in weeks or months, but the corruption is there and the plague is spreading."

"H-how can we save them?!" Twilight grabbed the traveler by the shoulders. "How? My brother and sister-in-law are there! You have to tell me!" she begged.

"Then they are corrupted." He shrugged the notion off. "I never found a solution because the corruption is on their soul."

"O-on? Why not in?"

"Because Sombra does not have that kind of power. I learned about that detail through..." The traveler scrunched up his lower lip. "specific means. A magic that shouldn't be used casually."

"How did you get it?" Twilight asked cautiously.

"It was a gift. Part of the many things I received from the dying timelines. An intriguing order that did not want their whole history to vanish to the ages for all eternity, so I gladly took it and kept it safe. I haven't told anybody else about such a thing before." He sighed. "Although I suppose the possibility of sharing this information with you can be...allowed." He blinked a few times in an irregular pattern. "But you will have to accelerate the construction of this farm to a week max."

"A WEEK?!"

"A favor for a favor, Twilight Sparkle," he spoke harshly. "The easiest solution is the one I have taken. The Crystal Kingdom has enough food and water reserves for a week at best. Perhaps a little more. Perhaps a little less. If you help with the construction and finish it within the allotted time, then I will have supplies dumped into the dome regularly until a time that you have found the solution through the magic of souls I might impart." He looked up at the sun. "I would hurry, though. Time is running out."

The lavender mare was conflicted, but she knew what to do. "Fine! I'm going to tell the princesses about the situation, and then I'm going to help you with organizing the construction." She snorted angrily. "I'm the best at organizing and speeding things along efficiently."

"You better be," the traveler threatened. 

Twilight bared her teeth angrily then galloped off, leaving the cephalopony to his own devices, but the mare wasn't pleased. She looked back at him and huffed in annoyance. "He could've told us. We would have found a solution to it without going to such drastic measures," she mumbled to herself.

"Perhaps a drink?" the traveler thought to himself. "I could do with something vanilla-mint flavored."

Applejack and a large minotaur missing his left horn were busy checking the soil compounds placed at their behest in large white crates the height of an average pony. As such, the farm mare needed a stool to climb to be able to look with them. The minotaur passed his hands in some of the soil samples and grunted. He had the reflex to wipe his hand off on his orange vest, and every time he grunted in annoyance that he forgot again.

"This soil is pretty malleable and fulla chunks," he said.

"Sure, but t'ain't no kinda soil fer a tree. They need sum'in proper strong fer their roots," Applejack replied. "Maybe this could do fer sum'in a little more..." she rotated her hoof. "Cabbagey?"

The minotaur shook his head. "Ain't the soil fer that. More better fer the regular type plants. Could be good fer gardenin', but we'll need ta check the best plants fer this kinda soil. Could be good to regrow forest what burned down or experiment with new plants."

The farm pony nodded. "Ah reckon we keep away from this soil, then." She walked over to another box, pushing the stool along the way, and passed a hoof through the substance. "Mmm. This one is good. Rich soil, no large chunks, 'n looks like water can easily pass through it."

The minotaur nodded. "We use soil like this at home. Very good for simple crops like tomatoes, salads, and eggplants. Mostly fer the small plants. Ain't sturdy enough fer the big ones."

The two stared longly at the crate then looked up at the sun burning down on them.

"Reckon this thing'll revolutionize how we farm?" Applejack as the minotaur.

Said giant spat on the floor and wiped his mouth using his arm. "Maybe, but sum'in like this would require several farmhands ta maintain, not to mention we'll need a way to take our equipment in each dome fer tillin', seedin', 'n fertilizin' with manure."

Applejack nodded and leaned against the crates. "Gotta say ah was surprised when ah heard that a minotaur was a farmer. Thought minotaurs preferred huntin' 'n gatherin'."

"We do. I just prefer the farming." He flexed his arm, demonstrating growing muscle mass. "Builds up the body 'n gives me plenty to do without threatenin' my life." He nodded for a moment then shook his head. "I didn't think I'd be called by Equestria to help with a new project of its, let alone see some kind of giant saucer-a floatin' above head."

The farm pony adjusted her hat. "True, but that traveler...ah can't tell what his end goal is." She narrowed her eyes to better see the cephalopony walking away from the work site. "He says he doesn't want us to suffer 'decay' 'n so he's tryin' ta help us get better lahves. Facilitate our livin' 'n improve our technology at a steady pace." She laughed a single time. "Ah won't be 'round ta see the end result, but ah believe that somethin' ain't right."

"If he wants to help your people exist, then I think that's a great endeavor," the minotaur spoke positively.

"Ya say that, but y'ain't seen the weirdos he keeps around himself. One tried ta kill Princess Celestia and nearly destroyed all of downtown Canterlot just because she saw a picture of her."

The minotaur hummed at the incident. "And what happened to her?"

Applejack shook her head. "Heck if ah know. He said he was gonna punish her, 'n he brought down some weird gigantic thing ta do it, but he knew it was gonna happen anyways." Her tone started becoming increasingly angry. "Instead of keepin' her away from the princess, he kept her around her more and more. It's like he was deliberately trying to make her get into some kinda explosive rage 'n make himself look like a hero for stoppin' her. He's even gone to repair the city, too."

"I see. 'N so what? They ain't got free will? He didn't think he could trust her?" he asked.

Applejack rubbed the back of her neck. "They got free will, but...dunno. They're a might bit strange. The round one seems alright ta me. Acts a bit happy like mah friend Pinkie Pie. " She leaned over to the side and looked up at the giant. "Albeit less extreme." She chuckled. "Still..." her smile dropped for a frown. "Ah can't figure him out. He's doin' all these...things around Equestria without tellin' us. What if he starts murderin' large swaths o' ponies just because they don't follow what he wanted 'em to? What if he needs ta control more?" She sighed and jumped off the stool. 

"Well..." The minotaur put his fists in his hips. "I don't know anything about that, but someone with great power who ain't showin' all his cards is tryin' ta hide somethin', whether it be about themself or what gives them their power. I would keep a close eye on him while he's here." He looked at the saucer gently rotating above Canterlot. "Even IF he has a giant flying disc of death."
> The farm finishes?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Twilight was working nonstop for two days straight, refusing to sleep at night. She was given very little time to work out how to construct such a massive project outside the reach of anything anyone had ever done in the past or now. She was supposed to solve the conundrum. Her room in Canterlot castle was covered with rolled up balls of paper, folders holding untold amounts of notes and projects performed in the past, boards where pencils and measuring tools rested. The room smelled rancid from Twilight's overworking, and she hadn't eaten at all. What was once a clean, white cover thick with cotton and silk, was now a disheveled mess of wrinkles and uneaten food frozen over its surface. The lavender alicorn was more preoccupied with scribbling on her desk than taking care of herself. She broke another quill in her frustration and angrily threw the pieces across the room, filling the pile of assorted quill shards and empty ink jars next to her bed and blocking the bathroom door partially.

When she reached for another quill with her magic, she found that their tiny, black glass hold was completely empty. She exploded in rage. "FINE! I'LL USE ONE OF MY OWN!" The mare ripped several feathers out of her right wing with her teeth, placed them haphazardly on the desk, then continued to write and toss balls.

"Twilight?" Spike called out after opening the door to her room. "You okay?"

"NOI'MNOTOKAY!" the mare blurted out explosively. 

Spike had to cling to the ground with his claws to not get blown away by all the hot air. "T-Twilight, you look terrible! Have you slept or eaten at all?!" 

Twilight turned away and went back to her scribbling. "No. I have to save my brother, Cadance, and everypony there, otherwise he'll...He'll..." 

Twilight's scribbling gradually slowed until she stopped completely and tears started welling up in her eyes. She turned to Spike and sniffled. "I don't want to lose Shining..." she mewled. 

The little dragon walked towards her and gave her a hug, letting the distraught princess cry as much as she could. "You'll find a solution, Twilight. You always do," Spike comforted her. "You managed to fix the whole Winter Warp-Up when there were only a few days left."

"That's not the same thing!"

"Sure it is!" Spike let go and sat on the floor. "Think about it: You had an entire season to clean up, and no pony could manage it, but then you got them all to work together and organized it all. You had a small village that time." He smiled and raised a brow, looking upwards to his friend. "This time, you not only have the princesses to help, but you have an entire city at your disposal and several races from other countries. The farm shouldn't be that much more difficult to build with all of this, should it?" Spike asked.

Twilight sniffled and started to ponder the idea. "You...might be right, but this is more difficult than just removing snow and ice," she noted. "I can't just have them use shovels and walk forward."

"If I may be so bold as to intervene?" a voice proposed. Chinch'k crawled in from one of the large open windows to the left of the room and climbed along the ceiling. He twisted his head first to look at the two fully, then twisted his whole body, disturbing the two severely. "I see that he thought it interesting to torture more ponies again." The metal pony sighed and shook his head in disappointment. 

"What do you want?" Spike asked aggressively. 

"Just a moment of your time. Please," he pleaded. 

Spike wanted to say something, but Twilight stopped him. "Go ahead," she told him.

The insectoid creature nodded and scratched his 'beak' with four mandibles. "What you're doing is thinking of only the regular folk that need to work. You took magic into account, but only for lifting and holding."

"I took other things into account as well," Twilight explained in an annoyed tone.

Chinch'k rubbed his lower 'beak' composed of his resting mandibles. "I see. Apologies. I base solely on what I see, but you could ask for animals and insects to help, too," he said. 

"What?" Twilight pulled her back and widened her eyes. She frowned. "What are you talking about? That's absurd!"

"Perhaps, but you know of somepony that can talk with them, don't you? Why, even insects could help out."

"Why don't YOU help out, then?" Spike pointed a finger accusingly to the metal pony. 

The metal pony snickered. "Can't. R..." He caught himself. "The traveler won't let me," he corrected. "I'd love to, but we can't." He leaned closer to the two and whispered. "He never said anything about us helping you out, though." He poked Spike several times then walked towards the room exit. "I want to walk around a bit. If you need me I'll be somewhere in this castle, alright?" The two didn't answer. "Alright. See you later."

"That was weird," Spike said.

"Maybe, but he had an idea, and I can work on that," Twilight said. "I need to find Fluttershy."

Twilight flew out of the window, leaving Spike alone in her room, forced to either stay there or go into the hallway and cross the metal pony. He slammed his head against the full mattress of Twilight's dirty bed instead. 

"I'd sleep here if it wasn't so messy," he lamented.

Several hours later, Twilight and Fluttershy landed at the construction site in front of Applejack and the giant, philosophical minotaur.

"We're here!" Twilight shouted.

Applejack pulled some paper from under her hat and unfolded it whilst walking towards her friends. "Ah got yer letter, Twi, but ah don't understand what you meant by it." She looked up. "Animals helping us? What?" 

The minotaur leaned forward. "Perhaps it's a figure of speech meant to embroil our spirits?" he pondered.

Fluttershy and Twilight stared at him, slackjawed.

"Ignore him," Applejack said.

Twilight regained her bearings before talking again. "Fluttershy agreed to help me with building the farm. Gather everypony and I'll tell them what we're going to do."

"If ya say so," Applejack answered halfheartedly. 

The farm pony gathered as many ponies as she could and brought them all in front of Twilight and Fluttershy, although her trust in Twilight's idea was lacking.

"Everypony, hear me out," Twilight shouted. "I have an idea that will accelerate the construction of the farms." She turned to Fluttershy and stepped back, letting the nervous mare forward.

Fluttershy cleared her throat and said something, but no one could hear. Twilight rolled her eyes and put an amplification spell on the pegasus' throat. "EXCUSE ME, EVERYPONY!" Everyone winced in pain at the booming volume of her voice. She chuckled in response and blushed. "S-sorry. I didn't mean to do that. What I meant to do is tell you that the animals are going to help us out, and they even got the bugs to help us, too!"

"THE BUGS?!" a few shouted. 

A huge black swarm came from the horizon, following birds to the construction site, leaving the workers to be horrified. Twilight quickly stepped in to relax the tension.

"It's alright, everypony. No need to worry. They won't buzz around us and bite. The birds are there to keep them in line. Everyone is going to help us build THAT!" She pointed towards the multilevel farm.

It took quite a while to even get adjusted to the animals, but hardly anyone became used to the bugs. It took quite some effort from Fluttershy to even make them listen to her as well. Twilight, however, used the additional workpower to have everyone build the open domes on the floor and have unicorns, pegasi, and the multitude of insects to lift them up to their 'arms' and connect them. The insects took care of the tiny work spaces that normally couldn't be reached, and the larger workers took care of plating and most cabling. Had Twilight not color coded everything, they likely wouldn't have known what to do. It was a project of large proportions and hard work, but Twilight was determined. That being said, something nagged at her.

"Fluttershy," she started. "How exactly DID you talk to the insects? I've never seen you do that before. I just threw a rock in the dark and hoped that it would hit something."

The pegasus tapped the tips of her wings together. "I don't know. I just...gave it a try after you left, and they listened." She scrunched up her lips. "A little."

"A little?"

"The birds needed to help me," Fluttershy said. "Not sure why."

Twilight placed a hoof to her chin. "I see." The mare hummed. "Did you see anything out of the ordinary around here? Something strange, maybe?"

Fluttershy shook her head in response. "No. Nothing. I just went to the animals first and then tried to do what you suggested to do, and they listened."

"Can't help us directly, huh?" Twilight thought. 

Her suspicious expression bothered her friend. "Are you okay, Twilight?" Fluttershy asked.

Twilight snapped out of her daze. "O-oh! Yes! Of course. Don't worry, Fluttershy. I was just thinking." She smiled and took a step forward towards the farm. "Let's get this thing built and see what he'll say about it!" Twilight spoke with pride.

Twilight and the construction team were a few hours early in finishing the farm, leaving everyone exhausted and on the floor. Even the insects were tired, but they had developed a nasty habit of lying down on the workers that hated or feared bugs. Unfortunately, since they were too tired to move, there were multiple colorful mounds dotted unequally around the landscape and creating muffled screams.

Twilight forced herself up from the soft grass dirt and tried to channel her magic through her horn. She clenched her teeth from the soreness she experienced.

"I'll tell him, and he'll free my brother. I'll how him that we're not toys!" Twilight strained to say aloud. She tried again and forced herself even further, eventually creating a bright spark from her horn making a disc of pinkish-colored magic in the air. "TRAVELER, WE FINISHED THE FARM! NOW LET THE CRYSTAL KINGDOM GO!" Her voice echoed throughout Canerlot and even further beyond, but there seemed to be no reaction from the traveler, aggravating the alicorn. "HEY!" Twilight shouted. "I'M CALLING YOU!"

"I KNOW! STOP YELLING!" the cephalopony answered angrily. 

Twilight jumped back but collapsed onto the floor from exhaustion. The traveler was busy cleaning out the holes in his head with his tentacles after nearly becoming deaf. 

"When did you get there?" Twilight asked.

"After your first yell. I was about to tap your shoulder, but you made another and nearly deafened me." He grumbled angrily. "I have devices to fix my auditory organs or replace them entirely, but Id rather not have to go through something like that." He walked past Twilight and looked up at the farm structure. "I'm impressed that you managed to make it work in so little time."

"Yeah? Well, you shouldn't underestimate us just because we aren't as 'advanced' or 'enlightened' as you," Twilight retorted aggressively.

The traveler looked at her from the corner of his eyes and snorted. "There is no underestimating. There is only pushing you past your limits so that you may survive and grow as fast as possible."

"S-so you WEREN'T going to destroy the Crystal Kingdom? That was all just a ploy?!"

"No. I was going to destroy it," he replied unabashedly. He took out a tablet from his tentacles and started tapping buttons on it and observing the responses it gave. "I can tell from my home's scans that the multilevel farm isn't properly functional." He tilted his head briefly and sighed. "Several cables are connected into the wrong sockets, there are struts digging into the arms, bolts not tightened fully, electrical systems missing entirely..."s

"But..." Twilight looked down and clenched her teeth angrily. So many things were wrong. She was going to be stuck with this in her memories forever.

"CALM down," the traveler told her. "A deal is a deal."

Twilight looked up at him on the verge of tear. "What? But you said we had to finish it in a week. It's not even functional..."

The cephalopony started talking whilst fumbling with his tentacles to store the tablet. "No. I said you had to complete it. I never said anything about it being functional." He stared at Twilight with his five eyes. "The farm is made of tech unknown to you. You even missed most of the electrical circuits!" he laughed. It was unbefitting of him and actually scared Twilight.

"But--"

"I removed the dome from the Crystal Kingdom. Everyone there can evacuate now, and you will also get that extra reward I mentioned." The traveler resumed his apathetic behavior. "I'll be taking care of fixing this farm, but I believe this gave you enough experience in how these kinds of buildings and machines are going to work in the future."

In proximity of the Crystal Kingdom, Celestia and Luna had brought in a massively long train that required the installation of three tracks next to each other during the trip to the tundra, allowing for the entire city to be evacuated easily, but the power required for the train was immense, so two carts filled with coal filled the space between the machine itself and the passenger cars. The second the shield went down, the whole Kingdom started to evacuate with the help of the princesses and the guards of both sides. They had been waiting in the freezing cold for days...
> Secret Spells
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Twilight glared at the Traveler in contempt. He wasn't reacting to her, maintaining his apathetic posture since his appearance. He had finally calmed down, it seemed.

"If you're going to see the 'secret spells' I mentioned, then you need to come to my ship."

The alicorn pulled her head back in surprise. "ON the ship?"

"A very minute section." The traveler nodded. "But yes. Upon the ship." A tentacle scratched his narrow muzzle. "You will not have free reign," he explained. "Stray too far from the library, and you will die by the security systems in place. This is the only warning I'm giving you." He looked at Twilight straight into her eyes. "Am I understood?"

"Yes," Twilight replied.

It didn't take long for reactions to spark up at the sight of the massive vessel slowly inching towards the work site. It needed only to move a few dozen feet for part of its outer ring to reach the recipients of its teleportation. The alicorn could not blink fully that she was already whisked away to the interior of the vessel and found her balance destroyed, prompting a kiss with the reflective black walls.

"You okay?" the traveler asked Twilight.

The mare fell onto her rear and rubbed her reddened muzzle. "What was that? You didn't warn me that we were going on it right away!"

The traveler shrugged. "I told you we would go aboard my ship if you succeeded." He looked down on Twilight. "I never specified what 'now' meant." 

The cephalopony sat on his rear a moment and clapped his hooves together, illuminating a screen the size of Celestia on the wall. Several other lights along the walls, floor, and ceiling started sparking from off to amber to green and flashing green. Twilight looked around, both in awe and confusion. The traveler walked over to the screen and started poking and prodding its surface with his tentacles until the screen displayed 'Tutorial' across its entire display.

"There," he said. "This is the library."

Twilight squinted and looked ajar at the traveler. "This can't be a library. It has no books."

Unfazed by her statement, the traveler insisted. "Technology does wonders." He pointed to the screen with a tentacle. "This screen holds all the knowledge you need, and this entire room is modular." He gestured to the entirety of the room with his forelegs. "If you need to train with a spell, it will change the room to accommodate it."

"It?" Twilight repeated.

The cephalopony was already outside the room and waved a tentacle to Twilight without facing her. The door slid shut with a puffing noise, leaving the mare alone in a room humming with working technology. Now that was alone, Twilight noticed just how...sterile the air was. It had no smell or weight to it, and Twilight had the impression that she was not breathing at all. It was a very uncomfortable sensation. She fiddled with her wings and too a moment before imitating the traveler and poking the screen with a hoof.

"Greetings. Twilight Sparkle," a voice spoke in fractured syllables.

The alicorn jumped around, trying to find where the voice was coming from, but as she could not, she decided on a more direct approach. "Traveler?" she asked aloud.

"No. I am your assistant. In using. This. Database surfer," the voice replied. "Which database. Do you. Twilight Sparkle. Wish to peruse?" Several rectangles of different colors popped up, with multiple shrinking into the background while one grew bigger to almost occupy the whole screen. Each had a title in them mentioning subjects like 'history', 'art', and 'math'. All the rectangles ended up doing this at least once while the voice spoke to Twilight. "You may either press the icons displayed. Or. Give me vocal commands."

"Why are you talking like that?" Twilight asked.

"I am sorry. I am. The oldest ai aboard this ship. I come from...'s home timeline. He keeps me. For. Memory."

Twilight narrowed her eyes ever so slightly but decided to leave the 'censorship' and the claims of nostalgia alone. Instead, her suspicion made way for curiosity, and the alicorn found herself smiling as she rubbed her chin with the back of her foreleg.

"Let's try a voice command," she suggested.

"Awaiting voice input."

"Um...your 'master'-" Twilight cringed at the word. "told me to look for something about soul magic?"

"Is it for. Necromancy? Soul capturing? Corruption Cleansing? Ether--"

"Corruption cleansing!" Twilight blurted.

The ai opened the boxes itself, leading to a large black screen with flashing red text spelling 'Access Denied' covered by a large gray chain reaching from the top left to the bottom-right of the screen.

"Access denied?" Twilight read. "But he told me--"

"Access credentials. Verified. You may view the documents on the. Sins of Eldromac."

Several windows opened up while the database loaded, flooding Twilight's eyes with images of tablets covered in curved, pointed runes. Barrel-shaped weapons and lances ebbing with green, fluorescent energy appeared multiple times alongside ponies and dragons twisted and deformed. Metal weaved into flesh into bone. Some had their limbs replaced with weaponry while others replaced their torso with a scripture of an unknown language upon it. Several images displaying a statue of a faceless figure, kneeling with seven arms outstretched towards those who would stand before it, was placed in an alcove behind several of these terrifying creatures. The alicorn had never seen such things before, and the longer she looked and took in, the more horrified she was. What would the traveler be doing holding information from such...vile, barbaric creatures?

It was during one of these horrified mullings and fighting against the need to look away that Twilight noticed an oddity in the pictures. Despite their disfigurements and living within bloody environments, these 'Sins of Eldromac' were all happy. Many were smiling with wide teeth or the sharp metallic replacements jammed into their gums and skulls. Although very few, several were shown talking with children, playing around with them, and chasing off wild beasts or relocating them rather than simply killing them. They could have easily done so, and yet...in every picture, the faceless figure was there, behind them. Be it as a transparent ghostly figure or a statue, it caused Twilight to become transfixed upon it, almost as if it was tugging at her soul and mind.

"The documents have been loaded. And. Your. 'Soul Cleanser' spell has been. Found." Twilight bounced in surprise and clenched her chest which heaved up and down with each heavy breath. "Are you okay. Twilight Sparkle?" The ai asked.

"Yes I'm..." She shook her head. "No. I'm not!" She glared at the screen as though it had eyes. "What is all this? What are these...these creatures? These ponies?"

"They are the. Sins of Eldromac. And they have the spell you seek: Cleansing. Corruption from. Souls."

Twilight stared at the screen a while longer then rolled her eyes. She dragged a hoof across her face and groaned loudly. "Fine! Tell me what I need to know about this spell. Like, are there any consequences?"

"For additional information. Please drag your. Hoof. Up the screen." Twilight was temporarily impressed by the convenience of the device and the miles of text that seemed to scroll before her. "There are no consequences perceivable. In your world. Twilight Sparkle."

Skeptical, Twilight asked the ai a question. "Why is that?"

"The elements required for the original spell are. Not present. You will have to find. Alternatives. To allow the spell to function."

Twilight looked around the room, then back to the screen. "Why show all of this, then?" 

"It is part of the loading process."

"Alright. I'm going to start reading now," Twilight trailed off.

Twilight was unaware of the time going by, but she had no choice but to learn the spell as fast as she possibly could. If what the traveler said was true, then there was only a day, maybe even two, before Sombra reappeared and corrupted the crystal ponies, her brother, and Cadence. She managed to solve the farm problem, partially, and even though it took the help of one of the metal ponies to do it. The alicorn was on the verge of pulling out her mane. 

Twilight became further and further disturbed by what she was reading. "Some of this is...dark?" she commented.

"Yes?" the ai replied.

"What are these 'Sins' of ergoblerg or whatever the name was?" She scrolled through the text again and shook her head. "Lots of this involves separating the soul from the body and either fighting the corruption in person or entering some other reality to kill the corruption and save the souls it's taken...Among other things," she mumbled under her breath.

"I will play a voice clip. For you. Twilight Sparkle."

Another voice came from the screen, creating a reverberating, deep stallion voice. The alicorn could also hear multiple, faint screams in the background whenever this pony spoke. At least, she assumed it was a pony. 

The Sins of Eldromac are so named from taking in the souls of the innocent to free them of otherworldly judgement. Our spells are made to help that breach. The war with the demons, the Ardur, and the Rul Mot are dangerous, after all. There's a long pause, and shuffling is heard. Of course, Eldromac gives us strength as we give unto it and our people bring it praises every day.

"That's enough!" Twilight spoke rapidly. 

"Is there a problem. Twilight Sparkle?"

"I don't need to know anymore. I just..." She leaned her head forward and passed a hoof through her mane. "I just need to know the consequences of the spell, if there are any."

"The spell in. The Sins of Eldromac. 'S world had consequences like: Soul rupturing. Possession. Corruption. Eldritch Contamination. And many more. By. The inexperienced. Worst cases are splitting a soul between. Corrupted. And. Clean."

"B-but, you said that can't happen here, right?" Twilight gave a sheepish smile to the screen and did her best to stifle her gradual shaking.

"Yes. But they told...They said that. If done outside their world. The effects would be. Unknown. There is no Eldromac to. Focus the spell. You are not a Sin of. Eldromac. You cannot channel its power."

The mare held her breath to stifle her greater shaking, but it wasn't helping much, if at all. She continued reading the instructions and imitating the movements of magic using her magic rather than her soul, considering that's not something she could do. At all. More time passed that she had a general idea of the way the spell worked, but she needed a break. 

"Maybe I can..." Twilight sported a suspicious grin and looked to the screen. "Can I access information of the other universes you visited?" she asked the ai. 

She knew that there was chance that he would have given her access to anything outside the spell, and yet the massive smile she was sporting that reached ear-to-ear wouldn't relent.

"Your access privileges are...insufficient. Twilight Sparkle. I am sorry."

The mare drooped in disappointment. "Awwww." She pretended to kick something gently with her hoof. "I really wanted to see." She heaved another sigh. "Fine," she grumbled longly. "Can you call the traveler here?"

"You have. A query. Twilight Sparkle?" 

"Yes."

"Very well." Twilight noticed whirring sounds and the increase of flashing amongst the lights before the voice spoke to her again. "He is here."

The door slid open, revealing the cephalopony once more. "What is it?" he asked.

The mare pointed to the screen and looked at the traveler with a judgmental glare. "You didn't tell me about these...these things," she complained.

"What about them?" he replied aggressively.

"Wh...They're horrifying!" She scrolled the text to the purpose of the spell and the incantations meant to manipulate one's own soul for the process. "All the things that voice told me, and the things I've seen!"

"Why are you so shocked?" the traveler asked. "Have I not done things that disturb you?" He walked around the mare, taunting her. "Have I not performed that are beyond your comprehension?"

"What?!"

The cephalopony stretched out his foreleg. "Be honest with me."

"Y-yes!" Twilight shouted. "You've done HORRIBLE thins, that--"

"And therein lies the problem."

Twilight's face contorted with bafflement. "Huh?"

The traveler walked to the screen and moved several images into view, slowly switching to the next, and the next, and again some more. "I see ponies and dragons happy with their lives. They want for not. They regret not," he spoke with a positive upper tone. "They help others, and are helped in return." The traveler looked at Twilight over his shoulder. "Isn't that what you strive for, as a 'Princess of Friendship'?" he mused.

"W..." The mare's ears were folded back and her mouth dared not emit any sounds. 

"Twilight, this is a case where blacks and whites aren't in the focus." He turned to face her with a tilted head and mocking expression. "Your world profited from what you call 'friendship magic'." He tapped the screen with a tentacle. "These ones did not. Thusly, they've grown far different than you are used to."

"And?"

The traveler smiled and spoke softly. "Ye who walk the Path of Bacon shall be with dinner bless, yet ye who follow the Way of Necktie shall be for dinner dressed."

Twilight sat down. "I'm even more confused than before."

Waving off the mare's confusion, the traveler walked back through the door. "What is horrifying to you is natural to others, and what is natural to you can be as horrifying to them. Different lifestyles and ways of growing up lea to different paths, Twilight." He put a hoof to the door's interactive panel. His somewhat teasing demeanor was lost to his apathy and an aggressive tone of voice once more. "Don't dwell on it too hard, princess," he growled.

The door slid shut once more, creating a low-pitched hissing sound once it sealed.
> Feedback
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Celestia and Luna watched the train, packed full of refugees, flee from the domed empire while they flew high above. The Crystal Heart was safely in the care of Cadance and Shining Armor, and the two vowed to return to the Empire as soon as possible. They didn't want it to become another ruin of legend lost to time. And thus, the princesses saw the violent blizzards of the tundra slowly encroach upon the kingdom until it was engulfed in the white, tumultuous clouds of white when the dome fell.

Luna shook her head in disappointment. "A pointless loss," she lamented. There was silence exchanged between the two sisters, but Luna wasn't going to remain silent. "I grow tired of this traveler's behavior. He acts without coming through us first."

"I agree," Celestia responded. "But we can't oppose him directly. I fear that our behavior might cause him to grow frustrated and destroy our world like he has already mentioned."

Luna grit her teeth and looked down in defeat. The two spun around to look at the train when they heard a disturbing noise. With a loud screech, everypony was thrown forward in the train cars and left groaning and in pain in large piles. Cadance pushed herself out of one of the piles and massaged her left shoulder.

"What's happening? What's going on?"

Everypony, please get out of the train. I have a solution for your problem.

"That's Twilight," Cadance spoke aloud. 

The mare helped everypony onto their hooves and brought them to the snowy ground outside, where everyone was still reeling from the sudden break. Shining galloped up to his wife with Flurry held in his magic, panting hard.

"I guess staying with me always causes issues," he joked between gasps. He looked up to see Twilight's approaching the train at high speeds. "What is she talking about?"

Luna and Celestia landed next to the couple, prompting Flurry to wave at Luna and get grumpy when she ignored her. Twilight, on the other hoof, flew in too fast and, although she did her best to catch herself from falling, the mare ultimate skid along the ground before faceplanting and stopping at Celestia's hoof.

"Oh my goodness. Are you alright, Twilight?" Celestia asked in concern. 

She lifted the lavender alicorn back onto her hooves, allowing Twilight to regain her bearings and shake the snow off of her face.

"I'm okay," she mumbled. Her eyes shot open. "I have a solution to what the traveler said about you all having Sombra in your souls!" she blurted.

"WE WHAT?!" Cadance and Shining bellowed.

Flurry cried from the sudden loud noise next to her ears, forcing Cadance to calm her down and coo her.

"He gave me what he promised. A spell to save everypony," she spoke quickly and enthusiastically.

Celestia was skeptical. "Are you sure we can trust this spell? And where did you get it from?"

Twilight's heaved panting wasn't helping her formulate her sentences properly. Her wings hurt greatly and she was about to pass out. Before she had time, however, some of the crystal ponies started noticing parts of their bodies turning black, giving Twilight the excuse she needed to use the spell.

"We don't have time," she yelled. "It's either this or they disappear forever." Twilight was on the verge of breaking, and her voice was reflecting that. "I don't want to lose my family."

The pleading eyes of Twilight stared deep into Celestia's stern and hardy ones, but the white alicorn still conceded. "Very well," Celestia sighed. "Go ahead."

The lavender alicorn pointed to both of the alicorns. "I actually need your help to perform this spell."

Cadance stepped forward. "What about me?" she asked.

Twilight shook her head. "No. You're affected too. You need to be under the effect of the spell."

"All of us?" Cadance asked. Twilight nodded, and the pink pony looked around to Shining and her people. "Very well."

Shining put a hoof to Twilight's shoulder and put his forehead against hers, making their horns cross. It was much easier with her being his height now. "I trust you, little sister," he said.

Twilight's spirits were lifted, and she turned to the other two alicorns. All three took to the sky, and Twilight began to focus the magic in her horn. 

"I just need you to give me as much magic as possible to keep the spell steady, alright?" she said.

"Did you even try out this spell?" Luna asked. Twilight dropped her head and smiled sheepishly at the mare who rolled her eyes and gave an exasperated expression in return. "Marvelous. Put the fate of our citizens in the hooves of an untested spell."

"Your berating isn't helping, Luna," Celestia quipped.

The two created beams of gentle light; one of blue and one of white, that melded into each other and into the middle of Twilight's back. For a few seconds, nothing happened, and everypony was doubtful if anything was going to happen. Eventually, Twilight's spell finally began to take effect, and while the two alicorn sisters watched her, they saw something transparent engulf Twilight. Like an echo or a window. The transparent afterimage took on the appearance of a pony with spikes protruding from beneath their flesh, and wraps of brown cloth around amputated limbs replaced with weaponry and tools. She was even gifted with two mouths and metal plate bolted onto her head to cover her eyes permanently. The magic took on a brownish hue with threads of gray appearing in the swirling vortex of energy expanding around Twilight's horn.

"Is that...?" Luna whispered.

Celestia's eyes were filled with a bright rage at the sight. "Yes. It's soul magic, but...it's twisted, somehow."

Above the trains, reality started to crack. Space blew outwards into several hundred small squares leaving way to a space containing a swirling vortex of blacks and white from which a faceless figure came forth. Everyone watched in horror as its four hands reached out and grabbed the edges of the vortex. It looked around first, curious as to its location, and its head 'looked' towards the three alicorns after it was done scouting.

"What in Equestria is that abomination. It dominates my field of vision," Luna cursed.

Celestia was speechless. "What did he bring to my Equestria?" she thought.

The entity looked down upon the terrified creatures before it and silently reached an arm out to the space above them. It immediately tightened its grip to grab hundreds upon hundreds of string attached to the creatures below. The crystal ponies froze in place, allowing the faceless entity to use another arm to tug on the them and pull out ghostly apparitions of said affected ponies.

"What is it doing?!" Celestia shouted. "We must stop the spell!"

"No!" Twilight pleaded. "This is how it works!"

"Twilight, I can't in good conscious let--"

"Look!" Luna interjected loudly.

Small black clouds were swirling along the ghostly apparitions that the creature didn't hesitate to squeeze off of each and every one of them at once with its third arm and keep them in its clenched fist. Each of the clouds screeched in horor and rage as the entity sucked them into an inescapable hold. It inspected its hand, nodded, then used its fourth to properly return the apparitions to the owners. Once its first hand let go, the strings disappeared and everyone started moving about fearfully, unaware of what just transpired. The faceless creature faded back into the void, and the squares returned back to their places until there was no sign that they anything had ever happened to the space to begin with. All the magic used dispelled, causing the afterimages around Twilight to vanish. Twilight and the two alicorn sisters collapsed into the snow far below, causing the crystal ponies to rush to them and prop them up.

"Twilight," Cadance started. "You're going to have to tell me exactly what that was."

"And we have much to talk about," Celestia spoke threateningly. 

Her angered face and furious -yet tired- eyes melted through Twilight, and she felt a great fear overcome her. The ponies took them inside the cars while the rest tried to assess what had just happened. Celestia was propped up on a chair and given a large blanket to cover herself with, as did the other two. Luna chose to stand and lean against the stall door, however, while Twilight remained on the floor. There was but tense silence exchanged between the three, and neither party felt inclined to start talking, but Celestia's anger broke through her fatigue, if only briefly.

"Twilight," she spoke harshly. "What you used was soul magic."

Twilight tapped her hooves on the ground. "And? I didn't know it would summon--"

"That's not the point," Luna interrupted. "You use forbidden magics that can cause great harm to both the receiver AND the caster."

Twilight blinked innocently. "They were forbidden?" She looked to Celestia. "But I never saw anything about soul magic."

Luna deadpanned to her sister and gave a playful, sarcastic smile. "Sister. Surely you didn't remove any and all mentions of such a thing." Her voice was serene and soothing, but Celestia was made uncomfortable by it.

She fidgeted in place. "I..."

"Are you serious?!" Luna exploded. "I was trapped for a thousand years, and you didn't think to make ponies aware of its dangers?!"

"Destroying any and all references to soul magic was sufficient to destroy its knowledge among the populace," Celestia replied with barely contained rage.

"And in the process, those that rediscover it by chance are chased after and punished and don't know why, because YOU never taught them!"

"But I--"

"Am punishing them for a crime they aren't even aware they committed!" Luna rebutted. "That's not how that works, sister. I understand the good intentions you had initially, but teaching about the issue rather than outright banning it CAN be a more sufficient deterrent." She shook her head in disappointment. "Who knows how many ponies practice this magic without even knowing what it is, likely thinking that they're prodigies of magic having discovered something entirely new."

"Except those incidents are far and few between." She used her legs to force herself to move on the seat and face Luna directly. "If you have vines invading your yard, you don't tug on the leaves and the few strings of the plant growing about the area. You track down the root then clip it off. The whole plants dies later on, facilitating your removal of it." She was about to continue the argument but refrained from doing so. "More importantly, Twilight, what exactly did the traveler give to you?"

"Um..." Twilight couldn't make eye contact. "A spells used by the Sins of Eldromac."

"The what?" Luna said with disbelief.

"The Sins of Eldromac!" Twilight insisted. "They apparently had lots of work with this kin of thing, and the traveler told me that he something that could save everypony if I worked fast enough with the farm project."

Celestia rubbed her temples and groaned from fatigue.

"Well, we can't fault you for what you thought was best-" Luna turned to Celestia. "-sister," she spat angrily. "But without knowing what that gigantic entity was or what it did, we can't in good conscious leave the crystal ponies unsupervised."

"At least it left the Crystal Heart alone," Celestia spoke with relief. "Most 'evil' beings would go straight for it because of the powers it holds." She massaged the top of her head with a hoof. "I still want to know what that thing was and why it drained so much of her energy so quickly...and why it seemed so curious when it came through." A shiver ran through her body. "I don't like it."



Further away, the black mass that the faceless being crushed with its grip gestated. Several days passed by before it all clumped together into a morphing mass of indiscernible shapes. Gradually, but surely, it started to stabilize and sculpt itself. It rose upon wobbly legs, each supporting the as-of-yet unstable mass of black clouds. Next came a long, bushy tail, then a back, then a neck, and then the head.

The black fur of the tail and mane were linked by a path of flowing mist along the spine. Their body became assorted with a variety of faint white dots imitating the stars in the sky, and their iris was a purplish color. The whole right side of their face, however, took on a concave appearance of sparkling amethyst crystals. Its whole body followed the sparkling with every movement it made in an attempt to walk. It faceplanted into the puffs of snow before it, forcing it to look at the freezing substance with curiosity. It sat up and pushed against the snow with a hoof, hearing a crunching sound. It repeated the action several more times, finding amusement with each crush, but there was more to discover. It felt it, and so it stood up and obeyed its instinct, and faceplanted into the snow again. It didn't know how to walk. It would learn.
> A trip across the ice
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The newly born creature wandered around the tundran wastes, expecting nothing and wanting nothing. The only thing to cross its mind as the child-like curiosity and wonder at this new environment. Its one eyes looked about, taking in its surroundings. There was naught but white as far as the eye could see within a rampaging fog of grays and white dots. On occasion, it would split apart to reveal a mountain range in the distance, but something else caught the newborn's eye.

Uninhibited by the snow, it strode across the reflective landscape for hours until reaching a large assortment of white mounds that it happily bounced around, keeping up snow into plumes of white dust. The creature poked and prodded at the mounds, trying to see how they worked. It fled with a high-pitched squeak and hid behind another mound when the first collapsed, revealing a dilapidated wooden hut ravaged by time. Its frame had been conserved by the freezing temperature of the tundras, although its interior was not so fortunate. The sudden bumping shook the snow loose from the second mound, but the newborn was not surprised this time.

It struggled to hop over a slope of ice and slid into the ruined home. Likely the first guest it had seen in many long years. The newborn looked around its surroundings, enjoying what it was seeing. Some beams of wood had fallen into the house and broken on its ruined floor, but they were the last vestiges of walls that remained. The newborn poked at a pile of stones and squeaked when it collapsed, kicking up the black ash it held greedily an eternity. Frantic face wiping followed coughing from inhaling the substance, but the explorer was not deterred. It bounced against a low-standing piece of furniture and looked around to see it was covered by the torn remnants of a blanket. The straw it once rested upon was black, thin, and frozen, and the underside of the bed had collapsed, creating a folded hole.

The gem-eyed creature grabbed a shattered assortment of glass and pulled a flat, bending item out from beneath its tomb. Curiosity covered the newborn's face as it looked at the item. Upon it were several ponies wearing thick, winter clothing decorated by white fluff around the neck and ankles. The creature patted the picture with a smile but that smile slowly became anger when the people in the picture wouldn't react. The newborn angrily waved the picture around then slammed it onto the wooden floor, breaking it.

It wanted to know who and what they were, but no matter how upset it got, the figures refused to speak. They just stared. Smiling. Content to keep their secrets to themselves. The newborn's face puffed up in frustration, and it stifled a few tears. It kicked the picture again, then the crystalline side of its shimmered with vibrant light. The house was engulfed in an orange-purple light, displaying it before its collapse. Its walls were covered with embroidered artworks, but not much else served as decoration save two chairs made of ice covered in white leather.

The ponies in the image walked through the door, laughing while a bulky one dragged a white furred body into the door. He became stuck and struggled to pull it in, prompting the others to help him. The newborn smiled and rushed to them with a silent laugh, but when it made contact with the figures, the whole mirage dissipated back to the snowy landscape. Left to it own devices, the newborn sat on the wood and looked around for any sign of the creatures. The storm started to calm down, giving better sight to the denizens of the tundra. Past the horizon, the tiny creature saw thick towers of black clouds puffing into the air in a constant and rapid trail. It also saw two colored, indistinguishable dots flying around it. The newborn had somewhere new to go to. Something more to discover.



Canterlot was surrounded by tents of the refugees from the Crystal Kingdom, many disheartened and upset from losing their homes. Regardless of Twilight's success, Cadance wanted to be absolutely certain that there were no more threats either within the Crystal Kingdom or among her people. She walked out of the largest of the tents amongst her citizens, frowning at their position. Shining was off in the plains, training the crystal soldiers and the new recruits that chose to join in both to protect their family from threats like the Traveler and for financial gain. 

The pink princess did not want an extravagant tent, but it was pushed onto her by her advisors. It was best to have a large tent so she could welcome dignitaries, her own populace, and the alicorn sisters. The crystal ponies would feel safer knowing that their own rulers still kept a calm composure and kept up their image despite all that had occurred. At least, that's what they told her. Shining Armor didn't care either way. He did not grow in luxury, and felt that such things would rust his skills as a guard, so he left the decision to his wife.

Panting and sweating, he slowed to a trot and halted next to his wife. With magic, he pulled his helmet off his head and wiped his forehead with a leg. "That was quite the workout," he panted contentedly. 

Cadance was broken out of her stupor by the strong stink of her husband and reeled loudly, covering her muzzle. "You stink!" she complained.

Shining frowned at her. "I just galloped several kilometers straight. What did you expect me to smell like? Vanilla?!"

Cadance stared at Shining's annoyed face and couldn't help but laugh. "You always look so funny when you're upset."

The prince turned red with a mixture of embarrassment and anger and turned away. It gave him time to see the massive saucer floating overhead and slowly rotating in place. It cast a shadow upon the land like a sun dial, bringing fear with it.

"So It's true, then," Shining said. "There really is a floating city above Canterlot."

Cadance observed her, her face pulled with fatigue. "Why has it not attacked Canterlot?" she wondered aloud.

"I wouldn't be so sure of that." 

Shining Armor pointed to a mountain with a large hole running from one side to another.

"That is...impressive," Cadance noted.

"I know." The stallion smiled while multiple ideas rushed through his head. "With something like this, we would be able to destroy Sombra is he ever did come back, or destroy something worse."

"I agree and disagree," Cadance said.

Shining looked at her with wide, intrigued eyes. "Why?"

"We don't know what that thing is or what it can do."

"Then we can learn," Shining said. 

Cadance was perplexed. "How? Technology we don't know brings with it threats and risks we could have never fathomed. Will it explode? What powers it? What is within it?"

Shining nodded. "That is true, and if the makers have long since vanished, the chances of us being able to find instructions for its proper functioning are too great to classify."

The two looked towards Canterlot Castle in the distance. 

"I wonder what my aunt is doing now," Cadance wondered.

"It must be very important, considering we saw dragons going there beforeh--"

Shining and several of the ponies watching the saucer gasped or yelped in surprise when a beam of blue light shot towards the castle.

"What was that?!" Cadance yelled. "What did it do?!"

"Calm down, Cadance," Shining reassured. "The castle is okay. I don't know what that was but nothing happened." 

The princess looked to the civil workers taking in her ponies names for a census and became concerned. None of them reacted to the event and most of them dismissed the concerns of her crystal ponies regarding the beam.

"They've been like this for a while," she noted.




After several days of work, the multi-floor farm was ready for testing. The traveler stood at the base of the building and waited for Applejack and the rest of the willing staff to enter the confines of the tube. 

"S'mighty cramped in here," Applejack grunted.

"You'll get used to it," the traveler said. He pushed a button n a colorful display next to the sliding doors. "It's usually limited in size. I'll replace this with a much larger elevator for food transport."

Everyone shot upwards to the only floor with the food domes, but it wasn't over yet. The occupants had no time to recover from the new sensation that the metal box rotated to the right and everyone fell to the left, toppled onto each other. They were left to groan in pain while the cephalopony walked out casually as though nothing had happened.

"Hurry out," he scolded the workers. "I don't have all day."

Applejack squeezed out from between the minotaurs, gryphons, and ponies. She nearly lost her balance getting to the traveler. "What in tarnation was that? Felt like our elevators, but--"

"They're technology. Not magic," the traveler interrupted.

"But our is technology, too!" Applejack protested. 

The traveler frowned and looked away. "Not exactly. The body is technology, but the rest is either magic or the actions of workers."

While the two talked, the rest of the passengers wobbled outside into the dome. Many were feeling queasy and took to breathing slowly and longly. They walked along a dirt path as wide as a minotaur was tall, and flanking it was rough, dark brown dirt ready to be treated with seeds and labored upon. The farm was enclosed in a glass dome whose form was interrupted by beams of metal holding the dome's pieces in place and providing strength against powerful winds outside. One of the minotaurs wiped his forehead and exhaled loudly.

"It's pretty hot in here," he gasped. "I know this is meant to be a greenhouse, but it's too much. Nothing but cacti will grow in this heat."

The traveler said nothing but walked past the group who asked him what he was doing. He gave no answer, instead stopping at a piece of the white wall the elevator was built into and pulled a panel out then pushed it up. Using his tentacles, he rolled a dial to the left and pushed a button underneath it. A cool breeze shuffled through the fur and feathers of the locals, giving them the relief they needed against the heat and humidity.

"What'd you do?" Applejack asked.

"I turned on the air conditioning and dehumidifier." He turned the dial back to the right, pressed the button underneath it, then went to a screen and pressed several things the farm pony couldn't see. Within seconds a loud roar blared through the dome, and everyone was sweating worse than before. "The domes can modify the weather using the form of the glass dome to reflect high-powered winds and break their strength, dropping heat and cold within," the traveler explained proudly. He restored the temperature and humidity to a more viable level.

"That's...that's amazin'!" a minotaur shouted. "The things we could do, that we could grow! We'd no longer be limited by region or the seasons!"

"No. You wouldn't," the traveler confirmed. "There's many things you could do with this." He looked up at the dome, his face still unchanging. "And yet, what we are lacking is soil. To properly use the multi-leveled farms, we would need to acquire soil from outside the planet's reach."

Applejack followed his gaze and frowned. "Whadda ya mean?" she asked.

The traveler stared at her a moment then looked to the rest of the farmhands evaluating the soil. "That is for something that goes beyond your lifespan."

The enthusiastic chittering in the dome died down to silence, and many looked disheartened.

"So yer sayin' that only our foals 're gonna see it?" she asked.

"Perhaps the foals of your foals, but yes." He nodded. "All the work you are doing here will be dedicated for your offspring, but..."

"But?" Applejack repeated. 

"You will not be forgotten, like the workers of so many centuries before us. There are a great many things that must be done, and your contributions will be noted."

The mare's eyes darted left and right, her mind running through her memories and piecing everything together. "So that's why ya had most of us write our names down fer this job."

"Yes," the traveler answered plainly.

Applejack playfully punched him in the shoulder and immediately regretted the decision due to the viscosity of his skin. "Gross," she said.



The newborn hopped off the long machine it was riding on and rolled along the ground to stop right in front of a massive white city. Shaking the dirt and dust from its body rendered wet and cold by the air and melted snow, the creature rushed off towards the colorful shapes sitting in front of the white walls encircling the city. It didn't even notice the looming form floating overhead.
> Kill it
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The newborn waddled through the tents, intrigued by all the colors it was seeing and the creatures around it. It approached a red tent held up by a few sticks and started to nibble on it, inciting the ire of the occupants. A middle-aged red pony with a white mane and short tail stomped out angrily towards the responsible party and yelled at them.

"Hey! Get out of here! Stop eating my tent, you stupid brat!" he shouted angrily. He slapped the newborn away, causing it to run away in tears. "What the..." He turned to his wife. "Did you see the side of his face?" She blinked silently in response.

That was a very unpleasant new experience, but the creature didn't mind too much. It didn't know what to expect when it came to this unknown place, so it had prepared itself somewhat. Of course, one can never truly prepare for the unknown, as it soon found out. It ran into a group of ponies, bouncing it onto its right side on the ground. 

"Oh no, what's this?" one of the stallions of the group pondered. His eyes met with the wide-eyed, innocent stare of the 'foal'. "Now why were you running around like that? Were you playing?" 

The creature blinked once in response.

"Where are your parents?" a mare asked. She approached what she believed to be a foal and raised him up in her magic and brought it closer to her. "What the..." The group of ponies stared in shock at the right side of the 'foal' before them. They didn't know what to make of it. 

"What is this thing?" the stallion wondered with fear. He took several steps back to be as far from it as possible but still close to his friends. "I've never seen anything like it." He turned to his friends. "Are we sure it's a pony?"

The mare shrugged. Another stomped forward. She had a scowl etched on her face, but her voice was softer and more than her outward appearance suggested. Using her hoof, she roughly poked the crystalline side of the 'foal', creating tinking and plinking noises. Disconcerted, she hummed pensively and furrowed her brow even further.

"It ain't no pony," she grumbled. "Looks like one, but it ain't." She poked its muzzle multiple times, prompting the tiny creature to grab her hoof with a playful smile. "Awww...I MEAN--"

Her gaze became empty, and drool dripped from the corners of her mouth. Terrified, the first mare knocked the 'foal' out of her grip, making it skim along the dirty ground and grabbed her friend.

"Lemon Dew. Lemon Dew!" she shouted.

Her screaming brought in some of the more curious wanting to know what was happening. Lemon Dew shook her head and wiped the drool from her mouth. After recovering from the stun, the mare looked at her unicorn friend with disdain and pushed herself out of her forelegs.

"Who are you?" she asked angrily.

"Wh..." the unicorn looked to the stallion then back to Lemon. "I'm your childhood friend," she spoke in a trembling voice. She tabbed her chest several times. "Its me: Raisinberry."

Lemon eyed Raisinberry up and down and clicked her tongue. "Never heard of you in my life," she stated dismissively.

Raisinberry stared with her mouth agape then glared at the sniffling creature wiping the dirt off of its scratched foreleg. The mare angrily stomped towards the creature and raised it to her face hard enough to nearly give it whiplash.

"WHAT DID YOU DO TO MY FRIEND?" She started to shake it violently. "YOU WORTHLESS PIECE OF TRASH! GIVE ME MY FRIEND BACK!"

The stallion grabbed her forelegs, trying to make the berserk pony let go of the creature. "Raisinberry, let it go! If you kill it we'll never know how to turn her back to normal!"

It was too late. The unicorn was trapped in a red haze, and only the death of the choking creature could let her feel better.



The alicorn sisters could feel their hearts beating in their chests. It was painful and stressful at the same time. They were accompanied by Ember and several other smaller dragons, each one sporting a look angrier than the last, but not came close to the Empress'.

Her claws had dug into the white wood of the round table usually used by the princesses' council, and the cramped room already felt more cramped. Opposite the dragons sat Chinch'k sporting a little grin on his face that didn't go unnoticed by the dragons.

"I want to know what REALLY happened to the dragon that was living in the mountain here!" Ember shouted.

"We told you!" Luna responded in greater volume. "She was vaporized!"

"That's impossible! Nothing can do that kind of damage to a dragon." The other dragons nodded to each other in agreement. "I thought we had decided to make a peace treaty between our kind, but now I see that ponies don't keep to their word."

"What?" Celestia spoke in a quiet tone. Her worried gaze was replaced by a calm, furious glare, and her body was emanating an increasing amount of heat. "We sent a message to you detailing what had occurred."

Ember crossed her arms, unfazed by Celestia's behavior. Luna, however, was scooting back ever slightly, concerned with her sister's well-being.

"We received no such letter," Ember stated with narrowed eyes.

The white alicorn shot a look at the metal pony who shrugged. "We're not responsible for lost mail," he explained. "I would be more than willing to help look for it, but it's a letter." He moved his foreleg in an arc through the air. "It can be grabbed by the winds, so there's no way to know where it is now."

Ember leaned against the plain white wall and heaved a sigh that let loose some smoke from her mouth. Another dragon leaned forward and stopped his clawed hands onto the table. His bulky blue frame caused the table to creak under the pressure.

"You've told us that it was that thing floating above that killed her." He straightened himself out. "And yet you work with those from it." He pointed to Chinch'k. "Like this bizarre creature. Because you never distanced yourselves from them, we can assume that you're associated by proxy."

"What?!" the sisters shouted in disbelief.

"That means that we will have to go to war with you for breaking your oaths with us."

Ember nodded in agreement even if it pained her to do so.

Chinch'k chuckled. The dragons turned to him and were off-put by his happy, bright, compound pupils and open mandibles.

"Where I come from, we were always hunted by dragons," he stated with a cheerful tone. 

"As it should be," the male nodded. "We are the strongest creatures in the world."

The princesses raised a brow at the empty claim. They knew better but chose to say nothing to avoid aggravating the situation, something Chinch'k was more than happy to do.

"Yes. They said that too. One day, we grew tired of being hunted for food and sport. Never being able to fend for ourselves, so we started training, and the bravest of my ancestors would hide in nature to see how you fought, what you ate, and so forth." He raised his right foreleg and pushed out a long, black beam of flattened metal to rest on his sharp hooves. He used it to sharpen the two blades on his other leg that served as 'nails'. Every few words he said would be emphasized by a hard scrape that brought up yellow sparks and a flickering, illuminating light. "Decades later, I was born into the Pony-Dragon war." The dragons repeated 'pony' questioningly. "While we learned and became harder and harder to find, and our villages became more and more scarce, your kind never changed." His smirk turned into a smile that reached ear-to-ear. "We killed so many of you," he cackled. "Slit your throats, tore off your wings, pulled out your bones, used your own tails to impale you. So many joyful things we did to the dragons of my world."

His smile and attitude rendered the dragons extremely uncomfortable. The 'pony''s eyes proved that what he said was no lie, and dragon kind knew of the truths eyes could tell. Ember didn't let herself be intimidated, however.

"So you would kill us all?" she asked with intrigue.

Chinch'k's murderous expression vanished, and he shrugged in return. "Your dragons never did anything to my people, so I have no qualms with you." He pushed another black blade from his left foreleg this time. "I only carry hatred for those responsible."

"And yet you claim to have killed all of my kind in your small area."

The metal pony shook his head. "No. I killed all those responsible for harming my people. The others killed all of you themselves."

The blue dragon's rage was extreme. "Then why don't I kill you, braggart?!"

He flew towards Chinch'k, ready to crush his throat or just his body. Instead, he found the wind knocked out of him, his left wing sending a sharp pain through his body, and he was now pinned to the floor fro his neck. The metal pony was looking over him with hungry eyes and a twitching mandible.

"It would be so easy to just kill you then eat you," the metal pony pondered quietly. "To kill all of you, really." He chuckled. "Keep in mind that we offered our services to the ponies of Equestria." He let go of the dragon and backed away. "We have done this little game so many times it has become tiresome." His face became weathered, tired, and unhappy. "We don't want to have anymore fights, but we will defend ourselves and our assets if needed." He walked towards the door. "I'm going home."

Chinch'k didn't close the door correctly, leaving it ajar for everyone to hear the tinking of his strange hooves upon the stone floor. Taking a few seconds to gather their wits, the dragons turned to face the princesses. They were now slacked against the wall, their whole backs almost completely on the floor. They were frowning, but they looked saddened and tired rather than angry. The dragons were now at a loss. Even Ember couldn't figure out what to say.



"What's going on here?" Shining bellowed after tackling Raisinberry and having his guards pry the 'foal' from her grasp. "Why are you strangling this foal?!" he asked her with the creature coughing in the hold of his foreleg.

The mare struggled, trying to free herself from the guards. "That thing isn't a foal! It did something to my friend, and now she can't remember! Look at the right side of its face!"

Shining mumbled under his breath, complaining about doing something so stupids, but if he wanted her to calm down,he might as well check that side.

"Alright then little guy. Let's see what's going on with this crazed...What."

The captain was shocked at the traits the infant was demonstrating. His eyes were wide with a myriad of questions.

"What happened to you?" Shining looked at the crystals and saw the muted images of several crystal ponies playing out within the crystals before fading out.

Cadance rushed over, accompanied by a guard that had called her attention. "Shining, what's going on? I heard a commotion." The stallion silently turned around and showed the 'foal' to her. It looked at her with a sparkling eye, but her attention was dragged to its right side. Her attention also lead to the smokey mane and tail. To the others, it was simply a very dirty foal, which it was. Paying attention to such matters was trivial, but a large oversight nonetheless.

"What is that thing?"

Shining shrugged. "I have no idea. I've never seen its kind before. Almost makes me think of Sombra," Shining said absentmindedly.

Cadance cringed mentally, expecting the populace to go up in arms and try and kill it. "Well, it seems innocent enough," she pondered. She reached out to Shining to hold the creature, something he reluctantly agreed to after much internal debate. "Let's see if there's any ill will within you," Cadance mused when she booped its muzzle. It let out a little chuckle, having seemingly already forgotten what happened to it just minutes prior. "Hmmm...I feel...nothing from it," Cadance said. She looked back down at the creature, saddened. "It feels completely empty."

"What does that mean?" a guard asked.

"I'm not sure." 

Cadance's brows furrowed while she thought of many different reasons for it, but her thoughts were interrupted by loud buzzing sounds reminiscent of insects. Chinch'k Kuchuk had come back from Canterlot castle and was sporting a satisfied smile.

"Hello, Prince and Princess of the Crystal Kingdom," he greeted them. "How are you people?"

"They're doing fine, but do you know what this thing is?" Cadance rushed. 

"What is what?" 

Cadance moved her mane away, showing the creature in her foreleg. Immediately Chinch'k's pupils brightened to a blinding white and his wings chittered rapidly. He rushed towards the foal in Cadance's foreleg, ready to impale it on his hooves, but he was blocked by the princess' shield. She grunted from the impact but held strong.

"What are you doing?!" Shining shouted in surprise.

Chinch'k leaned the side of his face against the shield and continued to glare at the unaware child. "Kill it. Now," he ordered her.
> There's no chance
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Why are you so adamant in killing this thing? It's just an infant!" Cadance said angrily.

Chinch'k pounded against her shield again. "That thing is not a mere infant. It caused the destruction of two universes, and I won't have that happen again!"

Shining tackled Chinch'k to the ground in the hopes of pinning him down, but the insectoid pony to looked at him with a bemused expression and twisted his joints so that he could push himself up again despite the leg locks the captain put him in. The pony, disappointed and frustrated, let go and stared up at the metal pony.

"What are you talking about? How does THAT thing cause that?" Shining asked with contained frustration. "And what do you mean by 'universe'? I thought you said you failed at whatever it was you were trying to do."

"We failed at what we did, but only two instances let to the destruction of a universe." Chinc'k pointed at the infant that remained apathetic to his actions. "THAT thing is the cause!" The metal pony clutched his head, and his eyes widened with fear. "I have no idea how it does it, but I know that it's the source. Twice we found it at said start, and twice the universe was twisted to be destroyed." He began to pace around and think. "It appeared after Twilight did that strange ritual by...uhh...the Sins of something or other," he rotated his hoof. His eyes shot back towards Cadance still protected by her bubble. "Will you not let me KILL IT?!" He bellowed angrily and pounded against the shield again.

"No!" Cadance affirmed.

Chinch'k Kuchuk's mandibles chittered angrily at the response. "FINE!" He walked away, tapped his neck, and began speaking to himself. 

"I don't know what he's going to do," Shining whispered to his wife. He silently gestured to his guards to surround Cadance, with him at the front of the shield. "I'd rather take my precautions." The stallion snorted angrily after several minutes of silence and glared at Chinch'k who was staring at the sky. "What's wrong with hi--"

The captain seized up when the traveler appeared in a bright flash in front of Chinch'k. Leaning against one of his guards to catch his breath and recover. There was a lengthy exchange between the two visitors, unnerving the guards who clenched their weapons harder in response. A loud, angry yell broke through the silence, and the traveler stomped angrily towards the wall of ponies, his teeth bared through his beak-like muzzle. He was surprised when he was pushed back by the guard before him.

"Let me through. I'm grabbing that thing and killing it before it's too late."

Shining snorted at the traveler, increasing his irritation. "We tried to ask your 'friend' there why, but he wouldn't answer."

"Because it's too dangerous to tell you!" the traveler retorted.

Shining continued to look down on the traveler. "That's not an answer."

The cephalopony stomped around, angrily cursing to himself before returning to Shining. "You want to know WHY exactly?!" The wall of ponies nodded, clinking their armor pieces together. "Fine! That thing single-hoofedly destroyed two universes!"

Shining rubbed his chin. "Yes. I received something by Twilight on that, but I only glosses over it." He snickered. "I couldn't make out heads or tails of it, but I imagine that you being here means that the timelines are okay."

The traveler looked at the captain as though he had received the stupidest of answers. "I said universes, not timelines."

The captain rolled his eyes. "And what does that mean? How did such a tiny thing do it?"

"From what I can tell you, I don't know where it came from." The cephalopony mulled over what Chinch'k had told him and the events that occurred before then. "It's possible that the spell Twilight Sparkle used gave birth to it in this timeline, but where did it come from in the others?" He paced around, his tentacles twitching nervously. "But it makes no sense."

"Can you stop avoiding the question?!" the captain shouted.

The five eyes of the traveler went from Shining to the small gap between him and a guard. "That thing warped the princesses, but I'm not sure how." Murmurs started growing in gravitas in the crowd. 

"What did it do to the princesses?"

"It turned them into eldritch deities."

Several ponies started laughing at the claim, but Shining was not one of them. "What happened?"

"I don't know. I just know that it died soon after it did that." The cephalopony turned around and tensed his muscles. "Have you ever seen two ponies explode outwards in an assortment of blobby and twisted flesh, only to see them warp and twist again? Seeing the people of the universe struggle to fight them, even with their own gods?"

"No," Shining responded bleakly.

"I did. I saw them warp from the magics within them, engulfing whole solar systems and acting like mindless bacteria. I have no way of stopping creatures at such levels of existence, and so I left the universe entirely." He shrugged. "Of course, the last one had its own share of eldritch deities, so I don't know what happened, but different houses can lead to different results." He pointed back at the creature. "That' is why it must die. I don't know how it happened in those times, but it WILL die in this one!"

Cadance pushed through the protective guard, ignoring her husband's protests. "But it is barely a newborn. We can change it!" 

"I've heard that one," the cephalopony scoffed.

"It'll be different this time!"

"I've heard that one too."

Cadance's cheeks puffed in annoyance and Shining Armor stepped forward. "What if you give us a chance? If it's taught right from wrong, then surely it can't harm anypony?"

Chinch'k created a painful screeching noise from scratching his chest pensively and stepped towards the traveler. "Why not give them a chance?" he whispered. "Twilight Sparkle already surprised us both with how fast she worked. This timeline is already diverging far earlier than the previous attempts."

The traveler looked to the group on the right and remained silent a moment. "I will kill it," he emphasized with an outstretched foreleg. "If just ONE thing goes wrong. Just one," he insisted.

The insectoid pony nodded. "As you should. I will be watching as well." He looked to Cadance and furrowed his brow. "I will be watching very closely."

The traveler's tentacles wiggled around. "I didn't want to be seen as the villain in this whole endeavor."

Chinch'k producing a creaking noise from his throat. His version of laughter, perhaps. "It's too late for that."

The traveler frowned and returned to the princess. "I've been convinced to let..." He took a deep breath. "-it live." The pink pony almost formed a hopeful smile on her face, but the cephalopony anticipated it. "ONE error. Just ONE, and I'm killing it where it stands, regardless of what is around." He glared at the creature that stared back with childish eyes and stormed off. "I have transport technology to work on," he growled. 

In a flash of light, he was gone, leaving a scorched circle of black dust behind.



Twilight was resting in her crystal castle, but her sleep was not a comfortable one. She twisted and turned and spun around under her covers until she finally awoke and threw them off. She heaved large breaths of air to cool off, although the heat left way for the cold near instantly when the mare saw what was looking at her from across the room. It was sitting in front of the entrance and, unfortunately, only exit to her room.

"Eldromac?" she muttered.

The misshapen, faceless creature nodded. "You called upon my powers, Twilight Sparkle." It stretched its seven arms before returning them to the 'circle' figure they were in. "I must admit that I was not expecting such a thing after so long." It hummed to itself. "I was growing accustomed to the silence."

Twilight clung to her covers more tightly. She felt like a little filly seeing a monster at the corner of her bed. "What do you want?"

The creature shrugged. "It all depends on you, Twilight Sparkle." It vanished in the blink of an eye then appeared to Twilight's right. "I just want to have followers again. If that is something you would permit an old god to enjoy once more--"

"I can't do that!" Twilight shook her head energetically. "I saw what you had your followers do!"

"Oh. That." Twilight couldn't see it, but she could feel the discomfort of the god. "I didn't ask them to do that. They did it to themselves and used the power I provided them with."

"But if you supplied them with the power, then you allowed them to do it! It's your fault!" Twilight accused the god.

It shook its head. "My followers performed the rites bequeathed unto them, by me, to call upon my powers," it explained calmly. "What sort of person would I be if I did not respond to the rules I set upon my followers?" It shook its large head. "No. It was their idea, and I felt nothing for it, so they took it as a sign that they could perform these strange mutilations as much as possible."

Twilight was horrified. "That's...terrible. All that...that pain. That loss."

"It wasn't a big loss. They still acquired better gifts because of the rites."

Twilight sighed internally and relaxed after assessing that the entity held her no ill will. "So you said you were here to have me reestablish your cult?"

Eldromac shrugged. "That is up to you," it said. "You are the only one to have called upon my powers after so long, pulling me through my world and into this world." It snickered. "Whether you accept it or not is of no consequence to me, but I won't help you the next time you ask for it."

Twilight raised a brow. "And what says I'll need it next time?"

The god rocked side-to-side in its spot. "Because the one you are working for has dubious means to reach his goals despite wanting to let everyone keep their free will."

Twilight furrowed her brows and frowned. "He's the reason why I can't commit to thanking you in the manner you want."

Eldromac stopped mid-rock for a moment, unnerving Twilight and letting her realize that the entity was floating above the ground. "Then you will need to keep my idol hidden for a time until you can bring it out." It raised a finger. "IF you bring it out."

"Yes. IF," Twilight emphasized. She hopped out of her bed, letting her hooves clonk roughly against the hard crystal floor. "I'm curious. Why would a god, of all things, come see me? I'm already preoccupied with the traveler and his...'friends'."

"I never said I was a god, alicorn," Eldromac spoke quietly. "

Twilight blinked several times while her brain tried to process what she just heard. "But everything I saw--"

"Is in line with what gods do, yes," the entity interrupted.

"Then what in Equestria are you?"

"I won't tell you directly, but there are things above gods, and even things above them." It floated towards the exit of Twilight's bedroom and exhaled tiredly. "Your 'friend', whether you call him that or not, is likely to show you a world that you would have never conceived of. I saw it myself." Its body started to lose solidity and was beginning to turn into a transparent and blurry haze. "Much like colonists, watch the forests around you. You never know what you might find."

"I'll take those words to heart," Twilight said. "Thank you for the help you gave me. I'll try to repay you when I kind."

The entity raised its seventh arm and stuck out two fingers. "There's no rush. I quite like the calm."

The alicorn turned back to her bed when Eldromac had vanished, seeing that the same tiny statuettes she had seen in the archive aboard the traveler's ship was laying within an indentation it made in the blue covers. Twilight shook her head and brought it to her with her magic, turning it every which way to take in its details, or lack thereof.

"A friend with a god-like creature." Twilight looked at the faceless head of the statue and placed it back on her bed. "I wonder if Discord knows anything about that." She shrugged off the idea. "I'd rather not get him involved. I don't know what that god is about, and if they're both gods of chaos, then I'm sure that there'll be a LOT of problems if they get inclined to compete with each other." She looked through the doorway to the empty, quiet halls of her castle and frowned. She felt sad for a sudden inexplicable reason. "I wonder why the traveler hasn't been doing anything for us yet. I mean, he made the farm." She closed the door behind her and trotted through her castle. The echoes of her hooves emphasized the silence. "It would be nice to see him try to do something for everypony rather than just work on stopping whatever paranoid threat is crossing his mind."



The cephalopony, locked in his dark room, raised a tall stack of papers with his tentacles. "This must be at least a thousand pages long." He wiped his forehead with a foreleg. "With a few more revisions, I'll be able to bring this to Celestia and avoid her suffering any lost of position by me forcing my will upon her." He tapped the sheets against the black table to straighten them out. "Good. This is the first step to getting this kind of knowledge normalized, but I need to iron out any problems first." A smiled broke through his beak. "Now I can finally start the actual first steps of my goal."
> Math and Science
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Celestia was somehow enjoying her time in the court of Canterlot. Ponies were still uneasy about the vessel in the sky, but the Traveler and his ilk had been silent for several weeks, something that was soothing but didn't bode well. The ponies still had no idea how he worked, so they had no way of predicting what his silence meant, especially when one considered the cephalopony had been active nonstop since his appearance. With a deep breath and stretching of her forelegs, the alicorn banished the negative thoughts from her mind. This was a moment of partial-celebration. 

"I never thought I would miss this mundane, tiring lifestyle," Celestia thought to herself with a smile. She took in the opaque air tugging at her nostrils not with disdain, but enjoyment. Her eyes remained closed while a frown reshaped her face. "How long until he appears?" she wondered aloud.

"Princess?" the audience pony squeaked.

Celestia opened a tired eye and shook away their worry. "It's nothing important." She cleared her throat and leaned forward in her throne. "You were talking about a border conflict between four families?"

The pony nodded energetically, but before he could resume his speech, the cephalopony and Scleretin walked in, pushing the guards and other ponies in front of them away. The sun princess let out a loud groan and dropped her forehead against a raised hoof. The traveler was different this time, however. He was overloaded with squarish, glass saddlebags filled to the brim with papers. Scleretin was no different.

"What is she doing here?" Celestia asked behind gritted teeth. She wasn't trying to hide her disgust. 

Scleretin was about to respond in, but the traveler slapped her on the head with a tentacle. "I've come with a proposal. I find the progression to be lacking."

Celestia leaned back in her throne and turned her head to give the traveler a sideways stare. She was annoyed that he refused to answer her question, but by now it was expected for the cephalopony to not answer them when he didn't see them as important. "Progression in what?"

"Everything scientific."

"Can you elaborate?" Celestia asked.

"Your knowledge of mathematics is impeding your engineering skills. You've yet to discover material tension for suspension bridges or cheaper, lighter materials for heavy duty work, such as aluminum and zinc." He tilted his head to the side. "There are, obviously, much more efficient materials, but these two will complement your present knowledge of iron, as I've seen you've yet to discover how to make steel."

Celestia looked up pensively then straightened herself out in her throne. "I recall you mentioning that you also wanted to help us improve our magical capabilities," she recalled with a sly smile. The traveler nodded. "Will these be implemented?"

"All things in due time. If you focus on magic, as you are doing now, you will never progress, and thus you will stagnate and suffer decay."

The princess stared at the immobile, monotone voiced cephalopony with disdain, but she knew he was right. She rested her head against a hoof and emitted a low groan from her nostrils. Unicorns had indeed become prominent in today's Equestria, most notably because of their ability to freely manipulate magic. This let them imbue items, such as crystals, with spells that allow pegasi, earth ponies, and non-pony species to use without the need for a horn. It came to the point where runes were now actively being researched and implemented into household items, such as crystals for lamps, but such things were costly and slow. A pegasi and earth pony would need to regularly go back to a local unicorn to recharge the runes, and a unicorn would have no need for such a thing.

"You said it would allow non-magic users to better cope with their needs?" she asked the traveler.

"Somewhat." He turned to face the crowds attending the audiences, and his five eyes looked in several separate directions. It caused visible discomfort to said crowds, ranging from mere eye narrowing to holding back an acid fall. "Even the earth ponies and pegasi will be able to freely manipulate magic," he stated plainly. An immense brouhaha erupted from the crowd, from excitement to spiteful phrases spat out like venom. "It won't be in the same vein as the unicorns, so you can sleep easily." The traveler added with a shout. "Your precious positions aren't threatened." He spoke with mockery and disgust.

"I vote that we hear him out," a unicorn shouted from the crowd. It was Caramel Corn. His eyes were still lifeless, but he displayed the best smile he could muster in such short notice. "Princess," he started. "Surely we can take this chance."

Curious and amused, Celestia leaned the side of her head on a hoof, imitating the stance many members of high standing position themselves. She wanted to act like she was above everypony despite never thinking in such a way. It was a good way to tackle this pony. "And why should I take such a chance? Surely, such an aged being can wait just a few decades longer."

The traveler gave no reaction to the comment, leaving Caramel to continue his proposal. "Up until now he's always forced his way into our lives," he stated loudly. "Might I remind you what happened to Canterlot concerning our esteemed guest awhile back?" he asked with a heightening voice of mockery. Scleretin shot the stallion a furious glare. "If we accept this proposal, our technological capabilities and understanding of magic could...skyrocket!" He shot his forelegs into the air and stood on his hind legs for a moment. The stallion fell down with loud clopping. "If we do this now then everything will be integrated calmly and gradually into society, and then we can share it with the other races," he turned to the traveler. "if he so chooses."

Celestia reflected on the proposal in the greatest of silence. Only the creaking of the castle setting in filled the audience's ears. Finally, Celestia readjusted herself and sat properly upon her throne.

"I accept the proposal," she said.

The pressure in the throne room gradually dissipated as the ponies around felt pangs of relief flow over them.

"Then shall we discuss the location of the establishment?" the traveler asked.

Before Celestia could answer, Caramel Corn had one more thing to say. "I'll be more than happy to fund the first establishment, as a token of good will, of course."

The white alicorn nodded, stood up, and waved a foreleg across the air. "Guards, suspend the audiences for now. I would talk with our esteemed," her eyes shot to Scleretin snubbing her. "guests," she spat like poison.

Protests emerged from the crowd, causing much grief to the guards. Why the oldest of the nobles did not protest came off as odd to the alicorn. They were all either planning something or too terrified of the traveler to protest. Then again, there's never a choice with only two possibilities. Finally free, Celestia was able to converse with the traveler while Scleretin remained behind. She was cowering in the presence of the traveler, although she did not show it. The alicorn was well-versed in the array of indicators that one could display despite their faces being calm or angry. She had a whole millennium of politics to sharpen her skills.

"So how do you want to approach this?" she asked the traveler.

"I was thinking of using a nearby site to construct the school or integrate within one of yours. Integration would accelerate things, but it would come at the cost of quick and unstable integration." His eyes looked in several directions while he thought. "That would accelerate my goal, but it could be costly and the outcome is too unpredictable."

"And the other?" Celestia pondered curiously.

"You give me an easily accessible site and we proceed to design the school. The naming will be left to you."

"So generous," Celestia said jokingly. 

"As for the staff, I will be using robots to teach the students, each programmed with the knowledge required to teach at every level."

Celestia's eyebrows furrowed. "What? Students will be discouraged by the presence of your...creations. They need living teachers until they have time to adjust."

"Then that will create a ten-year delay, and who will teach the teachers?" the traveler asked plainly. When Celestia didn't him an answer, he continued speaking. "My robots will be educating potential teachers at the same time as the students so this issue is no longer one to think about."

Celestia nodded. "I will at least need somepony to be around so they aren't too uncomfortable."

The traveler blinked. "They might be robots, but I designed them to sound and act like an actual pony." His tentacles shivered. "If anything, they're more androids than robots."

Celestia tilted her head, her face wreathed in confusion. "Android?"

"Robots designed to look like a living being," the traveler said dismissively. "Can we get to deciding on all the points to set up this school?"

The mare nodded silently. She noticed Scleretin looking at the traveler apprehensively and inch away slowly enough that it didn't create any noticeable noise. The cephalopony appeared oblivious to her movements.

"What did you do to her?" Celestia asked.

"Nothing important," the cephalopony answered plainly. 

Celestia didn't like the secrecy, but many things swirled within her. She both cared and didn't care about the mare. Scleretin had gauded her into trying to fight, and had gone berserk within the city after seeing something related to her, but the alicorn also took pity. Unlike her companions, she was a broken thing, lashing out at every injustice that she perceived existed around her. The fact that the traveler had her on a leash but did not hold it must have intensified her sentiments. She was never held back by a tug of the wrist, and so she was free to attack absolutely everything she wanted. It was something the white alicorn had witnessed many, many times before, and not just with her little ponies.

"I'm curious. Why are you now suddenly deciding to follow the rules, albeit partially, to install this next step?"

There was a moment of silence. "Because I am not the ruler of this land. The people fear me and likely hate me. I have done nothing to acquire their friendship." Celestia was about to speak, but the traveler continued. "I frankly do not care whether they like me or not, but leading a land through fear with breed contempt and hatred. You will eventually reach your downfall, but leading too kindly gives way to perceived weakness. The strong try to exploit that for what they view as a position more deserving of them." He eyed the alicorn up and down. "Something you have no doubt learned the hard way." Celestia narrowed her eyes, but she noticed that the robopony did not snicker like usual. "True kingdoms and empires were rules not with an iron hand or an open hand, but a strong fist clinging onto those of the weaker. It can lessen its grip and keep them held in place. It can tighten its grip to hurt them, but the wrist will tire eventually and must be lessened. Most importantly, it can let go or pull the hand up."

"Those are some colorful metaphors," Celestia mused. "Although I would be remiss to note that you don't have hands."

The cephalopony looked down and snorted. "I did not learn this idiom through our own kind, princess."

"Then who did you learn it from?"

The pony pointed to the ceiling with a tentacle. "Beyond the sky dwell many lives. Perhaps you will see them one day in the future, if decay does not set in and I'm forced to restart the process."

Celestia looked up, a foal-like sense of wonder engulfing her. What were the other worlds like? She shook her head. Such thoughts were too far away to get a concrete answer. She needed to focus on the task at hand and the road that must be paved for future generations to walk across more easily.

"I believe that you will need a new establishment entirely for your work," Celestia said softly. It was the traveler's turn to be interrupted this time. "But I can accommodate your need temporarily in my school for gifted foals. I will have a wing dedicated to the introduction of your math and engineering." She cleared her throat. "We'll discuss where to place your school later."

"Very well," the traveler answered. He set the papers next to Celestia's throne, as did Scleretin. The alicorn felt a tinge of discomfort from the proximity, but the robopony kept herself calm and quiet. "I'll have my machines present themselves to you tomorrow."

With no other words, the traveler left the throne room with Scleretin closely behind him. The white alicorn heaved a long sigh. He wasn't giving any polite hellos and farewells, but it was a start, at least. Left with her mind to wander, Celestia wondered how her cousin was doing with the strange creature that looked partially like a newborn foal.



"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"
> Robots
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Celestia awaited within an empty classroom of her school. The walls were covered in various bits of drawings and cutouts made by the students currently attending, creating a slough of shapes and colors. The wooden desks and chairs had been stacked on the end of the classroom, blocking several bookcases that reached the ceiling. The alicorn chuckled to herself, thinking about how Twilight would have reacted to see them all locked away and inaccessible as a filly here. The white walls emphasized the deep blue carpet floor illuminated by the two grand windows flanking both sides of the wall-bound chalkboard.

"Lost in thought?" the traveler asked.

Celestia bounced in surprise. "You scared me. I didn't hear you come in here."

The cephalopony patted the carpet a few times with his hoof. "Because this material absorbs sounds very well," he explained flatly. "I brought four models for the introductory courses. As agreed upon, I want to know which would best suit the ponies as first introduction."

Four sets of heavy steps passed the doorway, each belonging to a machine and not an armored pony, as Celestia had grown so accustomed to. However, they only passed through one by one. One was based on the people of the traveler, albeit slightly slimmer and with a more prominent 'beak'. It was already an acceptable contender for the 'introduction'. The second was a tripedal giant whose legs ended in bent-in claws. Its upper torso as thin and lanky, and its four arms were folded over its chest. Its head had the appearance of a helmet sporting a V-shaped visor ending in a slight outcrop of metal. Its eyes were red lights hidden behind darkness, and already Celestia didn't like it.

"Are you going to tell me that thing is a pony like 'us'?" she asked the traveler with skepticism.

"Of course not. That would be absurd." He stared at it for a while. "I merely believed that this would help with the shock of something new considering it is similar to the minotaurs."

Celestia nodded in agreement. "Be that as it may, I still believe this...erm, model to be inappropriate. It's too dramatic for my ponies to deal with." She hummed pensively. "The others aren't like this one, are they?"

The traveler's eyes slowly turned away from the alicorn, and she facehoofed.  "Fine. The one that looks like you will be a good way to introduce your creations and the other things of yours."

The cephalopony messed with some commands on another small tablet he pulled out from the mass of tentacles on his head and the other two unseen machines remained unknown to the princess. She felt a pang of regret when the current two left the room. Something within her really wanted to see what the other two machines looked like, but it wasn't to be. At least, not yet. A slight tremor shook the school, throwing some unsupported books onto the floor.

"What is that?" Celestia spouted out very quickly.

"My machines are taking examples of construction materials for use in the new school. I want to study them and see how good they are." He paused for a moment. "I'm going to use them for external construction while the interior is built from metal. Your subject named 'Corn' is providing me with the sample materials."

Several blinks were the only response Celestia had. She rushed out of the door, some part of her hoping to see the other two machines still present, but was left disappointed. She rushed outside of the school and flew into the air to see exactly what was causing the loud banging sounds and the tremors. The alicorn saw eight bipeds colored gray-black and reflecting the light of her sun off of their 'skin'. They towered above the buildings of Canterlot, easily reaching eight stories of height on their own. Their heads were domes sunken into broad torsos, seeing through two wide slits of red. Celestia could see that their bodies and strong arms were made from several cases of metal welded together. It created various shades of black and gray in consistent intervals across their bodies, alluding to the work put into them.  One of the colossi crouched and extended its arms, filling her ears with the scream of metal hard at work. It picked up a large stone block in its hands and raised itself easily. It turned to follow its five other comrades outside of the city and into the distant, hilly plains. Each step filled the gaps made by the others perfectly, creating an increasingly deeper set of footprints into the green outside the city.

"They carry it like it weighs nothing," Celestia whispered to herself. She shook her head. "No matter how many times I see his machines, I'm always shocked at what they're capable of."

Outside the walls at the refugee camp, the crystal ponies bore direct witness to the colossi making great strides over them and pulling gusts of wind with every leg movement, tearing tents away and taking the smaller ponies with them.

"Hold everything down!" a crystal pony shouted. "Grab the elderly and the foals so they don't flyyyYYYYYY!" 

His voice trailed into a scream when another colossus walked over them, throwing everyone around again. The tiny creature stared at metal giants, curious about what they could be. Its concentration was broken by Shining Armor grabbing by the shoulders and shaking it violently. 

"What have I told you about stealing somepony's memories?! GIVETHEMBACK!" he spurted angrily.

The little creature struggled and growled angrily, its body flaring up with wine-purple magic outlined with red. Behind Shining was a guard frantically trying to take off his armor, not understanding what was happening. His comrades were holding him down, trying to keep him from escaping and disappearing. After a few seconds, the creature relented and let the memories flow back into the victim via a wisp of wine-red. He was absolutely livid after realizing what had just transpired. Once his comrades had gotten off of his back, the stallion rush to the creature, a sword in his mouth. Shining saw the movement, but too late. He didn't have time to cast a spell to push the enraged guard. The attacking pony spat his sword out into a clamp on his right hoof and swung down at the little creature. Shining ducked underneath the strike and rammed him away with the side of his strong neck, pushing the attacker away and throwing him off balance.

"Restrain him!" Shining ordered. When the others threw the sword away from the guard, the prince sat down in front of him and slacked his mouth. "I understand your feelings, but my wife and I are trying to change that thing." He gave an exhausted smile. "At least we can get it to give your memories back."

The furious guard stared at the prince for a moment, then his body sagged. "Fine, but if it happens again we're ALL going to kill it, understand?!" he asked while staring straight into Shining's eyes.

The prince nodded and gestured the others to let go, allowing an unsatisfied rage to grumble away. Shining shook the stress from his head and marched to the tiny creature casually poking the leg of a wooden table and watching it rock back and forth with every strike.

"You're driving me crazy!" her groaned loudly. The tiny creature paid no attention. Shining held onto the ground when another of the colossi strode overhead, taking the table with them and leaving the creature on its own. "You're like a rabbit we didn't need," the prince lamented. "It's hard enough dealing with all of this on my own." He lied down on the floor in front of the tiny creature. "Cadance could have taken me up north with her, but nooooo," he mumbled to himself. 

Shining opened a tired eye wider than the other when he saw the creature staring at him and sparking up his magic. The white stallion snorted and bapped the creature on the head with his hoof. Stunned, it wobbled about before falling onto the ground, inciting snickers from the witnesses.

"I'm not sure if we'll manage to teach you anything at all." The prince stared at the still stunned creature. "Do you even grow?" Shining sat up, took his helmet off, and rubbed the sweat from his forehead. The cool breeze ruffling through his sweat-drenched mane was an enjoyable sensation. "Alright. I'll try my best until Cadance comes back. If we can get back to the Crystal Empire then we'll have an easier time teaching you and keeping you isolated from the others until you fully understand the extent of your power." He scratched his head then put his helmet back on. "What can we start by?"

"You could start by teaching it right from wrong?" one of the eavesdropping guards suggested. "But I don't know how it works. Maybe yell at it and bap its head like a dog when it does something wrong."

Shining fattened his lower lip and leaned his head forward. "That could work."

He saw the small creature get back up, shake its head, then try and steal the memories of the guard. Shining flicked the crystallized side of its head and yelled at it in a firm tone.

"No! Bad crystal thing. No!" The creature shrunk away from the stallion, leaving the prince satisfied. "Looks like that seems to work," he mused.

Bolbo looked out from the interior of the ship, using a zoom feature of the ship's windows to have a better look at the layered farm Applejack was given control of. He was very bored, and seeing everything from above was just about the only thing that still entertained him. His humming in the dark corridor stopped with abrupt coughing.

"Swallowed the wrong way," he choked. The metal pony zoomed further, tapped a few colorful buttons on the side of the image, and raised a virtual bar to increase the reception volume.

Twilight was approaching the farm, watching Applejack and a few other ponies getting upset at a group dropping a crate of fertilizer and shattering it. The lavender alicorn was carrying the strange idol in tow with her magic, but no one seemed to notice it or care about it. She called for Applejack who rushed over nigh instantly.

"Ah, Twilight, glad yer here."

Twilight tilted her head. "You are? Why?"

"Ah need sumthin' ta free me from these idiots, pardon ma language."

Twilight pushed up her upper lip. "Not going too well, I take it."

The farm pony shook her head. "Can't say it is, but this thing that octopus gave us is pretty awesome. He's been widening the elevator and started adding more of 'em."

Twilight looked to the layered farm, seeing tiny mechanical boxes producing sparks along the surface of the main body. "I see."

Applejack nodded with a smile, and for a moment the two didn't exchange words. "Watcha got there?" Applejack wondered. She leaned to the side to get a better look at the strange statue. "Never seen anythin' like it."

Twilight frowned and her head drooped in response. "The traveler gave me a tip to somepony who could help with the Crystal Kingdom, and uh..." She rubbed the back of her head, disturbing her mane. "They asked me to share this with somepony in return."

Applejack put a hoof to her chin and squeezed her eyes while thinking. "Mighty strange request, but ah don't know if--"

The two covered their muzzles when a gust of hot air snorted their way. It came from a colossal minotaur looming over them. His bulky body was covered in scars, his right horn was missing, and his eyes carried hints of bloodlust. He stood three heads over the other minotaurs working in the area.

"Twi, this here fella doesn't say much, but he's quite helpful 'round here." She frowned. "Other minotaurs ain't told me 'is name yet." Applejack sighed. "Ya need somethin'?"

Silence accompanied the minotaur's gaze which was fixated on the idol Twilight was carrying. Noticing it, the alicorn lowered it in front of her, sat on her haunches, and grabbed the statue with both hooves. She tapped it a few times then raised it to the minotaur, unsure of what would happen next. He careful grabbed the statue and turned it around, taking in its details. A grunt preceded him tapping Twilight on the head then rushing off into the distance. Furious, Applejack chased after him, ordering him to return to the farm site.

"So you're a creature who keeps her debts paid and promises fulfilled." The voice in Twilight's head laughed. "We'll be able to do much more business in the future, for sure."

The lavender alicorn was scared, moreso than usual, and she wasn't entirely sure why.