Chapter 26: Coulrophobia

"Ah still think ya should chuck it out."

Billy looked down at the foal standing next to him and shook his head. Once again, through some way or another, he had found himself foal-sitting for the Cutie Mark Crusaders once more. The trio were keeping their horsing around to a bare minimum, with the exception of Scootaloo who was groaning at every bad horse and pony related pun coming from the human. Placed on a ledge, safely out of reach was the object that had been activated the previous time and that, for better or for worse, had sent more and more chaos and action into their lives. The Multiversal Opener was akin to a time bomb but he couldn't bring himself to throw it out. For one thing, there wasn't a safe way for it to be dismantled and disposed of as even he didn't know how the internals worked. Oh, sure, he had pieced it together but he had been running on caffeine and the kind of concentration that could only come from several days of not sleeping. Dismantling an atomic bomb would have been much easier.

"I'd rather not. There are several components in here that can be used to repair the Dimensional Doorway if the ZARS were ever to run out of steam."

The younger pony tilted her head at the explanation. It didn't really make that much sense to her, but everything had flown over her head at school. Now that they were out for a few weeks of holidays, she was itching to find her Cutie Mark any way she could. The trio were the only foals in their final year that had yet to gain their Marks, but she guessed the pride she felt when helping the Rangers was a sort of Mark in its own way. Then again, without an external Mark, none of them felt like it was good enough for them. She looked behind her to see what the others were up to. As this was pretty much the first time in a while they had been inside the Command Tower, the girls were looking around at the changes, differences and the various security logs. One in particular had caught their interest as it was extremely protected and had required several things to be done or said at the same time for anything to happen.

"But that ZARS won't begin to break down for another hundred years or so. We'll still be kicking around so you can repair it then."

Billy looked down at the younger pony and ran a hand through his hair in exasperation. Whether it was an after-effect of Zedd's defeat or something that was bound to happen all along, it seemed some of the energy from the Element Morphers had, for lack of a better word, leaked over the family members and close relatives of the Rangers. Of course, the energy wouldn't grant them full immortality, but they would continue to live on for another few centuries. Interestingly enough, it had also affected Granny Smith and had de-aged the matriarch of the Apple Family until she looked young enough to be Applejack's sister. It was something that was rather amusing for all involved, including Granny Smith – who was revealing a carefully hidden mischievous streak. Looking over his shoulder to see Sweetie Belle squinting at some of the recent energy readings, he shook his head and thought of the other, more disturbing incident of the recent past.

On a whim, he had contacted the dimension of the Ultra Rangers to send over some of the images from the recent battle. Weihan had answered the call and had informed the Midnight Blue Ranger that they were also dealing with the aftermath of a crisis of their own. He hadn't said much about it, only muttering something about 'him' being responsible for the 'overcharge'…whatever that was supposed to mean. However, all half-revealed mutterings cut off with an audible snap as the Orange Ranger had set eyes on the monster. The Asian boy had gone very still and very silent as his eyes roamed over the body of the monster. In a very quiet voice, he had asked who sent down the monster and if it had said anything else. After reviewing the audio logs of the battle, Weihan had stood up from his set, muted the audio from his side and had, apparently, started screaming and swearing out loud. After around ten minutes, he had calmed down and had apologised for his outburst. Billy had waved it off somewhat had had transferred the recordings of the battle to the computers in the Ultra Cavern.

Billy had a strange feeling that things were being connected that would draw the two dimensions together even closer than before. Whether that was a good or bad thing was to be seen, but something suggested that Night Shade would be in the very centre of it. After the call, he had looked through the battle footage once more and had run numerous searches on the name the monster had mentioned 'Apollonia'. So far, he had come up empty-handed but the answer was somewhere close by. Surprisingly, Scootaloo had found what could have been a reference to the monster on one of the old logs from Zordon's war with Rita. It mentioned a monster that was dangerously destructive on the battlefield and was described like a Roman Hoplite, if Billy recalled his Ancient Roman History. He shook his head and turned around at the sound of teleportation. Materialising from two beams of light were Twilight and Applejack. Giving her little sister an affectionate rub on the head, the Red Ranger nodded to Billy before walking over to supervise the other two Crusaders. Twilight trotted over to him and spoke in a low voice.

"Any luck analysing the energy yet?"

He shook his head. Energy readings of the monster he had done in battle had revealed the creative energy to be a literal mash up of several different sources. One moment it had identified it as Zedd's energy, the next was something different…it was like completing a single jigsaw puzzle from several boxes of parts. However, throughout all the chaos associated with it, there had been some consistent results. His voice was low to avoid attracting the attention of the three younger ponies.

"No…it bears some similarity with the Ultra Energy, but slightly different."

He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, attempting to calm himself down by performing some of the Aquitian breathing exercises that he had remembered. Unfortunately, doing those brought about slightly more stress as they would inevitably remind him of Cestria and of her death. The sting associated with those memories had lessened somewhat, but it would always be there…no matter how much he could forgive Zordon or accept the fact that he had done all he could. Stepping away from the shelf that held the Multiversal Opener, he walked over to the station that monitored the old, abandoned outpost and frowned slightly. The power levels had fluctuated once more…almost as if there was other power being forced into the system, but it was probably an overreaction on his part. Absently, he opened his mouth and began speaking.

"At this point, all we can do is wait for Night Shade to make his move. I don't think he'll attack so soon after the scissor Ogre thing."

The alarms started blaring, causing all occupants in the Command Tower to jump. As Princess Celestia ran in from one of the outer chambers, Billy turned to Twilight and shook his head.

"Don't say it."

Chuckling under her breath, the Purple Ranger cantered over to the scanners and, using her magic, flicked on the screen to pinpoint the disturbance. What she saw made her tilt her head in confusion as it was nothing like she had seen before. It was a biped and it was proportioned in the same ways as any human she had seen. It was wearing a garishly bright green and white skin-tight bodysuit with an almost-cartoonish representation of a joker's head emblazoned on the chest. Clutched in one hand was a short rod that was topped with a comically large ring. Its face was done up with white, black and purple paint and there were red streaks on its face that looked disturbingly like fresh blood. Applejack took one look at the humanoid on the screen and felt a shiver of fear rush through her body.

"What the…Ah've never seen somethin' like that before."

"Rangers! Come out, wherever you are! I have presents!"

The shrill, almost too jovial, voice rang out over the speakers and the Rangers looked at each other uncertainly. Almost on an unconscious reflex, they summoned their Element Morphers and prepared to teleport off. Billy sent a short message to the others that they were needed and swallowed as he looked at the creature once more. It didn't look like it had been conceived by anything remotely sane but they had a duty to protect the populace from the twisted machinations of Night Shade. He looked behind him at the Princess of the Day and nodded slowly.

"We can't afford to let something that demented walk the streets. Princess, we're off."

Princess Celestia nodded back. The creature on the screen was something out of her worst nightmares and the thought of Twilight, and the Rangers, going up against it sent shivers of fear through her body. Frowning slightly at the last thoughts to cross her mind, she looked back and opened her muzzle to speak, three flashes of coloured light stopping her words. As the Rangers teleported off, she stated them softly to the Chamber occupied by her and the three foals.

"Be safe."

TBC…