Hey, guess who's still alive? Sorry for not updating over the past month or so, but it turned out I couldn't keep that once-a-week pace up forever, especially for the holidays. However, I am back! I can't guarantee that I'll be able to return to the old update schedule, but I do have the next chapter drafted so expect an update next week at least! In addition, I have revised up to chapter 5 since the last update, this time rewriting large parts of it again.
Happy new year, everyone! Enjoy the chapter!
Chapter 55: A Stitch in Time
The newly outfitted Blah bounded excitedly into the TARDIS, creating a symphony of metal-on-metal clanging sounds. "Alrighty then!" he cried. "I've got just one more stop to make before I finally get into the game, so Nook, set a course for Canterlot, on the double!"
"Aye, Blahsadfeguie sir!" saluted Tom Nook, getting into the spirit. "Shall I land us straight in the castle?"
"That'd be sensible..." Blah affirmed, but as he thought about it, something else came to mind. He still hadn't gotten used to the fact that they were in a time machine, and could theoretically go to any time they wanted. "Although... how about sending us back to around, say..." He recalled what he had heard from Twilight regarding the time of the murder. "6:10 PM?"
"Whoa, hang on," Tails cut in, entering the phone box. "You're not thinking about preventing the murder, are you?! I mean, changing the course of history is guaranteed to put us on a different timeline, isn't it...?"
"Of course not," Blah reassured him. "Er, I'm not going to try and save Pinkie, rather. Due to the thing about the timelines. However, there's no rule against simply being there and witnessing what happened, right?"
"Oh, I see," Nook understood. "You just want to go there and find out for yourself what really happened, while remaining as hidden and unintrusive as possible."
Blah nodded. "If Discord's telling the truth, and I'm fairly certain he is, then Pinkie will be... was... will have been kidnapped around that time. I have to know whether or not I'm right, and maybe find out who took her while we're at it."
"As if it could be anybody but Charge..." muttered Dr. Eggman, having found his way inside as well.
"Do we even know where the alleged kidnapping took place?" asked Tails.
"Well, we found Discord in the sculpture garden," remembered Blah, instinctively scratching his head, but stopping at the sound of an unpleasant scraping noise. "...so, I'd say that's as good a place as any to start looking."
"And the kidnapping could hardly have taken place in a heavily populated area," added Nook. "Judging from the population density of the city, that narrows it down quite a bit."
"The garden itself has been mostly deserted today. As far as civilians go, anyway." Blah leaned back against the wall. "So, without further ado..."
"Wait!" Professor E. Gadd stood in the doorway of the TARDIS. "May I come with you? I'm curious as to how this time machine operates, and perhaps I may be of assistance elsewhere."
"I don't see why not," shrugged Blah. Everyone nodded in agreement, with the exception of Dr. Eggman, who wasn't so sure the eccentric old man could be too helpful. "Make yourself comfortable. I'll explain everything on the way."
"Ohh, splendid!" E. Gadd remarked as he closed the door behind him. He looked around the room curiously. "I don't suppose there are any seatbelts? Or seats, at least?"
"Not really," Tom Nook answered, starting to work the console and start the engine. "Normally, you just pick something to hold onto when things get bumpy. Like right about now. Hoho!"
With the pull of a lever, the interior shook violently, giving the man barely enough time to react. It was all he could do to reach out and grasp the railing, keeping himself from falling over. As the initial shock wore off, and the ship began to move, he found himself rather enjoying the ride.
The TARDIS wound to a halt, landing rather clunkily in a mass of thick, tall shrubbery. It suddenly occurred to Blah that the thing wasn't exactly built for stealth, and he doubted anyone who was nearby could have missed such a massive and loud object materializing in the bushes, but it was too late now.
"I say, that was quite the thrill!" E. Gadd was the first to speak, laughing jovially. "If a trip spanning several hours is that wild, I'd love to see what a longer one would be like!"
"Hmm, you'd be the first to enjoy riding the TARDIS..." commented Nook, shutting it down. "Anyway, let's tone it down a bit, hm? We wouldn't want anyone to find us here."
"Right-o, sorry," the professor concurred, lowering his voice.
Blah headed for the door. "All right," he quietly announced, "I'll go out alone. Less chance of being caught that way. Also, we wouldn't want to leave the TARDIS unattended." Everyone nodded.
Slowly, Blah slid open the door to the phone box. He was immediately met with a wall of foliage. He carefully brushed past it, disappearing into the bushes.
Navigating the tangled mess of leaves and branches left Blah wishing for a machete or something, but eventually, he found the point where the plant matter ended. He pulled open the brush, creating a small viewing window for himself, and saw exactly what he expected to see: an empty cobblestone pathway, with a matching array of bushes on the opposite side.
He looked both ways down the path, seeing no signs of life, pony or otherwise. 'Well, at least we picked a good spot to land,' thought Blah, somewhat relieved. 'But Pinkie and Discord could be anywhere in this garden, and it's practically a maze.'
The place was eerily silent. There wasn't even a singing bird or a stray breeze to create background noise. If Pinkie and Discord were around here together, surely he would have been able to hear some kind of chatter, or at least hoofsteps.
As he stared blankly into the bushes across from him, focusing on listening to his surroundings, he nearly missed the pair of eyes staring back at him.
Blah withdrew in a panic, letting the branches fall back into place. His eyes had locked with theirs. He had been spotted, and he was sure of it. Was there even a point in trying to hide now?
Several seconds passed, and still the garden remained silent. Maybe he hadn't been spotted after all? Slowly, he opened the viewport again in a different location, to see if he could get a good look at whoever it was. Once again, he was met with the same pair of eyes staring at the same space, unmoving and unblinking.
'If eyes are windows to the soul, then these are brick walls,' thought Blah. He tried sticking his head out into the path. At this point, he just wanted to see if he could get a reaction out of them. Just as he thought, the eyes did nothing. He stepped out onto the path and tried poking his finger into one of the eyes. It stopped abruptly with a light tapping noise, indicating that they were solid. Confidently, he brushed the leaves away from the objects, revealing them to be two eggs, roughly the size of chicken eggs, with black dots painted on them.
Blah picked up the eggs. It was apparent that whoever put them there knew that somebody would be hiding in the exact bush that he chose, looking across at them. Was it a prank? A decoy?
Before he could contemplate the meaning of the eggs any further, they began to wobble ever so slightly in his hands. A crack appeared on one of them, then the other. Blah was mortified at the realization that whoever-it-was decided to use fertile eggs for their purposes, whatever they were, until he saw what hatched from them.
Sitting in the palms of his hands were Jelly Jiggler and Don Patch, wearing fake beaks and feathers.
"Mama! Mama!" they cried, amidst high-pitched peeping noises.
Blah had to take a moment to process what he was seeing, and not just because his internal processors had difficulty processing it either. Don Patch and Jelly Jiggler, dressed as chicks, had hatched out of eggs that were far too small for them and were now sitting in his hands. Finally, he expressed the entirety of his confusion through a single syllable. "What."
"Mama, I'm hungry!" whined Jelly, opening his beak-mouth wide.
"Yeah, hurry up with the grub already!" Don followed up. "We gotta get our energy back up after breaking through those tough shells!"
"You mean the shells that probably would have broken on their own on account of holding something that couldn't fit?" argued Blah, frustrated. "Sorry, I can't be your mama now!" He set them onto the ground. "I'm on... very important business." He ended with a whisper, suddenly remembering that he was supposed to be as stealthy as possible.
"Y-you're not our m-mama?" stuttered Jelly, who started to cry.
"Uh oh... when our real mama comes back, you're really gonna get it!" Don hugged his bawling bird-brother, pointing accusingly at Blah.
The robotic fox simulated a roll of his eyes. "Let me guess, Bo-bobo's the mother bird?"
"And what is the meeeeeaning of this?!" A booming, yodeling falsetto voice drew Blah's gaze to the sky, where he saw Bo-bobo, as expected. Instead of a bird costume, however, Bo-bobo wore a horned helmet and shining, somewhat scant valkyrie armor. Two long, braided pigtails hung from his afro, and he carried a massive golden battleaxe with wing-shaped blades. And to top it all off, his mount was none other than Discord himself.
"Good heavens aboooove!" bellowed Bo-bobo, descending onto the path. "What have you done to my baaaaaabies?!" He hopped off of Discord and made a beeline for Don and Jelly, taking them in his arms.
"It seems the foul automaton tried to steal them from you, O Valiant Queen of the Valkyreagles!" assessed Discord. Bo-bobo turned his angry, petrifying glare toward Blah, brandishing his battleaxe threateningly.
"Hey man, chill out!" Blah pleaded as he backed away submissively. His best, and only, guess at this point was that the Hajikelists had set up some kind of ambush for Pinkie's would-be kidnapper in advance, and that they mistook Blah for an enemy. "It's really me, Blahsadfeguie! I would never kidnap anyone!"
"Ha!" scoffed Don. "Nice try... not! If you think we're falling for that obvious trick, evil robot, you're dead wrong! And also just plain dead! Right, mama?"
"Actually..." Bo-bobo returned to his normal voice, lowering his axe. "This robot has a familiar, almost cheesy smell."
"That's right, I-" Blah stopped. "Wait, cheesy?"
Discord approached, examining the robot's head closely with a magnifying glass. "Yep, there's a human soul in there all right," he confirmed. "And I'd recognize that Hajike signature anywhere. It's Blah for sure!"
"Whaaaaaaat?!" yelled Don and Jelly simultaneously, their costumes falling apart.
"What happened?" asked Bo-bobo, stuffing his axe into his afro. "You lose a bet?"
"Long story short, I died," explained Blah. His casual tone only served to strengthen the shock value of the news. "Sera caught my soul before it escaped, and then we put it into this robot. But nevermind all that. I'm here to find out what really happened to Pinkie Pie." He paused, realizing that any hopes he had of remaining discreet were completely shot. He figured he might as well get some information while he was there. "So, uh, for starters, what are you guys d-"
The sound of rustling bushes from behind interrupted Blah. Expecting a fight, he turned around, only to see Tom Nook, wielding an axe of his own, with Dr. Eggman, Tails, and E. Gadd taking up the rear. Seeing no immediate threat, Nook put away his weapon. "Is everyone all right out here?" the confused raccoon asked. "We heard shouting."
"Yeah, it sounded like you were being attacked," Tails added.
"No, no, I'm fine," Blah dismissed. "The mission's kind of compromised, but there's nothing we can do about that now. We're here, they know it, and the timeline's just going to have to deal with it."
"So, if I'm hearing this correctly," began Discord, "something happens to Pinkie Pie in the future, so you brought your time machine to witness it yourself without altering the timeline?"
"That's the gist of it, yeah," Blah nodded. "Where is she, anyway? With you?"
"Funny story, I could've sworn she was here just a minute ago..." Discord looked at Bo-bobo, who shrugged.
Suddenly, the familiar sounds of a certain engine rang through the air. Blah felt an unpleasant twinge where his gut would have been. He turned around, doing a quick head count of everyone present, and the twinge intensified as he realized that nobody was guarding the TARDIS. Everyone else who had arrived with him had the same idea, followed by the same reaction.
A flash of pink caught Blah's eye. Through the space in the bushes hastily wrenched open by his worried party, he had a clear sight of the blue box's open door, in which stood Pinkie Pie, waving happily to them.
"Hi Blah! Bye Blah!" the pony cried as the machine began to dematerialize.
A surge of panic and bewilderment coursed through Blah's wiring. "Pinkie, wait!" he called, sprinting into the bushes after her. However, the door had already closed and the booth had already become intangible. Blah crashed face-first into the shrubbery behind where the TARDIS had been moments prior.
Blah remained motionless in deep, flabbergasted thought. Somehow, Pinkie had managed to slip by undetected and hijack the time machine while everyone was distracted with each other. But why? Did she know what she was doing, or was she simply playing around? Where did she go? By simply wanting to observe the past, did Blah inadvertantly trigger the sequence of events that leads to Pinkie's death?
"You shouldn't just leave your expensive, reality-altering toys out for others to play with, you know," scolded Discord impishly.
"That wasn't my fault!" Blah countered, throwing himself back onto his feet and aggressively staring down his away team. "I wasn't the one who was supposed to be watching the thing! I mean, I know you thought I was in trouble, and I appreciate the concern, but did you all have to come out of there?"
"You never know what to expect from Charge's goons," Eggman defended himself. "I thought you might need all the help you could get. I figured at least Shorty here would stay behind and look after it, but I guess I was wrong." He stared indignantly at the professor, crossing his arms.
"To be perfectly honest," E. Gadd admitted, "I couldn't possibly trust myself alone with such a remarkable vessel."
"And neither can I, apparently!" Blah flung his arms into the air. "Great! I thought we might finally be able to get some answers for once, but all we wound up with was more questions, and the added bonus of having a time machine stolen from under our noses by the least predictable pony in Equestria!"
"Can Blah go two hours without having a mental breakdown...?" muttered Tails.
"And as for the icing on the cake, Discord," Blah pointed sharply at the ruler of chaos, "you lied to me! Pinkie wasn't kidnapped at all!"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Discord backed away. "I haven't lied to you yet! If you have a problem, take it up with future me! Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a very important appointment in a couple of minutes. Ciao!" He then proceeded to bite his own tail and eat his way up it, getting smaller and smaller until he vanished completely.
Blah turned around to confront Bo-bobo, but he and his baby birds had already flown the coop at some point as well. Blah slumped over, pounding the cobblestone with his fist. He knew that there was nothing he could do for several hours until his current self traveled back in time, lest he risk messing with the timeline further.
"Well, we have a few hours to kill," sighed Tom Nook. "We should use the time to speculate what happened, hm?"
Blah had no objections. "Ok, let's start with where the TARDIS is," he opened.
E. Gadd cleared his throat. "If it's anything like my own time machine, I may be able to track its journey through spacetime with one of my gadgets."
Everyone else perked up simultaneously. "Well why didn't you say so?" questioned Blah, standing up. "Go for it!"
Without hesitation, Gadd produced another dual-screened handheld device, or perhaps it was the same one, as far as Blah knew. The professor wandered to the spot from which the TARDIS departed. He pressed a few buttons and held up the device, and a few electronic pings later, his face lit up with interest.
"Hmm, curious..." he uttered, reading the display. "There's some interference, but I've managed to discern the machine's destination. Target time: 5 years from now. Target location: unknown, but it's somewhere far, far underground..."
Blah froze. "The Underworld. The Omega Timeline." He slapped his forehead. "I can't believe I forgot about that."
"Oh, that's right!" cried Tails. "You told me what happened! Pinkie brought the TARDIS to the Underworld after you beat the Wall of Flesh... and she must've come from right here and now!"
"But that can't be right..." continued Blah. "She told me she found it in Ponyville. This is Canterlot. Don't tell me Pinkie lied to me as well..."
"Sure sounds like it," asserted Dr. Eggman, not helping Blah's mood in the slightest.
"She had good reason to," Nook pointed out. "If you had any idea that Pinkie was going to take the TARDIS under your watch, you might have tried to prevent it, hm? She had the integrity of the timelines in mind."
"So she does know more than she's letting on," Blah concluded. "There's no other explanation by this point. So, as for the Pinkie we discovered in the castle..." Blah's heart sank like a brick as he put two and two together. "When Charge sent us back to the Alpha timeline, we left Pinkie with him... so he could have easily..." He weakly turned around, facing the sunset. "So it was my fault. If I wasn't so obsessed with finding Pinkie's killer, she would still be alive right now..."
"But you wouldn't be." Blah's head turned, meeting Tails's comforting gaze. "Nor would Hailstorm, or Seraphina, or Broshi. If it weren't for her, you all would never have escaped the underworld. By taking the time machine that you brought, she was able to save all four of you at the cost of her own life, and she knew it from the beginning."
Blah considered the words of his likeness. It certainly sounded like her to have had everything planned from the start. But if she could think that far ahead, why couldn't she prevent her own death while she was at it? If she was planning on leaving him, she certainly did an excellent job of hiding it from him. Which, on the other hand, didn't sound like her at all.
"You have a point..." Blah responded, "but I don't think it ends there. She also knew that we would be reuniting again." He faced the castle with renewed confidence. "She expects me to prototype her. It's the only way she could face her premature death."
"Uh... are you sure about that?" Tails asked, fearing once again for Blah's sanity. "You did say it wasn't a fate you'd wish upon anyone... and is it really that hard to believe that Pinkie could let you go?"
"Looks to me like you're the one who can't let her go..." commented Eggman.
"I think we should humor Blah at the very least," Nook argued. "Loved ones make excellent and loyal sprites, for starters, and part of the point of SBURB is to grant second chances to those that deserve them. If what you say is true, I think Pinkie has earned a second chance with Blah, regardless of whether or not she planned for one."
There was silence, as no-one could refute Nook's statement. "Thank you, Tom," Blah praised. "Now, we have an incomplete robot, four scientific minds, and a few hours to kill. I think I know the perfect way to pass the time."
"I'll start simple for you. Where did you obtain all those legendary Pokemon?"
Bob Sladfigy allowed the uncomfortably bound Edwin very little space, staring him down in an attempt to intimidate him. Broshi and Seraphina stood on either side, supervising the interrogation.
Edwin's eyes met Bob's confidently. 'Charge provided me with them,' he thought, with Sera broadcasting. 'I'd like to know how he got them just as badly as you do.'
"Is that so?" Sera responded. "Surely, then, you would not mind helping us figure that out?"
'And betray Charge?' questioned Edwin. 'I've sworn my loyalty to him. Even when faced with death, I serve to the end.'
'So what is it about this guy that you'd risk your own life for him?' Broshi stepped in.
'Simple. Charge and I have been close friends ever since we were children. We both have the same goal: to preserve the multiverse.'
"Yeah, about that," Bob discredited, crossing his arms. "If you guys claim to be on the same side as us, why do you keep trying to ruin our plans?"
Broshi rolled his eyes. 'He talks like he's been a part of our group for as long as Blah has...'
Edwin shot Bob a condescending glare. 'Because, well, to put it in terms you'd understand, you're doing it wrong.'
"Care to explain what you believe is 'right' then?" Sera requested.
The cowboy shifted around, getting as comfortable as he could. 'By playing SBURB, you plan to gradually isolate each universe, as well as its central Jewel, with the intention to smash it. We happen to know a lot more about the Jewels of Universe than you do. Smashing them only results in more chaos. The pieces might sort themselves out eventually, but there's no guarantee that the universes will end up the way they were before the collision. The only way to revert all universes back to normal, one hundred percent separate and intact, is to win the game while protecting the Jewels from harm.'
Both Broshi and Bob had their doubts that this was the truth. They looked to Sera, expecting analysis of Edwin's statement.
Sera herself was conflicted as well. "He does not appear to be lying," she announced. "And I must say, his explanation makes sense. If you smash a vase, for instance, even if you put all the pieces back into their proper places with a suitable adhesive, the adornment will still have visible cracks and abnormalities."
"Whoa, Sera, you defending him?" Bob exclaimed, shocked.
'Yeah, remember what happened when you said that Charge wasn't lying?' Broshi brought up. 'Trusting any of these jokers never leads to anything good.'
Sera certainly did not forget the trickery that Charge pulled, but at the same time, the only other source of information about the Jewels from which they had heard was a single book in Twilight Sparkle's library. Neither the book nor Edwin could be considered a reliable resource; either one could be true. And if Edwin were correct, smashing the jewels may cause irreversible damage.
"If this is true," Sera continued, "why did you not tell us this sooner?"
'Would you have believed us if we did?' Edwin countered.
Sera remained unperturbed. "You have a point - ever since you appeared, you have incited wars, corrupted entire civilizations, and murdered innocent lives. If your motivation is for the good of the multiverse, why are you causing its denizens such suffering?"
'When the universes are separated, their timelines will separate as well, causing them to reset. None of our actions leading up to that point will stay as a part of history. No one will remember us. If nothing we do is going to matter in the end, why not take the easy, efficient route and assume total control over all of this universe's resources?'
Bob loudly stomped the floor, furious at the cowboy's dismissive attitude. "If you really and truly cared about this world," he shouted, glaring threateningly at Edwin, "you'd find another way to gain its 'resources'. Like, I dunno, earning everyone's trust? I mean, if they knew you were trying to help them, they'd gladly return the favor!"
'Once again, you are completely wrong.' Edwin showed no signs of faltering either. 'Did you already forget what I said? Restoring the universes involves resetting their timelines. Not everyone wants to reset, you know. The original collision created a new timeline of its own. Things happened. People made acquaintances, friendships, relationships. If this timeline were erased, Astra wouldn't even exist, and neither would Blahsadfeguie, just to name a few.'
Broshi shook his head. 'That can't be right. Most of the people I talked to hadn't seen anything from other universes until after Blah showed up.'
Sera's curiosity was piqued, however. Astra's parents certainly sounded like they originated from different universes, but she knew nothing about Blah's origin, and neither did he. "What do you know about Blah?" the Kadabra demanded.
'He has family here,' Edwin tersely replied. 'That's all I know. Search me all you like, you won't find another tidbit of information about him.'
Sera returned to the possibility that Blah and Astra were somehow related. They were very similar in many ways, for sure. The signs seemed to point to "yes". But there was no way to know for sure. Eggman already attested that his daughter was an only child, but they had yet to hear from her mother, and time travel was always a possibility.
"Wah!" Sera's thoughts were interrupted by a loud squeal from the door. Everyone turned around to see Waluigi standing there with an armful of Pokeballs.
"There you are," Bob acknowledged impatiently. "What took you so long? All you had to do was take our Pokemon to be healed..."
"I saw a moving light in the sky..." stated Waluigi. "It's headed this way."
Bob wasn't convinced this was a very good excuse, but his concern and fatigue outweighed his anger. "Fine, this better be important," he conceded, he and Sera following Waluigi outside. Broshi stayed behind to keep an eye on Edwin.
Looking up into the night sky, the three of them spotted a small white light in the distance, moving slowly towards them. Sera's sensitive ears picked up a soft whir. She identified it as some sort of machine or small vehicle, and probably harmless given its slow speed.
"Who goes there?" Bob yelled to the sky, apparently having a different idea. "I gotta warn you, I'm not in the mood for trouble."
"Good, because neither am I," a synthetic voice answered. The source of the light lowered, becoming close enough for the others to make out the shape of a certain robotic fox, carrying something slightly bigger than itself. Its tails spun rapidly, blending into a transparent circle.
"Welcome back, Blah," greeted Sera as her first companion came in for a landing.
"This is Blah?!" cried the utterly astonished Bob.
"We have succeeded in liberating Blahtown from the forces of Charge without casualty," reported Sera, ignoring Bob. "What have you been up to? Where is the TARDIS?"
"What in the name of Arceus is a TARDIS?!" Bob pleaded, his lack of knowledge getting to him.
Blah touched down, his tails slowing to a stop, and he set down the body of Pinkie Pie. "Oh, don't worry about it," he undermined, capitalizing on the trainer's confusion. "I've caught up with the god of chaos, had my flight system finished, and brought the dead body of my girlfriend back to be turned into a ghost, but not before she took my time machine to close a time loop. And now I'm about to buckle down and finally play this reality-bending game to restore 8 universes back to normal. Pretty standard stuff." Bob's jaw hung open. "Did you guys learn anything new?"
Bob stuttered and hastily straightened himself, reverting to a state of false calmness and control. "W-well, we just put a smug cowboy with a full team of legendary Pokemon in his place, and he told us a story about magical jewels holding the universe together and how we're not supposed to smash them, and that resetting the universe will stop you from existing." He placed his hands on his hips, confident that he had suitably matched the ramblings of Blah and perhaps confused him a little as well.
Blah nodded. "I see..." His unexaggerated reaction disappointed Bob. "...I hope you didn't believe him."
"Edwin had a solid point," Sera explained. "And he was telling the truth, as far as I could tell. His malicious history is currently the only thing hurting his credibility compared to our original sources."
Blah hesitated, but signified his early surrender with a shrug. "Well, we can argue about what that self-righteous jerk said later. I just want to get my entry into the medium over with already, don't you?"