[h1]Los Angelos, California[/h1]
[h2]July 8th, 2018[/h2]
[h3]3 PM[/h3]
Sunday

The day, thus far, had been quite uneventful. Los Hermanos De Las Rochas had been called over to the abode of their university friends... Who were still trying to come up with a name for their group. They're a work in progress.

What was in progress was the latest invention of this trio's brains, Ned Vincent.

"I call it, the Tesla Gate!" The bespectacled, long braided, Chinese-American announced. "By entering an algorithm into this interface, it will program the gate to generate a temporal distortion therein. Afterwards, the gate's gyroscopic stabilizes will tune the distortion into the proper frequency, which would then quantum tunnel a wormhole between our universe, and that vibrating at the frequency mapped by the algorithm! With this, inter-dimensional travel has become possible!"

Ned's excitement deflated at the blank stares.

Fred Hill, a tall, stocky, ginger raised his hand. "Ned?"

Ned sighed, already knowing this question would be a stupid one. "Yes, Fred?"

"What's a Tesla?"

"So, what does thing do, Ned?" Demanded Redemoinho Sampson. He was noticeably shorter than the rest of crew, just barely Escotto's height. His mocha complexion, gelled back black hair and penchant for fine clothes marked him as Brazillian.

"Redemoinho, I just explained the function of the Tesla Gate!" Ned grumbled.

"Yeah, but how about explaining it in [i]English[/i]!" Rede shot back.

"I [i]am[/i] speaking English!"

"Hang on, hang on!" Escotto cut in. "It means, this thing's a knock-off of a Stargate!"

Finally, the others' eyes lit up.

Fred practically bounced on his toes, clapping. "Ooh! Ooh! That means we get to go to Atlantis!"

"How come [i]you[/i] follow all this Science jargon?" Rede asked Escotto.

Smirking, Escotto clapped Rede's shoulder and explained, "It's 'cause I have something called an -follow along now- "Ed-U-Ca-Tion"!"

Which set Rede to rolling his eyes, grumbling something about having learned on the streets. Afterwards, a bored silence fell over the group as Ned fiddled with the gate's controls. Eventually, the giant rings of the gate's gyroscope whirled to life, crackling with power as their spinning blurred into a brightening sphere.

[h1]CRASH![/h1]

There was little time for anyone to contemplate what the noise was: A piece of the ceiling chipped off and hit a switch on the gate's controls. As Ned rushed to get control of it again, the energy sparking from the gyroscope began to branch out, zapping anything and everything. Including Ned. If only the nerd spent as much time developing his physique as he did his brain, he could have held on to that console. Instead, the increasing gravity dragged him towards the orb.

Behind the crew, the lab door burst open and figures poured into the room, trying to take Antonio and the others, who fought them back. Escotto managed to punch out one of these attackers before Ned's yelping drew his attention.

Escotto knew what he had to do. But the question was: Did he have the cajones and lack of sense to risk his life to save his friend?

"The hell kinda question is that?! OF COURSE I DO! Yújiā Yánshēn!" With that, Escotto's arm stretched across the lab, where he snatched Ned, but couldn't seem to pull him back. A quick decision led to Escotto grabbing the outer rim of the gate and yanking himself over. He managed to get between Ned and the gyroscope and kick the hapless nerd away from the gyroscope and into big Fred's arms.

"ESCOTTO!" he heard someone scream, and then a flash.

Then darkness.

[h2]Somewhere in Equestria.[/h2]

When Escotto came to, he was cold and wet. Maybe he did end up in Atlantis after all? No, wait this looks like a river. He managed to reach out and grab a rock before dragging himself to dry land. He felt sick. The kind of sick that came after one of his drunken rampages. But, he was pretty sure alcohol was [u]not[/u] in the equation of bullshit that brought him here.

Taking deep breaths, the Mexicano forced himself to stand, and keep his lunch where it belonged. His surroundings were green with forest life, until he looked north (don't ask how he knows) with what appeared the be a burning spire breaking the skyline. Further in the distance to another direction, Escotto could hear the thumping of something big, and most likely not friendly.

"Well, whatever that is, I hope it's ass is ready to meet my foot!" Pulling his trusty board, Ramona from... Somewhere, Escotto skated off north.