You know, I was actually starting to get used to being woken up by Nightmare Moon and Chyrsalis' arguing by this point. So, imagine my surprise when, instead, I was greeted by silence and a slight swaying motion from side to side.

"Jeremy... Jeremy..." Okay, maybe not that silent. Groaning slightly at being woken up, despite how gently, I opened my eyes by a small crack; just enough to get a look around. Turning to my side, where I could feel the flat of a hoof softly shaking me from my shoulder, I saw Halfy. Or, more accurately, her face, considering how close she was to me.

I blinked at this, squinting my eyes before I sat myself up on the bed and gained some distance from her.

"Oh, uh, hey Halfy." I said, partially on autopilot as my exhausted self-greeted her. "Morning... er, afternoon, I mean... It is afternoon, right?" A slight chill went up my spine as I glanced to the window of the room nervously. Fortunately, I noticed that the curtains of the window, though drawn, didnt seem to have any major source of light behind them, implying that it had in fact been the middle of the night.

"Yes," she let out an extended yawn, a small squeak tipping it off as it came to an end, "it is. Princess Luna rose the moon a few moments ago."

Looking at her more closely, I could see that she actually did seem pretty damn exhausted, to say the least. Her eye was drooping, barely able to focus on me as her eyelid seemingly weighed her head down to a slight bob.

Not to mention the fact that her posture seemed limp and she had the beginnings of bags under her eye. She looked like I did that one time my sister had made me stay up all night because it was 'an interesting way to experience another day'. Heck, if she caught a glance at my sleeping habits now, she'd probably be envious.

"Jeez. You okay, Halfy?" I asked, to which she half responded, half yawned, with a nod.

"Y-yeah. I'm fine. Just... Tired... Is all..." And I'd say she had reason to be. She'd probably stayed up the whole night since we had met her, along with however she had spent the day that followed. "I-if you don't mind though, would it be fine if I-" Yet another yawn cut her off as she then gestured for the bed, smacking her lips slightly as she looked to me.

I gave out a silent 'oh' as I quickly made my way off of the mattress. "Of course. It's your bed, after all." I said with a chuckle as she climbed up on top of the bed, not even bothering to cover herself with the now messy coverings that I had left behind and instead plopped herself onto the bed with a soft sigh.

"Thank you... I'll be up later to join the rest of you..." She muttered, her eye losing the remnant of resistance that she believed it had held, allowing her to just catch sight of me giving her a nod before finally closing.

"Alright." I said in a whisper. Making my way carefully out of the room, practically tiptoeing actually, I grabbed hold of the room's door behind me, softly bringing it to a close as I let out a quieted sigh. For second, I thought I heard her mumble something as I finished closing the door. Something about 'smelling nice'? It didn't really matter. I figured I should try to be quiet on my way downstairs. At the same time, I had the oddest feeling that it wasn't going to be that easy.

A quick example of this being the squeaking of the steps beneath my feet as I reached the staircase; I almost felt deafened as I made my way downstairs, flinching at every groan and squeal that the lumber below me made.

Eventually, after what felt like forever, I reached the other door that led from the stairway to the living room of the house. Pulling the door open, which of course just had to let out a deafening squeak as I did so, I made my way into the main room of Halfy's home and turned back to the door as I closed it behind me with a click.

Overall, I'd say I had been more or less successful in my attempts at being quiet.

"Good morrow, Sir Jeremy!" Nightmare Moon, on the other hand...

Turning, I gave my alicorn companion a short wave before then gesturing for her to quiet down. She seemed to understand quickly enough, giving me a curt nod before returning the gesture with a wink. At the time, I actually though it was pretty cute.

Scratch that out, you hear me? I can't survive her hugging me every time she reads that nice as it sounds.

SCRATCH THAT OUT TOO.

"Afternoon, Nightmare Moon." I whispered, a minuscule and thankfully unnoticed blush passing away as I pushed away a thought in my mind.

"How did ye slumber?" She asked, her voice now in a whisper as she looked to me with a small, cheerful smile on her face.

"Pretty good, actually. Halfy just woke me up a few moments ago. Before she went to sleep herself, that is." I said, crossing my arms and leaning against the now closed door of the room. "She was exhausted, by the looks of it."

Her eyes widening in what seemed like realization, Nightmare Moon's mouth made a small 'o' as she looked to the door behind me. "Ah. 'Tis for this reason that we converse in such a hushed tone." I nodded, somewhat surprised when Nightmare Moon then proceeded to roll her eyes. "As to Halfy's state of tire, she would not be the only of this matter." Raising my brow, I watched as Nightmare Moon gestured behind her, following the direction in which she had motioned.

In doing so, I quickly caught sight of the all too familiar lump that was Chrysalis, still resting on the couch where Nightmare Moon and I had last placed her. Her chest rose and fell in a steady and slow pace.

"She's still asleep?" I asked. Nightmare Moon nodded as she turned to the sleeping Chrysalis as well, her face turning blank as she looked to the changeling.

"A longer sleep than her previous showings, easily. Though, we suppose 'tis to be expected. A great amount of her energy was lost upon the more recent times." I couldnt help the look of concern I gained at this. As if the fact that she had long been starved of her more essential meal wasn't enough, but now she was pretty much ineligible to use any of her strength at all without causing great harm to herself.

"So... should we just let her keep on sleeping, or..." I purposely trailed off near the end of my sentence, hoping that Nightmare Moon would get what I meant.

She seemed to, shrugging as she glanced from me back to Chrysalis. "We would suppose that the decision is of your accord."

A very effective method of passing the buck.

"... We'll wait a bit. Say, an hour?" I offered. Nightmare Moon's internal clock would probably be able to keep us updated on that.

"Very well then. We shall inform ye of when the time arrives." She said with a nod.

I figured that would work just fine for now. The real problem was just finding a way to pass the time silently.

It was then that a thought popped into my head. One that, though it wasn't that important or useful for the moment, did bring about a sense of curiosity. "Wait, you knew that Chrysalis was asleep this whole time?" She nodded. "Then, why weren't you already whispering when I first got in here?"

She giggled as I asked this, quickly responding to me with an almost practiced speed. "Partially, the reasoning behind this was because we had forgotten, as it were." She said, a slightly embarrassed tinge of red going across her face. "Mostly, however," she then just as quickly admitted, looking to me with a smug smile, "we simply feel a sense of dislike towards the changeling."

Lets be honest, the only response anyone could have towards that was 'Fair enough'.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As Jeremy had thought, passing the time was, indeed, not as simple as he might have thought.

He had mentally made the choice to avoid the bookshelf. The memory of a certain book kept him from searching for another, especially with Nightmare Moon being in the same room as him. Instead, he had settled for simply sitting quietly in the room as time passed, a cool breeze from the outside occasionally entering the poorly sealed home and brushing past Jeremy as he would, from time to time, attempt to make silent small talk with Nightmare Moon. The alicorn in question was currently sitting nearby, just a foot or so away.

The two didn't particularly stick to any one subject, instead choosing to go through many various kinds. Nightmare Moon had, out of curiosity, found herself asking more and more of Jeremy's previous world, and family, while Jeremy, though sparing of a few certain details, was more than willing to answer.

"And so these... 'Cars', wouldst allow your kind to more easily travel from place to place?"

"That's pretty much the gist of it, yeah." Jeremy confirmed, his arms motioning for emphasis. Smiling, Nightmare Moon clopped her hooves, much like an excited child would.

"Oh, your world is so very interesting, Sir Jeremy!" She exclaimed, only barely keeping her voice at the hush.

"Heh. To an extent. Though, personally, there are definitely some things from back home that I'd rather forget." Jeremy returned, jokingly rolling his eyes as he did so.

"Such as?"

"Stuff that I can't imagine is completely foreign here. Your usual type of corporate greed, the occasional war, lots of monotony, and uh-... Uh..." Jeremy felt himself pause as he began to run out of ideas.

"How is it that I could list all of this stuff up the top of my head, but nowadays I cant even get past a few? Has it really been that long..." He wondered to himself.

Nightmare Moon, having been watching as he began to desperately search his mind for reasons, rose a brow at his silence. Gesturing for him to continue, if only of her curiosity, Nightmare Moon spoke up again. "Go on." She said.

Jeremy, preferring to simply move on from the subject, let out a sigh. "... Is it sad that I've forgotten?"

"... Forgotten?"

"... Nevermind, I... Its personal, sorry." He eventually relented, a sad look appearing on his features.

"Oh... Very well, Sir Jeremy." Looking to the shadow alicorn, Jeremy could see how visibly concerned she had been by his behavior. She looked down to her hooves sadly, the smile that had previously been on her face having disappeared.

Almost instantly, Jeremy felt a surge of guilt as he looked to his friend's expression, letting out a sigh as scooched himself closer from where he sat.

Nightmare Moon watched out of the corner of her eye as Jeremy relocated himself, the sound of him shifting being clear as he closed the distance between them. It was then that Nightmare Moon felt a soft touch upon her neck, momentarily recoiling away from the feeling before, almost as if she was unable to pull away, eventually moving into the sensation.

"Nightmare Moon, I really am sorry. It's just... difficult, realizing just how much I've forgotten. Its only been around a year and already things are starting to blur." As he said this, Jeremy could feel Nightmare Moon's mane slowly encircle his hand, up to his wrist. At the moment, he couldn't really care less. He was more focused on comforting his friend.

Thankfully, Nightmare Moon eventually looked to Jeremy, who gave her an apologetic smile, returning a smile of her own in return. "We understand. 'Tis no issue, Sir Jeremy."

Letting out a thankful sigh, Jeremy tried to pull his hand away from Nightmare Moon's neck. However, he himself unable to do so as her mane had almost impossibly gripped onto his wrist tighter. Not wanting to hurt her in his attempts at pulling away, Jeremy simply elected to address the issue directly.

"Uh, Nightmare Moon? Your mane?"

Raising a brow at his statement, Nightmare Moon looked to him questioningly, unsure as to what he meant.

"Uh... It's-... I-... Nothing, nothing at all." Jeremy resigned, pushing off his argument as he sat down next to Nightmare Moon, who gave him a shrug; his hand still on her neck, he felt the mane loosen its grip slightly, though not nearly enough to allow him to pull away. It was almost as if it knew that he had stopped resisting.

"Well, its official," He thought to himself, "her mane definitely has a mind of its own."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

... You know, I'd be lying if I said that this wasn't something I enjoyed. I mean, sure, I was technically stuck there because Nightmare Moon's mane had my hand in a death grip against her neck, but it still wasn't really anything worth complaining about.

If anything, it was nice being this close to her. Through her ethereal, yet silky, mane, I could feel her warm and almost velvety fur. It tickled a little, under the palm of my hand, but at the same time the warm and smooth texture of it was relaxing. Pleasant to the touch, even.

Huh? Should you scratch that out too? Ugh, nah its fine. If I have you scratch that stuff out every time, we'll probably have entire pages of stuff be made illegible. Just let it go through from now on, I'll tell you if I think otherwise.

Anyways, along with that, she didn't really seem to mind my closeness or contact with her in the slightest. In fact, if I didn't know better, I would say that she was leaning into it.

... This was actually a really good way to pass the time, actually. It was really relaxing. But, as with most good things, it had to come to an end.

"Ah. We believe that the hour has expired, Sir Jeremy. Shall we awaken Chrysalis?" Snapping out of my more blissful state, I watched as Nightmare Moon stood herself up, her mane releasing me from it's hold with little to no resistance as she looked to me with a smile.

I was kind of insulted by how easily her mane let go of me after all that.

Still, I stowed away that small pile of mental curses and gave Nightmare Moon a nod as I stood up as well. I dusted off the back of my pants and jacket as best I could as I looked to her.

"Alright. So, should I wake her up, or should-" I felt my eyes widen as a smug smile came to her face, her horn glowing faintly in the dim lighting around us. I quickly stepped in front of her and began to awkwardly step back towards Chrysalis. "Uh, heh, before you conjure up another glass of water to spill on her, how about you let me have a try?"

She was way too predictable.

She lost the smug expression on her face, instead looking to me with an expression that just screamed, 'oh, come on!'. She let out a small sigh as she looked to me. "As you wish, Sir Jeremy."

Giving her a thankful nod, I turned myself around as I realized how close I must have been getting, immediately being met with the aged sofa and Chrysalis as I did so. I nearly tripped, which I thankfully didn't, as I stopped myself and scratched the back of my head while I tried to figure out what would be the best approach to the situation.

"Maybe the careful approach?" I offered to myself, carefully reaching my arm out and placing it onto Chrysalis. I tried to take as much care with this as a person would a live bomb. Actually, I feel like the bomb would have been the better alternative here.

My hand on her hard, yet oddly warm and smooth, chitin, I gave her a shake in the same way that Halfy had woken me.

"Chrysalis... Chrysalis..." I said, attempting to rouse her from her sleep. I didn't get much of a response, aside from a slight twitch of her ear and a shift further into the couch. I repeated myself again, at a slightly louder volume, shaking her even more. This time, I got a groan as Chrysalis tucked herself into her lump even further, trying to escape my attempts at waking her.

So, I of course decided to up the ante yet again. I gave one really firm shake and upped my volume yet again. I was only halfway through repeating her name this time though as the elbow of her foreleg proceeded to knock the wind out of me. Chrysalis head quickly rose as she turned and immediately began to glare at me.

"I heard you the first time!" She yelled, her eyes narrowing while I used to opportunity to remind myself how to breathe and stood myself straight up again.

"Good afternoon... to you too." I groaned, a forced chuckle escaping as I stepped out of Chrysalis' hoof reach, to which she replied with a roll of her eyes. "Oh, and you might want to quiet down a bit. Halfy's asleep just upstairs." I then added as Nightmare Moon made her way over to my side.

"What? You expect me to quiet myself on your comman-" A flash of a familiar, magical aura above her caused her to freeze, drawing both her and my attention as we saw a floating and upright glass of ice water, just above her head.

Nightmare Moon gave me a small smile and wink as she turned her gaze back to Chrysalis. I gave the changeling a smile of my own as well.

"So... you gonna whisper now?" I asked, crossing my arms as I looked to Chrysalis with a smug expression. Her eyes narrowed as she glanced back and forth between the glass, Nightmare Moon, and I.

"... Fine then." She said, her voice already at a lowered volume. Upon hearing this, Nightmare Moon gave a satisfied nod as she quickly made away with the floating glass that she had so recently begun to torment Chrysalis with, walking off to the side of the room and seating herself once again while I looked to Chrysalis.

"..."

"..."

In hindsight, I really should have thought of what I would say or do once she was awake.

"... You feeling any better?" I finally settled on, mentally face palming at the simplicity of the question.

"Tch, I suppose it depends on what you mean by 'better'."

" Relatively the same?"

"What do you think?"

Let the records show that I could have said a lot of things there. Like, 'I think you should probably stop being so sarcastic', or something along those lines. There was a lot of material to work with.

"Good to know." I instead decided to say with a deadpan as then made my way to Nightmare Moon's side, seating myself next to her as I gave Chrysalis a small, sarcastic wave.

At least it would be just a little bit more exciting to wait now that my verbal sparring partner was back.

-------------------------------------

"As opposed to the other idiotic human custom of yours?"

"And what's that supposed to mean?"

"Your clothes."

"That is not up for discussion! We've been over this!"

We had hit the ground running, to say the least. It wasn't any more than a minute or so after she had woken up before she immediately made to begin her arguing. Believe it or not, I don't even remember what she had first said any more. Well, actually, this had happened before, so it's not too far off to assume this would be the case.

We'd been going on for hours, really, with Nightmare Moon serving as a kind of silent mediator. It reminded me a bit of when the three of us had first been together in the same cell.

... Funny how I thought of those as relatively good times, huh?

"You're still not giving a valid argument here." I taunted, watching as her eyes narrowed even further.

"You-" Before she could say anything else, the creaking of a nearby door cut her off. The three of us quickly turned our attention towards the noise.

Rubbing the sleep out of her eye with one of her forehooves, the three of us quickly caught sight of Halfy, having likely woken up a few moments ago. Though Chrysalis, of course, just gave an indifferent face towards Halfy's awakening, Nightmare Moon and I gave her small smiles before greeting her at a normal volume, seeing as nobody was asleep anymore.

"Afternoon, Halfy." I said, soon followed by Nightmare Moon.

"Good Morrow, Halfy!"

Flinching at this, Halfy's eye widened as she looked to us, soon returning to normal as she calmed her previously surprised self. I guess she still wasn't used to having guests over.

"H-hello everypony." She greeted in return, myself giving a mental chuckle as I quickly caught sight of the irony of her statement.

"So, I take it you slept well?" Chrysalis asked blankly, not even turning to face her. Halfy nodded in return.

"Yeah, I slept fine." She said, closing the stairway door behind her as she made her way further into the room. Looking to Chrysalis permissibly, Chrysalis let out a near silent groan as she scooted herself further to the side of the couch. Halfy giving her a small, thankful smile as she made her way onto the small space that Chrysalis had opened for her, seating herself with a sigh.

"Did I miss anything while I was asleep?"

"Not much." I answered, crossing my arms as I gave her a shrug.

"Oh, okay then..." She said in return, seemingly biting on the inside of her cheek as she glanced around the room. Like I said, she was probably still getting used to having guests.

"Halfy, if we might ask, do you have any duties or previous engagements for the night?" Halfy, Chrysalis, and I gave Nightmare Moon curious looks at this, though she didn't seem to pay much attention to this.

"... Um... Nothing for later tonight, no." Halfy answered, earning an excited clop of her hooves from Nightmare Moon.

"Oh, joy! Then, perhaps, you couldst lead us in a return to ye garden? We would very much like to show Jeremy of its splendor." I blinked as I realized I was being thrown into this headfirst.

"Uh, that's fine, you don't have to-" I began, only to be interrupted.

"I don't see any problem with it. I had to go water the gardens anyways."

"Splendid!"

Didn't really feel like I was getting a say in the matter, did it?

"Uh-" And, of course, once I tried to say something again, there was a knock at the front door.

"Oh, come on!" Was my first reaction to this, what with it being the third time I had been stopped in a row. My second reaction, however, was much less entertaining. "Wait... Who could that be?"

At this, both Chrysalis and Nightmare Moon's eyes widened, likely sharing a thought of worry similar to mine.

Halfy, having seemed to notice the slightly panicked expressions about us, stood from her seat and began to make her way to the door. "I-I'll go check." She said, the sound of her hooves against the floor echoing through the empty room.

An instinctual part of me screamed to hide. But even if I and Nightmare Moon did, Chrysalis would still be left out in the open, considering she wasn't really in any condition to move. So, I shoved that instinct back into the well that it had clawed its way out of, choosing instead to wait and watch.

As Halfy grabbed hold of the door, I felt my heart quicken ever so slightly, practically thumping against my chest as the dim light of the night sky slowly began to pour in.

"H-hello?"

Next Chapter: Chapter 14: Another Visit For A New Place [Here Again] Estimated time remaining: 12 Hours, 2 Minutes