On To Newer, Greener Pastures [Updated]

They are here, they are there, they are everywhere. Slowly filling up the miserable little shack I call a house. Crammed into the mailbox, spread all over the tabletop; stacked atop each other, like perverted imitations of cash wads. Watching me, mocking me, doing their best to suck out whatever tiny, infinitesimal pleasures I get out of life. I would like nothing more than to burn, shred, and tear the damned things apart.

Not that I do. It would be a pointless exercise, wouldn't it? Whether I destroy them or not, it wouldn't change the fact they are still overdue, nor the fact that we're facing foreclosure. So as tempting as the idea of having a bonfire with the little suckers is, I don't do it.

And my mom is there, lighting up as usual, watching me with a vaguely disinterested look.
She picked up the habit when she was a kid. Twelve, thirteen, fourteen, who knows. I keep forgetting, and I don't really care to remember. Apparently, it was 'cool' back in the day. Hmph! I hope it was worth it. That her little vice was worth the toll it took on her body and health; on the upbringing, the physical and mental health of her only child.

She was like a skeleton; rail thin, and her body unnaturally frail. Her breath stank, her teeth reeked, and her fingers colored a sickly yellow. She was a sorry sight indeed. She wasn’t always like that, though. There were a few odd pictures tucked away, from a time when her addiction was not all consuming. In them, she was very different. Bright, auburn hair; a beaming smile and a full face. But those days were long since past and her current appearance was a stark opposite of those days.

I watched as she inserted a cancer stick and deftly lighted up with practised ease. "I got some bad news for you, kiddo," she rasped.

I barely flinch. News are not usually good in this household. "You didn't get the job, did you?" I said flatly. "I guess it's back to bread and ramen noodles for dinner, huh?" I couldn't help but put on a snide tone.

Mom averted her gaze and ducked her head in shame. I felt a twinge of sympathy and guilt. For all her failings, as a parent, as a provider, she is still my mother. It annoyed me to no end I couldn't hate her, nor stay mad at her. It would make things so much simpler.

I ducked my head and muttered a barely audible, "Sorry." She seemed to pick up on it, though.
"I know you're not gonna like this but, honey, until I can find a steady job, you'll have to do your part as well," she said softly. Or, as softly as one can, when their vocal cords have been ravaged by decades of incessant smoking.

"Jesus, mom! Don't I do enough around here already? I do your laundry, wash your dishes, clean this pit of a house and..."

"I'm sorry, Jackie, but unless you can bring in some money, we're gonna lose the house." God, she looks so... deflated.

But I knew that as much as it would suck, she was right. She was kicked out of her recent gig because-- surprise, surprise-- she was lighting up on the job. It was one of those recurring themes with her. So I went and applied at the local burger joint. Dishwasher. I worked alone, in the back, and it suited me just fine. I don't work well with others and I would sooner run myself through a wood chipper than having to put up with people, customers. Ugh.

It wasn't much, but it was something. It helped delay foreclosure, and mom managed to land a gig at the gas station. A few months of hard, soul sucking work and we were mostly out of the woods. I even managed to save up enough to buy an old PS3. Mom, for the first time since ever, decided to attend a help group in curbing her addiction and much to my disbelief, was making progress. She was now down to one pack a day.

For a while, things were actually kinda going our way. But the world, in all its shittiness, had to go and beat me right back down. I hate that world.

Let me start from the beginning: My name is Jackie Brown, and I am beyond fucked. But that's the way of things, isn't it? Life has a notorious tendency to be unfair. Bad things happen to good people, and good things happen to bad people. It’s random, unpredictable, but such is the way of the world. I admit, I was not what you would call an exemplary citizen. Prickly, some called me. Antisocial. Rude. Disrespectful. Irresponsible. Granted, I was no girl scout, but even so, I am sure I didn’t deserve to go through the events that made me what I am today, or, will become. Heh, freaking semantics. I learned to not worry too much about them.

I am no longer on Earth now. I was taken from my world, from my home, by a force greater than myself. Away from everything and everyone I ever knew and dumped into a completely alien place. Things were hard at first, as they should have been. But that was a long time ago. I am a different person now. Older. Wiser, I’d like to think. It’s in quiet moments that I find myself reflecting back on my long, strange journey throughout the land called Equestria and the series of events that led me to where I am today.

Despite the fact the incident began so long ago, I remember it almost perfectly to this day. My last day on earth for a long time to come. It started oh-so-typical. I’d woken up an ungodly hour to get ready for work. Cereal for breakfast; a cold shower, as our heating was kept low to save on bills. Then I dressed myself to go to work. We didn’t have a car, so any places we wanted to go, we would either walk or take the bus.

Personally, I preferred to walk. Living on the shitty part of town, the buses there were rather lax on sanitation. It didn’t help that my workplace was quite a ways away, so I was forced to ride the urine-soaked, bacteria infested metal tub. It was utterly disgusting. Luckily for me, I had a solution. I’d stolen a roll of parchment paper from work and every day I’d take a nicely sized piece to act as a buffer from my clothes and the living, super sized petri-dish that was the bus.

I got into the store and passed the head cook, a thirty-something guy named Nathan, whom most girls would consider roguishly handsome. He flinched and looked away as I passed him, and I couldn’t help but let out a satisfied smirk.

A few months ago, I had worked a double shift, closing well into the night. I hid in the pantry, waiting for everyone else to leave and see if I could lift some food to take home. We’d been eating instant ramen for three weeks straight and if I didn’t get anything more substantial into my system I may have literally killed myself. Or not. I do tend to exaggerate.

When some time passed, and I’d taken some stuff, I started to make my way out, but something had given me pause. There’d been sounds coming from the front of the restaurant. Naturally, I freaked out, thinking I’d be getting caught, but nobody else came.

Curiosity got the best of me and I peeked into the dining room, only to see Nathan balls deep inside Chelsea Clinton, a royal bitch of a waitress that had only just turned seventeen and had developed a notorious reputation at school for being an unrepentant slut. I stared, frozen in disgust as they went at it like rabbits atop one of the tables, blatantly disregarding basic rules for hygiene and decency; but an idea came to mind and I whipped out my phone, getting the whole thing on film.

A couple of weeks later, he’d caught me trying to steal some food and worked himself into a state, saying how he was gonna tell on me, that I’d get fired and should know better than to try and steal from under his nose.

He changed his tune real quick after showing him what I’d caught on film, and I now owned his sorry, pedophiliac ass; blackmailing him into helping me steal whatever I’d need from the store, be it food, plates, cleaning solutions-- heck even paper towels and toiletries. But nothing in large amounts. After all, it wouldn’t do if anyone else got suspicious and it went a long way towards making life for me and mom a bit easier. There’d been questions, of course, but after a while, she learned to just take things as they come and not worry where I’d get all that stuff.

After work, I went home and cooked our dinner. Hamburger Helper, ready-to-bake garlic bread and orange juice that would expire soon. Mom arrived just as the food was done and we ate in front of the TV, watching an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie.

When that was done, I showered and got out of my work clothes, as I’d be taking a trip to the mall. It never was my favorite place and I would normally avoid it at costs, but the next installation of Grand Theft Auto was out and no reputable vendor would sell such a controversial game to an underage girl. Luckily for me, the GameStop there was manned by a fat slob who didn't give two shits who bought what, underage or not.

The mall itself was about a fifteen minute walk from my house. Me, I kept my head down and tried not to look anyone in the eye, or to wander a suspicious alley or street alone. Granted, it was still daylight out, but I was a mite paranoid about such things. When nighttime came, it was extraordinarily rare to see girls or women out in the street, as they became the prowling grounds for unsavory individuals.

There was an ice cream place across the street from the mall, and it was there that I went first. Sitting on one of the tables outside, I could make out the figure of my best(and only) friend Claire. Her back was turned to me, sipping on a shake of some sort and hunched over, totally engrossed on her phone.

I snuck up behind, grabbed her by the shoulders, and yelled ‘Boo’ right next to her ear. The girl let out a strangled sort of squeal. I had to back away hastily as she reared back, her head nearly crashing into my lip. She turned to me, eyes wide and startled and once she recognized me, a half hearted scowl formed on her brow.

“Bitch,” she said and tried to swat at me, but I deftly dodged and sat opposite of her.

“Takes one to know one,” I said and looked at her drink. “What’s this?” Without waiting for a response, I reached for it and took a sip. Hmm, butter pecan.

She sighed and rolled her eyes. “Sure, help yourself.”

“Thank you, and I am,” I said and took a big sip, prompting her to lunge and take her stolen treat from my grasp.

“You and those grubby little mitts of yours...” she murmured and took a sip. “You’re gonna get in trouble one of these days, you know?”

I gave her my best ‘are you serious’ look. “Really? You of all people?”

She sniffed haughtily. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. She herself was no model child.

“Might I remind you of that Lexus you took for a joyride?”

“I remember that you were there with me too.”

“Maaaybe, but it was your idea. All I did was keep a lookout while you broke in.”

She pouted, and I couldn’t help but snicker. I swear, even though she was two years older than me, there were times when her mindset seemed to regress to that of a child.

“So what was it you wanted to show me?” I asked. “And why is it so important you couldn’t just send a text or something?”

Her face brightened. She reached into her fanny pack and pulled out two tickets, sliding them over to my side. I picked them up and grimaced after taking a good look. They were tickets to go see some indie punk rock band called… oh, who knows. I forget. The music itself was okay, but apparently, these guys were becoming really popular and tended to play in random, hole-in-the-wall places, not especially big and that meant tightly packed crowds and lots of noise, two things I was not at all comfortable with and actively tried to avoid.

Claire must have been anticipating my hesitation, for she immediately spoke up. “C’mon, just give it a chance.”

“Ehhh… yeah, I don’t think so.”

“Don’t be like that,” she pleaded dramatically. “You know I can’t go to these things alone.”

I quirked an eyebrow. “What, you’re afraid or something?” She wasn’t, but it was amusing to see her trying to convince me, and she knew that.

“No! But… you know I can’t go to these things alone. If I go by myself, then people are gonna notice and next thing you know, there’s going to be like, a dozen guys trying to score with me. And it’s really annoying.”

That… was not entirely inaccurate. Anybody with eyes could see that Claire was a smoking hot gal. A skinny, athletic bod; legs that went all the way up to Canada, and a bust that was nothing to sneeze at. Unfortunately for guys everywhere, she was also a lesbian. Not lesbian for me, though, thank goodness. That would have made things awkward.

She also had the whole punky rock thing going, wearing all black. Black hair streaked with red highlights, black nail polish, black lipstick, one of those top pieces that cut off midriff and showed her toned abs, a tight black skirt thing that stopped just below the knees, high socks and black tennis shoes. Strangely enough, unlike the rest of her kind, she never took a shining to piercings. That may have been my fault.

She didn’t want to shell out cash for a trained professional to do it, so of course she insisted I do the deed instead. Well, at the end of it, her earlobe was leaking rivers of blood and she wound up with a nasty infection. Even today her ear was still tender, or so she claimed. Then again, watching a two minute YouTube video on the procedure was probably not the best way to go about it.

“Fine, fine, I’ll go,” I grumbled. “But I’m staying at the sidelines.”

“How come?”

“Because it’s gonna be packed, and if I’m in the middle and suddenly there’s a fire or something, then I get trampled to death while everyone tries to run out the door.”

She rolled her eyes. “Oh, c’mon. The chances of that happening are really, really small. Practically nonexistent!”

“That’s high enough for me.”

She sighed in exasperation. “Anybody ever tell you you’re a bit too paranoid sometimes? It’s not healthy-- more like there’s something wrong in that little noggin of yours.”

“Just you and also, shut up. And for the record, paranoia is the reason the human race has made it this without killing ourselves.”

“Fine, have it your way. But we’re getting there early so we can get spots right in front of the stage.” I was about to protest, but she help up a finger to shush me. “A-bup-a-pap, that there counts as being on the sidelines. No wall of people to trample you to death or anything.”

I looked up in thought. Hmm, that’s a good point. “Okay.”

Her face flashed with a beaming smile. I swear, that girl was about the most anti-goth/emo in history. Personally, I think she just liked the music, attire and accessories that came with it. We agreed to meet outside the mini-concert at 5 o’clock the next week and with that done, we went about the mall.

Keeping myself from scowling and sneering at the people and blatant overuse of advertising was a bit of a pain. Malls and I just did not mix. Claire had no such qualms, however, as she moved with a spring in her step, obviously in her natural habitat. Me, I just wanted to get my game and get out the place ASAP.

To my dismay, Claire held no such feelings. She pranced around, stopping every now and then to gawk at whatever caught her attention. Some new coffee place, the puppies in display behind the glass at the pet store, a mobile stand that sold earrings, bracelets and accessories… hell, even a toy store for kids.

It felt as though it would never end. Places like malls… they all felt, I dunno, closed off. It wasn’t so bad when I was outside, but in there, through the throngs of people and shameless consumerism, the feeling of entrapment was all too real. I can freely admit I never much cared for liked the city I lived in. Even before I met Claire, happy times were too few and far in between. The whole damn place... it sucked you in and didn’t let go. You were born in there and you died in there. There was simply no other choice.

…

Ha! As if. Jeez, was I really so angsty and fatalistic back then? It makes me cringe now that I think about it. Things could have been worse... a lot worse, and they would be, in time. If there’s anything I could take away from it all is that it all allowed me to mature. Granted, there was not much choice in the matter and I grew up much faster than I should have, not to mention the fact I’m still screwed up in many ways. Oh, well. No one’s perfect, right?

Ah, but I’m getting ahead of myself. There’s still plenty of ground to cover.

Just as we neared the store, we walked by a pair of the typical air-headed, high-school bitch queens. I made a point to ignore their shrill giggles and comments on my—admittedly ratty—plain grey hoodie. I proceeded to flip them off while Claire settled for sticking out her tongue and smiled in satisfaction at hearing their pompous, whiny reactions. I went in, bought the game and got the hell out.

We parted ways after that, her going to her relatively upscale home and me trudging the long walk back to my house. I walked in a hurried gait. Night in the city was far from safe, so, in a moment of utter brilliance, I took a shortcut through an alley, hoping it would be devoid of lowlifes and weirdoes.

"Hello? Excuse me, little lady."

I turned to look at the voice and there, leaning against a trash can was a creep in a sleazy suit-and-tie, brown hair combed back in a bad 70s style and glasses with a dark-reddish tint to them.

I ignored him and kept on walking at a hurried pace. I said I needed some mace. I said there were a lot of creeps in this town, but noooo. That's what I get for being cheap. There was a shuffling of movement and footsteps, growing closer despite my hurried pace. Great. The one time a guy notices me and it's some slimy old geezer. Can't this shit happen to someone else today? I whipped around, teeth bared in a snarl. "Stop following me, you creep!"

The creeper started back in surprise, but I didn't wait for him to recover and continued on, not paying him mind, stopping only when an oily voice spoke, right next to my ear.

"Hey, there's no need to be rude! I just want to talk!"

Reacting on instinct, I abruptly turned, and my leg bent back, ready to hit the creeper in the nads. Imagine my surprise when there's nobody in sight.

"Over here!"

The voice came behind again, and I looked over, only to find the creep right in front of me, his unnaturally perfect, white teeth splayed in a grin.

And just like that, before I could even begin to formulate a reply, the creepy old guy took a hold of my arm and in his other one was a syringe filled with... some... substance that looked to be as if one took a rainbow and crammed it into one small container. The creep swiftly injected the psychedelic swirling shit into my neck.

"Aagh! What the shit!? What did you just do to me!?" I shrieked like a bitch, spittle flying out my mouth and backing away from the pervert. "Help! Rape! Rape!" I looked frantically around the deserted alleyway, hoping against all hope someone would hear... or care. Of course fucking not! Why would they?!

"Now, don't you worry my dear. That little concoction I just pumped into your bloodstream is... well, you could say it's a bit of my own, personal... essence." He said it in such a sleazy, sinister way I couldn't help but shudder, wrapping my arms around me in a protective hug.

"F-freak! Pervert!" I hissed.

He had the gall to scoff and lifted his glasses, allowing his disgusting yellow eyes to shine through. "Will you stop it already? Believe me, my dear, you hold no kind of interest to me. Well, not that way, at least."

He lowered them back on and slowly walked forward with a strut, hands in his pockets and a leering grin on his pervert face.

"H-hey! Get away from me, you... you... sicko!" I tried to back away, but whatever that kind of drug it was that he injected me with had already gone to work. My legs were wobbly, my speech slurring and colors, swirling colors, just like that hippie drug were swimming through my vision.

Then there was the pain. Just like that, it goes from being the start of a drug-induced haze and now, it feels like there's fucking acid flowing through my veins! Burning everything, turning my flesh into goo and making me scream so loud that by the end of it, I'm lying like dirt on the ground, my body twitching, my throat raw and the pervert is still there, with his hands in his pockets and smiling down at me without a care in the world.

I spat on him. Or, I tried to, at least. My body wasn't responding. "F-fuck you," I said feebly as a line of drool trickled from my mouth.

With his right hand, the freak snapped his fingers and the agonizing pain that wracked my body was now gone. I gasped at the sensation, but the freak snapped his fingers again and my body seized, growing still and ramrod straight.

It must have been the drug or something, because I could have sworn my body levitated and now, I was looking into the disgusting eyes of the pervert. I tried to spit on him again, but, much to my alarm, I found I couldn't move an inch of my body.

"Excellent," he said jovially. "Now, while you're just floating there, pay attention. I have been watching you, Jacqueline Samantha Brown. I have scoured this world, looking for just the right individual to help with a little pet project of mine. You have just received a portion of my power. Anything I can do, you can do as well. You wished for nothing more than to be able to leave this rat's nest of your world, and you will. You crave the opportunity, the power, to make those around you realize the harshness of reality and life. And you will. I will grant you your desires and in turn there's only one... single... little... thing you must do for me in return."

He fully removed his glasses and brought his disgusting face close to mine.

"Have fun."

And with that, he tapped a cold, bony finger to my forehead and I blacked out.

When I woke up, I was pissed. There I was, lying face down in grass, feeling like steamrolled shit. Ugh. My head is killing me... stupid sun. Morning, it looked like. In a flash I remembered the events of last night. The alley. The pervert! I was drugged! Oh. Oh, my God... As quick as I could I checked to make sure that... stuff didn't happen while I was out. Okay, okay, I was good. But this good fortune did nothing to ease my mood.

That… that... freak! He dosed me with some... hippie, candy-land drug! He took all my things, and if that wasn't enough, I'm... somewhere else! But... wait. Why is everything so... cartoony? And with edge lines? Must be that pervert's drug. Just the thought that it's still in my system makes me want to retch. Ohh, if I ever see him again then... I'll do something bad, that's for sure.

But first things first. I had to get home and report his sorry ass to the authorities. No, wait, scratch that. Those pigs are so bloated in donuts and their own narcissistic superiority, their fat asses won't be good for much of anything. Except maybe write parking tickets and shooting unarmed minorities.

I rose from my position and a dizzy spell passed through, but other than that, I was feeling surprisingly normal. Well, except for the fact everything was so bright. God, I needed a shower. And some food. Food's always nice. Especially when it's battered and deep fried in grease. Just out of curiosity, I brought up my hand and yep, it's cartoony too. Whatever. I'll just have to wait until the drug's effect runs its course.

I looked to my surroundings and noted how strange they were. I was still in an alley, but it was surprisingly clean and maintained. Didn't stink either. And there was no concrete. Just healthy looking grass that was a shade too green on both ends, and the houses or shops or whatever on either side of me were made of stone, with thatched straw roofs and built like some... Disney fairyland theme.

I wanted nothing more than to burn them down. Down to the ground.

But first things first. Food and a shower, followed by copious alone time in which I could moan and piss on what just transpired. Maybe even entertain some revenge fantasies. And after that, just me, by myself in the overpass and a few cartons of eggs to pelt passing cars. That usually cheered me up. Now, where exactly am I? Certainly not in my neighborhood. Felt too nice, too... safe, even in this alley. Definitely not my 'hood.

A southern, feminine voice spoke from my side. "Hey, little fella. What'choo doin' all the way out here?" Oh Christ, I'm in Deliverance!

Now, I realize that maybe this person maybe didn't have malicious intentions towards me. But I was still pissed and stewing over last night, so I turned to rip this bitch a new one. Only... there wasn't anybody there. I looked down and came face to face with... some... fluffy, dog-horse thing? And... it was wearing a cowboy hat. Damn, that hippie drug is really doing a number on me.

Even so, I couldn't move. The little bugger just looked so real. And much too cute for my liking. I took a step forward and examined it more closely. The little thing tilted its head and looked at me in what I would guess was a curious way. Sheesh, those were some big eyes, and expressive, too. A little horsey muzzle, orange coat and yellow mane tied in a... ponytail. How quaint. If I wasn't so shocked, the sight of it would instantly send my blood boiling.

It really did look real, even if it was only a hallucination. I couldn't help myself. I reached out with my arm to see what would happen, and while the little mutant raised an eyebrow, it didn't react all that much. What happened next confused the hell out of me. My fingers made contact with the tip of its nose. Soft and furry... and solid. Da fuq? The little horsey blinked and I touched it again, now with both hands, running them through its face. Solid, and bone structure. Fuzzy and soft.

"Heh, heh. Well, aren't you a friendly one?" it or... she, chuckled, smiling and pulling back. "Where's your owner, missy? It's not too safe for you critters to wandering around out here. There's been more and more of you fellas gettin' snatched away, dont'cha know."

Uhh, did this little turd just talk? Man, just what was in that drug? Or maybe, there was also the possibility that the little dog-horse was an actual dog, and the psychedelic shit coursing through my system made it seem like it was talking. But… how would I know? On an impulse, I reached out with my hand and scratched lightly behind her ears. The little abomination closed her eyes and smiled, letting out a sigh of contentment.

“Aww, shoot. You’re just a precious little gal, ain’t cha? Your owners must be missing you somethin’ fierce.”

God, the way she looked at me, a saccharine carefree smile on her fuzzy mug. I wanted to punch the little mutant. NOTHING should be this cute.... But there was a horrifying thought slowly dawning upon me. This... was real. I was not in some drug-induced trip, and the cloyingly sweet abomination looking up at me was an actual thing.

"Well, come on, now. It's best we go and see if we can find yer owner." She turned to go and cocked her head, clicking her tongue as if to instruct me to follow. My eye twitched and a surge of anger and indignation shot right through me. Like I'm a freakin' animal! Just where did this puling, inferior life form get off!? By all rights, I should have flown off in a rage and shove my foot up this little shit's ass!

And yet, my body was strangely unresponsive. The sheer ridiculousness, the absurdity of it all! Just what in the world is going on in here! It’s all still part of a drug induced trip, right? But… it sure doesn’t feel like it. Granted, I have never done any kind of drugs in my life, but I’m not so ignorant as to not know that I should be feeling… trippy or something. No, I still had my wits about me. This was not a dream. This was not a hallucination. This was all real! The stream of swears and profanities meant to leave my mouth sounded instead like a series of incomprehensible gibberish.

"Aww, ain't that cute? You're trying to talk to me, ain't'cha, girl?" cooed the hick."C'mon, then. The sooner we find your owner the better."

The little dog-horse turned, expecting me to follow. Not that I could, even if I wanted to. The revelation I just had had caused me to go in a mild state of shock. I felt the blood drain from my face, no doubt giving my already pale skin a ghostly appearance. A massive lump formed in my throat and my heart rate skyrocketed as a wave of panic flooded my veins.

It... wasn't possible that I wasn't on Earth, was it? All of this, the little talking mutant horse, the despicably saccharine colors on every surface. Was it possible it was all real? Surely not. Or maybe, I was always here, in this hippie cartoon land, and everything up to this point; my life, everyone I knew; and shit, the entire world I lived in had never existed.

I pushed the thought from my mind, clutching at my head and letting out a half-sob. I can't fucking deal with this right now.... My breathing quickly accelerated out of control, rapid and shallow. What was real? What wasn't? Was I me? Not me? Am I even fucking here right now?! Don't think about it.

"Whoa! Easy there, girl! What's got you so worked up?" The thing was tense, looking at me with worry, its foreleg half-raised as if to run away at a moment's notice.

I pushed past her, roughly shoving her aside. God, please. Someone help me... I tripped over nothing, panting in shaky, quick breaths and blinking tears from my eyes. Fuck, not now! The abomination ran to my side, placing a hoof on my shoulder.

Oh God it's touching me!

I'm not proud of what I did next.

I shrieked and slapped the hoof away, rolling onto my knees and bolting down a dirt road. Can't...can't breathe! My chest felt tight, burning like I'd inhaled a lungful of battery acid. My vision blurred and darkened at the edges. I only made it a few more steps before the blackness crept in from the edges until I couldn't see at all. I felt my cheek hit the dirt, and simply laid there.

Can't breathe... can't breathe…

"Calm down, girl!" Don't touch me, don't you FUCKING touch me! "Shh...Ain't nopony gonna hurt ya..." A rough, dry hoof dragged through my already tangled, dusty hair, pulling and breaking strands left and right. Despite most of my body feeling heavy and numb, I managed to wrap my arms around my head. The hoof went to my back instead. Can't you fucking see I DON'T LIKE BEING TOUCHED?!

Somehow, despite my panic being at an all-time high, my breathing began to slow on its own. My vision returned, showing that I'd attracted an entire swarm of the mutants. If that wasn't bad enough, a number of the little freaks were even more mutated at a glance. Some of them sported stubby spiraled horns and others had wings on their backs, much too small to let them fly, but fly they did. All of them. So happy, so cute, so adorable. My stomach convulsed and I barely managed to keep myself from puking. I swallowed the acrid bile that made its way into my mouth, feeling strangely welcoming, a nice contrast to the saccharine, evil sweetness surrounding me.

I wiped unshed tears from my eyes and stood on shaky legs, keeping my eyes on the ground and making a point to ignore the crowd. As if on autopilot, I continued walking down the road and into a town full of the little nightmares and Disney Shacks. My hair hung like blinders, obscuring the view of the staring, huge-eyed freaks tracking my every move.

I did my best to ignore them and kept on walking, shoulders hunched and tightly clasping my elbows, wishing for the earth to swallow me up or for freaks to quit gawking at me. I was stopped, however, as I bumped into something. Letting out a choked gasp and drawing back, I looked up to find myself face to face with a man. He was short, stocky, ugly and hairy… and he was buck naked.

Hmm...Not much to look at.

But there he was, ass-hair blowing in the wind like it was the most normal thing in the world. For all I know, it could be. A collar and leash tied him to a post with dog bowls nearby, filled with water and... kibble? He just sat there, staring at the world around him with vacant, dull eyes, the markings of a stupid beast. Or a Freshman.

I don't know how long I stared, eyes wide with horror. My throat was dry and then, as if I'd been blind to it the whole time, I began seeing more and more of them. People. Humans. All of them with that vacant, listless stare. All of them with collars, some of them naked and shuffling like dumb animals to more of the little mutants, who led them through leashes. And they were there, all around me!

What sort of fucked up hell is this?!

The nudist Neanderthal leaned forward, grunting stupidly, sniffing at my neck and poking at my hoodie. I backpedaled, muttering a hissed 'fuck off' under my breath until I was out of range of his leash.

What the actual fuck is going on?!

The hick was back. I think she tried to talk to me. I looked back at her, but whatever she said might as well be in another language. The implications of what I'd just seen had thrown me for a loop. And why wouldn’t it? It's like someone had pulled the stopper on my reality, and everything I knew was being flushed down the drain. I was cold, my face was pale and fixed in a mask of sheer horror. I couldn't think or form a coherent thought.

The mutant took my hand in her filthy, slimy mouth, pulling me away, and me, I could do little but go along. We went in deeper, and there were more of them, the little talking mutants. All three types, going about their lives. Smiling, chatting up their friends, eating on disgustingly cute little restaurants; just like people. The sheer surrealness of it all served prolong my near catatonic state.

And then there were the... humans as well. Just what kind of place is this?! There they were, acting like pets! Munching on squeaky chew toys! Playing fetch! Rolling over to get rubbed! My own people, my own species! Animals! Stupid animals being dragged around by freaks of nature! But what did that make me? I can talk, I can think, I am intelligent. In this world. In this twisted, fucked up, mockery of my world, did that make me the freak?

I didn't have time to dwell on this. The dog-horse had taken me to the heart of the town, to a small, one-story building and behind it was a wired fence in which more humans were kept in separate pens. Digging in the ground, growling at each other, shoveling mouthfuls of kibble to their mouths and… and… fucking! I nearly retched again.

"Howdy there, Caramel," greeted the hick.

Caramel? Caramel?! I looked over and there was another mutant dog-horse. A plain one, no horns or wings. "Hey, Applejack. What brings you here?"

She pointed to me. "I found this little fella in an alley near the outskirts. She was all alone and, shoot, I couldn't just leave her there, you know? What with all the humans being foalnapped and such..." She leaned towards the vaguely masculine...little horse...pony? Pony. She leaned towards the vaguely masculine pony and whispered something, just loud enough for me to hear, "Ah think she might've had a run-in with some bad folks...She's scared outta her wits!"

Sister, you don't know the half of it.

He nodded solemnly. "It's a shame, yeah. So you found her all alone, huh?" He moved closer and inspected me. "Hmm. She looks well cared for. Good clothes, trimmed hair. Her skin looks a bit pale, though. Must be an indoor human." He prodded me. "Not unhealthy, but she could lose a little weight."

Glrk... pth...brargh. D-did that little fucker just call me fat?! I am going to feed you your own balls, shitstain.

The hick chuckled. "Heh, heh. That she does. Seems somepony was a spoiled little missy, ain't we, girl?" She rubbed my lower back, and it felt disturbingly good.

I... will... DESTROY you!

"So what do you think, Caramel? You wouldn't know who she belongs to now, would you?"

He shook his head. "'Fraid not. Thankfully, there's been no reports of missing humans for a while, but that could either mean that she is missing and nopony noticed, or that she wandered here from somewhere else."

"That's a good guess as any, Ah suppose. Well, until we can reunite this missy with her owner, do ya think I can leave her in your hooves?"

He winced and looked back at the human kennel. "I dunno, Applejack. We're kind of full as it is, and we just don't have the resources to keep taking in strays."

"But she's not a stray! She obviously belongs to somepony."

He sighed. "Well, couldn't she stay with you, at least until we get some room? You got a nice big barn and everything and you sure as heck are good at dealing with humans."

Bitch please, this cunt pulled out my hair.

"Yeah, but my humans are strictly for work and breeding purposes only." Wat. "And this little one just doesn't look cut out for that kind of stuff."

"Why not? What's the difference?"

It was the hick's turn to sigh. "Look, if I put her in the pens, then the males... well... they get randy at this time of year and throwing new meat in with them... let's just say this lil' missy ain't built to take that kind of attention," she winced and shook her head. "And the other females tend to be territorial, especially during mating season, and I don't even want ta think what they'll do if they think missy here's stealing with their males," she paused. "Uh, Caramel? You okay there, partner?"

The brown-furred mutant was slowly backing away, eyeing me in fear. The hick turned to see what had spooked her ilk. She caught sight of me and stuttered, "U-um."

The little shits were scared of me, and I could imagine why. My whole entire body was trembling as pure, white-hot rage coursed through my veins. My fists were clenched so hard, I could feel my fingernails pierce the skin, my teeth bared in a feral snarl and my whole face twisted in a mask of sheer, absolute fury, twitching and spasming erratically and I'm pretty sure I was frothing at the mouth.

The hick gulped, but stood her ground. She lifted a leg. "E-easy, sugarcube."

I saw red, and exploded. "DON'T YOU FUCKING DARE, YOU MUTANT, HALF-BREED, PISSANT LITTLE HORSESHIT!" I bellowed so hard, my throat fucking hurt.

The freaks obviously hadn't been expecting that, for their eyes bugged out(as if it was even possible) and their jaws dropped, looking at me in astonishment, and not enough fear for my liking. The same could be said for the rest of the mutants nearby, but it wasn't them that was the object of my fury.

The little fuckers had been so stunned at the revelation a dumb animal could talk that they froze on the spot. Kneeling down in front of the hick, I recalled my anger, my hatred, fury, horror and despair at finding myself in this twisted, godforsaken reality and channelled it to my arm and into my fist, delivering a vicious uppercut that sent the freak flying into the air and landed with a thump, moaning in agony and clutching at her mouth, upon which blood was freely pouring.

I turned and the rest of the little fuckers, eyeing me in equal parts of fear and bafflement. Even the dumb humans had paused to look at the spectacle. It made my blood boil even further. I took a deep breath and bellowed for the second time. "THE HELL ARE YOU LOOKING AT, YOU PULING LITTLE FREAKS!"

It was the first but certainly not the last mistake I'd make in this new world.

Author's Notes:

Ho, fellow tiny horse enthusiasts. This here is my attempt at an experiment of sorts that's been stewing in my head for a while. If you liked the story so far, then awesome, but before you go any further, there's a couple of things I feel you should know.

This story was written in response to the lack of villainous humans fics in the fandom, LOHAV(League of Humans Acting Villainous) included, and while there are a few stories out there with truly villainous humans who commit actual villainous deeds, they are few in number. Again, this fic is my response to that, and so, I believe I should tell you what kind of story this is.

As you can probably tell, Jackie and the Mane Six won't be on the best of terms with each other and they probably never will. I don't intend to hold anything back as far as villainous deeds are concerned, so you can expect this story to be very dark at times, and yes, there will be action and more than a little violence. That being said, if these things bother you, you may want to turn back now. If you are interested, however, read on. The insanity is just getting started...

First Impressions [Updated]

Silence passed and no one moved, neither the dumb humans or the little mutants. They simply boggled at me, most of them slack jawed in amazement and fear. The humans shifted uneasily and other than their movements and my own harsh, ragged breathing there was silence all around. Not to sound cliche’d but you could cut it with a knife. Then all of a sudden, as if someone had flipped a switch, there was a reaction. One of them, a cream coated one with red hair, screamed like a little bitch and fainted right on the spot. This prompted the rest of the mutants to give off screams of their own and began to run and fly in all directions, yelling about the infected, talking human.

As for me, I flipped my shit. Big time. Made all the other times look like piss in comparison. And really, could you blame me? In a very short amount of time I had been accosted by some greasy old creep, I’d been drugged, experienced excruciating pain, I woke up in a hippie cartoon land populated by these fluffy little monsters, I went through an existential crisis; I discovered the people here were stupid beasts, playing the pet to lower life forms and in the midst of this nightmare, I retained my awareness and intelligence. I was at my wit’s end, and the little monsters were there, all around me.

The other one, Caramel, was still there, hovering over the hick and a conflicted look upon his mutant face, as if he couldn’t decide whether to remain and lend aid to his ilk or run for his worthless, miserable life. He kept staring at me with those abnormally big, bulbous eyes and it made me even angrier.

“Stop looking at me, freak!” I screeched, my hands tightly balled into fists.

He blinked and recoiled before turning tail like the little coward that he was, leaving the still writhing hick to lick her wounds. I glanced briefly at her, feeling a sick sense of satisfaction.

All around me, the… ponies were still screaming and, in the confusion and chaos, the humans were stupidly stumbling about. Some of them tried running aimlessly, but more often than not, crashed into houses or the fleeing little pests; others… burrowed underground, with such speed that they disappeared after a few seconds of digging, much to my amazement and a number still must have gotten riled up or confused or something, for in their frenzy, they actually bit and scratched at the little pukes.

I looked to the pandemonium around, and it filled me with a curiously agreeable sense of elation to see the little monsters running from me. It was short lived, though, when a voice, loud enough to stand out even among the ruckus, yelled.

“You jerk! You’ll pay for that!”

It came from above, and I looked upwards only to see a conglomeration of colors speeding right into my face. The impact knocked me clean off my feet, sending me quite a ways away as I landed on my back. I winced, preparing myself for the inevitable agony of fractured bones, but despite a sense of disorientation and a ringing in my head, I felt perfectly fine. The fact that I was still unharmed, much less conscious, left me utterly perplexed. At best, an impact like that should have left me with a nasty bruise and quite a bit of pain. At worst, I should be dead.
Further adding to the WTF factor was one of the winged pests, with multicolored hair, glaring daggers at me as she came back for a second assault. She crashed into my still-lying body and began to pound away with her filthy hooves.

“Nopony hurts my friends!” shouted the freak in a scratchy voice. Add that to the prismatic hair and the tomboyish vibe all but radiating off her and you had all the making of a lesbo. Or bi… agh, who cares?!

The fact remained that this lesser creature thought itself above me, beating me with her hooves with the clear intention of causing harm. It looked like she was putting her everything in the blows but even so, rather than the agonizing pain of horse hooves pounding against me, all I could really feel were forceful taps-- not painful at all.

All of a sudden, the fury and indignity that had been heaped upon me today bubbled back up to the surface in full force, a fact not helped by the lesbo mutant. In a flash, I grabbed both her legs as they came down for another barrage and pulled them wide. I yanked her struggling form closer while I reared up and my forehead collided forcefully against her snout.

A cracking sound and a cry of pain were my reward as her head was flung backwards from the force of the hit, blood dribbling down her nostrils. She fluttered back up, holding her hooves up to her snout in an attempt to stop the blood flow, an exercise in futility as hooves were ill suited for such a task.

I scrambled to my feet, glaring daggers at the lesbo. “Don’t touch me again, beast,” I hissed.

The lesbo’s eyes, shut tight from pain, suddenly flared open and locked on to me. “Why you…”

She shot forwards again, ready for another round. Reacting on instinct, I hastily raised my arm to intercept her and, to my moderate surprise, actually succeeded in catching her by the throat mid-flight. Baring her teeth, the lesbo thrashed, yelled and grunted in exertion, struggling to break free, flapping her wings furiously and kicking up large clouds of dust, but my grip was as unyielding as a vice.

But, wait. Did I just…

Realization hit me and I blinked. I was hoisting this freak of nature in the air with only one hand. Granted, she wasn’t too big, but still, she must have weighed at least a hundred pounds and I knew I didn’t have nearly enough arm strength to pull off such a feat. The lesbo, realizing her struggles were futile, opted instead to hurl a glob of disgusting mutant spit at my face.

“Gah! What in the…!” I recoiled at feeling her slimy warm saliva hit me. My arm worked furiously as I wiped it away with my sleeve and made sure to keep a hold of the lesbo with my free hand. I shuddered in revulsion as the warm ickiness of her gunk settled in my face. There wasn’t enough soap in the world to completely get rid of the feel. While I was distracted, she kept on struggling as if hoping she could break free. But those hopes were dashed away as I leveled my gaze back to her, now filled with absolute fury. “You filthy, little...” I slugged her in the gut and a pained gasp escaped her lips. “piece...” I hit her again. “of shit!” And once more for good measure.

The mutant wheezed and she let out a number of hacking coughs. Either I was way stronger than I thought I was, or she was just fragile because somewhere around her fourth cough, several droplets of blood flew out her mouth to land either on my hoodie or the ground around me. Her face was set in a mask of agony, and her struggles had ceased almost completely and now, only her hooves were weakly grasping at my hand, yet another oddity on the shitstorm that had befallen me today.

But even though the fight may have been knocked out of her, my blood was still boiling hot and I was not yet done punishing this freak of nature for her insolence, which is why I hoisted her over my head with both hands, reared back and threw her as hard as I could. She sailed through the air at high velocity until a carrot stand stopped her trajectory, practically exploding and sending bits of wood and produce from the sheer force of the impact. What few of the little pests remained had stood by to watch the spectacle, but now that I had thoroughly defeated their ilk, the screaming began anew.

It was all too much for me. I ran. I didn’t know why, but I ran. There was no particular destination. I just wanted to get away from this town and its nightmares. The ponies screamed even louder when they saw me move, the little pussies, but I just ignored them. The one good thing about the situation was that, in the panic and confusion of the populace, I was able to make a getaway.

I ran wildly, ignoring everything else and simply tried to find a way out. I collided against a number of the little pukes, purely by accident but even so they were sent flying away as if hit by a car and a curious crunching sound resonated each time I collided against them. I think they might have cried and wailed in agony but I wasn't paying much attention. Whatever the case, be it by skill or luck I managed to get away with none of the freaks following.

It surprised me, though. I wasn’t in the best of shape, to be honest. Yet, as I hunkered down beside a house near the outskirts of town, I realized I should have been sweating and panting like crazy at this point. Not so much. In fact, I felt like I could keep running on and on forever until the end of time. Is this what runner’s high feels like? Weird. Add it to yet another freaking thing that doesn’t make sense.

But that was a moot point. Now that my adrenaline was wearing out, a sense of panic began to creep in. Or at least, it should have. It might have been the sheer surrealness of the situation, but I was surprisingly calm. Not that I wasn’t scared, which I was, but my mind was surprisingly clear. I considered simply giving in to despair and wallow in misery for a while, but a more logical part of my mind knew that the little turds would be on the lookout for me, and I couldn’t simply stand idly by and risk the chance of them finding me.

I tried to think of what my next move should be. Calling for help was not exactly an option, so that was out. I need to get away from here, but… damn it, where do I go? It’s pretty safe to say I’m not on earth anymore. I can’t call mom, I can’t go back home and… shit, I bet I don’t even have what passes for basic human rights!

I growled in frustration and slammed my fist into the ground, hoping to relieve some of the enormous amount of stress and anxiety coursing through me. What I didn’t expect was for the earth to completely crumble under my blow, nor for there to be a decently sized crater where my fist had made contact.

I yelped in surprise and scrambled away, looking wildly in all directions to see if anyone had heard. No. Good. However, now that I calmed down, the most prominent question on my mind was… How in the world did I do that? Last I checked, I didn’t have nearly enough arm strength for such a feat. All in all, I suppose it’s just another topping to the shit sundae that has been this day.

Still, a part of me couldn’t help but be curious. Exactly how strong am I? Well, I suppose I could try to find out. There’s plenty of trees out here I could punch, and letting out my frustrations on innocent vegetation might help take some of the edge off. I got up and made my way over to an especially large tree, its trunk nearly as wide as I was tall and inspected it.

It towered over all the other trees in the immediate area, the bark was gnarled and had a weathered, crotchety old look to it. The thing must have been ancient. I made a fist, reared back, and slammed it against the trunk with all my might. Almost immediately, I got a faceful of splinters and wood shavings, causing me to cough uncontrollably and double back as my eyes were assaulted by countless debris.

A few minutes later, my eyes red and puffy from tears and debris, I took a good look at the tree. My fist had completely driven a hole through it. I looked at my hand, noting that not only was it not broken, but it wasn’t even sore, or bleeding from scraping against the rough wood. So… I’m super strong and on top of that, I have super durability as well. Just fucking great.

I brought up my hand for inspection. Perfectly unblemished. I bit down on it, lightly at first, but gradually applying more and more pressure until finally, the pain was too much to bear. Sure enough, it sported teeth marks and there was some redness as well. Hmm. So I can hurt myself. I have to admit, this is kind of cool.

That, and it gave me a sense of comfort to know that, if push came to shove, I could easily dispatch the mutants should they confront me. I mean, if I can drive a hole through a massive tree, cracking a skull like an egg should be no problem.

Hmm, this needs further testing.

After a quick glance around, I spotted a stone no larger than a baseball. It took a bit of application on my part, but it was soon reduced to pebbles and dust.

Brand new world, superhuman powers, stupid humans and pastel colored little freaks… what does it all mean?

I was so consumed with the many possibilities of how I could use these new abilities to my advantage that I didn’t notice the soft thumps of hoofbeats on grass come closer, not until it was too late. I whipped around, fist reared back, ready to send the little beasts into oblivion, but they were faster. All I saw was a pair of hooves, coated with some sort of metal horseshoe heading straight for my face.

My world exploded in pain and I could have sworn I saw stars as I let out a strangled yell, my body falling backwards and collapsing like a lump of dirt.

“O-oww…” I moaned and brought up my hands, carefully tending at the point of impact. Whatever it was I was hit with had done quite a number, but I was not yet unconscious. Darkened spots flared sporadically through my vision, but be it by my newfound toughness or sheer force of will, I somehow managed to stay conscious and by the edge of my vision creeped in one of the freaks.

He was a dark green in color, I think, and built heavily. Either he was arrogant or just plain stupid, because he bent down to examine me and did not seem too worried that I was still awake.

He looked up, some distance away from where I lay and opened his mouth to speak. I'm not sure what he said. In my state of semi unconsciousness, his speech was more like a garble than anything. He got an equally unintelligent response and nodded, turning his attention back to me.

He lifted his filthy hoof, the metal covering it gleamed as it touched the sunlight and I knew right then and there he would try to finish the job. As if in slow motion, his hoof came down, ready to meet my head.

I’m not too sure what happened next. The little turds weren’t able to completely knock me out. I felt myself being dragged, then… flashes. They took me back to the town. Some sort of building. Large and with cages. Humans in them. There was growling, the smell of sweat and violence in the air. I felt myself being tossed in a metal cage, the bars digging into my skin in an uncomfortable manner.

I don’t know how long it was, but my consciousness returned fully. Gotta imagine, if the little turds were able to disable me, those legs of theirs must have packed considerable power. My head hurt for the first few minutes after I regained full consciousness, but that quickly passed. My senses recovered soon after and I was able to take stock of my surroundings.

The room I was in was hot, small and grimy. Wooden and bare save for a few crates. The only dim lighting came from two lanterns hung by the only visible door. I shifted uncomfortably in the metal bars of the cage and stood up, the throbbing pain in my head now almost gone.

There was a single window. Chipped and dirty, but not so much that I couldn’t see past it. I was in the upper floor of what seemed to be a warehouse of some sort and from what I could make out, there was an arena of some sort dug deep into the ground. On the ground level above, surrounding it, were cages filled with humans; some male, others female. All naked and in a state of agitation as evidenced by the muffled growls and snarls that muddled into my room.

Someone had abducted me. Two of the filthy dog-horse creatures. I brought a hand up to my forehead, where I’d been struck and noticed a dry, crusty sensation. After scratching away at it, I could see it was blood, but only a surprisingly small amount. It seemed that my newfound invulnerability had managed to take most of the brunt of the attack, and good thing, too. Because if not for it, I would most certainly be dead right now.

"H-hey, is anybody there?" I called out but there was no response.

Christ, at the very least they could have put me in a room with AC. Miserable little bastards...

I grabbed one of the bars of the cage and gave an experimental squeeze. I then pulled with all my might, struggling to bend or break the bars, hoping my newfound strength would be enough to make an opening and I could make my escape. No such luck, other than a slight creaking noise.

Shit, what is this made out of, mithril?

“That won't work,” said a menacing voice.

I gasped and looked over, only to see one of the horned freaks. What? When did he get here? He'd been lurking in one of the darkened corners of the room, the creep. He stepped forward confidently into the light and I could begin to make out his features. He may have been smaller than me, but even at first glance, I could tell his very being radiated an air of menace. So much so that a primal, subconscious part of me caused me to back away in self preservation.

He inched closer and closer, and I was able to take in his appearance. A blood red coat, black mane and icy, soulless eyes that pierced through me without effort. “Those bars are magically reinforced titanium. You won't be breaking through them anytime soon.”

No matter what he may have looked like, I refused to be cowed by this inferior creature, so I stepped forward in defiance, raising to my full height. “Let me out of here you, you... thing." I said in my best demanding tone, though it might have been offset by the slight hitch in my voice.

An evil smile formed along the bastard's muzzle. “Well, will you look at that. An actual talking human. You'll fetch a nice prize.”

Prize? What?! Oh, my God. The humans out there, in the cages... he intends to sell me! Like I'm some common animal! “W-what are you going to do to me?”

“Normally, a lot of things you wouldn't like. But a unique specimen like you; pure and unspoiled... well, that would be a waste. No, I'm gonna keep you clean and healthy and then-- well, who knows. I'm sure there’s somepony somewhere who’ll pay top bit for a human like you.”

That did it. I lost my composure and slammed against the cage. “Goddamn it! I have my rights! Let me out of here!”

He smiled cruelly. “No, I don’t think I will. And you best get used to spending the rest of your life in a cage. Or don’t. Either way, you won’t be my problem soon enough. It’s nothing personal, you understand. Merely business.”

“You filthy little creature,” I seethed. “You’re not going to get away with this!”

“I already have,” he said smugly. “But I should go. I have better things to do than listen to the ramblings of a freak of nature.” He glanced over at the window. “The show should start in a few hours. Enjoy.”

Show? What is the draft beast talking about? I didn’t get a chance to ask, as he left without another word, leaving me to stew in my misery. I tried to escape again, this time attempting to budge every square inch of the cage, but no such luck. I was well and truly stuck until the mutants decided to do what they would to me. I looked around for anything that might be useful, but save for a number of crates, the room was empty.

Time passed. I don’t know how much and no one else came in to check up on me. I tried a few more increasingly half-hearted attempts to escape, but they were no more successful than the first time. I spent the first hour or so in panicked, hysterical fits, my mind running wild at the possibilities the little turds had in store for me, but even that eventually grew tedious, so I had little choice but to make myself comfortable and try to keep an eye out for an opportunity to escape. After all, the freaks seemed to be little more than medieval peasants. How smart could they be? The whole situation just screamed of cheesy villainy. One of them was bound to make a mistake.

But that would have to wait. There was nothing else to do at the moment. As the day(or night) wore on, the activity in the space out my room seemed to increase. From out my window I was able to make out more of the freaks as they shuffled into the warehouse. Crates were moved around the outside of the pit, used as seats of sorts.

A chilling thought occurred to me. The neglected, shady building. The pit, the unintelligent humans in cages. Was this some kind of perverse fighting ring? To my horror, it was. More of the mutants came and eventually, the show started.

Somehow, someway, the cages that housed the humans lifted into the air and into the pit, opening and carelessly dropping the humans into the pit. The assembled freaks cheered, jeered, and made raucous noise as the fight began.

In a twisted, sickening display, I watched the humans tear each other apart, be it by using nothing but their bodies or crude, makeshift weapons that were thrown in. Big and small, muscled and wiry, male and female. They were all made to fight. There was a scrappy one, though. Tough bastard refused to go down, even though he nearly died more than once.

It was all too much for me. Like most anarchist teenegers, I fancied myself to have a bloodlust, and youtube videos had made desensitized to violence. But watching something on a screen and watching it happen in real life are two very, extremely different things.

My stomach heaved and I retched violently into the floor. I fell on my knees, gagging and gasping as the contents of my stomach emptied. Then the door opened and in came in two more of the horned ones, one grey, one blue. They both seemed annoyed.

“Is this the human Darkflare talked about?” asked the blue one.

“Looks like. Don’t look like much if you ask me,” the grey one said, not looking too impressed.

Yeah, asshole. Why don’t you try saying that without a metal cage between us?

“I dunno,” the other one piped up. “She’s a real cutie. Too bad the boss wants her ‘pure’. Wouldn’t mind a quick roll in the hay with her.”

Uhh, what?

The other one made a grimace. “Ugh, I don’t know how in Celestia’s wide flank you can stand doing that.”

The blue one shrugged. “Hey, don’t knock it ‘till you try it. If you train them right, human females are actually better than mares in some cases.”

He still didn’t look convinced. “I’ll take your word on that. Let’s just board her on the train and get it over with. We could still catch the end of the fight if we hurry.”

“Right, right. Where’s she going again?”

The grey one sighed. “Weren’t you paying attention, idiot? It’s the Manehattan facility.”

“All right, all right. Don’t get your saddles in a twist. I’m being all proactive and stuff, see?”

With no warning, and in yet another WTF moment for me, his horn lit up and from it, he shot a red projectile of magic at me. The bolt passed through the cage and made contact with my chest. I yelped and scrambled away in fear, but the thing, whatever it was supposed to do failed, as I only felt an itching sensation.

The both blinked in surprise and the blue one opened his mouth. “Oi, you see that? She resisted my stunner.”

“You didn’t use enough juice, you moron,” chastised the grey one.

“I used plenty!” Blue retorted.

“Then why is she still conscious?”

“Because… who cares? I’ll get her this time.”

He charged another shot and I flinched, lifting my arm for protection, but his piddly attempt was just as ineffective as the first one, my invulnerability negating whatever it was supposed to do.

“Hah! You cast like a foal!” crowed Grey.

“What in Tartarus is wrong with this thing?” asked Blue as he frowned, rubbing at his horn with a hoof.

“It’s probably her. Looks like Darkflare found himself a magic-resistant human.”

Magic?

“Alright, then. Let’s both of us try a stunner at the same time. Maybe that’ll be enough.”

“Yeah, fine,” grumbled Blue.

Wait, this could be my chance. I’ll play possum and when they open the cage, I can get the drop on them and escape! I watched in apprehension as they both charged up a shot and let it loose. As soon as they hit, I groaned and slumped from my position. Hopefully that’ll fool them.

“Alright, let’s load her up,” said Blue in a satisfied tone.

I kept my left eye opened by a fraction, just enough that I could barely see. I felt an odd sensation course through my body. Almost like the gentle rocking of floating on water and a light purple glow surrounded me. It took everything I had to not freak out right then and there, but I managed it.

“Damn it. We can’t even levitate her. Just where did the boss find this one?”

“Who cares? We get paid either way. Let’s just load her by hoof.”

I heard the clip-clop as they came closer. Yes! Come on, you little monsters. Just a bit more and…

There was the clink of metal on metal. The lock turned, followed by a creak as the metal door swung open. I felt one of their disgusting hooves nudge me and like a coiled snake, I struck. In an explosion of movement, I grabbed the offending limb with both hands and twisted with such force that the leg, which belonged to Blue, snapped completely as he let out an agonized howl. He reared on his back legs, his now useless limb flopping wildly through the air in a morbidly comical manner.

I didn’t stop, not for a second. Immediately after I disabled him, I turned to Grey and launched myself, tackling him against the bars of the cage. His horn lit up and shot me a beam point blank in the face. It didn’t do anything.

His eyes widened at his failed attempt and instead tried to use force to fight me off, but my superior stature and superhuman strength was more than enough to hold him in place.

Keeping a hold of him with my left hand, I raised my fist up high and brought it down with all my might upon his skull. The blow was so powerful his whole entire cranium caved in, with shards of shattered bone sticking out his head. The brain itself, having nowhere else to go, propelled out his nostrils, showering me in blood and bits of brain matter while his right eye socket was completely crushed, causing the eyeball to pop out, still connected by a veiny tendril to its cavity.

The body spasmed and slumped to the floor, all the while emptying its bowels, filling the room with a foul stench. I recoiled, holding a hand to my nose and turned to Blue, who at this point was trying to hobble out of the cage. He looked back at me, covered in blood and standing victoriously atop the corpse of his soiled ilk. Must have been quite a sight, as he redoubled his efforts to get away.

I was quicker, though. I strode over and lifted him up by his throat, holding him in a vicegrip. “And where do you think you’re going?” I whispered in a deathly quiet voice, feeling immense satisfaction at the sheer terror in his bulging eyes.

He opened and closed his mouth doing a good impression of an idiotic dying fish-- as if he was trying to speak but couldn't get the words out. Hmm, I think I'm choking him. I let him loose and he fell unceremoniously, his broken leg taking the brunt of the impact, a pathetic moan escaping his lips. I gave him one good kick to the gut and made my way to the door.

It led to a dimly lit hall and, after following it, I opened a door, but almost immediately closed it as it led to the center of the warehouse where the fight was taking place. I may have had the equivalent strength of a hundred grown men and a terrier, plus a high degree of resistance to attacks but even so, I knew heading out into a room full of the little monsters was a stupid idea.

That and the fact the winged ones were flittering about meant that it would be nearly impossible for me to get out without being noticed. I couldn’t risk it. Even if I managed to outrun them, there is still the fact I don’t know where this place is or if there are more of them waiting outside. No, I wouldn’t be able to go that way.

The crowd roared again and shortly after, the body of a human girl was lifted out of the pit, surrounded by a soft yellow light. Her body was carelessly tossed into a large cart where three unfortunate victims of the freaks lay, covered in blood with their limbs sticking awkwardly out the sides. The sight of it sent a new wave of revulsion and loathing through my being.

I shook my head vigorously, trying to put the matter out my mind, not that it did much good. I’d wasted enough time. I had to get the hell out of here. Closing the door, I took deep steadying breaths and inspected the area, taking stock of my surroundings. The hallway was empty, but there, further up, there was a window from which the night sky shone.

There was a problem, though. It was too high for me to reach. Walking with purpose, I headed back to the room where I was caged, the sight of Grey’s corpse sending a slight pang through my chest, but I immediately shoved it aside. There was no use feeling bad for these animals. Blue whimpered as soon as I came into view and tried to scuttle away, but I didn’t pay him any mind.

A number of crates were stacked in the room. I could use these to give me a boost and escape out the window. I spotted a good sized specimen and moved forward to lift it, but no sooner did I pick it up when I felt an odd sensation in the back of my head-- a loud thunking noise following and I stumbled, the crate falling off my grip.

I rubbed at my head, not out of pain but rather by instinct. I saw a wooden beam, about the size of a baseball bat hovering in the air, surrounded by a light purple glow. The same glow coming out of Blue’s horn.

Before I could react, the bat swung in a wide arc, hitting me in the temple with what would normally have been a fatal blow. The sheer force behind the attack sent me reeling into the side of the cage, rattled but relatively unhurt. The bat came again for another try, but this time I catched it in mid swing, Blue’s eyes widening in horror as his hold over the weapon completely dissipated.

I was less than pleased at this. In fact, I was downright furious. Even after I opted not to finish him off, the little shit decides to up and try to kill me anyway? Gripping the beam so hard my fingertips sank deeply into the wood, I stalked forward as panic set onto Blue’s eyes. He was in the process of stammering something along the lines of ‘Please don’t’ when I sent the beam crashing down on his skull with a single blow.

I didn’t pause to examine the fruits of my work, but it was a safe bet to say he was most likely dead. A wet squelching noise filled the room, followed by the stench of shit.

I scrunched my nose. Yeah, he’s totally dead.

With no more distractions, I was able to move the crate over to the window. Peeking out, I could see it was a good twenty feet off the ground. I jumped without hesitation, landing on my stomach and completely knocking the wind out of me, but otherwise I was unharmed. Several seconds of wheezed breathing later, I shakily stood on my feet. Nothing broken. Good.

Now the question was where to go. On one side of me was the town with the Disney shacks. On the other was an ever expansive green plain. Neither were good choices. I had no idea how to survive out in the wild and given recent events, I was more than wary about staying in a town populated by the little monsters.

I sighed in frustration. Is it too much to ask for a fucking break?

I didn’t get the chance to think too long on it. The still night air carried a commotion that caught my attention. There were soft hoofbeats. Many of them, coming closer, but not exactly in my direction. I kept to the wall of the warehouse and steadily inched closer to see around the corner. A gasp escaped my lips, a spike of alarm coursing through me at the sight.

There were more of the mutants there, but almost every one of them were identical and dressed in some… golden renaissance armor. Hm, attack of the clones. Leading them, however, was one of the little beasts. Purple in color, but even more mutated than the rest of them as it had both a horn and wings. Shit, are they here for me?

Turns out they weren’t. They charged into the warehouse and all hell broke loose. There were yells, screams, the sound of fighting and more than a few crashes. Curiosity got the best of me and, inching closer and taking care not to be seen, I peeked through the door.

It was a hectic scene as the-- what I’m assuming to be guards or police of some sort, swarmed in and proceeded to subdue the rest of the little monsters. The horned ones shot beams of varying colors, the flying ones did some sort of mid air jujitsu and the normal ones, which I guess got the short end of the evolutionary stick, brawled it out on the ground.

The guards subdued the rest of their ilk fairly quick. It seemed that pitting humans against each other was illegal or something, kind of like dogfights back home. I had mixed feelings about this. Up to this point I felt nothing but loathing and contempt for the little turds, but the zeal they showed in apprehending the criminals slightly rose my opinion about them.

The purple one drew my attention. She yelled for a medic or something and I could see a human male laying beside her. It was the same scrappy bastard fighting in the ring. I’m surprised he made it this far, but his body was a whole bloody mess. Who knows, maybe he can pull through this as well, provided he’s not considered a threat and euthanized.

It was more or less a matter of cleaning up after that, and I got the hell out of there. Maybe, just maybe, the little mutants weren’t all bad. But they still keep my kind as pets so the’re not all that good either. Whatever the case, I chose to retreat back to the town, feeling it was a slightly better choice.

I skulked through the perimeter, not wanting to go in and at the same time trying to find somewhere I could spend the night. No such luck. I went further and further, ducking and darting all the way for worry the little turds would notice me, not that anything happened. It looked to be that in this rural mud village, the denizens turned in early to bed, but still. Better to not take chances.

The night dragged on, with me feeling increasingly desperate until I found a potentially good spot. It was a cottage built right in the outskirts of the town, no more than about a dozen yards from what looked to be a heavily wooded forest. The night limited my vision, but I could make out a chicken coop and various bird houses plus the chittering of many animals. Would this be the equivalent of some redneck naturalist?
I looked around me once more and considered my options. The place was largely deserted and isolated. Maybe I could break in, subdue whatever lived in the house and steal a few things for the coming days. Not the best of ideas but to tell the truth, I wasn’t in the best frame of mind at the moment. That and I also couldn’t think of anything else to do. With undue caution, I moved forward in an exaggerated tiptoe motion and gingerly opened the door.

Didn’t seem to be anyone there, but then again, the place was pretty dark. I could see furniture, couches, desks and a variety of animals sleeping all over the place. Lizards, mice, rats, rabbits, squirrels, beavers, raccoons, cats, dogs, birds of all sizes and… was that a freaking bear?! Okay, so maybe this wasn’t the best idea.

There was a shuffling of movement and I looked down to see a white rabbit glaring up at me. The fact that even a lowly rabbit could do something like glare rendered me silent for a moment. A moment too long as the rodent beat the ground with his hind legs, creating a surprisingly loud thumping noise.

Every single animal roused from sleep. The rabbit then emitted a loud string of chittering and squeals at me, while I just stared stupidly at it, not knowing what to make of the situation. The vermin was getting more and more worked up until it jumped to bite me in the shins.
Gah! What in the name of…! I kicked the pest, sending him well across the room where he impacted the wall with a wet crunching noise and fell, never to move again. It was one of those moments when you realize you’ve fucked up big time, as every animal was up and alert and glaring at me with vengeful hate.

Now, I realize at this point that I have surpassed the physical limits of a normal human but even so, seeing a bunch of murderous woodland critters charging at you, with a twelve hundred pound bear leading the charge, tends to set off a primal trigger that floods your body with pure, unadulterated fear. This was a prime example, evidenced by my shriek of terror as hundreds, maybe even thousands of pounds of flesh, teeth, claws, scales and feathers mobilized.

I ran like a madwoman, arms flailing and made a beeline towards the darkened woods, pretty much the only place where I could go with all the animals hot on my heels. After few minutes of running in near total darkness, tripping and getting bitch slapped by branches, I managed to lose the angry mob. I was sweating bullets, bent over and panting as I struggled to catch my breath.

“Oh… *wheeze* oh, man. *gulp* That was… way too close.”

Murderous animals notwithstanding I now had a whole new problem. Namely, I was lost. In a forest. At night. Oh, shit. Oh, shit. No, no, no, no no! Come on, Jackie. Just remember the direction you came in. Um, it was… that way, right? An hour later and I was still trudging blindly through the woods

Agh, fuck me...

The blocky white structure of Ponyville Hospital stood on the western edge of the town and it was through its halls that Nurse Redheart trotted with a tired step, something she tried to keep from showing in her posture. It had been a hectic day today and the overworked mare wanted nothing more than to call it a night and go lay in her nice warm bed, preferably with a nice cup of tea. All in all, today had been anything but typical. Then again, days in Ponyville had a tendency to not be typical, but never in this way. Oh, sure the hospital and its staff was regularly kept busy.

Injuries in Ponyville were not an uncommon thing, but even those tended to be relatively mild. Farmers would come in now and then with heatstroke or dehydration as they tended their crops and fields with devotion and zeal, sometimes forgetting to take as good care of themselves. They were also often afflicted by aches and pains brought on by labor and farming equipment, but those too could be treated in a jiffy.

And of course there were the boisterous colts and fillies, whose daring and rough play would lead them to be taken in by their parents. All in all, about the most serious things the hospital would have to deal with were births and the occasional broken bones, again, things that magic and modern medicine would easily remedy.

The hospital staff had been able to step up whenever the occasion needed but even so, recent events, namely, Twilight’s coronation as the newest princess of Equestria had merited the hospital to undergo a change of sorts. The nation’s newest ruler had chosen to reside in the quaint little town, something that raised many an eyebrow throughout the land. That was all well and good as neither the Sun or Moon princesses had pressured their newest addition to relocate, but at the end of the day, despite her humility and affable personality, Twilight was a princess all the same and therefore a pony of great importance.

It was due to this that, at Celestia’s discretion, Ponyville Hospital had gotten a renovation. Certain members of the staff had received more advanced medical lessons, given by the personal doctors of Celestia and Luna who had been dispatched with orders to train the Ponyville staff on the care and physiology of alicorns. Though the newest princess looked enough like a normal pony, albeit with an additional set of appendages, her body, magic and core would undergo subtle changes throughout the years as it fully adjusted to its new state, as well as the influx and change in her magical abilities.

Of course, it would have been simpler to appoint new doctors hoofpicked by the princesses themselves but Celestia, kind and considerate to her subjects as she was, couldn’t simply put the staff at Ponyville hospital out of work, so it was with this in mind that Redheart and her peers were enthusiastic to learn as much as they could. After all, what could be more honorable or prestigious than being responsible for the well being of one of the nation’s rulers?

That’s not to say it was all bread and roses, as the trainees were put through the wringer. Endless studies, mock procedures and drills ran them ragged for three months, but at the end, when their overseers deemed their training complete, the hospital staff celebrated their newfound experience and knowledge by throwing a celebration within the hospital, with booze, cakes and good food to be shared all around, from the lowliest janitor, to the receptionist, to the aides and the patients themselves(barring any upcoming procedures or dietary restrictions, of course). Naturally, the substantial increase in their salaries didn’t hurt either.

So it was with this that the hospital staff, with a renewed sense of confidence and ability, felt they could handle whatever the future would hold. The events of today had put that notion to the test.

Earlier in the day, an exasperated Redheart had tended to Berry Punch, who was a regular… well, customer, as patient would be a bit of a misnomer. Ever an enthusiastic, happy drunk, Berry Punch was no stranger to the clinic at Ponyville hospital. It was no secret that the mare held a strange sort of fondness for the sauce.

Oh, sure, it seemed harmless enough, for even as the mare seemed to be in a constant state of drunkenness, she was surprisingly well behaved. She didn’t cuss, she didn’t loiter, misbehave or elicit inappropriate behavior such as using the town as her own personal toilet, with the exception of throwing up in public whenever she surpassed even her own considerable tolerance for alcohol; to her credit, more often than not, she usually managed to find a trash can in which to expel her stomach’s contents.

She might have even passed as a ‘model drunk’, if such a thing existed, if it wasn’t for the fact her impaired motor functions and alcohol-fueled numbness to pain left her prone to many an accident, thus the reason for her frequent visits to the hospital clinic. Today had been no different and Nurse Redheart had sighed and resigned herself to treating a particularly large lump atop Berry's head, the cause of a nasty fall.

Though in the past the fretful nurse had often chastised the earth mare in the hopes of stopping her reckless behavior, she had ceased to do so some time ago as the incorrigible pony had no desire to change. So when Berry Punch had come in with yet another alcohol related accident, Redheart did what she had done so many times before.

She treated the injury as best she could, gave the earth mare a poultice for the pain and hangover and allowed her to sleep it off in an exam table-- and was wondering whether or not she was enabling this behavior and whether or not she should take more direct steps to prevent it-- that at that moment the doors to the hospital burst open and in came none other than princess Twilight.

Whatever thoughts Redheart harbored about offering a lower standard of care were swept away as following in the alicorn's wake were more ponies-- townsponies and they were carrying someone else, held aloft by a thick blanket that was stained with blood. That was but the beginning of a seemingly never ending hellstorm of frantic activity as in a matter of minutes the hospital was swarmed with patients in need of care.

Rainbow Dash had been the most severe case by far. It was a well known fact that the tomcoltish pegasus’ dream was to join the elite team of the Wonderbolts, often practicing her moves and coming up with all kinds of stunts and sometimes this led her to inflict injuries on herself as a result… but never like today.

There had been evidence of severe trauma in the pegasus’ abdomen, whatever had hit her had done so with enough force to practically render her organs to mush. Her liver had ruptured, sending toxins throughout her bloodstream and if that wasn’t bad enough, she’d also suffered severe hemorrhaging and internal bleeding, to say nothing of the three broken ribs, foreleg, a concussion and various wooden splinters embedded in her side. It had taken well over three hours of feverish work but in the end, they’d managed to at least stabilize the pegasus.

Nopony said it aloud, but they all knew the reason Dash wasn’t dead at the moment was due to their recent training and of course, the renewed supply of equipment, potions, salves and poultices specially commissioned by Celestia in case of emergencies, far ahead of what a small town hospital would normally carry.

Then there was Applejack. The hardy farmpony was a less severe case than Rainbow Dash, but no less important. Redheart had seen her share of foals who were brought in, crying as, for some reason or another, they had managed to bite their tongue. But unlike most, or... well, all of them, Applejack was hit with enough force to completely bite off the tip of her tongue.

That by itself would not be especially worrisome as the damage could be repaired, but it was obvious the farm mare had been assaulted. By who or what Redheart did not know, but what she did know was that it hit her with such strength that not only did her jaw shatter completely but several of her teeth were knocked out as well. Last but not least was the concussion that resulted from the sudden and severe blow as her brain collided against the bony skull meant to protect it.

Fortunately for Applejack, modern potions and medicine would allow her to fully recover in a couple of weeks, but that was not the end of it, not by a long shot. About a dozen more patients came in, having been bitten by humans, who apparently had been worked into a frenzy and still more arrived, with more serious injuries. Broken bones and trauma, as if they’d been hit hard by something. A piece of machinery perhaps? There were many questions, but neither Redheart or the other nurses or doctors had time to dwell on them, or to seek out answers. Perhaps after everything settled down and things cleared up, princess Twilight could make an announcement or something to fill them in what happened.

The staff at the small town hospital was not especially large and the sudden influx of patients had to be treated well into the night. No sooner had the hospital personnel made a sizable dent in the number of patients needing treatment that in came even more victims for them to treat, ponies escorted by the royal guard, wearing magic suppression rings or otherwise bound and there were even a number of humans to boot! Princess Twilight's among them.

Thankfully, despite the commotion and panic that engulfed the hospital, there had been no casualties. The only possible exception to this rule was Rainbow Dash. She was in no immediate danger of passing, but she was not completely out of the woods either. The doctors had treated her as best they could but now it was up to the pegasus to fight on, and Redheart was fully confident she’d manage to pull through.

Still, the possibility was there, and it was all too real, which led Redheart to perform the one aspect of her job she truly hated. Dash’s friends had to be informed of her current state and it would undoubtedly bring them no small amount of fear and worry. Truth be told, she had no idea how they would react, as she’d never had to do this sort of thing before, but everypony else was busy and so it fell to her to deliver the news.

The nurse pony kept silent and contemplated as she trotted through the once immaculate hallways of the hospital, now lined with several scuff marks and various bits and pieces of medical accessories strewn about. There were a number of ponies shuffling restlessly about as well, worried looks on their faces as they waited outside patient rooms, no doubt friends and relatives of today’s unfortunate victims and there was the wailing of little foals here and there.

Redheart paid no attention to this and merely walked on, the faint sense of apprehension that welled in her belly rose steadily as she neared the double doors that led into the waiting room, where the friends and family(or just friends in Rainbow Dash’s case) of Applejack and Rainbow Dash were anxiously waiting for news. She reached the doors and, after taking a deep, bracing breath, pushed them open and trotted on to the expectant looks of the ponies inside.

The Pony of Shadows [Updated]

Summers in St. Louis suck. Seriously. Not only does the temperature skyrocket, making the afternoons feel like the people’s own personal hell, but it can get really humid as well. When combined with the unrelenting heat, it creates a phenomenon commonly dubbed as the ‘hot pot’ that can suck the life out anyone unlucky enough to be caught in its wake. It’s not a pleasant experience. Not only do you sweat buckets, but the air itself is stifling and no matter how many breaths you take, or how deep they are, you just can’t shake that god-awful sensation of being suffocated. It gets slightly better in the nights, but only to the point that it’s just below tolerable. At the very least people have the options to go back to their air-conditioned homes.

Ah, air conditioning, how I miss thee. Truly it stands as one of humankind’s greatest inventions. Wanna beat the heat? Simply close all doors, shut all the blinds and plunge that number on the thermostat-- have yourself a little Christmas in July. Freezing cold outside? Turn the thing all the way up to a hundred, set up a couple of humidifiers and create your own personal sauna.

Expensive? Probably, but it’s nice to have options. Options, yes… that’s not something I currently had at the moment as I trudged blindly and desperately through this godforsaken forest, trying not to scream in aggravation or desperation. All I wanted was to go home, play my video game, go to sleep and wake up tomorrow to find an unproductive way to waste the day. Was that too much to ask?

Apparently so. I recalled that old, greasy asshole who accosted me. This was all his fault, he did this to me, and for what? Not that it mattered at the moment. My mind ran with various scenarios about what possible retribution I might unleash on his sorry ass should I ever see him again, and let me tell you, they were not pretty. Pointless? Probably, but it did make feel just a bit better. It helped take my mind off the lessened hot pot feeling that permeated this godforsaken forest.

I'd been trudging blindly for who knows how long, trying to find my way back to the village with the little mutants. No such luck. Practically every inch of the damned forest looked to be the same. Rocks, ferns, bushes and trees. Maybe the odd flower or stream. It certainly didn't help my mood that, after what felt like hours of walking, my whole body was now drenched in sweat and various dirt patches littered my clothes as well, the result of various damned roots tripping me. Stupid darkness...

If that wasn't bad enough, my nerves were all the more frayed by the noises that seemed to come from everywhere around me. There was the pitter patter of creatures scurrying around the dark, rustling of bushes. Even the wind itself made terrifying screams and moans as it swept across the seemingly neverending forest. Worst of all were the sounds of predators. Howling wolves; roars and snarls that reverberated in my stomach, not unlike those of a lion. The ones that really freaked me out were a series of animal noises that were a strange mixture of whoops and yelps, high pitched and every time I heard them the hairs on the back of my neck would stand up and a chilly bullet of paralyzing fear would shoot up my spine.

It got so bad that during one point, when I opted to rest, crouching near some bushes and making myself as small and unobtrusive as possible, a small bird darted out of the shrubbery, frantically chirping and darting well out of sight. Normally this wouldn't be cause for alarm, but by that point my nerves were so stressed that I couldn't help but let out an earsplitting shriek of terror before bolting from my position and mindlessly heading deeper into the gaping maw of the forest. Looking back on it, I do feel kinda silly. Well, eventually the stifling heat of the forest and lack of breath forced me to stop, hands on my knees and gasping for air.

I'm gonna... kill... that greasy... asshole!

My blood boiled, and with an aggravated snarl, I backhanded a nearby tree with so much force that it completely broke and fell, the ensuing crash being nearly deafening to my ears. I stood blankly for a moment, gazing stupidly at the felled tree and barked out a harsh, humorless laugh.

Of course. I’d totally forgotten about my body’s new features. Well, I couldn’t really be blamed, right? There I was, a sixteen year old girl, suddenly plucked from her world and in one dominated by fluffy little mutant freaks, where my kind were animals and on top of that, now exiled to a cliche’d forest, right out of a Disney movie. Anybody would freak.

It helped ease my nerves and calm me down, but then I was faced with a new conundrum, namely, what the hell do I do now? Find a way back home? Definitely, that was at the top of the list. How to do that, well… that was a slightly trickier dilemma. I mean, I’d no idea by which means that geezer sent me here. Whatever the case, whatever I had planned or would plan, there was one single thing I’d need to accomplish before even contemplating world-crossing scenarios, and that was to find a way out of this forest.

And how? Just pick a random direction and hope it leads to what passes for civilization?

Hmm, that might be more difficult than I thought. I’d been turned around every which way since entering the woods, so my sense of direction was for shit. And… it was dark. Like, really dark. Probably not the best idea to go trudging blindly and lose myself even more, no. Better wait for daylight.

Well, it was a plan, at least. Find shelter, find somewhere to safely spend the night. Safety being the key word. Ugh, and maybe find some water and soon. I was parched, and I mean parched. And why the hell am I still wearing this thing? I pulled my hoodie off and I couldn’t help but notice it was discolored from moisture… sweat, and my plain black undershirt stuck to my body. I’d never wanted a shower so badly in my life.

No, a bath. Hell, make it a bubble bath. Maybe with some scented soaps and candles.

It was my secret shame, but again, looking back on it, I was being silly. I’d never been a girly type of girl. I preferred shorts and jeans where other girls flocked to dresses and skirts. Hell, I don’t think I’d owned a pink piece of clothing since I was nine. The whole fru-fru schtick just wasn’t for me. Still, there was just that one single image I couldn’t shake. Me, lying inside a massive, ivory-white bathtub; mood lighting, some scented candles, soothing background music, my trusty DS and a cold glass of iced coffee and a couple of deep fried Twinkies at arm’s reach.

Mmmm...

My pleasant escapist fantasies were ground to a halt as the shrubbery not ten feet from me moved and rustled. My breath hitched and I immediately stood, heart hammering and palms sweating as I stood there, frozen in fear and awaiting whatever monster would crawl out to try and make a meal of me.

I inhaled sharply as it came out, fully revealing itself and… it just barely reached above my knees.

I deflated like a balloon as I took in the thing’s strange appearance, much less terrified but wary nonetheless. Head and feet of a common chicken welded to a lizard-like body with leathery bat-like wings. It glared up at me with red eyes and let out a chickenish squawk.

“Well, you’re a fucked up little thing,” I mumbled numbly, a part of me still trying to process the whole ordeal. It didn’t look dangerous, and it looked light enough for me to kick it a good distance away should it try to come near.

I merely waited. For what, I do not know, and as the seconds ticked away, the thing seemed to glare at me even more intensely. Huh, is it trying to drive me out of its territory or something? Maybe it had a nest nearby and I was trespassing. Whatever the case, it kept on looking at me, its eyes never wavering from mine and I couldn’t help but feel my legs start to grow numb and stiff. I decided this was as good a time as any to move on and get away from the creepy little monster, only… my legs seemed strangely unresponsive.

I glanced down and nearly had a stroke as I realized my entire lower half was now colored a drab, uniform grey and as hard and unfeeling as stone. What nearly sent me over the edge was the fact the grey coloring was slowly but steadily crawling higher and higher, hardening me and turning more of my flesh to stone with every passing second.

Needless to say, I did not take this very well. I shrieked and cursed, half-spitting, and frantically swatted my hands at the ever growing grey coloration as if hoping to impede its progress. Surprise, surprise, it didn’t work. I was hyperventilating by this point, and I looked around, hoping to see something or someway I could save myself. My eyes landed on the lizard/chicken thing and I froze, by my own accord this time. I don’t know how and I don’t know why, but I realized this thing was responsible for trying to turn me into a statue.

The fear was there, but along with it, a wave of fury welled up in my stomach. My every instinct screamed at me to kill this thing before it could finish the job. With a battle cry, I lunged forward, or, tried anyway. The whole me-being-turned-to-stone-up-to-my-navel thing kinda made it hard to move from where I stood. I swiped at the air in futility, as if I could somehow grab the thing that was well out of my reach, increasingly growing in desperation as more and more of me was turned to stone.

I looked to my would-be killer and with a last, aggravated snarl, stretched out my arms toward it in a last ditch but ultimately useless attempt to grab and kill it. No such luck.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!

Was this how I was doomed to die? Alone, in a forest, with smelly clothes and used as a perching roost/crapper for random birds for the rest of eternity or until time and erosion whittled me away?

No, no! I-I cannot die here! I… I… I’ve never even had sex, damn it!

What happened next would be defined as one of the strangest experiences of my life.

Just beneath my sternum I felt… something come to life. A well of… power. That’s the best way I can depict it. Like an old but sturdy engine, long since used, it roared to life in a glorious blaze, filling me with energy and power.

But even that was an afterthought. My gaze was still fixated on the thing, my arms still stretched out and in my mind’s eye I painted a very clear, very direct picture. That by some means, be it The Force or whatever, the chicken would sail through the air and into my inviting hands where I would rob it of its life.

My wish granted. From the well of power beneath my sternum, I felt a pulse of… I dunno. something. It traveled from there to fill my whole body and exploded outwards in every direction. The chicken sailed through the air, forcefully yanked by an invisible source and into my waiting hands, but that was not the whole of it. From every side of me-- front, back, right, left and up, various miscellaneous objects made a beeline for me as well. Stones, ferns, leaves, twigs small clumps of dirt. They slapped me all around, but I didn’t flinch, barely registering they hit me at all.

No, my gaze was firmly locked on the little monster, squirming in my hands, panic evident in its face. Oh, how satisfying it was to have the roles reversed. Low, dark chuckles rumbled out my throat and I brought the thing closer, right in front of my face. It looked at me in fear.

“Think you’re hot shit, huh?”

And just like that, I gripped its midsection with both hands and with one brutal motion, tore its body in half.

In one last act of defiance the hybrid saw it fit to splatter my front with its blood and entrails. Okay, that may have been kinda my fault, but still. The grey coloration that made up half of my body receded steadily until I was back to my good ol', normal, non-stone self. Didn't stop its innards from absorbing and sticking to my clothes.

“Eww, gross,” I moaned as its blood seeped well into my shirt. I took it off, quick as I could and tossed it away, giving it up as a lost cause, leaving me with a slightly bloodstained bra. I looked down and noticed the pile of debris around me.

The pulse of power… the chicken-thing flying towards me.

Tentatively, I patted around my stomach, where I felt that surge of power well up.

It was still there, I could feel it.

“Weird,” I murmured and looked around, spotting my hoodie nearby. I went over to pick it, dusted it as best I could and put it on. A myriad of thoughts raced through my mind, too fast and too disorganized to properly pin one down. I had a hella lot of questions and no answers whatsoever. I was thirsty, hungry and dead tired.

I resolved to find a place to spend the night.

"Oof."

I brought both hands to my stomach.

That little ball of power suddenly flared, sending out a pulse like the one that sent the chicken into my inviting hands only this time its effects were a tad bit different.

I looked around, trying to spot anything out of the ordinary. Nope. I shrugged and stepped off the little mound that accumulated at my feet.

Huh?

"What the...?"

The ground was... crunchy.

I bent and plucked a little nugget of dirt, rolling it in my fingers. It didn't disperse. And then there was the smell, all around me. I brought the nugget closer and was taken aback when I smelled chocolate. Without really thinking about it I popped it in my mouth.

Oreos...?

Yep, the cookie part at least, crumbled. My stomach growled and before I knew it, I scooped up a handful of the chocolaty goodness and stuffed it in my mouth. Normally I'd be content to eat until I was full, but at around the fourth mouthful I crunched down on something considerably harder... A stone. I promptly spat everything out and didn't try to eat again.

Ugh, let's just find a place to sleep.

My searching led me to a modest crevice dug into a rock wall that jutted out the forest. It was hard, lumpy and it smelled weird, but it was dry and there weren’t signs that anything else lived there.

It was there that I made camp, though there was not much sleeping to be done. Tired as I was I was also hyper vigilant to any thing that might happen. Wouldn’t want some monster to stumble upon my sleeping body and decide I’d make a good snack. So yes, that was about it. Several hours of boredom interrupted by brief flashes of terror and uncertainty. By the time the sun rose I was still in one piece, though a lot more cranky and miserable.

The prospect of food and a nice long shower kept me going, even if they became increasingly unlikely fantasies. I rested whenever I got too tired, hunkered below a tree or in between bushes, keeping out of sight. I eventually came across a stream of water and sated my thirst, not caring for the fact it could be full of mutated, alien bacteria that might kill me. At the very least, it looked clean enough.

Of course, my trekkings were not exactly uneventful. I didn’t run into any more monsters, thankfully, which was a bit surprising. My clothing was still splotched with quite a few spots of blood. One would think any predators would smell it and converge on my location. Oh, well, I certainly wasn’t about to complain.

No, what made everything unusual was not the world around me, but rather something within myself. It was that little core of power beneath my sternum. How it got there I did not know, but what I did know was that through the whole time I was walking, it would start acting up. And when it acted up, strange things happened.

It was like… I dunno. Like it was continuously building up power. Pulsing, pounding. For the first couple of times, it terrified me, as I thought I would explode from the inside out and it certainly felt that way. Well, thankfully there were no explosions or else I wouldn’t be here right now, would I?

What happened was that when enough power accumulated, it would forcefully expel itself from me and in all directions, affecting everything it touched. Trees would come alive and sway in place, like they were dancing. Other times they’d simply uproot themselves and walk away, or use their branches to slap away unwanted bugs or critters. Others still tried to make themselves look menacing and took aggressive positions, as if trying to frighten me. Ferns, bushes and other miscellaneous plants would come alive and squabble with each other as they fought to root themselves where the sun’s rays pierced the thick canopy of the forest.

Seriously, you can’t make shit like this up.

Large boulders, would float away in the breeze as if they weighed nothing. Other times they would become overstuffed beanbag chairs and other times still their molecular composition would change to resemble solid foam.

The ground I walked on would become slippery for no reason at all. Other times every single dirt particle would change color… every color so that to the inexperienced observer it might look like I was walking through a powdered rainbow. One time I swear it actually turned into bubblegum… chewed bubblegum which, ew. That was not fun to walk through. I was forced to throw away my sneakers as they’d become crusted with it and whatever else they picked up.

By this point my nerves were frazzled beyond the point of corrosion, my weird-shit-o’-meter was on the fritz and I was no less closer to getting out of the forest.

“Goddamn it!”

With a rage fueled backhand, I smacked a tree with enough force to completely splinter it in half. Then again, it really shouldn’t have tried to scare me by grabbing on to my leg with its roots.

Hope it was worth it, you bastard.

It was nearing afternoon when I came across a peculiar find. A bridge. Old and rickety, connecting a deep ravine. Not only that, but further across were the decrepit old ruins of... something. A castle, maybe? And in the middle of a godforsaken forest, right out of a cheesy adventure film. All in all, considering the kind of shitty day I'd had, it was least surprising find at the time.

I was very wary, and rightly so. I knew I couldn't simply stay there in the open and hope some hellish monster wouldn't spot me and decide I'd make a good meal. The ruins looked to be a good spot for me to take shelter, but then again, the thought must have occurred to other forest creatures throughout the years. That, or it could be inhabited by backwoods cannibal rapists.

I lurked and skulked around the perimeter, looking and listening for even the slightest indication of movement or signs that something had recently taken shelter. There were none, but then again, I was by no means an expert on the matter and given my paranoia, I spent a good long while debating whether I should risk going inside.

However, the decision was made for me as I heard movement behind me, and I turned to look and past the bridge, partially hidden by the bushes were a number of... were they…. Yes, yes they were. At the other end of the ravine were a number of what I can only describe as wooden wolves. And they had glowing green eyes. What… the… fuck? Just when I thought I started to get a handle on the place.

That was the push I needed and I scurried into the ruins, watching them as I hid beside the broken remains of what might have been a perimeter wall at some point. They didn't follow me, thankfully and after a while they slinked back into the brush of the forest.

Well, looks like I’ll have to go and check out the ruins whether I like it or not. For all I know, the wolves are simply biding their time until I come back, and I didn’t want to risk it. I’d seen enough Animal Planet and National Geographic to know that wolves were crafty animals and very patient to boot, spending days or even weeks at a time stalking and following a potential meal.

Granted, the things I saw were not wolves in the conventional sense, but how would I know?

With that done, I set about exploring the ruins, which I am now certain were a castle at some point. It would have no doubt been spectacular during its glory days. It had spacious, gigantic rooms; chandeliers hung from the ceiling and even at a distance, I could make see there were what looked to be rubies, emeralds and other stones embedded in them.

What caught my attention was the fact that, after arriving at a particularly large and once-opulent room, there were two elevated chair-like thrones and atop them were two banners upon which two more of the mutant horses were displayed. One blue and one white, but unlike the rest of them, possessed horns and wings. Princesses. Queens. I could only assume they ruled this forest at some point, but were long since dead.

I searched some more, wanting to make sure there were no unpleasant surprises, being careful to not make too much noise. I came across a room filled with suits of armor(which were in remarkably good condition), fashioned to fit the little pukes. How in the world they would be able to put on the armor, much less make use of the weapons was beyond me.

On the topmost and only tower of the castle were two rooms, possibly belonging to the two winged super mutants from the throne room. Their insides were surprisingly well preserved. There was nary a sign of dust and the passage of time seemed not to affect them in any way. The white freak’s quarters was halfway a room and some weird shrine dedicated to the sun. Golden, Roman-like pillars were placed at the edges of the room and on the walls were more sun trinkets. Richly detailed oil paintings of the sky at sunrise, the bustle of what was undoubtedly the city back in its glory days, bathed in the light of the afternoon sun. Obviously they were nowhere near the perfection of da Vinci, Michelangelo and Botticelli, but considering these were handless freaks it was somewhat impressive. On one corner of the room was a study desk of some sort and on its opposite side a vanity with makeup and brushes and stuff and on the floor a thick, fluffy rug with a giant sun right in the middle. Guess these godless freaks were sun worshippers.

The bed was a canopy four poster with those curtain things that would close all around, shielding whoever was inside from sight. The sheets were plush, expertly seamed and made of very high quality material and no sooner did I decide to try it out that it literally felt as though I was sleeping on a cloud. It was that soft. Right next to it was an exquisitely crafted nightstand. Inside was a diary with a padlock. Just out of curiosity I crushed the thing and opened to read it. Eh, nothing too interesting. There was something about how she and her sister, who was apparently named Luna used some magical doohickeys to turn this guy to stone. Creepy…. And then she basically talked about everyday life. Boring things. What she did for the day, a particularly good meal, how she was fond of cakes, how some foreign dignitary from a place called Maretonia was an asshole(I paraphrased), her consideration about drafting new laws and treaties and just really boring stuff. Jeez…

Oh, and there was also some bitching about how her sister was growing distant, how she seemed to resent her and how she wishes she would talk to her. And then more pissing and moaning about how her sister turned to the dark side or something and she was forced to banish her to the moon and how she grew sad and lonely and depressed.

I closed the book after that, wanting to get something productive done. Wonder if she killed herself. That might account for why the whole place is long since abandoned.

The room opposite to it looked to be that Luna character, maybe. It was no less spectacular, only moon themed. Where the other room was yellow and gold, this one was black and blue. Sheesh, emo much? Unlike the other one, this Luna seemed to be a weapons aficionado. There was an armory thing with an admittedly impressive set of weapons and armor. Longswords, shortswords, two types of axes, what looked to be a meteor hammer, a halberd, a double edged spear, an ornate shield of what looked to be black glass and three bows. I whistled appreciatively and inspected each piece. Wonder if I could pawn these off somewhere...

What drew my attention was a dagger. Looking at it, you wouldn't think there was anything special about it. The blade was simple and conical, about six inches long, sharpened at both edges and was black in color. The handle was slightly grooved metal but again, it wasn’t impressive. Didn’t stop it from leaving a gash on my finger, slicing it as though… as though I no longer possessed my weird super durability. Oh, yeah, and apparently I heal fast as well. The cut closed in about a minute, not even leaving a scar behind. I was impressed. The rest of the weapons couldn’t slice or pierce my skin in the slightest.

This Luna also liked jewelry, it seemed. There were plenty of no doubt priceless accessories on her nightstand. Necklaces, bracelets, earrings, all that good stuff, straight out of a Tolkien movie. Hell, there was even a shirt looking thing that… was it mithril?

And then, before I knew it, I tried some of it on. There was no one around to see me, so why not? I was… surprised. Two pearly half moon earrings that seemed to glimmer without any light. One of those banded necklaces with minute emeralds and rubies on the bands and an armlet thingie, made of some unknown material that felt like velvet, yet was very strong and adorning it was an octagonal navy blue gemstone. Heh, I looked pretty… I think.

Didn’t last, though. Following a sharp spike of hunger I put back the earrings and necklace. The armlet I kept. I kinda liked it and it’s not like anyone owns it, right? With that done I set about exploring the castle again.

I came across a massive indoor library, with the shelves reaching all the way up to the ceiling. A baffling choice, as there was no way for the mutants to get all the way up there, except maybe for the winged ones. The books, though. They were in surprisingly good condition. You’d think that countless years of neglect, mildew and the elements would do some kind of damage, but no. Damn, this world just doesn’t make sense.

Curiosity got the better of me and I picked up a random book. The letters or glyphs or characters or whatever they were, were strange and foreign... and I could understand them. What... the... fuck. I swear I've never even seen this language and yet reading it is as easy as english. I looked closer at what the book detailed. It looked to be a cookbook of some sort and I'd stumbled on a recipe for... hay and alfalfa soup? I promptly shut it closed and chucked it out the window.

I went over to a random table and heavily plopped down on a chair, sighing in relief at the chance to get off my feet. I still wasn’t completely sure the castle was safe, but almost immediately, a wave of exhaustion overtook me. I couldn’t help myself. I folded my arms against the table, resting my head atop them and soon enough, I was out like a light.

It was night. It was warm, but at least it was dry and there I was, standing in line at the local WalMart. I could make at least forty people in front of me, and almost thrice that number behind. It was five fifty in the a.m.-- Black Friday. I'd made sure to camp out early, coming despite my instincts telling me not to. There's just something about Black Friday that encourages a violent atmosphere. It's been well documented that brawls tend to start out as people rush in and scramble to grab whatever they can get their mitts on, and incidents of participants being stomped and trampled to death were not unheard of.

So it was with no small amount of apprehension that I found myself here today.

I did have a rudimentary plan. When the doors opened I would run, run as fast as I could to the electronics section, get what I came here for and leave. Well, I had to pay for it and I did bring money. Still, if the opportunity presented itself, I'd be a fool not to take it.

Anyway, the people around me shuffled restlessly, impatiently checking their phones or watches, standing on tiptoes to watch the movements of the nervous staff inside. The air was teeming with anxiety and impatience. When the doors opened, it was like the floodgates were set loose and the mass of bodies around me mobilized.

I did not waste a second.

Moving as fast as I could, I elbowed those on either side of me as the sea of people swarmed into the store, scattering in every direction. Girls and women flocked to the clothing aisles and almost immediately scuffles broke out as more than one of them got their hands on a particular piece of clothing. I saw lots of guys at the sports and outdoors section carrying as much as they could in their arms to be deposited in nearby carts. Of course, there were those who took advantage of the pandemonium to swipe any choice items left unattended. Clumsy shoppers had run into and crashed against various shelves and display aisles, littering the ground with all kinds of miscellaneous junk-- lipstick, cotton swabs, school and office supplies, bottles of juice, shampoo, and cleaning agents.

I passed through a number of scenarios like that, not paying them any mind and focusing only on my sole destination-- the electronics aisle. people were already there, swiping everything of value, the vultures. Hi-defs and plasma screens flew off the shelves, as did printers, blu-ray players and gaming consoles. The latter was my destination. Someone bumped into me, a guy at least a few years older than me. It was probably an accident, but all my mind registered at the moment was that he stood between me and my destination. With a balled fist, I reared back and slugged him with my strongest kidney punch, causing him to double over.

With that over, I dashed forward to the nintendo section, hoping I was not too late. Shit! All the 3DSs are gone!

But fate, as if smiling down upon me, saw fit to answer my dilemma. A person nearby tripped, sending the bulk he had on his arms tumbling to the floor, smashing his head well and good against the floor and didn’t get up again. A number of boxes and accessories littered the already littered floor, but what caught my attention was a blue box, the words 3DS, and the picture of said console right on the front.

Not for one second did I hesitate or pause to ponder this new development. I lunged forward intending to claim my prize before anyone else interfered and no sooner did my hand make contact with the cardboard box that another hand in a black fingerless glove, which was definitely not mine, took ahold of it as well.

My head snapped up, only to stare at the face of an equally surprised girl. Black hair, black lipstick, black nail polish, black everything. Kind of a contrast to her light skin.

My eyes narrowed and with both hands I tugged at my prize, only for her to do the same.

“Back off. I saw it first,” I challenged.

“Well, I touched it first,” she replied and yanked on it, but my grip held.

“Well, I want it more. Go to a Hot Topic instead. That’s where all your kind gathers to drink tomato juice and pretend it’s blood.”

She sneered. “Says the girl who buys her clothes at the K-Mart. Go to the freaking GAP, why don’t you. At least you’ll look like a loser instead of a pauper.”

“They’re not open yet, Elvira. I’ll have to make do with this.” I pulled harder, but the bitch didn’t relent.

"Let go already!"

"No, you let go!"

"Don't make me come down there, shrimp?"

"What did you call me, bitch?"

"I called you a shrimp 'cause you're a shrimp. What are you, deaf or just plain stupid? Let go of my freakin' 3DS already!"

I couldn't take it. I simply lashed out. I threw a punch that connected with her nose, causing the girl to cry out in pain and bring both hands to clutch at the area of impact.

With her grubby hands off my gaming console, I promptly flipped her the bird and moved to leave. I didn't get more than a few steps before a voice shrilled out "You little bitch!"

And before I knew it, I was being tackled to the ground, my precious 3DS flying out my grasp. We rolled around on the cold tiled floor, struggling to overcome the other and landing cheap shots where we could. I punched, kicked and bit anywhere to get the crazy bitch off of me and her, she used her ridiculously sharp nails to scratch my unprotected skin. Even from the corner of my eye I could see various shoppers stop and gawk at the scene. We must have really been going at it. Eventually we were forced away as I felt two strong hands grip my shoulder and yank me from the goth bitch. I turned to look and to my horror, the first thing I saw was a police badge. Shit!

“Get off of me!”

Turning back to the wannabe vampire I saw her lashing out and clawing at the person restraining her… another officer. No sooner did she realize this that she froze, sharing my look of horror and practically all the color drained from her face. I smirked. He, he, what an idiot. She was really in for it now.

And just like that, I felt the cool sensation of metal in my hands followed by two very audible clicks.

Goddamn it.

The crazed emo and I were promptly escorted out and into a police car. As soon as they began leading us away, the shoppers must have realized what they came here for, as they hastily resumed their looting, only more behaved until the cops took us well out of sight.

About an hour later and I found myself in a holding cell, incredibly pissed off, arms crossed and doing my best to ignore my cell mate. Where not too long ago she was trying to claw my eyes out, she now sat there, all still like and slumped, her eyes red from crying, hands clasped nervously between her knees and letting out a little sniffle every now and then.

I sighed. Thanks to my cellmate I missed my opportunity to nab a brand new 3DS at Black Friday price. Now the opportunity passed and by the time I'd be let out of this dump the price would be back to normal. Goddamn it, I didn't have enough cash to shell out for it.

Only options left were to get a job, but, blegh. Or I could buy a used one, which sucked since the thought of grabbing something full of someone else's germs made my skin crawl.

In any case, my plottings were interrupted as the girl next to me let out a despairing whimper and covered her face amid fresh tears.

I closed my eyes, leaning my head back against the concrete wall. “Will you please stop crying?”

She made no indication she’d heard me. Her face was still buried in her hands and a small moan muffled through.

I rolled my eyes. “Oh, my god. What, have you never been in a holding cell? I thought you emo vampires are supposed to be all cool and emotionless.”

“I dun’ wanna go t’ jail,” she whimpered.

“You’re not going to jail, idiot,” I bit impatiently. “This is holding. All the pigs are gonna do is call your parents and give you a fine.”

The girl looked at me, her makeup sloppily smeared across her face. “R-really? I’m not...” she swallowed. “Is this going into my permanent record?”

“Police don’t have permanent records. They have criminal files. And will you stop worrying? You’re just gonna get a slap on the wrist.”

“O-oh.” She looked a bit more reassured. Not that I was sure it was gonna go like that, but anything it took to stop her blubbering.

I sneered, or, would have, but the cuts in my face stung. I winced and reached to rub tenderly at the spots.

“Does it hurt?”

I looked to her and she to me. Still looked miserable, but worry increasingly crept in.

“What do you care? You rubbing it in or something?” I mumbled and turned away.

She looked down in shame. “N-no. I’m sorry, I… I don’t know what came over me. I don’t usually go off on people like that, but I was just having a really bad day and my girlfriend broke up with me and I’m on my period and I’m just… ugh, I can get so emotional.”

I grimaced. Way too much information. “Please, we all get it. I get it and I still manage to control myself.”

“You hit me first,” she said sullenly.

“True,” I admitted after a moment of hesitation.

I looked to her. A few spots of dried blood were crusted just below the left corner of her lip, itself a nasty purple and very much swollen. Her left eye shared a similar fate sans the blood. She didn’t look angry, just… miserable.

Shit.

“And you? Does it hurt?”

She tentatively poked at her eye. “It’s sore… aches.”

I didn’t know what to say to that. “Pigs could have given us some ice. It’d dull some of the pain at least.”

She hummed and stayed silent. I fidgeted uncomfortably. Normally this would be perfectly fine by me, yet I felt I should say something.

“Who’s coming to get you? Your parents?”

Good god, is this what I've been reduced to? Making awkward small talk with a stranger?

“Yeah,” she said miserably. “They’re not gonna be happy about this."

“Eh, it’s not like they’ll kick you out or ship you to boarding school… will they?”

She sniffed and let a brief hysterical laugh. “No, no… I don’t… think so.”

“Are you an only child?” I really didn’t know what was coming out of my mouth at this point.

“Yes.”

“Then they won’t ship you off. Just ground you or something.”

She looked like she wanted to believe it. “How do you know?”

"Because your parents have coddled you your entire life. I bet there hasn't been a thing you want that they didn't give you. Unless you really, really and I mean really fucked up, then all they'll do is ground you and take away your cell phone or something."

She looked thoughtful for a moment. "I think you're right. I really haven't screwed up... that they're aware of."

"See? You got nothing to worry about."

"No, I don't," she said, looking a bit more chipper. "I... feel a lot better now. Thanks." She smiled at me and sounded genuinely grateful.

I looked away and mumbled, "Sure. What else have you done? That your folks haven’t found out?"

“Ah...there was this one time a few weeks back. I snuck out at night, like at one, I think. I… sometimes take my parent's’ jeep out, just to, you know, drive around town and go to parties. And my friend was picking me up, so I wanted to bring something to drink, right?”

“Your parents just keep alcohol around?”

“Yes. Well, no. They keep it in this liquor cabinet.”

“And you picked it?” I was mildly impressed.

“No…” she said sheepishly. “I just removed the back panel, get what I want and screw it back in. Easy peasy.”

I chuckled. “Nice.”

“Yeah, well, I almost got caught. I took this bottle of Peppermint Schnapps. Drank more than I should have and by noon I ended up throwing it all up in the living room rug.”

“And your parents missed that?”

“Heheh, no. The whole thing smelled like mint. I told my mom and dad I ate a bad candy cane…. No, really,” she added hastily, seeing the doubtful look on my face. “It’s a lame excuse, I know, but believe it or not they bought the whole thing.”

“Whoa.”

“Yeah… how about you?”

“Let’s see… there was this bitch in school, and I mean like a real bitch. The kind you see in cliche’d teen movies and stuff. She and about fifty other people got invited to a party near the boonies, where it’s remote. I managed to snag a ride from some brain dead jocks and when we got there, the thing was all full swing. I mean, you wouldn’t believe the ruckus. And the girl who hosted the party was running around like a headless chicken. The whole thing got a little too wild and everybody was making a real mess of the place. Breaking glasses, picture frames, spray painting the walls, throwing up. And this girl was running all over, trying to get everyone to stop. Heh… idiot. Anyway, it was one of these houses with a massive backyard. Was probably a farm at some point and I took a walk outside, like all the way back where there were no people, because the whole thing was getting to be a bit too much. Anyway there was this storage shed thing and I could see the area ‘round back was lit and when I go over to check it out there’s the bitch, unconscious, wearing nothing but socks and lying there in the ground.”

She gasped. “Oh, my God. Was she… violated?” she whispered the last word.

I couldn’t help but snort. “Not likely. She’s the type who goes around, if you know what I mean. Got herself fucked and blacked out because she was too damn drunk. Had a bottle of Michelob Light in her hand.”

“And… what did you do?” she asked hesitantly. As for me, I smiled wolfishly.

“Her clothes were still there. Grabbed her phone, took some pictures and sent them to everyone in her contacts list. Like two hundred people and then they sent it to their friends and them to their friends. Literally by around two o'clock the next day everybody had seen her lying down like the whore she was.” I chuckled darkly. “From that point on, the legend of Slutty Chelsea was born.”

“Slutty… Chelsea,” she said slowly before a look of realization spread across her face and she gasped. “Chelsea Clinton? That was you?” Where not moments ago her expression was that of disapproval, now she looked at me with… admiration?

I shrugged nonchalantly or, tried to, at least. Couldn’t keep from smiling a little. “Moi,” I nodded. “Why, did you know her?”

“Hmph. Met her in a party about six months back. I was new here, you know. Just moved from Philadelphia. I… didn’t know too many people. Met Chelsea at a party, which I know is not a good place to go if you want a steady relationship, but…” She sighed. “She was nice. At first, I mean. I thought she liked me. After she got what she wanted, she didn’t pay me no mind anymore… fuckin’ slut,” she muttered bitterly. “Well, good going, doing what you did. Bitch deserved it.”

“Thanks. Someone really needed to put that girl in her place.” She smiled at me. Like, genuinely. Nothing but kindness on her face. Weird…

I couldn’t help but return it with my own, slightly awkward one. “No problem.”

“I’m curious. Why did you do it, though. Take her picture, I mean? Was she mean to you?”

“Mean to me? Hah!” I scoffed. “That bitch never knew I existed. We never crossed paths.”

“But you still did that. Why?”

I held up two fingers. “Two reasons: I thought it would amuse me and I wanted to see what would happen.”

She blinked. “That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

It was at that moment that both her parents burst in through the front door. They looked respectable enough. The mom looked to be near hysterics, her eyes wild and the dad’s face was steadily growing redder as he talked to the pig who arrested us. He opened the door to the cell and no longer was my former cellmate out that she was literally hug-tackled by her near sobbing mom. Jeez…

They had one of those little cheesy family reunion things and when everyone was more or less emotionally stable, the officer guided her parents to fill a bunch of paperwork. She looked back and, after making sure everyone else was occupied, swiftly plucked a marker from a nearby desk.

Stealing inside a police station. I had to admit, I was impressed.

"Come on," she waved impatiently past the bars of my cell.

As soon as I was within reach, she pulled off the cap and grabbed ahold of my arm.

"Okay, so if my parents don't kill me, I'm probably gonna be grounded for the next week or so. Anyway, there's an indie art expo opening on the twenty third downtown. I don’t know if you’re into that, but I’ve seen some of their stuff and it’s really good. So… you know, if you want to go then call me. I can pick you up or we could meet there or whatever, ‘kay? Or don’t. No pressure.”

She gave me back my hand and I stared at the number she’d scribbled on my palm. I admit, I didn’t know what to make of it.

“Name’s Claire, by the by. Claire Hartigan.”

“Uh,” I swallowed. “J-Jackeline.”

We had time enough for a quick handshake. Her hand was soft… warm, and then she was called to go home. She flashed me a smile and that ‘call me’ thing with her hand and was gone in the blink of an eye. I was rooted in the spot for a moment or two. What just happened? It was like I’d been in a daze all along and it suddenly lifted to grant me clarity. And then there was my hand, where that goth, vampire wannabe had scribbled on me. I stared at the numbers stupidly as my brain sluggishly put all the pieces in place.

Did I just make a friend?

<Ugh, spare me!>

With a snort, I jerked awake. “Wha… who’s there?” I inspected the room, my eyes darting everywhere numerous times, searching for whoever made that noise. Did the mutants track me down? I was really not in the mood to deal with them, and probably never would be.

“Huh, nothing there after all.”

Almost immediately, I felt a sharp jolt inside my head.

“Ow! What the…”

<Argh! Blast it! I just about had it.>

The voice resonated in the inside of my head, like an echo.

"Oh, God. Am I going crazy?" I asked to no one in particular, clutching at my noggin. "I do not need this right now."

<Drat, you're awake.>

Shit! There it is again.

<She, you foal, she! I am not an it.>

I rubbed at my temples. "You're not there, go away. It's just stress. Yeah, that's it. Stress induced hallucination. That's a thing, right?"

The voice sighed and if it was possible, I bet it would've rolled its eyes. <No, it's not a thing. Your mind is as sane as anyone else's. Now will you pay attention? There are things I must ask you.>

Silence.

<Are you even listening to me?>

Again, I didn’t respond, choosing to close my eyes shut and shook my head in denial.

<Fine, have it your way. I’ll get your attention one way or the other.... Hmm, human brains are a bit different than a pony’s. Now where… aha! Found it!>

A sudden, dull throb spiked in my head, but it went as quickly as it came. It startled me into opening my eyes and, in another instance of the strangest experiences of my life, the room I was standing in lurched and rushed out, as if I was having tunnel vision. Everything in front of me becoming smaller, getting further away until there was nothing left. Just an empty white void all round me.

Yeah, that got me good and riled, alright.

“What the ever-loving shit?!” I exclaimed as I took in the scenery around me. White, white and white. Nothing else. Hell, I don’t think I was even standing on anything, yet my feet were clearly touching solid ground.

“Wrong again, foal. This is the inside of your mind.”

I whirled around, only to lay eyes on one of the horned beasts, not ten steps from me.

Almost on instinct, I yelped and scrambled away, putting good distance between us. “Little fucker! How did you find me?” I hissed and got into a sloppy combat stance, knees bent and fists half raised, ready to slaughter the mutant at a moment’s notice.

The beast, a female, if her voice was any indication, curled her lip and by the way she looked at me, I don’t think she was impressed. “Do not call me that, human. I have a name.”

“S-start talking! Or I’ll--”

“You’ll do nothing,” her voice rang out clear and brash, and I couldn’t help but be silenced.

She merely looked at me, and I her. Her coat was, I had to admit, a light, glossy, silvery gray-- not like that of an old person, but healthy and natural. Her mane and tail were pitch black, straight and smooth and her oversized eyes were a bright blood red. It kind of unnerved me.

She closed her eyes and it seemed she tried to steel herself into a more relaxed, friendly pose. After opening them, she cleared her throat. “Ah, sorry about that. I did not mean to draw you in here so abruptly. I was desperate, you see.”

No, I most certainly didn’t see. I stood rooted at my spot, not giving or moving an inch.

After a sigh, she said, “Tell me, foal, what is your name?”

“What’s yours?” I shot back defiantly.

She did what might have passed for a shrug. “Couldn’t tell you. I forgot it long ago.”

I snorted. “What, you got amnesia or something?”

“No, not amnesia. My name is still out there somewhere. I simply… hid it.”

Uhh, what? “Why?” I couldn’t help but blurt out.

“Because names have power,” was her sole response.

She waited for me to make some sort of acknowledgement, but I wasn’t feeling particularly chatty at the moment.

“Alright, well, don’t speak if you don’t want. Just listen for now.” She then cleared her throat and spread one of her front legs. “This empty space right here is the subconscious part of your mind. Your body is still right where you left it-- whole and unharmed, I assure you. The ‘you’ right in front of me is merely a mental projection. You can’t be hurt or feel pain in any way… unless you want it of course.”

I listened with no small amount of incredulity. I mean, what do you say in a situation like this. My brain was still sluggish from tiredness and lack of food and… well, if she brought me here then she could get me out. Right…?

“My mind?” I asked skeptically after a prolonged silence. She nodded.

“It’s all empty.”

“So do something about it.”

I was about to ask what she meant by that when the answer hit me. All of this… the creepy forest, magic wielding mutants, pegasi, that weird chicken/lizard thing and now this. It all screamed of magical, mystical, hocus pocus. From a corner of my mind, I pulled one single image and just like that, the empty white void was empty no longer. We were now in a room. Stone walls all around us. Moving portraits, plush sofas and armchairs, old carpets, polished oaken tables, chairs and various furniture. Last but not least was the fireplace alight with a merry, crackling fire-- a perfect replica of the Gryffindor common room.

“Not bad, not bad at all.” I looked back to the unicorn, inspecting the surroundings with an appreciative eye. “It’s cozy, if nothing else, and I do like the red theme.” She raised an eyebrow at the moving portraits, but said nothing and instead moved to sit atop a particularly plush armchair in front of the fire. She gestured for the seat in front of her, an exact replica of the chair she occupied. “Sit, please, and make yourself comfortable. It is your mind after all.”

My eyes darted from her to the offered spot, searching for any signs of deceit or falsehood, but there were none. She certainly looked sincere.

Slowly, carefully, I inched forward, never taking my eyes off her and hers never leaving mine. The only sound was the snap and crackling of the flames, illuminating everything else with a warm, inviting glow. When I finally sat down, hands atop my lap, a small smile stretched across her lips.

It was at that point that I was reminded, even in this pseudo-consciousness or reality or whatever it was, I was still hungry, as my treacherous stomach saw fit to remind me. Man, what I wouldn’t give for a little something. A large platter was suddenly in front of me, as if it had always been there. Almost as large as a hubcap and all but overflowing with golden fries, layered with oodles of chili and melted cheese. My stomach made its protests known-- telling me to quit dawdling and stuff my face. Still, I did have a smudge of self restraint. One lesson my mom successfully hammered into me early on was to mind my manners at the table, especially when in company.

"Oh, my. What is that?"

I looked to the self professed pony thing in front of me, eyeing the gut busting goodness with interest.

"Chili cheese fries," I said after taking a moment to properly whiff the calorie laden monstrosity. I plucked two perfect looking specimens-- hell they were all perfect-- and popped them in. Crispy on the outside, fluffy on the inside. Salted to perfection and neither the chili or cheese overpowered each other or the potato. Before I knew it, I started tossing them back with wild abandon, manners be damned.

"It looks... interesting."

I looked to the gray pony. She was taking slow, deep breaths, nostrils flaring as she took in the heavenly scent. Gulping and biting her lip.

"Want one?" I blurted out without thinking.

Her face lit up immediately. "Why, thank you." Her already large eyes widened as she tasted the warm, salty goodness and almost immediately started knocking them back. "Mmm. This is... quite good. Potatoes, aren't they? And obviously melted cheese... but what is this brown substance? I've never seen anything like it."

"It's chili."

"Yes, but what's it made of?"

"Beef."

She merely stared at me.

"Cow, it's made from cow flesh."

Her reaction was amusing to say the least. She froze mid chew, her eyes boggled and staring at me incredulously. "You... don't say?" Heh, it looked like the gears in her mind had ground to a halt. You could practically hear them slowly start back up. As if reaching some kind of internal agreement, she nodded. "Well, it's good."

"Kinda took you for a vegetarian, I muttered as we both continued to help ourselves.

"I still am, technically. This is not actually here, you know," she said, gesturing to the platter.

"So I'm not really eating?"

"Nope."

I sighed. "That's all I had left." I promptly sat back in my chair. "Why did you bring me here?"

“In time, in time. We should first get introductions out of the way, don’t you think? What’s your name?”

“Jacqueline,” I muttered lowly. “Who’re you?”

“I told you, I don’t remember.”

I scoffed. “Right, you hid your name,” I said sardonically. “How do you even do something like that?”

“Magic, of course,” she said as though it was the obvious answer.

“Uh-huh,” I said skeptically and waited on her to elaborate. She seemed content to stay silent and observe me. “And... why?"

"Why what?"

"Why in the world would you need to do something like hide your name?”

She tilted her head and, after a moment of indecision said, “I was… hiding from someone. A very nasty fellow. I don't know much of anything about him, but I do know he made it his mission in life to capture me. I... poked my nose where I shouldn’t, did things I shouldn’t have. It got his attention and he wasn’t too pleased with me. He came after me, you see. I had to hide… hide myself, hide my soul and my name, or else he’d have found me.”

I waited for her continue, but she didn’t. If her features were any indication, she seemed to be lost in thought. “And you were hiding from…”

She hummed. “I’m not sure. I removed that bit of information from my mind as well.” She must have seen the unbelieving, impatient grimace on my face, for she elaborated a bit more. “Names have power, foal. If someone knows your full name, they would be able to find you wherever you may be. This individual I am referring to used my name to track me down where I hid. Didn’t matter where I went, what I did or how well I covered my tracks. He used my name to hunt me for months across the whole of Equestria. I was getting desperate, you see and so I resorted to… well, what you might call highly dangerous and experimental magic. I removed my soul. Placed it within the gemstone you found where it would be nice and safe. I removed and hid my name, his name and anything else I deemed to be best left forgotten. I took every step necessary to ensure he didn’t find me-- may have worked a little too well, now that I think about it.”

She… removed her soul? Oh, god, did I just stumble into this infernal world’s version of Voldemort?!

I visibly tensed, and my words came out stiff and harsh. “You’re a criminal, aren’t you? You… you… you hatched some harebrained scheme to take over the world or some crap like that, didn’t you. That’s why you’re hiding, isn’t it?!”

She simply stared at me as though I’d grown a second head. “No, nothing quite like that,” she said slowly. “But no, you’re not entirely wrong. I am a criminal, yes-- was-- but my goals never stretched quite as far as world domination, no. What I wanted was much simpler than that. Knowledge; to explore new and untapped branches of magic. Very exciting work. Progressive. Perhaps a tad dangerous. Unfortunately for me, higher authorities declared my interests to be… well, dangerous. There were several laws and restrictions prohibiting the finding of new magics. They regarded my interests to be unhealthy. Obsessive was what they called me,” she sniffed. “If anything, I was misunderstood.”

I closed my eyes and rubbed my temples, trying to process all this. In spite of the whole outlandishness of it, I couldn’t help but be curious. “What did you do to make this guy so mad at you?”

She gave me a helpless shrug.

“Seriously?”

“I removed most of everything and anything regarding the matter, foal.”

“And if you don’t know what you did to piss him off, how will you know not to do it again?”

She opened her mouth to speak, but almost immediately, a look of realization lit up her face and her jaw was left floundering like a fish’s.

I rolled my eyes. “Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to poke around and remove everything from your mind, eh?”

“Blast it,” she sighed. “I may have… rushed a few things, but in my defense, I was getting fairly desperate by that point-- in any case, I would like to get down to the matter of things. I did not just get your attention to have a pleasant chat about my past.”

I hesitated for a moment. “What do you want with me?”

“To be blunt, I would like your help. I and my armlet have been stuck in this infernal castle for the better part of a millennium and--”

“A millennium…”

“Yes, over a thousand years,” she said a bit impatiently. “My point being, I have been without a body for a very long time. I can’t exactly get around on my own. I need someone to… carry me,” she said distastefully. “If I ever want to get out of here. That is where you come in. I would like your help in acquiring a host body for me to overtake and rid myself of this cursed state of immobility. Of course, I wouldn’t ask you to do this for nothing. Should you help me in my request, I would be more than willing to repay the favor.”

I looked at her doubtfully. "I'm still not clear on one thing."

"Oh? What is it?"

"If... if you really have been around for a thousand years then this guy you talked about is long dead, isn't he?" Or wait, don’t tell me, these infernal creatures can live for thousands of years.

“Ah, a very good point,” she said happily. “Then I don’t have as much to worry about, I think.”

“Still another thing I’m not all that clear on.” She looked at me expectantly.

“You said something about a host body…. What exactly does that mean?”

“I will overtake their mind and seize control of the body for my own.”

My face blanched. “W-wha…”

“Now before you get any ideas, I cannot actually take control of your body. I am a pony and you are a human. We are simply not compatible.”

For a moment, I could do little but stare at her in horror, but I managed to say in a shaky voice, “H-how do I know you’re t-telling the truth?”

The answer came quick and succinct. “Because if I could, I would have already done so, and we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now.”

“That… doesn’t fill me with a lot of confidence,” I trailed off.

“Then confide in this-- I am in need of help, and you are literally the only one who can help me. I can’t exactly wait another thousand years for somepony to hopefully stumble into me. And you… well, I’m assuming you yourself are in need of help as well. After all, you are an intelligent human. I highly doubt your kind could have reached full sapience in as little as a thousand years. Call it a hunch, but I imagine life in here can’t be too easy for you. I know there’s got to be a thing or two you might need someone else’s help on.”

I squirmed in my seat and her, she just looked patiently at me, waiting for me to decide. Gawd, what do you actually do in a situation like this. To tell the truth I had no idea what to choose. I had no plans beyond tomorrow. I knew I wanted to get back home and away from all this craziness. But I couldn’t deny one simple fact-- I was utterly alone here, an intelligent human in a world of midget dog-horse mutants where my kind were considered lower life forms. This world operated on different rules than mine and I… what could I do? Where could I go all by myself?

I… damn it, I need help. I… I… can’t do this alone.

“Fine,” I whispered, too low to hear.

“Pardon?”

“Fine,” I said louder this time. “I’ll… help you with your thing, now can you let me out of here?”

She clapped her hooves. “Ah, splendid! Truth be told, I was afraid you’d be much too irrational to listen. Very well, I will send you back. Now brace yourself. This will be disorienting.”

And just like that, I was yanked from the relatively comfy confines of my mind and sent hurtling back to the real world. I swayed, nearly losing my balance but remained upright. I doubled over, hands on my knees, breathing heavily and trying not to puke.

“What the shit?!” I gasped.

<Yes, sorry about that. First time is always the worst from what I hear.>

“You’ve done this before?”

<Oh, yes. Many times. Back in its glory days this castle and the land surrounding it served as the capital city of Equestria. It was filled with many servants and laborers. I tucked myself away in secluded little shelves, drawers, places away from prying eyes, anywhere somepony might stumble into me. Taking over their bodies was quite easy once I got the hang of it.>

“Bodies… just how long were you doing this for?”

<Three hundred and fifty eight years.> She must have sensed my disbelief. <This unscrupulous individual was persistent. I kept an ear to the ground while I hid. Whatever I did to anger him must have been quite severe. Really, what kind of sick mind hunts you for such a long time? I assume he didn’t have any family. Most ponies have enough going in their lives to hunt somepony for hundreds of years. He really should have learned to relax and let bygones be bygones, maybe pick up a hobby but--”

“You said something about needing help?” I asked loudly,

<Hm? Oh, yes, host body. Very good. Apologies. It is nice to talk to somepony else beside yourself, yes. First issue we need to address is getting out of this forest and into civilization.>

I was about to respond when my stomach did it for me, loudly protesting the long absent nourishment of food. Good though those mind fries were, they weren’t really real and it raised my already aching hunger to critical mass. “God, if I don’t eat something soon I will literally die.” Or not. I do exaggerate sometimes. “Is there something to eat in here?”

<Probably not. I do remember the kitchens were very well stocked, but the food’s probably turned to dust by now. If you’re feeling desperate, you can probably find rats or something of the sort. You do like rats, don’t you?>

“No.”

<Really?> She sounded a bit surprised.

“Really. I’m not that desperate.”

<So go to the forest. There’s bound to be some wild fruits you can eat.>

“Can’t. How am I even gonna find it. I know there’s a mud village somewhere in the forest’s perimeter. That’s where I’ve been trying to go.”

<I see. Well, we need you to be at your full strength. It wouldn’t do if you keel over from malnourishment. Now, I may have a way to find this village’s location, but you probably won’t like it.>

“What is it?” At this point I was willing to try anything.

<I would need to see your memories, from the point you entered the forest and up to you finding this castle. If your memories are fresh and vivid enough, I’ll be able to make a good guess as to where this village is.>

“Okay, fine.”

<Don’t be like that. It’s perfectly saf… wait, what?>

“Fine, whatever. You can look. Whatever gets some food in me, I’m starving...” I rubbed at my stomach.

<Very well, this won’t take but a minute.> All of a sudden I felt a very fleeting sensation at the center of my brain, like a very light pressure, but it went as quickly as it came. <I think I got it now.>

“You can find the village?”

<I have a fairly good idea where it is, yes.> Hmm, there was something in that tone.

“But…”

<Well, I may have looked a… tiny little bit further back than I intended-->

“Oh, god.”

<--and given the state of things, there might be a problem with this little excursion of yours. I saw that little altercation you had with the locals.>

Of course there’s a problem. Why can’t anything be simple? “What is it?”

<Well, before jumping to conclusions I’d like to be clear on a few things. Are you the only intelligent human these ponies have seen?>

“I… think. Maybe. You saw how they reacted, right?”

<Yes, well, unfortunately, those two mares you assaulted are not your usual run of the mill ponies.>

“So who are they?”

<They just happen to be the bearers of the Elements of Honesty and Loyalty.>

“Uhh… what?” She gave me a more or less abridged version of these Macguffin trinkets that shot some concentrated, hippie, candyland rainbow power that apparently could do any number of things to bad guys. Supposedly, even though she was trapped and unable to move, she could still project her consciousness around the castle, which is how she was able to see the two little pukes and four of their friends use the things to purge the pony version of Boogieman.

<And that’s not everything.>

I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Of course it isn’t.”

<Remember the alicorn?>

“The what?”

<The alicorn.> An image appeared suddenly in my mind… the little purple super mutant.

“Oh, her,” I muttered.

<Apparently she’s a princess now, or at least a very important pony, most likely with connections to whoever rules Equestria at this point…. And you just assaulted her friends.>

A migraine was quickly approaching. Christ, where’s some weed when you need it? Should have tried it at least once...

<Case in point, they won’t be forgetting you anytime soon. I wouldn’t be surprised if the town’s crawling with guards, or if they are planning to send search parties for you here in the forest. Oh, yes, and remember that little animal filled cottage? Belongs to the bearer of the Element of Kindness, yet another of the alicorn’s friends.> She chortled. <Oh, my, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone make such a bad first impression in my life,> she said, her voice quaking in mirth.

“Fuck!” I decided to take out my frustrations on an innocent table, swinging my arm down with enough force to break it in half.

<Oh, relax. It’s not the end of the world. And if something does happen, you do have ample magic reserves. I’m curious, by the way. What sort of magic can you do?>

“Huh?”

<Magic. Spells. You know, that kind of thing. What can you do?>

“Nothing,” I said after a pause. “I don’t have magic.”

<You’re kidding, right?> I let my silence speak for itself. <Magic, you foal, chaos magic! You’re practically brimming with it. Can’t you feel it?>

I was about to dispute this when a more rational part of my mind recalled the strange events of the past day. My new physical attributes, my encounter with the weird chicken/lizard hybrid freak and those random pulses emanating from beneath my sternum. Oh, God…

<I take it you do know what I’m talking about?>

“I… yeah, Kind of, but…” I trailed off, a hurricane of thoughts sweeping through my head.

<Yes?>

“How did this happen? I’m not magic. Humans are not magic.”

<I can’t be sure. Hmm, wait a moment, let me take a look.> I was about to ask what she meant by this until I felt that power source in my gut flicker.

“The hell?” I ran a hand through my stomach.

<Just as I thought.>

Finally, some answers! “What? What did you find?”

<Your magical core. It’s like you said, you are not magic and yet, there is a magical core inside of you. Chaos magic, very unusual that is. It’s artificially made as far as I can tell, not part of your natural biology. Poorly constructed as well. It’s like someone decided to, for lack of a better analogy, plant a magical seedling into a never before used terrain, let it sit and see what happens.>

“Is it bad?” I asked anxiously, wringing my hands.

<It’s crude, inefficient and wasteful.>

“Yeah, who cares?! Is something bad gonna happen to me? Something bad's gonna happen, isn't it? Son of a bitch, I knew it! There's been weird stuff happening to me all day and now My body's gonna explode--"My voice was in near hysterics at this point.

<Calm yourself, foal, you are not going to die.>

"I-I'm not?"

<No! It's… not bad for you. As far as I can tell, at least. I would have to do a very thorough analysis to be sure.>

“Can’t you do it now? I don’t wanna go without making sure the thing won’t implode on me!”

She sighed and if she could, I bet she would’ve rolled her eyes. <That’s not how it works. Sloppy as it may be, it’s stable enough that it won’t harm you.> Oh, oh thank God. <It can, however, have adverse effects in the long term.> And goodbye, half second of relief. <But if, and I mean if anything bad were to happen, it wouldn’t take place for months or even years, and before anything else, your body needs sustenance. I can make a more thorough inspection of your core, but only after I’m sure you won’t pass out from malnutrition.>

“Oh. Uh, thanks,” I mumbled.

<Don’t thank me, it’s mostly self-interest. I could be stuck here until the end of eternity if you go and die on me. Still, you are welcome. Now, you can’t exactly go as you are. It would be safer if you were to change your appearance. New clothes would be in order. Or you could simply go naked.>

“No, let’s go with clothes,” I said immediately.

<Very well. There’s got to be something around here you can use. Ah, and a haircut wouldn’t go amiss.>

“You know, you sound very sure about this. Those... ponies can’t be that stupid. How do you know they won’t recognize me anyway?”

<You give ponies too much credit, little one. Most ponies have a hard time telling humans apart from one another, even a troublemaker such as you.>

“Like horses are for us…” I muttered lowly. At any other time, I might appreciate how my reversed animal status was actually working for me at this point.

<So what do you say? Are you up for it?>

"I don't have much of a choice, do I? Whatever helps" I sighed. How do you go forward on a situation like this? How do you know if you're making the right choice or setting yourself up for failure? I did not have these answers and I didn't have time to dawdle. It's easy to tell yourself further down the road how things could have been different or how you could have done something better.

Oh fuck it, I was dirty, starving and my tenuous grip on my sanity was teetering on the edge of madness.

Now let's go and get some chow.... and hopefully some soap. I stink.

And hopefully, absolutely nothing will go wrong.

Of Stolen Cakes and Milk and Goods [Updated]

Ari. That is what… I dunno, the soul thing wanted me to call her. Well, that’s not entirely correct. She didn’t remember her actual name and if for nothing else than convenience’s sake, I needed something to call her. Oh, and it turns out ponies(yes, apparently they were called ponies) have different names that one would normally associate. Twinkling Star, Written Script, Soundspeed and Silver Stream were just some of what apparently passed for names here. She was pretty sure her name began with the letter ‘A’, but the whole selective amnesia thing kinda made it an impossibility to remember.

She wanted me to call her Arcana. Don’t ask me why, I don’t know. I suppose it sounded cool or grandiose to her. Actually saying it left a bit of an aftertaste in my mouth and after some haggling back and forth, we settled on me calling her Ari.

Compromise.

“Something’s missing here,” I muttered as I stared at the mud village, which if a nearby signpost was to be believed, was called Ponyville.

<I agree. It seems a little too quiet, don't you think?>

I merely grunted in confirmation. The mud town was in front of me and I took advantage of the forest and the night by pressing myself against a tree at the perimeter.

“You think it's a problem?”

<Hard to say. It's pretty hard to see.>

“Well I can't put this off any longer. I need grub and I need it now.”

<Hold on, hold on,> she said hastily, as I had just begun to emerge from the covering of the forest.

“What?” I hissed impatiently.

<Don't you think we should go over a few things before going in?>

“What things?”

<The kind of things you shouldn’t do. Or were you simply planning to waltz in without a plan in mind?> My silence was all she needed. It wasn’t anything common sense wouldn’t rectify, but all the same, she did make some good points.

“Well…” I let the silence speak for itself.

<Oh, for the love of… alright, just keep a few things in mind. First, and most obvious, be careful and don’t be seen. Secondly, ransack only stores and businesses; no homes or domiciles whatsoever. Much less chance of you being caught. Thirdly, make it a priority to carry only the essentials and what you think you’ll need most. Oh, and don’t get overzealous and loot more than you can carry. Fourthly, if you bring food of any kind, be sure you tuck it away very well. It will be problematic if you go bumbling about the forest smelling like a mobile smorgasbord. Lastly and most importantly, do not do anything that will bring attention on yourself. Do not linger anyplace too long; get in, get what you need and get out. Any questions?>

“No. Man, you really have thought about this,” I admitted grudgingly. To be honest, I really didn’t have a plan beyond sneak in, loot what I can, and maybe deface some public property, if only to spite the little pukes.

<Not exactly. Merely common sense.>

I suppose it is. I dunno, my brain was kinds sluggish at this point, and my blood sugar was dropping by the minute.

Turns out, the whole thing went rather well. I kept low, hunched over and stuck to the buildings, not daring to venture out into the open. The place was deserted, there was not a soul in sight and no movement save for whatever the wind stirred up. I had mixed feelings about it. That no one was there, not even the guards, was a good thing, and would make my task all the easier. On the other hand, it seemed almost too convenient, and this served to fuel my paranoia, envisioning a trap set by the little turds, watching and waiting inside their backwards, medieval homes to pounce on me at any moment.

Whatever misgiving I had had to be set aside for the moment, as my stomach and body constantly made their displeasure at the absence of food to be known.There was no going back at this point, so it was either nut up or shut up. With one last bracing breath, I left the protective covering of the forest and scurried to the nearest building in sight, another one of those interchangeable Disney shacks.

I amused myself for a second by envisioning setting fire to one of those colossally unsafe thatch roofs. What, were the little pukes too good to use stone or concrete? Or maybe they haven’t even discovered them yet? The mud village’s layout certainly attested to that fact.

I skulked deeper into the town, sticking to the edges of the buildings and keeping an eye out for any stores which I could loot. The sky was cloudless tonight, and the full moon provided more than enough light for me to see a good distance away.

I was passing through what seemed to be a sofa place, with large windows to display the merchandise. My attention had been caught by the reflection imprinted on the window. There were no mirrors in the castle ruins, so I never had a chance to see what I looked like after Ari gave that semi-makeover.

The person looking back at me was strange, yet familiar at the same time. The most jarring change was my clothing, if it could be called that. My hoodie, jeans, shoes, socks and plain black undershirt had been replaced by a toga-like robe; navy blue in color and lined throughout with spacious pockets which were sewn in. Ari insisted on it, but I drew the line at removing my underwear.

She had found a pair of dusty old saddlebags, light red in color and with stylish patterns running throughout, which I had slung over my shoulder in a kind of sash. That, combined with the toga-thing, and the bulky protrusions where I had packed items that might have come in handy had served to give me an utterly ridiculous appearance.

Then there was my hair. There had been a clear, clean spring running throughout what had once been the baths in the castle. I used it to clean myself up after Ari had done my hair, which she did a passable job of styling into a pixie cut. My eyes, my best feature, I’d like to think, were once a clear, light, steely gray. Now they were bloodshot, dulled, and marred by the clearly visible bags under them. God, I looked like shit. I shook my head and backed away.

<It’s strange, isn’t it?>

“What do you mean?”

<Doesn’t the town seem a little empty to you?>

“That’s what I was thinking. I kinda expected the place to be crawling with guards and all, but there’s nothing, and I don’t like it.”

<A trap, you think?>

“Who knows.”

<I would like to remind you humans are merely animals as far as ponies are concerned. Personally, I can’t see them raising a full state of alert for one single erratic event.>

So it was the little puke’s dismissal attitude towards humans that made this all the easier? Lovely, just perfect. Ah, well, their ignorance is my gain and it did make sense somewhat. A stray dog bites a random person in a random neighborhood-- I can’t see everyone raising too much fuss about that.

<You know, it almost feels like back home in this place.>

“What do you mean?”

<This. Everything. A thousand years have passed and yet, the architectural design of this place is not unlike that of countless little towns and settlements from my time.>

“I don’t see what’s unusual about that. Probably this place got built not long after you and no one’s bothered to tear it all down.”

<“For a thousand years? I find that very unlikely. Castles, citadels and fortresses can linger for a very long time, but small settlements like this? No, I wouldn’t put it at more than a few hundred years old.>

“Well good for you. You can get a semblance of home, at least.”

<Hmm… true.>

Was something bothering her? I couldn’t bring myself to ask. My stomach continuously gnawed at me and the hunger pangs were really starting to be a distraction. I needed sustenance and I needed it now.

The minutes passed, and a steadily growing feeling of impatience and desperation began to well up inside of me. Those little bastards! Would it kill them to differentiate the buildings?! Literally all of the Disney shacks looked to be the same, with little variety in design. It was hard to tell which were houses and which were potential marks.

But a stroke of good luck came. I came across a building that literally froze me in my tracks. Shaped like candy and pastry, a cloyingly sweet design. I suppressed a growing urge to set the damned thing on fire and moved closer, peeking into the windows. A restaurant of some sort. Pastries. Food. Yes!

I looked over my shoulder, just to be safe there really was no one tailing me and gingerly made my way up the steps and in front of the door. I reached into a pocket of my robe and retrieved what may have once been a butter knife, albeit slightly rusted, hoping I could wedge it past the doorknob to allow me access. I readied my sloppy lockpick and gripped the doorknob tightly, turning it as far as it could go and… the door opened.

What the?...

“There’s no lock on this thing,” I mumbled dumbly and blinked in quick succession.

<Maybe they forgot to lock it?> Ari offered.

“Maybe…” How fortunate. Looks like the universe has decided to throw me a bone for once. I slowly opened the door, praying it did not creak or something. Lucky again. Taking one last look behind I entered, shut it closed behind me and surveyed the eatery. Too dark.

I reached into one of the toga pockets and retrieved a number of mushrooms that bathed the immediate area in a soft blue glow. Arcana had me go down to the lower levels of the castle to pick them. I’d been very reluctant, and very rightly so, not knowing if they were poisonous or full of radiation. Ari had spent a good while giving me exasperated reassurances that they were safe to handle.

The place was nice and empty. My attention, however, was almost immediately commanded by a number of baked goods in display, just behind the counter.

Cakes, cupcakes, muffins, pies, tarts, scones, cookies, bear claws, strudel, donuts, lemon squares; all of them within easy reach. I swiped a lemon square from its resting place and brought it close for inspection. It smelled fresh and lemony. I took a measured bite and almost immediately had to suppress a moan of delight and my taste buds were assaulted by the sweet, tangy flavor.

I proceeded to stuff my face by whatever I could reach, paying little attention to what it was I ate, only caring for the fact it was all delicious. Flaky pastries, scrumptious jams, jellies and fillings served to leave my face sticky and smelling of sweets. An idea suddenly popped into my head. If this was a pastry shop, there was bound to be milk somewhere.

Moving to the back, the kitchen of this place, I ransacked through drawers and cabinets until I came across an… icebox? What is this, 1931? I looked inside and sure enough, it was filled with milk bottles, made of glass and sealed with a cork. I greedily guzzled down three of the suckers and stuffed two more in my bag for later consumption.

Ow, damn it. I winced and rubbed at my stomach. Ohh, man. I think I ate too much, too fast. Okay, that’s enough. I lingered around for too long anyway. Moving back to the front of the store, I stuffed one of the saddlebags with assorted pastries, dry ones, so as to not get anything smeared and got out the place.

Now with a full belly, I exited the cloying building in much higher spirits. I was still wary, though, and skulked carefully through town, keeping an eye out for any more places I could loot. A fruitless search as literally every other building looked indistinguishable from one another. Well, that wasn’t exactly true. There had been a library… stuffed inside a tree, if you can believe it and a gaudy, frilly clothing store of sorts that literally hurt my eyes upon gazing at it.

Either way, I knew I had to head back soon. I’d lingered around for too long and had pushed my luck a little more than I was comfortable with. The universe, however, seemed to decide to throw me another bone. I was making my way back to the forest in frustration when I caught sight of a large, one-story building near the center of town with the sign ‘Barnyard Bargains’ splayed in front.

I went to the back and broke in, a rather ambiguous term, as the door didn’t have any kind of security system whatsoever. I mean, what the hell? Either these ponies are way too trusting, naive or incompetent. Maybe a mixture of the three and my opinion of them, already poor enough, was lowering by the second.

Whatever. Their loss is my gain. As soon as I stepped from the back and into the store itself, I realized I’d hit the jackpot. Fruits, vegetables, snacks, furniture, mattresses, bedding, clothing, toys, kitchenware and other miscellaneous things; this place had it all, kind of like a Wal-Mart of the pony world.

They even had a pet aisle, with a whole big section dedicated to humans. How to Care for Your Human, Human Training Made Easy, Your Human and You, Housebreaking Your Human and other human-related books were on display, as well as chew toys, kibble, collars, leashes, bedding, food and water bowls and even clothes! My loathing for the little pukes increased tenfold and it was through a truly herculean effort that I managed to keep myself from blowing up and laying waste to the whole store.

I pushed the matter out my mind and got to work. A few socks, a shirt my size, soap, shampoo, and a razor which my legs were about a day's away from needing. No feminine hygiene products. Damn it! I went through the whole store and got some things that would make the following days easier to bear. Food, a towel, toilet paper and a couple of knives, one big, one small for utility purposes.

I had a powerful urge to desecrate the store in some way, but rather, I made sure there was no trace of my presence. Whatever I stole, I rearranged to make it look there had been no thefts and ensured nothing was out of place. I don't know what the days ahead had in store, but the possibility existed that I may need to come back here to resupply, and it wouldn't bode well for me if the little pukes got wise and decided to employ security measures.

“H-halt!”

What in the…?!

The voice rang loud and clear, almost making me soil myself and there, behind me, was another of the little pukes, the chill on my spine becoming all the more pronounced as I registered his golden armor.

All in all, Flash Sentry was content with his lot in life. Even from a young age, his dream was to join the Royal Guard. A noble profession, to protect the princesses and the land he called home filled his young mind with romantic tales of adventure, camaraderie, and heroism. The Royal Guard was Equestria’s first and best line of defense and for more than a thousand years had kept their homeland safe from foreign and domestic threats.

When the rogue Griffon Confederation split from their native land and embarked on a campaign to claim Equestria for their own, it was the Royal Guard, commanded by the fabled General Epona who drove the invaders back from the heartland of Equestria and culminated with their ultimate surrender on the rubbled streets of Stalliongrad. When the would-be dark lord Midnight Thorn rebelled against Celestia and sought to kill her and take the throne for himself it was the Royal Guard who stopped him at the gates of Canterlot. When the yak chieftain and his subordinates initiated raids on the Crystal Empire and the northern Equestrian towns it was the Royal Guard who drove the miscreants back to their snow-ridden lands.

Of course, Flash Sentry found out that reality is not the same as fantasy. Boot camp was its own special brand of Tartarus and many a recruit who couldn’t cut it was weeded out. Not Flash Sentry, though. he was determined to join the ranks of the Guard and fulfill his duty as one of Equestria’s citizens. It was his proudest accomplishment to date that, after many days and nights of grueling training that he was accepted as a cadet and placed under the then Lieutenant Shining Armor. After that, there was nowhere to go but up and in that he had succeeded.

Sure, the past years had been relatively peaceful and most of his time was spent patrolling, guarding important places and ponies or escorting said ponies. It could be incredibly dull at times, but it wasn’t all bad. Most of his exciting assignments took place outside Equestria, such as the time he and two squadrons of the Guard were deployed to investigate the growing pirate activity at the edge of the homeland’s borders, or when the duke and duchess of Maretonia had required a little outside help in stopping the growing minotaur incursions into their territory, or when the Saddle Arabians, after a bloody civil revolt, needed additional ponypower in keeping order in their citadel.

His current situation fell into the more mundane category that he’d become accustomed to. There’d been an altercation sometime in the day that left a lot of ponies hurt, but if anypony knew anything about it, he did not know. He heard tell in passing from one of his comrades that princess Twilight wanted to keep the situation in a need to know basis. Flash himself had been asleep when it happened, as his was the night shift but at least he got to take part in apprehending those criminals in the illegal fighting ring. It sure got his blood pumping and now that the ordeal was more or less over, he welcomed the tranquil stillness of the night.

It was one of the perks of being the night shift. Luna’s canvas in the sky was truly a sight to behold, quite a difference from Celestia’s attempts. Not that he had anything against the sun princess, but her nights were little more than a black sky and, in comparison to now, fading stars.

Deciding to take a break from his usual route, Flash Sentry changed course and instead of patrolling the perimeter of Ponyville, he opted to cut his shift short. The rest of the guards on break would be getting about playing their customary card games about now, and though Flash knew that doing so was technically a shirking of his duties, he didn't see the harm in it. Nothing of importance ever happened in Ponyville. Or at least, nothing that merited the attention of the Royal Guard. The town was as sleepy and peaceful as they come.

With that in mind he changed course, no longer patrolling the town’s perimeter and instead cut through to make a beeline for the guard barracks built on the eastern side of Ponyville. There was naught a sound in the air save for the soft chirping of crickets, periodic gusts of wind and the soft creaking of wooden signs that hung in front of the establishments in town. Yes, just another uneventful night.

His stroll led him past a few back streets, and among these was Filthy Rich’s second favorite pride and joy, Barnyard Bargains. Flash would not have paid the superstore much mind, but he caught something at the corner of his eye that caused him to do a double take. The back door to the store was left open. Shrugging, Flash headed over. Probably somepony forgot to close it, and he was about to rectify the problem when, as his hoof made contact with the door, he swore he could hear noise inside.

His eyebrow quirked and his curiosity led him to poke his head inside. The back of the store was filled with crates, pallets and boxes that housed Barnyard Bargains’ diverse assortment of products, but even in the dim lighting he could see the area was empty. His ears strained to pick up the slightest of sounds and sure enough, he was able to make out a muffled voice.

What could it be, he wondered. was it possible it was one of the employees working a late shift? Filthy Rich himself? Or possibly… could it be a thief? Flash didn’t want to jump to conclusions, yet his training as a Royal Guard and upholder of peace and law gnawed at him to do his duty and, if there was indeed a cat burglar, to apprehend said thief and bring him to justice.

He treaded carefully, being mindful not to make too much noise. That was easier said than done, what with the fact he was still clad in his Royal armor, horseshoes included. Luckily for Flash, pegasi were notoriously light hoofed and he managed to keep mostly silent as he headed deeper into the store.

Flash followed the source of the sound across the darkened aisles of the superstore and after turning a corner at the outdoors section did he spot the source of the noise. A human. Female. Young, if her stature was any indication, wearing an oddly lumpy garment that covered most of her and in the process of stuffing a variety of products within its confines.

A thieving human? How… random. An odd sight, if nothing else, made all the stranger for the fact the small human was also muttering under her breath. Flash had to rub his eyes more than once to make sure they were working alright. Yes. Yes, it turned out he really was looking at a talking, thieving human female.

His instincts as an upholder of the law then took over, and Flash foolishly stepped forward and made his presence known to the startled girl, who upon laying eyes on him, lunged forward, much too fast for Flash to be able to get out of the way, and the last thing he felt before everything went dark was the sensation of two hands gripping his neck, then tremendous pressure, pain, a sickening crunch and everything went dark.

"This is not what I signed up for," I hissed as I forced my way through the dense vegetation of the forest, the dead pony's body swung over my shoulder.

<Yes, well, maybe in the future you should think before you act. It's a good rule to live by.>

"You think this is funny?!" My voice was in near hysterics at this point. I had just killed the equivalent of a pony cop and there was no way his death would not go unnoticed. Just… fuck!

<No, I think it is wasteful. I could have used that body, you know.>

"Could you try being a little constructive and help me get rid of it? What am I supposed to do now?"

If she could have, I bet she would've sighed. <The guard's absence will be noted. Maybe in a few hours, maybe in a few days. What you need to do is get rid of the body.>

"Gee, thanks, I hadn't thought of that," I shrilled, my voice so high I could barely hear myself.

<If you would let me finish,> she said, a little more testily. <I was going to suggest you bury him. Or better yet, get rid of the body in a way that doesn’t look like murder.>

“What do you mean?”

<Keep up, will you? He is a guard. His absence will be missed and if murder is suspect then security and alertness in Ponyville will be that much heightened. Let the predators have his way with him and it will look like a tragic accident. If you bury him… well, nopony will really know what happened.>

I recoiled. Granted, I had no love for the little pukes, but I really didn’t know what to do. Damn it, I panicked as soon as I saw him. I saw a threat and given everything I’d seen since coming to this accursed place I chose to act first and ask questions later. “All right, fine. I’ll bury him somewhere.”

An oldie but a goodie in gangster films and there were quite a number of options to choose from. Dump the body in a swampland; into a lake, weighed down by stones. There’s the age old grave digging or simply stuffing his corpse in a freezer or an appropriately sized piece of furniture. I didn’t plan on being here too long, I didn’t really have to strain for a long-time solution to the problem.

In the end, I chose to literally put him under a rock. Like, a big rock. A bit bigger than a minivan. That puppy must have had some serious tonnage behind it. Didn’t stop me from lifting its end just enough to send the pony’s body under it, not unlike sweeping dust under the carpet, and let go of the rock, allowing gravity to even things out. The wet, squelchy crunch it made upon crushing the little puke was gross, though.

I have to admit, it surprised me how little remorse I felt. Hell, I actually tried to feel bad about it, but despite my efforts(however halfhearted they were) all I could really feel was a slight numbness and a sense of detachment. I mean, I wish death on people(those that really piss you off) about as much as any other person, but to be honest, I would probably freak the fuck out if I actually did eighty-six someone.

These little mutants, though… imagining them as animals, less than human certainly helped me keep my shit together. And, well, technically they weren’t human. I’d never seen them before, and I was still trying to wrap my head around the whole ‘nother world schtick so it was a little unclear how much remorse I should have felt. Can't help but wonder what a sane, rational person's mental progress would be in a situation like this. There are all these people that say they would do this or that if they found themselves in an alien world, but talk is talk. Actually having it happen to you... well, your priorities tend to change real quick.

You kill a bug, no one cares. You kill a deer and the bleeding heart, hemp-smoking hippies will curse your name but no one will really pay attention. Intentionally killing a dog, especially if it’s cute, will almost certainly earn you a case of loathing and contempt by most everyone in the nation but it doesn’t always mean jail time, and if you kill a human being, that’ll stay with you for life. So where exactly do these ponies fit in?

Kinda makes you wonder about alien movies, if the buggers have an easy time eradicating humanity for no other reason they’re another species. A-and from my perspective, that’s what these ponies are. Aliens. Filthy little hybrid freaks who keep dumb humans as pets and make sport of fighting them. Granted, that looked to be about as sanctioned as dog fights from back home but realistically speaking, I can’t be expected to hold the little mutants’ lives in as high a regard as I do for people, especially when I have never seen or heard of them before.

Goddamn it, I am extraordinarily unqualified for this shit. What is someone supposed to do in a situation like this?

Perhaps it was better to save these kind of questions for another time. Everything had been happening so fast that I really hadn’t had time to slow down and fully realize how terrified I should have been, and at the moment I was too fucking tired to give it much thought.

Much as I wanted to curl up and sleep for maybe a day or two, there was a more pressing matter to attend to. Namely, the fact that I stunk to high hell. It had been at least two days since I was able to clean myself. That, plus the fact I’d been covered in blood from the puke at the warehouse and the chicken hybrid, spending most of my time in this humid forest, pulling moisture from me and causing me to sweat pretty much the entire time had done me no favors. I reeked.

Luckily, despite the passage of time, the lower baths of the castle were in relatively good condition. I couldn’t help but notice that, even as we descended down the windowless passages of the castle, I was still able to see.

From what my guide told me, the whole entire castle had been enchanted by a particularly cheap monarch who wanted to save money by foregoing the use of torches and candles, which apparently ran to thousands of bits(pony currency) a year. He commissioned a bunch of unicorn scholars or… researchers. Whatever they called themselves back in those days. Anyway, they were successful and devised a way to enchant the walls, floors and ceilings of the castle so that they would take any available light, be it from the sun or moon, and reflect it to any adjacent surface, which would then reflect it to the next surface and so on and so on until the whole damn castle would be lighted by nothing but the natural light of the moon and sun.

Even so, it was still night and moonlight was not nearly as potent as the sun, rendering the available lighting to be somewhat dim and muted. It was still enough to see, though, and that was enough.

The baths were not particularly remarkable. The room itself was made of stone and very spacious. There was an indentation in the wall from where a natural spring flowed and was fed into a massive trench the size of a swimming pool that had been dug into the ground, layered with bricks of stone that had been smoothed down to remove any craggy peaks or other imperfections that would have made it uncomfortable to touch. At the opposite end of the bath a couple of small trenches removed any excess water which disappeared into yet another indentation drilled into the rock wall.

From the look of things it appeared to be a communal bath, where several ponies would cram themselves and bathe all at the same time and in each other’s presence. Disgusting.

Well, whatever. A thousand years should be more than enough time for any residual pony filth to have been washed away. Of course, I had to talk Ari into giving me some privacy. What followed was a particularly awkward and excruciating talk regarding the whole nudity, I managed to shoo her away. I don’t think she fully understood the whole nudity concept and I was in no mood to offer a detailed explanation.

Now alone, I got rid of the toga thing and slipped into the water. It was cold, but I didn’t mind much. I rubbed and scrubbed at myself with vigor, humming in contentment as the icky sweat, grime and stink clinging to me was washed away and by the end of it, I came out clean and refreshed, feeling like a new girl.

I can barely remember what happened next. It had been an eventful day to say the least and I was about to drop from exhaustion. I practically crawled my way back upstairs and collapsed on the first comfortable-looking thing I’d found, which appeared to be a pony sofa of some kind, falling asleep almost immediately.

No nightmares, thankfully. The night was more or less uneventful and I woke up feeling refreshed. Not much of importance happened after that. I washed up, ate breaky, and got caught up with the events of the day.

I’d taken the liberty to steal a newspaper(aptly named Equestria Daily) last night to get a sense for how this bizarro pony world operated. Surprisingly, and somewhat disappointingly, it was basically a carbon copy of Earth, but with much less bullshit politics. Besides the whole princess system, almost all other aspects of life you could have found back home. Oh, yeah, and unlike my mercifully normal planet, natural disasters here were practically unheard of. The little winged pests had the godlike ability to fully manipulate the weather with their filthy little hooves so droughts, floods, heatstroke, mudslides, hurricanes and other natural disasters that killed my kin in droves were about as rare as an honest used car salesman. Weathermen has nothing on the ponies, as they could actually schedule just how hot or cold it would be weeks in advance.

There was something about foreign relations with a place called Maretonia and Prance and I swear I saw the word Minotaur thrown in there once or twice.

I especially made it a point to look for any indication of how advanced the technology level was. Needless to say, the results were depressing to say the least. No cars. Anywhere. There were rickshaw looking things that the little draft beasts would strap themselves into and pull around. My excitement upped somewhat when I found a page detailing the rail lines that ran across the country. Locomotives... it's better than nothing and there was also a section with a number of little slips that you could cut out, send them in the mail with money and in about one to two weeks receive tickets to travel inside a blimp. Why in the world anyone would want to get into those death traps, much less pay to do so was beyond me. With the looks of things, the technology level seemed to be late 19th century so maybe there hasn't been a Hindenburg accident yet. Heh, won't they be surprised when they all go up in flames.

So no TVs, no video games, no handhelds, not even freaking AC or telephones in the least. Yep, this is gonna suck.

Well, it could have been worse. I could have been stuck in a time period without toilet paper or soap... or razors.

And I had to admit, those little mutants could make some tasty food, to say nothing of the produce. I'd lifted a few peaches and they... were... amazing. The earth stuff tasted like a cheap knockoff in comparison. Wonder what their secret was...

So yeah, a mix of good and bad. I like to think I'm adaptable, so hopefully my stay here will be minimally miserable.

In any case, I eventually got done with that and it was in that instance that I wondered what my long term plan would be. I would have asked Ari about it, but he was absent at the moment. Turns out, she could actually pull off a Tom Riddle and manifest her consciousness in a temporary physical form. Of course, this didn’t just happen willy nilly. To do that, she needed power in the form of magic juice, so I lent her some since apparently I had more than enough to spare. All I had to do was touch her trinket and by means of conduction, my magic would be absorbed in her weird little amulet.

Well, it worked. She made a temporary apparition that looked vaguely solid and was able to use a little bit of the leftover magic as well. Nothing flashy, just levitation. Moving stuff around. Must have been freeing or something… I can’t even imagine, for as soon as she realized she had a body, she was so overjoyed she proceeded to nuzzle me-- which was weird as fuck-- and proceeded to scamper off to another section of the ruins, saying she wanted to ‘check up on a few things’.

This alone time inevitably led to contemplation, and I quickly found out I did not like contemplation one bit. Depression and a sense of fatalism tend to worm their way in my mind in times of contemplation. Turns out, being yanked away from your world and everyone you knew tends to make you start to miss stuff. Who’d a thunk it, right? Well, riveting as it was to feel sorry for myself, it was probably for the best to take my mind off it and do something more constructive. Something like, say… this whole me having magic thing.

Apparently, this heathen horseland ran on the stuff and given what I’d seen and done the past couple of day, it was as good an explanation as anything. From what I gathered, the unicorns were the most magically adept of the little pukes, the winged pests specialized more in weather control and the normal ones were good at being serfs and laborers.

Point was, I too had magic mojo running through my veins. It was… actually sorta cool, to tell the truth. Yeah, back when I was little I sometimes ran around with a wire whisk and pretend battled fairies and gnomes, crushing them under my superior power, setting them ablaze, turning them inside out, and letting loose legions of conjured, giant-ass Japanese hornets. And if these mutated little freaks insisted on giving me trouble-- which let’s be honest, they probably will-- then I should strive to also find ways to crush them beneath me. I mean, call me crazy, but I don’t get the feeling the little pukes will be content to leave me alone should they find out what I am.

Ari said she would give me a basic rundown on how the whole magic thing worked, but given I had nothing to do at the moment, I might as well take a stab at it. She had given my body a more thorough inspection not long after breakfast and concluded that no, my spankin’ new magic core was not harmful… from what she could tell, at least. However, it did have a sort of drawback.

A pony’s magical core self replicates magic at a steady rate, and this magic is safely contained within a pony body. Apparently, the little pukes were born with an in built, natural ‘field’ just beneath their skin that contained their eldritch magic and prevented it from simply dissipating outwards and into their surroundings, which kind of made sense since magic, according to Ari, was a specific type of energy.

But unlike a pony, I possessed no such ‘field’ that kept my magic in, and so it was continuously radiating out of me, and why Ari said I positively ‘reek’of the stuff. It also made me hungry. While my own core was also self-sustaining, it also did not know what to make of my body, for in an optimal pony body, the magic would be contained until it was used. It was like trying to fill up a water bottle with a hole in the bottom.

For a unicorn, its core would stop or greatly decrease the rate at which it produced magic when the magic itself was not in use, only starting the process when the magic level got below a certain point. Of course, if a unicorn continually kept on using magic, its core would work all the harder to make up for it and would continuously keep on pumping the stuff. Still, even in this pastel pony horseland, there were still some rules and magic was not exempt.

The more a pony’s core works, the more strained it becomes and eventually, it has to derive its energy from the body of its host.

That was pretty much what was happening to me. Since my magic kept on radiating outwards, my core worked overtime to try and keep up and now it was literally feeding off of me in order to keep it up, and the worst part was I couldn’t stop it. Best I could do is eat every other time as my metabolism had been kicked into overdrive literally overnight.

I couldn't help but wonder if this meant that the more I used up this magic, the sooner I'd need to eat to keep my strength up. Well, I packed away more Than enough food, so I should be okay.

Oh, and the reason weird shit kept happening around me was because, since there was nothing to keep my magic mojo inside me, it would explode outwards in a wave of undirected, uncontrolled energy, and since it pretty much did what it wanted, it did some pretty weird shit.

Random stones and bricks became cheese, water turned into pink lemonade(which to be honest, was pretty damned awesome), spiders either grew six times their size(horrifying) or would stand up on four legs and do a tap dance. Books would pretend they were birds and fly away, paintings came alive and its inhabitants, a la Harry Potter, would move around or pose heroically, and a small clock took on a life of its own as well, a near perfect copy of that Cogsworth from beauty and the beast. It's life was short lived though, as it freaked me out so much I immediately stomped it into a mess of splinters and mechanical parts. It did make good kindling for a fire though, so it wasn't a total loss.

But yeah, weird shit. Ari had no idea how to stop it… wasn't even sure it could be fixed, really, so all I could really do was let it loose whenever it built to such an extent. Thing about this chaos magic, it did some weird things unless you directed it otherwise. Still, it served to amuse me, and it was pretty funny to watch birds fly backwards or upside down. I… don't really know how it happened, but I inadvertently turned everything upside down. Or at least, I think it was. I dunno. Everything was still on the floor, yet the floor was the ceiling. It was hella weird.

Still, my attempts, for all they were worth, did not accomplish much of anything. That greasy asshole who accosted me… he was responsible for all this, and he didn't even have the decency to at least give an instruction manual or something to sort all this out. Not that it mattered. Ari would be giving me some instructions on magic use later on and someday, when I can get a good handle on it, I will seek answers to find out exactly what's going on here, even if I have to beat them out of someone.

Into Enemy Territory [Updated]

Author's Notes:

A bit of a slow chapter today, mostly setting things up. But don't fret, there will be considerably more action and villainous deeds in the upcoming installments.

Goddamn Starswirl the Bearded! Would it kill him to give his books a little spice? Just because he was for sort of genius does not mean he can just bore any aspiring magicians to tears. I closed shot the book, titled The Theory of Magic, Volume I and brought both hands to rub my face and hopefully give all the words a chance to sink in. Theory, theory, theory. The past several days had been full of it, and damn if it wasn’t a bore. I mean, yeah, I could see why it was necessary, but wasn’t there a way to make it not suck?

“Uhh, my brain feels like mush,” I moaned.

No response.

I cracked an eye and spotted Ari-- well, her temporary form-- lazing leisurely atop a massive, velvet-looking, violet cushion, her face dug deep into its fluffy middle.

“Are you listening?” I asked in mild annoyance.

“Hm?” She lifted her gray-furred mug, still content and looked at me. “Did you say something?”

I set down the book atop the increasingly growing pile around me. “How long do I need to keep this up?”

“Until you learn the basic components needed to cast a spell.”

My eye twitched. Was she shitting me? Probably not. “Magic, visualization, intent. Magic, visualization, intent. Magic, visualization and fucking intent. It’s been nothing but that for a week straight. When do I get to the good stuff?”

“You do realize what happened the last time you tried your hand at the ‘good stuff’,” she said flatly.

Ouch. Okay, that was fair, but still. “Yes, I know what happened. I’m still itchy in some spots…” I muttered. “But I’m not gonna get any better without getting some first hand experience.” And she still did not look convinced. “Besides, you’ve seen what I did to those manticores. That was magic. That was all me, and I did not lose control.”

She considered this for a moment. “I… guess that’s true,” she said reluctantly. “Alright, you can try to conjure fire again.”

Hmph. Honestly, I didn’t screw up that bad, even if I did blow up one of the remaining towers of the castle. Not one of my best moments, I’ll admit, but this magic business was trickier than I anticipated. Still, I was getting better and more knowledgeable by the day. I could do this, damn it!

The room we were in was a study of some sort, filled with little midget tables and chairs, quite a few bookcases, dusty rugs(which I’d hung out one of the many windows and beat with a stick, for the thousand years’ worth of accumulated dust made me sneeze), expensive-looking chandeliers and miscellaneous paintings. I rose from my table which, even in my rather short stature was still a little awkward settling in, and sat down on a spot in the middle of the room, bereft of any flammable material. Ari obviously was still not sold I would not screw up, for she overturned a table and hid behind it, just in case.

I rolled my eyes and instead focused on my second attempt at conjuration. I settled myself, legs crossed, took a deep breath and brought both hands inches from my face, facing another in a grasping motion. I concentrated, staring at the empty space between my hands. I brought them up, closer, and tried to get a feel for things. To remember all that theoretical knowledge I’d absorbed over the past few days and put it into practice. The chaos magic was there, and I could feel it coursing through my body. Good. And just like that, a tiny ball of fire, no bigger than a marble, materialized in the space between my hands. Yes!

Slowly, steadily, I brought my hands down, never taking my eyes of the little sucker as it stayed in place, its surface pulsing and rippling gently. “Finally. Now I’m getting somewhere.”

“Good, but try not to blow it this time,” Ari called out from behind her hiding place.

“It wasn’t that bad,” I murmured.

“It was. You literally blew it… in your face.”

I grunted at the memory. It wasn’t bad enough that I had to learn witchy pony stuff from scratch, or that I had to absorb a whole entire field of concepts and theories I never would have imagined before, no, what really made me want tear out my hair in frustration more than once was how… hard this was.

It had been… interesting, learning to do spells. I was only limited to very basic stuff, though. Despite the fact I did indeed have a pool of magic to draw from, I did not have the knowledge on how to use it, and a large portion of my time had been spent trying to get a feel for it, as there was not much else to do.

Ari had been very helpful on that. All her time as a voyeur had allowed her to witness countless foals getting magic lessons, and most of them had proved to be transferrable to a human. It really helped speed things up.

Intent and visualization. Those were the cornerstone of every spell one would need to cast, and by themselves, were not hard concepts to grasp. Magic was-- at its most basic-- energy, plain and simple. A type of energy that could be molded into a desired effect.

If I wanted to, say, fire off magic bolts like I’d seen the unicorns do-- that was fairly straightforward. What was not as straightforward was figuring out a way to contain and compress that energy into a single beam. It could be compared to firing off an RPG.

The projectile delivers an explosive payload and the contents themselves are explosive, but what prevents those contents from exploding right in the face of the person who fires? A shell that envelops the explosives, delivering destruction while keeping the… firer(?) safe.

Without this ‘shell’ enveloping my so-called spells, the energy would simply dissipate in all directions like, say, if I wanted to make a fireball in which I accidentally poured too much magic juice into.

Without that ‘shell’ safely containing the spell, the user would be enveloped in a gigantic, whopping explosion that, besides tearing off all her clothes, would leave a normal human charred to a crisp. Luckily, said user was no longer an average human and merely got away with something akin to a bad, all-over sunburn and singed hair.

…

So… yeah. Progress.

I winced. “Don’t remind me.” It was not a pleasant memory. I shook it off and instead focused on the little ball of fire. It held in place and kept its form… mostly. Still, progress.

Yet another hassle was just how much raw chaos magic I had. Obviously, a larger pool of magic to draw from meant I could outclass the little pukes in terms of power and casting duration, which was a big plus in my book. Even so, I was still trying to get the hang of this magic stuff and moderating the amount of power I fuelled in my limited spellcasting was tricky.

My embarrassing blunder with that fire spell attested to that. Too little power meant that my attempted spell would fail; too much and it would grow beyond my control, possibly backfiring. It was really annoying.

I looked across the room where a cauldron stood, sitting on a bed of tinder and crackling flames. “How long until that’s ready?”

“Sometime before the eve, but be mindful to stir every now and then. You don’t want any residue to throw off the effects.”

“Yeah, yeah.” I pulled at the magic fueling the little fire ball, watching it dissipate into thin air and got to my feet, looking over the concoction, which had taken on a pleasantly orange color. Kind of like Sunny-D. “Now, where did I leave that spoon?” I mumbled and looked around, spotting it at a nearby table.

Okay, let’s try this again. I reached out with my arm, making a pulling motion. The spoon didn’t so much as float, but rather rocketed towards me, smacking me in the face and clattering to the ground. Oh, well, it wasn’t perfect by any means but hey, baby steps.

“You’re getting better.”

“Not fast enough,” I grumbled. “The sooner I get ahold of this magic business the sooner I can get to look for a way out of here.”

“Oh, come on,” she sighed in exasperation. “It can’t be that bad staying here, can it? From what I understand, your world does not have magic. It sounds pretty boring to tell the truth.”

Yeah, I filled her in on my whole situation. She bought it pretty quick, to tell the truth.

“It’s not boring, just shitty. Well, parts of it.”

“Either way, it doesn’t seem to me you’ll be going back anytime soon, so you might as well enjoy yourself. Live a little, you know.”

I scowled. “You want me to make friends with the ponies?”

“It’s not the worst thing that could happen. What do you have against them anyway? I’d like to remind you I am a pony as well. I’m not that bad, am I?”

“You’re weird,” I shot back.

“And you’re not?”

“Even if I wanted to, I don’t even know how to blend in with them.”

“You could try talking. That’s usually a good icebreaker.”

“And did you forget that they keep my kind as pets? Or what they do to them?” I continued on, pretending I didn’t hear.

“I kept a human or two, you know.”

Wait, what? I looked up at her, the spoon sliding from my hand and becoming lost amid the depths of the cauldron’s contents. “You… did?”

Ari nodded, and a small, wistful smile stretched across her fuzzy mug. “Back in the day, yes. I had this little female cub. I named her Sugarplum and we got along like cream on wheat. And I was a very good owner, I’ll have you know. Took her on walks, played with her, bathed her and shared my vegetables with her.”

“Well, whoop-dee-doo for you. What’s your point?”

“Point is, I’m a pony, I owned humans and you seem to have no problem with me. Now, why can’t you give other ponies a chance?”

“Maybe you’ve missed the part where I am an intelligent human from another universe,” I shot back. “Who even knows how they’ll react to me.”

“That’s what the potion is for,” she said and pointed to said brew. “Speaking of, it’s burning. Do something about that, won’t you?”

“Huh?” I whirled, the brew all but forgotten at this point and where before it was merely bubbling lazily, the concoction was now frothing, spilling over the sides and hissing loudly as it made contact with the fire.

“Shit!” Hurrying over, I heaved the cauldron with my bare hands, the rocket hot metal only barely scalding me, and placed it on the cool stone ground. I then turned to the fire. Last I looked it was almost embers and crackling peacefully, now a roaring blaze, with miniature explosions going off every few seconds, sending flares in various directions.

And just like that, an unseen force tugged a particularly thick piece of charred wood out, hurtling it to a barren spot on the room. It was immediately made clear this was the source of the ruckus, as upon its removal, the smoldering embers went back to normal, though the wood itself was still ablaze, with loud snaps coming off, immediately followed by a flare.

“What the hell was that?!” I demanded to no one in particular.

“Ah, yes. I forgot to mention this sort of thing might happen,” Ari said calmly. “Some timber wolves, or at least, parts of them if they are particularly old, absorb latent magic and organic components to keep their bodies resilient and to prevent rotting. But when they do this, their bodies can become extremely dense with organic matter, resulting in flare ups such as these.”

“Oh, shit, the potion!” I did not have the time or patience to brew a second batch, so I prayed to any and all deities I could think of that it was not completely ruined. “Oh, man, how does it look? Can we salvage it?” It looked to still be normal, but I couldn’t help but fret.

“I believe so,” Ari said, having approached and propped herself on two legs, scrutinizing the brew. It didn’t seem like the heat bothered her... “But quick, place it back on the fire or it will degrade beyond repair.”

That’s how the next couple of hours went, fussing over the damned concoction and me cursing my luck for being dragged into all this. For my sake and morale, I hoped that the next day would bring a shred of good news to ease my beyond frazzled nerves.

Thankfully, the potion worked, and come next day, I tried some of it. Do you have any idea what it’s like to not have a human body? It’s… fucking... weird. My body, for lack of a better word, twisted, contorted and melted until what was left was the lesser form of a pony, the pegasus variety. Walking was a bitch to try and get down. If I was to infiltrate their fetid little mud town then I needed to appear as convincing as possible. The first ten or so minutes were hard, but I managed to more or less get it down and was able to walk normally, though running and climbing stairs were not so easy.

Still, it was good practice, and with that in mind, I set out to enter Ponyville.

It… seemed to be going okay. I was just another nobody, minding my own business and the ponies around me made no effort to initiate contact and it suited me just fine. I carefully made my rounds through the mud village, body tense, heart pounding, eyes darting back and forth, hoping none of the little twerps would make me out.

The scenes playing out before me were cloying and gag inducing. Happy pastel ponies everywhere, tending to their mundane, everyday tasks and more than a few of them dragging along an unwitting human by leash.

I suppressed the bubbling indignity forming at the pit of my stomach and tried to ignore the… nakedness of both the humans and their disgusting little masters. Apparently, it was the norm for these backwards ponies to go without clothes, letting their… things out there for all to see, and though the whole point of this little venture was to blend in and go unnoticed, I was not about to reveal my everything to these lower life forms. Degrading myself by turning into one of them was already bad enough.

So it was here that I now stood, just another pegasus pony minding her own business. It was still a bit of an effort to walk on four legs, but I was getting better and better.

A unicorn would be more tolerable, but apparently, since I used pegasus hair, that’s what I became. The no magic thing would be a bit of a hassle, as I was still getting used to using hooves and the feel of an additional set of limbs was still kind of freaky.

I looked to the stubby appendages protruding from my back and ruffled them slightly. Could I fly like one of the little turds? Maybe, but I was not too fond of heights and I didn’t plan to use this lesser form any longer than I had to. God, I missed my normal human body.

Getting the potion ingredients had been a cinch. During my treks around the forest, I’d stumbled into yet another weird treehouse, where a zebra dwelt. A zebra… in a forest… in a land of magic ponies… ugh. Anyway, while she was out(how in the world had she not fallen prey to one of the forest’s superior predators and life forms, I do not know), I chanced a look at her African-themed house and saw a big-ass cauldron with a suspicious looking concoction stewing inside. I’d told Ari about it, and she suggested using this to brew a potion that would turn me into a pony. All I had to do was sneak in while that zebra was out and looted the place for anything I needed. Brewing the potion was another matter entirely.

Who knew that even something as basic as stirring clockwise or counterclockwise would affect the finished product, or that junipers picked at the height of the full moon would yield a more stable result?

Luckily for me, Ari was all too familiar with this potion, as she had seen leaders and would-be royals use this exact same recipe for their various schemes, some evil and benign. And it wasn’t like this potion was quick to brew, either.

It needed a full, solid week to achieve its potential and even then, there was a bunch of fussiness to contend with. The fire could not be too hot nor too cold and it was a bitch to find proper kindling as Ari was not too happy with me using the castle furniture or varying cloths to feed the thing.

And of course, not just any fuel source would do, no. It needed magical kindling because, why not? And about the only magical fuel source around that I could use were timber-- yes, that’s right-- timber wolves. A task not made any easier by the fact that the damned things could reform themselves when disassembled.

I’d deliberately allowed myself to be surrounded by the wooden plant things and they’d been more than a little surprised to find out that their teeth could not pierce through my skin. It was exhausting work, really.

A single, well-placed blow was enough to shatter one of the wolves, but they were also pack hunters and the rest of them did not think it prudent to stand idly by while I collected the remains of their ilk.

It went on like that for a while, me taking swings at whichever wolf got too close, while the previous one took advantage of the delay to reform itself. In the end, I was like, ‘fuck it’ and hoisted one of the bastards over my head and ran back towards the castle where, for some reason, the wolves would not follow and I had ample time to properly destroy the captured wolf and use it for fuel.

The last hurdle to cross was obtaining a piece of whatever I would want to turn into, namely, one of the little turds. The thought of putting something that contained a piece of them into my mouth was retch-inducing, but sacrifices had to be made.

I remember my first night here, after I escaped that blasted warehouse that there was a cottage of sorts right near the edge of the forest. Perhaps a pony home? I staked out the place, using the undergrowth of the forest to hide myself and eventually I spotted a pegasus who radiated such grace, purity and cloying innocence that I felt the need to avert my eyes, lest I gouge them out.

There she was, talking and feeding the birdies and puppies and kitties and all other manner of woodland creatures, singing at them, cooing at them-- such an idyllic, saccharine display that would leave Walt Disney himself seething in a jealous rage, followed immediately by him suffering massive, multiple strokes as the sugar clogged the shit out of his veins.

I drew her out of her pony house during the night. I’d snuck into one of the chicken coops and nabbed a chicken, being sure to make enough noise to wake her up. I lured her into the forest, where I’d tied up the chicken to a tree and broken one of its legs for good measure.

The racket it was making drew the little Disney abomination deeper in, quaking and with a look of fear on her fuzzy mug at the oppressing atmosphere of the darkened forest around her, yet despite her terror, she braved through it to help the bird. I had to give her some props for that.

No that it mattered, for I’d been lurking behind some trees, quietly sneaking behind her and when she got close enough, I pounced.

She screamed in terror, but didn’t see me over the darkness of the forest. I hoisted her from behind, a hand in her mouth and my other arm round her neck, placing her in a chokehold.

She squirmed and flailed, crying all the while like a bitch, but my grip was too strong and eventually she passed out… I think.

I’m pretty sure I didn’t kill her, but I didn’t stop to find out; there were other matters to attend to. After tearing out a chunk of her pink hair I went back for the chicken, snapping its neck and taking it with; it would fulfill a higher purpose by providing me with some much needed protein.

It had been a good idea in theory until I realized I had no idea how to properly butcher the damn thing, much less cook it over a fire. By the end of it, I’d made a complete mess and had more than a few dried chicken guts on my person, and with no spices or proper cookware the end result was a chicken that was bland and both over and undercooked in various parts.

It was no KFC by any means but it did sate my growing craving for flesh. Stupid vegetarian ponies...

Well, back to the matter at hand, or hoof as the ponies would say. I went in further, trying not to arouse suspicion and to not trip over myself. The peasants did not pay me much mind, and though there were some guards here and there, they mostly patrolled or stayed at their posts.

There were two main goals I would like to accomplish. To get a feel for the layout of the mud village and to see if there was a place I could gather intel on this hippie toon land. Oh, yeah, and also to see if I could get some unicorn hair. That way I could use magic and not seem out of place.

I’d made good progress so far. I’d managed to locate some guard barracks as well as learnt the name of the cloying pastry shop known as Sugarcube Corner. I’d made more than a few trips there during my stay at the castle, raiding as much food as I could.

However, the little bastards had been getting wise to my act. In yesterday’s nightly raid, I found a newly installed lock at the front door. Not that it detracted me, as picking it was was a cinch and just to spite the little bastards, I made a mess of the place and robbed the register of all its golden bits. Why I hadn’t done that before, I don’t know. Looking back on it, it was probably not my best idea. For all I know, the ponies would simply choose to employ better security measures.

I neared the center of town where, in my nightly raids, I’d noticed that a large section of the street had been empty, bereft of houses, trees, or anything of the sort, leaving nothing but a wide open space.

It was a different story now as it was clear the ponies had been using it to set up an open air market which was now filled with various stands and stalls and each of them filled with all sorts of healthy, delicious looking fruits and veggies.

It was a bustling place. Some ponies darting around in a hurry, some at a more sedate pace; haggling with shopkeepers, enjoying sweets and snacks and all of the repulsive little beasts naked and more than a few with a human in tow.

Now that I looked more closely(albeit reluctantly) I could tell that the humans-- some wearing clothes only above or below the waist and a few fully clothed-- sported a mark or branding of some sort in their clothing and on closer inspection, I could see it was identical to their… owner’s cutie mark. It didn’t take a genius to know it was a brand to identify which humans belonged to who.

I recognized the red-haired, cream coated little bitch from the first day who fainted at the mere sight of me, now manning a stall lined with flowers and bouquets. Another curly haired one selling mouthwatering candies that looked so scrumptious, I couldn’t help but bemoan the fact she had no proper store like Sugarcube Corner which I could loot.

“Hi!” A pink blob suddenly materialized in front of me, eyes wide and with a massive smile.

“Gahh!” What the shit?!

So surprised was I that I reared on my legs, falling heavily to the ground and just like that, my vision was once again assaulted by by a pink blob. No, not a blob-- a pink monstrosity, the star of every little girl’s dream.

She looked down at me, a wide toothy grin on her pony mug and not looking at all sorry for having startled me. “Oops. Sorry about that, friend.“

Bitch, I am not your friend! I seethed, glaring at the offensively pink pony and moved to get up.

“Here, let me give you a hoof,” she said helpfully. Her hoof touched me and I squealed in disgust, recoiling back from the dirty appendage.

“Don’t touch me! Get away from me!”

I glared daggers at the pink monstrosity, but it didn’t look like she took the hint. She merely stayed there, smiling that idiotic smile. What is she, brain addled or something? Can’t she see I want nothing to do with her? Much as I wanted to explode with a string of unpleasant remarks, I opted to do the next best thing and ignore her, roughly pushing past and get back to my task.

I heard a sort of… bouncy sound and once again, a field of pink entered my vision and to my dismay, there she was again, bouncing alongside me.

“Are you new here? You must be new here, because I know everypony in Ponyville but I’ve never seen you here before. What’s your name? Do you like parties? I like parties. They make ponies smile and making ponies smile is my special talent. Do you want to be friends? Ooh, I bet we could be best of friends and since you’re new here, you probably don’t have any friends, which is sad because everypony should have a friend--”

“You’re following me. Why are you following me?” I asked through gritted teeth.

The pink pest stopped bouncing and instead now trotted alongside me, though that idiotic grin had lost none of its potency. “I knew it,” she said triumphantly. “You’re not from around here, because everypony in Ponyville knows I’m Pinkie Pie.”

My mouth curled in disgust. “Pinkie Pie…” A nauseating name, though one appropriate for this pink abomination.

“That’s me,” she chirped. “And as Ponyville’s unofficial, yet still official member of the one party pony welcoming committee for new ponies, it is my pleasure to welcome you to Ponyville!”

Uhh. “What?” I literally had no idea what she just said.

The pink menace merely giggled at my confusion. “My job is to welcome new ponies to Ponyville and to become good friends with them.”

“You think it’s your job to become friends with everybody that passes through here,” I couldn't help but blurt out. That was by far one of the most asinine things I’ve ever heard. How is one supposed to keep track of so many friends… and who would be deranged enough to indiscriminately become friends with anybody off the street.

I looked to the pink menace with horror, but she was too busy blathering more nonsense I did not care to make out. And still, she kept on talking with that annoying voice and that creepy smile

My already limited tolerance for this pink monstrosity quickly evaporated, and I just barely managed to hold myself together and keep from tearing into her. “Do you know what funitis is?” I said abruptly.

She blinked idiotically at my interruption. “Funitis?”

“Yeah.”

She shook her head, the impossibly curly mane bouncing along. “Nope.”

Excellent. She looks like a gullible idiot, so I can probably bullshit my way out. “Well, I have it. It’s a disease that makes you sad and angry and not want to talk, smile or have fun.”

She gasped, her already freakishly huge eyeballs growing in size. “That’s horrible!”

I nodded grimly. “It is, and there’s no cure. You just have to wait it out. It’s also really contagious so you may not want to stand too close.”

Yeah, that got her good and riled, as she darted a distance away from me.

“You’re still too close. You need to go farther,” I said (un)helpfully.

She shifted on her hooves, a conflicted expression on her pony mug. “Ooh, I don’t know. Are you going to be okay? Don’t you want company? When I don’t feel so good I always like somepony to keep me company.”

I nodded. “I should be fine in about a week. Just don’t come anywhere near me and you should be fine… no, you know what? Don’t even talk to me. You can get funitis just by talking to someo… pony infected.”

“Well… okay, then.” Then all of a sudden she gasped, bringing both hooves to her mouth. “Ohmygosh! I just talked to you and I’m not supposed to talk!” She repeated the process. “Oh, no! I just did it again!”

She seemed to be on the verge of a continuous loop, so I intervened before it got that far. “Hey, get out of here already! You wanna get funitis too?”

The pink idiot squealed, keeping her mouth shut and shaking her head vigorously before disappearing in the blink of an eye.

I rolled my eyes at her idiocy. For my sake, I hoped the average pony would be smarter than her. Otherwise, how could they be of use? Not that it mattered, as what I’d seen so far in this mud village left me largely unimpressed. The town seemed to be populated only by the working class. Farmers and laborers. Peasants and serfs. I needed someone higher up the food chain.

I spotted an earth pony nearby. A mare, purple in color with purple mane and with grapes as her cutie mark. “You,” I said in a clear, firm voice.

The mare’s ears, which had been drooping, perked slightly “Huh? Whozzat?” She turned to face me and in that moment, I realized I should have picked a better target. For one, her coat and mane were a complete mess, tangled and in disarray and I swear there was something that looked like hay and twigs sticking out of her mane and tail. Her eyes were half-lidded and had a dazed, unfocused look to them and lastly in one of her hooves was… a bottle of wine?

Her face broke into a lopsided, goofy smile. “Heeey, gal. Havn’t sheen you ‘round these parts.” She trotted towards me in a clumsy, three-legged gait, almost planting face first into the ground more than once. “You’s called for me, gal?” she said in a drunken slur, taking a swig out of the bottle.

“Who’s in charge of this place?” I asked as clear a voice as I could.

She blinked. “Um, whazzat?”

“The boss. The big cheese. Who’s the most important pony in here?”

“Important… ponish,” she mumbled, letting out a burp. “Ahh, tha’was a good un. ‘S princess Twailaight Shparkle you wanna see--”

Finally, now I’m getting somewhere. “And where can I find this princess Twilight?” God, what a ridiculously girly name. Kind of makes you want to gag.

She did not look too pleased at being interrupted-- not that I cared-- but answered nonetheless. She pointed a bottled hoof somewhere behind me. “She’s in the treebrary thing, lives there. Waaay over ther’ but… hey, what givesh gal! That ain’t nice...” she squawked indignantly as I’d immediately turned and started to make my way there.

I was familiar with said library, having crossed it more than once during my nightly excursions. It was kind of hard to forget it, really. Still, I couldn’t help but wonder; Would this so-called princess live in a tree-hugging hippie’s wet dream of a treehouse? And in this fetid, backwards mud village at that? Aren’t princesses supposed important or something and live in opulent palaces?

It was a disconcerting thought, not only because it served to lower my opinion of ponies even further and into abysmal, but because of the implications behind it. If the little turds were content to confine one of the royal class into a tree house/library in some random, godforsaken village, it did not speak highly of their advancement, be it cultural or magical which was crucial in aiding my escape of this world.

The library came into view. Hmm, is this a home or public property? I was unclear on whether or not I should knock. After a moment of hesitation, I opened the door and went in. There were books everywhere, obviously and the place had a strangely pleasant smell of wood and parchment.

A quick once-over revealed no guards or security of any kind which, again, was baffling. This was the home of a princess? Okay, that does it. I have officially lost all respect for ponies as a species. A shuffling, scraping sound resonated and a… purple, midget lizard thing came into view, staring at me questioningly and was no doubt about to say something when I beat it to the punch.

“What in the hell are you?” I asked brusquely, more out of surprise than anything.

Its face scrunched up, obviously not liking my tone. “I’m a dragon and my name is Spike. What are you doing here?” It asked in a mildly accusing tone.

It’s name was Spike? Was it a pet of some kind? It’s voice was sorta androgynous, so I couldn’t tell whether it was a male or female, but I didn’t particularly care. And did it say it was a dragon? Aren’t dragons supposed to be like… awesome? Fierce? Intimidating? Hell, I’ve seen pictures of juvenile dragons that far surpass the pathetic excuse of a lizard standing in front of me. I almost felt sorry for it.

“This is a public library, isn’t it?”

“Well… yes, but--”

“Then by definition, I can come in whenevs during operating hours, right?”

“Technically, but--”

“And this library is currently open, right?”

“Yes, but--”

“Good, glad we straightened that out. I’m looking for a Twilight Sparkle. Does she live here?”

“She’s not here right now, and I would like it if--”

I did not care to listen to this pathetic being any more than I had to, so I turned my back on it, choosing instead to do something productive and get some reading done while I waited for this so-called princess to return. Ignoring the lizard’s protests, I browsed the shelves, trying to identify exactly what kind of filing system was in use.

For whatever reason, it was the Dewey decimal system, just like back home. Goddamn it. It's bizarre coincidences like this that make me wonder whether or not all my previous life was an elaborate, hyper-realistic dream or illusion or something of the sort.

I mean, what the hell? From what I’d seen so far, these ponies behaved eerily like people and all these freaky parallels to my previous life kept nagging at the back of my head. Well, whatever. I could feel the beginnings of a migraine coming on, so I cleared my head and got back to the task at hand.

There was an encyclopedia of sorts, with detailed and, dare I say, pretty drawings of the land I now stood on, which was apparently called Equestria. And there was Ponyville, right near the center of the map and further to the north the city of Canterlot, built on the side of a mountain(using pony magic, no doubt) and, if what one of the passages indicated was true, the capital city of Equestria where two additional alicorn princesses ruled.

No, scratch that. Four alicorn princesses. Apparently the last one rules some place in the far frozen north called the Crystal Empire. I wonder, did this mean crystal as in actual crystals or crystal meth? Given the freaky parallels with my world, it could go either way.

Was there a king or queen in addition to them? The book didn’t say. For all I knew they were dead and their spawn would play cutthroat politics in order to claim the throne or something.

The rest of the map was informative, though I had to do a double take and rub my eyes at the names of the cities displayed on the map. Fillydelphia, Hoofington, Trottingham, Baltimare, Manehattan and Vanhoover were just some of the names that kept on piling to the overstacked WTF file in my head.

Further south the forest and grasslands gave way to a desert with Wild-West-styled towns and even further below were the barren badlands where there were no pony settlements of any kind and to the southeast a myriad of bogs, marshes and wetlands called the Hayseed Swamps. Damn, they got all kinds of climates and ecosystems here.

Oh, and apparently there was also a city composed entirely of clouds called, appropriately enough, Cloudsdale. If what I was reading was right, it was a mobile city populated by pegasi, thought the odd griffon could be found(and now there’s griffons too? What’s next, minotaurs? Chupacabras? Wendigos?).

Still, I could only read for so long, and after I was done, I started to look around. The place seemed empty and the lizard was nowhere in sight. As discreetly as I could, I tore some choice pages from the book and placed it on one of the saddlebags in my back. I would need to study them further still. Given that the place was empty and bereft of any kind of security, I roamed around, inspecting the peasant surroundings where this Twilight dwelt.

Aside from the icebox, the kitchen looked to be fairly modern and the pantry was stocked with all kinds of goods and treats. I helped myself to a handful and noted how the level of advancement and technology in this land seemed to be set at random.

In the upstairs floor I found what was probably Twilight’s bedroom. The pony bed was quite a bit shorter than the average bed which I guess would make sense. On the floor, not too far from there was a basket with bedding and a pillow and the name Spike imprinted on it. Huh, I guess the lizard really was a pet. How pathetic.

There was a vanity of sorts, but no makeup whatsoever. Just a hairbrush, horsebrush and other hair things. A nearby picture frame depicted the lizard hugging a purple unicorn, Twilight Sparkle, presumably. A unicorn. But.. wait. Unicorn? Isn’t she supposed to be an alicorn?

That was… odd. Oh, well. I inspected my reflection on the mirror, a far cry from a normal human girl. At the very least, my pony form somewhat resembled my real body.

I was a bit shorter than the average mare and my coat and wings were near white and though most of it was covered by a green pony frock, they had a very pale, almost imperceptible tint of peach to them, though my hair and disgusting pony tail were pitch black in color. Surprisingly enough, my freakishly large eyes did not have stereoscopic vision.

Eventually, I got tired of waiting for this Twilight and just as I descended to go back into the forest and try again tomorrow, the door opened and there she was. Purple? Check. Horns and wings? Check. She looked tired, somehow and did not immediately see me standing there, so I cleared my throat to get her attention.

Her ears, which had started to sag, perked up at the noise and she turned her head to look at me. Now, I was by no means an expert in pony expressions, but her disturbingly human-like features would suggest she was tired. Not just physically, but emotionally and maybe quite a bit stressed.

“Can I… help you?” she asked, her tone more inquisitive than anything else.

I stepped forward confidently. “I’m looking for Twilight Sparkle. Are you her?”

She nodded, still looking at me with nothing but curiosity. “I am, and you are?”

Oh, shit! I didn’t think to think up a pony name! The words died in my throat and my eyes darted around the room, looking for a suitable alternative, anything that would help me come up with a passable name. Books? No. Chairs? No. Windows? No. Quill? No. Spray bottle? No… wait, wait! What about…

“Febreze. You’re one of the princesses, right?”

She nodded again. “Yes, I am, but what are you doing here?”

“Doing research for a little project,” I said simply. And hey, it was the truth.

All of a sudden, she seemed a lot more pleasant and friendly. Her face lifted, her eyes brightened and she trotted closer to me, her pony body language radiating friendliness(possibly).

“Oh, really? I mean, I don’t normally get that many patrons and even less ponies who come to seek knowledge. Tell me, what are you looking for? I’m sure I could help you out,” she said with a small, kind smile. God, those eyes look way too sincere.

Well… she seems nice, at least. Okay, so she was eager to help me out. That makes things easier. Normally I would have commented on how un-princess-like she was in manning a library and laugh derisively in her face, but she looked like she could be of use and so I held my tongue.

I forced myself to adopt a smile and a friendly personality and said, “Thank you for your help, princess,” and forced myself to do a quasi-bow, which left Twilight flustered, and weakly stammered how I didn’t have to do so. “It’s more of a curiosity than anything, but I’m trying to find information on the possible existence of other worlds.”

She quirked an eyebrow. “Other worlds?”

“Like I said, it’s just a curiosity. Been read a few too many novels, I think and I’m not even sure if such books even exist. Just thought I’d try and look, y’know?”

She put a hoof to her chin and a pensive look crossed her face. “Hmm, I don’t think that we have anything on that subject, but I could take a look at my directory.”

Her horn glowed with purple pony magic, and I tensed, just barely managing to keep from flinching. A nearby desk opened and from it, surrounded by the same purple pony magic was a massive book, easily half a foot thick and bound in red felt.

She brought it closer and opened it. “Impressive, isn’t it?” she said, obviously misreading the look on my face. “I wrote it myself during my spare time.”

“It’s… yeah,” I said lamely. “Don’t you have any employees who can take care of this stuff?”

She laughed lightly, speedily flipping pages and her eyes darting side to side as she took in the book’s contents. “Goodness, no. This is my home and having employees around would be, I dunno, odd. It’s not something I’ve ever considered and I really don’t mind helping a fellow pony out.”

“So it’s just you living here?”

“No. Spike lives with me. He’s a baby dragon and there’s also Max, he’s my human.” Her face sobered and her head dipped slightly at the mention of said human.

Be nice, Jackie. Be nice. “Human, huh? Is he here?” I really hoped he wasn’t. Looking at these lobotomized humans kind of creeped me out.

“No,” she said sadly. “He’s… he’s at the hospital.”

Say you’re sorry. You can do it! “Oh. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you.”

She shook her head. “No, no, please. You didn’t upset me, it’s just--”

“Yes?” I asked as kindly as I could.

Her ears lowered and she let out a small, mournful sigh. “He got hurt a while back. It was very bad and… and I wasn’t sure he’d make it. Some very bad ponies got ahold of him. Forced him into a human fighting ring and, and he’s such a nice, peaceful human and he was forced to kill his own kind.”

“Whoa, that’s messed up.” Come to think of it, was she talking about that scrappy dude at the warehouse? “So what’s it look like? He gonna pull through?” I asked, genuinely interested.

“Yes. The whole thing took a toll on him. He’ll have some permanent scarring and even with magic there was only so much that could be done. But yes, he’ll be okay. The doctors told me I can take him back in a few days, so that’s something to look forward to.”

She went quiet after that and kept on looking through her book and me… damn it, I felt an overpowering desire to say something.

“Looks like you really care for him.”

She nodded solemnly. “I do. He’s a very good friend.”

So she’s one of those peop… ponies, is she? The kind who thinks animals are people too. “Well, I’m glad to hear that.”

She gave me such a kind, genuine smile I almost felt bad for deceiving her, but not enough to stop doing it.

“Ah, here it is,” she said triumphantly and brought the massive tome closer. “Let’s see, world travel. Hmm, about the only book we would have on the subject is written by Pie Tin the Elder, and quite frankly, it’s a bit outdated, and Pie Tin himself was not known to be the most… stable of ponies, at least in his later years.”

So a senile crackpot, basically. Great, just my luck. “And that’s the only book you have?” I just had to ask again.

“I’m afraid so. The information you’re looking for wouldn’t exactly be a well known or popular subject among academic circles.”

Well, fuck me. I seethed in silence until an idea popped. “What if I were to visit somewhere else? Another town or city with a bigger library?”

The corners of her lips quirked and tugged into a near smile. “My, you really take this hobby of yours seriously, don’t you?”

Bitch, are you mocking me? I forced a smile. “Kinda.”

“Well, as a dedicated researcher and lover of knowledge, it is my duty to help those who seek to enrich their intellect.” Uhh, what? “To my knowledge, Fillydelphia, Los Pegasus and Canterlot have the largest, most diverse libraries in Equestria. If there is any information on the subject, those would be the places you’d want to look.”

I nodded. “I may have to try that. Could I see the book then?”

“Of course. Will you be checking it out?”

“Could I?”

“Sure, I just need to see your library card and you’ll be good to go.”

Library card? They have those here too? Ugh, what to do? On one hand, the proffered book was written by some crackpot, likely high on pony drugs, so who even knew if it would prove useful. I couldn’t simply stay and read it, as it was more likely than not to be full of mumbo jumbo and gobbledygook. Only Ari would be able to discern its contents, so that was a bust.

Fine, it seems I have no other choice. “Oh, umm… I don’t have a library card. I just got into town today.”

“So that explains it,” she said more to herself. “I thought you looked unfamiliar.”

“You, uh, know all the ponies that live here?” I asked in mild trepidation. The whole point of my pony guise was to remain as invisible as possible, and how was I to do that when I could be recognized-- or is it unrecognized-- at a glance?

“No, not personally, but I have a very good memory and can recognize almost everypony I see-- anyway, if you would, you can fill up an application. It’s a very quick process.”

I shrugged. “Sure, why not?” I could just bullshit the whole thing. Not like I plan to visit this place again anyway.

She put the massive tome back where it was and came back with a quill and a small sheet of parchment. I realized right then and there I’d made a fatal oversight.

“Febreze? Is something wrong?” asked Twilight, an expectant look on her fuzzy mug as the items floated in front of me, waiting for me to take them.

I stared at the quill, not knowing what to do. Was I supposed to write with my pony hooves? I can barely control them as is. How in the world did she expect me to… “T-the thing is, um…” God, this was hard. I looked away not able to meet her gaze. “I-I don’t really… you know… I don’t know how to… write,” I stuttered in a small voice, my face hot with embarrassment.

Twilight looked at me strangely. “You… you don’t?”

“Well, no, it’s not that. I know how to write. Who doesn’t,” I laughed awkwardly. “I just don’t have good… um, hoofwriting. A-and I sprained the thing the other day, you know,” I held out my right one for emphasis and wiggled it. “It’s still kinda stiff, so I can’t write much of anything…. Anyway, if you could help me fill it out I’d really appreciate it.”

She blinked rapidly. “Oh. Ohh. Of course, I would be happy to.”

Twilight came to my side, floating the parchment so that both of us would have a clear view. “Okay, first entry. Your full name?”

“Febreze.”

She looked at me, quirking an eyebrow. “Just Febreze. Nothing else?”

I shook my head and she nodded, seemingly accepting it as fact and jotting it down. Maybe it wasn’t unusual for ponies to have one name only?

“Now, where do you live?”

“Azeroth.” The way I figure, it doesn’t matter what I tell her. I can simply say it’s a place far away from here.

“Azeroth? What an unusual name, I’ve never heard of it. Where is it located?”

“Eh, somewhere west of here. Very small place.”

She seemed to take it as a given and she kept on asking a few more queries, nothing complicated, thankfully, and after that she went and pulled out a… camera? Again, WTF with this technology setting. She took my picture and the camera spat out a miniaturized version, small enough to fit into a card she pulled out from who knows where, and just like that, I found myself with a spankin’ new library card that I would be unlikely to use again.

Then, for some reason or another and to my dismay, Twilight found it appropriate to further engage me in small talk.

“So, Febreze, what do you think of Ponyville so far?”

What did I think of it? It’s a primitive, backwards, unenlightened shithole of a mud village, filled with the foul, wafting stench of horse and cattle. It is a stain, a blight in this, or any other land and it, along with you and the rest of your wretched kind should all be destroyed!

Is what I wanted to say, but something told me she wouldn’t take kindly to it, and even though I didn’t like her or had no kind of respect towards her, she was still a princess and most likely wielded power that could prove to be inconvenient should she decide to employ it against me, so I took the only other possible option available to me. That is to say, I put on a fake smile and lied through my teeth.

I gushed about how much I loved it, how much I adored the quaint, rustic feeling it exudes, how wonderful it was to see, ugh, everypony get along and just a whole bunch of things that heaped on the sweetness. Good god, I would need to do something bad or violent to rid myself of the feeling.

Hmm, come to think of it, I’d discovered a number of farms through my strolls and a couple of them had pigs as livestock. Given the ponies vegetarianism, the swine were most likely used as a form of garbage management. Either way, that chicken had been about the only taste of meat I’d been graced with for a while and the thought of succulent, tender ribs; crispy crunchy cracklins or pulled pork was mightily enticing. Yes, I’d be eating pork tonight.

I was still undecided on the subject of cows, though. They could talk like ponies, yes, but their willingness to be confined and subjugated in the same manner as cows from my world were, made them in my eyes to be an even lower form of life than the ponies. Little better than animals and with my position as the undisputed apex predator in these parts, I was well within my rights to prey on lesser beings to satisfy my hunger. Circle of life and all.

And now my mind is wandering. A necessary evil, I’m afraid, but I needed something to distract myself from the sickly sweet, saccharine bile spewing out my mouth and even though I didn’t mean any of it, this bint Twilight Sparkle was fooled, obviously liking the answer.

“I’m glad to see you like it here, Febreze,” she said with a smile. “How long will you be staying.”

“Not sure, really. I need to take care of a few things before moving on, and…”

“Yes?” She prompted.

“It’s just that… you’re a princess, right?”

She smiled bashfully and nodded.

“So, why are you here?”

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

“Why are you here, in Ponyville?”

She merely tilted her head, not knowing what I meant.

“You’re royalty, you have power, you’re superior to the average pony, so why are you not ruling some big city, with a castle and servants.”

A dawning look of comprehension dawned on her fuzzy mug. “Oh, that. You’re not the first pony who’s asked me that.” And just like that, she looked dejected.

Last thing I needed was to get royalty pissed at me, so I put on a look of regret and hastened to repair any damage. “Ah! I’m sorry, that was a stupid question. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“No, no, it’s fine,” she said quickly. “You didn’t do anything wrong. You were just curious. I can understand that. I mean… what sort of princess does that, right?” She tried to be friendly, but there was definitely an edge of bitterness in her voice. “Ponyville is my home. It’s where I met my friends and it holds a very special place in my heart,” she said wistfully. “It just wouldn’t feel right to leave my home and move somewhere else.”

“You know, I actually get what you mean.”

“So you can understand, right? There’s simply no place like home.”

No place like home. Right, at least she gets to stay home.

Proofread by the lovely Schroedingers-Katze

Once More, With Feeling

It was a nice day in Ponyville. The sun was bright, the sky was clear, and a refreshing breeze blew through the town. Being a rural settlement, the town was already bustling in the early hours of the morning. Farmers got up the earliest, way before dawn to tend their fields, feed their animals and take care of whatever work needed doing. Their families tended to be relatively robust, and any available hooves were put to work, rain or shine. When that was done and when the sun was well into the sky, they hauled their goods and crops to town where they set up their stalls in the market to be sold.

That’s not to say that the farmers sold crops exclusively. It was not uncommon for them to also extend their attention to other goods. For instance, the Carrot family specialized in making their very own furniture. They cut down their very own trees, turned them into lumber, sanded them, polished them and worked them into a finished product that was second to none in Ponyville and indeed, most if not all its resident ponies could claim to have purchased the Carrot family’s exquisite products at some point or another, and why wouldn’t they? They were sturdy, pleasing to look at, and lasted a very long time.

The Berry family, while growing a diverse set of berries, also found the time now and then to render them into fragrant soaps and shampoos which many a mare(and some stallions) eagerly waited on and when available, were almost sure to run out before noon. Even Berry Punch, when not getting drunk off her own product, could still turn a profit on the instances when she managed to crawl out of bed, or wherever she may have laid the night before, and sell her own stock of artisanal wines and spirits.

Roseluck and her sisters, unofficially labeled as the flower ponies, sold on the weekends a particularly delectable type of cold soup called gazpacho, the key ingredient being the delicate flower petals from their very own stock. It was a recipe supposedly learned by them when taking botanical classes at the Manehattan Institute of Horticulture and very refreshing on a warm summer day.

But they were not the only ones. Ponyville had a healthy population and every year that number grew. However, Ponyville itself was primarily settled by earth ponies and in its early days, it was already a self-sufficient little town. There were no trains back then, and so any supplies or necessities would have to be crafted by the ponies themselves. If somepony needed, say, a repellant to keep malignant bugs and insects from preying on their crops, they couldn’t exactly walk down to the neighborhood store, as there was no neighborhood store. They would have to make do and make a homemade solution themselves and when word spread, that very same repellant would come in demand, and ponies would be willing to pay bits for it.

Granted, Stinking Rich would eventually open up Barnyard Bargains and bring some much needed supplies to the budding young town, but the tradition the earlier families of Ponyville held of making their very own products to suit the town’s needs was alive and strong even to this day. It was the reason there weren’t very many stores in town, as the ponies got what they needed from the town’s very own residents, while the rest could be found at Barnyard Bargains. Even so, there were still some niches like that store that sold quills and sofas, the local bookstore and of course HumanSmart, for all your human needs.

Curiously enough, the one family that didn’t partake in this rich tradition was the very same family that, without it, Ponyville might not have even existed. No one could deny that the Apple family grew the most delicious, scrumptious apples in Equestria, to say nothing of their legendary cider and zap apple products. Throughout the years they had been regarded as standing pillars in the community and were generally well respected members of society. Even so, there were a few select number that quietly resented the Apples for not engaging in this tradition, believing they thought themselves as ‘too good’ or ‘superior’ to the other families. Still, they kept it to themselves and never actually brought out the subject in public.

What they didn’t take into account was the fact that, at least for the current generation of the Apple family, their numbers were not large enough to take care of their admittedly massive fields and still have time left over to make their own hoofmade products. Big Macintosh and Applejack had to take care of practically all the workload, while little Applebloom helped where she could. However, due to recent circumstances-- namely that little incident over a week prior-- Applejack had been left out of commision and so it fell to her elder sibling to take care of her workload.

Big Macintosh had been running himself ragged in trying to take care of everything that needed doing, not leaving him time for much of anything and so it fell to Applebloom to take the harvested apples to the Ponyville market and sell them. She would regularly help her siblings when it came to this and so she knew by heart how to set up her stall.

However capable and attentive though she may be, Applebloom was still a filly and so she didn't have the best concept of profit vs loss margins, as evidenced by the fact that, during her first day manning the stall the filly thought that if she sold a dozen apples for a bit, ponies would be sure to line up and she could sell her stock quickly; she could then close up shop and have the rest of the day to hang out with Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. Well, it worked. The filly sold all her apples in only a couple of hours and felt immensely proud of herself, wondering why neither Applejack or Big Mac followed her example and instead chose to sell the apples at two for one bit. Naturally, Granny Smith and Big Mac weren't amused when they learned of this and she wasn't allowed to man the apple stall by herself again, which was a bit of a disappointment to the naive filly.

Still, it wasn't all bad news. Only two days prior was Applejack released from the hospital and the fretful family had rejoiced, receiving their kin with open arms and though the occasion would normally call for a hearty feast, Applejack was strictly restricted to puréed and/or very soft foods for the time being, as per doctor's orders. A bit of a moot point as the brace she'd be wearing on her mouth for the next few days would prevent much of any chewing.

Anypony who knew the cowpony would be able to tell that if there was one single quality that defined Applejack and her character, it would be her staunch and unyielding honesty. What was not as known about the farm mare was that she also possessed a stubborn and bullheaded streak rivaled only by Rainbow Dash, this being made especially evident as within a day of being back on the farm, Applejack was adamant in working her cherished orchards. Of course, her family had tried to talk her out of this, as her doctor had prescribed plenty of rest, but the farm pony's stubborn streak won out. Eventually, she and her family arrived at an agreement. Applejack could help out with the lighter chores, nothing especially strenuous. The farmpony would not drive herself crazy with lounging around the house all day and her family need not fear her bring harm unto herself.

So it was with this that Applebloom now found herself with a free day, leisurely lounging on the Cutie Mark Crusader clubhouse. The filly had done her best during Applejack's absence and had earned a day off for her hard work, which she was currently enjoying as she laid back on the small sofa of the clubhouse, a magazine in her hooves and a cool glass of lemonade nearby.

Keeping her company were her two best friends in the whole wide world, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. The small unicorn laid belly down on the floor and kept herself busy with crayons and a few blank pages, doodling different types of cutie marks, every now and then sighing wistfully as she fantasized what her very own mark would look like someday-- if that day ever came. Scootaloo, meanwhile, kept her focus on a particularly large snail that was crawling through the wall of the clubhouse, the poor filly bored out of her mind as there was nothing to engage her. She understood that Applebloom was still a little worn out from her increased workload at the farm, but still! They'd been lounging for almost half an hour and like her idol, the Pegasus filly was a restless spirit, not the type to be lazing about when there were so many other ways to occupy her time.

She looked over to her friends, who didn't seem to share her sentiments and sighed. Applebloom didn't miss this and looked from the magazine to her friend.

"Is something wrong, Scoots?"

The feathered filly looked over and, after a moment of indecision, spoke. "It's boring in here. Can't we go do something else?"

Sweetie Belle ducked her head, letting out a muffled noise between a sigh and a grunt, then raised her head and stared balefully at her tactless friend. “Seriously, Scootaloo?” Despite the fact Sweetie Belle was but a filly, she idolized her sister Rarity, whose maturity and personality had slightly rubbed off on the little unicorn, making her a tad more tactful and considerate to others. Just before arriving at the clubhouse Sweetie Belle had anticipated her feathered friend would grow restless and try to cajole them into doing something else and asked her to keep such thoughts to herself and not bother Applebloom. Still, it seemed that Scootaloo had a finite amount of patience.

“I’m just saying… there’s got to be other stuff we can do instead of just laying around in here.”

“What did ya have in mind?” asked Applebloom, sitting up straight.

“Well, we’re the Cutie Mark Crusaders, aren’t we?”

“Yes…” both Sweetie and Applebloom said.

“And the point of being the Crusaders is to crusade for our cutie marks, right?”

“You saying you want tuh go crusadin’ then?”

“Yes!” Scootaloo burst out. “Sweetie and I haven’t gone crusading ‘cause we’ve been waiting for you to get some free time, and you are free right now?”

Sweetie Belle was about to admonish her brash friend, but Applebloom cut in. “Well… I ahm feeling better already. Yeah, I could go for some crusadin’.”

Sweetie sighed, seeing her fretfulness was for naught. “But what can we do? Do you all remember we were taking a break from crusading because we ran out of ideas?”

“Oh… yeah,” Scootaloo said, looking a bit less boisterous.

“Unless you or Applebloom have come up with anything new?”

“Well…” Applebloom said, a look of concentration on her face. “We could get our cutie marks in being doctors or nurses, like th’ ones that patched up mah sister.”

Sweetie Belle looked generally excited by this, but the mood was dampened by Scootaloo, who blew a raspberry. “No way, doctors and nurses are jobs, not special talents. Plus, you gotta study for years to be one of them.” Her friends visibly shuddered at the prospect of years of studying and didn’t pick up the topic again.

“Ooh, we could get our cutie marks in critter wrasslin’!” exclaimed Scootaloo.

Sweetie Belle was quick to deny. “No, no way! We already tried doing that with some timberwolf pups. Remember how that turned out?” Apparently they did, as both fillies winced and shook their heads. “How about cooking?”

Applebloom and Scootaloo shared a look before the earth filly made her way over and placed a hoof on Sweetie Belle’s shoulder. “Sweetie Belle, you know Scoots and I love you like a sister, raght?” Sweetie smiled and nodded. “Well, don’t take this the wrong way, but it’ll be a cold day in Tartarus before me and Scootaloo let you anywhere near a kitchen.”

“Or eat any food you make,” the feathered filly mumbled under her breath. Sweetie Belle in the kitchen was a guaranteed recipe for disaster. The little unicorn pouted, while Applebloom patted her consolingly and Scootaloo offered a reassuring smile.

“Everypony’s a critic… how about potion making? Like Twilight was teaching us?”

“We already tried that too, remember? It was a bust.”

“An’ you burned half yer ingredients.”

Sweetie Belle whined “Girls, again with the critics!”

“Ooh, ooh, how about we try foraging for potions’ ingredients in the Everfree?” Scootaloo suggested, hopping in place.

Applebloom looked doubtful. “I dunno, Scoots. Seems like ev’ry time we get on up there som’thin’ tries to eat us.”

“Or we end up having to be rescued,” chimed in Sweetie Belle.

“So we go to Zecora’s. She knows how to get around the forest, and she’s the best pony--”

“Zebra,” corrected Sweetie Belle.

“--zebra for the job. Gathering potions’ ingredients is what she does half the time.”

"Hey, yeah. Ye're right Scoots, we've never tried for a foraging cutie mark."

"And Zecora really is the best zebra to help us with that. Great idea, Scootaloo!"

The pegasus filly's chest puffed out, obviously proud of herself. "Well, it's what I do." She then looked to both her friends. "So are we agreed?" Both the unicorn and earth pony nodded enthusiastically. “Then you know what to do, Crusaders!” Scootaloo cried, bumping her chest with a hoof.

In unison, the three fillies huddled together and screamed their infamously loud catchphrase.

“CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS, FORAGERS! YAY!” And with practiced ease, they all fled towards the Everfree Forest, hoping that the 83d time was the charm..

You know that feeling you get when you wake up in a completely different place than the one you went to sleep? It’s not a pleasant one. There’s confusion as you try to recall the events of the previous night. It could be that you hung out at a bar, getting drunk and without knowing it, you went home with someone of the opposite sex or, god forbid, the same sex, in which case, would have been a very unpleasant surprise. It could have been that you were drugged; whether it was roofies, chloroform or simply a good ol’ blow to the back of the head, in which case a stranger would drag your body to a secluded place-- a greasy van with blackened windows, a secluded alley or an iffy looking motel-- places in which he might do unmentionable things to your body. That, or he takes a hacksaw to you and proceeds to harvest your liver, kidneys and any other organs you are sure to miss.

Yeah, it was kind of like that for me. There I was last night, minding my own business, nabbing a little piggy and pulverizing its vertebrae so it wouldn’t make a racket. There I was, taking it to the castle ruins and disemboweling it, which was a very messy and smelly operation. There I was, cooking it over a spit and thoroughly satisfying my meat cravings. Then there I was, going to sleep with a full stomach in a creaky, slightly dusty bed. Yeah, that I remember. I went to sleep on a bed, so why... in the hell… am I not in said bed? Seriously, this is not not funny. Is it someone’s perverse idea of a joke? What possible logical explanation could there be for me to go to sleep in a bed and wake up in the freaking clouds again? Ugh!

Goddamn it, this chaos magic could be a real pain at times. I could more or less control any outbursts while awake, but there was no telling what could happen when I slept. It was the second time this had happened, and no less pleasant. Ari said my magic core was still adjusting to my body and would reduce the rate at which it pumped the stuff. The sooner the better, because waking up hundreds of meters above ground is not a good way to start the day.

Well, luckily, I was only slightly freaked, and only for a minute or so. And sheesh, was it bright up here. Judging by the sun’s position, it was at least an hour or two before noon... maybe. Who knows. It was peaceful too, now that I was in a calm state of mind. Nothing but fluffy white clouds in every direction and right below me the dour grey stone structure of the castle. A few days ago, my options to get down would be severely limited. Come to think of it, they still were. Oh, well, at least it would be a nice opportunity to test my chaos powers.

A pony's magical core was basically a little, self sustaining engine that continuously pumped out magic. The unicorns had the largest, most active cores, followed by the winged pests and the mud ponies. It wasn't like an organ or anything. It had no physical form or structure, but it was still there, apparently. I dunno, Ari wasn't all that clear about it. Oh, and apparently, as soon as said pony died, the magical core would instantly disappear into nothingness. Basically the main reason why pony magical cores had been successfully studied before was because said ponies were heavily drugged and then cut open so scholars and researchers could prod and poke at the thing-- and apparently this was not always done with the test subject's knowledge or consent. Yikes...

Anywho, I too now possessed a magical core and in order to cast spells, I had to basically tap into it and channel magic from there and into my arm. Unicorns were naturally adept at this, the little bastards, and casting magic just came naturally to them. Similarly, their horns were natural conductors. I, however, had none of those advantages. There are no words to express how infuriatingly frustrating it was to try and tap into an unseeable, intangible magical reactor I'd never even had before, and whereas a unicorn's magic was naturally channeled through their horns, I had no such appendage, so basically any magic mojo I actually did manage to conjure up would simply be expelled in all directions. In order to prevent that, I had to consciously channel my magic power from my core all the way into my arm. I was... somewhat getting the hang of it, so long as I focused and consciously channeled the thing. My hope in this situation was that I could turn this handicap and make it work for me.

I treaded carefully toward the edge of the cloud, careful not to step on any thin patches. Yeah, I probably didn't have anything to worry about, but still. Against my better judgement, I leaned forwards slightly. I regretted it almost immediately as the dizzying heights made my stomach churn. I idly wondered whether I might survive a fall from this height. Maybe but, why bother?

C’mon, girl. Quit dawdling. Inhale... exhale. Good, good…. Okay!

First step; get a little piece from that magic engine. Glad to say that part was easy. Countless practices and repetitions for the past week had enabled me to tap into my magic core without too much trouble and quickly enough, I felt that familiar, subtle surge of power well up just a few inches from below my sternum. So far so good.

Alright. Now, to visualize intently(that part was pretty important) what I want the magic to do and make it do exactly just that. In this case, a simple levitation spell; a basic for unicorn foals everywhere.

And then came the last part, which was to channel that stored energy outwards. Well, normally that would be the case. Not so much so this time. I closed my eyes and released the charged spell, being mindful to let it flow into a continuous stream-- low and slow, and to keep it consistent. Yes, I felt that curiously invigorating sensation as the energy flowed head to toe and everywhere in between. Nice, last part complete.

Moment of truth now. I took a deep breath, held it, and stepped off the fluffy white surface.

…

I wasn’t standing on anything anymore, yet I did not feel that terrifying, pants-soiling sensation I usually got when falling… well, more like when riding atop a roller coaster that plunged down a steep incline, but they both feel the same, I’m sure. Whatever the case, I took that as a good sign and opened my eyes.

Yep, there I was, floating midair like it was the most natural thing in the world. Curiously enough, when a unicorn used levitation spells, the object being levitated tended to be surrounded by a magical aura. Not so much so with me. I never figured that out.

But man! That feeling of simply floating midair… there’s just nothing like it. There’s people back on Earth who said that flying in an airplane makes them feel as though they are able to be and feel like a bird, how they perceive the world. Yeah, fuck that. This was the real thing!

Unfortunately, I couldn’t dwell too much on it, as I could feel the tether I had on my magic begin to slip. Well, it was nice while it lasted. Now to get back to solid ground. I slowly, slowly, inched myself down, not daring to lose my concentration, as this was normally the part where I screwed up. Casting a levitation spell on an object? Simple enough. Actually moving it? Well, that’s a little more tricky. I usually ended up making whatever object I was practicing on to careen at alarming speeds. Which is why I took it slow. Slow and steady wins the race, right?

So yes, I slowly descended at a snail’s pace. Steadily, steadily, steadily, steadily and… goddamn it, is this even working at all? I must have spent a couple of minutes doing it, yet the stony roofs of the castle seemed no closer. I’ve never been an especially patient person, and while I had been more willing when I first started to learn this magic business, the novelty had quickly evaporated. Anyway, I didn’t fancy taking the slow route and wait half an hour to get back on solid ground, so I braced myself as well as I could for what was to come and canceled the spell keeping me afloat.

Sure enough, I immediately fell and despite knowing it was coming, I couldn’t help but let out a small scream. There were no sounds besides the rushing wind buffeting my face and a faint, dull throbbing in my ears, and it wasn’t like I managed to stay in one position either. The wind or g-forces or whatever it was, kept flinging my body in different positions. I so dearly wanted to panic and scream like a banshee, but that would probably be a bad idea and by some miracle, I managed to keep my wits about me.

When I first began to try to learn magic, it was… difficult to get a feel for my core and access it. Ari had me do some meditative exercises to help me get a better feel for it, and surprisingly enough, it worked, just as it worked now. I closed my eyes shut, somehow managed to expel all outside distractions, and reached within me to sense the core within me, taking the magic, forming it into a levitation spell and simply let it flow unrestrained.

I stopped abruptly in midair, upside down and floating on an angle, my back to the ground and facing the ever blue sky. I closed my eyes and sighed, limply hanging in there.

God, that sucked. Let’s not do that again.

Well with that over with, I opened my eyes and took stock of the situation. I was pleased to see that the top of the ruined castle was now much, much closer than before. Heck, I was hanging maybe ten feet from it. It was… interesting trying to right myself up again, but when I did, I canceled the spell and managed to land on the roof without losing my balance. Heh, I felt pretty good about that.

I picked a random edge of the roof and went over to investigate. Below me was an open section within the ruins that might have been a garden at some point. Twisting vines had overtaken the walls and most of everything else in sight-- some as thin as a pencil, others thick as my forearm and the ground was littered with decayed leaves, twigs and a whole bunch of unidentifiable organic matter that had piled up over centuries of neglect. A number of fountains were scattered here and there, some having crumbled due to the wear of time, others in surprisingly good condition, their bone white exteriors looming over the deserted courtyard like skeletons, a reminder this place had once been full of color and life.

I recognized it and jumped down(landing on my feet again. Yes!), finding an entrance and pushing past some uncooperative vines into the castle’s interior. I was now more or less familiar with the castle’s interior and managed to find my way back to the room I’d unofficially claimed as my base of operations. It was a study of some sort, adjoined to a bedroom at the far end. It was here that I’d been spending most of the time, sporadically exploring the castle now and then. While the bedroom had been left mostly intact, I used the study to… well, study and store my increasingly large pile of stolen goods.

I was pretty well stocked on food, having always made it a priority. Crates and boxes were stuffed with apples, oranges, berries, pears, bananas and peaches. No vegetables, yuck! I’d managed to pilfer some pans and other cooking utensils, herbs and spices included and more than a little bit of toilet paper.

Once again I cursed my luck for being stranded here. The human females in this place obviously didn’t have the same issues as me, or at least, nobody cared. Either way, being forced to learn to make my own tampons was not a fun experience. Sheesh...

Well, whatever. Thankfully, I shouldn’t be as crabby or as hate-filled now. Still don’t like ponies, though. Overall, I’d managed to acquire enough stuff so that my stay here would be relatively comfortable. To my incredulity and astonishment, the ponies had even built an exclusively human store called… ugh, HumanSmart. I was learning that, for the sake of my sanity and to avoid unnecessary headaches, it was really better for me to take these things as they come and not think too hard about it.

Anyway, I had to grudgingly admit that what few products they had in store were convenient and of good quality. I’d managed to procure a number of shirts and shorts. Pants would have been better, but there were none available. There was underwear, thankfully, but no bras. Stupid ponies... I had to contend instead with a thin piece of linen wrapped around my chest.

I also got a few good pairs of socks, some closed toe sandals(there were no tennis shoes) and a sort of deodorant that was surprisingly good smelling and effective. Who knows, maybe these ponies are not completely inept after all. And, to my ever growing astonishment, there was a refrigerated section that contained veggie bacon. Needless to say, I steered well clear of that.

So yes, it seemed for the moment that I would be as comfortable as one could be in this primitive pastel world. Still, something was missing and I don’t mean just people. Well, yes, people but more than anything, somebody... anybody.

It’s funny. Up ‘till now, I’ve made it a point in life to avoid people at all costs, not wanting them to bother me, or I to bother with them. The universe has a real sick sense of humor, it seems. I kinda miss people now. Hell, at this point even being given the automated, generic greeting of a store clerk elicited a strange sense of longing in me.

Dammit. There I am again, reminiscing and stuff. I sighed and got to my feet to get the brain juices flowing. I was steadily going out of my mind with boredom, a fact not helped by my self imposed isolationism. The constant loneliness and quiet of the castle ruins had steadily been getting on my nerves.

In the end, I decided to ponify myself yet again and go return that book at the library. It had been a complete waste of time to try and gain anything useful as it was apparently full of ‘hogwash’, the ramblings of a senile old coot, no doubt hopped up on pony drugs.

I took off my clothes in order to prepare myself for the change to come and… I couldn’t help but look. I pinched my side and couldn’t help but notice that the area was noticeably more slim. Same could be said for my thighs, which was a bit odd.

Until now, I’ve been surviving on stolen pastries, snacks and fruit and with all the spare time I had, I was continuously bored, which of course led to chronic snacking. Oh well, I’m certainly not gonna look a gift horse(pony?) in the mouth. I tested my boobs and gave them a light squeeze. I was pleased to see that they remained the same. Hell, with my lessening pudge they actually started to look bigger in comparison.

…

Anyway, now that I wasted enough time admiring myself I took a dosage of the potion and shuddered at the feeling of my body and skeletal structure shrinking, bending and twisting to accommodate a pony form. Surprisingly enough, it didn’t hurt. Rather, it felt as if I’d turned to putty and an unseen force twisted me into a pony. Either way, it was hella weird.

The first few seconds were the worst as my body adjusted to the change. The distribution in weight, my footing, my center of gravity were all off. I stood on slightly wobbly legs and proceeded to fit myself into a pony frock. It was… an interesting experience that took some creative maneuvering and more than a little twisting. Really, it was a bit baffling just how flexible pony bodies were.

I donned a pair of saddlebags, one with the book, the other with some stolen bits, just in case and made my way out.

I didn’t see Ari, but I did not pay it much mind. She randomly headed(phased?) in and out of the castle. To do what, who the hell knows, and I didn’t pester her about it. Figured it was only polite and as she’d been so accommodating, I suppose I could be a little considerate. After all, we all need our privacy. And… well, I suppose it was a little selfish of me, but I was kinda glad she wasn’t there. She always wanted to tag along whenever I headed out to experiment on the forest’s creatures, but I was an independent kind of girl and the fact I’d become so dependent on her help kind of rubbed me the wrong way. At the very least, I wanted to make sure I was not completely helpless.

The walk or, trot to the mud village was largely uneventful and I knew it from memory, using various landmarks such as a stream, oddly shaped rocks and withered trees to find my way. At this point in time, the forest was now more or less familiar and had lost is oppressive, sinister vibe. That did not mean I let my guard down or anything. I had to be wary, yes and keep an eye out for anything unusual, but by and large, I was not the least scared or intimidated and while I more or less knew the path to the mud village and back, many more sections of the forest were still a mystery and so I kept on a strict path. The only other notable thing was me spotting a few timber wolves further in the distance. I didn't worry too much as they didn't try anything.

Virtually every time I stepped out the ruins and into the forest I would be accosted by a manticore or the wolves. Needless to say, these events ended in their complete and inevitable defeat as I had no trouble whatsoever in massacring them. By this point in time they knew better than to try and pick a fight with me. Well, I couldn't complain too much as it was due to the beasts' futile assaults that I managed to come up with a nifty new sort of spell.

It was during my fifth day here, I think. I successfully looted the zebra’s weird african-themed treehouse and took whatever I needed to make the pony morphing potion. Still, not all ingredients were there and so I had to go about the forest to forage for them. Do you have any idea what it’s like to go trudging on a hot, humid forest while wearing a hoddie and jeans? It… fucking… sucks. Unfortunately for me, while my chaos fueled durability was kick-ass in that it was incredibly difficult for something to harm me, I could still feel the effects of the weather and the elements around me which, again, sucked.

I chose to go at this one alone, as all I had to do was head to a spot not too far away from the zebra’s place, where there grew a patch of some weird flower called Poison Joke. What it did was… well you get the idea. Ari said it wouldn’t affect me, because, chaos magic. Why not?

Well, at any point, the walk had been largely uneventful, at least it was until I heard a series of wet crunching sounds. It was faint, but it was there and it was coming from not too far away. I hesitated and, against my better judgement, moved cautiously towards it. Really, just a quick peek.

Hidden behind the thick covering of trees, bushes and ferns was a manticore. Its back was turned to me and it was hunched over, clearly feasting on a kill. I scrunched my nose at the smell of blood and iron mixing with the musky humidness of the jungle to create a most unpleasant odor.

Yikes. Better go back. And I did so or, tried, at least. No such luck, for I as soon as took a step back, my foot just happened to land on a branch, alerting the freakish monster to my presence.

Oh, you have got to be kidding me. I looked back to the monster and my heart skipped a beat as it too returned my stare with bloodied fangs. “Umm, n-nice kitty thing?” I said lamely.

Predictably, it roared and with amazing speed it moved its whole mass to lunge at me. I hissed, nearly wetting myself at the sight and fell on mybutt. With a few, powerful strides, the manticore closed in and leapt, it glinting claws outstretched and teeth bared, confident it could take down a small human like me.

Unfortunately for it, I was not the average human and far from helpless. I stretched out a hand and sent out a pulse of magic, catching the monster midair. It blinked stupidly and simply hung there for a second before it roared again and thrashed, as if hoping to undo whatever bonds held it aloft. Stupid animal.

Only now did I realize my heart was beating a mile a minute, so hard I could practically hear it pounding in my eardrums. God, all these scares and stresses are gonna give an ulcer at some point. I stood and the motion did not go unnoticed by the manticore. It glowered at me with its dumb animal gaze and tried to lunge, tried being the key word, for it was still floating and it merely gave the impression of a paraplegic swimmer.

I circled it, keeping a safe distance while the monster flailed and twisted, trying to break free. Dayumn, that’s a big fucker. And big it was. Easily three times the size of a lion, with powerful muscles bulging and rippling beneath its pelt. No way would I have had a chance to fight it off had the circumstances been different.

“Now, what am I gonna do with you?”

It merely roared and I rolled my eyes. I couldn’t let it go, for it would most certainly try and kill me again, not that it would succeed. Only other option I could think of was to kill it. Hmm, should I or shouldn’t I? I… really couldn’t think of anything else to do in this situation. Supposedly there are spells that can induce sleep, hypnosis, or a trance-like state, but I’ve no idea how to pull them off.

“So, don’t take this the wrong way, but I am gonna have to kill you.” It didn’t listen to me and merely kept thrashing around. I sighed. Well… on the other hand, I have been looking to practice on a live subject. Given my still novice status when it came to magic, I was more than a little annoyed that I couldn’t do anything too flashy. However, logic and reasoning allowed me to come up with a… unique spell of sorts.

Given that magic was pretty much a type of formless energy, the caster had to manipulate it into doing what he wanted. A little thing like levitation was no biggie, and light as well. More sophisticated applications required a more skilled, knowledgeable approach. Anyway, I’d been wracking my brains to come up with something destructive I could use, but simple enough to cast.

I eventually came to the conclusion that, if I could take some magic and release it in a strong enough wave of kinetic force, I could juice it enough to have the power to pulverize bone and shatter rock. And hey, kinetic energy is about as simple and basic as it gets. I’d tried some variations with promising results. Still, had to really tone it down and not do anything too destructive to the already ancient castle ruins. I didn’t want to risk the whole thing coming down on me.

Here, however, in the forest, that was not a problem. I backed away a good distance and canceled the spell keeping the manticore afloat. It crashed heavily to the ground with a loud grunt, but recovered quickly enough and now stared at me with hate-filled eyes.

Like a broken record, it roared again and charged with malicious intent, but I was ready for it this time. It got close and lunged, launching itself in the air. I’d not been standing idly by the whole time and as soon as it got too close for comfort I released the charged spell.

Several things happened at once.

The manticore, not more than a few feet from me, was hurled back violently from the force of the blast, flying well out of sight. Trees in a wide area either snapped or were outright uprooted from where they stood, filling the air with the sharp snap of splintering wood and accompanying them were the various birds, lizards and other forest critters that lived on them, flying away and some of them in bloodied chunks. The surrounding vegetation met a similar fate as it was either flattened or sent hurtling away from me.

By the end of it, a large area of the once dense forest was now decimated, with only the odd plant or tree stump left standing.

I stood there for a while, mouth agape and eye twitching. Um… wow. Overkill much? It worked, the spell worked. Granted, maybe a little too well, but still. I stepped forward hesitantly, the various vegetation and branches crunching underneath my hooves. I searched for the manticore, if nothing else but to satisfy my morbid curiosity.

I found it buried underneath some shrubbery and, after some deliberation, poked it with a stick. Yup, that’s dead alright. I removed the greenery that covered the body and couldn’t help but grimace at the sight. The body looked misshapen and lumpy. Upon closer inspection I could see that throughout the body, jagged shards of bone were sticking out. I poked and prodded and realized that virtually every bone in its body had been broken, feeling like gravel beneath its pelt.

Damn, that’s some high powered spell. Better tone it down a notch. Well, it worked, at least and it served to reinforce my belief that, if trouble arose, I could deal with it.

Now, what should I call that move? After some deliberation I decided to keep it simple and refer to it as a kinetic wave, nothing fancy.

I learned that during my second day here, and had been using that very same spell to take care of whatever monsters dared to come at me. And maaan, it worked beautifully.

The forest's beasts provided a virtually endless supply of test subjects for my experiments. Just yesterday I managed to snag a cragadile in a telekinetic hold and crush it into a big, rocky ball. The timber wolves were slightly more tricky. They would immediately disperse if I threw around a little fire but, well, this was a forest. Common sense dictated that I probably shouldn't rely on it too much. The timber wolves themselves were not living things per se. Rather, they consisted of wild, latent magic that lay deep in the earth and that, for some reason or another managed to somehow attain a degree of base instincts, nothing especially complicated. Anyway, the magic gained a degree of sentience and, as it originated in the ground where it's chock full of roots and plants and buds and shoots, it takes ahold of plant life to gain the form of a wolf.

Technically speaking, the timber wolves could make their bodies entirely of plant life, but even they are smart to know that wood is a much hardier, suitable alternative. But I'm going off topic, it seems. As I was saying, the one other way to kill a timber wolf, besides setting it on fire, is to destroy the magic that binds it together and gives it sentience, and seeing how I am chock full of chaos magic, the answer to this should be rather obvious. Turns out that in high doses, chaos magic will completely overwhelm and destroy the very same magic that makes up and controls the wolves, effectively killing them for good.

No, wait, that’s wrong. Apparently there are some laws to magic or whatever, made by some long dead unicorn named Starburst… or was it Starswirl? Eh, whatever. Anyway, one such law dictated that magic can’t be destroyed. It merely changes, and by pumping the wolves full of my vast chaos reserves, I turned the latent, semi-aware magic that made them up into chaos magic, which could not sustain them. Who’d have known? I kinda found that out by accident, but I guess it’s true what they say: you learn something new every day.

Huh, can’t imagine whoever thought up that phrase imagined it being used in a pastel colored, fairytale ponyland but, oh well.

So yes, I was coming in to these freaky chaos powers but there was still much for me to learn. I realized that if I wanted to get out of this primitive, backwater world then I had to extend my search beyond the festering cesspool known as Ponyville. From what I’ve gathered, ponies had had civilizations and a writing system for thousands of years. Surely there’s got to be someone or something out there that can be of use.

What did that Twilight pony say? The other libraries that may have some leads would be in Canterlot and Fillydelphia. I could get there by walking, but, meh. That seems like a lot of unnecessary exercise. I think I remember seeing some hot air balloons the other day, high over the canopy of the forest, but I’ve no idea where I would even get one, much less work it. I still had quite a few hairs left from the hippie pegasus, so if I’m desperate enough, I might resort to trying to learn to fly while in that form. Or, I could take the easier route and board a train. I’d noticed the tracks during my nightly reconnaissances and tracked them to a station near the edge of the mud village. That would most likely be my best bet, but even so, I don’t imagine the little beasts will allow me to get on for free. I could stow away, but that would likely mean stuffing myself in a small, closed off, uncomfortable space.

I sighed. “Guess I’ll have to buy a ticket.”

Well, I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it. First things first, get to the mud village, return the book and see how much I'm gonna have to shell out for a ticket. If this world is anything like mine then it's money that makes it all go 'round. Of course, if I am to move from this mud village and into somewhere more civilized, it's likely I may have to learn an entirely new monetary system. Ugh.

Whatever slacker moanings I had planned were put to a halt as through the thick foliage of the forest, a peculiar sound was carried through. It was faint, but it was there. It wasn't like one of the usual forest sounds, so out of curiosity, I stopped to better get a feel for it. I walked towards where I thought it originated and after about a dozen yards, I could now hear it more clearly. It was shrill and high pitched. It almost sounded like... screaming? Well, now, this is interesting. Yes, they were screams, definitely not animal and seeing how the mud village was about the only settlement near here, I could only assume the racket was made by the little pukes. Was it possible they were being preyed on by one of the forest's predators? A morbid, more primal part of me was excited about this possibility. Back home I used to frequent the Animal Planet and Nat Geo channels and the possibility of getting a firsthand look at the more visceral parts of nature sent a most approving sense of anticipation through my very being. So with that in mind, I picked up the pace, making towards the yells and hoping I was not too late to miss the show.

Given the nature of my situation, I had a lot of free time, and though I resolved to use a good portion of it to advance my skill and knowledge in magic stuff, I still needed periodic breaks to prevent my brain from turning into mush and allow any new lessons I learned to sink in. In a perfect world, this free time would be spent watching television, playing video games, browsing the internet, reading my assortment of novels or comic books or simply loitering around town. Options that, for the most part, were unavailable to me at this point. I'd been in this miserable backwards world for well over a week and without a home or the modern conveniences of good old Earth, I had an inglorious amount of free time and next to nothing to do or entertain myself. I was about ready to tear my hair off from boredom and watching one of the little pukes getting ripped apart by forest creatures was sure to provide some much needed entertainment.

I followed the screams deeper and as I drew closer, I could infer from the difference in tone and pitch that it was at least three voices making the ruckus. Soon enough, I burst into a small clearing where the screams originated. The first thing I noticed was the smell, namely, it was like rotten eggs and sulfur, enough to make me flinch back. The second thing I noticed were the three ponies smack dab in the middle of the clearing, standing atop a log, the three little turds huddled together, fear evident on their fuzzy little mugs. The third thing I noticed was that the log was slowly but surely sinking into the ground, which, it turned out to not really be ground at all. It was black, bubbling lazily and there were little pockets of steam coming out here and there. A tar pit, maybe?

Whatever the case, due to my abrupt entrance, it didn’t take the little beasts long to register my presence. One of them, an orange coated pegasus with purple mane was the first to spot me, and upon doing so, she nudged her ilk to get their attention-- a unicorn with whitish, grayish coat and a curly, violet and pink mane, the other an earth pony, yellow coated and with red mane. Now that what they perceived to be one of their ilk had showed up, a collective look of relief spread across their pony mugs. They called out for me.

Aw, poo. I was hoping for some pony carnage, not these little brats.

And brats they were. Half the size of a pony and, if possible, even more cloyingly, saccharinely cute than their grownup counterparts. Good god, if they are this bad, I can only imagine how much worse baby ponies are.

Seeing how I would find no amusement here, I turned to leave, but almost immediately, the little brats called out to me.

"Hey, miss, please don't leave us!"

I turned, ready to respond with a biting retort, but now that I got a better look at the brats, something gave me pause. It was the way they looked and the way they looked at me. Their bulbous impossibly large eyes eyeing me in wordless pleading and... good god, that little unicorn brat was actually on the verge of tears, eyes shining and lower lip trembling. The Pegasus herself was no better. She tried and failed to look brave, but with those abnormal pony eyes, it was impossible for her pissy facade to work. It was all too much for me. There I was, one moment ready to mock them and leave them to their fate and next thing I know, I use my pony hooves to completely knock down a tree, in front of witnesses, no less, and urge the little brats to scurry across it and come into solid ground. They did so, and no longer were they safe that I came to my senses. The little beasts, rejoicing at their near demise, saw fit to launch themselves and embrace me all at once.

"Thanks a lot, miss. Yew saved us!"

"Did you see the way she knocked down that tree? It was awesome!"

"I thought we were goners! Thank goodness you came along!"

A series of strangled, grunting noises were my only response. Oh, God, they're touching me! Why are they touching me?! Equally baffling was why in the hell did I rescue them. I loathed their kind, dammit! Even then, as they hugged me and me paralyzed, unable to do much of anything, I would have loved nothing more than to stomp them into a bloody paste and at the same time, I felt an inborn drive to shield them and keep them safe. Even to this day I'm not entirely sure what happened then. Best guess I can make is that watching their sorry, cloyingly, over saccharinely cute little asses in danger triggered some sort latent, deeply buried maternal instincts in me, thus causing me to leap to their rescue even if it was completely against my nature to do so.

"G-graargh.... ktch... hnnfgh..."

"What's that, miss?" Asked the normal one.

"Gehhtoffame..."

"Huh?"

My senses regained and I snapped. "Get off of me!"

They immediately let go and I took a few steps back and I couldn't help but notice a warm, fluttery feeling in my stomach. No, no! Think happy thoughts, think happy thoughts. Um, uhh, dead kittens-- no, dead ponies! Cops beating up hippies! The poisonous sensation faded, and I opened my eyes to see the pony brats eyeing me in curiosity. Me, I had nothing to say to them so I let out an aggravated growl and turned, cursing this waste of time and making back towards the mud village.

"Hey wait, where are you going, miss?"

There was the sound of hurried hoof beats and to my dismay, there they were again, trotting on either side of me. I gave off my best 'fuck off/don't bother me' vibe, but they were still much too young to pick up on it, so it went over their heads.

"Where are you going?" asked the Pegasus.

"Away."

"Away where?"

"Away from you. Now stop following me."

"What? But where are we supposed to go?" asked the unicorn.

"You got homes, don't you? Go there and stop bothering me," I replied through gritted teeth.

"We can't," said the unicorn. "Scootaloo got us lost and now we can't tell where Ponyville is."

"Yeah, that's... hey, wait. What do you mean I got us lost?" The one apparently called Scootaloo asked, frowning at her ilk.

"You're the one Applebloom and I were following, and you're the one that got us lost," the unicorn said accusingly.

"Me?! I was following Applebloom's lead!"

"No, Sweetie Belle and I were following your lead."

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

"Were not!"

"We did so!"

I couldn't stand that bickering in their annoyingly cute, high-pitched voices, so I whirled around, teeth bared in a snarl. "Be quiet, you little saccharine pieces of moe fluff!"

"What? But she's the one who--"

"I... don't... care. Just shut up and leave me in peace."

The little brats pouted sullenly and shut up. I resumed my walk and tried to ignore them, a task made all the harder by the fact the little beasts conveniently ignored my orders and kept on following me. I sighed and kept myself from making any number of unpleasant retorts, hoping they wouldn't bug me anymore.

No such luck.

"Say, what's your name?" Asked the orange one.

I sighed. "What were you brats doing here anyway?"

"Hey, we're not brats! My name is Scootaloo."

"I'm Sweetie Belle."

"And ahm Applebloom."

"And we're the Cutie Mark Crusaders!" they all said in unison.

"The what now?"

"It's our own exclusive club, and we're dedicated to find our special talents!" Said the one Apparently called Applebloom.

"Yeah, but we haven't had a lot of luck so far," said the pegasus.

"So we came here to see if we could get our cutie marks in foraging."

That there made me stop. "You came here willingly?"

"Uh-huh."

"Eeyup."

"Kinda."

"But... why?" I asked flabbergastedly.

"Tuh get our cutie marks," the little brat answered, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

"I mean why in the hell you'd come into a forest filled with dangerous predators."

"We gotta do what we gotta do to get our cutie marks."

"Yeah! Besides, it's not the only time we've come here."

"We've tried critter wrasslin'."

"Potions' making."

"Adventuring."

"Mapmaking."

"Mud farming'."

"Insect collecting."

"Hang Gliding."

"Fine, fine, I get it," I bit impatiently. "Just... don't talk anymore."

The more I listened to these brats, the more I wished I had simply left them to perish. I mean... these retarded little pieces of shit willingly ventured into the forest, knowing it's filled with dangers and have even been accosted by those very same monsters more than once. Really, what kind of moron keeps venturing into danger knowing full well it could be the last choice they make.

I resumed my walk and the little beasts followed suit. I mostly tried to ignore them and their attempts to try to talk to me. More than once was I sorely tempted to simply unleash a vicious verbal tirade against them or strangle their little necks. Well, thankfully we got to the mud village and I was able to ditch the brats.

I moved on and eventually came upon Ponyville. I avoided the cottage with the hippie pegasus and was walking the dirt road into town when I heard a noise coming up behind me, the frantic flapping of wings. It quickly drew near and a feminine voice called out. “Look out belooow!” I turned my head only to see a grayish blur speeding at me, hurtling out of control. Before I could move or unleash a lethal blow, it crashed into me, sending us both sprawling to the ground. Reacting on instinct, I scrambled back up as quick as I could, or… tried, at least. I was still not entirely accustomed to a pony body and found myself tasting dirt. Still, I prevailed over the lesser pony form and got to my hooves and if needed, ready to massacre the little beast that assaulted me.

There she was, a pegasus mare and she seemed even more disoriented than me. Her hair blond, coat grey and a cutie mark of… bubbles? The hell kind of talent is that? She sat up, shook her head vigorously and opened her eyes, which I could see were pointing in different directions.

Damn, did that fall cause a brain injury or something?

She looked to me and gasped, her wings fluttered and she hovered over me. “Oh, no! Are you okay? I-I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to crash into you, but I was running so late and I caught a bad draft and…” she gasped and her bulbous eyes looked about ready to pop out. She looked behind her and sure enough, there in the ground was a satchel of some sort and scattered all around it were various cards and envelopes. “Oh, ponyfeathers! Not again!”

In a blink of an eye she was already there, frantically, scooping up the satchel’s contents and blowing to get the dirt off. When she got all of them, she was about to dart off to who knows where, but at the last moment hesitated and looked at me again. The klutz fluttered close to me and, after reaching into her satchel, produced a muffin and held it out expectantly, a goofy, ditzy smile on her fuzzy mug. “Here you go, take it.”

I merely blinked stupidly, much too baffled at the absurd scene before me. The pegasus, realizing I was not about to move, opted instead to bend down and grab one of my legs upon she promptly placed the baked treat. Good thing for her too, for otherwise I would have broken her foreleg for such audacity.

“Alright, you enjoy that. And sorry for bumping into you, it won’t happen again.” She gave me another smile and zipped off towards the town. I dumbly watched her go and no sooner did she enter the edge of town and flew behind a house that another familiar yell rang forth.

“Look out belooow!”

And sure enough there was a crashing sound, accompanied by a rougher male voice. Even from all the way there I could make out the sounds of arguing as the male pony berated the klutz, who was once again trying to gather all her mail. The hell is up with these ponies?

I looked to the muffin still resting in the base of my hoof and gave it a smell. Hmm, banana nut. No doubt it was delicious, but it had been touched by the klutz’s filthy hoof and my own equally dirty one, so I tossed it away and resumed my walk towards the mud village.

I didn't get more than a few steps before a flash of movement drew my attention. Skulking back from the commotion was the klutz, hastily trotting in her pony hooves to hide behind one of the houses and away from the ruckus she'd caused, but that's not what was unusual. No, what was unusual was the fact that even as the klutz was lurking, eyes shifty and looking around suspiciously, that very same pony fluttered back up at the other end of the house and beelined further into town.

Huh, I guess they're twins.

And then just like that, the lurking one was enveloped in a cloak of green flames and where the gray pegasus once stood, now a... black, bug looking, pony thing was in its place. Flames enveloped it again and this time it's form was now that of...

Oh, my god, it's the pink idiot from yesterday!

The pony thing, whatever it was, looked satisfied enough, for it adopted a big, idiotic smile and bounced off into town. As far as I knew, there were only five pony types; unicorns, earth, pegasi, alicorns and sea ponies-- yes, that’s right, sea ponies-- but that buggy looking thing was not among them. Gotta imagine, seeing how it was hiding and these incompetent ponies get scared at the slightest provocation, it was probably up to no good. It was one of the things that got me wondering about this world.

These ponies were basically talking… well ponies. Herbivores. Prey species. And I knew at least to be griffons as well. Did that mean there were other intelligent species that preyed on ponies? For all I knew that funky bug thing might very well be one of them. Well, whatever. These ponies have magic, flight and supposedly enhanced strength and vitality, not to mention sapience, self-awareness and intelligence on par with that of a human. If with all of these virtues they were still incompetent enough to be preyed on by another species, or not even realize they are being preyed on by another species, then why in the world should I step in? Nah, better to step back and allow nature to take its course. For all I know, they are doomed to extinction anyway. That being said, if that freaky little bugger comes after me, I will be more than glad to show it who’s the apex predator around these parts.

And with that over, I decided to stop dawdling and head for the town library, but even as I walked around the mud village, I got the sense that there was something… different about it. I looked around, taking in the details and trying to pinpoint the reason. Everything seemed more or less normal. The little pukes were still going about their mundane, peasant routines, some of them obviously having gone shopping, tending to their gardens and front yards; little foals scurrying around, no doubt up to no good and various pegasi flew lazily through the air, not the least bit in a hurry.

So bugged was I about this that I did not notice myself bumping into another pony with enough force to send him to the ground. I gave a startled squeak and, upon laying eyes on my unintentional victim, I froze. The unmistakeable golden armor of the pony guard was a dead giveaway. It was a male, I think, of the earth variety.

I sucked in a sharp breath as he pulled himself back up. Bulky and quite a bit taller than me. His helmet had fallen and he paused to pick it back up. He turned to look at me, and he had the distinct air of a teacher staring disapprovingly on an irascible student.

“You want to be careful, miss,” he said, his voice neither angry nor amiable. Just firm and carrying a natural sort of command, which I guess would be the norm for them. “Ponies could be hurt.”

“Uh, r-right. Right, sorry. I-I didn’t see where I was going.” Shit, I think I actually feel a bit intimidated by him.

He began to say something along the lines of the typical ‘Don’t worry about it’ spiel before it hit me. I looked through my peripheral vision and finally realized just what was different about the mud village.

It was the guards. The previous times, they’d been relatively unobtrusive and had stayed at the edge of the picture, so to speak, but now that I looked, I could see that there were considerably more of them and this time in plain view, patrolling and stuff.

I looked back to the guard, waiting for him to finish his part and asked about the situation, but he merely told me it was them just doing their duty, which in my opinion was bullshit. We parted ways and I made for the treebrary, this time actually taking care to knock before I came in. The lizard answered, and upon seeing it was me, its catlike eyes narrowed in disapproval. Obviously it didn’t take kindly of my dismissals and lack of manners the day before, not that I cared what this little purple papule thought.

“Oh, it’s you,” it said. “What do you want?”

The thing’s uppity attitude made the corner of my lip curl, but I managed to keep my composure. “I’m looking for your master. Is she here?”

It blinked in confusion. “My… master?”

Jesus Christ are you dense. “Yeah, you know. Twilight Sparkle, ‘bout yea high, has a horn and wings” I said, slowly drawing out the word. I didn’t want to repeat myself.

It scowled. “Yeah, she’s here, and she’s not my master.”

Well now, this is a surprise. “So what is she to you, exactly?”

The lizard opened its mouth to respond, and was about to say something before stopping cold. Its face scrunched up and it adopted a contemplative expression. “Well, um… she’s--”

Well, this is a productive use of my time. “Yeah, fascinating. I’m gonna go in now.”

So caught up was the lizard in its thoughts that it did not immediately notice me pushing past and into the tree’s interior. Its weak protests died in my ears and I looked around, hoping to see Twilight Sparkle. Yup, there she was, in the upstairs floor. Her back was turned to me and I could see she was using her pony magic to mess around with a bunch of books on the shelves.

I made my way over, only somewhat clumsily climbing the stairs and cleared my throat to get her attention. Her ears twitched and the jaunty tune she was humming under her breath stopped. She turned and seeing it was me, offered me a smile. “Oh, hello Febreze. What brings you here.”

I pulled the book out the bag and presented it. “Came to return this.”

Her pony magic stopped and she turned from her task to come over to me. “That was quick. You only had it for one night.”

“Yeah. It… wasn’t what I was looking for.”

She chuckled lightly. “Yes, sorry to hear that, but I told you Pie Tin was not the most reliable of ponies.” Her horn lit up and for an instant, the book in my hoof glowed the same color, before immediately dissipating.

We both blinked. “Well, that’s odd,” Twilight said. A slight frown appeared on her face and she charged up her pony magic again and just like before, it fizzled out almost immediately after enveloping the book.

"And that's even stranger," she said and brought up her hoof to lightly tap her horn. She looked to the book with a concentrated look, narrowing her eyes at it as though it had slighted her. She tried again and this time the glow in her horn was considerably brighter.

I didn't want her to get suspicious of my true nature, so as soon as the book lit up I immediately let go. She'd poured so much magic in a simple spell and now that my chaos magic was no longer interfering with her own, the book rocketed towards her and Twilight could only muster a flinch before being smacked right in the nose. The book fell unceremoniously while Twilight moaned in agony, grabbing at her bleeding nose with a hoof.

I grimaced. Yeowch, that looks like it hurts. “Uh, sorry. Are you alright?” Now why in the world did I ask that?

“Y-yes, I’m fine. Just…” she said thickly. Her horn glowed again, this time a softer, gentler glow and after a few seconds it dissipated. She removed the hoof from her nose, now no longer bleeding but her fur was marred with a few red trickles. I couldn’t help but notice it clashed horribly with her coat.

There was a smattering of footsteps and the lizard emerged out the staircase. Its eyes quickly darted around until they came across Twilight’s blood streaked face. “Ohmygosh, Twilight! What happened?” It scurried to the bathroom and came out shortly thereafter, rudely bumping into me as it brought out a damp towel which it used to wipe the blotches from its owner’s face.

“Thanks, Spike,” Twilight said appreciatively, still holding the tip of her hoof to her nose.

“Did she do something to you?” the lizard asked, turning to me and eyeing me with suspicion. Well, I couldn’t fault it too much as it kind of was my fault it happened.

“No, spike, Febreze didn’t do anything. It was just an accident,” Twilight said diplomatically.

“See? Innocent,” I added unhelpfully.

The lizard… uh, Spike, was it? Anyway, it opened its mouth to retort, but at that moment a series of knocks came from the front door.

“Could you get that for me, Spike?” Twilight asked. “I need to finish up here.”

“Yeah, sure,” it grumbled and went on to do as its mistress commanded.

“What were you doing anyway?” I asked as soon as, um… dammit! What was the lizard’s name again? Something pointy, right? Anyway, I asked as soon as the lizard left.

“Nothing much, just giving the shelves a bit of a dusting.” Her horn glowed again and every single book in the shelves in front of her floated off. Meanwhile, she grabbed a feathery duster nearby with a telekinetic hold and used it to wipe said shelves. Why she bothered with this, I don’t know as the things were already pretty clean.

“...Right. By the way, can I ask you something?”

She nodded and ‘mmhm’d’.

“What’s with all the guards out there in the street? There weren’t that many the other day.”

Her ears flicked. “Oh, that. There’s been a string of robberies happening across Ponyville for the last week. I posted the guards to keep an eye out for suspicious activity.”

Well that’s just perfect. It seems I’ll have to tone down the B&E for now.

“Do, um,” I began to say, trying not to sound nervous. “Is there any idea who’s behind it all?”

She hummed briefly before answering. “None yet, I’m afraid, but whoever it is I hope they’ll be caught soon. They’ve been making off with a lot of stuff and it’s making things hard for everypony involved.”

Crap, now I definitely have to 86 any future robberies. If Twilight herself, a princess was becoming active in it then it’s best I call it quits for now. Granted, I still had quite a bit of stolen loot back at the castle that would get me through for a good time, but you never knew when you’d need a little something. And yeah, I still had a little bit of… well, bits when I robbed Sugarcube corner, but I had no idea how the monetary system in Equestria worked. Well, I didn’t get too much time to dwell on this, for coming up the stairs was a unicorn mare with a pure white, marshmallowy coat and impossibly curled mane and tail.

“Twilight?” she called out in a kinda sorta British-ish accent.

She turned and seeing it was her, immediately dropped what she was doing and headed over to greet the unicorn. “Oh, good morning, Rarity,” she said and nuzzled her friend. “What brings you by?”

“Good morning, dearie. I came by to see if… oh, hello there,” she said, noticing my presence.

“Hey,” I said, giving her a nod.

"I apologize for not noticing you, dearie." She then looked to her only other equal in the room. "Would you introduce us, Twilight?"

The alicorn blinked. "Hm? Oh, yes... sorry. Febreze, this is Rarity. Rarity, this is Febreze, she is visiting Ponyville."

The unicorn apparently called Rarity smiled and did a sort of weird pony curtsy. "Charmed, I'm sure."

Um... 'kay. I could do little but smile awkwardly. Whether she was bothered by this or not I did not know, for she turned back to Twilight.

“Twilight, I didn’t know you had company. This is very unlike you.“

“How do you mean?”

“Oh, you know, dear. It’s just that… well, you’re not usually the type to entertain visitors save for the girls and I. Come to think of it, I believe this young filly here is the only guest you’ve had since… well, ever.”

Apparently, Twilight took offense to this and was about to retort before I cut in. “You make it sound as though she’s a shut-in or something of the sort.”

Surprisingly enough, Rarity giggled and Twilight actually looked a bit embarrassed, if her shifty eyes were an indication. “Oh, you don’t know the half of it, dear, but Twilight is a very studious mare. She’s been known to coop herself with her books for days at a time. Won’t come out for any reason. Why, sometimes I worry I’ll come here and find out she’s a vampony!”

Vampony? Seriously?

“Heh. Ha, ha, yeah…” she chuckled and trailed off awkwardly. “Is there something you came for, Rarity?”

“Yes, actually. I wanted to see if you’d like to accompany for a day out on the town. I was thinking we could swing by for lunch, and then take a full course at the spa which, if I may say, darling, you are way overdue. Oh, and I was thinking we could go pay Rainbow Dash a visit. The poor dear must be so bored and I was thinking we could bring her one of those Daring Do books she likes so much.”

“Isn’t Pinkie with her?”

“Well, yes. But she’s been with Dash all day yesterday and… I know she means well, but even Pinkie Pie needs some time to herself.”

Twilight didn’t look too convinced, so the other one, Rarity, spoke up again. “Come on dear. Please? This has all been hard on everypony, but I’m sure it would do Dash some good to see your face.”

Twilight sighed and gave her a small smile. “Well, I have been kind of cooping myself up, haven’t I?”

Rarity nodded abashedly. “The girls and I didn’t want to say anything, but yes, you kind of have.”

"Well, I guess I could go for a bite." She then turned to me. "You know, Febreze here is visiting Ponyville. Why don't we invite her and show her the sights?"

Rarity’s oversized pony eyes gleamed. “Why, I think that’s a splendid idea.” She then turned to me. “What do you say, dear, would you like to accompany us? We’d be delighted to have you.”

Uh, wait, what? I came here to return a book. How did we get from that to being invited for a girls’ day out? “Um, I really shouldn’t. I don’t want to be a bother.”

“Nonsense! I already told you, dear, Twilight and I would be glad to have you.”

Christ, can’t you take a hint? I should have outright said no. I should have outright said I’d rather snort a line of fire ants before engaging in girly, fru-fru activities. I should have outright said to her that if she didn’t quit bugging me, I’d give her a first hand demonstration in what it felt like to be a bloodied pony pancake.

“O-okay.”

Goddamnit!

Rarity clapped both her hooves, somehow not managing to lose her balance. “Excellent! Oh, we’re going to have the best time, I can already tell.”

Twilight nodded. “Sounds like a plan. Anyway, would you girls excuse me? I’d like to get a bit freshened up before we leave.”

Rarity approved. “By all means, Twilight, take however long you need. A princess has to look her best when she goes out.”

“Alright, you girls make yourselves comfortable. I’ll be done as soon as I can.” She then headed into her bedroom, closing the door shut and leaving us there.

By ourselves.

All alone.

Shit.

As we waited there for Twilight, I could see that Rarity was acting a bit dodgy. She was staring at me, but not staring at me. It was one of those things. Her eyes would dart over for a second or two, taking in my details and then she’d shift her attention to something else. This went over for a bit, her creeping at me, and me getting more and more flustered by the second. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say she was restraining herself from speaking. Well, eventually, I’d had enough and turned to her while she was creeping at me.

“What?” I asked brusquely.

She blinked a bit and recoiled. “Oh… oh, my goodness. Pardon me, Febreze. I did not mean to stare, it’s just that...”

“Yes?” I asked, eyes narrowed.

A pensive look came on her fuzzy mug and tapped a hoof to her chin twice before speaking. “Might I ask… where you got that frock you’re wearing?”

I arched an eyebrow at the odd question but answered nonetheless. "A... friend gave it to me." I did not care to elaborate beyond that.

Rarity hummed. "Ah, I see." She gave me a once over again and looked away, her pony lips pursed shut and it looked as though she was restraining herself from speaking anymore.

Now, this was perfectly fine with me as I had no interest to engage her further and so I made myself comfortable(or as comfortable as one can be when standing on four legs while occupying the alien form of a pony) and waited patiently for Twilight to finish up so we could be on our way.

Me, I opted to remain stock still, while Rarity fidgeted, shifting her weight and kept on shooting uneasy looks at me.

I closed my eyes. Good god, what is taking that alicorn so long?

Was she getting dressed or something? Probably fixing herself up to go out. I sometimes forget girls tend to take a while before going out in public, but that was never much of a problem for me so these things tend to slip my mind.

I waited, not saying a word, and Rarity kept on looking at me. To my dismay, she didn't stop and so, finally losing my patience, I heaved a defeated sigh and turned to her, not bothering to hide the annoyance in my face.

"What?" I said in a near hiss.

Rarity couldn't contain herself any longer. She started to walk to me, speaking in a hurried manner. "I-it's just that I'm a dressmaker, dearie, and I know a thing or two about fashion. It's my passion, don't you know. A-and forgive me for saying this, I'm not usually so forward but..." She was now next to me and grabbed a piece of my frock with her hoof. "This is simply an affront to fashion, dear. I'm sorry, I don't mean to besmirch your or your friend's tastes, but it is. And you know, I have my own little clothes shop not too far from here. We could swing by really quick. I'm sure there's a few outfits that would just look fabulous on you." She then cupped my face with both her filthy-- no, wait. Her hooves were actually pretty clean. Sparkling, even. Clean enough to eat out of, not that I’d ever do, but still. She smushed my cheeks and caused my lips to stick out somehow managing to not lose her balance. She then leaned in closely, taking in my features. "A-and you have such lovely eyes and nice, full, thick eyelashes. I could do a bit of a touch up and we'd be able to really help your natural beauty come forth and I'm sure you'd have all the colts swooning over you. Now, wouldn't that be nice?"

With enormous restraint on my part, I pried her hooves from my face and simply said, "No."

"A-what? But... darling, what do you mean no?"

"I mean I'm not interested."

"B-but... I... are you," she paused. "Satisfied with the way you look?"

I narrowed my eyes and my voice took on a deathly quiet quality. "And what is wrong with the way I look?"

She looked like she was about to jump into a pointless drivel, but at the last moment her eyes widened and a look of realization spread across her fuzzy mug. "Oh... oh!" She gave me a small embarrassed smiled and backed away a bit. "I'm sorry dear. I did not mean to put you in an uncomfortable position, I just tend to get a teensy bit carried away in matters of fashion. And no there's nothing wrong with the way you look. Nothing at all!" It might have been my imagination, but it seemed she was trying to convince herself more than me. "After all every pony has their own unique sense of fashion, yours just happens to be more... well, um... different than what I'm used to seeing," she finished with what might have meant to be a reassuring smile, though it seemed a bit forced and it faltered as she gave me a once over again. It was obvious that my refusal for her to gussy me up seemed to be causing her a great deal of suffering, which was just dandy in my book.

Luckily, Twilight chose that moment to emerge from her bedroom and... she looked exactly the same. No, wait, it was her mane. Where before it was only somewhat straight, with only a few hairs sticking out here and there it was now completely straight and uniform in appearance, with literally none a hair out of place-- so straight and orderly that even the most fastidious nazi would approve of.

"Okay, girls. I hope I didn't keep you waiting too long."

"Not at all, dear. Febreze and I were just getting better acquainted. Are you ready to go?"

She nodded her agreement and so we went, with me trailing along reluctantly. Granted, this Twilight was just a pony, but she was also a princess and even though, for some reason she chose to rule this backwards, unenlightened mud village I was still not aware of how much power she truly wielded. It would be a real bummer if she takes offense to my admittedly offensive views of her and her ilk and chooses to bring her might down upon me.

As we walked on through the town, I couldn't help but notice how the serfs and peasants reacted to their ruler being out in the streets. Namely, they didn't react at all. Nothing, nada, zilch. No words of adulation, no prostrating themselves, nothing at all to indicate she was anything other than a normal pony. I mean, what the hell? As a princess they should very well know what she looked like, and I would normally be willing to dismiss this as the fact she wore no princessy ornaments whatsoever. No cape, no cane, no tiara, no crown, not even freakin' pony slippers made of glass. Even so, there were only a total of four alicorns currently residing in Equestria, and as stupid and incompetent as these ponies may be, surely even they would take notice if their ruler saw it fit enough to grace their filthy, fetid, mud streaked streets with her presence

Even more baffling was how she didn't have any sort of guard detail. She was supposed to be a princess, for chrissakes and there she was, out in the open. If I so desired, could just lunge forward and crush her rotund, purple head like an overripe grape. Are princesses so undervalued here or what? I mean... that's just... not...

What?!

No, no, remember what we talked about, girl. Just accept it, accept it... yeah.

Well, anyway, we got to the restaurant which for this primitive mud village, was relatively modern looking. Everything was smaller to fit the lesser pony form, with low tables and instead of chairs, the place used cushions which were actually very soft and comfortable. Pony waiters were traipsing around here and there, balancing trays on their backs or mouths and a surprisingly decadent smell filled the place. Despite the fact all they served here was vegetarian hippie crap, the smell was so good it actually made my mouth water.

We got seated and again, neither the hostess or the waiters or any of the other peons made any sort of recognition for Twilight and the fact she didn't seem to mind was really starting to bug me. Either the whole princess system was a farce, or Twilight herself was simply not respected and her princess title was a gimmick more than anything.

Anyway, we got seated, got drinks and got to talking, or rather, Twilight and Rarity talked while trying to include me every now and then, asking me about myself and generally doing that cutesy bonding crap people did. My answers tended to be short and clipped, but if it bothered them they did not show it.

Our waiter then arrived, and I had to consciously keep myself from sneering and making any sort of snide remarks. He was an earth stallion; white coated and his black mane, slick and greased with way too much product. A pretentious mustache grew across his horse muzzle, and he wore a pony version of a tuxedo. Lastly, there was a look of condescending superiority on his mug that made me want to punch his lights out.

"Welcome to the Polished Glass, madams and miss. My name is Silver Platter and I shall be your host this afternoon. Have you decided what you want to eat?"

Urge to snark... rising...

Gawd, his voice had a snooty, nasally quality to it. The urge to snark and deride welled up in my chest, and it was truly a monumental feat that I kept myself from acting up on it. Anyway, Twilight placed her order; some sort of grilled vegetable dish while Rarity got what looked to be a vegetarian version of eggs benedict. Content though they were with their rabbit food, I did not share their sentiments. To my despair, the menu did not offer anything that was not made with some sort of vegetable. Luckily, the kids', or rather, foals' menu had more acceptable alternatives and in the end, I wound up ordering a tall glass of milk and a peanut butter and marshmallow fluff sandwich. The frenchy waiter left and once again, my two most gracious hosts tried to do the whole getting-to-know-you schtick. I guess it was nice of them to try, but I hadn't come here to make friends.

Thankfully, the food hit the table rather quick and so their attempts at conversation mostly fizzled out. My sammie was unusually delicious, better than the ones I used to make back home and the milk itself was richer and more full-bodied than that Wal-Mart brand. I was a bit unsure on how to eat it, as I didn't want to pick it up with my soiled hooves, but after a quick glance around I could see Pegasi and earth ponies simply hunching down and taking a bite, not unlike a dog. Normally, I wouldn't stoop myself to these creatures' level, but free food was free food, and PB and marshmallow fluff and I went way back, so I was willing to make an exception. Just this time... really.

Rarity seemed to be enjoying herself too. she used her unicorn magic to daintily pick up her cutlery(how levitation can be made to look dainty, I don’t know, but she was somehow doing it) and cutting off bite sized pieces, carefully dabbing her mouth with the napkin after each bite despite the fact there were no smears or food to clean off.

Twilight too looked pleased with her plate of vegetables and to my mild surprise, bent down to take a large bite, not opting to use her pony magic. She chewed noisily, making ecstatic sounds and every now and then, a crumb of food would escape her mouth.

Sheesh... look at your princess, peons. Truly she is the epitome of grace and royalty.

Damn, even I had better table manners than her. The sloppy display did not go unnoticed by Rarity, who forced her face into a neutral expression, but she was much too anal about such matters to completely hide it, as her eye twitched erratically. She actually looked a bit embarrassed… hell, even I started to feel put out by our esteemed princess’ table manners.

“Eh… Twilight, darling. Do you think you might want to, oh, I don’t know… slow down just a teensy little bit?” she asked delicately.

*Nom, nom, nom* “Huh? Hwassat, ‘Airity?” she asked through a mouthful of half chewed veggies.

“You’re being a slob,” I cut in brusquely.

She actually looked taken aback, while Rarity gasped. “Febreze! That was very rude of you. Surely there’s a more tactful way you could have let Twilight know how uncouth she was.”

With a big gulp, Twilight swallowed her food. Kinda looked painful…

“Oh… was I really that bad?” she asked timidly, ears splayed back and a faint rosy tint in her cheeks. Ok, seriously? How can ponies blush? They’re covered in fur, goddamn it!

Rarity’s eyes widened and she immediately moved to do damage control. “N-no, not at all darling! We didn’t mean to put you down. It’s just that… well, you’re a princess now, Twilight. Don't you think you should... how should I put it... eat in a way more befitting somepony of your stature?"

Twilight did not answer immediately. She dabbed her mouth with her napkin and a slight crease formed in her brow. "Rarity," she began to say in that exasperated sort of way. The kind one uses in an oft discussed topic. "I've told you before, I don't want to be or be treated any differently just because I'm a princess."

Rarity nodded. "Yes, I can understand that, darling, but even if you are not a princess there are still some rules of etiquette everypony should follow."

"That was pretty disgusting," I said, adding in my two cents.

Rarity spared me an exasperated look before turning back to her reluctant overlord. "What I think Febreze is trying to say is that other ponies might be put off by such uncouth table manners."

Twilight sighed and chuckled sheepishly. "Well, I guess I was a bit of a slob. But I couldn't help it. The food was just so good and I forgot to eat lunch and dinner yesterday. Guess I got a bit carried away."

"Perfectly alright, dear. Just something to keep in mind."

And with that, Twilight emulated Rarity and used her magic to manipulate her cutlery, cutting off a piece of a brussel sprout(say, that's a name derived from a human city in my world. Are they called brussel sprouts here as well?) and placing it in her mouth, chewing and swallowing at a normal pace.

"Better?" she asked coyly.

Rarity beamed and nodded her approval. "Much."

Then they both broke out in giggles. Me, I rolled my eyes and suppressed a suffering sigh, praying to the gods to maybe send down a meteor and kill us all.

Oh, the Friendships You'll Go

The fetid town of Ponyville burned. The once green earth lay blackened and razed, those insufferable Disney themed buildings were ablaze in flames, consuming their charmingly rustic exteriors. Those trapped inside screamed and wailed as the flames surrounded them, consuming the air and feeding off their despair. A lucky few would be claimed by the noxious fumes of the smoke-- coughing harshly and their throats burning as the toxic chemicals irritated their throat and lungs and those unluckier still would be cooked to death by the glorious flames.

The outside of the houses fared little better. The sky’s normally gentle blue had been overcome by a sinister crimson tinge that bathed this whole accursed pastel land in an ominous red glow. Across the streets lay rubble, upturned earth and various other debris and intermingled among them were the corpses of ponies. Unicorn, earth, pegasi, there were no exceptions.

Those who were still alive ran for their lives as Daedra of all kinds chased after them. Dremora lords in plated armor wielded longswords, sharpened to the point they could cut stone with ease, cruel battleaxes capable of splitting the sturdiest of creatures in half and massive warhammers. Scores of ponies fell as they were hacked to pieces, stabbed, crushed or completely bisected in half.

Any who attempted to put up a resistance were terminated with extreme prejudice. Frost, Storm and Flame Atronachs joined the fray, the latter lobbing fireballs, indiscriminately setting everything and anything on fire-- Storm Atronachs, wielding one of nature’s most devastating forces, fired lightning bolts with pinpoint precision, their victims exploding in a messy burst of blood, bone and pulpy bits of gore as the sheer heat and intensity of the lightning strikes literally fried their insides, boiling their blood and searing their guts and entrails. Frost Atronachs barreled forward, engaging the lesser equines in full frontal assault, their massive ice bodies able to repel bolts, swords and spear thrusts with ease. Over four times the size of a pony, they simply crushed their victims underneath their massive ‘feet’, using their superior size and weight to their advantage, and the poor saps who thought their primitive, medieval abodes would protect them were in for an unpleasant surprise as the ice behemoths broke through the walls of their mud shacks with ease.

No one was spared. Those who attempted to flee were accosted by the Scamps-- small, goblin-like Daedra who swarmed in overwhelming numbers, their sharp claws and needle-like teeth tearing and rending flesh from their unfortunate victims with ease, reducing them to nothing but bones in less than a minute. The stench of mud was overcome by that of death as in less than an hour, the whole entire village now ran red with blood. None were left alive. The Daedra feasted on the flesh of the dead.

It was glorious…

“Febreze? Did you hear me?”

And just like that, I was broken out of my daydream and brought back to the crappy reality of reality.

“Huh?” I looked around, noting with disappointment that everything was still normal. The sky was still blue, the town was still intact and the streets were most certainly not littered with body parts, hacked ponies or stained red with blood.

"The spa, dear. Don't you think a trip there would be nice?" asked Rarity.

"Yeah, sure," I shrugged, not caring either way.

"Ah, splendid! Oh, you are just going to love it, I promise you. They have this hot herbal bath that leaves you so very clean, and the mud they use in their mud baths is imported straight from Atlantaur; some of the best in the world, don't you know. And Lotus gives the most heavenly massages. Why you'll feel as if your bones are made of putty, you simply have to try it--"

Stop... please, for the love of all that is good and holy, stop.

Rarity trailed ahead of us, lost in her own little world. Twilight shot me a sympathetic look and leaned close.

"You'll have to forgive Rarity. She means well but sometimes forgets not all ponies share her enthusiasms."

"Just never been much for the spa scene..."

Twilight giggled. "Neither was I before I came to Ponyville. Rarity had to practically drag me from my studies and into the spa."

"And you like it now?"

"Of course. Before coming to live here, I would never even dream of stepping into a spa. I realize now a trip every once in awhile is very enjoyable. It helps me de-stress and forget about my worries for a while, and let me tell you, that is something I definitely need."

I hummed and considered this for a moment. "Because you're a princess, right?"

She considered this for a moment. "A little of that, a little because I tend to burnout whenever I get carried away in my studies-- but what I'm trying to say is that I've come to rely on these trips to help me relax. And without Rarity, I never would have discovered this... probably for the rest of my life. It's because I made friends with her that my eyes were opened to new experiences."

"I guess that's true."

It was a fair point, I'll admit. And hey, if I'm going to be stuck in this infernal, derelict horse land then I might as well try a few new things.

And, ew, the view was still unpleasant. Put on some clothes, you heathens!

I tried to keep my attention on other things. The weather, the stench of mud that permeated the town-- hell, even the humans. Still not all that used to them. I mean, there’s really no way to properly describe the sight of a colt running past you, with a little boy following suit. Looked about six years old, with clothes, thankfully and chasing after his master in a dorky, four legged gait, making disturbingly cute squeaky noises. Eesh.

I saw him when we were passing through the market, which was in full swing. It was packed and all, but being an isolated, sleepy settlement, the ponies went about their business in a paced manner, dragging little wagons, carts or oversized saddlebags for their groceries. Twilight and Rarity went squee over some exotic pet things in a spot claimed by a pony mare, the mud variety, wearing an African hunter's ensemble and with a cutie mark of three teddy bears. And they were not the only ones. A crowd of mares surrounded whatever she was peddling. After pushing and shoving our way through(well, Twilight and Rarity mostly said 'excuse me' while I pushed through) I could see what the commotion was about.

In a wired pen were some weird fuzzballs. That's really the best way to describe them. Like the ponies, they came in a variety of colors. About soccer ball-sized, bulbous eyes and beaks on their otherwise featureless faces. That's really all they were. Two small, rabbit like stumps protruded out their bottom and they used these to waddle around in an irritatingly cute manner, making the gathered ponies coo and squeal in delight and if that wasn't bad enough, the fuzzballs could also kind of retract their stunted legs and roll around like a self-propelled ball of concentrated kawaii.

The sucrose levels around me were nearing critical mass, so I turned tail and got the hell out of there, practically dragging my two most gracious hosts despite their cries of protest. Rarity was all like how she wanted to get one and snuggle the hay-- yes, that's right, the hay-- out of it, until Twilight reminded her how she already had to care and clean up after her sister and cat. That shut her up.

With that done, we left the marketplace and I couldn't help but wonder why I didn't just ditch them while they were busy making googly eyes at the fuzzballs. There was something odd about the way Rarity was acting. As we passed some residential street, there were humans aplenty, most of them collared and confined to the front yards. She seemed to avoid looking at them. And get this, they were all ugly. Well, most of them. I mean, I don’t expect every single person on Earth, or whatever this world is called to be attractive but really, most every human-- males and females were not all that pleasant to look at. Really, about the most good looking one I saw was was a girl about my age, short curly hair, fair skin and a heart shaped face. She sat at the shade of a tree, calmly and obediently and… good god, her clothes, and I’m using that word very lightly, were more akin to a nighty. You know, the one girls use for sexy fun times. White, lacy, ruffled… see through. And if she stood up, I’d be willing to bet it would barely reach past her waist.

Upon looking more closely I could see she was wearing nothing under there.

Calm down, calm down. It’s not her fault. She’s not a whore. She’s not showing off her delectably toned body. She… she’s a victim, yes. That’s it. A victim. Definitely not a stuck up bitch queen.

Unlike the other humans, her collar looked to be made of higher quality materials and sitting not too far from her were two mud fillies, a pink one with some sort of tiara and a grey one with horn rimmed glasses. A checkered blanket underneath them and enjoying a picnic, every now and then throwing the girl a little something her way, which she eagerly scooped up.

But yeah, apart from her, most all other humans registered somewhere between average and below. Hell, the men had pronounced noses and foreheads. Kinda made them seem Neanderthalish. One thing they did share with people in my world was their bodies were in different states of fitness. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that, being bereft of clothes, looking at a select number of them was a horrifying experience.

And yet, other times it was not. I mean, yeah, the situation was all kinds of fucked up, but still. While there were humans aplenty who were more or less fugly, a few of them were not. Even as we walked to the spa, I couldn’t help but keep my eyes from stealing fleeting glances now and then. There was this one human, looked to be in his twenties. Not bad looking and with a muscley swimmer’s physique. Tall, bronzed, a six pack.

Now, I wasn’t entirely unfamiliar with the opposite sex. Or at least, how they looked under clothes. I-I mean, I was a teenage girl and before being stuck in this accursed land I did have access to the internet. And of course, back on Earth I had never, ever, seen a naked guy up in real life, but here, with a prime example of the male species, unclothed and with just the slightest sheen of perspiration on his-- ugh, curse me-- dreamy, rocking bod, I couldn’t help but look. It was like my eyes were acting on their own accord. Traveling from his broad shoulders, perfectly sculpted pecs, those killer abs, and all the way down to his… his…

I gulped. My jaw went slack. Did everything go hot all of a sudden?

I… I couldn’t tear my eyes away and really, I didn’t want to at the moment. Blood pounded in my ears, drowning out most of everything and a foggy blur crept up at the edges of my vision. A-and… I started to have… thoughts. Some of which I never would have imagined myself having. I will say this though; there’s nothing quite like seeing it in real life.

Something poked my ribs. My vision cleared, I inhaled sharply, shook my head to clear the daze.

“Feeling okay there?”

Yup, there was Twilight, her hoof still raised, her eyes twinkling with mirth and a little coy smile on her fuzzy mug. Rarity had an expression that fluctuated between amusement and disapproval.

My face was on fire. Okay, maybe not, but it certainly felt like it. God, I have never been so mortified in my whole life. Twilight certainly didn’t help, what with her trying to stifle her snickers.

Rarity cleared her throat. “Now, Febreze, I realize that a young lady like yourself must have needs, but really, it is very uncouth to stare at somepony’s nether regions… and so brazenly as you just did.”

Must… not… kill…

“Let’s just go,” I said, my voice thick with shame and rage.

The spa building stuck out like a sore thumb among the throng of thatched, mud buildings. To my surprise and incredulity, the inside was actually air conditioned, or at least this world's version of it since these unenlightened peasants seemed to have no concept of electricity. Either way I was much too elated at the feel of cool air to notice what went on next.

Agh, curse my lack of attention, for even as I stood there, a content expression on my face, Rarity and Twilight proceeded to do the necessary transactions, booking the services we would employ and before I knew it, I found myself stuffed into a fluffy green robe and made to sit in a cushiony chair. One of the spa owners, a pink mud pony, proceeded to take a file in her mouth and began to work on my hooves. Yeah, that kind of freaked me out a little. Why? Because when the word nail file comes to mind you usually picture a slender, popsicle-tablet like device made of wood or metal. Being ponies, the little beasts used not nail files but hoof files, which look more like an elongated cheese grater.

I mean, you’re a regular human girl with regular human skin and nails and a pastel midget horse comes at you with the intention of grinding your delicate digits down to the bone… that would freak anybody out. Granted, I had no skin or nails at the moment, but still. And if that wasn’t bad enough, the sound of grated hooves was not unlike that of a saw chewing through bone, which, eugh! Seriously, what are those things made out of? Twilight and Rarity got the same treatment and unlike me, they took it in stride. And don’t get me started on just how… unhygienic the little beasts were.

Being mud ponies, they had no hands of magic to manipulate their environment, so how did they go about grabbing things? Answer: their mouths. Now, I understand it’s unreasonable to completely make a place germ free, and even microbe-paranoid Americans have learned to accept not everything and everyplace can be made completely void of the little buggers, but these horrid little beasts pushed those limits to not only break them, but killed, trampled and pissed on them to boot. Like the animals they were, they used their filthy, bacteria-laden mouths to grab on. At first I hoped… no, I prayed that this was maybe an isolated incident and that this unhygienic behavior was limited to the two mud ponies. After all, why use their mouths when they have perfectly good hooves? Yeah, no dice. There were a number of other workers attending to other customers(apparently we got the owners' special attention because Rarity was their best customer. Again, they paid no mind to Twilight), a pegasus and an earth pony and they too used their mouths to grab onto things. I saw one of them place down a hairbrush only to be picked up seconds later by the other pony with her teeth. I threw up in my mouth a little...

With that done the mud baths followed, apparently made from ash taken from Mount Maresuvious, imported minerals and, if what one of the crates said(I mistakenly wandered into a storage closet-- the spa owner was quick to usher me out of there) dried, ground up Breezies were also a key ingredient, whatever those were. Apparently the baths were supposed to loosen out muscles, make them pliable or some other thing I didn't give a crap about. By all means I ought to have been grossed out and yet, it was strangely pleasing. I mean, I can't remember the last time or if I've ever been pampered. It was nice. I would expect that sliding into a mud bath would feel icky, but it was surprisingly pleasant. It was warm, that’s the first thing I noticed and it wasn’t slimy or anything. Rather, it felt like sliding into a big tub of warm, melted, velvety chocolate. Rarity and Twilight sighed in bliss and I couldn’t really blame them. And no sooner were we in that the owners plus a worker applied mud masks.

It was too much for me. Much as I pissed and whined about being stuck in this infernal world, I couldn’t deny that being there, submerged in warm mud up to my chin, tingling pleasantly as it seeped below my fur and into my skin, I had to admit that the situation, while not exactly paradise, was definitely a worthy contender. The mud bath ended a bit too soon for my liking, but immediately after, to wash it off was a mineral bath, also hot. It smelled herbal and… god, it was so good. Hot water, soothing background music, mood lighting and while we relaxed the workers got us hot, damp towels, cold water from a fancy glass cooler filled with slivered oranges, a number of cucumber sandwiches and other bite size snacks. I could really see why girls like the spa so much. Being pampered, waited on hand and foot… what else have I been missing? This girly stuff, it’s not all that bad.

I will say this though, my mood had considerably improved since the three of us set foot in the place. Hell, I almost found myself enjoying their company. I wasn’t what you would call social or a people person, so Twilight and Rarity took it upon themselves to engage me and me, I found myself growing increasingly recipient to their queries as time went on. Twilight spent a good fifteen minutes going on about how she was the head of some committee to organize events, celebrations and festivals in the mud village. Hell, the way she went on about it was more like doing a presentation at an office. She talked about how under her organizational skills, her planned events were executed with an 18% increase in efficiency. A fleeting but amusing image popped into my head-- her, in a pony business suit doing a PowerPoint presentation to a bunch of human executives, describing the efficiency and success of her planned events. Rarity went on about how she’d scored clients for her horse clothes in Canterlot, Los Pegasus and Trottingham. Gave Twilight and I some tips on mane and coat care and even offered to give me a free outfit from her boutique once we were done. I was too content and out of it to do anything but accept.

Now, if it were people taking care of me, the whole experience would have been that much better. In the meantime, these midget horses would do. Hell, I'll definitely have to try this spa thing back home.

Yes, back home... that got me thinking. I don't know how and I don't know why, but these ponies were loaded. Gold exchanged hooves every day as if it were vittles. Precious gems were tossed around like peanuts-- even embedded into fabric and used as decoration. From what I've seen the monetary system here was truly baffling but, whatever. Point was, wealth and riches abounded in this hippie pony candy land. The way I figured, I might as well make off with whatever I can. I could get enough dough to live comfortably for the rest of my life. Maybe even move to New Zealand... Maybe even buy it.

And build a theme park.

Just because.

"Enjoying yourself, Febreze?" asked Twilight, resting against the tub and the crook of her... I dunno, elbows(?) resting against the tiled rim.

"Actually, yes. Better than I expected."

"Well I, for one am glad to hear it," Rarity piped up, her mane, like ours, wrapped in a towel. "Pardon me, but you really seemed to need it, dear."

"It's... been a stressful week. Never thought of myself in a spa, but it's not all that bad."

Rarity giggled. "It is, isn't it? Every mare needs a little pampering every now and then, I say."

"You can say that again," Twilight added her two cents. "I'm curious, what's been your favorite treatment so far?"

"Definitely this bath," I said after a pause. "I haven't been on a warm tub of water since I was little."

"Ah, how the little pleasures get away from us" sighed Rarity. With finesse, she levitated one of the many canapés served to us, in fine china, no less and took a delicate, possibly measured bite, chewing slowly. "It makes it all that better when you revisit them, wouldn't you say?"

"Totally," I smiled, actually feeling content and, though I didn't realize it at the moment, took an equally measured swig of my own iced water-- just the right hint of citrus and bitterness to really make it pop along with the hot bath, unconsciously trying to imitate her own mannerisms. Yeah, there was a definite gulf between the way we moved.

And of course, Rarity picked up on it, a small, knowing smile in her horse muzzle and eyeing me in satisfaction.

"That reminds me," Twilight said after she downed a cucumber sandwich, simply using her magic to toss it in her mouth and displaying none of her friend's finesse. "Rarity, you said you had something planned for Febreze here, didn't you?

I looked questioningly at the marshmallow pony.

"Twiiiliiight," whined Rarity. "I wanted it to be a surpriiiise!"

Said unicorn's eyes widened and she brought a hoof to her mouth. "Oh... heh, heh. Sorry Rarity."

She sighed. "Don't worry about it, darling." She turned back to me. "It's not much, Febreze. I simply arranged Aloe to give you one of her special massages... is something wrong?"

Yeah, there was something wrong. "I don't really like others... touching me."

"You and many other ponies, darling," Rarity leaned forward, her eyes gleaming... Sheesh, they were pretty. "It's not unusual but I guarantee you won't regret it. Many a pony have changed their views when they witness firsthoof just how heavenly Aloe and Lotus' massages can be. You simply must give it a try! Pleaaase?" she all but begged.

I still wasn't all that sure but, I enjoyed myself. Much more than I thought. I looked to Twilight and she gave me an encouraging smile.

"Well, okay then."

All in all, it was nice. Agh, what am I saying, it was fantastic! When our time was up, Twilight and Rarity were ushered somewhere else while I was practically dragged by… I think it was the one called Aloe into a slightly darkened room. Not too big, but not small. Cozy, yeah, that was it.

New pleasures and experiences had been opened to me today and while it took some getting used to, I decided that a massage, even if it was from hooves, might, just might be worth a try.

Rarity sighed in contentment as Aloe went to work expertly in her back, kneading her muscles, loosening nerve clusters and making her body feel as soft as pudding. “Ah, this is just what I needed,” the marshmallow pony all but moaned.

“I’ll say,” Aloe chimed in. “You have been under a lot of stress, miss Rarity. Just what is it you’ve been getting up to? More world saving shenanigans, perhaps?”

“N-not quite dear,” Rarity said in a strained voice as Aloe reached a particularly tight muscle. “The past week has been hard on my friends and I.”

Aloe hummed, waiting for her most faithful customer to continue. Rarity could always be counted on to be an engaging pony and knew better than most how to carry a conversation. Heck, it was not unusual for the unicorn to take over and converse atop everypony else.

“Is it something you want to talk about, miss Rarity?”

“Mmm… I’m sure you’ve already heard part of it, Aloe. Really, just about anything that’s been the topic around town has something to do with it.”

“Well, yes, I have heard some things,” Aloe admitted. “But I am not even sure if half of them are true. Everypony has heard secondhoof accounts of what happened, but you know how ponies here are. If they don’t get the whole story they will fill in the gaps with their own interpretations and imaginations of what really happened.”

“I suppose that’s true,” Rarity conceded giving that she was… no, is one of those very ponies.

“Perhaps you could tell me a little about it? If you don’t mind, that is,” Aloe probed carefully. Of the two sisters, she always was a complete sucker for gossip and not for the first time had succeeded in wheedling some truths out of Rarity.

“Well,” Rarity half sighed, considering the request. “Yes, I suppose it would be alright. What is it you wanted to know?”

Though Rarity couldn’t see her, Aloe’s face threatened to break out in a happy smile, though she immediately schooled her features back into a neutral, vaguely interested expression. After all, it would be unprofessional to do otherwise.

"Well, from what I understand, two of your friends were hurt during... whatever it was that happened a week ago. Are they doing well?"

"Ahh," moaned Rarity as one of her vertebrae cracked pleasantly under the masseuse pony's ministrations. "H-heard about that, did you? Seems every pony has. Yes, they're doing very well, thanks for asking. Applejack's already out and about. Got released from the doctor the day before yesterday."

“I do recall seeing her early in the morning. Already out and ready to sell apples, yes?”

Rarity giggled softly. “Yes, that’s Applejack for you. Doctor House prescribed plenty of bed rest, but Applejack is who she is. I swear that mare is about as restless as a filly and stubborn as a mule.” Aloe raised her eyebrow at the offhand speciesist remark, but said nothing. It was nothing new, of course. Rarity had made such remarks often enough in the past to both sisters and they’d kept their silence. Nopony was perfect after all. “Back at the farm not five minutes and she decides to tend her apple trees, till her fields and tear up her old fence. I worry she overestimates herself, that she’ll get hurt and her family had to bring myself and the other girls to pound some sense into her head!”

“Ya, that sounds like Applejack alright. And how of Rainbow Dash? Is she faring better too?”

“She is, thank goodness. Rainbow Dash is a fighter and she is determined to fight her injuries. Nurse Redheart told us she’s recovering faster than they first anticipated. It shouldn’t be too long before they release her. She’s even more restless than Applejack if you can believe it.”

Aloe chuckled softly. “Yes, I think everypony has an idea just how restless Rainbow can be.” Warmup was over. Now for the more interesting morsels. “I heard it was a… human that was behind that whole ugly affair. Is that true?”

Rarity scowled. She didn’t care much for humans. Not since one of them attacked her beloved little sister. “That it is. Brutish creatures, the lot of them. Violent.”

“Was the human captured?”

“Unfortunately no. As far as we can tell it escaped into the Everfree and has been causing problems ever since.”

“You don’t say?” The gears in Aloe’s head were turning now. “Would this have anything to do with those rumors about the guards making trips to the forest?”

"Unfortunately," Rarity said gravely. "Did you hear about what happened to poor Fluttershy?"

"Of course," Aloe replied feverishly. "It was the talk of the town. She was attacked, wasn't she?"

"And one of her little chickens was stolen. Nopony really knows what to make of it. There was an investigation, you know. The Royal Guard sent some of their numbers into the Everfree to try and find clues what happened, but all they managed to find were human footprints at the site of the attack.”

“Oh, my goodness,” gasped Aloe. “Was Fluttershy alright?”

Rarity sighed mournfully. “She was relatively unharmed, but the poor thing is a wreck. She was attacked from behind, you know. Said it was a human and it grabbed her by the throat. It practically choked poor Fluttershy until she fell unconscious and then made off with her precious little chicken. That savage creature must have eaten it by now. And don’t even get me started on what happened with Zecora.”

Aloe quirked an eyebrow. “Zecora? You mean that nice zebra who lives in the forest? What happened?”

“Her home was broken into and her things stolen. From what she said, she stepped out for a bit and when she came back, her house was practically turned upside down. Every shelf, every cabinet open. Her cauldron went missing and almost all her potion ingredients were taken as well. She all but lost everything!”

“Oh, my. How terrible!” exclaimed Aloe.

Rarity nodded grimly. “Yes, I know, dear. Fluttershy has been helping her out when she can. Help her get back on her hooves, you know. And I know Zecora appreciates it, but she’s also a very independent zebra. Personally, I think it rubs her the wrong way to have to depend on others.”

“You mean, she doesn’t want Fluttershy around?”

“I don’t know, Aloe. I simply don’t. I think she lets Fluttershy spend so much time with her because it helps Fluttershy keep her mind off what happened. Poor thing spent three days straight in her house crying because that horrid human made off with her chicken.”

Aloe shook her head. “Shame, shame. Do they know who did it? Broke into Zecora’s home, I mean.”

In a manner most unbefitting of a self-proclaimed lady, Rarity let out a harsh, humorless laugh. “Oh, they have an idea. It’s a human… the very same one that attacked Fluttershy. They found its footprints in the ground around Zecora’s house and from what I hear, they are exactly the same as the ones present when Fluttershy was attacked.”

Aloe was silent as she pondered everything she’d heard. It was so much more than she dreamed of. “I must say, miss Rarity, this sounds a little too fantastical to be true. I mean, if what you say is correct then that means the culprit would be an intelligent human. No dumb creature could have set off a trap like that and remain undetected for so long.”

“Please don’t remind me, dear,” Rarity groaned. “The thought of an intelligent human of all things is much too unpleasant to think about. Surely there’s got to be a reasonable explanation.”

And with that, Aloe knew it was time to get off topic as Rarity clearly didn’t want to dwell on it. Still, it was more than she expected. Of course, Aloe wouldn’t exactly go around spreading the truths and suspicions Rarity shared with her. Maybe only to her sister, but while the spa ponies were always eager to hear the latest rumors and news they were also professionally discreet with their clients.

“Oh, and Aloe…?”

“Yes, miss Rarity?”

“The mud masks… there was something different about them today. What was it?”

“Ah, noticed that, did you? Yes, we tried adding a new ingredient in addition to the minerals we usually put in.”

“May I ask what it is? Whatever it was, it felt heavenly.”

Aloe giggled. “Well, miss Rarity, if you must know, it was Breezy nectar that we infused on the masks today? Pretty good result, no?”

Rarity’s head whipped around, staring incredulously at the spa pony. “Breezy nectar. Aloe… wherever did you get your hooves on it?” Breezy nectar, while possessing many curative, restorative and rejuvenating properties was also rather rare and even as small a portion as six ounces cost a hefty sum of gold.

Aloe smiled mischievously and tutted. “Ah, ah, ah, miss Rarity. I cannot go giving away the name of my supplier. She’s the sort of... pony who likes to remain anonymous, you see.”

“Oh, how unfortunate!” Rarity bemoaned, giving an exaggerated sight. “Please tell me you at least have a large supply.”

Aloe shook her head, a small apologetic smile on her face. “If only I could, miss Rarity. If business goes as usual, I expect to run out in a little over a week.”

Rarity nodded in resignation. “Well, then. I guess I know how I’ll be spending my afternoons for the next week or so.”

“And of course, Lotus and I will be sure to give you a good discount in light of your many years of faithful patronage,” Aloe said much to Rarity’s delight.

“Ohhhhwow,” I moaned as Lotus finished working on my back.

“And we… are… done!” the pony said triumphantly as she stepped back a few paces. “Whewh, your muscles were very tense and knotted, young lady. Do try to take it easy from now on, yes?”

I gurgled something in reply.

"Good," crooned Lotus. "Now, you just stay there and I will be back momentarily."

I mumbled my consent and she went out the door, leaving me all by myself. I'm not sure how much time passed. I was pretty much out of it. I mean damn, that felt good. My whole body felt like jelly and laying there, on the soft, padded table, low lighting and the pleasantly floral smell that hit all the right notes, I was content to not move.

The door opened and in came Lotus. If I was just a bit more alert or awake I might have noticed that her footsteps did not have that tell tale clip clop of hooves. Lotus' breathing was somewhat heavy and she was... grunting?

With considerable effort, I willed my voice into comprehensive speech. "You feeling okay th... eeep!"

Two hands grabbed me by my haunches and pulled me closer to their source. Wait, hands?

And before my brain could break out of its stupor, I felt those two hands roughly flip me so that I lay on my back. My breath hitched and my eyes widened as I took in the form of my accoster. A human. Male, well over six feet. Rippling with muscles, tanned skin and a healthy coating of hair on his chest and arms. So stunned was I that I could do little but lay there, mouth agape as the magnificent beefcake of a man towered over my considerably smaller form.

But he didn’t wait for me to break out of my stupor. He grabbed me just above the ‘knee’ part of my legs and pulled me closer to him.The gears in my head slowly started back up, scraping and grinding against each other and returning a smidge of control back to me.

With jerky, twitchy movements, I raised my head, unable to help but ogle the guy. Now, unlike the bronzed swimmer guy I saw not two hours ago, this guy was huge! Probably capable of going toe to toe with Schwarzenegger himself back in his prime, and while he was all perfect levels of hunk, his face left a lot to be desired. Heavy, grizzled, and his brow fixed in a permanent expression that just screamed, ‘Bitch, you are mine!’

He grabbed my legs firmly and leaned forward. Instinctively, my eyes wandered down his naked form and inevitably landed on that one appendage that all women both dread and hunger for. My eyes, if possible, widened even further and to impossible proportions, so much so that they threatened to pop out of their sockets. I gaped like a fish out of water, words failed me utterly and with only strangled grunts and squeaks making their way out my mouth. He lined his… pole up to my… my… womanhood and as soon as I registered this, its size and girth set off all kinds of alarms and warning bells in my brain.

Oh, God, he’s gonna split me in half!!!

To say that Twilight Sparkle was appalled at her friend Rarity was an understatement to say the least. "You did what!?"

“What do you mean, Twilight,” asked Rarity.

Twilight’s eye twitched. “What do I mean? What do I mean?! Rarity! How could you do that to Febreze?”

Rarity shifted sideways in her reclining chair to better look at her friend, being careful not to crease her fluffy bathrobe. “I’m sorry Twilight, but I don’t see why you’re so upset. I just wanted to help the young lady.”

Twilight facehoofed. “There is such a thing as going too far, Rarity and you just crossed that line. And just… I don’t… how is that supposed to help her?”

“I thought it would help her loosen up a little, if you must know.”

“Loosen up.” Twilight stated in a deadpan.

“Of course. I mean, you saw how tense she was, didn’t you? I just wanted to help her, ah, relax a little and loosen up so we could all enjoy ourselves.”

“Yes, Rarity, that’s a nice sentiment, but come on. Arranging a happy ending for her and not even telling her about it? And since when does this place even have happy endings?! How would you feel if I did that to you?”

“I… probably wouldn’t like it.” She then added hastily. “But it’s not the same!”

“How? How is it not the same?” Twilight asked incredulously, her face steadily growing redder.

“Because… you know. I don’t really like humans.” She chose to elaborate a bit more at Twilight’s befuddled expression. “Humans are the ones who provide, eh, special services. Aloe told me they lease Applejack’s more behaved specimens and they made a pretty bit out of it. And you saw the way she was looking at that male. Poor filly must be really backed up. Well, either that or she’s in heat and as a fellow mare I’m sure you know how unpleasant that can be.”

Twilight sighed heavily. “Yes, Rarity, I know what that’s like. Believe me, I know...” she muttered under her breath. “We all do, but you can’t just go around and set ponies up behind their backs. In fact, I think this little scheme of yours will end up backfiring on you. Febreze doesn’t seem like the type who likes these types of surprises.”

“You’re thinking too hard on this, dear. At the end of the the day, Febreze is still a mare, and what mare doesn’t like a good rutting now and then?” Rarity was not usually one to employ the use of crass language, but the look on Twilight’s face made it worth it. Truth be told, Rarity thought Twilight could use a little winding down as well.

Twilight buried her face in her hooves and then looked up at her friend balefully. “Fine, Rarity, have it your way. But if anything goes wrong it will be you who explains to Febreze why a human tried to mount her.”

Rarity beamed. “I knew you’d understand, darling. And please, don’t fret too much. After all, what could possibly go wrong?”

Naturally, it was at that moment that everything went wrong.

An earsplitting shriek of horror broke through the calm atmosphere of Ponyville Spa and all heads simultaneously turned towards its source-- the massage rooms. Immediately following were the sounds of a struggle. Furniture being tossed around, the sound of breaking glass, the alarmed howls and yelps of a human and of course the litany of swear words-- some familiar, some not-- that rang loud and clear even from the closed door.

Over half a dozen ponies had converged at various points, baffled and shooting each other uncertain looks as to what could possibly be going on. Rarity and Twilight stood next to each other, the latter giving her friend a pointed look.

“Get out! Get out!!!”

Without warning the door slammed open and, running as if Cerberus himself was at his heels was a human male, yelping in alarm, a panicked look in his eyes and hurtling out so fast and carelessly that he unintentionally slammed into a pony unfortunate enough to stand in his way, bringing them both aground with a resounding crash. Not that seemed to deter him, as he sprung back on his feet and launched himself through an open window, running off to who knows where.

Emerging out the room was none other than Febreze, her face flushed and her eyes bearing a glint of both fury and fear. Shooting a scowl at a gobsmacked Rarity, Twilight moved to comfort the poor mare. She’d be sure to have a nice long talk with the fashionista later on.

“Febreze! What happened? Are you alright?”

The younger pony’s eyes shot to her. “H-he… he... .” She seemed to choke on her words. “He t-tried to… fuck me!”

Yes, a very long talk with Rarity. The poor girl was obviously shaken, her jaw clenched and her eye twitched erratically. Twilight moved to place a hoof on her very tense shoulder. “I’m sorry you had to go through that, but you’re fine now. It's just us ponies here."

"My goodness! What happened?" Everypony turned to see Aloe. The mare had obviously just arrived and surveyed the room with wide eyes.

"What kind of sick game are you all playing at!?"

Febreze had recovered from her shaken state and now advanced on the nervous spa pony.

"G-game? I'm sorry, I d-don't know what you mean, young lady," Aloe stuttered, slowly backing away.

"What I mean is why the hell did a human try to... breed me?" Febreze's voice was growing more hysterical by the syllable and she was gnashing her teeth so hard, Twilight almost expected to hear them crack.

"Oh. Was he... not to your liking?"

Almost immediately, Aloe knew that was the wrong thing to say. Febreze froze midstep, fixing Aloe with a unsettlingly blank expression. "What?" She all but hissed.

Aloe looked around at everypony, silently asking for assistance. "I-I just thought... well, miss Rarity said you liked humans and--”

She whipped her head around so fast it left an audible ‘crick’ and landed on Rarity, who was the proverbial picture of a deer in the headlights.

"What is she talking about?" Febreze asked, all her teeth bared as she pressed the words out and her voice reaching a stone-cutting sharpness towards the end that could easily rival the Royal Canterlot voice in its intensity.

Rarity's ears splayed back against her skull as a mixture of embarrassment, surprise and a hint of that kind of shame a foal might feel when it tried to make breakfast for its parents as a surprise and instead ends up setting the whole kitchen ablaze instead.

With quite a bit of concern, Twilight witnessed Febreze posture changing. The mare crouched down slightly, her ears folded back and her wings began to unfurl, all clear signs of aggression.

Without breaking her sight on Rarity and with her teeth still bared, Febreze began stalking towards Rarity in a deliberately slow yet very intimidating way. The way she moved was not something Twilight was accustomed to seeing on another pony. Her every movement spoke of barely restrained fury, and no small amount of killing intent.

"N-now darling, let us not be hasty, yes?" Rarity tittered nervously as the angry pegasus drew closer. "I assure you, my actions have been nothing but well intended and with only your best in mind." The fashionista let out a short, nervous yet still irritatingly lady like laugh. "And to be honest dear, how in the name of Celestia could I have known that you had a dislike to humans? The way you all but ate that one back on the street up with your eyes was a strong indicator towards the opposite." The fashionista did not realize she was making the situation all the worse, as evidenced by the fact the smaller pony’s face was literally turning purple with rage.

"Oh, you prissy little bitch. Who the hell do you think you are? Your nose is so far up your ass you can’t even see how what you did is all kind of fucked up. You think you’re such a selfless, generous 'friend' and think you know what’s best for me? That you decided it was in my best interests to get laid as fast as possible?" Febreze asked, her voice eerily calm but thick with rage. "Without verifying your suspicions? Without even fucking asking me?! For all you know, I could be homo- or even asexual! Maybe I stared at that guy back in the street not because I was in desperate need to be fucked but because I had a traumatic experience with a human when I was small or maybe I am just someone who is fascinated by the human anatomy that this specimen out there showcased? And now you have the gall to accuse me of being at fault here?!? Is that what you try to say?"

Rarity and Febreze where nearly nose to nose now.

"Uhm... if you phrase it like this... maybe?"

Twilight watched with morbid curiosity as Rarity made an involuntary step backwards, which in turn caused Febreze to display a toothy smile that more resembled a snarl.

The pegasus´ muzzle inched closer to the Unicorns and nearly inaudible, Febreze breathed a single word.

"Run."

Rarity stared help seeking over to Twilight but the Alicorn of Friendship just stood there, watching the scene unfold. Deep inside her, Twilight actually felt that Rarity had it coming. Of course, Twilight would not allow Febreze to hurt Rarity but maybe, just maybe, letting Febreze vent her frustrations at Rarity would do both of them good. Bottling your emotions up was never a good idea and afterwards, one could always make both parties sit down and have a long and thorough talk about friendship and well-intended-but-ill-executed favors.

That is, until Aloe found her voice again as Febreze made her way over to the little tray wagon that held brushes and files alongside different bottles, skillets and jars with the necessary lotions, ointments and other beauty products the spa employees needed when tending to their customers.

"Miss, please, don't do anything hasty!" The one half of the Spa Twins shouted, fearing for her livelihood and the health of her best client.

It was at this point that Rarity thought it in her best interests to beat a hasty retreat, turning tail and making a dash towards the door. Normally, as the lady she was, Rarity would never have made such a rough and tumble action, but sometimes one had to make a compromise.

Especially when one was facing an immeasurably pissed off and quite possibly unhinged pegasus mare.

Febreze scooped up one of the larger jars and measured the fleeing Rarity like a foal targeting an opponent during a snowball fight.

Twilight thought it best to intervene before the situation deteriorated even further, but was too late. The jar left Febreze´ hoof and arced through the air, only to miss Rarity by a hair's width and instead crashed against the wall, leaving a big splash of thick, herbal smelling goop behind.

Rarity whinnied in surprise and changed course, heading down a narrow hallway with a number of doors on either side.

“Oh no, you don’t!”

A wild laugh escaped Febreze’s muzzle as she grabbed ahold of the cart, turned it to face her unfortunate victim(who was struggling to open the doors on either side of the hallway) and with one surprisingly forceful push of her hind legs, propelled the cart with herself atop it and made a beeline for the panicking unicorn.

"Come back here and take your punishment like an adult!"

Crash. Another container of undoubtedly expensive beauty product sailed through the air and found its premature end on the floor, splattering Rarity's coat with a mixture of creamy substance and tiny ceramic shards.

"Run as much as you want you stupid horse, I'll get you yet!"

A coat brush grazed Rarity's flank and made her yelp more in surprise than pain. She then beat a hasty retreat further down to the reception area and the front door that promised sweet salvation, but no sooner had she reached the door that Febreze hurled one of the hoof files with enough force that the iron implement embedded itself deeply in the wood of the door with a loud 'thunk', electing another screech from Rarity.

"I'm gonna tan your worthless hide and wear it as a cape!" Febreze yelled, her voice now brimming with anger while diving in for her victim.

Not looking back, Rarity scampered away from the door and desperately began weaving around the furniture of the spa in hopes of evading the mad-mare that was hot on her tail, all while containers of hoof softener, massage lotions, face masks and the occasional brush or file rained down around her.

Twilight looked on, completely stunned at the proceedings. Not minutes ago she was enjoying a nice pampering with an old and a possible new friend and next thing she knew, said possible new friend was out and about to violently mangle her old friend.

Another crash heralded the end of yet another jar but this time, the impact sound was much duller, telling that it had found its mark somewhere on Rarity.

"Eeek!"

"I'll end you!"

Rarity came bursting back into the area Twilight and the by now collapsed Aloe like a Thestral out of Tartarus. The fashionista’s normally immaculate mane and coat were splattered and smeared with generous amounts of various lotions and crèmes, and a few red trails where exploding glass shrapnel pierced her skin.

Febreze was hot on her heels, throwing a brush that actually made contact with the back of the fleeing unicorn’s head. Rarity's pained yelp broke Twilight out of her stupor. The mare quickly intervened before anything truly bad could happen. Her first instinct was to yell at the crazed pony to stop, not that it did any good. Febreze spat and cursed as she chased after Rarity, throwing crude insults and some Twilight had never even heard before.

“Twilight! Heeelp!”

Rarity was backed into a corner and Febreze capitalized on this by, in a slightly impressive athletic feat, hopping atop the moving cart and launching herself through the air, forelegs stretched out like a pouncing manticore, quickly descending onto a panicked Rarity.

Reacting on instinct, Twilight’s horn lit up and she enveloped the flying pony on a magic hold, but to her shock and surprise, it was only after the briefest moment that her magic field dissipated completely and the backlash caused a painful jolt to her horn, leaving the unicorn to cry out in pain.

Rarity screamed as only she could, cowering and covering her face with her hooves, bracing for whatever came next, but through a stroke of luck, the murderous pony miscalculated her trajectory and instead crashed on the brick wall atop her target with so much force that a sickening crunch followed the impact, spider-like cracks formed on the wall and a miniature crater was left on the small pegasus’ wake as she fell atop the panicked Rarity.

Twilight watched as her poor friend squealed in fright and scuttled away. For one terrifying moment she believed Febreze had broken her neck, so she was all the more surprised when the pony got up with no injuries or any indication she was in pain. She shook her head vigorously and opened her eyes, no longer filled with a murderous rage, but rather a simmering one. It seemed the impact had knocked some sense of self control back to her. She looked to Twilight, to Rarity, and the room at large before setting her head down, looking between her hooves.

Rarity hid behind Twilight, genuinely fearful for her life and Twilight, she did not know what to make of it all.

“I’m done with this.”

Febreze spoke too low and Twilight couldn’t help but blurt out, “What?”

The smaller pony looked up. The anger was still there, but mixed along with a sense of weariness. “I’m done with this,” she said in a louder but very still voice. “I’m done with this cesspool of a town, I’m done dealing with all you disgusting little shitbags, and you,” she said to Rarity, her voice still low, even, but carrying a highly venomous tone. “You better hope I never see you again, because if I do, I will literally boil you alive and reduce you until you’re nothing but a big tub of glue!”

And in a move that caused both ponies’ jaws to drop, Febreze turned, took two steps back and smashed right through the wall of the spa as if it was made of gingerbread.

“The hell with all y’all, I’m outta here!”

And so she was, head held high and a wrathful sneer on her lips. She spared all of them one last glare full of loathing and contempt before walking out the gaping hole to the town outside.

Targe of the Blooded (I)

I couldn’t believe that prissy bitch. By all rights I should have beat her worthless ass within an inch of her life, I should have strangled her with her own intestines, I should have stuck my foot so far up her asshole it would come out her mouth! Just… aagh!

Goddamn it, I needed to get out of this shithole of a town and somewhere more enlightened. Anywhere other than here would be better. And what was all that with the human? Do these filthy beasts actually fuck them? The thought nearly drove me to puke. Now that I thought about it, whenever I went to that HumanSmart or Barnyard Bargains there were some… questionable items on the human aisles, but how was I supposed to know it was for… for… that? Ugh, wishful thinking, I guess.

“Howdy there, miss,” greeted a random mud pony.

“Get away from me, you heathen!”

Okay, I might have overreacted, but I was not in the best frame of mind at the moment. The rest of the little pests looked at me after my outburst and it took every ounce of willpower to keep myself from bashing in every one of their fuzzy little mugs, consequences be damned.

Thankfully the train station was easy to find. Surprising, considering I’d been walking in a random direction all along. It was a bit on the small side, unsurprising considering the mud village’s backwards state and to my slight relief, it was bereft of any nauseating pastel colors. Just the dull brown of wood, the muted yellow of old hay and other dull tones. The train, however, was another matter entirely. It was a cloying abomination that had absolutely no right being in this, or any other plane of existence. Seriously, who designs these things, six year olds?

Eyesore thought it was, the inside of the station was about as unassuming as its outside. Benches were scattered along the walls and the walls themselves were littered with various posters and fliers, some depicting the map of Equestria, others showing rail lines and train stations. Some advertised the holidays and events that took place in the mud village such as the Summer Sun Celebration, the Fall Formal Festival, Running of the Leaves, some kind of cookoff, a fruit festival, a vegetable festival, and a bunch of other inane things I had no patience for.

Managing the ticket booth was a stallion of the winged variety, wearing a dorky clerk’s cap and, if the look on his face was anything to go by, had the air of being constantly harassed. Bearing down on him was a griffon-- the first I’ve ever seen, her front talons gripping the edge of the booth as she propped herself on her hind legs. I couldn’t help but take a moment or two to examine her. In spite of possessing the infernal pastel coloring that dominated this wretched world, she was actually pretty cool looking. Compared to the ponies, at least.

Her coat was a dark orange color, like that of a tiger but without the iconic stripes. Her talons and beak were the traditional golden yellow of eagles and actually looked pretty lethal, like they could actually harm something. It was somehow a refreshing sight having seen nothing but soft, squishy prey ponies since my stay. Lastly, her wings and the tuft at her tail were a sandy color and the plumage that ran from the front of her chest and up was a light blue.

Flanking her was a pegasus mare wearing a pair of saddlebags, her coat was a lime green and her mane a darker shade. Forest green, maybe? Not that it mattered. There was obviously a commotion or something going on and no sooner did I advance a few steps that the griffon exclaimed in frustration.

“Sonny, are you trying to go out of your way to make me miserable?!”

“Madame, please,” the winged pest all but whined. No doubt he’d been going at this for a while. “It’s not a matter of arguing, it’s simply out of my hooves.”

“Then let me speak to your supervisor. Where is he?” the griffon demanded. She had that way of speaking like people who tend to get what they want. Guess she was trying to bully the stallion into submission. Heh, worthless ponies.

“He’s not here right now, ma’am. He took a trip over yonder to Appaloosa, so it’s only me for the rest of the shift.”

“Now why didn’t you say that before, boy? If it’s only you here then that means you get to make the call. Now why don’t you be a good pony and get the train going already?”

The little puke looked as if he wanted nothing more than to sigh. “It’s not that simple, ma’am.”

The griffon snorted. “Of course it’s that simple.” She then held out her right talon and clicked it twice. There was an awkward silence as the stallion looked on questioningly at the griffon, his eyes darting from her face to her outstretched limb. The griffon’s face tensed and, with a jerky motion, turned to look at the pegasus behind her, who looked about obliviously. It wasn’t until she gave her a pointed look and clicked her talons again that the pegasus broke out of her stupor.

“O-oh, right. Sorry, auntie,” she muttered and dug into her saddlebag, producing a small bag and placing it on the griffon’s palm. Yeah, it was one of those money deals you see in movies, the baggie clinking with the unmistakable sound of gold, tied with string and true to its form, its bindings loosened considerably to reveal the shiny treasure inside. Do they actually practice this or something? Because there is no way that shit goes unrehearsed.

The stallion's eyes widened ever so slightly as he looked at the swag. "What is this supposed to be?"

"Call it a little incentive to allow us passage."

The little turd certainly looked tempted, and made a halfway reach to the gold. Still, it seemed that common sense won over and he pushed the bag of bits back to the griffon.

“N-no. I’m sorry ma’am, but I cannot condone this. Not when it might put innocent ponies’ lives at risk,” he said with a resolute glint in his oversized eyeball. “And anyways, it’s out of my hooves. It’s the higher ups who have to give the go ahead to get the train running again, and they won’t do so until that problem with the dogs is dealt with.”

With a last frustrated sigh, the griffon conceded defeat and turned to leave, the green mare following suit. As soon as she caught sight of me she said, "If you came here to board the train, don't bother. It's not running now, according to that little pencil pusher."

My eyes narrowed. "We'll just see about that."

I walked past her and to the sap who looked at me with poorly disguised annoyance. "Young lady, the train is not running right now, so could you-- yeaargh!"

Yeah, he wasn't so standoffish once I reached forward and forcefully pulled him over the booth, his startled mug nearly touching mine.

"Now listen here ya puke, and listen well," I said with a low hiss.

"H-hey! What do you think you're--"

"Quiet! I'm talking here." He shut his gob, whether because I told him to or just plain bafflement, I did not know. "Now, I don't know what's going on. I don't care what's going on. All I know is in exactly five seconds you are gonna get off your ass and get that metal contraption going so I can get the hell out of this place and into somewhere more enlightened."

"W-well, you see, i-it's not really something I can--"

With a frustrated cry, I fully dragged him off his perch and slammed him into the hardwood floor, my face all but pressed against his, and his bulging eyes alight in fear.

"I don't think you heard me, pal. If I don't get out of this fetid mud village soon, I will literally lose my mind. I am this close... this close to peeling off and tanning your worthless hide, so unless you want to be turned inside out, you will get off your ass and make sure I can get as far away from this armpit of a town as I can! Do you understand?!"

The little puke was barely conscious. Might have had something to do with me repeatedly smashing him against the floor. I might have done irreparable damage had it not been for the high pitched voice that screamed, "Stop it, please!"

I turned my head and there was the green pegasus, her wings halfway stretched her eyes wide and a look of alarm on her fuzzy mug.

"Mind your own business. I'm doing business here," I said and gave the nearly comatose stallion a shake.

The griffon then stepped forward, her posture, if I was reading it right, almost the opposite of the pegasus, fairly chill and eyeing me speculatively.

"Look, filly, I like your spunk, but this is not the way to go about doing things. You can pound him until he's red and black and blue all over and you still won't get anywhere for your troubles."

"Right," I drawled. "Because your way of doing things really got the ball rolling."

The griffin merely rolled her eyes. "And what exactly do you think you strong arming will accomplish?"

"Something more than you. One way or another, I will make this peon croak."

No sooner did I turn back to the barely conscious pony that I felt two hooves grab me by my back and I was pulled away from my prize.

“What the…!” I whipped around to see the pegasus, her wings spread and standing on two legs, looking at me as if she couldn’t believe what she had just done. “Why you…” I growled and lunged forward.

The pegasus squeaked and flapped her wings hastily, diving out of the way quicker than I anticipated and I found myself colliding face first against one of the wooden beams that supported the inside.

“You got a death wish or something?” I growled to the pegasus.

“Is that a challenge?” she shot back boastfully, not looking at all impressed.

“That’s enough, both of you!” the griffon barked sharply and stepped in between us. That actually gave me pause for a moment. Pastel coloring aside, she actually looked pretty intimidating. “Cutlass, stop aggravating the girl.”

“Me?” the pegasus asked incredulously. “She’s the one who started it.”

“Keep talking, I’ll be the one who finishes it,” I muttered lowly.

“And you,” the griffon now turned to me. “Stop being an idiot. You could have seriously harmed that poor sod. Just look at him! He’s barely there as it is.”

I looked over and indeed, the little puke was moaning, hooves clamped over his head as he reeled in pain. I don’t know why, but looking at him snapped me out of my hot blooded haze and brought me back to reality. Shit, I actually felt guilty about it! Don't get me wrong, senseless violence is well and good so long as there's a reason for it, but I'd like to think that despite my anger problems, I do have a measure of restraint. Taking out my frustrations on him was… definitely not one of my finest moments. Argh, it was that little prissy bitch’s fault! Seething! She actually had me seething!

All right, all right. Breathe in, breathe out. In, out, in, out.

My legs felt wobbly all of a sudden, and I slumped down into a sitting position, doggy style and hunched over. The fact that I was naked registered within me at the moment, yet I couldn’t find myself caring too much about it.

Goddamn it, I had to get better control of myself. For too long did I allow my emotions to run too hot and until now, I didn’t realize it. No, I was perfectly aware of it, I just didn’t care. Then again, anger is easy, isn’t it? Simple and satisfying, but not a very practical long term solution. The near unconscious pony before me was proof of that.

I admit, for all I dreaded being stuck in this cloying, hippie, fairytale candyland, there was also a sense of freedom that came with it. I made my own decisions, no authority figures, no law or rules to restrict my movements. No repercussions, and the only directive was whatever I deemed most fit. It hit me right then and there just how… stupid I’ve been.Shit, I was lucky I wasn’t yet caught in the middle of a clusterfuck, and my behavior back at the spa… goddamn it!

A spike of cold dread welled up inside me as the realization of what happened hit me full force. Losing control of myself like that was many things, and none of them good. It cemented my need to get away from the mud village as far as I could, as soon as I could.

“Oi, you still there?” The griffon’s clear voice broke me out of my stupor, and only then did I notice the feeling of two talons tapping my forehead.

“Yeah,” I mumbled, my gaze not breaking from the floor.

“Good to hear.” She then chuckled. “I know Ponyville ain’t much to look at, but what is it that makes a young pony like yourself nearly tear someone else’s head off?”

I got back up. “Too many things to count.”

“Well, unless you want to walk or fly out of here, you’ll just have to wait until they deal with the dog problem.”

My ears perked up at this. “Dog problem?”

Her head nodded, a sour expression forming on her features. “Aye, it’s the diamond dogs, don’t you know. Been causing all sorts of trouble for the past week, or so I heard.”

“No good thieves, the lot of them,” the pegasus apparently called Cutlass piped up, tentatively stepping closer and eyeing me as though I were a particularly cranky rattlesnake. “They keep messing around with the train tracks. They pile on dirt so the train has to stop in between destinations, and that’s when they break in. They steal whatever they want from the ponies aboard, and even got to us just as we were passing through Ponyville,” she finished indignantly.

“Well… is anyone doing anything about it?” I asked, praying for an answer that would not be a disappointment.

“The Royal Guard is doing, and I quote, ‘all they can’,” the griffon said sarcastically, doing that thing with her talons. “But really, don’t expect the matter to be solved anytime soon. Cutlass and I will have to start looking for accommodations until then.”

Was I pissed? You bet I was. My wrath knew no bounds, but all the same, I took a good deep breath and reined it in. “And there’s nothing anyone can do?” I asked more than a little desperately. The griffon, already heading out the door with the pegasus in tow answered.

“Short of someone going in and clearing out those troublemakers? No, all you can do is wait.”

Wait? Wait? Ha, not likely!

I put a hoof to my chin. “I see… and where exactly are these ‘diamond dogs’ located?”

She eyed me speculatively. “Why? You planning to go and pay them a visit?”

“Maybe.”

Don’t know what it was. Maybe it was something in my face, but it gave both of them pause. “You’re kidding, right?” asked Cutlass. “Diamond dogs don’t play nice with ponies… or anypony, for that matter.”

“I’m not worried about it,” I said dismissively. “Now, where can I find them?”

“You’re not going,” the griffon said matter of factly.

My eyes narrowed. “You gonna stop me?”

“No, but I’m also not telling you spit. A young pony like yourself shouldn’t be going alone into diamond dog territory.”

“I can take care of myself,” I persisted stubbornly.

“Either way, I’m not telling anything,” she then turned to the pegasus. “C’mon, ‘lassie. Let’s go find a place to stay tonight.” Said pony gave one last look before following the chimera outside.

I sighed. I literally had the power to take care of this problem, yet the griffon proved most uncooperative. A scuffle not too far from me got my attention, and I looked over to see the pony I manhandled getting back up.

Hey, what do you know? Maybe things will work out after all. He’s bound to know a thing or two and… well, I know I said I should not let my emotions rule me, but regardless, I already fucked up where he was concerned. A quick survey revealed there was nobody else close to the station, so I approached the stallion, who at this point looked at me warily, and with no small amount of fear.

A wicked grin suddenly stretched across my own fuzzy mug. “Hi there. Would you mind helping a girl out?” He merely cowered in fear.

Oh, I’m gonna have fun with this.

“Do you think she'll be alright?” Cutlass asked, giving a sideways look at her aunt.

“Who, that little pegasus? Maybe, why not?”

Cutlass hummed, and lowered her head.

Her aunt couldn't help but notice the young mare’s unusually subdued posture. “Hey, what's eating at you? Still thinking about that little ‘un?”

“I just can't help but think she’ll do something stupid,” she admitted after a moment of silence.

“What makes you think that?”

“Just a feeling I got. And I've seen that look before. Don't know about you, but I don't think she really listened to your warnings.”

The griffin snorted. “So what if she didn't? What's she gonna do, go and storm a diamond dog mine by herself? Nobody's that stupid.” If nothing else, she was sure of herself.

“I dunno, auntie,” Cutlass muttered. “She seemed really determined to go about it in spite of what you said.”

“And why are you even worried anyway? It's not your problem what a pony off the street gets up to.”

“Because I really think she'll do something stupid.”

She sighed. “So what, do you wanna follow her around and make sure she won't get in trouble?”

“Could I?” Cutlass asked a little too quickly. Her aunt chuckled briefly, but stopped as she saw the pegasus’ earnest look.

“You're serious?”

Cutlass merely shrugged helplessly. The griffon sighed.

“Fine, tail the little filly if it bothers you that much. Just be sure to get back before dinner. I don't think these ponies are too used to seeing griffins around here, and I'd rather they didn't look at me like a cranky snake itchin’ to bite.”

Cutlass looked genuinely surprised by this. “Since when do you care what some random ponies think of you?”

“I don't. Not really.” The griffon’s gaze then encompassed their surroundings, making sure nopony was nearby. “Still, given the nature of our business, it’s better to be seen in pony company.”

The pegasus’ eyes lit up in understanding. “Ohh… okay, I got you, auntie.”

Said aunt merely grunted. “Go on then, play around with your little friend.”

Cutlass nodded enthusiastically. “Thanks, auntie. I’ll see you guys later. Keep Anchor away from the almond cookies ‘till I get back, ya hear?”

“No promises. That old codger likes his sweets, and coming here to Equestria hasn’t exactly helped with his problem.”

“True,” Cutlass giggled. “Alright, I’ll try not to be too long. Later!” The pegasus then unfurled her wings and took to the air.

Heheh, that little puke sang like a canary. Didn’t take much prompting from me, but I wasn’t about to complain. If what he said was true, then these diamond dog raids had taken place roughly to the southeast of the Everfree Forest. Of course, given I was still not too familiar to this world, that didn’t help me out a lot, so I forced him to scribble the exact spot on one of the maps.

Now I was all set to go, but before anything else, I would need help on this venture. Only problem was how to go about it.

I needed to get Ari a body so she could get around, and there were no shortage of midget horses in here that would make a suitable host. I’m sure I don’t need to state this out loud, but I couldn’t exactly walk up to a pony in the middle of the day and drag him/her against his/her will to a creepy forest. Well, I could, but that would kind of defeat the purpose of laying low. And of course, the mud village projected that small town vibe where everybody knew each other. Kidnapping one of the populace would be eventually noticed by the little pukes.

"Hello there."

"Huh?" Darn it, I was so lost in thought I did not notice my surroundings and that obnoxiously pink blob from yesterday sidled up to me. There she was again, hopping alongside me like it was the most natural thing in the world and a no less idiotic grin on her fuzzy mug.

"What do you want?" I asked brusquely. And could you please go away?

Naturally, the pink menace did not pick up on my less than enthusiastic approach. That or she did not care. "I wanted to see if you were feeling better now. Spikey said you and Rarity and Twilight had gone out, and I realized that you must be all well and rested up. Now you don't have that gloomy gus disease and it just hit me that we did not introduce ourselves. My name’s Pinkie Pie, what’s yours?”

“What do you care?” I muttered and kept on walking, hoping she’d get the hint.

Her bouncing ceased and now she trotted alongside me, the expression on her mug now a bit less exuberant, but smiling all the same. “Aww, don’t be like that. I was hoping we could be friends. And you’re new here, so you must not have a lot of friends.”

“So I’m just a pity case, is that it?”

Heh, she actually looked shocked at this. “W-wha… no! You’re not a pity case! No pity here. I just like making friends. I’m friends with everypony in Ponyville, and I was thinking we could be good friends as well.”

“Fine, whatever.” Stupid choice of words. I was kinda hoping she’d leave me alone after that, but it seemed to have the opposite effect. Her eyes bugged out; her idiotic smile stretched, literally, ear to ear and her bouncing began anew. She then proceeded to assault me with a string of inane babble-- asking me all sorts of questions, whether I liked sarsaparilla, what my favorite color was, where I came from, what my favorite dessert was, when was my birthday… come to think of it, when was my birthday? The months here aren’t exactly like the ones back on Earth, so… eh, whatever.

“Is there a point to all this?” I asked through clenched teeth. The pest's voice grated on my ears in the same way a lawnmower grates human flesh. I had business to conduct and the pink menace just wouldn’t leave me alone. Even after I dropped none too subtle hints I wanted to be left alone she still latched on to me. “Because I’ll be leaving this town very soon.” And hopefully never come back to this eyesore of a mud town.

I swear, for a split second she literally froze in midair. “You… you’re leaving? But we were just starting to get to know one another!”

“Yeah, well, it’s been a slice.” Something told me she wasn’t too familiar at picking up sarcasm.

In a flash, she dove forward and clutched my arm… er, foreleg in a handless grasp. “Well come on! There’s no time to lose! I need to throw you a welcome-to-Ponyville-slash-goodbye party. Quick, before it’s too late!”

Okay, she is really trying my patience. “Thanks but no thanks. I’ll be fine.” I tried to get my leg back, but like a virulent disease, it was near impossible to shake her off and instead contented herself by allowing me to drag her around.

“Come on, just a little party?”

“No!”

“I’ll even bake a mini version of the Marzipan Mascarpone Meringue Madness!”

“I said no! And I don’t even know what that is.”

“”Do you like presents? Because there will be presents!”

“What is your major malfunction, numbnuts? Can’t you take no for an answer? Let go already!”

“Not until you let me throw you a welcome-to-Ponyville-slash-goodbye-party!”

I don't think she realized just how close she was to becoming nothing more than a bloody smear. Hell, I'm kinda proud I had enough restraint to not obliterate her where she stood.

"You're not gonna drop this anytime soon, are you?" I asked in defeat.

Still smiling, the pink pest shook her head, her motions and smile not unlike those of a retard who just doesn't realize is not wanted.

“Alright, fine,” I said simply.

“Oh… really?” she asked in slight disbelief.

“Yes, really, but if we’re going to do this then we do it how I want it. It’s my party after all.” Her eyes lit up and she tackled me into a full on body hug… eesh. Not that I had any intention of letting her throw me a party, but I had to get rid of her ASAP.

“That’s great! Ooh, I need to get to work quick! I need to send out invitations, get started on the cake, set up decorations and come up with fun games for us to play. But don’t you worry, aunt Pinkie promises to throw you the bestest, most splendiferous party ever!”

“About that. Where are you hosting this party?”

“Why Sugarcube Corner, of course. That’s where I do almost all my patented Pinkie parties and--”

“Yeah, that’s not gonna work,” I cut in bluntly.

"What do you mean?" asked the pink pest.

"I don't want my party in this Sugarcube Corner. I got someplace better in mind. In fact, why don't we go there right now?"

"But I really, really think that--"

"Noop. Sorry, not happening. You coming over or what?"

And so she did, chipper as ever. Christ, it was tiring just to watch her. I tried to mostly tune out her endless chatter and led us to our destination. Pest though she was, the pink idiot had inspired me to come up with an idea. Getting rid of her and hopefully get some help for that foray into diamond dog territory. Two birds with one stone.

"Well, here we are."

The pink menace looked none too sure about it. "It's... a little small."

No shit, Sherlock. The aforementioned place was little more than a run down shed on the outskirts of town, with dense brush and bushes surrounding it, keeping us largely out of sight from what few ponies could be seen within the confines of the mud village.

"True, but parties are your specialty, aren't they? I mean, you did say you are the best party planner in Equestria, but if you're saying you can't do it--"

"Can't do it?" she blew a raspberry. "I once threw a party in an old rusted grain silo with nothing more than tinsel, yarn and construction paper. This'll be easy peasy."

I smiled and, fighting the urge to grimace and pull away, I slung my arm over her shoulders as if we were good friends. "That's the spirit," I cheered with as much enthusiasm as I could. "Come on, let's go inside and see how you can make this work."

"Awesome! I love pulling off double themed parties. They can be really tricky, but are twice the fun if you can make them work. Oohhh, this'll be the funnest, most banging party I'll throw... this month."

No sooner did we reach the door and she stretched her hoof forward to open it, that my own filthy pony appendage slid upwards, grabbed ahold of that impossibly, obnoxiously tangled mess of hair and brutally smashed her face against the wooden door, completely shattering it and her body flung forward with enough force to send her sailing across to the opposite end, where she hit with a resounding crash.

"Yeah, but then that happened," I said to no one in particular. Huh, I probably shouldn’t have caved in the door like that. Now there’s a big gaping hole in the middle of the shack. The inside was sparsely furnished and stunk of wood rot and mothballs. I approached the pink pest’s body and noted with some relief she was still alive, if her chest was any indication. There was a big gash in her forehead that was freely bleeding, but she probably wouldn’t die from it.

Damn it, I should have put a bit more thought into this. I poked and prodded her still body, but nothing really happened. Hell, I don’t really know what I was expecting. Whatever the case, time was ticking, and my desire to get away from this mud village and its inhabitants had not lessened in the least. Which is why I tied up the pink pest with some funky smelling old fabrics, shoved a probably foul tasting gag in her mouth, stuffed her body in a sack and then hid her as best I could on the thick, unkempt vegetation around the shed.

When I was more or less satisfied the pink menace wouldn't be a problem, I headed back to town, trying to look nonchalant, as though I hadn't just knocked a pony unconscious. Yup, just another one of their ilk, minding her own business as she strolled around.

The noon rush was over and most of the little pukes were in the process of taking down their stalls at the market, ready to head on home. I admit, I did not really know where to look, and I didn't want to take up too much time. But to my slight disbelief, Lady Luck seemed to favor me today.

There she was, the pink pony, all smiles and exuberance as she jabbered nonsense at a big red earth stallion who wore a yoke, fitting for a beast of burden.

Then, to my mild disgust, the pink pest’s normally idiotic smile turned… lustful? Oh, God! Yeah, and even from where I was I could see the stallion’s face turn a deeper shade of red as he avoided the pink idiot’s gaze.

I mobilized quickly before anything weird would happen(well, weirder than seeing the pre-mating actions of mutants) and took on a jaunty canter, my face relaxed and my voice took on an unusually friendly quality.

“Hi there, Pinkie Pie!” I greeted loudly in my best girly voice. Could use some work, to be honest…

Both of them seemed surprised at the interruption and the stallion made no effort to hide his relief.

“Ah, hi there… um, you. What's shakin’?”

“Don't you remember me?” Hot damn. I don't wanna brag but I was going all Meryl Streep up on this bitch.

I could see the pink idiot start to fidget uncomfortably, trying to come up with something. It was amusing, really, but I kinda needed to get the ball rolling. “It's me, Febreze. Your college roommate?”

And just like that, she flipped a switch and reverted to her way too happy personality. Huh, I… almost can't believe that worked, not that I'm looking a gift horse in the mouth. For all I know she did have a college roommate named Febreze, but that did not really matter at the moment, for as she slowed down her jabbering, I was able to get a word in edgewise.

“Heh, heh. Yeah, it's good to see you too, Pinkie,” I chortled and tried to carefully, carefully remove her arms, which were embracing me. And I didn't hurt her or break her legs. Ha, I'm getting better at controlling my strength!

“So what brings you by, Febreze?”

“Don't you remember? You promised you were going to show me around Ponyville. You know, since it's my first time here.”

I could see her tiny mind struggling to work.

“Y-yeah, I did say that, but…”

“Awesome! We can start right now!” I said enthusiastically, placing an arm around her. “You don't mind, do you, big guy?” I asked the unnamed stallion. It was a little disconcerting how gratefully he looked at me.

“Nope,” was his only response before he turned tail and hauled ass out of there, leaving a trail of upturned dust in his wake.

Frustration and disappointment were evident in the pink pest’s eyes as she watched him go, lifting a foreleg after him. “W-wait… I--”

“See, he's okay with it. Could we start the tour now?”

“Okay, I guess,” she said a bit glumly.

Heh, heh, heh. Almost there.

The next part was relatively simple. I lured her to a small side street that lay behind two restaurants, sparse, rough and empty save for the large overflowing trash cans next to said establishments.

After looking both ways to make sure we were all alone, I tackled the pink pest to the ground. A cry of surprise and pain left her furry lips, but not too loud. The impact dazed her, and as she lay there, pinned under me, one of my hooves made a beeline for her throat while the other one stamped over her mouth making sure she did not make so much noise.

Her reaction was more or less what I expected. She squirmed and thrashed, making desperate noises and pounded at me with all her limbs. Turns out choking someone is not as easy as they make it seem in the movies. Yeah, it's not too hard to cut off airflow with hands, but I forgot to take account for the fact I had hooves instead. While for some reason or another things could be stuck to hooves in order to move things around, the things couldn't actually exert pressure, which was needed for any self respecting choking technique. Whatever the case, I wasn't getting anywhere in my attempts to choke her into unconsciousness, so I settled for smashing her head against the ground. Yeah, that wasn't so simple either. Do it too hard and her brains splatter all over. Not hard enough and she'll still be awake and trying to fight me off. Took three tries before she finally went still.

Stupid pony hooves. How do they get around with these things?

It truly boggled the mind at times, but I had no time to ponder the mysteries of pony life.

Then, just like that, the pink imposter’s body was enveloped by green flames and was replaced by a pony sized bug with fangs. Heck, upon closer inspection, the thing actually looked pretty cool. Still, that didn’t at all change the fate that would await it. My time on Ponyville was coming to an end, and I did not want to waste any time that would keep it from being a reality. I stuffed the bug pony’s body in a trash bag and returned to the castle. At this point in time, discretion was not really high up on my list of priorities and while I got plenty of weird looks dragging a lumpy garbage bag around, I was not stopped. Guess murder is not as prevalent here as back on Earth.

The walk back to the castle was uneventful besides the potion's effect wearing off me. Luckily, I had made sure to stash a set of clothes close to the mud village for such occurrences.

“Hey, Ari. You here?” I asked aloud when I was back inside the castle. Her amulet was still lying in the dresser where I left it and her apparition materialized itself after a moment.

“You called?” she asked expectantly.

“Got you something,” I said plainly, holding up the garbage bag and giving it a shake for emphasis.

“Oh. You… shouldn't have?” She said a bit uncertainly.

“Why don't you say that after you see what's inside?” I promptly tore open the bag and allowed the bug pony’s body to drop unceremoniously.

Yeah, that got her attention, as she stared at the thing scrutinizingly. “By Starswirl, is that a changeling?” she said almost breathlessly.

I shrugged. “It could be, for all I know. Can you use it to get around?”

“Maybe. Maybe…” she muttered and tapped her chin with a hoof. “It can't hurt to try.”

“So how does it work?”

“Place my amulet around the changeling’s neck. I'll take it from there.”

Was it that simple? Eh, I'll leave that to smarter minds than mine. I did as she said and for the next several moments, nothing happened save for the ‘ling’s chest rising and falling. Then his back leg twitched. Then again, and just like that, his eyes snapped opened, his limbs stretched and stuff, his back arched and his fanged pie hole opened in a soundless scream.

What the… It was unnerving and I couldn't help but back away.

His body then jerked and seized violently, his mouth lolling out and his every limb flailing wildly like a victim of possession, which I guess was not too far off the norm. Then it stopped. Abruptly, just like that, and it simply laid there.

I approached tentatively and after a moment of indecision, nudged the body with my foot. “Dude, are you even alive?”

Turns out she was, as she slowly came to. The buggy eyes slowly opened, still a cool blue and the face wincing in pain. Deliberately, the ‘ling slowly rose to a sitting position and rubbed tenderly at her head. “Did you have to be so rough? My head feels like it’s about to burst.”

The voice that came out was definitely not female and it posessed a buzzy quality to it, not unlike a fly flying around.

“I think I did fairly well, seeing how this is my first time kidnapping someone.”

“You walked down with a body in full view of the locals. Can’t get much worse than that,” she said reproachfully, eyes still closed and massaging the back of her head. “At least I have a body now. Thanks for that.”

I grunted in acknowledgement. “So how does this body snatcher thing work? Is the original owner still there, or…”

“No, he’s gone. I destroyed his mind.”

“That’s… creepy,” I said lamely, but truth be told, I more or less expected this.

“You seem okay with it,” she said casually, not looking at me. It seemed she had recovered, as she now inspected her new body with a critical eye, flexing her limbs and beating those fragile looking wings.

Perhaps I was. Or more likely, I wasn’t all that sure how to feel. It’s things like this you don’t usually think about, but this entire world-- away from Earth, from people, from humanity itself. The magic, the ponies, the annoying pastel colors. It made… atrocities and everything else seem less real, and given the ethical ramifications of what just happened, I was content to keep it that way. Hell, it’s probably how I managed to keep myself together during all this.

“I need your help with something.” My voice cracked as I abruptly broke myself out of my funk.

“Oh? What is it?” she asked half distractedly. She didn’t seem too impressed at my brilliant plan to stroll up on a diamond dog den and make demands out of its leader.

“You’re joking…” she groaned and tiredly rubbed her face.

“Do I look like I’m joking?”

“Do you honestly expect this to go well? At all? I’m assuming you’re not aware of the fact diamond dogs do not care much for humans.”

It’s always something, isn’t it? “What do you mean?”

“Diamond dogs are subterranean creatures. Humans are subterranean creatures. Do you see the problem here?”

“They… both live in dirt?”

“Rivalries, you foal! Territory disputes. Neither of them get along.”

“O~kay. That’s a problem…” I trailed off. “But that was a long time ago, right? Maybe things have changed,” I said, trying to go for optimistic.

“Are you basing that on the fact they’ve become an advanced enough society that does not engage in activities like… oh, I don’t know, robbing ponies? Because even if they were, I’d like to remind you that to them, you are no more than an animal.”

I facepalmed. “So I’ll strong arm them, or… I dunno, but I’m doing something. You coming with or not.”

She arched an eye. Green flames enveloped her and in a flash, where before stood a freakishly large bug was now a grey coated, black maned unicorn. “Of course I’m going. I did give you my word after all,” she said in a now feminine voice. “If nothing else, it’s a good excuse to stretch my legs.”

She then made a brisk trot toward one of the staircases that led down to the lower levels of the castle. “Hey, where are you going?”

“Preparations,” she called, not looking back. “If we’re doing this, I need to get my blades. Wait for me, I won’t be long.” And she disappeared from view before I could say anything else.

***

Oh, my gosh. Was Cutlass’ only thought. The pegasus had seen her fair share of unusual and outlandish things in her travels with her aunt. Still, an intelligent, talking human masquerading as a pony stood out no matter what. And with a changeling as a helper? It seemed like the opening line of a bad joke.

Just as she intended, the well intentioned pegasus discreetly followed her kin… or what she thought was her kin. All she ever set out to do was make sure that a fellow pony did not get hurt and now she stumbled upon a most bizarre scene. She had followed the ‘pony’ round Ponyville, and seeing her assault that friendly pink mare had been a shocker in and of itself. In fact, Cutlass had been so surprised she did not react much after it happened. Had she been of quicker mind, she would have done something to intervene, but then the disguised human went and subdued a changeling masquerading as a pony. It was like a train crash from there on out, as Cutlass could do little but watch in morbid fascination for what happened next.

She followed the human all the way into the Everfree. It was probably the magic or something, because the clouds there simply refused to cooperate in being marehandled. It was how she had maintained her cover during the whole thing, and trying to rein in an Everfree cloud was like trying to lasso a stallion during the annual Battle of the Broncos contests from her homeland.

In fact, she’d become a little too engrossed, for she had foolishly let her curiosity get the better of her and perched herself on the windowsill that overlooked the room the human had occupied. Without realizing it, she had pressed her weight on the railing directly below it, from which hung an old banner, and it creaked loudly upon bearing her poundage.

The human’s neck quickly snapped to Cutlass’ position and in that moment, the young pegasus knew she had been made.

Oh, horseapples. Was her last feeble thought before she felt a tug in her navel forcefully yank her from her position. With a startled squawk she sailed through the air, her limbs flailed and wings working furiously to stabilize herself.

But this lasted little more than two seconds before she let her instincts take over and acted accordingly. Cutlass twisted her body, using the built momentum to buck with both her legs, striking the human full force in her face and chest.

This broke her assailant's concentration, but by no means did it slow down The force by which Cutlass collided against her, sending them both sprawling on the ground.

Her blood pounded in her ears, and the rush of adrenaline, in combination with a pegasus’ natural resilience against high speed collisions enabled her to recover quickly as she scrambled to her hooves with little more than a ringing in her head.

She couldn't help but take a moment to gawk at the little human female, who fixed Cutlass with a combination of anger and annoyance, rubbing at her nose in an almost absentminded way, but if it hurt she did not show it. Cutlass couldn't help but be puzzled at this. The pegasus had been unlucky enough to be on the receiving end of a buck before, and knew for a fact that such a hit on one’s face should have merited no small amount of pain, wincing and blood on the afflicted party, yet the odd human looked no worse for wear.

“Why you…” the human muttered, her voice low, defensive and sardonic and all of a sudden lunged forward with the intention of tackling Cutlass to the ground. She missed by quite a good margin, as the pegasus mare’s reflexes enabled her to spread her wings and move out the way, keeping he left from harm’s reach. The chamber they all found themselves in was quite spacious, possibly used to host parties or events. This mean that despite being indoors, there was ample room to maneuver in the air, something Cutlass decided to take advantage of.

The drive to fight or flee had taken over her and in a split second, Cutlass realized that to escape, she ought to first disable the human, who by some reason or another was capable of casting magic. She was still trying to wrap her head around that. Cutlass herself was no stranger to scrapes and fights. She didn't usually go looking for them but were sometimes unavoidable and knew a thing or two about her own strengths and shortcomings. Yes, she could deliver a good buck like most everypony, but her svelte and slender form did not grant her with great physical strength and seeing what the human could do to a pony, she was not too crazy about getting too close either. Brute force was not her field, but even so, an idea popped into her head, something she could go to incapacitate the human long enough to make her escape.

Cutlass flapped her wings in a series of powerful and precise strokes that catapulted her forward with impressive velocity, a strenuous feat that allowed her to achieve great bursts of speeds for a few moments, but that was all she needed.

The pegasus was little more than a blur as she covered the distance between herself and the human in the blink of an eye, whose arm was outstretched and was no doubt about to do something Cutlass would not like.

Timing was key and in that she succeeded. Despite the velocity of her descent, Cutlass managed to grab onto the human’s left arm with both hooves and used the momentum of her flight to spin full circle, taking the surprised girl along with her, who yelled in surprise as she found herself sailing through the air and crashed into one of the decorative suits of armor that lined the room, taking it down with her and filling the whole room with the grating found of metal against stone. Not bad at all, considering she had only seen this move yesterday in a Power Ponies comic book.

Seeing an opening, Cutlass sped towards the nearest window, ready to make a hasty retreat, but did not expect the banners hung on either side of it to come alive and block the exit just as she was not more than a few feet from it. It was too sudden and there was not enough time to stop or change directions, and as soon as Cutlass came into contact with them, the banners wrapped around her, layer after layer passing through her vision as her body was completely enveloped from the neck down.

Cutlass struggled against her bonds, but the ancient fabric held. Not that it mattered much as she was unable to move even an inch of her constricted body. Oh, fiddlesticks! I’ve gone and done it now.

The sound of hoofsteps resonated along the stone surfaces of the castle and Cutlass looked in their direction, catching sight of the grey coated pony. No, not a pony, but a changeling disguised as a pony.

Cutlass licked her lips nervously and offered a weak smile. “Um… uh… h-hey there,” she stammered and squirmed uncomfortably. “C-could you let me go, please? I swear, I won’t tell anypony what happened… o-or what I’ve seen,” she added hastily. The changeling looked at her with interest, but did not appear malicious in any way. The same could not be said for the human girl, who muttered a string of crude words Cutlass could barely make out. Her voice was low, defensive and sardonic, the same as when she’d been a pony and was probably the norm for her.

She shuffled into view, scowling down at Cutlass before a spark of recognition could be seen in her eyes. “You… I remember you. You’re that pegasus from the train station,” she whispered harshly to herself more than anything and for a moment, her countenance gave way to alarm and worry before being replaced by suspicion and anger. Stalking forward, she bent down and picked up Cutlass, curtains and all and brought her close to her unnervingly expressive face. “Who are you? What are you doing here? What did you see? How long have you been following me? Answer me, unless you want to find out what it feels like to be strangled by your own intestines!” the girl threatened as she shook the pegasus harder and harder with every word.

For a moment, Cutlass was rendered stunned into silence as she had no idea how to respond to such a threat, not to mention the fact her vision was spinning and she felt a wave of disorientation at the rough marehandling. She closed her eyes and shook her head, which helped a bit and when she opened them, there they were again, both the girl and the changeling staring at her expectantly.

“I’m sorry! I didn’t mean anything by it,” Cutlass blurted out quickly. “I didn’t mean to spy on you, honest! I just wanted to make sure you weren’t going to get in any trouble.”

“What?” the girl said flatly.

“Well… you know. Back at the station. You were raring to go and storm a diamond dog den, and it really looked like you were going to.”

The girl merely rolled her eyes. “Of course I was going to, what’s your point here?”

“That’s stupid,” Cutlass couldn’t help but blurt out. She continued quickly at seeing the human’s unamused glare. “L-look, I thought you were a pony, and ponies just don’t go into diamond dog territory looking for trouble. You could be hurt. Nopony in their right mind would knowingly go headfirst and stir up the dogs. I… just wanted to make sure you weren’t really gonna go through with it.”

“You expect me to believe you were tailing after me for nothing more than to make sure I was alright? I wasn’t born yesterday, you know.”

“It’s the truth, I swear,” Cutlass declared hotly, doing her best to appear sincere, as she was, for the most part. She matched the girl’s accusing glare with her own earnest one. Cutlass fought against the urge to blink her increasingly prickly eyes as neither of them yielded for quite some time.

The human girl then suddenly huffed and backed away, though still keeping ahold of Cutlass. “Christ, now what am I gonna do with you?” she muttered to herself, though not exactly making an effort to hide it.

“You could let me go,” Cutlass offered with a small, uneasy smile. “I promise, I won’t tell anypony about this, and I’ll even make it worth your time.”

“How?” the girl asked after a moment of indecision.

“Well, you know my auntie? The griffon you met back at the station?” A nod. “We’re actually heading to Las Pegasus for one of her business trips. I can make sure you get a free ride with us and if you really can take care of the diamond dog problem, I’ll make sure she gives you a good reward. What do you think?”

“I think it sounds a little too good to be true and I don’t trust you to actually go through with it.”

The other occupant in the room, the changeling, suddenly stepped forward and made her opinion known. “Now, let’s not be hasty here. Ah, could I speak to you for a moment?” she asked the human girl, who gave a jerky nod and put Cutlass’ still bound body down.

They retreated a short distance away and spoke in hushed tones, the human girl’s growing in incredulousness as her opposite’s mildly annoyed countenance spoke clear and concise. Whatever the argument was, the human eventually relented and crossed her arms, looking not too pleased and the ‘unicorn’ approached Cutlass again, a small satisfied smile on her muzzle.

“It's your lucky day, um…” the unicorn prompted.

“Cutlass.”

“Cutlass, then. My friend here is willing to hear you out, but as you can understand, we need a little assurance that you will keep your word.”

Her ears perked up at this. “What did you have in mind?”

“Well you see, Jacqueline here is determined to go through with her little adventure and we’ll be leaving for the dogs’ den in a minute.”

“And… you want me to go with you guys?” Cutlass asked incredulously. “Into diamond dog territory?”

“Basically,” was the only response.

Cutlass heaved a long sigh and said, “Sure, why not? Anything that will get me out of this...” she trailed off and squirmed uncomfortably. “Speaking of, would you mind? It’s getting really tight in here.”

The unicorn’s horn glowed, followed swiftly by the sound of tearing fabric and Cutlass sprung eagerly from her constrictive cocoon.

“Oof, that’s better,” she sighed in relief and stretched her wings, which had been pinned against her at uncomfortable angles. An awkward silence then filled the room as all three parties looked back and forth at each other, unsure how to proceed.

Cutlass took the initiative. She spread her wings and fluttered over to the human in a paced trajectory. Said oddity had her arms crossed and her eye twitched briefly as Cutlass approached, her stoic expression not giving an inch.

The pegasus herself had mixed feelings about the whole ordeal. An intelligent, speaking human was a head turner in and of itself, and tense as the situation might have been, Cutlass couldn’t help but be overcome by a sense of foallike curiosity. And she could understand to a degree the girl’s hostile behavior, even if it was a bit frightening.

“Hiya there. My name’s Cutlass,” she said brightly with a smile to match and her leg outstretched in a friendly greeting, waiting for the girl to reciprocate. The human did not move for several moments, but this did not detract Cutlass, who stayed true to her friendly demeanor.

But her patience was rewarded as the girl slowly reached out with her own small, pale hand and shook Cutlass’ hoof, muttering only a simple “Hey,” before letting go.

Cutlass held back a sigh of relief. Traveling with her aunt had taught the pegasus a thing or two regarding mutual agreements; a key measure was needed for all parties involved, however small that sliver of understanding might be. And truth be told, Cutlass was actually looking forward to the incoming excursion.

Equestria was undoubtedly a nice place to visit, with its marvelous and scenic natural vistas and its unparalleled sweets and pastries, to say nothing of the friendliness of the locals. Cutlass found it truly surprising just how friendly the Equestrian ponies were. You could know someone for only a few hours and come night time, you would be the best of friends; not the kind of disposition she’d encountered in most other foreign lands.

But for all its attractions, Equestria or at least Equestrian life, simply lacked that sense of excitement and adventure Cutlass had grown so accustomed to, and a little jaunt into a diamond dog den looked to be exactly what she needed to get out of her increasingly sedentary funk.

“You gonna need anything?” the human asked. “Weapons or anything of the like?”

Cutlass thought about this for a moment… and she still couldn’t help but gush internally how bizarre and… well, awesome, it was to hear an actual human speak. She tended to favor light covering for her legs, studded with brass at the hooves and a single, form fitting vest lined with pockets where she could stash away any trinkets that might catch her eye. “Nah, I’m good. I trust my own four hooves better than any weapon. Know what I mean?”

“Actually… yeah. I think I get it,” the girl responded, a bit more forthcoming this time and her stance considerably more relaxed. “Come on, then. I want to get this over with as soon as possible.”

All in all, Cutlass believed she took the situation rather well, however unusual it may have been. She'd noticed the ‘unicorn’ had strapped a sash around her midsection, it's appearance resembling that of leather.

“And you, Ari?” Asked the human.

From her sash she levitated six blades that were sheathed in specially made pockets carved into the material, silver, conical and simple in appearance with no handle. “These are all I'll need,” she said confidently. “Normally, I'd use my magic to protect myself, but this body’s reserves are pathetically low.”

And so off the went. A human, a pony and a changeling heading into a diamond dog den. It sounded to Cutlass like the beginning of a bad joke

After passing the forest, Cutlass did some aerial recon and pointed us to the most likely place where these diamond dogs would make their den. It was about a twenty minute walk from the forest’s perimeter and the dense vegetation gave way to a bleak landscape. Nothing but rugged earth all around, boulders of various sizes jutting out the ground and what few trees could be seen were long since dead and dry. No sign of life at all.

“Are you sure this is the right place?” I asked Cutlass, who was leading the way.

“Yep, yep,” came the chipper reply. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say she was enjoying herself. “See those mounds of earth way over there?” She pointed to said objects, which lay a few hundred feet from our location. “That there’s various entrances to diamond dog territory.”

“They just leave it out in the open?”

“Nopony ever accused diamond dogs of being smart,” Ari chimed in, to which Cutlass made a sound of agreement. “Besides, we still have to figure out where to go in.”

“Right, right,” Cutlass said. “I think I heard somewhere that a diamond dog tunnel is like a maze. If you don’t know where you’re going, you can easily get lost in there.”

“Not to mention they can probably collapse the earth around you and bury you alive,” Ari said matter-of-factly.

“Yeah… do you even have a plan? Because I really don’t want to be lost forever. Or die at the paws of diamond dogs. That would just be insulting.”

“Of course I have a plan,” I said hotly. Well, part of a plan, really, but still. “We’ll just have to find a dog and ask it to take us to its leaders.”

“And you’re going to do this how, exactly?” Cutlass pressed on.

“I’ll draw them out,” was my sole response.

Cutlass and Ari shared a look while I took the lead. The diamond dog burrows stretched across an expanse of land the size of two football fields lined side to side, and it was to its middle that I made my destination. Cutlass and Ari shot furtive glances around them, as if expecting the dogs to pop out of the earth at any moment. Me, I felt a mixture of both apprehension and exhilaration. Who knows, maybe it was both their attitudes rubbing off on me. That I wasn’t alone certainly helped as well.

Now all I needed was a dog to interrogate. Obviously, it would be a bad idea to simply jump in, as we’d risk getting lost on a labyrinthine maze of tunnels, but with the beast’s cooperation, we would at least get a good understanding of their layout. And since diamond dogs were subterranean creatures, I assumed they would be able to sense vibrations. Well, I intended to give them a whopper.

Targeting a random patch of land, I let loose with a juiced up, kinetic wave that slammed into the ground with considerable force, gouging a decently sized crater and making a rather loud booming noise as it struck the earth.

A startled yelp somewhere beside me drew my attention to Cutlass. Said pony was airborne, hiding behind the remains of a withered tree and with only her head and a hoof poking out.

“W-what in the hay was that?” she demanded. Heh, clearly she hadn’t been expecting that.

“Relax, will ya? It’s just me. And keep an eye out, both of you. The dogs definitely felt that, and someone will be coming to investigate.”

Bemusement was clear all over her fuzzy mug but fortunately, she did as I said and kept a lookout for any dogs that would come out. Ari and I did the same, ready to capture one if the opportunity presented itself.

So yeah. We waited…

Then we waited…

And we waited some more.

“I… don’t think they’re coming,” Ari said after we’d been aimlessly standing/flying for a few minutes.

Me, I facepalmed. Oh, for the love of… Stupid diamond dogs. Couldn’t they play along? Very well, if my attempt to draw them wasn’t enough, then it was time to kick it up a notch.

“Alright, I’mma try something else. Get back, both of you.”

“What are you…” Ari started to say before she cottoned on. I drew lots, and I mean lots of magic into my palms, pooling enough for a whopper of a spell. In a flash of light, Ari teleported herself a good distance away and I let loose with a massive explosion of kinetic force, driving it straight in the ground. The earth all around me cracked and trembled, and it was a slight miracle that I didn’t immediately lose my footing. In other parts the ground caved in, forming sinkholes, trees and rocks had been reduced to splinters and pebbles, and by the end of it, only a scant few diamond dog burrows had been left more or less intact. Well, those well outside the range of my spell, as everything around me had been compressed into a crater.

Not that I had any time to register or appreciate any of this, as I dropped to my knees immediately after, as my body hurt all over. My muscles seared like white hot metal, my blood felt like acid and my head felt like an overripe melon ready to burst. Goddamn, it hurt.

“Hey, are you alright?” I could barely make out Cutlass’ voice. To be fair, I was a little too busy being wracked by extraordinary pain to be able to do much of anything. Didn’t stop me from making out a magical, pop-ish noise that signified Ari’s presence.

“You idiot,” she sighed. “That was a very stupid thing you did.” I could only moan in response.

“Okay, I’m confused. What just happened?” Cutlass asked.

“If you ask me, I’d guess that using all that magic at once put a great deal of strain on her body. Not surprising. Humans are not built to cast magic after all.”

“Well, we can’t just stay here. If the dogs didn’t notice her first little love tap, they definitely felt this. And this is just me, but I don’t think they’ll be all that happy with us.”

“Agreed. Alright, Jacqueline, hold still.”

Huh? Wha…? I felt two hooves roughly turn me over onto my stomach and immediately after, there was a bony, pointy something that pressed against the base of my skull.

“Hey, what are you…?” And bam! Just like that I felt a condensed flow of magic travel through my brain stem and into my noggin, messing things around and the pain that so wracked my body not moments before was gone.

“There. Better now?”

I admit, I was a bit too stunned to answer, but you go and see what it feels like to be Crucio’d and have it stop all of a sudden. Gives a good shock to the body. Eventually, I managed to get back up, albeit shakily and was in a better state of mind to answer.

“You… did you do that, Ari? I thought you guys’ magic didn't work on me.”

“Normally, yes, but you foolishly used far too much of your power for a single spell. In fact, I'd say you're as susceptible as anyone to magic at this point.” She accentuated this by levitating me, just like that, with no visible strain on her part.

“H-hey, cut it out. It’s not funny,” I protested as she willed my body to turn in place.

“Look on the bright side,” Cutlass said, unsympathetic to my plight. Said pegasus fluttered in tandem with me and bopped my nose. “At least you’re taller now. Heh, heheh. Get it? Because you’re such a cute little shrimp.” That she ruffled my hair really didn’t help matters.

I slapped her hoof away. “Alright, enough! Stop it, both of you. Did you forget what we came here for?”

“As you wish,” Ari sighed and abruptly released her hold on me.

“Hey, do you guys hear that?” Cutlass asked. She stood above our heads paying attention to a patch of land that was collapsing in on itself. Ari and I turned our attention to it and indeed, the thing was growing in size, starting out the size of a coin but gradually growing in size. And get this, as it grew so too were we able to make sounds coming up from below the dirt. Barely audible, but definitely there.

“They’re definitely coming through here,” I muttered to myself, and I couldn’t help but notice my palms were starting to get moist, my heart raced and muscles tensed. Obviously, common sense dictated that standing just above the hole was not the best idea, so the three of us backed away a good distance. Ari drew three of her blades, with a look of cool confidence on her mug. Cutlass, meanwhile, looked antsy, like a kid waiting for his turn at the ice cream truck, hitting her front hooves together. Man, I think they’re taking this better than I was.

I’m not really sure how much of it was real and how much of it was false bravado, but I managed to keep my composure. The hole was now as wide as I was tall, and the scratching of claws on dirt and yips and howls were more clearly defined. They were closer now, and like a termite mound, the edges around the hole grew upwards in size until finally, the bottle-corked dogs sprung from the ground all at once.

My first thought upon seeing them was that they were fugly as fuck, with sloping bodies, impossibly massive forearms that ended with paws that looked to be able to snap bone with a single swing. Their back end, on the other hand was ridiculously small. I was by no means an expert on diamond dog anatomy, but I couldn’t imagine they’d stand upright for too long. Probably used their front paws gorilla style. And their faces were not limited in size and shape. Some looked like dobermans, others bulldogs, others were clearly pit bulls, terriers, mastiffs and a bunch of others I do not care to name.

It goes without saying, but seeing so many of their number come out all at once nearly broke my composure and I was more than tempted to turn and run the other way. Still, the thought of losing face in front of Ari and Cutlass was not all that appealing either, so I braced myself and prepared to scrap my way out of a mountain of dogs.

Of course, the stupid canines just had to go and ruin my moment of solidarity. They completely ignored us and instead hauled ass out of there. A couple of them even bumped into me. Another dog that got too close to Ari found a massive gash carved along its midsection. Her blades moved to fast for me to catch more than a silvery glint. Nevertheless, she knew what she was doing as she succeeded in disemboweling the dog, who promptly dropped to the ground amid agonizing howls.

Still, she realized something was amiss as well, for none of the dogs seemed to have taken notice of their felled kin.

“Ari, the hell is going on?!” I hissed, hoping she could shed some light on the situation.

“I don’t know,” was her sole response.

“So, I’m not an expert on diamond dogs or anything,” Cutlass said from above us. “But it seems to me they’re running away from something.”

Yep, that was about right. Or at least, it seemed to be, now that I looked at the things with a fresh perspective. Again, it does not cease to amaze how most every living thing here can have disturbingly human-like expressions. Unnerving, really. Anyway, from what I could tell, the dogs were indeed scared, and Ari seemed to come to this conclusion as well. Question was, what in the world are they running from?

Almost as if on cue, a number of dogs burst out anew, but they were different than the other ones. For one, they looked pissed, growling, barking, and some of them even foaming at the mouth. Secondly, they wielded weapons-- crude things made of equally crude materials. Spears, swords and maces. Thirdly, was the armor they wore. Every other dog that came before them was bereft of clothing, yet these bozos were sporting equally crude plating of some type of metal.

Whatever the case, my companions and I couldn’t help but gape as these dogs began to systematically slaughter their unarmored ilk. Another thing I couldn’t help but notice was that the fleeing dogs seemed to be on the skinny side, with the worst cases emaciated. Not so much for the brutes, who were very robust. With fast, powerful strides, they ran down their victims. It was a slaughter.

In the span of a few seconds, the alarmed yelps and yips of the dogs was overcome by a litany of violence, pain and anguish. Pained howls and screaming signaled the unlucky sods who were mercilessly cut down, and it wasn’t like they went quickly. Showing what little civility they had, the attacking dogs stabbed their victims through the gut, oftentimes more than once and in the process spilled out fountains of blood and more than a few organs. The victims would then be left for dead as the attackers looked for more potential targets.

Other unfortunate dogs were literally hacked to pieces, their limbs cut off as they could do little but scream and hope death came swift. Those with maces seemed particularly fond of bashing in their victims’ brains until there was nothing left but vague remains of what used to be a cranium and other still used nothing more than their own fangs and paws to literally tear their victims in half… or apart.

They didn’t discriminate at all. There were dogs there too small to be adults and others still with a more feminine pitch in their voices. I craned my neck and could make out Cutlass expression of shock and disgust. Probably mirrored my own. Ari on the other hand, seemed to be taking it better. An upturned corner of her lip was all she gave away, probably in distaste. Me, I chose not to say anything. I couldn’t guarantee I would not puke if I opened my mouth.

“Ready yourselves. They’ve seen us now,” Ari said. All six of her blades were out now, forming a semicircle around her that glistened in the moonlight.

True enough, eight of the dogs had taken notice of us and bounded forward, all careless and arrogant, as if thinking we would go down easy.

“Let them,” Cutlass boasted. “If it’s a fight they want, it’s a fight they’ll get.”

I didn’t trust myself to speak now, so instead, I let my actions do the talking. With a telekinetic hold, I grabbed two of the dogs mid stride. The look of surprise on their ugly mugs was all they could muster before I flicked my wrist upwards and just like that, they were no longer there. Their yelps of alarm died out almost immediately as in the span of a few seconds, they were catapulted hundreds of feet into the air. If the thin air or the crushing g-forces didn’t kill them, the fall most certainly would.

Cutlass dove forward in a surprising show of speed. One of the dogs swung its arm clumsily, hoping to land a strike with its mace. With her air superiority, it wasn’t too surprising she’d managed to evade it. Diving just below the incoming blow, Cutlass’ hoof shot out and grabbed ahold of the dog’s side. Using the grip and the momentum she’d built up, her body turned a full 180 degrees so that she now faced the dog’s armored backside, grabbed ahold with both hooves and lifted them both into the air a good ten feet. The stupid beast did not know what to make of things, as it flailed helplessly. Not that it mattered much as Cutlass dove backwards and into the ground. A sickening crunch heralded the dog’s death, its neck broken while the pegasus looked no worse for wear.

A flash of silver and one of the dogs stopped in its tracks, clutching at its eyes and letting out a high-pitched whine of agony. Damn, Ari had good aim. The two blades that had embedded themselves within the dog’s eyes were violently yanked through its paws, cleaving through flesh, tendon and bone as if they weren’t even there. With unnerving accuracy, the rest of Ari’s blades plunged through the dogs’ unarmored kneecaps, effectively rendering them immobile. One of them even managed to stab its own throat by accident as it fell on its blade. The rest were swiftly dispatched as Ari slit their throats while downed.

Cutlass whistled appreciatively. “Not bad. Have you guys done this before?”

“Once or twice.”

“Not… really.”

“So what’s the plan? Are we still doing this?” She made a halfhearted motion to the carnage still going on around us.

“They’re taking them back,” I muttered.

“What’s that?” Ari asked. She was a bit distracted, wiping her blades clean on the body of a random dog.

“See? They’re taking back the other dogs.” I pointed to two of the mutts who were dragging a third one back into the ground. The scene repeated itself over the area. The armored dogs’ bloodlust seemed to have lessened, for now they focused on dragging back their malnourished counterparts. Said victims pleaded pathetically, not wanting to go back, others grabbed onto anything they could sink their paws into and more than a few allowed themselves to be taken without much of a fight. Probably either gave up or were beaten into unconsciousness.

“Ohh, I see what’s going on,” Cutlass said triumphantly. “Lotta diamond dogs are slavers. Those poor saps were probably trying to escape.”

“Quick, before they all go back in. Grab one of the guards. They’ll have answers we want,” Ari urged me, still trying to get all that icky blood off her blades.

Slaving sentient dogs. What? No, just go with it. I have enough problems without trying to make sense of this world. Spotting another dog, I outstretched my arm and with a gripping motion, it sailed through the air and towards us, where it landed not too gently. It scrambled to get back up and fight, but Cutlass gave it a good buck to the head, dropping it like a sack of dirt and leaving it dazed.

“Nice,” I remarked. She flashed me a toothy grin and held up a hoof. Not knowing what else to do, I bumped it with a fist. Seemed like the right course of action.

“Alright, you two. Hold him up,” Ari ordered. Neither Cutlass or I moved. “Well go on. Or do you not wish to interrogate him?”

We shared a look before simultaneously bending down and grabbed ahold of the dazed dog’s arms to prop it up in a sitting position. It was a fighter, I’ll give it that, no sooner had we touched it that its struggles began anew. And to my surprise, I was actually struggling to keep it in place. Damn, I’d have to ask Ari about that, though I can probably make a guess.

“Oh, for the love of…” came Ari’s annoyed mutter before a pained yelp caused the dog to keep still.

Out of curiosity, Cutlass and I looked to see what caused the beast’s compliance and winced at the sight of two of Ari’s blades pressed tight against the dog’s manhood. Similarly, said unicorn’s countenance was twisted into a disgusted sneer, obviously not liking her blades were touching something dirty. “You got him?” she said in a clipped tone. Cutlass and I reinforced our hold on it.

Ari stepped closer, looking at the diamond dog as if it was little more than a foul stain smeared on her hooves. “Alright, you inferior, smelly, stupid beast. I am going to ask you a few questions and you are going to answer. Otherwise…” she let the silence speak for itself as she dragged one of the blades pressed into the dog’s junk.

The beast itself seemed to be undergoing fits of both rage and terror, for it opened its mouth to let out a series of guttural noises, yips and barks.

“I don’t think he understands Equish,” Cutlass said unhelpfully.

Ari sighed. “Yes, I’m very much aware of that.”

“So do we let it go or…” I trailed off. “Because pretty much all of them are gone now.” It was true. We were pretty much the only still-living life forms here. Well, us and some buzzards that were attracted to the carnage.

“Of course we’re not letting him go,” Ari scoffed. “There’s more than one way to get what we need.”

“What do you have in mind?” Cutlass asked.

“You’ll see. Now keep him still.” We did so and Ari leaned forward and brought her face within inches of its own. I was about ready to warn her of any incoming bites before her eyes glowed. It was barely perceptible, but it was there. A soft, blue, lightsaber glow came out her eyes and almost immediately, the dog went still, its eyes glowing as well.

Both Ari and the dog maintained their positions, their bodies as still as if they were carved from stone. Hell, I wasn’t sure they were even breathing. Cutlass shot me an inquisitive look, but I merely shrugged.

And just like that, the dog’s body went into convulsive fits, becoming more and more violent as the seconds passed, yet its eyes never left Ari’s. Then stuff began to ooze out its orifices. From its ears, mouth, eyes and nose emerged trails of blood, growing in size and accompanying it were pulpy, snot-like bits of grey matter.

It was at this point that Cutlass and I let go with simultaneous cries of disgust and backed away, not wanting to get any of that mess on us. Ari also came to, though she took her time. Even after we’d let go of the dog’s lifeless body, her eyes were still open and aglow. Not sure if she even registered what just happened. Then she closed her eyes, and brought up a hoof to rub her noggin, a slight moan escaping her lips.

“Oof, haven’t done that in a while,” she muttered and opened her eyes, almost immediately spotting the mess she’d made, then us.

“Uh, I think I can speak for both of us when I say, what in the hay was that?”

“And why is it gross?”

“That too. You could’ve given us a head’s up, you know,” Cutlass admonished.

“Well, you see,” Ari said as she trotted nonchalantly towards us. “That was a little something I learned back in the day.”

“When you were a wanted pony, you mean?”

“I thought she’s a changeling,” Cutlass asked.

“Just go with it.”

“In any case,” she cut us off. “I successfully broke into the dog’s mind. Everything it knows, I know it too.”

“Now when you say everything…”

“Well, maybe not everything everything. A mind can only process so much in so short an amount of time. Suffice it to say, I managed to get enough to get a good sense of what’s going on.”

“And?” I urged.

“Like Cutlass said, these dogs are slavers. They used their victims to dig more tunnels, expand their territory and dig up as many gems as they can find. The force of your spell completely collapsed a great many of the tunnels, crushing many dogs-- guards especially. From what I can make out, the slaves tried to escape and the clan leader demanded they be brought back.”

“Right. Any chance they won’t cause trouble anymore?” Hey, a girl could dream.

“No. If anything, I suspect their leader will order more raids in order to make up for all the damage, not to mention the labor shortage.”

“So…”

“Killing him would be your answer.”

“Hey, don’t forget,” Cutlass warned. “Even if you manage to off him, there’s no guarantee whoever steps up as clan leader won’t keep stirring up trouble.”

“Are you… saying we need to kill them all?” Okay, maybe I’ve been taking the lives I snuffed out pretty easy, but I was by no means a Ted Bundy level of sadist. Wholesale slaughter just didn’t seem like the first option to go for.

“I guess if you manage to scare them enough you can get them to leave the territory altogether,” Cutlass suggested, though it seemed she was grasping at straws.

“Either way, we have to act now,” Ari stated. “The dogs are confused and disorganized at the moment. You won’t find a better opportunity to act. And however you want to go about it, you need to kill the leader either way. As long as he lives, reasoning with the dogs is a foal’s errand.”

So it’s like that, eh? Heh, screw all those bleeding heart liberals. Sometimes violence is the only way. In any case, our course was laid out before us. I’m not sure what Ari and Cutlass’ thoughts were on the matter. Would they rather we turn back or do we push on. Granted, I all but strong armed them into coming with me. The fact they didn’t put up a fuss was all the more irritating. They had to know their lives would be put at risk if they came with me, especially at this point in time. Still, they looked ready go on.

Damn it. Distracting thoughts. Pesky things they are. Action tends to shoo them away, so I went and crawled down the diamond dog shaft, Ari and Cutlass following suit.

Author's Notes:

Thanks to Schroedingers_Katze for pre-reading. She's awesome.

On another note, all chapters have been revised. Nowhere to go but forward now.

Targe of the Blooded (II)

“Ow…” Rarity moaned. It was not at all fun to have various pieces of glass and ceramic shrapnel pulled out your skin.

“You’re doing good, Rarity. Just a little more,” Twilight said patiently. For her friend’s sake she concentrated as best she could. and used her magic to pull yet another piece out of her friend. With that done and when Twilight was satisfied there were no more errant pieces of shrapnel to pull out, she dabbed at her friend’s wounds(well, minor injuries, more than anything, but the way Rarity carried on, you’d think she lost a limb or something) with a fresh towel and applied an ointment to soothe the pain.

“There. All done,” Twilight said in satisfaction.

“Thank you, Twilight,” Rarity breathed out.

“Not a problem, Rarity,” was all the unicorn said before levitating all the leftover waste and promptly placing it in a marked bag.

For her part, Rarity looked anxiously at her friend. Twilight had been unusually quiet since they both left the spa for the library. And what a mess it was. That upstart little pegasus had made a right mess of the place, cost Lotus and Aloe a great many bits in damages and sullied their reputation to boot.

Rarity would like to think herself a good judge of character and knew from the very beginning that the little pegasus was not the most socially adept of ponies, but really, who’d have known she’d turn out to be such a boorish, violent brute? The fashionista had nothing but good intentions and… well, granted, maybe hiring out a human to help relieve Febreze’s tense, uptight air may not have been the best way to go about doing things, but her ensuing rampage was a bit of an overreaction.

Regardless of what Febreze may have done, Rarity's thoughts drifted to another matter altogether. She worried that Twilight blamed her for what happened. The unicorn had more than voiced her disapproval at Rarity’s course of action just before everything went to Tartarus.

“Twilight,” Rarity started in trepidation, following her friend into the kitchen. She saw Twilight at the counter, her back turned to her and with a cutting board in front of her, holding a knife with her magic and an apple right in front. Ever studious and abiding by the rules set forth in her many scholarly books, Twilight was in the process of preparing refreshments for Rarity, as a well-educated unicorn would do when they had company.

Twilight’s ears perked as she picked up the sound of her friend’s hoofsteps and looked over. She stared at Rarity in an odd manner. A faint crease lined her forehead and though she fixed her gaze on the fashionista, it was clear her mind lay elsewhere. Rarity and the rest of her friends knew that look. They'd seen it on Twilight many a time when the alicorn thought or concentrated particularly hard on a knotty subject.

“What is it, Rarity?” she said in a tone that lacked her usual friendly quality and came off more automatic than anything. Rarity had heard Spike refer it to Twilight being on autopilot, whatever that meant.

“Is… everything okay?”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s just…” Rarity said delicately. “You’re acting rather odd, darling.”

By this point, Twilight had returned her attention to the apple and in the process did a rather sloppy job of peeling it. “Odd, you say? How?”

Rarity thought it best not to make a mention of one of the alicorn’s many quirks. “I just want to make sure that everything’s okay between us.”

Twilight turned her head with an odd look. Clearly she did not know what Rarity referred to. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

“So… you don’t blame me? For what happened at the spa, I mean.”

Twilight blinked twice and it seemed her attention returned back to the present. “Blame you? No, Rarity, why would you think that? I mean…” she said before Rarity could get a word in edgewise. “What you did was not responsible, but everything after falls on Febreze. There’s just no call for acting like that over a misunderstanding.”

“N-no. You’re right, darling. That was not a good thing I did, but…” she trailed off. “What’s going to happen now?”

“What happens now is we get Febreze to answer for her crimes, misunderstanding or not. I already sent the Guard on the lookout to apprehend her.” Rarity agreed wholeheartedly at this. It just would not do to let such an uncouth brute off with no repercussions. “I also promised Aloe and Lotus to help with their paperwork on insurance for their store. See if the damage can be covered and… oh, ponyfeathers,” she sighed and brought a hoof to her face. “I promised Rainbow Dash I’d keep her company tonight and bring her a few Daring Do books.”

“Well, why don’t I help you out a little? It’s the least I could do after everything that’s happened.”

“Rarity, you don’t have--”

“Nonsense, darling, I insist. You’ve been running yourself ragged with everything that’s been going on lately. The last thing you need is more troubles on your plate.” Twilight was about to object before Rarity continued. “Besides, I am a business owner, darling. I know a thing or two about insurance claims. And don’t worry about Rainbow Dash, I will keep her company tonight while you bring in that troublesome pegasus. I insist on it.”

Twilight took a deep breath before responding. “Well, I have been overexerting myself lately. Alright, Rarity, I’ll take you up on it.”

“My pleasure, Twilight,” Rarity smiled and nuzzled her friend affectionately. She couldn’t help but notice her fur felt softer than the week before. It seemed she’d taken her advice and tried that new conditioner that was all the rage in Fillydelphia. Satisfied that everything was right between them, Rarity bade her friend farewell and went out the door.

However, it wasn't long before the frantic pounding of hooves on wood abruptly resonated through the library. Twilight went on to answer. On the other side waited one of the Royal Guard.

“Princess Twilight, I’m afraid I have news concerning the pegasus you wanted brought in,” the unnamed guard said professionally.

“What is it, Lieutenant?”

“We… have been unable to locate her as of yet, princess. Guards have been posted at key locations and more still have tried to ask the citizens for their help. Unfortunately, while many recall seeing the pegasus, none know where she's taken residence, or if she has family in town, and neither the inn nor the boarding house recalled seeing such a pony,” he admitted reluctantly. "I am afraid she is no longer in Ponyville, princess."

Twilight cocked her head, a slight frown on her features. “How is that possible? I thought the train was not running at the moment?”

“No, princess, it is not. But there are three main roads that lead out of Ponyville. It is possible the pegasus may have gone out either of them. That or she may have flown away.”

Twilight hung her head, a slight hiss coming out her clenched teeth. It was very difficult to track down a pegasus in flight, especially seeing how they could go anywhere they pleased and the clouds themselves provided plenty of hiding spots. “If that’s the case then issue out a warrant to every town and city within a 50 mile radius. I want her found, Lieutenant, and I want it done todayand send troops to search the roads that lead outside Ponyville.”

The guard saluted. “Of course, princess. As you command. However…”

“Yes?”

“As it is now, we don't have a picture of the pegasus we can use on any wanted posters. From what I can understand, you spent some time with her. If you would, it would make our search easier if you could help paint a picture of her."

Twilight opened her mouth to agree, but stopped halfway as a thought came to mind. “Actually, that won't be necessary, Lieutenant.” As she turned around, the alicorn’s horn glowed in the telltale sign of magic and from one of the nearby desks levitated a camera. Twilight promptly opened it and handed the reel over to the guard, who looked at her inquisitively. “As it happens, I took a picture of her just the other day. Take this film and have it developed. You'll have your picture then.”

The guard nodded. “At once, your majesty.” And he left to do his job.

Twilight closed the door and found herself alone in the library. She’d taken on a habit of making herself a nice cup of tea to try and calm down whenever she felt a Want-It-Need-It-Incident level of anxiety coming on.

She might as well be reliving the day, for all the good it did. Advantageous as it may be, having an exceptionally sharp mind came with its own set of drawbacks. It was hard for her to not think, to not dwell, and to not worry about things she couldn’t do much about. But why did she feel this way?

Applejack and Rainbow Dash were doing exceptionally well, all things considered, and her feathered friend was set to be released the next day. Dark Flare had been captured, yes, and while his organization remained up and running, Twilight felt confident it would be unraveled soon. Her human grew stronger and better by the day and save for physical and psychological scarring, he was all set to come home as well. So why is it that she felt so restless? Surely not the whole fiasco with Febreze?

The damage had been done, so why is it that she felt so antsy regarding the volatile mare? Twilight was no fool. She knew the pegasus was hiding something, but she did not know what. In fact, she realized that despite spending most of the morning with her, she did not know much about Febreze at all. Sure, small talk may not have come that naturally to her, but then again, Twilight merely attributed this to her very own personality before she came to Ponyville. Even she, the Princess of Friendship, was not much of a friend those days, she could admit that much, and while the pegasus did not divulge much information about herself, this was not the reason Twilight felt so restless.

There was something off about her, about the whole thing, but Twilight couldn’t put her hoof on it, and it grated on her nerves. After many a minute dwelling on the subject, as well as trying and failing to put it out of her mind, with a frustrated sigh, Twilight threw caution to the wind and stepped out the library. It was obvious that merely sitting at home would get her nowhere and hopefully a nice walk around town would help clear her head.

A few minutes later she couldn’t help but notice it was unusually warm out. It looked like the higher ups at Cloudsdale had scheduled a warm front. It got her thirsty and she pondered going to Sugarcube Corner and maybe get a nice hay and banana milkshake to help fend off the heat.

And that’s when it hit her. Pinkie Pie, of course! She could have almost facehoofed. Capable as the Royal Guard might be, she did not imagine they were all too familiar with Ponyville’s resident party pony and her many quirks and eccentricities. Nopony knew how she did it. Perhaps it was due to the fabled Pinkie Sense, or maybe a variation of it, but whatever her secret, the hyperactive mare could somehow divulge when a new arrival set hoof in Ponyville.

And Twilight herself knew just how much Pinkie loved getting to know new ponies, even if her sometimes over the top friendliness made said ponies uncomfortable. From this, Twilight deduced that if there was anypony who had been in contact with Febreze for more than a few seconds, it would be Pinkie herself, and while it may have been a fairly long shot, perhaps Pinkie could have wheedled facts and information regarding Febreze. Information which would make locating her all the easier. It was a lead worth pursuing and if nothing else, at least it would give Twilight something to help take her mind off things.

So with that in mind she trotted purposefully to Sugarcube Corner. The store itself was already well past the lunch rush but even then, a fair number of booths and tables were still occupied. Mr and Mrs. Cake were similarly attending to their guests, but Pinkie was nowhere to be seen and the owners themselves did not know where the random pony ran off to.

The news disheartened Twilight. Pinkie Pie could be literally anywhere. In the end, she decided looking for the hyperactive mare would take up too much time.

“So, um, Twilight, I don't want to pry, but what exactly are we doing here?” Fluttershy’s delicate voice rang very much clear in the stillness of the Everfree.

Twilight answered, not breaking stride. “I told you, Fluttershy, we’re going to the ruins of Everfree Castle.”

“Well, yes, you said that but… um, why exactly are we going there?”

“There's a possibility a wanted pony is there. We’re gonna go, investigate, and if need be, bring her in.”

Fluttershy’s eyes shrank to pinpricks. “A-a wanted pony? Like, a criminal you mean?” The poor Pegasus was hyperventilating at this point. “B-but what if she turns out to be dangerous?”

“It'll all be okay, Fluttershy. And if anything happens I promise I won't let anything happen to you.”

These words seemed to be of little comfort to the meek Pegasus, but she followed her friend nonetheless. Unlike what most ponies would believe, Fluttershy was not scared of the Everfree forest… or at least, not as afraid as most ponies. Being an avid animal and nature lover, she knew better than most ponies that the Everfree was a place to be respected more than anything. And yes, perhaps a little feared.

By all rights, Fluttershy should not be too apprehensive to be trotting through the darkened woods, but the poor Pegasus’ delicate state of mind has been damaged after her violent altercation with that human.

Her eyes darted around, on the lookout for any unpleasant surprises. Where most ponies would see a bunch of dense vegetation, through Fluttershy’s eyes, the forest painted a very telling picture of the animals that lived within its confines.

“Twilight, stop,” Fluttershy said in a slightly more stronger time of voice. Thankfully, Twilight was able to pick up on it and she halted midstride.

“Why? What is it?”

“There's a manticore den nearby,” she said quietly.

“Manti… what? Are you sure? Where?”

The alicorn princess was on full alert now, wings spread and her horn lit up to let loose a spell at a moment’s notice.

"Close. Close to here, but I don't think the manticores are around."

Twilight let loose a breath of relief. "Good, I'd rather not deal with them now. Come on, Fluttershy, let's keep moving.

The meek pegasus nodded and they resumed their trot.

It had been pure dumb luck that Twilight stumbled on the right track. She had been trotting along the marketplace when she overheard Big Macintosh berating the youngest of the Apple family. Apparently, the filly and her friends, in yet another act of questionable judgment, had wandered into the Everfree forest in an ill fated attempt to claim their cutie marks.

For her part, Twilight did not mean to eavesdrop, but in all fairness, it was a bit hard not to. Big Mac had quite the set of lungs on him when he decided to speak up. It was when the stallion had asked his sister just how they got out of their latest scrape that Twilight stopped in her tracks.

Applebloom spoke of a pegasus, not yet a mare, who had uprooted a tree with nothing but her bare hooves, and did not possess a friendly disposition. An absurd story to anypony else, but for Twilight, a number of pieces finally fell in place.

Nopony had seen Febreze. Nopony knew where she lived and nopony knew where she went at night. There had been some eyewitnesses who faintly recalled her heading numerous times in the direction of the Everfree, but who would have thought she'd dwell within it? The idea was preposterous. The forest was full of dangers, but then again, Zecora lived in it as well. Who's to say a pony wouldn't be able to fend for herself? And if what Applebloom said was correct(and after a brief interrogation on Twilight's part) the pony led them to safety without the use of a map, as though she was familiar with the layout of the forest.

But if Febreze really was the pony they spoke of, where would she even live? Twilight knew of only one place that was devoid of the forest's creatures, a haven for whoever decided to stay within. The Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters.

It was by no means an open and shut case, but the more Twilight thought about it, the more it made sense. Her first instinct was to call for the guard and have somepony search the castle for any evidence, but thought better of it. In order to do so, the guard would have to wade through the thickness of the Everfree, and while Twilight was very confident they could fend for themselves, she did not wish to put them at risk for the possibility that maybe Febreze really did live there.

However, she knew a certain somepony who would be able to help her get safely to the ruins without much of a fuss and it was with this in mind that she sought Fluttershy's help.

At the moment, the shy pegasus led the way, but stopped short after parting through a wide species of fern. Twilight heard her friend let out a sharp gasp and turned away, eyes closed tight.

"Fluttershy, what is it?"

The poor pegasus whimpered. Twilight frowned and moved forward to investigate. Upon seeing exactly what caused her friend such a reaction, the princess gasped in shock.

Fluttershy was right. There was indeed a manticore nest nearby and the ponies were unfortunate enough to come across it. Lying just beneath her hooves were the dessicated corpses of three manticore cubs, their skin taut and sunken. They'd been like this for some time.

"O-oh, my..." Twilight brought a hoof up to her mouth in horror. She had never seen a dead body until recently, and after this, she hoped she'd never have to again. That these were cubs... babies, made it all worse. Her chest constricted, but whatever she may have felt, she knew it paled in comparison to what Fluttershy must be going through.

She moved to comfort her friend.

"It doesn't make sense," Fluttershy whispered, having run out of tears for the better part of a minute.

"What doesn't, Fluttershy?" Twilight asked, a hoof resting on her friend's withers.

"Manticores are good parents. They would never let their cubs..." She trailed off, not wanting to finish the sentence.

"It's the Everfree Forest, Fluttershy. It... these kinds of things happen here," she said lamely in a poor attempt to make her friend feel better.

"There's something wrong here, Twilight."

"What? What do you mean?"

"The forest... it's quiet. Something happened. I don't know what, but many animals are scared to come out."

"But why?"

Fluttershy shook her head. "I don't know, but something about the forest feels different. I... I can't really explain it."

Twilight fumed. So many strange things had happened over the past week, and now it spread to the Everfree as well? This was no coincidence. And where did Febreze fit in to all this? Whatever it was, she needed to get to the bottom of it, and by Celestia, she would do it today.

“Are you quite sure this is the right way?” Cutlass asked as our guide kept on leading us through the seemingly neverending tunnels of the diamond dogs. Ari merely shot her an annoyed look and didn’t say anything.

“It’s just that we’ve been walking around for who knows how long and we still don’t seem any closer to the alpha.”

“Maybe this would go quicker if somebody hadn’t caved in all the tunnels, making us all go around aimlessly in hopes of finding a suitable route,” she said and shot me a baleful look. Sheesh, everybody’s a critic.

“So, I don’t want to be a downer here, guys, but what if all routes to the alpha have been caved in?” asked the pegasus.

“They’re not,” I said with certainty. “Plenty of dogs survived. You saw it. It’s just a matter of time before we find the right way.”

“Oh, this looks promising,” Ari said as she came up to another entrance that thankfully wasn’t blocked off. “Do you mind?” she asked me and I made a noise of agreement.

It goes without saying, but given that we stood underground, away from the light, it was very dark inside the tunnels. The diamond dogs got around this by installing torches along the walls of the tunnels, but even without those, they had exceptionally good eyesight even in places void of any light. How exactly that worked was beyond me, but given the state of this world, I’m assuming magic had something to do with it.

Anyway, I sidled next to Ari and conjured a ball of light to light our way, bobbing alongside me as we walked through. For the next few minutes, Ari led us deeper in. It was creepy just how quiet it was, with only our steps being the sole source of noise. At the very least we knew it was the right way, partly because the tunnel we were now going through had been made by those dogs who tried to get away from their tormentors, being the reason why the place we dark and without torches to light our way. Well, thankfully, the tunnel eventually ended in a downwards slope, and Ari made a small ‘hah’ of triumph.

“It’s light. Do you see it?”

I certainly did. Peeking over the slope, I could indeed make out an orange glow.

“That’s the room the dogs escaped from, and if the guard’s memories are correct, from this point on our way should be rather straightforward.”

“You mean no more collapsed tunnels to go around?” asked Cutlass.

“Correct.”

“Well, it’s about time. Let’s get moving, eh? These cramped spaces are really bumming me out.” And just like that, the pegasus went and jumped in before Ari and I could get a word in edgewise.

“What… hey, Cutlass! Stick together you stupid pegasus!” I yelled after her.

“Well, you can’t say she’s not eager,” Ari said.

“Come on, then. Let’s make sure she didn’t kill herself or something.” I promptly jumped in after her.

The dirt was loose enough that I could simply ride the slope down, not unlike an incredibly dirty water slide. Ugh, and now my jeans are gonna stain. Hope I can wash all that dirt out. The end of the slope came into view, and I could see it ended a good fifteen feet off the ground. I struggled to slow my descent, but the loose soil made it hard to get a good hold and despite my best efforts, I ended faceplanting the ground, filling my mouth with gross dirt.

Agh, son of a… I spat and coughed, frantically trying to clear my mouth, and a silhouette above me made me look upwards to see Ari descending the shaft as well. Unlike me, however, she did some magic thing that slowed her descent to a crawl, enabling her to land smoothly in all four hooves.

“Showoff,” I muttered under my breath and hastened to right myself.

“Well now, it looks your new friend has already taken care of the dogs,” Ari commented.

Say what? I looked over and true enough, Cutlass was there, proud as a peacock and standing triumphantly over the still bodies of four dogs.

“I must say young lady, this is rather impressive. Where did you learn to fight?” Ari asked, paying no heed to the downed mongrels and trotting over to Cutlass.

“Eh. Not one place, really. Aunt Del and I travel to all kinds of places, so I pick up things here and there.”

“And is this kind of thing normal for you?” I asked. Agh, I still feel some grit in my mouth.

“Oh, yeah. More than you’d think, really. Not everywhere’s as nice and cozy as Equestria. There’s more than a few places where you’d best learn to take care of yourself, especially if you’re a female. And… well, I don’t wanna toot my own horn, but,” she said, not really bothering to hide a look of smug superiority. “Rough and tumble types can find it hard to keep their mitts off me.” I swear, if she was trying to look nonchalant about it, she was doing a poor job.

“You know, I’ve been meaning to ask you about that,” Ari said. “Is there something you do? Perhaps a special diet or some calisthenics? Your barrel is quite slimmer than I thought possible for a pony, but…"

“Oh, this ol’ thing?” She smiled, clearly reveling in the attention and patted the side of her belly. Hmm, come to think of it, it did look slimmer and more streamlined than Ari’s. Like pretty much all the other ponies I’d seen, her sides were kind of bulging out. “Yeah, the thin look is all the rage over in Zanzabar. About twenty years back this whole fitness movement kinda took over and ponies figured out some exercises to make your barrel slim and trim. You need to follow a proper diet as well and let me tell ya, that’s kinda hard to do here in Equestria. You guys really like to pile on the sugar,” she said a bit reproachfully.

“Hmm, you're right about that,” Ari admitted. “Back in the day I was known to indulge more often than I should. Perhaps later on you could give me a hooves on demonstration?”

“Of course,” Cutlass said brightly. “And it’s real easy once you build up a rhythm. All you gotta watch out for is…”

“Hey, people! Come on,” I said loudly, cutting off the pegasus before kept on talking. “Did you forget we came here to kill a dog? You can trade fitness tips later."

They both shot me an annoyed look.

"Later?" Ari asked Cutlass.

"Sure, no problem."

These diamond dogs were really worthless species. Literally all the tunnels looked to be the same. You'd think they'd think to put signs or marks or something. I asked Ari about this, only to find the unpleasant truth that the dogs used... secretions smeared on the tunnels to find their way around. An unspoken agreement formed between the three of us to get out of the damned place as soon as possible and we refrained from touching anything but the ground, and even that was questionable.

In a perfect world, the trip would have gone smoothly, but apparently this was not such a world. We encountered resistance further on. Stupid dogs who mindlessly threw themselves at up. They all wound up the same way whether from fatal slashing wounds, crushed skeletons or a well placed hoof to the brain stem. Still, it was a breeze, more or less. We had to improvise later on, for the earth around us was still very unstable. We'd come across a fork in the path when the earth above us destabilized. There was no room to react and we scurried off in different directions to avoid getting crushed. I took the right fork while the others went left. Ari warned me to not try and move the rubble to clear a path, for fears that doing so would cause even more of the countless tons of earth above us to come crashing down. We would just have to meet somewhere else. Since I had no idea how the tunnels were splayed out, Ari suggested we meet in the antechamber that lead to the 'throne room' that housed the alpha. Apparently, for all the twists and turns of the den, those two chambers and only them resided at the very bottom. Was it a perfect plan? Hell, no. There was a very real possibility that I'd never find my way out or that an unexpected shift in the earth would bury me alive but, lame puns aside, I'd kinda dug my own grave here, and only I could get myself out of it.

Drat, it’s freakin’ creepy wandering the tunnels all alone. It’s times like these that I really hate my paranoid nature, for I couldn’t help but envision scenarios in which the mongrels would spring a surprise and overtake me with overwhelming numbers. That or some other eldritch monstrosity would be waiting for me at the next turn. Giant cockroaches, maybe. Or even worse, giant naked mole rats, with wrinkly leathery skin, buck teeth capable of chewing through steel and soulless, milky green eyes. Revolting.
Come on, girl! Find your happy place. Find your happy place.

Finally, a measure of success. After a turn, I could make our the faint, flickering orange glow of flames ahead, so I extinguished my little ball of light as I drew close, only… I wasn't alone.

There were voices, and to my immense displeasure, as I drew closer one of those voices was very much familiar. As I bridged the distance between us, the enclosed tunnel dramatically increased in size as I went along until it became as tall and wide as a two story house.

I could hear the voices now, clearer and two of them speaking very broken Equish… er, english. Whatever. In any case, the ground I walked in served as a balcony of some sort and further ahead, the ground was indented a good twelve feet. On my level were an assortment of crates, barrels and furniture that overlooked the lower level and I hid behind these before peeking at the creatures below.

My heart sank when there, right before me, was none other than Twilight Sparkle. Said alicorn was facing two diamond dogs… well, three really, but that third member was knocked on its ass. It was unmoving, probably unconscious and the other two dogs slowly advanced on the pony, weapons raised.

“Pony has killed Bingo! Now pony must pay!” one of the dogs said in broken english.

I had to give props to the pony, she faced her attackers unflinchingly. “Your friend is only unconscious. Please, let me through. There’s no need for further violence.” She may be speaking for peace, but her wings were outstretched, her body lowered into some sort of combat stance, and her horn aglow, ready to blast the mutts at a moment’s notice.

Me, I had no idea what was going on here, but whatever the case, the dogs opted for violence and pounced. One of them gave a battle howl and bounded forward, raising a rather large sword with the intention of cleaving the admittedly soft looking pony. Said pony, however, had different plans and blasted the canine with a beam of purple magic with enough force to send it flying back a good ten feet.

But the other dog took advantage of her distraction and launched a spear that Twilight was barely able to grasp in a magic hold before it skewered her. Unfortunately for her, this meant that those few but critical seconds that she used up in halting the implement meant she had to take her focus off the dog, who capitalized on this by jumping forward and swung one of its massive forearms in the pony’s direction.

Twilight was too late to be able to completely avoid the dog. She’d been startled enough that she reared up on her hind legs, but even so, the dog was too close and instead of tearing open her gut, its claws slashed her foreleg instead.

The pony cried in pain as following the dog’s swing were miniature blood droplets that splattered on the ground. Twilight fell backwards and sheesh, it looked like the beast cut her deep. The diamond dog, seeing an opening, jumped forward like a lion, maw open, paws outstretched and ready to tear into its prey.

When you read a book, you oftentimes hear that things go in slo-mo. That the victim can see everything as though it were happening at a fraction of the speed. Personally, I think that’s bullshit designed to sell. Was it that way for Twilight as well? That she could see her impending doom? Who knows. All I know was that in that split second I decided to act.

I’m not sure what it was. Compassion, maybe? Dunno. I mean, yeah, out of all the ponies I’d met thus far, she was one of the very few who didn’t completely suck. Or maybe it was a sort of self preservation. With the shit luck I’d had since coming here, I wouldn’t put it past the universe to take a dump on me should the pony princess perish right in front of me.

Whatever it was, it caused me to act in defense of said pony. Reaching over my cover, I grasped the dog in a telekinetic grasp and roughly shoved it in the opposite direction, where it landed heavily in the ground. At this point I pretty much threw caution to the wind and jumped from my vantage point to the floor below.

Of course, Twilight had very much noticed she was not being mauled to death right now and when I hurled the dog away from her, she’d been looking everywhere for her savior. Once her eyes landed on me, however, her fuzzy pony mug had been overcome by surprise. Her jaw slackened and she gazed at me dumbly, but almost immediately, a dawning look of comprehension started to overtake her features and I did not like it one bit.

But I didn’t have time to dwell on this, for the diamond dog was still very much alive and quite pissed now that it got back on its feet. Ugly thing, really. Its paw reached for a crude war ax strapped near its hip and it charged at me with every intention of slaughtering me. Unfortunately for the beast, I had no plans to die today.

True, all that power I used in caving in the tunnels had sapped me of quite a bit of my strength and fortitude. Enough that the dog could kill me if it so desired. Still, I had plenty of juice left over, so when the beast heaved the ax over its head to bring death down upon me, I raised my own forearm to block it, pumping it with mass amounts of chaos magic that I then used to change the constitution of my skin to be tougher than steel.

A loud resounding twang echoed around the room as the blade made contact with the tip of my arm. The dog had obviously not been anticipating this, for the backlash caused it to drop the weapon in surprise and in a feat of admittedly impressive reflexes, I managed to catch the weapon before it hit the ground and drove it with all my might down onto the surprised beast’s mug, effectively splitting its face in half. Somewhere behind me, I could hear Twilight’s cry of “No!”, but given the situation, I paid it little mind. The dog’s body jerked and spasmed violently a couple of times before falling over, where its death throes quickly subsided.

The other dog that Twilight had blasted with her magic was at this point gaining it bearings and began to stir. This was unacceptable and so acting on instinct, I hurried over, grabbed its head between my hands and twisted until I heard bones snap. Like its ilk, its body jerked and shuddered before going still.

Of the emotions coursing through me at that very moment, I’d be lying if I said guilt or remorse were among them. At this point I was more or less used to death. I mean, I didn’t go out of my way to kill stuff, but during that first week in the forest, practically every monster I came across had the intention to do me in, so it was kill or be killed. You’d be surprised how quickly you get used to it.

So I was there, standing victoriously over the lesser beasts. That sense of elation receded, my breaths slowed, became more paced and for a few moments, there was nothing but silence.

Of course, there was still that massive pink elephant in the room. Her Royal Ponyness had just seen me slaughter two dogs and use magic to boot. I stood still, avoiding her gaze and my mind frantically racing to figure out a way to handle the situation. Thankfully, Twilight seemed to be a little busy heaving and retching, if the noises and the smell beside me were anything to go by.

For a moment I considered snapping her scrawny pony neck and bury her somewhere like I did with that guard, but quickly discarded the idea. Did she come here alone? Bring reinforcements? If so, the last thing I needed was for them to figure out I offed their overlord. Kinda make the whole laying low thing a tad hard. And again, universe.

No, she came here for something, and I’m not sure if it was hubris or whatever, but something told me she came here for me. No, I needed her alive and unharmed for the moment. I had to see for myself what she knew and how much she knew. Only then could I make an informed decision what to do.

So with that in mind, I reluctantly turned to see said pony eyeing me in a mixture of distaste, shock and anger. For several painfully stifling moments we simply looked at each other. I mean, really, what do you say in a situation like this?

“You’re bleeding,” I pointed out, not caring all that much she could hear me talk, and I was not surprised when she did not bat an eye at this.

Her ears flicked in my direction, and her eyes narrowed ever so slightly. You could practically hear the gears in her head working overtime. “Febreze,” she said in a strained voice. Whether from her wound or something else, it was impossible to tell. “You got taller.”

Drat. “How did you know?” I asked in a tone that did not betray my increasingly freaked out state.

She frowned. “You’re not exactly subtle. It wasn’t that hard to piece it together.”

Now, I wasn’t what you would call a wordsmith. I’m more a girl of action, really, so instead of answering, I looked around the room. Whether by pure chance or providence, I spotted a crate with a big honking red cross painted on the surface and true enough, in yet another weird coincidence with my world, inside were a number of basic medical supplies.

As a gesture of goodwill, I brought it over to the downed alicorn and broke it open.

“What are you doing?” asked a confused Twilight.

“What does it look like? You’re leaking all over. Here,” I handed her a number of bottles and tubes full of medicine stuff. “I don’t know how this pony stuff works, so you put it on.”

She gave me an odd look before nodding and got to work, cleaning the wound, which was actually a bit deeper than I thought, but then applied some sort of clotting agent that drastically reduced the blood flow in seconds. After wrapping her limb in bandages, she tried to stand up and gingerly tried putting some weight on it.

“Can you walk?”

“I… think so,” she replied, looking down and tried to take a few steps, hobbling in an irritatingly cute way. “Yes, I’m fine as long as I don’t put too much weight on it.”

“Well, come on, we can’t stay here.” Was I trying to avoid a potentially unpleasant conversation. Definitely. Whether Twilight did not notice or care was unclear.

“Wait,” she said more than a little forcefully.

Damn it. I turned around, eyeing her impatiently. “What?”

Gawd, those abnormal pony eyes looked at me in both anger and sadness. Almost made me feel bad. “You killed those diamond dogs,” she said in a quiet, wavering voice.

I nodded. “Yes I did, now can we hurry along? I got a schedule to keep.”

Great, and now she looked at me with disappointment. “You don’t care?”

Resisting the urge to both snarl and facepalm, I approached the pony and said in my best no-nonsense voice, “Look, we could stand here and waste time arguing the merits of human on dog homicide, but unless you haven’t noticed, princess, these tunnels are set to come down soon, so why don’t you move your little pony butt and come help me find a way out of here?”

I promptly turned and walked into the only other opening of the lower floor, not looking back, but sure enough, I heard the unmistakable flapping of wings and Princess Sparklebutt herself landed gingerly next to me. I chanced a look at her and she reciprocated with her own icy glare. Well, she’s obviously not gonna drop the matter, but at least she knows enough that this was not the time or place to dawdle and ask questions.

We walked on in silence and all the while I was praying to God and every deity I could think of that for once, not everything would go tits up. I could only hope something out there would take pity on me and bring down a healthy dose of luck.

Cutlass scrunched her nose in distaste as they headed deeper into the tunnels. The stench of dog and filth only kept on getting stronger the more they walked and she worried it might get bad enough that she'd have to puke. Her companion, however, did not seem to mind the stench. If anything, she periodically raised her muzzle to sniff the air around them in wonder, as if evaluating something within it that Cutlass could not make out.

"Stop," she said suddenly and Cutlass complied.

"What is it?"

"There's many dogs just up ahead. Can you smell them?"

"Kinda hard not to. The whole place stinks of them," she said sourly, waving a hoof in front of her nose. "How is this not bothering you?"

"Changelings smell emotions. Their olfactory systems do not register conventional smells like yours. Now come along and be quiet. We do not want to draw attenrion."

The pegasus followed suit and as the tunnel ended, the pair entered a massive underground cavern, the size of four hoofball fields side by side. It was the 'top floor' of an underground quarry carved hundreds of feet further down, replete with many fouls smells, the stench of misery, the clanging of metal and the impact of tools against rock. Compounding the sight were many slaves toiling under the watchful eyes of their captors.

Diamond dogs made the majority of the workforce, reduced to using crude tools to mine for gems, as their claws had long since been pulled out. But these were not the only ones. A few ponies were scattered throughout, their normally vibrant coats hidden beneath layers of dirt. Unicorns had their horns viciously shattered, pegasi their wings broken and a number of unfortunate, rebellious sods among them had but nubs where their wings used to be, long since scarred. There were the odd mules donkeys and even a cow or two. One thing they all had in common was the permanent look of misery and hopelessness in their faces.

"It's a sorry sight, isn't it?" Ari said quietly.

Cutlass grunted. "Reminds me of the labor camps on Limbo. Not as organized, though."

"We need to cross to the other end. That's the fastest way to get to the main den of the Alpha."

"Can't we just... I dunno. Go around or something? I mean, I guess I could fly over all this, but you'll get spotted for sure."

"We could, if we wanted to be set back an hour or two. But that's fine. It just so happens I know a way around this."

"Oh, good," the pegasus said in obvious relief. "What do you have in mind?"

"See that scaffolding? All the way at the top?" Ari pointed to a structure built on the fringe of the gaping chasm of the chamber. Cutlass squinted and sure enough, at the top, in a ramshackle room lined with wired fencing was a particularly fat diamond dog, twice as tall as the average mutt and three times as wide. "That there's the overseer for this quarry. All the slaves in this section of the tunnels are fitted with collars keyed to an enchanted jewel he carries with him."

"Okay..." Cutlass said uncertainly, not sure where she was going with this.

"You're going to get there and bring me back that jewel. If the dog's memories are correct, it should be a fire ruby about as big as your hoof. Make sure no one sees you and get it back here. I'll take it from there."

Cutlass tapped her chin with a hoof, as if assessing the situation. "Huh. Is that it? I thought it was gonna be hard or something," she said, a small smile on her muzzle.

She unfurled her wings and took to the air. She wasn't worried she'd get spotted. The sounds that emanated from the quarry were loud and grating enough that they'd be able to drown out what little noise she made. The slaves toiled, miserable and looking down, as if afraid to look directly in the eyes of their oppressors. Diamond dogs took such thing as a challenge and the dogs themselves—those who weren't slaves, at least, kept an eye on their charges, making sure no one got out of line.

It was almost ridiculously insulting just how easy it was, but then again, the dogs were either stupid or arrogant enough that they would never consider a lone pegasus conspiring against them.

The overseer himself was equally oblivious, sitting on a wooden, throne like chair and reaching for a bowl of some kind of dried meat next to him. The only clue he got that he was in danger was the split second Cutlass dived from above him, pulverizing his cranium with hooves that struck him like a ton of bricks.

It was possible that any dog from beneath the structure would have noticed the quaking that Cutlass' impact created. Regardless, the pegasus had already liberated the ruby and was already back just when a pair of guards came to investigate.

"One fire ruby, hot and freshly liberated," the pegasus quipped, tossing the gem at Ari, which she caught with her magic.

"Nicely played," she responded with a small smile.

"Now how exactly is this little doohickey gonna help?"

"Well you see, my dear," the unicorn said, her face a picture of concentration, not taking her eyes off the ruby. "It just so happens that the upcoming tunnels are under heavy guard. The cuffs and restraints the dogs use for the slaves do not use traditional keys. Rather, they are keyed to the enchantment placed on this ruby."

"I've heard of those. They're a popular item with slavers, but don't you need to, I dunno, tap the gem to each of the slave's restraints to get them on or off?"

"Normally, yes. But we don't have time for that."

"And I just don't see how messing with the slaves is gonna help us out."

"Don't you?" The unicorn said and fixed Cutlass with the look a parent would give a child who did not immediately spot the obvious answer. "The area ahead is thick with dogs. We won't be able to remain undetected if we try to go through. They'll likely overwhelm and kill us, but if we release all the slaves at once--"

Cutlass' eyes widened in realization. "They'll draw the attention of the dogs and away from us," she said in understanding.

"And we'll be able to slip by relatively unmolested, yes," the unicorn said in satisfaction, returning her attention to the gem.

"I admit, that's pretty smart. Maybe not nice, but smart. So, how are you gonna free the slaves?"

No sooner had she asked the question that the ruby suddenly exploded in countless tiny fragments, drawing a wince from the unicorn and a startled yelp from Cutlass.

"Well, there goes the plan," she said dejectedly.

"Don't be silly, filly," Ari said, busy running a hoof through her mane which was glittering with many minuscule pieces of the shattered ruby. "I got what I needed, just be ready to move if anything happens."

Cutlass watched in interest as the unicorn moved to the edge of the quarry, looking down at the scene below. Her eyes narrowed in concentration and channeled magic into her horn, where quickly enough, a rosy red ball of energy materialized, growing from the size of a pinprick to that of an orange. When she was satisfied the magic reached the desired potency and frequency, Ari let it loose.

The little ball of magic launched from her horn all the way down to the bottom level of the quarry. Its luminescence and trajectory drew many a stare, not that it mattered, for it then floated roughly in the middle between the top and bottom of the quarry when it burst, sending out an ever expanding wave of magic in all directions, starting out bright but diminishing in substance as it stretched out further and further, passing through every living thing in the quarry until it faltered and fizzled out

For several seconds, nothing happened. The quarry had grown silent as everyone did not miss the sight or sensation of a magical field passing through them. Everyone, both slaves and slavers looked around for something, anything that might have happened, but all in all, everything stayed as it was.

Then all at once, the slaves' bindings fell of simultaneously, creating a near deafening clang of metal that encompassed the chamber.

To those who bore witness to this spectacle, their mouths hung open in shock. The slaves gazing in wonderment at their now free limbs, some even going as far as to hold them up close to inspection, as if to make sure this was not all happening inside their heads. Then, acting as one, they lifted their heads to look at their keepers and their tormentors, and a dangerous glint flashed in their eyes. One that spoke of their realization that they outnumbered the slavers by at least thirty to one.

It was mass pandemonium. Years of pent up fury and hatred boiled over all at once, and the former slaves descended on their oppressors without mercy. True, the dogs had the advantage in wearing armor and wielding weapons, but it was all the more irrelevant when they were so laughably outnumbered. They fought off their attackers as best they could, but almost immediately were overwhelmed by the tidal wave of bodies, who clawed, stomped, punched, kicked, bit and otherwise beat the life out of them, leaving them little more than an unrecognizable, mangled mess of flesh. Likewise, some of the guards tried to escape, but there were far too many freed slaves everywhere they turned and soon enough, they too met their end.

They all made a mad dash through to the top of the quarry, their newfound liberation granting them with renewed strength and energy and dispersed to whatever exit they could reach.

Cutlass and Ari watched from a distance, the latter having cast a simple charm to help them go unnoticed amid the fleeing slaves and once the only living things in the chamber were them—with the occasional guard or slave who had been trampled in the chaos and desperately clung to life—they continued on ahead to their destination.

"Well, I had my doubts, but this worked out better than I thought," Cutlass said as they both trotted side by side into yet another configuration of tunnels.

Ari smiled and bowed her head in acknowledgement. "Thank you. I knew I liked you, Cutlass."

"Is that why you convinced Ms. Crankypants to let me come along?" The pegasus quipped.

"Let's just say I had a good feeling about you. That, and the fact that disposing of you might have been... messy. After all, there might very well have been a pony who would come looking for you."

"That so, huh?"

"Was I wrong?"

"Hmm," Cutlass hummed, looking up in thought. "No, not really."

"In that case, I'm glad it worked out."

"Hear, hear!" The pegasus enthusiastically declared. "Wait, do you smell that?"

"I told you already. I--"

"No, not that. I mean... ugh, it smells like something died," Cutlass said, her voice muffled as she held up a hoof to her muzzle.

True enough, waiting for them up ahead were dead bodies. The freed slaves, slaughtered and cut open.

"Hmm. It seems the dogs reorganized rather quickly. No matter, we still go on ahead," Ari stated, wading through the throng of corpses and being mindful not to step on any blood. Cutlass followed suit, trailing after in the air, protecting her nose from the stench of the viscera and holding her breath as well she could.

"How can you be sure this is the way?"

"I don't."

"Do you have a plan for getting out of here?"

"Not really."

"What if we run into more diamond dogs?"

"Then we'll take care of them."

Twilight fumed silently. Her attempts at getting... whatever she wanted to get out of me were unsuccessful so far. At least I think they were.

"Unless you know a way out of here?"

She did a 'hmph' sort of noise and continued on.

"Uh, we're going this way, princess."

"Well I think we should head this way instead," the flippant pony said and took the left path at the fork we found ourselves in.

I sighed and followed suit.

"Alright, pony. Just come and spit it out. What's your beef with me?"

Said alicorn whirled around, her fuzzy mug twisted in a mask of anger. "My beef? My beef?!" She near shrieked. "Do you realize what you've done?! Since day one you've caused nothing but trouble! You've brought misfortune to ponies... innocent ponies. Rainbow Dash nearly died because of you!"

"Who?"

"You hurt Applejack, Rarity and Fluttershy! You've nearly ruined Aloe and Lotus' spa and you... you..." Heh, silly pony. Did she think she looked scary or something? Man, she looked about ready to blow. So much so that words were failing her. "You killed that poor..." Oh, shit! Did she find out about the guard? "Pig." Oh, the swine? Whew, I was almost worried for a second there.

"Well excuse me, princess, but unless you haven't noticed, I'm not like the average human. My body needs meat in order to live, so excuse me for not wanting to die just now."

"That's a lie!" the furious pony screamed, stomping down a hoof. "I don't care what lies you try to sell me, your kind can live on a meatless diet."

I made a disbelieving noise. "Yeah? And you know this how?"

Her mouth was already open to continue her diatribe, only... she didn't say anything. She looked unsure, really. "I... I... I can't do this right now. Let's just go. I don't want to talk to you right now," she hissed with no small amount of venom. "But one way or another, after we get out of this place, you will answer for all your crimes."

She wanted to keep her trap shut? Well, that was perfectly fine by me. Insolent little bitch. Did she think her pissy threat bothered me? What's she gonna do, try to get a dumb human on trial? Wait, do these ponies even have trials? Hmm, given her hippie country's backward state, it wouldn't surprise me if she tried to use her princess power to screw me over in some way.

Still, maybe things were... actually not looking so good for me. What if... no, no. Shit, why am I even worried? It's not like I plan on staying in the mud village and even then, it's not like she can do anything to keep me in place. Nothing that I know of, at least...

For all her posturing, it was obvious Twilight had no idea where to go. She stupidly led us right into the nursery of the dogs—mats made of what looked to be leather on the floor, at least two dozen and in each of them were two or three of the dogs in infant form. Of course, they were not exactly alone.

Six... I dunno, nursemaids or nannies or whatever were also there. They didn't take too kindly to our intrusion, as evidenced by the fact that two of them barked at us while the rest charged forward, ready to tear into us.

Me, I wasn't worried. I'd already figured out at least three ways to kill them. Of course, Twilight was leading the way, and so they went for her first. Being the bleeding heart hippie that she was, the pony tried in vain to talk down our attackers. That went about as well as you might imagine and she was forced to conjure up a magical shield. The dogs howled, bit and pounded at the thing, trying to crack it like an egg. I hung back and watched in interest. Seeing how she seemed to be leaning on the 'dog lives matter' side, I figured it in good taste to let her try her hand at taking care of the situation.

Surprise, surprise. Words didn't work. Eventually, Twilight figured that her pacifistic approach wouldn't work and so she somehow caused her shield to explode outward with a rather loud boom. The pups wailed and shrieked—a noise borne straight out of the deepest pits of hell—so loud I feared my eardrums would burst. At least I had my awesome, superior, highly evolved hands to muffle out the noise. Twilight... well, there wasn't too much she could do, what with her little pony hooves and bore the brunt of the assault. Hehe.

One of the dogs that hung back and was untouched by the exploding bubble went stupid and decided to charge at me, thinking little ol' me to be easy pickings. I enlightened it as to its fatal error in judgment by grabbing it ahold in a magic grasp and shoving it as far away from me, as fast as I could muster. There was enough force in its trajectory that dust, random pottery, hay and even a few of the pups went flying as it sailed past them, smashing with a bone crunching impact on the opposite wall. It did not get up again.

Twilight used her pony magic to fire some sort of bolts on the dogs she'd downed, knocking them unconscious, leaving only one standing, the other dog that had held back in the initial assault. It promptly fled with its tail between its legs.

Of course, the infants were still there, wailing for all they were worth and determined to literally scream us to death. Twilight seemed torn at leaving them by themselves, but I did not give her a choice in the matter. I practically carried her away despite her protests and into another section of the tunnels, sending a wave of kinetic force to collapse it behind us and cut us off from the spawn and their piercing cries.

She didn't take it all that well.

Still, reason seemed to win out as she realized we couldn't exactly hang around. Didn't stop her from being pissed off at me, but at least she allowed me to take the lead. Well, more like I decided to go in front and left it up to her to decide whether to follow or not, but it all worked out. We stumbled in some sort of armory, stocked full of crude and unsightly weapons and armor.

We were relatively undisturbed, and only came across two other dogs at different points. Twilight knocked them out and we continued on. A kitchen—and I'm only using that in the vaguest sense—followed. The stench hit you like a tidal wave and it was enough to make us take a step back. The stink of death was so thick in the air it was hard to breathe.

There, propped atop slabs of stone and wood were corpses that belonged to quadrupeds, some resting, others hanging by rusted meat hooks that probably have never been cleaned. Some carcasses were not yet skinned, and many still had their hooves intact. One thing they did share in common was their heads were severed, carelessly tossed aside to one corner of the room. Ponies, mules, pigs, cows, goats, sheep. The severed heads intermingled with each other and all in varying stages of decomposition.

The ground and floor were discolored by years' worth of blood that in most likelihood had never been cleaned and in a special section all its own were carcasses—skinned, drawn and quartered and much too small to be adult.
Good God, it smells like Satan's butthole.

I scrunched my nose at the smell and covered my face with both my hoodie and shirt, which really helped with the odor. Twilight... well, she didn't take it all that well. You'd think she'd never witnessed death on a mass scale or something. It wasn't long before she doubled over and puked, getting sick on the front of her hooves, body wracked by violent tremors. She kept on heaving long after her stomach emptied its contents, coupled with some very audible sobs. Tears streaked down her face.

I crossed my arms and waited for her to finish with her little episode. At one point in time, I might have considered consoling her in some way, but it was all I could do to keep from retching at the smell myself. It was that bad. Eventually, she regained enough control of herself and dashed through the room to the opposite end and out, keeping her head down and avoiding looking at the carnage around her.

She went silent after that and followed me without a word. She was still crying and the odd sob or sniffle could be made out every now and then. Hm, looks like that display back there really shook her, but in between trying to find our way to the alpha, keeping on the lookout for more dogs and that nagging voice in my head telling me that the tunnels would collapse and bury us alive, I had little sympathy to give. She'd just have to tough it out.

We didn't go far before the sound of diamond dogs resonated through the dirt. There was no other way to go but forward, but we went anyway. Twilight and I hid on either side of the entrance and peeked at the chamber. A sort of dining room—again, only using that word in the vaguest sense—lined with three roasting spits, at least a dozen dogs inside who were feasting on roasted meat. Hmm, smelled pretty good, actually.

Twilight's face morphed into a grimace of disgust.

"Well," I said and cracked my knuckles. "Looks like we'll have to go through those mutts if we want to get out of here."

Twilight's fuzzy mug snapped to me, instantly knowing what I implied. "No, please." There was a weary sort of quality to her tone and she placed a hoof on my arm in a near supplicating fashion. "There's been enough death already." Her voice cracked.

"And do you have a plan to get us through? Call me crazy, but I don't think they'll let us pass just because you ask nicely?"

She looked away, her expression ponderous. Her head swiveled, searching for something. "There." She pointed to the wall beside me where the faceted end of a green gem peeked through. "Can you hand me that emerald?" I did as she asked, curious what she had in mind.

"What are you planning to do?" I asked as she scraped the dirt off the precious stone.

"There's a spell I know. It'll create a distraction and allow us to pass."

"Won't the dogs see us?"

"Well... yes maybe some of them, but trust me, this is going to work." She sounded certain if nothing else. After the emerald was clean she turned to me. "Maybe it would be best if you don't look. You might be affected by the spell as well."

"Just go ahead and do it, princess. Whatever you have planned it won't work on me."

A nod followed after a second of hesitation. Her horn glowed with power and out of it popped out a stream of—you gotta be kidding me—little pink hearts that disappeared inside the gem. A feeling rose up in me... an urge to swipe the thing and claim it as my own, but I managed to power through it and the sensation died down.

Twilight looked at me in scrutination, searching for any sign the spell had affected me. Her fuzzy mug remained ponderous even after and she peeked her head through the opening before taking aim and hurled the cursed gem over to a dog who was still wearing its helmet. A loud clanging noise echoed around the room, drawing the attention of every dog as the gem fell gracelessly to the ground, several sets of eyes following it.

I'm not a hundred percent sure what was supposed to happen, but for several seconds, everything was still. The dogs looked at the gem in slack jawed stupidness as whatever eldritch spell Twilight used overtook their tiny, inferior minds.

Then, suddenly, one of the dogs stepped forward.

"I want it."

Another followed suit.

"I need it."

Huh, I thought they couldn't speak Equi... er, English?

As one, every single dog dived forward in a conglomeration of flesh and metal, all of them vying for that moderately valuable little stone. A satisfied smile spread across Twilight's fuzzy mug, thinking her plan worked and that there would be no more bloodshed.

Yeah, maybe this kind of thing worked if you used it against soft, weak, squishy little ponies, but diamond dogs were another matter entirely. They were brutes, predators, uncivilized and little more than neanderthals and like the beasts that they were, it wasn't long before Twilight's mindwash drove them to massacre each other.

Compelled by a force beyond their understanding, the stupid beasts proceeded to gang up on whatever sap held the gem and simultaneously worked to liberate said item. Of course, this liberation ended up with the 'gang-bangee' literally torn apart. Diamond dogs were strong fuckers. If I had to guess I'd put their strength level somewhere around a gorilla's and if a dozen gorillas grab ahold of you and start pulling with all their might in different directions, aided by stone-cutting claws and vicious fangs... well, that probably won't turn out too well for you.

And that's not even mentioning the mess. I counted at least four dogs who were pulled apart so savagely that they burst upon the strain, splaying blood and entrails in every direction, coating the remaining dogs and the ground in an increasingly growing red stain.

With their numbers dwindled, they couldn't pull off the whole 'tearing each other apart' thing anymore and so their attempts to claim the cursed stone devolved to smaller but no less vicious brawls. A single swipe of those claws could tear open a stomach and more than one dog fell prey to that old disemboweling schtick. Others had entire sections of their limbs bit off. Yeowch, those mutts sure had some serious bite power. More than once did I see cases of thick metal crumpling under those chompers.

Twilight's curse more than did its job and in the end, only one single dog was left victorious. Well, more in the sense of Pyrrhus than anything else as it struggled to cling to life in spite of there being a rather large amount of fur, skin and flesh missing on its side. Still, in spite of the horrendous pain it must have felt, the beast had only eyes for the little green trinket, which at this point resembled more a ruby than anything.

I looked down at Twilight. A look of pure, unbridled horror and shock graced her features. Her little pony mouth hung open and her eyes, if possible, widened even further than their already absurd gargantuan size. In spite of myself, I could only feel a macabre sense of humor at the situation. Irony... such delicious irony. The little hippie pony princess set out to put a halt to wholesale slaughter, only to singlehan—what the hell, I'm feeling a little ponified at the moment—singlehoofedly orchestrate a massacre far more visceral and atrocious than I could ever achieve.

I whistled in appreciation. "Well, not exactly how I would have gone about it, but hey, whatever gets the job done," I promptly patted her on the back and stepped forward. Hmm, I think she's paralyzed from shock or something.

From somewhere behind me I heard the pony retch yet again. Well, more dry heave than anything as her stomach had long since been emptied. I sighed and covered my nose again, waiting until she was done and we could move on.

Christ, I think I'm getting used to the smell of death.

That... can't be healthy for me.

The sound of flesh hitting the ground thumped behind me and there was Twilight, sitting like a doggy, head hung low, eyes glazed over and staring into nothingness.

"Uh, you okay there? Hellooo? I'm talking to you, princess." I tried waving a hand in front of her and even snapping my fingers. I even went so far as to give her a few awkward pats on the back. Nope, didn't help.

Well that's great. That's just great. What am I gonna do with a catatonic pony princess?

In spite of my best judgment, I lifted her over and continued on anyways. Cutlass and Ari should be getting really close to the alpha right about now and I'll be damned if I miss my chance because I was forced to coddle the soft little pony. So with that in mind, I slung her over my shoulder, was mindful to not step on the large puddles of blood(I had to use some of the 'clean' dog corpses as stepping stones) and continued on. Well, if there's a silver lining to this, I'm pretty sure Twilight will be too out of it to see me off more dogs, should they choose to impede my path.

Things were more or less quiet after that. Whether it was luck or the dogs decided it was a good idea to leave me alone was anyone's guess.

It was after about ten minutes that Twilight finally emerged from her catatonic state. I guess being responsible for wholesale slaughter must have really messed with her head. These freaking ponies...

Seeing how she was such a bigwig in her wretched little village, I made sure to inform myself at least a little on what kind of pony she was. Apparently, friendship was a big deal to her, going so far as to have been crowned the Princess of Friendship.

Princess... of Friendship...

I honestly wish I was making that up. Silly little pony. Such a title might have served for her hermetically sealed mud town, but her fortitude was laughably weak when confronted by the more visceral aspects of the world. Well, hopefully she's toughened up at least a little by now. I really don't want to have to carry her again because she experienced a deeply traumatic moment that would probably stay with her for the rest of her life. Hell, no one helped me, and I was able to... mostly move through it, and I wasn't even royalty or anything of the sort.

"Hey, keep up, princess!"

She hurried her gait a little more, still looking down.

We were close. I could feel it.

The path led us to an antechamber of sorts, cleaner and more robustly furnished than the previous rooms we visited and in the middle, crudely carved from stone was a replica of a massive dog covered head to toe in armor. The alpha, maybe?

Perhaps, but my attention was then drawn by three other diamond dog guards splayed on the floor, blood still leaking from vicious slashing wounds. Looks like Ari and Cutlass have come through here already.

"Come on, princess, we're almost there."

Twilight broke out of her reverie and tore her sad gaze away from the dogs. Well, at least she finally shut up.

The pony trotted over to me, where I waited impatiently and was still so deeply shaken that she could not hope to see what came next.

From the corner of my eye there was a sudden movement. My head snapped towards it, but I only managed to catch a fleeting glimpse of an object that whizzed by, a bony 'thunk' and Twilight dropped with a cry of pain, unconscious from the stone that had struck her noggin.

Already I pooled magic into my palm, ready to crush whatever dog had the nerve to ambush us when there, peeking out from one of the mini mountains of gems was a familiar, fuzzy little green mug.

"Cutlass?"

Said pony shot me a sheepish smile and fluttered over to me. "Ah... hey," she said lamely.

"Cutlass, what the shit?!" I screamed, pointing to Twilight's still, but thankfully breathing body. "Do you realize who this is?"

She continuously tapped the tips of her hooves together. "Um, princess Twilight Sparkle?"

"You almost killed her!"

"H-hey now, I didn't want to kill her, okay?" The pegasus said quickly, holding up her hooves in defense. "I just... panicked." I shot her a glare that demanded an explanation, and she picked up on it. "Well, you see," she cleared her throat nervously. "Aunt Del and I... we're not exactly... well, we're the sort of ponies who'd rather avoid the law. Ah, princesses especially, because—"

I facepalmed. "Oh, my God. Are you criminals?"

"No, no! Well... I mean, maybe some parties would consider what we do to not be... wholly within the bounds of the law, but—"

I facepalmed again, this time followed by an aggravated snarl.

"—but, yeah. Aunt Del wants us to keep a low profile and when I saw the princess, well..." She shrugged helplessly and shot me an apologetic smile.

"Go easy on the filly. Cutlass did the right thing."

Gaah! What the—

I nearly jumped as Ari materialized out of nowhere, right next to me.

"Truth be told, I probably would have done the same. We have enough to worry about without the princesses getting wind of us."

"Easy for you to say. You're not the one she's found out," I bit back accusingly.

Cutlass snorted. "Yeah, but come on! I mean, did you really think you wouldn't be found out?"

"And what is that supposed to mean?"

"Look, I know I haven't known you that long, but still, I can at least make out that you're not exactly..." She trailed off, rotating her hoof midair and her face scrunched in concentration, trying to find the right word.

"Subtle?" Ari suggested.

"Yes!" Cutlass cried out triumphantly. "Or... did you actually think you'd be able to go unnoticed by them?" Both ponies looked at me expectantly. Smartasses...

"Can we just focus on the task at hand?" I asked through gritted teeth. "Because the alpha still needs taking care of."

"If what I know is correct, then he should be in the next chamber," Ari pointed to the corresponding exit.

"Alright. You." I pointed at Cutlass. "You're staying and watching over princess Sparklebutt. Wait here and Ari and I will go take care of the alpha."

"Wha—no! Why do I have to stay here?"

"Because you freaking knocked her out! I've spent enough time babysitting the waif. We're not taking her to the alpha and I sure as shit am done watching out for her."

"But—"

"Maybe that would be for the best," Ari said placatingly and placed a hoof on Cutlass' shoulder. She gave the pegasus a pointed look and Cutlass sagged, slumping into a doggy position and balefully glared at both of us.

"Fine, I'll stay and look after the princess," she muttered sullenly. "Don't have too much fun without me, ya hear?" She capped off with an unenthusiastic wave of her hoof.

I mumbled something and responded with a halfhearted wave of my own. Ari's was more enthusiastic.

"So give it to me straight. What can we expect when we come across the alpha?" I asked Ari as we walked through the tunnel and closed the distance to the upcoming chamber.

"Well, there's the alpha. Guards as well, but they shouldn't give you too much trouble. Ah, and he also drags around a number of concubines."

Gross. "Don't you mean sex slaves?"

"That too, but, there's something you should know."

"Hm?"

"The alpha is... quite a bit bigger and stronger than the average diamond dog."

"And he'll go down like all the others." Ari sighed and placed a hoof on my arm, halting my advance.

"Pay attention, little girl. I'm not joking here. Maybe if you were at full strength you could take on the alpha with no problems, but I can see you're getting weaker."

"I can take care of myself."

"And it's that kind of reckless, self-serving attitude that will get you killed. I don't know if you intentionally deluded yourself into thinking otherwise, but there are some very real limits to what you can and can't do. You forget, little human, I glanced at the inner workings of your body. My knowledge and experience with magic far outstrips your own and you would do well to heed my advice."

She challenged me to a staring contest and—damn—I folded. "Fine, I'm listening."

"You will challenge the alpha to a one-on-one duel to the death."

"Huh?"

"Per diamond dog law, the alpha may be challenged to single combat in order to claim ownership of the throne."

"And when did I say I wanted to rule over a bunch of filthy weredogs?"

"The point is for you to have an opportunity to fight the alpha alone, because if all other guards join in, you will most certainly die. I will as well and I didn't stay around for over a thousand years to die by the paws of some common diamond dogs. That would just be insulting."

That gave me pause. Shit, I did not consider that she might die as well. “If that's an issue then just stay here. I'll take care of the alpha myself.”

“You're being stupid again. Just listen to what I told you and... well, you'll probably succeed. Now let's get a move on. My coat feels dirtier just standing around in here.”

She led the way forward, not looking back and I followed. At the end of the tunnel were a pair of massive, honest to goodness doors made of wood, mud and stone. Ari stopped in front and I took this as my cue.

A well placed kick slammed the doors open and we rushed inside. Almost immediately, several sets of eyes darted in our direction. Ari hadn't been kidding. If anything, she undersold just how filled to the brim the place would be.

The 'throne room' was cavernous and large as a football field sentries were posted all along the perimeter of the chamber, consisting of particularly large diamond dogs. In front of us, situated between ourselves and the throne at the opposite end and carved into the ground was a rectangular crevice the size of a swimming pool, filled with all sorts of unusually shiny precious stones. So polished and of high quality that they caught the light of the torches lined throughout the room and refracted shimmering motes of various glittering colors to every corner of the chamber.

Had the situation been different, I might have considered being in awe of the pretty colors, but the sight of fugly, armored weredogs in every direction really dampened the mood.

My eyes darted in every direction, searching for the alpha, and almost immediately I found him. Ari said it would be big, but damn!

There he was, clad in armor head to toe, chainmail visible beneath the thick plates. Going by first appearances and the shape of his muzzle, I would peg the beast as a Doberman. It seems that I'd interrupted him while he was pacing in front of the jewel-filled pool, but he, like every other dog in the chamber, boggled at us in utter astonishment, eyes wide and mouth slackened.

The beast recovered quickly. It's features filled with rage and in one powerful motion of its hind legs, it leapt over the pool, landing on its paws with such force that dirt expelled outwards and glared with unnervingly intelligent eyes down on us.

Its actions quickly broke the rest of the dogs out of their stupors. The beasts howled and barked as they converged around us, weapons pointed and ready to skewer us at a moment's notice.

With a few measured strides, the alpha closed the distance between us and glared down at Ari with murderous intent... and it completely ignored me!

"I am Steel Fang! Leader of Clan Gargaroth! You have trespassed upon the inner sanctum of my glorious den and have shed our blood. By all rights, you should be dead already!" The beast's unnervingly articulate speech was made all the more imposing by its deep and booming voice. I swear, I almost felt it vibrating my bones. Ari stood her ground and despite her smaller size, somehow managed to look down on the much larger dog with poorly disguised contempt.

"But my clan mate has advised me that you be allowed to leave and spread word to your cities and your princesses of Clan Gargaroth's coming."

"That's a very generous offer," Ari said. "I was under the impression diamond dogs did not let intruders live."

The beast, apparently called Steel Fang snarled and paced in front of us, trying to look intimidating. "By letting you leave, you can tell your pups stories of how you bore witness to the majesty of Gargaroth and its ruler before our clan rises to conquer your lands."

Ari raised an eyebrow, not impressed in the least. The beast kept on talking.

"As we grow in strength and numbers, Clan Gargaroth will ascend from the deepest recesses of the earth and spread across your kingdom in a sea of blood," the beast raved.

We shared a look of disbelief. She turned back to the alpha, clearing her throat and trying not to sound like she was talking to a retard. "I admit, I haven't been keeping up on current events. What did ponies do to deserve such treatment?"

Steel Fang bristled. "Your ancestors drove mine from their rightful place in Oghrum. They drove our kin from their homes so they could bathe in the riches that belonged to the noble race of the diamond dogs. We were wronged! But the time comes when we will right such injustices and then, we will have our revenge!" It was so caught up in its rant that he kept on speaking, growing more furious and agitated with each passing word. "When Gargaroth takes up arms, all other clans throughout Oghrum will be in awe, and they will assimilate into our clan to drive you all back to whence you came. The scattered tribes of the diamond dogs will convene into an empire, with me and my clan mate as its ruler. All surviving races will frighten their offspring with tales of what the Gargaroth Empire did to the ponies. The buffalo will scream as their home is consumed with fire! We will topple the griffons and keep them as slaves and eat their eggs as delicacies! Your descendants will serve us as draft beasts and—"

"Sweet Christ on a stick, do you ever shut up?"

Ari sighed somewhere beside me as every eye in the room swiveled in my direction. The alpha was stunned enough that his tired ramblings ceased and he looked at me with bulging eyes.

"What sorcery is this? A talking human?" He then turned to Ari. "Your paltry parlor tricks are useless against me, pony. My mind is one sharpened and honed through many years of countless—"

"Hey, asshole. If you want to talk to someone, you're talking to me. Now shut your trap."

A collective intake of breath permeated the room at my disrespect for the 'roided mutt.

"How dare you speak to a clan leader in such a way, human?!" Steel Fang bellowed in fury. "your kind are but beasts and food to the superior diamond dog race! You are lucky that you are still alive and not filling our bellies with delicious meat. But I am as merciful a leader as I am strong. Leave now, and never come back, and tell your friends and family on the outside that the glorious Gargaroth Empire will soon—"

Good god, am I in a Quentin Tarantino movie or something? Nah, if it is, it's a shitty one. At this point I'd give anything to stop the beast's endless ramblings, so with lightning fast speed, I juiced up my arm with that sweet chaos magic and bitch slapped the dog with enough force to send it crashing down.

Outraged howls and gasps chorused from all around me as the dog got back to its feet.

"That does it! You have taken advantage of my hospitality and my mercy and for that you must pay the ultimate price with your lives. When this is over, the clan will feast on your flesh and use your bones as toothpicks and your corpses will serve as reminders to the rest of your species that—"

"Steel Fang, I challenge you to a one-on-one duel to determine which of us is best fit to rule Clan Gargaroth!"

Cries of outrage followed the bold proclamation. The beasts around us howled and shook their weapons, but I had only eyes for the alpha, whose eyes threatened to pop out of their sockets. It quaked with rage, no doubt due to the prospect of a human leading a diamond dog den.

"Blasphemy! Heresy! No human in the history of Oghrum has ever become clan leader, and no human henceforth shall ascend to such a position. The very prospect is an insult to the noble race of the diamond dogs and for that, your deaths shall be slow and painful."

"Hey, that's cool," I said and held up both hands placatingly. "I mean, if you're too afraid to go up against little ol' me, then—"

"Silence yourself, wretch! I fear no one, lest a scrawny human such as yourself."

"So why so hesitant?" I teased, linking both hands behind my head. "If you're so powerful, you should not have any problem beating me. You are Steel Fang, after all, leader of Clan Gargaroth and soon to be Emperor of the diamond dogs. Sure, you could killl me here and now, but what will the diamond dogs say down the line—that their supreme leader refused a challenge, even if from a human?"

"Then I will outlaw such heresy, and those who even think to whisper of it shall be skinned while they still live!"

"You know, you are right," I said casually, resisting the urge to sneer in contempt. "But then, that will just make the masses even more curious. You can kill whoever you want, but the truth will get out and those who are discontent with your rule will use this example to prove that maybe, just maybe, you are not as tough and mighty as you like to think—that is, unless you want to kill all diamond dogs who are watching us right now."

The beast's mug trembled with fury and a very visible drop of sweat trailed down its left temple. No, I'm not even gonna express the absurdity by which a dog could sweat. The dogs around us shuffled restlessly and shot nervous looks back and forth, obviously not putting such an action beyond Steel Fang, and the beast itself picked up on it.

Its face strained, warring emotions visible under its mug until finally it bellowed out, "Fine! If the human wants to die a warrior's death, let it! Back away, all of you, and witness how your leader did not yield from a challenge!"

The dogs immediately backed away, and after a moment of hesitation, Ari followed suit, but not before giving me a look that said 'don't die'.

"Come, meat, and step into the challenger's circle where I will proceed to disembowel you!" The dog then jumped over the pool to its opposite side, where carved into the ground was indeed a fighting ring of some type. From a nearby weapon's rack it retrieved a massive warhammer, nearly twice as long as I was tall and with a head the size of a jaguar's skull, made of tempered steel. I followed at a more sedate pace and tried to keep my hands from shaking.
Ok, it shouldn't be hard. I got magic on my side. This'll be a cakewalk. Yeah...

Steel Fang stood opposite of me on the other end of the ring.

"If there are any last words you wish to say, speak now, for the duel will now begin!" The dog boomed.

"I will piss on your bones and dance on your grave. Your clan mate shall be my personal slave and your pups will serve to feed me for the days to come," I said for no other reason than to rile it up. It worked.

"Such blasphemy will not be tolerated! The duel begins as of now. Prepare yourself, human, for your last moments on this world will be of pain and agony."

Steel Fangs charged, far faster than I could have expected of such a massive beast. So fast that I barely had time to guard against his attack. Well, guard may be putting too fine a point on it. His charge startled me so that I staggered backwards and tripped against a rock, sending me on my ass and his horizontal swing with that absurd weapon missed me by mere millimeters. I even felt it dragging some of my hair.

The beast recovered quickly and with practiced ease, heaved the warhammer over its head with the intent to bring it down upon my skull. I was just barely able to catch it. Magic pumped into my arms, but even then, I could feel it starting to put a strain on my body. Shit. I needed to end this fight and I needed to end it now.

If only the beast was a team player...

Seeing how his death blow failed and I still latched on to his weapon, he abruptly lifted the hammer, so suddenly that I did not get a chance to let go and I was taken for a brief ride through the air before it came to a painful end. The beast swung the weapon, with me still attached to it into a nearby pillar of stone that shattered upon impact.

Pain exploded out my side and a hoarse scream came out my mouth. Fuck, I think I busted a rib or two. At least I think I did. I extrapolated from the fact there was a stabbing pain on my side, yet there was nothing that punctured my skin. But goddamn, did it hurt. I'd never felt anything like it before and the sheer agony was nearly paralyzing.

Steel Fang approached while I lay there atop rubble. His steps fell heavy on the earth. Asshole looked down at me in sure triumph, as if always expecting our little scuffle would end this way and all of a sudden, wrath overtook me. Oh, sure, the pain was still there, still stabbing and still soul wrenching, but the sheer levels of pissed-offness that shot through my body were enough that, while not able to ignore it, I was able to fight through it.

I reached out with my hand and an unseen force levitated the mutt off his feet. The startled look on his face was priceless, but I was still too out of it to properly appreciate it and with a flick of my wrist sent him flying up, and up, and up until he struck the hard-packed ceiling and crashed back down in a heap of flesh and metal.

A vindictive sneer found its way across my lips as the beast stood. Still alive, but his movements jerky, his face twisted in pain and clutching through his armor to his side. Heh, it looked like the fall had broken a rib or something. Asshole.

"Like that, ya mutt?" I taunted, my voice strained from pain as I got to my feet. "I hope it freaking hurts." I winced and a hand went to clutch my side.

The beast glared at me, though he couldn't stop pain from coloring his fugly mug. "This is nothing!" He bellowed, but then immediately winced and let out a whimper of pain. Looks like being loud further aggravates his injuries. Heh. Hehe. At least he'll have to shut up now, imbecile. "I have faced and felled foes far greater than you, worm, and you shall soon die like all of them.

"Tough talk from an overgrown mud dweller. You think anyone will take your delusions of a diamond dog empire seriously?"

"My cause is one just and noble, wretch! When our brothers and sisters hear of my accomplishments, they will flock to me and become part of my noble crusade."

"Noble, schmoble. You're nothing but an overgrown beast, hopped up on steroids and delusions of grandeur. You... are... nothing!"

"Silence!" The beast practically shrieked. "You will not address your betters in such a way!"

"Better how?" I sneered. "You sit here, dwelling in dirt, throwing tantrums and plotting in secret like a rat, afraid you'll be found out. Hell, you can't even kill a single human girl. How will you defeat the ponies who have bested your ilk time and time again?"

In spite of the pain it undoubtedly caused, Steel Fang roared in fury and charged, bounding on all fours. I kinda hoped the well worn cliché was true. Enrage your enemy enough and he'll become sloppy. Time to see if it's true or I just screwed myself.

Gritting my teeth and pushing through my own agony, I met the beast head on. Power coursed through me, granting me strength, dulling the stabbing pain, only to replace it with a fresh wave of agony all over. Typical.

Still, it was enough. Steel Fang launched himself through the air, poised to tear into me like a fat kid on a Christmas ham. I met his lunge with my own charge, smashing my shoulder into his midsection with chaos-augmented force.

A loud, resounding clang, not unlike a gong, permeated the room as Steel Fang was sent flying backwards where he crashed into one of the pillars of stone that dotted the fighting ring, taking it down with him.

His roars, while filled with fury, were also laced with pain. As the dust cleared, Steel Fang lay on his back. There was a big, me-sized dent where I struck him and it was undoubtedly pressing down on his chest, if his clawing at the spot was any indication. Still, metal was metal and he couldn't simply unbend it.

I slumped to the ground, tired but victorious. Steel Fang would die from asphyxiation as the bent armor pressed on his chest. Probably wouldn't be quick but, oh, well. I was willing to wait him out. In the meantime, I looked around the room. The dogs' eyes were wide in astonishment and a few had even dropped their weapons. More still had their tails between their legs, but I paid little attention to them.

I searched the crowd for a familiar pony shaped object, but by the life of me, I couldn't see her among the throngs of dogs.

Thing about the beasts, they were stubborn things, and Steel Fang was the most stubborn of the lot. All I wanted was for him to die of asphyxiation, but he couldn't grant me even that.

A familiar roar broke me out of my stupor and following it were the furious strides of paws on dirt. Before I could react, a steam shovel-sized paw grabbed me from my midsection and squeezed. I shrieked in agony as the beast's paw pressed against my internal wounds. Tears sprang from my eyes and I was hurled back down to the unforgiving ground. I swear, I blacked out for a second or two.

As the stars cleared, the oppressive bulk of Steel Fang bore down on me. One of his massive paws pressed tightly against my chest, pinning me in place and I couldn't help but notice he was no longer wearing the plated armor, leaving his torso in only chainmail. He spoke again, his words were distorted, his features filled with rage.

Funny thing, my life didn't flash before my eyes, even as he opened his maw wide and brought it closer. No, instead a sort of desperation filled me. I did not want to die today, not here in the dirt and certainly not at the hands of a lesser creature. Cliched and tired as it may sound, it was like time slowed down and even though my brain felt like mash, I was still somewhat in control of my actions.

One of my arms was still free. A piece of rubble lay nearby, about the size of a toddler. Straining, trying to recall how to go about it, I channeled magic through my palm, the rubble sailed toward me, as did Steel Fang's namesake. But providence... I did not die that day. I jammed the piece of rubble onto Steel Fang's maw. Driving it forward as hard as I could. The beast's muffled sounds clearly spoke of surprise as the rough stone scraped against his rather sensitive mouth.

My desperate action worked as Steel Fang's lumbering form withdrew. This was my chance. I encompassed a field of crushing pressure around him, bringing him down to the ground. My head pounded with the effort, but this fight was over. I kept my spell running, but I was weakened enough that it wouldn't kill him. Well, theoretically I could, but I couldn't guarantee the strain wouldn't knock me out as well.

Luckily for me, Steel Fang's warhammer was just a stone's throw from me and I shuffled towards it. Panic was evident on the beast's eyes as it realized what I intended to do and his efforts to free himself from my spell doubled. I too doubled the power I pumped through it, and Steel Fang collapsed under the pressure. Christ, I swear I saw stars for a moment.

I heaved the absurd weapon. It must have looked somewhat comical. Me, a girl under 110 lifting a weapon twice my height. Certainly not comical to the beast, who eyed me in both terror and fury as I approached. He spat any number of crude words and threats, but I figured it was nothing I'd have an interest in and so I ignored him. It was only after I heaved the weapon over my head that his composure broke and begged for mercy. Unfortunately for him, I had no intention of allowing him to live.

The warhammer struck down with the fury of a locomotive, and where not a moment ago was a whole and very alive head, now was a pulpy mess of bone, blood and brain matter.

I let out a long sigh. About fuckin' time. Now to get back home.

I shambled back to the entrance, trying not to look too beat up, to show how tired or how in pain I was. Didn't want the rest of the mutts to get any ideas after all. Not that I had to worry. The dogs parted before me as I neared the entrance and let out scattered gasps and noises of wonder as Ari reappeared next to me. Huh, wonder how she does it. Some sort of invisibility spell or something?

Well, I couldn't find myself caring much at the moment. I merely walked, shooting the dogs the stink eye, daring them to challenge me. None came forward. Ari's horn lit up and the doors closed behind us, sealing us from the room full of dogs.

"Aagh, fuck," I moaned, not able to hold it in any longer and slumped against a wall, cradling my side.

Ari's horn lit up again. A sound not unlike an explosion boomed from the throne room. Muffled cries and yells could be made through the thick doors, frantic pounding and scratching as well, complimented by what sounded like an honest to goodness rock slide. Soon, the dogs' cries were silenced and the rocks too ceased their thunder.

"What... what happened?" I rasped.

"Detonation charges. At least a magical version of them. I set them up throughout the room while you were busy dealing with the alpha."

"Are they..."

"Dead? Probably. Let me see that." She pointed to my busted side and slowly, wincing, I lifted my shirt. Fuck, that didn't look good. Sure enough, there was a lump sticking out of my side, itself discolored in red and purple and blue.

"Are you a doctor too?"

"I know enough to get me by. Never bothered to get an official degree. Just to treat any immediate injuries." Her horn lit again, and my body was enveloped in her magic's glow for a few seconds before she withdrew it. "Good news, nothing's punctured, so you're not in any immediate danger. You'll really need to see somepony to fix those ribs, though."

"Can't you do something?"

"I told you, I'm not a doctor. Least I could do is numb the pain, but you'll need to see somepony more qualified to fix you."

"I'll deal with that later. Let's just get out of here."

"Hey, guys, what's going on?" Cutlass' loud voice followed said pony, who landed nearby. "I heard this explosion type thing. Felt it, too. Are the tunnels all coming down?"

"No. That was just me," Ari said, horn still aglow and scrutinizing my wound.

"Oh, alright. For a moment I thought... ooh, you're not looking so good," she winced after catching sight of my state.

"Thanks," I muttered bitterly. "Where's Twilight? Has she woken up?"

"Nah, she's still asleep. Well, she was starting to wake up, so I kinda had to knock her out again. Heh... sorry," she smiled apologetically. I groaned and dragged a hand through my face.

"Let's just get out of here," I said as the flaring pain on my side dulled considerably.

"Be careful with that. It only dulls the pain. If you strain yourself or damage your body, you're going to regret it."

"Yeah... got it." Ahh, that was better.

"Awesome. Can we get out of here now? I'm bored."

We doubled back, Cutlass hefted Twilight over her back and our trek back to the surface began. What few dogs we encountered were dispatched by the resident unicorn impersonator, but these were few and far in between and other than that, the journey was uninterrupted. Well, we did see dozens of corpses that belonged to a variety of creatures. Apparently the two ponies had used some slaves as a diversion or something. Probably encountered armed guards and met their end. Well, I guess it's a better fate than being in servitude for the rest of their miserable lives. I dunno, the whole trip was a bit foggy, to tell the truth. Almost like a dream.

Finally, we broke through the surface and tasted sweet, sweet air. Okay, not really. The stench of death was still thick, but it was moderately better than the stench of death and dog. Regardless, I couldn't help but laugh a little in relief of being free from that wretched place. Cutlass too celebrated, fluttering a few feet off the ground(inadvertently dropping Twilight like a sack of potatoes in the process) and stretched her limbs.

"Well, I don't know about you two, but I'd call that mission a success," the pegasus said as she backwards stroked through the air.

"Not yet," Ari said. She powered up, her horn enveloped in a white aura and all beneath us, the ground shook. I almost lost my balance. The earth around us collapsed in on itself, leaving it a ravaged mess. "Okay, now it's a success," she said, pleased with herself.

"Did you just collapse the whole den?" I asked.

"That's right."

"Hey, didn't you say you were low on power or something? How could you even do that?" Cutlass asked curiously.

"The power doesn't come from me. All I have to do is place a charge and allow the ambient magic around it to power it. When I want to detonate it, I simply release the spell. Instant explosive force," she said smugly. "Not one of my most important discoveries, but it gets the job done."

"Heh, neat. Well, I need to get back. Aunt Del's gotta be worried about me by now. See ya!" The pegasus turned to leave, but I put a halt to such plans.

"Hey, hold it!"

"What?"

"What about her?" I pointed to Sparklebutt's body.

"What about her?"

"You're bringing her back."

"But I—"

"Knocked her out, yes. And I'm not exactly in any shape to be dragging around a pony."

She then looked at Ari.

"Ah... I'm not exactly a manual labor type of pony," she said lamely.

"Seriously?"

"Besides, Jacqueline and I did most of the work."

"Hey yeah, we took out most of the dogs. You only got a handful."

"And if it wasn't for you, the princess would be awake right now."

"Wha... but you said I did the right thing."

"True, but you did it nonetheless. I had nothing to do with it."

Cutlass facehoofed and muttered under her breath. Still, she went and picked up Twilight again. "Fine, fine, I'll get her. Let's just go already, it's almost my bedtime."

***

"Wait."

"What is it?"

"There's someone coming," Ari said and extinguished the light from her horn.

"You mean like monsters?" I swear, no matter how many I killed, the Everfree was still teeming with them.

"No. I don't think so. They don't... feel like monsters."

"Can't you tell properly?"

"Give me a break, I'm still not all that familiar with this body."

"Uh, I could go and take a look," Cutlass offered, speaking up for the first time. Once again dropping Twilight carelessly(I swear, if something permanent happens to her and they blame it on me, there'll be hell to pay) she spread her wings and rose over the canopy of the forest. We did not have to wait long before she came back.

"Well?" I prompted.

"Soo, you're not gonna like this, but there's a dozen or so guards headed our way."

"What?!"

"Yeah."

"But... how?"

"Isn't it obvious?" Ari said. "The princess told somepony where she'd be, and now they're coming for her."

"Shit. Can we go back or something? Go around?"

"Actually, I have a better idea."

"Hey, what are you..." Ari turned to me and rose on her hind legs, propping herself against my shoulders. She was still somewhat shorter than me, but her horn, which started to glow, was very much at eye level. "What... what is..." My speech slurred. A feeling washed over me. I felt... sleepy. Warm. My eyes grew heavy. I never even felt myself fall backwards and into the dirt.

Author's Notes:

Thanks to Schroedingers_Katze for pre-reading and allowing me to borrow her character, Steel Fang.

Ultimatum

First thing I heard was that damn beeping. I heard it before I could even register I heard it. It was the first thing I heard upon waking up and if I had the strength or energy to do so, I would have smashed, crushed and punched whatever damned contraption made that insufferable noise.

My eyes had not yet opened, but I was very much conscious. How long had I been lying here? All I remember was... the dogs, the little pony princess, the forest. I busted myself up pretty good, didn't I?

I tried to move, but my limbs were unresponsive. It felt as though my joints were stuffed with cotton and even then, lying on the moderately soft bed, my entire body felt heavy. Shit.

For all my efforts at getting my body to respond to my commands, all my efforts produced were a measly twitch of the fingers. In spite of everything, I really didn't mind it too much. Just laying there, all warm and comfy like. Letting my body heal.

Gave me time to think. As the haze of unconsciousness lifted from me, my mind was surprisingly clear, yet I my limbs remained unresponsive. I couldn't even open my damn eyes. Hmm, might as well take stock of the situation. I was alive, which is a preferable alternative to dead. I did not detect chains or restraints holding down my body, so I was... pretty sure I wasn't in a jail cell or something. Well, I could be, for all I know. Someone went to the trouble of healing me. Keeping me safe and warm, but... hey!

I let out a breath. I consciously opened my mouth to exhale. Oh, yes! Slowly but surely, I got control of my body back. First thing on the agenda, open my eyes.

Gahh! Sweet Jiminy, close them. Close them!

Ugh, too much white, too bright, too fast. Slowly now... yeah, that's better.

"So you're finally awake," a very familiar voice said softly.

She sat on a sofa just to the right of my bed. Her head half turned to me, eyeing me not in anger but a sort of resigned weariness.

"You had to be put in a medically induced coma for the last three days. The doctors needed time to figure out what was wrong with your body and how to treat it. You nearly died, you know."

I let out a breath, staring back at the ceiling again. "Where am I?"

"Ponyville hospital," came the clipped reply.

I would have barked out a laugh If I could. Just can't stay away from the little mud town, huh? Keeps sucking me in.

"I, uh," I said and licked my lips. Man, I could go for some water. "Last thing I remember was going into the forest. What happened?"

"The Royal Guard found us and brought us back to be treated."

"...Thanks. For not leaving me there," I muttered and turned back to her. "Why didn't you?"

"It was the right thing to do," she said resolutely.

"So what happens now?"

"That's what I've been trying to figure out."

She left it at that and did not elaborate further and me, well, I found myself at a loss for words.

"I'm trying to..." She halted and licked her lips, carefully measuring her words. "I want to understand what happened where you are concerned."

"What's to say? You got knocked out by a dog and I carried you out of there."

"I meant to say, I wanted to understand how you found yourself coming from Earth and into our world."

At any other point in time, I might have turned my neck so fast it cracked, my mind would be brought to a screeching halt and if I was in the process of ingesting a beverage, at this moment it would have been sprayed messily all over. However, whatever drugs they'd pumped into my body the past three days were still being flushed out of my system.

"How did you..."

"Because there's someone else like you here."

"What?"

"Don't you remember? I mentioned him to you the day you first came to my library."

She did? I tried to recall said instance. What was his name again? "Max?"

She smiled sadly. "Yes, that's him. He came to see you yesterday, you know?" Her eyes found mine again. This time there was a fire in them, a steely resolution and her body straightened further in the chair. "I won't forget what you did, and I can't simply forgive it, either. Your actions were completely inexcusable, to myself, to my friends, and to everypony who was a victim of your poor judgment." It looked like she had plenty yet to say on the subject, but she halted her speech. There was clearly some sort of mental battle going on in there.

A sharp exhale of breath and she brought her eyes to mine again. "But I am trying... I am trying to hear you out, and to try and see things from your perspective. When I first discovered the truth about Max... he told me of his world, his culture and his society. He said that you were young, still a child. I can't imagine how hard it must have been for you, finding yourself here, thinking you're alone." Her gaze hardened. "It's because of that that I am willing to give you a chance. One single chance to come clear with me, tell me everything. To explain to me step by step what happened after you came here. What you did, what you saw and to tell me every single thought that led you to commit such heinous crimes against everypony."

As she spoke, her voice turned thick with rage, the muscles on her face strained and contempt slowly made itself evident in her features. "Make no mistake, it's given the circumstances... and a favor to Max that I am even willing to give you a chance. I have every right to throw you in a cell for the rest of your life and even then, if you are anything but honest and straightforward with me, I will personally make sure you never see the light of day again. Do you understand?" She brought her face close to mine, her eyes resplendent with righteous fury and in that instant I had not doubt that she would follow through with her ultimatum.

"Understood, princess," I said, my voice not betraying the panic I felt. "Where do you want to start?

"Isn't that the dwarf calling the midget short?" I muttered bitterly, hoping Twilight couldn't make out my words. No such luck. Must be those animal ears or something.

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"Depends. Are you gonna jail me just because you don't like the answer?"

The corner of her lip curled and her head moved in a stiff nod. Christ, this pony had been nothing but judgmental, even though I did as she asked and told her what she wanted, word for word. She was nothing if not thorough and just when she'd finished questioning me about everything that happened with the dogs, she'd been so outraged she went and resorted to name calling. Monster. Heh, how original.

"Correct me if I'm wrong, princess, but don't you have a good dozen kills under your belt as well?"

"That... that's not—"

"What, the same?" I sneered. "You killed them. You know you killed them, quite painfully, I might add. Your little spell controlled, them, robbing them of their will. They were your puppets, you pulled their strings, drove them to kill each other in the most gruesome way imaginable. You didn't even have the guts to put that last dog out of its misery. Just think how long it must have suffered. There, dying and in pain, not even in control of its own thoughts, only obsessed for that little rock and how much it wanted it. Call me what you will, princess, a few quick deaths are nothing compared to what you pulled off all on your own."

Yeah, that did it. Righteous anger had steadily given way to anguish. Her ears splayed back, her wings drooped and where her posture was rigid and agitated, now she slumped. Looks like her little massacre was still majorly screwing with her head. "I... didn't mean—"

"Whatever you meant is worthless, princess. Those dogs are dead by your own hoof. At least I can acknowledge what I did. You gonna do the same? Have you even told anyone what you did? Or are you just gonna bury your head in the sand and hope no one ever finds out?"

The way she averted her gaze was enough. "No one knows, huh?" I said, my voice ever so slightly vindictive.

She growled in an annoyingly cute way and stomped her hoof. "We're not talking about me!"

"Fine," I said and laid back down. "So how did I do, princess? Do I pass your little test?"

Distaste still colored her features, though it was considerably more muted than before. "Not yet. I will bring my friends by later, and you will personally apologize for what you did to every one of them."

"What?!"

"I've already told them about you, and they know about Max as well. If you're going to be living here, you need to apologize to the ponies you've hurt."

Living here? Living here?! "If you think for a moment that I'm gonna—"

"It's for your own safety—"

"I can take care of myself."

"If you'll allow me to finish," she said testily. "It's for everypony's safety as well. You've proven yourself to be a danger to others and for the time being, you will stay where I can keep an eye on you. You'll be living with Max and I until I'm satisfied this is no longer the case."

"Goddamn it, you can't do this," I seethed.

"I'm not giving you a choice," she said coldly. "It's either this or imprisonment. Until you are reformed and proven you are not a danger to others you'll be staying under my watch, no exceptions."

"And if I say no?" Damn my defiant nature. "I'll get better, you know? I can blast my way out of this damned horse town and be out on my way before you even realize what's going on."

For the first time, a corner of Twilight's lip curled into a vindictive smirk. "Well, you could do that. But then I'm afraid I'll have to launch a nationwide marehunt for you. We know now what you look like as a pony. I took your picture, remember? And I've taken the liberty to snap a few more shots of you in your human form. The other princesses are in the know about you as well, and they support my decision should you get out of line. Whatever it is you think you're capable of, even you cannot escape an entire country on the lookout for you. You'll be found eventually, and I'm afraid nopony will be feeling as lenient to you as I am now. You'll spend the rest of your days in the deepest pits of Tartarus, never again seeing the light of day. Are you prepared to risk all that?"

Had I returned to my full capabilities, I would have torn her apart where she stood. But I was still weak. Whatever drug it was they hit me with had considerably slowed my movements, made it impossible to focus the middling reserves I did have.

"Fine," I hissed through gritted teeth. I knew when I was beat. There weren't many options here at the moment. Maybe an opportunity would pop up in the future, but for that, I first needed to ensure I had a future and if that meant playing into the uppity pony's hooves, so be it. "I'll apologize to your pathetic little friends. I'll stay with you and play nice, just like you want me to. I'll keep my word so long as you don't try and screw me over in some way."

She nodded slowly. "Good. That will do for now. The nurse will be coming shortly to administer your medicine. I suggest you keep the talking to a minimum unless you want more ponies to be clued in on your secret."

My blood simmered as I watched the little princess go, her face a grim picture of satisfaction. So consumed was I with wrath for her and her demands that I barely noticed the white coated, pink maned nurse pony as she proceeded to inject God knows what into me. Little did I know this was but the tip of the iceberg as far as the animosity between me and Twilight would grow.

Author's Notes:

A little intermission to connect the previous chapter with the next.

Reformation... What?

No matter what lies or rationalizations I told myself, it didn’t make what came next any easier.

One by one, the ponies filed in and formed a semicircle beyond the edge of my bed while Sparkle went off to the side.

The Lezbitch, the Hick, the Pink Pest, the Hippie Pegasus and the Prissy Bitch. They stared at me with no small amount of anger and mistrust, which I readily returned in kind. The only exceptions to this were the Animal Lover, who shrank back and cowered; her mane draped over her face from which peeked out a single terrified eyeball; the Pink Pest merely tilted her head and looked at me in unnerving concentration. There was a faint scar, barely visible where she’d bled. How in the world did she get out of that sack?

Well, they were there. All ponies I’d previously assaulted at some point or another and all of them personal friends of Bitch Sparkle, who now held my fate in her hooves. Typical.

"Alright. Now," Twilight started in a crisp tone. "Jacqueline, these are my friends. Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy. Rarity you've already met. Everypony, this is Jacqueline." She then shuffled over to the side and looked hopefully between us, as though expecting either of us to take that step forward. Her Royal Ponyness frowned slightly when the silence stretched out, her friends and I giving each other the stink eye.

She then cleared her throat. "So as you all know, Jacqueline has agreed to make reparations for everypony she's hurt. Now," She turned to me. "Is there something you wish to say?"

One by one, she bid her friends to come forward so I could properly say my part, however insincere it may have sounded coming out of my mouth. I imagined myself grabbing the uppity little pony, shredding of her skin, sawing off her wings, dunking her in boiling water and turning her to glue and any other number of crude atrocities. Certainly helped make the ordeal easier.

"There, see," Twilight said, smiling softly and looking more or less satisfied how things had turned out. This is just the first step and there is still quite a bit to go, but I'm confident that in time, she can be reformed and learn to live peacefully among us ponies."

The Hick scoffed. The Lezbitch snorted and the Diva a sort of whining noise before stepping forward.

“Twilight, you can’t be serious!” she exclaimed.

“Yeah, just what do you think you’re doing?” the Lezbitch added in that Butch attempt of a voice. “After all she did, you can’t trust her!”

Twilight filled in her acolytes on her, admittedly, poorly thought out plan of having me stay with her to be ‘reformed’.

“Ya gotta admit, Twi,” the one apparently called Applejack said in that inbred, yokel accent of hers. “This is not one of your best ideas, and I don’t trust that filly as far as I could buck her.”

“Girls, please,” Twilight said. “Trust me, I know what I’m doing. Remember how it was with Discord? Everypony thought him a hopeless case until Fluttershy helped show him the value of friendship. How is she any different?”

“Are you kidding me?” the Lezbitch cried out. “Have you forgotten how many ponies she’s hurt? What she did to Pinkie Pie? You yourself said you saw her kill diamond dogs! Even Discord never did that.”

A general murmur of assessment rose among her ilk and neither of the ponies had the guts to meet their overlord’s eyes.

“No, Dash, you’re right,” she admitted. “Even Discord never did that.”

“So why are we even considering this? Just hand her over to the Royal Guard. She can be cellmates with Chrysalis and share tips on how to be evil or something.”

“It’s not that easy, Rainbow,” Twilight said patiently. “And I’m taking into consideration the extenuating circumstances by which she came here.”

“And what would these circumstances be?” the hick asked, eyebrow raised in doubt.

“I’ve told you girls, she’s not from here, from our world. I’m willing to concede that everything she’s done up to this point is an error in judgment on her part.” She spared me a stern look before turning back to her friends. “But make no mistake, I’m not absolving her of anything. Her actions have affected you all and many other innocent ponies, and for that she must answer.”

Her friends all stared uneasily among each other before Rarity stepped forward. “Twilight, if you think this is really for the best… that you can teach this human,” she said with barely concealed venom. “To be civil and live among ponies, then I trust you can do it. And… as much as I don’t like it, I must admit, were I to find myself in a world where humans reigned and ponies were their pets… I’m not sure what I would do.” She cleared her throat and addressed the rest of her friends. “Girls, I’m not a perfect pony, but I can at least admit that, should I have been in the human’s hooves, I would not have handled a similar situation in a good way. Could any of you say the same?”

The ponies shuffled and muttered their ‘no’s’.

“Then if Twilight says she can do this, I have every confidence in her. ”She promptly gave said pony a nod, a small strained smile on her mug. Twilight returned it, gratitude evident on her features and one by one, the rest of her minions voiced their consent and after that, there was nothing more either of us had to say to each other and so they left.

With slight hesitation, Twilight clambered up to the cushy chair next to my bed.

"So... how are you feeling?"

Bitch, how do you think I'm feeling? "Still alive, aren't I?"

She frowned slightly and paused, weighing her words. "The, um... the doctors found in you an unstable magical core. I guess you already knew that?" I shrugged noncommittally. "Well, I don't know what you did, but whatever it was, it strained your core to the point that it started feeding off of you to sustain itself. The doctors were baffled, since they would never think to look for that in a human. After they figured out what was wrong with you, you were filled with nutrients and vitamins. It gave you strength and helped stabilize your core. You healed very well since then. Enough so that you'll be able to leave tomorrow."

Her eyes never left me, watching closely. "Do... do you know how this happened? You being able to do magic, I mean?" She asked and I couldn't help but notice an undercurrent of hope on her voice.

"Nope," was my prompt reply.

It didn't look like she believed me, but thankfully, she didn't push the issue.

"Alright. So I'll be leaving now. Have to go and get things settled up at the library for you. I'll come get you sometime before noon tomorrow."

I grunted, my gaze not straying from the ceiling. Twilight sighed.

"Look, I admit, I could have handled the situation better. For that, I am sorry."

That there got my attention and I now looked at the little pony princess with renewed interest. "Does that mean I don't have to go and stay with you?"

"Well, no." Tch. Typical. "You still hurt a lot of innocent ponies... needlessly. You've stolen from others and no matter how you look at it, your actions were criminal. Given you've been living on your own since coming here, you need to be able to learn to live and coexist with ponies, especially if you will continue to stay in this world."

"Well, princess, you sure know how to kill the mood," I muttered bitterly.

"I realize this is a less than ideal situation, but it's going to happen," she said firmly. "Why don't you try to make the best of it?"

"Kinda hard to look on the bright side when you're kept prisoner."

"You are not a prisoner," she said tiredly. "You'll stay in a home with hot food and water. You'll get your own bed and be free to do whatever you want on your free time."

"Cage is a cage, princess, no matter how pretty you paint it." Funny, had this conversation taken place on day one, I might have actually been looking forward to this, but now I was rather fond of my freedom and self sufficiency. No accountability, that's nice once you get a taste.

Twilight frowned, but did not argue on the matter. She hopped down from the chair. "At least keep in mind what I said. Equestria is a beautiful place, filled with good ponies and many wonders you've never seen. Your life can be a good and comfortable one, but only if you're willing to work with me and learn to live alongside us."

I didn't answer. My gaze had since trailed back to the ceiling. I'd be damned if I gave the little pony princess the satisfaction.

"Back then, at the diamond dog den... why were you there?"

She blinked in surprise, obviously not expecting this question. "I was looking for you."

I hummed. "So, what, all of a sudden you decide to up and wander into a place full of hostile, carnivorous dogs in the hope that maybe I'll be there?" I asked derisively. "Come on, princess. What gave me away?"

She looked at me searchingly, as if looking for a reason why she should not divulge the information, but after a few moments, she answered slowly. "Believe it or not, Applebloom pointed me in the right direction."

"Who?" I honestly had no idea what an Applebloom was.

She sighed. "Did you already forget? She is one of the fillies you found in the forest. She says you led her and her friends to safety."

Fillies... does she mean the little brats who stupidly wandered about the monster-filled forest? Agh, I knew it! I knew I should have just left them. See this, this is what I get for helping someone out.

"Since nopony in town had seen you, or had no idea where you spent the night, I assumed you did so somewhere outside of Ponyville. The Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters seemed the likeliest place you would have gone. And I was right,” she said after a pause. “As far as it goes, it’s a safe place if you want to avoid the creatures of the Everfree. Everything you'd stolen since you came here was right there.” She looked at me thoughtfully. “By the way, there were bottled contents of a shape changing potion. Did… did you brew it?”

“Yep.”

“How?”

“I dunno, princess. You toss weird stuff in a cauldron and stir. There's not all that much to it.”

“It… Isn't there more to it than that?”

I shrugged. “Probably. Quit changing the subject,” I said brusquely. “What led you to investigate the diamond dogs.”

A somber, dejected look spread across her face. Christ, is she still hung up on those dead dogs?

“I'm… not all that sure, really. We heard something, some sort of explosion. I told Fluttershy to head back to Ponyville and alert the guard. I went on to investigate and when I got there…” She trailed off and closed her eyes. “All those poor diamond dogs were dead. Slaughtered.” Her eyes opened, hardened as they fell on me.

“And what, you blame me for that? Did you forget the part where the dogs are murderous slavers?”

“What? What are you talking about?”

If I could, I would have facepalmed. “Are you kidding me? Are your eyes faulty or something, princess?”

“My eyes are fine,” she said defensively. “And I saw nothing that indicates the dogs were slavers as you claim.”

“Yeah, ever occur to you to go and take a closer look?”

Now she outright glared at me. “The entire tunnel system was caved in. Guards have been searching the last three days for any survivors.” Her head lowered, eyes squeezed shut and her little chest heaved. “They haven't found anyone. Not one single survivor. They're all dead. Pups… females. All because of you.”

Well, shit. It's obvious I'm not gonna convince her otherwise. I don't know where this pony gets off throwing these accusations, but it seems she's dead set on believing her version of events. Sheesh, can you say denial?

She kept on giving me the stink eye, as if expecting me to offer some sort of explanation, express regret or beg forgiveness for my actions. Hell, maybe all three. Alas, if she was expecting this, the little princess would be disappointed. She sighed. "Well, I'll be leaving now. Get some rest at least. You have a big day tomorrow." With that, the little princess left the room and left me to my thoughts.

"There. See, isn't this nice?" Twilight said, her fuzzy mug contorted in a strained smile. "Don't you think so, Spike?" She referred to her pet gecko.

For its part, the lizard toyed with the food on its plate, moving it around sullenly and shooting its master glum looks. "Yeah, I guess," it said, but its heart was not in it.

"How about you, Max, are you enjoying the meal?" Said guy returned her smile half-heartedly and nodded, not that he could do much more than that, being mute and all.

The air around the little dinner table was so thick you could cut it with a knife. Twilight's servant was a mixture of butler and housekeeper and, much to my disbelief, had been responsible for cooking the meal in front of us. Grilled broccoli, carrots and corn on the cob and an admittedly delicious looking blueberry pie that currently cooled on the windowsill. Twilight had trained her pet well, it seemed.

Even now, a full seven minutes after we sat down to eat, conversation was near nonexistent, save for the little princess' desperate though ultimately futile attempts to lighten the atmosphere. I had absolutely nothing to say to the little pony, or her pet lizard, who kept on giving me the stink eye. No doubt it due to its infatuation with the prissy pony, which Twilight had been mindful to inform me of shortly after we arrived at her pad. Well, not that its lack of friendliness bothered me in the least, as I had nothing I wanted to say to it either.

The only exception to this rule currently sat to my right, morosely chewing on his food and looking warily between Twilight, her gecko and I. No doubt the guy would have tried to diffuse the situation if he could.

The little princess had kept true to her word and punctually arrived at the hospital to sign my release forms and personally escorted me to the strange hybrid that was her treehouse/library. There stood her pet/servant, sitting on the sofa as it waited for us to arrive, and next to it was him, the other human, the one who supposedly hailed from the same plane of reality as I.

Introductions had been made quickly enough. The uppity little lizard merely glared at me and did a 'hmph' noise before turning its back in a rude manner, not even bothering to greet me even though its master had informed it I was a fully intelligent being. I promptly ignored its 'tude, for my attention was drawn to the single other occupant in the house.

Tall guy, fit, scraggly facial hair, sporting some very telling scars and blind in one eye. Sheesh, someone had put him through the wringer. Now I admit, I may not have been the most socially adept of people, but even I knew that the little princess expected the introduction between Max and I to have gone a bit differently. Heck, even he did, I'm sure.

"Sorry about Spike," Twilight said, apologizing for the dragon after it had clambered up the stairs, disappearing out of sight. I immediately forgot about it. "He has a slight crush on Rarity, and after what happened in the spa, well..." She cleared her throat, knowing well enough to move to another topic. "Anyway, this is Max. Max, this is Jacqueline. He came to see you when you were in the hospital."

In spite of myself, I couldn't help but eye up the guy. He was... young-ish, I'm pretty sure. The hair, scars and his... I dunno, the air about him kinda threw me off. Despite everything, even then, at that point I still held some doubts as to the validity of Twilight's claims. It was his eyes. That's what sold it for me. Every other human I'd unwittingly come across had the same vacant, mackerel, dead-eyed look about them. This guy though... he was the real deal. He absentmindedly scratched at that very big scar on the side of his face. Fidgeting, I guess. To be fair, I was scrutinizing him very closely, half glaring at the guy.

“Ah… hey.” Yep. That pretty much summed up my whole greeting to another member of the genus of Homo Sapiens whom I'd never thought I'd see again, complete with a rather weak wave of my hand.

He reciprocated with a wave of his hand and a small smile. It's not often that I get self conscious in situations like these, mostly because I do my best to avoid them. Don't get me wrong, I was very much glad to see him… heck, I'd be glad to see pretty much anyone from back home. However, I didn't count on the fact that I'd be put in a position where niceties, small talk and just overall chattiness would play a factor here.

And I mean, shit, a banal ‘hey, how's it going’ is probably not protocol to meeting the first of your species in a cartoony, pastel colored, candy horse world.

Luckily, as I struggled to find a way to break the ice, the guy did… something with his limbs. A series of gestures, claps, and taps of his feet on the hardwood floor. What the… is he playing charades? Huh, certainly not how I expected this meeting would go, and I could not, for the life of me make out what those movements were supposed to represent. I guess he wanted to… square dance or something? Well, I was actually rather good at that particular type, believe it or not. Still, though I rather lacked in the social graces, even I knew this was hardly the time or place to dance.

"He says it's good to meet you, and asks how you are feeling," Twilight said. She elaborated a bit more after I looked at her in utter befuddlement. "Since he can't talk, he's using a form of hoof language to communicate."

"Oh." Yeah, that makes more sense. "I'm, uh, you know, getting there..." No, no! Shit, can't you do better than that?! Christ, you'd think I'd have something better to say in the situation. "A-and you? How are you, I mean? The um, uh..." I trailed off lamely and traced a line through my face, in a vague outline of his scars.

His face turned a bit somber. Twilight cleared her throat. She sidled close to me and whispered as best she could from her lower standing. "He got hurt. Remember I told you? It happened very recently, so try not to bring it up."

Great, Jacqueline. Just great. You're off to a great start. Come to think of it... yeah, I thought he looked familiar. He was there that day, at the warehouse with the... oh, shit.

In a rather clumsy display, I apologized as best I could. Yeah, if I went through that shit, don't think I'd ever want to be reminded of it. He did his hoof language thing and assured me it's all alright and following that, the situation turned even more awkward than it already was.

Don't get me wrong, there many, many things I would have loved to talk to him about, but there were two very major hurdles. The whole mute thing presented its own set of challenges, and though I did manage to spot a fair number of paper, ink pots and quills, having to wait for him to write everything down would become a chore real quick, not to mention he'd probably get hand cramps or something. The second obstacle was the Sperglord herself. Apparently she needed to be there to mediate whatever dialogue would pop up between Max and I, as she proved to be the sole source of translation for that hoof language thing. Problem was, pretty much everything I would have liked to talk to him about would have been better done by ourselves, alone, with no pony princess in sight.

And so, my mind raced frantically to fill in that silence. Christ, this is exactly why I don't like dealing with people. Talk, talk, talk, so much pressure to talk. Not my proudest moment, but I basically stumbled over myself in trying to keep things going. The real meat of our middling conversation would have to wait until I could get him alone, away from the prying eyes of the little princess, who never took her gaze off us.

Things did not get better after that. Either Twilight did not notice or care about my not so subtle hints to be alone with him.

Max tried to get the ball rolling with me, but again, I did not want to discuss sensitive topics in front of Twilight and so I tried to turn the conversation to him and see what I could dig up. From what I gathered, he got here a while ago, well before me and unlike yours truly, retained his every characteristic. No freaky magic powers for him, no siree.

Seeing how he was just another guy, mute, in a cursed land where his species were little more than animals, he had been relegated to live with the princess under guise of her pet because apparently, being a lone, wandering human is not exactly a good thing here, like a prissy, upper class, white collared bitch walking down the wrong neighborhood.

At the very least he seemed well taken care of, aside from that mauling he got the other day. He made it a point that he was happy living in this fetid, backwater mud town full of pastel, midget horses, probably for Twilight's benefit more than anything.

While we were 'talking', Twilight's servant set about preparing lunch. I know, right? Turns out, the little princess had trained her pet well and it proved more than capable of producing a surprisingly good meal. Of course, by that point I'd already exhausted pretty much all conversational topics I could think of. True, Max's accounts of what he'd been through so far were riveting and more than a little fantastical, but whenever he or Twilight had tried to shift the topic on to me, I'd done an, admittedly, poor job of redirecting the conversation. I... may have been a little hostile in how I went about it, and where the atmosphere in the room had been steadily relaxing, it turned all the more dour lickety split. By that point the lizard had announced the meal was ready and trying to salvage the situation, Twilight hastily directed us to follow her into the small kitchen, where her pet was already in the process of doling out the grub.

I admit, it could cook some damn fine vegetables. The first morose bite I took, I was nearly overcome by the burst of freshness and flavor that the deceptively simple-looking greenery held. This was definitely not your average cafeteria vegetable. Still, however good it may have been, the mood had plummeted around the table.

Twilight kept trying in vain to salvage the situation, her face steadily becoming more strained and I swear, the stress even caused increasing amounts of her perfectly combed mane to spring into erratic curls. It was rather amusing to watch, honestly.

No sooner did we finish eating that the little princess had the bright idea that to pass the time, I should learn this hoof language thing to better communicate with my counterpart. Seeing how I had nothing better to do and I was honestly interested in doing so, I agreed and Twilight produced a book and no sooner started to lecture me on the origins and use of this hoof language. Apparently she thought it a good idea that before anything else, I should first get a good understanding and background on the subject.

I looked to Max, not knowing what to make of the little princess' increasingly odd ticks and he merely shrugged helplessly and so we were treated to a half hour lecture on the subject. Even when she was done, Sparkle actually asked a series of follow up questions, wanting to make sure I did understand it, but the dry contents of the material quickly caused me to zone out and instead of listening, I spent the time daydreaming and looking about the library. She wasn't too pleased to learn this, as after I couldn't answer a single question, her eye twitched in a most horrendous fashion and even more strands of her mane 'boinged' up into curls. Heh, it looked like she was about to suffer a stroke.

Max quickly intervened and suggested we play some of the board games the little pony had laying around. Twilight relented and so we did. The hoof language would wait until tomorrow and for the next couple of hours, we played on and the mood around the room steadily eased to a more comfortable setting.

It wasn't even dark yet before I got drowsy. Twilight said it was an effect of the medicine I'd been taking as it turned out to be rather strong and would tire me as my body would start to flush it out. She led me to the basement—yes, apparently there is a basement—making me wonder how in the world the weird tree was still alive and green, where she'd set up for me an admittedly soft cot and before parting ways, she oh-so-kindly let me know that first thing in the morning, I would start to make reparations to her little friends as part of my 'reformation'.

Oh, joy.

The Tale of Shimmermist Island

The ponies migrated from their native homeland to the rich, and treasures of Equestria more than a thousand years ago. This is a fact any colt or filly would know. When the three pony tribes warred among each other and brought down the wrath of the Windigos onto the land, the leading figures of the three tribes—Princess Platinum, Chancellor Puddinghead and Commander Hurricane—organized a mass exodus to escape the inhospitable, ceaseless winter and ice storms.

But not all ponies made the journey to Equestria. There were those who fell disillusioned with royalty, the ruling class or simply their station in life and instead of doing as most ponies had done, chose instead to seek their own fortunes in other lands, founding new settlements and cities, some of which still stand strong to the day, such as Maretonia, Prance and Mustangia.

Similarly, the ponies who made the successful trek into the wilds of Equestria spread out beyond the newfound land, settling in on the islands that surrounded it. Not all of these colonies survived, and harsh conditions set many hopeful settlers back to look for other opportunities. Since their abandonment, scholars and historians had documented the reasons for these setbacks.

The island of Golden Grove, despite being lush and replete with flora and abundant with vegetation, also held in its fertile soil an abundance of toxins and enzymes that rendered any potential crops and plants inedible, and Ocean's Cape was beset by a series of wild typhoons and hurricanes that even the pegasi could not control, but far and large, no colony has puzzled historians more than the mystery of Ironshod Island.

At first glance, it had ideal conditions for colonization. Stable weather, fertile soil and several reservoirs of fresh spring water. Resources were plentiful, the population grew and the colonists were optimistic that Ironshod Island would grow to rival Equestria in its wealth and riches. Everything was fine for a while. The colonists maintained constant communications with Equestria and their industry swelled as they traded back and forth with the mainland. One such export was a crop uniquely exclusive to Ironshod Island called Havanu fruit, by all accounts so sweet and desirable that a significant portion of Ironshod Island's economy relied on shipping these specimens to other lands, for you see, Havanu fruit could not be grown anywhere else. Botanists tried for many years to find or synthesize ways to make it bloom, yet none prevailed, leaving Ironshod Island the sole way to get this highly coveted product.

But suddenly, something happened. Shipments from the island ceased abruptly and no communications were sent. Due to this unusual occurrence, and to Havanu fruit's immense demand, Equestria deployed two ships to investigate. Theories were made as to why the colonists severed communications, some ranging from probable to ridiculous and outlandish in nature. Regardless, the investigators were not prepared for what awaited them.

Ironshod Island was completely deserted. Groups were organized and sent to investigate and when they returned, their reports painted the same image. There was absolutely no sign left of the inhabitants. Every house, every building, every street corner was empty and all around there were signs of a great struggle. Doors were broken into, windows smashed in. The insides of the buildings looked as though a tornado had swept through and in many walls and upturned pieces of rubble and debris were darkened splotches that tests proved to be dried blood.

Ironshod Island had been attacked. But how? Why? When? And most importantly, by who? Despite the wanton destruction and viciousness, there were no traces of bodies to be found. The teams scavenged the island for any evidence that might shed some light on the situation, making it a priority to search for documents, diaries or journals that might describe what happened. Many were found, yet none contained a record of what transpired. Even stranger, there was nothing in there that indicated anything was wrong, and stranger still, every single documented entry stopped in the same day.

Inside many of the documents that were recovered was a symbol, written not only in them, but found throughout the whole island, carved into houses, trees and stone or etched in any number of fluids and substances. Its shape represented that of a simple cane—two of them, joined together at the base and splitting in opposite directions as they neared the handle, with the heads turned from each other. Many thought it looked vaguely like a horned face, but did not understand its significance.

In the main harbor of the island was a single ship, and when a group of ponies investigated, they were appalled to find it full to the brim with rotting Havanu fruit. As the teams investigated further they ascertained that there was not a single Havanu fruit left on the island. Plantations had been completely razed, uprooted and ultimately destroyed, and the once fertile soil of the island had soured, leaving nothing to grow. Many who were there that day said the island itself died, for other than them, there was no life of any kind left to find. Even the water was fouled.

After recording everything they deemed of importance, the investigators returned to Equestria and tried to put the pieces of this baffling puzzle together. It was tentatively proposed that the inhabitants of the island had all left in the many ships they possessed, but no one could tell for sure.

No official consensus was made as to what had happened and this fueled many theories for hundreds of years. One of the most popular ones was that the Island had been beset by an infection or a plague borne from the Havanu fruits. It spread rapidly throughout the island, inciting mass panic and so the islanders destroyed every single Havanu plant in the hopes of stopping it. They then set aboard their ships and abandoned their home, but somewhere along the way, the ships sank, taking everypony with them.

Of course, there are many holes in this popular opinion. No traces of bacteria or viruses on the island have been found and even so, what kind of symptoms and fatality rate would this mystery disease have possessed in order to incite such panic? There were no mass graves to be found that would correspond with such an epidemic, and even if all the islanders left above ships, pegasi numbers on the island tallied well into the thousands, lending any theory about freak weather conditions redundant.

Other such outlandish theories entertain the possibility of mass suicides at sea, or that the islanders abandoned their home and set sail for another land that has yet to be discovered, their descendants living their lives cut off from the rest of the world.

But as fantastical as this tale may be, the mysteries of Ironshod Island do not end there, for you see, one day, when two more ships returned, better equipped to investigate further, the island disappeared. Witnesses describe seeing the island on the horizon, but as they drew closer, a thick mist rose out of the sea and with it, motes of flickering light danced within. In mere seconds, this shimmering mist encompassed the whole island, leaving nothing in its wake. Terrified, the ships and their crew doubled back to Equestria and relayed this impossible sighting to anypony who would listen.

There were many who doubted these claims, of course. That is, until more ponies stepped forward, relaying the same strange version of events. Curious individuals who gathered and wanted to see for themselves whether the tale held a grain of truth and following soon, the mysterious tale of the island became known throughout Equestria.

It might surprise some ponies to know that Ironshod Island was not always known for its distinctive name, but then again, there are many sites in Equestria that once went by another name. Galloping Gorge was once known as Broken Hollow, Macintosh Hills were Spring Valley and even Equestria herself was at one point simultaneously called Unicornia, Pegasopolis and Earthville.

Ironshod Island underwent such a change and as time passed, so too did its name evolve to reflect that strange shimmering mist that has baffled countless onlookers throughout the years, for it is now known as Shimmermist Island

Huh, this was mildly interesting. Turning another page of the book titled Equestrian Tales and Folklore Through the Ages, I set to read the next story and waited for the pegasus to get back.

All things being equal, this whole reformation thing did not completely suck. True, Twilight often tread the line between tolerable and sperglord. Her pet lizard never took its eyes off me while we were in the same room and quite often got uppity with me. It didn't seem to like me much, and the sentiment was returned in kind.

Still, I don't know if Her Royal Ponyness was high or something—probably on a drug or her own never-ending well self righteousness—but part of my 'reformation' involved me playing nice and spending time alone with her pathetic little friends.

I'm not joking.

After the first day, she had decreed that I would spend the first half of the day with the Animal Lover, in her sickly sweet little cottage. Something about how I scarred the hippie or something and needed to make reparations—to show myself capable of getting along with her... or at least, not destroy her where she stood.

I was not at all pleased when the little princess escorted me to her friend's animal-infested cottage. She had to make several reassurances to the pegasus and complimenting her how well she did with this Discord thing, and that she could do the same with me as well. Unfortunately for them both, I had no intention of being reformed, thank you very much.

After Twilight departed, Shutterfly or whatever her name was, tried to cajole me into feeding her smelly animals, of which there were a lot. That didn't work out so well. The critters all either ran from me or outright tried to attack me. Naturally, I wasn't going to take this lying down and more than a few birds, ferrets, raccoons, snakes and any other assortment of random critters would be sporting bruises the next morning.

Growing desperate, the Nature Freak then suggested I try feeding her iguanas with some sort of pellet food. Given that I had nothing better to do, I made an actual effort to do so, but the lizards did not seem to like me any more than I them and chose to make this task harder than it needed to be. Luckily, I had magic on my side and for every time they tried(and failed) to scurry off somewhere, I could just summon them to me and stuff them full of the food whether they liked it or not.

By this point, Guttershy was in near hysterics, and me, I had enough of her timid, cowardly, oh-look-at-me-I'm-a-cute-demure-little-virgin attitude.

"P-please, go easy on them. Mr. And Mrs. Ridgeback don't like being force fed, so—"

"Agh, screw this. What am I even doing here?" I groused and let go of the overstuffed reptiles who dropped unceremoniously on their backs and were so full of food they couldn't even right themselves. "I grow tired of this menial labor. When's lunch?"

"Oh. Um, that's still a few hours away, a-and we still have to clean out Mr. Tweety's cage. Barry the Bear needs his weekly massage and—"

I groaned and stretched, clasping both hands and raising them above me. "Yeah, that sounds like fun and all, but I'm getting rather... hungry." I made sure to sound ever so slightly sinister, and eyed a few squirrels who in turn were watching me suspiciously, with a hungry leer.

The pegasus 'eeped' and darted forward to secure the rodents in her hooves, flying well out of reach.

"Y-you leave my little squirrels alone!" She said in a tone that was probably meant to come off as threatening. Heck, it seemed that my not so subtle implication brought down whatever cowardly veil was her default personality, for now, her countenance hardened and was downright shooting me with a moderate glare. Still, if intimidation is what she was going for, she did a piss poor job in that department. The pegasus was just too cloyingly sweet to ever come off as threatening.

"Well what about this guy?" I asked and held up a brown rabbit that had tried to sneak a bite of my shins. I held the squirming little meatbag in a firm grip to the Animal Lover's eyes, which at this point flashed with panic. "This little bastard's been copping an attitude since I got here. I could, uh... make sure he never gives you any trouble again," I said slyly.

Yep, this broke her composure and she proceeded to literally prostrate herself before me, begging not to eat her worthless little pet. Not that I would, seeing how I would have to go to a lot of trouble to gut, skin and clean the thing for a teeny tiny bit of meat. Still, geez, where was this pony's self respect?

"So... you don't want me to eat him?" I asked casually as I inspected the impudent rodent in my grip. "I mean, if only you had something else I could chow down on..."

"W-well, I have a very nice leftover salad from yesterday," she said, looking hopeful.

"Ehh, I'm allergic to salads. They ruin my complexion."

"Oh. Um, okay, I have some fresh and crisp carrots and celery... o-or some oatmeal. I like it with bananas and raisins and just a little dash of cinna—"

"I was thinking more along the lines of deep fried and smothered in chocolate."

"I... don't have anything like that. The only food I can think of is Pinkie Pie's Special Fudgilicious Triple Chocolate X-tra Large Fritter Delights, but—"

"Yep, that's what I want."

"B-but Twilight said I have to stay and watch you. That's the whole point of you coming here and—"

"Hey, that's fine. I understand," I said and held up my hands placatingly. Shutterfly let out a relieved sigh. "I mean, I have to eat to keep my strength up, so I'll just help myself to one of your bunnies or any other animals you got lying around."

"W-what? No!"

"Then I'll just wait here while you go and get me some grub. I promise I won't touch any of your little animal friends," I finished in a sickly sweet voice, with a smile to boot. Heh. Hehe. Apparently humans here can't smile and the Goat Lover looked disturbed at the gesture. A battle clearly raged on in her mind. The 'doormat' side of her personality warring against her overlord's orders. The desire to keep her filthy animals safe cemented her decision.

"O-okay, I'll get your food, but you have to Pinkie Promise not to hurt my little animal friends," she said shakily.

"What... in the world... is a Pinkie Promise?"

She elaborated on some inane ritual she and her friends partook in. Apparently you had to keep a Pinkie Promise and couldn't break it, otherwise… I dunno, something would happen.

Still, if it helped her scram, I'd be willing to put up with it. “Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye,” I droned and performed the necessary motions. After this, the hippie smiled and nodded contentedly, as if assured beyond a doubt I would keep said promise. And these ponies are supposed to be older than me…

Now having the cottage to myself, I headed over to the couch, swatted away a ferret that tried to launch itself at my face and withdrew one of the books Twilight had lent me.

The little princess had sent me with a knapsack filled with a few books of her choice, for me to read as I passed the time. They were supposed to be constructive and help me familiarize myself with pony life and culture, probably hoping this would speed up my reformation process. Contained in it were books detailing an overview of Equestrian history, another depicting tales and folklore that had developed in the land, the hoof language one and another portraying points of interest in the land.

Growing bored with these pony tales, I set aside the book and in its place withdrew the tome detailing the use of hoof language. Sooner or later(preferably sooner) I'd be able to get Max alone, without the princess or her pet. It was all a matter of preparation. Max made the thing look easy, but I guess he had to learn it quick out of necessity. For me, it was confusing as hell. I got maybe half a dozen motions and ‘words’ memorized by the time the Nature Freak returned and true to her word, she carried with her a box with four massive, fried, chocolate pastries. The rest of my time with her turned out more or less peaceful. The hippie, deeming it in her animals' best interests, decided it was for the best I keep away from them and so whatever chores she had to do she did them by her lonesome... well, not really. Her animals lent more than one hand in her to-do's, much to my disgust. Seriously, the things got everywhere. This may very well one of, if not the most unhygienic places I'd ever stayed in and I made a mental note to wash my hands thoroughly after getting back to Twilight's pad... and give my clothes a good once over as well. Besides that, not much of importance happened during my time with Flutterby, and all I had to do in return was chill out and keep away from her animals.

Heh. This reformation thing… it's not all that bad.

Author's Notes:

Thanks to Schroedingers_Katze for pre-reading.

Of Diamond and Troggs

+Really? Twilight did that?+

"Oh, yeah. A whole room full of the dogs. They fought over that cursed stone like drowning men after air." I speared a piece of cantaloupe and chewed while Max looked on, interested if somewhat dubious. "And then get this, Sparkle goes all limp; the mutts all tore each other apart. Literally tore each other to pieces. God, by the time it was over the whole thing looked like Satan's mural or something. Blood got everywhere." Now he looked queasy. Better move on. "So then your pony goes all catatonic. Guess her mind broke or whatever and so I had to carry her the rest of the way. Saved her life and everything."

Okay, so I may have painted myself in a slightly better light, but it's not like anyone cares.

Max pondered my words, tapping the pencil to his chin before writing down, +She never said anything about it.+

I scoffed. "No surprise. Guess she doesn't want her little friends to get wind she's a certified murderer. Actually," I said after a pause. "I guess the technical term would be mass murderer, seeing how she killed a whole bunch of them in one sitting. Exactly how many lives does one have to take to be considered a mass murderer, you think?"

He frowned and scribbled hastily. +That doesn't sound like Twilight.+

I resisted the urge to roll my eyes, opting instead to shove another piece of fruit in my mouth. "Yeah? And what does sound like her?"

+She's a good pony. She cares for me and her friends. If it wasn't for her, I would have ended up in a very bad place.+

My eyes glanced to the stairs, making sure the little princess wouldn't drop in on us. Probably not necessary, but just to be safe. For the last half hour Twilight had shut herself in the upstairs bathroom, paying homage to the porcelain throne.

Thing about the purple pony, she was a creature of habit, at least where her morning routine was concerned. From what I heard from Max and Sparkle's slave/pet gecko(who apparently was male, by the way. Guess its balls haven't dropped yet) Twilight had been known to have an erratic sleep schedule, for brainiac that she was, she tended to pull all nighters dedicated to her studies.

Still, every day she followed the same pattern. Wake up, go to the bathroom to shower and do her business, comb her hair and then come downstairs to partake in a meal her house slave cooked up and every time accompanied by a mug of hot tea.

Well, I hadn't been twiddling my thumbs these past couple of days and so I plotted to find a way for the little princess to get out of my hair for a while. To my luck, in one particular spot at the base of her weird treebrary, there just happened to grow a little plant called wormwoorth that, should you take its leaves and steep them in hot water, you'd be left with a bitter drink that acted as a powerful laxative.

Simple, but effective. I slipped out in the night, grabbed a fistful and mixed them in with her little tub of loose tea leaves. After that, nothing to do but wait and not an hour passed after breakfast that Her Royal Ponyness' digestive tract started brewing up a storm. Cheeks flushed, the little princess raced upstairs and locked herself in the bathroom and had not come down since.

I would have cackled in malicious glee if it wouldn't give me away.

With her gone, only Max and I remained. Oh, and Twilight had loaned her pet to Rarity for a day of hard, unpaid, backbreaking labor or something like that. Small miracles be praised.

With the house, er, tree empty, it was finally time for my human counterpart to have a little chat of our own. Well, I talked while he just scribbled and listened, mostly. He'd tried doing the whole hoof language thing, but I still hadn't fully picked it up so I mostly got fragments that proved annoying to sift through.

I grilled him good, wanting to know everything that happened while he'd been here, hoping that with the little princess gone, he wouldn't hold anything back, which then caused a good deal of confusion with me.

He... actually seemed to like it here. Here. In this candy horse world with brain dead humans and only mutants/freaks of nature as the sole means of conversation. I dunno if the ponies drugged him or brainwashed him, if he was suffering from Stockholm syndrome or his time here finally caused him to snap, but yes, it did actually seem like he was content being here.

Sheesh...

Well, hopefully he'll come around to my way of thinking and help me get out of this town, but man, it must have really messed him up in the head, everything he had gone through since his arrival. Granted, I too haven't exactly escaped with my full sanity intact so I guess I could understand to a degree.

The door to the library then opened and in came the poster child for addictive personality disorder better known as Pinkie Pie.

Her eyes widened ever so slightly after catching sight of me, but a hasty smile quickly replaced it. "Good morning everypony. How are we all doing today?" She asked brightly.

"We were doing fine," I said. Max shot me a reprimanding look before smiling at the pink pest and waving hello.

"Great!" She said obliviously. "So where's Twilight?"

"Up in the bathroom. But I wouldn't interrupt her. Princess came down with a bad bout of explosive diarrhea so you should probably come back later." Or hopefully never.

"Oh. Really? That's too bad, because today's my turn to spend time with you."

I nearly choked, and after a bout of violent, hacking coughs I said, "With you?"

She nodded happily. "Yeah. I know we got off to a rough start, but I think we can put it all behind us. What do you say?" She promptly stuck her hoof out at me in a gesture of goodwill. I eyed the appendage warily. No way she'd simply let go what I did to her... right?

Hmm, better play it by ear. "Sure. Whatever." I bumped her hoof with my fist, causing her to smile even wider.

"See? I knew we'd get along. Just you wait, by the end of the day we'll be super duper friends."

I seriously doubt that. "Yeah... friends..." I said with a smile that probably resembled a grimace more than anything.

"Anyway, I have to go and tell Twilight I'll be taking you. Be back in a flash. She then hurried up the stairs, legs working furiously before turning back to the only other occupant in the room. "Oh, hi Max!" She screeched, waving like a madman and disappeared from sight.

Great. Now I have to spend the day with her as company. The little princess' moans of misery did raise my spirits, though.

One of these days, I will burn this whole damned town straight to the ground.

Wishful thinking? Perhaps, but a girl had to take solace wherever she could. Twilight, despite her cronies’ misgivings, insisted we push on with this reformation agenda of hers.

The pink pony was by far the worst of them all. Oh, she didn't try to get payback. She wasn't mean, she didn't try to get me to do unpleasant labor and in no way acted hostile with me. Quite the contrary, really.

Since she picked me up from Twilight’s pad, she'd been nothing but smiles and good cheer. Shortly after lunch, the party pony came to collect me and, too emotionally drained to give much a shot either way, followed her and hoped we could get the ordeal over with quickly.

“So, whatcha wanna do today?” the pink pest asked as she trotted merrily beside me, loosely holding my leash in a hoof. Yes, I had to wear a collar and leash. Apparently, humans here—owned humans at least—had to wear them as a sign that they belonged to someone else. That way, you know, it was less likely some random pony would try and snatch me up, thinking me a stray. That, and according to the princess I was… eh… cute or pretty or something and that much more likely that a pony would try to take me in if I did not have an owner.

I gave the pink pest my best take on the 'Troglodyte look' I could force myself to do. Obviously Pinkie was as brain addled as she came over because she asked me this question in broad daylight, while in the midst of her unwashed brethren.

Me.

The supposedly rock stupid human.

As tempted as I was to just tell her that I wanted to dig a hole, put her in it hooves up and then fill it up again just for the hell of it, but for whatever reason beyond my comprehension I had agreed not to reveal my intelligence out in the open after the purple princess all but ordered me not to. She kinda won me over in the end when Max pointed out that there could be unsavory ponies out there who would go to great and criminal lengths to get their grubby mitts on me and it would be the best for all of us if I played along.

They were welcome to try, certainly.

Nonetheless I agreed to play the moldy piece of bread. Necessities and all.

"Hey, didn´t you hear me? I asked what ya wanna do today?"

Gah! Suddenly my complete field of vision was filled with hot pink!

I could not help myself but to make a step back at the massive invasion of my private space. The pink pony had no qualms about getting up in my bubble. And I really, really like my bubble. So while telling her off proved tempting, I settled instead with a non-committal grunt.

That seemed to get my message across as a look of comprehension dawned upon Pinkie´s face as she exclaimed. "Ohh, right. I'm sorry. I kinda forgot you're not supposed to..." She looked around, making sure no ponies were nearby and leaned in, talking in a conspiratorial whisper. "S. P. E. A. K." she said, grinning broadly, even going so far as conking her own head lightly with one hoof, not unlike a human would have done with a hand.

Out of the corner of my eyes, I noticed quite some of the peasant horses around us regarding us with suspicious glances. Obviously this was strange behavior, even for the town's cook. "Shut it, you! There's ponies staring..." I said in a harsh whisper. Luckily, no one seemed to notice and the pink pest took the hint.

Granted, she still talked. What about I'm not sure since I wasn't paying attention and merely focused on getting today over with. At some point we found ourselves in this so called Sugarcube Corner—even more an eyesore in daylight—and Pinks proceeded to take me to the back of the kitchen. The inside was actually empty, the shop closed, basically the pony version of a Sunday when everything shut down as was common in hick, podunk towns like this.

"Oh joy, I'm back," I muttered. "What are we doing here anyway? What's the little princess gone and try to get you to teach me?"

"Well you see, Mr and Mrs. Cake are off visiting their family in Trenthoof and they left the twins and the shop for me to take care of."

"Twins? What twins?" I asked, looking around.

Almost as if on cue, two ponies that I swear were sucrose and syrupy sweet made flesh came down the stairs. Well, one of them, a unicorn, enveloped itself(couldn't tell their genders) in some sort of magic bubble and came bouncing like a beachball down the stairs, giggling all the while, while the other, a pegasus, fluttered down, wings working furiously like a hummingbird.

"They allow you to take care of children?" I asked in incredulousness as the two little pieces of moe fluff were scooped up by Pinks.

"Yes indeedy," the pink one nodded her head, causing that fluff of cotton candy glued to her scalp to fly to and fro. "'Cause aunty Pinkie is just the bestest babysitter in all of Ponyville. Well, not counting in Miss Love Tap I guess but anywho." She then held the two infants out to me. "Jackie, I want you to meet Pound and Pumpkin Cake." She introduced us. The infants stared at me wide eyed... good lord, the eyes of adult ponies were already ridiculously large but the eyes of these two infant ponies nearly made up all of their faces! How could that even work?

"Gooo on~" Pinkie sing-songed out of the blue.

"Eh, what?" Was all I could ask in my bafflement over the ridiculous anatomy displayed to me.

"I can tell you wanna take them in your arms and give `em a big ol `huggie."

"No. Keep them away from me," I said in a clipped tone. Didn't seem to register with her.

"Aww, don´t be such a grumby-wumpy Jackie," Pinkie continued in an insisting tone of voice that somehow made it clear that she would not relent until I, ugh, got into physical contact with those babies.

So I snagged the orange haired baby–Pumpkin, if I was not mistaken–out of Pinkie´s arms by her scruff and held her in front of my face not unlike one would do with a dog or a cat. Holding the diapered pony there, I droned out a flat, "Hello, baby pony."

Strangely enough this caused Pumpkin to explode in pearling giggles despite the fact how I was holding her and to top that, she even reached out with her tinsy hoof and boobed me on the nose. "Gwumpy!" She then exclaimed in a high pitched voice, clapping her hooves together in an undeniable adorable display of infantile joy.

Argh!

As much as it caused me heartburn to admit but somehow, the small pony was adorable.

"See? I just knew you would come around," Pinkie exclaimed, taking the still giggling Pumpkin back while I still stared dumbfounded. "Now, just let me take the Twins to their play-pen and then I can show you what I came up with. I´ll promise you´ll just love it," Pinks said, undoubtedly thinking in an assuring way as she somehow put both babies on her back safely and cantered off.

Having nothing better to do, I just decided to follow suit. Fluttershy had tried to rope me into caring for her filthy animals, Daisy Mae had tried to get some free labor outta me in her failing farm and I could see how they might consider this would be able to mellow me out a bit. But Pinks? Well, apparently her goal was to have me bake.

"You're joking, right?" I asked as the pest bounded all over the kitchen, already wearing a big, poofy chef's hat and a weird sort of pony apron that clung to her body despite it only having the traditional two straps.

"Eh, maybe? I dunno, I joke a lot," she said as she gathered a number of mixing bowls and laid them on the long, wooden island in the middle of the room.

"I mean how is my doing... this," I picked up a particularly large whisk for emphasis, waving it around. "Supposed to help me be reformed?"

"I dunno," She shrugged and went about gathering eggs, milk and cream. "Twilight just said to use our best judgment, and since I couldn't think of anything else, I thought we could have a little fun baking."

"Great, just great," I muttered an pinched the bridge of my nose. "You do know I've never actually baked before, right? Hell, the closest I've come to it is heating up chicken nuggets in the oven."

"What's a chicken nugget?" She asked obliviously.

I smiled, seeing an opportunity to screw with her. "Do you know what mass production is?" She shook her head. "Well, I dunno what you've heard from Max, but our particular home country invented and refined it to a tee. Basically, it means humans can manufacture a fuckton of goods in an industrial scale. Hell, there's factories that are capable of churning out billions of pieces of candy per day."

Yeah, this got her attention alright. "Hard candies, caramels, chocolates, lollipops, nougat, taffy, peanut brittle... they're churned out by the tons." A starry look settled on Pinks, obviously trying to paint a picture of what I just said. However, we also do the same thing to our foodstuffs. Chicken nuggets for example.

Basically, we breed chicks when they've just hatched, put them in cramped little spaces with four hundred other chicks, stuff them full of food and drugs and when they grow up they're tossed into what is basically a giant meat grinder, turning their flesh into unidentifiable mash, shaping that mash into little nugget sized pieces. Bread them, fry them, freeze them and send them to grocery stores all around the country where humans of all ages can enjoy them to their leisure. Children are particularly fond of them. Gobble them up like you wouldn't believe. All a part of a well balanced meal."

I could almost hear the gears inside Hot Pink's head shatter as she stared at me. Her eyes were wide, with pin-prick pupils, her ears had long since vanished in her mane and speaking of which, that unruly mob of hair seemed to miraculously have changed its texture from fluffy to straight in a single instant. That together with her thin line of a mouth almost made her look like one of those cookie cutter horror film psychos. For an undefined amount of time, Pinkie just at there, not even blinking and me? I stood there, relishing the look of abject horror on her fuzzy mug. Heh, finally managed to wipe that idiotic smile off her face.

Just the moment I began to worry ever so slightly, a slight giggle began to bubble up from her chest as her mouth grew into a blood chilling smile, or well, it would if she would have been something else but a cuddly little horse.

Anyways, as I slowly backed up the giggling stopped just as abrupt as it began and as if a switch had been flipped, Pinkie´s mane poofed back into its original state with an audible sound effect like a god damn cartoon and her pupils grew back to normal.

"Eh he he... okay now~," Pinkie stated "Let us pretend this never ever happened oki-doki?" Then she trotted up to the counter and looked over the assorted ingredients she already had gathered.

Unable to suppress a smirk, I just gave a little shrug. "Whatever you say Bubblegum."

This in turn caused the annoying pink pony to showcase a new smile of her own, giving me one of those weird looks along the lines of 'gotcha now' or something.

"What?"

"I knew you would eventually start to come around," Pinkie said as she inspected a bag of flour "after all, nopony or in your case, nohuman can withstand the homely charm that is Sugarcube Corner, the bestest working place in the whole wide world."

I cringed at the word 'nohuman'. Fuck those stupid midget horses and their word new creations, they just felt so... wrong. "What are you even talking about? You are making even less sense than before."

This elicited a giggle-snort from my pink pony overseer as she waved a hoof in the air in my general direction. "You just gave me a nickname Jackie and that means you just made another step on the long Road of Friendship. Uh, I do sooo love traveling, you get to see new places, got to meet new ponies and the best thing of course, get to eat all the new and super duper delicious new treats you never knew they existed before...." She babbled as she went of the tangent by several miles.

Are all ponies weird or...

"So, today we'll be making a scrumptious new recipe from Germaneigh called Black Forest Cake." She proceeded to explain a bunch of baking terminology, thus making even less sense than before. "Did you get all that?"

"Sure." Why not? Watching so many cooking shows back home, I'd lie if I said I've never been curious about cooking and baking. Well, it's probably not gonna be Iron Chef here, but at least it should prove interesting.

"Great! Here," she gave me a stainless steel bowl with four eggs. "Alright, so crack these eggs and whisk them good. We'll add a little sugar and butter to them later. You do that and I'll go work on the frosting."

"I thought the frosting you usually do last, while the cake's baking." Well, I dunno. Who knows how well television translates into real life, much less a pastel world infested with midget horses.

"Yeah, but this way, I can sample it while everything else is being done," she said with a big, mischievous smile.

Shaking my head, I got to work and not for the first time questioned the logistics of this world. Ponies are herbivores. One would think they'd shy away from eating eggs, right? Well, not so much. I'd even seen Sparkle's pet gecko fry up a couple of sunny sides for his mistress' breakfast and I think I even heard of some pegasi with a fondness for fish. How does that even work?

Nope, nope. Out of sight, out of mind. Better not try to make sense of these things, lest I want my brain to implode. I set about my work, cracking the eggs easily enough and whisked them to scrambled perfection, and no sooner did I look up to ask Pinks what she wanted me to do next that I froze.

Frankly, I blame myself for this serious lack of foresight and common sense. I mean, I already knew ponies were fond of grabbing onto things with their bacteria-infested mouths, but never did I suspect this also translated into the freaking kitchen!

I watched aghast as the gross pink pony grabbed two sticks of butter in her mouth before placing them in a mixing bowl of her own, complete with cocoa powder, sugar and what I assume to be corn syrup or something along those lines. The pony then grabbed a whisk and set about mixing them, using her mouth to work the appliance.

My gut churned, and faster than you could say 'health code violation', I doubled over and emptied my stomach's contents all over the counter.

I could hear the pink pest screeching something, not sure what. I staggered backwards, trying not to think of all the food I'd pilfered from this wretched shop and popped back like so many beer nuts. The smell of sick quickly overshadowed that of sweet, baked goods as Pinkie Pie rushed off to find something to clean up the mess and me? I got the hell out of there.

Bursting out the back and taking deep breaths, I breathed in the fresh aroma of pony and mud. Not exactly pleasant, but you worked with what you had. A few passing equines shot me inquisitive looks as I burst out of the shop, but dismissed it soon enough.

I walked on until the shop was no longer in sight and plopped down at the base of a tree, relishing the cool ground under the shade. Apparently, the weather factory scheduled an extra warm day today and so not many ponies roamed the streets at this hour. I tried to fan myself, only to find the hem of my shirt snagged by that accursed collar, which I promptly tore off and flung in a random direction.

Closing my eyes, I leaned back against the trunk and brooded for a bit. Yes, I brood. Only sometimes, though. This seemed as good a time as any.

Something shuffled, coming closer. God, was it too much to ask for some alone time? I paid it no mind and kept my eyes closed, hoping whatever it was would simply go away. Yeah, no such luck.

Something poked my cheek. I kept on the act, hoping a higher power would answer my prayers. Another poke and this time, followed by something sniffing practically next to my ear.

Alright, that's it!

My eyes snapped open, ready to slap the hell out of whoever disturbed me, only... it was a human. A human girl, to be precise and one that looked oddly familiar. Young, heart shaped face. Short, curly auburn hair and hazel eyes.

She gave a soft chirp and cocked her head as she drew a little closer, crawling in her hands and knees. Oh, and she was also wearing a rather baggy pink shirt a few sizes too large, the obligatory collar every human wore and nothing else. How do I know this? Because from her position, the collar of her shirt drooped enough that I got an eyeful of what lay beneath. Not too shabby, all things considered.

"Oh, it's you. What do you want?"

She merely blinked obliviously.

Argh, of course. Despite her not all that unsightly looks, she was still one of those troggs the ponies called humans around here.

"Blossom? Blossom, where... oh, there you are!" A snooty, grating voice suddenly cut through the air and no sooner as the girl, who was obviously named Blossom, looked over her shoulder and gave another of these weird chirps the clip-clop of hooves could be heard. "Blossom, I told you not to run off all the time. What if one of those peasants got their dirty hooves on you?" The same light pink filly I had seen earlier doing this little picnic thing with the grey, glasses wearing filly asked the girl as it came trotting up to us. Hey, wouldn´t you know it, fitting to her whole snooty little princess vibe, she was even wearing a sparkling little diadem on top of what looked like one of those ridiculous pricy hair-do´s one always saw on the crème de la crème of the super rich.

Now it clicked with me why this Blossom girl looked so familiar, I had seen her sitting on the side of this little picnic, just like a brainless pet, scooping up the little bites her equine masters threw her.

"Hmm, what do we have here? Have you found a stray, Blossom?" The pink filly asked while giving me a scrutinizing gaze. One that I did not like one single bit.

"Not all that bad at all," the filly stated as she poked at my clothes "but these clothes, blech, so peasant and they stink!"

Why, thank you very much you little freak. I would like to know how you would smell after all I had gone through today.

"Hmm, no collar..." Pink filly stated as a expression bloomed on her fuzzy mug that did not sit well with me at all.

Blossom choose that moment to sidle up to me and... well, there is no other way to describe it, rubbed herself against my body in a disturbingly animalistic way. The very act made my skin crawl but what she did next, I would never have imagined.

In a fluid motion, she brought her face close to mine, extended her tongue and dragged it all over my cheek, leaving plenty of slobber behind!

That... that was just too much!

I jumped to my feet to bring some distance between... that... that... argh, her and me, rubbing my burning cheek with the back of my hand to get rid of the spit while that confounded mockery of a human looked up to me like a confused puppy.

"Grah, what the bleeding fuck is wrong with you? Uach, that is so much more disgusting than everything I have seen in this little hovel so far!" I almost shrieked, feverishly scrubbing my cheek... only to realize my mistake.

Absolute silence filled the air around us, well, except for the weird sound effect of falling coins one would hear in a cartoon when a character imagined riches. Good lord, if the inhabitants of this blasted world would not drive me over the edge, it´s weirdass physics would do it for sure!

I stared down at the tiara wearing filly who in turn stared up to me with a smile that would put any Wall Street banker to shame and her unholy big eyes sparkled with the unmistakable light of pure greed.

"Oh. My. Stars! You can talk! A talking human!" The filly pointed her stumpy hoof at me "An uncollared, talking human! What a lucky day..."

Without even thinking, I lunged forward, wrapping my hands around the little beast's mouth. "Shut up. Shut up, you stupid little brat!" I hissed next to her ears. "Everyone is gonna hear you."

Her eyes bulged in fear, but quickly enough, she calmed down and her oversized orbs now scrutinized me anew. Meanwhile, Blossom was busy licking her arm not unlike a cat, seemingly without a care in the world...

I let the little brat down, and was thankful no ponies were around, and her, well, her pony eyes still shone with greed, she rubbed her hooves together and a disturbing smile stretched across her mug as she whispered feverishly to herself how lucky she was, what a great opportunity this was and how much bits she could make out of this, the fame it would bring her and how some 'blank flanks' would be jealous of her or something.

And that was my cue to leave... or I would if not for a weight to suddenly cling to my arm... pressing it into something soft?

Looking down, I felt the heat return to my cheeks as I found what exactly felt so soft.

Blossom holding onto my arm, pressing it against her chest and subsequently between her... well... her breasts while doing these weird chirrups again over and over.

I wondered if one could die from embarrassment at this point but no such luck obviously.

"L-let go you stupid, clingy, c-c-cute mockery of mankind!" I warbled out, unsuccessfully trying to free my myself from the surprising vice grip that girl had on my arm.

The filly let out a prolonged, girlish giggle. "And look, Blossom already likes you! Yep, you'll be a keeper," she said and trotted closer, eyeing me with a smug little grin. "Alright you, you're coming with me."

"What?"

"From this point forward, you have the honor of being my pet. I think I'll call you Snowy."

"The hell you will!" I screeched in response, my eyes wide in horror and disgust.

"Oh come on now, think about it," the little abomination fluted in the same tone the devil would probably use to sell salt to a man dying of thirst in the desert. "With me, you would have a roof above your head, a warm basket to sleep in, you would never be hungry, eating only the best kibble my daddy's bits can buy and you would have lots of new... friends Snowy."

The way she just said friends almost made me want to vomit again, triggering every alarm my instincts could offer.

I was about to ponder if I just should snap that little filth's neck and bury her body in a shallow grave in the forest and if I could get away with it as another set of clip-clops heralded the arrival of yet another of those damned horses.

"Diamond? Diamond Paris Tiara, where are you ?"

The filly waved to an adult mud pony, probably in his middle age and with a cutie mark of money bags. "Daddy, daddy! Look what I found." She pointed to me. "See? She's an actual talking human!" Diamond Tiara said with no small amount of enthusiasm.

Her father barely spared me a glance. "That's nice, sweetheart. Now come on, it's time to go back home," he said in that tone between exasperation and amusement parents often use when their rugrats make outlandish claims such as hers.

Obviously, Diamond picked up on this, for a pouty frown entered her face. "I'm telling the truth. She talks, see?" She then turned to me. "Come on, Snowy, say something. You can do it, girl."

Her father eyed me with a bored expression and when—surprise, surprise—I uttered nary a sound nor a word, he addressed his spawn anew. "Yes," he cleared his throat. "I see. Very impressive, Diamond. Now come on, get Blossom and we can be on our way."

"I'm not lying!" The brat exclaimed, complete with a stomp of her hoof. "Bad girl, Snowy. Bad! Start talking!"

"Diamond, if you don't come with me right now, I'll halve your weekly allowance."

The brat's face blanched, her eyes bugged out. Her father already fastened a leash to Blossom's collar and looked at his daughter expectantly.

Diamond Tiara bit her lip, not knowing what to do. You could practically hear the gears in her head working furiously as she tried to come up with a way to salvage the situation.

It wasn't long before her eyes gleamed as inspiration struck. The little brat launched herself at my leg, clutching it for all she was worth and looking up at her dad with big, pleading eyes.

"Can I keep her, daddy?"

Wow, and here I thought these little beasts could not fall any lower. But well, consider me surprised.

Diamond Tiara´s dad on his part seemed to suffer the very same fate as every parent ever that was subjugated to the pleading puppy dog look. Either he would cave in or he would show that he had an actual spine and put his foot... hoof... whatever down and tell his little brat 'No!'.

Of course I could have not an ounce of luck here as it took not even a minute before her father´s head dropped visibly together with a loud sigh. "Alright, alright Diamond, seeing as... Snowy here has no collar, you may keep her BUT," the spineless miniature horse conceded before his voice regained a semblance of authority again. "We will have Dutiful Service and the other employees put up flyers saying that we found a stray human. Seeing as she is wearing clothes, she probably has an owner who just forgot to put on her collar today or she somehow squirmed out of it. So if anypony comes to our mansion and utters as much as a single word that he or she is the rightful owner of your Snowy, you will give her back without a single complaint, are we clear young lady?"

This seemed to at least somehow satisfy the little brat clinging to my leg because she hurriedly began to rapid fire the typical phrases along the lines of 'Thank you so much daddy, I´ll take good care of her', 'I´ll always take her for walkies, feed her, clean her...' And all that other drivel kids normally blabbered when they managed to successfully bend their parents to their whims.

I almost yelled out a 'You can´t be serious!' But bit my tongue instead. It was worse enough that this Diamond Tiara made me break my charade, two bodies would be so much harder to hide, not to mention double the work.

Weighing my options, I deemed it best to just book it, but once again, Blossom was at my side in a flash, clinging to my arm again and nuzzled the crook of my neck. Oh, but that wasn't the worst of it, no, for she completed the transaction with an affectionate nip just below my ear. I barely repressed a shudder.

Whether it was because it creeped me out or it felt kinda good was uncertain. If I would not knew it better, I would have said she just played the part of the rock stupid trogg and took a secret delight in torturing me with all this... affection stuff.

"Come on, Snowy. Let's go to your new home," the brat said as she tried to nudge me forward, frowning when I didn't comply.

Telling her to shove it up her little plot proved tempting... oh, so tempting. Still, I didn't want to bring an inquisition down on me, so I decided to remain silent and not move from my spot. The way I figure, the brat's dad is already impatient and if I prove uncooperative, he'll just drag her along anyway.

But alas, no such luck. A voice permeated the air. A familiar, screeching tone that grated on my ears. The Pink Pest was out and about, screaming my name. No doubt she noticed my absence and now frantically looked for me. Whether this was to inflict revenge on me for that little debacle or because she feared her overlord would execute her or something for losing me, I did not know.

So I had two options, go with the little brat and her weird human girl or stay and risk being found by the Pink Menace, where I would once again be subjected to her and returned to the little princess.

…

Well, this doesn't take a genius to figure out. I followed the obnoxious filly, who grinned in triumph, obviously thinking she'd won me over.

After I don´t really know how long, we reached our destination just the moment my brain managed to reboot; a large and ostentatious house more akin to a mansion built on the outer perimeter of the mud village. Unlike the other dwellings which were built of wood, grass and mud, this sucker was made of what looked like white marble, with all those tall columns around the entrance, large, perfectly trimmed greens dotted with ridiculously styled bushes and a large iron fence all around the estate, complete with a bigass gate that was topped with a expensive looking exhibit of metalcraft saying 'Villa Rich' just about the gates arch. A pristine walkway made of the same stone like the whole building curled its way from the gate to the mansion.

All in all, it looked extraordinarily out of place.

Making our way to the front door, I couldn't help but marvel at the sheer luxury in display. Polished, high quality floors lay beneath us, echoing the clip clop of hooves and two servant ponies, mares, dressed in an equine version of maid outfits, greeted us or rather, Diamond Tiara and her father, whom they referred to as 'Mr. Rich'. Heh, modest much?

Rich went on to do whatever it is he did, leaving his brood with a warning to not cause too much noise, as he had work to do. Diamond took Blossom's leash and led us to the opposite end and to the backyard.

A first glance was all I needed to know. I had to turn around and get the hell out of there. Why? Oh, it might have been the dozen or so humans roaming around the fricking yard! Was... was it even qualified to be a yard? It looked more like a habitat than anything, for Chrissakes.

The place was large and I mean large, like half the length of a football field, with healthy, vibrant green grass blanketing the lot. Holes were strewn here and there where the humans had obviously dug and even a couple of them poked their heads out of the ground like fucking groundhogs as we neared, only to return and keep on digging, throwing dirt every which way.

And did I mention the toys? Rubber squeaky animals, ropes, plushies and balls littered the yard. A couple of males holding said ropes in their mouths, lowered on all fours and struggling to outdo the other, complete with dog-like growls only fuelled my desire to get out of this freak show as soon as possible. A single massive oak planted in the middle had a few tire swings hanging from its branches and surrounding it were brightly colored plastic slides, climbing platforms, obstacle courses and playhouses like one often sees in a children's playground. To my silent horror, there were even oversized version of those weird water bottles you always saw in the cages of small critters and a god damned feeding trough filled to the brim with something that looked like dry food for dogs.

Jesus Christ in heaven, I think I even spied an human sized version of these hamster wheels on the far side of the compound.

"Do you like it Snowy?" Diamond asked me as she led us to the big tree. "Only the best daddy's money could buy for my prized humans. Everything is top grade, the most entertaining toys and playground equipment to give you and your new friends enough exercise and the food is made with the newest findings in human research," The pink brat rattled of proudly. She then gave me a look over the shoulder with an smug smile. "Wouldn´t you say that this is way better than anything you could ever hope to get in your whole life when not being my pet?"

"It's... it's..." I struggled, my voice thick with emotion, unable to find the right words.

"Great? Amazing? Everything you could have hoped for and more?” Diamond Tiara asked, both hooves clasped together and looking at me with a happy smile.

Words failed me. I had literally no words. I mean, I thought the human kennel was bad, but this? Just... ugh!

"I see," Diamond Tiara said. "You're so overwhelmed by gratitude that you don't know what to say, right?" She nodded sagely, or... tried to, anyway. Came off more as an awkward bob of her head. "Alright Snowy. I'm gonna go tell Silver Spoon all about you so she can come see for herself."

"But...but..."

"Hm? What is it?" DT asked, looking genuinely concerned. Her eyes quickly widened in realization. "Ohh, I see. You don't wanna be alone, do you? Well don't worry. There's plenty of humans here to keep you company."

Turning around, the oblivious filly whistled and from her summons came two other human girls, again, about my age. One was blonde with fair skin and her hair done in two braided pigtails. Oh, and a bikini composed the entirety of her clothing, sky blue like her eyes. The other had slightly darker skin, her black hair trimmed rather short, almost like mine, but styled with a more practiced hand... er, hoof and wore nothing but what might have passed for dark green gym shorts and nothing else, leaving her top exposed. I caught a flash of perky breasts and brown nipples before quickly averting my gaze.

"These are Bubbles and Buttercup," DT said, pointing respectively at the blonde and brunette. "They and Blossom are my most behaved humans. They'll keep you company until I get back, okay?"

Before I could even attempt to say anything, Diamond unhooked Blossom´s leash and not sooner she had done so, that Bubbles and Buttercup positively swarmed me.

"Whoa, what are you...?" 'Bubbles' clasped my shoulders, leaning in and sniffed the nape of my neck, then my head and trailed on lower. 'Buttercup' was more reserved, scrutinizing me with a glare as if trying to size me up or something.

Does not compute...

While my brain was in the process of rebooting, the troggs had not been idle. Obviously, I passed some sort of inspection, for Buttercup closed in and, for lack of a better word, started to louse me. Being slightly taller than me, she stood on her tiptoes, running her fingers through my head, searching for... I dunno, bugs or something and all the while, the other two troggs surrounded me and proceeded to do as their ilk, diligently looking for any kind of ticks, lice or any other insect that might have taken habitat in there. Sometimes, they even ran strands of my hair through their lips for crying out loud. Well, weirdly enough mostly Blossom seemed to do that while Bubbles seemed to be content with looking over my arms, even going as far as pulling my collar or lifting the hem of my shirt to search under there.

"Awww, they like you so much already Snowy, isn´t that cute? They are socializing with you." Diamond crooned with a sick smile while her pets had their infernal ways with me. "Anyways, I must be off now if I want to get ahold of Silver Spoon to tell her about you. Now, be good as long as I am away and maybe I will get you a nice treat, hm? Tata~" With that, the little beast turned around and left the compound, leaving me in the clutches of her trice damned pet slaves.

Oblivious to my discomfort, the three humans kept on prodding me, running their fingers through my hair. Of course, this was made all the more awkward when the clueless humans practically mashed their chests to my face!

Buttercup was the worst. She pushed my head down while standing on her tiptoes, causing my face to come in contact with... "Get... off!" I yelled and shoved Buttercup, whose tits were stuck to my face.

She fell back with a startled yelp while her compatriots retreated, hissing and eyeing me warily. Buttercup rose to her full height, huffing and scowling, baring her teeth. Fists clenched, low growls escaping her throat and her head lowered.

I was by no means an expert on Equestrian humans, but if I were to guess, I'd say she tried to project aggressiveness. Deeming it best to show her here and now who the top dog... er, human was, I followed suit, rising to my feet. She towered over me by a scant two inches.

Buttercup stalked forward, her face only inches from mine, growling in an attempt to get me to back off. She tried to make herself as big as possible. Kinda hard, considering she was already on the petite side. Nevertheless, I was not the least bit impressed and responded to her show of force by planting a hand on her face and shoved her hard to the ground.

Blossom and Bubbles whimpered as they saw their compatriot fall down, hurrying over on all fours and converged around the felled human. Buttercup rose to her knees, eyeing me with much more caution, her face considerably more subdued. Soft murmurs escaped her throat as she crawled closer, still on all fours and avoided my eyes at all costs. Hesitantly, she extended her hand, head bowed in some sort of weird human submissiveness.

"What the...?"

Oookay. Now what? Did she expect me to smell it or something? Well, I wasn't about to do so. Instead, I opted for the next best thing and clasped her hand, pulling her to her feet. She squeaked in surprise, obviously not expecting this. Her hand found my shoulder, using it to steady herself. Her face flashed with fear.

I had to remind myself she wasn't like me. Fuck, her train of thought is probably more akin to a dog's than anything. She probably thinks I'll hurt her or something.

"H-hey... come on now. It's fine," I said lamely, patting her head, not knowing what else to do. Still, my meager attempt seemed to work, for her face and stance relaxed considerably, almost content. She hummed in agreement and just like that, her mood did a complete one eighty. She pressed herself to me, nuzzling the side of my face.

"Quit it, you," I muttered, trying to prod her off me. Christ, I almost didn't want to. Buttercup resisted as well she could, softly nipping my neck. Uhh, why is getting hot??? Blossom and Bubbles joined in and like their ilk, proceeded to rub themselves against me, nuzzling where they could and even licked my neck a couple of times.

God help me...

Author's Notes:

This chapter was brought to you in collaboration with Schroedingers_Katze. That's right, she's not just a pre-reader anymore.

The Token

"So I said 'nice try, nanny' and I sent her to the back of the line."

The two fillies burst into a fit of shrill giggles.

"Oh, Silver Spoon, you are such a hoot," Diamond Tiara said after the laughter stopped.

"Still, can you believe my parents still think I need a foalsitter? I'm not a little filly anymore."

"Ugh, tell me about it. Daddy has the help following me around, skulking and pretending to do work when he's in one of his business trips."

"And let me guess, they say silly things like 'Excuse me, miss, but it's time for you to go to bed. Fillies shouldn't stay up past one,' or maybe something like 'cake is not breakfast. You must eat the right food groups and blah, blah, blah'." A second round of laughter followed the grey filly's mocking impersonation.

"Isn't it annoying when the help think they can boss us around? Daddy had to hire a new evening maid a few weeks ago because the last one quit, and she's still trying to tell me what I should or shouldn't do."

"She quit? Why?" Silver Spoon asked.

Diamond Tiara waved a hoof airily. "She kept on complaining about me. Apparently, I'm too awesome a filly for her to handle. Daddy was mad and said I'd be grounded for a week, but I managed to lower it to three days."

Either oblivious or uncaring of the disapproving looks sent their way, the loud fillies walked down Ponyville's main road, almost reaching Diamond Tiara's house.

"So what is this surprise you wanted to show me?"

"If I told you, it wouldn't be a surprise, Silver Spoon," Diamond Tiara said snootily. "You can guess, but you'll never get it right."

"You got a new human?"

Diamond Tiara smirked. "Sorry, but... what? How did you know?"

Silver Spoon adjusted her glasses. "Well, last surprise you had for me was that human you say came all the way from Zebrica, even though he looks like any normal human. Before that was the human your daddy got from the circus and which you said could do tricks. Then before that was the human you said could play a JoyBoy better than a pony even though all she did was chew it up and before that you said you had a human that..."

"Well this human's different! You'll see," Diamond Tiara said indignantly, trying to retain a measure of her dignity.

"How is she different?"

"I planned for this to be a surprise, but okay. Unlike the rest of my dumb humans, I found a female that can talk like a pony," Diamond boasted, eager to see the look of astonishment on her friend's face.

"You found a human... that can talk. Like a pony."

"Uh, yeah. That; s what I said."

"But," Silver Spoon tapped her chin, pondering how to say her words delicately. "You know humans can't 'talk' talk, right? Not like ponies, I mean."

"This one can, I swear it."

"Pinkie Promise?"

"Cross my heart, hope to fly. Stick a cupcake in my eye," Diamond Tiara recited, doing the appropriate motions. Silver Spoon nodded, as if this was all the confirmation she needed.

As I lounged by my lonesome under the shade of a tree in this blasted habitat, I pondered my next move. Well, or almost by myself. Blossom, Bubbles and Buttercup where only a few meters to my right.

Bubbles was watching a stray butterfly with rapt attention although it could just have been that she wanted to eat the colorful insect and was still planning on how to get it into her lithe mitts.

Buttercup half heartedly entertained herself with a dragon plushie that she held in her mouth like a animal, holding onto it with her mitts and occasionally jerking her head left and right complete with soft growls as she ripped the stuffing out, but not without stealing glances in my direction ever so often. I swear I still saw uncertainty and a smidge of fear in them since my little dominance usurpation. Couldn´t care less to be honest.

Blossom was doing nothing really, just plainly staring at me which to be honest was more than a bit unnerving after a while but no matter how many times I tried to shoo her away, she just gave one of these weird chirrups and continued to stare at me so I did the next best thing and ignored her for now.

I still don't really know how I did it but I managed to get those three girls to stop with whatever the bloody hell they were doing with me earlier. Probably the mixture of shoving them down repeatedly and lots of stern words like when one tried to train a young dog. Was really not that different in hindsight. that thought was enough to send a cold shiver down my spine.

A gurgling noise right at my feet startled me out of me thoughts as something touched my leg.

Looking down, I found myself staring at an human infant, the typical variant with big blue eyes, pudgy cheeks and limbs and for some weird reason was wearing one of these strange white bonnets the babies in old cartoons always wore and nothing else.

Wut?

The babe stumbled and fell on his pudgy behind, awkwardly getting up and with clumsy movements, climbed into my lap.

"What in the..." I held the little thing by its armpits at arms' length. Warm and cuddly. He gibbered in that nonsensical baby language and reached out with his chubby arms, making grasping motions. Hesitantly, I brought him close and the little bugger wasted no time wrapping his arms around my neck, snuggling into an embrace. The little trogg cooed and for the second time did I get that uncomfortably warm feeling in my chest. Like with the little pony brats, but without the urge to shove him away.

Ugh. Never did pay much attention to babies. Loud, messy and left most everything they touched sticky, yet the thing felt oddly right in my grasp. Heh, maybe it's not so...

A tiny little hand grabbed my breast and squeezed. My body froze in pure surprise and soon enough, another little hand joined in. The little trogg slipped from my grasp and into my lap where he proceeded to stick his face forward, trying to latch his mouth on a...

Oh, hell no!

"Don't even think about it, trogg," I hissed as I held him way out of reach, making sure his grubby hands were nowhere near places they shouldn't be. He didn't take it too well, being removed from his prize, for he immediately burst into tears.

"No. Bad baby. Stop crying." He didn't. Oh, man. How do you shut these things up? If anything he got louder until thankfully, a second pair of arms plucked him from my grasp. A human female, looked to be in her twenties, who shot me a glare and a admittedly halfway impressive growl before scampering off. The little trogg quieted quickly enough after he started suckling her bare chest. Fucking ponyworld...

Well, at least the weather was nice. About the only thing that doesn't make want to vomit. The troggs now huddled against me, thankfully keeping their grubby mitts off. I honestly couldn’t make heads or tail why they kept sticking to me.

Thankfully, other than those three no other humans had taken much of an interest in me. A couple of males, somewhat hairy and I'd guess in their early thirties, stopped by to give me a quick sniff and moved on soon enough. The rest, either females or kids, didn't pay me much mind.

And I had to admit, despite my initial altercations with the troggs, they were infinitely better company than the ponies. Better listeners, too. Growing bored, I initially started a bit of a one sided conversation with them, which eventually gave way to a full blown rant as I fully vented everything that had happened to me after my arrival.

"So the little bitch basically decides to put me under house arrest, under surveillance twenty four-seven. And don’t even get me started on her pet gecko. The thing keeps giving me its uppity attitude and talking behind my back when it thinks I'm not looking and if that wasn't enough, the princess, in her infinite wisdom decreed it that I should spend quality time with each of her minions, which of course I've assaulted at some point or another and she expects it to go well? Is it me or is she a few apples short of a... um, dammit! Where's Daisy Mae to make apple based puns?"

Buttercup licked the back of her hand, eyeing me stupidly. I reached over and grasped her jaw, moving it up and down accordingly. "You said it, Jackie. Ponyville sure sucks big fat dragon turds," I subbed my voice for hers in a lower pitch.

“Yes! Thank you. And really, I'm still waiting for a thank you. You'd think saving the little twat’s life in them caves would get me some recognition, but zip. Nada.”

“That Twilight sure sounds like a grade-A bitch. She needs to lay off your back and eat a big, fat dick!”

"Man, you totally get me," I said in mock delight, wrapping my arm around her petite shoulders. "It's too bad you're a stupid, brain dead trogg. Otherwise we could have totally been besties and hung out together." She did one of those weird chirps again. I sighed and let go, leaning back down. "Some conversationalist you are. You could at least put some effort into it, you know?" She yawned and stretched before laying her head down on my lap.

"So I'm just a glorified pillow to you, is that it? And here I thought we had something going on," I drawled. In spite of myself, I ran my fingers through her surprisingly silky soft hair. She seemed to enjoy it, if her contented murmurs were an indication.

Bubbles came shortly after. The blonde trogg had left my side a minute ago and no sooner did I imagine she left for good that she returned, plopping down in front of me and from her hands she let a number of little brownish objects hit the grass.

"And here I was just starting to miss you," I muttered, wondering not for the first time how healthy this one sided interaction between me and the troggs boded for my mental state.

Bubbles plucked one of the little brown objects and brought it closer and closer to my mouth. "Stop it," I snapped irritably, slapping her hand away. She didn't seem detracted by this and repeated her action, plucking yet another of the little brown things and pressing it against my lips. "Quit it. No means no," I said firmly.

She seemed to get the hint and shoved a handful of them in her mouth, chewing noisily and laid down beside Blossom once she swallowed.

Huh, is that the human kibble ponies use? I brought one up for inspection. It looked exactly like a generic doggie kibble. Curiously, I smelled it. No scent whatsoever. Eh, what the hell. I popped it in my mouth, chewing slowly. Wasn't nearly as bad as I thought. Hell, it even tasted like Apple Jacks. No, not the backwoods inbred yokel, I mean the Apple Jacks cereal back home. If only I could find a nice cold bowl of milk somewhere...

"Come on, little one. Just a bit further," the pony maid cooed as she led me by a leash. "Miss Tiara asked that we fit you into some new, comfortable clothes. Won't that be nice, hm?"

I swear to you, pony, I'm in no mood for your ilk's particular brand of bullshit.

This whole no talking thing can be a real downer at times. The tree troggs followed after and by this point I'd given up trying to figure out why they stuck to me. As if to add insult to injury, they remained unleashed while the pony maid led me to a little room, enclosed with no windows and only a few dressers in sight.

"Now then, let's get you out of those ugly old clothes and into something better, yes?" Her hoofsies made towards the bottom of my hoodie before a sharp slap from me sent her reeling back.

"Ow! No, bad human! Behave." To reprimand me, she bopped my nose. I returned her frown with the mother of all deadpans and after several seconds, I won our battle of wills. Flustered, the pony reached into her pocket, producing a flat, round little biscuit thing.

"How about a snack, hm? Open up," she prompted. No surprise, I kept my mouth shut. The pony frowned, pondering and a little smile stretched on her little mug. Her free hoof prodded me in the ribs and in spite of my best efforts, I couldn't help but giggle at the tickling sensation. The little beast capitalized on this and shoved the treat in my mouth.

A strangled noise made its way out my throat as I tried not to choke on the thing and after some effort, I spat out the unchewed chunks all over the pony, a faint aftertaste of peanut butter lingering in my mouth.

While the pony squealed and fretted over the mess, I took the opportunity to get out of there, barring the door with a heavy chair and leaving her to her fate. The sound of hoofsies pounding against the door and the mare's angry shouts barely fazed me as I made my way back upstairs, the troggs trailing after me. Turns out the room we were in was actually in the basement, so it'll be a while before someone comes to the pony's aid. Serves her right.

"I'll say this about the little pink brat. Her house was the definition of swag. Rich, polished floors abounded in her home. Thick, padded, expensive looking Persian carpets tastefully splayed across the rooms, velvety drapes hung over expansive windows with golden tassels completing the ensemble and the furniture sure as hell didn't look like the throwaway stuff you buy at the local Wal-Mart. It all looked to be made by hand... er, hoof. Kinda surprised me the ponies were even dextrous enough to accomplish such detailed, precise craftsmanship.

The troggs and I wandered. Me, for no other reason that I was curious, wanting to properly check out the obscenely opulent pad and the troggs followed for reasons known only to them.

The kitchen was my favorite by far. Tiled marbled floors over an expanse that looked capable of churning out enough food for dozens of ponies. Black, shiny countertops free of imperfections, on them resting bowls of assorted, scrumptious looking fruits. Peaches as big as my head; perfect, rosy apples that could only have come from Daisy Mae's farm, grapes as big as a baby's fist. The pantries were no less spectacular. Pasta of all known kinds, canned foods, literally dozens of spices on fancy rotating racks, dried fruits and veggies of all kinds and a cornucopia of jars filled with varying fruit preserves. One in particular caught my eye. A jar filled with what I could only describe as an edible rainbow jam. For a moment, I considered the horrifying possibility of this being the... secretions of the rainbow-maned lezbitch. Eugh!

But my fears were unfounded as I spied the label with the words zap Apple jam in bold lettering. And man, oh man did it taste divine. The troggs and I polished off the whole jar by our lonesome, the trio crowding around me and pawing for the treat which I doled out in conveniently placed crackers. Hey, since the pink brat seems to think I'm now her pet, I might as well make the best of the situation.

"And you are certain of its value?" Filthy Rich asked as he inspected the innocuous device.

"As certain as can be, comrade," the other stallion said confidently.

"It doesn't look very impressive..."

"It's not meant to be, Rich. It's a device of war and not meant to be pleasing to the eye."

"I suppose," Filthy Rich conceded as h took a closer look at the item. Its shape was cylindrical and a frame of metal held together the container, a reinforced cone of glass and though the device was coated by centuries' worth of grime and dust, Filthy Rich could almost feel a small, almost inexistent pulse of magic from within.

"So I assume it's to your satisfaction?" The other stallion, Shady Deal, asked.

"It's dirty."

"Well what do you expect? The thing was buried ten meters underground in the outskirts of what is now Appaloosa. You know, back then during the pony-griffon war, there wasn't even an Appaloosa in that time. Just a little, barley fortificated outpost. I assume a faction of the Royal Guard used this devices when their forces were pushed back to the Palomino desert. Probably led to a hideaway, a safe spot or a supply cache for the Equestrian forces."

"Oh? And does it still work?"

"My appraisers say yes, provided you sent a strong enough magical charge through it. But you'd need a unicorn to do so and even then, the device is old, so for all you know, it may even break under the strain before it took you anywhere." Shady Deal watched as Filthy Rich carefully hefted the device, carefully running a hoof over its surface, as if inspecting something only he could see. Then when he was satisfied, he set it down and turned back to Shady Deal.

"One thousand bits," he said he said in a flat tone of voice.

"We spent probably most of that just getting out of the dirt, Rich. Two thousand, and that's a bargain."

"You promised me relics intact and in impeccable condition. This is breaking apart just because we breath in its general direction. Let's call it one thousand, three hundred. That's a fair deal."

"Aye, maybe it's not in very good condition but do you know how fantastically rare such artifacts are? Celestia herself in all her infinite wisdom and unfathomable reasons ordered them all destroyed after the last war. Only a hoof full of ponies in this day and age can claim to have laid eyes on such a relic. One thousand, seven hundred, and not a bit less."

Filthy Rich sighed. "Fine. One thousand, seven hundred it is. You do so love bilking me out of my coin, Deal," he said as he took a key from his breast pocket and trotted over to nearby safe, which he unlocked and retrieved a small pouch that clinked with the unmistakable jingle of bits.

"Only because you keep throwing it at me, Rich," Shady Deal smiled as he pocketed the money. "A good day to you, comrade. Look me up anytime you feel up to a fair deal."

"Good day to you, Deal," Filthy said wryly. "Try not to drip oil all over the carpet. I just had it cleaned."

"Har di har, har," Shady Deal yakked and nodded politely before stepping out of the room but not before he snapped his tail sharpley, causing some clumps of dirt falling out of it which where clearly visible on the mansions expensive carpet but easy to remove. Little things like this aggravated Filthy Rich, Shady knew that but at the same time, kept their weird partnership going.

Filthy Rich immediately went back to his expensive mahogany desk and retrieved a worn, but well kept tool kit, designed for instances such as these. In it were custom made utilities to clean, keep and even repair old relics like the ones Filthy Rich so loved to collect.

His office itself was filled with obscure and not entirely legal items he'd acquired over the years, from coins and currency used thousands of years ago by ponies, griffons, minotaurs and even gargoyles, to a shaman mask symbolizing fertility by the zebra tribes of Zebrica, to a carved statuette by the olden warwolf clans, bestowed to youths who passed their rite of adulthood and even a seapony war helmet.

The shrewd stallion found such artifacts fascinating and after he made his fortune, he took the opportunity to hunt down as many as he could get his hooves on. He worked diligently, applying a measure of liquid to a soft cloth and gently, patiently, brushed away the grime that covered the device. In fact, he was so caught up in his work that minutes after, he hadn't even noticed the doorknob turn, nor did he notice the four human females that softly stepped into the room. It wasn't until one, a clumsy blond haired thing, accidentally knocked over a bust depicting the great general Bucephalus, that Filthy Rich's eyes snapped up, summarily bugged out and he was rendered momentarily speechless as a slim, dark haired female promptly started nibbling on a pair of Neighponese chopsticks.

He stared dumbfounded before he regained his senses.

"No, NO! Bad human!" Moving quickly, he conked the petite female on the head, who whined appropriately and fled out the room. "Out. All of you, out!" He chased off a brunette who tried to take refuge by climbing atop an expensive armoire, itself full to the brim of fragile and precious relics. Meanwhile, the blonde little bint sought out the bottom of his desk as a hiding place.

"Watch it! That's worth more than you," he warned as the auburn haired female's hands wandered too close to a glass orb, used by ponies in the past in an attempt to divine one's fate. The female hissed, baring her teeth. From somewhere in his peripheral vision, he could have sworn he saw yet another female drag her hand over her face.

The small orb fell and Filthy Rich let loose with a strangled yell as he dove forward to catch the precious object before it shattered in a million pieces. By some miracle, he did, though the ornery brunette took the opportunity to flee, but not before her actions dislodged a rather heavy vase and his eyes widened in horror, as it was a millennia old thing, crafted by one of the first civilizations that depicted the legendary earth pony hero Neighcules' adventures. The vase plummeted to the ground and, having no other recourse, Filthy Rich intercepted it with his stomach to create a safe landing. The artifact was saved, though the intense pain in his gut made the victory all the more bitter.

"Confound it, why Diamond likes these beasts I'll never know," he groaned as he gingerly got back to his hooves. "Troublemakers, all of them, and those three are the worst. Diamond spoils them rotten and now they think they have the run of the place. I should probably get them some training classes but..." As he rambled, Filthy Rich fretted to make sure his collections were unharmed and by some miracle, the fragile relics had escaped damage which could in turn not be said of the poor stallions nerves. However, now satisfied and in better spirits, he spun to lock the door only for his eyes to fall in a most unwelcome sight.

The stray human from earlier in they day. The little creature had the audacity to lounge lazily in a stuffy armchair, gifted to him by a Prench emissary, legs dangling over one arm while reclining her head on the other, a book in her hands and flipping disinterestedly through the pages.

"Oh no! You! You put that down right this instant! This is one of the rare first editions from one of Smart Cookies manifestos on early earth pony agriculture post-unification. That book survived time, dry rot, silver fish and even Discord himself. I refuse to let it become ruined by the grubby hooves... paws... of a human today!" Filthy declared, making his way over to the female which looked blankly at him. The way she held the book by its covers only made Filthy fear the pages could spill forth any seconds now when the worn binders finally succumbed to old age.

With a smile only a truly desperate stallion could muster, Filthy Rich held out a hoof "Now, please be a good human. Give that boring book to me yes? Maybe I have a treat somewhere for you if you do."

The female stared at the outstretched hoof in mild disinterest and, as if pondering the situation, carelessly tossed the book over his head in an arc. His blood pressure so great he feared he might stroke, Filthy Rich jumped and intercepted the book in an admittedly impressive display of reflexes and athleticism. He swore he could have heard something resembling chuckles coming from where the stupid human sat.

"Beasts, all of you," he muttered darkly as he inspected the fragile book for damage. Sure enough, a tiny, minuscule tear could be seen in the first page, if one looked very, very closely. "That's it. This is worthless now," he sighed and allowed the book to drop atop his desk. He noticed the human was still reclined on his expensive chair and scowled. "Shoo. Go on, get out of here. You little creatures have caused enough trouble for today."

The female did not budge, but stared at him with a stony gaze. In fact, Filthy could have sworn she could understand what he said and now eyed him in defiance. But that was ridiculous, of course.

"Fine, just... just don’t touch anything," he said in frustration, averting his eyes. For some reason, it unnerved him to stare at the females' slate grey orbs, as if judging him. He set about cleaning up. Thankfully, none of the females had had an 'accident' in their fright, which was a blessing as he did not want to have to get that cleaned up.

"Honestly, you work hard, try to make a good life for yourself and what do you get in return? You little animals destroying my priceless collection. What my daughter sees in you all, I don’t know. What ponies see in you, I don’t know," he rambled as he straightened up the place. "I mean, I can understand keeping a pet and all. I had a little mongrel when I was a foal after all, but we certainly didn't breed with them," he shuddered in disgust. "By all that is good an kind, I hope my little Diamond grows out of her infatuation for you lot. Last thing I need is for her to buy those hulking oafs from Sweet Apple Acres once her first heat sets in and..." He shook his head, clearly not wishing to think about such a travesty. He looked back at the female. What did Diamond call her? Snowy? Yes, that was it.

"And I have to see about finding your owner. I bet Diamond hasn't even gotten to that part yet. Well enough is enough. From this point on, no more humans," he said resolutely. Then again, he had said such things in the past, yet he found it awfully hard to deny his little filly, especially when she used those eyes on him. Truly her mother's daughter, he thought wryly.

"Now let's see, where did that little number go?" He muttered, eyes roving over the floor. The teleportation device was missing. He hoped the dumb humans hadn't accidentally broken it. Already he was regretting the deal.

THUMP.

His hoof connected with the device, sending it across the room and to his annoyance, to where Snowy sat. The odd female eyed, the device with as much fascination as one might eye a rock, but when her hand reached forward, Filthy Rich's eyes popped yet again. He was about to utter more stern words when a series of events made his diatribe die in his throat.

No sooner did the female bring up the device for inspection that a faint noise, almost indistinguishable but still there, could be heard. A low hum emanated from the device, the noise rising in decibels as the seconds ticked. Filthy Rich stood frozen, transfixed at the sight before him and the human now looked warily at the device, surprise also evident in her face. Then, a soft pink glow could be seen pouring from the cleared patches of the glass cone, rising in intensity as the humming noise took on a high pitch.

Filthy Rich was broken out of his state. The device was active! The human and his prize would be whisked away to some unknown destination, never for him to lay eyes on again. Should it activate, the whole transaction would have been a botched deal and if Filthy Rich hated anything with a passion, it was a botched deal. And so he sprung, eyes glued to the device but before he got anywhere close to Snowy or his prize, the glass shell broke, Snowy was enveloped in a hot pink glow and with a noise like a firecracker, the human disappeared, ruining the device in her wake.

"Fuck!" I yelled as I landed hard on the ground below. The oh-so-lovely taste of dirt flooded my mouth and I hacked, spitting random clumps. Great, what a great way to cap off an already crappy day. "I swear, this pony world will be the death of me," I muttered and stood up. Where was I anyway? Definitely not the little mud village. Harsh rock and red sand now occupied the vicinity, no ostentatious pony house, no siree. Then there was the heat. Good God, it felt like I was in an oven and my hoodie was doing no favors where that was concerned, so after wrapping it around my waist, I took stock of my surroundings. Dark, that's really all there was to it. I was in a crevice of some sort, dug deep into a rock formation of some kind. From a turn in front of me, I could see the glow of sunlight filtering through. It was good enough for me to be able to see, to a degree, but not so much that I could take all the features of the place.

"I swear, if I am in some random pony desert I'm gonna be so pissed off." After dusting myself I walked on over to the entrance and could see that yes, I was well and truly screwed. Nothing but vast expanses of harsh, rugged terrain spread all around and the heat so intense it made everything over the horizon a blurry mess. Whole thing was drier than Hillary Clinton's snatch. I could literally feel the moisture being wicked away from my eyes.

"Just when you think things can't get any worse, something like this happens," I said to myself.

Well, it certainly beats having to remain in that filthy mud village... though the no water thing and me being stranded in the middle of nowhere quickly put a dampener in things. Shit. What to do? What to do? These primitive little beasts have no cell phones, no ways of instant communication. So what then, do I take my chances and walk around in the hopes of stumbling into some pony settlement? Fuck, and that was if the fates were generous.

I knew where I was... well, roughly. All that time alone in Twilight's pad had given me a chance to stock up on my reading, as other options to pass the time were few in between. The badlands. I was in the fucking badlands, where dragons, giant scorpions, and eldritch monstrosities that lurked beneath the ground called home. Fuck!

So I retreated back to the crevice. At least the heat was more bearable. But as I spotted a low, flat rock to sit on, my foot connected with a hard something, sending me sprawling against the ground. Getting really tired of that...

Looking back, I could see it was a wooden something, with sharp corners. A chest? Huh, how... random. I dug it out and after breaking the lock effortlessly, peeked inside. Dusty, eugh. There were rolls of what might have been parchment, but they literally fell apart as soon as I touched them. A couple of canteens were there as well, but I was not so thirsty that I would dare to drink the foul water inside. Within it were what I assumed to be rations of some sort, but long since expired, a broken compass and, to my surprise, a few weapons, now rusted and beyond repair.

"Useless junk," I kicked the chest, sending it tumbling and spilling its contents and no sooner was I about to go sit down that something caught my eye, glinting faintly under the scarce flickers of sunlight. A leather string bound around a curious token and I swear, as I looked closer, that I could hear a voice speaking on the recesses of my mind.

Author's Notes:

Well guys, I have news to tell you. Whether you consider them bad or good is up to you. I haven't been idle these long months without an update. In fact, I've been very busy writing and so you can expect, along with the next chapter, over 50,000 words' worth of content to be released over the next couple of weeks. Why would this be considered bad news, you ask?

Well, be sure to check out my Author's Note in the following chapter.

The Call

Author's Notes:

As I stated in my previous Author's Note, I have news for you guys. See, several months ago, a certain friend approached me and suggested we do a collaboration between our stories and I said sure, why not. I did not originally intend for our collab to be made canon with this story but the more we wrote, the more I realized I couldn't not include it.

Now, when I first started writing this, I didn't really have a clue what I was doing and that very lack of experience reflected on the story, more specifically, our heroine. As I gathered experience going forward, I realized I didn't like the direction I was taking Jackie and so I plotted to find a way to expand on her character and make her as I pictured her in my mind. This collaboration between Schrodingers_Katze and I proved to be the solution.

So yes, this crossover will be classified as a Displaced setting, but worry not, I still have a storyline in mind for Jackie and her stay in the Displaced universe will be temporary. Yes, I am all too aware of the reputation Displaced has in this fandom but if you awesome readers have liked my horsewords so far, I believe you will enjoy Jackie's forays into the Multiverse. Ah, and I almost forgot a very important detail. The collab'd chapters will be seen in first person via Katze's main character, Umbra, but nevertheless, if you want to see a few sides to Jackie you won't find on the main storyline(or at least not anytime soon) then take a gander, why don't you. It's a hell of a ride, if I do say so myself.

What a weird little thing, I wondered as the little pendant swung gently in the air. By all rights, it didn't look all that impressive. Mundane, even and yet... shit, I don't know if I've officially lost it but I could swear there's a voice in my head, telling me... telling me to call for aid. That someone will come.

Could it be true? Is this my way out? Have I finally lost my mind? No, I didn’t think so. Crazy people don’t consider the possibility they're crazy, right? Well, whatever. My mental state aside, it didn't change the fact I was up shit creek without a paddle. Here, lost in a barren wasteland, no water or civilization in sight, to say nothing of food. Shit, I needed to do something and do it quickly, or risk becoming a sun bleached skeleton in the near future. That, or for some random, wandering dragon to find me. I'd seen pictures of them—actual, fearsome specimens that Sparkle's pet gecko resembled only in the vaguest sense.

And yes, teleportation is a thing here, but I've no idea how to go about it. The little princess flaunted her mastery over the technique, as well she should when her peons saw it fit to visit her imposing, opulent domain... not. But yes, Twilight 'ported like it was the most natural thing in the world and while maybe, by some farce I might be able to pull it off should I try it, I really don’t like the image of pieces of me scattered all over the country. Dunno if that's also a thing here, but why risk it? With my shit luck, I wouldn't put it past the realm of possibility.

So walk it off and hope I might run into what it passes for civilization? Fat chance. The heat alone would probably kill me long before I made it any pony settlement nearby. I was particularly nervous about running into this world's version of the Mongolian Death Worm—a creature with a hard to pronounce name. Tat... Tatlulz... something. Whatever the case, I didn't particularly feel like tangling with it just now.

I looked warily again to the little pendant. It swayed innocently but even I could detect... something. Almost like the shadow of a heartbeat, almost imperceptible, pulsing from within. Then again, it might be the heat. Christ, it's hot in here. And the pendant, as if sensing my hesitation, spoke into my mind.

To you, who holds this trinket. No matter if you wish to conquer or to protect. No matter if you wish to destroy or to create. I do not care if your intents are black, white or any shades of grey, call my name and I will come. But be prepared, for the judge of our actions will be Time alone.

I am Umbra, the Overlady.

The Mistress of Minions.

And this is my token.

There it was again. That voice, almost as if it were a recording. It just played again and again. It promised help, but by who? Is a demon? Do demons even exist here? Or is it an angry spirit of some... no. No. Fuck damn it, this is no time to hesitate. I need a way out of this godforsaken pit hole and I need it now!

"All right, you. How do you work?" I inspected the thing up and down, looking for a clue as to how to activate it. No instructions or anything of the sort. Typical. I tried jingling it up and down, biting it, muttering any number of made up magic words. Didn't help.

"Goddamn it, come help me already." No sooner did the frustrated words escape my mouth that the trinket came alive, vibrating. Vibrating so hard it almost escaped my grasp and a surge of magic that was definitely not pony related poured off of it like a faucet.

The thing freaked me out so much I immediately dropped it and hauled ass out of the little cave, not wanting to be there when whatever it was that came forth spilled into existence. But as the harsh sunlight hit my eyes I could see there, floating midair as if it was the most natural thing in the world, a swirling vortex of god-knows-what came into existence. First the size of a walnut but growing, expanding and no sooner did I wonder if I majorly screwed up and conjured a black hole into being that from within, a body dropped from the mass of energies, flailing and cursing as it hit the ground. The not-black hole, having done its job, sputtered out of existence.

Well, that's interesting.

Earlier in the day, in another universe far away...

"Careful. Careful..."

With my tongue sticking out and sweat forming big beads on my forehead, I channeled the last bit of Mana into my Dimension Door Chalk, patent pending. Opposite of me sat, clad in her deep black cultist get-up, Lyra with her horn aglow as she kept the runes etched into the chalk stable. The Unicorn's muzzle was a picture of concentration as well. Both of us had our fair share of exploding chalk and wildfire Mana to the face so we could gladly do without any more of that in the closer future.

"Aaaand done!" I let out an exhausted sigh and canceled the flow of magical energy, leaving my equine minion to carefully put the unassuming piece of white chalk into a box that already held a good dozen of its brethren.

"Amazing." Lyra gushed, despite her own exhaustion "You are getting better and better at this Master. Soon you will surely be able to do this on your own, without little, old, superfluous, unimportant..."

As much as I came to appreciate Lrya´s self-demeaning ramblings, I stopped her by holding up my hand. My head was positively pounding from Mana withdrawal. "Lyra, be a doll and put this batch of the DDC to the others on the shelf, then fetch me a snack and something to drink from the kitchen, will ya?" I asked, plopping down on a chair and whipping my face with a cloth. "Get yourself something too. You did well in assisting me today servant."

Minty Horse nodded eagerly and left my arcane lab, doing lots of curtsies and talking her mouth fuzzy... well, fuzzier with an seemingly endless stream of praise for me and emphasis of her own unworthiness.

After Lyra left, I spend quite some time with my head simply planted on the burned, chipped and in general very hard surface of the sturdy table that took up most of the space in the room, feeling the Tower Heart doing it´s damn job and refueling me with fresh, ambient Mana and making the Shub Niggurath damned headache go away.

"Ah yiss, that feels good..." I half moaned in a low tone as I sat back up, eying the shelf that held at least twenty four pieces of magically charged chalk amongst other, more obscure things, like glasses full of newt eyes, frogs in alcohol and all other kinds of alchemical ingredients that I scrunched together, partly with Lyra´s help and partly with the help of Patches. It was surprising what a successful mine could produce beside ore and gems. Also the Gobs from the Hayseed Swamps had been true to their squeaked words and delivered literal baskets worth of all kinds of ingredients. I felt quite a bit of satisfaction rising in me.

True, the past week or so had been rather uneventful, but there was plenty to keep me occupied at the tower. Yeah, when I played the games it was all 'go to tower, get mission from walnut, kill stuff, rinse and repeat'. Turns out, it's a little more different in real life.

It wouldn't be so bad if the Minions didn't keep on coming at me for the littlest things. "Ooh, master, the latrines are filling up. Should we keep on using them or build new ones?" "Master, it seems our chickens and cattle have died due to neglects. What does your Eminence want for dinner tonight?" Ugh! It just went on and on and on and on! Capable as the kobolds could be in battles, they had little more than two brain cells to rub together in order to generate thought when it came to maintaining a big-ass tower.

Gnarl helped out where he could, but even he was but a single Minion among hundreds. In the end I was forced to rope Onyx and Lyra into helping me keep track of what the kobolds needed.

Lyra, she went at it with her usual eagerness.

It seemed she was rather fond of ordering around the kobolds and more than a few came complaining to Gnarl about the 'loud, annoying, bossy pony'. Yeah, you don't want to get ordered around? Then think for your fucking selves, you little idiots!

Onyx... well, she got results, but the minions were quite scared of her. Surprisingly enough, none complained, and I wasn't about to investigate the matter further. Although... just to be sure, I kept an eye on those under her watch and had been pleasantly surprised to see none had mysteriously gone missing. Huh.

Well, that's how it was. I was set to keep on minding my own business when, wouldn't you know it, all of a sudden the pull of "the Call" made itself known once again. To be honest, I was quite surprised, seeing as Zinnia and I by now nearly exclusively used the magic chalk to visit each other and the other Displaced I had met so far had not called upon me for quite some time.

"Well, looks like my snack will have to wait." I said to no one in particular as I geared up and stood up. Just as I heard the clip-clop of four smallish hooves coming closer, the light swallowed me and off I went away to another episode of Multiversal shenanigans.

Only, this time, I did not simply appear on my summoner's location, instead I found myself back into the weird space-time rift that initially had brought me to Equestria. For a second a small spark of hope that I was about to get home came to life but was just as fast stamped out again. That would be just to much luck for me.

Finally, after what felt like several minutes of floating around in the area between dimensions, the swirling vortex of magic and otherworldly energies finally saw it fit so spit me out in the world of whoever it was that found my token.

No, it literally spat me out. No gentle landing for me, no siree. I was promptly dropped at some point in midair and wouldn't you know it, I was so surprised that I landed face first. I was that close to biting off the tip of my tongue and if that wasn't bad enough, I also landed hard on my stomach. Hard enough to get the wind knocked out of me.

While I waited to regain my breath and allow the pain to abate, I gave the multiverse some choice words of what exactly I thought about it at the point and none of them were nice. Hmm, maybe I can lodge a complaint against it for its lousy travel methods and slow rate of service. Really, would it kill it to at least put out a snack bar or soda machine while traveling? Hell, I would even go for a tomato juice! Well, it certainly beats those family vacations we took back in the day, mom stuffing ungodly amounts of luggage into dad's mini-bus, all of us cramped inside and my little brother who seemed to make it his mission in life to literally annoy the hell outta me. Ugh.

"Whoever summoned me here better be dead or dying," I muttered darkly and slowly got back to my feet. "Or else they're gonna wish they were."

Where was here, anyway? Oh no. Oh, nonononononono! God fucking naw! Am I in the fucking Badlands again?! Yes, it looked that way. The harsh sun, the dry air, the barren earth ripped straight out of a post apocalyptic film... I was indeed back in this hellhole again and this time, with no well stocked tower in sight.

With a cry of frustration, I unhooked the Beast from my hip and swung it at the nearest object which turned out to be withered remains of a tree, all gnarly and stuff. Just looking at that thing briefly gave me the best Sleepy Hollow creeps, half expecting to hear the heavy thundering of hooves any moment now, followed by a searing pain biting into my neck. Or Johnny Depp suddenly popping up from nowhere. But just as the Universe liked it, nothing of those happened, the only thing that happening was the Beast colliding with the dead tree and turning a huge part of it into toothpicks in a very satisfying manner.

"Alright, whoever is out here, you better come out!" I screamed into the open terrains, consciously deepening and distorting my voice to make it scarier than it really was. It was a trick most Overlords used early on, but as they got eviler, their voice naturally took on a scary as fuck quality. Certainly helps cow lesser enemies.

>>It really better be a fucking good reason for coming here.<<

And... nothing. I nearly facepalmed. Where was this person? I looked around, and for the first time noticed behind me the base of a particularly steep cliff that soared hundreds of feet into the air, and right in front of me was a cavern dug into its rocky depths.

Ooookay...

Clearing my throat, I opted for a more diplomatic approach and spoke in my normal undertones. "Alright, buddy, look here. Sorry for the whole display, I apologize if I scared you and yada, yada, yada. Now can you please come out here?" I crossed my arms and waited for my summoner to make the next move. To pass the time, I began humming Ode to Joy. Classic music was always a good way to show your cultured side and make you seem less psychotic. I find that less psychotic is good for first impressions.

Well, I didn't have to wait too long. The scraping of dirt resonated somewhere between the cavern and from behind one of the sides of the entrance poked out a head. The short hair kinda made me think it was a dude, but closer inspection revealed my summoner to be of the female persuasion, if the features were anything to go by.

>>Hey, another girl. Wonder what she can do. Time to put on the winner smile.<<

Relaxing my stance, I flashed her said smile showing just enough of my newly acquired Alucard teeth not to totally freak her out and waved with one hand. "Hallo auch[Hey there]. Nice weather we got, ain't it?" Yes, the weather. I talked about the weather. What? It's a perfectly good opener, even if you talk about a skin scorching and bone bleaching day in Faust´s ashtray.

The girl looked at me questioningly and cocked her head, but her features were very much wary. Not surprising, she did look kinda young after all. Agh, and then I realized I still had my helmet on, which more than did its job of both protecting my precious mug and making me look awesome. I promptly removed it and allowed her to see I was... well, that I looked humanoid, at least.

"Oh come on now, please don´t give me this frightened squirrel look, come out, despite looking like it I won´t bite." It took every ounce of willpower in my body not to add a 'hard' at the end. Perviness was something that could botch up first contact like a lead pipe to the face.

I waited her out, keeping my friendly smile and trying not to lose my patience. Sure enough, she hesitantly stepped out. Heh, my winning personality works, who cares what my BFF used to say? Now that she stepped out, I could see she was in dire need of some sun. Seriously, the girl looked pale as a ghost. A bit more and she might would become see-through. She wore jeans and tied around her waist were the sleeves of a gray hoodie and on her torso was a plain sky blue shirt. To sum it up, she looked like a picture book example of a background character. Maybe she was from some kind of Indie game?

"'Sup," I said. "Name's Umbra, the Overlady and one of any number of Multiverse trekkies. And who might you be?" Yepp, I´m smooth as fuck.

She eyed me up and down, no doubt awestruck by my presence and amazingly cool armor.

"What are you supposed to be, some kind of demon?" She asked bluntly.

"Tha... Wha... some kind of demon?!" I spluttered. "Look, squirt, I'll give you a pass because you're obviously not aware of who I am, but don't compare me to some common, everyday 'I'll possess you and make you do evil shit!' Demon. I´ll have you know that I, Fräulein, am a bona fide Dark Ruler, otherwise known as an Overlord or in my case, the Overlady."

If she was affected my outburst, she did not show it, but now that she gave me yet another once over, a look of realization began to dawn on her features.

I couldn't help but smile and answered her unspoken question. "That's right, I am a Displaced who dressed up as the Overlord. Pretty sweet armor, eh?" I said smugly and half turned, taking a pose to show off said armor.

"Displaced?"

I nodded. "Ja, I got sent here by that asshole merchant, same as you. Now, what exactly did you go dressed as, lonely wandering girl? You have this distinct Indie game vibe to you." I asked cheekily.

By the way she looked at me, you'd think I'd just professed my undying love for her. "What are you even talking about?"

I sighed. This girl was really putting a damper on my mojo, and I'd been working on my introduction to other Displaced for days! Well, maybe more like a couple of times in front of my bathroom mirror, but I put a great deal of thought into it.

"Okay, let´s do this slowly then, kay? I give you my name, how about you do me the same courtesy? I'll start, my name is Umbra. What's yours?" I said pleasantly and held my hand out to her.

It took her but a brief second of indecision before grasping my armored gauntlet with her own hand. "I'm Jacqueline."

"There, that wasn't so hard, was it?" I said with a smile. "So tell me, Jackie, can I call you Jackie?" I continued, channeling my inner Disney Hades masterfully.

"No."

"Anyway, was it you who summoned me here? Did you find my token, a small iron pendant on a leather string?"

Her brow furrowed. "Token? You mean this thing?" She said, holding up said token after pulling it out of her pocket.

"Yep, that's the one." I smirked, giving the pendant a small tap that made it swing gently. "Seeing as you don´t know fluff bout the whole she-bang you are in, let aunty Umbra tell you about it. Ahem, when a Displaced channels some of his or her inner power, chi, ki, mana, mojo or however you wanna call your spiritual and magical juice into a small object that represents them best and sends it out into the Void between the many, many, maaaaaaaaa~aany Verses the Multiverse is composed of to be summoned by other individuals, this little thingamajig is called a Token. Think of it like the soapstones in Dark Souls or if you want it really simple, an invite for Co-Op during an online match. Normally, these invites are used by other Displaced when they are in a pinch and need some extra oomph to show whoever is on the receiving end not to mess with us Displaced or if they are in need of advice, are curious what the little talking thingamabob does they just found or when they feel like having something else but little technicolor ponies or anthro ponies for company. You with me so far?"

"What's an anthro pony?"

I swear, I very nearly did an anime facevault. "You're kidding. You're kidding, right?"

She shrugged, looking as clueless as ever. Oh, for the love of... "They're ponies, only anthro. You know," I made some sort of gesture with my hand. "They stand upright, have bodies like people, only with hooves instead of feet. Fur covering their skin and muzzles on their faces, tails, horse ears, all that jazz."

"That sounds... disgusting," she said, her face twisted into a grimace.

"Don´t knock it till you laid it." My mouth blurted out before my higher cognitive functions could prevent it.

She opened her mouth to say something, but she was prevented from doing so and looked at me with something akin to horror. "Wait, what?"

I cleared my throat. "Anyway, I take it you've already met the ponies?"

"Ponies? As in small, pastel, bug-eyed little shitbags?"

Well, that's certainly a new way to refer to them. "Well, I would call them 'plate eyed' since their eyes are so fucking huge but yes. But hey, that´s the way Hasbro and Miss Faust made them. After all, it’s a show for what, twelve years old girls? You should know it, all other Displaced I met so far do."

"And why do you keep calling me a Displaced? I'm not Displaced. I'm here because some greasy creep used some powers or something and plunged me into this cursed ponyworld."

"Those weird powers are called magic dear," I said, casually letting my Corruption flare in my hand before extinguishing it as fast. "And the greasy creep was some eldritch abomination that likes to rip humans from their cozy lives and toss them into all kind of different version of the Saturday morning cartoon 'My little Pony'. Thus the name Displaced, cause we all hail from another place or something like that. Zinnia never really explained the origin of the name to me. And since you, my dearest Jacqueline are clearly from good old Terra, this makes you a Displaced." I punctuated the last sentence by playfully bobbing the girls nose. "Also, from how you speak about your version of Equestria, name of this whole land by the way, the Ponies put you through some kind of wringer or gave you shit for just being different, hn? That seems to be the norm in most 'feral' or 'classic' Verses. Hypocritical little shits, all talking bout Love and Tolerance but only as long as you are a Pony yourself. Be another race and they shun you or even unleash the Orbital Rainbow Cannon at you, turning you into a lawn ornament for the next millennium, give or take," I huffed a bit after my mini rant before I managed to collect myself again. "Wanna talk about it? Tell me a bit about your version of the show?"

"...What?"

This time I could not hold back a full fledged facepalm. "Sweet black fucking Sabbath, girl. What am I, talking in another language or something?"

She crossed her arms, scowling.

I sighed. "Alright, look, let's just start with the basics and see if I can catch you up. Have you met the Mane Six?"

"Mane... six?" She asked lamely.

"Really, not even them? What kind of pegasister are you?"

She looked even more baffled than before.

"Are you even aware of My Little Pony?"

A shake of her head.

"Then how did you even wind up in this world?"

"I ask myself that question every day," she said without a trace of humor.

I sighed yet again. This girl just seemed determined to make things difficult. "Alright squirt, I'll tell you again, and pay close attention because this'll be the last time I explain it. There is such a thing as the Multiverse and within that Multiverse are any number of infinite universes that are parallels to your own. You with me so far?" She nodded. "Alright. Now, within many of those alternate universes there exists a show called My Little Pony, specifically the fourth generation created by the lovely Lauren Faust and which has spawned a cult following of men and women of all ages throughout the world. Still following?" She nodded again, though there was clear skepticism on her face. "So the dealio here is that in several of the universes there are people like me, called Displaced. At one point in time we were average Joes and Janes, but be it by fate or coincidence, every single one of us attended a fateful convention where this 'greasy creep' as you call him, took us from our world and plunged us into this fictional cartoon universe based on a show for little girls. Now here's where it gets interesting. In doing so, the 'creep', us Displaced call him the Merchant since he usually poses as one, gives us powers that correspond to whatever we went dressed as. Since I dressed like the Overlord from the same game, I now have access to all of his abilities. If you were to dress like, say, Supergirl, you would have access to all of her abilities after the Merchant sent you here. Do you understand now?"

She looked down, her expression ponderous. Heh, she was kinda pretty. "I think so," she murmured. I guess if she really wasn't aware of all this by now, it must have been a lot to take in. "Multiverse, Displaced, little girl's show... what the hell," she said probably more to herself than me.

"You know what the weird thing is?" She asked rhetorically. "That explanation actually kind of makes sense. After everything I've seen..." She trailed off.

"Let me guess, it's the cartoony state of things that got you at first, wasn't it?"

She rolled her eyes. "Ugh, tell me about it. First time I opened my eyes here I thought I was high or something."

I quirked an eyebrow. "Really now? You get high a lot? I mean, no offense but you look kinda young. Are you even old enough to drive?"

"Yes I am. Shut up. And if I thought I was high, it's because this Merchant creep of yours ambushed me in a greasy alley, injected me with some sort of eldritch, psychedelic drug and next thing I know, I wake up in this pastel colored, ponyworld infested with all sorts of freaks, idiots and hedonists." The way she said it, all in a deadpan monotone made me question whether it was all true or just her way of being sarcastic. Couldn't tell which.

"Yeah. Well..." I chuckled awkwardly, fidgeting, not that she seemed to notice, for her gaze turned introspective, her scowl deepened, probably recalling her first memories here. I'm guessing they weren't very pleasant.

"So," she said, shaking herself out of her musing and returning attention to yours truly. "Displaced, gender-bent Overlord, huh? Were you from Earth too?" Man, the way she looked at me, you'd think I was about to prove or disprove the existence of God. She looked at me with intense focus and scrutiny, her eyes searching mine for any sign of deceit.

"Of course I'm from Earth, girl. Didn't I just tell ya?" I said with a laugh. "Germany, to be exact, hence the accent, in good old Nordrhein Westfalen. And you, what city do you hail from, squirt? I'm guessing you're one of our neighbors over the Atlantic?"

Weird girl was weird. She stepped forward, hesitantly, and the features of her little mug shifted as she looked at me in a completely new light. Like a starving man looking at a stuffed crust meat lover's pizza, or a pirate leering at a mountain's worth of booty. She took a step closer and I couldn't help but notice the difference in height between us with me being my awesome one meter eighty tall (plus boots) while Jackie seemed to be a whole head smaller. Then, the corners of her mouth twitched upward, slowly stretching until there was an honest to goodness smile of pure joy on her little face.

"You... you're like me?" She chuckled. A small, disbelieving sound. "I didn't think I'd ever see someone else. I... I thought I would die in this wretched world and never see someone else again a-and you... you're here and..." The poor girl looked so overwhelmed that words failed her. I admit, I'd never seen anyone look at me quite like that. Like a precious treasure she had only dreamed of, but thought unattainable.

Then she did something I honestly never would have seen coming. She grasped my shoulders, pulled me down and met my lips with hers, enveloping me in a fierce, passionate kiss. So stunned was I that my brain momentarily shut off for the moment and I reacted on pure instinct. I kissed back, with quite a bit of skill, mind you. Heh, I don't think she realized what she was doing. She held the position for about five Mississippi's before a dawning look of horror spread throughout her features. Her attitude then made a full one-eighty, and where not a moment ago I was enjoying her eager, if unskilled smooch, I now found her hands shoving me away with enough force to send me flying backwards by quite a smidge where I landed heavily on my back.

"Oh... oh, god. I can't believe I just did that." I heard her choke out and sure enough, she promptly began spitting to get 'me' out of her mouth. I might have been offended had it not been so funny.

Suppressing a massive grin, I deftly got back to my armored feet and busted myself off. The poor girl had her back turned to me, arm furiously rubbing at her mouth and muttering a number of things under her breath. So busy was she freaking out she did not notice me sidle right next to her."Oh my, Fräulein [Miss] Jacqueline," I tried to say in a sultry tone, though it came out as mirthful more than anything. "I´m quite flattered but I'm afraid I am already taken. Not that my girlfriend would mind. I am pretty sure Zinnia would be all in for a threesome with a cutie like you but I somehow have the distinct feeling that this was a spur of the moment thing and you normally don´t bat for the other team. Still..." I trailed off, making sure she was looking at me and used the tip of my tongue to slowly give my lips a once over and smacked them like a connoisseur assessing a particularly fine wine. "I´d give this kiss eight from ten possible points. Would smooch again." I quibbed, a mischievous grin etched on my face before I clasped my hands behind my back and leaned forward, shooting little Jackie my best shit eating smile.

"What? You sound like a pervert for Chrissakes!" Her voice cracked and backed away a good distance from me.

I could not hold it back any longer and burst out in a full bellied laugh. Man, was this girl inexperienced. "Oh, come off it, squirt. I'm only joking. Besides, you're... what, fourteen?"

"I'm sixteen!" She snapped irritably.

"Still, a whole ten years too young for me. Now, do you understand what I tried to explain to you? Displaced, tokens, multiverse, all that jazz?"

She grimaced, eyes closed shut, obviously trying to put what just transpired to the dankest, darkest corner of her head. "Yeah, yeah, I get it. Hard to believe it makes sense," She mumbled.

I nodded concedingly. "Ja, I know what you mean, kiddo. But hey, at least you know you're not the only one. There's many more like us out there and who knows, you may yet get to meet some of them."

"Wait," she said suddenly, looking up at me with a newfound spark of hope in her eyes. "If you can do all this dimension hopping thing, does that mean you could get me back to Earth?"

I sucked in a breath through my teeth. "Ahh... no, Fräulein. I'm afraid it doesn't work that way. There's no way to get back, as far as I know. Sorry..." I trailed off lamely. Girl looked disappointed, that's for sure, but not as much as I'd have imagined. She looked bitter, more than anything.

"Typical. Just my luck," she mumbled darkly, more to herself than to me. "So, do you maybe know a way out of this desert? I really gotta get back."

"Let me guess, to Ponyville, right?"

She looked at me strangely. "Uh, yeah. How did you know?"

I scoffed. "Please, girl. About ninety percent of all Displaced wind up somewhere in that little horsetown. It's like a magnet for strange and unusual, don't you know?" I clapped my hands loudly but suddenly, I felt the familiar tug of an opening portal inside my mind "Well then, looks like the Universe thinks that you don't really need me to stick around, seeing as it is about to get me back into my own Verse. Fucking random summon timers. But hey, I like you, kid. Gimme a holler if you ever need a helping hand with a baddie or a beastie or anything of the sort, ja?"

"W-wait, wha... you're leaving?"

I sighed and looked back at her. "Well, yeah. The whole point of the tokens is for you to summon me whenever you're in a pinch. When you got a monster or a baddie or something that needs an extra set of hands to take down. The only drawback is that the summons have a rather random timer that I can not influence and right now, I am about to get sucked back because reasons. Anyway, Jackie, it's been a pleasure to meet you. Let's do this again sometime, ja?"

"B-bu... wait!" She yelled out and in the blink of an eye, she was there, right next to me and clasping my forearm with her two small hands, her eyes looking up at me in panic. "Where am I supposed to go? I-I can't find my way around these badlands. I'll get lost and starve to death!"

I couldn't help but chuckle and tousled her already messy hair, making it even more spiky. "Oh, don't worry, kiddo. Believe it or not, I actually do know where we are, more or less. See where I'm pointing?" She followed my arm west. "Just keep on heading that way. About an hour or two and you'll see Appaloosa just on the horizon. Just ask for help or whatever and the ponies'll take care of you. Now if you'll excuse me, momma's got to get on going."

Removing my hand from her grasp, I walked a little distance away as I felt the portal open up that would take me home. Huh, this was odd. Where it normally would appear under me, it now stood at least twenty meters in the air and its... I dunno, gravitational pull or something grabbed ahold of my body and I found myself steadily floating off the ground.

I chanced one last look at Jackie. The girl was looking up at me, her face the epitome of anxiousness. She continuously wrung her hands and bit her lip. D'aww, was she worried about me or something? That's sweet. I was about to raise my hand and wave goodbye to assure her nothing was wrong when the squirt exploded into action.

Before I knew it, she dashed forward and jumped, latching on to my ascending midsection like a koala.

"What in the...! Get off me, girl! You're not supposed to come! You don’t have a token out so I will maybe not be able to send you back. You would be stranded in my Verse!" Yikes, so apparently freakish strength was one of the girl's powers. I literally felt her steadily crushing my spine.

"No! Please take me with you! If I have to remain the only sane person in this heathen horse land I will literally die!" She cried out in desperation and tightened her hold on me.

With a growl escaping my throat, I did what I could to pry her off. One armored gauntlet went for her head while the other headed straight for her collarbone. "Fuck, let me go already you crazy, goddamned Gör [Brat]! I can't fucking breathe!" I gasped out with as much venom as I could.

"No!"

"Get off!" I tried a judo chop at her head. In retaliation, the crazy strong little girl reared back and socked me with an honest to goodness headbutt in the gut. The wind was literally knocked out of me, even through my thick armor. Fuck, that hurt! So much so that I hung there limp in midair, gasping in desperation and tried in vain to clutch at my poor stomach, only there was a head where my aching gut should be.

And all the while we were still heading into the depths of the portal. Jackie herself looked none too sure about heading deep into it, but her hold did not waver in the least.

Well, I was too out of it to do much. Our trajectory led us into the portal, which closed immediately and we were there, floating aimlessly in the space between dimensions. Well, at least when I got back to my tower I could give the little brat a lesson or two on respecting her elders and send her on her way. Maybe putting her over my knee and giving her a long due spanking would do her some good!

Of course, that cunt Fate and her pimp Murphy reared up their heads again from the putrescent cesspool of bad luck and broken dreams that they dwelled on and saw it fit to render those plans moot.

Something happened. I'm not sure what it was. The dimension around us warped and distorted, flashing in a myriad of colors, not unlike the effects of dropping acid. Jackie could see it too, and she looked nervously all around her. Her grip slackened and though it was relieving to be free of the crushing pressure, I knew this was not the time to celebrate.

Something was wrong. There was a force that interfered with the delicate balance of the energies that governed the space between worlds.

I tried to concentrate and extend my senses, which was particularly hard to do when you have a stabbing pain in your gut. It hurt nearly worse than my first period! I did not have to look far to see the cause of the problem, and that very same problem was currently latched onto me. Looking at Jaqueline's small frame, my eyes stung from what I saw. Where I normally would see a single dominant or main mass of Ley or Life Force, sometimes with another, underlying color I was greeted with a pure hurricane of chaotic colors. It was like watching a broken kaleidoscope. Not only the were the main colors yellow/brown, red, blue and green swirling around in Jackie like a pissed of swarm of killer bees, there where also amalgams like purple, white and even black. The Ley was shifting constantly, sometimes a single color, sometimes dozens over dozens. It was... pure chaos.

Fuck, whatever it was this girl had inside her it was majorly screwing up with the fabric of space and time. If this kept on going then... well, comic book law dictates that messing around with this was probably bad for the Multiverse. Like in the end of all things existing bad.

If I didn’t do something then we would be well and thoroughly screwed.

I closed my eyes and breathed, trying to calm, focus, and harness the reserves of Mana within me. Her grip shifted to hold on to me more securely.

I used my own Manaflow to absorb as much of the magic that leaked off the girl and that was screwing up the space around us. Gott im Himmel [God in heaven], it was hard. The stuff leaked off of her like water off a broken faucet. Not to mention that it felt like I was guzzling down gallons of rancid fish oil! Never before I literally tasted Ley but the first time I did, it nearly made me puke. Typical!

The space around us stabilized, but there were trickles that escaped despite my best efforts. We were like that for a while, Jacqueline tried asking questions in regard to what was going on, but I didn't answer. I was a little busy trying to keep the Multiverse from imploding! Also, speaking through gritted teeth, nah, does not really work.

If that wasn't bad enough, our return trip wasn't exactly fast and the more time passed, the lower my Mana reserves got, the more tired I was and the more likely it was that the energy leeching off her would escape my attempts to contain it.

Sure enough, it happened. More of that cursed power leaked off of her. My head was pounding. Stars danced across my eyes and all around us, the corridor between worlds grew more unstable.

I'm not all that clear what happened next. Maybe the Multiverse knew that prolonging our trip would be catastrophic. Who knows. But whatever it was that was inside this girl, the Multiverse wanted it out as quick as possible. Do it did.

We were meant to appear back in my tower, but somewhere along the way we got derailed. We reached my universe, the portal opened and we were spat back out.

The first thing I noticed was the cold. The next thing I noticed was the white all around us, and the next thing I noticed was the fact we were falling from the sky.

Jackie had let go of me at some point and there she was, barely visible over the vicious snowstorm, flailing her arms and cursing. Me, I was drained. I knew I was in danger of becoming a bloody smear on the increasingly growing blanket of white beneath us, with a miniscule chance of being revived afterwards. I wanted to something, anything, to help stop our fall, but I had overexerted myself. My Mana reserves were depleted and it was all I could do stay conscious in spite of the pounding headache.

Well, not the way I imagined I'd go, but it probably wouldn't hurt. Too much.

I was half conscious at this point, but somewhere through the haze, I could hear Jackie's voice crying out my name. I felt two small, but strong hands grip me and she held me close, shouting any number of things I could barely make out.

Suddenly, my body shook violently and explosive sound resonated all around me, like crushed stone and from the corner of my eye I could make out pebbles, boulders and debris that resulted from whatever had happened. Huh, I think we hit the side of a mountain or something.

...And we were not dead.

Well, what do you know?

Regardless, we were still falling. Jackie's hold on me slipped and I went flying from her grasp.

Finally, I hit the ground and everything went dark.

Mending Wounds

First thing I noticed, even before registering I was awake, much less alive was the fucking pain. Literally, everything in me ached! My muscles felt like they were on fire, my bones ached and my head literally felt as though it'd been split open. I should know. It happened before.

I wasn't sure how long I'd been lying here. I tried to get a feel for my Mana reserves. They were slowly but steadily getting back on to their usual level, and by a rough estimate of their increment, it was probably a couple of hours since I smacked into the ground.

There was the shuffling of footsteps somewhere around me, echoing all around. I barely opened an eye and could see that I was lying down in a cave of some sort, and somewhere beside me was the light, warmth and crackling of a fire. I tried to get on up to a sitting position, but the strain proved to be too much for my body and I failed to suppress a moan of pain. "Gahh... fuck me sideways with a rusty garden rake... The bloody fuck happened?" I managed to say out loud. Even words hurt quite a bit.

Still, no one answered my question. Quickly losing my patience, I slowly... slowly ambled to move myself up. Oh, there was pain to be sure. Quite extraordinary at that, but pain and I had been getting well acquainted as of late, so I was able to power through it.

Now that I had a better view, I could see that the cave was well removed from the harsh weather conditions outside. There was nary a trace of snow, and whoever it was that put me here had been considerate enough to place me close to the fire. Was it the brat who did this? Did she survive a fall that even the Shepard couldn't hope to walk away from? Or was it someone else.

From what I remember of the show, the only place where there's snow are the northern territories of Equestria. Maybe a nice pony had seen my sorry state and moved to help?

No, that wasn't it. Why? Because filling up the cavern was a smell, a particularly good one. The smell of roasting meat. There, in the fire, propped up on sticks were hunks of some unfortunate animal. My mouth immediately watered. Using up all that Mana, not to mention my body churning through calories like crazy in the winterland had caused me no small amount of hunger. I felt like eating a horse, all the bad puns intended.

I reached out with my bare arm and... wait, what?

My armor. Where in the fuckedy fuck was my armor?

Looking down, I could see I was still clothed. Red tunic? Check. Brown pants? Check. Panties? Yup, all there. Whoever had laid me down here had made an impromptu bed out of a thick, brown, blanket like material that was very good at keeping me toasty and warm, even if it smelled a bit funky.

Minding to keep as much of myself under it, I removed one of the glorious meat chunks, juicy and brown and bit into it, not minding the fact it was searing hot. Tears began streaming down my face in a anime-ish fashion, of that I am sure as I chewed, swallowed and repeated. At this point I did not care what kind of meat this was, it was hitting the spot. After finishing my first course, I found enough strength in me to properly sit up, keeping the smelly yet warm blanket around me. "´Ello? Someone there? Jackie? Can you hear me girl?" I asked into the cave, mentally preparing several plans for several possible situations that I might would find myself in.

Ah, there was my armor, and I couldn't help but feel a smidge of irritation at how it had all been lumped together in an unsightly pile. But... where was the Beast? Surely not... well, shit. It was a sobering thought and though I would normally curse and make a big fuss about losing my trusted companion, I had just enough strength still to merely slump and sulk. Man, I liked that Beast.

>>No. Come on, already, me. This is not the time or place to be sentimental.<<

Mustering my slowly increasing strength, I tried to stand up again and... fraaaaaaaak that hurts! Ow. I may still be alive, but I banged myself up pretty good. I couldn't move much under my current condition. Shit, feels like some broken ribs. That will severely limit my movement.

It was at this point that I assessed the situation and assumed the worst. I was badly beaten, barely able to move. My armor had been discarded, the Beast lost and I couldn't perform a measly Fireball to save my life. Fuck, I was the Overlady. By all rights, my name and presence alone should be enough to inspire fear and hopelessness in the masses and here I was, easy pickings for whoever saw it fit to end me. This was unacceptable. UNACCEPTABLE!

I slowed my breathing, calmed myself and closed my eyes. I called to what little Mana I had left and guided it to heal me. Not that any Overlord or even the famous Warlock himself thought about to create a self-healing spell, nooooo sir. All mayhem and destruction en masse but not the flimsiest bit of restoration magic, it would have been a reason to laugh would it not nearly made me cry! So I had to make with the bits and bobs of magical knowledge I scrunched together from Lyra or to be more precise, her memories. Mare had been at Celestia´s School for gifted Unicorns for a reason. Nonetheless all I could do was a far cry from any "real" healing spell. It accelerated my natural healing process at best and ate through my measly Mana reserves faster than a starved Dragon would through a pile of gems. It was a slow process, and I couldn't tell you how long I sat there, but sure enough, little by little, the overall pain eased, the stabbing sensation in my side had been reduced to a dull throb, and while I still couldn't perform any offensive magic, I was able to move around without immense discomfort or pain.

There, that was better. Now, first order of business, gear up. No sooner did I make to move for my armor when the sound of footfalls resonated on the stone walls around me, and coming round the bend that probably led outside was the brat herself.

She was covered head to toe in one of the same blankets I had, and snow clung to it like ticks to a moose. She shook it off a draped it over rock to warm. It was obvious she still hadn't' spotted me, for she searched the area around the fire. I cleared my throat to get her attention and sure enough she gave a little start of surprise before hurrying over to me, her face clearly anxious.

"Oh, my God. Are you--" But she was cut off as I slugged her with my strongest haymaker. Gaw, that hurt like a bitch! Still, it was worth it.

"O...kay. I guess I deserved that," the brat said, and half heartedly rubbed at the spot. What... did she not even feel it? Aargh!

"Deserved that? Deserved that?! Girl, you nearly, single handedly caused the destruction of the entire Multiverse!" I screamed with an intensity I never knew I had. "Do you have any idea how difficult it was to keep all that bad juju inside you from leaking into the Void, not to mention that if it wasn't for you, I'd be chilling in my nice warm tower instead of being here, stuck in a damned ice box in the middle of nowhere and half dead! You... aargh!" I went for another hit, but she had enough sense to dodge and me? Well, I was still not all that there and so I ended up faceplanting the ground. Not exactly good when you've sustained massive internal damage.

Despite my best efforts I wailed in agony.

"God fucking son of a mother dancing polka with shoes full of rusty nails this hurts so fucking much my organs are trying to murder me by committing suicide by guzzling down barrels full of battery acid somebody kill me now!"

I had not felt that much pain since a long time. The incident with the Chimeras was definitive a close second.

I heard her footsteps come closer. "Here, let's get you warm," she muttered and grabbed my arm, draping it over her shoulder. "Can you stand?"

I was in a little too much pain to formulate a coherent response, so I tightened my hold on her and shakily got back to my feet. She guided me back to the fire and set me down close, taking a spot next to me.

"Are you hungry? There's meat," She offered, sounding a bit apologetic.

"I'm good. Already had some."

"Alright," she said quietly. From a pile of various assortment of things, she retrieved a small wooden board—kinda like the cutting boards people use back home—and grabbed one of the searing pieces of meat right out of the fire, placing it atop her little board and sticking it with a knife.

She sat down next to me and quietly ate, board in her knees and slicing off pieces of meat, using the knife as a sort of fork. I would have advised against this or at least have warned her to be careful, but I was still kinda ticked.

"Sorry," she said all of a sudden, after we'd both been sitting in silence for a minute or two. "I didn't mean for you to get hurt."

I let out a breath I did not know I was holding. "It was pretty much all kinds of stupid what you did. You nearly killed us both and with ninety-nine, comma, nine, period percent all other forms of life all over the Multiverse," I said in a hard voice. Jackie looked away. "Well, I guess I can understand where you're coming from. I'm probably the only other person you've seen in a while, right?"

She smiled tentatively. "First person who still has their head on straight, yeah. I missed that. People, I mean. And when you were there and all of a sudden you were leaving... well, I could have handled that a little better."

In spite of myself, I couldn't help but chuckle. Man, I couldn't stay too mad at this girl. Hell, she was still so young. Me, I think I handled my coming to Equestria relatively well. True, I still missed my family, but all the same, I learned to take care of myself, I moved out and was more independent and knowledgeable in life than Jackie. Her... she was still a kid. Went to school, lived with her parents, hung out with friends and probably never had to deal with the shit us adults have had to. The things that hardened us and enabled us to fend for ourselves in the world. And if I was in the same situation as her... well, I could understand why she acted the way she did.

"Yeah, maybe next time think a little before jumping into the corridor between dimensions. That Multiverse can be a sneaky one, so you never know what it's gonna hit you with next."

For the first time she looked a little more upbeat. She sliced off a piece of her meat hunk and offered it, still impaled in the knife. I flashed her a big smile, wide enough that she could see my Alucard teeth and downed the morsel, chewing contentedly.

"You know, that was some mighty fine campfire cookin' you had going there. Where'd you learn to do that?"

She chewed her own piece, staring off thoughtfully and swallowed. "Learned pretty recently, actually. I'm actually better at it than I thought I'd be. Never done it before coming here to this horsey fairyland."

"Equestria, girl. Equestria. World usually goes by the name of Equus in the fandom."

"Tell me something," she said after swallowing a piece. "Is it just me or do these ponies have an unhealthy obsession with punny names. I've taken a look at some maps and atlases and basically every pony territory sounds like it was named by a prepubescent girl."

I chuckled. "Ya, them ponies sure like their play on words. But remember, kiddo, based off a little girl's show."

"And I still find that both ridiculous and easy to believe."

"I suppose it would be, to someone who's never been exposed to the fandom." Despite already partaking on a hearty chunk of roasted critter, my stomach rumbled yet again. Girl noted this with a wry smirk.

"Seconds?" She said and presented me with yet another tasty, juicy morsel.

"Don’t mind if I do," I quipped, trying my damnedest to not let my blushing cheeks show.

After a few seconds of comfortable silence, Jackie said, "You know, I'm actually surprised this turned out as good as it did. Didn't have much time to practice before coming here."

"Practice, huh? On what did you practice this exactly?"

"Chicken and a pig. First one didn't come out all that good. Pig was a lot better, though," she said offhandedly.

Whoa, what? Damn, this girl had some nerve. "And how did the ponies react when you killed an innocent life... hey, whoa," I held up my hands as she looked a bit miffed. "I mean, I like me some pork chops as much as the next girl, but killing a piggy in colorful horseyland... I can't imagine that went over well. It´s pretty much like good old Hannibal Lecter for us."

"Ponies? Hah!" She scoffed. "They weren't even aware it was me. Stupid little things have no security whatsoever. All I had to do was sneak in the middle of the night, grab one and scram before anyone could investigate."

I thought about this for a moment. "So I've been meaning to ask you. Where exactly were you staying during all this? With one of the Mane Six, maybe... oh, wait, you don't know who they are, do you?" She shook her head and I enlightened her as to who the show's heroines were. As I listed each and every one of them, Jackie's face morphed into an increasingly sour grimace. "I take it you know them?"

"Oh yeah, I know them," she said in a tone that booked no further argument, so I decided to change the subject.

"Well, we can't stay here forever. I think as soon as the blizzard dies down we should go and try to look for the nearest town or city. What do you say?"

"Oh, right! I forgot..." She stood up and headed on over to a pile of... stuff, I dunno. There were wooden boxes, burlap sacks, some bottles... alcohol? Oh, yes! Well, before I could call out for her to toss me one, she came back holding a piece of parchment as tall and wide as a small child. "I found this map, see? But I can't make heads or tails of it."

True enough, it was a map, scribbled in some weird language. It wasn't what you would call professionally made. There were scribbling in the margins and stains of what looked to be coffee. At least I hoped it was coffee. Still, it was better than nothing. Looked somehow like stuff smugglers would use.

"Hey, not bad squirt," I said, my spirits just a little bit higher than a moment ago. "Where did you get this?"

And just like that, her countenance spoke of uncertainty. "Well, I got it from some... I dunno, cow things."

"Cow things?"

"Well, yeah, you know. I mean, after we both crash landed I was looking all over for you and I did, I knew we had to get out of the snow as soon as possible. So I carried you for a while and found this cave, only... it wasn't exactly empty," she said, unconsciously wringing her hands.

"And what happened?"

"Like I said, those cow things. Really hairy and loud. There were three of them and I think they were bandits or something because their leader attacked me."

"And..." I asked, dreading the answer.

"I eighty six'd him, obviously. Then his lackeys went after me and I had to off them too and... what? Don't look at me like that, it was us or them."

Us or them. Yeah, I could get behind such thinking, but damn! This girl... she wasn't an adult yet. Just... damn.

And then, something hit me. A thought, a suspicion. Nothing more than that and yet, it hit me like a sucker punch to the gut.

"Jackie?"

"Hm?"

"Where did you get this meat?"

For a split second she froze before going back to chewing as if nothing was amiss. "What do you mean?" She asked in a forcibly casual tone.

I chuckled, trying to lighten the mood, yet the sound that emanated from my throat was strained and void of humor. "Well, you certainly didn't find any meat out there in the snow. It came from somewhere and I don´t talk about the meat-blimp."

The girl now avoided looking at me, her chewing ceased and you could practically hear the gears on her head grinding against each other. "H-hey, why don't you eat some more? We need to get you better and back on your feet, huh?" She said more than a little quickly and a chill that had nothing to do with the cold suddenly shot up my spine.

She tentatively offered me another slice of meat, a look of uncertainty and uncertainty on her face. Something was wrong here and it was impossible to not smell the cow shit in the dark at this point. I stood up, not bothering to take the offered morsel.

"Where are you going? You shouldn’t be walking around right now, you know."

I did not answer. My legs seemed to be moving by their own will. From somewhere behind me I could make out a muffled curse, the pattering of feet and a hand clasped my arm.

"Look, let's just—"

I wrenched my arm from her and kept on walking. As I left the warmth of the fire and the smell of cooking meat, the stench in the air was replaced by something else. The chamber I woke up in seemed to be one of at least two in the cavern and as I left its confines and wandered further on, I came upon a grisly sight.

Three yaks, dead. And killed in the most gruesome way possible. The floor and stone walls were stained with buckets worth of blood, long since frozen. One of the yaks' stomach had burst from the inside, splattering everything around it with blood, organs and any other number of bodily fluids. Another one had its entire hindquarters severed from the rest of its body, a long metal something sticking up in the air from its shoulder blades, but it was the fate of the last yak that broke my composure.

It's head was severed, and its body void of skin and its bloody fur was propped atop a slab of stone, its belly gutted of any organs, its legs hacked off. A carcass, drawn and quartered and with some very noticeable chunks of meat and muscle missing from its frame.

The whole scene could have been straight from one of these shitty psycho-slasher movies Phil was so oddly fond of.

From the corner of my eye I saw a small shape sidle next to me. It was Jacqueline. She looked at me in guarded wariness, but there was nary a trace of regret or remorse on her features.

"Yeah, those guys," the girl said, trying to sound nonchalant. "Fucking assholes. Tried to kill me and all. Smelled, too. Obviously, they picked the wrong human to mess with. Hell, I even warned them to leave but they just charged at me and—"

My stomach churned and before I could help myself, I doubled over and puked up its contents.

"Aw! Watch it!" She cried out as my puke very nearly splattered against her feet.

"God fucking... damit Jaqueline! Rule one, rule number motherfucking one, NEVER eat the meat of someone who can beg you not to! That shit can give you this nasty nerve disease where you begin to shake uncontrollably and you can become addicted to boot." I wiped my mouth and backed of a bit from the... remains I just splattered all over the caves floor. "I mean, I devour souls on a regular basis, I absorb the very essence of life into me to create my Minions but this is plain nasty!"

If she was the least chastised she did not show it. She crossed her arms and stared at me defiantly. "Food's food. What does it matter to you?"

"Are you fucking daft, girl?! There's a difference between eating a little piggy and talking, sapient being!" I was this close to bitch slapping some sense into that brat.

The insolent girl had the gall to roll her eyes at me. "Oh, please, if I threw a rock in a random direction I'd probably hit a sapient bird or spider or bunny rabbit or something. Besides, what would you have me do? Roll over and let them kill the two of us?"

I winced, my whole body ached, but even that paled in comparison to the fury I now felt. "Goddamn it, brat, you could have done something different. If you had the power to kill them, you sure as hell could have restrained them or sent them packing. You... you... you didn't have to do this!"

She didn't look too impressed, though her cheeks steadily flushed. "Uh-huh. And if you and I had switched places, would you have done just that? Or would you do like me and kill them where they stood?" Jacqueline replied, nary a trace of regret on her features. "And what does it matter to you, anyway? Didn’t you say this world is based off of a little girls' show? It's all fictional! Who cares what you do, it's not like it matters." She stared at me, challenging to oppose her.

"OF COURSE IT MATTERS YOU INSIPID CUNT!" I suddenly found the strength to shoot up to my full height and to raise my voice to levels that would have probably cowed a charging dragon. "A butterfly's wingbeat on one side of the globe can lead to a devastating hurricane on the other and a falling bag rice can cause an earthquake. This is the fucking Multiverse, all of this might have been spawned when the kids show MLP was created but this here, THIS IS REAL! Every creature here is as real as you, living, breathing, not just some imaginary piece of entertainment. If the Predators someday would show up on earth, starting to do their thing, gutting you and your loved ones alive for trophies, would it not matter just because we thought them to be 'just fictional'? The moment your scrawny ass was dumped into this shit, it BECAME your reality! Everything you will do impacts your Universe in a way that can never be undone. Everything is finite. Do you understand?!?" I did not know when my hands had clenched around Jackie's shoulders but the moment my anger driven rant ended, I noticed just how tightly I had clenched them because a massive wave of pain rolled back into me. Regardless, in spite of the pain I did not let go.

I stared into her eyes, hoping, searching for a sign that my rant might have gotten through to her, even if just a smidge. Jackie's arm were still crossed, but as I laid into her cracks started to form and now, I could have sworn that even if it was for a split second, something akin to regret flashed in her features.

"Well, the Predators are not here, are they? I am and I can tell you right now, if some idiot sapient beast tries to kill me, I will defend myself with everything I have. If it's a choice between me or some random cartoon characters from an obscure show for little girls... I will always choose myself. Besides, it's not like I had much of a choice."

"Damn it, girl! Of course you have a choice!" My voice cracked, the pitch in my voice more than a little desperate as I shook her. "You... you didn't have to do this."

"You've killed before, haven't you?"

"What?" I whispered, my body frozen. "How did you know?"

"I didn't, not really. I had a suspicion and you just confirmed it." She studied my face evenly, a ponderous expression on her face. "If this universe of yours is anything like the one I came from, then I know for sure the ponies would never accept someone like you. Not someone with your looks, armor and I saw that monster mace you had strapped to your hip. Or are you really gonna try and bullshit something about how it's for self defense or the like? No, you've killed before. That much is obvious. And if you have, you know as well as I do that hindsight is 20/20. When those fuckers came at us I acted the only way I know how. Yes, I killed them and I would do it again. I'm good at killing things, I found."

I stared at her with horror, my eyes wide, mouth dry and unable to form words. But this didn't mollify the girl. If anything, it seemed to piss her off more than anything.

"You goddamn hypocrite," she hissed. "You're no better than me and you have the gall to try and lecture me? How many lives have you ended? How many creatures have you killed with nothing but your bare hands? You think eating souls is that much better than carving up a dumb animal? The only reason I made it this far is because I'm willing to do whatever it takes to keep my life and freedom, so if you think you can come here with your holier-than-thou attitude and judge me like you're so much better, then you can go to hell. And your ideals too."

Without another word, she freed herself from my grasp and moved well into the cavern and out of sight.

I collapsed. Man, that took a lot from me. I did not regret going off on the girl. She had to learn. It was for the best. But then... I had a good feeling about Jackie, back the first few moments we met. She seemed like a good kid, so what could have possessed her to have such a callous attitude for other living things? Might or might not have been due to my injuries, I suspected to have suffered at least minor head trauma. I'd have to make sure and ask, but how to approach her?

Plus the little things Jackie said about me, being a hypocrite... well, no shit, those hurt nearly worse than actually dying and not only because Jackie had at least somehow been right...

Whatever my plans were, they would have to wait for another time. All that exertion had taken its toll on me, and the incoming haze of sleep proved impossible to shake off. I could only hope the girl would still be there when I woke up.

Don´t know how long I was away in my surprisingly dreamless slumber but with a shit-ton of relief, I carefully stretched after waking up again. Almost immediately pain greeted me, shooting through every nerve in my body, thankfully not with the intensity of a raging bull but still like a mob of pissed off Yorkie dogs. Looking around I failed to find Jackie but the fact that the fire was still burning gave me at least a smidgen of hope that she was still around.

Hissing through clenched teeth, I stood up. Right now, I would have committed cold-blooded murder for a Med-Kit or a Healing Potion. As the stars blinked out of my eyes I noticed for the first time in front of me was a small bag... a sack, laid at my feet.

Food was inside it. Dried hunks of some sort of vegetables and fruits. A peace offering maybe? Either way, I downed the whole thing. Didn't taste good, exactly, but my body was still in sore need of nourishment.

Now, where exactly did that girl get off to?

"Hey, girl. You there?" My voice was raspy and harsh. Damn, I needed some water.

A quick once over revealed no other life forms in the area. The pain that flared throughout my body had thankfully reduced to a dull ache. Gotta love that Overlord endurance.

Well, I still needed to see whether the girl was still in the vicinity. I was... pretty sure she was still around. Then again, I did go pretty hard on her.

I tried the alternative passageway—the one away from that... ugh, kill room and but did not get very far. The storm was still well and howling outside, blowing enough cold air to freeze a moose solid in seconds. Nope, nope, nope.

Did she venture out again? Tough kid, considering she didn't wear much in the way of protection. In the end, I went back to the campfire, rummaged through the yaks' belongings and found some water, more dried foods and eventually, after waiting a while, Jackie herself eventually stumbled upon. She still wore that blanket, encrusted in snow and upon seeing me, she froze.

"Come here, girl," I said, mindful to keep any hostility from my voice. "Let's get you warm." I tried offering a small smile while replicating Jackie's own words, though I'm pretty sure it came out tired more than anything.

Jackie cocked her head, surprise evident in her eyes. She dropped the snow covered blanket and slowly ambled forward, hesitation coloring her every step. Truth be told, I was feeling a bit too tired to get angry. Rage and anger's not really me, much less so when I'm not feeling like it. Instead, I opted for a different approach. I met lil´ Jackie halfway, pulling her in a hug while channeling as much of my 'older sibling' vibes as I could.

"H-hey... what are you..." Her body tensed and she squirmed, trying to get away, but I kept my hold on her.

"Sorry that I had blown up in your face like that Hon. I get a bit cranky when I am in horrendous, soul wrecking pain."

She sighed, a muffled sound as I kinda had her face pressed to me. "I told you, I was sorry for that," she said, indeed sounding regretful.

"Yeah, that you did, kid," I tried to chuckle, but my ribs were still kinda banged up, and instead, a pained wheeze came out my lips. "Ow... come on. Let's... let's go sit down or whatever. I think standing up's literally killing me," I said jokingly. She didn't laugh.

I could tell she did not fully know what to make of my turn about. Still, she helped get me back to the fire.

"Hey, where you going? Come back here." Silly girl. She tried to sit somewhere away from me. I opened the blanket, signifying her to come in, which she grudgingly did so. I in turn wasted no time putting my arm around her and pulled her close. Well as much as I could without pressing her against my ribs. "See now, that's better. Cozy and warm, eh?"

"Sure." She shrugged and got herself comfortable on the smelly blanket.

"Speaking of... all of this stuff, the blankets, food, water and all—that was all the yaks', wasn't it?"

A terse nod followed.

"Look, squirt," I sighed and licked my lips, not fully knowing how to proceed. I was a very 'direct and to the point' type of girl and didn't usually like to skirt around things, but it had to be done. "What you did to those yaks... that wasn't good. You shouldn't have done that, no matter what they planned to do to you."

Already she was gearing up to protest, but I held up a hand placatingly. "Hey now, please, just let me say my piece, okay?"

"Fine," she sulked and withdrew into herself.

"Jackie... I like you. You seem like a nice kid. Whatever your reasons were for doing what you did... can I assume it was because of whatever happened in your own universe?" After a moment of hesitation, she confirmed my thoughts and nodded. "Okay. I don't know what happened, but whatever it was, I'm sorry. I'm sorry you had to go through it and that it caused you to... do that to the yaks. But squirt—I don't mean to sound authoritarian or something, but you oughta know that there's some things you just shouldn't do. Whatever your viewpoint was coming here—about this world and the creatures that inhabit it—they deserve the same amount of respect as you would have for a fellow human. I know that I am not one to talk, seeing as I admittedly took a couple of life's myself but even than, it never became something that got easier over time. Trust me, once it starts getting easier, you are on a one way trip down to a very, VERY dark place and I would hate to someday meet you there."

Now that got a reaction from her. She craned her head to look at me as if I'd just told her that unicorns are real... well, provided we were still back on Earth, at least.

"They're not human," she said firmly.

"Well, yeah, but still. How would you feel if some aliens showed up all of a sudden and decided they liked to eat people?"

"It's not... ugh," she groaned. "Alright, I guess I can see what you're trying to say, but I can't just up and consider them people. It doesn't work like that!"

"So work at it," I said simply. She looked up at me questioningly. "Since you're being a good sport, I'll admit that not everybody can just put a bunch of colorful cartoon creatures on the same standing as people, but Jackie," I paused, taking a second to mull over my next words. "You're not going home anytime soon. I know that's probably not what you want to hear, but it's the truth. For better or worse, you're gonna be here a while. If not in my universe, then the one I pulled you from and whatever it was that happened... at some point you're going to have to learn to trust and live alongside the creatures who live here, because if you think that it's acceptable to do what you did to those yaks then... you're not going to be happy, and your life will become so much harder. Is that something you want?"

"...No."

In spite of myself, I couldn't help but pet her messy mop of hair. "Well, give it a try. Trust me, not all of the ponies are all bad."

She mumbled something, too low for me to hear.

"What's that?"

"I'm not sure how to do that. The ponies I know... well, I've pretty much done everything in my power to make them miserable."

"Let me guess, the Mane Six?" She nodded and I sighed. "Yeah... I do so love them little ponies but they can be hard to get along with. Well, from what other universes I've heard about, it seems. But I can tell you this much, squirt. Ponies are creatures of harmony. Most of them, anyway. I'm sure that if you take a step forward and do what you can to mend things between them, they're bound to accept you sooner or later. It's in their nature."

"That's... way harder than you make it sound."

"Baby steps, girl. Baby steps. Nothing worth doing is ever easy, after all. So long as you get there, that is all that matters. And who knows, if you give the little ponies a chance, you might just find that you like them in turn."

"Yeah. Maybe..."

She shuffled closer to me. I could feel her shoulder just barely brush against mine and she tightening her hold on her share of the blanket and doing her best to bury herself beneath it.

"Well, I don't know about you," I said after a few minutes of comfortable silence. "But I could go for a drink right now."

"A drink?"

"Any kind of alcohol, really. Gets you warmed up all nice. That's hit the spot."

"Hmm." She drew out a hand from underneath the blanket and 'force pulled' a bottle of... wouldn't you know it, honey mead right from the yaks' belongings.

A weak yet hearty chuckle came up in me as I took the unmistakable bottle and opened it, the heavy and rich smell of fermented honey blasting into my nose. "Wohohoo, praise fucking Odin, I would recognize this stuff everywhere. Honey mead, nectar of the Norse Gods!"

After nearly dropping the damn bottle because another wave of pain shot through my arm, I brought the bottle to my lips and let the smooth alcohol flow into my mouth and straight down my throat. The effect was instantaneous as warmth began to flood my cheeks and radiate in my stomach.

A long, blissful sigh escaped my lips. "Now that´s the stuff. That´s mead!" I gave another of my patented and ice breaking impersonations that usually went over everyone's heads. Then, my glance fell on Jackie. She had retreated back into Blanket Town, not really leaning onto me but not trying to worm her way out either. So far so good, now how to proceed? Ah! I held to bottle out to Jacqueline, after whipping every residue I might have left of. "Hey, how about you take a sip too? Tastes really good and gives you the warm fuzzies too. Not that I would encourage underage drinking but fuck the rules. Let´s call this New Year."

I held the bottle out to her. She looked from me to the thing and back again and shrugged. "Sure, why not," and took a sip. She swirled the beverage in her mouth before swallowing, a sour look on her face.

"Hey now, don't be telling me any of that 'it tastes bad' tripe. This is mead, girl, not some fruity French wine. You don't savor it, you guzzle it and taste it with the throat. That's the way to do it. Go on, give it another try."

It looked like she wanted to protest against this, but whether it was latent pity for me or whatever, she gave it another go, guzzling down a hearty amount and almost immediately, she almost choked on it. I patted her on the back for a job well done until she recovered and asked. "How was it?"

A number of little coughs still wracked her body and her eyes watered. Still, she answered, "Not... not that bad, really."

"Atta girl." I smiled, taking the bottle back for another swig. "You know, I just wondered where these Yaks got the honey for their booze. Bees don´t live in snowy regions. Hmm, maybe there´s a city closer by than we thought? Anyways..." I let my rambling linger a bit, just listening to the crackling of the fire and Jackie´s and my own breathing.

"There... hic... there is a place close to here. I saw it."

"Really?"

"Yeah," she nodded. "That's why I went out. The yaks marked some landmarks close to here and I used those to kinda get around. There's a city like... I dunno, ten miles away from here?"

My body was already in the throes of a pleasant buzz. Still, it wasn't enough to dredge up a bit of concern in me. "Thirty miles... yeah, us Europeans use the metric system, but isn't ten miles like, a lot?"

"Yeah," she said. "But... how are we gonna get you there, I mean..."

I scoffed. "Girl, don't you worry about that. Just tell me, can we make the trip? I got an crazy idea already that should get us into walking distance. There is a lot of snow out there, so going by foot is more or less suicide and I don´t feel like dying. Again. So my plan is that we do it like the Inuit and travel by sleigh. Only thing we need is to throw together said sleigh, I provide us with the much needed MS." After receiving a confused blink from Jaqueline I added a very helpful 'Minion Strengths'.

"Minion Strengths?"

"'Course, girl. Don't you remember? I'm basically a gender bent Overlord and with that comes the very handy ability to summon murderous little kobolds who will happily carry out my every whim."

"...Right."

"Now, in an ideal setting we would have access to some sled dogs or maybe even reindeer, but seeing how we're in short supply, my Minions will provide the necessary, uh, Minion-power to get us through the snow and close enough to the city you saw. "

"There's still a problem. We don't have a sleigh."

"So we'll throw one together," I said dismissively. "I have read enough survival guides to know that for a basic model, we only need some wood or bone for the frame, something to tie shit together and pelts or skins or canvas to span it over the frame. And seeing as we are sitting in a nifty little bandit's hole, we should barely have enough mats for one or two tries."

"Right," she drawled. "Are you a carpenter or engineer too? Because I wouldn't even know where to start."

"Stop being so negative, girl!" I did rather poorly in keeping my frustration down. "Sheesh, even Wednesday Adams looks like a little Miss Sunshine next to you. No offense. And no, I am not but I worked with enough wood to know the basics and a frame is not that hard to make and if push comes to shove, we just let the Minions build the thing. I mean, they built most of the stuff for my Tower... on a second thought, I´d say we just let the Minions build the sleigh right away to prevent waste of material and time." I looked around, groaning in frustration as all the Ley Lines I could spy where to small to spawn a Minion Portal. "Now all I need is a good spot in the Ley Lines to call my little helpers... come on..." I made to stand up, eager to carry out my scheme and get out of this frozen pit. Of course, I momentarily forgot I was still pretty banged up after that little meteor impression the other day.

Ok, so our plan would have to wait a bit. In the meantime, my new friend spent the time getting ready to head out. Girl insisted I rest and take it easy, for come next day, I would have the strength needed to endure the harsh winter conditions.

Snow was melted down for water, foodstuffs were rationed, packed and double checked. Heck, girl even managed to turn those funky smelling blankets into pseudo coats, basically cutting openings in the waist and necklines so that at least it clung, however loosely, to our bodies.

And of course, what food the yaks did have now ran out. I... might be to blame for that. In using my Mana flow to accelerate my body's healing process I needed quite a bit of calories and energy, not to mention my body already churning like crazy through them due to the cold. Jackie set out into the snow and came back a few hours later with a lump draped atop her shoulder. It was after she came into view and let the bulge drop that I realized it was a freaking seal!

But before I could make any objections known, the girl quickly assured me it was a normal animal and in no way sapient. When I asked she said that in order to confirm, she, quote 'smacked it around a little' and when it didn't talk she was satisfied enough that it would serve as a food source. And, well, we did kind of need it, or else risk death. A-and it did taste pretty good I had admit. Still... I couldn't help but feel a bit guilty but mostly because I was a enormous sucker for cute, little baby seals.

In any case, we hung out, we ate and chatted about random topics and sure enough, I healed and gathered enough strength to make our little trip in earnest. Also, I managed to gather enough snippets about Jackie's weird ass magic powers to come to an not unimportant part of our plan.

Disguises.

Seeing as there was a sum on my head, I could not nilly willy waltz into a settlement and now less then ever with an undisguised Jackie in tow. Heavens and Hell might know what that girl might do when someone tried to get the bounty on my head with her caught in the crossfire.

Nope, time to practice Overlord Rule number eleven 'Deception can sometimes wield greater results than running headfirst into a problem. And even than, Violence is always a viable second option.'

"Sooo Jackie, I´ve been thinking," I started while watching her bundle up the last parts of our traveling rations "And I might have encountered a wee lil´ problem. See, due to some unsavory cultural discrepancies, it is not wise for me to show my handsome face to Ponies. Or anyone who could be a Bounty Hunter. Thing is, once we are to enter the city, I will use a spell to alter my form into that of a midget candy horse but I would be willing to bet my favorite panties that you can't do something similar, which would leave us in quite the conundrum."

"So, what, you want to turn me into one of them?"

"We do need to blend in, ya know?" I said, trying to be rational. "Or would you rather every pony from here to Los Pegasus know there's a human girl running around? Besides, it would not be me to 'turn' you into a pony, it would be you for I would teach you the spell."

She sighed, head hung in resignation. "Fine, turn me if you must. Not like I haven't done it before."

I blinked in surprise. "Oh, you have? Turn into a pony, I mean? How was it?"

"It was great," she said mockingly. "I hung out with Twilight and Rarity, ate some grub, went for a spa session... and oh yeah, some muscle headed Neanderthal nearly split me in half. All fun," she finished with a snarl. I chuckled uneasily. At some point I probably should ask just why it is that she seems to harbor such animosity for cute, fluffy little ponies. But that will have to wait for later. Good as it might be to know, getting out of this icebox took precedence.

"Well, this spell I'm gonna teach you is rather basic, an Illusion not unlike those Ninja techniques from Naruto, you know? All you have to do is to concentrate on your Mana and will it to coat your whole body or at least the parts you wish to mask. The feeling should be like a warm and toasty blanket encompassing you. If you feel that, you can proceed to form the disguise. You need to envision what you want to look like, the more details you get down on the first try the better. Envision how you want to look, how your voice should sound, the sounds of your steps, how you want to feel... fuck, even how you want to smell or taste. You can change some details to the spell later but it is more difficult. If you have all this down, let the spell go and it should create the Illusion for you but it can only work with what is there, meaning you can for example look like a guy but no matter how good you are, you will miss a very important piece of anatomy that will just stay a intangible phantasm. This spell is really useful and you can create dozens of disguises with it. But I have to warn you though, the first few uses can be rather taxing but from what I felt when I tried to prevent the Multiverse from going kablooey, your Mana reserves are way, waaaaay larger than mine so you should be fine." I did my best to explain the important bits of the spell to Jackie. "Did you understood that so far?"

"Sure. Let's get this over with."

I did what I could to help the girl. Turns out, she's not all that bad at magic. Of course, this ponification did not go smoothly right away. The first four times or so she did a passable imitation of being constipated as she tried to get the illusion to take place, basically the magical equivalent of using a rocket powered sledgehammer when instead she should have gone for the hammer and chisel. After correcting her, progress was made. She managed to turn her hands into hooves and her head turned into an admittedly creepy hybrid of pony and human. Good thing we didn't have any mirrors or anything of the like, for the girl would have surely freaked out. Anyway, fast forward a couple of hours later and in front of me stood a white unicorn pony with a black mane. An almost perfect transformation, save that her ears were still those of a human. Oh, well, good enough.

We were as prepared as could be now and so I donned my armor, we strapped on the cloaks and set out to find a suitable ley line in which to summon my Minions.

At this point I made the mental note to offer a generous sacrifice to whoever invented the whole mechanic behind my Ley-o-Vision, for one could have thought that a blanket of snow deep enough to reach up to half of my calves would be enough to hide something as delicate as a magical flow of universal life energy but no siree, it was shining bright and easily visible. At least to me.

After we hiked a good bit, I finally managed to spot what I was looking for. Not wasting any more time, seeing as my toes had stopped complaining over the cold already, I raised my hand and with a bit more force than necessary opened a portal for my Browns, resulting in a geyser-like eruption of snow and ten happily gibbering kobolds.

"Jackie, my Minions. Minions, say Hi to Jaqueline. She´s a new friend, no food." I introduced my loyal, little mavens of mayhem to my newest human friend, who stared at the kobolds with interest. The Minions on their part gave their usual, enthusiastic and incomprehensible greetings.

"Now fellas, I need you build a sleigh big enough to carry me and Jackie here. Materials are in a cave nearby and after you are done with that, you ten will get to play in the snow for a bit."

Without waiting for the given confirmation, I turned back to the cave with Jackie in tow, my Minions being themselves, bounding through the snow with absolute glee despite being decked in their heavy armor and wielding their various weapons.

Back in the cave, I let go a internal sigh of relief as the Minions immediately went to work, gathering materials from everywhere to do my biding. Would I not have known better, I would have felt tempted to compare my murderous little monsters with the Brownies from folklore.

Capable as they were with murder, pillaging and mayhem, the kobolds could now place carpenter on their resume, for they made good use of whatever wood lay around the cave. Crates, barrels and what looked like it might have been a cart at one point were broken down and repurposed as the sleigh slowly took form. It was all going smoothly until one of the elves... ah, I mean Minions, wandered about to search for more materials and yelled out 'Food!' This prompted the rest of the Minions to abandon their duties as they went over to investigate and to my horror, after following them, they were indeed making a feast of the slain yaks, happily tearing chucks of meat with nothing more than their claws and brute force and stuffing themselves silly.

Fighting through the nausea, I clapped my hands and bid them to get back to work under perjury of gruesome death. Damn it, I couldn't even get too angry at them, for this kind of behavior, I realized somberly, was simply part of their nature.

Things progressed from there and my Minions completed the mismatched sleigh, proudly standing around their contraption. Hell, somehow they even managed to give that thing carvings to decorate it and a crudely fashioned Minion face was grinning the usual insane grin as some kind of figurehead.

Respect were it was due. "Alright, time to get out of this Ninth Circle for the poor, Minions, strap up! And Jackie, take a seat." I commanded and sat down on the sleigh myself. Again I came to realize that my Minions did a swell job as they somehow cobbled little, cushioned seats together which where frankly a delight after sitting on hard stone for a while.

As she made to comply to my request, she suddenly gave a yelp and her hand shot to the back of her collar.

"Everything okay squirt?"

Fishing something out of her shirt Jackie gave a annoyed grunt "Just a piece of ice. Must have fallen down from the ceiling or something. Hate when something like this happens."

Flicking the offending piece of frozen water away, Jackie grumbled a bit more and went over to the sleigh and not a second later, a icicle easily as big as one of my legs on the ceiling became loose and with the sound of a whole house worth of breaking glass, came crashing down just where my grumpy friend had stood not a moment earlier.

I for my part was sure my heart stood still as I had all the Final Destination flashbacks but thankfully Jackie just shrugged in a 'Oh wow, that sure was close or whatever', seemingly not phased in the slightest.

Jackie went to sit behind me but I made sure to have her in front of me if I could not have her next to me. I had to more or less coerce her to sit there, like a little child would between the outstretched legs of a parent or a older sibling just before they would zip down a hill on a bob. The fact that she grumbled something under her breath made it even more fitting.

Seeing as the Minions had all strapped themselves in harnesses, I scooted a bit closer to Jackie after I secured a slightly musty scarf around my face and put my arms around her, to which she only mildly protested, much to my surprise.

"Alright Minions, mush!" I commanded and the wacky ride began.

For the fact that the snow was nearly as high as the Minions were tall, the little guys made ground impressively, combining their seemingly endless energy for one single goal, namely getting their Ruler to the next city in record time.

I admit, it was a bit frightening and at the same time intriguing to see. Ideas and plans came nearly automatically to my mind as I let my eyes wander over the white in white landscape, powdery snow swirling up around the sleigh.

If ten Minions were capable of effortlessly pulling a two person sleigh through deep snow, what would twenty Browns be able to do? Or thirty? Fifty? One hundred? I may just have to test this out at some point.

Regardless, the weather was as good as could be. The blizzard had long since died down and the clouds parted to reveal a silvery sun on the horizon. My Minions mushed, untired and unrelenting and as we traversed the all encompassing blanket of white, I was eventually able to spot in the distance some very distinct shapes. Buildings and houses and more than a few flickering lights of orange signifying a fire.

Grinning broadly, I took the Minions' reigns and hollered at the raving kobolds to 'giddy on up', the Minions happily complying as the city grew closer and closer.

Feeling the warm sensation of mirth rising up in my chest again, caused by the lovely little sleigh trip that so reminded me of my childhood I let out a long and hearty laugh, doing my best impression to sound like jolly old Nick but judging from the way Jackie turned her head to look at me, I would be willing to say all I managed to do was an, at best lacking, impersonation of the Grinch.

But before I was able to say something, anything really, things went downhill.

Literally.

Guess in their boundless enthusiasm (at one point they even started to sing what I only presumed to be a version of 'Rudolf the red nosed Reindeer'), my Minions had managed to overlook a pretty big dip in the landscape and the realization only hit them as at least seven of them were already sailing through the crisp air with loud exclamations of inane joy.

I for my part, well, I opted for an all time classic, screaming "Ohhh shiiiiiiiiii~" on top of my lungs while I tightened my grip on Jackie, who cursed audibly as she too fell prey to gravity.

Luckily, our fall was cut short but that changed nothing about the fact that mid-fall, Jackie and I were thrown out of the sleight, left to sail face first into the cold but thankfully soft snow below.

Cold white encompassed me as I flailed around in order to free myself out of the snow, looking without a doubt like a picture for the gods themselves while doing so.

Finally managing to emerge victorious from my struggle with the frozen fluff, I looked at the crash site.

The sleigh was sticking out of the snow nearly vertical, our supplies lay scattered around and my Minions were sticking out of the snow in various ankles, some buried face down to their hips, with their feet flailing in the air while other stamped neat cut-outs in the snow, only the tips of their ears showing where they came down and yet some others somehow had managed to turn a nearby pile of snow into a Minion pin-cushion, with their bodies as pins. All in all, it looked hilariously, making me nearly forget that I almost pissed myself a moment ago.

"Well, that's one way to stop," I muttered to myself.

"You idiot. You could have killed us!" Jackie's voice hissed from somewhere behind me. Yup, there she was, frantically trying to swat away the snow that covered pretty much all of her.

"Relax, girl," I said offhandedly. "I got us this far, didn't I? And look, there's the city you saw on that there map, now let's get on up and move. I dunno about you, but I could go for a hot drink and a warm bed right about now."

Her expression softened somewhat at the prospect, though she still kept on giving me the stink eye. Finding a nearby ley line, I opened the portal and sent my Minions back, with instructions to relay to Onyx and Gnarl that I was still alive and whole and would probably need a couple of more days until I could gather enough strength to 'port back to the tower.

"A'right, Jackie, ready to experience high life as a pony?" I said and clapped my hands cheerfully. Calling to the Mana reserves within me, the illusion spell took hold until I was well and truly ponified. The brat still stood there, but a pointed look on my part got her ass going and soon enough, she too transformed into a pony.

"See now, there's more like it. Are you ready to go?" She nodded and so on we went, towards the settlement that would provide a safe haven from the elements. And preferably booze and a warm bed.

But most importantly, booze.

A Great and Powerful Act

"Hey, Umbra?"

"Hm?"

"What exactly is the plan here?"

"Plan? For what?"

"I dunno. Something. What are we supposed to do?"

"Hmm. I hadn't really thought about it. Just take it easy, I guess," I replied in an offhanded manner. Jacqueline scowled. I don't think she was all that impressed by my proposed plan... or lack thereof. "I mean, hey, I like a plan as much as the next girl, but all things considered, I'm still not feeling a hundred percent. I told ya, squirt, my Mana reserves need to recharge before I can 'port us back to my tower. For that, all we need to do is take it easy, rest and just... I dunno, find a way to spend the time."

Girl still didn't look all that sold, but she conceded and followed suit. Luckily, no one had paid us no never mind when we entered the snowy city which, if a signpost at one of the roads leading to it was true, was called Yule.

Strangest thing. No sooner did my ponyfied friend and I entered its limits that the all encompassing harsh cold receded. Not so much that we could no longer feel it, but enough that walking around in the open became considerably more tolerable. Must be due to some sort of field encompassing the city, protecting it from the elements. Maybe not on as effective or refined a scale as the love shield of the Crystal Empire, but it sure did the trick.

And to my pleasant surprise, Yule was a very developed city, along the levels of Manehattan in the show. No little remote village or outpost here filled with unfriendly hermit ponies, no siree, Yule's status as a full fledged city stood evident everywhere we looked. Even better, due to the constant snowy weather, the houses here were built with slanted roofs, in a style strikingly similar to our little settlements in the German countryside, lending it an especially homey feel to the place.

The locals were friendly, and more than one stallion took off his hat in passing greetings to us, which I cheerfully returned in kind. Griffins were here too. More than I expected to see, that's to be sure. If I had to guess, I'd say there was one griffin for every four ponies and they too were more or less pleasant and I spotted a few eyeing Jackie and I with curiosity. Must be that we were still dragging around those smelly blanket things, because unlike most of what we'd seen on the show, a large majority of the ponies and griffins here actually did go around in clothing. Winter wear such as scarves, booties, earmuffs, beanies, sweaters, snow pants, those funny looking Russian hats and many more. In contrast, I guess we kinda sorta looked like bums. Or hobos. Or bum-hobos. We'd have to rectify that.

Closer to the downtown area the little houses and the mom-and-pop shops gave way to industrialization. Skyscrapers clustered together in a ten block radius, with lesser buildings interspersed among them.

And... hell, it seemed we arrived while the city was in the middle of a celebration of some sort. It was... lively, for the lack of better words. Wherever one looked, there was activity of some sorts. The first thing I noticed was the sheer diversity of the little stands, booths and whatever you wanted to call this little spots where a business savvy pony, griffin and even the odd yak had set up shop with just a blanket between four posts to serve as a roof and a table or crate to present whatever they wanted to sell.

I spied a little particular stand that sold more or less fashionable winter wear and I bought a set for Jackie and I, ducked under one of the stores that were still open, changed into our new outfits and happily discarded those old, ugly brown blankets. Now we could more or less blend in with the locals.

For myself, I chose a snuggly scarf in a muted blue with little, white dots that should probably resemble constellations, one of those beanies with those funny ear flap things (even though they were kinda redundant on a pony since the beanie had extra sheaths for the ears and equine ears where nowhere near those flaps intended for human ears) in a dark green with decorative white zig-zag lines, one of these armless pony jackets things in sand color and four booties in the same color as my scarf. I liked my stuff simple and quick, never was fond of those things considered 'girly'. No wonder everyone in school called me a butch or a bull dyke back in the day. That I broke their noses when I caught them saying it behind my back probably did not help at all, but hey, I was young and did not knew better.

Choosing little Jackie's clothes however, that posed its own set of problems. I mean... girl was cute as a pony, and I mean cute. Man, I really couldn't help but want to stuff her into equally cutesy outfits and when I did... well, she kinda threw a tantrum and I had to duck under an outfit that could only be described as a Victorian Loli outfit that consisted of so many lace that it was more a costume than actual winter wear, an outfit that just screamed Rockabilly, some outfit that looked like the pony variant of a sailor uniform for the cold season, including long socks to keep the legs warm and the odd chair turned projectile to avoid bodily harm. Mostly from the chair though. In the end I managed to, more or less, convince her into wearing one of those weird saddles that where more plush and fleece than anything called a saddle should ever have the right to, in a decent salmon (I still called it pink just for the hell of it) with cute white fluff lining the edges, matching booties in salmon/pink and white fluff and a pair of adorable ear muffs that looked like Parasprites, the one on the right in yellow and the other on the left in bright red. They even had little wings made of some kind of glossy material. In short, Jaqueline looked plum adorable, even while gnashing her teeth, shooting daggers at me and mumbling dead threats under her breath. The bright blush coloring cheeks whenever a stallion and the odd mare gushed over how cute she looked rendered all her hostility null and void tough.

First and foremost you had of course the knick-knack sellers. Can´t have a festival without at least one dozen vendors trying to sell you little porcelain pugs, decorative mugs with portraits of historical figures and modern celebs or whatever little, dust catching trinket ones heart could hunger for.

The second biggest group on these kind of shindigs where of course consisting of food sellers.

Oh Lords and Ladies above, the food sellers!

We had not made it five steps onto the festival grounds as my nose was mercilessly assaulted and annihilated by a plethora of mouthwatering smells. I spied a griffin behind a some sort of grill, cooking what looked like Shish Kebobs (with real meats!) next to a surprisingly unbothered looking earth pony that was selling some kind of deep fried dough goodies.

A short stop and a few bits later I was quite ferociously tearing through half a dozen what the vendor called 'original Stalliongrad Beignets'. Seriously, these things where divine, golden brown and crunchy on the outside, warm and soft on the inside with just a hint of vanilla and something else I could not name. I think I moaned through the whole eating process if the weird looks we got where anything to go by.

Also, there were quite a few vendors selling all kinds of hot drinks, ranging from tea and cocoa to the seemingly Multiversal known hot spiced wine. Phil would have loved this, guy always went for those stands first, much to Vivi´s frustration. Girl never could stand the smell.

"So, not that I'm not enjoying this," the flushed pony girl said as she munched on a still warm donut the size of her head, frosting smeared across her mouth and booties. "But should you really be spending so much money? We still need a place to spend the night."

I held up a hoof and focused on guzzling down my second helping of spiced wine. "Ahh, that hit the spot." After wiping my mouth and discarding the cup, I returned my attention my increasingly impatient looking compatriot. "Don'tcha worry your cute little head, girl," I said and patted said noggin. Her scowl deepened. "I always carry around a little extra dough, just in case and with the gold we liberated from the yaks, we should be all set for the next couple of days."

"Yeah, that's a relief to hear. Now how much gold do you have left?" She insisted.

I sighed and moved to check my purse, if only to stop her harping. I'd hoped she would at least lively up a little at whatever celebration took place in the city, but she still seemed somehow on edge. "Alright, so after our outfits, some delicious food and that kickass wine, we should be at around, uh..." I trailed off as I rummaged through my pocket for the little bag of cash. "Huh, I know I put it here somewhere," I mumbled and checked my remaining pockets. "Oh crapbaskets..."

I looked back to Jackie, who at this point looked like someone who was sucking on a lemon. The mother of all lemons.

"It´s gone isn´t it?" She asked me in a flat monotone that would have made Maud Pie sound like Pinkie hoped on a truckload of sugar in comparison.

"Ehrm... no?" I gave a sheepish smile and was this close to just empty my pocket out just to find my money pouch. "Come on you little bastard, I know you are in there, stop hiding!" I grumped half loud and continued my rummaging but to no avail. My pouch was gone and where it once was, there was a nearly unnoticeable slit in the material of my jacket.

I just got pickpocketed.

The flat look on Jackie's face nearly inversed her face in it´s sheer intensity and she looked like a soccer mom ready to tear into something that had managed to trigger her divine rage.

"Eh he he... whoops?" Was all I could offer, my ears folding back in embarrassment.

Jaqueline let out a snort and scuffed the ground with her right front hoof, keeping her aim straight at me.

"Now girl, let´s not be hasty okay? Getting pickpocketed could happen to anyone. Not my fault." I tried to defuse the situation, my body deciding for me that it would be wise to be ready for a hasty retreat. Sure, I had more mass than Jackie, even in pony form but righteous fury was one hell of a boost and I could only imagine what that Chaos juju in Jackie would do one it reached its boiling point, which could be anywhere between sub zero and core of the sun.

"Not your fault? Not your fault? You're a grown woman, for Chrissakes! How could you be so irresponsible?"

"Hey now, that's not fair. You can't expect me to know when a wily pickpocket will come around."

"I said we should have just stayed out of the way. I wanted to lay low and stay as far away from these ponies as possible, but nooo. We just had to go and assimilate into pony culture. Well I hope you're happy!"

"Come on, Jackie, it's not that bad. This is a city. There's money everywhere. We just have to get our mitts on some of it," I said more than a little desperately. To my surprise, she actually took on a thoughtful expression, her anger taking a backseat.

"What, you mean steal it?"

"Well, that's always plan X. If anything goes south."

"Sure, I could get down with that."

"...What?"

"I... kinda had to steal a lot when I first got here. Well, to the other Equestria, I mean. Got pretty good at it, too," she said it as if it was a point of pride.

"Sooner or later, we really should just sit down and have a nice, long talk," I mumbled under my breath and rubbed my mug with a hoof. "But before we resort to thievery, we should at least try to get some cash the non-criminal way."

"So, what, part time at a burger joint, or whatever it is these ponies have? That'll take forever. We need gold and we need it now."

"Well, I could always stand under the next lamp post and do it like the girls in St. Pauli but I am seriously not in the mood to let any greasy stallion put one away with me. Also, I highly doubt Zinnia would ever let me live that down. At least not when she could not be part of it." I mused more to myself, not fully noticing Jackie´s reaction. "Plus I don´t know the rates here in Equestria, so I would probably undercharge." Then I continued, addressing my companion properly "Come one, think logical. From all we have seen so far, from all we... that is I, know, this world is a mix of modern and medieval and what do we know about medieval hoedowns? There were always ways to make quick money, like, dunno, little game stands or something along these lines?"

"Do they even have those here?"

"Of course they do!" Well, I hope so, at least. "We just gotta go and look," I said cheerfully, not that it had much effect on her.

"I still say we should just lift whatever we can, it wouldn't even be that hard. Hell, with this disguise spell you showed me I bet we could even..." She stopped mid-rant, mouth opened soundlessly and a dawning look of realization spread over her face.

"Uh... Jackie?" I poked her shoulder after five seconds of her impersonating a dying fish.

Her head snapped at me and I swear I could practically hear the gears grinding in her head as her little noggin hatched no doubt devious, unsavory schemes. As if to further emphasize this point, a near-Joker smile stretched over her face.

"Am I gonna like what you're about to say?" I asked warily.

"Probably not."

I sighed. "Okay, shoot."

"You. Me. Dress up as the princesses and bilk the nearest bank out of their loot," she said with a fierce smile.

That... that's actually not an entirely crappy idea, and this must have shown up in my face as Jackie prodded further.

"it's perfect, don’t you see? We can disguise ourselves as Celestia and Luna, go in, throw down some princess authority and make off with whatever we can carry. It's brilliant." She descended into a fit of small, low chuckles, deviously rubbing her little hooves together.

I admit, I was more than a little tempted to take her up on her offer, if nothing more for the opportunity to relive some childhood fantasies with Phil and I making off like bandits. Hey, this might actually work and...

"Whoa, whoa, hold your metaphorical horses, girl," I urged as Jackie now started literally vibrating from excitement.

"What now?" She said, annoyed.

"You really think it'll be that easy? What if the bank manager or whatever need like... I dunno, a password from the princesses to know it's for real or some sort of documents. Complications like these could give us away."

She waved a hoof impatiently. "So we threaten to have them executed or thrown to the dungeons or something. Hell, I could do the talking if you're squeamish about it. So long as flex some muscle and authority, we can steal whatever we can and disappear before anyone knows what hit them. We can literally be any pony we want! It's a perfect plan."

I rubbed the bridge of my nose. "Jackie... no. Just no. It's a good plan, I'll admit that much but we can't go around robbing banks. That kind of stuff tends to paint a big, honking target on your back and that's the last thing either of us needs right now."

"Oh for... have you forgotten the part where we can look like whoever we want? Long as we take some precautions we'll never be found."

"No is no, girl, and that's final," I said with as much authority as I could muster. "If nothing else, this is still my universe and if anything goes wrong, it's me who'll have to deal with the fallout. Sorry, squirt. If it's any consolation, I would have liked to try the whole Bonnie and Clyde thing with you if the circumstances were different, but my word is final."

I led the way and the still grouchy girl followed though as luck would have it, we just happened to pass by the bank, appropriately called 'Bank of Yule' and though Jackie's gaze did linger longingly on the concrete structure, she relented and followed me still, darkly muttering, "Better be fucking worth it" and "Bleeding heart tree hugger." We had to ask a few ponies, but sure enough, some very helpful stallions pointed us to the right way. Turns out the festival had an entire section dedicated to these sort of games.

Most of them seemed to be more or less the same like on good, old Earth.

There were those games were you had to find the pea under one of three cups, which I pointedly avoided. Those where always rigged and I had lost enough cash to prove it.

Something that looked interesting was a game where a surprisingly large mouse was set down in a little wooden box that was lined with miniature houses all around, which each bore a number ranging from one to thirteen. One had to bet correctly into which house the little rodent would scurry of to win the pot. Seemed easy enough and I was about to bet myself when suddenly a small foal pointed out that the mouse used was not an ordinary mouse but something called an 'Escovil Mouse' or something along these lines. A mouse that, from what the foal said was on the same level of sapiens like a foal itself so it could probably choose a door nopony was betting on in order for the games owner to win. The griffin that ran the stand grew visibly nervous and was quick to assure us that it was a ordinary mouse he caught in the little room he had rented in a shabby Inn near Downtown. That was the line that broke the camel's back as the supposed ordinary mouse suddenly stood on his hind paws, pulled a little black hat and a suitcase out of nowhere and squeaked in quite a pissed off tone that 'he was never insulted like that in his whole life and that the griffin could now look for someone else to pull the bits out of the people's pockets' and left the box through a little door. Jackie and I wisely left as a mob of angry (and most likely cheated out of their hard earned money) ponies, griffins and yaks descended on the doomed griffin.

The poor cat-bird's wails of pain aside, we continued on to look for suitable games. Nothing but small-time stuff, really, and they were games that did not exactly give out a lot of cash. I pondered aloud whether we should take our chances with them, but Jackie opposed my plan, insisting we look for bigger fish. Well, that and the fact if these games are anything like on good ol' Earth, they're most likely rigged. And of course, we'd have to pay to play them on the first place.

But luck seemed to finally smile down on us, for as we headed deeper into downtown, Jackie and I became aware of two magically amplified voices that easily carried over most everything around us.

"Excuse me," I asked a nearby mare who eagerly trotted to the voices' source. "What's going on over there?"

"Haven't you heard? It's the Magnificent Mustachio Mafioso and his wife, the Beguiling and Perplexing Pandora!" She gushed with a squee, eyes aglow and cheeks rosy. "They've been going on tour throughout Equestria this past year and everypony says their shows are all the rage. Oh, my stars, I never thought they would come all the way to Yule." With that, she promptly galloped towards this show.

I looked to Jackie, who seemed to know what I was thinking and before she could make any objections known, I got in first word. "Well, my dear pony friend. Since we're here and all, might as well check it out, hm?"

The corner of her lip twitched, no doubt she wanted to oppose this course of action, but by some small miracle, she closed her eyes and sighed, her posture slumping. "Alright, fine," she said sullenly. "But let's make it quick."

Oh, I see ya, girl. She was curious, just didn't want to admit it. Well, that suited me fine. I didn't plan on dallying that long anyway.

We did not have to trot far to find a big, neigh, hugeass crowd of ponies, griffins and yaks gathered in front and partially even around a pretty impressive looking stage. Polished hardwood floors that gleamed below the stage lights, props dotted the background, framed by some surprisingly expensive looking stage curtains. Some spectators even hovered in the air in case of griffins and the occasional Pegasus, or they stood on crates or barrels to see over the heads of their artiodactyl brethren.

But enough of gawking at the crowd, it was high time to see what all the hype was about. Judging from the reactions all around us, one could think that the pony variants of good old Siegfried and Roy were about to make a free show with all the Playboy girls as assistants.

"'Scuse me," I muttered as I used my superior mass to (gently) plow a path to the front rows for me and Jackie, though her method was considerably less gentle than mine. Given that she trailed behind me, plus her smaller size, ponies were quick to crowd around her, and she promptly pushed and shoved them out of the way and more than one poor sod ended up tasting dirt-encrusted snow. Eugh... "Sorry. Comin´ through. Careful, hot stuff on the way. Hey, watch the horn partner!"

Finally, we made it to the first row. I ignored the stink eyes that I felt burning into the back of my head and looked for the performers. Hmm, so far the stage was empty but just as I was about to ask someone when the performers would show up, something that sounded like muffled thunder could be heard and judging from the fact that all the quadrupeds around us turned their gaze as one to the stage told me that this could very well be the intro to the show.

The thunder grew louder and just then, something occurred to me. This was far to rhythmic to be thunder but did not sound like drums either.

"Holy fuck, are those steps?" I muttered involuntary as my eyes grew wide as I began to feel the vibrations seep into my hooves. Just what the ever-loving fuck was going on here?

The crowd cheered as the curtains began to ripple like agitated water and like the Red Sea, the ridiculously expensive looking fabric parted before a Behemoth of an earth pony, a stallion if the thick handlebar moustache and the barrel chest were any indications. Seriously, the guy looked like he could eat Big Macintosh as a snack and still have room for more. If I had to take a guess, I'd say the magnificent beefcake of a pony was either about to or had already hit middle age, not that it made him any less formidable. Muscles rippled beneath his frame and at nearly twice the height of your average stallion, his frame was made all the more intimidating. He had a tan coat and a healthy black mane that was cut in a way one always saw on these strongman on old fashioned carnivals. The fact that he was wearing a leotard and one of these leather bracers on his right foreleg only helped to cement that image.

Oh and let us not forget the fact that he was effortlessly carrying a fucking safe as big as a washing machine on his broad shoulders without a single bead of sweat on his face!

I took my jaw from the ground and stuck it back into place as the mountain of a equine came to a stop, flashed a blindingly bright smile to the crowd and began talking. Well, booming would be more fitting, but details.

"Come one, come all, and marvel at the amazing feats of strength and power by none other than the Magnificent Mustachio Mafioso!" The beefcake pony then, I shit you not, reared on his hind hooves and tossed the freaking safe into the air as easily as one might toss a tennis ball. The ponies wowed and awed as this Mustachio caught the falling safe in his hooves, and just for shits and giggles, twirled it like a baton. For the finishing touch, he slammed the thing down on the stage floor, and I couldn't help but notice it remained unscuffed or blemished by the supposedly heavy safe even though they creaked audibly.

Not that it mattered to the ponies around, for they cheered and stomped their hooves in approval as flashy fireworks set off behind Mustachio, enveloping the stage in a stunning array of flashing colors. Heck, I couldn't help but join in with everypony else although... something seemed oddly familiar about this. Oh, well, thinking's for nerds and mad scientists. I had a show to enjoy.

Not sooner as the last firework had sparkled out, cornflower blue smoke began to emanate from seemingly nowhere, turning the stage into a spitting image of a Scottish march together with a subtle but enthralling music that seemed to originate from the safe itself.

As I tried to make heads or tails out of this, I noticed that many ponies and griffins, notably all males with the occasional female sprinkled in, began to cheer and whistle in a very specific way.

"Ponies, griffins and yaks of Yule," a new voice, this one clearly female, could be heard and the cheers nearly tripled. "Are you ready to be amazed beyond your wildest imaginations? Bedazzled and charmed like never before and to witness feats of magic that even the Royal Sisters only found appraising words for?"

Wow, the owner of the voice performed for Celly and Lulu and got props from them? Unholy fuck! That was some serious rep.

Obviously, the crowd went wild.

The music grew in volume until it resembled these beats one would expect in a smoky jazz bar and shadows began to move in the mist in a dance like fashion.

I had to admit, whoever was pulling this show knew his or her stuff, this was top grade entertainment. A quick glance to the side revealed to me that even little Miss Grumpy-Pants had a hard time not to show that she was at least as intrigued as I was. Maybe even a bit more, if the little sparkles in her eyes were something to go after.

"So whatddaya think, girl? Not too shabby, is it?" The girl merely shrugged, making a noncommittal noise. I rolled my eyes and returned my attention to the show. "Well, be interesting to see magic tricks by ponies who can actually perform magic, hm?"

"I guess..."

Then, the crowd roared as even more of the smoke poured onto the stage and the same female voice could be heard. "Now then, mares and gentlecolts, prepare yourself for the amazing, the stunning, the tantalizing, the one and only..." The voice gained a definite Jessica Rabid quality, smoky and husky and totally screaming, 'I´m everyone's wet dream and I know it!'

The big, stirring wheel thing on the door of the safe began to rotate.

All around us, the spectators leaned forward.

Slowly, agonizingly so, the safe´s door swung open.

"The Beguiling..."

I caught myself intently staring at the stage too, trying to figure out what would happen next but found myself unable too.

"… and Perplexing..."

The heavy metal door opened complete and just that moment, a swarm of birds burst out of it... no, they weren´t birds, but rather fireworks that looked like birds. Phoenixes perhaps? Anyways it was a massive page out of Gandalf's big book of magnificent pyro techniques and it looked glorious.

Everyone was looking around wildly.

"Pandora!" Finished the mysterious female voice as suddenly, a new figure appeared on the stage or to be more precise, directly on Mustachio´s back!

If the crowd was going wild before, now Pandemonium broke loose! I had a hard time to stay up-right as all around me, bodies moved like the stormy sea in order to get a better view. Hell, I even had to act quick and take Jackie on my back with a fast and well practiced maneuver to avoid getting separated from her.

The new-comer was a Unicorn mare with a powder blue coat and a sea blue mane that cascaded over the left half of her face, effortlessly giving her a ever so slightly wicked aura. She was wearing a very interesting outfit consisting of a white dress shirt without arms, a black swallow tail jacket (without arms too), something that looked like these bloomer things that one always saw the typical magician's assistant wearing, in combination with very tasteful black fishnets on her hind legs and some sort of black shoe things.

Cat calls and wolf whistles soon drowned out whatever semblance of cheering preceded them, and I couldn't exactly blame them, as I too participated. This Pandora was one foxy lady. Gahh, if only I didn't have a girlfriend...

Or she wasn´t married to a Pony that could probably crush me effortlessly should I ever even dare to make a move on his better half. Oh well, a girl can dream, yes?

The stage ponies basked in the attention and as soon as the crowd calmed down a bit (took a surprising amount of time, too) Pandora slid off Mustachio's massive frame and I just couldn't help but wonder. I mean, he's so friggin' huge! How does he not crush her when they're, well, intimate or whatever?

Circling around her hubby, Pandora moved with a sleek, fluid gait, hindquarters bobbing and swaying in a manner that just drew the eyes to that smooth, ripe, perfectly sculpted ass and... uh, no! Think unsexy thoughts. Think unsexy thoughts! Argh, to late! Stupid sexy Unicorn!

"Now, dear ponies," Pandora said, her voice husky, leading, like she knew every stallion (and some mares) in the audience wanted her. "We have a little surprise for you today," the seductress pony said as she paced back and forth at the lip of the stage, numerous sets of eyes following. "Come and give a hoof to our very own daughter, the Great and Powerful Trixie!"

Sparks of all colors emerged from the floor beside Pandora along with a puff of smoke and when it cleared, there was the showboating showpony herself, in the very same attire from Boast Busters, chest puffed out and head held high. I swear, my jaw literally dropped as the connection between the three ponies suddenly became clear.

"Ow!" I exclaimed as something forcefully poked the back of my head.

"Quit gawping. You look like an idiot," Jackie said from atop my back.

"B-but... tha... do you know who that is?" I demanded, pointing to Trixie, who like her parents, basked in the attention.

"She just said it, didn't she? The Great and Powerful Trixie," she said mockingly.

"No, that's not what I... oh, who cares. Just watch the show," I grumbled. Right, I forgot that before this, the girl had never been exposed to MLP in her life. I idly wondered whether this was because she actively avoided it or because there was no MLP in her universe. I made a mental note to ask later, for I'd missed what happened next on stage.

From what happened next, I'd say Pandora announced Trixie as her 'assistant' or whatever, for the showpony moved to the center of the stage, her parents giving her a wide berth, making sure all eyes were on her.

"As I'm sure everypony is aware," Pandora said. "Yours truly is a bit of an enthusiast in regards of creatures of myth and legend. Well, for my opening trick today, I, the Beguiling and Perplexing Pandora, calling upon the arcane arts, will transform my dear daughter into a creature known to all as the most obscure of all mystic beings. Of course, I am talking about nothing else but an elusive creature, one seen only in fleeting glimpses and whom nopony has ever captured before. Naturally, I am talking about the one and only, the genuine Human!"

Say what?!? I felt my eyes nearly pop out of their sockets as I stared at Pandora like she just declared that she found the cure to Pony-Aids. On my back, I felt Jackie tense up too.

The crowd, they seemed to take to the idea with flying colors, shouting and stomping their approval, all but begging the alluring magician to show her art to them.

From my spot, I could see that Trixie's composure seemed to crack ever so slightly under her mask of haughty confidence.

"Is she for real?" Jackie asked from her perch. I didn't answer, not daring to even blink.

Pandora's horn glowed, her aura swelling with magical power. Out of thin air, two ribbons made of what looked to be magic made tangible encircled Trixie—sapphire blue in color—spinning around the showpony. As they picked up speed, a white light materialized from under Trixie's hooves, bright and translucent, but not so much so that it hurt to look at. It rose steadily until completely enveloping the now somewhat twitchy unicorn. The conjured ribbons spun ever faster, the light that enveloped Trixie swelled like a balloon about to burst, and burst it did. With an explosion that scattered motes of multicolored light in all directions, there stood a newly transformed Trixie.

My jaw unhinged at the sight that presented itself to us. Really should let a doctor check that, happened quite a lot lately.

Right there, on the stage stood an honest to everything human Trixie. Or well, her equivalent from Equestria Girls, plus something extra. The body structure was right by any means, long, slender legs with five toed feet, arms long enough to reach the middle of the thighs with delicate looking hands at the ends that Trixie used to stabilize herself by holding onto the safe her Dad brought on the stage and had not yet disposed of. Her platinum colored hair was still the same and so was her skin color, still powder blue like her coat. Oh and she was butt naked! I mean, seriously, that Pandora called herself an human enthusiast and completely forgot the most prominent part about human lore? The effing clothes? I mean, not that she did not do an outstanding job making Trixie´s human body look utterly delectable. Human Trixie was now sporting a smooth stomach with the cutest belly button, a waist that looked like I could almost close my hands around it without looking unhealthy, legs for days and her sweater-puppies were nothing to scoff at either. They were even at the right place, sitting on her chest, perky and proud.

Sweet Baby Jesus, they looked to scrumptious! Good thing I had Jackie on my back, or else I might have said and/or done something I would probably regret. Speaking of Jacqueline, she was suspiciously quiet.

Anyway, now I noticed that aside from the skin color, Pandora got another few details wrong. Instead of human ears, a pair of powder blue pony ears sat on top of her poofy hair, swiveling ever so slightly from side to side and behind her, I could see a Trixie´s old tail still attached to her behind, swishing to and fro, indicating the transformed mare's state of mind. Additionally, her digits lacked nails and her boobies, tasty as they were, were without nipples. Not that it made them any less pleasant to look at. Also, her crotch was looking more like that of a Barbie doll than an actual womanhood but hey, she got it pretty close without ever seeing but the hair of a actual human being.

Still, for all the inaccuracies and imperfections, the crowd ate it up and now the roars, whistles and stomps reached a near deafening crescendo. Trixie, quickly gaining her composure, grinned widely and held out her arms in a classic Leo DiCaprio pose, causing the ponies to cheer louder. I joined in wholeheartedly.

"That's what passes for human around here? Ugh," Jackie groaned as the crowd quieted down. I was about to scold her for being such a sourpuss when somepony beat me to the punch.

"What's this? Are Trixie's ears betraying her? Because it sounds to Trixie like there are neighsayers in the audience," the haughty unicorn-now-humanoid said, eyes immediately locking on to the two of us. Damn, that's some pinpoint hearing she's got there. I don't think I could have done the same. Then again, I was no little quadruped prey species originally.

By some force, call it experience in pointing out neighsayers or any number or neuroses, Trixie's roving eyes locked onto us. "So, you two ponies think yourselves better than us, do you?"

Goddamn it, Jacqueline! "Uh... no, no! That's not it at all. M-my little friend here was just..."

"Oh, woe be to us, dear husband," Pandora sighed in a theatrical moan. "It seems somepony is not satisfied with our performance."

"A challenge then?!" Mustachio boomed. Challenge? Where did he pull that out of? "So," he said as he trotted closer, his hooves causing minor tremors in the stage. "You ponies think Mustachio and Mustachio's family are hacks, do you?" The mountain of a pony asked, lumbering over me like doom given form.

What? No! When did I say that? It was her! The little brat atop me!

"Fine. You two fillies, come here to the stage where Mustachio and his family can get a better look at you."

I scarcely remembered a time I was more embarrassed. Pretty sure it happened, but it was a bit hard to remember. Maybe that one day when Leo played in my room and found the box containing my sex toys under my bed, curiously asking Mom and me what those weird things were. The spectator ponies scrambled away like we were lepers or something, leaving us to stand in a wide berth and eyeing us in a similar manner.

At some point, the brat had clambered down me and readily returned the glares everypony shot at us, and if she had fingers, I'd bet she'd be making good use of them at this time.

Powering through the embarrassment, I hooked a foreleg around my 'friend's' throat and yanked thusly, wanting to just get it over with. It slightly helped that I imagined myself strangling her.

The now silent stage held its breath as we clambered up the stairs and eyeing us all the way were the three showponies. Trixie made no effort to hide her arrogant disdain, head held high and looking down at us snootily which was rather easy, seeing as she was still under the influence of her Mommy's spell. Heh, kinda made me want to give her a good conk.

"Now then, neighsayers," Pandora said. "What are your names?"

I gulped. Damn sexy unicorn. What business does she have being all alluring even now? I opened my mouth, but rather than words, a hollow rattling sound came through. Agh! Come on, focus. Breathe. Yes, that's better.

Pandora looked on patiently while Trixie rolled her eyes, tapping a foot in impatience and Mustachio... well, it was kinda hard to read him, really. Still friggin' huge though...

"Umbra," I managed to eke out. "Umbra Illusion."

"And you?" She asked Jackie next.

"Uh, that is... Pretty Prancer, yes, my very good friend Pretty Prancer." I rushed out with a smile that was just a hint malicious before Jackie-Girl could answer anything stroppy. From somewhere beside me, a strangled kind of choking noise could be heard and yes, I couldn't help but smirk a little more, feeling my villainous needs ever so slightly satisfied.

Pandora nodded. "Umbra Illusion. Pretty Prancer," she said, looking respectively at me and 'Pretty' whose teeth were bared and grinding, her fuzzy mug quickly taking on the hue of a tomato. "Do you ponies think us hacks? Showboats?"

"O-of course not," I croaked.

"Then again, you did create that horrific abomination of man and beast, so..." Jackie said unapologetically, gesturing to the mutant Trixie. My head whipped around so fast I'm pretty sure I got whiplash, shooting a murderous look at the brat who in turn shot me a shit-eating grin.

"What she means to say is—" I began, hoping to undo the damage. Alas, no such luck.

"Horrific abomination? Horrific. Abomination?!?" Trixie all but screeched, her light blue cheeks nearly turning purple, together with a vein starting to pulse dangerously on her neck. "You dare to besmirch the astounding spell craft of Trixie´s mother like that? A mare that even Celestia herself called the best Illusionist of her generation? You dare..." She made a step forward and to be honest, I felt just the tiniest bit intimidated, if just for the righteous fury blazing in the mare turned woman´s eyes. Luckily, the behemoth of her father held her back by simply stepping half in front of her, cutting of her path, giving his better half a meaningful look all the while.

Pandora for her part seemed to get the message as her horn lit up again and in a flash of light, Trixie was her horsy self again. Not that it seemed to diminish her wrath in any way.

"Why, such crude criticism, I am wounded." Pandora 'lamented' before her face gained a serious expression worthy of the Godfather himself, all hints of seductive sexiness vanished without a trace. "If you think so low of my spells, then I propose a contest between the four of us. Let us test our wits and brawn against each other to determinate who of us is the superior and who deserves to be called the Grandest of the Grand." She turned to the masses who watched in anxious silence "What do you say ponies, griffins and yaks of Yule? Do you want to see a battle of might and magic worthy of its own tale being told for generations to come?" Pandora had not to wait for even a second before the masses roared their approval. Respect were it was due, that lady was a master demagogue.

Walking over to stand beside her hubby and daughter, Pandora shot Jackie and I a thin, dangerous smile that just screamed 'You just done goofed!' as loud as the unwashed masses in front of the stage.

"The audience has spoken. What say you, Umbra and Pretty Prancer? Do you accept our challenge?"

"Depends. Is there a prize?" Jackie asked.

"I beg your pardon?"

"Look, Jezebel," Jackie said. "Believe it or not, we got better things to do than perform parlor tricks in front of you... ponies," she said at last. Well, I guess it's better than whatever other word she had in mind.

"What she meant to say is that: would it not be much more entertaining if there was a prize at stake?" I interjected, trying my hand at being the diplomatic one around here.

This in turn seemed to got the interest of Mustachio as the colossus pony took on a complementing expression, his handlebar moustache waggling ever so slightly while he silently worked his jaw. Finally, his lips broke into a huge grin (was everything on this guy extra large or was it just me?) and he stomped his hoof on the stage, causing a small scale quake.

"A wager then? Moustachio approves of this," the huge pony boomed. "Pandora, sun of my stars, what do you think?"

"A marvelous idea, husband," she said smoothly. "A little spice makes everything nice after all. Fine," she said, turning back to us. "We will henceforth compete so see which among us is truly the greatest. Should you young ladies win, your prize shall be the total sum of today's earnings—one thousand bits!"

The crowd cheered and stomped their hooves while my eyebrows shot up into my skull. One thousand bits? Not shabby. Not too shabby at all. "We accept!" I declared loudly and the crowd cheered even louder.

Pandora waved a hoof, signaling the masses to quiet. "As we accept as well. Now, as Equestria's premier illusionist and strongpony, you and your, uh..."

"Friend," I clarified.

"Yes. The two of you will try to outshine mine and my husband's feats of strength and skill. Should you succeed, the gold is yours."

"And if we lose?" I asked.

"If that case should come to be, and it will," Trixie stepped from behind her parents and lit up her horn to conjure two large cardboard signs with strings on them to wear them around ones neck and a black marker from somewhere. "You will admit right here, in front of all those spectators that Trixie´s parents are superior to the two of you in any way possible and wear these as long as you remain in this city." The marker squeaked as the younger showpony busied herself with scribbling something on the signs, then showed to us what she wrote. Now the signs said 'Loudmouthed, unworthy frauds!' And 'We stink!' In flowing script, with small versions of Jackie and Me underneath, heads hung in shame and some sort of wiggly stinky lines rising from our sketch counterparts' heads.

I sighed. "Great, is that all?"

Trixie hummed, tapping a hoof against her chin and eyeing Jackie for a moment. "Yes, Trixie will also want those earmuffs." She promptly pointed to my little friend's winter wear. Jackie looked surprised at this, but quickly removed the things and tossed them over to Trixie.

"Keep them," she said, seemingly glad to be rid of them. Trixie caught them in her magic, grinning and quickly donned the 'muffs.

"But you looked so cute in them," I said mildly.

"Shut up."

"So it is decided!" Moustachio boomed. "Let the contest begin." He took a step towards us and puffed his impressive, perfect to lean against and purr kitten barrel chest out. "Moustachio will, as always, the first to start. Behold!" He boomed. This seemed to be some sort of signal because from somewhere underneath the stage, whirrs could be heard and a portion of the floor slid open to reveal some sort of lift platform that was laden to the brim with all kind of weights, dumbbells, heavy chains and even the odd anvil. How the blooming fuck did all this fit underneath the damn stage?

Trotting over to the assorted heavy objects, Moustachio made a small show of flexing his impressive muscles, earning whistles and cheers from the audience. Then, with a blinding smile, he hooked his left leg around the bar of a weight with those stereotypical cannonballs at each end. To my secret amusement, they even had a big fifty painted on each ball. Without even flinching, he then raised the damn thing over his head in a fluid movement like someone else might reach for something in a shelf. To top his action, Mr. Stache McStacheington twirled the damn thing around like a cheerleader baton a few times before he let go of it, causing surprised gasps from the crowd as the heavy weight sailed through the air. Just as the cherry on top, Moustachio then caught flying device with nothing else but his freaking mouth, giving it another twirl and in an seemingly impossible feat of 'how the hell did he do that', placed the whole weight on top of his nose, balancing it like a seal would a ball!

My jaw met the stage floor and the crowd went wild. It was at this point that I reconsidered the wisdom of my agreeing to this challenge. I mean, as the Overlady, I did have a leg up as far as physical strength goes. Well, compared to other humans at least, but the prospect of a thousand moolah made me momentarily forget I was not at my best right now.

"Well, looks like this is me," Jackie said from beside me. Huh, I kinda forgot she was abnormally strong for a runt. Hopefully she'll be able to make something of herself.

The crowd laughed as the small pony took center stage and I could practically hear her teeth gnashing against each other. Please don’t do something stupid. Please don't do something stupid...

Moustachio barked out a full bellied laugh. Trixie could also be heard tittering on the side while all Pandora did was raising an intrigued brow. It did look comical, I'll admit. The Goliath of a pony challenged by someone he could use to pick his teeth with. Then again, we all knew how those kind of stories normally went down right?

"So, little filly, have you come to admit defeat against Moustachio and his spectacular feats of power?" He demanded while making a show of flexing his absurdly massive muscles, eliciting cheers from the crowd.

The girl-turned-pony's lips curled in a disdainful sneer, but thankfully refrained from, well, speaking at all. She walked on over to the platform, inspecting the assorted weights, hefting a couple of the smaller ones in a hoof. Not appearing satisfied, she turned back to Moustachio. "Is this all you got? Come on, Meatlug, give me a real challenge."

Moustachio's eye twitched ever so briefly. Granted, given that all of him was so freaking massive, it did not go unnoticed. "You dare to make fun of Moustachio?!" He demanded, moustache bristling in indignation. "Fine. Trixie, my dearest daughter, bring forth the Big One," he commanded to the aforementioned pony, whose horn lit up and, materializing above the stage floor a scant few hands above Jackie's head, emerged the mother of all weights, causing her to look up in surprise.

A monster of metal, trapezoidal in shape, the size of a car, its sides marked in white lettering with the number 4,000 and with an overtly large handle at the top—as if anyone could get his hands around that thing. It fell with all the grace of a plummeting blimp, crashing against the stage floor with a deafening bang with my little friend barley dodging out of the way in the last second.

I was afraid I had to step on any moment to stop Jaqueline from murderizing a visibly shaken and bashful looking Trixie, but to my immense surprise, all the girl did was shooting the showpony a look like thermite that made her wilt even more.

The crowd murmured in awe at the thing and at this point, I could feel myself sweating up a storm. That... wha... how in the world is anybody supposed to lift that?! Hell, even Jackie seemed to have doubts if her face was any indication.

"You wanted a challenge, filly? Well, it's a challenge you get! Even Moustachio can barely lift this. He is eager to see what you will do."

Swallowing, Jackie circled the monster. All eyes on her, the stage was now silent. She hoisted a hoof on the thing, then another, and rose on two legs. Curious as to what she planned, I extended my senses just a tad, wanting to see if she'd employ magic on this puppy.

Yup, she did. Power surged through her limbs and with one mighty pull, she heaved the massive weight a good six meters in the air. The crowd gasped, even Moustachio choked on his words, but Jackie was not done yet. As the thing lost its momentum and dropped, Jackie charged forward, meeting it head on and in one of the most absurd, stupid things I've ever seen anybody do, she crashed her skull against it, eliciting a deafening, gong-like sound as the weight sailed through the air and into the spectators, who cried out in alarm and scattered like so many bugs.

By this point, all three stage ponies were doing a good impression of an idiotic, dying fish as the monster of metal crashed down on the ground, creating a mini crater in its wake.

Just as my absurdly overpowered little friend stood there, the mother of all smug smiles etched on her muzzle, I had an neat idea to put the extra icing on top of the cherry on top of the epic cake of epicness Jaqueline just served piping hot, straight from the oven.

"How´s that Yule? Witness the one, the only, Pretty Prancer!" I half yelled in my best entertainer voice as I began trotting up and down the stage. "Come on Yule, I can´t hear you, give it up for the diminutive wonder, the oompfh packing filly, the mean machine of awesome in a room saving package." I flashed my biggest grin to the awed crowd, gesturing to Jackie with one hoof. "I said, I can´t hear you!" I all but roared and it worked. Only a few at first, the spectators began to stomp applause, then a good dozen, then several and in the blink of an eye, the whole crowd was going wild again, chanting the name Pretty Prancer over and over again, much to Jackie's mortification. I allowed me a satisfied smirk, mission accomplished. Yepp, that was how you fired up a crowd.

Still smiling broadly, I turned around to Jackie and the Showpony family. It satisfied me immensely to see smug pride and utter embarrassment rage a merciless war on my little friend's face while Moustachio looked like he was ready to cash in his sanity card because he just witnessed a mare that barley reached up to his sternum do something with contemptuous ease that even he had trouble with and Trixie had a striking resemblance to a stone statue, with her mouth wide open and her pupils so small they were almost invisible. Only momma Pandora had retained a semblance of her former composure, but it was clear her mask started to crack.

"Hmm, looks like we won this round judging after the audience's reaction yes?" I asked, only halfheartedly trying to not let my voice ooze with smugness.

It was that moment that Trixie managed to overcome her petrification. Her gob twisted in indignation and anger. If I had to guess, I'd say she was going for intimidating, but those Parasprite earmuffs were really hampering her efforts. "No!" She screamed out, making a step forward, thrusting an accusing hoof at Jackie aka Pretty Prancer "No, you´ve not! That mare clearly cheated! Not even Trixie´s father could hope to do what she just did and Moustachio is the strongest Earth Pony in the recorded history of Equestria! There is no way in Tartarus that a pint sized mare like your friend could have bested him!" Jeez, there was the pulsing vein again. That mare seriously needed to lay of the espresso or something.

"Is that so?" Jackie asked, taking a step forward. "Well, Great and Powerful Trixie, why don't you come on over? I'll show you first hand just how much a cheat I am," she said while doing an approximation of cracking her knuckles, just... with hooves. I dunno. Either way, it seemed to do the trick as Trixie looked that much more hesitant.

Luckily, it was that moment that Pandora decided to show that she was clearly the composed one in the family as she gave her half fuming, half scarred daughter a loving nuzzle and even an affectionate little lick over the cheek. Hmm, must been the equine equivalent to a motherly peck or something. "Now, now my dear, this is most unbecoming of you. A true Roani never lets her emotions get the better of herself onstage." The mage mare gently chided her hot blooded offspring before looking at Jackie and me, well, more Jackie. "While I say that the outcome baffles me to no end, there is no way to deny that Pretty Prancer did best your father fair and square." With that, her horn lit up and out of nowhere a magic projection appeared in the air over the stage, not unlike the stuff Trixie used in her Boast Busters ep, only worlds more refined. The whole thing looked like one of those football score boards, with the faces of the whole showpony family on one side and mine and Jackie´s on the other. Our side of the board read a neat one while the other side read zero.

Moustachio sighed. An action that would normally be mundane but the big lug's succeeded in ruffling the heavy-looking stage curtains. "Though it pains Moustachio to admit it, he knows when he's been beat. But Moustachio assure you, little lady," he looked to Jackie solemnly. "From this point forward, Moustachio will train and push himself harder than ever before and one day, he will hunt you down and see once and for all who is truly the strongest." With that, the massive stallion lumbered to the very back of the stage and resembled a statue more than anything.

Giving her husband a nod, Pandora turned to me, again slipping into her sexylicious routine. "Well then, looks like this leaves the two of us now, yes?" The mare-devil asked me as she swaggered over to me, a small smile on her lush lips... was she wearing lipstick? Sure as hell looked like it. Aaaanyways! I had to concentrate on pressing matters, namely what the obviously best Illusionist in all of Equestria had up her non-existent sleeves for me.

"For our contest, my dear Umbra, I propose that we each show our best magic act and like before, whoever earns the most applause from the audience will win this round. Do you agree?" Pandora all but cooed in a voice that had me sweating bullets for different reasons. That the undeniably gorgeous mare was sashaying around me close enough to get a good whiff of her heady perfume had totally nothing to do with it!

I swear, if I did not knew better, I would have thought that mare the pony version of Zinnia!

Fighting the dryness in my mouth, I finally managed to respond. "Y-yes, that sounds delicious... ehrm, I mean, agreeable. Yes, that is totally what I meant!"

The smile on Pandora´s lips intensified without ever even threatening to break her façade of classy stallion (and maybe mare) eater-ness. She gave me a wink over her shoulder before she asked me if I would mind if she would the one to start. All I could do was shake my head, hope that my dark coat would hide my furious blush and trot back to the sidelines, from where Jackie was sitting giving me a look bordering on disgust, while simultaneously managing to give of vibes along the lines of 'Are you freaking shitting me?' Judging from the way she silently moved her mouth. She even drove her elbow into my ribs as soon as I sat down at her side with quite some force.

Pandora nodded in satisfaction. She turned back to the masses, who'd been watching in rapt attention.

"Everypony, for our second challenger, I present to you Umbra Illusion," she gestured to me with her hoof and as if on cue, one of the stage lights(who was working those, by the way?) shone down on me, to my moderate surprise.

Umbra and I, The Beguiling and Perplexing Pandora, shall engage in a contest to see which of us is truly the greatest illusionist to ever roam these lands," she finished with a flourish, her voice rising in pitch and like Moustachio before her, a number of dazzling fireworks went off behind her. The ponies cheered and whistled. Some catcalls sprinkled in as well as Pandora trotted with that damnably tasty swaying of her plot to her respective place on the stage.

"Now, let us begin!" Pandora declared dramatically, her horn flaring to life once again. The same low music from before emanated from seemingly everywhere again as she began her act. I must admit, I was more than curious to see what Trixie´s yummy MILF could do.

Pandora gave the whole audience a smoldering gaze, coupled with a sultry smile as she began to sway her hips to the beat not unlike a Belly dancer. The males(and some females) that made up the audience appropriately drooled, entranced at the display. Well, all this certainly explained were the 'Beguiling' in Pandora's name came from.

Pandora basked in the attention and from my peripheral vision, I could see Trixie rolling her eyes and facehoofing at her mom's display with a healthy blush sneaking on her cheeks. To my not so secret amusement even Jackie blushed, my short companion even more furiously than Trixie.

The magician's horn lit up, conjuring up the smoke from her entrance again. I raised a brow and to be honest, felt rather queasy. If that mare that was rocking the stage just with a bit of fanservice was really the best Illusionist of her generation, than what kind of chance would I stand with my own admittedly rather meager magical skills?

Okay, so I could hurl Fireballs or Lightning and could pull some kind of changeling like transformation but that was it. Oh, and I could also erode anybody's free will and replace it with my own, turning them into thralls, but I don't think that will go over too well. From there it's a slippery slope from inquisitions to persecution and a millennium or two as a rooster/crapper for random birds.

In hindsight, I slowly but surely arrived at the decision that I would probably have been better off contesting against her husband.

At this point, Pandora was dancing more enthusiastically now, much to the crowd's pleasure. Didn´t she say something about her and her family being Roani? Probably the same thing as Roma for the human world. Anyways, that mare sure got her moves down.

Something moved in the wafting fog. The movement reminded me somehow of a whale or a dolphin that was breaking the surface of the sea while swimming... only that the movement seemed... serpentine somehow.

The crowd clearly noticed while Pandora seemed oblivious, never once ceasing her fluid movements.

A shocked gasp rang out as suddenly a long, slender body erupted from the smoke. Its shape resembled a serpentine creature that looked somehow like a Asian dragon, only without the lion-ish head instead sporting a more European one with those weird fin ears and a pair of leathery wings somewhere in the middle of the body. Speaking of the body, from my point I could see that it was ever so slightly transparent around the, well, edges.

The glow of Pandora´s horn died down to a weak glimmer and the music stopped.

So that was part of Pandora´s show hn? Most interessting.

The audience went dead silent as the dragon-serpent loomed over Pandora, the mare seemingly finally noticing that something was wrong. She stopped dancing and slowly turned her head around. Not earlier as she came snout to snout with the beast, her eyes widened and her ears nearly vanished in her mane. She even let out a startled gasp, making a step back.

That mare was a brilliant actress I had to give her that.

The dragon stretched his body to follow Pandora.

The Illusionist took a step to the left. The dragon mirrored her movement, following her with a flap of his wings.

Pandora seemingly froze for a few moments until a look of realization replaced her shocked look. She then took a step back, followed by a step to the right.

The dragon mirrored each movement, seemingly slithering through the air with a grace akin to a dancer more than a overgrown wyrm.

A smile grew on Pandora´s lips as her confidence seemingly returned. The glow of her horn intensified until it was as bright as at the start of her performance again, the music returning which a much more volume. Strangely enough, it now had a familiar, driving vibe, like I knew the tune from somewhere but could not point my finger on it.

The tempo increased, and with it, so too did Pandora's sashaying of her hips. The stagelights dimmed a bit, and where before they bathed the stage in blazing light, now they seemed to take it, lending the area a dusky quality.

Ponies gasped as this served to highlight the dragon's features. It was still transparent to a degree, true, but its vivid green coloring made it a small, writhing sun in the darkened atmosphere.

Its body twisted, circling Pandora. The MILFy mare's hips now gyrated at a rate I thought impossible for ponies, and I could feel myself growing warmer as the blood pooled in my face.

And out of nowhere, the dragon dived, maw wide, revealing an impressive set of gleaming teeth, intending to devour Pandora. Some ponies, so entranced by the show, cried out in alarm, momentarily forgetting this was all an act. But they needn't worry.

Anticipating this, Pandora, in an admittedly impressive display of gymnastic skill, easily turned her body like water, the dragon bypassing her by a hair's width. What I (or anybody else, I'd say) did not expect was for Pandora to grab on to the conjured dragon as it sailed past.

A sharp intake of breath could be heard all around as Pandora literally, not figuratively, rode the damn lizard even as it continued to grow in size, turning in midair, twisting and making all sorts of death defying turns as it tried to shake her off.

Throughout all this, Pandora's visage remained composed. Hell, a small smile played across her lips, seemingly without a care in the world.

Quickly growing agitated, the dragon, in a seemingly last ditch attempt at its freedom and dignity, opened its maw to release a torrent of conjured flame in all directions. Great billowing sheets of amber and golden yellow that glowed so bright it was nearly blinding.

By this point, my jaw was all but gone, I'm sure and though I stood as entranced at the display as anybody else, I could have sworn I had a mini-stroke or two, wondering how in the world I'd be able to top this.

By this point, the dragon twisted so quickly and expelled so many flames that it lost itself in the sea of fire and like that, as the flames remained suspended in midair, not dispelling, its furious roars and bellows silenced.

It lasted only for a heartbeat before the beast's serpentine body shot out of the dome of fire and into the sky. The flames receded and in one final lunge, the dragon finally managed to dislodge the pony that tormented it so.

Quite a few ponies screamed as Pandora found herself literally in the air with nothing to hold onto and gravity quickly reasserted is hold as she plunged back to the hardened stage.

The dragon had not been idle during all this. It swerved upwards, intending to devour the pony as she fell, but Pandora had other plans, it seemed. She extended a delicate hoof, meeting the dragon's aerial charge head on and from her horn, a sphere of bluish white light emerged.

It hovered to her outstretched hoof, where it grew, elongated and took shape of a, for lack of a better word, spectral sword. The dragon and pony met head on. Pandora swerved at the last moment, cleaving the dragon as she fell, her spectral blade leaving a luminescent white gash as the dragon growled weakly, knowing it was defeated.

Pandora, somehow, landed gracefully on the ground, sword dissipating. The music reached as crescendo as the dragon, emitting a death rattle, exploded in a stunning array of fireworks and flashing lights in a display of pyro techniques worthy of Vegas, nay, Gandalf the fucking Gray himself!

Pandora just stood there, her chest heaving visibly, quite a few strands of her mane gone wild not that it would have subtracted from her raw beauty, starring at the stunned crowd.

A heartbeat later, the whole of the audience exploded in deafening cheers, showering Pandora in verbal affection, congratulations and what not.

I felt my tail tug itself between my legs and my ears splay back as I watched Trixie's mother soak in the absolutely hard and well earned praise.

"How the hell am I supposed to top this?" I muttered glumly, watching Pandora wave to her adoring fans, blowing kisses every so often. "Might as well give up now..." Cold dread grew in my stomach as I saw Pandora trot over to her waiting family, Moustachio saying something with a proud and soft expression while Trixie, that powder blue bitch was smugging in my direction, her expression clearly telegraphing something along the lines of 'Bitch, you got nothing on ma momma!'

I did not realize that I was making a slow retreat from the stage until a small hoof made contact with my shoulder, stopping me dead in my tracks.

"And where do you think you're going, hm?" Jackie hissed at me.

"Everywhere but on that stage. Did you see what that mare just pulled? How am I supposed to beat that? Fuck, I could die happy if I ever where to possess even a quarter of that skill and..."

For a moment, my world blurred and seconds later, white hot pain seared through my cheek.

Baffled I stared at Jacqueline who was now standing on her hindlegs, her right front leg still swinging from the bitch slap she just gave me.

"Listen here, you, and listen well." Grabbing ahold of my jacket, the girl pulled me roughly so that we were nose to nose. I could take in all the details of her eyes. "It's your damn fault we're in this ridiculous situation in the first place. You wanted to go and mingle with the little beasts. You insisted on participating on some dumb carny game instead of straight up stealing and of the two of us, you're the adult here, so fucking take responsibility and finish what you started." With that, the impudent little brat spun me around and despite my digging in my hooves, shoved me with enough force that I slid straight into the limelight.

I think my heart just stopped beating then and there.

Silence reigned the whole damn city and despite knowing better, I swear I heard a cricket chirp.

Someone in the audience coughed.

Glancing to the side, I saw Jackie do some kind of 'Get the fuck on with it!' gesture complete with mouthing the words. We really should work on her pep talks at some point.

Taking in a long breath, then exhaling I tried to recall my lessons from my drama club back in school and how to deal with stage fright.

Concentrate. Focus just on yourself. Forget the stage, the audience, everything around you. Close your eyes. Breath.

In.

Out.

And now, just give your best, that´s all you can ever do!

The cold in my stomach indeed begun to dissolve and the trembling that assaulted my entire body lessened to a degree.

>>Okay, let´s do this Multiverse!<<

I began tapping my hoof to the beat in my head, praying for a miracle, internally chanting 'Work work work work, please work!' Over and over again. And lo and behold, this once, the Multiverse seemed to smile down upon me or at last, was not actively sneering because a faint melody begun to emanate from nowhere and everywhere at the same time.

I opened my eyes again, firing up my own magic to seemingly let my clothes melt away, leaving me au naturel. Or at least, my ponyform spell. Spell over spell, that would give me a real headache but that was future me´s problem!

Then I started to sing.

"Fillies and colt´s of every age, wouldn´t you like to see something strange? Follow me and you can glean something ne´er before seen."

My voice was a bit of on the first few notes and I had to remake the lyrics to better fit but all in all I was surprised how well it all went.

I trotted to along the edge of the stage, noticing that more than a few ponies where already showing the first signs of being under the influence of Equestria´s very own and very unique magic, swaying ever so slightly in tact with the music.

"Come with me and you will see something that has never been."

I had to suppress a cry of joy as I could heard some ponies half whisper "Something ne´er before seen? Something ne´er before seen?" In a sorta chorus.

"Haunted souls scream in the dead of night!" I chimed back in, trotting down the stage, giving the audience a Cheshire smile while pretending to look around like a frightened schoolgirl in a cheap horror flick "Looking left, looking right, hear a noise, die of fright!" I did a little twirl on my hindhooves before landing on my four legs again "It´s allright, everybody scream since this was ne´er before seen!"

Okay, so far this had not been a bomb as I could see some of the audience starting to raise an eyebrow or even starting to look bored so I had to up the ante and pronto! Good thing that the Multiverse had dropped some convenient magic in my lap to do just that.

Letting my head drop to conceal my face, I willed my illusion magic back to work. A low growl escaped my throat for effect as the fur on my body, mainly on the center of my back, began to grow longer, my ears became more lupine and even claws began to emerge from my front hooves. "I am the one hiding under your beds," I sang, adding the last touches to my new form "Teeth ground sharp and eyes glowing red!" I almost roared the last part as I shot upright, reveling in the reaction I got from the audience as they witnessed my, well, ponywolf form with my new, real, sharp teeth shimmering through the spell and my eyes shining blood red like two pieces of coal straight out of the fires of hell.

I think the first row was vacated nearly in an instant and that only made me more determined to keep going.

Taking a step back and turning around, I took to reshape my appearance once again, my front hooves growing longer, likewise did my mane and fuzzy things the size of eggs began to stir in it. Then I turned around, now sporting two anaconda like front legs, even going so far as to have them actually end in two snake heads who hissed at the audience and big spiders crawling out and about in my long, messy mane. Quite a feat for an arachnophobe like me.

"I am the one behind your windows pane, hooves like snakes and spiders in my mane!"

This time I earned some honest shrieks and screams but also I could see that the audience was seemingly getting into the swing of things. Ha, I still had a chance!

Changing back to my "normal" pony self, I sauntered along the stages edge, bobbing my head and swinging my hips to the music.

"In the darkness we call home, everbody hails to the Nightmares song!" I sang, trying my damndest to give my voice a sweet, feminine quality before abruptly adopting a more butch tone "In the dark, don´t we love it now, everbody´s waiting for the next surprise!"

I briefly let my eyes flash red again before crouching down, pretending to sneak around on the stage. "Round that corner there, hiding in the trashcan..." I pretended to look around an imaginary street corner, looking away from the audience "Something´s waiting now to pounce. Oh how´ll you..." Another touch of magic altered my face to the ghastly death mask of a Banshee before I again turned around, leaping to the stages edge and lean down to the few courageous ones that came to the first row "SCREAM!" I howled, my voice taking a echoing quality like it came out of a grave.

Barley able to hide my satisfaction I strode back to the center of the stage. "This is how it´s always been. Red and black, slimey green! Aren´t you scared?" I asked into the crowd, my coat changing its properties from red and black scales to green, oozing slime and back to my normal black. Then I gave a smug grin and flipped a hoof as if swatting a fly.

"Well that´s just fine. Say it once, say it twice. Take a chance, roll a dice and ride with the moon in the dead of night!"

I went back to the edge of the stage, looking down at the crowd with my best imperial expression and sung-demanded "Everybody scream!" and to my utter delight, quite a few ponies in the audience did so and some even seemed to finally found their way into the song as they chorused "Everypony scream!"

Twirling around, I prepared one of my biggest, most mana hungry tricks. Like a chameleon, I changed the color of my coat, mane and eyes to match the curtains behind me, effectively making me vanish from plain sight.

Fuck, I could literally feel my magical reserves shrink like an ice cube in an industrial oven but I pushed through.

"I am the one when you ask 'Who´s there?', I am the wind blowing through your hair." I rasped out with a thin, ghostly voice only to "pop" back into existence with the fringes of my body moving like smoke to give me a shadow like appearance.

"I am the shadow on the moon at night, filling your dreams to the brim with fright!"

A sudden lightheadedness made me stumble ever so slightly, canceling my smoke illusion and nearly, for a heartstopping second, my ponyform spell. Colorful light dots filled the fringe of my vision but only for the quarter of a heartbeat. Then I regained my bearing somehow.

Sweating under my coat, I steeled myself. >>Time to drive this home!<<

Addressing the crowd once more I kept singing "Tender lumplings everywhere," I visibly licked my chops at this statement for extra effect as I starred at a view ponies in the audience at random before continuing "Life´s not fun without a good scare. That´s our job but we´re not mean, it´s just how it ever been."

Picking up tempo, I gestured to the crowd "In the dark, don´t we love it now..." I sung and thanks everything the crowd really finished with a pretty enthusiastic "Everypony´s waiting for the next surprise!"

Taking the reigns again, I reared onto my hindlegs and looked up to the moon "Our dark Lady might catch you in the back and scream like a Banshee, make you jump outta your skin!"

I took a step forward and willed all my magic up for the grande finale.

"In the darkness we call home, everybody hails to the Nightmares song."

I gestured with my left hoof "Looking left," and then with my right "Looking right," my ears swiveled around "Hear a noise, die of fright!"

Still standing upright, I send magic through my spellwork, making my whole ponyform waver and ripple like the disturbed surface of a lake.

"This was ne´er before seen, everybody scream!"

I imagined myself to grow, larger and thinner, my body taking the proportions of my old self again. I visualized hooves melting into hands and feet, my head loosing all equine features and gaining human ones again. Slowly but surley, I formed the illusion of a young woman with shortish brown hair and bright blue eyes, the same like I had seen my whole life every time I had looked into a mirror.

Reopening my eyes, I smiled broadly as the gathered ponies, griffins and yaks gawked upon the illusion of the human being I once had been.

But I was far from done, no my dear. Gritting my teeth, I willed my magic up again and made a great effort to condense a slim yet impressive suit of armor on my form, with highlights like silver moonlight and the main color being such an inky blue it almost looked pitch black.

A long, slightly frazzled cape rolled out behind me like an ominous pair of wings and a formfitting helmet with pointy horse ears on top and a little horn on the forehead appeared on my head, concealing my face in darkness. In short, I looked like a human Nightmare Moon.

Letting my eyes flash bright white I took a leap forward, earning satisfying yelps and shrieks once more. "Our dark Lady is Queen of the Nightmare Realm, everyone hail to the Nightmare Queen now!" I sung out, already feeling my vocal cords starting to fail me.

"In the darkness we call home, everbody hails to the Nightmares song. Looking left," my left hand shot out "Looking right," same did my right "Hear a noise, die of fright." I stormed through the last vocals, putting my last into them while starring straight at the crowd "For I am a Spirit of Nightmare Night!"

At this point, my performance technically ended but once again the Multiverse showed me that it could be benevolent at times as without any further prompt, the ponies in the crowd suddenly begun a canon between the mares and the stallions. Who would have thought it possible to put so much into simple singing "La, la, la, lala, la~" making it sound so incredible. At the end, someone even throw a cupple of foals up, the little munchkins providing a cheerful 'Weeeeee~' as the true finishing note.

As soon as the last vocal had rung out and I let my Human Nightmare spell fade away, replacing it with my ponyform once again, it felt to me like a blanket of silence had been thrown over the whole damn plaza.

With my pulse still hammering, I nervously licked my lips as I reigned my a-million-miles-an-hour breath back in.

The audience stared back at me or at each other. Someone coughed awkwardly and a few lonely souls applauded to me ever so meekly.

Well, what had I been expecting? Jeez, I knew that I would see no land against Pandora but it still hurt like a red-hot knife driven into my heart.

Taking a deep breath, I let my clothes glimmer back into existence and with shaky legs and tears in the corners of my eyes, took a bow, preparing to trot back to Jackie. Girl would probably give me another earful. Maybe we really just should have busted a bank or something.

A gentle hoof was suddenly placed on my withers. I looked up and came face to face with none other than Pandora, the latter smiling softly down at me.

"That was a very interesting presentation. I must admit that I never saw any of those creatures and the transition between your spells was already very smooth. Well done, Miss Illusion," the wonderful mare told me. "If you hone your skills diligently, I am sure that one day you will find your name amongst the greatest of our craft."

And just like that, I felt a massive lump in my throat. Even though she thoroughly demolished me, Pandora still had encouraging, kind words for me and I could detect no ill will or gloating in them. Uhh... damn, sexy mare. Why is she so wonderful?

Then she lit her horn up again and the score board flickered for just a moment as one point appeared at the side of the show ponies.

"Thank you Miss Pandora," I replied meekly, voice thick with emotion and hastily blinking away my tears. "That means a lot for me." Taking a look at the score board, I sighed. "So, guessing from the applause, I would say you brought this home for your family, hn?"

That caused a melodic giggle that somehow reminded me of silver chimes. Showing me a smile with just a hint of her own pearly whites, Pandora hummed. "Now, I would like to think of this as a well earned draw, yes?" Then she turned to the gawking crowd.

"Ponies of Yule, I declare this a draw. Please applaud for Pretty Prancer and Umbra Illusion. These two mares gave their best and braved Equestria´s premiere showpony couple without batting an eye. Does this show of courage does not deserve respect?" She asked the crowd, her voice silken as before but with an subtle commanding undertone that I almost missed, where it not for the fact that I as the Dark Ruler myself could use something similar.

Well, in hindsight, it was as familiar as a scalpel and a howitzer but semantics.

"Hah!" A very familiar, slightly nasal voice cried out in victory. "So you see, neighsayer, Trixie's mother is far beyond a lowly commoner such as yourself," the obnoxious pony said in smug satisfaction, a cocky little smirk on her lips that I so wanted to slap off.

"Trixie. I am ashamed of you," Moustachio boomed, trotting over to his spawn, looking down in disappointment. "A true Roani knows when he or she has met a worthy opponent and always shows the appropriate respect. Have you forgotten everything your mother and I taught you?"

"What? But they—"

"Proved themselves worthy contenders, dear," Pandora cut in before turning back to me and Jackie, who had sidled next to me at some point. "Please excuse my daughter. She should know better by now," she said sincerely.

Trotting to the edge of the stage, all eyes on her alluring form, Pandora addressed the masses. "Everypony, please give a round of well deserved applause to our contenders for the day, Umbra Illusion and Pretty Prancer, for a performance worthy of the ages." On cue, the masses followed. They cheered, stomped and called out our names. Not just Jackie and I, but Moustachio and Pandora as well. Hell, even Trixie got a few nominations and somewhere along the way, the trio of showponies bowed as one and I followed in tandem. Honestly, it was more than a little overwhelming and disorienting an despite the fact the contest ended in a draw and we didn't win the cash, I couldn't help but keep a big, goofy grin in my face through it all.

Healing Waters

Author's Notes:

Whew.

Well, if you're still here, I guess that means you chose to give this experiment of mine a chance. With this chapter we've reached the halfway point of this arc and after, Jackie's story will resume. Thing of note, this chapter concludes the fluff and characterization of our heroines... mostly. With the following installments we can move on to the action side of things. I think you'll like them.

"Okay everypony, dinner is served," Pandora announced as she trotted in, balancing a number of platters in her magic. She set them down on the small table and immediately, a delectable aroma filled the room. A simple white apron hugged her body snuggly, mysteriously adding only to her allure. Stupid ponies being sexy in clothing!

"Ooh, what are we having? Smells good," I said, taking in the heavenly smell. Even Jackie looked in interest at the assorted foodstuffs, her nose twitching like mad and for a moment forgot her silent battle of wills with Trixie.

True, we may not have won our money, but Moustachio and Pandora had been so impressed with us that they insisted they treat us to a nice, warm meal in their home. After the show wrapped up, they led us to a wagon, not unlike Trixie's in the show, only three times as large and wouldn't you know it, the thing was so much bigger on the inside! I mean, hell, it was pretty much a cozy apartment with all the amenities.

"Well, over here we have a lovely vegetable lasagna, I got the recipe from dear old donkey jenny way back from when I was younger and still traveling with my parents," Pandora explained smiling, her seductive stage demeanor completely replaced by a nonetheless seductive housewife. Fuck, I don't think she even had to work at it. Just came naturally, it seemed. Kinda made me wonder if I could take a page or two from her book. That way I'd be able to turn things around with Zi'. "This here is a dish from Griffonstone, something you need to have a beak to pronounce it right I think but in essence, it is cooked meat in a coat of cabbage."

That earned her a surprised gasp from me and a raised eyebrow from little Jackie as we stared at the off green rolls swimming in a delicious smelling, dark sauce.

"Of course, I had to replace the meat with a substitute but I found that a little something called tofu from Neighpon works just as well, if correctly seasoned." Pandora explained, a bit of mirth in her voice at our reactions. "For dessert, we have this lovely little sin from Prance. It is called Crème d´ Amande, essentially a light, fluffy crème made from almonds with a hint of caramel sauce as a topping."

"Wow. You guys have been all over, haven't you?" I asked.

"We do get around," Pandora said smoothly as she took a seat beside Moustachio and used her magic to manipulate the serving utensils, doling out a healthy portion of food for Jackie and I before serving her brood and herself. "It's not all a vacation and traveling so much can wear on you, but it's all been worth it."

"I'll say," I said after sampling the lasagna. "What you guys did out there was amazing. I've literally never seen anything like it."

"You're too kind," Pandora said sweetly. "We're trying to pass this on to Trixie as well, you see."

"Is that so?" I looked to the showpony, who was mid-chew and froze as the topic changed to her.

"Aye, but there is only so much Trixie can learn while she is with us," Moustachio said, his portion of lasagna pretty much half the dish itself. "That is why we insisted she go and travel by herself, so that she may see and discover new things and that she may learn what it is to be a true showpony."

By this point, Trixie's coat color was steadily receding, her pupils shrunk to pinpricks and the food in her fork lazily trailed down into the table.

"Oh rea~aally," I said with a barely restrained evil grin. "And how did that go?"

But before either Moustachio or Pandora could respond, Trixie broke out of her stupor. "M-mother, father!" She nearly jumped over the little table. "Must we have this discussion again? And even in front of Sorba?"

Well, whatever that weird word just meant, it seemed to set of Moustachio like a rocket. "Beatrix Horizon Lulamoon! Watch your tongue in front of our guests! You are dishonoring yourself and your family when you resort to such foul words!" The mountain of a pony boomed, causing his miserable progeny to shrink back into her cushion. After that, he turned to Jackie and Me, an apologetic expression on his face. "I wish to apologize for my daughters poor choice of words."

"Hmm, what exactly did she just called us?"

"This... word means a lot of things in the tongue of the Roani but none of them are to be spoken in polite company. Basically, it is a derogatory term for all Non-Roani." Pandora told us, shooting her daughter dearest a look that could have pierced the heavens with ease. "Beatrix, apologize!"

"Someone's a sore loser," Jackie muttered, almost too low to hear, focusing on her meal, not paying much attention to the little drama unfolding before her.

Looking like she just had been condemned to swallow her body weight in slug slime, Trixie or rather Beatrix, visibly fought with her demons Pride and Prejudice before gulping audibly, her ears folded back and she dipped her head ever so slightly before she mumbled half-assed, "Trixie apologizes..."

Well, that seemed like the best I would get so I graciously accepted, but not without adding Trixie´s name to my personal shit list. I just knew the perfect little opportunity to "by chance" run into her again. Time to massively mess with the show´s timeline!

"Well, back to our topic, I take it that your daughter did not like that idea too much, hm?" I asked between two forks of lasagna. "I know the feeling, the pet of the family vehemently fighting against leaving the nest. Well, good thing your trailer does not have a basement so Trixie won´t end up as a basement dweller," I idly said, my words doing a piss poor job in hiding the knives in them and Trixie grew so red I'm surprised steam didn't come out of her ears.

"Trixie will have you know that she is not afraid to leave on her own, she merely has not found the opportunity to do so yet. She will need her own trailer, furniture and the likes. All those things take time to gather, not to mention that it is an important part of a Roani´s life to leave the fold, something that is not to be rushed!" Missus powder blue and bitchy said haughtily, nose high in the air.

"Trixie, honey," Pandora said delicately, though there was an undercurrent of sharpness in her words. "You could have done that anytime you wished. You've been traveling with your father and I for the last year, actively partaking in our show now and every show you get your portion of the earnings. Perhaps if you managed to save your money instead of going off every other day getting hooficures, on spa days or shopping trips..."

"T-that's... I need to do that mother! You said a showpony must keep a clean, trimmed and appropriate appearance. That's the reason I go out and..." Man, it was both amusing and a little sad to see her try so desperately to come up with that bull. But amusing, mostly.

"I dunno," Jackie said to my surprise, cutting in. "Seems like your mom and pops do pretty good without getting involved in all that shopping nonsense. Are you sure you're not just sloppy with your money?"

Trixie looked ready to explode. "Q-quiet, you. A pint size of a pony such as yourself should know better than to speak that way to your elders."

"You remember what she did to that mammoth weight, don't you?" I offered my thoughts while putting my plate aside to allow Pandora to serve dessert. My totally subtle threat seemed to have fallen on fertile ground as Trixie shut her snout rapidly, opting to shoot seething glares towards my person and Jackie for the remainder of the quite nice dinner.

"You know, dear," Pandora said as she served a generous amount. "Perhaps it would do you good to tweak your act a bit. I mean, I know we've talked about this before, but are you sure you don't want to change your wardrobe? You do have such a good figure and that stuffy cape does you no favors. Perhaps something that can help accentuate your flank and your hind legs? I think you would look lovely in something with a long slit half the way up to your Cutie Mark, just the right amount of sex appeal without looking cheap. Maybe something in burgundy velvet?"

Oh, that was just too good! I had to clamp my jaws shut in order not to spray half-chewed food all over my hosts and the table. Trixie herself was doing as spot-on impersonation of a fire hydrant, spluttering incomprehensive babble and flailing her front hooves.

"For the last time mother, no! I will not change my wardrobe. If I am to be successful it will be because of my talent, not parading myself in front of the drooling masses!" The hotheaded pony declared indignantly.

Pandora sighed, probably expecting things to go this way. "Very well, Trixie. It's your choice. I do have to try, though," she muttered the last part under her breath as she finished serving dessert. Deciding it was in her best interest to change the topic, she then said, "So Umbra. Tell me, are you and Pretty Prancer from Yule or just visiting?"

Weighing my options, I decided to troll Trixie just a little bit more. "We're from Ponyville, actually," and no sooner did I say it that Trixie went pale as a ghost. "And you know, it just so happens that Trixie paid a visit way back. Put on a show and everything." I refrained from smirking evilly.

"Really now?" Moustachio asked, his salt and pepper moustache holding on to random specks of the cream. "And how did our dearest Trixie perform?"

By this point, Trixie shook her head desperately, eyes wide, almost watery and pleading.

"Well, it sure was a good show but the aftermath was what really will be remembered for generations to come, that you can bet on." I smirked, showcasing my teeth in a predatory way. "I mean, the way she humiliated the Bearers of the Elements of Harmony on stage, only to have to run with her tail between her legs as everything came crashing down on her head in the form of an Ursa Minor and she could not live up to her own tales... well. Luckily, Twilight Sparkle was able to save what the rampaging monster left of the town."

"I'm sorry... what?" Pandora asked, at a loss of words for the first time. Trixie's visage bordered on murderous at this point and Jackie watched with interest and no small amount of satisfaction. To both her and Trixie's dismay they'd both found themselves sitting next to each other at the table and throughout had been shooting each other hidden and not so hidden snooty looks and pointed glares.

"Yeah, wouldn't you know it..." I proceeded to give them a very thorough briefing on the events that happened that day, watching as their faces processed different emotions ranging from anger, disappointment, doubt and grudging acceptance. Jackie just seemed to find the whole thing amusing and by this point, Trixie had receded into herself, trying to look as small as possible.

"I can't believe it. I simply can't," Pandora said, elbows on the table and supporting her head with both hooves. Moustachio stood as still like a granite statue. "Trixie, is this true?"

The mare in question gave a small 'Eep' and a nod, the motion so miniscule that one could think she was afraid that it could shatter the very fabric of time and space. She didn't not even dare to as much as glance into her father's direction.

She licked her lips nervously. "D-daddy, I—"

"No, Trixie. We'll have words later," Moustachio said with a tone of finality and Trixie deflated like a balloon.

"In all fairness, I think what Trixie did was brave." Amusing as it was to watch the events of Boast Busters come back to bite her, I did feel just a tad bit bad. "I mean, yeah, she screwed up more than a little, but come on, she actually held her ground and tried to fight off an angry Ursa. And yes, she failed spectacularly, but how many ponies could say they would do the same in that situation?"

"You... have a point," Moustachio admitted, staring thoughtfully at his progeny.

"Besides, it's all in the past. It may surprise you to hear this, but things like that happen in Ponyville like every other week. I betcha by now everyone's forgotten all about it."

This served to somewhat mollify our hosts and we were able to move from this line of talking and on to more pleasant topics. Of course, having already finished our meal, Trixie and Jackie soon grew restless. Trixie, probably because she was ticked off at me spilling what happened and still seemed a little meek where her parents were concerned. Jackie... well, she didn't seem to want to be dragged into conversation and merely did her best to stop looking utterly bored, though as time passed, it became increasingly clear she grew more and more fidgety and so I decided it for the best that we pay our goodbyes.

"Must you be leaving so soon?" Pandora asked.

"Unfortunately," I said as I donned my hat. "It's getting late and I gotta get this little one back home," I gestured to my ponified friend, rubbing her noggin and received a halfhearted slap on my hoof.

"Since you said you are just visiting, are you staying in a hotel around here?" Pandora asked while starting to do the dishes.

I was about to say yes but a certain pint-sized pony was faster.

"Well, we would but a certain someone managed to get pick pocketed while dragging my ass from food stand to food stand, throwing gold left and right," Jackie snarked, shooting me a pointed look while she fidgeted to get herself back into her own clothes.

My face heated up as I felt my tongue tie itself into a knot. Damn brat!

"Hmm, so the two of you are completely out of money, yes?" Moustachio asked, raising an eyebrow. Behind him, I spied Trixie snickering behind her hoof but only after she made sure neither her mom or her dad would notice. Just you wait, lady!

"Yes..." I admitted, hanging my head in shame.

"Well then, this won´t do at all. We cannot in good coincidence have two brave mares without any money to rent a room for the night." Mister Beefcake said, more to himself while rubbing his chin with a hoof. Then he turned his head into his wife's direction. "Pandora, my dearest flower, would you kindly?"

"Of course, my handsome husband," the mare in question replied sweetly, her horn once again lit with her magic.

From somewhere, a sizable bag floated right in front of me and from it, I could hear the unmistakable clinking of gold. "Wha~" is pretty much all I could utter.

"Take it. It's yours," Pandora said kindly. Trixie looked like she so wanted to protest. Her cheeks swelled like balloons and her face steadily grew redder and that vein of doom was back again, pulsing full force. Thankfully, she knew better than to raise up a stink, considering how deep in the red she already was with her parents.

"But... why?" I blurted out.

"Why not? Our little contest ended in a tie, true, but the two of you proved yourselves on that stage. You, specifically, my dear. Tell me, was that your first time performing in front of an audience?" I nodded. "Then you are a very brave pony indeed. Not many have what it takes to get onstage to be judged by the masses. Consider it a gift. You and your friend have more than earned it."

Gawd, why am I getting so choked up? Almost, imperceptibly, my eyes stung and my breath hitched as I stared at Pandora's kind face. "This..." I swallowed. "This is more than I expected. I-it means a lot to me. Thank you," I said almost shyly and reached out slowly with a trembling hoof to take the little bag... only for it to be swiped right before my eyes!

"What the..." Following the little bag of stolen moolah, my eyes landed on Jacqueline, holding my stolen prize to her chest and looking at me in defiance. "The hell do you think you're doing, brat?!" I couldn't help but exclaim.

"Keeping it safe. You can't be trusted with money, so I'll be holding on to it," she said bluntly.

Moustachio exploded in booming guffaws while Pandora fell into a unmistakable noblewoman laugh and even Trixie began cackling in a way that made one think of brooms, flying monkeys and pointy, black hats.

Stewing in my own embarrassment, I glared at Jackie, who returned my death rays in absolute nonchalance. Thankfully, the amusement did not last long(except Trixie´s) and so we bid our goodbyes, finally departing the mobile homestead.

A short trot later and the two of us stood in front of a hotel Trixie´s parents recommended to us. It was a huge building with the promising name The Royal Sisters' Haven.

I whistled in appreciation. Pretty ritzy hotel they got here. Again, I couldn't help but shake my head in wonder at how such an isolated city in these inhospitable conditions could be so advanced. From what I gathered from Pandora and Moustachio, Yule had been built in Equestria's northeastern tip, just a few miles from the sea that separated the land from its sister continent. Thing about Yule, seeing how it was so freaking cold, the waters more to the north had remained frozen for the last tens of thousands of years or so and it was by this bridge of ice that the ponies were able to install rail lines that traversed the continent all the way to Griffonstone, which lay to the east of Equestria. This meant that a majority of the trade between the grifs and the pon-pons made its way across Yule and that gave rise to a big, rich, multicultural city, even if it lay in the middle of a frozen wasteland.

At this point, I didn't really care and only thanked the stars that we'd be able to escape the cold. Already nightfall, even the protective dome that encircled the city was not enough to keep the cold from biting through my layers and Jackie's teeth were long since rattling like maracas.

Bursting through the front doors, we were greeted to a most spectacular sight. Floors of polished marbled echoed our footsteps, of so fine a quality that we could see our own reflections in them. Rich, wooden furniture dotted the lobby. None of those mass produced, commercially available sofas and chairs you see so often and give you a bad back, no siree. Everything here had the markings of being... uh, handcrafted for lack of a better word. Rugs and tapestries depicted several images. Some featuring moonbutt and sunbutt, others the city of Yule from a bird's eye view. Others had scenic mountain scapes or ponies who were probably important for some reason or another. Case in point there was one word to describe it all: swag.

Approaching the teller, we booked a room—cost us only four hundred bits—and a very helpful bellboy or whatever he was showed us to our quarters for the night. The inside of the rooms were no less spectacular. Hell, it put my awesome chambers in the tower to shame. There was a fountain. A freaking fountain right in the middle of the room, for chrissakes!

I bounded inside like a Tiny Tim ready to tear into a Christmas ham. There was a kitchen. Not like a pissy little kitchenette, but a full kitchen. The pantries were stocked with all sorts of goods. Nothing too perishable, but it was impressive nonetheless. Pasta, rice, dried hay, beans, meals in a can and the snacks... by the gods, the snacks! Pretty much anything you could want was in there. Chocolates, cookies, crackers and pastries and some things that looked a little more foreign like pickled mangoes, crystallized pineapples and dates.

"Odin's swag, this is incredible! Don't you think so, Jackie?" Girl didn't respond and she wasn't beside me either. Where...

I trotted back to the entrance and was surprised to see she'd only barely made it past the doorway. She examined her surroundings with a strange look. I couldn't pinpoint it, really. I don't think she even registered I was there either and me, I couldn't make sense of it. I opened my mouth, about to call to her when she took some hesitant steps forward.

"Gawd, I feel like I'm gonna break something," she muttered, warily eyeing an ornate crystal vase full to the brim with flowers.

"Well come on, girl, let's go see our digs," I called out cheerfully, startling her. Whatever funk she was in, she managed to shake it off and followed suit. The bed, to my delight, was as big as the one in my tower. Good thing too, since I tend to toss and turn a lot and... man! I swear they put my already sweet bed to shame. I jumped in immediately, squealing in delight like a little kiddie. Not sooner as my hooves made contact with the coverlet, I began to sink into it almost to my... ankle... things... Where they called ankles for a horse too or was there another specialized word? I had to ask Lyra about that later.

"Hooo boy, this is su~weet! It´s almost like a cloud!" I grinned my biggest, dumbest grin before an impulse began to make itself known. It started out as a weak call in the back of my mind that soon intensified as it traveled to my legs and before I knew it, I was already bouncing up and down on the unbelievable soft bed. "Jackie, girl, you have to try this, it´s great!"

I heard some halfhearted shuffling and when I looked over, the girl had already dropped her pony 'guise and now stood on her human form.

"Come on, live a little," I said playfully and hurled one of the pillows at her. She didn't bother dodging, or doing much of anything, really.

"So... there's a problem here," she said.

I barely suppressed a groan and like her, reverted to my humanoid form. "Alright, what is it?"

"Morons," she muttered. "We paid for two beds didn´t we?"

"And?"

"There's only one."

It took me a moment but eventually I chuckled, causing Jackie´s face to sour even more. "No, they got it right. We booked a room for two, did we not? See, ponies are incredibly social creatures from what I could glean from my loyal horsy lackey and this here, my dearest Jackie, is in fact a two pony bed. Sleeping in the same bed, snuggling and whatnot is considered a social norm for two ponies, more so when they apparently are traveling together like we do." I patted the coverlet, smirking cattish "Why? Is something the matter? Afraid to get cooties from widdle old me? Come on, we can share. I promise I'll sleep with all my clothes on. Can't promise I won't cuddle, though."

She groaned almost imperceptively and turned. "I'll just... I dunno. Take the sofa or whatever." She promptly started to walk out and I couldn't help but feel more than a little annoyed. Darkness, why is this girl so... stubborn? Well, that lasted only for a heartbeat as an idea suddenly popped into my head. Jumping up off the bed, I dashed forward and grabbed ahold of Jackie, easily hoisting her over my shoulder, much to her surprise.

Acting quickly I doubled back and threw her on the bed, joining her quickly enough with a shit eating grin.

"What is wrong with you?!" Jackie nearly screeched, her face beet red for some reason or another.

Reaching for one of the big, plush pillows, I slightly closed my eyes as I locked on my target. "A lot of things but none of them are relevant to this situation."

That, she seemed to register because a look of alarm, disbelief and indignation bloomed on her face. "Oh no, you are not... don´t even think about..."

POMF!

The pillow made contact with Jackie´s face in a oh-so-satisfying way, the sweet sound of fluffy fluffness colliding with a sourpuss never ceasing to bring joy to my little, black heart.

"Pillow fight!" I declared, cackling like a madwoman and gathering all pillows I could get my mitts on as ammo.

"You... pffht... you can´t be serious?" The baffled girl asked me, trying to get a stray feather out of her mouth.

"Nope, I´m fucking Severus!" was my only reply. Well, that and another volley of pillows that hit Jackie straight in the face again. Wow, even drunken golems could dodge better than her.

"What is wrong with you?" Red-faced Jacqueline demanded to know as she removed the latest projectiles from her face. "You are a grown woman or at least you are supposed to be one! S-stop acting like a child for crying out loud."

Instead of answering to that, I puffed up my cheeks in mock-indignation but only for a moment before I used the faux feeling of security I so dastardly lulled my victim in to deliver the mother of all pillow blows with my last projectile. Then, I pounced, bowling little Miss Grumpy Pants over in the process, eliciting a very cute squeak of surprise from Jackie. Heh, that had to be the most feminine and childlike tone I had heard from her since we knew each other.

"What the bloody fuck?!" The squirt hissed, her cheeks burning so red hot, they were probably on the verge of turning white, flailing her arms around like a epileptic squid.

"Baby Jesus on a pogo stick, you seriously need to lighten up and live a fucking lot, girl," I playfully replied from my position on top of her, my smile nearly splitting my face before I reached down and tussled the almost rats nest Jackie called her hair.

Seeing the brat struggle and squeak in protest, a truly devious idea spawned in my noggin. Following that deliciously evil inspiration, I leaned down, puckering my lips much to Jackie´s growing horror if her widening eyes where anything to go by and the warbled attempts at speech leaving her mouth. Closing in the last few centimeters I could really feel the heat radiating from Jackie´s cheeks before I planted a playful kiss on her forehead.

Pulling back my face, I stuck out my tongue at the flabbergasted girl. "Thought I was gonna smooch ya, hn?" I asked her, basking in the look of sheer WTF on Jacqueline's face.

An awkward silence permeated the room and despite my broad grin, I just knew then and there I majorly screwed up. Jackie'e eyes were wide, her pupils shrunk and where not a moment ago she'd been sputtering with anger and indignation, now her features remained unnervingly blank. I laid there, still holding on to her arms and for the first time, was at a loss what to do. Anger, bashfulness, indignation... those I could work with but her utter stillness caught me unprepared.

Well, that didn't last long. Jackie's features flared, her eyes burned and her teeth bared in a snarl. Faster than I could react, she yanked free and with a gut wrenching cry, slugged me right in the kisser with the mother of all haymakers. My world exploded with pain as the sheer force behind that pale, bony fist of hers sent me flying backwards and well into the air. Even as I hit the floor I still skidded backwards until a hard cabinet stopped my trajectory and a lump quickly swelled in my noggin. Of course, I barely had time to register this, much less the sound of feet pattering away, past a door and the sound of a lock.

I considered going in after her, but that would probably just make things worse. Nice, Umbra. Real nice. You have an opportunity to make a friend and you manage to go and cock it all up.

Oh, baby. I had to admit, when the squirt paid four hundred bits for a room, I'd already been planning her funeral procession, but I had to admit, it had all been worth it. Yeah, you'd think shelling out that much gold for a couple of nights would be akin to extortion, but the baths alone made the whole experience worthwhile.

Usually, when you pay that much cash for a room, you'd think you'd get the penthouse or something. Well, seeing how Yule was situated in the middle of a frozen wasteland, higher altitudes like, say, a penthouse suite, meant more energy had to go to keep the room warm. Luckily, the hotel had been built right on top of a natural reservoir of hot springs.

They did the job in keeping the lower levels toasty and warm even on the most frigid of days, and if that wasn't enough, it just so happened that the room Jackie got for us came with its own feed of those hot springs.

It was a circular room, connected to one of the bathrooms with a similarly spherical pool of hot, steaming water. Marbled tiles, polished to perfection, engraved with floral designs dotted the floor and surrounding the small pool were pillars that resembled that of ancient Greece. Further adding to the atmosphere was a sweet scent—probably potpourri—that wafted through the humid air and the warmth of the spring water filled the chamber with a constant, hazy mist.

About an hour passed since that little episode with Jackie. Against my best wishes, I backed off and instead of making a bigger idiot of myself, I decided to give her some space and hopefully, she'll come back on her own.

So now I returned to the hot springs, naked save for a towel carelessly tossed around my shoulders. Dipping in a toe, the temperature passed inspection and with a nod, I just started to slide in when a very unexpected voice called out.

"Good God, woman, cover yourself."

My head snapped up and sure enough, there she was. Jackie sat on the opposite side of the little pool, in as naked a state as me but with a towel still wrapped around her chest to protect her modesty.

"W-what are you doing here?" I asked, half stumbling while hastily moving to cover up the goods. She turned her head back to me now, cheeks slightly flushed. Whether this was due to seeing me in all my bare glory or the heat and steam of the room was unclear.

"Bathing," was the sole reply.

I couldn't help but fidget awkwardly. Not that long ago she resembled a cornered little rabbit and now, her grey eyes met mine with a stony look. She still appeared somewhat guarded

Deciding it would make no difference if I stayed out of the inviting water seeing as I already had one leg up to my knee in or not, I gave a sheepish smile, nodding towards the water. "Uhm, mind if I...?"

"Knock yourself out." Came the reply, Jackie now not really looking at me but rather studying something in the water.

With a silent sigh of acceptance, I carefully climbed in the pool and boy, it was bliss! The temperature was just perfect and inside the tub, there where even little bench thingies to sit on. I idly rubbed my lips where Jackie's fist struck. That hurt and bled like a mother for a couple of minutes but thankfully, that enhanced Overlord healing kicked in and though my lips were still a bit swollen and numb, the pain was all but gone.

"It's nice, isn't it?" She asked, her tone suggesting she didn't particularly care about the answer. "I told you I went to a spa in Ponyville, right? Had a hot tub and everything, but this is way better."

"A spa?"

She nodded. "I went in disguised as a pony and somehow, Twilight Sparkle and her other unicorn friend rope me into going with them. Fuckin' random ponies..."

I couldn't help but chuckle. "Yeah, they can be. So how was it?"

She shot me a droll look. "Didn't we go over this already? Neanderthal. Split me. Cock."

"Wait, what?"

A rueful grin stretched across her face. "Yeah, I didn't tell you much about the 'verse you pulled me out of, did I? Well, get this—" She then proceeded to tell me how our two universes differed. Hot damn if it wasn't hard to believe. I mean, a race of stupid, animal-like humans playing the part of pets to cuddly little ponies? Yikes! Planet of the Ponies, much?

"So then the little bitch wants to try and help me relax and how does she go about it? She leases one of the spa's humans to go and show me a good time right then and there. Never even told me about it."

"Wow."

"Right? So, as you can imagine, I didn't take it all that well."

"You didn't, uh..." I hesitated.

"What?"

"Kill anyone?"

"Unfortunately no," she replied with a wry smile. I tentatively took this as a good sign. "I threw some things at Rarity. Scored a few hits too, maybe wrecked the place up a bit, destroyed a fair number of spa products... well, could have been worse," she trailed off and looked at the ceiling.

We stayed silent for a bit, though it didn't seem to bother her, and while I too was tempted to just lay back and relax, I simply had to ask. "Hey. Uh, we're okay, right?"

"Hm?" She grunted and eyed me with a half-lidded gaze.

"Back there, in the room, I... I didn't mean to—"

"It's fine. Forget it," she said flippantly.

Oh, that was quick. "So you're not mad at me?"

"Nope," she said, still not looking at me. "I... kinda overreacted, I'll admit. I'd rather just forget it did happen at all."

I... guess that's fine? "Right, sorry," I said awkwardly. "I just kinda thought that—well, I don't know but I just assumed that probably, maybe, you were," At this point I was literally wringing my hands together, not sure how to delicately touch this. "I dunno. That maybe someone tried to force himself on you," I ended with a weak chuckle.

Her reaction was curious to say the least. She straightened up and looked at me with wide, baffled eyes. Heck, her towel very nearly slid off before catching it and securing it across her torso. Uhh, and now I feel like a perv... just couldn't help but give a quick glance at her puppies. Not bad. Anyway...

"No! God no, that's not it at all. What gave you that idea?"

"Weeell, because you kinda reacted like a rape victim?" Not sooner as I finished this very sentence my eyes went wide and I clamped my jaws shut. Could I have phrased this any more bluntly?

To my surprise, she actually chuckled. Hell, I'd daresay it could almost be a giggle. "Yeah, I kinda did," she said sheepishly, rubbing the back of her neck. "It's stupid, really."

Well, she didn't seem to hold a grudge or anything. That's good, right? Seeing how this was the case, I slowly edged closer to her, becoming a bit more bold when she didn't shy away. "So why did you?"

"Like I said, it's stupid."

"Well, it's just the two of us here. I promise I won't tell," I said with a smile and did that zipper thing with the lips.

She regarded me curiously, like an entomologist who'd come across a particularly strange breed of tree. "Promise?"

"Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye," I said playfully, along with the necessary motions. She looked at me like I was mental. Well, only for a moment and she was not that far off but anyways.

She expelled a breath like a balloon. "If you must know... Christ, I can't believe I'm saying this," she muttered, rubbing her forehead. "You kinda caught me off guard?"

"Huh?"

"You..." She paused, possibly looking for the right words. "Look, I'm not a girly type of girl."

"I've noticed." Neither was I for that matter.

"I don't do all that huggy, kissy thing you pulled off. And when you went and pulled an awful, cliched moment from a crappy Japanese anime, I just really didn't expect it, 'kay? I'm... I'm not used to that, is all."

I couldn't help but bark out a brief laugh, relieved I didn't screw up nearly as much as I thought I did."Well, no d´uh but a fair warning ahead. If you are to hang with me for a longer period of time, you will have to get used to my random shit. Oh, and pop culture references. A whole fucking lot of pop culture references."

A small smile graced her face. "I guess it's too much to ask I meet a normal person for a change, eh?"

"Sorry girl," I said with a wink. "What you see is all you get."

Yep, another little chuckle from her. Well, not exactly the way I imagined I'd get her to ease up a little, but whatever works. "But we're okay though, right?"

"Yeah, we're okay."

"In that case, you wouldn't mind if I took this off?" And before she could respond, I whipped off my towel carelessly throwing it over my shoulder, landing on the floor with a wet splat but I did not care. We paid royally so I could full well behave like a snooty Kardashian or Hilton or some other rich brat I would stab, shoot, run over with my car and then loot their corpses of anything of value, in that exact same order. Seeing how I was sitting more or less straight and being considerably taller than the brat, this left my chest very much exposed and Jackie quickly darted her head away with a small groan.

"Must you really do that?"

"Hey, don't go all prude on me. You should try it too. You can really feel the water without that stuffy towel in the way."

"Yeah... no," she said flatly after pretending to think it over.

I shrugged. "Suit yourself," I said and leaned back, relaxing on the edge of the bath, shooting her my best, cocky, daring smirk, returning her half scowl with a shit-eating grin. Come on, girl. Come on over to the dark side, we have fucking cookies!

Jackie's eye twitched, her gaze never straying from my own. Whatever battle of will was going on, it seemed the brat cracked, for with a frustrated sigh, she said, "Fine!" And followed, suit, discarding her towel and leaving herself in the buff. Eh, she still had an arm protecting her little—or not so little—muffins. Oh well, progress.

"Happy?" She said in a slightly challenging tone, cheeks already rosy and on their way to becoming full flush.

Giving her my best Molestia smile and a little nod, I replied in a voice dripping with sugar water. "Yes, verily."

"Ugh," she groaned. "Honestly, why are you... You're so... weird."

"And you're a brat."

"At least I have shame."

"Well, no one's perfect. Come on, relax. We have this sweet spot to ourselves. Might as well make the best of it. Speaking of," I licked my lips. "I could really go for something to drink right now."

Reaching behind her, Jackie pulled an honest to goodness little trapdoor on right near the bath and retrieved two glasses, along with an ice cold pitcher of—huh, was that wine or something?

"Gotta give it to the ponies," she grudgingly admitted as she held up the up the bottle containing a rosy pinkish liquid. "They know how to do luxury right. Well, for a backwards, medieval little prey species, at least." Pouring a generous amount, she gave a glass to me and took one for her own.

Giving the concoction a sniff and then a careful sip, I was pleasantly surprised at the faint taste of alcohol, barely there and more fruity than anything and not some fru-fru champagne. Blegh, I wouldn´t even scrub the floor with that stuff.

"Hey, cut them some slack, girl. They were spawned from the concept of a show appealing to little girls, for crying out loud and the cosmic forces keeping the Multiverse running just took it up and blew life into it. Would you rather have them be some kind of Berserk or Claymore-like beasties that try to rape you into a bloody pulp or try to feast on your quivering guts while you are still alive?" I asked, swirling the pink drink in my glass in a way of faux class before draining almost half of it in one go. After refilling it, Jackie and I lounged in a comfortable silence, enjoying the water and company. I couldn't help but notice, and to my amusement, that the girl was obviously a lightweight when it came to handling her alcohol.

Her posture relaxed noticeably the more she drank, her eyelids drooped and a rosy tint spread across her cheeks.

"What?" She asked all of a sudden.

"Huh?" Crap, I was staring, wasn't I? "Sorry, kiddo. Just wondering," I half lied.

"About what?" She took another sip, only to find her glass empty. Her brow furrowed lightly, somewhat annoyed and poured herself another generous helping.

"Easy there, girl. You don't wanna overdo it," I said in a mildly chiding tone, the words escaping my mouth before I could even register them. Couldn't tell why, really. If she wanted to drink, then let her. Not like I'm her mom or anything.

"Just a little more," she said, her words slightly slurred and took a hearty gulp. I couldn't help but chuckle.

"At least you're enjoying yourself." She gave a noncommittal grunt. This brought forth something that had been lingering on the back of my mind. "So tell me, my new, underage drinking buddy. How was your first foray into Ponyland? Wait, let me guess. You woke up in Ponyville, is that about right?"

She blinked. "How did... uh, yeah. That's it."

I held up a finger. "Alright, alright, let me guess. So right after you woke up, you ran into one of the Mane Six, is that right?" Yep, I definitely hit the nail on the head, for her eyes shot open in surprise before nodding slowly.

"And after you met said pony, you then went on to live with Twilight Sparkle, is that it?"

"So, so. You left out everything that happened in between."

"Oh? Like what?"

"Well, there was the time I got knocked out, kidnapped, thrown in a cage and about to be shipped like a common animal across state lines to some asshole pony who thought to make a profit out of me or something."

"Ehh, wut?" I asked oh-so-eloquently. I admit, Jackie took me by surprise then and there but she did not seem to register my question, for she downed the whole of her drink and filled it full to the brim, the liquid sloshing messily over the water. Not that she seemed to mind as her cheeks now sported a full on blush and her speech noticeably slurred, the alcohol's effect emboldening her.

"But I broke out. Had to kill a couple of the little beasts but I got out. Damn, that was messy. Got blood all over me," she said with distaste, nose wrinkling at the memory. "And this other guy, he kinda surprised me so I broke his neck and buried him out in the forest. Don't think anyone found him and don't even get me started on the wildlife. Fuckin' manticores and wood wolves and craggadiles trying to get up in my business. Think they're hot shit and all until you peel off their skin, turn them inside out or burn them alive." She chuckled. An unsettling sound that gave me a queasy feeling on the stomach. "And then the Diamond Dogs. Stupid things. Ugly, too. Crushed their leader's face with his own hammer until it was nothing but a puddle of goop." She took another swig. "Got my ribs and insides busted, but I showed him what's what." Her features darkened. "And then little princess Sparkle goes and finds me. You know she all but blackmailed and kidnapped me. Forced me to socialize with her minions in the hopes I get reformed or some shit... threatens to throw me in a pony dungeon if I step out of line. Filthy little beasts," she hissed. "God, what I wouldn't give for the opportunity to snap her scrawny little neck."

She took a swig of her drink and emptied it. She reached for the bottle again and I was so tempted to slap it from her grasp. But the alcohol's effects had made her clumsy and so she knocked the bottle of no doubt expensive liquid into the water. She muttered something along the lines of, "Tch. Typical." And to my surprise, she used the arm that kept her puppies modestly covered to try and retrieve it. A pervert I may be but even I had standards and so I quickly averted my gaze, but not before catching a flash of perky, pink nipple. God, I'm awful...

I don't know what was worse. That she committed all these murders or the hint of pride that laced her voice. Chara much? A part of me hoped her claims were exaggeration but judging what I saw in the cave, with yaks and all, I feared it may very well be true.

"That's... Jackie, that's not healthy. You shouldn't talk like that," I couldn't help but blurt out. Girl did not seem to pay me much mind as she now held the bottle to her eyes, seemingly oblivious to the fact her chest was exposed for the world to see. Must not look. Must not look...

"Thanks, mom. I'll take it under advisement once the ponies aren't trying to screw me over," she said condescendingly. She sighed, now aware of the fact her drink was ruined by the bathwater and carelessly tossed the bottle and glass, where they shattered into a million pieces. To my relief, she now noticed her sweater puppies were on full display and hastily covered them, her cheeks now positively flaming.

But even this gave no relief, for Jackie's rant still rang through my mind. I swallowed the heated words and arguments that threatened to spill from my lips. I so wanted grab the girl, shake her repeatedly and maybe beat some sense into her, for all the good it would do. She's stubborn if nothing else.

"Jesus Christ, girl. You almost make me want to take up smoking," I muttered, running a hand over my face.

To my surprise, she barked out a harsh laugh. "Yeah, I'd want to take up smoking as well, considering all the shit I go through."

"Now you're being ridiculous."

"Am I?" She asked, a hint of venom lacing her tone. "You're ridiculous. You actually seem to like this damned place. I don't see how you could. Everything here is just so... unnatural."

"Unnatural how?" I challenged. Jackie scoffed.

"Gee, where do I start? Common animals possess a degree of sapience, for one. Ponies tend the weather and the world, believing wild sanctuaries like the Everfree Forest, which functions perfectly without their interference, is something to be feared. And don't even get me started on the worthless wildlife. I honestly thought when Rarity tried to explain the concept of Winter Wrap-Up she'd been trying to pull my leg, but no. The little bunnies and birdies and snakies and beavers and racoons and any other number of wild pests that would have belonged in a stew pot or a grill back home were tended to as if they were helpless infants, unable to go through life without the constant, incessant mothering of the ponies. Minotaurs, griffons, hydras, dragons and any number of mythological creatures strutting around as it were the most natural thing in the world. The sun and moon, governed by pastel freakazoids. Love, at the whim and manipulation of an eldritch creature secluded in the Crystal Empire, free to roam around as it sees fit. A little pony princess, governing a backwards mud town in the middle of nowhere. Seven MacGuffin trinkets representing harmony, able to Deus ex Machina anything that stood in their way. My days are spent looking at abrasive, overtly bright colors that no human eye should be forced to take in, while on nights I listen to the retch-inducing lullabies of crickets, melodious winds, pony mothers tucking in their little beasts and it's all I can do to stave off a steadily increasing psychotic break, or to keep from slipping into a diabetic coma." She'd given herself to her full blown rant at this point and even as I listened, appalled, I made a note to keep the girl well and away from alcohol in the future.

At this, I could not held myself back anymore. I let my fist crash down on the tub's edge(damn, that hurt!), leaving a dent in the solid stone. "Well, surprise, so have I!" I hissed, glaring at Jackie "First off, after I crashed face first from high orbit into the Wastelands, I ran into a Unicorn that wanted to dissect me for his bullshit Nazi supremacy plans so I had to off him and his mercs. Afterwards, I had to cut my way through a whole burrow of Diamond Dogs who somehow managed to get their mitts on my Red Minions' nest. After getting killed by their leader, I drowned the fucker in his own fucking smelter after smashing all his ribs... slowly!" I jabbed a finger at the girl opposite of me, then pointing at the three long scars covering my abdomen "See this? This is where a frikking Chimera almost disemboweled me. In my own fucking Tower because it thought it would make a nice new kitty box! It´s pelt now is a nice rug in my bathroom. It´s mate got pounded to paste by my half dragon girlfriend, who by the way nearly went berserk there, not to mention the whole fucking civil war going on in Zinnia´s Verse because some asshole Pokemon is trying to kill everything that moves with lucid nightmares!" I don't think she quite understood that last part but I continued on nonetheless. "Oh, and have I mentioned that almost every single time I leave my tower, I run at risk to be snatched up by bounty hunters because there is a damn bounty on my head from the Princesses themselves?"

"So what's your point?"

"Urgh, Jackie, please." I felt my anger dissolve as fast as it had come. "My point is, that killing might be a necessary thing but you should never ever, under no circumstances, get used to it or let it become your first choice of action. That kind of thinking will take you to a bad place, girl. A place of never-ending darkness that makes the nine circles of Hell look like the Garden of Eden." She seemed to ponder my words, her face nearly expressionless. I stayed silent, allowing her time to reach her own conclusion. I just hope it will be a good one.

A small, barely audible sigh escaped her lips. She avoided eye contact with me. "How'd you do it? Not let it get to you, I mean?"

"Honestly? I dunno. Not really. Your whole life you try to be a decent person, live by certain moral standards. Killing is wrong. Stealing. Bedding your neighbor's wife. Even if said wife is a yummilicious piece of..." I cleared my throat, my cheeks only slightly burning. "Look, what's done is done, squirt and no amount of fairy dust can undo it. All you can do is move past it and strive to be a better person tomorrow where that's concerned."

A disbelieving sound escaped her throat. "Yeah, I might be wrong but I don't think wholesale slaughter is the kind of thing you get better from."

"However you can do it, girl. So long as you put your best foot forward and you're honest about it you'll find your way. Don't get me wrong though, sometimes, there are idiots who deserve a good punch in the snooze. Nothing against a few Renegade points." She still didn't look convinced.

"It happened to me, you know? Back in the day, before all this pony nonsense. There was a time in my life I wasn't a good person, daughter or all around human being, to be honest."

"You?"

I nodded. "Aye. Me, girl. Allow me to tell you a little story. A story about this girl named Sara Schneider. It's not too long." I heaved a sigh and licked my lips. It's not a story I'm particularly fond of. "So you see, there was once this young girl that thought it would be cool to be a rough and tumble gang member, doing drugs and giving people shit just for the hell of it. And so she joined the ranks of a small group that called themselves a gang, even though they were merely more than nuisances at best at this time.

Seeing as she was the only girl in the group, she had to be tougher than all the guys and after busting some heads against walls, several kicks in the crown jewels and the threat to cut some guy's dick off, she was accepted as a full-fledged member. So the girl's days as a street thug began, much to the dismay of her friends and family. Oh, how her mother begged her to stop meeting with these shady people and oh, how her father was furious how his little girl could stray so far from the right path, seeing has he himself had made the exact same mistakes in his life early on, wishing his child not to experience the same things he had to endure, but to no avail.

The girl would hear nothing of that and so she spent her days with her new friends, drinking booze, doing drugs and behaving like the last piece of social refuse in public. They bullied goody-two-shoes, were mean to old people and made fun of everyone in general. Our girl specifically had it out for another girl jogging along the park where the gang hung out every day. Countless were the times she made the jogging girl trip, or how often she threw a half drunk can of beer her way all while shouting obscenities like a sailor.

All of this went on for months, years even until one day, the leader of the gang had the bright idea that the gang should start selling drugs themselves to earn more money. So they, did but the boss soon became their own best customer much to his mens' and our girl's ire but they put up with it, seeing as they still made good money. That is, until the day that our girl and some of the guys went to fetch new booze that the boss, high on drugs, thought it a good idea to get a bit too touchy-feely with the woman of the leader of the local Hell's Angels charter. Yes, it went as well as one could imagine.

The charter's leader rallied all his men, fifty in total, and drove to the little gang's hideout to deliver the punishment for the boss' misdeed. It was just then our girl returned with the booze as the bloody, beaten leader of her gang was bound to a bike which in turn drove off with high speed, the screaming idiot dragged after it towards a gory death. But it did not end there, no. The Hell's Angels leader decided to make an example out of the gang and so, he had his men break the legs of each male member of the girl's gang while she herself received another offer.

Either she were to work the streets for the Angels until the leader deemed it that she had atoned enough for her own leader's misdeed or she were to do each of his men a... favor. Caught between a rock and a loaded gun, our girl decided on the latter. It was not pretty and lasted a whole grueling day but in the end, our girl was let go, broken, defiled, a quivering wreck. After what felt like hours of numb wandering, the girl finally broke down on the side of an often frequented jogging path in her favorite park. She did not knew how long she sat there, sobbing her heart out. It was then that suddenly, she felt someone put something over her shoulders.

Looking up with red, puffy eyes, our girl looked into the face of the one jogger girl she had tormented all this time. This girl right now looked at our girl with nothing but genuine concern on her face, offering her jacket to the sobbing girl as well as a shoulder to lean on. After another seemingly endless while, both girls went to a nearby bakery where the jogger girl, over a cup of coffee and some small baked goodies, silently listened as our girl poured her heart out to her, sniveling apologies to her former victim more often than not.

The jogger girl patiently listened and after our girl finally ended her story, she offered to drive her to the hospital or home first, if the girl preferred. Meekly accepting the saintly offer, our girl asked to be driven home and so it happened, but not before asking one burning question, the question of 'Why?' to which the jogger girl replied that she was a firm believer in that everybody deserved a second chance in life and why not start over now? To that, our girl could only rapidly nod, new tears of gratitude streaming down her cheeks. And this, my dear Jacqueline, is the story of how I became a better person and met my best friend for many years to come, Vivianne. The end."

I drank a big part of my glass as Jackie took in my tale. Her eyes searched mine. For what, I did not know and I could see something stirring behind her façade.

"I like that story," she said at last. Her features soft. She didn't have to say anything. Certainly looked younger that moment than her sixteen years.

"So you see, my dear. If stupid little Sara can bounce back from her poorly thought out life choices, you can too." I tousled her hair gently and for once, she didn't slap me off. Rather, her visage turned ponderous.

"Was it easy? Coming back from all that?"

The ghost of a smile graced my lips but died instantly. "No. No, it was not. It took the better part of five years of therapy until I could let anyone, let alone a man, touch me for longer than three seconds before dissolving into hysterics and for the nightmares to stop." I showed her my left wrist, pointing out a luckily good healed scar that nearly went all the way from my wrist to my elbow. "That was my first attempt, nearly offed myself then. My second try was with sleeping pills but luckily they did not mix well with the other meds I took that time and I threw up most of it. I spent a whole year in the closed section of a psychiatric ward afterwards." I gave a forlorn sigh as I felt my heart ache at the memory. "What really helped me out of there were my parents and my little brother. He is a nuisance most of the time, to cool to do anything like other children his age do but this time, he drew me a picture. Y´know, with crayon and all. It was a picture showing all of us as cats because I really love cats. Complete with a 'Get better soon, Sis' and all. It's still sitting in my drawer back home, last I saw. And that Mom managed to bring me my old Teddy. An old, worn thing really. Was hers before she passed it down to me. Old Fuzzy still has his place on my bed. Well, back home, I mean. And thanks to Vivi, I met a baker's dozen of people who I truly and proudly can call my friends from now on till Ragnarök." My mood almost evaporated as I remembered my current predicament. "Truth be told, I don't know if I'd ever see them all again. Fuck, even if only to say goodbye."

"Do you miss them?"

"Of course I do, girl. I missed them since day one and I still do but it gets easier. A bit like when you move out of home and into your own apartment. I'll probably stay here for a very long time, if not for life. I'll always remember them but I'll allow myself to let go and recall the people they once were."

She grunted. "I had a mom back home too. And a friend. Had some family scattered across the country but I didn't know them all that well."

"It's the one thing they don't prepare you for, being Displaced and all. But I think we've held up pretty good so far."

We were silent for several beats, only the occasional stirring of the water to break it. "Would you go back if you could?" She asked.

"Of course," was my automatic response and yet, a part of me wasn't too sure. I've come into my own being here, for all the hardships it's brought. "And you?"

"In a heartbeat. I was hoping to find some way to do that back in my 'Verse. No luck so far." Watching Jackie's face, I could see her mind was starting to go dark places. Poor girl. Well, there'd be time for that later and though I couldn't exactly help her find a way back home, I'd help her the only way I knew how.

"On a totally unrelated fashion..." I started, glancing at Jackie over the edge of my glass. "Please don't take this the wrong way but I just have to ask you that because the question is nearly killing me by now: Hot Dogs, Fish Taco or both?"

Little Jackie gave me a blank stare. Jeez, guess I had to be blunt again.

"Are you straight, gay or bi?"

"W-what kind of question is that?"

"A simple one," I replied idly. "And I am just asking because the phat smooch you gave me the very moment we met."

She let out a long groan, covering her face. "I was hoping you'd forget that."

"Yeah, no such luck."

"What do you care, anyway?"

"Like I said, idle curiosity."

Looking at me balefully, she said, loud and clear. "Hot dogs, okay? Hot dogs all the way."

"Agh," I exclaimed theatrically and snapped my fingers. "And here I was hoping you played for the other team. Many things I could have shown you, yes."

"I honestly can't tell if you're joking," she muttered, face flushed.

"You'd be surprised. I've had friends I've known for years and they still can't always tell either. But yes, kiddo, I'm joking. Besides, you're a little too young for my tastes. What, you said you were sixteen, right?"

"Almost seventeen," she said quickly.

"Still, I like my partners to be at most three to five years younger than I am. But enough about that. Tell me, and I think I already know the answer to this—was that your first kiss?"

Yep, that did it. If she was already flushed before now she went positively nuclear. Poor girl, she actually dunked her face in the water and didn't come out for almost a minute. Wow, that was some lung capacity. Also, it was almost impossible to not make some cheesy 'Wanna see how long I can hold my breath?' porn jokes right then and there.

"Was it that obvious?" she moaned after emerging from the water again.

"Eh, to me it was," I said and reached over to pat her head. "Hey now, nothing to be embarrassed about. Like I said, you did pretty well. A little practice and you might be a contender for best smoocher in town."

"Could you just shut up?" She practically begged.

Agh, why was it so fun to poke her? Well, I did stop. Or... well, I would. I just had to get one more thing out of my system. I sidled over, wrapping an arm around her, pulling her to my side. "Come on, squirt, lighten up. Like I said, if you're gonna stick around, you better be prepared for a whoooole lotta weirdness and randomness from yours truly. It's all in good fun. Life is grave enough on its own." She still looked sullenly up at me, but made no move to remove herself from my grasp. Heck, even though she still covered her puppies she was more or less relaxed at this point.

"Anyway, good news. I can feel my strength returning. My mana reserves as well and in, oh, a few hours I should be good and ready to go and 'port us back to my Tower. Ohh, you're gonna love it, girl. It's got all the amenities you could want. Well, maybe not as nice as this hotel, and you may want to steer clear of the torture chamber when Gnarl is using it or Gnarl in general but other than that, you're gonna like it, I guarantee," I said enthusiastically and she did seem to perk up a little. "But until then, let's just sit back and relax. Hey, if you're willing, we could even put in a little practice."

"Practice?"

I smiled evilly. "Well, you know..." I licked my my lips and leaned forward, making all sorts of smooching noises and taking glee at the look of abject horror that graced Jackie's face.

I got a slap in the face for my troubles, but it was so worth it.

"Okay, that one, I did deserve."

Mad Cult's Design

We slept well and soundly that night. After our little heart-to-heart, Jacqueline was now comfortable enough with me that she agreed to share the bed. Didn't stop her from making a cute little barrier down the middle made entirely of pillows to separate our halves. No sooner did we lay down that the previous days' events came back to bite us full force in our sweet asses and we went out almost immediately.

I was the first to wake, well after midday. Consciousness returned slowly, my body still very much groggy even after a full night's sleep. The feathery comforter had more than done its job and despite the snowy weather outside, my body remained enveloped in a lovely cocoon of warmth.

As the haze of sleep gradually lifted from me, I became aware of a very telling sensation that ran through my midsection. I opened my eyes to the sight of two slender arms wrapped around me and a mop of messy black hair.

"Jackie?" I muttered and lightly shook her frame. Girl slept like a rock. Sometime during the night her little pillow barrier had been scattered in all directions and where she set out with the intention of putting some distance between us, now her body was pressed snugly against mine, each of us separated only through a light layer of clothing and our legs had somehow become tangled that were it not for our very contrasting skin tones, I wouldn't be able to tell us apart.

Eh, what the hell. I contented myself by laying back down and simply enjoying the moment. Faint flickers of light trailed from the thick curtains, scattering throughout the large chamber and the contrast of the slightly chilled air and the luxurious warmth beneath the sheets proved mighty tempting to close my eyes and drift off again.

Still, as nice as that would be, first things first. I called upon my mana reserves, pleased to confirm they were almost completely recharged. I now had more than enough juice to 'port us back and forth dozens of times before I started to feel some strain on my reserves.

And yet, I couldn't help but wonder what the next step for us would be. Jackie seemed interested enough in visiting my pad and yes, I kinda just assumed we'd go there, chill for a bit, have a jolly old time and all, but what then? Girl didn't seem to miss or like her old universe very much so... would she stay with me? I... kinda liked the idea. Had to admit I've grown somewhat fond of her. Okay, maybe more than a little but I couldn't help but wonder if I would end up kinda pressuring her to stay with me. Ugh, we'd have to get this sorted out at some point or another.

Well, there's time still. The minutes ticked on and Jacqueline eased her hold on me a little. The spot where our bodies met was still fiery warm. Felt a chill once she pulled away. I made to get up and take a nice long shower and was just wondering if I should wake Jackie up to join me when she started muttering in her sleep, her lips making soft, lazy trails as she muttered a number of unintelligible babble. Aww, she was kinda cu...

"Death to the proletariat..." Aaand she ruined the moment. Yeah, just great, Jackie.

Leaving the little anarchist lie, I slipped into the bathroom for my morning shower. Lots of muscle-soothing, hot water could also help me coming to a decision in my little dilemma regarding Jackie´s stay here.

Heh, I could really see this scene playing out, with me holding tight to Jackie, standing in front of Gnarl and asking him 'She followed me home, can I keep her? Huh? Huh? Can I?'.

Then again, if anything she had told me about her Verse was not extremely excessive, squirt would not take kindly to my special brand of humor.

With a sigh, I undressed and slipped into the shower.

After I finished my little water orgy (not my water and we paid grand so Wayne), I wrapped myself into a lot of pony sized towels and went back to see if little J was already up and running.

As I stepped out, Jackie was already up and awake, her bedhead looking like she had just jammed a fork into a plug socket, stretching while simultaneously jawing wide. Hell, she even had her tongue poking just the tinniest bit out of her open mouth, making her almost look like a kitten.

A violence prone, slightly nihilistic-anarchistic kitten full to the brim with pony hate and really freaky chaos juju.

Still made me smile like a nerd on a steam games for free day.

"Morning, sleepy head," I said cheerfully, leaning against the door's frame.

Jackie grunted, her mouth instantly morphing into a slight frown which seemed to be her default as she extracted herself from the bed. "Morning..." Her eyes where partially hidden behind her mob but I still saw them roaming ever so slightly over my person, followed by averting them and a slight blush.

Geez girl, how did you ever got through the communal showers after sport classes without dying from your head exploding? Maybe they had single person cabins in Amiland?

"Up and at 'em, kiddo. It's a bright new day and we have some things to check out of our list. So get showered, scrub up and maybe I'll fix us up some breaky. My French Toasts are to die for or so I have been told."

She stretched again and the very audible cracking of joints cut the sleepy air like a knife. A very gross knife.

"How are you? Magic wise?"

"Near full to the brim, girl. Now come on, get cleaned up and whatever it is you do on mornings. After that we're gonna swing by my tower."

The prospect seemed to perk her up and despite some groggy, zombie-like shambling on her part, she made her way to the bathroom while I set about cooking us up something to eat. I was no master chef by any means, but living alone you learn quickly to adapt or live out of insta meals for the rest of your life. And breaky wasn't a complicated affair anyway. Eggs, milk, honey, sugar... hell I even spied some sausages way at the back of the fridge, obviously for griffons and the like. Hot dog!

A short time later and Jackie stepped out, fresh and scrubbed while I'd just finished putting the finishing touches on our meal. Scrambled eggs, sausage and yummilicious French Toast, powdered with fine sugar, a nice little bowl of whipped cream provided by the awesome housekeeping ponies (gotta make sure to leave them a big tip), OJ and milk to complete the spread and when she laid eyes on the food, her stomach was quick to voice its protests as to why the food was still there and not traveling down her gullet.

So we feasted with minimal talking. I too had been particularly hungry and so we set about to more or less stuffing our faces. Man, what would Mom or someone like Rarity have said if they saw us... hell, we even made a bit of a contest of it, seeing who could shove more food in their mouths. I won, obviously, for... reasons that should become apparent.

When that was done and the plates cleared away, it was time to address the issue of my new pal's hairdo. Surprise, surprise, she all but admitted to basically running her fingers through her mop each morning as part of a 'combing', without even bothering to look in a mirror. So after some cajoling and a little bit of bribing, I managed to sit her in front of a vanity and, with a trusty brush in hand, set about to correcting the rat's nest nestled atop her head. Hell, even I'm a bit of a tomboy and never paid as much attention to my hair as most other women, but this was ridiculous. First brush practically tore as I fruitlessly tried to untangle her knots but after several minutes of continuous strokes, her wild hair slightly tamed so that it could be called, messily organized, if such a thing existed.

"Holy stoned Jesus rocking at Woodstock girl! I have brushed honest to goddess horses whose manes and tails where practically silky smooth compared to the thing on your head." Another brush stroke, another tangle and I felt my argument cemented. "Seriously, Jackie, just a few strokes with a proper brush each morning and this would never had come to be."

"Well, sorry Mom that not everyone had the obvious luxury that others seemed to be gifted with after getting dumbed into this sucrose nightmare." Little miss grumpypants shot back between wincing and squirming on her chair.

"Ah ah ah, none of that sass now!" If she went as far as calling me 'Mom', then I could full well answer in kind. "This is all on your head, literally." Another set of quite brusque strokes and I set the brush down on the vanity. "See, there we go," I told the squirt in a warm tone as she glared into the mirror in a way that could probably sent a hungry Cockatrice running.

Brushing my fingers through her hair, a malicious smile graced my lips. "Now, what can we do with this? Braids maybe?" I held a length of now visibly less wild hair out, giving it a first few turns before letting it go. "Or maybe we can do something with the bangs? You have such nice eyes Jackie, that is when you not try to ignite people with your glare."

Then my eyes fell onto the small but obviously high quality assortment of make up stuffs sitting on the vanity. Now, I never used more than some eyeliner, blush or even the odd bit of lipstick back in my day but I still had my fair share of experience with my female friends.

Taking a hold of a small golden tube containing some sort of lipstick (Appelosa Sunrise if the label was something to go by) and screwed it out a bit. "Hmm, nice color. Maybe a decent amount of blush and something of this... hm, I wonder if there is some eye liner or eyeshadow?" I idly commented while I leaned over Jackie´s shoulder. "Why dear, I think you would positively ravishing. Sure to turn the head of every male and female on the streets."

Oh I would have paid a million cash for just one peek in Jacqueline's noggin then and there. Her eyes went wide and her mouth froze in that disbelieving expression as I brought the lipstick playfully towards her lips as first, all the color drained from her face only for Jackie to explode bright red.

"Hey, hey, what are you doing?"

"Why nothing, my dear, Jackie. Just gonna see if we can make you more pretty, slash, cuddleable than you already are." I brought the lipstick close until a hand shot out to stop me.

"Yeah, no. Thanks but no thanks."

"C'mon, girl. It won't bite or anything. In fact, you may find you actually like it."

"If you like it so much, do it on yourself." Quick as a viper, her remaining arm stretched, a lipstick with a frilly, pink color in her grip, making its way to my precious mug. With a strangled noise, I barely managed to avoid it. Scratch that, I did not manage to avoid it and now a smear of pink stretched from my lip almost all the way to my ear in a twisted, half-assed Joker smile.

"Looks good on you. Brings out the color of your skin," Jackie said.

"Oh, for... come here, you." I lunged forward, intending to repay her for her little stunt but the damn brat was slippery as an eel. She bounded out of the way and no sooner did I ponder the wisdom of summoning forth an army of Minions to hold her down so I could proceed to inflict cosmetic vengeance upon her that her hand shot out and made a grasping motion. I felt the pulse of magic and braced for what would happen to me next.

The sound of something whistling through the air and my back was struck by a soft, fluffy something. "What the...?" A pillow, and that was not the only one. Dozens more sailed through the air, making a beeline for me. With an undignified squeal, I jumped and danced clumsily in a piss poor attempt to avoid getting hit with the fluffy projectiles. No such luck.

One after one, my body was riddled by the soft, cushiony blows as I staggered backwards, eventually tripping on a lone pillow and fell flat on my ass. But the brat was not yet done and mercilessly buried me under a pile of the things and when I flailed around, breaking my face free, I saw Jackie straddling me, a smug smile as she laid atop the pillows covering my body.

"Me one, you zero," she said, making a zero with her fingers.

"Challenge accepted!" I smiled my best shark smile and with the practiced ease that one only could achieve by being an older sibling for years, my hands shot up to grip Jackie at her hips before our bodies turned into a flurry of movement, ending with our positions reversed and me smiling down on a thoroughly bamboozled Jackie.

"You might have come to the realization that straddling me was a grave mistake my dear Jackie-Bear because now," I told her in a chit-chat tone "You are in tickle monster territory!"

Girl had no the time to bring out a 'Are you shiting me' before I dug my fingers into her sides and mercilessly began to extract my revenge. Jackie exploded in laughter, managing to sprinkle in protests and even the odd death treat while I left her gasping for air.

Even the few more or less half assed punches she threw at me did not bother me at all, if anything, this was the most normal I had seen Jackie until now.

"Do you yield?" I asked while attacking a tickle spot under Jackie´s ribs.

"FuahAHahaHA... fuAhahack yuhuu~!"

"Maybe later." I continued my torture, managing to get a hold of Jackie´s feet. Turned out she seemed to be partially ticklish on her soles.

"Say uncle!"

"Nehehehvar!" A pillow impacted with my head.

"Say it!"

Jackie shook and squirmed under my merciless attention but eventually, she relented and finally said the word which was not 'Bird'.

Fun though horseplaying (heh, heh... geddit?) with her was, we still had the rest of the day ahead of ourselves. When Jackie regained her breath and muttered some more of her oh-so-lovely pet names to me, we gathered our clothes, possessions, and double checked to make sure we didn't leave anything behind aside of a tip for the housekeepers on my insistence and when I was sure we had everything we needed, I called upon my Mana reserves to open a one way, non permanent portal in the living room of our quarters.

"This one's safe, right?" Jackie asked, somewhat hesitant to step through. "I don't wanna end up crashing through a mountain again. Or end up in the middle of an ocean."

"It's safe as can be, girl," I reassured her. "What happened then was a freak accident or something because Multiverse travel and shit, but don't fear. Nothing but good ol' solid ground on the other side of this. You have my word."

She reached out with a hand, disappearing inside the portal and waved it around, as if testing for something. When she was satisfied, she took slow, steady steps and sure enough, her frame was swallowed by the portal. I followed suit and sure enough, we stood at the entrance of my tower.

Why the hell we came out here, went above my head since I aimed for my throne room but oh well.

"Welcome to my humble abode Jackie. Towah de Umbra" I waved my hand at the entrance of my tower that looked like the entrance to Barad Dur if Tolkien had used a Minion theme instead of these Gargoyle thingies. A massive drop gate made of black wrought iron was pulled up, accompanied by a fitting cacophony of massive chains, gears and hard working Minions.

After the gate opened enough, I led my newest guest into my casá or better, into the entrance hall since the entrance gate was more or less set into directly into the mountain and the rest of the tower protruded from the solid rock after a few stories.

Inhaling deeply, I took comfort in the smell of Minions (not that bad once one got used to it), the smell of hot iron and roaring fires that wafted up from the smithy and the weird, slightly sweet odor that came from the bioluminescent fungi that grew in small groups or alone at the base of the pillars which held the ceiling.

A group of Guard Minions scampered towards us, displaying this unnerving strain of discipline that only they had. I swear, seeing a handful of Browns move and act with an actual semblance of military drill send more shivers down my spine than a full grown dragon could probably ever hope to.

I waved at them as they came to a full stop, halberds held ready just in case. "Hey guys, be at ease. This is Jaqueline or Jackie for shorts. She is a guest and a friend, so behave."

One of the Minions gibbered at me, slightly cocking his head.

"No Splatter, not even a bit. Besides, she would lay down the beating of your lifetimes on you. Girl´s stronger than she looks."

Another Minion, Scruffle, made himself known.

"I said no and that is final. Or do you want to end up in Lyra´s workforce for the next month?"

Just calling the mint-colored devil by her name was enough to made the Minion shut up. Kinda sad actually, that a technicolor Unicorn could inspire more dread in my own Minions than I, but well.

"How the blazes can you understand what they say?" Jackie inquired, slapping the weapon of one of my Minions away from her face with the flat of her hand, sending the little bugger spinning around as he held onto his polearm.

"Some part intuition, some more parts guessing and the rest is plain luck." I admitted, shrugging and lead Jackie to the stairs going up. The entrance hall was after all nothing grand, just a forest of pillars, glowing 'shrooms and the odd scampering Minion hunting a rat.

Putting an arm around her shoulders and a big grin on my mug, I said, "So, Jackie, let me give you a tour of my humble abode, yes?"

She offered her own little smile. "Let's."

First off we toured the ground floors, some living spaces with plushy couches and suits of armor, Minion banners, a few kobolds engaging in a strange game of pin the dagger on the sheepie and then the kitchens, where Wiener was busy at work cooking up a pot of foul smelling grey sludge for my munchkins' dinner. The odd bone and body parts of whole rats poked out of the ominously bubbling surface.

"Hey, Wiener. How's it hanging?" I said pleasantly while Jackie gagged over the smell.

The chef minion gibbered something excitedly, waving his arms around, the big spoon in his hand splattering the grey goop in all directions.

"Lyra? What about her?"

Some more Minionese later...

"What is it?" Asked Jackie.

"Apparently, Lyra has been raiding my private pantry and made off with my favorite quatro choco cookies. All the while I was away."

Inhaling deeply, I yelled in my enhanced Overlord voice. "Heartstrings, get your furry, klepto butt down here!" A few pots rattled satisfyingly in their racks.

Minty Horse arrived literally a few seconds later, bursting in through a door, eyes wide, slightly out of breath and her eyes bugged out when she caught sight of me.

"Mhssturr!" she said, her mouth still full, crumbs and chocolate smears scattered all over her muzzle. Swallowing hard, Lyra was the proverbial picture of the deer in the headlights. "I-I mean, Master. What brings you here?"

I ran a finger through her muzzle. "Well now, what do we have here?" I asked rhetorically, inspecting the chocolaty contents.

"O-oh, that," she said, failing miserably at sounding casual. "Well, you see Master, one of your Minions was trying to steal your favorite quatro choco cookies, so I said 'Hey, you leave those alone! Those cookies belong to Master!' and he was all like 'Master's not here' And I was like 'Give them back!' But he was all 'Nuh uh!' And then he ran and I chased after him and then I slipped and fell on the cookies, so..."

I held up a hand, stalling her pathetic babbles. "Lyra, this is Jackie. Jackie, this is Lyra, my most faithful," I said sarcastically. "Servant."

Lyra's eyes snapped to the girl beside me. "Another human? Who is she, Master?"

"Not another human. A human. Do I need to explain to you that I am a demon again? Also, Jackie is a fellow Displaced who will be staying here in my tower for a good while. But that's not important. What is important is me coming up with a suitable punishment for you. You do know stealing the Overlady's cookies is a crime punishable by, well, maybe not death, but being drawn and quartered at least. Which is death if I think about it, but you get what I mean."

Seeing Lyra´s ears fall flat and her tail vanish between her legs filled me with a good bit of satisfaction. Her big eyes began to water and I think out of the corner of my eye, I already saw Wiener go through his massive cookbook, opening a page for something called 'Unicorn Roast', complete with a rather comical picture of a roasted Unicorn with an apple in its mouth and several more on its horn.

After enjoying the moment a bit longer, I rubbed my chin as in thought as I looked down in the quivering Lyra. "Ah, but you know, since I am in one of my rare benevolent moods, I am willing to change your sentence to doing the dishes for Wiener today instead. With only your tongue as a cleaning implement."

"T-the dishes?" Lyra spluttered in disbelief. "But today is Rat-Bog stew day!"

"Tomorrow will be roasted pony day. Pick your poison."

A fierce internal battle raged on in Minty Horse's already unhinged little mind. Really, I couldn't tell you which option was worse, but after several seconds' frantic thinking, Lyra slumped and uttered a small, "I'll do the dishes," before Wiener grinned victoriously and jabbered away in rapid fire Minionese, pointing to the dish room (because Wiener was A, a lazy ass that pushed doing the dishes as long as he could and B, cooking for my legion of Minions produced unholy amounts of dirty dishes) and, with a large grin on his face, tossed Lyra a filthy apron that by the looks of it had never been washed.

Wiener went back to stirring the pot with a jaunty tune, ignoring the stricken unicorn. Eyes downcast, Lyra shot me with a look that almost melted my little black heart and marched forward like a convict facing the guillotine.

"That pony's weird," Jackie stated as we took the stairs down, Lyra's faint moans of misery and exclamations of disgust trailing in our wake. "How did you come by her?"

"I didn't, actually. If anything, she came by me. There I was, enjoying a morning shower and when I stepped out, there was Lyra, sitting in the middle of my bedroom and geeking out about finding the world's first human," I chuckled, shaking my head at the memory.

"And she became your servant. Just like that?"

"Well," I began uncertainly. "Not exactly. See, I kinda wanted to send her on her way with a promise that she'd never tell anybody about me. But the mare's stubborn, wouldn't take no for an answer. We yelled a little, tempers flared and... well, I kinda pulled a Palpatine on her and bombarded her with a Corruption Burst, turning her into a willing servant by overriding her free will."

"What?" Yeah, that caught her by surprise.

"There's this spell that I can do. I call it Corruption." I demonstrated by letting arcs of lightning trace my palm. "I can power it with enough mana until my victim is either entirely dissolved into nothingness... or use it to break down their minds and make them absolutely loyal to me."

"Wow," she breathed. "You know, I didn't think you had it in you."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You basically made her your slave, you know that right?"

"What?! No, that's not..." Uh... did I? Fuck. I did, more or less.

"Hey, someone's gotta show them ponies who's boss around here, huh? They screw us enough already." She patted me on the back and walked on, leaving me sputtering.

Deciding it wiser to just drop it, I continued our tour. I led Jackie down to the Minion Burrows. She seemed fascinated with the place and took great interest inspecting the Brown and Red hives. A number of my little kobolds, both Browns and Reds, came over to say hi, surrounding Jackie like so many murderous little elves.

The upper levels of my tower followed. We swung by the library, containing tomes and grimoires hundreds of, even millennia old, their contents surely lost to the ages, preserved for my own perusing(really should give them a read sometime) then to my chambers, proudly showing off my acquisitions and finally...

"And here we are, my little friend. The crown jewel of my tower in all the literal sense. I present to you," I paused for dramatic effect. "The treasure room." As if by magic—well, more like me sending a mental command to a couple of my munchkins to open the doors from the opposite side—the double doors opened with a ponderous groan and the resplendent light of my hoarded riches hit us in the face full force. Girl's eyes were positively sparkling(then again, that might just have been the sparkles of all my precious shinies reflected in her eyes) as she appraised my riches.

"Goddamn, this is yours?" she breathed in wonderment.

"Eeyup," I said smugly. "All mine. Go on take something."

"Really?"

"Sure. Go ahead and take a shiny. Keep it as a memento or spend it or whatever."

With my go ahead, Jackie approached a rather massive pile of gems, easily tall as a house. Her little hand made to reach for an emerald the size of her fist and no sooner did she lay her fingers on top of it that several things happened in quick succession.

A black claw shot out of the pile and grappled a very startled Jackie's arm before roughly pulling her in, the girl disappearing in its depths. No sooner did I start to freak out, thinking Onyx had eaten her that the gem pile exploded, scattering shinies in all directions, the two present Minions chasing after them with greed in their eyes.

"You little freak! Let go of my gems," Onyx growled, pinning down Jackie with her strong arms. Jackie's eyes bugged, clearly not expecting an eight-foot dragoness to suddenly pop out.

"Onyx!" I shouted and moved to intervene. "Stop that this..." But Jackie did not seem to like being held down like a prized hog. The squirt clamped her mouth shut on one of Onyx's talons and the dragon let out an earsplitting screech of pain, hopping off the girl and nursing her wounded talon.

"Hey, hey stop it, you two!" I yelled, getting in between them.

"That little thief tried stealing my gems!" Onyx accused, pointing an accusing claw at Jackie.

"No, Onyx. They're my gems. Get that through your thick head already! And I said she could take one." I then looked to Jackie, noting with some nervousness a thin trickle of blood in the corner of her mouth.

"You alright, girl?" She nodded.

"I am. She's not," she said with a sneer and true enough, a larger trickle flowed down Onyx's talons. Sweet Jiminy Cricket, just how strong is her bite force? Dragon scales are seriously tough.

Onyx roared. "Why you little..." She unfurled her wings and with a massive leap, cleared the distance between her and Jackie, looming over the smaller girl in an attempt at intimidation. "Say that again!" Onyx challenged.

Jackie, in a particularly stupid course of action, grabbed ahold of Onyx's horns and pulled her down, meeting her snout with her stubborn hard head. Onyx cried out and I couldn't help but wince at the very telling crack that came after. I swear, one day I'm gonna bend that brat over my knees and...

"Gott verdammt! [Goddamn it!]" Yes, apparently I was so pissed I now reverted back to my native tongue. "Hört auf euch zu zanken wie ein ein Haufen Kleinkinder! [Stop bickering like a bunch of rugrats!]" I marched up to them, grabbed Jackie by the collar of her shirt and Onyx by one of her horns. "Ernsthaft, selbst die Schergen benehmen sich reifer als ihr beide grade und das will schon was heißen! [Seriously, even the Minions are behaving more mature than the both of you right now and that's saying something!]"

Giving Jackie´s collar a tug, I addressed her, masterfully ignoring her confused expression. "Junge Dame, du must nicht jedem sofort die Nase brechen, sowas kann man machen wenn man Schwarzenegger heißt und in einem Testosteron strotzenden Barbaren Film mitspielt, nicht wenn man sich vor jemandem erschreckt! [Young lady, you don´t need to break someone's nose, you can do something like this when your name´s Schwarzenegger and you play a role in a barbarian movie brimming with testosterone, not because you got a little jumpscare!] Turning to Onyx, I continued. "Und du! Krieg das endlich in deinen Dickschädel das all diese Schätze MIR gehören und ICH dir lediglich erlaube drauf zu pennen also komm mal drei Stufen runter klar? Wenns mir passt verschenke ich das alles an den nächsten Penner, klar? [And you! Get it into that thick skull of yours already that all this treasure belongs to ME and that I merely allow you to sleep on it, so take a chill pill or three, kay? If I want to, I'll give away all of it to the next hobo, kay?]"

I awaited her response, but the brat kept on staring me oddly. She shared an uncertain look with Onyx before they turned back to me simultaneously.

"Uh... what?" she asked, confused.

A series of strangled grunting noises and gurgles were my only response.

"Yeah," Onyx muttered, considerably less hostile than before. "We don't speak... whatever it is you just said. Sounded a bit like this screeching Griffins do, just less birdy."

Defeated, I slumped to my hands and knees. "Jackie, I love you like my own sister but I swear you're gonna give me a hernia one of these days," I moaned.

"I... uh..." She muttered uncertainly, and I could see her feet fidgeting. "She... started it," she said lamely.

"You stole my—" Onyx gulped, looking down at me. She sighed. "Fine, you stole Umbra's treasure that she so graciously shares with me," she said dully.

"And with that out of the way," I proclaimed and got back to my feet. "Onyx, this is Jackie. Jackie, Onyx. Now the both of you shake hands, slash, talons and make nice. You're gonna be sharing this tower for the foreseeable future and I do not need the two of you going at each other's throats."

Onyx bared her teeth and growled, small wisps of flame escaping between her chompers. "I'll apologize if she goes first,"she said boldly.

I sighed. And here I was hoping she´d be the more mature of the two. "Jackie?"

Girl grumbled something under her breath. "I'm sorry," she said venomously. "That I didn't get to turn you into an entire line of fashion products." One of these days, girl. One of these days...

Onyx blinked perplexedly but did not seem offended by the statement. More confused than anything.

"Onyx?"

"Fine," the irascible dragoness said, crossing her arms. "Sorry for almost painting this whole room with your blood."

Well, I suppose that's as good as I'm gonna get from either of them."Right. Well, let's go ahead and continue, shall we, squirt?" I grabbed Jackie's shoulders and steered her towards the exit. "Before I lose it and murder you both," I muttered lowly.

I left a somewhat confused Onyx and two kobolds trying to scoop up the fallen loot.

To my mild displeasure, Gnarl was already waiting for us in the throne room. Well, more like we caught him by surprise, since the old walnut was lounging on MY throne as if it was the most natural thing in the world, looking pleased like a cat that just got the cream, the canary, burned down the house AND managed to successfully blame it on the dog. When he saw us approach, his eyes bugged out and with more speed and agility than one would expect of his wrinkly old arse, he scuttled off and to his rightful place beside the throne.

"M-my Lady," he said, way too quickly and with false cheer on his oily tones. "What a delight to see you up and alive. We feared and mourned for you since your disappearance these past few days, but I... I said to the rest of the Minions that our Ladyship was well and alive, biding her time until she came back to honor us with her presence." Yeah, reaaaally piling it on, ain'tcha, walnut?

His gaze then drifted to my companion, peering at Jackie and you could practically see her shivering erupting in goosebumps.

"Who is this, my Lady? Another one of your pets?" He gave Jackie another once over, his lips twisting in a horrid, gruesome pervert smile. "My, my. I had no idea your Ladyship liked them so young. Oh, yes..." He cackled sinisterly.

Oh gods above, I felt all my sins crawling on my back from that! DO NOT WANT!

"What? No, ew! Shut up, you mangy old walnut, or I'll have your mouth sewn shut for you."

Thank you Jackie.

"I swear it, Gnarl. One of these days, you are seriously gonna outlive your usefulness. I've half a mind to command my Minions to drop your wrinkly old ass in my forge. Maybe put your soul into a toilet plunger or something of the like."

"Now that you mention it, my Lady," he said hastily. "There's something I... planned to talk to you about if you were still alive."

"Make it quick, you disgusting lecher."

"Yes, well," he cleared his throat. "While Your Ladyship was missing, one of our Minion scouts reported finding an object of interest far in the north. The Arcanium smelter, my Lady."

This gave me pause. The Arcanium smelter was by far the best forge in the Overlord games, capable of churning out sweet armor and weapons that were on par with legendary stuff like Excalibur, Glamdring or Havel´s Armor. With that sweet puppy in my possession, nothing short of a fully charged Alicorn-Laser could even hope to even put a scratch on me.

Well, Discord maybe because Chaos but if what Lyra had told me was true, the old chap was still stoned like Woodstock. Still I made a mental note to check the truth of that statement in the near future. Heh, maybe I could even get the chance to troll Blueblood.

"Hey, you are drooling."

Eh? What? At Jackie´s bland statement, I brought my hand up to my mouth and really, I was leaking like a waterfall. Okay, maybe not really, but still a good bit.

Clearing my throat and straightening my posture for good measure, I addressed Gnarl again. "Well, looks like you just managed to get out of the frying pan." I noticed that a good deal of tension left Gnarl and I could not have that. "But that just means your ass is now hovering of the roaring cooking fire." The expression on Gnarl's mug was priceless and told me that, at least for now, I was again the undisputed queen in my castle. "Okay, now tell me where they found the smelter!"

"As I understand it, my Lady, it was Gabber who found it. He said it was on a cave far, far north, where the land is nothing but cold and snow. But that is not all my Lady. There is something else that should interest you greatly."

"You see, Your ladyship, Gabber and his companion Wart were ambushed by a sect of... well, cultists or something of the like. They got to Wart quickly enough but Gabber managed to escape, and while he was running for his life to the nearest ley line, he reported seeing something that belonged to Your Ladyship."

"And what is this 'thing' that belonged to me?"

A shrewd expression entered the walnut's wrinkly visage. "Tell me, my Lady, where exactly is your Beast?"

Okay, that took me back. "That's... I... why does it matter to you anyway?" I snapped irritably. Last thing I needed was the treacherous little gremlin giving me grief over losing it.

"Because Gabber just so happened to spy Your Ladyship's favorite weapon as he was making his escape."

Wait, what? Hmm. That's... that's great! Best news I've heard in a while. Okay, okay, I gotta go and get ready, marshal my Minion forces and plan for a raid on this so-called sect of ponies. One mission, two items I so desperately need. A better two-fer there never has been.

"Gnarl!" I barked. "Get my best Minions ready and armored. We'll mount an expedition to find, liberate and maybe pillage a little bit. I want them ready to go in the next ten minutes." When the Walnut remained, muttering words of praise and admiration, I very nearly lost it. "Move it!" I roared and he scrambled out of the way. Serves him right.

"Uh, what was all that about?"

Huh. Oh, shit. I didn't even register Jackie was still here.

"Yeah... sorry, squirt, but I think I'll have to put our tour on hold for right now. Got some Overlord business to take care of. You know how it is."

"No, I don't. Never played the game."

You shitting me right now, brat? "Well, still. Look, I'll have the Minions bring you to a room or whatever. Maybe get Wiener to bring you something to munch on. Just stay here and wait. I shouldn't be too long."

I... don't think she liked that idea.

"Or, you know, I could just come with you. I don't wanna stay alone in a place full of these freaky looking goblin things."

"Minions, girl, Minions. And no, you can't come. There's most likely gonna be violence, swearing and more than just a little bloodshed."

"Yeah, well, what else is new?"

"Wut?"

"What do you think I've been doing in my version of Ponyworld? Sitting around, twiddling my thumbs and engaging in friendship adventures with the little beasts where each time I grow closer to them and learn the value of friends? I've done my fair share of bloodshed. Hell, I could find a job at a slaughterhouse if I ever get away from here."

"Point taken." Holy Christ, at this point I was seriously considering if a healthy dosage of Orbital Rainbow Laser could do Jackie more good than harm. Seriously, that girl had a grim way of looking at the world.

No, bad Umbra! You don't want that for yourself, so do not wish it upon others.

With a defeated sigh, my shoulders slumped a little. "No way to talk you out of this hn?"

A brusque nod was all I got.

"Well then, if you gonna tag along, I want you outfitted for it. You may have freaky strength, you can use the Force and whatever I have not seen you do yet but that does not mean that a stray blade or arrow can not end your life faster than you can say 'Only two more weeks until my retirement!' so we will make a little detour to the smithy. Maybe Welder has something in stock that could fit you."

She nodded, satisfied and a smug little smile on her mug. Reluctantly, I led her into our forge where Welder lounged lazily, sleeping against one of the rocky walls, the glow of his belly brightening and dimming with his snores. A miniature Corruption Burst, barely more than a glorified static shock, jerked him awake.

"Welder, Jackie. Jackie, Welder. Get her some armor and weapons or something so she doesn’t go and die on me as soon as the first blows are thrown."

Welder lifted his goggles and peered at Jackie through narrowed eyes, as if appraising her and led us to the armory, replete with weapons of all kinds.

"Not bad," Jackie murmured, eyes wide as she stared in awe at the assortment of weaponry. In my free time, I'd taken up to smithing or more precisely, I had forced Welder into making all the weapons and sometimes armor pieces I came up with in my free time, which was a lot. So it was no wonder that the wall racks where filled to the brim with all sorts of swords, axes, maces, chestplates, bracers, shin guards and even the odd helmet to spare. There was even a lonely bow, just because!

"Now let's see here..." I reached in and drew a rapier, slender and sharp. "I think this would be good for someone your size, eh?"

She took the weapon, corner of her lip curled up in doubt and inspected it. "I feel like I'm gonna break this damn thing. And what am I gonna do with it, poke little holes in stuff? It's more suited to be a shish-kebab. Next," she said, shoving the thing back in my grasp.

"O-kay. Um... ah, how about this?" I pointed at the bow.

"You're kidding, right?"

"What? It's not so bad. Go on, give it a try."

She took the bow and arrows and experimentally nocked an arrow, pulling back on the string.

"See, you're already a natural," I said with all the false cheer of an instructor that does her job only for closing time and cash. "Try to hit that plaque over there." I pointed to said wooden plaque that hung over the entrance of the armory, a hammer and anvil. Still, she drew and aimed at the target, her grip clearly shaking and unsteady and after several seconds of amateurish aiming, she let loose. The arrow flew through the air and to mine and Jackie's surprise, actually hit its mark with a loud twang of metal.

The arrow hit and rebounded wildly, arcing through the spiral stairs and plunged past the eye socket of a wandering Minion. The kobold's body jerked and spasmed and tumbled down like a marionette through the steps, dissolving into nothingness before he hit the ground floor.

"Yeah, pass." I was inclined to agree.

I growled in mild frustration. "That's fine, that's fine. There's gotta be something here more appropriate for you. Maybe a..."

"How about this?" In her grip, the aspiring Minion slayer hefted a war axe, a monstrous thing, almost as tall as she was, with a double bladed head that looked capable of cleaving rocks with minimal effort.

I honestly did not know what possessed me when I had Welder make this thing. Hell, even with my enhanced strength I could barely lift this thing with both hands! And Jackie, scrawny little Jackie, lifted the frikkin´ thing with one hand like it were nothing more than a whiffle bat! I did the only appropriate thing and stared slack jawed while uttering a disbelieving "Whaaaa~?" As if to further mock me, the squirt gave the thing a few experimental swings, effortlessly arcing it through the air.

"Yep, it's a keeper," she said. "I'm taking this."

"That's... what... where are you even gonna put that? It's as tall as you, for Darkness' sakes and don´t you dare to say Hammer space because I am the only one here allowed to make crappy Pop Culture jokes!"

"I'll lug it around, no big deal. Besides, I'm not like classically trained in weapons or anything, so something that you can swing around and cut things in half is more my speed."

"I still say it's too big for you. Give it here. Maybe we can find you a nice little sword that won't accidentally disembowel me or something." I moved forward to reach for it.

"Quit fretting already, I'll be careful," Jackie said, stepping back and swung the axe behind her and out my reach. What neither of us expected was the sound of that monster cutting through flesh and bone and when we looked there was poor Welder, cut in half and uttering a death rattle before dissolving appropriately.

"Goddamn it, Jacqueline..." I facepalmed "Well, looks like we need to make a short stop at Norbert before we set out, so he can pull Welder out of the Styx. Again!"

"Aaaand we are back to ice and snow again. Peachy," I growled as I stepped out of the portal. To be fair, it was not the same white desert like the one around Yule since you could still make out large patches of grey rock far and wide between, but still. From the look of it, this lovely little garbage dump was at the base of a mountain. Grumbling under my breath, I pulled the thick cloak tighter around my shoulders that covered most of my body while the other tightened around the handle of the longsword I chose for myself for this endeavor. The fact that the blade was imbued with Red essence and therefore permanently wreathed in a coat of flickering hellfire, giving me a bit of extra warmth plus the intimidation factor against whoever had my smelter had driven me to take this particular weapon.

"Okay, we´re here. Now what?" Came the ever so enthusiastic voice of Jackie from behind me as she stepped out of the portal herself. At my insistence, she too wore winterwear against the weather since her summery attire was worth jackshit against even a stiff breeze. Girl looked oddly comical, bundled up in layers, hood pulled up and wearing thick mittens. Looked more appropriate for her to be one of Santa's helpers. The massive war axe did overcome whatever cute factor she possessed though, and gave her more a Discworld-ish flair. Just one look at that thing would be enough to stop any would-be attackers in their tracks.

"Now we look for my Beast, girl. If what Gnarl said is correct, it's closest to us and the smelter lies somewhere deep in the cave. Probably behind dozens of cookie cutter enemies like, dunno, Slimes or some kind of Undead. Or maybe some sort of bandits. Most likely with a big Zampano as the final encounter once we have made our bloody path all the way to the my belongings. You know, just the usual."

"Yeah, yeah. So... which way?"

I pointed to some mountains in the distance. "Gnarl said the entrance should be right over there. Now less chatting, more walking. We need to waste as little energy as we can in the cold like this."

So our little trek began. Ideally, I would have 'ported to the entrance of the cave, but my attempts had proven fruitless. Something was blocking my magic, an even more powerful source that prevented us from 'porting anywhere near it. Fucking cultists. So I had to take us all the way out here in this unforgiving wasteland and hope we wouldn't get frostbite or get attacked by a yeti or something. Actually, that'd be a nice enough distraction. I've never killed a yeti before. Hey, maybe I could even make a makeshift clothing out of its pelt and wear it as a trophy, with its desiccated yeti head serving as a headgear.

Agh, no. Bad Umbra. Not good to get distracted, not out here. I briefly considered opening up a Minion portal and have the kobolds carry us there, but there were no ley lines sight. Well shit.

After several minutes, freezing cold and biting winds, the entrance of the cave now stood before us. Jackie and I huddled close, hidden behind a rocky outcropping and scoping out the situation. There in the entrance stood two sentries, unicorns wearing some sort of shawls which looked more decorative than anything. A magical field enveloped them, keeping out the snow and a flickering fire could be seen within.

"What are we waiting for? We can take them," Jackie said impatiently. I half glanced at her. I still wasn't too crazy about her coming with me. True, I had slaughtered my fair share of cronies and lackeys and disposable canon fodder but still something nagged at me. Jackie almost seemed eager to confront them and for a second I considered the possibility of maybe trying to talk/intimidate the ponies instead of up and offing them. Actually...

"Easy, girl. Hold your horses, I'm thinking."

"Better be some good thinking 'cause it's freezing cold out here."

"Alright, here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna sneak up on those jokers and take them by surprise."

"Got it."

"Alive."

"What?"

"Think about it. We're about to head into enemy territory. Who knows what'll be waiting for us down there. We sneak up on them, subdue them and make them talk. Reveal info and all, you know? For all you know it's a maze in the cave and we could spend the rest of our lives trying to find the exit, eating rats and worms as sustenance. Is that what you want?"

"You're ridiculous," she sighed. "Fine, no killing. Alive and all. Let's go already, I literally can't feel my nose."

We split up and went to opposite sides of the little campfire, the ponies within oblivious to our presence and when I gave the signal, we moved. We closed the distance and in my free hand I pooled my Mana, arcing bolts of electricity sparked and crackled, congealing into a sphere. I slammed the Corruption Burst into the magical field. It rippled violently as the spell hit, thick, lethal bolts firing off in all directions with the intensity of thunder and the field vanished. Heh, I think I gonna name that move 'Shield Buster'.

The ponies clearly hadn't been expecting us as their mugs clearly told me they were very much startled, eyes wide and looking around wildly, but when they saw us, it was too late. One of them lit his horn, no doubt intending to send some magic juju my way, but I was faster. I slammed the pommel of my sword right at the base of his horn and the burgeoning spell fizzled out, but not before he let out a splitting shriek of pain. Gotta be a sensitive spot or something. Props where it was due. The unicorn recovered fairly quick and even attempted to get back up and fight. That's cute. Renewed howls of pain tore the air as I hit him with a full fledged Corruption Burst, the little equine writhing in agony as the lightning bolts ravaged his flesh and corroded his will.

I looked around for Jackie and saw her straddling the body of a struggling unicorn. To my relief, she had refrained from actually killing him and yes, she was in fact trying to subdue him. The unicorn flailed, his oddly flexible, marshmallowy pony hooves preventing Jackie from getting a good grip. Quickly growing frustrated, the girl instead put him in a chokehold, seized his horn and with a single motion, tore it off his noggin! With the sound he made, you'd think he was a little filly or something. Couldn't blame him, it did look painful. Blood and sparks sizzled from the stump where his horn used to be and Jackie stood, curiously examining the broken appendage in her hand.

Jeez...

"Oh for fucks sake Jackie, I said no killing right now!"

Jackie gave me a annoyed glare. "What? Is it my fault that these beasts are as tough as soggy marshmallows? Besides, it is still alive."

"Yeah, but it now he or she has a gaping hole in his or her skull!"

"So stick a hot poker in it or something. You know, medieval style."

"Right, ram a white hot spear right into the brain, that is sure to help. You know that lobotomy is out of practice since I don´t know how long?"

"Hey, at least I try to be productive. Not like someone else I could name, with her stupid 'No casualties because Horses have feelings too' policy."

"Actually, we have a medkit with a few potions right over there..." The mutilated Ex-Unicorn piped up shakily, pointing one hoof in the mentioned direction.

"No one asked you!" Both Jackie and I yelled at the same time, causing the wounded equine to whimper even more and almost crawl into the ground.

"Now, where were we?"

"Uhm, something about you being a soft bellied horse lover?" Jackie pointed the bloodied horn at me.

"Well, excuse me for not being a Genocide runner!"

"Ehrm... maybe... about these potions? I just could get them myself. I actually feel a bit lightheaded, I think it is the blood loss and the adrenaline..." The pony under Jackie piped up feebly.

"Ergh, shut up will you? Higher life forms are talking." Jackie snapped and bonked her victim over the head with his own horn. Now, that's just insulting!

"Just get it already. The poor sod will bleed out." I pushed past her and retrieved the kit. Inside were some bandages, ointments and potions which I had no idea what they did but sure enough, one of them had a big red heart with a white cross in it on the label. If that was not a healing potion, video games had lied to me my whole life!

"Eh... right. You do it." I tossed the bag at the pony who, with shaky hooves, proceeded to stem the blood flow from his stub.

After he was done, both Jackie and I towered over the wounded equine like doom made flesh for effect before I growled, "Now talk!"

The little pony's eyes, I shit you not, rolled to the back of his head before he promptly collapsed unconscious in sheer terror. Well, I assume the blood loss had something to do with it.

"Typical. Just my luck," I muttered. "Jackie, I like your enthusiasm and all but you should really take a good, long look at the meaning of the word restraint."

Said girl snootily turned her head away. "There's still that guy." She pointed to the remaining stallion who just started regaining his bearings.

Seeing how arguing with her would be pointless, I instead turned my attention to my newest thrall. I allowed the pony to fully regain consciousness. The Unicorn had a navy blue coat and black mane and like Lyra, he now stared at me with devoting eyes. Creepy...

"Mistress," he intoned and bowed low. Jackie watched with amusement.

"Rise already," I said impatiently. "Now tell me your name."

"Starburst, your Grace."

"What were you and that guy," I pointed to the felled pony. "Doing here, Starburst?"

"Guarding the entrance, your Grace," the stallion said, bowing again and I rolled my eyes.

"Obviously you were guarding it, I figured that much out by myself. C'mon, Starburst, spill the beans. What is this place? Why were you guarding it? And why in the hell is there an outpost here in the ass end of nowhere?"

Starburst's horn glowed and just as I wondered whether my trusty Corruption had failed to do its job, Starburst enveloped a small area around us in a protective shield.

"Apologies, your Grace, but I thought this'd be best done out of the snow." He cleared his throat. "This place is a research outpost and a temple, built and commissioned by our previous leader and champion of the night."

"Who the hell is the champion of the night?" I asked, not liking where this was going. I´ve read far too much crappy fanfiction to not have at least an inkling where this was going.

"Champion of the night is the traditional title of our leader," Starburst explained dutifully. "For we are a following of the true lunar sister. Myself excluded of course, since my life now belongs to you my liege..."

"Yes, yes, quit the brown nosing. You wanted to tell us why the hell you are guarding this little piece of frozen hell and why we are freezing our asses of here," Jackie interrupted, stepping from one foot to the other in an attempt to warm herself up.

Though Starburst clearly now belonged to me, the same could not be said for Jackie and he regarded the girl with a disdainful sneer, eyeing her in the same way one might look an unsightly stain at the sole of one's shoe. Nevertheless, he answered.

"My group's purpose was to use this outpost as a place where we could research in peace and divine a way to return the glorious Nightmare Moon back to this plane of existence, that her reign might be long and glorious as she dethrones her traitorous sister and wrests control of fair Equestria from her hooves."

"Oh, great," Jackie sighed. "Cultists. We've run into freaking cultists of all things."

"It could be worse," I said.

"Worse than a bunch of ponies who'll probably gladly die for this pony moon?"

"You... have a point. Well, maybe Discord worshippers?" I admitted grudgingly and turned back to Starburst. "So you freaky cult guys wanna bring back Nightmare Moon. How?"

"It doesn't matter how," Jackie cut in impatiently. "Just make him tell us how to get the smelter and your Beast. It's freaking cold out here." True enough, I could see her shivering under her layers of clothing and truth be told, I was about to follow.

"Starburst, are there any other surprises waiting for us inside?" I gestured to the opening of the cave.

"A few runes meant to ward off trespassers and if need be, kill them with a powerful magic pulse. But I should be able to disable them so you Grace and her scrawny pet," he looked at Jackie, who promptly flipped him the bird. "May pass unhindered."

With a gesture on my part, he led us in, motioning for us to wait at the entrance of the cave as he went on and sure enough, his horn pulsed with magic and in turn, the floor and walls ahead of him glowed a soft blue, the carved symbols igniting in tandem with his magic. Tentatively, I used my Ley-sight to try and get a better understanding of what he was trying to do.

By glancing at the runes, it seemed they were first designed to ward off curious onlookers harmlessly by making them turn away, but there was an underlying second layer that held back a massive charge of magical energy, just barely. That was probably the kill charge my newest servant told us about. Yikes, that looked like the equivalent of a magical landmine, if anything.

Starburst carefully manipulated the arcane matrices within the runes in an attempt to harmlessly deactivate them. Hell, he actually seemed to be doing a good job. But naturally, seeing as how things were going my way for once, the dynamic duo of Fate and Murphy chose that moment to render my hopes moot, for a slight spark, nearly unnoticeable, emerged from Starburst's horn. Then I remembered with a pit of dread, I conked him well and good at the base of his horn not a few minutes ago.

Unicorn horns were curious things. Composed of a similar material that made up bone, yet able to dispel powerful blasts of magic with enough training. At the same time, despite their sturdy build they were also remarkably sensitive. Lyra explained to me that Unicorns in combat learn to guard their precious horns for while it is a potent tool, it can also spell a pony's downfall. Several nerve clusters are contained inside the thing, more than a pony has in his entire body but at the same time, are protected by the horn's hard, outer casing. The nerves that run from the horn and the base of the skull... those are not offered the same protection and thus are sensitive to outward stimuli like, say, a massive blow from yours truly that could very well disrupt the flow of magic needed to carefully disable a lethal set of wards.

Starburst clearly noticed this as well, for he drew a sharp intake of breath and, if his breathing was any indication, panicked as the lapse in his controlled magic manipulation faltered. The poor stallion did what he could to regain control, but the damage was done. The wards, clearly designed to counter such an attempted scheme, ignited in a brilliant flash that in my Ley-vision left me temporarily blind. But I got off easy, all things considered. Couldn't say the same for Starburst as the magical surge from the wards immediately traveled through his magical connection and into his body. The massive discharge of conflicting energies succeeded in literally bursting the stallion apart like a balloon in a showy explosion of gore, pulpy bits of meat and an admittedly impressive display of wildfire mana.

"Gah, fuck!" I yelped as I was showered in the red slush. I spat and hastily cleaned my face all the while my sight returned to me. True enough, the wards where gone now, having done their duty and having done it good. All that was left from Starburst was blood and chunks of flesh dripping from the surrounding walls and a Rorschach-like, slightly steaming red splatter on the floor.

A series of amused chuckles could be heard. "That is one way to do it," Jackie piped up from behind, having used me as a blast shield against the Unicorn's demise. The girl inspected the gory spectacle with an appreciative eye and stepped forward, tilting her head as she examined Starburst's scattered pieces. "Well, rest in pieces I guess."

"…" I just stared at her silently.

"Hey, come on. I thought if one could appreciate that crappy line, it was you huh? Anyways, way´s clear now or is there anything else?"

"Way's free, yes." I answered, feeling a slight mental exhaustion creep into me.

"Great, time to get out of this freezer!" Jackie exclaimed, wasting no time in march forward, stomping over the gory pony remains without a care and leaving dark red shoe prints behind.

Deciding that all the potential emotional baggage would be future-me´s problem, I just followed Jackie although I avoided to step into Starburst´s bloody starburst. "I need a blunt after this," I murmured. "The mother of all blunts!"

The cultist had been true to his word. Almost.

The crazed pony leader and his minions had definitely put a lot of man... er, ponypower and effort into making this an appropriately evil cultist lair. Like the now deceased Starburst said, right at the back of the cavern's entrance there was a sizable rock that sealed the temple-ish maze hidden beneath.

"Tell me again, why is this mace and smelter of yours worth going through all this trouble?" Jackie asked as we peered into the lair's depths. "Can't you, I dunno, have a whole new one made instead?"

"Maybe," I said as I led the way in. "But my Beast has quite a bit of sentimental value. Plus, I don't have the ingredients to make another one. For that I'd need the Arcanium smelter and I can't make an Arcanium smelter because, well, I've no freaking idea how. The things have just kind sorta been around as far as I know."

"And when we run into more of these cultist freaks?"

"We knock them out cold and show them who's boss. Easy peasy."

"Say," I suddenly thought of something. "I don't suppose you know who this Nightmare Moon the cultists worship is, do you?"

"I assume it's an angsty, emo pony mare obsessed with the night and darkness."

"Kinda," I admitted. "But you know of Celestia and Luna, right?"

"Yeah."

I gave her a fairly thorough explanation of what happened during the whole attempted coup fiasco, Moonbutt's banishment and eventual restoration to her old self.

"So, what, these guys want to turn her back into Darth Luna or make another one from scratch?"

I paused. "You know, I hadn't considered that. Either way, whatever it is they're doing here we need to put a stop to it. "

"I... thought we came here to get your stuff back, not interfere with whatever it is these ponies get up to."

"So we multitask," I said airily.

Jackie sighed. "Alright, let me put it this way. Why do we need to get involved in all this mess?"

"Because, squirt, bringing back Nightmare Moon will accomplish many things, none of them good. Think about it. Crazed mare would plunge Equestria in an eternal night. The land would freeze, plants and crops would die and under her tyrannical reign, I think it's likely more than not hundreds if not thousands of ponies would die a suffering death."

Girl stopped in her tracks, eyeing me with a strange expression. "And... we don't want that?"

"Wha... no! What kind of question is that? Because Eternal Night means that one half of the planet freezes to death while the other half turns into molten slag. Kinda bad for everything that lives, really. That would include you and me too." I snarked with a deadpan.

She held up her hands placatingly. "Fine, fine. Just saying, you could eke out a good existence in your tower, invent some kind of cold weather crops and ride the whole thing over until pony society finally implodes under the weight of its own idiocy or something and you could be there to pick up the pieces."

"Jackie, Alicorns, corrupted or not have eternal life. Even with my dark magic and Respawn ability, I highly doubt I could sit that one out. Nice idea though."

"Emo, remember? Hey, maybe she'd be a cutter if you're lucky. One day decides life's not worth living and offs herself in the bathtub."

"That is... a pretty funny thought to be honest, in a dark way but still. Would still leave the sun and moon motionless. Hmm, maybe we could robe Discord into getting them to move naturally? Dead ponies are no fun after all."

"So you go find the sweet spot between night and day, where it's twilight all the time."

"It is a scientific fact that this twilight zone would be constantly plagued by storms with wind speeds making the biggest, baddest hurricane the U.S. ever saw look like a decrepit pugs fart."

She sighed. "Ugh, fine. Let's help out the ponies. Let's just get it over with quickly."

"I agree. I want back to my tower and just laze around for days with you, this whole shit is defs enough to fill my quota for looong time." As we moved on, a passage came into view. A more or less narrow corridor with several doors at either end. Now we're getting somewhere.

"Eenie, meenie, minie..." I trusted the time proven way to decide on the right door, pointing in turn at the doors. "Mo!" With that, I stomped over to the unlucky winner and kicked the door clean off its hinges. Turning to Jackie, who looked at me with a just slightly gobsmacked expression I grinned widely. "I´ve got a good feeling with this one."

Jackie in turn gave a huff and followed me in. It was another tunnel but this one was lined with a lot more lamps which in my book could only mean that this tunnel was more important than others and would subsequently lead us to our quarry.

After a while of walking the smell of miniature horse, old hay and something sweet became more notable in the air.

"Kay Jackie, I think we are close." I whispered, checking for any Ley Lines but nada. "Darn, no Minions for now but hey, I think we can get those horsey cultist by ourselves, hn? Just try to not kill them on purpose, ya?"

"What about mangling, mutilating and mentally scarring?" Jackie not as much whispered back, with a big grin of her own and playfully wagging her massive axe. Once again did I debate the merits of letting her come along. That monster on her shoulder was not designed for light, non-lethal combat and with her freaky strength... well, I don't imagine the no-kill rule will be of much use here.

After a short moment, I shrugged. "Meh, as long as you don´t go overboard with it. We are no Nazis after all Jacqueline."

"Hey come o... wait, seriously?" Heh, that look on her face.

"Jepp. I mean, come on, we are facing the probably deranged members of a Doomsday cult and I highly doubt they would do us the same courtesy. So feel free to let them swallow a few teeth." I sighed at the mental image. "Wow, this is almost like the turf wars back in the day."

After some more unproductive minutes of wandering around, Jackie noticed a particular door. Wooden and somewhat crudely made and from the sizable crack in the bottom, light flickered through and moving shapes could be seen.

"Okay, showtime," I whispered as Jackie and I flanked either side of the room. "Let's come up with a plan. I don't want the cultists getting the drop on us."

"We don't need a plan. We got the drop on them."

"I still say we need—"

"Less talky. More smashy," the brat interrupted. Mimicking my earlier action, Jackie took a step back and kicked the door off its hinges. Well, more like completely splintered it and, axe held high, the girl crowed out a, "Surprise, assholes!" Before disappearing inside.

I stood dumbfounded for a moment as my brain struggled to register what just happened. "Goddamit Jackie!" I groaned in disbelief and hastily followed inside with my sword held ready, where the sounds of fighting and painful screaming were already underway.

I hefted my flaming sword and joined the fray. Already I spotted an earth pony in the ground, writhing in agony and flailing his stumps where his hooves used to be, the things laying down unceremoniously before him. I saw a Pegasus dashing for Jackie, but the monster axe arced through the air, intercepting the poor sod with the flat side of the blade like a oversized flyswatter. A sickening crunch of bones could be heard even amongst the fighting and the unnamed Pegasus crashed against a stone wall, where he slumped to the floor. He didn't move again.

Well, I had no time to stand there and gawk so I joined the fray. Right in time too since another Earth Pony charged at me, obviously in the delusion that between the axe swinging squirt and I, that little old me was the lesser of two evils despite my massive armor and glowing eyes.

The pony attacked me with a classic tackle head-on and I wasted no time to show him the error of his ways. I sidestepped my attacker, stepped behind him as he was hitting the brakes to slow his charge and with quite an amount of nostalgia, kicked the guy right in the balls.

A shrill, haunting shriek later, the pony was reduced to a pitiful mess on the floor but I had no time to smug because something stung my shoulder from behind, heating the protective armor plates up to quite the painful level. Turning around, I spied a Unicorn mare, her horn still aglow as she charged another spell. Weird runes covered her whole face, a moon sickle the most prominent and reoccurring.

"Bow before the Night!" The mare yelled and an impressively large bolt of black lightning left her horn, intending on turning me to a smoking heap.

"Nope!" I countered and dove down and towards the little witch, her lightning sailed over me and struck an unfortunate cultist behind me. The smell of charred meat quickly followed. Before she could do anything else, I rammed the little equine with my shoulder, putting all my mass behind the tackle and bowling her over effortlessly.

"Rargh! Get of me you heathen!" The mare winced, in obvious pain.

Instead of giving her the dignity of an answer, I simply socked her square in the face so hard, her head impacted with the stone ground which in turn knocked her out cold.

My triumph sadly was short lived as in quick succession, three more ponies piled themselves atop me and promptly started to wail away at me with their blunt hoofsies. Marshmallowy though they may look, they sure pack a mean punch especially since these ponies seemed to wear horseshoes and boy, were these three dishing out an amount of punches. My armor succeeded in deflecting the first round of blows but sure enough, even the durable metal cracked and dented ever so slightly and I could feel the things hit me with near full force.

Croaks and even small whimpers of agony escaped my mouth as I fought to fend them off. Even calling on my mana reserves proved difficult, the incessant pounding not giving me a moment to concentrate and call forth a spell.

"C'mere, you," I heard Jackie's faint voice and one of the ponies beating on me immediately went bye-bye. A snap of bone later was followed by renewed screams. This gave my attackers pause and the moment I so desperately needed. Fury welled within me and I used it to gratuitously power forth my favorite spell. The air cracked and the room bathed in a strong luminous glow as the massive Corruption Burst exploded from my palm with such power that the unfortunate ponies atop me were violently flung into the air from the force of the blast, crashing on the ceiling where they fell down unceremoniously in an unmoving heap.

Shooting back up, I let out a pissed off roar, searching for the next victim to vent my fury. Unluckily for me and luckily for them, there were no more conscious cultists. Only a satisfied looking Jackie, leaning on her axe surrounded by her victims. To her credit, most of them seemed to be still breathing, however shallowly. Girl sure didn’t shy away from breaking bone or inflicting crippling injuries.

"Nice lion roar," she commented dryly. "That another Overlord perk?"

"What do you think, brat?!" I snapped irritably, the pain and humiliation at being bested by colorful horsies made my words considerably sharper than I intended to. Thankfully, Jackie didn't seem to mind.

"Hey, you smell something cooking?" She wandered off to one of the small fires lined around the room where a small pot hung over the flames. Now that I got a good look, this chamber was pretty bare bones as they went. A few lit torched were scattered throughout the room and save for some benches and assorted camping equipment, there wasn't really anything of note.

"Ugh, brussel sprouts?" Jackie groaned as she got a full whiff of a pot's contents after lifting the lid.

I rolled my eyes.

"Hey, check it out," she said, pointing to the wall behind me.

Care had been taken to carve it into a makeshift mural, replete with unintelligible runes, symbols, what could only possibly be a strange language and pictograms depicting the various stages of the moon.

"What in the..." I reached out with a hand to touch the dark red paint, the tips of my gauntlets peeling off the substance. It almost looked, and smelled, like...

"Well, we're not gonna find anything here. Let's move on," Jackie said. I agreed, not wanting to spend a moment longer in this damned cave.

Forty minutes, twelve rooms, and dozens of cultists later, an increasingly frustrated Jackie and I tried our hand at yet another door. Damned cultists. Would it kill them to make a little map or something? Maybe some arrows in the walls, something along the lines of 'Center of the evil Lair, this way' or something? How is anybody supposed to traverse the lengths of this complex without getting lost?

Jackie opened it, neither of us caring for plans or subtlety at this moment as the cultists had proven to be a suitable form of stress relief. Beakers, flasks and test tubes abounded greatly and fumes of various colors emanating from substances over a fire. We warily entered the laboratory.

"Don't touch anything, girl," I warned. "God only knows what's inside these bottles." She made a noise of agreement and we both went around, searching for whatever there may have been of interest. The room was quite larger than I initially thought but right near the back we found a few desks, the remains of several burned out candles and a messy assortment of notes, journals and papers written in some egghead jargon. Hmm, maybe I could find a health potion recipe or something?

While I leafed through the mess, I heard Jackie opening up a creaky armoire behind me.

"Gah! What the...?"

I spun around to see the girl recoiling from what she found. I couldn't exactly blame her.

"Motherfucker," I hissed as I made my way to her, seeing what it was that startled her so.

There, resting in heavy shelves were four massive jars, filled with some sort of thick, murky fluid that glowed a faint, sickly green under the light. Inside them were darkened shapes, small and rigid. Foals embalmed and left to gather dust.

"What do you think happened here?" asked Jackie, transfixed at the sight before her.

I didn't answer. My feet dragged me closer to the departed foals in morbid fascination, taking in their features. I gasped, a hand covering my mouth as the nature of the unfortunate foals was made apparent. In each of them, a small, stubby horn atop their heads and on their backs featherless appendages, small and twisted.

"Who... what could have done this?" I whispered in mute horror.

"I think I found something," Jackie said, ruffling through the papers. "Check it out." She handed me a worn and battered journal. I knew right then and there I wouldn't like what I found and though simply leaving it be would be the safest course, I found myself reaching out for it. Dated entries. I opened at a random page right near the beginning and read.

1st day of the 12th month, 999 AB

Progress is slow. Steady but slow. Just this past week I managed to find three potential candidates. Those who would enlighten themselves recognizing our true princess, Nightmare Moon. Mares are important, mothers even more so. I carefully picked those with the weakest will. Kitchen wenches, destined to die alone and unhappy, fathering foals born out of wedlock. Brides whose husbands were lost to the distant wars and conflicts in the next continent.

I approached them as a friend, taking the time to know them and the details of their miserable little lives. But that's fine. I'm patient if nothing else. As my base of power grows and more servants to the true lady of the night found, things will progress much quicker. It's only a matter of time.

21st day of the 2nd month, 1000 AB

Time passes and my followers continue to grow. I've located a suitable base for our group. A secluded cave deep in the north, far away from prying eyes. I led a small team the other day to better appraise it. It will take time and effort, but I believe we can make it habitable during the next six months.

6th day of the 7th month, 1000 AB
We've encountered a problem. Deep within the bowels of the earth, it seems we've accidentally awakened a great beast from its long sleep. Four members of our sect were taken, falling prey to its ravenous hunger before our best spellcasters drove it deep within the earth. I must now go and devise a way to keep the creature at bay. Far too much time and resources have been invested in this endeavor to turn back now or start somewhere else. I must go now. Time grows short but with it, the return of our lady steadily approaches.

13th day of the 9th month, 1000 AB

Success! After much planning and research, my most trusted advisors and I have divined away to keep the wretched worm away from us. Now our work can finally resume.

As of this moment I have succeeded in converting eight mothers to my cause. Now approaches what may be the most difficult step. Wind Runner is a faithful servant to our cause and I believe it is from her that I will see the best result. Sacrificing one's foal plays no small burden in one's conscience after all, but I believe she will consent. Let's see if I'm right.

15th day of the 9th month, 1000 AB

Wind Runner consented, much to my relief. Truly she will make a devout, faithful servant to our lady upon her return. It is through her that I was able to convince the others to relinquish their foals for a higher cause.

If our lady is to return, she will need a suitable body. The wretched Luna would be a folly to use, of course. In the all but impossible event that we manage to subdue and foalnap her, there is still one glaring problem. Though our lady initially managed to overcome her lesser half's mind, the Elements of Harmony ripped her from her host's body. If they did it once, they could surely do so again.

No, in order for this to work, our lady will need a suitable body, but what pony could possibly be worthy of being her thrall? None. That is why we must create an entirely new body for her. That comes with its own set of problems. No such feat has been attempted after all.

This is why the foals are necessary for our efforts. By dissecting them can we see what goes into making a body. The muscle structure, the ligaments, the nervous system, so many things come into play in order to create each and every one of all living things. If we are to create a suitable vessel for our lady, we will need all the information we can get.

10th day of the 2nd month, 1001 AB

The remnants of the last foal have run their usefulness. He was buried under the snow with the rest and now our work can truly begin. Our Lady's vessel will be made of only the best parts available, but even the creation of a suitable body is quite a ways away. First we must work on the prototypes.

Even in death the foals have played their part well. Their mothers are honored they played such an important role in our lady's return, but they served another purpose entirely. We took apart their bodies however we deemed it best. From some we took their bones, others their organs and others still their muscles and we used these spare parts, transforming and transmuting them appropriately to create the perfect pony.

The first experiment was a failure. Though we did indeed manage to craft a passable body, we were never able to breathe life into it. I considered disposing of the remains, but decided to keep them, to better learn from my failures.

30th day of the 5th month, 1001 AB

The second experiment was met with more success. We succeeded in attaining a heartbeat and even minor functions of the body, but it expired hours after. Progress is slow but steady.

26th day of the 8th month, 1001 AB

The third experiment was the most successful by far. The vessel actually woke, breathing like a normal pony would. We tried to communicate or at least restrain it for study, but during its brief span of consciousness, it continually kept screaming in agony until a massive stroke took its life.

I slammed the book shut, not wanting to read just one more word. My body trembled with rage, hands clasped so tight I tore the flimsy bindings of the book. In my stomach, a blazing fury roared to life as at the same time, tears ran down my cheeks in streams.

What kind of monster could do all this? Use desperate mothers, lure them in with the promise of support and friendship, then brainwash them to give up the most precious of things a female could ever hope to bring forth into the world? Destroy the innocence, debase the souls of unborn children in the mad attempt of artificially creating a genocidal goddess?

Without a second to spare, flames erupted from my palm, immolating the unholy tome in my grasp near instantly.

The ashes still spilling from my hand, I spun around and lashed out with my blade at the nearest table, the flaming blade effortlessly tearing through the beakers and vials. A wordless scream accompanied the next strike that sliced the massive table in half, setting it ablaze.

Then my gaze found the armoire again. The bestial fruits of unknown amounts of time found themselves on the receiving end of a white hot fireball that utterly obliterated the furniture in a rain of smoldering splinters and clouds of grey ashes that not a moment before had been papers.

"Are you done yet?"

Faster than she could react, I took a hold of Jackie's collar and pulled her close, looming over her like Doom given form.

"I will not have any of that right now Jaqueline! Are we clear?" I seethed at her, my eyes pouring the boiling, all consuming hatred churning inside my mind all over her. "Do you have any idea what was inside that wretched book?"

"Uh, no. You torched it, remember? You could at least let me have a look."

I screamed and before I knew it, I slapped the brat with all the strength I had and unlike the cave, I noted with satisfaction she actually seemed to feel this one.

"What was that for?! she demanded angrily, hand over her reddening cheek.

"I am not in the mood, brat. I am SERIOUSLY not in the mood," I said, my voice thick with rage. "This... this place is an abomination. Fuck the cultists, fuck their leader, fuck Nightmare Moon. Everybody here is going to die today in a bloody, gory blaze of AGONY!"

My fist lashed out, gouging a hole in the wall. Jackie eyed me warily and with more than a little bafflement, but I didn't pay her any mind and stalked outside, vengeance screaming in my blood.

I don't recall how long it took in my hazed state of mind but somehow, I found myself staring at the massive double doors of what could only the inner sanctum of this hellhole, consisting of a silvery metal and a black, glassy material. Any other time, I would have probably found the time to appreciate the fine craftsmanship but at this moment, all that occupied my mind was a thick, red fog and one hundred and one ideas of how making the last moments of all those behind these doors the most excruciating since the started record of time!

I barely noticed Jacqueline stepping in behind me, keeping her distance.

Laying both hands on the large doors, I pushed until the massive wings slowly began to move and a sliver of light fell through the crack, together with muted chanting. For such a massive thing, it hardly made a sound.

Within were dozens of ponies surrounding a circular stone platform, itself elevated a good seven feet off the ground. The ponies were on their knees(or whatever they're called) prostrated as they chanted whatever eldritch chant they chanted. My eyes darted to a small form in the middle of the platform where a small Pegasus filly struggled against her bonds.

Presiding over her was a unicorn stallion clad in intricate, silver armor in a vaguely reminiscent style of Nightmare Moon. He was an impressive specimen. Didn't hold a candle to Moustachio, certainly, but he could give Shining Armor a run for his money. And even from at a distance I could see that like some of the Unicorns I ran into before, his face and visible patches of fur were carved—thick and fully healed scars in the shape of strange runes and symbols.

His coat was midnight blue and mane a silvery grey and he stared with cool authority over the ponies, slowly pacing the stone platform.

"Brothers and sisters. We gather here today to accept this brave soul's sacrifice, that she may serve our rightful lady of the night. For almost two years now we have toiled in secret and while our lady's return is still over the horizon, we grow closer to her return with every day."

His cronies groveled and chanted, paying no heed to the tearful filly, pleading with them to release her.

"Mama," the filly croaked, her eyes trying in vain to catch the gaze of a nearby mare. "I'm scared, mama. Please... let me go. I'll be good, I promise," the filly said between choked sobs. But the raving mare had completely given herself to her cause and paid no attention to her daughter. Like the ponies around her, she groveled and prostrated, chanting, her gaze never leaving the cold ground. The asshole leader then reached behind him and approached the terrified foal, dragging along a very familiar sight. My blood boiled in fury at the sight of this... this abomination even daring to soil my Beast with his foul touch.

Magic enveloped the Beast, looming like a specter over the wide-eyed filly.

"With this foal's death may we retrieve her soul and use it to bring to life a suitable vessel for our rightful Lady. So mote it be."

"So mote it be," chanted the cultists.

The unicorn hefted the Beast higher, preparing to strike. I broke out of my stupor and decided to act.

"Drop it," I growled with such a hate filled voice, so unlike my own.

All heads in the room snapped to me. Jackie followed soon, flanking me and axe at the ready.

"What is this?" the leader demanded in fury. "How dare you besmirch sacred ground with your presence? Who do you think you are?!"

"Your executioner!" I stated with the finality of Death herself.

The unicorn snarled. "Stop them! These heathens mean to halt our lady's rightful return!"

His cronies mobilized at once, swarming like a tidal wave at us both. Reaching out with every ounce of my willpower, I forced open a Minion portal, calling forth my own army. Sixty Browns flooded into the cavern, ready to tear, mutilate and kill at my behest.

Pointing the tip of my burning blade at the approaching kettle I roared my orders.

"Let them suffer!"

My warriors smashed into the cultists like a battering ram, sending splashes of blood and severed appendages into the air, but the insane ponies answered in kind, smashing Minions under their hooves or dousing them in lethal magic.

I followed close, my blade held in both hands. Driven by the fury that this whole place filled me with, I plowed myself a way through the mass of bodies, slashing and stabbing at every pony that came within range. All this time, my thoughts were solely focused on the leader and how to deliver him from this plane of existence only to drag his soul back to torture him for all eternity.

To my immense satisfaction, he looked horrified. A number of Browns scrambled up to finish him, but he recovered quickly. With a sneer, he swung MY Beast and felled my little munchkins, who dissolved into nothingness after their bodies broke under the massive blows.

From the corner of my eye I saw Jackie charging at a unicorn who fired off a flurry of spell at her. I almost lost it when she didn't bother to dodge and she was struck by the deadly magic. Her bulky sweater tore and split, scattering its stuffing in all directions, but the girl seemed unfazed. She swung down the axe at the panicking mare, completely cleaving her in two.

I focused again on my opponents, gratuitously throwing Fireballs and Corruption Bursts every which way, every cry of pain and agony music to my ears, each stroke of my blade as it ended a life slightly quelling the toxic rage that burned within me.

The cultists put up a fight, but the outcome proved inevitable. The combined might of my overwhelming kobold forces, Jackie swinging that monster axe of hers like nobody's business and my destructive spells whittled them down entirely. Minions overcame the weakened fighters, in some instances literally tearing them apart while on others they abandoned weapons entirely, felling the ponies with nothing but their claws, brute strength and needle-sharp teeth; the bloodlust that filled me so emboldening them as well.

With a victorious cry, I drove my sword into the gut of a felled pony, breathing in satisfaction as the blade sank deep beneath the ground and he expired soon after. The chamber had almost gone silent at this point, with only a few scattered groans of the ponies that my Minions quickly silenced.

My gaze then drifted towards the platform where to my immense displeasure, the raving maniac of a leader remained standing, trickles of blood flowing from beneath the armor.

"Heathens... imbeciles. You ruined it all!" He hissed through gritted teeth, my Beast still firmly in his magical grasp. My eyes wandered down and to my vast relief, there was the filly, alive and somehow unharmed despite the pandemonium that filled the room not long before.

"You meddling beasts have set me back years. Years! But no matter," he rambled, swaying slightly under the loss of blood. "I... I will get away. I will start again and work without rest. Not until our lady of the night is restored to her former glory."

"Give it up, freak," I growled. "Step away from the pony and I will make your death swift."

He scowled in fury. "I may fall here today, monster, but somehow, someway, somepony will take up my noble cause and work to bring our lady back to this plane of existence."

"Noble? Noble?!" I screeched. "You brainwashed ponies, used innocent foals for your foul experiments, mutilated their bodies and plotted to plunge Equestria into an eternal night and sentence every living being on it to a slow death! How is anything that you did even remotely noble? Not even the demons of Hell are so cruel!"

He sneered. "I wouldn't expect an unenlightened heathen such as you to understand. My reasons transcend the morals of mortal ponies. So long as our lady is brought back to us, there is no price too high to pay." He stared at me in defiance and before I could even stop it, he brought the Beast down. The filly barely had time to scream before her head was completely annihilated under the force of the blow, bloody pulp spraying everywhere, dousing the defiant cult leader.

Deep inside me, I felt something break.

I closed the distance to the leader with two steps and thrust my blade into his left foreleg's knee, nailing it to the floor. Before he could even scream, I let go of my sword and grabbed ahold of his horn with one hand and his skull with the other. With one savage motion, I ripped the appendage out of the cult leader's skull.

While a primal scream of pain ripped from the throat of the pony, I changed my hold to his throat and effortlessly lifted the mutilated stallion, splitting his left leg from the knee downwards as my blade cut through meat and bone without any resistance.

As he reached my eye level, I unceremoniously plunged his own horn into his left eye to the point of nearly jamming it into his brain.

Following that, I freed my blade from the ground and set the tip onto my victim's stomach. With a fluid motion, the blade sank into the soft flesh of the exposed belly before I sliced upwards all the way to his sternum, blood and guts gushing out of the gaping wound, pooling at my feet.

Drilling my own burning glare into the intact eye of the cult leader, I focused every last bit of my burning hatred, every last shred of the primordial inferno raging in my very being's core as I clenched my hand around his throat, pulverizing his windpipe.

Straining the muscles in my arm, I whispered one word to the living carcass before me.

"Burn!"

Then, I drove the head of the stallion into the ground with enough force to drive the horn still lodged in his eye socket all the way through the leader's brain to the point where it punctured the skull and stabbed into my own palm as the whole head turned into jelly under the raw force of my execution.

I breathed ravenously, heavily, as if I'd just run a marathon, barely registering the stabbing pain in my hand. I looked over to the unfortunate remains of that innocent filly, blood still leaking from the hole where her head used to be and in that moment, I felt the events of the day come crashing down on me.

I didn't even notice as I lunged off the platform, heaving and emptying my stomach's contents as painful, wracking sobs shook my body. Two small hands steadied my shoulders, Jackie giving me a few awkward pats on the back, not knowing what to say at a time like this. I shook her off. I desperately wanted to crawl into a hole and drown myself in alcohol more than anything.

As my fits seceded and I was able to breathe, I saw Jackie making her way up the platform. She bent down, grasping something and when she stood again, there she held the mutilated body of the filly in between her fingers.

"Gross," I heard her mutter before she unceremoniously dropped the corpse and bent down again to pick up my Beast.

"Is this what you were looking for?" She asked, presenting it to me, the Beast still drenched with the blood of the innocent foal, as if hoping the sight would cheer me up a little. "It's, um... it's pretty cool. Definitely feels like there's some power behind it," she said lamely.

I shoved the thing away. The mere sight of it made me nauseous. Stiffly, reluctantly, I made my way up the platform again. Jackie followed suit.

"We... we shouldn't leave her. Not like this," I croaked, staring at the filly's remains. "Not here. Not in this cursed place. We were too late to save her but..." I closed my eyes, hoping that ache in my chest would go away. "The least we can do is give her a proper burial."

I removed the cult leader's cape from him, carefully bundling the remains of the filly. "Let's get out of this place," I said firmly and opened a portal. Jackie hefted the Beast and followed suit.

The funeral, if it could be called that, was brief and without ceremony. Norbert graciously had offered a small patch of land near his hut as soon as he had laid eyes on the bloodsoaked bundle in my arms. Even then, my heart still ached over the innocent foal’s life. So much so that I couldn't even muster the strength to dig her a proper grave. Jackie took the shovel from me, offering to do it herself and I let her.

She worked methodically and diligently, on her face nary a trace of pity, remorse or any sort of indication the filly’s death affected her in any way. I suppose she did it for my sake more than anything.

Lyra and Onyx were the only ones to join us.

Onyx remained stoic, out of a sense of respect for me, I suppose. Aside from a sense of sympathy, I don't imagine the filly’s gruesome fate engendered much of anything from her.

Lyra seemed the most affected of the trio, her eyes downcast, pitying the poof foal and a steady flow of tears dripping down her snout. She'd probably forget about it in a couple of days. In that point, I envied her unconditionally.

Despite being surrounded by my friends, I felt strangely alone.

“Thanks, Jackie,” I croaked as the girl finally laid the bundled body in the grave. She made a grunt of acknowledgement and stepped back.

“We…” I licked my lips. “We should say something. A few words.” My eyes found Jackie's again. “Do you want to…?”

“No.”

"Alright," I murmured. Fighting down a sob, I willed my voice to sound as steady as possible as I looked down into the little grave. "Sleep now, sweet child and dream of endless days of joy in sun flooded meadows and peaceful nights under the moons gentle light. Until the wheel of time itself stops, the last star in the sky fades into nothing and all souls meet again in a new world of bliss and light."

Author's Notes:

Yep, a two-fer for you all today. Enjoy.

A World at War

The following week passed without too much incident, if you didn't count Jackie's brushes with death and/or mutilation. Seriously, I don't know if the girl was born on a Friday the thirteenth or maybe some pony witch put a curse in her or something but the girl seemed to possess an uncanny amount of bad luck to make even Woebegone look like Fortuna's favorite.

Just the following morning after we buried the filly and I was still too miserable to get out of bed, the brat, bless her, came into my room well past midday and refused to leave until I got my ass off and went to eat something. No sooner did we take a few steps outside the door to my chambers that just like that, out of nowhere, an honest to goodness flowerpot smashed atop Jackie's noggin. Ignoring the fact I never remember this place even having anything remotely close to flowers (Lyra got it for herself, to brighten up the Tower or something along those lines), it was hella weird, but after some muttered cursing on Jackie's part, it was dismissed as a freak accident soon enough.

That lasted until the next day when, as I brought Jackie to the Diamond Dog mines to show off my workers and riches, one of the dogs tripped as he hauled a mining cart full of gems. The thing, with a good ton or two of weight behind it, soon barreled out of control and very nearly succeeded in turning the girl into a messy red paste on the wall. Jackie settled for throwing everything short of the destroyed cart itself at the unlucky dog as he beat a hasty retreat.

The day after, as we got together for lunch and Wiener brought in, to both out delights, a roasted goose with browned, crispy skin, and little potatoes cooked in molten goose fat (I made sure to reward him for just that alone) and when the chef Minion jumped on a little stool and set about to carving the bird, that the bigass carving knife of his slipped clear out of his greasy grasp and landed point down where Jackie's hand had been not moments before, deeply embedding itself into the wood, wobbling slightly.

"Okay, now this is getting ridiculous!" I exclaimed, my eyes never leaving the quite deadly implement. "Jackie, did you slight a Pony witch or a maybe ever run afoul of a rhyming Zebra mare that lives in the Everfree? Did you picked up a rubber ducky in an old dungeon despite better knowledge? Cos it slowly looks like you are cursed or something."

Girl didn't have an answer to that and merely muttered something about the universe trying to get her because reasons. Oh, how right she was, even if she didn't realize it at the moment. Meanwhile, I had Lyra sent away to Ponyville.

Faithful and dedicated though Minty Horse has proven to be, I could tell she missed Bon Bon and to be fair I has been cooping her up in the tower for quite some time so it would probably start to look suspicious despite the cover story we made up for Lyra´s prolonged absence. And of course, it became imperative I had a set of eyes and ears on Ponyville, even if said eyes and ears belonged to a raving, mentally unhinged, weirdo mare.

Needless to say, many a Minion had sighed with relief knowing they'd no longer have to toil under the bossy pony's metaphorical thumb. Hell, I'm pretty sure they even had a party to celebrate the event. That might explain why one morning I woke up to find my munchkins sprawled unconscious throughout the tower, looking like a mini tornado had swept up in their wake.

The issue of the tunnels also needed to be addressed. As it was, the original tunnels had run dry as to any valuables hidden in them, and if I wanted to keep my goodies and riches flowing—and I really do like my goodies and riches—my dogs would have to expand the network of tunnels.

This meant that the ones that ran dry would be left to gather dust, aside from the scattered segments where my slaven dogs made their home, leaving me with abundant amounts of wasted space. Jackie was quick to point out that so many unused, unguarded space would be ripe for ponies or any other critter to move throughout the vast network of unused space without drawing attention. The security risk was simply too high to ignore and so I made it a priority to rectify this.

Legions of Minions had been dispatched to work under the dogs' watchful gaze. It was a perfect idea on my part, if I did say so myself. Though they lacked in the intellectual department, the dogs had an uncanny knowledge of the mechanics behind building halfway stable, secure underground complexes, better than any Earth foreman or architect could hope to achieve.

The dogs (mostly Patches though) expertly guided my unrelenting Minions, whose unlimited magical stamina allowed them to work tirelessly and without rest. In just a few days, my faithful kobolds' work already showed. Unnecessary tunnels had been caved in or blocked off, while the rest had been retrofitted to serve other utilitarian purposes.

A few of the networks that ran under my tower had been converted into secret tunnels, accessible only to those who knew where to look, a fair few leading away from the tower in case the day came when I had to make a stealthy getaway, another one to a secluded bunker buried deep beneath the earth, another one connected to a dungeon, should I ever feel the need to take prisoners and that sneaky walnut Gnarl had somehow, without me knowing, had some of the kobolds outfit a chamber into a torture room, replete with torture racks, a wide assortment of whips, thumbscrews, various other crude instruments and an honest to goodness pit where unfortunate victims would be sacrificed to a pair of vicious Manticores! How Gnarl had gotten ahold of them, much less sneak them in without me knowing was beyond my ability to reason, and when I confronted him with it, he shrugged and said, "One can never have too many torture chambers, my Lady."

In the end I relented and allowed him to keep his little... ugh, playroom (just thinking of it that way makes me shudder) promising untold pain should he ever use it on any unfortunate souls without my permission. At the very least I did acknowledge the shock value it could possess against the untrained, should I ever need to coerce an uncooperative individual into talking.

And to mine and Jackie's very unpleasant surprise, as I guided her underneath to examine my Minions' efforts, we literally shrieked in fright as out of the darkness emerged a very familiar and very fugly sight. An honest to goodness Mole Rat the size of German Shepherd, with saggy, wrinkly skin; soulless, milky eyes and a set of yellow chompers the size of a banana, capable of chewing through rock without too much trouble. Luckily, before either Jackie or I unintentionally caused a cave-in in our near frantic efforts to obliterate the fugly vermin where it stood, a Brown, Scabies, shuffled next to the Mole Rat, patting the thing and eyeing us quizzically.

Turns out my Minions had unintentionally ran into a whole pack of them as they dug and had, for lack of a better word, domesticated the damned things. A couple more Browns emerged from the darkness with flickering miners helmets on their noggins, mounting even bigger rats, the size of a pony, sporting wide grins in their faces and after much pleading on their part did I allow them to retain the disgusting beasts as pets and living tunnel drills, provided I never had to set eyes on them again.

Aside from that, Jackie and I enjoyed several days of R&R. I set her up in a swanky room close to mine with all the amenities including her own proper bathroom and a cozy bed. Smaller than mine, though, and though I offered (one half cheekiness, one half serious) that we could merely share a room and cuddle, she resoundly shut me down. I chuckled and relented, not taking offense. Besides, from what she tells me, she didn't have much in the way of privacy back in her 'Verse so I couldn't really fault her for wanting some me-time. After a few seconds of thought, I sent a mental note to Welder to make a name plaque for the room, indicating its new owner. It was shaped like a big, two headed war axe with Jackie's name on the handle.

Truth be told, I was a little worried the girl would be bored out of her mind seeing how my tower seemed to lack the amenities from good old Earth, but it didn't seem to bother Jackie any. I suppose it was the same back in her verse and she had to find new ways to occupy her time. Admittedly, though I did like my leisure time as well, I was constantly being delegated some Overlady duties day after day. Nothing big, just the mundane runnings of my tower which did their job in keeping me occupied, lest I die of boredom.

Girl constantly kept me company, save for when she wanted a little me-time, and quickly enough became familiar with the tower itself. And I must say, my little friend underwent something of a change in her personality.

It seems I'd been right when I pegged the squirt as being too wound up. Dunno if she was constantly under a state of stress or something back in her 'Verse, but she certainly seemed to loosen up during our little vacation. She smiled more, for one and even started to tentatively try to engage in conversation with me. I never would have expected it of the previously moody girl but man could she talk. Well, she is a teenage brat, so I guess that's to be expected. Hell, her mood turned so good she even made up with Onyx of all things. Well, they punched each other´s shoulder and for a chance it had been the black she-dragon who had been send flying. That in turn seemed to have earned Jackie some props with Onyx. Not sure how it happened but I am grateful nonetheless.

On nights, when the temperature would drop into the single digits (damn you awesome but glassless windows), we huddled together close to the fireplace in my room, roasting marshmallows, nuts, little bites of meat and anything else we could come up with.

But alas, our vacation came to an end. On the second week of her stay, I'd wandered to the library to peruse the ancient tomes in my possession, just to see if there was anything of note when I heard a rather telling explosion outside my window.

"The hell?" I muttered. Even from my vantage point way up in the tower did I recognize that tuft of black hair.

I opened a portal and stepped onto a rocky field outside my tower because A, I could and B, it was so much easier than running down all those stairs. Jackie was there, looking satisfied as can be, panting slightly and wiped a trail of sweat from her forehead. "What's going on here?"

Jackie looked momentarily surprised at my abrupt entrance, but smiled widely. "Practice."

"Practice?"

She bared her teeth in a grin. "Watch." She turned from me and rubbed her hands. I took in the field before us. Massive, craggy stones jutted out the ground every dozen paces or so and quite a few spots where the boulders should have rested looked like they exploded outwards, which might account for the many, many pieces of broken stones that littered the space in between their intact brethren.

After taking a few bracing breaths, Jackie cupped her hands, as if she were holding an invisible something. I felt something surge within her and in her half closed mitts, a bright green power threatened to slip through. Jackie bent down on one knee, hands planted in the ground as if she were about to go for a sprint and she let the power loose through the palms of her hand.

One of the boulders exploded, shattering into hundreds of little pieces as a broad column of that green energy erupted from the ground.

"Whoo," Jackie sighed. "I'm getting better but damn if it isn't tiring." She wiped more sweat off her forehead and looked eagerly at me, waiting for my reaction.

"Well. That... is... I... Wut?" Hm. "What the actual blinking blue blazes was that?"

"Like I said, practice. I have all this magic mojo inside me. Might as well put it to good use."

"And what use is blowing things up, Jackie girl? The massive awesome factor aside, I mean?"

"You never know," she said cattishly. Oh no you don´t! I do that smile on other people, creeping them out as fuck, not the other way round!

"Much as I encourage you to enrich that little noggin of yours, what purpose could this possibly serve? You look into taking a job in demolitions?"

"I was thinking more in the line of vaporizing ponies or any other assortment of critters."

"Jackie," I sighed. "We have been over this. Ponies are annoying but mostly harmless nuisances, no targeting practice."

"And can you guarantee we won't have to charge into battle with the little beasts for as long as we live? I guess you're gonna tell me next we will all be best of friends."

"Alright, maybe I'll admit we might have to... ugh, fight at some point but this is too damn excessive."

"Says you."

"What does that mean?"

"I mean this method..." She repeated the process, obliterating another innocent boulder into smithereens. "Is a lot quicker and cleaner than going face to face with beasties. I dunno if you noticed but I got drenched last time with the cultists and all. Got their blood and guts all over me and with a ranged move like this, I won't have to go around smelling like a soiled tampon."

Eugh! Even I couldn't help but bury my face at the crude remark. "I swear, Jackie. One of these days I will hold you down and give that potty mouth of yours a good scrubbing. With super bleach."

"Uh-huh," she drawled, looking none too impressed at my threat. "Because you're so much better, yes? Who then called Gnarl a moldy, shit stained Lustmolch[lecher], whatever that last part means.

"Argh, point taken." Just as I was about to rub my temples in frustration, I felt it again, the call. "Oh, boy," I muttered.

"What is it?"

Shit. Shitshitshitshit! I'm being called to battle while Jackie was still visiting!

"Hey, what are you...?!" Jackie protested as I pulled her close to me.

"Hush girl. Now be a good little brat and act as your beloved friend's human shield. We're about to be pulled over and..." I didn't even get to finish before we dissolved in countless motes of light.

The brat and I emerged on a little village. Nighttime, it looked like.

"What just happened?" Jackie asked, all too baffled as she disentangled from my grasp.

"We were summoned. Remember all that I told you about the Displaced and tokens?" She nodded. "That's what just happened. Another Displaced called on me. Although this one did a quite summon, I heard not a single word. Normally, people say at least a small line or something."

"But why?"

I wondered that myself. The village we found ourselves in looked deserted for the most part. Nary a sound save the whooshing of wind, rustling of leaves and the odd croaking of frogs. Nevertheless, I drew Ruin, the no longer unnamed sword I wielded in the cultists' cave and at my will, the blade erupted in flickering hellfire that made even Jackie too uncomfortable at close range. I had started to make it a habit to wear some sort of weaponry around and for some reasons, the blade made me feel secure somehow.

Hah, a razor sharp, burning blankey!

"Be ready, girl. Displaced call each other to help them fight baddies or beasties. Stay close and keep an eye out. This whole place just screams 'fuck me sideways with a garden rake'."

We wandered carefully through the small settlement, alert to any sounds our ears picked up. No such luck. Where was everybody? More importantly, where was our summoner? "I swear, if we got called here as some sort of prank I am going to be very..."

"Can we just go back to your tower?" Jackie asked. I didn't answer. Something about the situation didn't sit right with me. Where were we? Why were we summoned? Who summoned us and why hadn't they come out to say howdy do?

"Fraid not Jackie-Bear, not until my timer is up or my summoner sends us back. There are few rules about being a Displaced but those who are there mostly suck majorly," I explained in a low voice. I suddenly had an idea. What if my summoner was like Jackie, hesitant to come out or without a blue clue what just happened? I suppose Ruin did have a bit of an intimidating edge to it. I prepared to switch to Ley Sight, hoping I could pinpoint my summoner's magical signature or something.

A gargled scream tore from my throat almost immediately. My eyes burned and Jackie hastened to my side. I could hear her asking any number of questions, but I was in too much agony to respond.

"Jackie, we need to go," I said thickly, struggling to stand up.

"What do you mean? Is there..." A sharp gasp from her drew my attention.

I followed her gaze down the road where a lone pony stood. I hefted Ruin, should the little creature make a move.

"Careful, girl! That's not a pony. Not a normal one, at least," I muttered darkly, eyes never leaving the unmoving equine silhouette.

"What do you mean?" She asked, looking none too impressed at the pony.

"This whole place. It's not nearly as empty as we thought. There's magical signatures everywhere. But something's wrong with them."

A door creaked from behind us, and another pony stepped out, silent save for the clopping of his hooves, his moves stiff, slightly awkward. And as if in unison, dozens more doors followed. The ponies, stallions, mares and foals filled the street, unblinking eyes trained on us both. Jackie hissed as they surrounded us and I literally had to fight to keep my composure and from freaking out.

"Jackie, not gonna lie. This is not an up-hill battle and not a tactical advance backwards, but rather I´d have it we get the hell outta dodge. The literal air here feels wrong on a fundamental level and coming from me, that means something," I tittered, never stopping to keep as much of the creepy horses in my field of view as possible.

"What? Come on, these are even less than those cult freaks. We can take em!" My little friend ranted.

"Bail to fight another day Jacqueline. We are in unknown territory and unknown shit is going on. Like my old Sarge would have said, we need to 'get our lazy asses out of the zone intact and get some intel on the enemy forces stat' and I agree."

But whatever plans we had were negated when a lone earth pony stallion trotted forward, a crude spear in his mouth. He lumbered still with that blank, emotionless unblinking gaze that unnerved me more than a raging pack of pissed off Yorkie dogs.

Jackie uttered threats to the advancing equine and I hoped beyond hope he would heed them. No such luck. "Ey, I'm talking to you!" Jackie yelled, eliciting no response from the pony. This was bad, I could tell the girl was getting freaked out to no end, and combined with that juju inside her...

Before I could stop her, Jackie's palm glowed with that sickly green light again. I watched as the energy congealed into a wibbly-wobbly sphere(sloppy spellwork and all) in her palm and she threw it like a baseball at the pony. I gasped as the sheer might inside that little orb completely severed his front leg. The pony stumbled, but otherwise made no reaction to the crippling wound it now bore. It steadied itself on his remaining hooves and drew closer.

"Great, Nurgle ponies!" I wailed "Also, fuck Jackie, fuck dammit!"

"The hell is up with these things?" Jackie seethed.

"Some of the blackest magics, that´s what!" I hissed back, tightening my grip on my sword.

The pony advanced. In desperation, Jackie conjured another of her gunky green magic things and hurled it at the pony. This time, the green orb carved a deep gouge in his chest. The stallion's body shuddered violently and a haze lifted from his eyes. He looked down in surprise to the big hole in his chest and screamed in agony, falling on three legs and uttered a death rattle before going still.

"Son of a bitch," I muttered. "They're being controlled. This... What kind of dark magic could do this? The only bad guy I know so far... nah, not nearly enough crystals around..."

The remaining villagers looked to their felled comrade and moved as one with the clear intent to swarm us.

"Jackie dearest, I think you just set the hornet's nest on fire!" I almost screeched, unable to hold my irritation and fury back any longer.

Already balling her fists and shrouding them in her magic, Jackie barked back. "I gave plenty of warnings but no, that zombie horse did not heed em, so he got it! What? Should I have given him a bloody love tap and send him to the corner instead?"

"Not now!" I barked back, feeling the lightness in my head that came with adrenaline. My body was at this point screaming at me to finally make up my mind and choose between fight or flight.

Now few ponies silently produced an array of mob weapons, mostly what looked like worn cooking knives, a few shivs, clubs that were nothing more than thick branches too long for the oven and the like.

A foal, a filly if I had to guess, starred up to me with these blank eyes, a pointy piece of metal wrapped in a bit of cloth to form a handle held in her mouth and took a step forward.

Ice cold dread flooded my core.

At this rate, it was more than certain that we would end up fighting. Jackie already had drawn the first blood...

Pictures of the poor filly from the cave rushed back to my mind and with it the memories of helplessness but also the burning hatred that so soon had replaced it.

No!

I would not fight children, I refused to lower myself to that! I was a monster, yes but not a beast. Not yet!

A loud crack brought my senses back and I just saw a bunch of the controlled ponies getting bowled over by one of their own and Jackie in the last motions of swinging a right hook.

"Get your shit together!" The brat yelled. "I swear, if you have some sort of breakdown now, I will ditch you here and now!"

Crude as her words where, she had a point. Surviving now, everything else later!

Just in time for me to feel something bump and scratch against my shinguard. Looking down, I saw the foal with its shiv wailing away at my leg since that was all it could reach. It would have been cute in a deranged kind of way would it not had made my heart clamp together painfully.

"Sorry," I whispered, gritting my teeth and kicked the young pony like a football, sending it tumbling between the legs of its adult brethren until it finally hit the wall of one of the huts with an audible clonking sound. Did not sound wet, thanks for small favors.

Said small favors came to an end when Jackie charged up again and sent columns of that crippling volatile energy straight into the ponies. The unfortunate equines were literally torn apart into fleshy, bloodsoaked pieces that slapped against their brethren, who continued on their silent march.

"Call your Minions already. Do you wanna end up as a bloodied paste?" Jackie snarled as she picked up a discarded club and threw it at the advancing ponies, cracking at least one skull.

I relented and opened two portals. Forty gibbering Browns and twenty Reds spilled forth. The battle, if it could even be called that, began in earnest. It was little more than a slaughter. My Reds divided in groups and climbed atop the buildings, pelting the unsuspecting ponies with globs of hellfire from their vantage points.

My heavily armored Browns charged as one. Spears and halberds literally skewered the lumbering ponies as the wall of Browns clashed with the controlled but numb equines. Despite my best judgment, I joined in and sent a mental command to my Browns to cripple instead of kill. It wouldn't do any good to the already dead ponies but better late than never.

Those that weren´t torn apart now found themselves with a broken or missing limb or severe, crippling burns. But even then, they remained stoic, under whatever spell controlled them. Only death seemed to grant release.

Ruin arced through the air, severing limbs, immediately cauterizing them under the searing heat of the hellfire. Taking inspiration, I bombarded a stallion with a Corruption Burst. His body jerked and twitched in agony, but it seemed even the power of my favorite spell could not overwrite what dark sorceries plagued his mind.

Of course, the ponies did not take this lying down. They stomped where they could, felling Minions under their surprisingly powerful kicks, caving in heads and breaking bones and more than a few of my kobolds found themselves on the receiving end of a shiv, garden rake, scythe or whatever else the ponies appropriated as weapons. They charged without regard for their own safety, as if determined to overcome my kobolds through sheer numbers alone. Then again, my Minions were kind of the same.

Nevertheless, I did not like at all how many munchkins fell under the ponies' assault. I felt a slight pang of guilt knowing I was partially responsible. My kobolds were limited in their abilities due to the no killing rule and now they were paying for it.

Two columns on sickly green energy tore through the ground, courtesy of Jackie, literally tearing ponies apart again and stunning the rest, thus giving my Minions some much needed respite.

After that, it became a clean up operation more than anything. Stragglers were liberated of their weapons and tied up with whatever was available. Throughout the whole ordeal they uttered nary a word and looked at us through literally bloodshot eyes. Creepy...

I surveyed the damage to the town. Numerous houses were already on fire, courtesy of my Reds or in some instances a flaming pony who brushed against said settlements. Bodies and body parts littered the ground, itself wet with blood and the stench of organic waste hung heavily on the air.

"Someone is gonna pay for this," I growled.

While Jackie was busy wiping off pony blood from her arm, I used my Ley sight again, searching for a possible source of magic. I caught something. A single dim spark far away, underground. Not the overpowering darkness that hung off the possessed ponies but a living, coherent being.

I rushed the place as far as my feet could take me. Whoever this bitch or asshole was, was gonna pay. My run led me to a concealed set of doors that led downward, hidden underneath some bushes. With a Corruption powered punch, I broke the lock and dove inside. Shaking the pain in my hand away, I looked around. A narrow hallway, lighted by the flame of a single lamp with a door at the end. I gripped Ruin and kicked down the door.

A magical bolt shot straight to my face, but I narrowly dodged it and went in. An equine figure collided against my taller form, causing me to drop Ruin. I was suddenly grateful for Gnarl putting me through all those strength exercises for otherwise, the pony would have succeeded in bowling me over. I hefted the surprised pony and threw it (or her, if the scream was anything to go by) into a nearby desk which broke under the weight.

I picked up Ruin and stepped closer to the moaning mare. A slight pink coat and two toned mane of purple and blue.

"Starlight Glimmer?" I rasped.

The pony's eyes shot up, taking in my form. There was no fear there, just a weary resignation that clearly mirrored her face.

"You... you did all this?" I asked incredulously. "Why?" I demanded. "You stupid, self centered, communist bitch!" I grabbed her by her, well, collar? Do naked Ponies have a collar? Anyways!

The pony looked down miserably, not saying anything.

"Oh no, you don't," I picked her up, her small form almost weightless under the sheer fury that coursed through me. "I want answers and I want them now."

"What does it matter?" She asked miserably. "You killed them, all my ponies and now," she choked back a sob. "Now I won't have a chance to make it right."

"Make it right? Make it right?!" I screamed in outraged astonishment. "Of course you can't make it right, you commie bitch! You just sent innocent ponies to die. You broke their minds so thoroughly that most of them not even noticed when they got literally shredded to bloody bits! And for what? What did you hope to accomplish with all this?"

"It's all my fault," she said miserably. "I had to fix things. I wanted to make it right again, just as it should be. Not this. It wasn't supposed to be like this."

"And so was Auschwitz, Dachau and all the other death camps!" I roared into her self pitying face. Disgusted, I threw the pony down and leaned close. "By God, you're gonna talk straight or what I did to your victims out there I will inflict on you tenfold. Now talk."

Starlight looked up at me with such weariness, no fear on her features. She was awfully tired, so much so that it overcame whatever fear she should have felt. "I had to do this," she said in a small voice. "It's my fault. This timeline, Sombra, the war. All the lives that have been lost in his lust for power. It's all my fault. I never wanted this. I wanted to break her, to make her suffer. I wanted to take Twilight Sparkle's destiny from her. I never meant for all this to happen, I swear." She licked her lips.

"Sombra's armies are too powerful, his methods brutal. I... I had to do something. Something to help end this war. I wanted to build an army for Equestria. An army even grander than Sombra's so he could be defeated and this pointless war come to an end."

"What? What are you even babbling about?" I asked.

"This, all of it," she waved a hoof. "This skewed timeline is my doing. I never wanted it, I swear," she said yet again. "But now it's too late. Some dark magic is disrupting the flow of time. I can't go back and make things right again, but if I can, I will help end this war."

I rubbed my head. This is way more than I'd bargained for. What was she talking about anyway? Did something happen in the show with Pony Stalin after I came here? I opened my mouth to ask more questions, but before I could, several things happened at once.

An oppressive presence manifested itself in the small chamber, so overwhelming I nearly fell to my knees. Something materialized in the room. Something that radiated dark power, but almost immediately was subdued. Nonetheless I jumped for Ruin. Starlight screamed and the familiar sound of metal cutting through flesh and bone filled the air. When I looked, there slumped Starlight's lifeless body, her severed head rolling away.

"Holy fucking hell!" I whirled around, sword raised and adrenaline hammering through my veins. I lunged at the figure, a broad structure of muscle and armor, easily towering over me which was a feat in itself. Ruin swung, itching to repay the favor. Just because I gave Glimmer a thrashing and a bit of abuse, decapitation had not been on the list.

A sword longer than mine blocked my thrust. Undeterred, I went in for more strokes, but Ruin was expertly blocked time after time, the figure's swordplay a step above my own.

"Die!" I screamed and in irrational anger, magics pooled in my palm, forming a massive Fireball, which I hurled at the figure. An armored hand moved forth to intercept the fiery projectile, which exploded in a searing blast of heat, light and concussive force. The close proximity caused me to sail through the air and crash into the wall. My head was ringing, a trickle of a warm something flowed out of my nose.

The world was a blur as I fought to right myself before he could finish the job. A set of hurried footsteps could be made out and a familiar pair of hands held me down. Jackie's face blurred through my vision, her features lined with worry. I saw a smoldering figure lumber close. I tried to open my lips to call out a warning, but a gurgle was all I could make out. Starlight's killer stopped beside Jackie. He uttered some words to the girl, too garbled for me to make out. I wanted nothing more than to stand back up, get Ruin and finish our duel, but he bent down, his massive palm covered my eyes and then, darkness. Nothing.

Author's Notes:

That is correct, another Displaced for our young heroine to interact. Now don't worry. Jackie ain't gonna be hopping dimensions during her stay. She does have her own story to play after all and her interactions with Displaced will be strictly limited to Umbra and this new player. Other than that, not much to say. Jackie's stay in the Multiverse is coming to an end and after... oh, three chapters she'll get back to her own version of Ponyland.

The Best Laid Plans

Author's Notes:

Jackie's time to shine

“So that's basically the gist of it, from what Umbra tells me.”

“Interesting,” Ganondorf muttered as he took in Jacqueline’s explanation. It had been a very illuminating experience. “And this token,” he held up Umbra’s pendant for a closer look. “Is capable of pulling someone through dimensions?" Jackie nodded and Ganondorf examined the item more closely.

"There is a strange power inside this object," he muttered more to himself. "Almost as if it's dormant, but of such an arcane branch of magic I have never heard of." He looked to Jackie again. "Do you know why I summoned the two of you here?"

The smaller girl shrugged. "I assume you need help with something or another? Umbra says that's the reason why tokens exist in the first place, for Displaced to help each other defeat a bad guy or whatever." She looked around the longhouse, as if expecting an abomination to pop up at any moment. "You don't have a bad guy here, do you?"

"Not here, in this village. And I don’t have a 'bad guy'. I have over two thousand of them and they are all camped at the base of this mountain." He continued at her questioning gaze. "Since my arrival in this world I have attempted to keep my presence from the ponies as much as possible."

"Can't imagine that's been easy. The whole place is infested with them," Jackie remarked, eliciting a slight smirk from Ganondorf.

"For the past two years, Equestria has been embroiled in a war with a neighboring kingdom far to the north—the Crystal Empire. Despite my best attempts, both parties are now aware of my presence."

Jackie snorted. "And let me guess. They want to either kill you or convince you to join them."

"To put it lightly. A garrison of over two thousand Equestrian forces sit at the base of the mountain this very moment, preparing to take the village by force and kill every living thing in sight."

"Really?" Jackie asked, looking sideways at Ganondorf, a skeptical look etched on her face. "I always took the ponies as gutless little pieces of fluff. Seems way too hardcore for them."

"Perhaps in your universe this is true," Ganondorf continued. "In this world, the Crystal Empire is presided by a king named Sombra. The ponies under his command are brainwashed into his service. They will die and endure the most extreme forms of torture before betraying him. Sleeper agents have delivered devastating strikes against the civilian populations of Equestria, able to pass as one of their fellow citizens without anyone being the wiser. Despite their best efforts, the Equestrians have yet to devise a way to break Sombra's hold over his victims and so any ponies suspected of being under his influence are to be immediately executed."

To Ganondorf's surprise, Jackie erupted in a fit of chuckles. "Oh, man. Ponies must have been really desperate to resort to such extreme measures. God, what I wouldn’t give for the little princess to what's become of her kingdom."

"Princess?"

"I haven't told you, have I? Where I come from, your secretary Sparkle has overcome the limitations of her ilk and was made a princess. Horn, wings and everything. No castle, though. All she had was a weird treebrary on a miserable little mud hovel called Ponyville."

"Interesting," Ganondorf muttered. "How did Twilight become a princess?"

"Friendship lessons."

Ganondorf frowned. "Friendship lessons?"

Jackie held both palms up placatingly. "Hey, that's what I was told. Apparently Twilight had been sent by Celestia to Ponyville to study—ugh, I can't believe I'm saying this—the magic of friendship. Apparently, when Celestia deemed her ready, she gave her a pair of wings, slapped a tiara and a fancy title on her and declared her Princess of Friendship," the very words seemed to sicken Jackie, if the grimace in her face was anything to go by.

Ganondorf considered this for a moment. "I have detected a great power in Twilight. It's untapped and dormant but it's there. I don’t believe she is even aware of it. Could this be related to her being a princess?"

"Meh, I don’t think so. Way I heard it she had more magic than the average pony even way before becoming a princess, all the way to her childhood. I dunno if she was bragging or something but apparently she was able to carry off an Ursa Minor by herself with nothing but her magic. But who knows. She might have been lying."

Ganondorf rubbed his chin, deep in thought. "Perhaps."

"So I've been meaning to ask," Jackie continued, drawing Ganondorf's attention. "How did you come by here, this place? And how do you control these ponies?"

"I awoke in a crystal prison. How I came to be there, trapped and in this world, I do not know. The ponies found me in a research laboratory, hoping to somehow draw from me a way to formulate an advantage over the armies of the empire."

"And I'm guessing that didn't go over too well?"

"It went very well, I'd like to think, for not only do I possess Ganondorf's body, but it seems his mastery of magic has passed on to me as well. I used it and the power granted by the Triforce," he showed the back of his hand to Jackie where indeed, the yellow triangular shape of the Triforce of power brimmed with a yellow glow. "To break out of my prison and conscript the ponies into my service. We made our way out of the research base, but did not go unnoticed for long. Now both Equestria and the Crystal Empire are aware of my presence."

"And you summoned me and Umbra to bail you out, ya?" Jackie asked with a slightly mocking grin.

"Did I choose wrongly?" Ganondorf asked evenly, schooling his features into an unreadable mask.

"Oh, I think we should be able to help... if we wanted to, at least. I'm still not crazy about you ditching the two of us in that town filled with brain controlled ponies," Jackie said, a measure of sharpness in her words. "And you know, with Umbra all banged up, she won't be able to do much."

"Then I am fortunate you came along. I saw what you did to the ponies. Even from here I sense the magic that flows through your veins."

"I'll take that as a compliment," Jackie remarked, inspecting her nails. "But I'm still kinda pissed and not feeling very charitable at the moment. And much as I hate to admit it, I think two thousand ponies are too much for me to take on alone."

"I wouldn't expect you to do so. Their force easily outnumbers mine and capable as you may be, you are right. No, this is not something that will be won by brute strength alone. That is why you will be responsible for infiltrating the Equestrians' war camp and deliver a devastating blow."

"Umbra doesn't want me to kill my way out of things. Says it's unhealthy and... well, she does have a point."

"And she is right," Ganondorf said to Jackie's surprise. "But whether her words are true or not is irrelevant. This is not your world nor mine. Perhaps, if things were different, the ponies and us would be able to live in peace together. But that will not happen. We are very different beings with varied ways of thinking and different ways of looking at the world. You and I will never be able to integrate into their society and if I am correct, this is something you have figured out as well. Am I wrong?" He asked and watched Jackie closely.

The smaller girl frowned. "Well... no," she said quietly. "It's been obvious to me since day one. It's been obvious every day I'm forced to interact with them. But Umbra says I should make an attempt and she's right. I won't be going away any time soon, not back home, I mean. Whether I like it or not, I have to try and make nice with the little beasts."

"To try and coexist with them and to become a part of their world are two different things. No matter your efforts, you will never be seen as one of them, nor should you attempt to do so. Our identity is ours and ours alone. But in essence, she is correct. To try and coexist between them is a worthy goal, but don’t fool yourself into thinking you'll be accepted as one of their own, especially not after what you told me about your world." He stepped forward and looked at Jackie closely, the girl's mouth drawn in a tight line.

"We are killers. You, me, Umbra. We've taken lives because we had to and so long as we remain in this world, we will do so again. It is inevitable. It is a perilous path to take, certainly, but it is only because we've gone to such extremes that we are alive, whole, and have retained a semblance of our freedom. Do you deny it?" Ganondorf could see the emotions flickering behind the girl's eyes, noting it with satisfaction. He found he rather liked her.

She'd told him about her universe, the trials she'd endured and truthfully, she'd been very lucky to have come so far alive and whole. Of course, luck played only a small part in that. Jackie was like him in more ways than she realized. They'd both inexplicably found themselves ripped from their homes and into a strange world and like him, she too had to quickly adapt to this new reality and learn how to survive. She was smart enough as circumstances dictated, a quick learner and could push aside her emotions and do what needed to be done in order to retain her life and freedom. A useful trait to be sure and one that this Umbra had foolishly tried to stamp out of Jackie. Ganondorf watched the girl closely, knowing it best to let her arrive to the only possible conclusion. She didn't disappoint him.

"No. It's true, what you're saying. I knew it to be true but..."

"Umbra's heart is in the right place. She cares for you and it is because of that she would attempt to dissuade you from this line of thinking. But whether her intentions are pure or not, the fact remains her actions are foolish and will very likely put you at risk." He turned his back to Jackie, hands clasped behind him. "There are too few of us and too many of them that we cannot afford to doubt ourselves. Whatever paths our lives may have taken back on our worlds, whatever destinies we were destined to walk, that is all irrelevant now. Now we must survive in a world we do not belong. We've had to make hard choices, you and me. We have done things our families would find repulsive, that some might say would doom us to eternal damnation, and we will do so again. That is the way of our world now and there is nothing that will change it."

"You make it sound so bleak," Jackie murmured.

"Perhaps. But I will tell you this." He turned back to her, holding her gaze. "We have been gifted with unique powers and abilities, attributes normal ponies—normal people—can only dream of. We have a unique opportunity to forge our own path in this world, to breach, to break barriers and achieve new heights we could only dream of in our homes." He now held her complete attention and he strode forward, Jackie's eyes searching his. "So tell me, Jacqueline, will you bend to Umbra's wishes? Will you cease hostilities with the ponies and pursue a peaceful path, knowing all too well such a choice would spell your doom? Or will you forge your own path, rise above your station in life and demonstrate to the creatures of the world what a human being is truly capable of? This is not a choice Umbra nor I can make for you. It is yours and yours alone."

Not for the first nor for the last time would Umbra awaken in a strange place. Her body ached and felt bruised, her back most of all and every twitch of her limbs seemed a battle in itself.

"Oh, you're awake," an oddly familiar voice said. Hooves clopped steadily closer to Umbra and from her vantage point she could barely make out a blurred mess of purple. "Take care not to exert yourself. Your body is recovering but it needs time to heal," the voice said calmly.

"Wa... water," Umbra rasped. She felt the pulse of magic and the sloshing of water before a cup was gently pressed to her face.

"Drink slowly," the mare said and Umbra gratefully did so, sighing as she laid back down. The world came into focus now and Twilight Sparkle's form entered her field of vision. "How are you feeling?"

Umbra merely looked at the pony. She was instantly recognizable as Twilight, yet there was something different about her. The spectacles certainly hadn't been there last time Umbra saw the mare in her universe, nor was she used to seeing the mare's normally flowing mane in a tight bun, nor a pressed white shirt and lab coat over her body. Not that it did not suit her.

"Like shit..." Umbra groaned and made to sit up against Twilight's protests. "I'm fine, I'm fine," Umbra said impatiently, waving her away. Twilight meekly retreated, giving her some space. Then it clicked. The Twilight she knew was a confident pony, not one to show submission to even the greatest of opponents.

"Please don't exert your body more than necessary. Ganondorf wants me to make sure you don't harm yourself."

"Ganondorf?" Umbra snapped. "Is that who..."

"The one who brought you here? Yes. Your friend is here as well. She and Ganondorf are in the main hall. I'm supposed to let them know when you're awake."

With the speed of a viper, completely ignoring her banged up state, Umbra´s hands found Twilight´s collar. "Jackie´s alone with Ganondorf? Take me to them Purple Smart and pronto!" she hissed. Her body promptly took revenge by sending Umbra into a painful cramp out of protest.

"Ahh, pl-please miss, you need to stay calm. You'll aggravate your injuries and..." Twilight tried but was cut off.

"Calm, my ass!" Umbra wheezed, sitting up "Take me to my friend this instant or Darkness help me!" She glared at the Unicorn, shakily coming to her legs.

Twilight moved quickly, offering her withers for support. She grunted lightly as Umbra's weight bore on her but bared it without complaint.

"Where is this place anyway?" Umbra gasped as Twilight led the way out.

"Haven's Peak. A small village secluded in the mountains. Ganondorf and his forces took over a few weeks ago."

"What? What do you mean? How long was I out?"

"A little over a day. You suffered severe concussive force that shattered many of your bones. Your eardrums burst from the sheer intensity of a near point blank exploding Fireball, but we managed to mend them. Your hearing should be dulled for a few days as they fully heal."

"How nice," Umbra muttered. "And you? Why are you here and not Ponyville? Did this Ganon guy kidnap you or something?"

Twilight cocked her head, staring quizzically at Umbra. "Ponyville? That little town at the base of Canterlot?"

"Is there any other?"

Twilight shrugged. "I only went to Ponyville once and that was to explore the ruins of Everfree Castle. Why would I be there?"

Umbra sighed, not liking where this line of thought was heading. Starlight Glimmer had raved about changing timelines or some such, Twilight's name having been thrown in. Just what did she miss?

"Do the names Rarity, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy or Rainbow Dash mean anything to you?" Umbra asked as they stepped foot outside. The crisp mountain air felt refreshing on her lungs, the tang of pine needles a welcome reprieve from the smell of blood and death and the rising sun over the mountain peak lent an air of serenity that did not fit the tense atmosphere of the place. They passed through maintained but worn dirt roads, ponies already out and about doing their daily chores. They quirked a curious eyebrow at the unlikely pair but made no comment.

"Hmm," Twilight hummed. "I have heard of Rainbow Dash of course. Almost everypony has. A war hero who joined the Wonderbolts a few years ago. At the battle of Mustangia she and her small platoon of guards held down a fortified position against Sombra's forces until reinforcement arrived. As to the others..." She trailed off in thought. "No. The names are not familiar to me. Should they be?" She asked genuinely.

"Wow, this is the most fucked up Universe I've been summoned in so far," Umbra muttered, hissing at her protesting limbs. Then she looked down at Twilight. "Depends if this Universe still has them draw breath and their personalities are mostly the same as in the others. Then yes, they are worth looking into. One can always use a few friends as back up in a fucked up situation. Or in a world like this."

"So it's true then? You're from another world?" She stared at Umbra intently, traces of the inquisitive Twilight she knew shining through.

"Aye, little Unicorn. Umbra the Overlady, Mistress of Minions, Ruler of the Dark Tower, Darkness Incarnate, All the Things Going Bump in the Night, Cheapshot Queen, Fighter, Lover..." The last title, Umbra drawled out purposely low only to cough painfully. "Ouch, my everything... and yes, before you ask, there are many other worlds, Universes, out there. An infinite amount to be exact. One for every 'what if', one for every decision made by mortals and immortals alike. An ever expanding Multiverse."

"I see," Twilight said, though it was clear much of that went over her head. "And you... you came from another Equestria?"

"Correct."

"How is the war going? Did Equestria win?" She asked hopefully.

"Well, I have not started a war yet and when I do, I doubt you Ponies will stand a chance. No offense but you lot rely on Deus Ex Machinas way to much."

"What?" she asked, clearly baffled.

"I said how did this war even start in the first place? Didn't Celestia catch Sombra's return in time? And even more importantly," Umbra peered close at Twilight. "Why weren't you there to stop him together with Spike when the Crystal Empire re-appeared?"

Now Twilight really did shoot Umbra a look that clearly questioned her sanity. "What? What are you even talking about?" She said with annoyance creeping into her voice. "Why would I stop Sombra? How would I stop him? And what's a Spike?"

"Just to make things clear, you were never Princess Sunbutt's private pupil? Never hatched a dragon egg as an entry test for Celestia's school? Never tasked with learning the magic of friendship? None of that?"

Twilight's visage darkened at the mention of Celestia. "When I was a filly, I applied to take a test and prove I was worthy to become Celestia's pupil." She sighed. "But I failed. I tried everything I could think of, but I could never get that damned egg..." She spat venomously and trailed off. Umbra watched closely. Clearly she'd brought up bad memories. "But no, I didn't become her pupil. I finished school, took a job at the Canterlot library and interned for a research company. When the war broke out I joined a team of scientists to research methods of war. We were tasked with finding new ways to counter the might of Sombra's armies and his war machines. We actually made good headway. We were on the right track to create an instantaneous method of communication when... he came."

"Who?"

"We're here now," Twilight said abruptly. Umbra looked to see in front of them a pretty Viking-ish longhouse, well equipped to host hundreds of bodies. Umbra could not help but to imagine faintly smelling mead. "Ganondorf and your friend are inside. Come, we shouldn't keep the waiting."

Umbra adjusted her grip on Twilight as they climbed the few steps. Twilight used her magic to open the large oaken doors with a groaning of wood. An assortment of long tables were inside. Two stone hearths on each side of the hall, with a big one at the end. She immediately detected Jackie near the end, sitting atop one of the stone protrusions on the hearth, legs swaying as she engaged who could only be Ganondorf in conversation.

The two occupants looked at the duo. Ganondorf's face remained impassive while Jackie leapt down and hurried to Umbra's side. She groaned lightly as the smaller girl threw Umbra's arm around her for support. Twilight sighed with relief as Umbra slackened her grip and moved aside.

"What are you doing here? You're supposed to be in bed," she admonished.

"What are you talking about? I'm right as summer rain, can't you tell? Could do leap frogs for hours on end," Umbra groaned sarcastically. She scowled as Ganondorf's heavy footsteps thundered close.

Umbra glared at the towering figure, clad in ornate armor colored a deep blue, nearly black in the dim lighting. An equally large cape flowed behind the massive humanoid and her eyes found his, Ganondorf's visage an impassive emotionless mask framed by light orange hair, a contrast to Umbra's seething glare."You," she hissed.

"Me," Ganondorf said simply. "You really should take more care of your body. Any fool can clearly see it is clearly exerting itself."

"What not kills me makes me stronger and what breaks me even more so." Umbra coughed. "And what the hell was that about back there? You murdered Starlight. Chopped off her head like it was nothing."

"Will you deny she deserved it?"

"Yes... No... Grrr! Of course she deserved it! That mindbending shit she pulled back there was even stronger and more cruel than my own, effectively turning Ponies into hollow shells that nothing short of death could stop."

"Starlight was a misguided soul, wishing to atone for crimes known only to her. It did not change the fact she posed a threat to me."

"Then dress her into a red mask and chains, give her a Zweihander and let her find redemption in a death in the front lines. Don't be so fast with a death sentence in the future!" Umbra snarled.

"I will deal with threats to me however I deem it best," he replied. "But that does not matter. Starlight is dead and so this line of talking is pointless. You have been summoned here to help me deal with a threat to me and my ponies."

Umbra grew furious. "And I haven't forgotten about that," she snarled. "What was that shit you pulled, leaving Jackie and me to face a bunch of controlled thralls? We could have died! No really a problem for me, but for Jackie."

"If you were so weak as to fall under spellbound ponies, barely able to function without direction, then you would be useless to me. I had to ensure your mettle and skills proved strong," he said without a hint of regret.

"How about I knock you senseless and leave your ass to some hungry Mole Rats?!? Let´s see how hot you are then, shall we?" Umbra countered venomously.

"You could do that. It doesn't change the fact I am in need of your assistance and if what your friend tells me is true," he looked at Jackie, who seemed to hold none of the contempt or animosity raging through Umbra. "You are to remain here until you've served your purpose."

"Wow, sugar, way to make a lady feel appreciated. Do you think there is even the smallest possibility I will help you after the shit you just pulled?! You know what, I am not nearly stoned enough for this right now!"

"No. In your current state you are useless to me. A well trained pony would make short work of you. She, however," he nodded to Jackie. "Will prove more than adept."

"The fuck SHE will!" Umbra managed to roar, finding enough energy to shove herself between her friend and the Gerudo Lord. "Me? Fine and even if my Minions have to wheel me into battle! Hell, I´d even go so far as giving you temp command of a Minion task force but not Jaqueline! Over my cold body and considering that I have the nasty habit not to stay down, that could take a whi..." Her righteous fury was cut short by another spasm and coughing fit that speckled her palms with blood. She then settled for hotly glaring at her massive counterpart, trying to shield Jackie as much from sight as possible.

"I can speak for myself, you know," the smaller girl said with a hint of annoyance.

"Then tell this massive dick he can go shove it where the sun don't shine!"

"Right. About that..." she hesitated for a second. "I already... kinda sorta promised I'd help him."

"What?!"

Jackie shrugged. "What? He's a human in a world of ponies in need of help. Isn't that kind of the whole point of us being here?"

"Yes... but..." Umbra sputtered. "Did you forget the part where he set us against a bunch of murdering, brain controlled ponies?"

"Because that's so much different than going against a group of raving cultists," she drawled. "Which by the way, you all but charged into after that little episode of yours. That reckless charge could have gotten us both killed, you know?"

"Argh! I'm trying to make a point here, stop pointing out all of that!" Umbra seethed. "Besides, I am an adult and you're not!"

"So if it comes to putting my life at risk that's okay, but when you don't like it I'm suddenly not an adult?"

"That's the point. You're the kid, I'm the adult and this adult says you are not gonna help this prick one single iota without me giving the A-Okay."

"Then you will both die," Ganondorf said.

Umbra swelled with fury. "Is that a threat Ganonprick?" she growled.

"It is a fact. Equestrian forces are camped at the base of this mountain as we speak. By this time tomorrow, they will advance and kill every single living thing in this village, you two included."

"Wait one Darkness damned second! I thought Sombra was the enemy?"

"He is enemy to the Equestrians, but my allegiance is to myself. The Equestrians view me in as much a favorable light as you."

"I can get behind that, same here..." Umbra grudgingly admitted. "So the enemy here is the Retard Guard? Those golden plated idiots can normally barley handle themselves against a blind kitten? Or is this the only 'Verse where they are actually competent?" She mused to herself. "Well, whatever. You can go to hell while Jackie and I slip out the opposite side of this mountain."

"Then their scouts will spot you and you will be faced down with a legion of hardened war veterans."

Umbra pinched the bridge of her nose. "Gah! Fine! I´ll give you a company of Minions but Jackie stays put. She does not even have her axe, not to start with armor. I do not let her walk into a fucking warzone just in her everyday duds!"

"Your Minions will be a welcome addition, but it is Jacqueline who will be the crux in this endeavor. I need her assistance more than yours. There is a skilled enough smith here who will fashion armor for her, and my enchantments will grant her enough protective wards from magical attacks."

"I can do this, Umbra," Jackie affirmed. "It's gonna be cake, like with the cultists and those ponies last night, no biggie."

"I still don’t like it, not one bit!" Umbra grumbled and looked at Ganondorf. "Why Jackie? Why is she so important to this scheme of yours?"

Ganondorf paused, measuring his words. "The ponies of this village are mine and my responsibility. They were peaceful, for the most part and only a select number of them were trained for combat. The army at the mountain's base outnumbers us four to one. If we are to make a stand, then their morale must be raised. Jacqueline will prove instrumental to that. She will infiltrate the Equestrians' camp in the night and tear them apart from the inside. They will suffer a severe blow to their own morale, buying us further time to prepare and hold back their assault."

"Wow wo wow, let me stop you right there! Jackie? Infiltrating? To infiltrate, you need to be cunning, subtle and silent. Jackie is as cunning as a kindergartner, subtle like a sledgehammer to the face and silent like an atom bomb." Umbra looked to Jackie, cracking a small smile "No offense, brat." Then she turned back to Ganondorf. "You´d better have her tear into a portion of the enemy, like a flank maneuver or something. Collateral is more her thing."

The smaller girl rolled her eyes. "Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence." She disentangled from Umbra's grasp and backed a few steps. Her form shimmered and warped, her figure dissolving and turning into a perfect replica of a generic golden armored guard. "Here's the ticket," she said smugly.

Umbra face palmed with a pained groan "Right. Forgot that I taught you that spell for a moment. Brain´s still a bit jumbled." Then she addressed the Gerudo again "Okay, infiltration is a go but I still want a chair overlooking the battlefield and some spy glasses so I can direct my Minions better."

Ganondorf's lip curled into what might have been a smirk. "You won't need that." He looked pointedly at Twilight, who had been watching the proceedings quietly. From her lab coat the pony produced a small, violet crystal in the shape of a rhombus, which floated atop Ganondorf's palm.

"What is that?" Umbra asked.

In response, Twilight gave an identical crystal to Ganondorf's remaining palm. One of the crystals levitated out the window, well out of reach while the remaining one on Ganondorf's palm spun furiously in place and shone with an inner light and from it shined a projection—the village of Haven's Peak in a bird's eye view. The village then grew larger, the image shifted again to the longhouse, the open window and back to the room, where the remaining crystal floated in.

"Huh. Neat," Umbra murmured in spite of herself.

"So we're agreed then?" Jackie asked. "I sneak in, kick some pony butt and slip away before they know what hit them. Sounds simple enough."

"Don't you jinx it hon! But yes." Umbra deflated with a sigh.

"Say that again," Jackie said, her words brimming with poison.

"You committed a great evil yesterday," Twilight responded quietly. "You murdered and took life when you could have easily spared it. Those ponies were innocent, bewitched and commanded by dark magic. They were victims in all this."

"Perhaps you missed the part where they tried to kill me and my friend," the girl retorted bitingly. "And as you said, they were enthralled. Hell, their minds were likely broken by the time we got there. For all you know they would have gone stark raving mad and... I dunno, killed and eaten their own kids and stuff." She sniffed. "Besides, from what I hear we did you guys a favor, and it isn't murder if they have weapons and they're trying to kill you. An egghead pony like yourself should be able to work that out at least."

"They were bewitched," Twilight's words barely held a sense of calm, the anger hidden beneath threatening to spill forth. "I understand you were under a lot of pressure and you needed to ensure your and your friend's survival but..."

"Excellent. So we're in agreement. Stuff tried to kill me and I returned the gesture in kind. Glad we worked that out."

Twilight seethed, but fought to compose herself. Her parents would encourage her to be the larger pony and keep a straight mind, but the human's callous attitude and disregard to the lives she claimed strained her composure to the breaking point.

"Do you regret any of it? Do you feel the smallest sliver of remorse for the things you've done?"

"Remorse..." Jackie looked upwards, pretending to think it over. "Is that the one that makes your pants feel funny?" She snickered at her own joke. "No, princess. Fat lot of good that would do me now. I dunno if you were paying attention but I gotta go down there in a few hours and kick some pony flank. Or is it plot? Whatever," she shrugged. "These things happen." she said simply.

"Eighteen." Twilight whispered.

"What's that now?"

"That's the number of foals you tore apart. When it was over, we took the wounded here, to be healed. I supervised the aftermath of the attack myself. I saw the broken bodies of your victims. You didn't kill them. You slaughtered them like animals."

"So, what, you gonna give me a time out?"

Twilight halted in her tracks and for a split second, her composure broke, glaring at the human with absolute disgust. Jackie met Twilight's burning gaze, surprised at seeing such loathing and contempt. But It was over quickly. Twilight averted her head and looked to the ground. Her voice shook with anger and pain.

"Let's just go. I don't want to talk to you anymore."

Jacqueline frowned, eyeing the pony who went on ahead with an odd expression. For a fleeting moment, her features softened by the slightest margin, and the echo of an ache manifested in her chest, but it was brutally shoved aside. There was a job to be done and hesitation at this point would only hinder her.

Her life—Umbra's life as well—hinged on a successful raid tonight. Twilight was soft, weak. The pony had lived in a land of sunshine and rainbows for most of her life and still clung to her childish, idealistic doctrine that all life was sacred. Perhaps, by some farce, that might have even been true, but these creatures were foreign to Jackie.

Umbra tried to instill in her a sense of respect for these odd little beasts, and though she did acknowledge them to a degree, she would lie if she said she held their life in as high a regard as a human's. But this wasn't Jackie's world. It lay far away, out of reach and for the moment she would have to contend herself in a land where she did not belong nor cared for.

She had found a friend in Umbra and some much needed respite. Their brief, burgeoning friendship boded well for her state of mind and she treasured it above the meaningless lives of these curious, bizarre little ponies. And if keeping Umbra alive and well meant shoving aside what reservations she may have had and claim the lives of the ponies plotting against them at the base of Haven's Peak, she would not hesitate to do what needed to be done.

“Alright, strip.” Twilight looked on expectantly at the human, who returned the pony's gaze with her own flat one.

“Excuse me, princess?”

Twilight looked up at Jackie with a frown. “We need to take your measurements in order for Hammer ‘n Anvil to craft some armor pieces for you. Now take off your clothes.” Jackie didn't move. Twilight sighed. “I don't like it any more than you do, believe me, so we might as well get it over with. Or would you prefer going in to battle with nothing but those flimsy clothes?”

Sneering, Jackie did as Twilight bid, undressing down to her underwear. It was a battle to keep embarrassment from creeping into her features, but she'd be damned if she gave Twilight the satisfaction. The mare produced a roll of tape from her lab coat and proceeded to go about her job, the air in the small room thick with tension and hostility as neither said a word to each other. When Twilight finished, she put back the tape and left without another word. Clearly the little mare still held a measure of anger towards Jackie, not that the girl would trouble herself by it.

As she dressed and stepped out of the small room, she came face to face with Ganondorf, who’d been waiting patiently outside.

“Come with me,” he said and turned. Jackie blinked but followed quickly enough. “For this operation to achieve its maximum effect, you will hit the Equestrians and hit them hard. You must be swift and efficient. Strike when their guard is down and leave before they can organize an assault. For that, I will give you weapons suitable for this endeavor.”

“Now we're talking,” Jackie remarked. “But I'm still not clear how you expect me to… well, do any of this.”

“Tell me, how trained are you in the use of magic?”

“Magic? Not very much. You saw me do that stuff the other night but besides that…”

“Do you have a good measure of control?” She didn't answer immediately. “That's perfectly fine. As a practitioner of the arcane arts, I am knowledgeable on controlling the flow of power within my body. You are not, but this is good. In order for this mission to succeed, we will need to play to your strengths.”

“My strengths?"

"Yes. I saw what you did last night. How you manifested the magic within you to kill your opponents. A good start, but now, you must harness that very same power and use it on a far larger scale." Jackie remained silent and Ganondorf looked over, seeing doubt in her features. "Is there a problem?"

"That... what I did last night... I'm still not very good at all this stuff. It took me a week to be able to do it and even then, I can barely pull it off."

"That won’t be a problem. I will help you where that's concerned but for now, let us go." The Gerudo lord led Jackie past the perimeter of the village, to a dark opening on the side of the mountain.

"Before we came here, the ponies of this village carved a series of mining tunnels in the mountain. After my forces and I took over the village, I had sections of the mine converted to research departments."

"I have noticed this world seems a lot more technologically advanced than either mine or Umbra's," Jackie commented as she followed Ganondorf. The tunnels were a moist place, cooler than the outside and lit by lightbulbs scattered every few feet, the wiring system in plain view.

"A necessity in this world. The Crystal Empire is mainly populated by Earth Ponies. Without the magic of the unicorns or the pegasi's ability to manipulate the weather, the ponies who settled the empire had to rely on their own inventiveness to build and settle a city in the frozen north. Sombra was smart enough to see that very same inventiveness and ingenuity could be used to build war machines unlike anything the Equestrians had seen before. The Equestrians' losses were heavy during the first months of the war. To counter this, they too had to embark on a technological revolution if they wanted to stand a chance of countering the empire's armies."

"I'd say it's worked out well enough. They haven't by any chance invented handhelds, have they? Games, I mean."

Ganondorf halted, looking at Jackie with a strange expression. "No," he said slowly. "They already had those, from what I hear."

"How about AC? Do they have that?"

"Yes."

"Then your world is already ten times better than the crappy two I've been before this."

"Indeed," Ganondorf said dryly. "Let's move on." They entered a room guarded by a heavy steel door. It had no handle or discernible hinges, none that Jackie could see, at least. Ganondorf placed a hand atop a circular pad carved into the door. The flat of his palm glowed a soft blue as he channeled his own brand of magic and the door dissolved, its composition resembling that of molten slag.

"Neat," Jackie commented as she followed Ganondorf inside. The room was a stark contrast to the dirt tunnel outside. The walls and floors were cement and polished steel and where the tunnels smelled musty and earthy, a clinical sort of odor now permeated the room, along with what might have been oil of some sort. Four long, rectangular steel tables dominated the room, their legs melded to the floor beneath and atop them lay a variety of materials.

Some were weapons, not too impressive. Swords, maces, axes, spears, a couple of morning stars and meteor hammers. However, there were also curious little contraptions. Some more of the little crystals Ganondorf had demonstrated earlier, what might have been a radio at some point, and even items one might have found in an apothecary. Powders of varied colors, stones either roughly cut or finely hewn, armor pieces, both for ponies, and some clearly meant to fit Ganondorf's bulk.

"This is one of the chambers I had retrofitted into a lab. A sort of research and development."

"Developing what?"

"Weapons, of course. You might have noticed that in spite of the higher level of technology in this, or your world, firearms are curiously absent in the ponies' arsenal." He went over and picked up what looked to be a crossbow with a cylindrical container attached to the bottom, itself full of steel headed bolts. "This is the closest they've been able to achieve with firing weapons. Effective, but primitive."

"Can I...?" Jackie asked, her hands twitching.

Ganondorf handed her the contraption, watching as Jackie fiddled around with the instrument. "So how does this work, you just..." A bolt suddenly went flying as the weapon fired, ricocheting against the steel wall with a loud clang and made a beeline for Ganondorf's face. With reflexes that belied the Gerudo lord's bulk, Ganondorf's hand shot out, grasping the steel bolt inches from his face. He looked down at Jackie with a flat stare.

"Heh. Sorry," she mumbled and handed him back the weapon.

"As I was saying," he continued. "This design is primitive. Neither of the warring factions has developed a more... advanced design of ranged weaponry."

"And you have?"

"Of course. Ballistics as we know it have not yet been invented. Cannons exist, true enough, but the closest the creatures of this world have gotten to developing firearms as you know it are the minotaurs, who have managed to craft hand cannons?"

"Hand cannons?"

"It is exactly what it sounds like. Miniature cannons. They are clumsy, unwieldy designs. That is why my ponies and I have been trying to come up with new ways to expand on ranged weaponry."

"Any luck?"

"Yes." Ganondorf went over to a workbench and from it, retrieving a prototype. Its shape resembled a firearm, but like none Jackie had ever seen. At least none that she recognized from her modern era. The entirety of the firearm seemed to be composed of one single material, and even more oddly, the weapon looked to be composed of one single part as well, its composure resembling stone, strangely enough. The general shape resembled a pistol insofar that it had a slightly curved grip and a quite long barrel. It reminded her of the firearms she'd seen in movies and documentaries during the time of the Revolutionary War. Some other material was set into the side of the handle, looking like leather or rubber or something like that, maybe to improve the hold the wearer would have on this strange weapon. There were a line of weird looking runes etched into the side of the barrel, covering the whole length and Jackie could have sworn she could see them faintly pulse whenever she had them in the corner of her eyes. On the back of the weapon, where a similar gun might have the hammer, sat a quite sizable gemstone that was shining with latent power from within.

"There's no trigger," Jackie said after running her eyes through the curious contraption.

"It doesn't need one. Triggers on the firearms you're familiar with are used to ignite a chemical inside the usual cartridges via a hammer creating a spark, but this method of ignition always carries the risk of the trigger getting pulled by accident, resulting in often fatal accidents. This weapon must be triggered by a miniscule but well measured spark of magic since it utilizes a permanently enchanted gemstone as ammunition.

Once the spark is induced, the spell matrices will activate and channel the spell into the rune-enforced barrel. In this case, a plasma spell which is essentially a fire spell of the highest order," Ganon explained to the wide eyed girl before him. "It is quite amusing to think that the ponies only used this spell to cut and weld metal until I repurposed it to a far better goal. Another boon of the missing trigger is, aside from the higher security for the carrier, that only beings capable of actively channeling their magic are able to use these weapons, and even if they would manage to get ahold of one of them, they still need to know just how much magic there is needed to activate the spell matrices. A weak charge would result in the weapon not firing at all, a charge too strong and the runes set in the barrel would cause the weapon to melt and warp, rendering it useless for my enemies."

"Me, I would have settled for the thing exploding in their faces," Jackie remarked, inspecting the weapon more closely. Ganondorf considered this. It wasn't a bad idea, all things considered. "So a plasma pistol, huh? A freaking, honest to goodness plasma pistol."

"I take it you approve?"

"Approve?" Jackie's eyes now positively shined, eyeing the deceptively looking weapon with greed. "It's fucking awesome! Uh, can I...?" she asked, her hands twitching once again, eager to try the pistol for herself.

"Not here," Ganondorf said firmly. "Come with me." He led her to another room at the back of the workshop, of a Spartan build, with training dummies stacked at one end and several more propped up on poles. Said dummies were rather crudely build of hay, burlap sacks and odd bits of metal, resembling ponies, griffins, dragons and manticores.

"This room will be more suitable. Here," He handed Jackie the pistol. "For now, I've deactivated the runes to protect this from unwanted users. To activate the pistol, simply channel a portion of your magic through your arm and into your hand. The amount of plasma that will fire depends on how much power you channel through. But be warned, too much at once may cause the pistol to explode in your face and douse you with lethal amounts of plasma."

"So no pressure, then," Jackie muttered. She took the weapon, feeling its weight under her hands and gripped it with both hands, aiming at a distant pony dummy. Like Ganondorf said, she channeled a modest surge of magic and the runes on the pistol glowed, a shrill whine emerged from the weapon's barrel as it glowed a bright, neon orange and sure enough, a torrent of searing plasma exploded forth like water off a pressure hose, dousing the dummy, which immediately caught fire.

"Sweet," Jackie gushed as she gawked in wonder at the sheer destructive power of the weapon.

"Now you see. With this in hand, your task shouldn't prove too hard."

"I'll say."

"Now," Ganondorf took the weapon and a different set of runes in the back glowed softly. "The security measures are back in place. It won't explode or anything of the like, but it will not work unless you channel the correct amount of magic through."

Jackie nodded and tried to shoot another random dummy, only for the pistol to sputter weakly.

"Focus. Concentrate," Ganondorf said patiently. Jackie tried again, getting the same result. From behind her, Ganondorf sighed—a sound that if one listened closely, might have been misconstrued as annoyed.

"Ah, Captain Shining Armor. Welcome."

"And you as well, Valiant Charge," Shining Armor said politely as he shook off his snow covered cloak. He entered the spacious tent from where in the middle, a pleasantly warm fire burned, smoke drifting its way up the opening in the top.

"Please, sit. I'll have refreshments brought in." Shining armor made his way to the sturdy round table in the middle of the room, taking a seat on a slightly shabby chair. "I trust your journey here was not too tiring?"

"Somewhat," Shining Armor replied as a pony trotted in, bringing two plates of hearty warm stew and a slice of bread, placing them in front of the stallions. "But that doesn't matter. What can you tell me about this... rebel we're after. Have there been any new developments?"

Valiant Charge chewed slowly, weighing his words. "Not many, thank Celestia. My scouts have engaged with a few skirmishes with his forces, which left with more casualties than I'd have imagined. Whatever foul sorceries this being has employed gifted the ponies under his thrall with an unnatural amount of endurance and strength. Since discovering this troubling fact we have made our best efforts to avoid engaging in fights with his ponies. It is a shame, but even with forces numbering over two thousand at my command, our losses would be catastrophic should we try to take their outpost by force."

Shining Armor nodded. The news was as he'd heard from passing travelers. "And the leader? What can you tell me about him?"

"As far as we know he is not a pony. Nor does he belong to any of the neighboring races. A bipedal creature, male. Definitely not a Minotaur and at least as tall. He has been seen employing the use of vile magics to dominate and convert those ponies who would resist him, and from the accounts of my soldiers who survived, a very capable combatant, able to employ the use of weapons and magic simultaneously. He wields a strange weapon similar to a crossbow but more compact and able to fire off volleys of continuous exploding blasts of energy. It is a wonder my ponies even managed to survive."

Shining Armor frowned. This weapon of his sounded a lot like the hand cannons employed by the distant tribes of minotaurs. The Royal Guard held a number of the centuries old weapons inside their caches, but had never been able to replicate the fabled black powder that powered them.

"And these ponies that the being has taken under his thrall. Is there no hope of breaking his hold over them?"

"No, from our observations so far. In our initial skirmishes we have captured at least a good dozen of the cursed ponies, but our examinations have yielded no results, save for one. As far as we can determine their bodies are in perfect health—strengthened even by quite a bit. We have, however, managed to procure a clue that might explain their devotion to him." Shining Armor looked on expectantly. "In our initial raid against their settlement we captured a pony, but she died of her wounds soon after. We had our medics perform an autopsy on her body and he found something of particular interest in the brain."

Valiant charge licked his lips and took a breath. "Apparently the part of the brain that deals in pleasure had been overstimulated on this particular individual. The presiding pony's theory is that by some means, this creature is able to stimulate the pleasure centers of the brain, releasing a dose of dopamine every time he orders his thralls to commit acts in his stead—essentially making them addicted to him and his service, literally conditioning them like Pawlovs famous dog."

"This... this is very troubling news," Shining Armor commented. "In all my years I have never heard of such a manner of mind control. Have you?"

"No, and that troubles me greatly. Whatever this being's intentions are, he has proven himself hostile against Equestria. As far as we can tell, he and Sombra are not in allegiance to each other but this threat must be stamped out before it becomes something of significance. Already the war with the Crystal Empire has stretched our forces thin and the last thing we need is this upstart making more trouble as it is."

"I have reviewed one of the maps of the area. What is the plan of attack?"

Valiant Charge produced a map, setting aside their food and laying over the table.

"The rebels have spend the last few weeks collapsing paths, goat trails and alternate routes, blockading them or destroying them entirely via landslides. The only path left to navigate an army is through the main road." He pointed it out on the map, a narrow strip of land. "The inclination is too steep for our soldiers to build any momentum. The march will be slow and laborious. We'll need shields at the front to block spells and arrows. Even with our more sizable horde, taking the mountain will be a battle."

Shining Armor nodded and carefully studied the map. Sure enough, the rebel pegasi and unicorns had been hard at work the past few weeks, inciting landslides and avalanches to make the already narrow trail up the mountain even more constricted.

"I find it curious that this rebel leader picked such a remote village as his base of operations. There are other such small settlements close to here, with warm, temperate climate and fertile soil. That he chose this isolated location, situated in a very defensible site, tells me much about his motives. I fear that this is no group of peasants and farmers led by a simple warlord, but could very well prove to be a cunning, dangerous adversary. This will be no ordinary siege."

The two stared grimly at each other, lost in their thoughts.

Jackie was by no means inexperienced in the high art of sneaking around. True, she did spend more than a night in the sleepy town of Ponyville prowling through the streets, but this was not Ponyville. This was a war camp and even in the dead of night there were sentries patrolling about. With her normal human looks, she would be hopeless at blending in with the ponies but her current visage of a golden armored guard made the whole ordeal infinitely easier.

The reckless and foul mouthed human might not be a highly trained spy but she wasn't so ignorant that she would do anything to give herself away. She trotted confidently, not missing a step and nodding curtly to any guards who caught her eye. It had worked so far and as she made her way to the heart of the encampment, she could see how utterly screwed Ganondorf and his forces would be should the ponies march at their full might. Only the strategic position of Haven's Peak afforded them the time to come up with a suitable method of counterattack.

She was tasked with changing the terms of battle, bring the fight to the enemy and ram a sixty foot pole up their ass before they knew what hit them. That being said, she couldn't help but wonder what schemes Ganondorf had in mind to pull her out of the fire. Perhaps if...

"Oof!"

Jackie blinked. She'd been so lost in her own thoughts she didn't notice the pony in her way. Now obviously, she could not not notice the equine obstacle. It was a Pegasus of the male variety if Jackie where to venture a guess. He wore the same stupid looking golden armor that crumpled like tinfoil under pressure but curiously enough, he had an orange coat and a blue mane, differencing him from his brethren. Maybe he was something special?

"… said are you alright soldier? That was quite a nasty bump."

It finally dawned the disguised girl that she was being talked to. "Uh? Didn´t I kill you already?" These words left Jackie´s mouth only seconds before their meaning could be processed by her brain. Instantly, her heart began to hammer and she could feel her body release adrenaline, reading herself to pounce the strangely familiar pony and pound him into pastel colored paste.

"Hum? What was that? Sorry, did not catch that, my helmet got knocked over my ears," the oblivious Pegasus chatted, rightening his head gear so that his ears once again poked out of their holes.

With discipline like steel, Jackie forced herself to smile as amicably as she could(though it came out more crooked than anything) as she sighed internally that fate had thrown her a bone here.

"Sorry, was nothing really. You just look familiar and I guess I was just surprised, is all... ehrm, Sir?" Jackie pressed out, adding even one of this stupid little giggles at the end.

"Oh, I´m no Sir, not yet. Just a patriotic Pegasus, serving Equestria against her foes." The pony extended a hoof which Jackie eyed with barely hidden distaste. "My name is Flash Sentry, Private from the third Royal Pegasus Wing. Who are you? I thought we got our last batch of new soldiers one week ago?"

"Ehrm, I am... my name is..." Jackie pranced a little on the spot. This had not been part of the briefing! How should she answer this without blowing her cover? As much as she hated to admit it, she would have given her left arm to have Umbra here in this situation. She seemed to be quite an expert when it came to interacting with the little beasts and would probably be able to rattle of a whole cover story for both of them and...

"P-pretty Prancer..."

"Sorry, come again?"

"I said my name is Pretty P-prancer you dolt!" Jackie hissed, feeling her cheeks burn with the intensity of a magnesium flare.

"Pretty Prancer, eh? It suits you," Flash Sentry said with a bright white smile.

"What?"

"Pretty Prancer. You sure look the part," he added with a wink.

Jackie's eye twitched in a most horrendous fashion. "Move," she said, her voice so thick it was hard to make the words out.

"What?" Flash Sentry blinked obliviously.

"I said get out of my way before I strangle you with your own intestines." The disguised girl rudely shoved him aside as she moved past him and as she put distance between her and Flash Sentry, she swore she heard the word 'monthlies' thrown, adding to her already foul mood.

Gnashing her teeth, Jackie reached what she imagined to be the center of the war camp and slipped inside a random tent, immediately dropping her disguise as she confirmed the two occupants to be sleeping. She stretched her limbs and cracked her knuckles, breath slightly rushed as she prepared to carry out Ganondorf's plan.

She unsheathed the short blade provided to her and knelt down by the sleeping ponies. She placed a hand at the mouth of a sleeping guard and plunged the steel into his neck, severing the spinal cord. The guard's eyes shot open for an instance and his body went rigid, spasming weakly and when it stilled, Jackie removed the blade and dispatched the remaining stallion.

Now for the crux of the operation.

Jackie bent down on one knee and plunged both hands underneath the black soil. She prepared and braced herself for the sheer strain her body would endure. Her breaths started deep and measured and the human called on her reserves of magic, manipulating them all to flow. From her legs, to her torso, to her arms and lastly her palms. Greenish light poured from the soil covering her hands as Jackie strained for control, directing the energies within her to those two points.

It built to such an extent that her body itself glowed softly, highlighting the veins and arteries on her visible patches of skin. She groaned in pain at the sheer amount of power pooling in her palms, far larger than anything she was accustomed to. Her body burned and blood spurted from her nose. She felt like bearing the might of an entire battleship on her shoulders.

And then, when the energies proved too much to hold back anymore, she let them loose.

A terrible explosion, louder than the crack of a thousand cannons blasted throughout the war camp, instantly bursting the eardrums of those unfortunate souls within a hundred feet of the point of origin. A flaring column of black and green energies erupted from the ground, all but vaporizing the few wakeful, off-duty soldiers who had tried to peek into the glowing tent as well as the oblivious stallions and mares who lay nearby and had woken up not a moment ago.

The pillar of foul magics dissipated almost immediately but in its place, a concentric dome of explosive force exploded with the same fury, dissipating after a second and creating more explosive domes in its wake. Legs, heads and other pieces of bloodsoaked meat were strewn around as their original owners were completely torn apart by the sheer force of the blasts, splattering against the ground, tent canvasses or astonished onlookers, themselves blasted away as more and more of the concentric domes exploded from the point of origin.

The domes flared quickly and succinctly, carving up the earth and moving faster than ponies were able to outrun them, screams of fear and agony quickly snuffed out as the ponies were too slow and were caught in the wake of the domes, claiming the unsuspecting and the panicking alike.

One after another, the concentric manifestations of green erupted forth. Soldiers who had trained to be fearless in combat wailed, shrieked and screamed. The suddenness and viciousness of the attack breaking their composure. While a few tried to help their brethren to safety, more and more shoved, pushed and trampled over one another as they tried in vain to escape the explosive domes of energy. In seconds they and dozens of others were ripped apart by the unforgiving blasts of force.

The troops' only saving grace proved to be the diminishing force of the domes. As more and more of them spiked out of the ground away from the original source, the domes lost power, but certainly not so much as to be rendered harmless. By the fifteenth wave the explosive component was greatly diminished, but the probability of a lethal blow was all too real to those caught in the middle. By the twenty first, the domes' power degenerated so that they merely crushed and pulverized bone, though a hit to the head was a guarantee of death. Increasing cries and screams of agony now dispersed throughout the ruined camp as the crippled ponies became aware of their injuries. Even so, by the time the last wave petered out, the explosions had claimed a staggering amount of terrain and lives.

If the Equestrians thought they might have been ready and confident to storm the village of Haven's Peak, they sure weren't now. While the casualties were great indeed, the damage to morale and resources would postpone the assault, to say nothing of the injured who would be taken out of commission.

Not that Jackie was aware of any of this. The massive surge of magic had ravaged her body. Her very bones felt as if they were on fire and it was all she could do to keep from crying out. She took note of her trembling hands, noticing the skin had split open in places and bled profusely.

"Fuck," she croaked out, her voice barely audible even to her.

When Ganondorf had laid out his plan, Jackie was meant to follow the initial attack with a rampage to the command tent and either kill or capture(though Ganondorf preferred capture) the enemy leaders. But it became clear soon enough that her body was in no state to handle so much exertion.

At the moment, it was all she could do to fight her protesting limbs and stand, taking in the sight of upturned earth, tattered tents and body parts that surrounded her. Even that seemed like a triviality in contrast to that raging pounding on her head.

"Be... fucking... quiet!" She flared out her arm, creating a massive telekinetic shockwave that tossed aside a number of unfortunate ponies like rag dolls.

Several ponies who had come to survey the damage ran away in fear, though a few brave souls held on to their weapons, slowly spreading out in a semicircle around the pained human. A pony, an earth mare stepped forward, a warhammer clamped on her mouth, approaching the kneeling girl.

If Jackie was concerned, she didn't show it. Ganondorf had provided for her an enchanted set of armor that he personally reinforced with powerful runes capable of diverting most missile attacks and severely reducing the blows of physical weapons. Not that the pony would have the opportunity to see this for herself, as Jackie reached for her thigh and unstrapped Ganondorf's specially commissioned gun. A row of glowing runes lit up on the enchanted steel barrel, a light growing in the muzzle rapidly to blinding levels and with a high pitched whine, doused the brave mare in a searing spray of sun-hot plasma.

The pony fell screaming as the substance ate away at her armor, evaporating her skin and bones. Jackie smiled.

"Huh. I might actually enjoy this."

"A Plasma Pistol? You gave her a fucking Plasma Pistol? Are you out of your frikken mind you numbnutt?!? How the everloving, unholy fuck did you even get one of those?!?" Umbra screamed incredulously as she stared at the image in the Spy Shard, as she called the little crystals Ganondorf used to survey the battlefield and Jacqueline's little Spec Ops mission.

Several ponies nervously backed away as the woman screamed her head off at their lord and master. The Gerudo for his part remained as impassive as he had been since the moment they had met.

"It is a device I had my best scientists develop, together with a bigger version for me. It is a weapon of great potency, able to create massive devastation and also harbors an undeniable shock effect," he calmly explained, absolutely nonplussed at Umbra´s outburst. "So it made only sense that I equipped Jacqueline with the smaller one on her mission, to maximize her efficiency and ensure the success of this operation."

"Stop sounding so absolute aloof about this!" Umbra growled, showcasing her razor sharp teeth in an subconscious act of intimidation and aggressiveness. "That thing could have blown up and cooked her for all we know!"

"I have every confidence in you friend. You'd do well to do the same. Contingency plans are in place should she need help. Now it's a matter of allowing her to carry out her mission to the best of her ability." He watched in satisfaction as scores of ponies fell under Jackie's relentless assault, relishing the looks on their astonished faces as spells and arrows were diverted away from her. "And from the looks of it, she seems to be enjoying herself."

"As much as I hate to admit, that armor you had made for her is doing one hell of a job. Does not mean I like that you are fostering her sociopathic nature one single bit." Umbra jabbed.

"Do you think so low of her?" He asked, almost amused.

"Shut up, asshole! She is a mentally not very stable young girl who just got encouraged to work out her repressed and hormonal stress and anger through wholesome slaughter. You know perfectly well what I mean. Do you think this helps a teenager's still developing mental state? At all?" The dark woman slammed a hand against her chest. "I have been through this shit, even before having my life `jacked by some eldritch arse. I had the chance to ease myself into the bloody, unforgiving nastyness that is existence and all the consequences it brings! You," Umbra jabbed her finger at Ganondorf. "By extent probably have been too, given the way you act all the time. That or you are an even greater psycho than I initially thought. Jackie, she still is developing her sense of self and needs all the guidance and support she can get."

"Aside from a strange predisposition for peppermint puffs, I assure you, I was a very normal human," Ganondorf said smoothly, Umbra's impotent rage slightly amusing him.

"Ha ha, ha ha ha," a dry, humorless laugh escaped Umbra´s lips "Guess than you are not a lost cause after all, eh? I mean, no one who likes peppermint can be that bad, aye?"

Ganondorf watched silently for a moment as Jackie liberated a spear from a stallion who dared to sneak close and skewered the hapless pony. "Tell me, did your friend have an easy or even remotely happy time during her stay in Equestria? Her own version, I mean?"

"What? What does that have to do with anything?"

"If her ponies and yours are anything like the ones here, you must already know that with her strange powers and abilities, she won't ever be one of them. Ponies are much like us in that way. They fear that which is different, which they cannot understand. I sense a raw, unrefined potential in her. It is a shame you have not nurtured her abilities yourself. You would hold her back and attempt to integrate her in a worlds she does not belong. She knows this. She's told me. And since you have not helped her in that regard she turned to me for guidance."

"Don't you dare to go all Emperor Palpatine on my friend!" Umbra hissed, her hair slightly standing on end. "I might not be perfect, hell, I am probably damn lousy in many aspects and this might sound hypocritical since I enslave and kill stuff on a near daily basis, but there is a fine line between being a respectable Villain and a psychopathic Beast and you, Freundchen [buddy], are shoving Jackie full force and well knowing into the later corner. And that," Umbra glared up at Ganondorf, the fringes of her yellow eyes flickering red.. "Is the one thing that scores someone a one-way ticket down into the pits of scarlet fire and eternal chains of ice! Also, on top of my shit list!" She punctuated her words with poking her finger against the taller man's chest.

"This discussion is pointless. Pay attention. I fear your friend will be needing help soon enough," Ganondorf stated, his eyes never leaving the screen.

Umbra swallowed any number of rude and unpleasant retorts, but relented and returned her attention to the floating screen. The images displayed disturbed her to say the least. Jackie had completely lost herself to the haze of combat, a feeling she knew all too well. She capitalized on her enchanted armor, brute strength and Ganondorf's strange pistol, whooping, cursing and laughing as ponies fell, one after another. The mere sight sickened her, a dreading sensation on her stomach not at all directed to the small girl's victims, but to the mirrored image she projected.

Twilight suddenly rushed in front of them, peering at the screen and before Ganondorf could inquire as to her behavior, a sharp gasp escaped her lips. "Shining Armor?" She whispered harshly.

Umbra's gaze snapped up at the screen. Indeed, Shining Armor prowled at the edges of the ruined earth, keeping out of Jackie's line of sight. He eyed his quarry with cool detachment, analyzing and evaluating the unsuspecting human, a pair of blades, held in a telltale magical aura hovering beside him.

"Fuck me sideways, Prince Fearbubble is here? Did you know that?" Umbra asked venomously, not taking her eyes from the magical screen for a second. "Jackie you moron, there, behind you! Get your ass out there this freaking instant!" She yelled at the image of her oblivious friend plowing her merry way through the encampment, none the wiser that she was sized up like a literal piece of meat.

But Jackie remained oblivious to the incoming threat, her attention solely focused on the battle before her. With more dexterity and grace a robust stallion like he should be capable of, Shining Armor entered the fray, still unnoticed and his blades raised beside him, preparing to strike. When he got within distance, he aimed the swords at the nape of Jackie's neck and struck, only to find his blades impact against a flaring blue shield that formed around her body. The protective sphere held but for a second as a surprised Jackie turned to face her attacker before the sheer might behind the blades overloaded the arcane matrices of the protective enchantment, resulting in a minor blast of sheer force.

Shining Armor recovered quickly with his swords almost instantly returning to his side and assumed a defensive stance, only to find Jackie eyeing him with a sense of wariness.

"Crafty bastard. You nearly got me there."

Shining Armor held his blades at the ready. "Might I have your name, strange little creature?" he asked politely.

Jackie adopted a mocking smile. "Sure, why not. I'll just—" she leveled the gun and blasted a spray of plasma, which Shining Armor barely dodged. "Carve my name on your flaccid dick!"

A shimmering shield flashed into life, massive ripples rolling over the magical sphere that protected Shining Armor from the surprise attack. The stallions expression fell and his nostrils flared in a snort. "If this is how you want it, I will gladly comply." Then, in one fluid movement, the shield dissipated and the Captain of the Guard exploded in a flurry of movement.

Shining Armor proved to be more than a match for the rampaging human. His constant strikes kept her on her toes and though her notion of swordplay seemed to be 'swinging a sword as fast as she can', that weapon of hers proved to be more than a sufficient deterrent. The strain to his shield spells was severe even from the initial volley and he would rather keep from figuring out if the protective enchantments on his own armor would hold.

In a search for an opening, the Captain of the Royal Guard reached inside a pocket and threw what looked to be a glass orb filled with pulsing blue magic. The sphere exploded close to Jackie, bombarding her with searing bolts of lightning. Ganondorf's remaining enchantments mitigated much of the damage, but her skin was left with burning red streaks where the bolts bypassed her protections.

"Mother...!" The furious girl raised a foot covered in potent green magics and slammed it down, causing a wave of concussive force and upturned earth to sail against Shining Armor, who didn't manage to dodge in time. The Captain was sent hurtling away, barely keeping a magical hold on his swords. The impact bruised some ribs and with a barely restrained wince, he got back up to his hooves.

But Jackie had not been idle during this time. She charge forward and unleashed a volley of those debilitating plasma shots. Shining Armor couldn't keep up and eventually, the plasma collided against his shield, itself overloaded and fizzled out, allowing small droplets of searing plasma to spray against his armor and exposed fur. The Captain groaned as bits of his skin melted away, but the damage was superficial at best. He was still in fighting shape.

Umbra´s fingers resembled claws at this point, digging into the strategy room's table as she stared with held breath at the magical projection.

Thinking quickly, Shining Armor's horn let loose with a blinding flash of light, of such high intensity that could be seen even at the top of Haven's Peak. Jackie yelled as her retinas burned, dropping her weapons as her hands instinctively clawed at her eyes.

Shining Armor didn't hesitate. He barreled into Jackie, slamming his head on her unprotected torso. As the girl bent down from the force of the blow, Shining Armor lifted his swords high and plunged them down her exposed backside. The enchantments on her armor finally broke, but not without granting Jackie one last, much needed protection. Though the blades pierced through it, only about six inches managed to pierce her shoulder blades. Which still hurt a lot.

"AAARGHH! YOU FUCKER!" With a sudden upwelling of strength and vitality, Jackie pushed herself upwards, facing the astonished captain. Her fist glowed with green energy and before Shining Armor could react, she slammed it into his breastplate, the sheer power behind the blow making the metal bend inward as the protections granted by Princess Celestia herself faded into nothingness after one bright final flash.

Then the swirling magics ignited, sending Shining Armor flying through the air. He landed hard against a tree, bones shattered with a sickening crunch and he crumpled into a heap.

Umbra's armored fingers bore deep gouges on the table as she watched the scene unfold, far too stunned to react appropriately. Her eyes latched on to Jackie, now spent, lying in the ground with scores of advancing ponies as she feebly tried to reach behind her back to remove the blades still lodged in her flesh.

"That´s it! This mission is done!" Umbra yelled, her eyes burning brightly as she went over countless ways she possibly could do to aid her badly wounded friend as the remainders of the Equestrian Army closed in to her.

"Work dammit, work!" She growled, fixating a spot not far away from Jackie through the Spy Shard. To her, it was pulsing, like a heartbeat.

"What do you think you are doing?" Ganondorf's voice was just barely colored with irritation.

"You shut your fucking mouth!" Umbra roared in response, only to immediately return her attention to the screen again. There! A Minion Portal burst open and after a agonizing few seconds, Umbra´s loyal kobolds spilled forth in a geyser of black armor, razor-sharp weapons and murderous intent.

A massive spike of pain wracked Umbra´s body and forced her to lean on the table for support. Then she caught herself and directed her mind back to the task at hand. Sending her mental commands through the ether, she watched with a bloody, satisfied grin as the surge of Brown Minions took the Equestrians by absolute surprise.

Blades found the spaces between armor plating, heavy halberds where brought down on helmets and maces smashed into kneecaps as the kobolds battered themselves a way through the enemy soldiers, with a single goal screaming in their minds.

To protect their master's friend and return her to her immediately.

The Minions dispatched the last soldier standing between them and Jackie, swarming around the wounded girl like one single organism, effectively shielding her with their own bodies.

The wounded girl herself only looked in befuddlement as small, clawed hands lifted her up with an uncanny amount of care.

"Gotcha! Now," Umbra wheezed, straining to keep the control over her forces over the massive distance between Haven´s Peak and the camp "Bring `er home!"

The Minions carrying their charge steadily moved towards the point where they had left the Ley Line and where the Minion Portal had vanished not a second before, being replaced by a one way teleport stone.

The unsteady wobbling girl was deposited on the rune etched surface and not sooner had the Minions stepped back to form a defensive bulwark, was Jaqueline's body swallowed in bright blue light. The same light filled the strategy room not a second later, followed by a pained groan as Jackie was unceremoniously dumped right in the middle, the portal stone crumbling to dust under her.

Umbra strode forward, shoving aside the Minions that had gathered around her charge.

"Jackie? Jackie! Talk to me girl," Umbra urged as she held her friend. Her body was a ruin. Those lightning bolts had done more damage than initially thought and the angry red streaks left in their wake oozed sporadically with blood. The blades embedded in Jackie's shoulders had splintered the armor, driving bits of shrapnel inside her and the toll of her initial attack now bore down on her, with the adrenaline surge having run its course. Jackie's breaths came in shallow pants, her chest barely moving but even so, with enormous difficulty, she rose her head to meet Umbra's eyes.

In spite of the horrendous pain she no doubt felt, her lips twitched and turned upward, revealing a set of blooded teeth. "H-hey, Umbra," she was just barely able to make out.

Umbra couldn't help but bark out a harsh laugh, her eyes stinging. "Hey, girl. Still with me?"

Jackie coughed, splattering Umbra with droplets of blood. "Did ya see?" She asked, her voice so weak it was almost inaudible. "I fucked 'em good." Her body went limp as unconsciousness took over.

Umbra's eyes found Ganondorf's, her yellow orbs brimming with fire and hate. "Get me a fucking medic! She better make it or so help me, I will tear your body apart in so many shreds there won't be enough left to fill a baby shoebox!"

Medical personnel were summoned, who quickly hefted Jackie on a hastily built gurney, hurriedly trotting to the infirmary section of the camp, with Umbra hot on their heels.

The Battle for Haven's Peak

"What is the extent of her injuries?"

Twilight levitated a slightly bloodstained clipboard in front of her. "Magical exhaustion, for one. A human's body is obviously not meant to channel nor conduct magic, much less in as massive a scale as she did. The sheer strain damaged her muscles and ligaments, but with proper medicine and treatment she should be able to move her limbs without much discomfort in a few hours." She turned a page. "Lacerations to the palms, an effect of so much raw magic channeled through them. Numerous blood clots were in the process of forming in her brain, but we managed to take care of it before they did any damage. Burns consistent with electricity throughout her face, forearms and legs. Aside from the stabbing wounds on her back and the bits of shrapnel embedded in her shoulder blades, there is no more."

"Will she recover?" Ganondorf asked after a moment, his face betraying no emotion.

"She will. Advances in medicine allow us to take care of such injuries without too much effort. It's a good thing you had their supplies stolen during the raid."

"I will go see her." He turned to leave, but Twilight stopped him.

"I don’t think that would be a good idea, Ganon." He quirked an eyebrow and Twilight continued. "Umbra hasn't left her side once and she's very mad at you. I don’t think it would be a good idea to be there. Not now at least. Not while the wounds are still fresh."

Ganondorf sighed. "Very well. Continue with the treatment. Keep me updated to any changes in her condition."

Twilight nodded and slipped out.

She made her way out of the longhouse that Ganondorf had commandeered as a sort of command center and into the thick of Haven's Peak. Even from there she could tell the mood in the remote settlement had lifted somewhat. Ponies busied themselves, attending to their everyday chores.

A pleasant aroma wafted from the local bakery, where the resident baker churned out oodles of delicious pastries to feed the hardworking ponies. Golden brown loaves, fresh and hot from the oven were lathered with honey, put on display to tantalize the populace. A few colts and fillies played rambunctiously on a sizable water puddle in the middle of the street, shrieking and laughing and making a mess of themselves to the disapproving looks of ponies nearby. Housewives were busy at work tending their little gardens. Some grew potatoes, carrots, peppers, grapes, melons and many more. Construction ponies were hard at work putting the finishing touches on a bell tower, commissioned by Ganondorf for sentries to be on the lookout for enemy activity and the blacksmith's shop had been running through the night, the clanging of metal on metal ever present since the Gerudo leader had been made aware of the impending Equestrian assault.

Though Ganondorf had conscripted the ponies to become his minions, forcing them to gladly obey his will, that did not mean they were mindless thralls. They knew all too well what an Equestrian invasion would entail and the successful raid last night made its job of lifting their spirits. Maybe they would come out of the whole ordeal alive.

She bypassed the infirmary section of the village, little more than a clearing filled with tents, themselves housing the wounded and still alive ponies of Ourtown and slipped into the cabin at the end, where a single patient resided.

The human girl laid on the bed, IVs with fluids of different colors sticking from her arm and serenely sleeping. Hovering over her was the remaining human or, demoness as she proclaimed herself to be. Truth be told, Twilight couldn't tell what the difference was aside from a stark set of skin tone and glowing eyes.

Umbra seemed to be in a state between sleep and wakefulness, sitting down on a plushy sofa. She hadn't left the smaller girl's side throughout the whole night and even now refused to rest properly. Twilight didn't quite know what to make of her. She had decided she did not like Jacqueline very much. For such a young specimen, she seemed to harbor a particular disregard for ponies and a special animosity for Twilight herself.

Umbra though, had seemed nice enough, strangely enough. Twilight thought she was as far from a demon as one could be. Sure, she engaged the thralled ponies in combat, but had strived to injure rather than kill (as much as one could with a burning sword) and though the demoness had displayed no small amount of hostility towards Ganondorf, her interactions with the ponies were polite enough, occasionally dispersed with threats to bite somepony’s head clean off when they would not stop bothering her about her own wounds.

Twilight moved to check on the sleeping girl, her hoofsteps alerting Umbra to her presence.

"Sparklebutt?" Umbra muttered, rubbing her eyes and peering at Twilight.

"Twilight,” she corrected.

"I know, but it gets under your skin so I´ll use it. Or do you prefer Purple Smart? I´d come up with some more names for you but I can´t really brain well at the moment." She eyed Twilight with a bit of suspicion. "You are not here to stick more needles in either of us or some of these magical probe things, ja? The other medics did more than their share of that."

Twilight sighed and rolled her eyes. The demoness' strange penchant for nicknames aside. "I'm here to check in on her," she said, not able to keep a slight hint of disdain from entering her voice. "No needles or invasive procedures for now."

Twilight moved beside Jackie and gazed intently at the sleeping girl. Her horn glowed softly, bathing the girl's head in a haze of purple mist, then to her chest, torso and legs. Twilight nodded to herself and made a note on her clipboard.

"Since when are you a medic?" Umbra asked as she watched Twilight work. "Don't get me wrong, I really appreciate what you're doing for her, even if Jackie isn't... well, always the friendliest shark in the pool, but I always pictured you in a library setting."

Twilight worked silently for a moment, making no indication she had heard Umbra speak, a contemplative look in her muzzle. "When the war broke out and Sombra's armies pushed back our forces, Celestia passed a law, drafting ponies all over Equestria to aid in the war effort. I had a position in the Canterlot library with a very nice mare named Moondancer, but my name was called and so they gave me a choice. Infantry, engineer or medic. I can operate machines easy enough, but have no idea what makes them tick and I couldn't imagine myself fighting, killing ponies,” she trailed off, her thoughts drifting back.

"A war can be fought from any position and sometimes, there are soldiers who never fire a single shot during a whole conflict. A nurse is as important as a pioneer and a devoted logistics officer can make a bigger difference than a brilliant general."

Twilight smiled appreciatively. "Thanks. That's what they told all of us in the division. Me and about ten other enlistees served under this mare, Nurse Redheart I believe, who volunteered from Ponyville. We were right there in the front lines, tending to the wounded. When our forces weren't being pushed back, at least," she said resentfully. "Almost none of us had experience in the medical field, but by Celestia did we get some hooves on training," she chuckled. "I must have thrown up half a dozen times when we amputated limbs, and some of the other recruits as well. But as time passed and we became hardened to such things, I was able to treat and dress a field wound in less than thirty seconds,” she said with a hint of pride.

The moment was broken as the door of the small cabin was enthusiastically kicked open and a Brown Minion waltzed in, carrying a tray with a small, slightly cracked pot and a few dirty cups on it. The kobold grinned broadly as he placed the tray on his mistress lap.

"For the master!" The Minion proclaimed cheerfully.

Umbra took the time to pat the weird creature on its head with a tired but nonetheless honest smile. "Thank you, Gnasher. You can go and play now if you want. But no stabbing any of the horsies until I say so, yes?" She reminded the kobold who promptly scampered away. Her Minions had caused her quite a bit of grief earlier in the morning when a group of them just so happened to discover the ponies kept a rather sizable herd of sheep in the pastures of Haven's Peak. That... had not been pretty to say at least. It had been a while since the Minions had laid eyes on a proper sheepie, and since Minions really, really loved their sheepies...

Umbra shook her head, hoping the ponies could forgive them for the few little sheep that had not survived the Minions' enthusiastic playtime.

"My little kobolds can be such dears when they are not busy murderizing my enemies, wouldn´t you agree?" Umbra said, pouring herself a cup of the blackest coffee this side of Zebrica. With an audible, pleased sigh, she downed the steaming contents in a few moments. "Care for a cup of coffee too? It is honestly not that tasty but it has a good kick to it,” she offered to the Unicorn.

Twilight eyed the steaming mug for a second, thinking it over before she said, "Sure," and grabbed it in a telekinetic grip, downing the scalding hot contents in one mighty gulp. "Thanks," she said, handing the cup back to a bemused Umbra. "Your friend should be waking shortly. I'll give you two some time alone."

She organized the papers in her clipboard, made a few more notes and departed the small room, closing the door behind her.

Umbra watched Jackie intently. Sure enough, it wasn't too long before the movements of her chest became more pronounced. An eyelid opened, barely and blearily. The second one followed and roamed the room until they landed on Umbra.

To the dark woman's surprise, Jackie's mouth twitched and stretched into a wide smile. "Hey," she croaked, her voice still a bit rough.

Umbra returned the gesture. "Hey girl. How are you feeling?"

Jackie, yet again surprising Umbra, stuck out her lower lip in a contemplative pout, as if considering the answer.

"Trippy," was the response and Umbra couldn’t help but chuckle.

"No surprise. You are kinda stuffed to the brim with drugs and painkillers, Jackie girl."

Jackie hummed. "Is it morphine?"

"I guess. Maybe a pony version of it?"

"It feels awesome," she said, slurring her words. "Almost makes it worth it," she said, giving a very uncharacteristic giggle.

"Don't get used to it, brat," Umbra said with a smile, amused by the small girl's quirky, drug induced deposition. "I know I asked already but are you fine? Need water or something? I'm not sure if you're allowed to have fluids but I could ask."

Jackie slowly ran her tongue over her lips, assessing. "No, I'm good." Her hands moved to draw the woolen blanked all the way to her chin. "It's cold, though."

"Okay. Stay here, I'll see if I can get you another blankie," Umbra said and moved to stand up.

"No, that'll take too long," Jackie slurred. "Come in." It seemed the surprises would keep coming on, for to Umbra's astonishment, Jackie scooted to the edge of her bed and opened the blanket, making room for Umbra.

"Uhh... wut?" The demoness said, too dumbstruck by the very un-Jackie like gesture.

Jackie frowned. "Come in already. You're letting all the warmth out. Move your butt and get in here." Demonstratively, she lifted her blanket a bit more.

"Wow," Umbra chuckled "You must be tripping major balls girl, because it just sounded like YOU invited ME to slip under your blanket."

At that, Jackie let out a burst of snorts "Hehe, you said balls..."

"Yepp, trippier than the whole Sixties."

"Are you commin´ or do I need to write you an invitation?" An adorable pout formed on the younger girls lips.

"Jeeze, don´t you go and give me such temptations Jackie," Umbra chuckled as she removed her boots and other armor pieces "But who am I to look a gifted horse in the mouth hn? If it's cuddles you want, it's cuddles you get." Left in her tunic and pants, Umbra carefully slipped into the creaking bed and covered both of them with the blanket again. "Hmm, cozy."

"Body warmth, not cuddles," Jackie muttered commented as she groggily pressed herself to Umbra, laying her head atop her shoulder.

"You know, I'm halfway tempted to ask Sparklebutt what she dosed you with and take some of it back home," Umbra couldn't help but joke.

"That'd be nice," Jackie murmured as she made herself comfortable, pressing as much of herself as she could against Umbra's warmth. Umbra herself was content to enjoy the silence, only the sounds of their breathing and the soft beeps of the machines to keep company.

"Hey, Umbra?" Jackie said after a long stretch of comfortable silence.

"Hm?"

"Do we have to go back?"

"Back where?"

"To... you know. Your tower and all."

"Well, yes. That's how it works."

Jackie hummed, thinking, or as much as one could think in a drug induced haze. "What if we don't go back?" She said quietly. "What if you and me just stay here, in this ponyland?"

"What? What do you mean, girl?" Umbra chuckled. "Why do you want to stay here? It's not a very nice place."

"What'choo mean?"

"Well, where to begin," Umbra said as she idly played with Jackie's mop of hair, caressing the black strands. "That massive gaping anus Ganondorf is here, for one. Never thought I would see the day that I met a Displaced I want to deck in the face so bad or outright shiv him. The whole of this Equestria is embroiled on a devastating war with Sombra, ponies are dying left and right every day, the country is in a state of fear and well on the way to becoming a ravaged, war torn wasteland."

Jackie erupted in a string of giggles burying her face on Umbra's neck, enjoying her ministrations. "I know, isn't it great? Awesome? I always thought the ponies could use a good war, break 'em out of that... uh, pedestal? No... knock 'em off that... horse. Yes, knock 'em off that high horse," she chuckled at the play on words.

"You... like it here, Jackie girl?" Umbra asked, more than a bit taken aback.

"Duh. Don't you?"

"No, I can't say that I do," Umbra said slowly. "And you shouldn’t either. It's the drugs making you say that, isn't it? No one in their right mind could actually like being in this hellhole. Yes, that must be it," she said to herself.

Jackie's hand loosened from her firm position across Umbra's torso, taking ahold of Umbra's hand.

"You know what?" Jackie asked rhetorically as she started playing with the dark digits. "I dunno why, but when I went in, and I blasted them ponies apart, showed them who's boss," she said, an uncharacteristically thoughtful, sober expression on her face. "I've never felt so alive," she said in a hushed, conspirational whisper. "Ponies... they break so easily. Almost like... pretzel sticks. Yes, that's it!" she giggled and fiddled with Umbra's index finger, bending and flexing it. "So fragile..." And like that, she nuzzled her befuddled friend's hand to her cheek.

"Shut up Jackie, you´re high!" Umbra tittered, ever so slightly creeped out. Then quickly but firmly, she pressed Jackie´s face against her chest. Anything to shut her up.

Dawn broke across Haven's Peak, but even in the wee hours of the morning the ponies were already hard at work. The successful attack the previous night, executed by the curious little human Ganondorf seemed to have pulled out of nowhere had reinvigorated the villagers' spirits, if only by a little. Ever since news of the Equestrians' impending assault had reached them a few weeks back, Ganondorf had ordered as many hooves as possible to work at hindering any potential assault.

Various off roads, game trails and passages known only to the Havenites had been completely sealed, leaving only the main road up the mountain as the sole entry point for an invading force. While the Equestrians held the advantage of numbers in spite of their catastrophic defeat the night prior, Ganondorf and the Havenites worked to establish as much control of the battlefield as possible.

They knew exactly where the enemy would march (seeing as there was only one way) and capitalized on the fact they held the higher ground. Lumberponies and several volunteers had worked day and night, felling trees and assembling them into a hastily built wall that lined the front of the village, as well as spiked barricades that guarded the front and a number of craftsponies and carpenters had been sequestered by Ganondorf to work on a secret project in the mines, the entrance guarded fiercely against unauthorized personnel.

Crude catapults had been constructed to hurl loose stones and rocks, the ammunition gathered and provided by numerous colts and fillies who prowled the village, eyes searching, saddlebags and wagons strapped to their backs. Cauldrons of boiling water and hot oil were readied to be dumped from atop the walls. Blacksmiths busied themselves crafting caltrops and the resident alchemist worked overtime, aided by a select number of ponies, to build bombs and other anti-personnel devices.

Twilight Sparkle, the unexperienced might say, was everywhere at once as the little mare prodigiously teleported to and fro, organizing the Havenites' effort to the best of her ability. Ganondorf was pleased at how efficient the little pony proved to be at the task, directing the villagers and showing them the most efficient methods to go about their assigned tasks. His fighters sparred lightly against one another, keeping their wits sharp and teams of pegasi prowled the skies, on the lookout for any suspicious activity.

"I can't believe this!" a voice growled beside Ganondorf, who had been supervising the activity on the village via a vantage point—the entrance to the mines built on a ridge overlooking Haven's Peak. He turned his head to see a very displeased Umbra walk up beside him, arms crossed and scowling as she looked down at the hardworking ponies. "We came in, helped you out and instead of going back to my 'Verse, we're still here."

"Perhaps it is because I am still in need of help," Ganondorf commented. Umbra seethed beside him. "I know you don't care much for me, Umbra..."

"Really, Ganonprick? What gave you that idea?" Umbra bit snidely.

"But loathe me as you may, you wouldn't walk away, even if given the chance," he said confidently.

"Is that so?" Umbra asked with a challenging tone. "That what you think, huh?"

"It's what I know," Ganondorf replied. "Though I am sure you wouldn't hesitate to leave me to the Equestrians' mercy, you are not capable of subjecting the hundreds of innocent ponies here to the same fate. You fashion yourself to be a force of evil, yet your good heart makes you pathetically predictable."

"Right now, I have come up with about five different ways to shiv you and make sure you bleed out like a stuck pig before any form of first aid could be applied,” Umbra replied, inspecting her nails.

"Cute." Ganondorf turned to face Umbra fully. "Then let us spin this scenario further, just as a mental exercise, shall we? Let´s say you actually have the temerity to commit a cold blooded assassination and succeed, then what? This would not deter the Equestrians from storming Haven´s Peak, even if you were to present my head to them on a silver platter. They would merely see you as another evil creature that usurped its place by means of bloodshed and murder, that needed to be removed from the world by force. No, this war has already passed the point of no return long ago. But to continue our little thought experiment, let us say you would manage to rally the Ponies of Haven´s Peak behind you, there would still be the threat of you simply disappearing, from what I gleaned from my talks with Jacqueline and your own words. Imagine you were to disappear right in the midst of battle, robbing all these Ponies of the last semblance of a leader and completely leaving them at the Equestrians’ mercy. Which, I can assure you, is surprisingly non existent at this point despite them sharing the same species."

Umbra´s sole reply was a scalding glare. "You think you're so smart, don't you?"

"I should hope so. Otherwise I wouldn't have survived this long."

"And you know if it wasn't for my girl still being out of commission and these ponies needing a leader, I would have turned you into my own serving thrall."

Ganondorf smiled. "Ah, yes. Your friend told me about that. A most crude method that is as likely to kill your victims as making them your slaves. Sloppy, unreliable and limited in use. Much like its caster."

"Ganondorf?"

"Hm?"

"Go find a nice big hole and die in it!"

The screams of the dying and wounded resonated through the war camp all through the night. Flash Sentry tried to ignore the death and destruction around him as he cantered to the command tent, the dull scraping of bone saws filling the air, the now familiar screams of pain following in their wake. Even now at dawn, ponies were still hard at work getting the wounded loaded in carts, all piled unceremoniously atop one another, to say nothing of the dozens of unfortunate victims that had been literally torn apart, all heading for a massive funeral pyre that had been alight for hours.

Flash Sentry reached the command tent and slipped inside. Already the Captain of the guard was already seated, surrounded by six of the highest-ranked ponies. Half had died in the attack the previous night and their successors by military rank had now assumed command. Flash Sentry's squad leader for the entire pegasi wing had perished as well and so now he took his place at the small war council.

"My fellow soldiers," a weary Commander Valiant Charge began. "Thank you all for attending this meeting on such short notice. Let us begin." Valiant Charge looked to the dozens of documents in front of him and selected one, holding it up for everypony to see.

"I hold in my hooves the casualty figures from last night's attack. A figure that is not yet complete, but growing as we speak, the task further slowed down by the fact ponies are simply in too many pieces to determine the exact body count." He grimaced at that, having witnessed firsthoof his brave soldiers and comrades being ripped apart by the flaring domes of light. Shining Armor scowled beside him. The Captain had soldiered through his wounds and now sat, heavily bandaged and on painkillers. Modern medicine allowed him to recover far faster, but it was clear to everypony present the toll on his body.

"How many casualties so far, Commander?" Shining Armor asked hoarsely.

"Our best estimates are roughly two hundred, and that is only from the initial assault, not counting for the wounded. It has been difficult to differentiate those who died in the initial phase of the attack and those who succumbed to their wounds, to say nothing of the fact far too many of our fellow soldiers were simply in too many pieces to gauge a correct figure." He sighed heavily and continued.

"From our estimates, over one hundred and eighty six ponies perished from the exploding domes of force that erupted from the ground. A further three hundred and nine have died from the grievous wounds sustained by the blasts, though the numbers are still trickling in, and forty six more were claimed by the foul creature that engaged our soldiers afterward. A further two hundred and fifty are out of commission for the remainder of the campaign. All in all, the death toll stands at over three hundred and ninety five, with more casualties coming in by the hour. Coupled with our wounded who are in no shape to fight, over a third of our army has been taken out of commission."

"One third!" A general shouted, slamming a hoof down on the table. "One third of our army! All by a single creature born from the union of a minotaur and a diamond dog!"

"And let us not forget that during the confusion, spies infiltrated our camp, poisoned our food supplies, stole what they could and destroyed our siege weapons," another pony commented, to the surprise of some. Valiant Charge gestured to the pony, who continued. "It seems the attack last night served another purpose entirely. In the pandemonium, while our forces were engaging the witch last night, small bands of rebel saboteurs took this opportunity to sneak into our camp. Sentries standing watch over the eastern side of the mountain were found dead this morning, their throats slit. We can assume the rebels came through here and during the fight last night, infiltrated our camp. They poisoned our food supplies, stole armor, weapons, rations, medicine and put our siege engines to the torch. What's more, our engineer division was killed in their sleep, making our capability to reconstruct siege engines... limited."

Valiant Charge digested these news, as did a fair few more ponies. "We need a way to breach those walls. While our army still outnumbers them, our losses will be all the more heavy without a quick, efficient way to bypass their fortifications."

"The walls the rebels have built are simple," Shining Armor said. "Little more than wood and stone. Our battering rams and catapults may have been destroyed, but we can still use ladders to climb up the walls."

"We would be slaughtered," Flash Sentry piped up. "Our troops would have to march while carrying them, leaving them vulnerable to archers and spellcasters. Why not wait for reinforcements and additional weapons to be brought in? It could take as little as a week and..."

"A week for our enemies to fortify their position and to allow that foul creature to recover and launch another raid against our war camp," Shining Armor countered. "With our stolen medical supplies, the witch could very well get back to her full strength in less than a week. How long do you think until she infiltrates our camp once more? Would you have us wait until she gathers her strength and deliver retribution on the rest of our own? And what of the rebel leader? He has proven to be a more cunning adversary than any of us initially thought. The more time we sit here and dawdle, the more time he has to craft insidious schemes against us, schemes that could very well prove as devastating as the witch's attack last night."

Shining Armor looked around to the assembled ponies, allowing them to take this in. "This work done by a single rebel witch tells me one thing—our enemy is desperate. It was a display of power meant to intimidate and make us question ourselves, because they know they don’t have the numbers to defeat us. Or perhaps they are in preparation to unleash an even more devastating attack."

Shining Armor and the rest of the officers considered this, deeming it too dangerous to postpone the assault.

"So it is agreed?" All presiding officers nodded, some more reluctantly than others. "Then it's settled. We attack at dawn tomorrow."

That night nopony slept well. Disciplined though they were, the Royal Guard were all to mortal, and the display of foul magics by the little human still fresh in their minds, many of them did not dare nod off, for fear the little witch would come back and reap vengeance.

So it was with no small amount of relief that Shining Armor rose from his bedroll and donned his armor. The Captain was still sore and bruised from his encounter with the sorcerous little creature but his bones were mended and he was back in fighting shape.

Not for the first time did the Captain wonder how an isolated incident of rebellion had turned into a full-fledged battle. The war with Sombra and the empire had been draining enough on Equestrian resources, costing untold amounts of gold and lives. And now this upstart rebel sought to control ponies and build himself a fortification atop Haven's Peak, increasing his forces—forces already proven to be hostile to Equestria...

No. For better or worse this rebellion had to be stamped out here and now or else Shining Armor feared his beloved kingdom would fall into ruin.

Shining Armor and Valiant Charge led the assault. Troops had been preparing the day prior, felling trees to fashion crude but sturdy ladders to climb the wall. Shields were salvaged and hastily repaired, for the front troops would be given them to form a defensive wall against spells and arrows. They had the might of the Equestrian army behind them. They couldn't afford to lose. They wouldn't, Shining Armor told himself and so the wrecked army began their laborious march to the village of Haven's Peak.

"I did not get the chance to tell you this, but I am grateful you decided to participate in the assault. Your presence instills the troops with confidence. Not many could have gone up against such a witch and come out alive," Valiant Charge told his captain.

"We are in this together, Commander, for better or worse," Shining Armor replied. "Let's just hope our fortunes will bear fruit. We can't afford any more distractions from the war."

The army marched in formation, a slow haul due to the loose earth and muddy slopes of the mountain. Rebel pegasi had rained down water on the trail, effectively slowing their advance. Shields lumbered at the front, raised and ready to defend against ranged attacks while archers and spellcasters trailed right behind. Shining Armor watched carefully for any ambushes or concealed traps.

Bringing up the front was a long line of infantry ponies, their swords sheathed as they carried the ladders, propping their shields between the rungs to help stave off ranged attacks. A number of officers cantered back and forth, keeping a sharp eye and keeping the formations intact.

The march was more or less uneventful and while some would see this as a good sign, others couldn't help but be unnerved, wondering if the enemy had something worse in store. The army marched on, and when they were able to make out the hastily built wall and gate of Haven's Peak, with sentries standing guard atop it, Commander Valiant Charge issued directions to begin preparations. The army halted after positioning itself at maximum archer range. Infantry ponies readied their shields and swords, while archers, nocked their arrows and spellcasters prepared to let loose with a volley of debilitating magic or cast protections to their brethren.

The Commander turned to his forces, ready to give his speech.

"Ponies of Equestria! Are you with me?"

"HOO-AH!" The ponies chorused, hefting their weapons.

"Are you ready to exact revenge on these vile rebels?"

"HOO-AH"

"That's the spirit! Listen to me, brothers. Victory awaits us today. We shall ride up those flimsy walls, smash them down and show those pitiful peasants and traitors what real soldiers are like! We shall hunt down every single rebel, then burn and execute them on their own homes! And finally... finally, we will capture that blasted witch, strip her of her clothes and armor, shatter her limbs and let every stallion who has lost a brother to her foul sorceries have his way with her! What do you say to that?"

"HOO-AH!"

When preparations were finally ready, Valiant Charge gave the order.

"Archers! Fire!"

The battle for Haven's Peak began in earnest.

"What´s wrong, Breeze?"

Summer Breeze, one of the sentries on Haven's Peak's new wall looked over to her comrade, Gumball. The stallion was a foalhood friend of hers, one whom she loved dearly but sometimes he could be denser than a granite boulder.

Summer Breeze gestured with one armored hoof towards the newest addition in their master's arsenal, the weird, red, devil-like creatures with the bright glowing bellies who littered the whole length of the wall now. "It´s these... things. They freak me out to no end, Gum."

The stallion hummed, tilting his head as he watched two of the red creatures chittering amongst each other, occasionally belching up small flecks of flame, which in turn normally resulted in maniacal laughter from both sides.

"I admit, the laughter is a bit off-putting but all in all, these little guys look rather tame compared to everything else. Sure, they breathe fire but so do Dragons but these little fellows don't toast you just because they can. Their claws are tiny and they have no thick scales. Hay, I bet one good buck could squish them."

"Ach, stallions!" Breeze face hoofed, resulting in a loud clang as her shoe met her helmet. "How can you be so nonplussed, Gum? Don't tell me the fact that they just jumped out of the ground did not worry you at least a bit?" The mare gestured to the weird ring of stone with the red mist wafting out of it that sat at the base of the wall. "For all we know, we could be sitting atop a massive burrow of these things! And what about that tall, black creature that opened these holes and called them here?"

"You mean the one with the burning sword yes? Well, I thought she just might be their leader or their mother or something. They seem to obey her without hesitation." Gumball watched with fascination as one of the devil things spat a glob of fire in it´s armored hand, only to smash it into the face of the other devil. Surprisingly, that only made both even laugh harder and more hysterically. "Okay, I might see what you mean there Breeze." Gumball conceded. "But hey, at least they are on our side, yes?"

Summer Breeze´s ears flicked suddenly. "Do you hear that?"

"Hear what?"

"There is something whistling..." Breeze looked up and her ears splayed back. "Arrows!"

Without waiting for her friend to react, she tackled Gumball and pressed both of them against the wall, praying that would grant them at least some sort of protection. Not seconds later, a hail of arrows fell down, piercing into the wood of the wall, the ground behind the wall and clinking loudly against the sentries' armor.

After she was sure that all arrows were down, Summer Breeze dared to look up. Her surroundings looked like a massive pin-cushion. A few of the red creatures had literally been riddled with arrows and were in the process of dissolving into a disturbing cloud that looked like a skull of sorts. "Hey Gumball? Gum? Are you alright?" She asked, looking at her friend.

"I think there is an arrow sticking in my butt," Gumball groaned.

"What a loss for the Equinity," Summer Breeze snarked as she noticed that there was only a fine, red line running down Gumballs flank, barley a glorified scratch. Then she looked over the wall and her heart nearly leaped out of her throat. The Royal Guard was here! Nearly tripping over the still cowering Gumball, Summer Breeze reached for the signal horn and blew it with all her might.

Shining Armor watched, pleased that a number of the arrows had found their marks. Even from a distance he could see the strange red colored creatures stationed atop the walls and that some of them seemed to turn into some sort of cloud as the arrows speared them. The uncouth little beasts that had survived the assault taunted and jeered in some inane language, making faces and turning around before slapping their buttocks, mocking him and his fellow soldiers.

From beside him Valiant Charge sneered at the display, while Shining Armor's line drew in a tight line. These goblin-like vermin and the brown colored ilk that, by witnesses' accounts, burst out of the ground during the witch's assault, had not been before documented as a part of the rebel leader's forces. Perhaps he'd come into their possession recently? Or had he been keeping their existence secret until forced to play his hoof?

Intelligence was frustratingly limited when it came to the rebel leader. Wherever he came from, he had made it a priority to keep as much of himself as he could a secret. His origins were unknown, his brand of magic and foul sorceries foreign to the Equestrians' record keepers. His goals and motives remained shrouded in mystery. They couldn't even place the name of his species, and what limitations they might possess, to say nothing of that devastating projectile weapon he'd been seen employing, and now the witch...

There were too many unknowns to Shining Armor's taste. True, the rebel forces were a pittance compared to his army, but that didn’t stop the rebel leader from springing some very unpleasant surprises that took his forces by surprise and decimated the brave ponies under his watch. Ideally, Shining Armor would prefer to gather intelligence before engaging such a deceptive, resourceful foe, but the more time the creature was allowed to run free, the more power he gathered. That his actions clearly spoke of hostility to Equestria was the final straw. No, whatever he was, whatever his motives may have been, he and his forces were a blight that needed to be extinguished as quickly as possible.

"Second Volley!" Valiant Charge called out. Countless arrows nocked in their bows before being let loose, sailing like a dark cloud through the air. At the sight of this, the little red creatures' eyes bugged out and started running around haphazardly, arms waving like windmills in a mad attempt to avoid the projectiles. What stunned Valiant Charge and Shining Armor was how effective this proved to be, for none of the little beasts had been struck.

"Third Volley!" Valiant Charge cried out, annoyed. But as the archers readied their arrows, a lone, lumbering figure made its presence known. Shining Armor's eyes narrowed as who could only be the rebel leader appeared at the center of the walls, seemingly unbothered by the advancing army. The tall biped of armor and muscle raised a hand and within it, a surge or red magics pooled before the creature let them loose... and high into the air, where it exploded in a flashy show of lights.

Shining Armor looked to the Commander, clearly confused and Valiant Charge mirrored the expression. The archers too had stopped, clearly expecting... more.

"Calm yourselves, everypony," Valiant Charge boomed. Shining Armor sent officers down the line to return some semblance of order to the ponies, who had halted, befuddled at the strange action by the rebel leader. The rather confused infantry at the front continued their march with halfhearted enthusiasm. Already they entered in range of the enemy archers and spellcasters. Too few of the former, though a straggle of arrows and spells continued to pelt the advancing line. Not enough to cause much concern, but the decline in ponypower was certainly noticeable.

"Third Volley! Move!"

The archers regained their composure and fired. Shining Armor watched the volley fly, but almost immediately he noticed something was amiss. While the majority of the arrows made their way to the walls, a second wave rose higher than the rest, almost heading skyward. He wondered whether the order had been misheard from the archers in the back, but as the errant volley flew back down, the sinister intent crashed down on Shining Armor with horrifying clarity.

The advancing line of Equestrians was fortified and well defended to shield against attacks from the front, fashioned to halt incoming attacks or deflect arrows, the advancing line only keeping eyes on the scene before them, and completely oblivious to the rain of death bearing down from above.

Pandemonium reigned as Equestrians fell under the sudden and unexpected blow. The amount of dead and outright injured was enough for the Equestrian line to halt, several holes in its formation, the sheer surprise halting soldiers in their tracks.

Those squads that carried the siege ladders and many others dropped what they were doing immediately and searched frantically, looking for a possible ambush. Then any semblance of order in the ranks of the Equestrian army completely dissolved.

A furious officer charged forward towards the confused and disarrayed mass of archers and pinned down an archer before the stallion could react, yelling obscenities. Then, the archer grabbed a nearby rock and caved in the officer's skull. The defiant arched stood amongst his stunned brethren, raising the bloodstained rock and yelled something out, too faint for Shining Armor to hear over the commotion, but a third of the archers then mirrored his cry and the Captain could hear it loud and clear.

"For the glory of the Demon King!"

The frenzied archers immediately turned on their brethren, slitting throats and stabbing backs. Those who simply couldn't comprehend their situation died outright while those who were of quicker mind dropped their bows and drew a dagger to defend themselves. A vicious battle broke out amongst the infantry and the assault on Haven's Peak was forgotten as the bewildered Equestrians engaged in a fierce battle for survival. Innumerable numbers of Equestrians spread out to do battle with their counterparts. Infighting started amongst the disciplined soldiers, the turncoats' armor and visage mirroring them entirely, making it impossible to figure out who among them were traitors until an often times lethal first blow was struck. Lifelong friends and acquaintances turned on each other, believing the other to be traitors, desperately fighting an enemy they could not spot.

Then the rebels' archers let loose with their own volley, focusing on pockets of organized resistance and further fueling the chaos. Atop the walls, the strange red creatures begun their attack in earnest with wild and incomprehensible war cries.

Then fire rained from the sky. A rain of Firebolts pelted mostly the ground in front of the Equestrians, but some reached far enough to hit their mark. Most guards were lucky enough and the fiery globs did nothing more than singe some fur but one pony was not so lucky. The first archer who had changed sides had no time to react properly before his whole body lit up like a torch, crumbling into a thrashing heap.

The rebel spellcasters engaged in battle with their Equestrian counterparts, doing their utmost to prevent devastating elemental attacks from tearing either side. While the Equestrian spellcasters held the greater numbers, the rebels had the luxury of warding their predetermined positions with powerful runes, erected by courtesy of their leader. Incoming fireballs were completely snuffed out, lightning bolts diverted harmlessly into stone or upturned mounds of earth and telekinetic assaults turned back at their attackers. Everything thrown at the rebel mages atop the walls simply didn't have any effect.

The archers worked in tandem with the spellcasters, overcoming their Equestrian counterparts and adding to the fuel of panic that spread across the Equestrian line. Those at the edges of the formation threw down their weapons and anything weighing them down and ran for their lives.

A slow, lumbering creak and the gates of Haven's Peak were raised. A battalion of heavily armored infantry surged forth, clad in hellish red armor, the very earth trembling under their heavy hoofsteps. The mere sight of these heavily armored berserkers broke what semblance of discipline remained among the Equestrians.

"For the glory of the Demon King!"

The unified roar of the rebels succeeded in routing the Equestrian line. Many soldiers abandoned the fray and galloped downhill as fast as they legs would allow, but even then they received no mercy. An example had to be made of them, for daring to challenge the powerful rebel leader.

Waiting for them were strange creatures, resembling the ones atop the walls that lobbed fireballs at them without pause, but brown in color, heavily armored and waiting patiently for the panicking soldiers. Spears, halberds, maces and swords felled ponies by the dozens, the unrelenting little creatures working as a cohesive fighting force as they advanced like a pack of hungry timberwolves. Pegasi swept through the skies, dropping bombs that exploded in roiling flames, jagged ice, searing lightning or poisonous gases, taking yet another high toll from the Loyalists.

"This... this is betrayal on an unimaginable scale!" Valiant Charge growled, shaking with fury.

Shining Armor, despite his wounds, managed to dispatch a rebel who tried to kill them. "It seems the rebel leader has no shortage of tricks to spring upon us," he said grimly.

A nearby mage, along with two fellow brethren worked in tandem to stem the overwhelming projectile attacks fired in their direction. "The creature must have addled the minds of our own with his foul sorceries! What other explanation could there be for so many brothers to turn against us?"

"I don’t know, comrade. I simply do not know," said Valiant Charge.

"Then what are we waiting for? With me, colts! We must cleanse these vile magics from our brothers' minds."

"No, stop!" Shining Armor commanded, but too late. The three headstrong ponies charged at a unified group of turncoats, their horns radiating potent magic.

"Cleanse yourselves, and be free!" The ponies chanted and a thick wave of magical power doused the frenzied ponies, making most of them—and quite a few of the unaddled Equestrians—halt their actions. More than a few looks of puzzlement were directed at the mages.

Then an innocuous bolt of magic hit the lead mage in the face, itself exploding in a shower of gore. The remaining two were riddled with arrows or their armor split by the heavy blows of the berserkers.

Shining Armor was nothing if not saddened by this turn of events. The sheer feeling of hopelessness he felt at watching his army tearing itself apart from the inside consumed his being. "This battle was lost before it began. We need to retreat, Commander, and gather what forces we can."

"Retreat!" The commander said furiously. "I will not run with my tail between my legs like some filthy Diamond Dog! That fell creature must pay in blood for the lives his foul sorceries have claimed this day!"

Shining Armor put a hoof on the Commander's withers. "I know your pain, comrade, really I do. But this is not the time for such a rash action. Our troops will die if we stay here any longer. We owe it to them to salvage what lives we can in return for this failed assault."

Valiant Charge looked like he so wanted to explode into action, but his friend's words got through. "You are right, Captain," he said, his voice now weary. "We must ride back and provide leadership for those ponies who have yet survived."

"Then let's be on our way."

Shining Armor and his Commander rallied what troops they could and fought their way down the slope, felling as many traitors and rebels as they could. Their path led them into the thick of the mountain, forgoing the main road where stray pegasi followed, dropping explosive payloads on the retreating ponies. Archers and rangers that had lived and prowled the mountains their whole lives gave chase, pelting them with arrows and bolts of magic dropped their numbers further.

By the time Shining Armor and his remaining soldiers reached a rocky, steep cliff, only Valiant Charge and a dozen additional soldiers remained.

"So it is to be our last stand," the Captain muttered to himself, readying his weapons. Only the sight of his composure managed to bring some semblance of discipline to the ponies, who barely managed to keep from shuddering as legions of rebels emerged out of the woodwork, these bloodthirsty brown creatures skittering amongst them, many now wearing stolen Guard helmets.

Shining Armor hefted his sword and readied to charge. If this was to be his death, then he would take as many rebels as he could.

"Brother! Wait!"

Shining Armor was dumbstruck as a very winded Twilight emerged from the throngs of advancing rebels.

"Twily?" He whispered, hardly able to believe his eyes. Right there, from the ranks of his enemies emerged his beloved little sister. Strangely enough, she did not look like a prisoner. Maybe aside from one of the brown kobolds sitting on her back, waving its sword enthusiastically in the air or at least until it was plucked off by Twilight's telekinetic grasp and hurried back into the mass of enemy soldiers.

"T-twily? What are you doing here?" Shining Armor felt a odd mix of relief and dread well up in his heart. "They... you were... intelligence had you reported as... as fallen. How...?"

Twilight was now standing halfway between the rebel forces and the remainders of the Royal Guard troops. Her lab coat was fluttering in a slight breeze, revealing a glint of metal underneath as a ray of light fell on a harness in the same color like those the rebels forces wore.

The mare scuffed the ground with her hoof lightly before looking at the stallion that was her brother again. "It... it is a long story, really and not a very pleasant one, believe me."

"Captain Armor, who is this mare?" Valiant Charge stepped up besides Shining Armor. "More importantly, can´t you see that she is wearing the rebel scum's armor? We shouldn't be talking with her, we should..." The stallion immediately shut up as Shining Armor stared him down with a glare that could have culled an adult dragon.

"This is my little sister, Twilight."

"Your sister is a traitor?!" Valiant Charge demanded furiously.

"No!" The Captain snapped. "That's... that's not what's happening here." He looked back to his sister, a myriad of emotions rushing through her face. "Right, Twily?"

"Shiny, I..." Twilight gulped. "Yes, I am a part of the rebel forces," she forced out the words.

"Your own sister is a traitor to the crown! She just admitted to high treason!" The Commander shouted. "This makes me question your own loyalties, Shining Armor. How else would the rebels be able to deliver such a devastating strike against our forces? How else could all these traitors have infiltrated our ranks? All this makes a suspicious amount of sense now!"

"My allegiance lies to Equestria alone!" Shining Armor shouted, greatly offended at the accusation.

"Be that as it may," a new voice said and a unicorn mare advanced. "Our leader Ganondorf is ready to grant you mercy, should you drop your weapons and surrender. We are under orders to bring you back alive, Captain," she nodded to Shining Armor. "Your compatriots, however, are none of my concern. If they don’t drop their weapons and surrender before our leader, they will be cut down where they stand."

That statement seemed to delight the brown creatures as they left the main mass of the rebels, their blood caked weapons glimmering in the light and demented, murderous glee shone in their eyes but then, they all stopped at once, like clockwork toys whose mechanisms had all run out at one. Now they only blinked owlishly at the Equestrian, their heads slightly cocked.

"Shining, please," Twilight pleaded. "Do as she says. I will explain everything but you and your ponies have to surrender. You will be unharmed, I personally guarantee it."

At this, a single pegasus stallion, Flash Sentry, was the first to drop his weapons and eagerly joined the rebel line. The remaining loyal guards were quick to follow and were summarily cuffed and restrained.

"Cowards!" Valiant Charge howled in fury. "All of you, cowards! I will personally execute you for this dereliction of duty!" The Commander hefted his own waraxe and charged at the dissenting ponies, but he was promptly bombarded with arrows and globs of searing hellfire.

"Now that that unpleasant business is over with," the lead mare said plaintively as the former commander's body burned into a crisp. "Will you come with us, great warrior?"

Shining Armor scowled. "Very well. Take me to your leader."

Ganondorf lounged easily on the imposing, throne-like chair fashioned for him in the longhouse, satisfied by the fortuitous events of the day. The Equestrians had been caught with their metaphorical pants down, clearly not expecting the Gerudo overlord's cunning to bite them so deep in the ass.

Jackie's raid the other night had served more than one purpose. The diminished enemy force was a boon in itself, but in the commotion, a number of Ganondorf's troops had infiltrated the Loyalists' camp and donned the golden armor of the guard, itself enchanted to mask its wearer's appearance. His best troops had infiltrated the Equestrian line and after that, it was merely a matter of giving the signal for his forces to announce their presence and instigate the enemy's revolt.

Of course, more of his raiders that night had made off with food supplies, medicine and medicinal tools, weapons, intelligence reports and anything else they could get their hooves on.

Ganondorf smiled, pleased. Though the ponies certainly held the advantage of magic, it seemed humans—or at least he—was a step ahead in matters of war, an art refined and perfected since the dawn of mankind.

And now, the proud Captain Shining Armor was brought to him in irons. Twilight had pleaded with him for hours on end to spare her beloved brother, and while Ganondorf was insistent he should die as a consequence of defying him, Twilight did bring up a good point. Allow him to live and serve under him. As Captain of the Royal Guard, the stallion would be privy to valuable enemy intelligence that could help him outmaneuver the Equestrians and exploit their weaknesses.

"Shining Armor," Ganondorf drawled. "So you're the Captain of the guard. One can't help but wonder why such an important figure as yourself is leading the charge on a little revolt." From a corner of the room, Umbra scoffed, the demoness having insisted on participating on the meeting. She hadn't forgotten the punishment Shining Armor had inflicted on Jackie, who laid stoned out of her mind in the infirmary at the moment.

"Probably because he is one of the best shield conjurers in the whole guard, maybe except for Celestia and Luna themselves. One of the few competent members of the whole Guard too, so sending him as a leader is the only logical thing to do," Umbra jabbed, idly playing with her longsword.

Shining Armor bristled at the jab. "The Royal Guard is Equestria's best line of defense..."

"And sent running like a bunch of scared rabbits!" Umbra mocked, smiling maliciously. Shining Armor's jaw tightened.

"Do you know why you have been brought here, Captain?" Ganondorf asked.

"No."

"You are here for no other reason than your sister," he motioned to Twilight, who had never left her brother's side. "She convinced me to capture you alive and indoctrinate you into my ranks, to serve as another faithful soldier."

"You think I would serve you after what you did to my ponies?" Shining demanded incredulously. "Two thousand troops, almost all dead by your hoof!"

"Oh come on Shiny, think about it," a new voice could be heard as a light pink Alicorn with a tri colored mane sauntered towards the stallion. "Don´t you think you can do it, for me?" The tall mare then leaned forward to whisper into Shining's ear. "I´ll make it worth your while." But while she said it, her voice lost its sweet quality and instead a distorted voice came out of the mare's muzzle, like two voices speaking out of synch.

Eyes wide, Shining Armor's ears splayed back. "Cadence? No... this voice..."

Twilight at his side was equally standing ramrod stiff as she stared at the being in front of her brother.

A cruel, sharp toothed smile broke all over Cadence's muzzle as her body flickered like a phantasm in the desert before the spell fizzled out and revealed a sardonic grinning Umbra.

"Oh, your face! I must do a great Cadence, hn? I mean, I do Cadence greatly, so that´s kind of a self answering question." Umbra never tried to hide her mocking tone as she soaked in the shocked expression of the white stallion, turning to walk back to the corner she previously stood in.

"Creature! What have you done with my wife?!" Shining Armor roared and lunged for the demoness, but the rebel guards restrained him.

"Oh, don't get your panties in a twist. Other than fucking her pretty Princess brain out, I haven't done anything to her. Swearsie Realsies," Umbra sing-songed before forming a V shape with her fingers around her mouth and performing very obvious, very lewd licking motions between them.

Shining Armor swelled with fury "You...!"

"Get dunked on punk," the heavily armored woman waved the fuming stallion off as she returned to her corner, once again leaning against a support beam.

Ganondorf snapped his fingers and a sharp snapping noise like a firecracker quelled the Captain's furious diatribe.

"Why were you sent here, Captain? Answer the question."

Armor glared at Umbra, who promptly gave him the finger but answered nonetheless. "I was sent to assess the threat you and your rebels posed to Equestria and to determine whether you should all be exterminated."

"And your assessment?"

"You all need to be destroyed immediately," he replied with a hard voice.

An outbreak of threats and exclamations broke out as the Havenites who had been allowed to attend the meeting raged at the Captain's words, shouting threats, insults and urging Ganondorf to smite him where he stood. Ganondorf raised a hand and the ponies silenced, but still shot glares at the unbowed Captain.

"Shining Armor, for your crimes and malicious intent to me and my ponies, you would normally be sentenced to a swift death." His eyes found Twilight's but for a moment.

"Dibs on his soul!" Umbra chimed in happily. Ganondorf continued on, not paying any heed.

"But your sister Twilight has made a case for you. She believes you would be more useful to me alive than dead. She has served me well and faithfully these past few months and it is only because of her that you still draw breath. So," he said and sat straight up. "Will you serve me and act as my vassal? Will you lay down your life for me and serve to the best of your ability, knowing refusal will mean your death?"

Shining Armor couldn't believe his ears as he stared incredulously at the massive Gerudo.

"Of course I won't join you!" He spat.

"Shining, please..."

"No, Twilight, this I cannot do. This monster killed my brothers and conscripted you into his service. I know you, Twilight. You're a good pony and yet you're here, serving this foul creature! What vile magics has he worked on you? What will he do to me? Am I to remain a slave for the rest of my life, giving myself to this monster that killed thousands of my brothers? No, I refuse it!"

"Well, charisma check failed, Ganon. What now? Waterboarding? Beatings with bamboo rods? Making him listen to ABBA?" Umbra asked as Twilight burst into tears, pleading for her brother to change his mind.

"Shining you idiot, they're going to kill you!"

"I don't care," the stoic pony said calmly. "All my life I wanted to help ponies and defend Equestria. I forged lifelong bonds with my brothers and swore my service to the princess. Submitting myself to this creature's will goes against everything I live for." He looked into his sister's eyes, and his visage softened. "I'm sorry, Twily, I really am, but this is not a path I can walk." He brushed her cheek with his hoof.

"I'm sorry," Twilight whispered. Shining Armor could only look on in puzzlement as Twilight immobilized him, her magic flaring about, enveloping his frame and rendering him immobile.

"Twilight?" The captain rasped, only being allowed control of his mouth. "What are you doing?" Ganondorf answered his question.

"It is by Twilight's will that you were not cut down in the battlefield, captain. Your life, every breath you've drawn henceforth is her doing and her responsibility. It is because of this that she will be the one to carry out your execution," Ganondorf calmly explained to the horrified stallion.

"No! Monster! How dare you?!" Shining Armor screamed in outrage. Twilight's small frame entered his sight. Tears streaked down her muzzle, eyes bloodshot and a dagger wavering unsteadily in her magical grasp, yet a spark of determination, of unyielding will flickered in her eyes. Shining Armor knew there and then his sister would carry out the foul creature's will. "Twilight, no..."

"I'm sorry, Shiny. I have to," Twilight croaked. Shining Armor could see it clearly now. Ganondorf's dark magics had corrupted the mind of his beloved little sister. She loved him still, he saw throughout their brief reunion traces of the Twilight he had come to know, but her life and her mind belonged to Ganondorf. His will was her command and she would carry out her orders, regardless of the bond they shared.

This horrifying realization was too much for Shining Armor to bear. "Stop!" He yelled with as much authority as he could inflect in his voice. Twilight immediately halted, a glimmer of hope in her eyes. "I accept," Shining Armor whispered. Twilight's hold on him eased, but remained strong, enough so that Shining could now look at Ganondorf, a look of pure, venomous spite and hate in his features. "I will do whatever you want. I will serve you faithfully to the best of my ability. Just... just don’t make my sister do this," he said, defeated.

Ganondorf smiled, pleased. "So be it." He then looked to the two guards flanking the Captain. "Lock him in the cells. I will deal with him tomorrow." The ponies saluted and hauled the defeated stallion, Twilight hurrying after them, keeping her brother company.

"Well, that was somehow unsatisfying." Umbra commented, then turned to the gathered Havenites. "Alright, enough of the doom and gloom. Today was a huge success thanks to all of ya, you kicked some of Equestria's finest square in the balls so hard even Celestia will feel it all the way to Canterlot. Let's party!" Umbra yelled to the enthusiastic cheers of the ponies.

Throughout the settlement, the Havenites reveled in their mighty victory against the larger Equestrian army, celebrating through the night, feasting, drinking, dancing and singing. The Minions joined in eagerly, reenacting the scene of the battle and those imitating the invaders cowering and running like headless chickens at the disastrous rout, eliciting laughs from the colts and fillies. Even Ganondorf partook in the wine that flowed like water, Umbra popping up all over the place, never staying in one place to long but always toasting with some partying Havenites, telling some dirty jokes but always maneuvering around Ganondorfs general surroundings. As much as she wanted to pay back Shining Armor for all the pain he brought down on Jackie, seeing the stubborn stallion so cruelly and ruthlessly manipulated by Ganondorf gave her a sick feeling in her stomach.

After a while, she managed to slip away from the party, making her way to the cabin Jackie was still resting in, a jar of wine on one hand and a loaf of bread in the other.

With the battle for Haven's Peak now over, it was only a matter of time before she and Jackie went back to her home, and away from this twisted, nightmarish world the Demon King made his own.

Author's Notes:

One chapter to go.

"Sayonara, auf Wiedersehen and Goodbye"

Dawn broke once again across Haven's Peak, carrying a bracing chill. Even then in the early hours of the morning, the evidence of last night's revelries stood as a testament to the Havenites' celebrations. Tables, tankards, banners and plates and chairs and many more items lay haphazardly about, as did a fair few numbers of ponies who had passed out from intoxication, obliviously huddled next to each other. Umbra's Minions were even more scattered and ended up in the oddest of places such as random closets, sticking upright down in empty barrels, at the top of the bell tower sleeping by a rather ferocious looking timberwolf and sawing logs below ponies' beds.

But despite the serene atmosphere, Ganondorf prowled with intent through the streets, the normally ever present Twilight by his side now absent. The little mare had been infinitely grateful that Ganondorf had spared her brother's life and though Ganondorf himself had come to rely rather heavily on Twilight, he allowed her to keep company to her brother in the cells of Haven's Peak. Of course, killing Shining Armor would be wasteful. Sure, it would send a powerful message to Celestia and the Equestrian forces a measure of Ganondorf's capabilities but the Captain would be of so much more use alive than dead.

The stallion was stubborn and held on to his ideals. That was fine. Ganondorf was patient if nothing else. For the moment, he had one task to attend to. He silently made his way to Jackie's cabin to check in on the girl. Ganondorf did not appreciate having to sneak in on a place that rightfully belonged to him, but despite the festivities of last night, Umbra's fury and hatred of him remained strong. To be in the same presence as her and Jackie would be... unwise.

As he neared the single cabin that the girl was situated in, the Gerudo lord found himself slightly surprised and annoyed at the same time as he found Umbra right beside the door. The woman was sitting in a tailor's seat, leaning against the wall of the cabin. A empty jug was still clutched in her hand and a strand of drool was streaming down her chin, dripping on the mane of some of his own guards Ganon failed to name on the spot, the pony in question sleeping soundly on Umbra´s lap. A few meters away, another duo of his servants, Gumball and Summer Breeze, snored in unison with a gaggle of Umbra´s own lackeys pilled on top of them.

He focused particularly on the demoness. She lay slumped, unprotected, completely open to attack. Sloppy. Ganondorf's lip curled in distaste and approached the woman. He placed his hand over her head, channeling a subtle form of magic. A safety measure to ensure she wouldn't wake unless something short of a tornado swept through the town.

As he entered Jackie's room, he could see the young girl was already awake.

"Uh... morning," she said, clearly not expecting Ganondorf to come in.

"How are you feeling?" He asked.

"Still sore in some places. That little turd did a number on my back." She winced and unconsciously moved her shoulder blades, where Shining Armor had stabbed her.

"Are you in pain?"

"Discomfort more than anything and my body's numb in weird places. Freaking pony medicine..." She trailed off. "Where's Umbra?"

"Sleeping outside, with some of my guards." Jackie's face morphed into a grimace of disgust. How curious.

"Oh god..." She moaned, rubbing the bridge of her nose. "I thought she was trying to be funny with Pandora but I never thought..." She shuddered in disgust. "I need a shower."

Ganondorf quirked an eyebrow, but didn't pry. "So," he began. "I assume that you and Umbra will go back to her universe soon, am I correct?"

"Looks like it," Jackie replied. Ganondorf continued eyeing her speculatively. "What?"

"What Shining Armor did to you should never have happened. His presence was not something I anticipated in your skirmish," Ganondorf stated in the same monotone he normally employed, though an undercurrent of hesitation could be heard, if just barely.

"Is this your way of saying you're sorry? And here I thought you didn't have a heart," the young girl remarked as she reached for a glass of water atop the nightstand. She drank greedily, trickles flowing down either side of her mouth. "Don’t know what's in that medicine of theirs but it makes me thirsty as hell," she muttered and wiped her mouth. "So, Shining Armor? That's the little bastard that did... this?" She pointed to herself. Ganondorf nodded. "Umbra told me they tried to come in and invade the village, but you lot beat them good. Is that Shining prick dead?" She asked, her eyes narrowed.

"No. He is of more use to me alive." As he expected, Jackie did not like his answer. Her cheeks colored and indignation quickly overcame her features. "Let me explain."

The girl looked like she so wanted to do otherwise, but gritted her teeth. "Explain what?"

"Shining Armor will be mine, he just doesn't know it yet. His sister is my loyal servant and he will follow in turn. Wouldn't you say that serving the individual he hates the most and helping bring down the country he loves is a worse punishment than death?"

"Sister?"

"Twilight."

Jackie's eyes widened. "The little princess is that bastard's sister?" She erupted in a fit of giggles. "Oh, man, small world after all. Fine, keep him. It'll drive them both crazy, I just know it," she said with certainty.

"I am glad you see it that way," Ganondorf said. "But there is another matter I wanted to discuss with you." At her questioning look, he continued. "I will be frank with you. I would hope you not go back with Umbra. You'd have a place here in Haven's Peak."

Jackie was taken aback, clearly not expecting this. "Yeah... call me crazy, but I really don’t wanna be a servant to you for the rest of my life."

"That is not what I meant. But no matter, I can see that Umbra wouldn't allow such an action. If she thought I tried to coerce you into staying, she'd..."

"Rip you a new asshole?" Jackie helped, grinning. Ganondorf followed suit.

"Indeed. She's not very fond of me, it seems."

"Umbra's cool, but she's too much a pony lover, I'll admit. She can't see things won’t always be rosy with them."

"Which leads me to my next issue. When I asked you, you said Umbra did not so much as instruct you in use of your abilities, save for that illusion spell, correct?"

"Well, no."

"Then I would like to make a proposal. This war will not end anytime soon. The empire and the Equestrians are in this for the long haul. I expect by the time it is over, millions of lives will be claimed by the warring factions. That is why I wanted to make a deal with you."

"What kind of deal?" Jackie asked warily.

"Umbra has a twisted view of the world. She would expect you and me are capable of living amongst the ponies and it is for this very reason that she will not instruct you in the proper use of your powers. Granted, she may let you in on something every now and then but these will be lessons that she deems 'appropriate' for you. Should you stay with her, you will never learn, never reach your true capabilities. You admitted to me that the ponies and us will never be able to truly exist peacefully and because of that, it is inevitable that you will have to defend yourself and Umbra from those who would do you harm. That is why I will be willing to show you how to properly harness your abilities to their full potential."

"Whoa, whoa, wait," Jackie said, holding her palms up. "You? Teach me? How? Even if I said yes, you're still a universe away and it's not like you have tokens or whatever. Not to mention Umbra would totally flip if you start doing the whole Palpatine thing. Her words, not mine," she said after a moment.

From within his pocket, Ganondorf retrieved what looked to be a piece of... chalk? "I took this from Umbra just yesterday during the festivities. Do you know what it is?" He handed Jackie the stick, the young girl looking at it closely.

"It's her dimension door chalk."

"Correct. By using this, you'll be able to open a portal yourself and come here, no matter where you may be. Umbra will be none the wiser and you will learn to properly handle your magic."

"In exchange for what?"

"A favor."

"What kind of favor?"

"That remains to be seen."

Jackie sighed. "What? Come on, speak straight."

"Like I said. I will help you better understand your powers in exchange for a favor. Whatever I ask of you in the future, you will help me, no questions asked."

"A blank check," she stated, eyeing Ganondorf warily.

"For all intents and purposes, yes."

Jackie sighed. On one hand, she couldn’t deny Ganondorf was wrong. Umbra's blue eyed notions that all ponies were relatively harmless nuisances would come to bite them both in the ass eventually and like Ganondorf said, Jackie didn't expect Umbra to teach her how to pull off lethal, destructive or otherwise harmful moves. Ganondorf, on the other hand, had no qualms about it. He held a more pragmatic, ruthless view of things, so far from Umbra's and Jackie couldn't deny he would prove a very apt and knowledgeable instructor in such matters.

Ganondorf watched this play out across Jackie's face. He didn't need to be able to read minds to see the young girl was clearly conflicted, carefully weighing her options.

"If I am to do this," she said after a length of time. "To write you a blank check and help with your schemes or whatnot, then I wanna get my money's worth. I don’t know what you have planned, but I know you're a crafty bastard. Whatever it is you've got in mind for me ain't gonna be as small as infiltrating an enemy camp, right?" Ganondorf remained silent. "No, you got something bigger in mind, don’t you, big guy? Fine, I agree. I'll do whatever favor you ask, but some piddly little lessons ain't gonna be enough. You want me to write you a blank check? Fine. Then I want as big a payment in return."

In spite of himself, Ganondorf couldn't help but smile. "Name your price."

Waking up after a night of partying and drinking was usually not a pleasant thing. Usually, the morning after came with a dry mouth, one smelled of cigarette smoke and booze, more often than not pieces of rather intimate clothing were amiss which had ended up on lampposts or ceiling fans, a nasty hangover was digging through one's skull and if things went especially south, one awoke after a night of drunken, unprotected sex with a total stranger. Or several.

Umbra groaned miserably as she squinted at the morning sun sending her merciless rays through the patchy cloud cover.

"Urgh, what the frikk do these horses put into their drinks?" The black skinned woman garbled as she shoved a still snoring pony from her lap. "I feel like that one time back in Poland, when we drunk straight from the distillery."

After regaining her plump line, Umbra patted herself down and to her relief, felt that everything was still where it belonged. Looking around, she noticed that most of the settlement seemed to be in a similar state as her. A few early risers already had begun to clean up or poking sleeping ponies awake with varying success, for most party goers simply grumbled something and turned around to continue sleeping. The prone forms of her Minions littered the place too and for a second, Umbra considered yanking them from sleep's embrace as rudely as possible so that they would share in her misery. Ultimately however, she decided against it since it would mean she had to concentrate to an amount that was simply unachievable right now.

Instead, she rubbed the sleep out of her eyes and turned to see if Jackie was up and better already. If she was honest with herself, she could not get home soon enough. The more distance she brought between that Ganon and her little friend, the better. That jackass could go straight to hell and sit on a burning coal until it would start to snow for all she cared.

Stepping over her equine cuddle buddy, Umbra cracked open the door, slipping inside as silently as a massive suit of armor allowed one to. "Jackie? You awake yet girl?" But to Umbra's surprise, the room was empty.

The room didn't look disturbed by any means. Jackie's bed lay haphazardly made, but that was to be expected. Her clothes were no longer in the small cabinet beside the bed and the gown she'd been outfitted into was now on the floor. Looks like she'd waken up and gone on before Umbra woke.

Stretching and cracking her joints, Umbra now blearily shambled to the inn of the small village. Jackie could sure put away the food, which she hadn’t been allowed for almost a full day, so Umbra figured the young girl would first go and look for sustenance. She wasn't disappointed.

There in the inn sat Jackie, eating what looked to be porridge and some sunny side up eggs lathered in a creamy gravy of some kind and even more surprisingly, Twilight sat not too far. Umbra wasn't too sure what happened between the two, but from what she gathered, Jackie and Twi were not on friendly terms with each other.

As she approached the small table, her footsteps alerted the two girls to her presence.

"Heya squirt," Umbra groaned and sat down, pulling a nearby pitcher of water to herself and drank deeply from it, splashing the remains all over her face. Twilight scootched away, fearing to get wet.

"Long night last night?" Jackie remarked, eyeing the proceedings with mild amusement.

"I feel like there's a pack of pissed off Yorkie dogs pulling my brain apart piece by piece but other than that, peachy. Hey, where's the chef? I need something for this headache." Sure enough, a pony came in, serving the trio a pot of admittedly aromatic coffee, which Umbra poured and downed eagerly. "Ahh, that's the ticket," she sighed.

Grabbing a nearby muffin, she ate ravenously, the more sedate and mannered Twilight looking on with mild disapproval. "So hey, I was thinking that since Ganonprick doesn't need us anymore, we'll be going on home soon enough. Got this feeling in my gut that we´ll be porting back anytime now. Won’t that be nice, eh, Jackie girl? Dunno about you, but I've had my fill of this universe and its resident douchebag to last me a lifetime. No offense, Sparklebutt."

Twilight rolled her eyes. "None taken. It's not the most hospitable of places, I'm sure." The trio ate silently, neither feeling much like making conversation. "But you know, it wasn't always this way," Twilight said after a minute of silent chewing. "Equestria used to be a beautiful place. Peaceful, with none of these wars, suffering or conflict. Tell me, Umbra. The Equestria you come from, has Sombra risen?"

Umbra chewed slowly, not sure how to go about this. The Twilight she knew and the one next to her were very different ponies. The Twilight she knew had lived a happy, fulfilling life. She'd managed to attend Celestia's school, hatched a dragon egg from which she was gifted with a lifelong friend and fulfilled a life and destiny far grander than the little mare next to her could hope to achieve.

"Not yet, I guess. Back again, I mean. Timeline is kinda jumbled from what I could learn." Umbra chewed her way through a fried egg she liberated from Jackie´s plate, ignoring her friend's protests. "He rose to power after he killed the princess of the Crystal Empire by turning her into a crystal herself and shattering her to a million pieces. After he drove the Empire nearly into the ground with his dark obsessions, Celestia and Luna confronted him, but just as they were about to finish him, he cast one last spell, a curse or something. Took the whole Empire with him as his essence was sealed into a glacier. One thousand years later, the Empire reappeared, Sombra with it but this time, a group of young heroines showed up and ended the tyrant by means of a love powered artifact, leaving only his crooked horn behind. The crystal ponies were free now and a long lost descendant of the original crystal princess came to be their loving ruler." Umbra gave Twilight a apologetic shrug. "At least that is the way I know it is supposed to go. Maybe it happened back home already, maybe not. Like I told ya earlier, each 'what if", each 'maybe' creates a different timeline."

Twilight nodded and looked down at her plate, her features ponderous.

"It's gotta be hard for you, ain't it, Twilight?" Umbra said, sympathetically. "Out of all the universes you could be born in, you get the one where your country's at war. Well, hopefully this whole thing will blow over eventually. Power of friendship and all."

"Power of Friendship?" Twilight said, the words sounding strange to her.

"Yepp, and if that does not work, there is always peace through superior firepower." Umbra nodded.

"You mean assuming Ganondorf doesn’t win and dominate them both," Jackie commented.

"Can we not talk about that rat´s arse? At least until my hangover is gone?" Umbra groaned.

"What? It could happen."

"You´re right, girl," Umbra admitted. "As I see it right now, Ganonprick has a seventy-something percent chance of world domination with all his tactics, new weapons and the surprise on his side, unless Celestia goes all Nightmare Star on him and chars him into a soot stain. That´s what I mean with 'peace through superior firepower'. Pax imperialis and all that jazz." She addressed Twilight again. "So what's your take, Sparklebutt? Who do you put your money on to win?"

Twilight's eye twitched, as did the corner of her lips. "I am not qualified enough to make such a hypothesis."

"So guess," Umbra replied.

Twilight sighed. "Sombra has the technological edge where the war is concerned. His troops are fiercer and more brutal than Celestia's and are able to fight for longer periods than the Equestrians. Sombra also can conscript and brainwash prisoners of war to do his bidding. But while he has these advantages, Celestia is a better tactician and with centuries' experience in matters of war. She knows a head on assault against Sombra will result in her ponies' defeat. She has, however, managed to outflank and outmaneuver him on several occasions and with her ponies' technological industry catching up to Sombra's she will be able to fight him on more equal terms eventually."

"And Ganondorf?" Jackie asked. Twilight contemplated this.

"Ganondorf has no army. His force is small, less than a thousand, yet he has managed to slip past both imperial and Equestrian forces during his stay here. We've engaged imperials in small skirmishes but yesterday was the first day we faced a full fledged army. Though he doesn’t have the forces of the empire or Equestria, he is more than capable of surviving against them both."

"Come on, princess. Get to the bottom of it. Think he'll win?"

Twilight pursed her lips, but reluctantly continued. "As I said, Ganondorf's forces are too small for him to have any hope of winning this war. But should he manage to rally a sufficiently large army... I think he'd have a chance."

"Well, don’t worry Sparklebutt, luck always favors the bold, stupid or children," Umbra said. "Fingers crossed that prick spends the rest of his miserable life on Tartarus. He wouldn't make a good ruler anyway. Well, maybe better than Sombra but only that much." To demonstrate, she pinched her fingers together until they nearly met. Twilight looked on with doubt. "What, you don’t agree?" Umbra said, a little surprised.

"Ganondorf..." Twilight licked her lips. "He is as bad as Sombra in many ways. He will use, manipulate and blackmail others to achieve his goals. He will kill those who would challenge him without a second thought and he has no qualm pitting ponies against each other. But..."

"But what?"

"But he is a more apt leader than even Celestia in some ways. I'm not excusing his actions but if it wasn't for him, me and other ponies would have been dead weeks ago. Yes, he conscripts ponies against their will. Yes, he implants a portion of his dark magic in their minds, but he repays our loyalty with his own. There have been many times when enemy forces almost succeeded in killing us, or overtook our own. Ganondorf could have left us to fend for ourselves. He could have ordered us to sacrifice our lives in exchange to buy him time to escape, but he didn't. He takes care of us and takes his responsibilities as our leader seriously. Even here, in Haven's Peak he could have abandoned us to be slaughtered, but he didn't. He may have conscripted us, but we wouldn´t be healthy and alive if not for him."

Gritting her razor sharp teeth, a growl from the depth of her core escaped Umbra´s lips. "Okay, I get it, it is a smaller of two evils scenario for you. Still feel like shivving him."

"You're too hard on the guy," Jackie commented. "He's more of a realist, is all."

"That has nothing to do with it," Umbra snapped back, only to catch herself. "Okay, almost nothing. I just can´t smell him and that means something. I normally... oh!"

Both Twilight and Jackie quirked an eyebrow as Umbra´s mood made a one-eighty. Taking a firm hold on her friend's hand, Umbra waved a two fingered salute to Twilight.

"Well, wadda ya know, time to go back home," Umbra exclaimed cheerfully to a befuddled Twilight. "Sayonara, auf Wiedersehen and goodbye. Hang in there Twi, you´ve got a good head on those purple shoulders." And before the confused mare could utter another word, both Umbra and Jackie vanished in a flash of blue-whitish light.

Twilight shook her head. Honestly, Umbra could be so random at times. Their departure was somewhat less climactic than Twilight would have imagined. She half expected to see a void of arcane energies to suddenly spring from existence.

Well, good riddance, Twilight thought. She definitely wouldn't be missing Jacqueline and the sooner the young human left Haven’s Peak the better. With the duo now gone, Twilight made her way out the inn and into Ganondorf’s research laboratories in the mines. She was one of the few ponies whose magical signature was keyed in to the wards protecting the underground chambers.

“Well?” he said expectantly.

“They’re gone, both of them.”

“And the device?”

Twilight withdrew from her pocket a small, rectangular contraption, grey and plain save for two knobs and a small counter framed by glass. “It's as you said it would happen,” the mare said as she levitated the device to Ganondorf’s outstretched palm. “The readings picked up a strange sort of energy when Umbra got near. They increased exponentially the longer Umbra stayed within range of it, going well off the charts as they went back to her universe.”

She regarded Ganondorf with a wary expression, and the Gerudo lord picked up on it. "What's wrong?"

Twilight opened her mouth, but paused, thinking better of it. She licked her lips nervously. "What do you plan to do, Ganon?"

"What makes you think I want to do anything?"

Twilight frowned slightly. "You didn't have me stick close to Jacqueline and get these readings for nothing. You're scheming something right now," she said with certainty. Ganondorf's silence on the matter further strengthened her suspicion. "For Celestia's sake, don't tell me you're planning to involve yourself in all this... world traveling nonsense."

Ganondorf's lip curled ever so slightly in the ghost of a grin. "I would think a pony such as you would be interested in such an endeavor."

"I would. I am. It's just... is this really the time for that? We've just handed Celestia and the Royal Guard the worst defeat they've suffered in the last two years. Her sights will almost certainly be set on us, not to mention Sombra's. Some of the enemy managed to escape the slaughter and soon enough, all of Equestria will be aware of you and what you've done. Is wasting your attention on this multiverse nonsense really the smart thing to do right now? We should be focusing on our next move and strengthen the fortifications around Haven's Peak. Additional ponypower will be needed as well, not to mention that with the ponies of Ourtown, our food supplies will last us only a few weeks longer at most. We need to secure a perimeter at the base of the mountain and get ponies to grow fruits and vegetables since the pastures here are inadequate to grow enough food for everypony and..."

"I am well aware of these pressing concerns, Twilight."

"Then please, don’t waste your time on this world traveling business. The ponies here need you."

Ganondorf's lip curled into a smirk. "Who said anything about traveling to other worlds?"

"What? But you... what do you intend to do, then?"

"Observe, of course. From Umbra's pendant I sensed a strange magical signature. Jacqueline allowed me to study it for a while and from it, I was able to glimpse the means by which to open up passages to other worlds."

"Are you saying you can travel to other worlds?" Twilight asked incredulously.

"Even that is far beyond my abilities, at the moment, no. I will need to study and research this far more extensively before being able to accomplish such a feat. I can, however, do something with the information I already have."

"And that is?"

"To see these other worlds. Or at least, to observe our guests for the past two days."

"To observe the events of another world..." Twilight breathed in wonderment. "How? Even if you now have a semblance of understanding how to breach dimensional barriers, it's a big world out there, not to mention universe. How will you know what to look for? To do that, you'd need to be able to use something as a focal point, something pertaining to what you wish to observe, otherwise you'd be doing the equivalent of choosing different spots and hope for the best."

"You are correct," Ganondorf said, pleased the little mare was able to pick up quickly on such matters. She really did have a remarkable mind. The large Gerudo walked to a nearby metallic container, wide and cylindrical in nature. He placed his palm at the top for a moment, channeling his own brand of magic. A portion of the contraption then rose from the center with a fain whir, expelling cold, billowing clouds of vapor across the small room.

Ganondorf then stepped aside. Twilight blinked owlishly but stepped forward, peering amidst the thick clouds of vapor to see four large vials within the machine's protrusions, filled with a viscous red liquid.

"So you see now," Ganondorf said after a few beats of silence. "Within their blood lies their own unique signature. This will be the focal point by which I will find them across the reach of the universe."

Twilight watched the vials in fascination, her heartbeat picking up considerably. So simple, yet so brilliant. When Ganondorf ordered her to take samples from Umbra and Jackie while they were unconscious, she couldn't fathom why he would want blood of all things. She entertained brief musings involving a dark ritual of some sort but this was beyond anything she could have imagined. By using the blood and the unique magical signature within it as a focal point, Ganondorf would be able to find the human and demoness wherever they may be. Of course, the applications beyond this were extraordinary. To see another world, a parallel mirror of her own. What would be different? What would be the same. Would the war even exist?

Twilight gulped, straining to pull her mind back to the present. "Fascinating..." She whispered. "What will you do with this? Will you use it to travel to their worlds?"

"No. For now, we stand back and watch."

"Haha, home sweet fluffing home!" Umbra exclaimed as the teleport flash died down, the weird dimensional magic having dropped her and Jackie right in front of the main gate of her tower. Again.

Normally, that would have been a dampener on Umbra´s mood but just because she was not in Ganon´s Verse anymore rendered that notion moot. After all, it was a nice day in this part of the Badlands.

The sun was shining overhead, a few clouds lazily floated over the vast sky and a chunk of black stone easily the size of a house was sailing straight for the two diverse friends.

Wait, what?

"Move it!" Umbra yelled, jumping into Jackie and pushed the surprised squeaking girl away from the lethal impact that gouged a massive crater into the ramp leading up to the tower's gate, showering both of them in sharp stone shards.

"What in the name of...?!" Umbra scrambled upright, eyeing the house-sized stone with wide eyes. "Well, that's a hell of a homecoming," she muttered while Jackie boggled at the rock in bewilderment.

"Did we miss something while we were away?"

"You know squirt, that just might be it," Umbra agreed, but in that moment, an earth rending shriek blasted through the air, so loud that both girls had to clamp a hand to their ears. "Seriously, what the hell is going on?!" Umbra demanded to no one in particular and opened a connection with Gnarl.

<<Gnarl, we just returned and almost got pasted by a massive rock that looks like someone ripped out a part of my tower! Did you start a fucking war while I was away?>> Umbra 'yelled' over the mental connection.

<<In the whole three hours your Ladyship has been absent? I may be competent but that goes even over my abilities,>> promptly came the snarked answer. <<No Milady, for that you can thank the massive flamethrower that showed up just moments ago and... oh dear, watch out Milady, here it comes!>>

Umbra had not the time to ask for specifics as another roar reverberated through the air and a truly massive shadow blotted out the sun. Seconds later, the ground quaked, rattling the bones of every living creature in a one kilometer radius like maracas. Looking up, Umbra suddenly understood the meaning of 'shitting bricks'.

A dragon, easily as tall as her very tower loomed over them. Scales as dark as a moonless night covered the monolithic body, only interrupted by a granite grey underbelly. Massive horns curved upwards from a head that looked like a sperm whale would look like a salmon in it´s jaws, gouts of dark red fire lancing from the spaces between the truly intimidating teeth. Golden eyes with slitted pupils so thin they looked almost nonexistent bore down on the small creatures before the beast, wings larger than sails on a warship casting a shadow that choked out hope and light alike.

"Uzgrolein. Zu'u rund hi ahst jok! [The anomaly. I found you at least!]" The dragon boomed, the sheer force of the voice crashing into soft bodies like a shockwave. Slowly, the creature bent its head down towards the tiny frames to its claws.

Umbra stared, her limbs frozen in primal fear. She stared up to the massive beast, no, the force of nature that loomed over them. Every instinct, no matter how deeply buried in her mind begged her to run, to flee, to crawl into some hole and never show her face again. Through this, she only faintly noticed that her pants were sopping wet by now.

"Rodraan hinmaar, wah dir. [Prepare yourself, to die.]" The voice of the beast rang like a death-bell of titans as the hellish red glow in its maw began to intensify as a flame unmatched in this plane of existence rose from deep within the dragon's belly.

This was it, Umbra was sure. She would die once again, but given that dragonfire always had some magical properties, she would probably not come back.

The heat grew to blistering levels.

Any moment now.

But then, another voice, not nearly as dominating as the titanic dragon's cut through the air. A voice Umbra knew well very well.

"Monah, saraan! [Mother, wait!]"

The heat almost instantly died down.

"Mon dii? Fos... druv los hi het? [Daughter mine? What... why are you here?]" The voice of the giant dragon boomed, a hint of disbelief audible in it.

Cracking on eye open, Umbra nearly cried out in part joy, part concern. Right there, protectively in front of herself and Jaqueline hovered Onyx, the dragoness' wings beating a furious staccato to keep her aloft and in the line of fire right in front of the leagues taller dragon's maw. To her unending surprise and gratitude, Umbra now noticed that her draconic friend had taken a aggressive stance, arms outstretched, tail whipping around behind her.

"Zey? Fos los dreh het? Paakmey zey ko teyn do dii fahdon! [Me? What are you doing here? You're embarrassing me in front of my friends!]" Onyx shot back.

Umbra couldn’t make out the strange yet familiar dragons' language, but whatever Onyx said, seemed to slightly annoy the Godzilla sized monster.

"Friends?" The massive draconid peered at the two minuscule humans, slipping into Equuish or English or whatever one liked to call it, as well as lowering its volume to more bearable levels. "These creatures are your friends?"

"Yes, mom, they are. And what´s more, the black one gave her hoard to me!"

"WHAT?!?" The obvious elder dragoness roared, causing a rockslide to go down on the surrounding mountains before she leveled her burning glare at the cowering Umbra. "Dreh dii mon tinvaak vahzen? Lost hi krilon wah kroved dii fariik sogaal? [Does my daughter speak the truth? Have you dared to defile my precious gem?]" the dragoness roared, making one ground pounding step forward but once again, Onyx thankfully intercepted her mother.

"Monah! [Mother!]" Onyx yelled, snorting her own blue fire "They do not understand our tongue! And Umbra has never laid as much as a claw on me! She doesn´t even know of our rites and traditions but not only saved my life but gave her hoard to me by her free will and out of pure intentions!"

The massive dragon growled and, before either party could react, her form shrunk down, much to the amazement of the two humans and where before stood a Godzilla sized draconid, Onyx's mother was now reduced to a good ten meters in height. Which was still a lot.

From above her, Onyx fluttered to the ground. "Explain, young wyrmling," the dragoness commanded, her words still as imperial as when she was a walking mountain moments prior.

And so Onyx regaled her mother with the tale of how she and Umbra came to meet, starting with Onyx shamefully admitting she'd been captured by a pony of all things, how they'd stumbled across Umbra, how the demoness had freed Onyx from the clutches of the ponies and became friends, with Umbra inviting Onyx to share her home and hoard. By the end of it, Onyx's mother was doing a good impersonation of an exasperated parent, rubbing her temples with both claws, eyes closed and muttering frustrated curses under her breath.

"E-excuse me...ehrm, ma´am," a small voice said, Umbra's who now spoke for the first time, still shaken at their near death. "What is your name, if you please? S-so that I can address you proper."

The still massive dragoness stared at the fidgeting Umbra, as if complementing something connected with dragonfire and mortal flesh. Finally, her lips curled upwards, showing off her fangs. "Demotha. The mortal races call me Demotha, little pusojur [insect]."

Umbra licked her lips and now registered a very uncomfortable warmth in her trousers. Fighting down the embarrassment, she straightened up and addressed the dragoness proper. "Oh, great Demotha, queen of dragons, why did you attack my tower and myself? Have my Minions or I offended you in some way? If so, then I really, really apologize. Whatever it was, it won’t happen again."

Demotha snorted. "You? I have no interest in you, child. It is your companion I am after," she said, peering over at Jackie.

"Jackie?" Umbra blinked dumbfounded. "Why her? What did you do, girl?" Said girl simply shrugged helplessly, clearly confused at the proceedings.

"I'll tell you what," Demotha said. "Your friend there, miniscule as her stature may be, she still harbors inside her sil, or soul, as you would say it, a force so unnatural, so keiz..."

"That means revolting, by the way," Onyx supplied.

"Yes, daughter mine, so revolting that the sheer will of the planet itself refuses her existence."

"What?" Both Umbra and Jackie uttered at same time.

Baring her fangs again slightly, Demotha continued "Yes. Despite what you young species believe, our world has indeed a consciousness and a will of its own. All the lu, the magic and the laas fus, the life force of all living creatures flows back into the everlasting flame that first gave life to this world. All the emotions, memories and all that an individual has amassed in its life merges with the condensed mass of all those before them. From this, the planet gained a consciousness and a will of its own."

"Forgive my impertinence, oh mightiest dragoness, but what does this have to do with Jaqueline?" Umbra questioned, giving her damnedest to sound submissive. Unknown to her, Gnarl had been listening through every word via his mental link with her and promptly admonished the Overlady for showing submission against this foe, claiming she disgraced herself, her Minions and other such blatherings until Umbra commanded some nearby Minions to pummel the old walnut into paste. An order the kobolds happily obeyed.

"Ah, the groveling of mortals, so refreshing," Demotha smiled "I feel for that, I shall regale you. Now, have you noticed strange occurrences over the last weeks or days? At first seemingly harmless accidents, like tripping down a stair only for these occurrences to grow more lethal to the point that it seemed like someone was out for her life?"

"Yes?"

"Well, that is because it was exactly that. For you see, the world itself tried to rid itself of this child, much like a body acts against an illness. For her very presence warps the fabric of reality itself, although in such subtle ways one might easily miss it even when looking for it. Your... Jaqueline is like an infested barb in the flesh of this plane and after every attempt to remove her failed, it fell upon me to do the deed of ridding the world of her. Even now, I feel a primal pull at my very core, urging me to simply annihilate her with a gout of flame or devour her."

From the corner of her eye, Umbra could see Jackie twitch in indignation and no sooner was the unruly girl about to say something that would no doubt fatally anger the draconid, that Umbra's hand snaked across the back of the girl's neck and roughly pulled her down. "I will not have any of your attitude right now, brat, ya hear?!" She hissed. "There's a time to be snarky and a time to bow down and now is one of those times, so shut your pie hole and behave like normal girl, you hear me?" Without waiting for an answer, Umbra let go and addressed Demotha again.

"I had no idea. Please, great dragoness, forgive my little friend. She had no idea her presence in this world was so unwelcome. But killing her is a step too far. Can we not settle this in peaceful terms? Return Jackie to her own plane?"

Demotha looked thoughtful while Jackie tensed beside her. "Her very presence is a cancer on this world. But if she were to go back, the problem would go away. Yes, child. This would be an acceptable course of action."

"Is anyone gonna ask me what I want?" Jackie piped up indignantly.

"Girl," Umbra placed her hand atop her friend's shoulder and sighed. "I don't like this anymore than you do, but it's either go back home or become a crispy roasted critter."

"And a snack, even though a pitiful one." Demotha muttered.

"Mom!" Onyx flared up.

"That being said," Umbra continued. "How would we even go about this? Jackie ain't no normal Displaced, as we dimensional wanderers call ourselves. She didn't use a token and so we can’t send her back that way, so how...?" She trailed off, in thought. "Couldn’t you help us in this, Demotha, ma'am? Surely you know a thing or two about this whole business."

"Pray tell, you speak of 'tokens' and 'sending'. This sounds like the magic art of summoning to me," Onyx's mother inquired.

Rubbing her head nervously, Umbra nodded. "In a sense, yes. Tokens are small objects imbued with a part of our essence, used to summon the owner into the user's universe. Through that token, one can send a Displaced back, too. I hope that makes sense to you, ma´am."

"More than you might think," Demotha nodded, her tail whipping around behind her. "These tokens sound like anchors to me, something used to open a tunnel or gateway. Summoners can use any object with a strong enough connection to him or her to open such a gateway."

Mulling over these words, Umbra chewed her lip carefully. A personal item could be an anchor, a fix point to open a gateway. Something soaked in her essence, something that had been close to a person, very close. Maybe something like an article of clothing? Or...

"My helmet!" Umbra exclaimed suddenly, startling Jackie with her outburst. "Remember, girl? When the portal pulled us over onto my world, I dropped my helmet. It's still there, in your universe, probably just lying in the ground."

"And do you think you could make a gateway via this?" Demotha asked.

"Well... maybe? I mean, I can make portals easy enough and I used the Beast itself to open a gateway close to it, so... yes. Maybe."

"Congratulations, little one," Demotha said drolly. "Looks like you get to live another day."

"But," Umbra said. "I've never tried to open a gateway to another world. That's on a whole other level than anything I've done before."

"Are you saying you can't do it?" Demotha asked.

"Hey now, none of that. It will be tough, and it'll probably take me a while, but I'm sure it can happen." Umbra licked her lips and addressed the great dragoness again. "So, Demotha, ma'am. I know you are driven to restore balance and whatnot, but could you find it in your heart to give me a few days to try and open another portal? I'll get this little one back home, I promise, I just need some time. Can we have that, at least?"

Demotha eyed the duo speculatively, but if the expression on her face was any indication, she didn't think too highly of this idea. She shared a glance with her daughter, the younger dragoness giving her a stern look. "Very well," Demotha growled. "You have three days to try and send this little creature of yours where she belongs. I suggest you spend your time wisely."

With that, Demotha unfurled her wings and with a mighty flap that sent both human and demoness to the ground, took to the skies, with a speed rivaling that of the sonic rainboom effortlessly.

"Well, that went well," Onyx commented, having dug in her claws to keep from being knocked to the ground. "By the way, you owe me for this one, both of you," she said smugly.

"Thanks, Onyx," Umbra mumbled miserably.

The next three days were spent under the heavy shadow of the ultimatum issued by the dragoness Demotha.

Umbra spent almost every waking moment brooding in her arcane lab, trying to make heads or tails out of the delicate process behind breaching barriers between dimensions to get Jackie safe back home before either her part of the Multiverse or Onyx's mother would end her young life. After the first day had not yielded any progress at all, the demoness had commanded her loyal lackey Lyra back to the tower and sent her to dig up all tomes even remotely helpful from the vast evil library inside the tower.

Jackie for her part had been in a sullen mood ever since, barely talking to anyone, either her friend Umbra on the rare occasion the later left her study to eat a bite in order not to faint on the spot from exhaustion or Onyx or even the odd Minion for that matter. The young girl had spent her time mostly in the room issued to her by Umbra, lost in her own thoughts behind closed doors.

When Lyra arrived via a Minion escort, Umbra sequestered her in the arcane lab and the pony hadn't been seen outside since, having her meals brought in per Umbra's orders as the duo pooled their heads together to try and come up with a way to open a portal between two dimensions. No small feat to say the least.

Umbra succeeded in teleporting close to the Beast's location because the mace itself was forged from the Arcanium smelter, itself used by countless Overlords before Umbra and so the armor and materials borne from it, and the other smelters such as the Durium, or even the often overlooked but always trusty Steel had been infused with the essence of the Overlord itself. It was by this tenuous but stable connection that Umbra managed to locate her Beast and retrieve it.

However, in order to open a doorway to Jackie's own dimension, Umbra had to get in touch with the very distant signature of her helmet's essence, which lay a universe away. This was not something she could merely concentrate on and achieve, and so she commanded Gnarl and Lyra to pore over her vast collection of books. Sure enough, Lyra herself proposed a solution.

Long before Umbra's time existed an Overlord, the Conqueror, who had set to devise a plan on how he would be able to not only find other realms of reality but also reach them safely after he successfully became the supreme ruler of all lands in his time. The first parts read like the typical dark ritual, involving a lot of candles, a complex array of mystical runes drawn on the floor and the sacrifice of at least one regular human's worth of life energy to fuel the portal. That part made Umbra feel ever so slightly squeamish, but with the return of Demotha looming on the horizon, the self-styled demoness decided that she had to do what she had to do, reservations be damned.

And so everything was prepared. Lyra, with her proven understanding of rune work was tasked with the runic array, together with Gnarl and to everyone's surprise, Norbert too. The Death Minion just showed up during the preparations, presenting his liege with two glowing, yellow soul orbs. When questioned of how he knew that souls where needed here, he simply answered with, "a reaper knows such things," and left it at that.

The runes prepared and the candles lit, Umbra took her position on her designated spot, her left feet on a rune resembling the letter alpha and her right on one resembling the letter omega, her body meant to act as a conduit for the ritual as well as supplementing the magical spark to start.

"Forces from beyond the veil, heed my call. I command you to tear open the fabric of reality, for I wish to set to the stars and conquer the very heavens themselves!" Umbra droned out, trying to give her voice the ominous quality the spellbook clearly demanded(it was written in bold and underlined three times), as she felt the runes flare to life and started to sink their metaphorical teeth into her mana reservoir.

In the background, exactly one dozen Minions dressed up in the traditional garbs of nuns gave their very best to present a nameless yet crucial dance to guide the untamed arcana swelling in the room and guarantee the success of the ritual. The hopelessly oversized clothes in combination with the kobolds' very own brand of erratic energy all but managed to make it look like a dance routine taken from the fever dreams of the great Monty Python.

The candles' flames suddenly began to burn thrice as intensely, which signaled for Lyra in her hastily appointed role as second-in-command ritualist to gently float the two soul orbs into the glowing circle at Norbert's behest. The souls had not made it a step's length into the runic array as an eerie wind began to blow from everywhere, carrying with it the faint moans of the damned or otherwise eternally suffering. Within a heart's beat, the souls flared to life like twin stars, briefly banishing every shadow from the ritual chamber, forcing everyone to close their eyes, lest they wished to risk blindness or vaporized eyeballs.

"Did... did it work?" Lyra croaked from the sidelines.

"Don´t know," Umbra answered, rubbing her eyes one last time before taking a peek. Indeed, the ritual had been an marvelous success, for right there, in the middle of the circle, just a few centimeters above the ground was now a shimmering and wavering tear in the very fabric of space itself.

The portal in itself was without any sound. No ominous humming emanated from it nor produced it the sound of a breaking mirror as it opened up and most importantly, no hellish beast from the darkest reaches flooded the tower, ready to slaughter the fools who unwittingly invited them in. It just was.

"Well, that was underwhelming," Umbra muttered, skeptically eying her work.

"Master, how do we know that this is a portal to the right place?" Lyra inquired from underneath her getup's hood.

Just at this moment, something shot out of the portal. It was a small, fast blur and before someone could have reacted, impacted with Umbra´s mug with a wet crunching sound, sending the Overlady sprawled on her back, yelling profanities in pain.

"There is your answer, pony," Gnarl said with a sour undertone as he neared the object, having to rely on a walker made out of an adventurous mixture of bones and crooked wood, held together by sloppily hammered nails, rat guts and a lot of faith in lieu of the beating he had been subjected to three days prior. "Ah yes, this is clearly the Evil Glare, her Ladyship's most trusted helmet. Can´t you see the finesse that has been involved crafting it? The love for the detail? The induced urge to empty your bladder and babble like an incoherent madman under its baleful glare?" The old Minion lectured as he slowly bent down and retrieved the headgear, dusting it off with the hem of his cape.

"Okay, so my helmet is back, but what tells us that it was not just pulled here by some freak chance?" Umbra grunted as she took the helmet from Gnarl and put it back on her head. It fit like a glove and for some reason, Umbra now felt whole again.

At his liege's query, Gnarl rubbed his wrinkly face ponderously. "Why, we could of course just send someone to go and see if it is the right place beyond that portal, Milady. After all, from what we know, your little acquaintance hails from a rather unique world, does she not? I am sure, it would not take long to verify your success Milady. I vote that we send the Unicorn to test the waters, as they say."

"What? Tartarus no!" Lyra bristled.

"It is not as you have much to say in this, you squishy gluebag," Gnarl retorted snidely. "It is only fair for her Ladyship's most useless slave to embark on this quest. Should you die for whatever reason, there is no real loss on our side."

"I show you useless, you damn rat licker!" Lyra growled, lighting up her horn and taking a battle stance.

"Enough! Stop this, both of you!" Umbra´s presence ended the potential fight before it could break out. Lyra was lifted by her scruff and Gnarl by his collar. "I just tore open time and space and feel a bit thin skinned so if you want to start a fight, be prepared for me to crack your damn skulls open, ya?" She growled, giving the equine and the minion each a hearty shake before dumping them unceremoniously back to the hard stone floor. "But Gnarl is not entirely wrong. We should only send someone through this thing who would be no real loss should something go south."

Gnarl´s face lit up at that while Lyra´s fell.

"So in that light, someone hand me a rope!" Umbra demanded and a Minion quickly handed her the demanded good. From where the little beastie got a sizable length of rope so fast, Umbra decided to ignore for the sake of her own sanity.

Lyra huddled down on the floor like a scolded puppy as her master loomed over her, rope in hand. "M-master, please... don´t..." She squeaked terrified.

"Don´t what? Don´t tie this rope around Gnarl and kick his wrinkly ass through this potentially lethal portal into the unknown?" Umbra asked as she proceeded to secure the rope around Gnarl's person, ignoring her adviser's loud protesting. The wrinkled old walnut flailed and so two Browns were summoned to slug him in the kidneys and hold him down as Umbra fastened the rope around him. Meanwhile Lyra looked on with relief and a nastily vindictive grin spread across her muzzle as the lecherous gremlin got his due.

Neither she or Gnarl had gotten along, and that was putting it mildly. Ever since the little mare had become the Overlady's newest thrall, Gnarl had been insecure about his position as the Overlady's most faithful servant and so had made it his mission in life to make Lyra's stay as miserable as possible. He had itching powder put in her bed, commanded rats to flow from her basin and toilet (a very unpleasant surprise, especially early in the morning) and even went so far as to issue thinly veiled threats to the unwitting little mare.

Of course, Lyra didn't take this lying down for long and reacted appropriately. One day, when Gnarl ordered his daily breakfast of squished insects, rat liver and fungi, he had been presented with a very delicious and nutritious fruit salad, a little honey drizzled in; a steaming bowl of porridge laced with flower petals and a blueberry muffin to top it off. Such delicious, hippie fare would likely kill the evil little gremlin, that is, after his stomach exploded. Enchanted suits of armor had come alive as Gnarl hobbled past, poking him with their sharp spears in his sensitive parts or entrapping him in their hollow confines for hours on end. It was only due to Umbra's intervention that stopped such incidents from devolving into real violence.

"Ach, quit being such a pussy, Gnarl. Even if you die, Norbert can just pull you out of the soul river without any lasting harm. Like you said, it would be no loss at all. If anything, you would be one probably interesting death experience richer."

The dazed Gnarl mumbled incoherently as his two younger brethren hoisted him over their heads and carried him to the silent portal.

"Alright Gnarl, thank you for volunteering to boldly go where no Minion has gone before. I´m sure you will do me and the whole Minionity proud. Throw him in boys." Umbra declared cheerfully.

Gnarl just had enough time to utter a last yelp before he vanished into the surface of the portal like a pebble in a pond, only the rope leading into the portal a indication that something had happened.

"Master, ah," Lyra began. "If Gnarl really does get eaten or something, is it really necessary to bring him back? With me at your side, you won't need that skeevy old walnut anymore and I promise, with Celestia as my witness, I'll never say mean things about you behind your back, or boast how I'll overthrow you one day, not like him."

A vein pulsed in Umbra's temple. "For the moment, yeah, Harpbutt. That lecherous little geezer's more use to me alive than dead. But who knows, I might just have a position for 'most faithful lackey' opening soon." That he'd been plotting behind his mistress' back was left unsaid but then again, Umbra already had such an inkling about the treasonous walnut.

They waited patiently for any sign or indication that Gnarl had died by some means and when, to Lyra's dismay, the old Minion had tugged the rope three times, he was promptly hauled back.

"Still alive, huh?" Umbra remarked as Gnarl was unceremoniously dropped. "So how about it, Gnarl? Is it Jackie's universe or what?"

Slowly, the old Minion stood, cracking his joints in a very repulsive fashion. "I cannot say, my Lady, but I can tell you it is very much safe. The portal took me inside a closed space, itself moving and rattling with every bump in the road. I believe it was the inside of a train."

Umbra mulled this over. Did a pony come across her helmet during this time? Gnarl didn't say anything about seeing anyone else and if the portal really did open inside a moving train, that would only mean it was heading for civilization and due to the unusual state of Jackie's world, it'd be for the best she appeared somewhere out of sight. Wherever the girl might be, she had to leave and the sooner the better. "Fine, I'll let Jackie know," Umbra said, a hint of dejection creeping into her features. "Gnarl, get this cleaned up. Lyra, when this is done, go back to Ponyville and keep your cover. Make whatever story you need for you being here so suddenly. And let me know if there are any changes with the portal, I gotta go get that girl," she muttered, already on her way out.

Umbra walked with purpose through the halls of the tower, searching for her wayward friend. She hadn't seen much of Jackie since Demotha's ultimatum, instead having focused her attention and energy on solving the dilemma presented before her. Only now did she realize Jackie would be going back shortly, and who knows when, or if, they'd see each other again. She felt a cold pit of dread form in her stomach. The two had minutes, maybe an hour or so before the smaller girl would go on home and instead of making the most out of these three days, Umbra had been ignoring her friend completely, so absorbed in her own work.

She sent a mental command to her Minions, to be on the lookout for Jackie and inform Umbra of her location. That hundreds of kobolds populated the tower made the task all the easier and now Umbra approached the doors to her throne room. Sure enough, there was Jackie, standing before her throne, hands clasped behind her back, her gaze fixed on Umbra's seat of power, an unusually ponderous, introspective look in her face.

She looked up as Umbra's footsteps heralded her arrival. The taller woman stopped short, unsure how to begin. Jackie's face remained oddly blank as she met Umbra's eyes.

"You got your helmet back," she said after a short span of time. Umbra blinked, not realizing she was still wearing her headgear.

"Oh, this old thing?" She removed it, holding it in her hands. "Yeah, gotta hand it to Lyra. That manic little mare sure outdid herself. Gotta think of a suitable reward for her," she rambled on. Jackie didn't answer and Umbra fidgeted uneasily.

"So there's no way around it, huh? I gotta go back," she said it with a hint of finality. "I assume the portal opened?"

"It did. I sent Gnarl in, to make sure it was safe. He made it sound like the place was inside a moving train. Guess someone came across my helmet and planned to make off with it." Umbra licked her lips. "Look, girl, I know you don’t wanna go back... hell, I don’t want you to go back, but you see why it's gotta be this way, right? If there were another alternative..."

"Yeah, I know," Jackie sighed. "It's just... I dunno. I was really starting to like it here and now I gotta go back to that place filled with stupid ponies and brain dead troggs and... ugh. But yeah, I know. Balance to the universe, roasted by a dragon and all."

"But hey, it might not be so hopeless after all," Jackie then said. "I was talking to Onyx, and she's been talking with Demotha. Some sort of dragon fire thing. I don’t know how it works, but old D said that after some time, when things start to get in balance or some cosmic shit, I could pay you guys a visit now and then. Not as long as I would like, but a little short visit and always sparingly would be okay."

"Wha... really?" Umbra blurted, her eyes wide. "Hah!" She dove forward and threw her arms around Jackie enveloping her in a crushing hug. "Onyx, you wonderful bitch! Ohh, this is great, awesome news, girl. See, it's not all that bad. The universe seems to have thrown us a bone for once and we sure as hell are gonna gnaw the shit out of it!"

"There's... one thing though," Jackie said, her voice strained and a small smile on her face, making no attempt to escape Umbra's clutches. "No one really knows how long it'll be until I can cross over again. Not even Demotha. Could be weeks, months, years..."

"Don't worry about that none, Jackie girl," Umbra sighed. "We can get all this stuff sorted out later, but we really need to get you back. That train could reach its destination at any time and you really don't want to make things difficult on yourself by waiting. Last thing you need is to appear in front of a crowded station or something, especially with the status quo of your world." Umbra set her down and grasped her arm. "So come on, chop chop."

Jackie rolled her eyes, but followed suit.

"So I gotta ask," Umbra said as they walked side by side. "But what exactly were you doing in the throne room in the first place? Wanted to try out the seat for the royal posterior, eh?" To her surprise, Jackie chuckled.

"No, not that. I was just... wondering."

"About?"

"Well..." Jackie trailed off, thinking of a way to formulate the words. "It's just that I've been thinking. Being here, in Ganondorf's 'Verse. I look at you guys and... well, you've done pretty good for yourselves," Jackie said, her gaze directed to the ground, a small crease in her brow. "You guys, both of you. You're like me. Or I'm like you, whatever. You two were sent to this horse fairyland, but you haven't like... I dunno. Assimilated or whatever. Neither of you have taken the ponies' bullshit. You've built something here, you've made something of yourselves and me... well, what have I done? Sure, I can screw with the stupid little ponies, but I don't have a big ass tower with a tons of treasures in it. I don’t have legions of brain controlled ponies. I haven't given them the metaphorical finger besides screwing with them a bit, but you... well, you're cool," she said almost shyly. "And me... what have I done?"

Umbra listened, equal parts flattered and confused. "Really now?" She locked an arm round Jackie's neck and pulled her close. "Aww, thanks girl. It means a lot, you saying that. But what are you talking about? You're not me, and you're certainly not that colossal fuckwit Ganonprick, thank darkness for these favors, but you don’t need none of that. You are you and that is all you ever need to be. Sure, you take the 'Jackie smash' route more often than I would like, but you managed to come this far without any real outside help. You not only survived in a universe where mankind is nothing but braindead livestock but you thrived. That right there is the foundation for your future and the person you will become. Take it from me when I say, I am ready to bet my whole life on it that you will find your way in your Verse. Point is," Umbra continued. "You don’t need to be like me or Ganon. If I may quote a cuddly, squishy panda, 'you just need to be the best you you can be', and that, Jackie girl, is someone I'd very much like to see in the future, capische?"

"Right," Jackie replied, in higher spirits now. Umbra smiled and squeezed once more before letting go and so they made their way to Umbra's arcane lab.

Lyra was still there, keeping a close eye on the portal while Gnarl directed the still dancing Minions, who now started to look restless, to keep on dancing. Jackie didn't bat an eye, already used to such odd happenings in Umbra's domain. Another Brown, Nibbler, entered soon, presenting to Umbra a bundle wrapped in cloth and a little pouch atop it.

"Well, this is it, girl. Are you ready?" Umbra asked as Jackie looked guardedly at the portal.

"I'm still not crazy about just jumping blindly into these things," she muttered. "But yeah, I'm ready."

With a mental command, Umbra ordered nonessential personnel to vacate the area, Gnarl included. That he was deemed nonessential while Lyra was allowed to stay chafed at his pride and so he shot a truly nasty glare at the unhinged mare before hobbling out.

"So," Umbra clapped. "Presents." At Jackie's raised eyebrow she continued. "What, you didn't think I'd let my best buddy rough it out in hostile Ponyland without a few gifts, did ya?" She punctuated by bopping a finger atop Jackie's nose.

With an exaggerated clearing of her throat, Umbra gave Jackie the little innocuous pouch. "Well, open it," she urged after Jackie merely held the thing in her grasp. Jackie snorted and did so, peering inside the contents. "Like it? I modeled it after the Expansion Charm from Harry Potter. Lyra helped with it too."

Jackie's eyes were wide open as faint, golden glimmers of light refracted from the pouch and into her face. "It's... money?"

"Gold, girl. But yes. Not good to send a young un' like yourself out into the cruel world without a little extra cash for a rainy day."

"How much is it?"

Umbra shrugged. "I dunno. I just grabbed a bunch and put it in. What, is it not enough?" she said with a false frown.

"No, no, it's fine," Jackie said quickly. "Um... thanks," she mumbled, not meeting Umbra's gaze.

"Think nothing of it, girl," Umbra said, waving a hand airily. "But that ain't the crown jewel, no siree. For that, I present you with this." She now picked the enveloped bundle, holding it in the flat of both palms before passing it to a bemused Jackie.

"It's a dagger," she said after unwrapping it and sure enough, within lay a short, sheathed blade. With half curiosity, Jackie pulled the dagger out of the sheath, revealing a curved, single edged blade of roughly eight inches in length. Upon closer inspection, Jackie discovered that the name Jacqueline was etched into the blade itself.

"Not any normal dagger, girl," Umbra said with a shark smile. "Made from the fires of the Arcanium smelter itself. Stronger than any old dagger, unbreakable but by the mightiest of forces and with a blade honed to perfection, immune to the wear of time but most importantly, it is made from an ore named cold iron. My dogs found a small cache of that stuff while expanding their mines and I thought I give you a little something made of it. If you are unfamiliar, cold iron is the most anti magic metal ever. Its slightest touch alone can dispel most forms of magic and this little puppy here is sure to slice through even the most powerful wards and spells like wet toilet paper. Also, it is easy to conceal and if you wear it close to you, there is a big chance that it will sometimes dispel or at least hinder spells aimed at you," Umbra explained, wrapping an arm around Jackie. "You do know why I'm giving you this, right girl?" Jackie nodded. "I... may have been a bit too hasty when I tried to hold you back from all this mess. You're right. You'll need to get your hands dirty sometimes. I sure hope to whatever deity is looking down on us that it doesn't happen, but with our luck..." She chuckled humorlessly. "Well, take it. Defend yourself if you have to but do me a favor, will you girl?"

"What is it?"

"Try to live a little. Stop with the doom and gloom all the time and try to get along with the ponies or dogs, griffins, zebras or dragons or whoever, those you think you can with, at least. Yes, human troggs and asshole ponies and all. You won't be friends with many of them, and I don’t think you'll like them all the same, but promise me you'll try and get along with at least a few, to give them a chance and make your stay less crappy than you have to. Could you do that for me?" Umbra asked, her eyes never leaving Jackie's.

"Sure. I can do that."

Umbra smiled, affectionately running a hand through her head. "That a girl." She chanced another look at the portal. "Enough with the dawdling now. The longer we drag this out the harder it will be."

Jackie approached the portal, Umbra following close behind. "So... this is it, huh?" Jackie muttered, scuffing the ground with her shoe, her new dagger clasped tightly in hand. "Well, goodbye, I guess," she said.

For her part, Umbra scoffed good naturedly and wrapped both arms around Jackie, who sighed.

"God, you're grabby. It's like you're a pervert or something."

Umbra couldn't help but laugh. "Never said I wasn't."

They remained like that for a few comfortable beats of silence. "You gonna let me go now?"

"Depends. Are you gonna give me some love?"

Umbra could literally feel Jackie grow warmer, but nevertheless, the recalcitrant girl's arms snaked upwards, briefly hugging Umbra in return.

"Alright, for realsies this time!" Umbra declared and pulled away. "Go on, get back to your horsies."

Smiling softly, Jackie stepped closer to the portal. "Remember, soon as it's okay you pull me out and back in here."

"Without a doubt."

"Literally the second it's alright."

"Sure, sure."

"Cause if you don’t I will hurt you."

"Your dearest friend? Jackie, how could you?" Umbra gasped in mock indignation. "You have my word, girl," she said seriously, a broad grin still on her face. "First chance I get you and I are gonna stay and live it up in this tower. No adventures, cultists or other 'Verses in sight. Just us girls having a swell time."

Jackie nodded. "I look forward to it." She turned, not looking back and stepped out the portal and into the other side.

"This is boring, daddy, I wanna go home!" Diamond Tiara complained, emphasizing this by stomping a hoof.

"Just a little longer, sweetheart," Filthy Rich replied, his attention solely focused on the throngs of ponies moving in and out the train. The stallion fidgeted uneasily, looking over the heads of ponies, his tail swishing in excitement. Not half an hour earlier his acquaintance, the stallion Shady Deal had approached him outside the schoolhouse where Filthy Rich had come to pick up his daughter, that he informed Filthy of a new, exciting find Shady's appraisers had unearthed in the borders beyond Appaloosa.

Phrases such as 'never seen anything like it', 'one of a kind', and 'surely belonging to a lost civilization of the past' had been liberally thrown around, Shady using the full extent of the Equish language to accentuate the object's uniqueness. And so Filthy had fallen prey to the shrewd stallion, which is how he came to be where he now stood.

Sure enough, after minutes of torturous waiting, Shady emerged from one of the train compartments, a sizable wooden box carried on his back. Whatever this object may have been, it must be rather weighty, for the stallion visibly strained and beads of sweat rolled down his head as he approached Filthy and his daughter.

"Is that it?" Filthy asked, barely able to contain his excitement.

"It is... comrade," Shady huffed. "Though I don't remember it being quite so heavy," he strained and grunted and no sooner was he about to remove it, that a... voice? A voice emerged from within the box, a dull, thumping sound of flesh on wood and the box tumbled off Shady's back, violently crashing against the hard ground.

The impact broke the box open and within its confines, and in an act that made the two stallions' jaws drop to the floor, a young human female now lay sprawled on the floor, groaning weakly and clearly disoriented. Filthy Rich was the first to recover.

"This... what is the meaning of this, Deal? Is this some some sort of sick joke?" the stallion demanded furiously.

For his part, Shady's mouth opened and closed soundlessly, the stallion struggling to form words. "T-this... I don't... where did... I... what?"

But the young female, now gaining her bearings, rose to a seated position and Filthy Rich would bet all the gold in his vault he knew the little mongrel from somewhere. From beside him, a high pitched squeal rang through the station and a pink blur shot out, tackling the befuddled human. Only now did Filthy register Diamond Tiara, her hooves thrown around the human's neck and nuzzling the confused creature for all she was worth.

"Snowy! I can't believe it's you! I knew you'd come back, I just knew it," Diamond babbled as she happily squeezed the human's neck for all she was worth. For her part, just now 'Snowy' seemed to register the fact there was a filly lodged against her neck. The human's eyes widened in horror as she looked to the pink filly, to the train station and a plaque hung over the entrance to the station that read 'Welcome to Ponyville'.

Filthy and Shady watched in bafflement as the human brought both hands to her face, let out an anguished growl and bent down, repeatedly smashing her head against the hard tiled floor, drawing the attention of several ponies nearby. The two stallions looked to each other, neither able to make heads or tails of what in the hay just happened.

Author's Notes:

Whew. And there we have it, folks. Well over 100,000 horsewords of collaboration come to an end. I hope you've enjoyed Jackie's stay in the Multiverse as much as I have, but now it's time to pursue her own storyline. Ah, and as for Ganon and Umbra, you bet they will make an appearance sometime in the far off future, though it certainly won't be as lengthy as this endeavor.

Jackie is back with a new lease on life, a slightly different perspective and some new toys to try out. Her time in Ponyville is nearing its end and from then on, I will do my utmost to take you all on a wild ride. These past two years have taught me much, for all the stumbles and pitfalls I've waded into, but you can be sure I will see my girl's journey to its end.

Thank you all who've decided to stick with me through this massive collaboration. I will see you all soon.