Alex woke up with a start, he overslept..

In his time here, Alex figured that a lot of his time would be spent sleeping, but he had overstayed his welcome, upon the realization, he bolted to the main lobby. The pain accompanying his bullet wounds was entirely non-existent, but the burns still stung a bit, so the doctors had told him not to do anything too crazy for a couple days. With that note, the first human in Equestria was released from the hospital.

Cloudchaser and Flitter immediately greeted him upon exiting the hospital. Happy to see that he had made a full recovery.

"Hey, Alex, how are you holding up?" Cloudchaser asked.

"To be perfectly honest, pretty good." Alex said, for the first time in a month or so.

"We heard from Pinkie that you were going to be Ponyville's Mercenary in residence." Flitter said, impressed.

"Apparently, I have the right set of skills for the job, how often do monsters just pop up around here?" He asked.

"More than you think." Cloudchaser admitted, "Princess Twilight usually has these sort of problems about once a week."

"What kind of things usually attack the town?" Alex questioned.

"All sorts of things, timberwolves, ursai, I think I saw some type of 'bug bear' a while ago." Flitter answered.

----

Alex walked over to a small type of house, Cloudchaser and Flitter's lunch break was over, so they said their goodbyes and flew away. Noticing the house nearby, Alex saw that the workers were already putting some large crates outside the door, a few levitating crowbars and opening them up, revealing couches and tables and things.

Alex still was not entirely sure what to think of this. Sure, first alien in Equestria was a huge frickin' dealio, but holy hell, he did not expect this kind of treatment. An earth pony in a suit walked up to Alex with some papers. The deed to the house, which he had to sign, and a few bills he had to pay by the end of the month, like the mortgage of about 44,000 bits a year. The Utility bill, about 250 bits a month, basically all that stuff that nobody tells you when you buy a house. Thank God that Monster Hunters get paid so much.

Alex noticed a small record player being unboxed alongside the extra-large bed. He enjoyed listening to music back home, hopefully they had something good here. He grabbed the medium-sized bag of bits Celestia had given him to start out, and walked over to a record store close by.

----

Alex hit his head on the top of the doorway upon entering the record store, he hoped that his hipster buddies were right when they said music sounded better on vinyl. Hey, he lived in a Portland suburb, there were plenty of hipsters around there.

"Welcome to- oh, my goodness, you're tall!" The stallion behind the desk gaped, staring in awe.

"Hi, as you can already tell, I'm new here, so what would you recommend?" Alex asked. He needed something decent, he always did, between the teenyboppers and the hipsters that flooded his schools, he needed something truly original, remembering every time that a Taylor Swift or a Nirvana song played on the school intercom. Thinking back, he didn't miss Earth's music that much.

Alex's reverie was interrupted by a tap on his shoulder, or rather, his shoulder blade. Turning around, he noticed a unicorn made with an electric blue mane and sunglasses.

"Um... Hi." He waved.

The unicorn didn't say a thing, instead, she walked a little ways deeper into the store, waving a hoof as if to say 'follow me'.

Alex obliged, following the mare to the back left of the small store, she pointed a hoof at one of the shelves, Alex looked at that particular shelf to see... That same unicorn on the cover, labeled DJ-PON3 at the top.

Alex couldn't help but chuckle a bit, shameless self-advertising, his one true comic weakness.

PON3 didn't look as amused, rolling her eyes and sighing with annoyance.

"Sorry, sorry." Alex apologized. Continuing to browse music, picking out a couple more of her albums, as well as a few others. Before making his way to the counter.

"That'll be 50 bits." The clerk said.

Alex just barely grabbed the bag when DJ-PON3 paid for him, placing 50 gold coins on the counter.

"Thank you." He said.

The mare again, did not reply, instead, she gave him a small business card, with the name 'Vinyl Scratch' typed near the top, as well as a phone number. It didn't take long for Alex to figure out what she actually wanted.

"Oh, you want to play your music at the welcome party." He concluded.

Vinyl nodded, smiling broadly.

"Well, it's the least I can do, I'll be sure to tell Pinkie. Thanks again." Alex said

He left the record store with a bag in tow. Returning to his new home nearby, the workers finished placing all of his stuff and were just now finishing.

"That'll be 400 bits, sir." The foreman said.

Alex looked in his bag, counting out 400 coins. He gave them to the foreman and went into his new home.

He had to admit, they did a pretty good job. The record player near the couch with a small shelf nearby, obviously for albums and stuff.

Alex placed one of Vinyl's records into the player. It was basically dubstep mixed in with some classical. Not much different from what he listened to back in his old world, that and Alt Rock.

Alex then figured it was necessary to go to the forge. It was a good mile away from his house, he'd better get moving, reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a couple of shell casings and ran like hell in the forge's general direction.

----

About 10 minutes later, Alex walked into the small forge, a .44 and a 7.62 cartridge in his pockets as a reference.

The metalworker there welcomed him, saying if he ever needed help, to not hesitate to ask.

Alex then showed the blacksmith the cartridges. Asking how to make exact copies of those casings specifically.

The blacksmith then looked at each one, writing down exact measurements and giving them to Alex, telling him to make a mold with the casings he had, then filling it with brass, and then a crap ton of other things to do, like making a hole for the primer, hollowing out the casing, stuff like that, and then to always check that the measurements were exact. And with that, Alex got to work.

-8 hours later-

Alex made about 330 .44 magnum shells, and 690 7.62 shells, figuring he'd get to the whole primer, powder, and projectile thing soon, according to Celestia, the shipments of Nitro glycerin and magic propellant would be mailed to his house tomorrow. Then he would figure out how to build more Magazines for the SCAR and use the extras for grenades for the M203.

Alex lugged the massive haul of shell casings in a two large bags behind him. They were really heavy, and Alex knew one thing for sure, he would sleep like a baby that night.

Opening the door with his teeth, Alex placed the casings on the couch, noticing a note on his closet door. How did someone get in the house? And, on that note, who?

Alex picked up the note, It didn't take long to figure out who wrote it.

Alex,

It's me, Vinyl, y'know, from the record store? You weren't home when I stopped by.

Thanks again for promising me a gig at your welcome party, business has been a bit slow lately, and I need the money, you know how it is, right?

So, anyways, call the number on that card I gave you to let me know when the party is. And if you somehow lost it, just come over to my place, apparently, we're neighbors. I live literally right next door.

Thanks again,

Vinyl.

Alex moved the note over to his phone, and placed the card on the table, he would call Vinyl tomorrow.

Right now, he was beat. He stumbled over to the bedroom nearby and plopped right on.

Alex fully appreciated the value of a good night's sleep, the bed at the prison wasn't even a bed, he didn't get to sleep in his time with the Militia, and that hospital bed was uncomfortable as all hell, but this was actually quite soft. Wrapping himself in the flannel blanket, keeping him warm in spite of the early fall chill, and went directly to sleep. The work at the forge sapped Alex of all his energy. And, hell, given what happened to him the past month, he felt the universe owed him this one.

----

Alex was awoken by electronic music, the sound exploding from the house next door. Not the best way to wake up, sure, but it was better than torture or interrogation by visitors.

Alex looked at the clock on the wall adjacent to his bed. 6:44, it read.

Who plays dubstep that loud at 6 a.m?

Alex then remembered the record store, the note, and immediately figured out the pony responsible.

Vinyl. Who else?

Alex got ready for breakfast, these ponies didn't eat meat, apparently, so he got to work on some French Toast, cracking the eggs into a bowl and heating the pan on a stove.

Grabbing some cinnamon from a cupboard, and getting the bread, he made his morning meal quick, remembering how to make food from back on earth, thinking back, Earth wasn't all that crappy.

Alex couldn't quite get how his fridge was already stocked, or how fast that the workers set this up, he only spent a half hour at that record store, right?

Grabbing a glass of milk from the fridge, he drank the liquid in a few gulps. He didn't need to eat very much.

The rest of the morning pretty much consisted of showering, getting dressed, all that stuff. When he looked at the clock again, it read 7:23. Before any of this, he would be spending this time lazily moping around the house, while his parents all but pleaded for him to do something. But his parents were now dead, and in an alternate universe, far beyond his reach, and now he had a job? He had pretty much become an adult in the span of a month.

Then, there was just the small matter of his past. Rainbow Dash, which was apparently the rainbow headed one's name, still looked doubtful and almost vindictive at the hospital visit. She was probably the one who he should be the most concerned about. Knowing full well that people weren't made to always have to hide, or lie about their past. However, it didn't seem like he had anyone to turn to about it, and that the more time he spent around ponies, the higher the likelihood he'd let something slip, and he'd be done for.

'How will I be able to handle this?' Alex thought hopelessly to himself.

Author's Notes:

Well, boom, more on Alex's personal life besides the whole
'Tortured by the government, betrayed by rebels, and riddled with gunfire, multiverse, blah blah blah' stuff, I bet most of you were waiting for this sorta thing to happen, well, here.