Is it that time again? It feels like it was just yesterday when you were coming around looking for another part of my saga!

Yes, I know it was yesterday, I was just … ugh, nevermind. Some of you boyos just aren’t that bright are you? Anyway, so once again before we start things off where I left them, why don’t we get another Q&A done?

Yes! You in the back. Did any of the plants or the boar look alien-like?

Surprisingly enough, not a single thing looked out of place or gave off the vibe that I was actually in another world … you know, minus the fact I was helping a female griffon. It was one of the few blessings that I had in that world. A nice feeling of familiarity can really help a man’s condition when he is lost in a rather unique and different place … or world in this case. The boar looked like a typical boar here, and the plants all looked common for an Arizona or a desert setting in general.

Next question. What do griffon feathers feel like?

Honestly that is a surprising question since it never really came to my mind when I was helping her. Now that I think about it, they felt much the same as any feather from a large bird. Wait … actually, they felt extremely soft, like an almost uncanny valley type of soft. Honestly, in my entire life, it was probably the softest thing I had ever felt and trust me, I have touched a lot of very soft fabrics. Though come to think of it, they probably had ways to take care of feathers, not that I ever saw them, honestly. Sure, later on I saw her groom her feathers but never saw her use any product to help them. Great, now I’m wondering how she kept them so soft.

Ugh, this is going to bug me for longer than I would like to. Any more Gilda orientated questions while we are on the topic of her? Was she a good dining partner you asked?

Considering some of the people I’ve come by and eaten with … yes. Probably one of the best, honestly. Had great manners for being a cat-bird hybrid from another world. Hell, off the top of my head I can count at least seven people I’ve eaten with that not only would talk with their mouths open but at the same time they were trying to chew food … or they would eat with their elbows on the table, or even just scarf food down so quickly it was like it wasn’t on their plate (which it wasn’t). So to eat with her when she chewed softly and ate slowly … it was a change of pace from some people out here.

Did Gilda remind me of anyone? Damn that’s a doozy of a question really.

I’ve met so many people in my lifetime that it is getting tougher and tougher to remember all of them. You’re going to have to give me a second to recall some of them.

Hmm … no, not him, or him. Definitely not her.

Hmm.

Hmmm.

Hmmmm.

Alright, I’ve done the best I can in remembering but I can only come up with three people. Two of which I knew before The Reckoning and one which I met prior to the mysterious trip. The first was one of my friends that I met in college. Probably one of my best buds from that time. The connection isn’t that close really but much like Gilda, Nolan often called me names and gave me a hard time … which you’ll learn about later, but in the end they both were friends that I could always rely on.

Now, the other friend was the polar opposite of Nolan in ways and pretty much is the exact same as Gilda’s “opposite side.” Even though she was a great friend in the previously mentioned ways, she also would leave me hanging in situations where watching me from the sidelines would earn her a good laugh. She also tried to trip me up often, especially if I told her anything that could be used against me. She was essentially my closest friend, Bryan. She and that dude would have laughed at my misery if they ever met.

Now for the last person, her name was Match. Now, much like the other two, Gilda and her only have a certain area of similarity. For her, it was definitely Gilda’s anger. Honestly, I’d rather not recall any of the times which Match got angry, though when a part of the story where Gilda’s anger flared up comes along … just picture Gilda as a five foot four Russian gal that could wield a semi-auto shotgun with one hand while carrying around way too much dynamite. Horrible … horrible mixes.

Next question, I say we got time for a few more.

How could I tell that Gilda’s wing joint was back in place properly? Reasons. And sheer luck. It was literally all about me guessing which way the wing was supposed to be based on her other one, and then just popping it into place. Honestly I was worried about it for a few days after but when she started flying again … well I just assumed I had gotten it right, especially since she never complained afterwards.

Three more questions and then we’re moving on. This has been lengthy enough. You, you’re up.

...

Wait, let me make sure I have the question right. Why was I willing to risk approaching Gilda at the risk of exposing us to possible diseases and such which neither of us could have immune protection from? Or did I not have that in mind when approaching Gilda?

Is that correct? Yeah? Jeeze that is a hell of a thought. Wished I thought of it then as well. I’ll be frank with you, and Jim if need be; that type of thought didn’t even cross my mind when I first met her and helped her. Hell, I think the only thing that actually could be considered a rational thought was when I brought up the point about her attacking me … you know, prior to the realization that she could be considered sapient.

Damn that is a hell of an idea. Everyone, I would like you to note this question. Remember it well and burn it into the back of your minds for next time because that is how you ask a question.

Damn.

Right, two more questions. Go. Were the stars the same?

Oh, you’re trying to get spoilers now … even if unintentionally. On the first night I didn’t really pay attention to such things as I was more focused on securing food and ensuring that said cat-bird was alright. Though don’t worry, I’ll answer that question in the next leg of the story.

Last one. Yep, you.

What exactly was The Reckoning ... as in what happened specifically? Fuuuuuuuck … do you even know how long of a question that is if I even tried to comprehend it myself? Ugh, this is going to be longer than I want to allow it.

I’ll keep this as short as possible.

The Reckoning as you all know is essentially the end of the former world as everyone knew it back then. Some, if not half, never saw it and were born in the Post-Reckoning era that we are living in. So I guess you can say The Reckoning is simply another name for Doomsday. Hell, as far as I’m concerned it is merely one of many names attached to the events … though definitely the coolest name in my opinion. Anyway, moving on.

The Reckoning happened … probably over two decades ago, I’m exactly sure what year it is now, but not the exact date it all started, because it wasn’t just a simple day-long thing, no siree, was November 8th, 2015. It truly was the worst day in all of history, for not only did the world end … it happened before the tenth. God what a horrible time to end the world … don’t worry about the tenth … I don’t even want to think about the tenth. Anyway, that was the start of what was a world-encompassing two day war, though could it be called a war when most of the attacks were simply drone or missile strikes? Hell, there was only a handful of nuclear attacks and those only happened at the end of the ninth. It was fast and deadly, attacks on major cities mixed with the sheer pandemonium and tumult that the public caused in response to thinking the world was going to end. I think I even heard about a few last minutes doomsayers saying they predicted it from the get go … fucking liars.

My family and I bunkered up in our house rather heavily. Boarded up windows and the like before setting up camp in the basement, hugging our supplies and means of self-defense.

So following the colossal shitstorm of those two days, the world looked like a fucking mess. Yet we could still pull together and would have if the eleventh didn’t happen. See, despite probably losing almost every main government in the world or at least forcing them underground during the times, people were still helping others and constantly working to make things better. Everyone knew that society was fucked and broken but we were still able to gather the pieces and put it back together. That was what the tenth showed … hell, I even still had my entire family. Though they were in rough shape and … and only lasted a week after the eleventh.

Shit. Sorry. Still a rough memory for me.

…

Alright. Now, if you ask anyone who survived The Reckoning and the weeks after it, they would tell you that the war was only the prelude. What happened after … I can’t even begin to describe it. Honestly, it was shaky and rough, not to mention there was next to no way of telling what happened across the world. All I knew was that my home city, and I’ll remind you this all happened during a span of three days for us, flash flooded even despite the fact the river was in a low valley compared to the rest of the city. Then following that it proceeded to flash freeze, fucking everything up greatly. An enormous amount of people died in that process. Next it was as if the ozone didn’t exist over the city, and the frozen ground and water melted within hours before baking the entire city to the point of nice golden brown. Finally … on the third day it rained for half the day before the entire city was overtaken by plants.

Let me hold there for a second and state something. This took three days. Three. If there was comprehensive book listing all the rules of nature and physics … well it would seem that ‘Mother Nature’ decided to light the book on fire before putting it through a shredder. None of what happened made sense and the scarce few that survived were nearly completely broken. I was lucky to escape sane … my parents were already insane before I was born, haha! Still, I ended up running into someone who studied geology? I think that’s what he studied … lets just say he wasn’t all there … he was insane.

Now it was shortly after all that happened and my parents passed away that I finally took off. Started up one of my parents’ cars that was still fine … minus some water damage, and started my journey.

Now if you try to ask me how any of this happened? Well at the beginning I mentioned my theory on how the war started, but as for how the world up and decided to turn against everything on this planet … that’s something no one knows. Hell, if we can’t tell exactly what happened, what is the point in asking the ‘whys’ and ‘hows’?

Right, this Q&A thing has gone on too long this time. Going to limit the questions next time I think. So where were we yesterday? Talking about the first night together. Well that wasn’t till later if you know what I mean …

Ha! You should see the looks on your faces! Fucking priceless. Nah, we didn’t hook up or anything like that. Sure I got a little close to a few of the beings there, but Gilda? Ha, she would have beaten me to death before such a thing.

So back to the story, the sleep was rather peaceful but surprisingly sparse of dreams, and trust me, I can tell. Usually I can lucid dream, but that requires me to actually be asleep first … most of the time. You just have to be aware that you are asleep and ask yourself that when in your dreams. Simplistic is the process, but extremely tough in application. Either way, when I awoke rather early the next morning, I was surprised by two things.

First one was that Gilda was still there when I checked, ‘cause I half expected her to bolt when I drifted off asleep.

The second … well it actually should have been the first, was that I was alive. See, normally I forestall sleeping until I can find an area of terrain or a building that allows me to bunker down for the night. Instead, last night we had slept in what should have been a massive gathering spot for all sorts of animals. Yet there I was, alive and awake. What a blessing this world was … at least in the small ways.

So the routine of eating food and gathering up all my gear for the day trip went as well as it usually did, with the only exception that I had to wait for Gilda to wake before stowing the food and the second canteen … and the blanket. Surprisingly she was a rather heavy sleeper. Probably the cat side of her.

So instead of passing the time lazily and just waiting around doing nothing, I decided that it was the best time to clean my weapons.

And thus I proceeded to do just that. Seriously, you don’t need me to walk you through each step of my day.

Eventually Gilda woke up, a little surprised that everything that happened yesterday was indeed reality, but after tossing her a piece of boar, she settled down again … well that’s actually a bit of an over-exaggeration considering that she didn’t freak out or anything. She just took a few minutes to comprehend last night all over again.

When she had scarfed down her bit of boar meat, we proceeded out into the desert. As we first started off, I made it clear that I was wandering at this point and had no general direction except west. Apparently Gilda had no objections to this as she was also going west, though she was headed to a town called Ponyville apparently. Yep; Ponyville. Let that sink in for a second.

See, I was tempted to laugh at her and brush off what she said, but the amount of conviction in her voice told me she was being serious. Still wanted to laugh, but in the end I held it back, instead opting to tell her that Ponyville sounded like a wonderful destination.

She slugged me in the leg for the sarcasm that dripped off that statement.

Now, normally I wouldn’t do what happened next, but since my travelling partner was a mix of a cat-bird, I figured why the hell not?

“Yo, G,” I said out of the blue, after we had been walking for at least ten minutes of dead silence.

Now at first she didn’t respond, probably because she either refused to or she didn’t adhere to the nickname ‘G.’ So I proceeded to repeat what I said … multiple times. Finally, she actually responded, and not with an angry response either.

“Huh?”

“Right, two things now. First off, a tip for wandering in areas you aren’t extremely familiar with. Don’t ever drown your senses out by trying to daydream. That is the best way to get careless and die … in that order respectively. This is especially important since both of us are in rather uncharted territory,” I said while gesturing around us.

She gave a small nod in response, and the fact that she started scanning around told me she actually was paying attention.

“The second thing … and while this is hypocritical of me, I was wondering if, for at least a few minutes, you could take up the duty of keeping an eye on the surroundings. I need to listen to some music and think.”

“Wait a sec! You just -”

“Which is why I’m being hypocritical. If it wasn’t for the fact I have no idea where I am, or for that fact what I’m going to do now aside from head west, I wouldn’t be asking for such a blessing. Right now? I need like fifteen minutes to gather my thoughts … cool?” It was a shot in the dark.

“Ugh … fine … dweeb,” she muttered in response. Now I didn’t reach for my iPod right off the bat, only because I knew the statement would finally click in and she would ask the most important question. “Wait … how would you listen to music?”

“Glad you asked, my dear cat-bi-”

“Griffon.”

“Cat-bird!” I finished before pulling out my iPod Touch and holding it in my hand as we came to a stop. She looked at it closely before casting a dull glare back at me. It was safe to assume she was not amused. “This little thing here, holds thousands of songs, actually. They are all fed into it via a digital program that literally reduces the songs to electric pulses. Said pulses get run through a digital sound processor and thus it gets spewed out through a speaker or headphones which you can see are attached … at least that’s my basic understanding of it.”

“Like I’m going to believe that,” she said before sitting down and attempting to fold her forelegs across before wincing in pain.

“Here, let me show you,” I said before offering the headphones to her. “Put these in your ears and I’ll play a song you might like … possibly.”

She merely rolled her eyes before slowly taking an earphone, brushing back some of her feathers and placing it in her ear, then repeating the step for her other ear. Once she had them in, I asked her the most important question, “How fast and hard do you like your music?”

She gave me another deadpan look before answering, “I’m a griffon. I can handle anything you can throw at me, idiot.”

“Right-o! One hard ass song coming your way! Let’s see how you handle this!”

You’re lucky I found speakers for you all to listen to what I played her. Just listen.

Keep listening. In fact don’t even pay attention to me until it’s done.

…

…

I said stop looking at me and focus on the song. I don’t care if some of you don’t like metal, it’s only four minutes, so suffer if you really can’t enjoy Slayer.

…

…

…

Right, now you can pay attention to me and my story again. Jeeze, some of you … I can’t believe you guys were so impatient that you were actually complaining! It’s four minutes! You can’t even wait four minutes for me to continue talking!

So, as I can see by some of your faces that you were taken by surprise by the song. Well to be honest, you all did better than I thought, though at the same time so did Gilda. See, like some of you who were nodding along, she actually got into it as far as I could tell.

After the song ended, she looked up at me as though I was a chump who had been played. “Please, lame-brain, that was hardly anything. It was crazy at the end but otherwise nothing that I haven’t heard before.”

Now you see, that actually brought a smile to my face since that meant if I had to, I could easily resort to listening to whatever she had listened to. If it wasn’t obvious to me before, I knew then and there that Gilda was going to be a good friend as long as I was there in that land. So, much to her surprise I decided to up the game a little bit. With a surprise I asked her a question she probably wasn’t expecting.

“So, faster and heavier or just straight heavier?” She knew what I meant immediately so she simply shook her head before saying four words.

“Give me your best.”

Yep, that meant another song for her … and it means another song for you all!

“This one goes to eleven,” I said before pressing play. And thus time to listen for another four minutes.

…

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…

…

…

…

…

Wow, you guys were actually much better that time. Not a single one of you complained about it being too long … though apparently some of you were evidently struggling to cover your ears. Actually from the looks of it, more people liked the previous song … huh. Honestly I can’t see how you can dislike Twilight of the Thunder God. Seriously, I followed Amon Amarth for many shows. Saw it back to back at least once and even travelled to a different country to see them. You all missed out on the best of times, really …

Anyways, back to how Gilda took that last song. Now, this time she actually reacted closer to how I expected, though I think it was due to the singing for the most part. Slayer has the speed and intensity easily down but Tom Araya could actually sing for the most part. Johan Hegg … he was meant to be a growling viking. Seriously.

“Okay … that was … that was a lot to take in,” Gilda said, handing the earbuds back to me before using a claw to poke at her ears.

“Oh, Gilda. Sweet, sweet, Gilda. If only you knew what other songs are on this iPod. That was merely the tip of the iceberg. I have songs that eclipse that easily. You barely even moved up really,” I said as I wiped an earbud clean before putting it in my ear and maneuvering the iPod into its resting pouch.

“So, now that you have had a taste of my music, let us continue and be on our merry way. And like you promised, you need to watch for a few minutes while I gather my thoughts,” I said before fishing the other earbud out and into my other ear. I’m pretty sure just after I pressed play, Gilda mumbled something about me being stupid, but hell if I knew.

So I’m going to give you two options. You can either go and get a snack within the next fifteen minutes or stay and listen to me ramble about what I thought about for the duration of like four well-used songs. If you want to go, then go right ahead … alright, I see none of you left. And here I was hoping all of you would leave so I could just move on. Right, tally-ho and all that jazz I guess.

As my music started to play, I decided to look at the facts that were in front of me. I was more or less being guided by a sentient cat-bird on an alien world that could possibly see me as either a nobody which is one of the better options or they could see me as the ultimate evil that requires them to use some foreign alien weapon to vaporize me … though that was a long shot in all reality. Gilda had been fearful of me originally, but that could also have been attributed to what she last remembered and the fact I was holding a knife at the time. So there was a possibility that they would actually warm up to me if I just either gave it time or didn’t do anything stupid.

That actually brought up the next point, what was I going to do when I reached a town, let alone a major city, or found a way to get me back? My initial first contact plan had surprisingly survived … well, survived first contact. That was a rare if not an impossible thing. Never had my plans survived initially, though looking on the bright side, they hadn't ever critically failed before.

So if we made it to a town, I guess I needed to act friendly and not show myself as being intimidating. If I could manage to actually keep the townsfolk at ease, then I could actually survive in this odd world. Following that, I would need to establish myself as something useful … find a way to gain currency to gather payment either for goods and materials or to hire a scientist to find out how the fuck I am here. Of course that’s assuming that this world was anything like home. Who the hell knew.

Oh, by the way that was literally my train of thought, obviously I would find out but back then that was what I thought. Back to somehow remembering my pondering word for word!

That actually brings up a great point I didn’t really think of … who the fuck inhabited this world. I never actually asked Gilda what the dominant species was. Was it griffons like her? Or perhaps it was another species that mainly inhabited the planet? Would that mean that Gilda would be more of a burden than a boon in my travels? Too many damn questions to answer and not enough information to even answer one of them. Fuck it all.

Now, would you believe that was only about one song worth of thinking? Yeah, I slowed it down for the storytelling aspect, though in actuality I resolved to ask a few questions after the last song, but until then, I would simply listen to the beauty of Symphony X, Blind Guardian, and Kreator.

No, I would make you listen to them, it’s really a shame though that you’d have to go scavenging extensively to actually find an album of theirs let alone something to play it. Alright, I’ll be moving on before I have to start explaining what an album was …

When my last song was up, I pulled the earbuds out and tucked them away before taking a deep breath. It was nice to smell such pure air. Sure there is many place on earth that had pure smelling air but for some reason this place just was another level of purity. As I gazed around, I noticed that we were near a hill, nothing of true note really but the decent height on that meant that it could actually give us a nice view of the land. The hill was a little rocky on the side facing us but that wasn’t an issue, it would be more pertinent to see the land, even if it meant a slight deviation from going true west.

“Hey, Gilda,” I said as I nudged her. She gave a simple sound of acknowledgement in return. “We should get to the top of that hill. It’ll give us a nice view of the area and allow us to see any resting spots.”

“Ehh, why the buck not?” she said as she shrugged.

“Right, I’ll lead the way, you take your time climbing it but I’ll make sure to make a path that’s easy to follow,” I said, almost not realising my mistake, “only because you’re hurt and all that.”

She simply glared at me before walking ahead of me in the direction of the hill. At least she didn’t try to do anything stupid. Seriously, that griffon had issues with being nice.

So, the following half and hour was spent trudging up a hill that had a surprisingly high altitude to it. Seriously, it looked tiny but the moment you tried to climb it the fucking thing decided to grow another hundred meters. It was fucking ridiculous I tell you. Either way, no matter how much the hill fucked with us, we still ended up making it to the top. Well I made it up first by a few moments and upon reaching the summit of the hill, I found a startling revelation.

“Hey, uh … G?”

“What?!” she yelled back. Apparently my cat-bird was getting grumpy and hungry … though I found the latter out later.

“Well … good news … we won’t need to hunt tonight, hopefully,” I said as she finally made her way to the top.

“Why no-” she stopped mid question as she saw what I was looking at. Over the hill and (a little) far away … yes I had to make that joke, sue me … anyway, over the hill and far away we saw a town, and in that town I could see a fucking train. Thank every single god ever for this blessing.

“Looks like only a little more walking left,” I said as I unslung my M110. Of course it was the moment I peered down the scope that she decided to ask about the weapon.

“What is that anyway? You’ve been lugging it around and it doesn’t seem to do anything,” she said, all the while probably staring at it.

I gave a big sigh, because if she didn’t know what a gun was then that meant some rather unfortunate things, really. I’ll let you figure them out. Luckily for her, I had seen all I needed of the town, and let me tell you something … that place was as close to an Old West town as anything I had ever seen. Though it wasn’t just a single stretch town thankfully, which meant it would definitely have nearly everything I needed.

So now to the gun thing.

“This, Gilda, is a gun. Have you ever heard of a gun?” When she shook her head I sighed a little. “Alright, I’ll give you a description and then a demonstration.”

I first ejected the magazine so I could show her everything. Then I pulled the chamber open, ejecting the round which I caught in the same hand that was holding the magazine. Yeah, I’m good like that.

“This, is an M110 rifle. It is probably the only gun you will see if my theory is correct. This thing takes bullets,” I showed her the single bullet I ejected, “and it uses a little tiny hammer to ignite gunpowder inside the bullet to fire that copper tip down the barrel and forwards in a rather straight line at speeds faster than our eyes can perceive. In my world they are meant to hunt things or kills others that threaten you.”

“Does that mean you’v-”

“That is a can of worms for another time, Gilda. I’m going to only tell you one thing before I show you what it can do. Only the wicked and morally debased find themselves at the end of my barrel.”

It was actually kind of funny to see Gilda stunned speechless, yet she still followed along. She hadn’t questioned what I said or even thought to criticize me on how such a thing couldn’t be really. Apparently she was a good listener when she knew someone was being serious.

I gazed around for a moment as I placed the single round back into the magazine, and thankfully, facing away from the town I saw a single dead tree which we had passed earlier. I fed the magazine into the lower receiver before cocking the gun and flipping the safety off. I slowly laid down on the ground and opened the bipod before taking a quick second to feel for the wind. None was always a good wind.

“Do you see the dead tree down there, Gilda? The one we passed earlier?”

“Yeah …” she replied hesitantly.

“Good, you see the long tree branch on the right?” I asked, to which she also replied yes. “How well can you see it?”

“Clearly, I mean what do you take me for? That tree is only like a kilometer away,” she replied nonchalantly. I mentally fist pumped that this society used the metric system before turning the dial on the side of my scope barely even a single click.

“Thanks for the distance,” I said, before adjusting myself to be perfectly comfortable. “Now watch that branch … and plug your ears.”

I waited roughly ten seconds before exhaling and slowly depressing the trigger. To me, a soft thud sounded from the barrel, for Gilda it probably was the loudest bang she ever heard. The kick was hardly anything anymore but even before I could really register such a thing, the tree branch I had been aiming at exploded from the rest of the tree.

I quickly went through my process of de-mobing myself from my firing spot as I had always done, as well as picking up the single shell casing. The only thing different was that I had a griffon staring at me with wide eyes. I simply sighed before kneeling in front of her. “There is a reason I don’t want to ever see these weapons leave my possession. Understand?”

She nodded in understanding before giving a small gulp. I had actually scared the griffon into silence. Yay for me.

“Let’s get down to the town and hope they don’t kill me. Perhaps we can even get some good food for once,” I said before starting to cross the summit and descend the side facing the town.

Food break!

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…

Alright, now that I’ve got some beef jerky and whiskey in me, I think that we can continue. You see the next part really needs to be visualized but unfortunately you’ll need to hear my hopefully descriptive enough words. Seriously, the next part was probably one of the greatest things I had ever done in my life, really. Sure it wasn’t overly badass or action-packed. Nor did I pull off some crazy stunt but instead … well I’ll let you determine it when we come to it. I’ll warn you when it happens.

So, essentially Gilda and I spent a little bit of time going down the hill, though this was much easier for me than climbing up. For her it was tougher … at least for the first little bit since about half way down it got too tricky for her to even attempt with three legs. So begrudgingly on both sides, I offered to give her a piggy back down the rest of the hill. At first you might think it was adorable or something like that but in reality it was a little bit of a nightmare since the cat-bird was volatile as fuck. I was worried she would get upset at something that would be an accident and then slice my throat with a single claw.

...

No, I didn’t fucking survive the descent down. She sliced my throat halfway down and I bled to death on the mountain. I’m just a fucking ghost that is telling you all this for no fucking reason other than to entertain you.

…

Stop talking and go sit in the corner. I’ll be over shortly with some goddamned duct tape.

Holy shit.

Alright, back to what actually happened. When we finally reached flat ground I let Gilda down so there wasn’t any confusion between us, ‘cause god knows she had the hots for me. That’s sarcasm. Yes, yes it was.

“Right, so when I looked through the scope I didn’t exactly see any griffons … in fact they looked more like miniature pastel horses. Explanation please?” I asked as we continued walking to the town.

“Oh … right. Griffons actually only have about three cities back east. Ponies make-up Equestria for the most part if not all,” she replied.

“Ponies? Equestria?” Yeah it sounded exactly as you’d think. This was only the start.

“Yeah, you know. Unicorns, pegasi, earth ponies, and alicorns. You act as if you’ve never heard of ponies before, dweeb,” she replied quickly enough to not think her response fully through. Though after the dead silence for a few seconds, she eventually caught on. “Oh … right.”

“Yarp,” I said in response. “Luckily for you I can kind of guess each of those races … minus a few facts … and alicorns.”

“Alicorns? They have wings and a horn and they lead the country. They’re know as the Princesses and whatever.”

“You mean pegacorns.”

“No, I mean alicorns.”

“I’m pretty sure pegacorns is the right word,” I said, barely holding back the mischievous grin.

“It’s alicorns, you haybrained dork!” she replied with a little venom filling her voice.

“Yeah … I think I’m the expert here and I say pegacorns.”

“Alicorns!”

“Pegacorns!”

“Alicorns!”

“Pegacorns!”

“Alicorns!”

“Alicorns!”

“Pegacorns!”

“I’m glad we came to a mutual agreement,” I replied. At this point I was close to collapsing in laughter.

“Good … hey wait!” she caught on quickly, obviously.

Of course, when she caught on I was allowed to fall over laughing if I truly wanted to. Usually I can stand and keep my dignity for the most part, but when she shoved me to the ground for pulling that old trick on her, the dam burst and I laughed harder than I did for a long time. Ahh, if only you guys got the jist of that joke. I truly made Bugs Bunny proud right there. No, I’m not telling you who that is.

So after I pulled myself off the ground, I apologized quickly which surprisingly went over well enough. It seemed I was slowly breaking through to this stubborn griffon. Either way, we continued walking before I needed to ask another question.

“Is there anything I should know about these ponies? Like why they are crazy different colours?”

“Don’t ask me that question. All I know is that some of the colours make my eyes hurt, and their damned cutie marks are weirder than anything else,” she said dismissively.

“Cutie marks?” I asked incredulously. This was starting to sound like a happy-go-funland type of place.

“Yeah, each pony gets some butt tattoo that symbolizes a talent or something. Another question to not ask me,” she said ending that conversation. Though it wasn’t like we had to actually last in silence for too long for the town was quickly approaching. As we got closer and closer I noticed that this place was exactly like an Old Western town. Crazy things this world had already shown me, and believe it or not, there was a whole shit tonne more to come.

Now, at this point as we started to actually enter town, I expected at least something to happen. Someone to freak out and do something, or for everyone to freak out and do something. Either one of those would have been suitable to my expectations. Hell, it would have been a nice addition to the story in the end, but no. Nope. Nothing happened at all really minus one thing.

“Welcome to Dodge City! My name’s Braeburn and if I must say so you two are the most interesting pair to come wandering through this town,” the golden furred male(?) pony said as he seemed to greet us. “An injured griffon and by far the strangest minotaur I’ve ever seen!”

Honestly, I think Gilda wanted to sock him right in the mouth. Hell, I kind of wanted to for the oddest of reasons but at the same time, he was too damned nice to. Also, sorry to break the badass character type you’ve seen me in but a miniature horse or pony in this case wearing a cowboy hat and a vest was fucking adorably funny at the same time. Yep, you heard me and now back to my badass routine.

Kind of.

“Yeah … minotaur, right. Listen. I saw a train pull up. If you don’t mind, we’ll just be heading that way and all that,” I replied, trying to walk past him but instead he seemed to follow.

“Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, partner, but the train won’t be going anywhere for a little while. The tracks connecting us and Appleloosa were destroyed in a rogue tornado two days ago. We’re all stuck here until they bring some new tracks from Griffonstone and that won’t be for a couple of days at the earliest.”

Now how he knew all of that in the … hour, that it took to make it to the town was fucking amazing. Some crazy skill or something, but that wasn’t actually a big issue for me. Though at the same time I didn’t want to wait ‘a couple of days’ for the tracks to be fixed.

“Huh … great. Thanks for the update,” I said before zoning out. I needed a new plan. Thankfully, the golden pony took my zoning out as a hint or something and said something before departing. Now, when this actually happened I literally just stared forward for a good minute before Gilda poked me in the leg.

“Right, we’re going to need supplies if we continue on foot. At our pace we should make another town in a few days depending on how far away they are. We’ll most likely finish the trek before the train is complete anyways. Now the big issue is acquiring the local currency in order to purchase said supplies unless they use a barter system which means tha-” I started rambling out my plan before Gilda slugged me in the leg.

“Dude, I always keep bits on me, calm down,” she said before pulling a sack out of the feathers around her neck, much to my amazement. How did I not find that when I was patching her up?! And to this day I still don’t know the answer to that.

“So what do we need?” she asked. “I’ll go buy them … I have a way with ponies.”

“If by ‘way’ you mean to threaten them until they cower in fear …” And slugged in the leg again.

“Hey! I’m better than you think, dweeb.”

“Use ‘twat’ next time. Mix it up,” I said with a snicker before turning serious again. “We’re going to need to get you some bags of sort to help carry stuff. Food for the both of us, though water will be the biggest of the issues, so another canteen or two. Also anything that is medical in nature since you’re wearing like a third of my medical kit. Finally, anything that can help us make a camp overnight. So a fire starting kit is the most important, then anything that allows us to camp outside. Oh and any sharpening stones if you can find some.”

She looked at me for a few more seconds before nodding and heading off in the direction of what I assumed was the General Store, I honestly didn’t know. Of course the moment she was out of talking range I realized I forgot to add whiskey to the list. It was a serious blow to the group morale at the time.

Hmm, what was that? Yes, yes, yes, I’ll get to talking about the town. Now, as Gilda left I was still standing in the middle of the main road of the town, albeit on the outskirts more or less. Still, it allowed me to see pretty much everything about the town, which wasn’t very much. It’s tough to describe it past saying that it was a stereotypical Old West town.

One main road through the center, a few roads that went in between the larger buildings that seemed to hide smaller buildings behind it. The building structure was completely wood and had the typical look of a two room store for single story buildings with a covered patio that connected somewhat to the building next to it. The two two story buildings were obvious in their nature, especially since the blatant English writing, which is another baffling thing, said Tavern and Common House.

Now aside from the ponies milling about around the front of the stores and on the street, there was a wagon of some sort parked in front of a building. Now that wouldn’t have been anything special normally, but said wagon had a stage attached to it that was rather lavish in design. It seemed that a performer or snake oil merchant was in town today. In fact, that seemed like the best place to start my wandering of the town, even if it was just to see which of the two it was.

As I neared I got my answer for I could hear the shout of a mare, and yes that is the actual term for a female horse and pony in this case.

“Come one, come all to the greatest magic show of all time! The Great and Powerful Trixie will regale you in stories of mysticism and wonder!”

Travelling storyteller and magician rolled into one? How can you not resist even if you’ve seen everything … and no that was just a joke, I haven’t seen everything.

I saw a group of older stallions leaning by a post across the street while families made their way to the front of the stage. Why should I go into the crowd when none of the ponies even came up any higher than Gilda? Which by the was was roughly my waist.

Now, I kind of expected them to move when I came over and leaned against a pole right next to them, but instead they gave a simple nod of their heads before turning their attention back to the stage. Apparently I wasn’t even close to a big deal around this town. Back then, I couldn’t tell whether or not it was a compliment or an insult … in hindsight I feel it was slightly insulting.

Now, I’m going to be completely honest with you. When the show actually started I should have been enthralled since she did things that are not possible in our world. Magical things, literally. As I said, I should have. The reason I wasn’t? Just before the show, I saw what appeared to be a unicorn mother pick her foal up with a glowing aura that seemed to be coming from her horn.

Now there is a reason they call me the Logical Lamenter or Laramie … yes that was an actual nickname for me for a little bit. No, I’m not making that up. Laramie is still around and if I went back there they would call me that. Seriously.

Anyways, because of my awesome logic skills I concluded two things at once. One, physics in this world made physics in our world look like a toddler playing with a toy. Secondly, these unicorns, if not all of the subspecies of ponies, had access to magic of some sorts, or at least basic levitation. Now I have to admit levitation would have been the more reasonable choice based upon the evidence, but that didn’t feed the inner kid in me. Nope, I went with magic which meant that this travelling showper- I mean showpony, probably was a unicorn that knew some other spells.

So I guess the wonder died a little for me but that didn’t mean I didn’t pay attention to the show. After her grandiose introduction, she proceeded to tell a story about a ‘Ursa Major’ and how she and her trusty sidekick had wrangled the bear up through stunning illusions and trickery. She was able to actually visualise it with what looked like neon lights of some sort. It was pretty rad. That tale took a good amount of time and did some flash things, in fact so much time, that Gilda was actually back from the store and was standing beside me looking on.

Now, as she started the next story which apparently was a story about a magic duel, something unexpected happened. Something that lead to my moment of semi-badassery and epicness. Yep, it’s coming up.

A group of three stallions stormed on stage with a fourth sneaking from the other side while the other three had her distracted.

“Who said you could play in this town, you horn head? I don’t think you’ve paid Red Hooves his fares yet,” a dark orange stallion said.

“How dare you interrupt Trixie in the middle of her performance!” Yep, she spoke in third person … or is that third pony. Hmm.

“Oh, you can get on with your show, just as soon as you fork up the bits,” the orange stallion said as he drew closer to the blue mare on stage. Oh, yeah right, I never described the appearance of the performer. She was a light blue all the way around minus a silver hairstyle, though for the most part she was covered up by a star speckled cape and hat.

“Trixie will be paying nopony for something she has been allowed to do! Now please leave the stage before I have to hoof you off!”

“You can darn well try! Knocks!” As he said that, the fourth member leaped on her and hit the hat on her head but it didn’t seem to come off, instead causing her to fall to the ground in pain. They must have hit her horn.

From there … well they started to actually attack her all the while laughing, which was the final straw to what I could take. It definitely was not part of the act. As I removed myself from the post, I prepared the exact line I was going to use on those fuckers.

I quickly, though in more of a speed walking manner, made my way to the left side of the stage and slowly walked up. Cue epic moment.

“Oi! Chucklefucks!” I shouted as I marched up on stage, which apparently drew the crowd’s complete attention away from the violent scene which none of them tried to stop.

“Who the buck are you and what do you want, you skinny minofreak?!” the orange stallion said as his gang slowly stopped beating on Trixie.

“This is Les Grossman, who is this?” I said, barely holding back a sadistic grin.

“I’m Flaming Dragon you haybrained bull!” I kid you the fuck not. He actually was either named Flaming Dragon, or was called himself that. It just made my world a whole lot easier. I got right up in his face, well as close as I could while standing tall.

“Oh okay, Flaming Dragon ... fuckface. First, take a big step back … and literally fuck your own face!!” I yelled much to my delight and the stallion’s creeping terror. “Now I don’t know what kind of Pan-Equestria bullshit power play you’re trying to pull here but Dodge City, jack, is my territory so whatever you’re thinking, you’d better think again otherwise I’m going to have to head down there and I will rain down an ungodly fucking firestorm upon you! You’re going to have to call the fucking United Nations to get a fucking binding resolution to keep me from fucking destroying you! I am talking scorched earth motherfucker!

I will massacre you!

I will fuck you up!!”

Then I brought a wicked uppercut underneath his muzzle, sending him flying backwards.

I didn’t even bother to pay attention to his buddies, instead forcing my way forward and picking the stallion up by tail and neck, then proceeding to hurl him off the other end of the stage. Of course if he wasn’t unconscious after the first hit, the throw definitely put him out. The moment he hit the ground, I turned around and proceeded to crack my fingers on both my hands before cracking my neck. “Alright … who's next?”

Apparently without their big bad leader they were nothing but whimpering pussies, for they ran around me and fled the scene, but not before picking up their fallen leader and carrying him off back the way we had come. I watched them clear the town and take a right before turning around to face the downed mare. Said mare had apparently managed to pull herself together after the whole incident and stared at me for a brief moment before limping into her trailer.

I turned to the crowd and gave them all a shooing motion before deciding to follow the mare and see if she was alright.

The door to the trailer was luckily open but I was by far too big to fit into it, so I had to make due with poking my head in to see if she was okay. “You okay in there?”

“Leave Trixie alone! She’s been humiliated enough!”

“I’m not here to humiliate you! I’m just seeing if you were okay. You had a fair amount of blood on your face before you left.”

“I’m fine! Now just leave Trixie alone.”

Oh I was too stubborn for that. “Not until you come out so I can help you. I know first aid.”

There was a rather lengthy pause before she finally emerged from a small room in the back of the wagon. The mare wasn’t as bloody as before but you could definitely see the cuts on her face and the bruises on her body. She didn’t limp, which was a good thing, but it was a slow trek for her to come out and sit on the stairs which was just enough time for me to pull out my First Aid kit, and for Gilda to appear once more.

“Who’s she?” the blue mare asked while pointing at Gilda.

“Gilda this is Trixie, Trixie this is Gilda. And I’m Ryan, not Les Grossman. Now that introductions are underway, hold still while I clean those cuts,” I said before taking a puff ball that had rubbing alcohol on it and dabbing her face gently.

“So who were those stallions I had to humiliate?” I asked.

“Trixie has no idea, they simply attacked Trixie for no reason, claiming I didn’t pay them. The mayor allowed Trixie to do her show!” she said in between winces from the rubbing alcohol.

“One of them said Red Hooves or something like that,” Gilda said from behind me as she proceeded to make rustling sounds. Probably organizing her bags. Though this made me think for a second … not her organizing the bags, but what she said. Based upon the actions I saw and what they said, there was a good chance that I was going through the typical storyline of ‘outlaw/crook running the town through fear and extortion.”

Though in retrospect, I should have realised that even in this world that plotline gets a little twist that I wasn’t expecting.

“Excuse me, sir … it is sir, isn’t it?” a male voice behind me spoke up. Apparently Gilda didn’t give enough fucks to let me know through whatever forewarning system a cat-bird had. So I slowly turned around, one hand reaching for my sidearm on my hip. Didn’t I ever mention my sidearm? Really? Huh … well simply put it is an all black CZ-P09 pistol that I might or might not have a suppressor for … maybe. Seriously I thought I mentioned it before because I was sure I told you I had a pistol holster … hmm. Oh well.

When I finished turning, I saw three ponies addressing me and well … they were attempting to look serious or intimidating in ‘sheriff's’ clothes. It was more funny than anything really because the look just didn’t suit them. You could tell that despite wearing the badges they were hardly officers of the law. Probably stand ins until the new one came into town. The leader of the group was a dull yellow in colour, but had a brown moustache (and mane) that looked completely out of place considering the pony didn’t fit a ‘weathered sheriff’ role at all. He was too skinny and looked nervous as fuck. The other two, a light blue stallion and a green mare, looked even worse as deputies.

“Yarp?” I answered back, because why not. By the way I am going to use that a lot … and for you slow learners that is yes in the language of Lurch.

“Umm … yes … well you see, sir, as by the show we have been having an issue with Red Hooves and well … the actual Sheriff is in Appleloosa trying to get ponies to help capture Red Hooves … but the train is … I mean … and then you said those things … on stage …” the pony fumbled his words around as though he was talking to someone important. Important in their eyes at least, and I was nothing of the sorts, but I understood what he said in the end.

“What have they done?” I asked, a little curious.

“Well umm … extortion … assault … stealing money are the ones that happen the most but they also …” he gulped audibly before dropping his voice into a whisper, “raped some ponies.”

I cut him off from needing to say anymore by putting a hand in the air before turning around to face Trixie again. “Listen, Trixie, with those bruises and cuts you might be a little more injured that I think. Now I suggest going and finding a doctor to get them looked at if there is, but that is up to you. We can talk more perhaps later if you are still in town? I’ll pay for drinks!”

Gilda shot me a look that asked her question without her having to say it.

“With Gilda’s money of course,” I finished, my previous line much to Gilda’s resentment who actually shouted out in protest but I simply started laughing which told her I was kidding.

“Hmph! Trixie doubts she will stay in this miserable place! Trixie doesn’t need a train to get around … “ she said trailing off, a few tears appearing at the corner of her eye as she mumbled something. Something I definitely heard, and probably Gilda as well. I’m not going to tell you what she said because some things are more personal than others, and this is one of them.

I was actually going to leave at that and move onto my next objective but Gilda actually pulled me aside, away from the small group. She pulled me down with her good arm, forcing me to her level before whispering in my mind. “She mentioned Ponyville! We should see about getting her to come along … cause it seems like she really wants to.”

“Wait a moment … when did you grow a heart?” I replied sarcastically.

“Shut up, twat!” Score. “She has a wagon that would make it easier to travel in … as well as give shelter.”

I nodded my head in agreement while gazing over at Trixie before turning back to Gilda with a small smile. As I rose I gave her a small pat on her head. “Good thinking … a little behind me in the thought, but good try.”

I left her quickly enough before she could punch me again; moving over to Trixie, I could see that she was struggling a little bit to keep tears out of her eyes. She had been sitting on the steps of her wagon but there was enough room for me to scooch in … barely. Either way, I sat next to her, forcing her to turn away even more to hide the tears.

“Listen, Trixie. If you can wait until tonight, you can come with Gilda and I to Ponyville. You allow Gilda a place to sleep at night, as well as storage for our gear and I will ensure that not a single hair in your mane gets damaged,” I said, rubbing her back slightly which actually made her relax a little. I guess it was a universal thing.

She didn’t respond immediately, so I could tell she was really thinking about it. “Just think about it, alright. We’ll be going no matter what so if you want to come just talk to Gilda. Don’t be afraid of her outer demeanour … she’s actually a big softy on the inside.”

She simply nodded before I got up and walked back to Gilda. I stopped in front of her before turning to look at the group of three ‘sheriffs’. I knew what had to happen next.

“I’ll be back in a few hours … nightfall at latest. If she decides to come with us, then you two should get some sleep … if not … we’ll find a way to get some sleep. We’ll be travelling by night tonight, it’ll reduce water consumption.”

“Wait! Where the hay are you going?!” she asked, almost angry.

“Don’t worry about it. The more you think about it, the more the mind will wander,” I said before nodding to the sheriffs and gesturing with a finger for the first one to come over.

I bent down and whispered in his ear, “Make sure neither of them are hurt, and I’ll take care of Red Hooves.”

With that I walked away, not even bothering to look for a response. If they had been that desperate to ask the ‘minotaur’ for help then they would agree to anything. Even something so simple.

“Really?” he asked with a small shout.

“Permanently,” I replied just loud enough.

“What?” he asked slightly confused at the question.

“Permanently,” I answered once more.

I’m not going to tell you what happened. This is one of those things that are better left out of the story. Sometimes a story is better told with gaps … ones that leave the entire episode up to the listener’s imagination. This is one of those times.

No.

No matter how much you beg or say you can handle it, I will not recall what happened for you all. Leave if you find that unfair, curse me out, but that is my decision and it will stay final until my fucking grave.

Gilda watched as Ryan walked out of town, surprisingly slowly for someone claiming he would be back in a few hours. She didn’t exactly know what to make of him, even despite having travelled with him all day. Though that was probably entirely due to the fact neither of them really talked much past a few spur of the moment topics. Neither of them really wanted to talk about each other that much anyways.

She was an odd griffon because of that exact reason. Despite being part of Equestria, the griffon province of Prospero was almost an entirely different country to those not born in it. The culture was the biggest shock to visitors, and the oddest part of said culture was just how open griffons were when talking about themselves. Extremely boastful in accomplishments and willing to share nearly all stories, it was extremely odd for a griffon to not partake in such cultural norms.

Though there were other reasons Gilda refused to talk to Ryan, besides not taking part in that cultural aspect. Mainly, he was still hardly an acquaintance to her. Barely a travelling partner at that and only because she was too injured to just fly away. Of course that would be the only reason she would give up. Others would have to pluck out all of her feathers to get her to even say another if she didn’t want to.

“Why are you travelling with that … minotaur? Trixie doesn’t understand,” the blue mare spoke up from behind Gilda.

“Ugh, he patched me up. If it wasn’t for my bad wing I would have ditched him a long time ago,” Gilda responded, turning to face the mare who asked the question. “Also he isn’t a minotaur. He’s a human apparently.”

“Human? What’s that? Trixie has been all over Equestria and never heard of a human,” she said, even more puzzled.

“You’ve got to ask him that one. All I know is that it is what he is,” Gilda replied before flopping backwards on her back right next to the steps of Trixie’s trailer. She didn’t care at this point, she felt exhausted even though it hadn’t been that hard of a day … or even a full day yet.

For a while the two sat in silence, just enjoying the silence that enveloped the general area. Almost no ponies even passed by the area that Trixie’s trailer took up. The only ponies that even paid them any mind was the temporary sheriff and his deputies. That was how Gilda preferred it actually, and though Gilda didn’t know it, she was right next to a kindred spirit in that way.

Despite being a showmare, Trixie enjoyed the time she had to herself, even if it was the most depressing time in her life. At least that’s what she told herself.

Eventually Gilda decided to ask the question that needed to be asked. “So, are you coming with us, or what? We’re headed to Ponyville if that means anything.”

This took Trixie by surprise as she hadn’t expected the griffon to ask the question so quickly or bluntly for that matter. It made her wish that the human was back so she could deal with something that actually had tact … though after she saw how he dealt with the ruffians she wasn’t sure tact was one of the human’s assets.

It took minutes, or what felt like forever to Trixie as she kept going through the pros and cons in her head. If she went with them, he had promised her safety and that was always something that she lacked in journies across Equestria. Despite Equestria being the most peaceful country in the world, minus the supervillains, there were always areas that the Equestrian Legions couldn’t patrol and monitor. Those were the areas that the roughest outcasts inhabited. The same areas that were beyond tough to avoid.

The cons were … well it was her travelling company. She would be travelling with something that doesn't actually live in Equestria for all she knew, as well as griffon which seemed to truly not give a buck about what happened to her. Would they actually keep their promise, or just use her like so many others had in the past? She really couldn’t make up her mind on what to do in this situation.

It was this exact situation that made Trixie want to crawl back to Ponyville and ask for Twilight Sparkle to help her.

When she was last there, she had done horrible things, but in the end she felt like a changed mare, for the better. Sure, she still thought of Twilight Sparkle as her rival, but not in the bitter form that she originally was. No, it had turned into something friendly yet still competitive. Of course that was before she became the Princess of Friendship.

When that happened, Trixie had felt hurt, betrayed, lost, and yet happy for her rival. She didn’t really understand that last one especially since it meant she basically lost the competition, even if there wasn’t officially one. Yet a small voice in the back of her head told her that not only did that mean she was friends with a Princess but also that her friend had done something amazing.

Of course the rest of her told her that she shouldn’t return to Ponyville because of that exact reason. What if Twilight Sparkle had changed and become meaner … she would banish Trixie for even setting hoof in Ponyville, no doubt. That was just a small excuse, with the main one being focused entirely on her lack of being able to do anything important.

Her friend had saved the world multiple times over, been the student of Princess Celestia, and gained the title of Princess … as well as wings. All the while Trixie barely survived with her show … barely made any bits or anything. No tales of adventure that would make anypony marvel. No heroics. Nothing.

Today, though … today showed something to Trixie. It showed her that perhaps she was going about her life all wrong. She had always wanted to be the greatest mage in all of Equestria, and she wanted everypony to know it. She wanted to travel and show off her talents … yet what did it get her? A bunch of bruises and cuts, and having to be saved by a mysterious creature.

It was afterwards, when she was being cleaned up, that she felt the most lost. She felt like she had nopony to help her at all. Yet that small voice in the back of her head spoke up again, telling her that she was telling herself lies. It spoke of friends that would help her in her time of need. It told her of a purple pony that no matter what title she held, she would let Trixie bawl her eyes out into her shoulder before helping her get on her feet.

She needed Twilight Sparkle.

It was the first time in her life that she could actually say that line, and not have it being uttered with a sarcastic quality to it. The first time that there was an emotion behind those words that didn’t make a pony wince when they heard it.

And at the moment she knew her answer to Gilda.

“Trixie will go,” she replied, a little quieter than her usual boisterous voice. Instead, her voice nearly wavered; the fresh thoughts of despair still plagued her mind like a weed that just seemed to spread no matter what one did. Every single thought was focused on what she would do when she returned.

“Then … uh … we should get some rest? Like Ryan suggested,” Gilda said hesitantly. She heard the emotion in Trixie’s voice and even she knew that it was better to leave such a wound alone … at least she had learned that.

If she was even a year younger she would have said something. Now? Now she knew that the blue pony needed time.

“Sure. Trixie’s trailer has enough room,” she said before walking into the trailer. Gilda followed behind, passing through shortly after the mare and shutting the door behind her.

Night was about to start its slow descent upon the when I arrived back in town. There were still some ponies mulling around, but for the most part, the ones that had been out earlier in the day had retired back to the houses. So it was quiet, which was … not a nice change of pace, in fact it was the same pace as usual. Too much quiet drives a man wild. If you’ve ever worked as a painter, you'd understand the sentiment.

Oh, so you work as a painter? Fun, isn’t it? Have you solved the mysteries of the universe yet? Ha! That was a joke I heard a long time ago. Man walks up to a painter doing the side of a house. The man ask the painter how's it going. The painter doesn’t respond at first, still brushing the side of the house. The man tries again but this time a little louder. He startles the painter, though not badly. The painter apologizes, saying he was lost in his thoughts. The man asks the painter what he was thinking about. The painter says, the mysteries of the universe. The man, a little shocked, asks “What mysteries?” The painter replies, “Why we’re here, what our purpose is, if we are the only thinking beings in the universe, you know … those kinds of things.”

The man asks how far he’s thought those out. The painter replies with, “Oh, I’ve figured out all of those already. What I can’t wrap my head around, is how the hell I’m still stuck here painting.”

Ehh? Funny huh?

…

It was funny to me. Tough fucking crowd.

Whatever, continuing on I guess.

So as I walked the sole street in the town, I saw that Trixie’s carriage was still there, and that in fact the three officers of the law were still guarding it. They held up their end of the deal, much like I had held up mine.

When I neared them, they perked up a little and started to meet me slightly ahead of my destination. It seemed that they were eager to hear if I had done what I set out to do. So eager in fact, that you could see their faces brighten up drastically, filling with hope.

“Are they …” the interim sheriff started asking but I cut him off.

“You’ll never have to worry about Red Hooves again,” I said simply, no real inflection in my voice.

“You drove them off?! Thank Celestia, mister!” And I’m not shitting with you. That was probably the most country-sounding phrase ever.

“Sure … drove them off,” I answered. If that doesn’t spark your imaginations and shut you all up, then fuck me sideways and call me the Princess of the Moon.

Whatever.

They gave me their thanks over and over again, while constantly telling me that if there was anything I needed I could just ask of them and they would be more than happy to help. Of course to that, I told them that we wouldn’t be in the town for much longer so there wasn’t anything I really needed.

Of course, the moment they started walking away I remembered the one thing that I hadn’t told Gilda to get.

“Whiskey!” I said, getting their attention thankfully.

“Whiskey?” The interim Sheriff said hesitantly.

“Yeah, your finest whiskey or bourbon. Hell, Scotch also works if you don’t have the others. And I want the whole bottle,” I replied with a grin that they couldn’t see. A hero such as me deserves that at least.

“Plum, go to the tavern and get this minotaur the finest whiskey!” the interim Sheriff said to the mare deputy. She raced off to get the bottle. Thank god for small miracles, eh?

During the time that it took her to get the bottle and bring it back, the air was filled with awkward silence, which was broken the moment I had the bottle in my hands. They were still filled with joy at my success and parted ways before that joy died down. I bet they actually went to the tavern to get shit faced.

I didn’t really care where they went afterwards since all that was on my mind was getting back on the road. With or without the third partner. Speaking of which, I decided to go see if Gilda had convinced Trixie to come with us.

Why did I want her to come with us? Good question, and though I would love to be a sarcastic bastard and throw the question back in your face, it actually helps develop the plot and I completely forgot about it.

You see, at first you might think that I was using her completely for the fact that she had a wagon which would greatly increase our survival skills and well as our storage capacity. Well … you’d be right … initially. When I first saw what she had, I figured she was a traveller as it was, and after the result of the performance I knew that she would most likely want to get out of town. She was no different than many others who had fallen into the same issues.

So why not ask if she wanted to come with us? She would be moving to another town and we would get the help that her trailer offered. Perfect idea, really. Of course, that was until I heard what she said. It brought me back to the destination that Gilda had mentioned this morning, and with a quick bout of reasoning, she should be more than willing to travel with us if she desired to go back to Ponyville.

When she had said what she said, and I’m still not going to repeat it, I knew that I couldn’t look at her as mere means of improving our travelling conditions anymore. She was in need of help and comfort. A solo travel would do her no good, and most likely leave her in a situation she wouldn’t be able to endure alone. So why not offer my help? It was the ethical and moral thing to do.

Damn my morals, huh? Haha!

As I neared the trailer, I noticed that there was no light coming out of the windows, which meant that either they weren’t there or they had indeed taken my advice about sleeping now so we would be able to continue during the night.

So I knocked.

Knock, Knock, Knock “Trixie.”

Knock, Knock, Knock “Trixie.”

Knock, Knock, Knock “Trixie.”

On the third knock, the exact opposite of Trixie opened the door and growled out a very firm ‘what?’. Ah, that was good news at least, since that meant Gilda and Trixie had gotten along at least.

“Good evening to you too, Madam Gilda. What a pleasant evening it is! Perhaps you’d like to go for a leisurely stroll amongst the rose garden? I will ask the butler to bring out the wine and we shall sit and gaze upon the encroaching moon,” I said with a seductive voice and a shit-eating grin.

Gilda glared at me for a good moment, not even phased by what I said. Apparently she was learning to take anything, that I didn’t say seriously, at face value. The only response I got was a groan of annoyance before she let the door handle go and proceeded back inside.

If I had decided to follow her, I would have had to crawl to fit well. It wasn’t extremely small mind you, but I knew that unless I wanted to be bent at the waist, essentially, I would have to crawl. Of course I didn’t actually follow, instead opting to wait outside, listening as Gilda apparently shook Trixie awake.

I took to humming a song off the top of my head, which I won’t play because there would be no point in it. Let me just say that it is an awesome song. All my music is awesome.

So when Gilda finally came out of the trailer, she simply stopped in front of me, none of her bags on her or the supplies for that matter and simply said, “She’s coming with us.”

“Solid … we’ll need to pack up her stage though. Ugh, this could take a little bit,” I said, rubbing my hand over my still clothed face. It would delay us longer than I wanted since I was actually back a little later than expected.

“There is no need for that! The Great and Powerful Trixie has that all taken care of!” Trixie said in her, what turned out to be normal, boisterous stage voice. The blue mare trotted out of her trailer, right past us and to the side of the stage before turning to look at the stage. The stage was encased in a magenta glow. At least I think magenta is the colour? She never told me and I never cared to ask.

Either way, the stage was surrounded in the glow which was probably coming from her horn. At first I … well I didn’t even have a clue as to what she was going to do originally. So when the stage seemed to shrink before folding up into the side of the trailer, I was amazed to say the least. Well … I think it was amazement from her tricks earlier that had yet to be spilled outwards.

So I gave a clap at what I saw, which actually elicited a confused look from Trixie. “What, have you never seen magic before, human?”

“Nope, and if you’re interested I’ll tell you why,” I said before doing a few stretches to get my body ready. Gilda actually followed my lead in a way and decided to proceed to do the same. Yeah, sure the stretches were kind of out of nowhere, but that’s what happens when you are old. Your body starts to get stiff and you need to stretch to get used to travelling again. Hell, I’m lucky to be as agile as I am for my age. I blame all those nanomachines I swallowed back in Berlin. Now that is a hell of a story. One of my best tales really.

Too bad this ain’t it, huh?

Trololololo. Haha! You don’t know how long I’ve practiced that troll thing. Years! Fucking years and it was worth it!

Ahem, so as we all prepared to head off into the wild blue yonder, I saw Trixie looking at me as those I was supposed to say something to enlighten her.

“What?”

“Trixie is waiting for you to tell her why,” she said indignantly, all the while hooking herself up into the harness for the carriage.

“Oh, you expected me to say it now? Ha! That’s not how things work right now, Trixie. Even ask Gilda; in this travelling chain gang, we play twenty questions to find out answers,” I replied, earning a huff from said cat-bird. I lowered my voice just a little so it was still loud enough for Gilda but soft enough to imply it was supposed to be a whisper, “Gilda is horrible at it by the way.”

You ever been punched in the nuts? From behind? Some of you? Fair enough, well let me tell you … the bony knuckles of a human hand are soft and plush compared to a griffon talon. You’re all lucky bastards for never having experienced such pain.

“Oh god my jimmies,” I squeaked out before collapsing to the side, my hands trying fruitlessly to ease the pain.

The next few minutes were agonizingly painful, and apparently I was pretty pitiful, laying on the ground holding my nuts and whimpering, because when I finally was able to stand again, despite remaining traces of pain, something unexpected happened.

“I’m … I’m sorry,” Gilda stammered out, looking completely opposite of how she normally looked. That’s to say, shy. Let me tell you … it was cute as fuck. That face beat the face of every single woman I have ever seen. Ever.

“Yeah … don’t worry … all’s good,” I groaned out as I attempted to fully straighten myself, which brought on a new type of discomfort in my groin. Well … new as in at that exact moment, all you guys know what I mean.

So skipping ahead, past the minor bit of snickering and the agonising time it took to walk off being punched in the nuts, we eventually made it out of town. As we exited the other side, right next to the train tracks, I got a good look at the train, and let me tell you. It was designed by a six year old girl. It was that … crazy of a design to say the least.

Either way, we wouldn’t be riding it it anyways so I didn’t have to even worry about thinking about it. Instead we simply followed the tracks because it was the smartest thing to do when you needed to get to the next town over. Though in the end it might not be the best if it had other stops … so for that moment it was headed southwest-ish which meant it was alright to follow it.

Now … let me tell you something that is honestly a little surprising. You’ve heard a little bit of how Trixie acts and how I’ve described the blue mare. Well let me tell you something … she does indeed shut up. Apparently there is a universal rule or at least one in this land that read along the lines of ‘All travelers must walk in awkward silence until a certain point’.

I’m not kidding. It happened with Gilda earlier in that day and it happened that night.

Speaking of which, let me tell you something I’ve learned and grown to love over the years. When you get away from cities, you see the most beautiful pitch black darkness amongst the ground and the brightest stars up in the skies. It is one beauty that our world has now after everything. In Equestria … that’s cranked up to eleven … thousand.

The moon was bright … holy shit it was bright as fuck. Bright enough that it was acting as a dimmer sun for the most part. Dark enough that if you closed your eyes it didn’t keep you awake, yet at the same time it allowed anyone to see in the dark. Did I mention it was also fucking massive compared to ours? Seriously, it was probably twice the size of Earth’s.

Yet the most beautiful thing of the night was the stars … the endless amounts of stars glistened across the sky as though a light was being shone on them to enforce their beauty. Such was the night sky that you could even see what appeared to be galaxies among the sky. Coloured clouds that fell in behind the stars. I marvelled at the sight, letting my eyes take in the entire spectacle.

“It’s just the night sky,” Gilda said to me, finally breaking the silence.

“When most of your life, you see hardly a star in the sky because of light pollution and a horrible atmosphere … you can’t help but see such a sight as the most beautiful painting of them all,” I replied before looking back down to her. Apparently my response drew out a thought as she contemplated something before nodding her head.

“I guess you’re right … for once,” she finally said.

I hummed in reply, knowing that slowly I was worming my way under the hard shell that Gilda encased herself in. If I was going to help her or Trixie for that matter, I needed to know more about them. It wasn’t a cut and dry case of ‘they need this’ like some people I had helped in the past. No, this needed to be handled with care and by someone who they could consider a friend.

“So I guess, I know more about you then you know about me … or probably even Gilda for that matter,” I said to Trixie who had maintained our previous silence. “So let’s start over, hmm?”

“I guess that is suitable for Trixie,” she said with a small smile. “She is curious about you, human.”

“Well to start off, my name is Ryan. I do have a last name but that is being withheld temporarily. I’m probably about forty two, though not sure … and don’t ask how that happened. My home … it’s impossible to tell how long it has been. Oh … and I’m from another planet. Fun, huh?”

“Another planet? That explains why Trixie’s most simplistic magic impressed you … hmm,” she murmured but her thoughts were cut off as I gave Gilda a slight nudge to introduce herself.

“I’m Gilda, from Griffonstone,” she said with a little bit of finality to that statement, but I gave her another nudge and a glare. She needed to work on opening up. “Ugh, fine! I was travelling by myself to Ponyville when a Rogue Tornado caught me by surprise and knocked me out. Ryan … ugh … saved me. Now here we are, good enough?”

She spun her head back to me at that final question. “Now, was that so hard, Gilda? Sometimes you have to be friendly and open up.”

“Whatever,” she dismissively said, though I felt as though some little tidbit got through to her.

“How about you, Trixie? Aside from your name and what you’ve been doing, we don’t know much … though the same can be said for Gilda,” I said, which apparently went right past Gilda.

“Well, Trixie is a travelling showmare. She resides in no one town and is always moving. I’ve travelled to many places to entertain … though it seems that Trixie’s stories are not good enough anymore …” she said with a somber tone before sighing and continuing. “My cutie mark is in magic and showponyship, which obviously shows my talent!”

“Ahh, gotcha,” I said with a nod, still paying attention to Trixie but hopefully trying to convey that I didn’t want to talk about that subject. Of course that’s not how life works.

“So, Trixie wonders if humans have cutie marks? Or are you closer to minotaurs as everypony referred to you as?”

Huh, this mare was smarter than I thought.

“If you want to compare me to a minotaur then sure, that works. We don’t get cutie marks … though if we want to we can willingly ink ourselves.” I have some pretty awesome tattoos … though you don’t get to see them. I will describe them, but later on when it actually happened in the story.

“Oh, so you have tattoos as well? Closer to a minotaur than I thought … or perhaps a griffon …” Trixie said with a voice that was implying something. I immediately dismissed it and instead looked to Gilda, who apparently had caught the inflection and the meaning.

“Ugh, no way in Tartarus,” she grumbled before continuing forward at a little bit of a faster pace. Though one thing I noticed as she walked ahead was a little stumble with her unbroken foreleg. That wouldn’t be good if she wore that leg out from walking too much. I mean we had been probably walking silently for an hour and no doubt her legs were getting tired, considering the earlier part of the day.

“Hey, Trixie … think you can pull the trailer and someone in it at the same time?” I asked, not sure if she was as strong as a normal horse would be.

“Easily! Trixie worked on a rock farm for a while; pulling my trailer is hardly anything for me!”

“Good, because Gilda needs to rest her legs. The strain of walking on three instead of four is getting to her,” I said. Unfortunately that statement was loud enough for Gilda to hear.

No, I didn’t get hit in the balls again, thankfully enough. I did get a fair amount of spittle on my jacket though. And yes, I was still wearing all my gear. The heat did not and still doesn’t bother me anymore.

“What did you say?! Did you call me weak?!” Gilda turned around on me, the anger almost palpable in the air.

“I said you need your rest because you’re going to wear yourself out if you don’t-”

“I’m not weak! I can walk on three legs easily, and no twat, especially not you, is going to tell me that I can’t!” she cut me off.

When in a normal conversation I can stand for someone to cut me off, meaning I deal with it. When there is a shouting match or an argument … that’s a step across a line that you can’t cross.

“Listen here, you piece of shit hodge-podge of chicken feathers and house cat, if you want to fucking keep walking on your three remaining legs, go right fucking ahead, but when you fucking collapse in the middle of the desert, neither I nor Trixie is going to fucking pick you up. I will fucking leave you to be feasted off of by vultures before I fucking let a prideful bitch like you think for one moment that I will help someone that can’t even fucking understand when to accept help. So I’ll say it once and only once. Either you get inside the trailer or I’ll leave you to die.”

Yep.

Word for word.

Kind of went Drill Sergeant … except not at all at the same time. If only I could have recorded some of their lines, it would have helped immensely in my life. Mine were weak compared to some stories I heard.

Gilda stared back at me for a few moments, her posture still showing defiance, but as I looked at her eyes I saw that within her gold eyes that there was belief that I would leave her. There was fear in the brash griffon’s eyes.

I knelt down in front of her, grabbing her by the shoulders, pre-emptively stopping her from running. “Listen, Gilda. Sometimes what one says, no matter how harsh, is for the best. As long as you trust me to help you, I will not do anything that could harm you. If you truly want to go off on your own, I can’t stop you, but as long as I am around I will not let you die on purpose … no matter if I say it out of anger.”

She turned her head, and especially her eyes away from me before nodding her head in acceptance. I released her letting her head into the trailer, though she left the door open when she fully walked inside.

“It needed to be done,” I said before even looking at Trixie. I didn’t know if she was going to say anything or not, but instead I just started walking again.

That was the beginning of the longest gap of quiet.

Even now when I look back on what I said … I still think it was the right thing to do, even Gilda agreed when I asked her about it later. Still … recalling it is a little painful. I never like recalling things that involved hurting someone I care about. Though often enough it comes up in stories I tell … it won’t be the last time I remember such a time in this story.

One thing I forgot to mention when we started our journey that I kind of skimmed through, was that I turned my stopwatch on on my iPod. So during our little, or in this case extremely long, break of silence I checked my stopwatch.

We had been travelling for three hours. Wow, that’s actually pretty impressive, all things considered. Especially considering how I only took two light sips of water and neither Trixie nor Gilda had any. Honestly, time truly seemed to fly while we walked, though I was regretting the silence that loomed around us. Talking was always a good way to make the journey shorter.

So we continued walking in silence because there was really nothing to talk about at the time.

Another hour passed …

And another.

Though eventually one thing won out over us all. Hunger.

It started off with a growl from my very own stomach, though not even close to loud enough for them to hear, however it did start the chain reaction of hunger pangs. Trixie was the second one to fall prey, while Gilda’s was by far the loudest … also because she directly stated she was hungry immediately afterwards.

“Agreed, lets stop here for a little bit and eat and relax. Take a nap if you want to,” I said before stretching my arms up and out. Sometimes even though you’re already loose, you just need to stretch.

“Hey, Gilda. Is there a fire-starting kit in there?” I said as I neared the entrance of the trailer.

“Yeah, catch,” she said before chucking a small box out at me. I caught it easily before replying with a thanks and turning around to see about where to make a fire.

There was surprisingly enough stuff around, though just barely. I could easily gather the rocks to form the makeshift pit, but the wood was a little more sparse. Luckily I spotted a downed tree in the distance that would easily allow us to burn the bark a little bit if we chopped it carefully. The ultimate last resort was my whiskey, but that was only life or death use.

“You do realise, Trixie could just use her magic to make the fire,” the blue mare said as she neared me while I built my little rock pit.

“If you utilise magic all the time, you’ll become accustom to it so badly that when it fails you’ll be helpless,” I said simply, not even looking at her. I was still a little ‘bitter’ from the Gilda incident even though I had already resolved the issue, including the one in my own head.

I think Trixie actually balked at that statement. In fact, I turned around to her and found her struggling for words. I simply patted her on the head before saying, “It’s not meant as an insult. It’s how I view all things when used excessively and inclusively.”

“Oh,” she replied simply.

“Mhm, though I wouldn’t mind if you used your magic to drag that downed tree over here so I can make a fire for us to sit around.”

Without a sound, Trixie made her way over to the fallen tree, which wasn’t that far, maybe thirty meters away, and picked it up in her magic as though it was nothing. She then proceeded to trot back to me with the surprisingly large tree in her magic. Oh how I would love to have a taste of being able to do that. It would allow my old bones to rest more often.

So as she dropped the tree close to the pit, I simply snickered and shook my head at the sight. She of course was confused but apparently didn’t want to question it for she instead made her way to her trailer, probably to get some sort of food. Or at least that’s what I thought.

Shortly after she disappeared, she reappeared with an axe in her magic. To that I smiled, because it meant something rather important.

Trixie knew what she was doing.

And I knew what I was doing.

So we both just nodded at each other and began to hack at the tree. With what did I hack at the tree you ask? Didn’t I tell you? I always keep a machete with me. It rests in the small of back right underneath my other pack back there. I usually use it for … wait! I fucking told you already!

Yeah, I did! In fact I told you last time that I used my knife for cutting the boar!

Okay, so I said knife instead of machete, sue me! It’s a fucking machete.

Whatever you fuckwads.

So while Trixie went about hacking off logs that we would use to stoke the fire, I proceeded to hack off smaller kindling and bark so that the fire would have a nice little kickstart at the beginning. While we were hacking at the tree, I heard Gilda moving around behind me before walking back to the trailer … and then back out here. She did that a few more times before she went back into the trailer for good. Hmm.

I didn’t worry too much about that, especially since I needed to get the kindling done quickly, Trixie was starting to really destroy her side of the tree. Though I wasn’t too worried since my job was infinitely easier than hers. Well … kind of. She had magic on her side so it could be considered cheating.

Eventually we both finished, though we left a large enough piece of the tree. Left for … well for whatever reason.

So as I moved back to the fire pit, I noticed that there were small containers of food on a small wooden tray somewhat close to the fire, as well as a sleeping blanket and some pillows that sat on top of said sleeping blanket. Wow … Gilda either felt really bad not being able to help or … well that was the most likely scenario.

I’ll just skip some boring filler about me making a fire and the others gathering around. Eventually we sat down to our meal. Trixie ended up cooking some grains and vegetables while I roasted some of the boar from the previous night. She was surprisingly calm about our eating meat, which I merely attributed that to the fact she had travelled a lot.

Eventually I broke the silence by saying that I was going to go have a nap, before heading off in the direction of the trailer. Which actually elicited some concerns, and I’ll tell you why.

“Dude, there is no way you’re fitting in there,” Gilda said with some hesitation behind her voice. Still probably fearing me a little.

“What’s this now?” I asked while standing next to the open doorway of the trailer.

“Trixie’s trailer is larger and all, but Trixie knows you will not fit well in there,” Trixie replied instead of Gilda.

“Oh, who said anything about sleeping inside the trailer?” I said as I climbed up onto the roof of the thing.

Now you may be wondering two things.

A) Why did I decide to sleep up on the trailer? and B) Could the trailer support me?

First off, I enjoy looking at the night sky while I sleep, it feels relaxing. Secondly, I knew for a fact Trixie’s trailer could support me, mainly because I had slept on a smaller one in the past. That trailer was simply a cargo trailer compared to hers that was made for living in.

I don’t think I properly explained to you what the trailer looks like. The thing was probably six meters long and at least two meters across so there was easily enough room for anything to be in there. The reason I wouldn’t fit was because the ceiling was made for these ponies that came up to my waist. Sitting on top of the trailer base was a rounded roof that was easily flat and large enough at the very top for me to lay on comfortably (thankfully I rarely moved in my sleep).

Unfortunately I can’t for the life of me recall the exact decorations and the colour of the carriage. It has been awhile since I’ve seen it after all. That, and it didn’t really make a memorable impression … unlike that fucking train.

Back to the moment after I said that line.

I simply used a few foot holds and thus scaled the trailer with great ease, crawling up until I was able to position myself on my back. Staring up at the night sky was always a lovely thing to do. Of course, before I laid down, I made sure to shift around my weapons, and bags so that they were beside me or on my chest.

“Wake me in like an hour,” I said as I leaned up to look at the two down there. They nodded their heads, which meant … sorry, I know you’re not that stupid.

Alright, now let me tell you something before we move into the next part. First off, and I stated it before, I can lucid dream. That meant I can tell when I am in a dream thus making me able to morph the dream to my will. I’ve long since mastered it … when you do it almost every night it becomes ridiculously easy. Now, the second thing I need to tell you is that I can also wake up on command, though that is more from inducing a shock to me in the dream. Those guys from Inception would be proud of what I can do.

Thirdly, let me tell you this. Despite what happens, it’s, by Equestrian standards, not at all freaky or creepy. You’ll see why I said that in a second.

Now, have you ever had a dream that you couldn’t forget no matter how hard you tried, if you even tried at all? Some of you? Well, this is one of those dreams. Sure the beginning of it was also one that I always remembered and returned to, but that night’s outcome is always fresh in my mind because looking back, it was fucking hilarious.

So when I closed my eyes, I actually started off in a black space, one that I could walk on. That’s where I always start when I decide to build my dreams. Yet that night I was feeling rather nostalgic and decided to build one of my dreams that I kept going back to.

A family reunion in a nice provincial park that we always visited. It included every family member that was descended from my grandfather on my dad’s side. Every two years we would go there and unwind. It was the same cabins almost all the time, the same fire pits we’d sit by and bullshit. It was heaven to remember all of them, yet at the same time it was extremely somber because it made me remember all of my cousins.

I didn’t always get along with every single one of them, but that didn’t matter for just the setting and all the family mended any frayed bonds quickly enough. We’d play bocce ball, volleyball, minigolf, golf, biked around, and took walks through the forest. Then when we weren’t doing that, we drank and acted silly. Such great times and I would give anything to have one more family reunion there. Anything.

Sigh, what a sad thing huh? Well that was exactly how things went weird.

See, I kept my normal image, the one I actually looked like and then just adjusted the dream so that I would appear like the old me to my dream family. Everything I wore and had was on me yet I went around acting like I was twenty again. It was amazingly fun, but then something happened.

We were all sitting around a campfire, chatting. I’d heard the stories all before, but no matter how many times I was told them, I laughed at them as though it was the first time hearing them. Yet when it came around to a story from me, I froze. There was something watching the scene. Or somepony watching, to be correct.

Behind me, I heard a voice speak, though it wasn’t directed at me or for that matter anyone of my dream family. It was as though the mare believed herself to be alone. “What an odd dream ... and odd creatures too. They seem so happy yet the dream is melancholic and wistful. I wonder why?”

Now, I knew for a fact that the mare that said this was not of my imagination. Now, the only reason I’m telling ahead of time that it was a female pony is because I actually caught her out of the corner of my eye. She was not directly behind me, but more to my seven o’clock, seven thirty at best, so I was able to turn my head slightly and go undetected.

I was legitimately freaked out that I was seeing this pony in my dreams. That wasn’t the worst part of my fears though, and you’ll know why in a second.

The mare took a step forward as sounded off by the crinkling of the grass, yet when she took a second one, I knew that was enough dreaming for one night.

With a simple thought the entire dream faded out, only to leave a light gray background and the camping chair I was sitting on. This startled the pony immensely.

“What?! What is going on? Why did the dream unfold?!”

At that, I stood up and turned to face the pony; the chair disappeared the moment I started to stand. When I finished facing the pony in question, my face paled.

Standing in front of me was a much taller, darker blue mare. Said mare had this weird ethereal mane and tail that flowed in an invisible wind. This pony stood roughly at pec level on me which meant that not only was this mare taller than any other pony I had seen, she also had to be special. How right I was when I noticed the two most defining features of her.

Her horn.

And her flared wings.

She was a pegacorn … or alicorn if you are picky, which meant one thing and one thing only.

One of the Princesses.

Now in a more normal situation I would have acted rationally and greeted the pony princess, but this was my first time meeting her and it was in my dreams. That freaked me out more than I like to admit. Of course my paled face and wide eyes didn’t stop the Princess from trying to talk to me.

“You’re the dreamer?! Amazing! Who are you? How’d you change the dream like that? I’ve never seen anything like that, or you for that matter! Wait … what are you doing?” she said

See, when she first began speaking I was standing stock still in fear, but as she started to not attack and kill me, I proceeded to come up with the most on the spot way of waking myself up. I imagined a small red two dimensional box, about the size of both my hands stacked on top of each other. Then I added a small wire that ran to my arm. Said wire would deliver a shock when the button was pressed.

Upon seeing said box, the Princess got the hint. Mainly because the red box had an X on it and above it, floating in the air, read the word ‘close’.

“Wait, wait, wait! Don’t go! I don’t mean-” she managed to get out before I cut her off with a single, loud …

“Nope!” then pressed the box.

Next thing I knew, I was awake. Awake and unharmed by the blue pony princess. Thank all that was good.

“Oh! Good, you’re awake, Trixie was about to wake you,” Trixie said from the ground to the left of my sleeping position.

“Yeah … yeah, I’m awake. How long was I out?”

“Only an hour, dork … you know, like you asked?” Gilda replied instead.

“Oh … good,” I said as I sat up, seeing the fire put out and all the supplies and items gone. They had packed up camp without me. “I guess it’s time to get going. huh?”

“According to your plan, yeah,” Gilda replied again. I simply sighed before slipping off the top of the trailer and onto the ground.

“Then let’s get going,” I said as Trixie hooked herself back up to the trailer, and Gilda sat down in the doorway, so she could at least be a part of the travelling team. So just like that, our break was over and we were off towards the next town.

Believe it or not, this time we actually spoke! Gasp! What magical wonders are ablaze?!

…

I can see that even now, my sarcasm isn’t that welcomed. I am severely disappointed in your town for not being able to handle such amazing sarcasm. Though admittedly few people I have ever met can in fact handle my sarcasm well enough.

Now, despite the fact we were talking, I initially didn’t like it. Why? Because they got to ask the questions first … though predominantly it was Trixie who asked.

“Trixie is curious what your world is like,” Trixie said out of nowhere. “You have yet to speak of it! Even Gilda has no clue.”

“There is a reason for that,” I mumbled under my breath, probably still loud enough for them to hear, but if they did, neither of them showed it. “First off, let me say that when I compare your world right now, to my world … well I don’t have enough to really compare, but I can safely assume that your world is going to be a paradise in comparison.”

“Why do you say that?” Gilda asked.

“We haven’t been attacked yet … or killed for that matter. Though would we even know if we were killed? Perhaps we are merely walking in purgatory awaiting judgement!”

To that they simply looked at me with confused faces. None of them got it … nor the sarcasm that the statement was literally dunked it.

“You’re bucking weird,” Gilda simply said. Buzz kill.

I decided to actually go back to Trixie’s question, “Simply put, Trixie, my world got ravaged by the closest thing to an apocalypse and now humans are not only much scarcer, but also not in control of the world anymore … the planet itself is its own master once more.”

“Interesting … is that why you carry such weapons?”

“What?!” I nearly shout back at her, the surprise on my face was indeed palpable.

“That thing on your back, and the one on your leg. It looks like the weapons that Trixie saw minotaurs use in Tayros,” she said nonchalantly. Damn this mare was crafty … I liked her more and more … despite the near heart attack. I would have liked to keep the fact I was carrying weapons a secret from at least one of my travelling companions.

“Minotaurs … are using guns … and they haven’t taken over the world?”

“Well, they never called them ‘guns.’ That’s such an ugly word, though flintlock isn’t much better,” Trixie replied to which I visibly relaxed. “Besides, the minotaurs are the friendliest nation aside from Equestria. They just like inventing things.”

“Riiiight …” I said before becoming quiet. If she didn’t answer my question like that, I would have had a big issue being here. Still … that could be a problem in the future.

Or was it?!

Maybe it was!

Maybe it wasn’t!

Find out next time on Dragonball Z!

…

Haha, you should see your faces right now. Fucking priceless.

No, I’m not done for this segment. I know I’ve been talking for like four hours straight. You only have to suffer a little more.

Eventually, after walking a little bit more in silence, I decided to flip the question back on Trixie. “What’s Equestria like?”

At first, Gilda looked like she was going to respond, but after a moment of hesitation, she became quiet and contemplative. Odd … very odd … if she doesn’t open up next time I ask her, I’m going to need to get her drunk enough so that she does answer.

“Well … Trixie likes it … for the most part,” the blue mare said, though she appeared to be thinking as well. I guess it is tough for a native citizen to really describe their country without being biased. “For the most part, it is a calm and peaceful place … minus Ponyville, but that’s because of all the harmonic magic that Equestria resides on.”

I gave her a flat stare, one that wasn’t questioning her, but closer to asking her silently.

“Oh, right. Trixie forgot you aren’t from around here. You’re lucky Trixie studied at the Canterlot School for Gifted Unicorns!” Right back to boasting … even if it was temporary. “Thanks to many factors throughout or history, The Founding, The Rise of the Sisters, and the Discord Wars, Equestria has become a ground that is basking in harmonic magic. The magic keeps everything in sync with one another. It allows pegasi to manipulate the clouds, the earth ponies to accelerate their farms, and unicorns to perform many feats other than levitation. It essentially is what allows Equestria to be Equestria!”

Wow, right?

Yeah, some decent info drop she threw me then, and it still amazes me that the only reason the ponies could do what they do is because of some latent magic in the land. Amazing.

Want to know my response?

“Uhh … cool … back to the topic?”

“Right, Trixie is sorry … Trixie has been told she rambles at times, but Trixie still doesn’t hear it,” she says haughtily before finally getting back to the topic. “Trixie would say that Equestria is a good place to live, for the most part. Rather boring, but it is nice.”

“Interesting, interesting … say .. can you tell me about the Princesses?”

“Tell you?! Ha! Trixie is friends with one, of course she can tell you! I’ll start with the one Trixie knows the best. The Princess of Friendship, Twilight Sparkle! She used to be just a purple unicorn … now she’s a purple alicorn. When she was a unicorn, she and Trixie were rivals, but now … well as you can tell that isn’t possible,” she said, to which I nodded. Makes sense, can’t attack royalty and all that, though Trixie didn’t explain how Princess Twilight Sparkle became an alicorn. “Then there is Princess Cadance, the Princess of Love. She rules over the Crystal Empire with her husband Prince Armor. Trixie doesn’t know them as well. She’s pink is all Trixie really knows.”

Yep, you heard it. Pink and known as ‘The Alicorn of Love.’ Can anyone say marketing ploy for young girls? Which … surprisingly you’d be mistaken … mainly considering that she’s a real living being and all that.

“Then there is the oldest two Princesses. Princess Luna and Princess Celestia. They raise the moon and sun respectively, though Princess Luna is also the Dream Warden,” Trixie said, though before she could go on, I cut her off. I wasn’t going to debate the whole ‘rise the sun and moon’ portion right then. That was for another time.

Yes, you’ll get to hear it. I know, I made you guys balk at that statement.

“Let’s start with Celestia,” I say really, really quickly. When Trixie said ‘Dream Warden,’ a quick shiver ran up my spine. There was no doubting who I met in my quick dream.

“Well, Trixie has never personally met Princess Celestia, but Twilight Sparkle says she is really kind and loving. Twilight Sparkle used to mentor under Princess Celestia so Trixie believes she is blinded. Princess Celestia is known as the Great White in some circles for a reason … aside from the fact she is white. She seems to know everything and anything that happens under her nose. Trixie isn’t sure if that’s good or bad,” Trixie says with a small sneer.

Trixie was also displaying a biased attitude, but I let her continue on thinking otherwise. It wouldn’t help if I pointed out her faults on a regular basis … especially that third person speak.

“Now, Princess Luna … Trixie likes Princess Luna. Trixie sympathizes with her, feeling like she is in the shadow of another. That, and Princess Luna has helped Trixie on a few occasions with dreams and life issues. Trixie only wishes she could repay the Princess back. Also, Trixie likes her because she is blue and blue mares need to stick together.”

I merely nodded, still thinking about how my first ‘meeting’ with Princess Luna went. Perhaps next time I won’t be so hasty in pressing the big red X. That, or I’ll come up with something more imaginative to close out my dreams with.

Apparently that was the last question of the night … only because the sun was rising as she finished speaking. It was going to be a long day since if I had my way, we’d keep moving through the approaching town.

Right, I didn’t mention that as Trixie finished speaking, the next town came into sight. Hell, we made fucking great time. Seriously it was a little weird that it only took us one night of walking to make it to the next town, yet that golden pony back in Dodge made it seem as though he was stuck there …. What a pansy.

Nah, not really, I just like name calling.

As we approached, Trixie spoke up once more, “Ahh, Appleloosa! … Trixie dislikes it here.”

I started snickering at how she managed to instantly kill an excitement she seemed to create. That mare was a keeper.

“Alright, so we’ll park Trixie’s trailer and then stock up on a few supplies. Once that’s done, we can sleep for a bit. Around midday we’ll get going again. Though if this place has a tavern I think it would be a fine idea to get a drink before we leave.”

“Trixie agrees to that idea,” she said approvingly.

“Fine, whatever … just wake me up when that happens,” Gilda says before giving a big yawn. Once done, she made her way into the trailer to find a place to sleep.

“Just give me a list with stuff you need … oh and some bits … I’m good for them,” I said, rubbing the back of my head.

“Sure you are, and Trixie was born yesterday,” she says with an eye roll. “Trixie will lend you some bits for now, but she expects you to pay her back in some way.”

“Agreed.”

And with that we went into Appleloosa.

And with that you all are free to get the fuck out of my cave.

Ta-ta! Toodaloo! Arrivederci! Good riddance! And so on and so on.

Author's Notes:

Chapter's title song: Far Away From Here - Headstones

This was a mammoth to write, but that's just how I like it! There is honestly little to say with regards to this chapter. no clarifications, or statements. Just Ryan gathering the next member of his wandering party. Though that should be obvious from the story picture :P

Remember to leave questions if you are curious about anything. Take care and thanks for reading!