With one little breath, the fire went out.

He looked at the extinguished candle and sighed. All around him many candles, both new and almost out of wax, burned brightly in the little grotto where he sat.

He spied a simple ceramic vase that had fallen to its side. The vase had been blown over by an errant gust of wind, in a spot that wasn’t very safe for the vase on its own. In the vase two roses were slowly dying, the water having left the vase when it had tipped over. He walked to the vase and grabbed it at the top, making sure the flowers stayed inside.

He walked out of the grotto into the path that led outside. The air was cold, as a light breeze brushed the dead grass and the barren trees that stood upright along the sides of the path. He looked to the right to see a little spigot that dripped every second, and walked off the path towards it, pulling the vase close to his chest. It quietly clanged against the dog chain like collar around his neck.

He pulled the lever of the spigot up, causing water to gush down in a torrent, splashing his naked and sprained feet. With a snarl of pain, he pushed the lever down a small bit, and the water fell at a much more manageable pace. Nodding his head in satisfaction, he held the vase in his hand as he moved the opening under the water, letting the vase fill up before he pushed the lever fully down to stop the spigot.

He walked back towards the grotto. His feet still dripped with very cold water, and he wanted to get the whole thing done quickly so he could get inside his house to wrap them before the winter bite sets in. So, when he set the vase down, he set it down in a different area than where it was before, and pushed it firmly against the ground, as the soil itself was somewhat frozen. He shifted the flowers a bit before nodding his head again, and stood back up.

With nothing else seemingly out of place except himself, he walked out of the grotto and went on the path again, going past the spigot and following the path down to the collision of metal, brick, and plastic that stood up tall and sporadically at the end of the path.

“Angel! Hey, Angel!” he heard someone cry his name. He turned to the source of the voice before seeing a man with long hair like a woman but very frizzy, with tan skin and wearing jeans and, despite the weather, only a white t-shirt. He didn’t wear shoes either, just like he did. He approached him with a basket of bread and started talking, but Angel’s eyes stared at the basket.

“Angel, oye! What have you been doing, my friend?” the man asked.

“I was helping to clean up the grotto a little bit. Some candles were out of wax and had only the fuse burning, so I blew them out, then I refilled a vase of roses someone left in there,” Angel explained.

“The grotto? That’s nice of you to do, but, why all the candles today?” the man asked.

“I don’t know, at least this time around. It was a woman and her baby daughter, police found them dead in a ditch near Alexei’s shop.”

“Ah, another memorial then?” the man inquired. “Was the girl?...”

“She wasn’t someone you and I know, but she was married; word around is that she was a recent refugee from El Salvador.”

“A Salvadorian? You don’t think her husband is that new officer in the local police, huh?”

“Uh, no. She might have been a widow, actually, because no one else came up as someone of her family or even as friends. She apparently had been a shut-in at her apartment. Alicia might have known her, we could ask her more about… Sujer?” Angel grew uncomfortable with how the man looked at his stomach.

“When was the last time you ate?” Sujer asked.

Angel finally stopped staring, and altogether looked away. “One, or, uh, two days…”

Sujer gasped. “Three days! Uh uh, mister, you’re coming home with me tonight. Alicia will cook and you will eat!”

“Ah, but I don’t like having to be a burden on you two. It’s an old habit from the Muertos Reyes days, I promise I’ll find something later!...”

“Your monthly allowance is more than this country’s economy, and yet you don’t eat anything unless we have to force you, now you’re coming with me. Right. Now!” Sujer glared at Angel, who cringed at his tone and his eyes. Sighing, Angel nodded, and Sujer walked away while waiting for him to follow.

After walking a few steps, he turned around while holding one half of a full loaf of bread. “Here. Take and sate yourself with this,” he ordered.

Angel looked at him in confusion. “Sate?”

“I mean that you eat this to help yourself a little bit until we get home,” he explained.

Angel looked at the bread with some slight curiosity before snatching it away from him.

“And don’t eat too fast! You remember what happened last time? I had to clean up your fucking mess in the market, and you embarrassed us in front of the lady near the bank, and not to mention that…”

“So, how have your days been?” a woman with blonde hair, a lighter skin tone, and blue overalls walked from the kitchen to the room where Angel and Sujer were sitting. She carried a large pheasant roast in one hand while a small plate of a simple salad rested on the other. With one smooth glide, she slid both items onto the table, with the pheasant landing in the middle and the plate landing near Sujer.

“They were well, Alicia. I helped to clean up the grotto a little bit today,” Angel answered.

“Oh, Angel,” Sujer piped up, “I wanted to tell you something today, about what I saw with the Capital soldiers lurking around one of the old gardening warehouses, but I got sidetracked by the talk about the murders.”

“Ah, yes, a very tragic event, that one. Although, I am intrigued. Why would someone want to murder a woman who stayed in her house all day with her baby?” she asked.

“It’s over my head. Best I can come up with is that her husband murdered her and left the country, leaving us to deal with his mess,” Angel replied. “Back in Equestria, there’s all sorts of magic they could use to track him, but here we don’t have anything on him, or even who he was, since no one has ever seen a man walking inside the apartment.”

“Oh right, Equestria. Truly a place of wonder, ain’t it?...” Alicia said in a mocking tone.

Angel laughed briefly. “I told you, I’d love to show you the land, but this asshole here,” he pointed to Sujer in the middle of biting a particularly big leaf from his salad, “gave the princess a reason, exactly this,” he flicked the chain on his neck, “not to bring any more people in the castle until she says she’s ready for another human.”

“Right, a big white horse princess with magic powers and wings ruling over a land of talking small horses that can use magic and fly sounds like a perfectly reasonable acid trip. I thought you had said you were out of the drug selling business, hmm?”

At the last sentence, the small grin ever present on Angel’s face faded, and he turned his head with a small frown towards the window, giving the outside world a thousand yard stare.

“Angel? Oh, don’t be like that. You know I didn’t mean anything from that.”

Angel turned back to her with an angry stare. “I’ve shown you the golden bits, Alicia, and even Sujer believes me whole-heartedly, even telling you why we can’t get the chain out. You’re bordering on cognitive dissonance about Equestria, like you just have to deny everything even though it’s all in front of you. What the hell is wrong with you?”

“‘Cognitive dissonance’, eh? Big words from a bloke like you,” Alicia seethed. “What’s wrong with me? Oh I’ll tell you what’s wron’!” She glared angrily right back at Angel. “For two weeks ah’ve got two tenants to this apartment along with me, they’ve been toget’er even though they tell me they only met each other only a week before I met ’em, they look like they’s from the gutters, yet one of ‘em has the cash to literally buy this damn coun’ry and won’ tell me a single drop of his past other ‘an that ‘e ran with the most ruthless and brutal cartel this coun’ry’s ever known, and that he apparently can go ta some random bloody place he call Equestria, where everyone’s a goddamn pony and ‘ey solve their problems with rainbow fucking magic. And yet, some ’ow, this arsehole keeps telling me about it like he’s gettin’ the same acid trip or whatev’r the ‘ell kind of drug he’s been takin’ even though ‘e looks completely fucking clean, and on top of it all, ‘e just expects me to accep’ tat ‘atever ‘e wen’ through durin’ ‘is time in tha Dead Kings made ‘im completely lose his fockin’ mind!”

Angel and Alicia glared at each other, daring themselves to try something. Sujer only stared at Alicia with a confused look. “Wow. Your accent really comes through whenever you get angry.”

Both of them looked horrified at Sujer’s comment, before Angel shook his head and sighed loudly.

“Sujer, shut the fuck up. Alicia,” Angel looked back at her with a neutral expression, “Tomorrow I’ll take you, no matter if the princess says no.”

“I don’t take drugs anymo’, Angel. Remember what I told you aboot why I came ‘ere?”

“You wanted to get away from London, yes, but I promise you, it won’t involve anything of the sort. Just… just trust me, Alicia. I’m not crazy, I guarantee you that.”

“…Fine. Let’s ‘ave a tea party ’en with your princess.”

Angel gasped. “Shit, the tea! Sorry, but I have to go!”

He started to run out to the front door when he heard his name. “Angel, wait! What about the warehouses?”

“Tell me later!” Angel yelled back as he ran outside into the night.

“I do have to say, Angel. Alicia sounds like a mare, er, woman that I would trust with others’ secrets, but never my own,” Princess Celestia chuckled.

In the Royal Castle of Canterlot, the Princess was currently drinking tea with a colt that was just shy of being a full grown stallion. His mane was black, short, and frazzled. His coat was a dark beige, like of a wooden sculpture or furniture being given its first coat of paint before it dried. His eyes, contrary to the rest of his body, blazed a brilliant blue. In his left ear, there was an entire piece of the ear missing, and one would wonder if it was due to an animal attack.

On his neck, a collar usually seen on wary dogs was hanging right at the top of his neck, held in place at the base of his skull by some special nail that had caused scar damage around where it was pushed into his skin.

“What do you mean? She’s stubborn enough to not even believe me even when I showed those Equestrian bits you give to me every fucking month!” Angel exasperated.

“Language, Angel. If you were to tell anypony that you knew of a world beyond their wildest dreams where technology is so advanced and yet it is a violent world full of guilty beings, I doubt you will be believed. I both like and dislike her, because she can be stubborn. She stays to herself when pressured, but sometimes she is too strong-willed and thus doesn’t listen to reason.” Celestia explained. “A habit that all of us at some time fall into, I’m afraid. It will be an interesting night when I meet her.”

“Wait, you mean...?”

“Well, if she is going to give you trouble about your past simply because she doesn’t believe in your ability to Transport, then perhaps I shall lift my ban on visiting humans if only so she can see.”

Angel looked incredulous before he hugged Celestia with a big smile. “Thank you. I promise she won’t be as much trouble as Sujer was.”

Sujer, while he was spying the aforementioned building and seeing a couple soldiers with batons entering the warehouse, felt his ears warm up.

“Yeah, fuck you too Angel,” he muttered under his breath.

“I do hope so, Angel. Ever since you controlled your Transport as a colt, I’ve always held a bed for you here in the castle, and it broke my heart when you simply didn’t come back all those years ago. I understand you do not wish to remember those years the same as I do, and if Alicia is going to, as Sujer would say, “act like a bitch”, then I suppose I have some words for her for talking to my, well, to whom I consider a son.”

“Celly...” Angel whined. “Please don’t scare her off. She is the one that holds the deed to our apartment, even though I’m paying all of the rent for us.”

Celestia chuckled. “Well, if you get kicked out, you know you could always return here. Like I said, you have a special bed here in the castle, and I’m sure a brief meeting with the guards will help them understand you’re a resident.”

Angel shook his head. “I’m a human, Celestia. Even though the last few years were hell, I have to learn how to live on Earth…” he scratched his head. “And I have way too much shit to atone for,” he muttered.

“Again, language. And why do you wish to stay in Las Rosas?” The princess wasn’t worried for Angel living in that violent town. She knew he could defend himself, especially that first day when he came back, saving that mare from some of her own guard that were acting out of conduct. Using their authority they brought in other guards to arrest him and give him the death penalty to get rid of him quickly, but as soon as she heard about the defendant’s cutie mark of a weird red lotus, she had to go see them immediately.

Celestia always hoped in her mind that Angel would come back to Equestria one day, and there he was, a bit bruised, but not as injured as the other guards that were in the prosecution, who looked like they needed their own medical leave that was as long as what war time guards used to have. As soon as he saw her, he smiled, and Celestia knew it was him by that smile.

No pony ever smiled like he did. It was smile that could only be found on someone that knew true pain and suffering, and yet had the audacity to laugh at it.

She had noted that the smile seemed more authentic that day, and she would realize it was because of the last few years, where Angel, back on Earth, had become in his own words, “a selfish monster whose only food was pain and innocent blood.” He always had a flair for the dramatic, Celestia told herself, but those words were still etched into her mind months later, where she and he were having some tea before she went to Ponyville to start the Summer Sun Celebration.

And also lure her there, but right now she didn’t want to think about that plan yet.

“…I would also like to say that, for me, it would be my friends. For Sujer and Alicia, it would be because they want me to stay near them, particularly because I’m paying rent, but also of other things too.” Drat, she zoned out of what Angel was saying about her question. Well, maybe she’ll ask later, when she wants others to know. “But, to be honest, I’m not really sure. The town is named Las Rosas for a reason, princess. All that holds up the beauty of the petal is the stem, covered in sharp thorns. But everyone in that town is still looking to find their petals, their purpose for suffering the thorns in order to have the flower…”

“And what is your reason for suffering the thorns?” the Princess asked. She inwardly chuckled at his dramatization of his life. She taught him a little too well in fine arts all those years ago, it seemed.

“I cannot answer that with an answer that I will consider true to my heart. I do not know what my purpose is, Celestia, even after all these years, and I am scared of that fact…”

The Princess smiled. “You are not the only one who feels they do not have a direction in their life. Believe me, there are many in my realm who feel lost, even in their own home, and I wouldn’t doubt that there are many lost in your world. You are still young in your lifetime, colt. 19 years, yes? And with your birthday coming up you’ll be 20 too… Regardless,” she put down her teacup, “Let’s talk about happier things. How is Sujer, by the way?”

“Sujer is fine, he’s still up to his usual tricks. I think he wants to raid a warehouse of gardening supplies, see if there’s anything useful to take and pawn off. Or at least find out what some Capital soldiers are hiding in there, from what he told me he had seen.”

“I trust that you will not accompany him this time?” Celestia asked as she levitated another cup of tea up to her lips.

“Huh? Oh yeah, yeah, I won’t, don’t worry,” Angel brushed off the question, and against her better judgment, Celestia decided to drop the subject. She believed anything involving Sujer was always going to end in pain. And a loss of wealth.

“Well, it is late enough as is. I suppose Alicia will want you to sleep in their house for the night. Unless, of course, you wish to stay here in the castle, Angel. Remember, I have that bed ready for you, in that room you used to stay in…”

“While I do appreciate the times I’ve slept with you, Celestia, I still have a couple things to do back home before I sleep,” Angel nodded with a smile. Celestia mentally slipped at the first half of Angel’s sentence before reassuring herself that it was probably a quirk of Angel taking from Sujer’s way of speaking Equiish, or as they call it, English. That, or their language didn’t recognize double entendres as her own language did.

Suddenly, a loud bang echoed throughout the room. Celestia and Angel looked to see a mare almost as tall as the princess appear in the doorway and march up to them. The mare was black as the night and her dark blue mane was ethereal as it fluttered in a non-existent wind. She wore lighter blue armor that stood more to entice fear than to act as actual protection.

Celestia opened her eyes and gasped.

“Well now, sister, it has been too long since we’ve last met, has it not?” the mare asked before she cackled into a long laugh, pronounced with thunder from unseen lightning.

“Princess, get back!” Celestia finally shook herself out of the shock of seeing her sister and looked to see Angel, whom had ripped a leg off a wooden chair and waving it around as a club, ready to fight this new menace.

“Angel, wait! That is…” she hesitated, “…Nightmare Moon. She is a foe that I battled about one thousand years ago. She is my sister, and please, Luna, you must snap out of this madness!”

“Luna? She is no more, dear sister. Nightmare Moon has seen to her demise, and soon she will see to your defeat as well!”

“I don’t know what you’re seeing. All I’m seeing is a walking corpse with anger issues,” Angel twirled the makeshift club around his hoof, thanking his luck that he had 15 years to practice using his hooves.

“Anger issues? Why, you would dare to have that attitude towards me, colt?” The mare marched up to Angel, a snarl on her lips.

“Of course I will. You’re the one I’m going to drag back to their grave anyway, so why bother being scared,” Angel spat.

“Why you little...!” Nightmare Moon shot a blue pulse of magic directly at Angel. On instinct, the human-turned-colt lifted up his club to defend himself when he was violently pulled away by some golden force. He soon found himself almost muzzle-to-muzzle with Celestia.

“Angel, this is not your fight. I have a plan for this, but I wasn’t expecting to act so soon. Do not worry about me or Equestria though. Transport and come back tomorrow evening. Everything will be fine then.”

“But, Celestia!...”

“No ‘buts’, my little colt. I do not want you to get hurt again. Just… please…” Celestia blinked, and Angel swore he saw a tear on her left eye, “Trust me for this.”

“…Fine, but call your guards to help you with this battle, seeing as strangely none of them are here.”

“Oh, they were easy. A little nap on the job never bothered anypony, has it? Then again, they are also having their worst nightmares, so I suppose it can hurt!” Nightmare Moon laughed. The two ponies gawped at the dark mare marching up to them, her horn blazing in a blue aura as she charged another attack. “Is this colt important to you, Princess? If not, then I suppose you would not mind if I did this!”

She lowered her head as she fired off another magical blast at the colt, Celestia too surprised at the sudden attack to pull him out of the way.

With only a split-second to react, Angel closed his eyes, and felt the air change around him as the magical charge came closer…

Author's Notes:

After a substantial re-write, the HiE fic I've been planning for two months is finally here!

Now to substantially re-write all the other chapters I had been working on sporadically...

In any case, I hope you guys like this one!