“I DON’T WANT TO CHOOSE!” Cloud sat bolt upright. His breaths were ragged and his chest felt tight.

Looking around, he quickly realised was still in his cage. Just… Just a nightmare… Mind racing, Cloud brought a hoof up to his chest. Wait, what? He looked down he looked down to see that his chest was heavily stitched, and wrapped in a makeshift bandage soaked with what he could only assume was his own blood. Aside from the obvious pain and discomfort, it felt to him to be in very good condition and, for the first time in a long time, his mind felt clear.

“Good to see that you’re awake,” said a monotone voice. Cloud looked to his left to see the voice belonged to Maud.

“What just happened?” The words flowed from his mouth with ease. “I feel healthy as a Horse in a… healthy condition.” He paused. “That was the first and last time I’m using that expression.”

“A Gryphon used the crystal I found to absorb magical energy from your body. He left you to die after taking it back. I performed surgery on you to save you.”

“You-?” Cloud stopped and groaned. “Yeah, sure, why not…” He checked himself over a little more thoroughly, and found that most of his entire body, like his chest and mind, was in surprisingly good condition. The crossbow scars remained, his chest was stitched and bandaged, he was a little dehydrated, but otherwise he felt just fine. How the hell would she get me to a condition this good?

“So you say you saved me, huh?” He asked, turning back to Maud.

“Yes.”

“You, a student of geology, performed life saving surgery on me?”

“Yes.”

“On a wound that so catastrophically fatal most medical professionals would announce me dead on arrival?” Maybe a little over the top, but even still...

“Yes.”

“While separated by two cages, each with three inch thick steel bars?”

“No. I went into your cage.” This mare...

“Oh, really? You did? You left your locked cage without the use of a key, or magic, or a bulldozer?”

“Yes.”

“And how exactly did you do that, if you don’t mind my asking?”

“Like this.” Maud grabbed a bar of her cage in each hoof and pull them apart like wet spaghetti.

Cloud’s brain shut down for a moment.

“Are you okay?” Maud asked, as monotone as ever.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. I just needed to reboot my brain.” He climbed to his hooves, walked over to the bars of his own cage and tried to copy Maud’s actions. They were as tough as he’d expected them to be, definitely thick solid steel, and they didn’t move a milimetre. This could be a trap; she could be one of my captors inside a trick cage to earn my-

Maud left her cage through the hole she’d made and sat opposite Cloud. She took the bars he was holding and, once again, easily pulled them apart.

“Like that.”

Cloud’s brain shut down for a moment.

Maud cocked her head to the side a single degree, and otherwise looked the same as ever. “Did your brain need to reboot again?”

“It sure did,” Cloud replied after a few moments. “So… you can just do that? Do you have some kind of affinity with metal, or minerals since you said you study rocks?”

She shrugged. “I’m just strong.”

“Okay then…” Well, if she’s the real deal... “Do you… wanna escape together?” Cloud asked.

Maud shrugged. “Sure.”

“Quiet down in there!” Yelled a deep, muffled voice. Heavy footsteps could be heard from behind the door, quickly thudding against wood as they approached.

Cloud hesitantly let a little magic flow to his horn, nervous that his body wasn’t ready, then smiled as he realised his fears were false. He did some quick stretches, powered his horn fully and stood ready, facing the door.

“Keep behind me,” he said, “and try to find something to take cover behind.”

Maud gave an unseen nod before walking behind a small tower of boxes.

Summoning a Support Circle, Cloud powered himself up as much as he could, filling his horn to its limit. His body was filled to the brim with magic, so much so he could feel his veins coursing with mystical energy.

Through the door came the blue Gryphon, the anger on his face melting to confusion for but a moment before swiftly returning.

“Cute,” he spat, “but the magic of a puny Unicorn could never-!” The beam of magic hit him like a steam train, carrying him back through the doorway. The Gryphon’s pained screams were inaudible past the ringing in Cloud’s ears. After a handful of seconds feeling like minutes, the ringing faded and the room was left in a perfect silence.

Cloud took a deep breath, washing out any trace of exhaustion inside of him with the air in his lungs, and relaxed his body. At the end of this mental cleansing, he smiled.

“Come on,” he called back to Maud. “Let’s get out of here.” Without checking if his words were heard, Cloud walked briskly out of the room.

“This seems like a poor plan,” Maud replied, walking out from behind the boxes. “You wasted a lot of energy doing that, and your body is still under stress.” Looking at the ground where he’d been standing, she saw a few clear splotches of blood. “You’re doing too much while you’re hurt.”

Too far too hear her, Cloud continued in stride. In the next room, he found boxes filled with files. He took a quick flick through a few. These seem like documentation on various magical artifacts, at least as far as I can tell. But why are they written in Equestrian? Actually, why did the Gryphon speak Equestrian? As if hoping to find answers, he continued pouring over the documents. After a little time, he found a file listing details on the crystal previously lodged in his chest. No time to read this now…

Quickly glancing around, Cloud noticed the unconscious Gryphon was wearing some kind of uniform. On the chest was a strange symbol which Cloud did not recognise.

Paying the symbol little mind, he tore the clothes from the Gryphon’s body and fashioned them into an impromptu saddlebag. He stashed the file inside, along with a handful of others.

“I’m impressed,” said Maud, in her usual tone. “You seem to be fluent in Saddline as well as modern Ponish.”

Cloud mentally sighed. “There were so many things wrong with that sentence that I have to break it down. First of all, it’s called Equestrian, I have that on terms with the student of a goddess, secondly, Equestrian is the only language I know, and third, I’ve given you absolutely no reason to think I can speak Saddline.”

“One, ‘Equestrian’ is a slang name. The languages true name is ‘Ponish’.”

“Sure,” Cloud rolled his eyes, “don’t address where I got it from-”

“By ‘student of a goddess’ I assume you’re referring to one of Princess Celestia's acolytes. I only know about two of them from when I used to read newspapers before going to school. If you aren’t talking about Acolyte Sparkle or Acolyte Shimmer I don’t know who specifically you’re referring to.”

“It’s Twilight Sparkle, and-”

“Two and three, you spoke Saddline earlier when talking to the Gryphon and you just read a collection of documents written in Saddline.”

Finally, Cloud was lost for words.

“From your silence,” Maud continued, “you seem to not know you were speaking and reading Saddline. Since I was abducted for finding a magical artifact, I can assume you were taken for the same, or a similar, reason. Is there any chance it could somehow do this? Better yet, do any of those documents,” she pointed to his bag, “go into detail of what you found?”

“Uh…” Cloud swallowed, trying to digest the new information. “I’ll, uh, check…” He began to check the files not in his bag, before suddenly stopping. “No, no…” He turned back to Maud. “They don’t have any pictures with them, and I have no idea what the name of what I found would be.” He grabbed a couple of files and motioned for her to look, forgetting they were written in Saddline. “They have very specific names, see? Like these ones; ‘Staff of Vampirism’, ‘Crown of Nebula’, ‘Amulet of Alicorns’, ‘Tube of Unreachable Fathoms’ - what the hell should I look for? ‘Book of Melting’?”

“I have literally no context to what you found.”

Cloud turned to her to begin explaining, but froze with a look of horror on his face. “Get down!”

Behind them stood a tall, ape-like creature donned in robes the same as the Gryphon, holding a crossbow big enough to be a ballista.

Cloud grabbed Maud by the head and pulled her down to the floor with him, just in time for the crossbow bolt to take out a few of his mane hairs.

The ape-creature threw aside the crossbow, and lunged toward Cloud. With a single swipe from its enormous fist, he was launched across the room. Lying dazed on the ground, the creature had no problem grabbing him by the throat and holding him high up against a wall.

His mind once again spinning and fading, Cloud barely caught the words escaping the creature’s mouth:

“Die in the name of the light.”

Its fingers tightened, and Cloud’s body went limp. All of this, for nothing…? After everything I’m just going to be taken out, again?! For the first time in a long time, rage overtook Cloud’s mind. No! A fire lit in his heart, and through adrenaline alone feeling returned to his limbs. Coherent thought left him.

The creature felt the muscles in Cloud’s neck suddenly strengthen, and frowned in confusion.

Cloud headbutted the creature and blasted him with magic as his horn connected with its eye. The creature was thrown back, howling in pain, only howling more when Cloud launched himself forward with a Support Circle and slamming his head into its abdomen. He buried his horn into the creature and unleashed his freshly charged beam attack. If his last beam was like a steam train, this one was like a freight train.

The puny wooden wall the creature crashed into didn’t stand a chance. Light shone through, revealing the deck of a ship at sea littered with crew of various species, all in uniform. They grabbed their weapons at the sight of him.

Sprinting out onto the deck without a second thought, Cloud ducked under the slash of a Minotaur’s sword and slammed a semi-charged Thunder Punch into his knee. A Support Circle carried him above the various arrows and crossbow bolts flying at him, then launched him hind leg first into the face of another Gryphon. He grabbed his body with magic, used him as a shield for the next volley of projectiles, then lit up the scene with a boosted blast of flames.

As the crew devolved into a frenzied panic, some trying to deal with the fire with others still firing at him, he teleported behind another ape creature and blasted the back of its knee with a magic bolt. With the kneecap smashed to pieces, the creature fell right into another beam attack pushing it into the flames on deck. Cloud spun as a Horse threw a punch at him and gave him a taste of Princess Luna’s counterattack. The Horse’s teeth shattered like glass against his hoof. Cloud ignored her screams, grabbed her and pulled her into the way of the Minotaur’s next sword swing. Using the second of cover, he battered the Minotaur with a torrent of water.

The Minotaur shrugged it off and kicked Cloud in the throat. He was only knocked down for a second, springing back up with an electric blast on the wet Minotaur. It fell to the ground with a thud. Cloud turned, ready for whatever attack was next.

“Here!” Shouted Maud, still somehow in a monotone voice.

Some semblance of coherence re-entered Cloud’s mind and his head whipped around to her. She’d prepared a rowboat in the chaos, ready to cast off at any time. He ran in her direction, but didn’t notice the large blue Gryphon back on his feet. The Gryphon flew at him with the speed of a cannon and buried his talons into Cloud’s side. The bags taking the the sharp claws, Cloud was instead hurled from the force of the hit. He fell onto his side, but kicked off a screaming victim of his flames to land back on his hooves.

The Gryphon threw himself at Cloud with a wing-boosted punch, only to get a facefull of the counter-attack. He didn’t miss a beat, and grabbed Cloud’s face with his beak before slashing at his chest. Cloud’s chest wound reopened fully, and blood quickly covered the both of them.

With a punch that could bend steel bars like putty, Maud’s hoof belted into the Gryphon’s face. The pure power from the hit was enough to create a shockwave putting out the fires. Within the same second, she grabbed Cloud and pulled him to the rowboat before the Gryphon even landed from her punch. She bit a chunk of the rope holding the boat up and they fell into the water. With the power of a speedboat engine, she rocketed them through the water at near breakneck speeds and the two of them quickly vanished over the horizon.

Author's Notes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uints81YYMc