Travelers and Jumpers

Chapter 5:

Round Two

Five. Hours.

That’s how long I was interrogated by Twilight Sparkle. She asked me question, after question, after query, after question about my magic, and how it worked. I had to dig up old memories of theories I didn’t think I remembered, but somehow did, and several of my answers were sketchy at best. I hardly knew half of what I was talking about, and I had to somehow form it into coherent sentences while Ivy gathered knowledge from the tomes around her.

And I loved every second of it.

There’s a certain joy to be had in teaching someone. It’s the sharing of knowledge, the passing of information from one to the next, ensuring that what you know will be spread to others, and not forgotten. Ye Gods, I had forgotten just how great it felt to do that. To go through my mind, to tell her my theories on magic, gathered from guesswork, facts, and a bit of pure luck. What made it even better was the fact that she was truly interested in what I had to say.

Hell, even when the rest of the ponies, plus the two other humans, joined us, I didn’t even stop to greet them. I was too absorbed in my conversation with my fellow magic enthusiast.

“Now, say you had to conjure a fireball underwater,” Twilight said while furiously scribbling notes down on a piece of parchment. “Would the laws of physics prevent you from being able to do that?”

“Not at all, actually,” I replied, drawing on a chalkboard to give a visual aid. “You see, the basic molecules for water are Hydrogen, and Oxygen, correct? Well, by using an air spell, I could take the ambient oxygen atoms, and use that to create a sort of air bubble to allow me some breathing space, something fairly basic on a couple of the worlds I’ve been to. For this scenario, I would use an extended version of the bubble head charm used on-”

“Hey, Dumbledore,” I heard Matt say from behind me. “Not that this isn’t interesting or anything, but-”

“Oh, shove it,” I snapped, turning to send a glare at him. “I’m in the middle of a magical discussion! If you don’t want me to turn you into a toad, I’d suggest you put a cork in it!”

Matt blinked, and opened his mouth to shoot off what would undoubtedly be a witty retort, only to be cut off by Twilight saying, “Yes, Matt, please wait just a moment! Now, you were saying?”

“Right, right. Now, bubble head charm. It’s a basic spell, conjures a pocket of air you can use to filter in pure, breathable air. By extending that, you’re able to provide yourself with a way to walk underwater, and cast some decent spells. Now, say I use this fireball spell. The water would put it out, right?”

“I would think so,” Alex chipped in, his own expression a mixture of polite curiosity and genuine amusement.

“Ah, but not for a mighty wizard with five hundred straight years of magic behind him!” I replied enthusiastically. “So, to counter this, I’d-”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” One of the new ponies, this one a cyan colored pegasus with a rainbow mane, interrupted. “You mean to tell me you’re over five HUNDRED years old?”

Ah, damn. I didn’t mean to let that bit of information out, but there’s nothing I can do for it now. Still, it was only a bit of the truth. For the last five hundred and seventy one years, I had been going to nothing but worlds that could use magic. As a result, I had been catching up on a LOT of magical theory. And being the experimental bastard that I am...well, I knew a few good Kaboom spells that I could use in a pinch.

Wait, I was about to lie to them, wasn’t I?

“Erm...give or take a couple decades,” I sheepishly chuckled. “All I know is that I got pulled into one universe, and, uh, started from there. Been learning magic ever since.”

That seemed to silence the entire room. All of the ponies wore an expression of mistrust, suspicion, and something akin to fear, while the humans both wore matching masks of neutrality. Damn good poker faces. Twilight, though, regarded me with...sympathy?

I coughed lightly, and gazed evenly at all of them. “So. I take it I don’t get a senior citizen discount any time soon?”

Wiseass under pressure. That’s me.

The older looking human, Alex, gave me a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “That old, huh? How’d you survive this long?”

“Same way I always have,” I replied. My staff glowed once more in my hands, as I gave them all a small smile. “With faith, luck, and a little bit of magic.”

Alex regarded my glowing staff with caution, his hand almost unconsciously slipping back to his knife. Twilight noticed him doing this though, and in an obvious attempt to change the conversation, she asked me, “So, didn’t you say you had found a filly who led you here?”

I shook my head, and forced my staff’s runes to dim once more. “Yeah. It was pretty lucky, too. Some kinda chimera was attacking her. Probably would’ve been in serious trouble if I hadn’t stopped her.”

This time, a yellow pegasus with a soft pink mane asked me something, in a voice so quiet that I had to strain my ears to properly hear it. “Oh, dear. I feel so bad for that chimera now...”

“Hey, I didn’t hurt it that bad,” I shrugged. “Just scared it off so that I could run away and get the kid to safety.”

As soon as I said this, both Twilight and the quiet Pegasus cringed, and started looking around uneasily. I felt a stone drop into the pit of my stomach, as I considered the implications...

“That’s...that’s not good,” Twilight stated, her voice raw with worry.

“What? What did I do wrong this time?!” I asked, a hint of panic in my voice.

The quiet one stepped forward this time, and said in a slightly louder voice (I could count it as a whisper this time), “Well...are you certain it was a chimera?”

“Goat head, lion’s head and body, snake tail, tried to roast me alive...yeah, that’s a chimera,” I said, biting back the sarcasm I wanted to throw in there.

The two ponies cringed again, this time eliciting a concerned look from Alex.

“Girls...tell us what’s wrong,” he said in a strangely soft voice. “Twilight? Fluttershy?”

The Pegasus, who I guessed to be Fluttershy, said, “Um...It’s not good. Chimeras aren’t nice animals at all. They’re predators, that, well...”

An extremely familiar, horribly enraged, ear-piercing roar echoed throughout the night. All of us were frozen for just a single instant, as we listened to the remnants of the monster’s cry. The same roar once more broke the silence, this time even louder, and closer than before.

“They don’t give up the hunt,” she meekly finished.

The kid. Cherry Lime. That thing was...Oh, Ye Gods!

I was out the door a half-second before the others, running once more towards the sound of the monster’s cry.

“HOLD ON KID,” I shouted, my legs pumping at full sprint. “WIZARD’S COMING!

I slid around a corner, and reached into my jacket for my blasting rod. The runes that had been painstakingly carved into the aged wood burst into a blinding blue light, fueled by my will, as I prepared myself for a real tussle this time.

It was just as well that I did. Barely an instant after I reached a large plaza in something close to the middle of Ponyville, another long lance of flame shot by my head, this time igniting the tips of my hair.

I frantically beat the fires out with the sleeve of my coat, and brought my blasting rod down to aim at the monster.

The Chimera was just as ugly as it was before, both of its faces twisted into an inhuman snarl, with pure hatred glowing in its eyes. The snake tail was poised to strike, small droplets of venom falling off of its inch-long fangs. Fire filled its maw once more, as its muscles tensed to pounce.

I beat it to the punch, this time aiming the rod at them, and yelled, “Flipendo!”

A small orb of blueish-purple energy rocketed out of the wand, and smacked the chimera right in the middle of his lion’s forehead. That didn’t go over too well with it, only serving to piss it off even more. Thankfully, though, it stopped its rampage long enough to refocus on its other target that had gotten away, and forced it to come to Ponyville.

Hell’s Bells, I really know how to make ‘em mad, don’t I?

This time, I gripped my staff in my left hand, and my blasting rod in my right, a feral snarl of my own throwing my features into a grim light. The air around me literally started to shimmer, as I gathered more and more energy from the surrounding area. The chimera, for its part, tore apart the dirt road it stood upon with its hooves, while it angrily snorted fire in short bursts from its nostrils. The goat’s head let out a shrieking battlecry, the only warning I got before it pounced. I focused the gathered energy into my staff, planted it into the ground, and screamed, “Protego!”

I gave the magic shape with my will, and forced it to stretch around me in a protective wall of force, effectively calling up a brick wall to absorb the monster’s attack. Well, maybe something more like a wooden picket fence, judging by the way it barely seemed to register the defenses. My head pounded with the strain of keeping up the shield against its attacks, and I didn’t trust myself to keep up the defenses for much longer.

Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of the ponies and humans that had followed me...and there, in the window of the home it had just attacked, the small foal. Kid.

I grit my teeth, and thrust my jaw forward. “Hey, ugly!” I growled, slowly moving myself between the chimera and the kid’s home. “You want them? You gotta get through me...”

The chimera turned around and put the entire town square between us. I thought for a moment that it was leaving. I had won without killing it! And then, of course, it came right back around, this time charging at full speed, its entire body ablaze with its own fire.

I remembered one of my teacher’s lessons then; a chant that would help clear my head in battle, one that helped me remember just what I could do with my magic. With a deep, calming breath, I focused all of my effort into reciting some of my titles to reinforce my confidence. “I am Travis Voyageur, Traveler of Eternity, Warden of the White Council, Auror for the Ministry of Magic, second apprentice to the Sorcerer Supreme, and student of the mighty Yen Sid; by my power and responsibility to the innocent, I say unto you...”

I took all of the energy I had left in me, and forced it into my blasting rod, the runes growing uncomfortable to the touch. An insane impulse shot through my mind, and I had to smile at that thought. I mean, what the hell. I had already quoted Gandalf once.

“YOU! SHALL NOT PASS!” I roared, jabbing my blasting rod in front of the charging beast as I dropped my shield. The runes continued to grow in intensity, as I unleashed all of its pent up energy with a single cry of one of the most common spells in wizard history: “FUEGO!”

A small column of navy blue fire, about as thick around as my wrist, launched out of the destructive wand and spiraled in its familiar corkscrew fashion until it collided with the charging beast. The monster was hit right in the eyes of its goat’s head, a miraculous shot even for an expert, and howled in pain, halting its charge completely.

Around this point, I was dimly aware of the fact that most of the town had been awoken by our scuffle. The ponies I had seen at Twilight’s library, plus the man in the armored suit, moved forward to deal with the chimera, to finish it off I assumed. As for me, I elected to fall to my knees, and wait for the stars to fade from my eyes.

Tossing around that much magic with barely any food or sleep in my system had definitely taken its toll on me. I now felt like I had been running full sprint in a small marathon. My legs weakly trembled beneath me, and I had to lean on my staff just to make sure I didn’t fall all the way over.

A pair of arms gripped me by the shoulder, and hauled me back to my feet again, despite my weary protests.

“You alright?” I heard Alex ask me.

I shook my head a final time to clear it of the stars, and mumbled, “Yeah. Not gonna go Gandalf the White this time around...”

“Can you stand on your own?”

“I...I think so, yeah,” I said with a bit more conviction in my voice.

He let go of my shoulders...and I nearly fell over. If it weren’t for the fact that he was pretty much expecting this, I would’ve been met with a lovely faceful of dirt road. Mmm, mm, mm, dirt.

“Alright, come on, Wiz,” he chuckled, helping me move slowly along the road. “I think you’ve done enough. The girls and Matt can take it from here.”

I nodded in agreement, and managed to use my staff to haul myself to a quieter corner of the square, away from the slowly growing crowd. While ponies of all shapes, sizes, and colors gathered to see what was going on, Alex and I managed to slip away unnoticed. Just as we ducked into a nearby alleyway, I caught a glimpse of a newspaper hanging onto the edge of a small trashcan to our immediate left.

Almost unthinkingly, I snatched up the paper, and stuffed it into my pocket. That little action reminded me that Ivy was still in the library, hopefully finished with her information hunt. I needed to get her back into the watch before sunrise, else I risk her becoming unavailable for a few days,

“Hey, Alex,” I wheezed. “Do me a favor? Make sure the kid’s alright. I’m gonna go back to the library, and find a nice patch of floor to fall on. I need to get some sleep.”

“I think that’s reasonable enough,” he replied. “You know the way there?”

“Big tree with books. How hard is that to miss?”

{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}{}

I pushed the door of the library open, found a comfortable bookshelf to lean against, and pulled my pocket watch out for Ivy to go into. She did so gratefully, the strain of absorbing so much information away from a vessel evident in the way her puffball form flickered uncertainly.

“Get some rest, Ivy,” I yawned. “I think I’m gonna get me some shut eye here too...” A crinkling sound argued against this as soon as I fixed my jacket underneath myself. “...As soon as I get caught up with today’s news.”

Ponyville Inquirer

-

MURDER IN PONYVILLE

Tragedy has struck the small town of Ponyville today, with the loss of Silver Scrolls, age fourteen. A suspected victim of foul play, Miss Scrolls had been visiting Ponyville from Canterlot to purchase and sell books for her vast collection. Investigators have yet to cast new light onto who may have committed the heinous crime, but they are confident that they will find answers soon. The Royal Guards themselves have since joined the investigation, hoping to find the perpetrator.

No known suspects have been found, as of yet, but the body was found in a dumpster just two blocks away from Sugarcube Corner, the famed bakery known for providing...[More on page 4]

The rest of the article had been nothing but an interview with the lead investigator, somepony who wished to remain anonymous, and a couple of paltry facts about Scrolls’ life before she died.

“Well,” I wondered out loud, “it’s probably just a coincidence that I get pulled here to a land of magic right after a book collector gets brutally murdered in what seems to be a relatively peaceful town. Definitely not because I’m supposed to look into this. And not because I’m that unlucky.”

My watch warmed up a little around my neck.

“Yeah. And tomorrow, I’ll swear off sugar.”

I sighed, and closed my eyes.

Alright, let’s go over the facts.

I’ve been pulled into a new world by something with the same power as a god around the same time that some important pony is murdered. In terms of magic, book collectors are some of the most valuable people to know, due to the fact that they may have some form of magical text that can improve power. The only other humans here don’t seem to trust me, and from what the kid was saying, there are a few other ponies who feel the same way about them. My office is still somewhere back in the woods with little more than a relatively weak magic circle to protect it, and most of my gear is back in Seattle.

And this is all just stuff I’ve acquired in a single day. Let’s see what happens tomorrow. Or in a couple of hours.

You know, it's kind of funny. Everyone assumes that when they get pulled through time and space, they'll be used to the same time zone as the place they just got pulled from. To be fair, there ARE some solid theories behind why that'd happen, but...it rarely does though. Seriously. Jet lag is an incredibly real factor in something like this...as evidenced by my sudden fatigue.

I yawned once more, and felt my mind fade into the bliss of a dreamless sleep.

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