A Dragon's Wake

by Cold Spike

First published 16th of November, 2012

A young human child wakes up in the dragon lands as a dragon, following some unforseen consequenes..

A young human child wakes up in the dragon lands as a dragon, following some unforeseen events he ends up in Equestria with his new dragon friend of the same age. Follow his insane journey as he tries to make sense of it all and the ponies try to make sense of him. Eventually a certain goddess discovers his strange actions and ideas have something in common with a certain bearded wizard of the past.

Editors: skultech, Albert Manhattan

Fully Edited as of 8/8/14

Chapter 1: The Dragon Lands

Darkness. It is the visible absence of light and, ironically, has the greatest potential for light. Without light, creatures are unable to distinguish colors from one another. Shapes become anything that your imagination can think of under the veil of darkness. Perceptions are ultimately blinded; with no visible light the perceptions of reality are limited to only what we hear, feel, taste and smell. It is in these moments, surrounded by darkness, that we refuse to trust our logic over instinct. Fear takes over and fear can be anything.

The Dragon Lands: a small continent surrounded by caves, mountains, and dragon hoards. Very few expeditions have ever taken place there by ponykind, or any other race, for that matter. Those that dared venture in never stayed for long, dragons are territorial creatures. Most hoards are split up, with a few full-grown dragons in each one to watch over the younglings until they are deemed old enough to form their own hoard. Dragons do not need concepts such as parenting or love, they merely need to survive.

It was in the darkness of a cold, moonless night that one of those dragons began to wake. The young dragon was lying on the earth, defenseless and utterly alone. His eyes opened to the sight of nothing, the darkness was too thick to pinpoint anything. For a moment, he was unable to move and was quite confused.

“Why is it so dark?” It was then that he snapped his eyes open in shock. “And why is my voice so high?”

His hand reached down to the ground and it was at that point, he noticed he was no longer in his bed, he was outside. He quickly stood up only to fall flat on his back. Everything, including his body, felt foreign to him.

“Why can’t I get up?" He tried again, grunting, but nothing would work. "Why am I outside?”

Unable to come up with any reason or answer, he decided to feel around to make sure nothing was wrong with his body. His first surprise came from his skin, it was rough and felt like a lizard he had once owned back at the home. His second surprise came from his fingers, not only was he missing one on each hand but his nails felt much sharper. His final surprise came from his tail.

“WHY DO I HAVE A TAIL?!” The child screamed in surprise, it was starting to feel like too much for him. Tears were starting to form in his eyes but he quickly shook his head to stop them.

“Okay, get a grip. I guess I’m some type of big lizard, but is this a dream?" He looked up at the massive expanse of stars. "Why is there no moon out if I can see the stars?” He shrugged and switched back to the problem at hand.

For several minutes, he attempted to stand up, but every time he tried his tail wagged violently and he felt dizzy. After ten minutes of falling down, he decided to try a different tactic. He noticed each time that he moved his tail would move with him, but it would stay upright. He thought that perhaps he could use it for balance. So, slowly, he stood up while keeping his right arm firmly holding down his tail, it took some practice to hold it down. After another five minutes, he was standing and in full control of his tail. Walking still felt natural so, after a few more minutes, he was off. But then it dawned on him. He was completely lost.

He walked around and noticed that he didn’t always need the tail down to balance. He reasoned that if he couldn't use his eyes then he might as well try his other senses. Smelling was the first one that came to mind; he smelled dirt everywhere, so that was no help. His next idea was to try and listen for other people or things, but the only thing he heard was the wind. The wind made him confused, it was cold out, but he didn't feel freezing, just cold. I guess I don't need clothes.

After a while he decided to just slump down, sit, and wait for the sun to rise. He sure hoped he was dreaming because he had never seen a night’s sky without a moon unless clouds were blocking it. After an hour or so of exploring his new body and growing bored, he started to yawn. He did not feel like he was in danger outdoors, he just felt strange. So he did his best to get some sleep. Lying down on the ground was not his ideal place to sleep, but his new body did not seem all that bothered by it. After one more yawn he let his dreams take over, hoping that this one would end.

The sun rose high up in the sky, washing over the Dragon Lands. The shining light bathed over the young creature causing him to stir from his sleep. His eyes sprang open and, to his relief, he could see, but to his utter horror he was still a lizard. All around he noticed a path he had been lying on and a small lake off in the distance surrounded by several mountains, but no trees.

He ran up to the lake and looked at his reflection. To him, only one thought came to mind. Dinosaurs. His whole body was colored purple which reminded him of a certain character from a video game that he liked. His scales were red and his chest was a light yellow. The random color combination did nothing to faze his young logic.

“I look like a T–Rex, I have got to be dreaming.” He looked all over his body and noticed his scales and the spikes on his back. “But I don’t remember a T-Rex that had spikes on his back. Am I a stegosaurus?”

He stood up and looked around, he was still quite lost with nobody around to help. He sighed and took a seat near the lake to try and figure things out. Before he could start thinking, however, his nose began to twitch. He tried to hold in his breath to hold back the inevitable, but it was useless. A split second later, his mouth erupted in one large sneeze followed by a fire trail, to his astonishment.

“THAT WAS FIRE! DINOSAURS DON’T BREATHE FIRE!” He was panting heavily, and then it dawned on him. “I’M A DRAGON!” He was about to panic again, but then something else dawned on him. Dragons are awesome.

“Okay, so I’m lost and I’m a dragon. Cool. But where are my wings?” It was simple logic, all dragons had wings, but after looking all over, he found none.

“Grrr, Spyro had wings, so why can't I? If this is a dream it’s a pretty lousy one!” The child dragon stomped his feet in frustration. “Also, why am I so short? It’s like I’m five again! But I’m supposed to be ten years old!” He stomped on the ground, his short temper wearing thin.

He took a few deep breaths to calm down; he remembered at the home some of the other adults teaching him this trick when he got angry. It worked.

“Okay, I guess I need to start looking for people, or is it dragons?” In that instant, a wave of confusion overloaded his brain, but after a minute it was over, leaving him dazed. “What was that about? Oh well, I better go find some other dragons.” He stood up and slowly walked back to the path from before and chose to follow it in a random direction.

After twenty minutes of not running into a single dragon, he came across a large sign.

This way to the dragons’ hoard. Ponies BEWARE.

“Ponies? And what’s a hoard? Well it did mention dragons so I guess I’m going the right way.”

His walk was again uneventful, but he did spot more signs pointing toward the hoard and warnings to ponies to stay away. He even saw a sign that told gryphons to stay out. After thirty minutes of walking, he was exhausted, thirsty, and hungry, but he heard a noise up ahead and ran towards it. He spotted a rocky surface that he would need to climb in order to reach the noise. He got to the top and slowly looked over the surface, spotting dozens of dragons in a crater of some type with crystals all over the place. All the dragons were split up into different groups.

In the middle was one of the biggest dragons he had ever seen (not that he had seen many before). He was a brown dragon and looked quite intimidating with spikes and scales fully grown all over his body and, to the kid’s annoyance, he had a set of fully grown wings.

“At least he gets wings,” the child explained to nobody. He looked around and saw that the groups of dragons were separated by size, so he assumed also by age.

What was bothering him was the appearance they had compared to him. So far, he had not spotted any dragons that were as small as him or without wings. In the smallest group stood several dragons twice his size so he assumed that he would fit in the best there, but again, every one of them could fly. He gulped and climbed up to the top and began a slow descent. He noticed plenty of dragons taking crystals from the large pile in front of the biggest one and, to his confusion, eating them.

“I guess I’m supposed to eat crystals.” At first this made no sense to him, but then he remembered that in the game Spyro he used and collected them. He now assumed that the character consumed them.

He slowly made his way up to the youngest group; even in their small size they looked tough to him. Slowly, he inched closer to the dragons until they finally noticed him. All eyes fell on his tiny dragon form; they looked annoyed rather than angry.

“Yeah?” a taller, red dragon asked. The question was so simple that it caught him off guard.

“Uhhh,” he had nothing to say to the other dragons so he just stood there, dumbstruck, while the others sighed in frustration.

“HA! You don’t even have your wings. Why don’t you run off to the baby dragon hoard,” the same red dragon said, waving his hand dismissively but not pointing to anywhere in particular.

“Hey! I’m not a baby dragon, and you’re the youngest dragons I could find!” He instantly regretted saying this; the other dragons from their young group gathered around him.

“Let me see here, you have no wings, you are half our size and you look like a scared hatchling. Last time I checked, that was a baby,” the same red dragon said, laughing at his own comment. The others followed suit.

While it was true that he lacked wings, he didn't feel that much smaller than them. But the crowd of older dragons and the hurtful words of the red one made him feel uneasy. It was an instinct he had not felt for a few years, but he suddenly had the urge to suck his thumb, which now was a claw. Before he could comply with his overwhelming urge to comfort himself, his mind blanked. Out of nowhere some of his senses felt overpowering, particularly his sense of smell.

He smelled a… well he wasn’t quite sure, but he soon followed it and walked past the other rude dragons. The other dragon looked at him but soon decided to shrug him off, glad to be rid of him. The child soon stopped, having arrived at his destination where, before him, lay hundreds upon hundreds of gemstones all guarded by one very large dragon.

He looked up at the dragon, unsure of himself and why he had done something so crazy, but, to his amazement, he noticed the dragon was not looking down at him, or any other dragon for that matter. He wanted to turn around and leave, but fear was keeping him rooted to the spot. His sense of smell and his hunger were also keeping him from moving. He looked at the gemstones as hunger started to overpower logic. Without thinking, he grabbed a red one and stared at it. Upon looking up, he noticed the large dragon did nothing in response. He slowly brought the gem to his mouth and, with a loud crunch, half of it was gone. This unfortunately brought his presence to the attention of the older dragon. The large one stared down at him for what felt like hours, the younger dragon rooted to the spot. The large dragon narrowed his eyes and took one last look at the younger one before huffing out some smoke and continuing to gaze off into the distance.

Okay, I guess that means I can stay here, he thought while he ate the rest of the gem. Unsure of what to do next, he grabbed a few more gems and sat down next to the bigger dragon and waited.

He ate his gems in silence and noticed other dragons throughout the day had come up to grab some before quickly returning to their groups. They all seemed afraid of the largest dragon, but the smallest one, ironically, felt calm with him. He decided to just sit there with the biggest dragon and wait for something to happen, it wasn’t like the other groups were giving him a chance.

When the sun started to set, it became apparent that the moon was going to come up that night. It all seemed so weird to the young dragon. Almost instantaneously, the sun went down and the moon came up. But instead of thinking that this was still a dream, he simply accepted it as a fact, like it had always been that way.

Out of nowhere the oldest dragon let out an ear-shattering roar, streams of fire shooting out of his mouth. It was the scariest thing the young child had ever seen or heard before. The ground shook which caused him to fall and land on his tail, which hurt, but he didn’t dare say anything. After a while, some of the other groups were gathering around in a half-circle, forming around the bigger dragon and him. He gulped and joined the other groups in the front and sat down, feeling more confused than ever.

“Gather around young dragons and hear my tale,” the biggest one said with the voice of someone wise and old, “hear my tale of ponykind and their evil ways.”

Ponies again, I don’t get it.

It would seem that gathering around for a story was a nightly event for this hoard. The youngest dragon listened with interest, feeling relieved that his boredom was gone and something was happening.

“In the time before the wicked princesses of the sun and moon, there was a dragon by the name we all know as… DISCORD!” The entire crowd behind the young dragon roared in cheers at the mention of the name.

“Discord was the mightiest of all dragons; he was able to bend the other nations to his will. Ponies bowed before him, gryphons cowered before him,” the eldest dragon explained, his voice keeping the same volume the entire time. “A dragon was in control of this world for centuries. He controlled the moon, he controlled the sun, and he ruled above all!” The crowd’s interest was growing, other dragons continuing to cheer, while the youngest one just stared at him like he was crazy.

“His reign was ended by the evil sisters of the sun and moon.” The large dragon paused to hear the other big dragons hiss at the mention of them. “The pony sisters and their kind believe themselves to be above us dragons!” This time, he yelled in anger causing the others to do the same.

“The wretched ponies live in peace and harmony,“ the large dragon said with disgust as the others followed. “They believe our way of life is unsettling!” Again, more boos from the crowd at the mention of ponies. “There is nothing wrong with chaos and greed, it is the nature of our race!” More cheers erupted.

“But the ponies accept love as their nature.” More boos as he continued. “They live their useless existence to try and spread and force that nature on other races.”

The young dragon listened to the entire story about the pony race being evil and the nature of the dragons being good despite the irony of mentioning greed. The more the dragon talked, the more disconnected he felt with the other dragons; to him, they seemed nuts. The only good things he had gotten out of this so far were the tasty gems and the ability to breathe fire. Which, in all honestly, made up for it, but the dragons still seemed crazy.

After the dragon finished his tale, the entire crowd cheered for the dragon race until everyone went silent. Before they could leave, he decided to speak up.

“I don’t get it,” the young dragon said speaking as loud as he could.

All eyes fell upon him, including the largest one. The rest of the crowd looked at him like he was crazy, but the largest one eyed him with curiosity.

“What do you not understand, young dragon?” the elder dragon said.

“Well it’s just that you said that greed was good and love was bad. How can that be?” he questioned, ignoring the protests behind him. But the dragon said nothing so he kept questioning. “And what’s so bad about peace?” The elder dragon’s large head moved down closer to him but slowly so as not to intimidate him. “Also, what’s so bad about ponies? I never really liked them that much, but why be afraid of them? I mean we are dragons, right?” When he finished speaking, he realized that the crowd was silent but all standing and staring at him and, to his horror, the elder dragons head was mere feet away from his.

“What is your name?”

Name? Uh, oh, hmm... Spyro sounds cool, so I’ll go with that!

“Spyro,” he casually replied hoping it sounded like a dragon’s name.

Behind him, he heard others laughing at the name, which did nothing to ease his nerves. He even started to feel embarrassed and when that happened he would usually start to…

HICCUP!Spyro let out one great big fire breath on accident after his loud hiccup; it was puny in comparison to other dragons’ so they just laughed even more.

“Spyro, you dare question the wisdom of our race?”

HICCUP! Another embarrassing burst of flames caused more snickers and giggles.

“And you dare question me?”

HICCUP! He cleared his throat. “Um, yes?” He quivered in fear, looking up at the dragon who might as well be king for all he knew. HICCUP!

The dragon let out a final roar.

“Then you are banished from the hoard! Leave now!” He pointed off into the distance, but Spyro just stood there, unable to move out of fear.

“I. SAID. LEAVE!” He let out an even bigger roar than before and used his claws to point in the direction of the path from before.

Without thinking, Spyro stood up and ran as fast as his small body could carry him, hiccupping along the way. Spyro ran for ten minutes straight, trying to keep himself under control. But his exhaustion won out in the end and he sat down and cried. He wasn’t sure why, but he either figured this was a nightmare now or that he was in big trouble. His crying was loud enough to be heard from all directions, but no dragon came to his aid, there was no one there, or so he thought.

“Hey, you!”

Spyro perked up at the sound of the voice. It was similar to his. At least, it was high and squeaky just like his was. “Huh?” He looked around and saw no other dragons or any creature.

“Up here!” The voice said, obviously annoyed.

Spyro looked up and saw another dragon just as young as him with no wings. He could not clearly see much more than the other dragon’s general shape as he was mostly hidden behind leaves. Only his green eyes were clearly visible.

“Oh, hi.” Spyro sniffled and took a deep breath.

The young dragon moved closer to Spyro. “Hey, my name’s Claws.” He reached out his claw for Spyro to shake and Spyro did so after fumbling around in the dark.

“My name is Spyro.”

“So why were ya crying?”

“Oh, cause I was banished from the hoard.”

“Oh really? Me too,” he said in defeat, but he didn't seem very sad.

“How come?”

“I was too… nice,” he said after some thought. “How about you?”

“I questioned the biggest dragon.”

“Ooh, not a good idea.” He took a seat next to Spyro.

“So what happens now?” Spyro asked.

“I don’t know. Unless you have a boat so we can get off this island, we’re kind of stuck.”

“I guess this is an island,” Spyro said quietly to himself.

“Yeah, it is. You don’t have a boat do you?”

“No,” Spyro said plainly.

Claws slumped down next to Spyro in defeat.

“Have you ever seen boats come to the island?”

“Well sure, every once in a while some stupid ponies show up, but they don’t stay for long.”

“How often?”

Claws tilted his head to the side. “I dunno. Why?”

“I was just thinking, if one did show up we could sneak on board maybe?” Spyro really wasn't sure how much sense that made, but he didn’t feel like giving up and dying on an island.

“Yeah right! All those ponies are, like, four times our size. Unless you have a plan…”

“Well, no, not yet. But if we can go find one of their boats I can think of something. I mean… why give up?”

“But why go to the land of the ponies?” Claws asked, dumbstruck.

“Why not? We are banned from this place and if we don’t try something we’re going to die anyway. Plus, they sound nicer than these other dragons, so… why not?”

Claws had to think about this. Sure he was considered nicer than other dragons, and some of the things the ponies did sounded better than this life. It was true that they were both stuck and out of ideas so he concluded that Spyro was right.

“You know what? You’re right! In the morning let’s go look for a pony boat and hitch a ride!” Claws sounded like someone out of a movie that Spyro had seen before. He sounded friendly enough.

“COOL! But what do we do tonight? It’s gonna be really cold.”

“We’ll make a fire, duh!” And with that, he started to sniff around on the ground in random directions.

“Um, what are you doing?”

“Sniffing for sticks and tinder, duh!”

“Uh, right.”

Before long, Claws had gathered up a bundle of sticks and wood and placed them in a pile. He then put some rocks around it and waited, staring at Spyro.

“Well? Go on. Light it!”

“Me? Why not you?” Spyro pointed at what he assumed was Claws in the darkness.

“Because I gathered the sticks, now light it!”

Spyro sighed; it was true that Claws did half the work so he should do the other half. He tried to breath out some fire by taking in deep breaths and letting them go, but nothing came out, only air. He tried again by breathing out harder, but all that came out was spit.

“Fine! I’ll do it!” Claws said in anger. Within a few seconds, fire came out of his mouth and lit the wood. Claws was a red dragon with a red belly and blue spikes; he looked pretty similar to Spyro.

“How do you control your fire?”

Claws looked back at Spyro curiously and after a few seconds he noticed that Spyro wasn’t laughing.

“You’re serious?”

“Yeah, how do you control fire?”

“Didn't any dragon ever teach you?”

Spyro simply shook his head.

“Okay, I guess I can teach ya.” He sighed and stood up. It was then that Spyro noticed that Claws was slightly taller, and probably older, than him.

“Okay, first you need to get down on all fours.” He waited for Spyro to comply and continued. “You don’t need to take in any breathes like you were doing, you just need to visualize the fire coming out and cough it out.”

“Cough?”

“Yes, just visualize the fire you’re trying to make and try to cough at the same time and it should come out.”

He sighed and tried it the way Claws had instructed. After a few coughs, a loud burst of flame came out causing both dragons to jump.

“Now that’s what I’m talking about! Nice going!”

Spyro smirked. “Thanks!”

After a few minutes of excitement, they both sighed and sat down near the fire. It warmed them up just fine, but they still felt glum. The odds of a pony ship randomly showing up just seemed improbable.

“Hey, Claws, what if we can’t get off the island?”

He laughed nervously. “Then we’d better get really good at stealing and hiding!”

With two sighs they decided to call it a night and slept on opposite sides of the fire. It wasn’t long before darkness crept up on both, leaving them fast asleep.

The sun came up just as quickly as the mood did the previous night; it shined on everything in sight. The fire had long gone out, but the two dragons were not in the same position as the previous night. Spyro was lying on top of Claws, huddled into him for warmth. Claws was the first to wake up.

“Hey! Get off me!” Claws instantly shoved Spyro off, rudely awakening him.

“Hey! I was just cold, okay?!” Spyro said in his defense.

“Well, ask next time!”

Spyro felt like yelling some more, but thought better of it. “Okay, next time we sleep can I—”

“NO!”

“Fine, sheesh.”

Claws looked back at Spyro and gave him a curious look but then shrugged.

I’m in a strange land, I’m a dragon, and I’m standing next to another one, but I don’t care? I mean the my house wasn't fun but still… I wonder why I don’t care. Spyro shrugged and figured he would think about it later.

“Okay, weirdness aside, now what?” Claws asked him.

“We find a ship, duh!” Spyro exclaimed, feeling completely satisfied at being able to throw a ‘duh’ back at Claws.

“Heh, okay. Which direction do we go?” Claws stood, staring in one direction as Spyro was turned around, looking in the other. It felt like they were close to the beaches on the island, but they weren't sure.

“Eenie meenie miney mo, catch a tiger by its toe—”

“What are you doing?” Claws asked, he brought out his claw and stopped Spyro’s hand from moving.

“You said we needed a direction to go, so I’m choosing randomly.”

“That sounded stupid. What you were saying?”

“It’s not stupid! Now let me finish!” Spyro stamped his foot on the ground, he looked like a child throwing a tantrum and it caused Claws to giggle.

“Okay, go ahead,” Claws motioned his hands up and down and he encouraged his new friend to continue.

“Eenie meenie miney mo, catch a tiger by its toe, if it hollers let it go, eenie meenie miney mo!” Every time Spyro said one word he would spin around back and forth and on the last word he pointed in the opposite direction of the dragon hoard.

“So we go this way!” Spyro said excitedly.

“You’re crazy, but let’s go.”

Claws walked forward with both his claws behind his head. Spyro chose to copy him. For a while, they walked in a silence, but Claws kept looking back at him. He looked like he wanted to ask him something but thought better of it until curiosity got the better of him.

“Spyro, what’s a tiger?”

“…What?”

“You said ‘tiger’ in your… in whatever that thing you said was. You mentioned a tiger, so what is it?” Claws asked.

“You’ve never seen a tiger before?”

“Nope, can’t say that I have.”

“They’re large cat-like animals; they have stripes all over them and they use these large paws with claws on them to hunt other animals.”

“Oh, that’s weird.”

“Ooooookay.”

They continued in silence for a while, but Spyro’s stomach interrupted them.

“I’m hungry,” Spyro said while looking down at his stomach.

“Yeah, me too. But we don’t have any gems or anything. Sorry.”

“I’m guessing there aren't any shops around here where we can buy food?” Spyro asked while they both stopped.

“Okay, stop saying weird things. I don’t know what you’re talking about, and dragons don’t usually use money. If we want food we either need to hunt for it or get lucky.”

Spyro was about to protest, but he stopped and sighed and they continued on in silence. They walked for what felt like hours until eventually they found the beach. To their astonishment, docked on it was the largest ship they had ever seen, and in front of it were ponies all over the place.

“We did it! We found a ship!” Spyro jumped in the air for joy before being tackled to the ground by Claws who covered his mouth to silence him.

“Are you crazy? We need to stay hidden. We were lucky enough to find a pony ship, but we can’t get caught.” Spyro simply nodded and let Claws take his hand off his face.

“Okay, sorry I’ll keep quiet.”

“Right, so we found the ship, now what?” Claws asked as he looked over at Spyro. Both were on the ground looking over the beach, hoping to remain hidden.

They both looked around the beach, ponies were all over the place, but they followed a certain order. Like the dragon hoards, they remained in groups which could be easier to sneak around. Spyro noticed that there were crates all over the place and some seemed to be filled with gemstones while others were empty, but they were all being loaded onto the ship.

“You see those crates?” Spyro pointed to some empty ones.

“Yeah?”

“If we can sneak into a big one and close the top maybe they will bring us on board without noticing us.”

“But there are ponies all over the place; there is no way they won’t notice two dragons running to the middle of the beach.”

“Maybe. But look at them closely, they look bored and most of them are barely paying any attention at all.”

“Well, I guess we can try.”

They both nodded and slowly inched their way to the largest crate they could find. There were two piles of crates. On one side were the closed ones filled to the brim with gemstones, and on the other side, empty ones waited to be filled. Spyro figured if the ponies saw a crate that was closed then they would assume it was filled and his plan would work. After five minutes of crawling in the sand, they made their way to one of the crates. They looked around and, sure enough, none of the bored-looking ponies had noticed them. With a shrug from both, they each slowly climbed into one of the crates and quickly brought up the top. With quiet thuds, the crates were sealed, leaving them in darkness.

“Now what, Spyro?”

“We wait. If they bring us on the ship then we should be fine as long as we keep quiet.”

“Spyro?”

“Yeah?”

“You’re one crazy little dragon,” Claws said with a giggle. Spyro just smiled and took a seat.

They waited for twenty minutes. All around them, they could hear other ponies lifting up gem-filled creates, but so far none had lifted theirs. After another twenty minutes they heard a noise outside the crates.

“Hey is this one filled?” They heard a foreign voice ask.

“What? Of course it is, haul it on board!”

A soft, violet glow enveloped the box as it was lifted into the air with the two dragons riding along. Spyro felt weightless in that moment. It was surreal.

“What’s going on, Claws? What’s that glow?”

“They must be using unicorn magic to lift it,” Claws explained while keeping his voice as low as possible.

“Oh,” Spyro paused and had to process what he was just told. “I didn’t know they could use magic.” Spyro did a double take, but Claws could not see him.

“Duh! You really don’t know a lot, huh?”

Spyro just made an annoyed groan back at him and sighed; he figured it would be best to just stay silent until the crate stopped moving.

Chapter 2: Parley

The crate that was holding the two dragons was slowly being moved to the bottom of the ship. Spyro began scratching the floor of the crate out of sheer nervousness, though not loudly enough for even Claws to hear him. The crate was being moved gently enough that they didn’t slide along, but the silence was still causing them some concern. Finally, after ten minutes, the crate was lowered down gently and the unicorn in question left in a hurry to get another.

"Are we on the ship?" Claws asked.

"I think so, but I don't hear any ponies," Spyro said while attempting to remove the top of the crate to peek around.

He saw a dark room filled with dozens upon dozens of large crates; a quick smell told Spyro they were all filled with gems. Though it was too dark to to notice anything else, it was unmistakably part of a rather large wooden ship, and that's all that mattered.

"Yeah, we are on the ship."

"Good! Okay, quickly jump out and go get us some gems to eat," Claws basically commanded.

"Why me?"

"You're smaller and quieter. You need to hurry, though, once the ship sets sail I'm sure there will be guards down here or something."

Spyro sighed and jumped out of the crate. He looked around and noted that he could barely see a thing. He shrugged and felt around for a nearby crate and eventually found one. Feeling around again, he lifted his claw to the top of it and attempted to pry it open, but it wouldn't budge. Spyro turned around and gently knocked on the crate behind him.

"What?!" Claws hissed.

"The crate's locked or something! I can't get it open."

"Well, try harder. And hurry!"

Spyro grabbed the top of the other crate and tried again to pry off the top. With quite a bit of exertion, he finally heard it break off with a loud noise that made the two flinch. He looked around quickly and saw no ponies coming to the attention of the noise and sighed in relief. Climbing to the top of the new crate, he looked down and his heart stopped; there were hundreds of gemstones that somehow made the ones in the hoard look… lame. He grabbed as many as he could carry and tossed them gently into the crate where Claws was still sitting. He did the same thing a few more times before giving up and closing the crate as tightly as he could. Climbing back in their box, he sighed and placed the top back on.

"Finally, some food!" Claws cheered quietly and started to immediately eat a few gems.

"You know, you could say thank you at least," Spyro said, huffing in anger.

"No, I'm good. Now start eating; we don't know how long we will have to go without food so… eat!"

The serious tone that Claws gave him was all Spyro needed. He grabbed a random gem in the darkness and started nibbling on it slowly. The taste was amazing, at first he thought it tasted like a lemon candy, but that was wrong. The flavor kept changing the more he chewed on it. He ate a few more and so did Claws. They decided it was best to keep the rest for later. So they sat there in silence, occasionally hearing another unicorn pony come by and drop some more crates in the cargo hold. So far, the ship had not set sail.

"Claws, why do you think the ponies came here if they aren't welcome?"

"Because ponies are greedy and they wanted to steal all the gems off the island."

"Do you really think they're evil? How can love and harmony be evil?"

Claws stared at him for a while. All Spyro could see of his body where his eyes. After several minutes, Claws spoke. "Spyro, you're weird."

"Stop calling me weird!"

"Shh! We need to stay quiet. And I can't help it you say weird things."

"But you said you were banned from the hoard for being nice, and they made the ponies sound nice."

"How do you know? You ever met a pony?"

Spyro scratched his head but had a quick comeback. "Have you?"

"Well… no, but for now let's just assume that they are bad. We don't wanna get caught."

"No, I don't want to be caught, but once we get to their land what do we do?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean once the ship sets sail and we, um, dock in their land then what do we do?" Spyro nervously shuffled his claws.

"I… guess we didn't think that far ahead, Spyro," he admitted while sighing.

"Well, we need to think of a plan. Evil or no, I doubt some random ponies are just gonna invite us into their homes and let us stay."

"Right, let me think for a minute."

They both went silent again for a while. Occasionally they could hear more crates and occasionally Spyro heard Claws shuffle around to get more comfortable. After a while, Claws decided to voice his ideas.

"I got nothing."

Spyro facepalmed immediately after hearing his "idea".

"Well I can't think of much. I mean, I guess it's possible that the ponies aren't evil which would change things, so to speak."

"Right. But we won't know that until we actually meet a pony, and we can't do that until we are off the ship!"

"Exactly, so I got nothing."

Spyro sighed. "Claws, I'm thirsty."

"Well, unless you can mash these gemstones into liquid, I doubt we will be getting water anytime soon."

Spyro sighed again and slumped down in the crate. The noise of moving crates had long since stopped. It wasn't until recently that he sensed his growing need for water; he was starting to notice a few other things too. Ever since he woke up on that island, he had felt numb, but now it seemed his dulled senses were returning and so was his dulled mind. It was unnerving how he accepted the fact that he was a dragon so quickly. To any child, this would seem like a dream come true, yet he knew that he didn't used to be a dragon. But whenever he tried to think of his previous life, he only saw vague memories and nothing showed his past self in them, even if he could still think of the memories clearly.

He knew that he had grown up in an orphanage until age ten and he knew it wasn't easy or fun. He also clearly knew about stuff from his world while his dragon friend clearly did not. Could that mean that things like tigers and video games didn't exist here? Shuttering at the thought of no video games, he pushed it aside to try and clear his thoughts. He wasn't a stupid child and he had always been quite curious even after getting past that innocent age where he would ask question after question to his caretakers until they were driven crazy.

Clearly, ponies could talk here and had magic like in storybooks. But why wasn't he excited to see these things? There he was, on a very large wooden ship surrounded by magical ponies, sitting with another dragon, as a dragon, and he wasn't phased at all. He was far more uncertain than phased, if anything. When the elder dragon had given his story, Spyro was certain that he was insane, but clearly something about the ponies had bothered Claws and, annoying as he was, Claws was still his only friend. Spyro had always been good at trusting others and he wasn't about to stop doing that, so for now being surrounded by ponies that might be evil made him feel uncertain and maybe a bit scared. Instinctively, he moved close to Claws for comfort but stopped when he thought of their sleeping incident earlier, so he slumped back and kept thinking.

Thoughts seemed so clear, but the more he thought of his world that was devoid of dragons and mythical ponies, the more they became muddled. It was an odd feeling; if thoughts of his old world popped up randomly they were clear as day, but if Spyro chose to willingly bring up old memories then they became clouded again. Mentally sighing to himself, he decided to clear his mind and focus on the problem at claw. They were in a dark crate and both of them were stowing away on a ship, they had food in the form of gemstones, but they had no liquids or water. Darkness was quickly becoming a theme for the two but so was silence. After twenty minutes of sulking in silence, they finally heard a noise and they felt the whole ship move in a big thrust.

They both listened eagerly on the edge of the crate with their ears pressed to the wood. They heard voices saying things like 'move out' and 'set sail for Central Equestria'. They both sighed in relief, glad to be rid of the island. To their relief again, nopony had came down in the storage room after an hour of sailing; apparently there was no reason to. After a while the silence was getting to Spyro.

"Hey, Claws?"

"What?"

"Well, we can't stay in this crate the whole time. Eventually we need to get out and try and find some water."

"Yeah I know, but we don't know how many ponies are on this ship. We need to be really careful when we start sneaking around. It's best to wait for nightfall."

"Sounds good, but there's kind of a problem with that."

"What?"

"We don't have watches and there are no windows down here. How do we know when it's night time?"

Ignoring the watch comment, Claws replied, "Well I guess after a bit we should get out of the crate and sneak upstairs to check on the time of day. We can sneak back up every once in a while until it's night. After that, we find some water."

All Spyro could do was nod at this and wait. After another hour they decided to leave the safety of the crate. They both looked around and saw all the crates and after feeling around, they eventually found some wooden stairs. The stairs led up to a door that barely showed any light behind it. Taking a big gulp and some encouragement from his friend, Spyro walked slowly up the stairs and opened the door to peek outside. He saw a long hallway, but no ponies yet. The hall led to other doors and what he assumed was more stairs.

"What do you see?"

"A hallway and more doors, but no ponies."

"Good. How bright is it?"

"Very bright, it's still day time."

"Okay, well let's close that door and wait here for a few more hours and check then."

After a few hours, the thirst and the silence was starting to get to them. They decided then and there that they would need to start sneaking around the ship in hopes of finding a kitchen or food storage room that held fresh water. After those hours wore out, they both decided to walk up the stairs and leave the safety of the storage room. They tiptoed through the hallways, still not coming into contact with ponies. After a few turns, they finally spotted a pegasus pony, but he seemed oblivious to the two dragons standing behind him. After a few minutes of them hoping he wouldn't turn around, the pony trotted forward, leaving them alone.

"Where do you think he's going?"

"Well, judging from the time of day, maybe to get some dinner? We should follow him!"

"Alright. But let's be careful," Spyro replied. He was certainly nervous, but he couldn't deny that Claws was making sense.

They followed the pegasus pony, trailing far behind. After walking a few hallways and climbing two sets of stairs, they noticed more ponies heading in the same direction and started to hear loud noises coming from a mess hall of some sort. Both of them quickly hid behind two barrels and waited for all the other ponies to enter the hall.

"Okay, we found where all the food is, but also found all the other ponies. Now what?" Spyro asked, turning to his friend.

"I have no idea. We can't just sneak into there, someone is bound to see us. Maybe we can sniff around for a kitchen, someone has to be making this food and it would be easier to sneak in a less populated area."

At this, Spyro looked back at Claws, what he said made perfect sense but it made him sound more mature. "Hey, how old are you anyway?"

"Nine. Why?"

"Uh, no reason. Let's start sniffing." There was actually a big reason. Spyro was ten. It didn't make any sense that a dragon younger than him would be bigger and seem so much older. Then again, he had bigger problems to worry about right now.

They sniffed for a while away from the mess hall. Eventually, both of their noses landed on one specific door off in the distance. They peeked inside and saw a few chef ponies busy making food. They walked inside and closed the door behind them. With another sigh of relief, they noticed the two pony chefs were far too busy to notice them walk past. After searching around, they found a pantry room and slipped inside. They found plenty of food and, to their luck, some barrels. After sniffing at the barrels, they felt confused.

"This is not water. What's inside?" Spyro said.

"I don't know. Definitely not water, but it is something to drink at least." Claws shrugged after saying this and pried open the top of the barrel.

Inside, they found a red liquid and, after a few sniffs, they concluded that it at least seemed sweet. Finally, Claws decided to dunk his mouth in and take one large gulp. He immediately began to relax.

"Okay, this stuff is good, you need to try it." Claws sounded far more relaxed and slightly more incoherent, but he still sounded like Claws.

Shrugging, Spyro decided to follow his lead and take in a few gulps of his own. The drink tasted wonderful. He finally had something to quench his thirst. After one final gulp, he decided to sit down with Claws while they both sighed in content. Spyro felt far more at ease and slightly dazed, but then he snapped back into alertness.

"Okay, we got something to drink and now know where it is, we need to get back to the crates."

"Yeah you're right. I just wish we could take some of that drink with us." Claws stood up and began muttering to himself, looking around for something to carry the drink in.

Spyro looked around the pantry and eventually spotted two smaller barrels made out of wood that seemed empty.

"Here, grab one of these barrels and fill it up. If we're lucky we can drag them back without anyone noticing," Spyro said, praising himself for thinking on his feet.

Claws and Spyro filled up the two barrels and they again walked past the chefs unnoticed. After some luck and sneaking around some more, they made it back to the storage room down below and shut the door behind them. They slowly dragged the two smaller barrels to their crates and lifted them both inside. After climbing back in, Spyro gently lifted the top back on and they both sighed with relief.

"I can't believe that worked. These ponies are so stupid!" Claws was giggling louder than he probably should have for someone who was trying to conceal himself.

Spyro only giggled back, relieved that they now had food and liquid. They sat there for a while talking about whatever, sipping more on their new drink and munching on more gems. After a while, an ease began to form between the two with their new drink relaxing their bodies far beyond what they could comprehend.

"Hey, Claws?" Spyro said in a slurred voice, sounding very tired.

"Wha?" Claws barely responded. They were both slumped on opposite ends of the crate in relaxed states.

"Um, when… when we go to sleep tonight, can I sleep with you?" Spyro felt confident in asking this, it just seemed normal to him.

"Fine, I guess so." For no reason, Claws smiled back at him and nodded at his request. They knew that sleeping would be required soon and that drink they found was making it harder to stay awake.

Spyro nodded at his response, stood up, slowly lay himself down next to Claws, his head resting on Claws' shoulder, and shut his eyes. Claws instinctively did the same back and soon they were fast asleep. However, they failed to notice the top of the crate was not fully in place, and the two barrels they had dragged back with them were, in fact, leaking.

"Sir! Somepony appears to have broke into the pantry and stolen some our alcohol. There is a trail leading to the storage room." A rather large earth pony sailor exclaimed, facing the captain of the ship.

"What? Well, follow it! I want to know who in their right mind would do something so foalish!" The captain, a pegasus pony, barked out the orders to several other ponies and they soon were following the trail.

Three ponies followed the trail of wine into the storage room. One of them, a unicorn, used magic to light the way to the usually dark underbelly of the ship. It didn't take them long to notice that the liquid led them to an obviously opened crate. They all walked up to it and removed the top. Three very loud gasps followed. Inside were the two dragons sleeping with each other, completely unaware of their horrible mistake.

"What do we do?" The unicorn pony turned to his shipmates after looking back at the two dragons.

One earth pony spoke up, sniffing the air. "I guess we take them to the captain. From the smell of it, they are clearly… drunk. It won't do us any good to try and wake them yet."

The unicorn shrugged and enveloped the two smaller bodies in his magic and gently started carrying them back upstairs. They remained sleeping the entire time. The other two ponies followed him in utter confusion. After several minutes, they were in front of the captain's quarters with his door closed. After a few knocks, they heard his voice.

"Come in."

"Sir, we found the problem… we have some stowaways, sir!"

"DRAGONS? What in the holy mother of Celestia…" The captain stopped himself before he said something that he would regret.

"Right, leave them here. I will deal with them when they are awake."

"Sir? Shouldn't we turn around and send them back?"

"NO! We are not turning this ship around for two little dragons. I don't know why they decided to sneak on-board, but clearly they didn't want to be there. Can't say why, but we will find out soon enough." He paused and took a few sniffs. "Still, judging from their age and the smell on their breath, they will not be happy when they wake up!" The captain, always being a dark joker, couldn't help but laugh. The others joined in nervously.

"Now, GET OUT!" the captain barked. In a bit of a panic, the ponies followed their order, blindly shutting the door as they ran out of the room. The captain looked at the two dragons, shook his head, grabbed a blanket, draped it over them and left the two sleeping on his desk.

Spyro's eyes began to stir several hours later. He immediately regretted that decision as his senses began to slowly return. He had a splitting headache that, coupled with waking up in a strange room, did nothing to ease his mind. He slowly looked around and recognized it as some type of private quarters on the ship with a giant map in the corner and a private desk that both he and Claws were resting on. He saw no ponies, but he knew that they had been caught somehow. Claws was still sound asleep and some nudges did nothing to wake him.

The door in front of him opened and closed rapidly causing Spyro to flinch and grab his head for support. His headache had gotten much worse.

"Heh, a splitting headache no doubt?" asked a pony with a very deep voice.

All Spyro could do was nod slightly and moan in response.

"Right. That will get better with time, but I have no concern for your head, dragon." The pony's tone was one of anger, but it held an odd calmness as well.

Spyro just stared at him with wonder, taking a specific interest in his wings.

"What is your name, dragon?"

"S… Spyro." His voice sounded weak and child-like.

"And, Spyro, what is it that you and your companion are doing on my ship?"

Spyro was now feeling pretty terrible about their plan to sneak on board, but he spoke up. "Um, me and Claws here… well, we are banished from the dragon hoard, so we sneaked on-board so we could, um, live?"

"And what caused you both to be banished?" The captain was now speaking with a sincere voice, but still one that demanded respect.

"Claws was banned for being nice." This statement caused the captains eyebrow to raise but he let Spyro continue. "And I was banned for questioning the elder dragon, I guess."

"Questioning?"

"Yeah, he told this story about how the ponies lived in love and harmony and were evil and it didn't make any sense. How can love be bad? So I questioned it and I got banned." After speaking, Spyro smiled sheepishly back at the captain.

"Hmm, I don't see how those things can be bad either. So you two decided to sneak on board because you thought you could survive better with the ponies than being on that island?" the captain questioned with his full curiosity.

Spyro simply nodded his head.

The captain started to laugh. It was powerful and caused Spyro to grab his ears out of fear for his headache getting worse.

"Well, I suppose that is brilliant in its own right, but that still leaves us with a few problems, Spyro."

"Problems?"

"Quite. For one, we now have two young dragons on-board, illegally, which means I will have to do some paperwork and report them to the princess." He paused and waited for the words to sink in and when Spyro said nothing, he continued. "And now I need to think of what to do with you until we get back to Equestria and then you meet her." His words echoed in Spyro's soul. Her. He definitely meant the princess, but he failed to mention what kind of princess she was.

"Is she nice?"

"I should think so. Otherwise I would be out of a job." He laughed again causing Spyro to flinch but laugh out of sheer nervousness back.

"Right, it will be a good two weeks before the ship ends up in her—"

"TWO WEEKS?!" Spyro spoke out so loudly that it caused Claws to wake up slowly.

"Yes. Two weeks is the standard sailing rate on this ship. Why does this alarm you?"

"Spyro? What's going on?" Claws spoke up, looking around with his right claw massaging his scalp for comfort.

"Do you at least have video games so we don't get bored?" Spyro said the statement so plainly for such a foreign word to both the other dragon and the captain.

"Video games? I beg your pardon, but I do not know what you mean."

"You have never heard of video games?" Spyro turned his head to the captain and back to his friend, Claws. Claws was really confused at this point but simply shook his head not knowing what he meant. The captain did the same.

"No Sega Genesis or Super Nintendo or even arcades?" Each word he spoke sounded higher than the last. And with each phrase, the captain only looked more and more confused.

Spyro had to pause and think for a minute. What else hadn't they heard of? "Excuse me, but have you, um…"

"Captain Sailing Winds, Spyro."

"Excuse me, Captain Winds, but have you ever heard of a television?"

Again, Spyro got the same response from both of them, two shakes of their heads and confused looks.

"Ever heard of electricity?"

Claws shook his head, but the captain responded this time.

"Yes, back in Equestria we have a few things powered by it, but I'm afraid nothing on this ship. I wonder how is it that a dragon who has lived on that island his whole life knows about it."

"I just… do." Spyro paused and continued. "So no such thing as a television or video games?" Spyro stood up on the captain's desk and waited for the answer that he already knew.

"I'm afraid not. Since I have never heard of this I would imagine they don't exist in Equestria, but judging from, uhh, your friend over here, I would imagine he has never seen these things either."

Spyro had to grab his head. He felt dizzy for a few reasons. First, the realization dawned on him that this new world he was thrust into had no video games or modern comforts that he was used to. Second, the same dizziness that he felt back on the island was returning. Video games had always been his life back at the orphanage; they comforted him and brought him into other worlds, but now that he was literally in another world he simply wanted it to end. The dizziness finally stopped and all he could do was say one thing.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Spyro sounded like a child throwing a tantrum. He felt angry.

"What is the matter with you?" Claws walked up to him, attempting to calm him down.

"How can video games not exist here? And television? And how can you live like that?" Each question seemed more comical than the last; not only did the captain and his friend have no idea what he was talking about, but they both felt uneasy from his outburst.

"Listen to me, Spyro, on this ship you will both follow my lead and obey my rules. For one, I want no further outbursts from you like you just did. I have no clue what video games are, or for that matter, television, but it sounds to me like an addiction of some sort. Now if you would please calm down and listen to me, both of you."

Spyro simply nodded and took in some deep breaths like before. He wasn't sure why he got so angry so quickly. Ever since he got his new body, it was like being a young child again; outbursts were commonplace now and difficult to control. His emotions were now the most difficult thing to manage and being in a new body wasn't helping things any.

"Now then, you are both under the authority and rule of Princess Celestia's Naval Command. Technically, you are prisoners now, but being so young, I cannot treat you as such."

"How did we get caught anyway?" Claws said, relieved that Spyro had stopped screaming.

"The wine you stole was leaking into the crate that you stowed away in," the captain said, laughing to himself.

"We drank wine? We are too young for that!" Spyro said.

"Quite. I'm surprised you even know what wine is. But regardless there will be no more for each of you."

"We just wanted something to drink, sorry," Spyro said, smiling sheepishly.

"I must say, you are quite polite for a dragon, but for now, don't worry about it. We need to find you two a room to stay in and some food and I guess a guard to keep you under control." The captain said sternly.

"You want us to spend two weeks in a room with nothing to do?" Spyro said sternly.

"Well, if you're good I will let you see the ship, but at least for tonight, yes." And with that, the Captain stood up and told them to stay put in his quarters until further notice.

The door slammed shut again, leaving them alone.

"I can't believe we got caught and I let you sleep next to me again," Claws said, grabbing his head. He looked like he was in pain.

"Well, it could have been worse."

"What's worse than this?!" He practically yelled, but winced in pain and stopped, lowering his voice.

"They could have killed us or something. He said in two weeks we will see their princess though, it doesn't sound like a death sentence to me." Spyro stood up and crossed his hands in a smug triumph.

"You don't know that; for all we know their princess is just as crazy as the elder dragon!"

"I dunno, but we don't have much choice unless you can fight, like, a million ponies with your fire when we get there. Otherwise, we're stuck," Spyro said dismissively as he got off the table to look around.

Claws, being taken aback by his statement, had no choice but to shrug and do the same.

After ten minutes of looking around the captain's quarters, they both came to one realization; they were bored. There wasn't much to look at other than the massive map in the back that showed them Equestria and all the land markers. Spyro had to stifle a giggle at the mention of a pony town named Ponyville. After another five minutes of sitting there, the door swung open revealing Captain Sailing Wind.

"Right, you two follow me," the captain said, waiting for them to obey.

They followed him to a less secluded spot on the ship. All around them, the sailor ponies had to stop and stare at the two new dragons on-board. Eventually, they found a room with two guards out in front who had orders to not let them out under any circumstances. Inside was a spare room with two beds large enough for adult ponies and some books in a rather plain-looking room. Before the captain left them for the night, Spyro felt he had to ask something out of curiosity.

"Excuse me, Captain?"

"Yes, what is it, Spyro?" The captain said, turning around to face the young dragon. He was smiling while Spyro just looked as curious as ever.

"How come you were on that island anyway? It said clearly all over the place that ponies were not welcome so… it just seems weird," Spyro said, stammering the entire time like a lost child asking a question that he knew that kids shouldn't ask.

"Hmm, Princess Celestia had ordered us to sail here and do our best to chart out the island. Occasionally, a crew is sent to your dragon islands to do this, but we usually come up empty-hooved. We cannot venture too far for risk of angering the other dragons."

"So why do it then?"

"For the gemstones, of course. The island is full of them and they can be quite valuable. Speaking of which, I will have some sent to your new room, but we cannot have you both eating our entire supply, so you will both have to get used to pony food," the captain said, leaving them in the room and shutting the door behind him.

They both shrugged and decided to call it a night. It was getting late and they weren't in need of any food or water, plus, Spyro remembered what the captain said; if they behaved, they would get to see the rest of the ship. So Spyro climbed into his new bed and let the darkness take him for the night.

Chapter 3: Questions

Spyro and Claws woke up early in the morning feeling far more refreshed. They were also now headache-free. Spyro looked around and, to his disappointment, realized that they were, in fact, stuck in a room together with nothing to do but wait. Spyro decided to stretch his new body some and Claws decided to watch him, still giving him that curious look.

"Spyro, again, you're weird."

"Good morning to you too," he replied sarcastically.

"Okay we’re up, stuck in this room and are now prisoners. So now what?"

"We wait for the captain to come get us, I guess. He did say he would show us around the ship."

"Oh no. No way am I going to be paraded around with those ponies staring at me!"

Spyro gave him a quizzical look but stopped when the door swung open to reveal Captain Sailing Winds.

"Good morning, dragons. I trust you're both ready to see the ship." Spyro gave him an enthusiastic nod, but Claws was simply glaring daggers at him.

"No! I will stay here, thank you!"

"C'mon, Claws, you really want to spend the next two weeks just sitting here?" Spyro questioned while walking away from the captain.

"Yes! If it means staying away from those ponies then fine by me!"

The captain was unable to reply so he simply stood by to wait out their argument.

"Fine by me. I mean, it's okay if you're scared."

"What? Of course I'm not afraid of them!"

"Then let’s go!" Spyro was pointing to the captain and smiling.

"Fine!" In a momentary lapse in judgement, Claws ran out the door and into the ship. He looked around and was greeted to over a dozen eyes all staring down at him.

"Gentlecolts, these two dragons will be accompanying me today. They are prisoners, but just treat them as you would treat anypony that's underage." The captain finished speaking and all the other ponies simply nodded their heads but did nothing else.

"Oh, and… GET BACK TO WORK!" With a command from the captain, they all hastily attempted to follow his order but only caused some chaos. But they eventually fell back in line.

"Now, come along you two, and keep up!" Immediately, the captain started his daily routines, not waiting for them to listen or not. Spyro did his best to follow, with Claws looking reluctant to do much of anything, but he kept up as well.

They both followed the captain, with Spyro asking a million questions a minute on every single task he was doing. Meanwhile, Claws was nervously twitching his fingers every time a new pony would greet them and keeping as silent as he could. It turned out, a captain had a lot of tasks to take care of just in the morning alone, and most of what they did seemed like busywork below the decks. After a while, the questions became less about the ship and how it operated and more about ponies.

"Can magic cause lightning bolts to appear?"

"Well, sort of. Pegasus ponies can manipulate the clouds and make thunderstorms. Does that answer your question?"

"No, I meant can, like, a unicorn pony summon a cloud and cause lightning so they can target something?"

"Why in the world would you want to do that?" The captain was taken aback by such mention of violence.

"Sounded cool to me!" Spyro exclaimed defensively while crossing his arms.

"Harming others is not in any way cool. And to answer that question, I very much doubt it."

Questions would start like that; Spyro would think of all manners of magic that he had witnessed in fiction and video games from his world and seem to ask about topics relating to them. But a lot of the magic he remembered either involved wishing or harming others, so the captain would grunt and simply ignore him for a while and go back to his duties. After a while, Spyro made a note to not ask about harming others, but it still didn't stop him from asking question after question.

"Can magic make a carpet fly?"

"Well, yes it can."

"Can you use magic to make wishes come true?"

"Absolutely not."

"Oh, can it make you invisible?"

"Well, yes, but to be honest, Spyro, I don't know too much about unicorn magic, not being one and all," the captain said dismissively.

At this, Spyro had to think. He wondered if other ponies would feel jealous of the ability to use magic. For that matter, wouldn't earth ponies feel jealous of both? He would wager that the captain was at least thankful to be able to fly so he couldn't be that jealous, but still, using magic sounded like the best option if he could become a pony. The dismissive nature of the captain at the mention of a simple question was starting to bother Spyro. Still, they were already in trouble so it wasn’t not like more annoying questions could make it worse.

"Hey, Captain?"

"Yes, Spyro? What is it?" The captain was already at his wits end and the constant drum of questions was not helping.

"Do you or earth ponies ever feel jealous of unicorns?"

The captain had stopped walking when he heard this question to think. Why in all of Equestria did that dragon ask such a random question? Sure most non-unicorns had wished in their lives to use magic, but flying itself was always enough for him. He couldn't speak for earth ponies, not being one himself, but they all certainly seemed happy enough.

"I'm not sure why you ask, but I'm perfectly happy not being a unicorn and so are other earth ponies." The captain continued to walk, not bothering to even look down.

"I just wanted to know. Magic sounds cool!"

"Well, it is, but all of us can use magic, Spyro."

"Even me?"

"Uh, well, not really, but dragon's do have some resistance to magics."

"So I have, like, magic defense points?"

"Sure, whatever that means."

The rest of the morning was spent under the ship while they went back to eat some breakfast in the captain’s quarters. Spyro noticed that Captain Sailing Winds was a rather quiet pony; he only seemed to speak when necessary and always looked like he was deep in thought, even when busy. Eating with him was awkward to say the least. Both dragons could note his silence. After some more questions, the captain agreed to let them see the rest of the ship and hopefully find some other pony to watch after them. They were heading for the deck.

The walk to the deck was excruciatingly boring to Spyro but just made Claws more nervous. The way the captain said nothing the whole time did not help his nerves much. The closer they got to the top of the ship, the more nervous Claws started acting. He was near the breaking point. Spyro was near the breaking point of boredom and wished to speak with other ponies. The captain was cool and all, but he was just too stoic and silent for Spryo’s tastes.

They finally reached the top while they ascended one last set of stairs. All around, they could see ponies working on the ship. Unicorn ponies were using their magic to move around ropes and sails, among other things. Pegasus ponies were busy flying up above to make sure that the weather was clear enough while the ship moved at a brisk pace, for a ship, anyway. And finally, earth ponies were on the ground directing others and making sure that no pegasus pony strayed too far behind on their weather duties and got lost. Overall, it was a sight to behold and to the untrained eye it looked like chaos, but in reality, it was organized chaos.

The waves hitting the ship made just enough noise to be louder than the ponies. All around they could see nothing but ocean with no clear landmarks or other ships. All three neared the middle of the deck and waited while the captain spoke with some of the other ponies. Spyro waited, feeling more bored than ever, and Claws simply stood by, nervously waiting and expecting a pony to pounce on him at any second.

"Um, Spyro?"

"Yeah?"

"I really, really don't like it up here," Claws said while looking all around. His eyes kept locking onto random ponies from earth ones to flying ones like he was being distracted, but it was more than that.

"Why?"

"All these ponies just make me nervous, okay?"

"They're just ponies. I know they are bigger than us but we do have fire you know? We're dragons, dude."

"I know, but… can we just go back down? I'm scared…" This comment caused Spyro some concern so he went up to talk to the captain.

The captain agreed to let another pony lead Claws back to his guarded room, and Spyro demanded to stay up on deck for as long as possible. The captain was far too busy to notice him wander off, but he decided to look around the deck while trying his best to stay out of the way. He wasn't exactly sure what to do so he tried to drum up some conversations, however, most were not interested in speaking to a dragon. He tried to talk to the pegasus ponies, but they were all too busy attending to the clouds. He tried the earth ponies, but they just grunted at him, and finally he tried the unicorns, but they all seemed far too busy.

With a sigh, he walked back to the captain and waited, after a while the captain had stopped ordering others and was now enjoying the ocean breeze. Spyro took his chance to act.

"Hey, captain?"

"Yes, Spyro?"

"Ever see any pirates?"

"No. There haven't been pirates in these waters for over three centuries."

"That's so boring! Does anything exciting ever happen on your ship?"

"The most exciting thing to happen recently are two very annoying baby dragons who stowed away. So, yes."

"I'm not a baby! And we are not that exciting. We don't even have wings!" Every word was followed by a stomp of his foot and a grunt. After, he simply sat down, sulking to himself.

"You will get your wings eventually. True, pegasus ponies are born with them, but it’s not like we could all fly at your age."

"Really?"

"Oh yes. It takes quite a bit of training and practice. I believe my first real flight was at the age of eleven. Before that, most pegasus ponies can only glide or barely manage to break off the ground," he replied, smiling down at him.

"So, you're saying that I just need to wait and I can fly eventually?"

"Well, yes. One thing I can say that you have on me at my age is the ability to breathe fire. I would imagine that is something exciting at least."

"I guess so."

"Right, I'll order one of my stallions to bring you back down. You have plenty of books in your room. You seem quite content on staving off boredom, so try some reading."

Spyro agreed to walk back in silence. With some encouragement, he picked up a random book and started reading. Claws appeared to be taking a nap, but the two guards remained just outside. They were still prisoners, but they didn't feel like it; they only felt slightly annoyed. The moon was just about to rise which caused Spyro to sigh loudly. It had only been two days at sea. They still had around ten days to reach Equestria.

"This is going to be a long trip," Spyro said to himself, placing extra emphasis on the word long. With another heavy sigh, he decided to call it a night.