Twilight trotted into the hospital waiting room, this time she had company, she smiled at the stallion that had walked in with her. The stallion had a white coat and his mane was a two-tone mix of blue, his cutie mark was an ornate shield, and his golden Royal Guard armor had a radiant glow as if the armor itself was magical.

"So... Shining... Do you really think that Renko has what it takes to be in the Guard?" Twilight asked the stallion.

"Well, if he's been trained as a soldier I don't see why not, many of the other guards have taken a liking to him so I bet he'll fit right in." Shining Armor explained. Twilight gave a warm smile to her brother as she walked with him to Renko's room. When they entered, they saw him sitting awake and reading the book Twilight gave him, Shining Armor had to do a double-take to make sure he was seeing the right book.

"StarSwirl's guide to Chronomancy? What does she think she's doing giving him a book like that?" His thoughts stopped when Renko closed the book and placed it on the side table. There was an awkward silence in the air as each one waited for the other to speak. Shining could see the killer instinct hidden deep in the man's eyes, he also noticed that the man was certainly as tall... If not taller... than Princess Celestia. The man's gaze had an unnerving quality to it, as if he could kill and not feel a single shred of remorse. He had to fight back a shudder before he finally spoke.

"My name is Captain Shining Armor, commander of the magical defenses of Canterlot, I'm here to interview you for a job in the Royal Guard." Renko noticed something about the stallion as soon as he had began speaking, the unicorn was actually afraid of him, he pushed the thought to the back of his mind and let Shining proceed with the interview.

The interview went along similarly to the court hearing. Shining would ask Renko about his experience in the field and Renko would answer. When everything was all said and done Shining shook Renko's hand and said that once Renko got out of the hospital, he would have a job to pay for housing and other expenses. Shining bid them both goodbye, but Twilight decided that she wanted to stay with Renko a little longer since she had time before her scheduled meeting with the princess.

"So... Renko... How did you like the book I let you borrow?" Twilight asked with a kind smile.

"It's quite interesting, there's information in that book that many of the scientists on Katorga-12 would've killed just to get a small portion of... and all of it done... without the desire to rule the world... You ponies sure are different from many humans I knew about." Renko replied, thinking back on all the governments of his time vying for world domination, he sighed as he thought about all the friends he had lost because of conflict with another country. A long silence passed between them before Renko spoke again.

"It never gets easy..." Twilight cocked her head in confusion, her expression asking him to elaborate, "...No matter how much I fight, no matter how many I kill, there's always more death waiting for me around the corner..." Twilight hesitated for a few seconds, deciding whether to give the man a hug like she had the morning of his trial or let him sit, waiting for him to indicate that he needed a friendly gesture.

Renko let himself slowly fall back into a resting position, letting what was left of his wounds heal so that he could begin his new training with the guard, Twilight gave a small sigh before walking out of the room, she gazed at the clock on a nearby wall, she had only a few more minutes to get to the room where she was meeting the princess so she took off at a fast trot.

Renko only gazed up at the ceiling, he hated feeling the way he did, whenever he closed his eyes he would see the hideous visages of the monsters that had conquered and laid waste to the island of Katorga-12... The monsters that he had to fight his way through countless times.

"At least I have a way to pay the bills now..." he thought with a small chuckle.

The next day, around noon, Renko was released from the hospital. The doctors were astounded by how fast all the wounds he had sustained had healed, Renko had only chuckled at their confusion as he thought of the field medic training that he had to learn on his own. He was escorted out of the hospital by one of the nurses and he bid her farewell as he made his way over to the barracks. His thoughts trailed off as he wandered through the castle, anypony who tried to catch his attention was faced with absolutely nothing, he spoke to noone as he walked through the corridors towards the Royal Guard barracks.

"Three weeks... Three weeks, two days... and six hours..." A smile managed to show on his face as he walked, "I can finally be sure that time is not repeating... Finally, I can look at a calendar and know that time has passed..." Renko's thoughts were cut short as one of the Guards blocked his path, because of the way their armor worked Renko had a hard time figuring out why this specific guard was stopping him, then the guard spoke.

"Renko, it's good to see you're still alive... It's me, Moon Shimmer, The unicorn who was the first to explain about the Guards..." The charcoal unicorn stallion gave him a knowing smile as Renko actually began to show the realization on his face.

"Oh! ...I thought that you were a pale yellow stallion though?" Renko puzzled, he knew that there was something off because he had taken notice of the little things like how each type of guard looked almost identical to the others... give or take minor differences in height and build... all of the Pegusai guards were pure white, the unicorns were charcoal-grey, and all the earth ponies were dirt-brown, he knew that there couldn't possibly be that many ponies that were that similar. In fact, he had noted through his travels just wandering canterlot itself that no two ponies...save for the guards... had exactly the same look to them, whether the civilians had even just a minor adjustment to the saturation or tint of their coats. He knew for a fact that when he met Moon Shimmer the stallion was a pale yellow with a brown-black mane, and now the charcoal grey pony in front of him was telling Renko that he was Moon Shimmer. The guard had to stifle a laugh at Renko's expense before explaining.

"Being a unicorn, I know more about the armor of the Royal guards than the other types of ponies. All guard armor is enchanted to project a certain appearance onto the wearer, these enchantments were decided a long time ago and just became routine as the years went on, the only ponies whose armor does not change their outward appearance are the higher officers like Captain Armor... his coat is white, unlike the charcoal grey of all the soldiers under his command."

Renko was hooked on what the stallion was saying, he had even started walking with Moon Shimmer so that he could learn mre on his way to the barracks, he nodded while taking in every word.

"This is amazing... It almost mimicks the United States military, but in the military we had patches that said our rank and name, these guys... these guys have everything individual about them erased to give a sense of unity to Equestrian military." His train of thought happened to stop in time as they approached the castle barracks, he could hear the sounds of military training coming from the other side of the door. It was like music to his ears as he heard the barking of commands to fresh recruits who thought that they had what it took to be in the military, but something was off, he was expecting a drill sergeant to be yelling at and demeaning the recruits like they had when he was in boot camp. As he opened the door he noticed that a couple officers who happened to be in the room turned their attention from the fifty-plus recruits doing 'midday excercise' to him but none of them seemed to be bothered in the least by his curious looks. he examined every part of the room that he could, trying to find out if there was a prank going on, but not one officer was doing anything to demean the troops... in fact... they were actually encouraging them.

"Nope... No way! This does not make good soldiers, soldiers are trained with fighting instincts... Not praise. They fight because it's their duty, not because someone will praise them for it, most of the time soldiers even get insulted for how ready they are to take someone's life." It took a lot of willpower not to grind his teeth in frustration. Unfortunately for him, he knew that when he joined the military here he was going to be starting on the same low rung of the military ladder that the recruits in front of him were on, he was going to have to set an example.

Renko quickly found his way to Captain Armor and gave him a salute, when the captain told him to rest he began speaking about his concerns regarding their training method. After the Captain had silently let him concern his opinions he spoke.

"I understand that that may be the case where you are from, but here we haven't had to draft soldiers... They volunteer for the job... and they all have the dedication to push themselves into being the best soldiers they can. We certainly do things differently here, and I understand that it concerns you, but this is how we've done our training for years and it still has yet to give us soldiers that aren't ready for duty." As much as it bothered him, Renko nodded his head respectfully, he saluted once again before Shining Armor informed him of his new schedule.

From that day on... It was just like boot camp all over again, well, except without the drill sergeant saying that he was going to make you eat what you didn't clean out of the toilets with your toothbrush.