"That's a dragon?"
"Hey! I'm right here!"
Geralt shook his head at the small purple-and-green reptile before him.
"Sorry, just... hard to get used to how different things are, here."
Twilight laughed and rolled her eyes.
"Spike here's just a baby dragon, Geralt."
Spike pouted. "I asked you to stop calling me that!"
The witcher smirked, and crouched down to get closer to eye-level with the dragon.
"Hey, now. It can be tough being the little guy, but there's an upside to that. People are likely to underestimate you; gives you the advantage if you're more than they think you are."
Spike eyed the witcher incredulously. "What would you know about being little? You're huge!"
Geralt laughed, and heard Twilight trot out of the room to give them a little privacy – and likely to get back to work researching how to get the witcher home. He had been stranded in Equestria for a full week, now, and contracts weren't easy to find.
"I wasn't always an adult. I was once small like you... and besides, I regularly face creatures many times my size. Like you, I'm often underestimated."
"Huh... really? Wow. What kinds of creatures did you face, back home?"
Geralt pondered, stroking his freshly-shaven chin.
"Well, dragons, for one – though I have a rule against taking contracts on them, I've still had a run-in with one. There's also manticores, ekkimara, trolls, leshi, larger kikimores, arachas, griffons—"
"Griffons? What kind of griffon is bigger than you?"
The witcher paused, surprised.
"You have griffins here?"
"Yeah! But they're the same size as ponies!"
Geralt tried to picture a griffin as small as a pony.
The thought brought some stifled laughter to the witcher.
Spike cocked his head. "What? What's so funny?"
"Just trying to picture a fearsome griffin reduced to the size of a pony. It almost sounds like a bad joke, a prank played by an irritated sorceress."
Spike laughed at that. "How big are griffins in your world?"
"Not much smaller than adult dragons. Easily three times my size, and that's the smaller ones. A full-grown archgriffin would have trouble opening its wings in here to full span."
Spike looked over the massive chamber, which housed the friendship map. "Whoa."
Geralt nodded with a smile.
Kids do always seem fascinated by tales about monsters.
"Man. You're going to be so disappointed when you see our griffons, then."
Geralt shrugged.
"I think I can live with a vicious monster only being half my size, to be honest."
Spike quirked an eyeridge at that. "You know our griffons are friendly, right? Or, well, at least they're not monsters. Most of'em are pretty rude."
The witcher mentally checked off another potential source of contracts.
"Good to know. Still eagle in front, lion in back, right?"
"Yeah, just try not to get them confused with hippogriffs. Happens to a lot of ponies."
Geralt sighed.
"They friendly too?"
"Yeah! Way moreso than griffons."
"So much for that... tell me, there any kind of monster that regularly causes problems?"
"Well, there's parasprites."
Geralt thought back to the parasprite contract he'd taken a few days ago with a shudder. Organizing an impromptu band in Van Hoofer had been far easier than it should have been; the ponies had a strange affinity for spontaneous musical numbers.
"Dealt with some of those already."
Spike shrugged. "I mean, if you wait around long enough, you're sure to see a monster attack of some kind. They happen here pretty frequently. Usually, Twilight and her friends handle it."
"That so? I didn't realize she was a fighter."
"Oh, yeah! Twilight's amazing. She can do all kinds of crazy stuff with magic. And then there's Rainbow Dash – she's the fastest pegasus I've ever seen. You know that she can make a sonic rainboom?"
The witcher heard a something approach, but figured it to be Twilight and paid it no mind.
Geralt cocked his head. "What's a sonic—"
"Someone talkin' about my awesomeness?"
Spike and Geralt turned to see a cyan pegasus hovering in the doorway, with a rainbow-colored mane.
These ponies sure do have indicative names.
The witcher stood up and nodded to the pegasus. "Rainbow Dash, I'm guessing?"
Dash drew herself up and folded her front hooves in midair. "The one and only! And you're Geralt, right? Twilight said you're some kinda magical athlete and warrior."
It was Geralt's turn to raise an eyebrow. "I'm a witcher, so that's about right."
Seems like this Rainbow Dash doesn't care much for details.
"Great! Let's race."
Geralt had seen how fast some of these ponies could run; witcher or not, there was no way he could hope to outpace a professional athlete, especially one that might be the fastest flyer in Equestria.
Still, I could use a workout.
"Alright, but I have a condition."
Dash landed on the ground and smiled, full of confidence.
"Name it! It's gonna be the wings, right? No flying? No problem!"
Geralt shook his head, smiling viciously.
"No... it has to be an endurance race. Whichever one of us can make more laps around Ponyville before becoming exhausted wins."
"You're on!"
The poor witcher didn't count on Rainbow Dash being able to zip laps around Ponyville in seconds after breaking the sound barrier, allowing her to score hundreds of laps in a single circular flight pattern in mere minutes before stopping to rest – and not even seeming too tired for the amazing feat. Still the witcher put up a tremendous effort, running without pause for hours.
Dash watched him, in amusement at first, and then in amazement as the witcher kept up his pace with a smile and a nod to her each time he passed, running faster and farther than any normal man could manage. Still he only managed a couple hundred laps of his own before he finally stopped, panting and hands raised in defeat, with a smile on his face.
"Alright, that's enough for me. That speed of yours is something else, I just can't compete with that."
"Are you kidding?! That was awesome! You just kept going and going – I had to take breaks to eat and go to the bathroom! I could never have covered anywhere near that much ground on hoof!"
The witcher laughed, despite straining for breath.
"Should have taken you up on that no-wings offer, then. Still, I got what I came for."
Dash furrowed her brow and frowned quizzically. "And what was that?"
"Got to see a sonic rainboom."