How a Man and His Friends Helped Save Equestria

by FinInfinite

No More Stalling (A.K.A. The Third Pony)

Chapter 6

No More Stalling (A.K.A. The Third Pony)

Immediately continued from Chapter Five

“...Let’s see if they match up.” Spry walked out of the crowd with Eagletone, the others of the team following. As they were walking, Spitfire caught Eagle’s eye and they looked back awkwardly. Once they got to Spry’s house - a quaint place without excessive furnishing along one of the few lanes that made up Appleoosa - Eagle started unloading questions onto him.

“First and foremost, how in the blazes did we get here? Apparently, there’s a portal somewhere up at Camp, but there’s also a portal in our dreams. I don’t get it. Also, what is this monster that we need to defeat, exactly. How did you recognize me, even though you’ve never seen me like this before, and how do you know why I changed my name? How long have you been here? How are we going to defeat the monster, and finally and most importantly as you seem to know who the Three are, who is the third?!”

There was a silence in the house as Spry processed all of the questions. When he finished, he talked. “Most of my answers are only meant for the ears of the Three. It is a fortunate thing that they all are standing before me.” There was a look of startled surprise on the faces of the ponies. Eagletone and Mitchell. You already know that you are two of the three. As you all know, though, there is one more. Cache, you are the Third pony of legend.”

“Me?”

“Of course. I wouldn’t make a mistake like that, now would I? In fact, that brings me to another of your questions. As to how long I’ve been here, you may find record referring to me hundreds of years ago, or even across the ages. In my time, I’ve been here for only a few years.”

Mitch was flabbergasted. “So you’re a time traveller? But I thought that the most advanced time travel by ponies could only allow you to go for a small amount of time, and even then, you could only cast the spell once!”

Even the other ponies were rather astonished, especially the two real ponies. “Time travel is possible...?” Spitfire asked, rather dazed.

Spry gave a rather dark look. “Indeed, Starswirl the Bearded made that spell, and many others. One of these other spells was not meant to be used by any pony; not even the Royal Sisters. That was the last spell he created - the ability to permanently travel through time multiple times with a group of ponies as big as a unicorn’s power could handle - a breakthrough even bigger than his previous time travel spell,” he said, reminiscing in some nostalgic time.

Already wide eyes were now accompanied by slack jaws.

“Starswirl, of course, was wise enough not to share this information to any pony besides the Alicorns themselves, who told him that a spell like this was dangerous for everypony, to which he completely agreed. Unfortunately for him, he was unwise enough to use the spell himself, with a group of two of his closest consorts. One of them was an Earth pony.”

Eagletone could see where this was going.

“That was the day that Starswirl the Bearded’s official death was marked. According to my calculations,” he said, for he was a math teacher on Earth, “He was alive for an additional two years, relatively. In the end, time travel was the downfall of two ponies: one unicorn, one pegasus. Oh, they died spectacularly,make no doubt about that,” he said reassuringly, “He saved the lives of many by dealing with the time stream, but perhaps it could have turned out equally well had he never succumbed to the urge to adventure in time.”

As he finished his sad tale of the true death of Starswirl the Bearded, he looked on the pouch that was around his neck. Eagle guessed that he had received it from Starswirl, and that whatever was in there, or maybe even the pouch itself, were extremely valuable. He could tell something else, as well - something that Cache also seemed to realized.

“You’re holding back,” Cache concluded, finally.

Spry Canyon sighed, and replied, “Yes, I am. I wish I wasn’t, but much of the story - our adventures and this little pouch in particular - have to do with the Three Elements of Balance.”

“Tired?” Spitfire asked simply.

“Exhausted,” Spry answered. “Exhausted from keeping secrets. Exhausted from running away. I’m ready to hit the hay and wake up ready to start fighting!”

His short speech was inspiring, and the ponies agreed by cheering.

“But seriously,” he called, interrupting their cry, “I’m tired. I need to get some sleep and wake up early. I’m not exactly young anymore!” He was laughing as he dismissed them. “Go talk to Braeburn for some lodging. I trust you know who he is?”

“Of course, Rob!”

“It’s Spry, Eagletone!”

“You don’t seem very spry to me!” he called as he flew out the door.

Spry smiled as the last pony walked out. “Cache. Tell the other two to come to my house early tomorrow.”

“Sure thing,” Cache said.

Spry walked slowly to his bedroom. his shoulder was killing him at the moment. He popped it. Ahhh, that’s better! He layed down on his bed, excited to see what tomorrow would bring. Certainly a lot of questions, a lot of new things, and a lot of him having to explain everything. Perhaps his seership was doing him more harm than good, forcing him to run his mouth. Oh, he would have to explain that too. For the first time in a while, Spry Canyon fell asleep at a reasonable time without staying awake at ridiculous hours of the night.

***

The sun was setting as the team of six humans and two ponies were trying to find Braeburn. Spitfire accidentally caught Eagle’s eye again and they both looked away, then after a slight hesitation, looked back only to look away again because the other was doing the same. Timing was merciful that night though, as the found Braeburn immediately afterwards.

He seemed nearly as enthusiastic as he was in the episode Over a Barrel, but Eagle could tell that some of his enthusiasm was a bit forced; understandable in these circumstances as possibly the last settlement standing in all of Equestria. “Well, howdy! What can Ah do ya’fer, seein’ as you eight’re new ‘round these here parts?”

Aaron was the one to answer in his seemingly regal voice. “Spry Canyon sent us to find you. He said you could provide us lodging.”

Braeburn just seemed to notice the large red pony and his similarly-featured brother. “Hoa, you two sure are mahghty big. Y’look even larger’n m’cuzin Big Macintosh!” for indeed they were. “Anyways, yer lookin’ fer a place to bed, are ya’? Y’all can head on over t’the Salt Block over yonder,” he said with a gesture of the hoof in the direction of their watering hole.

“Thanks, Braeburn!” Said Josh, thoroughly tired - Ironically, it was the two brothers who had been doing all the work that day, and a couple of days before and they seemed limber and ready to pull for another week without sleep.

“Not a problem, pardners!” he smiled, leaving.

The group of eight walked in the road until they came to their destination, the Salt Block. It looked no different than in the show, with its classic saloon-style double-doors. As they approached, the tall barkeeper came out the door. Like in the episode he was in, he was rather fancily dressed and would be slightly intimidating to any smaller pony. “Howdy! Welcome to the Salt Block, the finest waterin’ hole around!” He laughed at his own joke - it was the only watering hole around. “What’re a few’a you youngsters doin’ round here?”

“We were hoping to find lodging, if you were able to supply,” Jed replied in a similar voice to Aaron’s.

Oddly, Jed had a similar effect on the barkeep as Aaron did on Braeburn - they seemed to notice the two little until they talked. “Hoa, you two sure are-”

“We know,” they said together.

The tall barkeeper regained his composure and started talking again. “Well, we have some rooms, but like ev’ri’thing in this here saloon, it’ll run ya’ some bits, no matter who y’are,” he said, talking business now.

“Well then,” said Spitfire grinning, “It’s a good thing I have some bits to run, isn’t it?”

The barkeeper’s eyes seemed to grow as big as his legs as he saw a sample of the money Spitfire was carrying for circumstances that required it.

“Well, that sure is quite the sum y’got there! I’ll tell’ya what: Ah’m an honorable stallion - Ah don’t go and charge higher prices to those with more money. A hundred n’twenty bits for the lota’ya ta’ room.”

Spitfire and Soarin’ nodded - a hundred and twenty bits was more than reasonable for rooms enough for eight. The humans had no idea how much a bit was worth, though, so they just tried to go along.

After money had been exchanged, the barkeeper happily let the group in, showing them to their rooms. As they were walking through the building, they saw more than a few ponies with a block of salt instead of a hard drink. Most of them weren’t even Appleoosan, and many of those looked downtrodden, trying to dry up their sorrows with Sodium Chloride. A good number of others were completely unconscious, though from salt or lack of sleep, Eagle couldn’t tell.

Once everypony was in their room (there were two to each) they promptly either bathed and went to bed, or simply slept immediately, to wash in the morning. For the first time in a number of days, Eagletone (and all the others) went to sleep on something soft. It was rather nice.

Everypony was tired, except for Jed and Aaron, but Eagle could not get to sleep for a while. He was too excited about what tomorrow’s answers would bring. Cache also could not sleep, excited about the fact that he was the Third Pony, and all were both looking forward to and dreading what would happen.

***

Dawn of the Eighth Day

X Hours Remaining

***

Eagletone awoke early (a rarity for him) and went to have breakfast, remembering that he was in one of the saloon rooms. He thought it odd that there should be hotel rooms in a bar, but he didn’t complain. Perhaps it was sort of like in Lord of the Rings, where there were places to bed in the taverns. He realized that either everypony had woken up very early; which he found unlikely, or he had woken up before anypony else in his small band. As he walked down to the dining area, the only ponies he saw there were two who were unconscious, and one who was slowly circulating a small block of salt around in his mouth. This pony ignored Eagletone as he sat down.

“Hey,” Eagle said to this pony.

He still ignored Eagle.

He looked back to the bartender and ordered the least fermented cider they had, along with a lot of oats.

“Just plain oats? Nothin’ hard or peppy to drink? Not even any salt?” he asked incredulously.

Eagle grinned the slightest bit and replied, “My tastes are a little more than strange.”

The bartender shrugged and went about his business.

“Wimp,” said the stallion sitting next to Eagle without looking at him.

Eagletone, on the other hand glanced over. He had a look of disapproval as he realized who he was from a fanfiction he had read - large, strong, blond, an apple for a cutie mark, of course, though no western-style hat, strangely enough. “You call me a wimp when you leave your own family for... who knows why,” he replied, casually accusing.

The opposing pony became defensive. “Whadda’ you know ‘bout that? It doesn’t concern ya’, boy.” he said, anger starting to rise, though volume still kept low.

“You’re nothing but a disappointment; I don’t know why you’re in here, of all places, Bad Apple,” Eagletone said using the stallions nickname used by his boyhood friends, further aggravating him. “Eeyup. ‘Bad to the core,’ as they used to say. Of course they always loved that about you, didn’t they? You led’em astray. They thought you’d settled down when you had three foals.” he laughed scathingly. “I reckon they were wrong. Could never stay in one place for too long, could’ya, Apple Pie?”

The adjacent stallion could hardly keep his fury contained, trying to hold it in as he said through clenched teeth, “A’ve changed. That’s the past, this is the present.”

Eagle shook his head. “You’re not even worth talking to, Apple Pie, father of Big Macintosh, Applejack, and Applebloom. You call me weak, but you’re truly the weak one. Strength lies not in the body, but in the mind, because if you live your life too freely, you’ll lose all that matters all too soon.” With that he finished, turning back and proceeding to ignore any protests by the errant father.

When his food came, he ate, grateful for the sustenance he needed in order not to die from starvation.

Eventually, Apple Pie stormed off. At that moment, Spitfire walked down, probably for the same reason as Eagle. As she walked down the stairs, she saw him quickly open the door, somewhat stomp out, and slam the door behind him. “What’s eating him?” she asked.

“We had a rather personal argument,” he said casually. “I won.” At that moment, he took a look at the almost-flame-colored pegasus, and immediately looked back to his food, laughing.

“That bad, huh?” she asked almost despairingly.

Eagle had to fit in his quip between his fit of giggles. “Let’s just say that I’d rather sleep on the cave floor again than have that bad of terminal bedhead.”

Spitfire walked down the steps confused.

She stayed confused for a moment longer, because Eagletone had to fight his laughing hard. “...Terminal for... everypony else, that is! Ahahahaha!” He was literally crying at this point.

Every conscious pony in the room was experiencing some degree of humor at the moment. Then again, ‘every conscious pony in the room’ consisted of Eagletone, Spitfire, and the bartender.

“Of course, that isn’t to say you’re not still pretty,” Eagle added, thankful that he was already red to begin with. Man, there’s a lot of red ponies with blond hair, he thought.

Spitfire, on the other hand, was not so lucky; her blush showing through. “Thanks.”

The tall bartender chose that time to take Spitfire’s order. “Whad’ll it be for you, ma’am? Something less strange than plain oats and nothin’ hard to drink, I should hope,” he said with a rather accusing look at Eagle, who shrugged surreptitiously. Spitfire gave him a look that almost had a caption that said, “SRSLY?” on it. Which only made him laugh again.

Spitfire looked at the menu, then saw something that fit her fancy. “I’d like to try this platter of lilly-filled caramel apples.”

Eagle choked on his cider. “You have caramel apples? Why do I not know this?!” he shouted to nopony in particular.

“Well sir, no offense, but actually looking at the menu might help just a bit,” replied the bartender in a confidential whisper.

“Oh yeah. That might help,” Eagletone said, now staring off into space as if he’d just had an epiphany. “Well, could I have some of that, too? Plain caramel apples?” he added innocently.

The bartender was now focused on cleaning a glass with a rag. “It’s her money, far as I know,” he told Eagle.

He gave a look to spitfire to rival Apple Bloom’s. She tried to look away, but the pleading gaze seemed to hold her in its grasp. “Well,” she said, trying to fight it, “... Okay! You can have your dumb apples!”

Eagle pumped his hoof in exuberance. “By the way, where’s everypony else?” he added, his tone casual.

Spitfire was equally casual. “Well, Aaron and Jed got up before dawn.” Typical. “I’m not sure where they went to. Everypony else besides us are either asleep or comatose, it seems,” she joked.

At that moment, their food arrived. The second time that morning for Eagletone. Despite that, he ate quickly, invigorated by the sugar content of the caramel apples. Spitfire on the other hand, ate more delicately, savoring the flavor of each sweet bite.

Needless to say, Eagle finished first, leaving him nothing to concentrate on except for the mare next to him. “So...” he started awkwardly, “Nice weather we’re having...”

“I suppose it doesn’t change all that much out there, save for the occasional flash flood,” she replied.

Eagle decided to get a little less lame. “I suppose this ‘Monster’ thing has affected us all in some way or another.”

Spitfire tried to mare it out, to stay strong, but that struck a chord. She almost started crying. “Yeah, I guess it has.”

Eagle knew he had just done something something forbidden by some unwritten book of how guys should act around girls and all his instincts were telling him to switch the subject, but he knew he had to press on. He could help her with whatever was the matter with her. With some hesitation present in his voice, he continued, “I know it’s affected me; I’m gone from my entire universe because of it. Just to fight it. But you know what, that doesn’t matter. What matters to me right now is what’s wrong with you.”

Spitfire looked at Eagle through somewhat teary eyes, trying to fight her emotions. Her voice came out sorrowfully. “The thought of those endless ponies. That endless line of lives lost. Not just in Cloudsdale, but everywhere. I’m lucky to have survived. I don’t really care about what Wonderbolts show this put off, what race, or anything personal. I feel guilty; guilty that I’m alive just because of pure luck. Guilty that somepony else could be alive instead of me, but they’re not. It’s me.”

Eagletone knew that this was perfect. He could make his master stroke, solve all of her problems. Now if only he knew what the crap to say. As a result, when he tried to respond, it came in chunks, pausing for a while before figuring out what his mind was thinking. “Spitfire... It’s not just pure luck. Nothing is coincidence, you should know that... There’s no reason to be guilty, because there are other ponies who survived. Ponies that escaped... And as far as I know, these ‘Three Bearers of the Elements of Balance’ that I’m apparently a part of are going to fix that.” Yes. It was perfect. Or, at least, he was pretty sure of it.

Spitfire had dropped a few tears by this point. Eagle decided to be even more bold - he put a comforting arm around her. “Thanks,” she said.

Just one thing to top it off, he thought. And thought for a moment longer. Perfect. “And just know that, no matter what, I’ll be here.”

“Yeah,” Spitfire said, turning the arm around her into an embrace.

There was only one thing going through Eagletone’s mind. AAAAAWWWWW YEEEAAAAAH!

They continued for a short while until it became slightly awkward, then Eagle had to covertly point that out. “Ah... You can go back to being Normal Spitfire now,” he whispered.

The broke out of the embrace. “Oh. Yeah.” After that brief moment, she was back to being normal, awesome, leaderly Spitfire.

Eagletone decided to leave the bar to go for a short flight - something he would have rarely done at home, even if he had wings. He opened the wooden door and stepped out, only to be immediately bombarded by light.

“AAAARRGH! NATURAL LIIIIIIIIGHT!” he shouted in a low, nasally voice, covering his face with his hoof. After his usual ritual, he took off, a short contrail of flames following his phoenix feather. He had grown a habit of concentrating on the warmth from that contrail, since it was strangely comforting. As he was doing this, he suddenly noticed more than saw something out in the distance, thankfully northward of the eastern sun. Somehow he knew it was a phoenix, and not just a phoenix, but Philomena. And then he felt a comfortable burning in his feather, which told him that the feather was the source of his knowledge. He decided to fly towards her, to meet her in the air. He felt unusually clumsy this morning, and so ended up walking by the time he actually came to the bird. “I suppose you’re not just here to say hello, are you, Philomena?” he asked, half-guessing the firebird’s intents.

To his surprise, the bird produced a third feather, much like his own. Then he remembered - Cache never met Philomena. He didn’t have a feather. And a phoenix feather would be very useful for a human who was already somewhat knowledgeable in the arcane arts.

His eyes widened in revelation with a quiet “Aahh,” then he was back to business-mode, feeling somewhat nostalgic at him following the bird, this time to a civilization that was not ruined.

He laughed - that day seemed so long ago, despite it being only eight sunrises ago.

Eagle’s recreational flight, he realized, had been cut short, replaced by more important things. He flew through the door with the large, flaming bird much to the surprise of every conscious pony there, the number of which had increased by one, due to one of the formerly unconscious stallions having woken up. He ran up the stairs, up to the living quarters, and pounded on Cache’s door, much to the dismay of everypony who was currently sleeping and was awoken by his pounding.

“Wake up, Cache! I’ve got a present and it’s not violence!” he called through the door. Fortunately, ponies had little need of locks, so he just opened the door (which had been cleverly designed for the use of ponies) and walked in, followed by Philomena.

Cache had just gotten out of bed in response to Eagle’s yelling, and was immediately awake at the sight of fire in his room. “FIRE! He called in fear before realizing that it was not spreading. Or even very hot.

“Don’t worry silly, it’s just a phoenix,” Eagletone said calmingly.

“A phoenix?!” Cache exclaimed.

“Phoenixes are always good guys; you know that Cache!”

That seemed to calm him down a bit. Enough to give him his feather, at least. He wasn’t really sure where to put it, but he eventually settled on the opposite ear Eagle had put his on.

“I should explain something. This feather doesn’t just look cool, even though it definitely does that too, it protects you from a lot of physical harm, and improves your unicorn abilities, along with some other things,” he said energetically.

“Oh, cool. Thanks,” Cache said with a grateful smile, as he had finally calmed down enough to think rationally.

The feather definitely looked cool, the flame-colors contrasting nicely with his turquoise coat and dark blond hair. As the ends of Eagle’s and Mitch’s wings were tipped with flames that seemed to dance if one stared, so was Cache’s horn. He took a look in a mirror and proclaimed, “I... look awesome.” And indeed he did. “Oh, and Eagletone!”

“Yeah?”

“Before I forget, Spry said to meet him at his house again today. Just the three this time.”

Eagle nodded and then left to try and get some flying in before Mitch woke up and finished eating. “Oh, by the way Cache, look at the menu before you order.”

Cache laughed to himself.

End of Chapter Six

Comments

[FinInfinite]

Yeah! Chapter Six! I think that Spry Canyon's backstory is so complicated that I'll just make it into Chapter 7. Trust me, Starswirl is cool.
Edit: and FINALLY... Over 3000 words! (In fact, almost four thousand!)