Cloudwalker Chronicles

by krafty

Lesson 12: Off Week

“Off Week”

It was late at night when Copper Head finally returned to Cloudwalker Kingdom, even though it was still day when he left the Changeling badlands. The journey back was difficult as he now had a physical body and a heavy one at that. Soul Glow had to take many stops to regain enough strength to fly a little more while carrying him. Copper Head would have gladly used the teleportation crystal that was giving to each student that went on a mission; if he had known what it was in the first place.

He entered the school without too much suspicion, but he was able to get past the questioning guards after lying that he lost his teleportation crystal. The guards snickered and muttered “clumsy dirtwalker” as he walked past them. Once inside, he opened the door to his dorm quietly. The lights were out and everypony’s door was closed. It looked the same as when he had “left” it. He sneaked silently towards the stairs that led to his room, but he stopped at Spot’s door.

Was she still alright? He thought to himself. He had to check. He slowly opened the door and peeked inside. It was so dark that he couldn’t see anything. He stepped into the room a little more, trying to get a better look.

Little to his knowledge, Spot was awake and she was frightened. What is Copper Head doing in my room? He hasn’t talked to me ever since that incident. She stayed as still and as silent as possible, but it was hard as she fought the urge to scream. Copper Head kicked something in the dark which startled Spot. She let out a small squeak which made the stallion stop suddenly.

“Spot? Are you awake?” He called out to her in the darkness. His eyes still hadn’t adjusted to the darkness. “I’m back! I have so much to tell you!”

Copper Head’s words confused her, “You’re back? But you were here…” She put her hoof over her mouth. She accidentally spoke out of excitement. Now it was too late.

“Well, it’s a long story. If you’re willing to listen, I’m sure you’ll begin to understand what happened while I was gone.” Copper Head felt something wrap around him and a weight that caused him to stumble to the ground. Spot had jumped out of bed and hugged him around the neck.

“Of course I’ll listen! As long as you’re back to the way you used to be. I missed you so much!” She squeezed him harder, just to make sure he wouldn’t go away or change again.

*BAM!* Suddenly, the door to Spot’s room slammed open and Grand Prix and Shadowstorm barged inside. Shadowstorm tackled Copper Head to the ground while Grand Prix picked Spot up. “Are you ok?” She said comfortingly, “We heard a noise coming from your room so we came as fast as we could. Did he hurt you?”

Spot completely ignored Grand Prix and shoved Shadowstorm out of the way. “Get off of him!”

“Are you stupid?” Shadowstorm growled, “He probably came in here to kill you or something. Why are you defending him?”

“Shadowstorm. Grand Prix.” Copper Head said calmly, “It’s good to see you two.” Copper Head burst into a huge smile. “I never thought I would miss you guys so much.”

“Ok, I’m confused.” Grand Prix scratched her head, “Can you explain what’s going on here, Spot?”

“I’ll tell you what’s going on here!” Shadowstorm growled, “He’s trying to trick us! First, he gains our trust. Then, he treats as like dirt. Now he’s back to being all friendly? It’s not going to work!” Shadowstorm charged at Copper Head, but was unable to knock him over. They locked eyes. “You can’t fool us, bug!”

“The Aberration is gone Shadowstorm! It’s the real me! I can prove it! Remember detention? Remember Buckit and the Enfield? What about Zebrica and the first day we met?” Copper Head did his best to convince his friends. Reminding them of the things they’ve been through together.

“K9 probably told you all that stuff! Him or the King!”

“Shadowstorm, maybe we should give him a chance?” Grand Prix put in, “We can decide what to do after he tells us what happened?”

“Guh! Fine!” Shadowstorm gave up, defeated.

“Thank you guys.” Copper Head started to tear up. He had never felt so close to others in his entire life. “This is what happened…” Copper Head told them all about escaping Tartarus with Wonderbolt, about Soul Glow getting him off the island, and about fighting the Aberration. They listened to him fervently, but Shadowstorm only really started listening when Copper Head described the changeling that was controlling his body.

As Copper Head finished his story, Shadowstorm looked at Grand Prix and Spot and said, “He has to be telling the truth. That… thing that he described was the same thing I saw hovering over him. And it’s not there anymore! I checked when you all weren’t looking.”

“So what do we do now? Surely Krafty knows by now that you’re back. Won’t he come after you?” Grand Prix looked around nervously, “He seems to know everything. As if he has eyes everywhere.”

Copper Head thought for a second, “There really is nothing we can do. If we confronted him directly, who knows what he would do? Plus, he has those wolves at his side at all times. I think the only thing to do is see what happens.”

The others nodded in agreement. They talked for a while, mostly just catching up and filling Copper Head in on what happened while he was gone. Eventually, they decided it was getting late so they all headed off to bed. After a few “good night's”, Copper Head made his way up to his room. He didn’t bother getting under the sheets, instead opting to go straight to sleep.
______________________________________________________________________________

“It’s been a while Copper Head.” Copper Head stirred in his sleep after hearing a familiar voice. “Come on! You can’t be that tired.” Copper Head sat up gasping. It took him a while to realize where he was, but he was instantly reminded when he spotted the orange unicorn sitting across from him.

High Noon smiled, “How’s the world’s last living Joragurr doing?” He scooted a cup in front of Copper Head, “Drink this. It’ll heal your soul a bit. Being away from your body that long isn’t good.”

Copper Head eyed the cup. It was filled to the brim with a steaming green liquid. Copper Head cautiously took a sip. It wasn’t horrible, but it wasn’t all that great either. It reminded him a lot of the taste of blood. “How did you know I was dead? Did you try to contact me before?”

“Sure did!” High Noon exclaimed, “But that thing showed up here instead. Put up quite a fight too.”

“You mean the Aberration?”

“Is that what he calls himself? Very strange.” High Noon grabbed a book from the shelf and set it on the table. “When I tried to summon you a couple weeks back, he showed up inside. He was a very rude fellow, always saying how superior he was.”

Copper Head started to get worried, “What happened? Did he realize who you were?” He was afraid that the Aberration would have reported to King Krafty the fact that he had been visiting a unicorn from Tartaros in his dreams..

“Hmm? Oh, he doesn’t know anything about our exchange. After I subdued him with my magic, I used a curse to remove the memory of our encounter from his mind. Fairly simple magic for me, but there’s something else we need to worry about.” High Noon opened to a certain page in the book and passed it to Copper Head, “Take a look.”

Copper Head finished off the rest of the drink and took a look in the book. It described how a changeling “king” rose in the past. It subdued the many different changeling hives and led a combined army against the kingdom of Saddle Arabia. “What does this have to do with anything?” Copper Head replied confused.

“This is what the ‘Aberration’ is. It’s a changeling king. What this book doesn’t explain, is that the king isn’t a natural occurrence. In order for something like this to exist, it requires ancient and powerful magic. I would go into the details, but it would keep you here longer than possible.” High Noon closed the book and returned it to the shelf before resuming, “What you need to know is this: whoever created this thing is immensely powerful.”

This made Copper Head uneasy. “That doesn’t really make me feel any better, High Noon.”

“Make you feel better? Why…” High Noon was about to say something critical before seeing the look in Copper Head’s eyes. They were exhausted, and not just from a lack of sleep. “Eh, never mind. I have something else for you as well. Follow me.” High Noon got up from his chair and exited the room through a door almost directly behind him.

Copper Head got up quickly so as not to lose him. Through the door was a long hallway littered with different framed pictures on the wall. The stallion gave each one quick glances, but stopped at one particular picture. There were seven ponies in it, one of them being High Noon. They all looked happy. “Were these your friends? Other Joragurr?”

High Noon gazed longingly at the picture. “Yes,” he replied, “Bear Claw, Wonderbolt, Rainfall, Bori Alice, Black Eye, and Double Rainbow.” He listed them all off, one at a time with increasing sadness. “I only know where two of them are. Bear Claw is still a stone and Wonderbolt is somewhere in Tartarus. The others…” His voice trailed off.

“You know, I met Wonderbolt.” Copper Head suddenly realized, “Back when I died, he was there at the bottom of the pit.”

High Noon laughed, “So Doom put him on the welcoming committee? That’s a riot!” He sighed and stared into the picture for a few seconds more. He turned and started walking back down the hall, “Come on, Copper Head. We don’t have time to remember the past. Let’s start working for the future.”

High Noon led Copper Head to the end of the hall where he pulled up part of the floor. Underneath the boards was a staircase that led down into the earth’s foundation. It was dark beyond measure, and Copper Head hesitated before finally following High Noon into the darkness. It didn’t take long for the two ponies to reach the bottom, where they were greeted by a soft light. The light came from pools of magma that were scattered in the cavernous room underneath High Noon’s house.

“You see that rock?” High Noon motioned to a large rock that jutted out of the ground. It was about as tall as two ponies, but very slender. “I want you to crush it.”

Copper Head sidled up to the rock. In technical terms, it was actually a stalagmite and from what Copper Head could see, it looked like it was made of some kind of black substance. Copper Head stretched his legs before turning around to try to buck it. The stallion lashed out with all his strength, only to feel jarring pain in his legs. “Ack! Why did you want me to do that?”

High Noon smirked and tapped the rock. “This is Tartaros obsidian. One of the strongest naturally occurring substances on earth. For any normal pony, this would be impossible to even chip let alone crush. But you are a Joragurr.” High Noon took a deep breath and closed his eyes. His cutie mark started to glow intensely and he started to change. His horn became longer and he grew what looked like small tusks. The size of his body also increased, but that was the least noticeable. He opened his eyes and reared up on his back legs. He brought his front hooves down and made a turning motion with his head. His horn sliced cleanly through the obsidian, causing the top half of it to slide off and fall to the ground.

Copper Head’s jaw dropped and he remained speechless. “How… what?” He alternated looking at the rock and High Noon. “I didn’t know you could do that?”

High Noon chuckled, “That’s the power of Joragurr. And that’s why I brought you here, to teach you how to harness your powers.” High Noon closed his eyes again, and in an instant, he returned to his normal self. “As you know, each Joragurr gets its power from magical creatures. I got mine from a saber-toothed kelpie. They look a lot like unicorns, but are incredibly dangerous monsters.”

High Noon pointed at Copper Head’s heart, “The magic flowing through your blood is even stronger than mine though. You obtained your power from a legendary creature. That there is something special. My goal is to teach you how to harness that power.”

Copper Head’s excitement grew; if High Noon could teach him to do the same things he could do, then Copper Head would have no trouble facing off against monsters like the Aberration ever again. “When do we start?”

“Mmmm,” High Noon squinted his eyes, “Some other time. You have to go now.” With a powerful push, High Noon launched Copper Head into a pool of magma.

Copper Head woke up with a jolt. He quickly checked the clock that was on his nightstand. It read “6:23 AM”. It was too late to go back to sleep, but too early to get up and do anything. Copper Head groaned. High Noon really needed to time his rude awakenings better.

______________________________________________________________________________

Later that morning, the group headed to K9’s office. In celebration of getting there friend back, Shadowstorm, Grand Prix, and Spot made a great breakfast for Copper Head. It was the best meal he had ever had. After breakfast, they headed to K9’s office in high spirits. As they filed into K9’s office, the teacher was caught by surprise. “What are you four doing here? Didn’t you just come back from an assignment yesterday?”

The four were just as surprised as he was. “What do you mean teach?” Shadowstorm questioned, “We came here BECAUSE we didn’t have an assignment. What else are we supposed to do?”

“It’s off week for you guys. This isn’t rocket science.”

“What’s ‘off week’?” The four ponies said in unison.

K9 face hoofed, “I keep forgetting you all haven’t been here for very long. After every assignment, the students get a week to do whatever they want. This week is termed ‘off week’. Haven’t we talked about this before?”

His students shook their heads.

“Well, you four have free reign to do what you want for a whole week. Go crazy.” K9 spun around in his chair; a sign that he was done talking.

The four hesitantly walked out of the room and stopped just outside of his office.

“Well, what are we going to do now?” Spot asked everyone. “I’d like to take a look around Cloudwalker Kingdom. It seems as soon as I got here, I was ushered straight into the academy.”

“That sounds like a great idea!” Shadowstorm exclaimed, “You guys can meet my family! Plus there’s plenty of things to do at Shade Manor.”

“Please,” Grand Prix interrupted, “The Raceway is much better than your danky old mansion. We wouldn’t want to bore them to death.”

“We’ll do both.” Shadowstorm had a sly grin on his face, “Then we’ll ask Copper Head and Spot whose house is truly better.” Grand Prix grinned back, as if accepting his challenge.

Copper Head and Spot laughed. Today promised to be fun, especially if Grand Prix and Shadowstorm were out to outdo each other.

Comments

[Aaron2424]

Brilliant! Can't wait for more. I swear it pains me how this hasn't gotten many views. The fact that this doesn't have over 1k infuriates me. Keep up the good work

[krafty]

4369586 Thanks man Maybe once I finish it I'll get more views.