The last of the drizzling rain came to an end in the very early vestiges of the morning as the sun peeked over the horizon. The land was still covered in water but that was to be expected since the rain struck. We had spent a while in Nibel though the moment we returned it was almost as though no time had passed. We left so suddenly that I didn’t have enough time to fully appreciated our time there.
With the constant near threat of death though I understood how little time we had. We were lucky in the first place to even have time to rest. With all the darkness overwhelming the area and balance slowly being destroyed the entire world had almost fallen. Throughout my thoughts I stared out the window watching the morning pegasi moving the clouds out of the way to make way for the sun.
It was at that point that I heard the rustling of hooves clip clopping across the wooden floors. I probably should invest in carpets but the sounds were good for my paranoia that sometimes flared up. They had helped immensely when the remnants of Nightmare Moon had tried to attack me. I was lucky that she had regarded me as a threat and hesitated on striking out at me.
“Morning. Have you been awake long?” Octavia asked as she trotted over to me and wrapping her hoof around my neck and she nestled herself in my hooves.
“Not really. At most an hour or so.” I lied… I had been up since the moon started to fall below the horizon.
“So a few hours then, huh?” Octavia caught me looking me in the eye. It wasn’t a stern look… but the concern was there. I looked well rested enough.
“Yeah… I woke up to watch the clouds. Though from where I am the cloud follows the winds so seeing them being moved by mortal hooves destroys cloud watching when you can shape them with your own hooves in a sense.”
“I suppose. Earth pony so I can’t exactly manipulate them.” Octavia chuckled as she snuggled into the spot between my forelegs so she could relax in my embrace while at the same time being the little spoon in a sense. I don’t know if she understood the implications. The look on her face said otherwise, innocent and just full of wanting to be spoiled by hugs.
“I think I mentioned that I wasn’t always a pony so… I was in the same boat.” I wrapped one of my hooves around her cradling her in a sense.
A part of me was confused by the sudden need to hold on to Octavia. I realized that I needed to cope with the past. I had lost a lot and now I had something new. I didn’t have to let go of the past… but I could make my peace with it. Then there was more scuffling as more hooves came down and piled around me.
“Tavi! Don’t hog Nebby to yourself.” Vinyl cried out as she squeezed herself into my embrace.
“Me too!” Fresh Coat followed getting her way into my grip to the right of Octavia.
“Might as well sneak in as well.” Redheart muttered as she got into place next to Vinyl’s left which stretched my arms to the brink just to hold them all.
“Jeez… you girls are insatiable.” Sunshower groaned as she hopped on my back and under my wing.
“You’re one to talk there Sunny.” Spitfire chuckled as she did the same to my free wing… though I felt her back hoof glide along my side. I felt a lot touching me...
“Whose hoof is on my flank?”
There was nothing but silence as I peered at everypony. Nothing but blushes though Spitfire was smugly smiling as well. It was slightly hilarious to me how much things had changed. When I was going through my first life I had horrible luck in any romantic situations. It was either used or loveless relationships. It was different.
“So what brought on this much affection.”
“We were waiting all that time on Nibel…” Octavia started twisting around to face me.
“Yeah Nebby… all that time riding a top you… It builds up ya know.” Vinyl added joining Octavia in turning to look me in the eye.
“We still have an extra day before we have to get back to work.” Redheart joined in allowing herself to wrap a hoof around my neck.
“I have so much I want to try.” Fresh Coat chuckled as her blushing got worse.
“It’s been a while since we did get to have some fun.” Sunshower glomped me one again using her wings to help her grip me.
“Now… let me pay you back for teasing me so much when we were there.” Spitfire smirked though I swear that it was raunchier than I thought was possible.
“Um… yeah… let’s go ahead with that then. I did say as soon as we get back from Nibel.”
I didn’t get much chance to say anything else before Vinyl’s horn lit up and the curtains were closed. I didn’t see much more after than before the girls immediately pounced all over me. Spitfire was the most aggressive. From there it was a cavalcade on uncertainty and moans that I kind of lost focus after the first hour of their… needs.
I limped upstairs to the bathroom. My wings and front hooves were completely sopping wet and my back legs felt like they were giving out. What was a sunny morning turned into a lazy afternoon. Spitfire was the most needy due in no small part to my teasing before we found the Sunstone. I took a shower while they enjoyed the afterglow. I needed to schedule these out better so they don’t come after me all at once.
“Really need to see if there are any potions for longevity… or stamina. I can’t feel my hips…”
At this point I was muttering to myself trying my best to work through the stress or lack thereof. The water was refreshing as I turned my thoughts back to the Report I got from Kuro. Not only was it in her talons, it was on that planet as well. The fact that Star Swirl’s work reached other worlds meant that he had found a way to travel to other worlds. I knew he was important to Equestrian History but the presence of keyblades and heartless changed everything into something much different than canon.
When God had shoved information of this world into my head alongside the knowledge of how to use my body I had learned about the history of the world… at least to some extent. Star Swirl was a powerful wizard who worked to help ponies colonize what would be Equestria as a whole. He helped the founders and was joined by several ponies of similar mindsets. Afterwards things went bad for them and they were locked away with one of their threats.
I knew I could mess with things preemptively but… I didn’t want to. If I did go out of my way to change things so much then this world would go in weird places. The problem was that that was what actually happened to Star Swirl. Going by the secret report I found it meant that Star Swirl was roaming the universe instead. My head started hurting with how complicated this sounded and how much this could actually change things if that was what true.
The shower slowly cleared my head and cleaned off my wings and matted fur. As much fun as it was, cleaning up wasn’t as enjoyable when you didn’t have fingers to actually clean fur. I left the tub and flew back down to the ground floor fully refreshed… I wasn’t soar at all. Ow…
It took a bit for everypony to get back up from our exercise. Surprisingly, Fresh Coat was the first up. When she noticed I was already cleaned up she started to shake everypony awake. I went into the kitchen and looked over our supplies. The sound of the shower kept going while I worked on make food. As most I could make some fruit dishes with what was in my fridge and I placed it on the kitchen table… we couldn’t use the small table near the couch when it came to food. For obvious reasons…
Two by two ponies joined me at the dining table where we ate in personable silence. Where most of the mares looked a bit flustered from everything, Spitfire and Octavia looked smugly satisfied oddly enough. I didn’t say anything because then it would be focused on me… but I did need to put the idea of pacing things out.
“So… how are you all feeling now?”
“Better/Fine/Great.” Several sighs and different words came out to answer me.
“We should pace things out better so I don’t wind up with a broken back.”
“C’mon Nebby. You’re a tough stallion you can handle us.” Vinyl waved me off dismissing my concern for my poor back.
“Yeah. You’re finally reaching my standards now.” Spitfire added with a knowing chuckle as they both gave each other a high hoof… which made the deadpan stare I was making all the more funny apparently.
“Seriously though. If we paced it out better then I can get really go into more in-depth methods with those times. Long, long in-depth methods.”
I gauged everypony’s reactions seeing that they were actually fantasizing based on my talk. Spitfire and Vinyl were the only ones who didn’t have their eyes glazed over or drooling. They were instead smiling deviously to each other clearly wanting to take advantage of my little condition.
“All in favor!” Octavia sang out raising her right hoof in the air.
“Aye!” A resounding agreement was belted out without any warning.My ears were slightly ringing.
“How do we decide that though?” Octavia looked towards me.
“You’re all grown mares. I trust you all to decide this like adults… regardless that I’m the oldest one here.” I started… then remembered that I needed to do something before the mayor’s office closed. “I’ll be back. I need to see the mayor about planting that tree.”
“Ok Gray. We shall be… resting still. Also discussing how this would work as well.” Octavia answered stopping several of them from voicing their opinions.
I looked over everypony noticing that there were some melancholic looks from everypony. I didn’t know why either. Something big must be going on if this was a discussion topic. I gave each of them a hug before I left the house. If I was lucky I could get there and back before the mayor could leave for the day. As I left I noted that there were serious looked on everypony’s face though I didn’t overthink anything at this moment. I would figure out what was going on eventually.
“So… We do need to discuss this don’t we.” Octavia brought up as the rest of the herd sat on the couch. Thanks to the magic they possessed at this point the clean up was… efficient to say the least.
“We can’t just make this our day job?” Vinyl piped in before anything else could get rolling.
“No. I have too many responsibilities to the Wonderbolts to just resign. Besides if I’m not around all of them are going to be lazy.” Spitfire grumbled as she folded her hooves across her chest. “Regardless of how much I really don’t want to see Soarin.”
“We all knew that joining Gray like this would be taxing if we wanted to keep our ordinary lives as well. Personally I think we lucked out by how versatile Merlin was in magic with his… what was it called?” Redheart mentioned before tapping her hoof against her temple trying to jostle the memories loose.
“Warp-G I think. That warp gummi block right?” Fresh Coat answered scrunching her eyes slightly to focus her memory a bit more.
“We need to tell him that we have to continue with our job. Whenever all six of us have free time together we need to take it. Either to see Gray or go with him on these missions. As much as I don’t want to say it out loud… I’m kind of pumped for going to new worlds. We’re the only ones who have done such things too.” Sunshower smiled as she fiddled with her hooves.
“It’s true. I’ve gotten more inspiration for my work in the past two Equestrian days then I’ve done in my entire life…. Ha! Look at me. I’m already adjusted to all the weird time dilation things.” Fresh Coat giggled receiving quite a few more giggles in response.
“It’s true. Inspiration did come from all this. I have a lot of wubs to produce. I just… I don’t want to have to leave Gray on his own for that long. Dude doesn’t sleep unless its forced on him. Seriously… did you see his eyes while we were in Nibel. Uptight right there. I mean I know that Kuro was being… murderous but he needed to relax.” Vinyl cringed as she remembered her fall from the waterfall.
“Why do you think I suggested that we all go at it like rabbits? I was hoping we could wear him out so he could finally relax for a while. It didn’t work out like I planned but he did certainly seem more relaxed. At least, a bit.” Octavia muttered the last part.
They had each looked at Gray and while he did sleep he didn’t actually rest. Spitfire had noticed that even when he closed his eyes his ears would always twitch a certain direction that a sound came from. It had concerned everypony more than once during their adventure to the point that they needed to force Gray to sleep for longer than a few hours.
“You think he’s been having nightmares?” Redheart brought up covering her mouth with her hoof.
“I don’t think he’s been having nightmares. He didn’t toss or turn during any of the nights we all spent together. It might be his diurnal thing he was doing acting up. To be fair we haven’t had a chance to actually get him on a decent schedule.” Octavia mentioned tapped her hoof against her muzzle.
“When he gets back we need to tell him that we need to keep up with our day jobs.” Spitfire ordered to Octavia’s grumbling but the agreements from everypony cut off any arguments.
“I don’t want to leave him on his own for so long though.” Vinyl voiced up immediately.
“We know Vinyl… but we have to trust that he’ll be fine for a while without all of us around him.” Octavia reassured her.
“So that’s what I want to do Mayor Mare.” I quickly explained catching the mayor leaving the office.
“Is that so Gray? What does this tree look like?” Mayor Mare quirked an eyebrow at me as I pulled a picture from out under my wing. I was lucky that my book created an illusion of the tree sapling I was given in picture form.
“This.”
“Hm… weird tree… but I’m certain it should be fine. You may plant it so long as it is isolated to your backyard. Is that fine?” Mayor Mare sternly stated.
I quickly nodded and was glad that it had been so easy to do so. She gave me a warm smile as I took off to the air to glide back home. I was actually pretty lucky that I hadn’t seen hide nor hair of any of the Element bearers. There was no one following me and I felt pretty good… little tired but that was usually the case.
I didn’t like to sleep in general. It was partially an insomnia thing and more of a paranoia thing now that I had a keyblade. Keyblades were beacons that heartless wanted to capture at all costs. Unless I was in a secure place, sleep would be a death sentence. That, unfortunately, impacted my sleep habits like a ton of bricks.
While working as a cop there were several nights where sleep was avoided entirely because of stake outs and tailing suspects. Those habits were built up over time to the point where I nearly functioned with no sleep for at the most three days. Though that was only at my prime and if I never had to drive.
My thoughts slowly faded as I reached home once again. I would get on the ship and get the sapling to plant it. Eventually I would have stories of other worlds told through all the trinkets I found on these adventures. When I stepped inside everypony was actually standing near the door.
“Welcome back Gray. We've figured out what we're going to do.” Octavia spoke out. I guessed being the Alpha Mare meant she was in charge of making decisions or forming a consensus or something like that.
“Great. Though if I'm looking right you all need to talk to me about something else.” My eyes trailed over everyone and there were some flinches when our eyes met.
“Yeah. You see we all have jobs here in Equestria so…” Octavia trailed off rolling her hoof around. She was beating around the bush.
“Sweet Celestia. Nebby, we need to keep working so we probably won't be around for a while. We gotta keep up appearances if you want to keep this a secret.” Vinyl spoke up though as her words got out her ears folded down lower and lower.
“Okay. That's really a smart idea.” I answered in a completely serious tone.
“Bwuh… “ Several mares managed to piece out as if I had just gone and killed someone.
“I'm not forcing you to do anything. I won't head off on adventures by myself so just figure out a day when all of you are free and I'll plan accordingly.”
I got several hugs and words of enticement for how understanding I was. I had to wonder if this really counted as understanding. I never wanted them in danger but I couldn't keep them out of my life… at least, now I couldn't. Before everypony could head out to get ready for work I zipped up to the ship and brought down the sapling.
I led everypony outside and we found a decent place to put the tree acting like a barrier between home and the Everfree Forest. We didn't have shovels though. Smacking my forehead I pulled out the tomahawk and used that rarely used function of shifting the earth around creating a hole to place the tree in.
As soon as the roots touched the soil the tree lit up with a soft gentle light not unlike the one from each spirit tree. The glow reached a good distance as we looked at the reminder of a long mission where we faced off against a corrupted curse goddess in the shape of an owl as we stopped a planet from falling into darkness. It was the only mission where something we got would be on display for all of Ponyville to see.
That sent some worries up my spine but a quick pat by Redheart made me push those feelings aside. For now at least.
Everypony finally said their goodbyes and walked home. Only Fresh Coat stayed because the trains had been doing maintenance and she didn't want to travel through shadows at this time of night. Surprisingly, the moon had risen during our talks about the immediate future.
Spitfire went back to the Wonderbolt Academy. Susnshower, Redheart, Octavia and Vinyl went back to their respective home. It was going to be really quiet when I was left on my own. Still I had some options to handle that solitude. I still had those pages of the star book to place and I could always do what this show preached and make more friends.
So much to do… so little time.