//------------------------------//
// Chapter 11 
// Story: Harry Potter and the Evil Within 
// by Damaged 
//------------------------------//

"But what about—" I stopped at the look on Hermione's face. She looked determined, and it was clear my 4th what about wasn't going to sway her. Just like Draco's 3rd hadn't. I shared a quick look at Draco and he shrugged his shoulders. Well, it was his turn next. They walked up to the hole in the side of the castle and Harry looked down.

"It's not that far," Hermione said. "If you want to chicken-out now…"

"It's not that. Look, I know you lot always work in groups of three, but I don't get why we can't have Ron along too?" It was a good shot from Draco. I knew he and Ron had some kind of agreement, so all three of us could tolerate him.

"Ron has gotten—He'd bring his sister. Then his brothers. Then next thing you know we have two-dozen students and it's no longer possible to be in any way sneaky." Hermione reached up and started to pull her school jumper and shirt off in one swift motion.

I had just a moment of panic, then looked at Draco to see him in the same situation. Both of us spun around to face the other way. "What are you doing?!"

"It's easier to change if I take things off first. Professor Black said I should only need another six months to master being able to change my clothes with me."

We, me and Draco, stared at the wall for a while, wondering what was going on while trying to keep from looking like we were wondering. Wondering this kind of wonder—ing—was not British. Then we heard a thump and both spun around.

"Draco already has Bes. Can you pick me up, Harry?" Hermione the snake asked. Only, she didn't ask in English.

"What did she say?" Draco asked.

Right. Parseltongue. "You can speak Parseltongue?" I asked her, holding out a leg for her to slither up. Was it weird to feel my friend climb up on me and coil around my neck to hold on? You bet. Was it the most wizard and witch thing to do I had ever seen? Absolutely.

"I'm a snake, Harry. Comes with the scales. Wait, is this Ginny's book?"

Oh, right, I hadn't told her about that. "Yeah. She threatened to tell Ron if I didn't bring her. I am pretty sure she learned Parseltongue, so, uh, she's probably listening right now."

"Sorry, Ginny, but your brother is just a bit—He's dealing with other things right now. You might as well appear, I don't think Draco will be upset with you being along," Hermione said.

When Ginny did appear, Draco jumped back—out the door. I jumped to the edge and looked down, only to see him flapping his wings and circling. "You know the interesting thing about all this?" I asked.

"What?" Ginny and Hermione asked together.

"Well, whenever I do much more than basic magic, something always catches on fire." I stepped off the edge of the castle and started to fall. Well, more like plummet.

The spell to stop falling people from taking damage was really quick to cast, obviously, but it wasn't simple. I'd been practicing it ever since Madam Hooch had saved me from an unfortunate fall. I might have left it until almost the last moment to maximize the wizardness of it. Also, because it was cool to light myself on fire as I hit the ground.

My hooves sank into the ground just a little and my belly bumped it too before I bounced back up and came down with a little thud. Banishing the flames with a little focus on how wizard that had been, I adjusted the shoulder bag Addera had made me. Was it weird to have a bag made from shed basilisk skin and scales? A little. Was it both resistant to fire and wizard as heck, yes.

"Harry!" Hermione's hiss, somehow, had a whine to it. 

"You're both immune to my fire. Well, mostly immune. I don't know if I could burn Ginny's book if I tried, and you're alive, Hermione. I can only burn living things if I really focus." Now I had to work out where Draco was. Looking around, I eventually spotted him landing just down the alley a little.

"We're lucky they probably don't have anyone flying. When you hit the ground, everypony would have seen you catch fire." Draco landed and fell-in beside me. This was such a weird thing, now. I mean, we weren't friends still, but I kinda got where Draco was coming from, and I think he did too. If only he could be a little bit less of a jerk about everything.

"Okay, so we'll go there and see what's going on?" I asked.

Draco shrugged. "I guess. Hermione really didn't have any ideas?"

"For someone so smart, she tends to focus on all the wrong—ack!" She might not be a constrictor type snake, but where Hermione was coiled around my neck she was squeezing enough that I knew she heard and understood me. "Sorry."

"It's easier with Bes. We get along and I make sure not to ever insult her." Raising his wing a little, Draco let me see that he had a much smaller snake than Hermione wrapped around him. 

The snake lifted its head and looked me in the eyes, then said, "Be nice to my brother." The weird thing was the snake had this strange accent, and while I tried to figure out what she'd meant, Draco tucked his wing back down.

"Do you have another snake?" I asked.

"What? No. Father only got me—" Draco snapped his mouth closed and marched away.

"She's talking about Draco, Harry," Hermione said, still in Parseltongue. "She's known him all her life and she's very protective of Draco. Also, she's probably the most venomous snake in this world, so don't get on her bad side."

"Not going to ask how you know all this, but message received. Draco's pet snake is not to be messed with."

"Her name is Bes."

"Right!" I groaned. "Bes is not to be trifled with. What accent was that?"

"Australian."

Now, my next question should have been why does he have an Australian snake or even do you think its fangs could get through my scales, but I'd heard enough jokes about them that I knew I should just accept that I didn't want to try the latter and I honestly didn't care about the former. "Right. An Australian snake that thinks they're siblings. Have either of you come up with anything yet?"

"We still don't even know what we're going to have to do or what we might be up against," Hermione said.

Clearing her throat as she appeared, Ginny changed her shape down to that of a small pony like me and Draco. "Whatever there's going to be, you have me to help."

As we got closer, I started hearing a lot of noise. "What's going on?"

"I don't know. Normally this side of the city is quiet. Give me a second." Draco spread his wings out, somehow not showing where Bes was, and took off.

Ugh, that was one thing that so wasn't fair. He could fly anywhere he wanted. He could just spread his wings and be light as a feather in the sky. I swear, the only reason he even started playing quidditch was to annoy me.

After a few minutes, he landed again. "It's crazy. There are wizards in the street stunning and tying up other wizards. There are ponies helping them. I think—I think everyone finally go sick of everything the Ministry were doing."

"So, what should we do?" I asked.

"Beats me. Most of the fighting is kinda pitched, but the good guys kinda have the Royal Guard ponies at their back, and boy do those guys pack a punch. I saw one just blow past a shield one of the Ministry goons put up, like it wasn't even there."

"So they don't need backup," Ginny said, "but what if the higher ups try to make a break for it?"

"Perfect! Then we'll try to work out what's the best way for them to escape and head them off." I translated for Hermione, telling Draco the madness we were apparently going to be part of.

"Draco can scout for them in the air, direct us to run into them, and I'll keep them from casting while Harry and Hermione can disarm them." Grinning, Ginny bounced around on her hooves a few times in what looked like very ponish excitement.

"And what do I do if they're flying on a broom?" Draco asked, already spreading his wings.

"Uh, come and get me? I don't think I actually weigh anything, so I should be able to just hover with you, and I can shut down their brooms with a jinx." Ginny beamed, and I got a sense that she was excited just to be here and doing her part. 

An instant later and Draco was gone again, launched into the sky on his completely and utterly unfair wings.

A loud explosion sounded on the other side of the city block from where we were. It was where the wizards and witches still loyal to the Ministry's madness were fighting with—well, whoever.

The sounds of spell-casting, and all the explosions and whooshes that accompanied it, echoed around us as the fighting went on. Then, slowly, things started to quiet. I was just about to say the magic words (not actually magic, though), I guess we aren't needed, when Draco swooped down and hovered before me.

"S-Sombra! He's escaping out the back of the Ministry. He blew by two wizards and is moving way too fast for a normal pony to catch on foot!" Draco pointed with a wing, somehow holding it still longer than he should have and not crash.

There was a spell I'd seen at school in Ponyville, or was it in Twilight's library? I knew I'd seen it somewhere—teleport. It was nothing like the apparition spells, but was really heavy on maths. But the simplest one I'd seen let you teleport in the direction you were facing and you just had to change the distance. 

The only problem for me was I didn't know how those numbers were input, though I did remember the pattern for 100 meters. Shoving it out through my horn, I felt heat all around me and my magic set me alight—and shoved me through 100 meters of nothingness to pop out just beside Sombra! Aiming my horn at him, I poured anger into the mix and blasted directly at him with it.

"Harry! Why are you—That's him!" Hermione sounded a little panicked. "What should I do?"

My blast hit a glowing purple shield around him (well, it wasn't there when I'd cast, or was it just invisible?) and I might have said some nasty words. "Hermione, bite him."

Ginny appeared beside me, drawing two barely seen wands and holding each in one hand, she started hammering Sombra with spells. When she grew a third arm just to have another wand, I knew she was getting serious—the problem was Sombra was deflecting everything she threw and sending some back for her to counter.

In the sky above, I noticed Draco circling around behind Sombra, and I realized he was our best chance of getting a spell past Sombra's defenses. "Do you think you could circle around behind him and try to flank while we keep his attention?" I asked Hermione.

She answered that by dropping off my side and slithering off out of sight. I turned all my attention back to Sombra and focused on what he'd done and to how many. It got me angry just thinking about it all. Leveling my head, and aiming around Ginny, I let off another blast of burning fury at him.





King Sombra was starting to get angry. The two children pressing him were both uniquely a problem in their own rights, but he could have easily dispatched either on their own in a normal one on one fight. Together, they were going to cause him to have to kill them.

And it was then that Sombra recognized each of them. "Ginevra?" It almost cost him his life. She'd just sent a particularly nasty stunning blast his way, and in his confusion he only managed to counter it late. The other of the pair he recognized as the small colt that had assisted him in the chamber of secrets, and later been part of his undoing in the battle at Hogwarts castle.

Spotting his chance, Draco Malfoy paused mid-air and twisted his wings up, pointing all his primary flight feathers at Sombra. Focusing for all he was worth, he aimed and let loose with ten stun spells at the same time.

Spinning at the last second, Sombra's eyes widened as he saw ten fully charged stunbolts about to hit him. He threw counters at three, tossed extra shields up to absorb several others, and barely managed to get out of the way of two more. 

Seeing Draco's spells become a major problem for Sombra, Ginny went on the offensive. She cast two concussive spells to blow down Sombra's shields and followed it up with a laughter spell that actually hit home.

Smirking at first, Sombra started to chuckle. It felt wrong, but to fight against the bubbling giggles that overtook him would have cost him his defenses as he was now engaged by three wizards. What was startling for him was how two of them seemed to be casting multiple spells at once.

Hermione Granger, at first, had been a little disappointed to have become a snake animagus. Not only did it radically differ from her Gryffindor roots, but she'd been hoping for an animal roughly pony size so that she could fit in better with her friends. 

The discovery of being fluent in Parseltongue while as a snake—and being able to talk to Bes—had been a pleasant surprise. She'd gotten used to her reptilian form, learning all the best places to warm herself up from Bes, and even tolerated eating mice—not being able to taste them was a huge plus in her book.

Slithering was its own kind of meditative joy. Listening to her body, feeling for the ground and turning muscles, flexing them, this way and that—it was relaxing and harmonious. And oddly hard to notice, or so she'd found. Like right at that moment she was not a meter away from Sombra and getting closer with every undulation of her body. She'd never actually tried to bite someone, but she was willing to listen to her body and let it do most of the biting.

Sombra spotted Hermione a moment before she was within lunging distance. Despite his thousand-plus years of life, despite all his mental faculties, and despite him being embroiled in a fight—the sight of a snake broke through to his equine brain like nothing else could. Screaming in shock, he jumped backward to get away from the perceived threat.

Bes was a smaller snake than Hermione, and though that should make her slower than her friend, she was still far better at slithering than Hermione would probably be for many years yet. She was sitting, hiding against the side of a building where there was a slight shadow, and waiting. When Sombra jumped back from her friend and landed right beside her, Bes reached up with barely any need to exert herself and closed her mouth around the dark leg. 

The feel of her fangs sinking into something far too big to be a meal was distasteful, and Bes knew that sinking a full load of venom into Sombra was probably not advised, but she had a good friend now who would protect her until her venom was restored. She squeezed down on the muscles around her venom sacks and emptied them into Sombra.

Hermione hadn't planned to herd Sombra toward Bes, but seeing her reptilian peer strike at Sombra's leg was a welcome surprise. "Harry, back off. Get Ginny and Draco to leave him."

Harry Potter was riding the edge of his anger. Trying to keep furious enough to be a nirik and work his fire, but aware enough of his environment that he could respond to others. He was, however, failing at the second facet. Blasting away at Sombra, he noticed his opponent was faltering now, slowing—that meant he could strike!

At first Sombra sent his magic coursing through his body, shoving the venom out of organs almost as quickly as it spread, but even just the slightest contact between it and nerves caused them to wither and die. To his shock, he realized he was fighting a losing battle.

Sending off a blast he'd been building, Harry aimed right at Sombra's head. He was so focused and sure of his target, he was shocked when Sombra stumbled and fell sideways. It was enough of a shock to see him drop that it snapped Harry out of his laser focus. "What happened?"

"Bes bit him. Harry, you weren't listening to me just now." Hermione wasn't too angry with Harry. She was more shocked at how quickly Sombra had died to the venom. Slithering closer, she approached Bes. "Are you alright?"

Slithering up to her friend, Bes leaned against Hermione—cheek to cheek. "I've never bitten anyone before."

Draco rushed over to Hermione and Bes, leaning down to press the tip of his snout against the top of Bes' head. "Are you alright? Did he step on you?"

Hermione wanted to tell Draco to pick Bes up, but even despite not knowing Parseltongue he managed to get the idea. She was surprised to be scooped up too, but didn't complain. "It's alright. You're probably going to be called a hero, though."

Harry walked up to Draco, watching as both Hermione and Bes seemed to disappear into the area under his wing. "Nice work with that flankin—"

Sombra struggled with death just as his student had, ripping and tearing free of his body as his lungs refused to inflate. He certainly hadn't planned to use a horcrux so soon, but was thankful he'd acquired what he had. The only travesty was how much power he'd used to no avail.

Galloping through the streets, Shining Armor spotted the little group huddled around something on the ground and diverted from where he'd thought Sombra was running to protect them. "You need to go back to Hogwarts! There are renegade Ministry agents fleeing their offices and King Sombra is—" As he neared them, he finally recognized what was on the ground. "… dead."





"It was a whirlwind of activity after that," Hermione Granger said to the assembled Gryffindor students in the common room. "Draco carried Bess and myself back to Hogwarts while Harry carried Ginny. Draco and Harry are still talking to Headmistress McGonagall."

"How'd you get away?" George Weasley asked, laying beside Ember, his pet salamander—with only a fire blanket between them.

"Harry distracted everyone and then Draco found a good spot for me to slither clear." Reaching up to her neck, she gently brushed at Bes' cheek. "Of course, when one snake can get away, two can just as easily."

Katie Bell reacted first, putting the story together and coming up with two snakes. "So that's the snake that bit him? How venomous is it?"

"She. Bes is a girl snake, and she isn't venomous at all right now. She used up everything she had. I promised her I'd take care of her and Draco until she recovers. Harry's sticking to Draco like glue." She rubbed Bes' cheek just once more before letting her rest. 

"No, what I mean is, how poisonous is she usually?" Katie asked.

"Venomous," Hermione said quickly. "And she is very venomous. I managed to talk to Hagrid and he said she's more deadly than anything short of a basilisk." Turning to look at Addera, Hermione gave her a sheepish smile. "I guess that means you're still number one."

"As is only proper, Hermione Granger. I'm still upset you didn't invite me to come along. I could have dealt with that horrid pony much faster." Crossing her forelegs before her, Addera felt somewhat appeased by knowing she was, probably, still number one. "I wouldn't have even needed to bite him. Just one look is all it takes."

"So that's it, right?" Ron asked. "Sombra is dead and can't mess with us?" When everyone in the room stared at him as if he'd just said the stupidest thing in the world, Ron looked at Hermione. "Well?"

Hermione shrugged her shoulders, then murmured an apology to Bes. "We thought Voldemort was dead after a war, but he came back. I don't trust that he's gone for good, but I'm not going to let that get in the way of learning better ways to defeat him." 

"There's gotta be more to it than—" Ron was cut short when everyone turned to look at Harry.

Harry looked around everyone, trying to ignore the feeling of dozens of eyes attempting to suck information from him. "Hey, uh, Draco's not here to stay, he's just passing through. Hermione, do you want to bring Bes up to—"

"You can explain everything to everyone here, first." Hermione wasn't inclined to move, nor was she particularly upset that Draco, a former resident of Slytherin house, was in the Gryffindor common room. 

Draco just wanted to leave again, with Bes of course. He looked at Hermione for help, but only got an amused glance back from her. Huffing out a breath, he walked over to the couch and jumped up beside her. "Is Bes okay?" He knew perfectly well she was, given he only had to look up to see her contentedly sleeping draped around Hermione's shoulders.

"Of course she is." Lifting Bes up from where she was napping, Hermione carefully set her beside Draco's wing, and watched as she slithered up and into the warmest place a pegasus could offer.

"Come on, Harry," Fred said. "Spill it. What did McGonagall say?"

"I can't believe she wasn't angry with you." Draco's ire was high. "Every time I did the slightest thing wrong, I'd get in trouble for it."

"What?" Harry's attention was on Draco and his own outrage now. "You never got in trouble for anything!"

"That you noticed. The professors kept making me clean boards and classrooms every time I did anything. But this time, because you were involved too, I was let off without a word."

"Harry," George said, unusually serious, "he's right."

"It wasn't just because of that we 'ung around with you, it let us see that there was more to you than the whole chosen one thing." George shrugged his shoulders. "But if we got into something with you involved, we got it less trouble. Both 'ere and at home."

It hit Harry hard. A revelation that people treated him like they did because of something he wasn't. "Ron? Hermione?"

Shaking his head, Ron just laughed at his friend. "No, Harry. I hung around with you because you're a good friend and you listen to me even when I'm saying stupid stuff."

"Harry, if you think I stuck with my very first friend I ever had because of some kind of special treatment, you're absolutely wrong." Hermione's speech, to everyone but Harry and Bes, just sounded like hissing. "Draco, too, often got in trouble for the wrong reasons. This might be the first time he did so for the right ones."

Hermione's words were enough that Harry wasn't going to lose his cool and nirik out. Squaring back up to Draco, Harry smirked. "You were great out there, Draco. Without you, we couldn't have stopped Sombra from getting away."

It was an angle Draco hadn't anticipated, and for a moment her actually felt good about the outcome—then he managed to remind himself who was saying it. "Go kiss a mandrake, Potter." It wasn't very pony of him, but he didn't care. Stalking out of the Gryffindor common room, he made his way back to his room.

"Anyway," Harry said, moving past Draco's comments, Harry explained what had happened. "She was upset we went without telling anyone. They are pretty sure he won't stay dead, even after what Draco's snake did to him, but everyone is satisfied that for now, for a while, he won't be back."





Standing on the prow of her ship, Luna felt as proud as could be. Not only had she made contact with some more humans-turned-ponies, but she was bringing them home to meet actual ponies. Following the coast of Equestria, their ship flying Equestria's colors—with her own pennant visible—ensured that no Guard airships rushed out to do battle. 

Swinging inland from Manehatten, they made excellent time with a constant wind at their back. Less than a week since meeting the privateers, they were coming out of the mountains and over the snow plains of the Crystal Empire.

"I'll head down and ensure we have no unexpected welcomes," Luna told the crew before, with a blast of magic, teleporting herself well clear of the airships and over the huge city. Spiraling on midnight wings, Luna enjoyed the simple act of flying as she surrendered altitude for speed—and finally landing at the entrance to the castle. "I need to speak to Shining Armor and Cadance immediately!" She wasn't holding back, it was time for the Royal Canterlot Voice if ever there was one.

One of the guards rushed off into the castle while the other remained steadfast, though Luna could tell his hooves were itching. Her voice had that effect. When Shining Armor was the first to arrive, Luna breathed a sigh of relief. "Your Imperial Majesty," she said, making sure to stress his title, "I have taken the liberty of inviting some more of the former humans here, though you may want to warn your Guard to stand down from any rash action they may take if—"

"Commander! Commander!"

Shining's attention strayed from Luna, who was rolling her eyes now, to the guardpony who was galloping toward him, seemingly with no plan on how to stop in time. "Report." Shining extended his magic to help halt the excited stallion.

"Commander, there are two warships flying in low across the plains from the mountains!"

Looking back at Luna, Shining saw her slight smile. "Friends of yours?" At her nod, he turned back to the guardpony. "Have the garrison stand down. Ready a minimum royal guard contingent. No more than four total."

Relieved that sanity was prevailing—and she was getting her way—Luna turned in the direction of the airships. Over the following half hour the two ships approached the center of the city. The parrots' ship was bright and colorful, though deadly in its own way, while the one the wizards were flying looked huge and far more of a threat. The amount of cannons running down the side was impressive, and at least to Luna's senses it hummed with magic. 

The city was amazing, even to the world-weary Celaeno. She tossed ropes over the sides of Pandemonium and, using it as only a guide, dropped nearly all the way to the ground before using her peg leg to wrap it and slow her to almost a stop. Walking over to the most official-looking group, consisting of Luna, a white unicorn stallion, a handful of trained soldiers if ever she'd seen one, and the most pink pony she'd ever seen in her life. "Ho, there. Forgive me for speaking too forward, but I don't have anyone fancy to introduce me. I'm Captain Celaeno of the Pandemonium, and this scalawag coming up behind me is Captain Blastback of the Stiff Wind."

Shining glared between Luna and the sergeant who both would have jumped at the opportunity to introduce Cadance and himself with all the titles they despised. Though, he had been forced to admit to using one—"Emperor Shining Armor, Empress Cadance, Princess Luna, and accompanying guards."

Celaeno's eyes widened. "Since when did ponies start talking about empires?"

"Since we had a huge pile of refugees of a thousand-year-old war arrive, with descendants of other refugees of said war, and"—Shining shuddered—"politics. It's a little far out for the Lorikalia pirates to be sailing the skies, isn't it?"

Her mind skipping a beat, Celaeno stared at Shining with new appreciation. "Not many non-residents know of Lorikalia, and fewer leaders would let a resident of the isles live if they discovered them."

Groaning, Cadance decided to shatter the rising tension. "My husband was the captain of the Royal Guard of Canterlot, he had close ties to the Royal Dragoons, and is well aware of the histories of various parts of the world outside Equestria's border—as am I. The pirates of Lorikalia have never, in the history of Equestria, attacked ponykind." She smiled, hoping to take the edge off the situation completely. "You are welcome to the Crystal Empire, as visiting citizens, but please don't extend your trade to our people."

Blastback felt overwhelmed. Princesses, emperors, soldiers—and no one had even bothered talking to him yet. He tried to focus on Celaeno and Cadance's verbal jousting, but it was just that. They were literally showing off to each other and seemed to be having fun doing it. Turning to (and he had to give himself a mental thump in the back of the head for it) Emperor Shining Armor, he gave him a look that begged a way out.

"Excuse me, ladies, but I believe I'll escort Captain Blastback to meet the locals from his world." Shining could recognize a fellow stallion—well, male of any species—that wanted an excuse to be away from the present topics. "If you'll follow me?"

Moving as fast as he could, Blastback gave a sigh that was mirrored by Shining. "I don't want to assume, but I take it you're not a fan of…"

"My wife, though I love her to bits, can get carried away sometimes, and your Captain Celaeno seemed to be equally made." Shining looked up at Blastback and saw a grin on the man's face. "You looked like you could use rescuing from them, and I can do exactly what I said."

Looking back to his ship, Blastback made eye contact with Firelight and nodded. "That's much appreciated. We might have been almost as far from their country as you could get on our world, but the Poms are still decent people."

Shining nodded to that, but figured he should bring the man up to speed on current events. "They had some difficulty adjusting. Some did, anyway. We aren't sure how long he was involved, but an ancient, evil unicorn used their own fears against them and took control of a faction that was an offshoot of the Ministry of Magic. And when I say control, I mean he attached some kind of device to the poor guy that took over him. We still haven't managed to remove it—and might not be able to.

"The same unicorn had made two other such devices that our own agents confirmed were destined for myself and Cadance."

Wincing in sympathy, Blastback nodded. "Where is this unicorn now? Did he get away?"

"You might not believe this, but one of our wizard school's students had a pet snake that was particularly venomous. I still don't have the full picture, but apparently its venom works particularly fast on ponies. He didn't make it two minutes before he died."

"Almost sounds like they got a snake from my part of the world—well, when we were back on my world." Looking up, Blastback noticed the odd mishmash of castle styles. "I don't know how long we can stay, but if there's anything you need a hand with, let me know."

"We've got most of it cleaned up now. There were a few henchmen working for Sombra's plant that were fully okay with what was going on—we're helping the new College of Lords deal with them in a way that doesn't make us bigger monsters than Sombra. Just here on your left is the place you'll be looking for." Shining walked up to the building and knocked with a hoof.

"Come in!" a feminine voice called from within.

"After you," Shining said.

Opening the door, Blastback was relieved to see the interior seemed built to handle tall people. The female voice belonged to a woman sitting behind a desk inside. She was completely a pony, just like one of his crew, Daku, had become.

"Gemma, I have another one you might want to talk to. This is Captain Blastback, he's been—" Shining cut himself short and shook his head. "I'll leave him in your capable hooves."

"You're not the first someone found after the big migration, and I am not sure you'll be the last. I'm Gemma Farley." Warmth radiated from Gemma. She had found her spot in life. She was working with the most powerful ponies and wizards in either world, and they all listened to her because she paid attention. Like, right now, she could see a lot about the man before her that most would miss. "Can I have your name, first?"

Feeling more official than he had in a long time, Blastback decided he should use his former rank and details—at least at first. "Commander Blastback Davies of the Australian Federal Magic Police, now captain of the Stiff Wind out of Lorikalia."

"'Australian'?" That got Gemma's attention. "Please, tell me everything you're able to about your travels since arriving."

It wasn't quite what Blastback had been expecting, but then he hardly had any idea what to expect. "Well, it all started with my team being sent to investigate an emerging event. Just about everything that could go wrong from then did, though we met a nice girl who needed a little help. It's not much of a story, I'm afraid, quite boring really. Oh, except for the war."

Gemma had been ready to write off the whole thing given the steady, boring manner Blastback had described it in—then he got to that last line. "The war. I believe I'll need another notepad."