“Your ears do work right? I asked who in the heck are you?”
Chase’s hind legs shook, knocking together before giving out completely as his rump hit the floor. The speaker, and owner of the gold eyes, was a female pony with a dusky blue-grey coat and short upturned violet grey mane and tail, the latter of which was shorter than his. Her eyes were like a cat’s; deep amber and slitted, and a pair of membranous bat-like wings were folded to her sides. She cocked her head to one side and frowned when he failed to answer.
Chase stuttered as he tried to find his voice to answer her, the words coming out as nothing more than garbled gibberish, though eventually he managed to stammer out his name. He was still trying to wrap his mind around the fact that he was face to face with a Lunar Pony, a real one. Sure he was in their wing of the place, but he'd expected them to be, well, out.
“Sun Chaser huh? You’re one of the Solar Guard right?” she asked. He nodded dumbly, still trying to will himself to speak. “Yeah, you definitely don’t belong here buddy.”
“I uh, got lost looking for the bathrooms,” he said quickly, finally having found his voice.
“With your book bag?” she pointed at the bag over his shoulder, “Yeah right.” He gulped, rear still planted firmly on the ground. She wasn’t buying it. “You know, I don’t think I’ve seen you ‘round before.”
“I-I just started today. This is my first night,” he said meekly.
She gave a groan and put her face in her hoof, “Oh no, are they doing this crap again?” She gave a sigh, “That explains everything.”
Now it was Sun Chaser’s turn to be confused. “It does?” he asked, cocking his head slightly.
She nodded, “Yeah, they pulled this stunt last year with some the new recruits. It’s some sort of, initiation or hazing or something. You’re not the first one to be sent here to try and stay the night,” she shook her head and looked at Chase, “Why don’t you follow me, before the actual on duty guards catch you, I don’t think they’ll be as nice as me.”
“Follow you where?” he asked, rising to his hooves as he spoke. “And why?”
“The common room. Most everyone else is out; it’s my night off. Besides you seem like a nice guy and I don’t want you to get in trouble.”
He looked around nervously as he stood before taking a step forward. “Is it safe there for me?”
“I don’t see why not, it’s not like we’re going to eat you.” She laughed at her joke, tail swishing as she started walking. As she turned to lead him he got a look at her cutie mark, a shooting star.
“Y-yeah I knew that,” he said with a nervous laugh. He didn’t know that, in fact until that moment all he knew about the Lunar Herd was what he’d heard from rumours, including ones about them eating ponies, or drinking their blood at least. “I mean that’s crazy talk, why would a pony eat other ponies?”
“Because they have teeth like this?” She spun around to face him, grinning widely to reveal her fang-like teeth. They weren’t large fangs like a Changeling’s, but they were clearly sharper and more pointed than a regular pony’s teeth.
He gave a whinny of fright and reared back, falling over and onto his back. He wasn’t sure how long he lay on his back staring up at the stone ceiling, legs tucked to his belly as he shook nervously, ears pinned to his skull.
Her face came into his line of vision and she scowled, “You’re just like the others, you’re scared of me.”
He rolled onto his side, looking up at her timidly, “No, I mean yes, I mean I did but not really, I mean,” He let his head hit the ground with a dull thump. “I’m not helping myself am I?”
“Not really no.”
He sighed, “This night just keeps getting better and better,” he muttered sarcastically. “Fine, lead the way.” She gave a nod before continuing down the hall, Chase following close behind with his head held low. He berated himself silently as he followed her, what a wonderful first impression he was making of himself. The young unicorn glanced around as he walked, hoping nothing would jump out of the shadows at him. He wasn’t scared of her so much as it was she had startled him. Anypony would be if they suddenly found themselves nose to nose with a set of sharp teeth when they least expected it. He raised his head timidly, trying to look around at her. She didn’t seem that bad a pony to him, certainly nothing like what the stories about them had said. Save for an odd sense of humour she seemed quite nice.
“I hope you’re not staring at my flank back there,” she teased, glancing over her shoulder at him.
“Of course not. Why would you think that?” He was taken back, what sort of colt did she make him out to be?
She laughed, “Luna above you’re so paranoid, can’t you tell when somepony is joking?”
He just sighed, hanging his head again as he walked. “Apparently not. I’ve never been very good about picking up when somepony is joking like that, and it tends to make things, awkward.”
“Oh.” She rubbed the back of her head with her hoof, “Sorry, I’ll try not to do that.” She looked back at him and gave him a slight smile, “You know, you’re not half bad when you’re not screaming like a filly.”
His cheeks reddened with embarrassment, “You startled me that’s all. I wasn’t exactly expecting you to shove your face in mine like that, let alone seeing your, fangs.” He paused, “They are fangs right?”
She ran her tongue along them before nodding, “So of, but we don’t drink blood or anything, or eat meat for that matter. The only things we suck dry are fruit.”
Now he was just plain confused, didn’t creatures with teeth like that eat meat? “So wait, what are your, fangs, for anyways?”
She chuckled, “You ask a lot of questions don’t ya?”
“Well, I’ve never met a Lunar Pony before. I guess I’m just curious that’s all.”
She smiled as she stopped in front of a door. “Well, I’ll be willing to answer your questions in here, but you gotta answer some of mine ok?” She pushed the door open, leading him inside.
Much like his common room it was, spacey with a table and some chairs and a small fireplace. The colour scheme was different, a bit darker than he was used to and the ceiling had a good view of the night sky. It also seemed to have doors that he assumed connected it to other rooms.
“It’s not to different from our common room,” he said, “Save that giant window in the ceiling. What’s up with that?”
“So we can look at the moon and stars of course.” She gestured to a chair, “Sit down, I can see you’re just bursting with questions.”
“Like I said, I’ve never met a Lunar Pony before,” he said as he sat down. His bag was enveloped in a red glow as he lifted it off his back and set it on the floor beside him. “I’ve only ever heard what other ponies say, and I’m beginning to suspect they greatly exaggerate things.”
“That they do,” she said as she sat down, “Like the whole blood sucking bit, totally false unless blood means fruit juice. We’re not vampires, just more nocturnal than you.”
Chase laughed slightly, “Good, means my neck is safe.” A creaking from the other end of the room cause him to stop laughing and stiffen up, ears pointed forward. A door opened up and several voices carried out into the room. A pair of colts walked in, chattering between the two of them and apparently arguing about something. They looked almost identical, with ash grey coats, bat wings, feathered ear tips and gold eyes. Their manes were short and rather scruffy as were their tails. One of them was carrying something under his wing, but Chase couldn’t make out what it was.
“No, rules say you can’t do that. You have to roll 3 of the 6-sided ones for each stat, in order.”
“Nuh-uh, you roll out all the stats first then pick which numbers you want for each stat.”
They bickered back and forth as they made their way to the table, having not yet noticed Sun Chaser. There was a thump as one of them placed something on the table before turning to the young mare.
“Hey Wish can you help us out here?” he asked. “My brother thinks you roll the stats in order, but he’s wrong, you get to pick which stats the numbers go to. Tell him he’s wrong.”
She groaned, putting her face in her hoof. “You can do with either way, it all depends on the GM and their rules.”
The twins shared and look before looking back at her. “Really?” They said in unison.
“Yes really. Don’t you have rule books for this sort of thing?” There was a prolonged silence, broken only by a thud of her head on the table. “Guess I know what I’m getting you two for your birthdays and next Hearth’s Warming. Trying to figure out how to play Ponies and Castles without rule books, really?”
“We just borrowed Midnight’s books when we needed them,” said the one farthest from Chase.
Chase looked around, wondering if he’d suddenly become invisible. He tapped a hoof on the table, clearing his throat in an attempt to get their attention. While he hated being the center of attention he disliked being ignored even more.
“Oh, Chase!” She gave a meek smile, turning her attention to him. The twins turned to look at Chase finally, before looking between each other and then to Wish.
“You, brought a friend back,” said one.
“Who the heck is he? Certainly not one of ours,” said the other.
“Well, I’m glad to know I’m not invisible,” said Chase.
She blushed in embarrassment, covering her mouth with her hooves. “I’m sorry, I forgot to introduce you. Sun Chaser, this is Comet and Star Dust. You two, this is Sun Chaser. I ran into him in the hall, literally.”
“Ok, but what was he doing here in the first place? He’s one of the Solar Ponies.”
Chase blinked, cocking his head to one side, Solar Pony wasn’t a term he’d heard before. Solar Guard or Day Guard yes, but Solar Pony, that was a new one.
“A dare,” he said, “I’m here on a dare. Or, I was in the halls on a dare; I’m right here because she, er-Wish was it? Dragged me here so I wouldn’t get in trouble.” He looked about nervously, “It won’t be a problem will it?”
“Naw, actually this makes things a lot easier. We needed one more player,” said Comet with a grin, picking up the object he placed on the table earlier.
“For what? Ponies and Castles?”
“Naw, Old Nag.” He held up a pack of cards in one hoof and grinned. “You game?”