The six of them screamed and backed away as the creature bolted up into startling consciousness, as if it was awakened from a horrible nightmare. Its features were clear to Twilight, able to absorb and note everything about this being in front of them. First: it was clearly not a pony, zebra, donkey or gryphon. Even with a short black mane resting over its head, the creature looked closer to a fleshy and tailless dragon. It had fingers like one, although lacking sharp claws and an extra finger at the end on each hand. Its snout and nose was small, fitting between both eyes with plenty of room to spare and its eyes... the eyes were the most startling to her, as if they were a mask of kindness and trust over death and viciousness. She wondered where such a creature, or where the other two from before, could even come from, or how they could be so intelligent.
Rarity stepped forward, the creature recoiling back if it she was a hot stove. She leaned away, trying to look as least intimidating as she could. “Wait... Its okay, my friend and I helped you. We took you out of the mines and brought you here...”
He glanced between her and Twilight. He did seem to recognize them from earlier, so Twilight gave him a reassuring smile and took a step forward, gesturing out her words to try and get him to understand her. “We don’t mean you any harm...”
He frowned at the mare’s movements, opening his mouth to only need to clear it with a hacking cough. “You... you can stop the game of charades,” he said in a strong, masculine voice, “I can understand you just fine.”
They were all taken aback by his sudden outburst after a display of distrust, enough so that Applejack stepped forward next to Twilight. “Y’all can speak our language?”
He glanced over the six of them. The white unicorn who spoke to him first, the violet unicorn after her, the orange pony with an accent, a cyan pegasus giving him a distrustful stare, a pink pony looking at him wide-eyes and a yellow pegasus sheepishly hiding behind her pink hair. Whoever they were... he wasn’t one of them. “I was about to ask you the same thing... figuring that you’re the hosts... but I am afraid I have no idea what that said language is called...”
Rainbow Dash burst between Rarity and Applejack, resting her muzzle only inches from the creature’s face. “I’ve heard enough of you already, why don’t you explain to us who you are and why you and your friends were underneath Canterlot?”
“Canterlot?” he pulled back, “Who am I? You’re the ones who brought me here, you tell me.”
“Hey, I’m the one telling ponies what to do here, bub. I don’t take kindly to-” Twilight pulled Rainbow back with her magic, pulling at her tail until she was behind her.
“Rainbow! Behave yourself... if he meant us harm, he probably would have harmed us by now.” She turned back to the stranger and bowed her head. “I’m so sorry about my friend, she can get a little too loyal sometimes Mr...”
The stranger stared at her with a blank expression for a couple seconds before blinking and tilting his head downward. “I don’t know...”
Twilight stepped forward again. “You mean to tell us you have no idea who you are?”
“Not only that, I also can’t tell you what I am... I have no clue...”
Twilight stared at him doubtfully, “And yet here you are having an intelligent conversation about it right now.”
“Funny thing amnesia... but I’m not lying, seriously. I have no recollection of who I am or what I did or where I’m from yada, yada...”
She tilted her head as if to ponder whether what he was saying could remotely be true. Applejack, on the other hand, stepped forward and cleared her throat. “Do ya remember anything?”
“Other than words, reflexes and basic bodily functions, I know nothing. No names, or places or things.”
Twilight frowned. “That’s not helpful... not helpful at all.”
The stranger shrugged, “I wish I could help more. So... who are you guys?”
Twilight turned back to him and shook her head furiously. “Oh, I’m so sorry, I forgot to introduce us to you. I’m Twilight Sparkle.
“This is Applejack.”
“Howdy,” the orange one responded.
“Pinkie Pie.”
“Hiya!” the pink one yelled.
“Fluttershy.”
“Hello,” the sheepish yellow one mustered.
“You’ve met Rainbow Dash.”
The cyan pegasus with the rainbow hair (duh... he thought) who charged him earlier only hmphed.
“And finally, Rarity.”
“Pleasure,” said the white one.
“Well, I’m pleased to be in your company... even as a stranger...”
Applejack looked over at him, then back to Twilight. “So, what’ll y’all plannin’ to do now?”
“Well, Rarity and I do have to return and get that crystal, and I know you all have your own things to do.”
“Well we can’t leave him here alone...”
“That’s the point,” Rarity whispered.
Applejack waved a hoof at her. “Don’t worry sugarcube. I’m sure the rest of the Apple clan can deal with the caterin’. I’ll be happy to stay with him while y’all are busy.”
The stranger looked over at the ponies talking. “I do believe I can be fine without a babysitter...”
Twilight ignored him, “I’d hate to impose.”
“Honestly, it ain’t a problem Twi’. I’ll be happy to be the one who catches him up to speed with things.”
The stranger tilted his head as if to determine whether he should protest, but ultimately didn’t. Twilight only nodded to him. “I know this might not be appropriate, but we don’t know what will happen if you’re left alone. What if those things came back and decided to stay for a bit... causing mayhem and destruction? Besides, Applejack might be good company and could even answer any questions you may have. When Rarity and I finish what we have to do, I’ll come straight back and show you the royal library, okay?”
The stranger seemed to think about what she was saying. It made sense, of course, and he nodded in agreement. “I hope you’re wrong.”
“Don’t worry; it’ll only be a couple hours at most.”
“That’s not what I’m worried about...”
Twilight looked at him perplexed, contemplating on what he could mean before Rarity interjected about the mines and pulled her out of the room before she could get into a lengthy lecture or something of that nature.
“We should probably get going too,” Rainbow Dash noted as she flexed her wings, “You better not try any funny business while we’re gone buster...”
“Calm yer horseshoes!” Applejack shouted, “I’m sure we’ll be just fine.” With that, Rainbow, Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie walked out of the room to leave Applejack and the stranger alone. Without the distraction of several other voices, he found himself staring at every detail of the room itself: the lavish chairs and tables, rich tapestries telling old stories hanging from the marble walls, even a large bookshelf filled with thick books and scrolls. It was certainly a place of one with opulent tastes.
“Where are we?” he asked.
Applejack tilted her head before shaking off her remaining awestruck self and cleared her throat. “Oh, ah... this is the Canterlot Palace. Twilight an’ Rarity took you straight here after findin’ you down in those mines.”
“A palace? Hm... I suppose that means a regal monarch... or matriarch?”
She spend a couple seconds thinking before answering. “Why, ah yes, of course. We have two princesses who watch over our country.”
“Which is?”
“Equestria.”
He looked over at her, “...How ironic...”
He then took the time to look over himself, a silent overview of his body. He had legs, hands, fingers (lots of fingers), eyes (two), nose... soon everything checked out for him according to his knowledge, leaving only two questions: who and what was he? He know many things: his body, what he eats, reasoning and skills, making him possibly a well educated being, but the places, the names and things that would have made him who and what he was were blank, completely void from his mind like perfect holes in his brain.
“So...” Applejack started, “You can’t remember anything about yerself?”
The stranger returned his attention back to the cream-orange pony and shook his head, slowly and carefully, before turning back to a full body mirror he found, gazing at the image of himself before him.
“Is this really what I look like?” he asked quietly. His hand involuntarily went up to his face, where a finger pressed down on soft flesh pushing against solid bone. His skin was a peachy white, covered in dust, grime and dirt which left marks of dark black or red streaking across his cheeks and neck. Black hair rested on his head, disheveled and lopping over his eyes... His eyes... they were a rich blue surrounded by a clean white, though his right eyes seemed a bit more reddish in color, but it was what he saw behind his eyes that interested him more. To him, he saw knowledge and intelligence: the works and words of countless scholars and teachers... and it scared him...
“Yeah,” Applejack stepped into the mirror herself. The tip of her hat barely reached his nose and her mane brushed against his arm due to the lack of mirror space.
“So,” the stranger said, never looking away, “What kind of pony are you Miss... Applejack?
“Correct,” she replied and he flashed a smile at his success, “I’m an earth pony, without magic or flight: only the earth underneath my hooves an’ the wind in my mane.”
“I mean what kind of pony are you? Are you smart, funny, kind...”
“In a word?” He nodded and smiled in agreement, so she sighed in thought. “Well, in a word: honest. I strive an’ work on honesty, leading me to work hard an’ truthfully.”
The stranger looked back at her before turned to the mirror and staring at his eyes again. “Can you tell honesty in others?”
Applejack stared into the mirror with him. “If yer askin’ whether I can tell a little about yerself, the answer would be yes: I can tell a bit.”
The stranger only stood there and stared at his face as she kept talking. “The way ya step an’ walk, even if yer a different kind, I can tell yer honest and hard workin’ too. ‘Kind hearted’ and ‘ambitious’ scream from a pony... er, being, who carries themselves high an’ carefully.”
“But how can you be sure? I was a prisoner, by what your friends were saying. I could be a criminal or a lying silver tongue for all we know.”
Applejack looked up at him and placed a hoof on his back (not easy considering his form) and walked away a couple steps. “I guess we’ll find out soon enough. I’m not supposed to leave ya alone here... but...” she stared at the grime and mess over his clothes and face, “That’s beginnin’ to even bother me. Can ya please stay here and get a feel fer everything while I get some water so ya can wash up?”
The stranger smiled and nodded, “I won’t let you down.” Applejack turned back to the door and walked out, the stranger then silently beginning to walk around the room again, this time stopping in front of the large bookshelf. Each book that rested inside were large, around the size of his arm, and some were even thick enough to barely fit in the palm of his hand. One book, perhaps the largest of them all, attracted his attention the most. He ran his finger across the spine, briefly struggling to pry it from its vegetative position and carried it to the table in the center of the room.
Thud.
He stared at it for a moment, the hardback cover colored a greying brown with age and use. Les Miserables, Hunter Victoire, was embroiled in rich and sparkling gold letters resting over a picture of a small brown pegasus filly, covered in dirt and tattered clothes, holding a broken and beaten straw broom with her wings. The colors of the image were drastically faded and diminished, removing much of what could've been its previous impact, but the image was still able to convey the filly’s broken spirit, and the stranger sympathized with this character.
He opened the cover and read aloud the perfect and crisp calligraphy on the inside. “Property of Tia K...” He pondered slightly on who ‘Tia K.’ could be, but eventually opened to the first page, starting with the massive novel...
...During the eight hundred and fifteenth year since harmony, Monsieur Vicaire Saint was the Bishop of Neigne...
________________________________________
Applejack carried the water bucket firm in her mouth as she tried to quickly trot back to the study room, water silently sloshing back and forth with each step. She tried to quicken her pace, knowing very well that she had already spent an unexpected thirty minutes trying to find water (and that she wasn’t suppose to in the first place...) in the palace. The thought of the stranger being left alone and causing trouble worried her deeply and forced her to trot even faster as she passed a hallway...
CRASH!
She found herself sprawled over another pony, a unicorn stallion to be precise, the bucket of water draped over his horn. “Sweet Celestia, I’m so sorry mister.”
The stallion shook his head and lifted the bucket off. “Oh, no it’s okay. Everypony’s has probably crashed into each other at least once in their lifetimes... no harm done.” With a little struggling, both of them managed to get back on their hooves, Applejack offering hers to try and introduce herself. “I’m Applejack.”
“I’m Mr-” he took her hoof and they smacked together with wet fur. Applejack blushed in embarrassment as she realized the water she was carrying was spilt over both of them. “Ah, horse apples, now I have to not only get more water but a towel too...”
“Oh, allow me.” The stallion’s horn lit up with a maroon-red and Applejack felt a crawling sensation as the water was removed from her body and began to float mid air, combining flawlessly with the water from him and placed smoothly into the bucket again.
“Wow, that’s some mighty impressive skill.”
“Oh, that? That was something I had to conjure up a couple months ago to keep dry in the Zebrican Jungles. It’s very handy when water is one of your most inconvenient predicaments.” He smiled before deadpanning and shaking his head. “Blast it, I forgot to introduce myself.”
He extended a hoof to Applejack.
________________________________________
Twilight and Rarity managed to finish earlier than expected. Upon arriving at the castle grounds, the two decided to part ways: Rarity delivering the crystal to the princesses, and Twilight (with quite a bit of self arguing against her better judgment) heading to the study to check on the stranger from the mines. The main reason, she tried to rationalize, was that she should keep track of what could become the greater good of all Equestria. The stranger should be a priority watch, carefully and attentively kept an eye on until deemed unnecessary. She herself had been down in those mines several times within the past month, exploring and discovering what had been hidden for over ten centuries. Never once has she seen a creature like or even similar to the stranger or those... beasts... that held him. Further scrutiny lead to her realize that not only did she not know anything about them, she most likely didn’t know anypony else who did, figuring something of that magnitude would lead other ponies to telling others of the danger and hazard of two gory and monstrous creatures...
...It was that fact that troubled her the most...
It wasn’t long until Twilight found herself outside the study itself. Silently trotting in, she found the stranger sitting silently in a chair reading a relatively small book... or so it seemed. After a few more steps, she realized he was only flipping the pages, not actually taking the time to read them. It made her sad to think he might not be able to read Equis...
“Et qu'ai-je fait pour être béni avec vous revoir si tôt, violet celui-ci?” He asked an awestruck Twilight.
“Since... since when could you speak Arcadian?”
“Since a couple minutes ago,” he answered giddily, “I started with reading that amazing book there on the table, then I found this book here on how to speak fluent Arcadian, so I went ‘what the hell’, so I read this and learned Arcadian.”
Twilight looked down at the massive book that she herself remembered reading long ago as a young filly. It took her over a month to read it cover to cover, then almost another month of studying to understand it...
“You read, all of that, in just over an hour?”
“Correct...”
She looked at him doubtfully. “Who is the main character?”
“Chignon Chignon.”
“What did he do?”
“Steal a loaf of bread.”
“Why?”
“Because he was starving: victim to the ‘Glorious Revolution’ of Arcadia.”
“Who helped him, and who did he help?”
“The Bishop of Neigne, Vicaire Saint, who inspired him to help the young prostitute, Coulant Crinière.”
“By?”
“Raising her daughter, Caramel...”
“While?”
“The High Inspector Justice Marteau tried to place him back in prison...”
Twilight was utterly shocked. He did seem to have read to whole story, at least, but all fifteen hundred pages (more or less)? “How did you read it all?”
“I don’t know,” he shrugged excitingly,” I just looked at the page and it’s like the words and information leaped out straight to my mind... I remember every word as clear as day.”
She placed him under more intense questioning, having him recite entire pages and chapters, even going so far as to have a complex conversation with him in Arcadian to see if he knew as much as he was letting on. After over ten minutes of him passing with flying colors, Twilight just gave up and accepted it as truth, even asking him to show her. He did so, staring at a page for three seconds before reciting back to her word from word all over again.
“Perhaps we found a trait of your race...”
“Perhaps...”
Twilight trotted around the room with the stranger silently staring at her. That was when she stopped and turned back to him. “Wait a minute, where’s Applejack?”
“Oh her? She left to get me water almost fifty minutes ago... I was starting to get worried for her, but I promised not to leave... I rationalized she just had to travel a little.”
Twilight nodded to him, delighted that he decided to stay put instead of go out and freak everypony out, but she was still worried about Applejack. She was about to go look for her when she heard the sound of a solid object being set down on the floor and the sloshing of water.
“Twilight, you ain’t goin’ to believe this...”
“I think there’s a line in my head for that phrase now...” She turned around and stared intently at the door. Her friend stood there, all normal and smiling, but behind her... the stallion behind her was almost as shocked as Twilight. He was a bluish-grey unicorn, short black mane and hazel eyes. Covering his chest was a deep maroon vest, embroiled with Zebrican calligraphy stitched in gold. His cutie mark showed rich golden-orange curves, creating symbol of two crescent moons next to each other.
She stared at him, and he at her, both too shocked to speak first. The stallion cleared his throat and moved forward a step. “Hey Sparks...”
Twilight felt tears well up in her eyes. “Crescent Star…”