//------------------------------//
// Chapter 12 - Like Clockwork 
// Story: My Little Warcraft - New Friends 
// by Shin Guyviroth 
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Daybreak began to motion into the horizon within the early hours of the morrow. The sun raised slowly as it began to beam colours of oranges and reds upon a skyline of blues and pearl whites. Seeing the sun reflect off the clouds in the sky made the horizon something of a lustrous painting upon a global canvas. Everything felt so vivid and alive despite it only being a scenery. As the light glared upon those mounds of fluff that drifted upon gentle breezes it rendered them as dark patterns of waves upon the skies, making the sunshine feel all that more glamorous. It was a sight to remember, surely.

Within the Golden Oaks Library, things were still peaceful and at rest. Twilight and Spike were on the first floor inside Twilight's sleeping quarters, with Spike curled up in a small bed-like basket, sleeping upon a soft quilt while blue silk blankets kept him tucked in and cosy. Twilight was more or less in the same state; laying on her back with her forelegs over the covers as she looked so at ease within her slumber. Rainbow Dash remained in near enough the exact state as last night, with half of Gai'vahros' cape over her body while the other half was hanging over the side of the mattress'. Gai'vahros, however, looked restless as he was hunched forwards over the desk, looking as though he couldn't get comfortable after he fell back to sleep. 

Within a moment's notice, a loud ringing sound began to blare through the house for several seconds before stopping. A small *click* came from upstairs as Twilight pressed her hoof against a button on a small alarm clock. She sat up slowly before giving a big yawn and stretching her forelegs to the side. Although her eyes were half closed and looked as though she hadn't had much sleep through the night she was quite energetic as she quickly kicked the covers from her with her hind legs. 

"Ah… morning already." Twilight yawned again as she spoke, holding a hoof up to her widened mouth-- a natural reaction to avoid being impolite around others when she showed her tiredness. "I hope Gai'vahros had a good night sleep… Come on, Spike, we have a lot of work ahead of us."

"Uh-hmm…" Spike tossed a little, turning over to his side as he began to mumble in his sleep. "Just five more minutes …" the baby dragon gave out a small yawn himself as he snuggled up to his pillow with an arm wrapped around it.

"No, Spike, I need you to be up to look after the library while I'm out do introduce Gai'vahros to Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie." Twilight turned and removed herself from her bed, setting down onto all fours before making her way to a dressing table.

"Nnnnng… okay, okay." Spike grumbled, sitting up in his basket. His face was still gaunt and sleepy although he knew that he had to get up at this time to help maintain the library. "Gee, Twilight, you look like you barely got any sleep last night. You normally look more… well, ready."

"I guess I still felt a bit uneasy about the whole leaving the library thing we talked about yesterday," Twilight replied to her friend as she used her magic to take hold of a soft hair brush, gently running it through her mane. "I mean, I've never left the whole library unattended for this long before. Maybe I can ask some-pony to watch over it for me while I'm gone?"

"Oh come on, Twilight, stop being such a worrywart. It's not like anyone's gonna break in here just to steal a book, right?"

"Yeah, perhaps you're right. Well, it's in my best interest to try and show Gai'vahros a good time while he's staying in Equestria."

"Oh, speaking of which, Twilight, do you think he's still sleeping? Should I go wake him up?"

"Don't worry, Spike, I'll go wake him and Rainbow Dash up. We'd better get moving early if we're going to be spending the afternoon camping. Spike, take a schedule for me, if you please?"

"Sure thing, Twilight." The little dragon was already up and on his feet at this point, quickly rushing to a nearby chest of drawers and pulling out a long piece of parchment and a quill pen already dabbed in ink somehow. "'Kay, shoot!"

"First; go and meet up with Fluttershy. Second; go meet up with Pinkie Pie. Third; return back here and get ready for camp. Forth; make sure everything is pristine, clean, and organized. Fifth; let every-pony know that we'll be away for a few days. And, finally; go camping. All of this needs to be done by at least 4 o'clock this afternoon. Did you get all of that, Spike?"

"Sure I did!"

"Good. Gotta always make a schedule when preparing for something like this. Anyway, I'd better get Gai'vahros and Rainbow Dash up so we can get going." Twilight placed the brush back down on the dressing table and made her way to the stairwell, with Spike following close behind her. However, as she trotted down the steps with little knocking sounds following her, she noticed that Gai'vahros was already wide awake on a seat next to a desk by the window with a smile upon his face.

"Ah, good morrow, my Lady Twilight. Little Spike." Gai'vahros greeted the pair of them with a soft tone and a small wave of his hand. "I trust the both of you slept well last night?"

"Probably a lot better than you did, Gai'vahros," Twilight made her way to the bottom of the steps before looking around, trying to find the second mattress but couldn't see it. "don't tell me you spent all night asleep on the chair."

"Of course. Lady Rainbow Dash felt the mattress was too uncomfortable on its own, so I let her have mine as well." Gai'vahros looked down at the sleeping pegasus, who was still snoring. looking completely relaxed.

"I see you gave her your cape, too," Twilight said with a small giggle, smiling at the two of them as the blood elf returned with a little chuckle himself. "I'm sorry you had to stick your neck out for Rainbow Dash. I appreciate you having to give up your accommodation for her, and I think she'll appreciate it more."

"It was nothing at all," Gai'vahros raised his hand as if to gesture to hold her compliments, shaking his head a little. "I was more than happy to make sure she had a good night sleep. I kind of owe it to her after what happened yesterday."

"But, Gai'vahros, you know it wasn't your fault. We all know that."

"Even so, we all do things we know that isn't out fault, and we still hold guilt over them. Making up for it puts the mind at ease. You understand, don't you?"

"Hm, yeah. You're right." Twilight nodded as she made her way to Rainbow Dash, standing over her as the pegasus kept snoring with her mouth wide open. "Rainbow Dash, wake up. You gotta get ready for camping today." the pegasus only replied with a snort before rolling over onto her side. "She really is a heavy sleeper…"

"Don't worry. I know what will work." Gai'vahros gave assurance to Twilight as he stood up from his chair and walked over to Rainbow Dash. Kneeling down in front of her, he moved his hand close to her open mouth and, with his thumb and index finger, slowly placed them inside and pinched her tongue slightly. In reflex, her mouth closed, her lips around his digits, awaking immediately. In shock as to what was happening, Rainbow Dash bolted backwards with great speed, flying off the mattress and hovering in the air.

"H-hey, what the hay are you doing!?" Rainbow Dash exclaimed as she stick her tongue out, trying to see what Gai'vahros had done to her. "What did you just do to me, Gai!?"

"Gai'vahros… How did you know that was going to work?" Twilight questioned the blood elf's methods with a raised eyebrow.

"And old trick I learned back home." Gai'vahros was ready to explain while wiping the pony's drool from her tongue into the cloth of his faulds. "You see, while the body sleeps it still maintains a certain spacial awareness. The mouth, for example, will close and stimulate the brain to awaken it should anything touch the inside. This reflex prevents the sleeper from inhaling and choking on objects while they sleep. Pretty cool, right?"

"No, that wasn't "cool"," Rainbow Dash complained as she began to spittle to one side. "I thought you were trying to suck out my soul or somethin'!"

"No no, of course not; that's a warlock's job."

"Well, anyway, I'm glad you're awake now, Rainbow Dash. We need to get going to meet up with Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie so we can keep on schedule."

"Pfft, schedule-smedual," Rainbow Dash wasn't pleased with Twilight keeping a schedule on what was meant to be a fun week out with all of her friends. "I have enough time tables to keep up with while I'm on duty. I didn't take the week off from weather forecasting to jump hoof first into more of them."

"In any case, I think we should probably get going," Gai'vahros didn't care about schedules although he cared less for possibly having to sit through an argument between Rainbow Dash and Twilight about the importance of timekeeping. "So, my Lady Twilight, where are we headed to, first?"

"We should head over to Fluttershy's first," Twilight used her horn to pull the schedule list from Spike's grasps, holding it up to her eyes a few inches from her. "I know Sugar Cube Corner is on the way but Pinkie Pie's probably still asleep. Fluttershy will be up feeding her critters at this time."

""At this time"? Exactly what time is it?"

"It's six-thirty in the morning, Gai'vahros," Twilight said, turning to a small clock on the wall near the door. "it says so right there."

"Hm?" Gai'vahros turned, noticing a small, round, wooden device, similar to a saucer or a plate, with a glass window and numbers in a circle. Two hands-- one long and one short-- pointed at the number six on the southern face of this contraption. "What kind of machine is this?"

"Gai, that's a clock," Rainbow Dash responded with a dumbfounded tone in her voice and a raised eyebrow on her face. "you know what a clock is, right?"

"No. I've never seen such a device before," Gai'vahros was astonished by the work of equine engineering that he had to absolutely have a better look at it. Gently, he lifted it from the hook on the wall it was sitting on, holding it between his hands and turning, flipping, rotating it so he could examine it. "I mean, I've never seen one such as this before. I know that we have timers on explosives but nothing that is actually used to tell the time. We use sundials to give us the time base on the position of the sun."

"Haha, sundials," Rainbow Dash gave off a bellow of laughter as she hunched forwards. "how archaic are you guys?"

"Well, if it does the job, it does the job. No sense in fixing what isn't broken, as they say." Gai'vahros gave a calm response as he hung it back into the hook. "So this thing isn't a timer for any explosives?"

"Uh… no," Twilight gave a blunt answer. "I don't think I would want to blow up my own home, would I?"

"Oh. Yes, that makes sense."

"Well, let's go. I'm sure Fluttershy will be happy to see us."

"Hey, you guys go on ahead," Rainbow Dash said as she made her way to the door, opening it while looking back at the others. "I need to head back to Cloudsdale to get my stuff ready. I'll catch you guys up at Sugar Cube Corner." the pegasus didn't bother giving a farewell as she zoomed out the door and through the skies, heading back to Cloudsdale.

"Follow me, Gai'vahros. I'll take you to Fluttershy's place," Twilight followed suit of Rainbow Dash and headed out the door with the blood elf following her from behind. "Spike, could you look after the library while we're gone? We should be back in a few hours."

"No problem, Twilight," Spike said in a confident manner, saluting her as a token of duty. "Say "hi" to everyone for me, won'tchya?"

"Sure we will, Spike." Twilight giggled before closing the door behind her with her elven friend standing beside her. "Fluttershy's place isn't too far from here. We just got to go east of here, near Rarity's place, but we take the middle bridge this time."

"Oh yes, I recall seeing three bridges when we went to Lady Rarity's shop," Gai'vahros replied in acknowledgement of the scenery, recalling a moment when he was intrigued by the many bridges that crossed over Ponyville's river. "but where about does the third bridge lead to, my Lady Twilight? I'm rather intrigued, seeing that it leads to outside of your village"

"That bridge leads on to the main road to Canterlot. It's an hour or so walking, but we usually take the train there; it's only half an hour or so by locomotion."

"That doesn't sound like such a long time," Gai'vahros gave a light sigh before he could imagine having to spend that short a time walking from one city to another. "I remember the days when I would spend three day's grace on horseback from Silvermoon to Lordaeron. I only wish I had transportation as fast as yours to get me there in half an hour, my Lady Twilight."

"Wait, wait. "Horseback"?" Twilight stopped for a moment as they reached Sugar Cube Corner, as her rather disapproving expression beamed towards the blood knight. "You mean you ride them? You use horses to carry you?"

"Well, yes," Gai'vahros wished he hadn't mentioned such a thing; he was pretty empathetic towards Twilight, in that she had to imagine her race being used as labour. Gai'vahros probably would feel the same way if his people were used as pack mules. And they were, during the third war. "but you must understand, my Lady Twilight, that the horses and other creatures in our world are not sentient being like you and your people - uh, ponies - are. We help raise them, and look after them, and in return they become our steeds and our carriers. Kind of like helping each other. Companionship."

"I can hardly imagine a world where ponies and stallions aren't sentient," Twilight admitted as she felt rather discomforted with this information, but she would not let it strain her relationship with the Gai'vahros-- not after everything they've been through despite there being such short time. "but, then again, I guess it's hard for you to imagine a world without elves, right?"

"Haha, you can put it that way, yes," Gai'vahros gave a more comforting chuckle to help raise the spirits of his friend, "but our worlds have completely different workings. I can understand and appreciate that your world, Equestria, has no other sentient humanoids like me around. Perhaps it's better that way."

"Gai'vahros, don't say that," Twilight tried to comfort the elf despite him not looking as though he was discontent with his predicament or about his own world, but Twilight knew better; she could see that the elf was sorrowed over the fact that his world knew nothing but fighting, be it over politics, distrust, or prejudice. "you're not the only one in your world who dislikes warring between people."

"Yeah, you're right," Gai'vahros said, petting Twilight on the head, which made her feel much more at ease. Twilight could recognize that, whenever Gai'vahros touched her, it was like he was pouring his heart and soul into her. "I guess I'm just upset that I'm the only one who gets to experience what true peace can feel like. I just wish everyone could feel the way I feel right now."

"Oh, Gai'vahros…" Twilight softly cooed. She was so infatuated, so admired, towards the elf's ideals, his nobility, and his devotion. It was hard for her to believe that anyone like him could exist, even in Equestria, let alone in a world that was scarred by the rapture of strife and conflict. "we should get to Fluttershy's soon. Maybe we can help her with her critter friends." Twilight proceeded over the bridge and towards the pathway to Fluttershy's place, with Gai'vahros following behind her.

"I just hope I don't scare the pants off her. You know, if ponies wore pants."