Forever Roaming
Chapter 5
Questions meant to be buried.
Rick leaned against the wall. “The physical form they use could be damaged by this weapon. Each piece is what would describe them.” He pulled the sword out once more and pointed to the glass blade. “Clarity, and Insanity.” To the golden hand guard. “Charity and Greed.” He pointed to the handle. “Sacrifice and Summoning.” Than to the split diamonds. “Life and Death.” He made a circular motion around the diamonds showing how they were being held. “Purity and Corruption.” He moved his hand up to the hand guard once more, pointing to the rose petals. “Love and Hate.” Then finally to the marbles at the end of the spirals. “Order and Chaos.”
He sighed. “It took so long to get all these materials and make the sword just right. After I had constructed it, I had brought it to our king, King Olven.” He sheathed the blade. “Upon his inspection he had to choose who would wield it, to fight off and finish the demons. He chose me.” He shook his head, eyes closed. “I had served as a knight before but, I was out of practice... I do not know why he chose me. He could have chose one of his best knights, but instead he had chose me.”
“I had to lead them. Through the corruption we walked, and even then we were constantly attacked. The more we went on the more people died, some of those knights looked to me as though I could help save them all... But, what happened was worse... Much, much worse...” A tear fell from his eye. “They all died, my friends, those who were like family to me, died within my sight, or even in my arms. I had to fight some of them even! They rose from the dead and attacked us!” He placed a hand on his forehead, looking towards the floor. “All those people, all of those people who died by my hands... I had no choice! It was to either kill them and finish what had to be done, or die and let the whole world fester!” His hands covered his eyes. “But it did not get better as we rode through the land, no... Clarity graced us with his presence and told me a small message... To fully bid the world rid of these demons, I had to die. My body and soul in my world would have to leave because I was the one to get rid of them.”
William turned his head, he looked at him. “So, coming here, was a gift then? A reward for giving up everything at home?” He turned back to look up at the ceiling. “Lucky,” he spat that word out. “You got to prepare for being gone.”
“Prepare for death? For being gone? I already lost everything through death and fire. I did not get to say goodbye to my family, they died in my arms. I did not say goodbye to my friends, they died from the demons and came back just to try and kill me, I had to kill them myself! Prepare to lose my home, no I lost it in a explosion that nearly killed me and that was not the first time, nor the second or third. I had to run. I ran for years with those around me! I am thirty-nine years old and I had started running over thirteen years before, facing death and destruction at every turn.” His gaze rose and he looked to William, his eyes brimmed with tears. “Tell me, do you think I was I prepared to deal with this for thirteen years?”
William blinked and curled up as he has a look of anger on his face. He was grumbling and smacking his right hand on his left arm as if trying to punish himself. He was berating himself for the question and being a jerk and insensitive to causing more pain. But those were barely audible as he was mumbling more than speaking coherently.
“Well I can safely say that you are the first person to tell me his friends and family died and brought back to life to kill him.” Chris bluntly stated not caring about the others feelings.
“From what I have heard your people have no magic. Tell me, has that ever happened, has that happened to anyone else as well?” Rick questioned not even looking at anyone anymore, he had sounded tired.
“To us,” William spoke, his voice sorrowful and had pain in it upon seeing Rick’s expression. He had moved to sit on the bed as if hoping to amend for his rather rash question. “That is just stories, fiction, from zom...zombies, to wizards and what not... you faced a living hell, and I don’t use that word lightly.” He paused. “Please, forgive me for my unthinking question.” He muttered. “I do not know what it is like, I can never know. But, you, you are here, you won, and,” he paused and it turned out that he was not going to continue after a few more seconds of silence.
“It... It is fine.” Rick said, his voice soft. “By the gods... I would never wish that on a man or creature...” he mumbled.
“Tell me if you will Chris. Has that ever happened to your world?”
“Well not as extreme as what you said with your loved ones coming back from the grave but I seen similar cases. Families mourning over the lost of their child, people mentally scarred from wars, etc.” Chris started. “I learn to forget the past or don’t dwell on it so much or else it will just hurt you in the end. It is part of the job to interview these people just to make a living. Sure it makes me heartless but it isn’t like I am not upset about what they tell me.”
“It is easy to ignore pain when you do not deal with large portions of it at a time... I will not pretend to know everything that has happened to both of you. I may be old in the eyes of my people, unless you live just as long, seventy years or so, but I can still see the line between pure and corrupted.” He shuddered. “Sadly in more than one way...”
“Well I can’t say I have experience such tragedies to know what you are going through but I dealt with people who have gone through them. So I know what you are going through.”
Rick shook his head not wanting to respond. By now he had slid down the wall and was sitting on the floor, his knees up and his arms around them.
William blinked and found that his head was no longer hurting him. He sat up and saw Rick on the floor and, moving slowly, he got off his bed and walked over to the wall and sat down next to him. “take your time, I can wait at least.” he glared at Chris before looking down as well. “Sorry again for, for what I said, I, I’m a little bitter over some items, I hope you can forgive me for... being a part of this.”
Rick didn’t really move but words could be heard from him. “It is, no problem. I do not hold it against you...”
William only closed his eyes and smiled a little bit before looking at Chris, a small smile twitched on his lips, but what the emotion that was connected to it was masked by other emotions more easily on his face. The major one now was peace.
Chris was fooling around with his camera, trying to see how much battery power that was left from it. “Well know that you told us your story Rick, “ Chris turned around towards William, “I think that William should tell us his story and how he got here.” Chris spoke while looking at William with a glint in his eyes.
“So, do we get to learn about you?” William asked as he looked up at Chris with a glare of, well it was a glare of curiosity. The same one that Twilight gave Chris a day ago.
“Well there is nothing interesting about me to say.” Chris pointed out. “I grew up in New Jersey, went to school, dropped out of college, became a reporter/photographer and been living off the money I make from the job. That is it, nothing special.” Chris didn’t have any emotion behind what he said and just stated it as facts. “Your turn soldier boy.”
William shook his head. “Soldier boy, an odd nickname, but, thank you?” he asked as if wondering if it was a compliment. “As for me..” he closed his eyes. “I was ripped from my world by forces of darkness that wished to use me, to corrupt me to become a tool to enslave the worlds of Equis, and then, move to my own home world. Taking the technology and improvements and, creating, an empire of evil that would have dwarfed anything Humanity ever saw.” He shivered with a sudden shake of his body as he closed his eyes. “I saw nightmares that I fear only Rick could beat in how terrifying they were, I faced things in the dark that no normal pony would ever see.” His voice a low whisper now. “I fought the darkness and, the darkness took me out of the equation. Here I am, lost in another Equestria that is not my Equestria, and I just want to go home, see my family, and-” He cut himself off as he looked up at Chris. “Be grateful, you had a boring life, if this world is like my own, or the TV show, you just stepped into having an adventure, welcome to Oz.” he smirked and laughed a little as if something was not there at the moment. “Your life is forever changed.” he lowered his voice and seemed to channel a line from some type of media. “Foreverrrrr” he droned out.
Chris was a little taken back at what William did with forever but ignored it as him being weird. “So you fought evil beings bent on taking over the world by capturing Earth, and Rick lived in a place that had magic and other magical beings as well...” Chris paused to see if he got everything in there, “Damn...makes my boring life seem like a luxury.”
“Be thankful.” Rick said, almost in a whisper, slowly getting up and headed towards the balcony.
William nodded his head. “Agreed, at times, a soldier does what he does so that you can have your boring life, be, be happy about it.” He paused before standing up. “If you keep up with your photo taking, you may just become famous back home.” He moved to look out the window and Chris saw him drop into some memories.
“Doubt I will be some great photographer.” Chris flopped backwards onto the bed. “I rather just see the sights and document them for others to see. Doing so is really expensive and I am not made of money.”
“Then try it here.” Rick was heard from the balcony. “Things unexplored... I do not know...”
“Things of interest, and if the time lines is correct, dangers.” William muttered to the space in front of the window. “You might be famous here, you never know, besides any picture taken here, will be eaten up by any news agency back in your world. Unless interdimensional travel is as common as a cruise in the Caribbean.” he paused. “or Space travel,” he trailed off again.
“You’re probably right on that.” Chris was just staring at the ceiling. “I mean, I am in a new magical world to explore, new places, new people to meets, just like the stuff I read in books.” Chris started to sit up in the bed. “I just hope it won’t kill me in the end.”
William paused and looked around. “Anypony else hungry?”
Rick waved his arm from where he was on the balcony. “I am not, but the guards should be outside the room. I will be here.”
“For the love of God! No pony puns!” Chris bitterly exclaims.
“But that is what they say here in Equestria... anyway, I think a Griffon Salad would do us all good.” he moved to the door and opened it, two Solar Guard ponies stood on the outside. “Three Griffon Salads please.” He blinked as if having second thoughts before nodding his head to confirm the meals. “Also, some mineral water for the three of us.”
“Of course.” One guard replied as he teleported away and another teleported in to take his place, looking just like the one that left. William smiled and closed the door. “There, Lunch has been ordered.” he walked to the beds. “I really wish I had my pendant working, I, I haven’t had a Griffon Salad in weeks.” He sighed. “At least it is chicken.”
“I am too starving to care about what I eat. As long as it doesn’t have any human meat in it.” Chris said.
“I assure you that human meat will not be in the salad, as we are the only three humans in the world.” William spoke cheerfully as he sat down on his bed.
“You may never know.” Chris stated.
When lunch arrived Chris and William ate and talked to each other about how the pony culture is, or was in Williams world. He had made key notes on how things work, such as weather, farming, the type of ponies, and even how to deal with some of the royalties. After some time Rick had joined the group once more and listened to William, learning about some of the pony cultures.
Eventually Night had fallen and after many questions from Chris, they finally set off to bed.
When morning arrived, William was the first one up, mostly due to some internal clock telling him to wake up. He smiled as he went to the balcony to do his work out, as he slept in his PT uniform of the Lunar Guard. Rick woke up next, grabbing his satchel and sword before he noticed where he was, placing the satchel back down, he sat on the bed with his hand on his chin, thinking of what he was going to do. Chris woke up much later, reached over to the bedside table, mumbling about a cellphone, before rolling over too far and ended up on the floor.
“I’m up...” Chris groaned in pain. “but I think I’m in pain.” Chris start to rise up from the floor trying to stand up. He arches his back and hears a loud pop. “Definitely in pain.” Chris said again while flopping to the floor.
William looked at Chris. “Ouch, I had that happened, only with my neck and sleeping in the wrong position.” He looked around. “When we get back to Ponyville I will have to take you to the Ponyville spa.”
“That sounds nice...” Chris said while on the floor. “I think I rather stay on the floor...I am getting an amazing view of the ceiling.”
Rick looked up for a moment, realizing it was a plain white ceiling before turning towards where Chris was. “Yes... Amazing...” Rick said rolling his eyes with a slight grin on his face.
Before Chris could respond there was a knock on the door.
William blinked, he had come out of the restroom dressed in his ACUs, he walked to the door before anyone could say anything and opened it a crack to see who it was that knocked on the door. Standing there was a solar guard.
“I have a request that all three of you are to come to the Throne room as soon as you are able, her highness Princess Celestia wishes to meet with you all there.” He gave a small curt nod and turned around waiting for them to be ready and to escort them to their destination.
Rick leaned on the wall next to the door, waiting for Chris to get up so they could go. Chris on the other hand stood up and went to the bathroom and took his time. After a couple minutes they set off towards the throne room.
Upon reaching the large doors, the guards snapped to attention, opening the doors for the three guests. Celestia looked up from what letters she was reading and with a smile placed them onto a table at her side.
“Perfect timing, I had just finished.” She said with a small smile. “I wanted to ask you three a question, you can decline, but if you accept it would make it all the more better.”
“What might this request be your highness?” Rick questioned.
“I wish to ask all three of you if you would like to help out with a wedding coming up. William, I would like to ask if you could assist the guards due to your past as a lunar guard if I am correct. Chris, If you could, would you like to take photographs of the wedding, you seem to have your camera on you at most times so I would assume you like to do so. Rick, I wish to ask you if you could help set up the main hall for the wedding, decorations and such, Pinkie would be nearby if you were to need help. You can all decline if you wish, but I would be grateful if you all could help, we are lacking in some areas.” Celestia said.
“Are you sure your highness?” William spoke with an uncertain tone. I mean, I know this and that, but I have not had full training yet in either my original verse, or the Lunar Guard of my Equestria to feel that I could be of full help.” His voice showing that he did not fully trust his own abilities.
“I am sure, I think you would be fine for the job, you seem to know what to do and how to deal with it. You won't be alone if you are wondering about that. It’s like, a team effort in this I guess you could say. It’s not like I am having you command all the royal guards.” She ended with a chuckle.
William chuckled back. “I, I guess that can work. I will do the best of my ability.”
“I never got a photo gig at a wedding and a royal wedding at that. I just hope that this will end better than the last gig I did at a college party.” Chris stated. “I ended up waking up on the top of a roof with no pants on and for some reason a goat was next to me.”
Celestia raised a brow in question but decided against asking about it. She turned towards Rick.
“Sure, I would enjoy helping out with what I can.” He scratched the back of his head sheepishly. “I could never sit around long, I had to typically distract myself with my work.”
“So, what did you do? I mean, you’re outfit reminds me of those blacksmiths from Williamsburg, and the Lunar Forgers, but, I could be wrong.” William muttered as he noticed Rick twirling his hammer while speaking.
“You just remind me of that steampunk fad that people seem to be into.” Chris pointed out.
“You my friend, are correct. I worked as a blacksmith, but I did more than that. I, at some points, had to help with construction of our city walls, or just some item that came to mind. I had once set up a way for shop keeps to remain safe behind their desks and still be able to deal with customers.” Rick remembered with a smile. “Nevertheless it seems we all accept! When is this wedding coming up?”
“Two days.”