//------------------------------//
// House of the Shards of Sorrow 
// Story: The Unwilling Command 
// by KGBCowgirl 
//------------------------------//

	It has been said that the human race is a cruel species. We fight one another over foolish things, such as money, land, religion, or even a simple set of differing view on trivial topics. It comes to no surprise that we failed to see our world dying around us, since we have secluded ourselves from the potential to be as open as the Equestrians. We look for how one view differs from the other in lieu of finding the similarities. This was a recipe for disaster from the beginning, since we couldn't even see the war that threatened to spill over from another dimension. A war that could easily destroy our entire way of life...





After leaving New Orleans, Celestia told Jay and I to continue towards the capital as quickly and directly as possible. Our new route was lining up to take us through West Virginia, and I knew what was to come when we reached that state. For now, however, we were refueling in Raleigh, North Carolina. Vinyl and Octavia had gone into the convenience store to pick up a couple cases of NOS, since I hadn't slept a single wink since we left Louisiana. I was beyond exhausted, but I had no inclination to stop in a state that I'd come to know for it's relatively small, albeit influential, bigoted population. I'd lived outside Charlotte for my last two years of high school, dealing with the ridiculing remarks from those who found out I'd moved their from California. The jabs at me about how I was either a pot-head or homosexual, simply because I'd lived in Los Angeles for a little over a year, were almost too much to bear.

I quickly became that target of abuse for the school football team, because they had somehow concocted a story about how I was too good to play on their team. Mind you, calling it a team was a stretch, as the only practices I'd gone to early in the season resulted in me being used as a tackling dummy because I didn't have the standing capacity to want to hurt anything that got in my way. It wasn't that I lacked the capacity to get angry, I was simply afraid of my temper. The last time I'd ever gotten truly angry, I'd almost put someone in the hospital.

However, I found out later, after leaving the caustic environment of that failure of a team, that the rest of the people of North Carolina were actually quite sociable, if a bit strange to me at times. Those two years before I left to join the military were the most tumultuous period I'd ever been through. There were no fewer than four drug raids, five cases of vandalism, and a number of other freak occurrences that almost permanently marked North Carolina as a state to never live in ever again.

Yet here I was, refueling my car on the way to speak to the person who used to essentially be my boss at the highest level. Vinyl said something, which snapped me out of my reverie.

"Sorry, I spaced out. What did you say?" I asked. Vinyl giggled quietly before holding up a stack of boxes of my favorite drink.

"Where do you want these? I think there's room in the trunk." She nodded to the back of the car. I pressed a button on my remote, opening the rear hatch. I took several of the four-packs from Vinyl and started playing "trunk Tetris", and age old game of fitting an almost impossible amount of cargo into an otherwise too small space. After about five minutes, the gas pump had already stopped and I had successfully loaded twelve cases of NOS Energy Drink into the space not taken up by everyone else's belongings. I even managed to fit one of the four-packs into the space under the driver's seat for easy access.

I pumped my fist in the air as I removed the nozzle from the fuel port of my car. "I am the King of Car Tetris! Bow down to my awesome cargo-loading skills!" This caused several of the people at the gas station to look at me strangely, and I sheepishly lowered my arm while ducking my head to hide the blush on my face. I looked into the car to see Octavia was passed out on Celestia's shoulder. The Solar Princess was equally indisposed, her mouth hanging open slightly while a drop of saliva rolled down her chin.

Vinyl jumped into the passenger's seat and fastened her seatbelt before I could say anything else. I looked back to Jay to see that he and Pinkie were ready to go. I nodded to him before getting into my own vehicle. I had decided to save the remaining canisters of nitrous for any situation that called for a quick getaway, so the Banana-Mobile from Hell would not be getting any exercise in North Carolina. I started the car and pulled away from the gas station, starting us on the way to Huntington, West Virginia.

The place where my father's parents were buried.





We entered the small town several hours later, since Fireball-Flank made me Pinkie promise to respect the speed limits the whole way there. And, since the demon of shattered logic was in the car behind me, I grudgingly complied. Huntington is a small town, the kind where everyone knows exactly what goes on all over town within an hour of the event's occurrence. My dad was from here, so I had been obligated to visit once when I was younger. Everyone we met said that it was like looking back in time, and that I looked just like him. My dad and I were never on the best of terms, but I respected him, if only for the reason that without him I wouldn't be alive.

I was in the small town for one reason, which was a matter of personal responsibility to me. I had come to visit my grandparent's grave. I never knew them, but Mom had told me that they were nice enough. My grandfather was apparently just an older version of my dad, which made me wonder if they had somehow discovered the secrets of nearly cloning someone in earlier generations. It wouldn't have surprised me, but I wasn't visiting to ponder the impossible. I was there to pay my respects.

My grandparents had, in fact, been ruthlessly murdered in their own pawn shop before I was born. It was a ruse disguised as a potential customer wanting to purchase some coins. The details were never completely worked out, but the encounter had ended with the fake customer shooting both of my grandparents in the head before taking as much money from the store as he could. It made my blood boil to think of the story, but the culprit was already in prison. I walked through the cemetery and stopped at their gravestones. I had my hands in my pockets while I muttered a prayer to the gods of the afterlife, wishing them peace.

I had never met them, simply because one individual chose to act on his greed. He killed two people, without regard for their families or friends, simply because he wanted their money. It was a known failing of humans to covet things that others worked hard to obtain, Mikael had been the most recent proof of that. Chrysalis was now trying to do to the ponies of Equestria what my grandparents' murderer had done to my father and his family. She destroyed the ponies' way of life because she craved the love she could never have in her tyranny. This was why I accepted the task of helping Vinyl, Octavia, and the other Equestrians. This was why I knew we couldn't fail.

I stayed there for a while, silently remembering the stories my dad had seen fit to tell me about his parents, I think it was almost an hour, since the sun had begun to descend past the horizon.

I walked back to my car to see Jay leaning against his Mustang. I nodded to him curtly and got into my own car. I sat there for a minute, trying to return myself to the present. I started the car and began driving towards the highway.


I know of a place, where none dare tread
Atop the darkest hill,


I turned onto the ramp and began our final northern stretch.


A place of memories, a place of the dead.
The house of the shards of sorrow.


Vinyl tried to get my attention, but I was quietly focused on the road to D.C. while planning how my first encounter with the President would take place.


Gone are their bodies, passed are their souls
Our loved ones enter, to never exit upon the morrow.


Celestia and Octavia had joined Vinyl in the effort to rock me from my stupor, shaking me by my shoulder and calling my name. I finally started to return fully to the world of the conscious and living, but the final words of my poem echoed in my mind before I came out of my reverie.


Though they have left our world, eternal they are
Our memories make them immortal
To never fade, even as we leave
The house of the shards of sorrow.


I blinked a few times before I took on a determined expression. "Alright, ladies... and Celestia." I began with a sly grin. "We have politicians to convince, so let's start planning."

All three women smiled, and we began our work.





"Oh, and I suppose we can just demand that the Head of the CIA tell us if he had a bounty on my head?" I asked sharply, doing my best to keep my volume down. "Yeah, that'll go over really well. And while we're at it, we can tell him that he may have spies from a different dimension hiding within his ranks with no way to prove it!"

"I didn't say it was a perfect plan, I just suggested it so we could make sure you had no problems when we were in Washington!" Jay snapped back in an equally hushed tone.

We were currently sitting outside a bistro near Congress, arguing over the information that Celestia had mysteriously obtained. Apparently those "agents" from back in L.A. were Changeling soldiers that had managed to follow the Equestrians to Earth about four months after their escape from the scourging of their home. Chrysalis was in the process of opening a mass portal to follow the Equestrians to this world.

"And I suppose you have a plan for avoiding their attention while we try to meet my old boss? The President doesn't exactly have an open appointment book for anyone to walk in and chat." I pointed out.

Jay crossed his arms, his usual smile long gone as we argued. "The Princess could just show off her magic..."

I cut Jay off quickly. "And then we'd have to fight off the government scientists that would want to figure out how to duplicate that same magic. It's bad enough we're not human, but what do you think will happen if they figure out how to use magic themselves? Do you want to run the risk of Earth being killed off because we wanted to prove a point?"

We both threw up our hand in exasperation as the girls walked over with our food. Apparently, since we had been changed into Equestrians, the partners to the Equestrian natives had become as vegetarian as the former ponies. I would not forsake the flavor of burgers entirely, however. I graciously accepted my veggie burger with extra cheese, unwrapped the sandwich, and tore into it like a starving man. The burger itself was filling, but I never knew veggie patties could taste as good as the ground chuck I had grown up eating.

I finished the burger before anyone else had even finished half of their own. The looks of disbelief I received were perfect, as even Celestia's mouth was hanging open. "Celestia, it's not very lady-like to gape. However, if you want to catch a fly, that's a very good way to do it." The princess snapped her mouth shut, blushing furiously and giving me a sharp glare. "Don't you have to attend to the Elements of Harmony? Last I checked, Vinyl blows things away with her telekinesis and I can barely make a shield." I started counting off the Elements on my hands. "Applejack could probably break someone's ribs with a light jab, Rarity could talk their ears off, Rainbow Dash could throw them off a cloud, Twilight could probably teleport them into a holding area, Fluttershy has the Stare." I nodded towards Pinkie Pie. "And we could just give her a can of my NOS and let her loose after we got into a bomb shelter."

Pinkie perked up at the idea of being given a drink she'd seen keep me awake and aware for the last two days. "OOH! Is that the stuff in the blue can that you like? I bet its good!"

At that point, everyone looked between me and Pinkie with expressions of fear and disbelief that I could suggest such a thing. Once again, they seemed to ignore just how cracked I had become since the three days in New Orleans. I pulled a can of the aforementioned drink from my bag, holding it loosely at the top. "Maybe we should get to work on finding the other Elements before I get a bad idea?"

Everyone finished eating very quickly before we began our attempt to rendezvous with the rest of the Equestrians and their partners. Today was going to be a long day.


End of Part 1