//------------------------------// // Chapter 2: A Friend // Story: A Chaotic Land // by donutsforthewin //------------------------------// I slowly opened my eyes, and the first thing i noticed was my massive headache. What happened? As my eyes began to focus, I noticed a glowing light. Then I realized it was attached to a pony, a mare in fact. That doesn't make sense. After about a second or two, my headache started feeling much better. Able to think clearly, I looked at the unicorn standing next to where I was. Oh, a unicorn, that explains it. When the the unicorn's horn stopped glowing, I tried to remember where I was, but I failed. I decided to look around and my eyes fell on an old pegasus laying about ten feet away from me. Then it all came back. I felt a tear roll down my face as I continued to stare at the pony who had taken care of me for my entire life. More tears followed when I looked at the hole going through his body. I turned to the unicorn. "Is... is he..." "Yes, he is dead." More tears began to cover my eyes. I had to keep blinking just to see. I had just witnessed what had happened to my parents years ago. The only difference was I was there, watching this time. But I had been just as helpless to save him as I was to save my parents when I was miles above them. I never wanted to have this helpless feeling again. Ever. "What happened here?" I turned to look at the unicorn as she spoke, remembering she was there. I tried to explain, but it ended up taking 10 minutes to say what should have taken 2 minutes. "Ok, I think I understand." she said "If you need a place to stay you can come with me." I thought about it a little and figured it would be pretty boring up in the clouds alone. Alone. The sadness in me intensified as the thought crossed my mind. Another tear. I still couldn't get my mind around Grandpa being dead. The unicorn watched as I stared at Grandpa. "We should bury him." she said. I nodded and slowly began trying to dig a hole with my hooves. "It is going to take you forever to dig a big enough hole that way. I can get a shovel from my shack. You stay here and I'll be back in a few minutes." Sure enough, she left and came back with a shovel. She levitated it with her magic and started digging. In a few minutes we had a decent hole. It would have to do. It was hard to predict sometimes, but the sun looked like it was headed toward the horizon. We had to finish soon. The unicorn levitated Grandpa's body into the hole, and started shoveling the dirt back into the hole. I searched for a little while, and found a rock, which I put on the mound of dirt. The unicorn mare lowered her horn and put some symbols on the rock. "What are those?" I asked "Don't tell me you don't know how to read!" she paused, waiting for me to tell her I could, but I disappointed her with my silence. "You have a lot to learn." she finished. As we walked to her shack, we started talking. "You never did mention your name," she began, "My name is Starlight, but you can just call me Star." "I'm Spark," I answered. I noticed her cutie mark on her flank. Wonder when I will get mine. Her's was a crescent moon with some stars around it. "Whar kind of special talent is a crescent moon?" I asked. "Well, some things are just a mystery." Was she avoiding talking about it, or did she really not know? I decided to change the topic. "So I guess you saved me back there." "No, you would have woken up eventually, just a few hours later with a much worse headache. But, I couldn't tell until I started healing you. I had no idea if you were perfectly fine, or almost dead. But, when I saw the hole in the pony next to you, I wanted to make sure you were fine." "Well, thanks." I said, "Do you live with anyone else?" "No, not many ponies around here are very friendly. You have to be careful around other ponies." "Then why did you trust me not to just attack you after I you healed me?" "You've got a bright coat, I.. I mean you're very noticeable. That's how I saw you from far away and wondered if you were OK. You have to watch out with a coat like that. Bandits could see from a mile away. You probably shouldn't fly around too often. You could attract all sorts of unwanted attention." She definitely avoided my question that time. We walked a little further, then I noticed something move to our left. I stopped and turned to look, but all I saw was a large rock. I looked over at Star to ask if she saw anything, then I saw a gray pony leap off of a rock to out right. The gray pony was falling right toward Star, with a sword in his mouth. I was about to yell a warning, but it was over before I could say anything. A sword covered in a blue glow was sticking out of the gray pony, and Star's horn was surrounded in a similar blue glow. I blinked, my mind trying to process what just happened. Before I could try to think, a grayish-blue pony jumped from behind the rock I first thought I saw something moving around. Star, however, didn't see this pony. She was still facing the dead gray pony. This was exactly the way Grandpa died, with a pony stabbing him in the back. My new, and only, friend was about to die the same way Grandpa did. Rage filled me as I launched myself at the grayish-blue pony. I saw the surprise in his eyes as he glanced toward me. My right fore hoof plowed into him. We landed on the ground with a thud. I continued to slam my hooves into him, even long after he went limp. Star walked over and pulled me off the pony. "He's dead Spark." I continued to struggle. "HE'S DEAD! SNAP OUT OF IT!" The rage inside me slowly faded. I looked at the bloody mess that had once been a pony. My eyes went wide. I had just killed a pony. The proof was all over my hooves. I told myself I was just defending my friend. But, I couldn't convince myself. If I was just defending a friend, then why wasn't there a face left on the pony? I had gone way out of control. We walked the rest of the way to the shack in silence. I saw it in the distance. The shack was quite small. "Here it is. Home sweet home." Star began, "It's not much, which is good when you have bandits looking for anything valuable around here. Most just pass by, assuming it is abandoned." It certainly looked abandoned. It hardly looked big enough to fit three ponies in it. How could anypony live in there?I found out as we walked inside. The only thing in the shack was a set of stairs going down. They creaked as we walked down, threatening to collapse under us. "How old is this place?" I asked. "I have no idea. I found this it a while ago when I was traveling, patched it up a bit, and moved in." When we reached the bottom of the stairs I looked around. It didn't look much better than the floor above, but it was much more spacious. And it had some furniture. OK, it was a lot better than the floor above. But, just as dirty. "First, you need a weapon if you want to survive out here. You can't just beat all your enemies to death with your hooves, it only worked that time because you surprised him. A weapon gives you a big advantage. Since you are a pegasus, lets try a bow first. You could fly above your enemies and shoot down on them." Star levitated a bow off of the wall and set it down next to me. She got a bow out of her bag, pulled out an arrow and demonstrated how to fire the bow. "You strap this strap around your forehoove, you get out an arrow with your teeth, you put the arrow on the string, and you pull the string back with your teeth. Then you aim it at the target and fire." Star demonstrated the steps and shot the arrow. It hit the target a few inches away from the center. "Now you try." It took me about a minute to wrap the string around my hoof, and it wasn't even tight when I got it. I tried getting an arrow with my teeth, and managed to somehow pick it up with the sharp end in my teeth. After much struggling I got an arrow the right way around. I latched it onto the bow and pulled back. I tried to aim, but ended up just going in a circle, never coming close to the right direction. I decided to just close my eyes and fire. Twang. I opened my eyes and, sweet! I hit a target! It wasn't very close to the center, but I still hit it! "Ummm, weren't you aiming for the target on that wall?" Star asked, pointing to the wall to my right. "Oh, darn. Can we try something else?" "Yeah, how about a sword? If all else fails you can just swing it around wildly in the enemy's direction." She levitated a wooden stick to me. "Try to hit me with that stick." "That doesn't look like a sword to me." "Well, we aren't going to practice with actual swords. One of us could get killed. That would not be helpful." "OK." She levitated a stick in front of her and started walking towards me slowly. I picked up the stick in my mouth and ran at her. I beat the stick she was levitating out of the way and lunged at her. She leaped back and picked up her stick again with her magic. I kept swinging at her, and she kept dodging, until I felt a stick poke me in the side. I glanced over and saw a blue glow covering the stick. "Always keep track of what you enemy is doing. If they can catch you by surprise, you don't stand a chance. However, that was an impressive first attempt. Lets try again." After about ten or so rounds of me trying, and failing, to best her, we stopped. "You have made a lot of progress, Spark. Now, lets take a break from fighting." Finally, some rest. "Now it is time for you to learn how to read and write." Great, I thought sarcastically.