Chapter Seventeen: Date With Fate
Equis, Equestria, Ponyville
It was nearly four o' clock, and I was heading to Derpy's house- I realized that I did not know where she lived, so I had to find out from somebody on the street- to pick her and her daughter up. She said that she had a daughter, and I told her that I would buy them both something, so I was prepared to spend some money. It is not like I did not have a lot of money, but I just did not want to go through all of it too quickly. But I am not complaining, because I would do anything for Derpy.
I looked at my iPod clock and saw that it was almost ten till, so when I got there, we would be on our way. I was listening to my music as I walked so I could think clearly- I did not do so well when there is a bunch of noise everywhere- and remember where I was going. According to my internal sense of direction, I was almost there, so I turned the last corner, and there it was, Derpy's home. I could tell it was hers because of the mailbox with her Cutie mark on its side. I walked up to the front door and knocked loud enough for me to be heard throughout the interior.
"Just a second!" a voice called from within.
I smiled as I heard her voice. I always smile when I hear her voice. When I see her face, her smile. Just seeing her makes me happy, and I had no idea why, but I did not mind it too much.
"I'm coming, hold on!" the voice called to me again.
A moment later the door opened and standing before me, was Derpy Hooves. Her mane, her coat, her face, her eyes, her... everything really, was just as beautiful as the last time I saw her. "Hello Derpy, it's good to see you again."
She smiled brightly, and my smile grew. "Oh, hi Django! I was hoping you didn't forget our date today. I'm all ready, but Dinky is out with her friends, so it'll just be us."
I did not change my facial expression, but I was shooting confetti out of a canon in my head. With only Derpy, I could have a lot more freedom than I could if Dinky was with us. "That's too bad, I was hoping to see her again."
"Yeah, she said that you weren't in school today Django. Is everything okay with you?"
I scratched the back of my neck. "Uh, yeah, I'm fine. I just had to take care of some things concerning my friends," I lied.
She seemed to believe me. "Oh, okay then, are you ready to go?"
I nodded my head at her. "That I am, miss Derpy. I'm going to treat you to the finest food in Ponyville."
She put a hoof over her mouth and gasped. "Are you taking me to-"
"Cafe Corral? Why yes, yes I am," I said.
Her eyes grew wide. "That's one of the best places to eat in all of Equestria. How did you get a reservation so quickly?"
I tapped the side of my nose. "Magic."
She flew up and hugged me tightly. "You're amazing, you know that?"
I hugged her back. "Not nearly as amazing as you."
She broke away, and I felt a little sad inside. But what I feel does not matter, only she does. All I could think about as we walked side-by-side down the road is that she is the only thing in my life right now that could ever matter, and it confused me. I had thought that Twilight was the only one who mattered to me like this, but now I was feeling like the king of the world for just having made Derpy smile. I felt a kind of happiness that I have never felt before just being next to her, and I did not feel that with Twilight. I was so busy thinking about this that I barely heard Derpy talking to me.
"Django, what's it like?"
I shook myself out of my daze. "Hmm?"
"Being like you, I mean. What's it like?" she asked again.
"What do you mean?" I asked her.
"Well, you're so good at so many things, and ponies only have one thing that they're really good at. Do you have a bunch of Cutie marks under your shirt?"
I laughed a bit. "No, Humans are a lot different from ponies. For one thing, we aren't born with a special talent or skill for us. We have to develop skills. We need to get good at the things that we do."
She looked confused. "You don't have a Cutie mark?"
I shook my head. "Nah, I don't have, nor want one. I have too many skills to get them all branded on my back."
She nodded. "Yeah, I guess you would have a lot of them Django."
"Exactly," I said. "Wouldn't it look weird if I was walking around with, like, twenty Cutie marks?"
She giggled at that. "Yeah, that would be a lot."
We walked down the road for a bit longer until we came to our destination. We were seated in a booth near a window, just like I asked, and we were waited on by a very polite young mare. Derpy ordered a Daffodil and Daisy sandwich with hay fries. I just got a glass of water and nothing else- I had no interest in eating hay and grass. We talked about all kinds of things while we were there, and I was so caught up in her, that I lost track of the time.
***
Twilight was sitting in her kitchen looking at the clock on the wall. Django had said that he would be back by seven, and it was nearly eight. After what had happened to him in town the other day, she was getting worried that something bad had happened to him. She was sure that he could take care of himself, he was the one who put three full grown stallions in the hospital after all. But... what if something had happened to him? What if he was laying in a ditch dying somewhere and he was calling for help but nopony could hear him? What if... Oh sweet Celestia, she needed to go out and find him, now!
"Spike, watch the library, I'm going out!" Twilight called to her assistant and friend, Spike. She did not even wait for a response, instead she bolted out of the front door and down the road into Ponyville in search of her new coltfriend.
Where could he be? Why is he still nowhere to be found? What could have happened to him? There were far too many questions going through Twilight's mind to focus on just one of them.
"Oh Django, where are you?" she quietly asked the air around her. When she found him, she would hug him hard enough to crush him, then she would kill him, and then she would never let him out of her sight again.
She walked down the main road in town and asked anypony she came across if they had seen him, but they all said that they had not. She could tell that some of them were lying about seeing him, but she did not want to start anything that could cut into her time she had to spend looking for Django. She had no idea where he could be, so she had to look everywhere, and that was going to take too long. She needed a plan, and fast.
"Hey Twilight, how are ya?" a voice called from ahead of her. She looked up to see Applejack trotting towards her with a smile on her face. But as she came closer to Twilight, she became aware that something was wrong. "Twilight, what's wrong?"
Twilight looked deep into her friend's eyes and nearly broke down in tears. "Oh Applejack, it's horrible! It's absolutely horrible! Django left this morning saying that he was going to go help Applebloom, Sweetie Bell, and Scootaloo crusade today, but he's an hour late coming back and I'm so worried that something might have happened to him!"
Applejack's eyes widened and she looked at Twilight seriously. "Twi', the Crusaders said that they would be plannin' on how tah get their Cutie marks at their club house. They might still be there, so that's a good place tah start lookin' for 'im."
Twilight did not even wait to say thanks to her friend, instead she started sprinting toward the Cutie Mark Crusaders club house, hoping with all her being that he was there. Twilight had never run so fast before in her life. She ran fast enough to impress even Rainbow Dash, but she did not focus on how fast she was running, only on how far the club house was. If she held this pace, then she could get there in a matter of minutes, so she planned to do just that. She nearly knocked over vendor carts, vendor signs, and the vendors themselves as she ran as fast as she could to her destination. Nothing else mattered at that moment in her life. She had to find Django. She had to make sure he was okay. Because if he was not okay... She just could not bare it if he was hurt somewhere and she was unable to help him.
After nearly ten minutes of running at full tilt, she could finally see the CMC's club house. But what was more, she could see movement inside of it! She ran even faster than she was already running, and ran straight up the small ramp that allows access to the small club house in the tree. She burst through the doors and ran straight to the center of the small room. "Django, are you here?!" she screamed. She noticed that three pairs of wide eyes were now looking straight at her.
"Twilight, are ya alright?" Applebloom asked her.
Twilight ran right up to Applebloom. "Applebloom, where's Django?!"
"Uh... I don't know Twilight, ah haven't seen 'im since yesterday." she said in a hesitant voice.
There was a silence hanging in the air that seemed to suffocate the entire room after she said that. Did she hear her correctly? Did she just say that she had not seen Django since yesterday? There was no way she could have said that. She must have heard her wrong.
"What did you say?" Twilight asked in a squeaky voice.
"Um, ah said that we haven't seen 'im since yesterday, in class..." Applebloom said in a quiet voice.
Twilight could not believe what Applebloom was saying. They had not seen him all day, but he had said that he was going out to help them find their Cutie marks. If he was not here, then that meant that he had lied to her. He had swore that he would never betray her again, but he had lied to her. She did not know what to do, what to say. All she could do was walk numbly out of the small club house and down the dirt path back to town.
Django said that he loved her, right? No... He said that he cared about her. He had never said that he loved her, even after... No, she could not think like that. Maybe it was just a huge misunderstanding. Maybe he got sidetracked by something in town on the way home. That had to be it. He was on his way home now and here she was, worried that he had gotten into some sort of trouble. She was going to walk through the front door of the library and see him standing there with one eyebrow up and a smirk on his face and he will say something like "And here I was worried sick about you. You're grounded young lady!" Yes, that was all that had happened. This whole thing was just a crazy misunderstanding and he was at home waiting for her.
As Twilight realized what she thought must be the truth, she lifted her head and smiled. "Django is going to pay for making me worried tonight," she said to herself in a naughty voice. So she sped up, hardly able to contain her excitement for tonight and turned the last corned to head home and what she saw made her stop dead in her tracks. Django was there in front of her, and he was kissing that mailmare with the crooked eyes.
***
"And then the fire burned up the wick way faster than I thought it would, and I swear, I nearly lost my hands!" I said, laughing.
"Wow, that must've been one of your bad ideas," Derpy laughed.
We had long since finished our meals- or just water, in my case- and now we were swapping some stories from our past. She told me some great stories about how she went on a delivery job and nearly got eaten by trolls, and one story where she even had to battle a giant manticore named Chip-Tooth, with nothing but a rusty wagon wheel. Compared to her stories, my stories were seriously lame. But hey, there is just something about nearly losing your life from a giant, burning, backed up potato gun that makes people laugh.
"So Derpy, have any more tales to tell?" I asked her.
"Well, there was this one time when I-" but one of the staff working here interrupted her, and I had to bite my lip so I did not tear his throat out.
"Excuse me," he said in an uppity voice, "but we're closing now, so you'll have to take your leave."
"What do you mean you're closing?" asked Derpy. "The sign said that you don't close until seven thirty."
"Yes," said the staff member, "and it's seven thirty-eight right now."
My eyes widened when he said that. "What?! How can it be so late?!" I pulled my iPod out of my pocket and checked the time. Sure enough, there were the numbers seven thirty-eight, staring me straight in the face.
"Yes, so y-" the restaurant staff started.
"Yeah, yeah, I fucking know, we need to leave," I said in a bitter voice. I looked over to Derpy. "I guess we gotta leave, but I'd still like to hear that story," I said, half smiling.
She smiled and nodded. "Okay then Django, I can tell you on the way home."
I nodded my head at her, and then we both got up and walked, side-by-side, out of the front door and down the road to Derpy's home. It was an uneventful trip, except for the side splitting laughing that took place after Derpy finished her story. It truly was an amazing story. It was about how she had to bring a cursed book of spells to a snake sorcerer who turned out to be evil. Then she had to beat him in a staring contest and escape with the prisoners from the dungeon and destroy the book in the fires of a dragon's breath. She really was an amazing mare. So amazing that I wondered why she would want to hang around a loser like me. I mean, I do have the face of an angel, and the muscles of body builder. Not even to mention that I have an enormous-
"Hey Django?" Derpy said quietly.
I looked down at her with a smile. "Yeah Derpy?"
She did not smile back at me. She did not even look up at me. "Why do you like me?" she asked in a quiet voice.
I took a second to try to process what she asking, but I could not figure it out. I was not sure what she was trying to ask, but I felt that somehow, saying "Because you're way cool!" was the wrong answer. "What do you mean?" I asked in a voice filled with fake cheer.
"You're always hanging around Twilight and her friends. But now you want to be with me? Twilight and her friends are famous, and I'm just a mailmare. It just doesn't make any sense why you would want to be with me Django," she said in a serious voice. Then she looked up at me with a hard face. "Why do you really want to be with friends with me?"
We both stopped walking at this point. We were staring straight at each other. The smile was still on my face, but it was hollow. We were both silent for a while before I broke the silence. "Heh, I guess it's because we're the same."
She still looked serious, but confusion was mixed in now as well. "What do you mean?" she asked.
"Remember when you asked me what it was like to be like me?" I asked her, and she nodded. "Well the truth is that being me is hell. There's the never ending pain from my broken skull, the voices always yelling in my head, and the whole slipping into insanity thing. But that's the stuff I can deal with. The worst part about being me is the pictures and thoughts in my head about doing things straight from nightmares. everyday I wake up wanting to burn everything around me and to hurt everybody. I hate everything, and I can't stop it. At first I thought seeing a shrink would fix it, but the hate, the want to burn, only gets worse every day. I know I have to control it, but it's getting harder to stop myself from doing these things. I started off in life being tortured by everybody around me, and I couldn't do anything about it. I was always the odd man out, the weirdo... the freak. I know that you were picked on and teased relentlessly, and so was I. Derpy, I like you because you know what it's like to be the odd man out. You know what it's like to not fit in, no matter where you go or what you do. That's why I like you Derpy, because we're the same." I do not like talking about myself, but once I had started talking, everything just sort of came out all at once.
Derpy was speechless after that. She did not realize just how much of a fuck-up I really was. I would not even blame her if she walked away right now and...
"Django...?" Derpy said.
"Yeah?" I said back.
She flew up to eye level and got within my personal space. "You're right, I do know how it feels to not fit in."
"I know you do Derpy, and I'm sorry that that's true," I told her.
She got closer and put her forehead up against mine. "Can I tell you a secret Django?" she asked me softly.
"Yeah Derpy, you can tell me anything," I told her.
She took a deep breath, then she spoke. "You're really messed up Django."
I chuckled softly and smiled. "Yeah, just a bit."
I looked into her eyes, and I was amazed at how beautiful they were from this close up. But then she shifted, and I could feel her lips on mine, and I felt like I had molten fire running through my body. Kissing Twilight felt good, but this was beyond amazing. Kissing Derpy was better than any drug that I have ever done, better than any drink I have ever had, better than anything I have ever done in my life. I needed more, and I needed it now. I put both arms around her, one around her hips, one around her shoulders, and I pulled her closer to me. She must have felt the same thing that I did, because she wrapped both of her front legs around my neck and started pushing my head back with the kiss. I did one better and added tongue to the kiss, and she liked my idea judging from the soft moans she was making. Locked up in each other like that, Derpy did not even need to flap her wings to stay up, but her wings were beating hard enough to create a breeze strong enough to blow my hair around. The kissing was hard, hungry, and intense in a way that I have never before experienced, and I could not get enough of it. Now she was fighting my tongue with her own, and it added to the heat. But there was a heat building somewhere else too, and not above the belt line. From how she was pressed up against me, I knew that she could feel me, but she did not say anything about it, she just kept kissing me. This lasted another minute before she broke the kiss, and I saw a small line of saliva was visible trailing between our mouths. We were both panting, but not from lack of breath, but from the intensity of the kiss.
"Django, I never want you to leave," Derpy breathed onto my neck.
I kissed her neck gently and she moaned softly. "I'm never gonna leave you Derpy," I told her. "I promise."
She smiled brightly and kissed me again, then she kissed me harder. I kissed her back just as hard, and soon, it was a fight for dominance over the other. I admit it, she was a good fighter, but there was no way I was going to let her get the better of me. I pushed my tongue past hers and brought the fight into her mouth. But she fought back by rubbing herself against me on my manly areas. I let out a small groan and I could feel her smile in the kiss. I moved my grip on her upper body so I could tease the sweet spot all pegasi have between their wings. She moaned into my mouth, and I moved my other hand lower, and lower until I reached her flanks. While I rubbed her sweet spot I massaged her Cutie mark, making her squirm a little, but I just held her tighter. After a few seconds, I moved my hands lower, until I reached her tail. I brushed her tail aside, but she moved it back, so I moved it more forcefully this time, and she did not move it back in place. I could not see where my hand was, but I would judge its positioning by Derpy's reaction. I slid my hand slowly down, between her haunches. I was feeling light headed from the kissing, but I still had a good idea where my hand was going to end up. Derpy tried to say something through the kiss, but she was not able to. But I could guess that it had something to do with where my hand was. I was about to kick things up a notch, but...
"Django...?"
I stopped instantly. I knew that voice. Everybody in Ponyville knew that voice, which is why Derpy's eyes shot open the same time mine did. I broke the kiss and looked to my side, and I saw Twilight with an unbelieving expression on her face and tears in her eyes.
Oh no, I fucked up...
Twilight started to sprint off towards the library, tears streaming from her eyes. I looked back to Derpy. "Derpy, I'm sorry, but I have to go after her. I will see you again, and soon." With that I ran off after Twilight as fast as I could. I ran fast, faster than I ever remember running. I had to get to the library before Twilight did. If I could get their first, I could explain what happened. If she got there before me though, she would lock me out and I would never be able to talk to her. I was almost there, I had almost caught up to her. I was only about twenty feet behind her, but the library was coming up fast. "Twilight!" I yelled as loud as I could. "Twilight, stop!" She was at the door, and she looked back at me, and I nearly lost my balance and fell flat on my face from her expression of pure pain. Just as I reached the door she shut it and locked it.
I had messed up. I had messed up really bad, and I could not fix it. But just then a light appeared through the open doorway of the library. Twilight was letting me back in! "Twi' I- oof!" Something had flown out of the door and hit me on the chest hard enough to knock me down, then the door slammed shut and the light went out. All she had opened the door for was to throw something at me. I looked down at my chest where the object was that had hit me, and I saw that it was my pack. She had just thrown me out. It was really over. I could not believe it. I had finally found myself stuck in a problem that made it impossible to talk my way out.
I slowly got back up, and brushed the dirt off of my back. I picked my pack up and slung it on my back so that it would not get any dirtier than it already was and put my hands in my pockets. I heard wing beats behind me, but I did not turn around, I knew who it was.
"Django! Django are you okay?!" Derpy's concerned voice called from behind me.
"Yeah, I'm fine Derpy," I said in a low voice.
She flew up in front of me when she reached me. "I saw you get hit by that bag. I saw you fall down. Are you okay?"
"Yeah, don't worry about me Derpy, I'm fine." I sighed deeply. "You should go check on Dinky; it's late."
"Actually..." she said slowly, "Dinky is staying over a friend's house tonight, so it's just me."
I looked her in the eye and raised an eyebrow. "Really now...?"
"Yes, so since it looks like you got kicked out of the library, you could stay with me tonight," she said with a smile.
I smiled back at her wryly. "Well, if only to stay off the streets..." Nobody said I did not work fast. But in truth, I was already sealing away what had just happened with Twilight in a dark corner somewhere in the back of my mind. I have been through enough that stuff like this is old hat by now. I believe in not worrying about things that you cannot fix, so this thing with Twilight did not bother me too much. But enough about this, it was time for me to have a sleepover with Derpy Hooves. I turned to start walking down the road with her hovering by my side to her house, and that was when I saw the flames in the distance.
End Chapter: Chapter Seventeen: Date With Fate