When I woke the moon was just coming up. It took me a moment to recognise this for what it was. This moon day stuff was confusing as hell. My first movement brought back to me the events of the day before. I lay back and thought about it.
I hadn't really have to think about it yesterday. The Diamond Dogs were... if not evil, then definitely 'bad'. They'd attacked me, just because I wouldn't go with them, but what really put the seal on it was their kidnapping and abuse of the little filly, Aura. Once that had happened, it had been on. There was no way I'd let them get away with that. No way. I remembered being asked last night why I'd done it when I hadn't even really known Aura or her mother. Heck, I hardly knew anyone here. I'd only been here for around twenty-four hours, or however long a 'day' was, here. But that hadn't been an issue. Some might consider me a little old-fashioned, but I don't hold with the mistreatment of women. Especially young children. You hurt them, I will do my best to hurt you and get them away from you. And the fact that the Dogs had kidnapped Aura because of me really put the icing on the cake. There had been absolutely no way I was going to let them get away with that.
I recalled my conversation with Luna. I had no idea what was going to happen, in fact I was having trouble working out exactly what had happened. Had she been telling the truth? Was Celestia to blame? Or, rather, was Celestia the one at fault? Luna admitted to having made 'a mistake' when she disposed of not only Celestia, but the sun as well. The fact that any mention of Celestia had been struck from all records and memories, spoke of a magical power pretty much beyond my comprehension. I mean, whatever she'd done with Celestia and the sun was one thing. But to actually erase them from ever having existed? It made my brain hurt just thinking of it.
Luna had, apparently, been forced to use her magic, not only to control the moon, but to keep Equestria going. That made sense in a way. Not much grew in moonlight. To survive as they had, there would have had to have been a substantial amount of magic used.
Luna had lied, though. Sort of. She'd told the ponies that the sun would scorch the earth and turn the grasses brown and... She'd also said that Celestia wanted an eternal summer. Now when she'd said that I'd automatically thought of the summers in Australia. Hot, dry and dusty. Sixteen hour days. An eternity of that would scorch the earth. But that wasn't really the case, was it? I mean, if they had enough power to control the sun and the moon, they probably had enough power to control the climate as well.
I thought about other things that had happened yesterday. I didn't know how I'd gotten here. But I did know, deep within myself that one thing Luna had said was true. Somehow, for reasons only known to God himself, or whoever else was controlling this show, I held the fate of Equestria in my hands. I mean, it was crazy. If I'd been watching this on the television I would have done a coin toss. That's how much I cared. Yet here? Here, where I was immersed in their world and was becoming immersed in their lives? Now it felt different. If I'd been watching the show, I probably wouldn't have cared about Aura getting kidnapped by the Dogs. I wouldn't have cared about the claw and bite marks her mother had sustained. But yesterday there had been no question in my mind. I was going to either rescue Aura or go down trying. It was the same with the fate of Equestria. It mattered now.
I sighed and swung my legs painfully off the bed, heaved myself to my feet and went to the door. When I opened it I saw Aura's mother. She smiled up at me, her face slightly marred by a scratch across her nose. "I brought you some fish." she told me, indicating a large tray laden with freshly-cooked fish.
I squatted down. "Thank you. How are you both?"
"I'm okay, Aura is still rather sore, but she's..." her face worked "She's alive, thanks to you." It looked for a moment as if I were in for another hugging but, instead, she pulled a piece of paper from a bag that hung around her neck, and offered it to me. "She drew that this morning."
It was childish and roughly drawn, but it showed me, covered in blood and surrounded by what I took to be Dogs. A scrawled 'Thank you.' in childish writing ran along the bottom of the drawing. I had to use a bit of imagination to recognise myself, but... "It's lovely. She's such a sweet little one, too. As well as being very brave."
By that time, other ponies were gathering around. I saw Twilight, Applejack and the others I knew from the show, but there were many others as well. They all expressed their thanks, and several brought cakes and other goodies as tokens of their appreciation. Me? I was as embarrassed by all the attention. As I said to Luna, later; if it hadn't been for me, the Dogs might not have attacked in the first place. They'd wanted me to come to their cave and when I'd refused, they'd kidnapped Aura to force my hand.
The rest of the day was spent rather quietly. A lot of things had happened in the last day and a bit, and I really wanted to catch up with myself. I had a lot to think through and I still could not shake the idea that Celestia would, somehow, want to talk to me. My eyes worked fine in the light given by the moon and I walked around and, or so I hoped, made myself useful.
One of the harder things I tried to do was cheer up Applejack. It was apple harvesting–or 'apple bucking' as she called it–season. She'd been used to helping her brother and, in fact had done most of a season alone when her brother had been injured at one time. So, naturally, apple-buck season, forcefully reminded her of her loss. I offered my help and found I could, with some padding on my fists, hit the trees hard enough to bring most of the apples down. I had to time the blows right, but I could do it. I could pull a cart, and do all manner of other things that required more strength than the average pony had. The mood wasn't exactly cheerful in the orchard. Applejack was, naturally enough, having a hard time of it. The others tried to help, but there were times when she just broke down and not even Pinky could cheer her.
That after... oh, heck, I'll stay with my normal thinking or I'll only confuse myself–not that that's hard. That afternoon I got a visitor. She was still obviously a little sore in the shoulders–apparently they'd been partially dislocated–but Aura came out to see me. She was a fun little filly, I have to give her that. She wasn't afraid to help, either, picking up a surprising number of apples. She actually tried applebucking but she was too small and her shoulders pained her.
Her mother came out with her and watched as she picked up apple after apple. "I still can't believe I have her back. When the Dogs attacked me, they said I'd never see her again." She snorted slightly, "It's taking me longer to realise she's back and whole, than it took me to realise the fact she was gone. When you were gone so long. I thought... I..."
"You thought I'd failed and that she was dead?"
She nodded. "I thought you both were. I saw your face before you left. I knew that if you didn't bring Aura back it was because you were dead."
“I'm not easy to kill,” I murmured, “fortunately.”
“Can I confess something?”
I blinked. “Sure.”
“When I saw you coming back I hoped that blood was yours, not... not Aura's.”
“I don't blame you in the slightest.” I told her with a smile. “I'm not a parent, so I can only imagine what you were going through. A total stranger has offered to go and rescue your daughter from the Dogs, insisting that no one go with him. I'm only surprised you let me. I mean, I could have been in league with the dogs.”
“No you couldn't.”
“Oh? What makes you say that?”
“The look on your face when I showed you the note.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”
“You could have killed, then. The look on your face told me that. And...” she paused.
“And...?”
“And I was glad. I hoped you would. I... It might be wrong but, for capturing and foalnapping Aura like that? I wished them dead.”
“You're her mother. While I've never been a parent, I would be very surprised if that isn't a totally normal reaction. Some one is harming your daughter. You have a dire need to protect her or to see her freed from that situation. What happens to the one harming her doesn't matter to you.”
There was a long moment of silence as she watched Aura talking to Twilight. “Thank you. Again.” she smiled a slightly crooked smile. “I seem to be saying that a lot to you lately, but that's been bothering me a bit, today.” She turned. “Aura. Come here, sweetie.”
Aura came over. Her shoulders were obviously getting rather painful and she seemed to be glad to be called away from the others. She nuzzled up against her mother for a moment before going to lie down. “Aura?” I said quietly. “Would you like a comfortable place for a nap?”
Both mother and daughter looked at me quizzically and I indicated my lap. I was sitting, with my legs out and there was plenty of room for a foal. Aura looked up at her mother who hesitated a moment, then nodded. I helped her up and she lay down with a happy sigh. “Softer than ground.” she murmured. Within a few moments she was asleep. She was a little heavier than I thought she might be, but it wasn't too bad. I've had dogs on my lap before and she wasn't much heavier than those.
Her mother looked at her with a soft smile but one that couldn't hide the worry she obviously felt. “She had nightmares last night.” she told me. “She dreamed the Dogs had her again and were hurting her. She was screaming, terrified. It was enough to terrify me, I can tell you.”
I gently stroked the soft, blue mane. I wondered what colour it would really be in the sunlight. I could make out the basic colour, but that was about it. It was the same with the purple colour of the rest of her coat. Her mother's coat was the same colour as Aura's mane, with her mane being a shade of green. “I'm not surprised she had them. She wasn't well handled.”
“Well, my introduction to Equestria has been a little rough,” I said quietly, continuing to stroke Aura's neck and mane. “but I've survived so far.”
“You haven't had the best of starts, have you?” Splash replied. “I mean with the dogs and all."
I merely shrugged. "Well, I do admit it could have gone better, but... it could have been a lot worse, too."
We chatted for about half an hour or so, I guess. She helped me gain a little more insight and a little more knowledge of Equestria than I'd had before. Then she heaved herself to her feet–or should I say 'hooves'? “Well, things to do and all that.” she said with a smile. “But thanks. Yet again.”
“Oh?”
“For making me... For... That was nice.”
I smiled. “You're most welcome. I must say I enjoyed it, too.” I looked down at Aura who was slowly waking up. “She's a very beautiful filly, you must be very proud.”
“I am.” she replied, then turned to her daughter. “Come on, sleepyhead.”
They moved away and I couldn't help but sit there in wonderment. Two days before, if I'd seen that filly or the mother on the television show, I would have laughed and called them 'cutesy crap' or something similar. But now? Now I was actually getting to know them? The colours didn't seem to matter to me. Not anymore. They mattered. I clambered to my feet and proceeded to knock apples out of trees.