Homecoming of a Jumper

by tosety

Interlude 1

Tallic and I sat in an unused hangar bay for the ponytechs and watched Twilight bring down the sun for the night. There was a certain sadness knowing that it wasn’t Princess Celestia doing it anymore.

“Tallic, please tell me a story,” I asked.

He sat for a while, chest rising and falling slowly from his calm and steady breathing.

“I was in a world that I believe was Alex and Matthew’s home reality,” He replied. “I found myself in a land with slightly lower technology than this. The country I landed in was the eastern coast of a nation of confederated states, and after a few passes from their air patrols, I decided to find a defensible place in case they turned hostile.”

“Did they attack you?”

Tallic rumbled with quiet laughter. “None that had any chance of success. I was careful not to act threatening despite the annoyance of screaming engines passing within two tail lengths of me.” A rumble of irritation vibrated the floor. “I found a rocky chasm that, while a tight fit and rather shallow, did not provide any good terrain for their military vehicles. It took a little bit of time, but I was able to carve out a decent cave for myself and settled down for the inevitable visits from the locals.”

“Knights?” I was feeling a little nervous, knowing how most of his encounters with humans went.

“Their equivalent was what I was expecting, but this reality sent some respectful military and then lots of tourists.”

Tallic

Shortly after settling in, I was approached by a human in ceremonial clothing.

“Greetings from the United States of America. My name is Captain James Sawyer. Do you come in peace?”

“Greetings, I am Tallic, the Iron Dragon. I come against my will,” I replied. “But I am willing to live in peace if your kind is willing to leave me in peace. I will, however, use deadly force if I deem it necessary.”

“A-against your will?” My presence was starting to get to the poor creature, but he did an admirable job holding himself together, especially since it turned out that they believed dragons to be mythical creatures.

“Yes, little one, I have been pulled from my reality by an unknown force. I have what usually amounts to a decade before I get pulled to yet another world. All I truly want is to lie here and rest undisturbed in my cave for that time, but if you are respectful and abide by my time schedule, I am willing to exchange knowledge,” I replied in what I hoped was a congenial manner.

Thankfully, it worked.

“It is good to know that you view us as equals-”

“No.” I cut him off with a faint growl. “I do not see you as equals. I see you as weak little things deserving of my pity. I condescend to be gentle with you because you may interest me, but you are not, nor will you ever be my equals.”

“Okay...” He replied. “Then what is this time schedule we must abide by?”

“Let us make this easy. I assume you have a way of keeping time with your technology?”

“Yes... We have clocks... we usually use a twelve hour chock, but the military uses a twenty-four hour system to keep things clear,” he said.

“Good, now at what point does the new day begin? Sunrise, sunset, midnight, or midday?”

“Midnight is twelve or zero hundred hours.” The captain was visibly relaxing now that we were on a topic he understood.

“Good, then please bring me one of these timepieces and let it be known that every other day, twelve people may come to request an audience. Each one must bring roughly half their weight in either metal or raw meat. They may only come from one hour before midday to one hour after.” I moved my face threateningly close to him to drive home my next clarification. “Anyone coming one minute before or after this time, failing to bring the necessary tribute, failing to be properly respectful, or being the thirteenth visitor will be eaten.”

I pulled my head back and let him recover.

“I will, as a concession, throw the head of the transgressor out of this cave as a sign that the next may enter and request an audience and so that you have something to bury in case your kind needs to show respect to the dead.”

I felt like I was gonna throw up listening to him talk about eating po- I mean people.

“I thought you didn’t kill people you didn’t have to. Why did you threaten them like this?”

“My reasoning,” Tallic said, “was that it usually brought more trouble than it solved. Revenge for a murdered loved one usually involved hiring someone to slay the dragon, but this world valued everyone’s life and I could not only enlist their help in keeping irritants away if they believed they could let sleeping dragons lie.”

“Did you actually eat any of them?” I hoped against hope he’d answer no.

“Yes, quite a few,” Tallic replied. “I could hear their guards turning people away after the time or number of people was up, but there were plenty who snuck in. I was gracious to those who snuck in during the time allowed and to those let in even after the number of visitors had been reached.”

Tallic breathed a heavy sigh. “Sadly, many were too stupid to leave when I told them that our conversation was done. They would grow disrespectful and they would not give me peace until I killed them, but I was true to my word and gave their heads back to their people.”

I swallowed back some bile, insisting to myself that if I was gonna be a proper son to a dragon, I needed to get used to this kind of talk.

“I did not eat any hatchlings, even though one wandered in once.”

Tallic

The little pink thing stood, staring at me with wide eyes. “Are you a dinosaur?”

“Nay, little one, I am a dragon, and a creature not native to this reality.”

The hatchling’s eyes grew even wider. “Does that mean you can breathe fire?”

“If I were a fire dragon, I would, but I am an iron dragon, so I can use metal rather than fire.”

“Cool! Can I see?” He sounded just like Gajeel.

I shot a small spike into the wall of the cave.

“If you get it out of the wall, you may keep it,” I said.

While he worked at it, I heard multiple humans calling the name ‘Timmy’ outside. I left ‘Timmy’ to work at the spike while I went to the mouth of my cave. Upon poking my head outside, I saw one of the guards.

“I assume from the calls that a,” I took half a moment to remember how they referred to their hatchlings. “...child is lost. It is most likely the one that has wandered into my cave.”

The guard’s face drained of color.

“No need to worry,” I reassured him. “I do not harm hatchlings of any sapient species. Bring his parents here and I will return him to them.”

Tallic chuckled as he remembered their tearful reunion. “His parents ran to him and hugged him even while berating him about running off where a ‘vicious dragon’ was living. They were completely oblivious to my presence, but then again, so was the hatchling as he showed off the spear he was able to work free from the wall.”

I quietly breathed a sigh of relief.

Tallic

“Please tell me about your world,” The man in ripped jeans and a black shirt said.

“The scrap metal was merely to gain entry into my home,” I replied. “It was also obviously trash and would have gotten you killed for your disrespect by a less patient dragon.”

The little thing backed up in fear.

“If you wish knowledge,” I continued, “then I expect you to pay in knowledge. Tell me about your world, then I will tell you about mine.”

I closed my eyes as he rambled on about useless details, noting key elements like portable communications devices that also functioned as information storage and entertainment. I grew intrigued when he mentioned ‘computer games’ and ‘science fiction’.

After a few hours, a military officer called from the front of the cave. “Mighty and powerful Tallic, is the last visitor still alive?”

“Yes,” I called back. “He has intrigued me and I plan to give him special permission to visit.”

After several more minutes of hearing about stories of humans travelling among the stars, I sent him away.

“I wish to sleep now,” I explained. “But if you can bring me examples of these shows and games, I will welcome you without expecting tribute any time after noon tomorrow.”

“I could bring my laptop, but I might have some problems with the signal and the screen is only about this big.” He held up his hands, indicating something roughly twice the width of his chest.

I put a claw to my mouth as I thought. “No way of increasing its size?”

The human brightened up. “I think I have an answer, let’s just hope the military will get it for me.”

With that, he dashed out of my cave with a “See you tomorrow!” called over his shoulder.

“So, this ‘science fiction’,” I asked. “Is it like magic fiction?”

“Yes, in fact, the book you had previously told me about, this ‘Stables of Steel’ is oddly similar to one of the great treasures I gained in that world,” Tallic said, reaching to a scale near his right foreleg and pulling out a scrap of fabric.

As he unfolded it, I could taste something akin to unicorn architectural magics. When it was sufficiently spread out, he reached a claw through the fabric and pulled out a small book.

I carefully took it and read the cover.

Even the author’s name was eerily similar.

“Take care of it. This is a loan, not a gift. Knowledge is power and so are ideas. I took this among others because, in the right claws, it is valuable beyond measure. One thing humans do right is dream. They come up with fantastical worlds and do not let impossibilities get in the way of their imagination. This Asimov was one of the greatest dreamers. Many of his ideas inspired their creation.”

I carefully tucked the book into my saddlebags and settled down for more of the story.

Tallic

“You sure you want to do this?” Some voices outside my cave were arguing. “We’ve already had three casualties from people slipping in when he didn’t want visitors.”

“He told me specifically to come back today if I could get this stuff,” I heard the voice of the man from yesterday say. “You brave enough to help me carry it, or do I have to come back for a second trip?”

I moved to the front of the cave to find him with three guards.

“Greetings.” They all jumped at the sound of my voice. “Anyone who wishes to partake in this may enter. I will even give one warning if you irritate me.”

None of the guards stayed, though they did help carry a projector and screen into my cave.

The screen was small by my standards, but was adequate for the task.

As I settled into place, he asked “Would you like to see games first or movies?”

“You may make the decision as you are more familiar with them.”

“Okay,” He said. “Let’s start with TV... Star Trek.”

He fiddled with his devices for a bit before looking up at me with a nervous look.

“Would it be okay if I recorded your reactions?”

I thought for a while about it and decided that while his recording would be valuable, it would mean no loss to me. In the end, I said “Yes, you may, although I will expect payment for it.” At his increasingly worried look, I added “Books will be the default payment, although I may request others if I like what I see.”

With a relieved smile, he nodded before finishing up what he was doing. Soon I heard music and saw what appeared to be a marble of sodalite. As the view moved back, it appeared to be hanging in the night sky. A stylized sun came into view and it occurred to me that the marble was supposed to be a planet. Soon more came into view as the music swelled and a voice started talking about exploration and a ‘Starship Enterprise’. The ‘starship’ came into view as it was named.

With the introduction done, the name of the show appeared on the screen; ‘Star Trek, The Next Generation.

Soon, the show came to an end, I spoke up. “It was highly entertaining, especially with this ‘Q’ character acting so much like Loki. I enjoyed how he took pleasure in tormenting the protagonists even while helping them right something they considered to be wrong. My only question is why it is given the designation ‘The Next Generation’?”

“Well, you see...” He seemed embarrassed as he spoke. “There was an original series that was kinda campy.”

“Campy?”

“It was fun in its own way, but it wasn’t all that well made or realistic...”

“I wish to see it despite that.”

He surprised me by going to his device and messing around.

“Okay, found it,” He said before bringing up a very similar, though obviously older and less well made opening.

We quickly found ourselves laughing at the captain’s manner of speaking and penchant for mating with everything even remotely female.

“I notice that there is more death in this version, although it appears to only be the underlings,” I remarked.

“Yep, redshirts are expendable.”

“Like so many royal guards,” I added. “They also tend to wear red.”

“I heard that humans make very violent shows. How often did humans die in those?” I asked Tallic.

“Not nearly as often as in real life. Most of the shows I saw did not come nearly as close to the brutality that I have seen humans actually commit.”

“That bad?”

Tallic nodded his head in the affirmative. “Although, on a lighter note, I was never able to look at at the king’s guard the same way again.”

“Did you get any copies of those series?”

Tallic jumped across the hangar. “How many times have I told you not to sneak up on me like that, Pink One!”

“Actually, none in this reality. I really did a number on you last time we met, didn’t I?” Pinkie’s mane deflated a tiny bit.

“I apologize. My reaction was not only unnecessary but uncalled for as well.” Tallic gave a respectful nod of his head as he, cautiously, made his way back to where I was sitting.

Pinkie was being extremely calm and quiet as she slowly walked over to us from the doorway, but I did notice a twitch to her tail (not that kind of twitch) and a glint in her eyes that spoke volumes as to what she wanted to be doing.

“I was originally going to tell you I had a ‘welcome to this reality’ party planned for tomorrow afternoon, but I heard your story and found it utterly fascinating. I would love to buy the ability to copy anything you have.”

Tallic reached in and pulled out multiple books, a black box, and something that looked like Alex’s laptop. Pinkie was literally vibrating with excitement and practically drooling. Noting Tallic’s discomfort, she took a few steps back, letting him place them on the floor and retreat before she moved in, picking them up with a hunger in her eyes.

“Thank you so much,” She whispered reverently. “Twi is gonna freak when she sees these.”

"True to her word, she returned everything not only undamaged, but gave us a device that could let Tallic read the books and play the videos via hologram." Steelskin took a sip of his gin and tonic (unsalted) and smiled at his fellow jumpers. “Tallic said he didn’t mind that reality much. He only got thirteen attempts on his life and those were really pitiful.”

Emerald looked up from his character sheet. “Do you happen to have any of those books or movies?”

“Yep,” Steelskin patted his saddlebag. “Pinkie gave me a projection crystal with all of Tallic’s stuff and a few from their reality. If you want, we can have a movie night sometime.”

“Anyone object to putting O&O on hold for next week? I wouldn’t mind seeing what you’ve got,” Alex said.