I sat in my new study, my body hot, my hands shaking slightly. My chair creaked under my weight as I leaned forward, shifting around a few stolen papers. Cosmic walked up next to me, standing proud beside me. "Jason, mornin." She looked around the papers on my desk. What's all this?"
I rubbed my forehead. "Uh, notes, papers and junk." I rubbed my burning eyes. "Oi, did you hear anyone last night? Like...after we got home, was there anything weird?"
Cosmic looked out the door of my office. "A table was all jacked up, aye, but I figured it was you."
"Hmm, guess it wasn't a dream." I rubbed my arms, "Hey, Cosmic, how do you feel about Storm Side?"
She looked down at my notes. "Uh, bloody great pisser." She shook her head. "Ya know, it wasn't always frozen. When I lived there it was actually really green, used to have a hell of a garden in the center of the city."
I rubbed my rough cheeks. "Aye, been reading up on the place." I stacked the notes I had. "Moth ponies, genetic research, spell testing, potion testing, your...deal." Cosmic cocked an eyebrow. "Lots of research in that place."
Cosmic nodded. "It was a rather well known place in the old empire. Old Equestria...." She shook her head. "It's the same as now, but different name." She looked over the notes. "Aye, crossbreeding was a big advance about three-hundred years ago." She looked out the window with a smile. "First hybrid was actually one of Celestia's children, half dragon spod." She grew a shallow frown. "Storm Side...it's a fascinating place for the demented."
I looked over my notes, creatures made, portals open, materials fabricated from pure magic. I could barely understand it, but what I could grasp was rather staggering. "Why do you say that?"
Cosmic turned to me with a rather sour face. "Live testing was pretty much commonplace. And stealing from old temples and such was normal to them." She sighed loudly and rested her chin on my desk. "So long as it was for magic and science, they didn't care."
I slid my hand over the desk and to her head, digging my fingers into her mane and jostling her. "Apparently they didn't care about you, or anyone."
Cosmic smiled. "No, I was just some guard. They used prisoners as much as they could, but the time I was...used, was about the same time as thing started to freeze over." She stood up and shook herself. "Were getting desperate. Old ponies trying to find a way to be like Celestia or Luna."
I frowned hard and rubbed my throat. "Cosmic, I'm happy you're safe. I mean, things were weird, things still are I guess, I rushed headlong into all of this, but I love you."
Cosmic looked up at me, stern, apparently unhappy with my face. "Jason, you were the first pony in thirty years to not run screaming from my body, if that don't say something about you bein' a little odd, I don't know what else could."
I lowered my head, the orange mare at my side burning hole into my head with her bright eyes torqued up into an angry look. "When I got to Equestria, talking horses became normal. And aft- I--" I looked behind me, spinning around in my chair. "There's a seat over there...war story time."
Cosmic smiled at me. "You know, I've never read up on your people's wars--"
I shook my head, watching as she clopped along the wood floor, over to a waiting recliner. "It's a lot of political and religious squabble. Modern ones are complex to say the least." I forced myself around with my toes, wheeling myself around like mad. "From what I've read Equestria hasn't had many major wars, right?"
Cosmic snickered, watching me bounce off a wall, the plastic clatter of my chair's wheels cutting her laugh. "We had a huge one in ancient times, back when Celestia was a filly. We had a few with the griffons in the east, every so often a few monsters from the old land in the west would come over and we'd start a militia, Saddle Arabia asks for assistance every so often, when there's a civil war. Oh, and north of Storm Side, across the ice about three--four-hundred miles across the ice cap, you'll run across the deer land. Used to be trade routes and a rail line over, cute folk, ya know?"
I swallowed hard and wheeled myself over to her. "Uh, yes." I pressed my tongue against the roof of my mouth. "Uh, war time...right?"
Cosmic settled her back into the seat. "If you want, I'm doubtful Dust will be awake any time soon, that conk to the head took it out of her."
I shrugged. "I was going to-- Uh, you see your friends with their face full of more shrapnel than a junkyard magnet, you learn that seeing a living body without a head, not so bad." I rubbed my lips. "Did I ever tell you what I did in the army?"
Cosmic shook her head. "I assumed yer' like me, marching status grunt."
I shook my head. "Medic, and let me tell you, nine times out of then, I.E.D." I rubbed up and down the space between my eyebrows with my thumb. "God damn...every time we'd show up, either some American or some anglo bastard would have eaten shit, and they sit me down with a bunch of others, tell me to do what I can, then stick the poor bastard in a transport." I slid my hand through my hair, feeling something writhe in my gut. "I've seen some things, made grown men cry, missing limbs blasted off, Arabs peppered and burned by their own bloody people, bloody helter-skelter bullshit." I shook my head. "No, you came to me, she came to me, rearing, moving, alive. With or without a head, I'm not going to leave something moving just because its hurt or messed up."
Cosmic's smile faded quickly. "You're lying, aren't you?"
I bit my lip. "I can't...I hate them so much. Bloody Paki refugees, Islamist, I know its not their fault, but I hate them so much...." I felt my skin cool as I leaned back into my seat. "But I never let one die under my hands, I had a job, and I fucking did it." I slid my hands up and down my chair. "You did your job, for people I assumed you hated. And look where you are now. You outlived them all, can't name a soul from these notes or from that little show you had for me when we met, but three-hundred years, they're in the ground by now."
Cosmic took a deep breath, her voice wavering gently as she drew in. "Bloody...piss." She shivered hard, her eyes tightening up. "They are dead.... Good, bastards can rot in the ground forever if you ask me." She lowered her head and looked towards my notes. "They were supposed to create, to build and be good to ponies, but so many of the subjects, so many failed hybrids and magic infused ponies died in their tests."
I rubbed my chin. "Be a shame to--"
"Ya know, the first hybrid, Celestia's half-dragon. Lived exactly three hours!" Cosmic slammed her hoof into the arm of the chair. "They raised it in a damn test tube, birthed it from a cow and it died in three hours!" She ground her hoof into the chair, gritted teeth and burning eyes. "They bloody- they-- Monsters, all of them. They used to cast spells across Equestria, the whole reason this hybrid thing exists is because of them! They bloody- they-- raugh!" She kicked her legs out and paced between me and her chair. "Every pony changed, every damn pony born from five-hundred years ago, on, they're different. Magic burned into our damn DNA because of those nightmares!"
I rubbed my arms. "Pardon?"
Cosmic lowered her head. "The bloody, Storm Side, it used to have a metal tower. They used to cast spells across the planet from there!" Cosmic sat herself down on the floor with a loud plop. "They tore it down when somepony tried to annihilate the Griffons." She looked out the window, a heavy frown on her face, her eyes hurt, finally showing that crack in the armor I knew was there. "I don't think that even made it into the history books, probably in the archive." She looked up at me, her sharp eyes dour and pained. "I could find notes if you don't believe me."
I stared at her, shifting about before standing up and walking up to her. "Cosmic, I move to a land of talking horses, I met a headless body, a bodiless head, and ran through this adventure like mad. But you know what, there's one thing I can count on you for, you tell the truth." I ducked down before her, holding the back of her head and planting a kiss on her forehead. "You've said some crazy shit, but so far, nothing you've said has been wrong."
Cosmic just sat there. "...I'm honest, am I?"
I pulled back, turning back to my notes. "So far."
Cosmic stepped onto my feet and leaned up my chest, laying up my body. "I love you." She buried her face in my stomach. "Don't...bloody, don't tell Dust...." She rubbed her head over my gut, her wings flared out as she pulled away. "I'm gonna go jog...you, you study--"
"Would you go back?" I asked, walking back to my desk to grab some notes. "To Storm Side."
Cosmic swung around, accidentally bumping her flank into the door frame. "Ow-- Storm Side? Why?"
I bit my lip and shifted around some files. Because there's stuff to learn there, and a lot of lives went into all the artifacts and tools we took." I looked through the old blueprints and maps of Storm Side, my mind shooting back to the pure white mass of ice that covered it five stories high. "You are a princess now...you're going to need--"
"You know that would make you a prince, right?" She glared at me. "If you're gonna push this you're gonna wear bloody tights like a mare."
I shrugged. "I'm just saying, no one else is there, you're the only one who survived long enough to know what it looks like it. And it really is a shame to let all that research go to waste." I leaned against my desk. "Who knows...with your running it, maybe it could do some good--"
"I'm going to jog." She spun around, whipping her tail around like mad. "You keep learning, maybe you'll find something that'll change your mind."
I bit my lip. "Cosmic, think about it?"
"I am." She slipped out of the room. "I'll bring back food, tell Dust to keep her mouth off your cock."