//------------------------------// // Minion // Story: Arrived at Dusk // by aliengirlguy //------------------------------// Chapter 22: Minion. Dusk grunted, sweat beading down his muzzle, muscles aching with effort as he dug in his hooves into the ground. He growled "oh no you don't your coming out you stubborn little..." he clamped his jaws, and gave one last mighty pull. Then was sent promptly sailing into the bushes as the root of the Grip Thistle finally loosened its hold. Dusk groaned, spitting out the muzzle guard made especially for ponies who had to handle things that were potentially damaging to a vulnerable mouth, and rubbed his jaws. He hated that bloody weed, but the annoying foliage was popular for brews that dealt with headaches, canker sores, vertigo, jaundice, and was popular for hair growth potions. Unfortunately for Dusk, it had to be harvested without direct magic to be the most effective. He shoved the plant into his saddle bag, tossed it over his back, and levitated the rest of the baskets and bags with other, more magic friendly, harvested ingredients. A solid week in the Everfree Forest to restock his supplies…ah yes, there was nothing better then the peace and quiet of a good ingredient hunt and bringing home a large haul for his reward. Dusk smiled when he remembered how Soarin had pouted at the mention that he would be away for a week while his employees covered for him, but Dusk had encouraged Soarin that he would likely be to busy dealing with his week on the Apple farm to miss him. Soarin had growled and grandly promised that it was highly unlikely. Macintosh when told had not been pleased either,though the Earth Pony was used to his friend disappearing at odd times for undisclosed days at a time to gather ingredients. Fluttershy had as usual been quite nervous for him. Living so close to the forest, she was well aware what sort of horrors the forest held, but he had reassured her that he could handle himself. He had regaled to her once during one of their lessons of the story of the time that Brew Bag had dragged him along, during his first few months as his apprentice, to the very heart of a dormant volcano in Saddle Arabia to get a rare ingredient. while it didn't help her blood-pressure any for some reason, he had at least made her forget the dangerousness of his trips into Everfree. He hummed as he walked through the shadows, casually ducking a grasping vine, whistling as he casually sent a dead tree branch flying onto the noggin of a stalking chimera moments away from pouncing, which cursed and ran off, vowing revenge(which he didn't hear as he was some distance off). Dusk was nearing a small gorge when he spotted the unusual sight of a hot air balloon, oddly empty of anypony, landing in the Everfree. Then he had a sudden worrying thought that something could have happened to Cherry Berry, the pink Earth Pony that ran the hot air balloon, she could be lying unconscious in the basket for all he knew. Resolved to at least check it out, he began galloping in the direction of the landing site, not to far from where he was currently. He skidded to a halt however when he heard the familiar howls of timber wolves and and a certain familiar yell of terror not to far away. He skidded to a halt and veered back towards the sounds of distress. He broke out on the edge of a cliff, overlooking the stoney gorge and beheld the sight of Spike of all beings, all alone and being backed into a corner by the wooden canines whose bark was as equally bad as their bite. He didn’t even pause as he leaped down into the thick of the pack, directly in front of the dragon, and with a blaze of silvery magic blazing from his horn, snaked out in all different directions and ripped up a a few surrounding trees, lifting them into the air and wielding them like so many threatening clubs. There was a moment of perfect stillness, as two powerful forces regarded each other, before things sped up drastically as the large trees he was wielding began to spin like a top, smacking a devastating trail through the entire foul-breathed pack, sending them into the air in a wave of yelps and the sounds of cracking wood. When the creatures were swiftly dealt with, he tossed aside the trees, and grabbed Spike with his magic, galloping away with all his might. The last thing they needed was to deal with timber wolves after they had been mulched and dismembered. If that had been the entire pack, they would be in deep trouble when the predators pulled themselves together. Dusk didn’t relax until they hit the outskirts of Ponyville and were nearing his shop. He met Cherry Berry along the way and handed off the rope that he had grabbed on his hasty retreat (as luck having it, stumbling into the roped off balloon along the way, and for whatever reason, grabbed it), who thanked him shortly, giving Spike, who was on his back, a brief annoyed glance before marching her balloon back into town. Spike remained quiet until they reached his shop, his talons wrapped tightly in Dusk's mane, and they were soon indoors and in the basement where he unceremoniously dumped his supply (having held onto most of it throughout the episode). Spike slid off his back and looked up at him with big watery green eyes, then unceremoniously wrapped his small arms around one of Dusk's Front legs, burying his face against the soft silvery pelt. Dusk paused and looked down at the green spiky head, his smaller body was shaking. Harry rested a hoof on the younger’s back comfortingly as the dragon clung to him, mumbling, “you saved me, you saved my life.” Dusk let him continue to cling to him, after all, being chased through the Everfree Forest by timber wolves would terrify anypony. When Spike had manged to collect himself, he asked if he could help Dusk unpack his harvest. “Oh, well, I suppose,” Dusk replied, grateful for the assist. There was nothing overly sensitive or dangerous within the goods, so he allowed the young dragon to help him unpack and store the materials, patiently explaining the proper process when it looked like Spike was going to botch something up. After all, he couldn’t expect the young dragon to know how to properly store tea ingredients. When they were done, he took the young dragon to the kitchens, poured them both a cool cup of iced apple tea (grabbing the marble dust for Spike to put into his) and sat them down at the table and began grilling the young dragon on why he had been all alone in the most dangerous parts of the forest. He didn’t buy the investigating the empty balloon claim. Judging by Cherry’s annoyance, he was likely somehow involved in the runaway balloon, but Dusk let it go given the circumstances. “Let me get this straight,” Dusk said finally once he got the whole story, “your basically on your own this weekend while Twilight studies?” The young dragon nodded, “though I’m not alone anymore since I’m going to be helping you out now,” he declared happily. Dusk frowned thoughtfully. Well, he supposed it was a good way to keep the young dragon out of trouble. “Alright, I suppose an extra hoof around the place can always be of use.” The Dragon perked up, “oh you wont regret it! I’ll be the best servant you’ve ever had!” Dusk was confused at the small spurt of foreign pleasure that the word "servant" caused and he hastily shook it away and corrected “no, I mean, you don’t have to be my servant! I just meant that a bit of help is appreciated, you don’t have to spend the entire weekend working for Celestia’s sake!” Spike frowned now, “but of course I’m your servant, you saved my life.” Dusk shook his head “no, you don’t have to be my servant for the weekend just because I saved your life, it was the right thing to do, nothing more, I meant just a bit of a helping hoof here and there, maybe a game of Yahtzee or something.” “Actually I meant for the rest of my days for as long as you live,” Spike corrected helpfully. “Right well, that either…wait…wait! What?” “Oh, I forgot about that, its part of my dragon code here,” Spike belched out a crudely drawn card and held it up, “it's part of my code of honor as a noble dragon." he stuck his chest out proudly, "If somepony saves my life I am required to serve them for the rest of their life.” Dusk slumped back in his seat, his mind whirling as he tried to figure out some sort of way to deal with...this. He knew about the conventions of honor. Brew Bag had lectured him about this. Honor was an important edict that somepony based their entire perception of life around. While it was likely that this dragon code was something made up by Spike himself and not something that was particular to all dragons (given the...unique presentation of the card) that still didn’t make it any less important to Spike himself. He sighed, catching the large puppy dog eyes, no, there would be no outright refusal here, as much as he was loathed to admit. Then Dusk's more sly mentality kicked in as it occurred to him that there maybe a way to appease Spike’s dragon code, but keep him from underhoof most of the time, he wasn’t delusional enough to think that he could escape having a "servant" *shutter* completely. Again he felt that strange thrill at the notion. He rubbed his forehead, he needed to keep a better eye on what he touched in that forest, it was giving him strange ideas. Meanwhile in the deepest recesses of Harry’s subconscious... Voldemort was pleased! Finally! After so long! He had a minion! Not just some piddling little friend that belonged to his Precious, though he was sure that the sentimental boy would consider it more as a friendship *shutter* then anything, but Voldemort saw the servant/master connection there, and he was going to focus on that part. Not only that, but this minion was a dragon! Granted he was a relatively young dragon, but still a dragon! Who had connections to royalty! Even Voldemort's main soul could not boast of that! Hah! He rubbed his dark hooves together and cackled. Back outside Harry’s head… When he was sure he had mentally sorted out his plan, he addressed Spike seriously. “I understand that your code is important to you, so I wont dismiss this notion of you...helping me out, but you must understand that my life has no room for a full time servant, so in this one and only time that i address you as my servant, I’m ordering you to continue as you are, being the best assistant to Twilight, that would be very helpful to me.” Spike frowned, rubbing the back of his spikes and asked, “how is me continuing to be Twilight’s assistant, and me not doing anything else for you, helping you?” Good question, but Dusk had a ready reply. “Well,” he took a sip, “Twilight Sparkle is my friend, and it would make me feel bad if I took away someone so dear to her.” To give Spike credit, he did look conflicted at the idea, deeply conflicted, and Dusk took advantage of that. “And lets face it Spike, you love her dearly, she’s practically raised you. You would be miserable, even if you are following your code, and you are my friend to, so I would just be hurting both of you and that would make me feel doubly worse.” He sat back and took another sip, hiding his smirk when he noticed that he had struck home as the young dragon nodded slowly. “Well, I don’t want to cause anypony to be upset, and if it would distress you more to have me by your side all the time, then....then that isn’t serving you properly I guess…you really consider me your friend?” Dusk hummed in his drink and nodded. He supposed he couldn’t blame the question. They didn’t normally hang out after all, but the two did hang out from time to time when they both got dragged into some Mane 6 incident, and with what had recently happened, nopony could walk away from something like that and not form some kind of attachment, code or not. “Sure,” Dusk agreed. The dragon gave him a big smile and then insisted “well, I’ll do what you ask, but I still think I should come around once in awhile to help you out, or else it wouldn't be completely fair.” Dusk grunted, but conceded to the compromise. The two of them returned upstairs to find Fruit Salad ponying the cash register, looking bored. It was a quiet afternoon apparently. Then the door jangled and in staggered Soarin and Mac, leaning against each other, bruised, missing patches of pelt, mussed up manes and tails and covered in bandages, particularly Soarin, who was sporting a hoofcast. “Hi Dusk,” they both greeted him at the same time raggedly, “welcome back!.” "Holy Celestia! What in Tartarus happened?!"