I grew up in a remote village, far from any other form of society or outpost. You've likely never heard of it, but there is a village deep within the desolate Smoozelands – a wasteland tainted by an ancient foe, where nothing can grow, and the water is undrinkable. There is but one small, solitary spot, where the grass is fertile, and a reservoir of clean water lay out of reach of the foul, polluted rivers and lakes.
When the first settlers found this place, after months of travelling and searching for a new land to call their home, they set to work on building their houses and planting their seeds. It was not ideal, but the poor farmers had finally found a place to call their own. An oasis in a dried-up desert, a shining light of hope for a group in the dark.
Oasis became its name, and so did mine. Named after the village that had stood the test of time but was on the edge of collapse, my mother knew that one day, our village would stand tall again. She wanted me to remember that. She wanted everypony else to. Our village was down, but not out.
Most foals worry about school or breaking their curfew. At eleven, most would be flaunting their new cutie marks and sharing stories of how they got them. But in Oasis, everypony had to pull their weight, including the children. The population was growing, but the fertile ground was full, so food had to be rationed. Water, too, was running scarce. The reservoir was shrinking every year, and so drinks were limited to one glass per meal.
The wounded had no way to clean out their wounds, so infections grew severe quickly. Medicine was also running out. This far from society, trading was not easy. Those few who set out to trade returned almost a month later, if at all, and most would have the same story to share: we had nothing of value to trade.
Indeed, times were tough. But my brother wasn't worried, because he believed that hard work would always be rewarded. I believed that, too, and so I worked without any regrets, without any worries. As a unicorn, my magic could perform the work of three ponies, so I studied it whenever I had a break. I practiced hard, and learned many different types of spells, so that I could help those that were exhausted and needed to rest.
You may be wondering why nopony ever came our way and helped us out, and the answer is simple: our village was small, and dying. We were marked on no maps, and we could not afford to send out ponies to the big cities of Manehattan or Canterlot to request aid. The nearest towns and villages had to tend to their own first, and could spare nothing for us.
And so, we were on our own. Nopony ever came our way… until one day, when I was twelve. My father had passed away earlier that year, but I continued to do my best. My big brother said that hard work will always be rewarded, and I believed in his words. Finally, his words came true.
From the skies descended five large, golden chariots, filled with ponies in fancy clothing and escorted by armoured ponies with spears and swords. Nobles, and the Royal Guard. At last, we were saved. At last, we could get word to Canterlot, and food and fresh water could be sent to us.
Our village explained our situation to these noble ponies at a distance. They told us to stay back, offended by the stench. We explained that there was not enough water to spare for bathing, and they took pity on us. We explained that everypony worked hard for all hours of the day, and they were impressed. We explained that we were starving and on our last legs… and they smiled. They said that we were 'perfect', and proclaimed that they would help us. They would give us work, and reward us with food, water, lodging, bathing, even new clothes.
We thanked them. We revered them as gods. We welcomed them into our village and our elder passed all leadership to them. The nobles picked out the cleanest and most healthy among us for the 'elite' positions, which included myself. I was to be a waiter, but I did not understand at the time what that meant.
The rest were told that they would be working important roles where 'our guests' could not see them. When we asked what 'guests' they meant, the nobles explained that they had been seeking a new, out-of-the-way land to build their new hotel-casino. A place in the countryside, where they could open up shops, restaurants, attractions, and many other 'tourist traps', where they would be no other place to stay but our 'humble little village'.
The work was hard, and the wages were laughable, but it was a step-up. Those like me, who worked where the public would see and interact with us, were given bathing rights and medical coverage. Those who were already too old, too sick, or too filthy to work in the open were given roles where they would not be seen. Construction, janitorial, maintenance, farming, mining, transporting… Those ones were kept quarantined from the rest of us, and whenever they weren't working, they were sleeping their days away.
It didn't take long before we began to question our decision, but it was too late. We were alive, and that was all that mattered. I continued to work hard. I would earn a ticket out of this village and then work my way up the ladder in Manehattan. Then, when I hit it big, I would return and buy the rights to this hotel, and then I could save everypony. That was my goal, and to achieve it, I just had to work hard. Because working hard always pays off.
My resolve first wavered when I was fourteen. My mother, who was involved in the construction of a new bathhouse, lost her last bit of strength and fell dead. I took the day off with my brother to attend her funeral. Not many showed up – not many had the chance. I didn't cry until I got home.
My brother held me that night. He waited until I had stopped before he prepared dinner for the two of us. I helped him out, despite his objections. I had to stay strong and work hard if I wanted my dreams to come true. And they would… right?
The following day, I stopped in my duties to observe two of the nobles who owned the hotel. They were just sitting there, complaining about how their hooficures were messed up or how their coats took hours to maintain. It was nothing new, but this time, I stopped to consider: how hard have they worked, to reach a point where they can make money and live comfortably by just sitting there?
They ordered me to fetch them some wine from the nearby fridge. I had a cart full of dirty dishes and towels on my back, yet they wanted me to drop all of that to open the fridge that was two feet away from them? Do they even work at all?! I complied, and then hurried away, realising that I had just had my first angry thought in years. I asked my brother about it that night, and he had no answer. He just told me to keep working hard.
Two more years passed. I was sixteen. I was still poor, as was my brother. I was starting to understand the value of money, and now that my wages were being paid to me directly, instead of to my brother, I could finally see the trap that I was snared in. My taxes were almost my entire wages. I was left with a token sum at the end. I began to fear being trapped in that place forever, but that was not the case.
The plague hit then. Nopony knows where it came from. The mines? The polluted water? The tainted lands? The rats? When ponies started to show symptoms of it, the nobles fled. They gathered their possessions and boarded their chariots, and left us all behind to fend for ourselves.
A fire broke out in one house, and that fire spread. It consumed land, it consumed crops, and it consumed buildings. Within minutes, the village cast an eerie orange glow over the horizon, and those who made it out started searching for their loved ones.
I searched and I searched for my brother. He had to be alive, he just had to be. Nopony worked any harder than him, so if anypony was to survive, it would have been him. But I couldn't find him.
Those who carried the plague were too unwell to make it out of there. As we searched the crumbling ruins of our village, I found my brother's corpse, untouched by the fire, in the quarantine block. He had caught the plague, and had locked himself away to prevent it from spreading. He was dead.
The fire had cleansed the plague, but the nobles never returned. Our crops were dead, our buildings were exposed to the elements, and our water was down to a puddle.
All around me, ponies regrouped and started to work once more. They buried the dead, they salvaged what they could, and they set out to rebuild the village.
Why?
Why bother? Why rebuild what will inevitably die? I worked hard my entire life. Where's my pay? My brother worked even harder, and he died before he ever knew peace. My parents died when I was young. I never even had a chance to know them. The nobles never worked a day in their lives. Where were theircorpses?!
"It's not fair!" I shouted. I screamed. I kicked. I fought an invisible foe, drawing looks and creating a scene. I destroyed what remained of my home and I smashed the surviving portraits of our 'gods'. Those damned nobles, posed in such finery and staring at me through the painting. Mocking me with their wealth! "You liar! You damned liar! You said that hard work would pay off, but you were just trying to make yourself feel better, weren't you?! Why should I listen to you anymore, big brother?! You're dead! You're dead and I'm not!"
Tears fell down my face and my legs buckled. "You worked harder than me, but I outlived you. How can you explain that one, big brother?"
A hoof presented itself before me, and I looked up. Connected to that hoof was a stallion not dressed in rags, nor in the shining fabrics of the upper-class. His golden hair dangled before a stern yet friendly face. "That is for you to decide, but the first step would to get up, and learn from your past."
"W-Who are you?" I took that hoof and righted myself. More ponies – stallions and mares – gathered behind him. There were six in total, including this stallion, and they were carrying many barrels and bags.
"My name is Midas. My companions and I saw the glow of your village's fire and came to investigate. It seems that it has taken its toll."
"We're better off," I said. "Those nobles tricked us. They didn't want to save us, they simply wanted slaves."
"Slaves have no choice," Midas said. "Tell me, did you have a choice?"
"I would've died without them, but that kind of life was hardly worth living."
"Everypony deserves a choice." Midas clapped his hooves, and his crew travelled into the village and set their supplies down. They took out food, water, seeds, money, tents… "The nobles seem to think they can buy freedoms. My crew and I travel around to give them back."
"W-Who are you ponies?" I asked, stunned by what I was seeing. In just an instant, hope had revitalised this dying village. "If you could have saved us this easily, then why not sooner?"
"I apologise, but we had no knowledge that this place even existed."
"B-But we get tourists all the time."
"Only the ones that those nobles invited, I imagine. The nobility have a nasty habit of shushing mouths with their money. The truth is, your village isn't even marked on any maps."
Midas didn't stop there. He loaned the village an airship, and taught us how to pilot it, and keep it maintained. We could use that airship to travel to Manehattan, where everything had a price. We could travel to farming villages far away, and exchange crops and seeds. We could travel to rock farms and lumberyards. We could trade and barter for all that we needed, and even bring in scientists to investigate our water!
The village was reborn by the time I was eighteen, and by then, we had returned Midas' airship. He returned occasionally to aid us, and whenever we offered him payment for his kindness, he simply asked that we remember to pay his kindness forwards.
"What do you plan to do now?" I asked Midas as I tended to his leg. He had injured himself on his journey to the village, and I had been studying nursing and medicine for two whole years, thanks to the books that he brought us. I cleaned his wound with the water we had to spare, and wrapped it with the clean cloth that was filling our storage sheds.
"There are other places that need help. Places that Canterlot doesn't care about, because they are unseen by their eyes."
"Canterlot sounds like an awful place."
"It's a wonderful place to live," he said. "If you have the money, that is."
"I want to help ponies, too."
"You already are."
"This village now has three nurses and a doctor. It doesn't need my help anymore." I grasped Midas' hoof and said, "I want to go with you, and ensure that the same fate that nearly befell our village never befalls another. I want to save lives from corruption and negligence."
Midas smiled. "I am glad. The truth is, this is a battle that we cannot win without an army." Midas told me that he had been slowing gathering followers, but many of them quit, because the work was 'too hard'. He said that he needed ponies like myself, who understood the struggle of ponies born outside of Celestia's graceful eyes.
He introduced me to Robin Hood, previously of the Royal Guard, and together, the three of us left, to scout out new ponies to join our cause.
"And that was how I joined Midas' service," Oasis finished explaining to Sunset Shimmer, who had been listening intently, and quietly, to the entire story.
Sunset's frown finally curved into a smile, and she said, "I'm glad that it had a happy ending, at least."
"'Happy'?" Oasis asked. "Maybe, from one perspective. I met Midas and Robin Hood, and together, we were able to form this group dedicated to saving Equestria. But what is happy about a group that saves people, when such a group shouldn't be necessary to begin with?"
"But such is the way of the world. If we are not fighting each other, then it is the elements. No matter what, we must band together to survive, and not all are lucky enough to find their kin. You, Oasis, were."
Oasis frowned. "I feel out-of-place, though. Robin Hood used to serve in the Royal Guard, but left when he was ordered to throw a pony in jail for stealing one picnic basket from a rich mare. He begun the philosophy of taking from those who had too much, and giving to those with too little.
"King Midas comes from royal blood; he is the last descendant of Queen Platinum, from her cousin's side."
"You don't say," Sunset said, her eyes wide. "The last descendent, huh?"
"The nobility doesn't recognise his royal heritage, though, and denied him his dreams of entering the Royal Court that he had spent his entire life studying and working to enter. He wanted to shape this country's politics from within, recognising its flaws and thinking of ideas to solve them. But those with power felt threatened, and denied him any chances that he may have had. In their eyes, he was nothing more than a 'lowly commoner'.
"Genesis comes from nobility himself, and is disheartened by how corrupt even his own family has become. And then there's you, and Trixie. You were cast aside by Celestia simply for being too ambitious, and Trixie was denied her rightful place among the great magicians of our time because she was poor!"
Oasis sighed. "I came from a village struck by poverty, far away from this town. I feel like an outcast amongst you all. You each have such strong hatred for this town, and great devotion to taking down the crown, but all I want to do is help ponies down on their luck. I feel like… I lack the same drive that you possess."
Sunset Shimmer shook her head. "There's nothing wrong with having a kind heart. In fact, with all of us who are prepared to go to war with Celestia, a heart like yours is exactly what we need to balance ours out.
"Don't worry about what you can't do, Oasis. Your place is here, on the backlines, offering support to those who are short on hope. You can live up to your namesake, and be a shining source of hope in an otherwise hopeless wasteland!"
Oasis smiled. She took Sunset's hoof in hers and nodded her head. "Thank you. And thank you for hearing me out, Sunset Shimmer."
"Don't mention it," Sunset replied. "I'm glad that you shared your story with me. I want to get to know everyone here." Sunset rose from her seat and looked down into Oasis' eyes. "Midas was wise to chose you, Oasis. You are the perfect pony to have close to one's side. However, there is one thing that bothers me."
"What's that?"
"When the time comes, will you be able to exact revenge against those nobles that tricked you and your village?" When Oasis didn't answer, Sunset said, "Please think it through. The time will soon come when you will need to give a straight answer, and I pray that, when it does, it is the right one."