A Dream

by totallynotabrony

A Horse Shoe-In

I don’t know who the hell thought it would be a good idea to schedule rain for a funeral.

I stood there with water from my soaked mane running down my face. Knowing ponies, someone would probably see it and think I was crying.

I didn’t cry over Lemon. Yes, I knew what her name was, but I also didn’t care.

Jeeze, for being emotionally unaffected by this, I sure was thinking a lot about what people thought about me thinking about it.

They did their funeral deal while I stood in the rain and considered it. Lemon’s death felt weird. Sure, I’d seen a lot of ponies die Most of them had been under my hooves, so I definitely got an up close look. I wasn’t sure why this seemed different. It certainly couldn’t be because of the sham marriage. We’d both wanted out of it and she’d protested even more loudly than me.

Thinking back on it, I’d also noticed something strange about how I’d reacted to Twilight getting cozy with me. It felt weird. I couldn’t really chalk it up to an emotion I knew, or thought I knew.

Love?

Screw you, I thought to myself. I should know what love feels like, I’ve had like three dozen girlfriends. Plus, I also felt something from Lemon’s death, obviously love wasn’t it.

Though, I realized maybe the flaw in my logic. I wasn’t used to feeling...well, feeling in general.

Feels. Oh Jesus. Of all the things to catch. Was I going to have to kill more people to make up for this? Where the hell was I supposed to find that many who deserved it?

I’d said it before, but God I needed to get out of this universe.

I spent the rest of the funeral considering ways to false-flag people into being acceptable targets to kill. No, murder in general was not acceptable by pony standards, but I had to justify it to myself somehow.

I almost missed the event wrapping up. A stallion in a suit came up to me, holding an umbrella. “Mr. Valiant?”

“What?”

“My name is Elegant Assurance, and I need to talk to you about the matter of your wife’s affairs.”

“She’s not - she wasn’t - my wife.”

He nodded, but didn’t show any other indication of having heard me. “There are several items of paperwork that will need to be completed.”

I was prepared to kill him right then and there, but odds were that if we were going to do paperwork, we would be going somewhere dry. Plus, even though I wasn’t going to do the paperwork, I would at least like to know what I was up against so I could figure out how to get out of it.

We went to a hotel room in Ponyville. “I am down from Canterlot for the day,” he said. “It was important that I speak to you.”

He opened a briefcase and laid a sheet of paper in front of me. “This is your benefit from your wife’s life insurance policy.”

I looked at the number on the page and swore quietly under my breath.

“Am I really the beneficiary of...all this?”

“There was not one listed, so it has defaulted to her next of kin: you.”

Why the hell have a life insurance policy without a designated beneficiary? Lemon wasn’t dumb, so surely she couldn’t have thought that life insurance was a payment you got when you died.

“When was this policy taken out?”

“Two days ago.”

“By who?”

He frowned. “You did.”

It must have been when I was blacked out before the Power Pony convention. At the same time, I’d sent the letter to Sombra to let him know where I was and invited Lemon to be there too.

Blackout-me had apparently committed insurance fraud.

Well, also maybe set up Lemon getting killed and making it look like an accident in order to pull off said fraud.

Shit.

I stared at the paper. Accepting the money would mean accepting that I was actually married to Lemon. Not accepting it would leave me still too poor to do anything to get me out of this universe, and also interrupt whatever plan I had been concocting while blacked out.

So the question was, how much did I want that money? Actually, two questions: did I trust myself to be sneaking around behind my own back, or was something else at work here?

“How long do I have?” I asked.

“Well, if you refuse to sign the acceptance, then the rights of next of kin would pass over you.”

“I’m not refusing, I just really need to think about this.”

“My train back to Canterlot is tomorrow,” he said. “I can give you until then.”

That was how long I had to figure out what the hell I was going to do.

I wandered back to the castle, intent on the couch. It was where I did my best thinking, after all. I met Twilight coming out the door. “Hello Valiant.”

I was instantly on guard, but it still kind of shocked me when she wrapped her hooves around my neck and wasn’t trying to strangle me.

“Um.”

“There there. I’m here for you, whatever you need.” She pulled back from the hug. “I know, why don’t you come with me to the school? Something to take your mind off things. Would you like to see Starlight in an uncomfortable position?”

Well yes, but...what the hell?

I nodded dumbly and followed her to the school while trying to figure out what was going on. Was this some weird way of her trying to make me feel better? Was this some weird way of trying to get with me now that the pony the law said was my wife was dead?

We walked into Starlight’s office. Twilight said, “Starlight, I have something very important to discuss with you.”

A look of panic immediately went across Starlight’s face. “If this is about leaving early yesterday, I didn’t have any students on my schedule, and Trixie was having a magical emergency, which actually turned out to be nothing-”

I actually did enjoy that. However, Twilight couldn’t maintain her serious expression any longer and laughed. “It’s not anything like that. I want you to be the new headmare of the school when I move to Canterlot to take over the throne.”

And just like that, good mood ruined. Despite my repeated demonstrations that Twilight wasn’t ready, apparently the Princesses were still moving forward with the whole thing. She still couldn’t even control the sun and moon without the little magic gadget the Princesses had given her, much less actually control the country.

“Do you think I’m really up for it?” said Starlight. “Of course you do, I’ve covered for you every time you’ve had to run off and save Equestria.”

“You did?” I said.

“What’s he doing here?” Starlight asked, suddenly nervous. Good.

“Oh.” I could see Twilight’s mind working to try to come up with an explanation. She blurted, “I was trying to help Valiant take his mind off things and thought he might be interested in employment within your new administration.”

“I was considering hiring a vice-headmare,” said Starlight.

“Oh hell no! I am not going to be railroaded into running this damn school again!”

“You have experience with schools?” said Starlight. I’d told the story to Twilight, but not to her. “Would you mind helping me make an impartial selection?”

My displeasure was balanced by the fact that I could pick who I wanted and seed my own influence in the school while simultaneously not having anything to do with it. And yes, Twilight, this would help me take my mind off things.

Twilight trotted out, passing Trixie.

Trixie walked in and asked, “What was that about?”

“Princess Twilight just offered me the position of headmare,” Starlight said.

“You know I’m nothing but proud of you,” said Trixie, “but I can’t help wondering if it's going to cut into our social schedule.”

Memories of my Trixie picked just then to surface and I cut in. “Starlight, I will absolutely get you an assistant.”

Trixie opened her mouth.

“Not you,” I said.

She huffed. “I hadn’t ever considered it, but hearing you say it out loud made me realize what a great and powerful vice headmare I’ll be! Plus, I’d get to work and socialize with Starlight at the same time!”

“That’s exactly why not you,” I said. “The leader is the figurehead and the decision-maker. The deputy offers advice and gets shit done. Doesn’t sound much like a job for you. Also, hiring friends solely on the basis of friendship is just bad business. I don’t even have friends and I could tell you that.”

“You don’t have friends?” said Starlight. “Then maybe you should be my-”

“No.”

I made that very and repeatedly clear.

Unable to convince me, Starlight went and solicited for the job, receiving applications from several candidates. I was kind of surprised to see who had applied: Time Turner, Octavia Melody, Big Macintosh, and Spoiled Milk. And Trixie, who I thought we’d already disqualified, but figured the aptitude tests would weed her out.

I was at least partially right on that. Starlight promptly cut Spoiled Milk for teaching her test class how to be a gold digger. That also inadvertently reminded me that I had to deal with the life insurance paperwork.

But first, I pulled Time Turner out of the lineup to talk to him. Or Doctor Whooves, or whatever his name was. The doctor had, in the past, seemed to know more than he was letting on. I wondered if it was the same for this universe.

“I was hoping you could help me with something,” I said.

“What’s that?”

“I don’t want to discuss it here. Could we go to your box?”

“My what?”

“That blue box thing that you’re always traveling in. I kind of need some help in hopping universes.”

“Well, I’m afraid I don’t know anything about that, though if you’re interested, I have recently been working on a temporal transportation device.”

Now that had my attention. “Yes, I am absolutely interested.”

He pulled out a gold pocket watch. “One...two...three... four... five...congratulations! You are now five seconds into the future!”

About five minutes later, I walked into Starlight’s office. “You’ll have to remove Time Turner from consideration, too.”

“Why?”

“I...discovered that his face was recently broken.”

“I would have thought I would have noticed. How recently?”

“Extremely.”

“That sounds serious.”

“Good thing he wasn’t employed yet so you don’t have to pay worker’s comp or anything. Anyway, who’s left?”

“Octavia, Big Macintosh, and Trixie.”

“Both good choices.”

“I said-”

“I heard you.”

She sighed. “I know, I really want Trixie to be successful, but I’ve already given her too many chances. I just really wish there was some way to have this work out.”

“We all have to do shit we don’t want to do, believe me. I’m in this universe against my will, and on top of that I’m currently trying to decide whether to accept Lemon’s life insurance payout and I’m as surprised as anyone that it’s a hard decision.”

I waved a hoof and turned to walk away. “Anyway, do what you’re going to do.”

I went to the school library to get drunk, sulk, and maybe hopefully come to a decision. It wasn’t as nice as the old tree library, but it was better than nothing.

There was the matter of annoying kids, but I could mostly tune them out.

Unfortunately, all I did was procrastinate and put off the decision about the life insurance by speculating what my blackouts could mean. My theories got progressively more creative the drunker I got.

Skipping through time. Hmm. The most hopeful explanation was that someone in another universe, possibly Sunset and Trixie, was throwing around a ton of magic and trying to get me back. They were still fine-tuning the spell, so they’d only been partially successful so far. Maybe. Maybe they’d been unsuccessful to the point that they’d had to repeatedly wipe my memory of horrors I’d witnessed. Maybe not.

The whole theory about someone from another universe doing this to me was worth exploring. I knew plenty of people out there. Hopefully it wasn’t another Valiant doing this. Probably that bitch Valiantina. I should point out that I use the term gender-neutrally. Anyone can be a bitch. Dudes can be bitches. Especially if she had the whole Council of Valiants helping out.

Unless the Council had imploded and it was every Valiant for himself. Oh shit, what if this was a Highlander scenario? I’d been afraid of that ever since learning about the Council. I’d been preparing for such a situation, keeping in mind all of them probably would be, too, but since I’d lost my last universe, all my preparation had also gone out the window. If they came for me, I’d be a sitting duck.

And if they were doing some shit in an attempt to swap universes or bodies or whatever, then of course I sounded like myself during the blackouts, because I kind of was.

I took a step back from that terrifying theory, but my next one wasn’t much better. Going back to my idea about the mindwipes, what if I was becoming an NPC? At least I could discount that one pretty easily, because I’d apparently continued doing things that sounded like things I would do even while blacked out. Still, the idea that the universe might be trying to get me to conform and act like someone who belonged there reminded me that my series of world-creating exes were still out there. If that instance were true, then I’d highlighted myself by trying to call one with my hacked-together multiverse phone. Come to think of it, I’d told Valiantina where I was, too.

So there I had it. A couple of leading theories: someone was trying to rescue me, or someone was trying to kill me.

I reached the end of my bottle and stood up, swaying, thinking of going to get more. I stumbled over a grate in the floor. It kind of reminded me of the one that led down into the caverns where Cozy Glow had set up her lair.

The grate featured a small keyhole. Apparently, Twilight or somebody had learned from the incident and had it locked up. I stared at it. Wait a second…

I knelt and took the small key the strange pony in the strip club had given me from around my neck. It fit the lock perfectly.

Opening the grate, I found a tangle of wires and blinking lights.

Twilight walked in just then, talking with Starlight. “I’m sorry Big Mac gets his words twisted when he tries to speak too many of them and Octavia was too busy to take the job, but I don’t think-”

“Hey, you might want to evacuate,” I called.

“Huh? Why?” said Twilight. She and Starlight came over and looked down at what I had found.

“I’m diffusing this bomb.”

“Do you mean defusing because diffusing means something spreading over a wide area.”

I glanced at the bomb and then looked back up at her. “Depends on if I cut the right wire.”

Twilight backed away, her voice pitching up in barely-contained panic as she held it together for the kids. “Hey everypony, let’s all get out of the library for a while, huh? No reason, just do it quickly and orderly.”

When the room was completely empty, I said, “Whew, good thing this wasn’t a real bomb that I really had to defuse. I’m drunk as hell.”

Unsure why I had said it aloud, I pulled the wires aside to discover that there was still a passage down into the caverns. I slid down, being so drunk as to be practically a wet noodle.

Landing on the floor, I stumbled up and blinked in the dim light of magic crystals along the wall. I focused on what was in front of me, and then looked left and right, deep into the darkness. “What…”

Titanium dioxide paint, tanks for liquid oxygen and kerosene, heat shielding, USA painted in red letters.

Saturn V

“Oh my sweet baby Jesus.”

I fell to my knees in awe. I had done it. Again.

I didn’t remember doing it, but who the hell else would have? Who could have?

I glanced down the length of the cave. The main entrance was hidden behind a waterfall beneath the school. I now had exactly what I needed to get to the moon and figure out what was going on with the mysterious signal. Now I just needed to prepare.

I did my best to climb back up to the grate into the library. After that, I pulled the wires out and shut it, locking it again. No way was I letting this secret get out.

I headed towards the front door. I found Twilight nervously standing in the hall. “Did you take care of it?”

“Take care of what? Oh right. Yeah, it’s fine.”

“My first day on the job and something like this happens,” said Sunburst, standing there as if he was about to wet himself.

My eyes went to Starlight. “You hired him? Do you seriously think this guy is leadership material? Do you think he can actually get children to respect him? They’ll eat him alive! And furthermore, what will the ethics committee think? You apparently didn’t give him the same tests as the other candidates. Not to mention, he’s got the same conflicts of interest by being your personal friend that Trixie had.”

“We don’t have a school hiring ethics committee,” said Twilight.

“Oh, well nevermind then.”

I left.

Outside, on my way back to my couch in the castle, I was stopped by a mare in a long cloak, her face hidden.

“You actually pulled it off,” she said.

“What?”

She lifted her head.

“Lemon! What-how…?”

A fleeting half-smile went across her face. “You said you wouldn’t remember. Okay, so, the other day you came to me with a deal to fake my death so I could get away from the castle and my family, and you could get rich quick off the life insurance.”

Oh shit, the whole thing had been my plan all along. Thanks, me. I made a mental note to accept the payment.

“Well, I guess I couldn’t have done it without you,” I said.

Her expression darkened and she pulled back her cloak a little to reveal extensive bandaging. “You could have at least not gotten me impaled.”

“Wait, if that was real, then how are you alive?”

“I’m incredibly wealthy.”

“I guess I can understand that.”

“Anyway, you got what you wanted,” she said. “I got, well, most of what I wanted.” She turned away. “Goodbye.”

Comments

[I Am The Night]

It's insane that some stories from 7 years ago are still going strong today. I don't know why, but that's actually really cool.

[Dragon Turtle]

9836943
Do you know of any other stories started that long ago that are still being written?

[I Am The Night]

9837087

IIRC, Know Your Mare published in 2012 and is still being updated (though I haven't checked in a while so I could be wrong).

I think the Disgruntled Twilight story is still going too!

[ThePoker]

Well, I'm glad Lemon is still alive.
Really hope Valiant can get back home to his own people, though. I kinda miss that hella-copter, Tin Mare.

[totallynotabrony]

9836943
It's pretty easy when the source material writes itself. However, it's BYOC (bring your own crack)

[Salty Milk]

9837087
Diaries of a Madman was also published back in 2012 and is still being updated.

That and this story are probably the only reason I still swingby this site every blue moon.

[TartarusFire]

Real question is if Valiant caused his own timeskips or not