My Life as a Bipedal Quadruped

by Snakeskin Ducttape

Shadow Of The Horned King

Back when I was human, I sometimes found myself musing about the celebrations of the human body.

Yes, I suppose I did so because of the trauma my own had suffered through, or at least I think it was.

This time, I was thinking about it in terms of athleticism again, as we were about to head for the Crystal Empire to watch the Equestria Games. I had some interest in seeing it, but it was overshadowed by my curiosity about the Empire itself. More on that later, back to the human body. It wasn’t really a subject I contemplated with much bitterness. What athleticism most people have isn’t appreciated by many in any case, so it’s not like my predicament had changed much on that front.

In antiquity, the Greeks, and other hellenistic cultures, made quite a few works of art celebrating the ideal physical human shape, mostly statues it seems. They probably would have drawn them too if that art was refined back then. Also worth noting is of course their famous celebration of physical prowess, like that regular and widely celebrated event, the Equestrian Games’ Earth equivalence, the Olympic Games.

There was actually quite a lot of celebration concerning the pinnacle of human bodily capabilities, and animals’ too, when I think about it, throughout history. As mild as my enthusiasm for sports generally is, I had to admit that it was better in modern times. Way back when there was a lot more violence in sports, especially in Rome. Caging people or animals to fight is not cool, yo.

This all made me consider some of the implications I had overlooked about my research. My prostheses had the ability to surpass a normal pony’s capabilities in many ways, like those springy prosthetic running legs where some people could boing-boing around faster than natural legs.

I didn’t care much for potential unfairness when it came to sports, but it did made me wonder if there were some who would remove their limbs willingly to use the more powerful versions like I was using.

After all, if you don’t count potential phantom pain, a long healing process, and little when it comes to built-in sensory feedback, using my prostheses had some pretty big advantages, especially for me now that my magic had been attuning to my new limbs for quite a while, primarily making me able to use them for longer before draining myself too much of magic.

I wasn’t very worried that they would come to be used as weapons. Equestria already had weapons technology, though I hadn’t seen any other than what the guards carried around, and what was lying around in Scrap Armor’s workshop (mostly in pieces), and I hadn’t ever seen any being used. So there didn’t seem to be much demand for it. If Equestrians wanted to use violence against one another, something which required the commitment of a prosthetic limb would be a strange choice when one could use any number of objects as cudgels and sharp sticks.

That made me consider the gryphons. Not that I had any indication that they were more prone to violence than ponies, with my sample size of one single individual, a very courteous and agreeable one at that, but it was obvious that they might be having a harsher time of it all on the whole than ponies, and thus might be more in need of some of my contributions.

’I’d have to dress it up as research or something,’ I thought to myself, as I stood at the platform at the Ponyville train station. It was pretty clear that gryphons didn’t care for charity. ’Then again, it would be research. I wanna see how gryphons’ magic fields differ from ponies’, and I wanna see gryphon talons made out of metal.’

It was pretty packed at the platform, with Twilight and friends, the Cutie Mark Crusaders, Spike, some people from class, and many others that were talking amongst themselves— mostly expressing their excitement at going on this trip. Animated discussions were had, flags were waved, and a few whistles and horns were tried out. No vuvuzelas though, thank goodness.

I was travelling pretty heavily. I figured that I might as well bring some research materials with me while I was away... then I dismissed this idea and figured that my guitar work needed some love, and my guitar plus case was now a lot larger compared to me than it used to be, especially since my new ukulele hung from the side of the case. I still had a few gems packed here and there just in case, as well as my latest invention: a boombox in a gem no larger than my hoof.

I wasn’t all that hindered by luggage compared to Spike though. Spike travelled light, but Rarity didn’t. As much as I love her, she makes me shake my head in disbelief a lot of the time.

As demeaning as it looked, him struggling to stand up straight beneath suitcases and bags about twenty times his volume, he did a good job. He had even offered to carry my guitar, an offer which I had politely, but adamantly, refused.

“So how’s your routine coming along?” I asked the Crusaders.

“They’re doing awesomely,” Rainbow Dash answered above them, having taken to hovering overhead to ease the congestion on the crowded platform.

“Why don’t you wanna join, Gabe?” Apple Bloom asked.

“I’m not much for the spotlight,” I said. “Besides, unless Sweetie Belle or I suddenly turned into an alicorn, the representation ratio is perfect as it is.”

“But you would be the human representation,” Sweetie Belle said.

“I guess,” I said. “But I’ll be fine cheering you on.”

“We don’t need no cheers!” Scootaloo insisted. “But, you know, thanks anyway.”

The train was steadily closing the distance to the station. I uneasily looked around at the gathered ponies, and up at my luggage. I turned to Rainbow, who was still hovering in the air. “Hey, Rainbow. How many cars are there? I can’t tell from here.”

Rainbow Dash flew up a bit farther to get a better view.

“Plenty,” she said when she got down.

“Oh, good,” I said in relief.

The train came to a halt at the middle of the station, and everyone started filing in calmly and in good order. This wasn’t a commuter-train from back on Earth, filled to the brim with half-sleeping people who just wanted some place to sit down. There was plenty of room, and we had seats reserved.

Twilight, the Crusaders, and I, were about file in, and I took a look around, to take in the temperature and the weather. The Crystal Empire was still modernizing, and I was curious about what their weather might be like in comparison to the Equestrian heartlands.

Over at the entrance to another car, I saw Rumble standing next to a pegasus stallion with his mane in a very natural looking mohawk. He was smiling at something in my general direction.

I looked behind me to see who he might’ve been smiling to, but everyone else had started moving into the car.

Looking back at Rumble, he had already started moving into his car as well, with a downcast look in his eyes. The stallion ruffled Rumble’s mane with a wing, and asked him something. ’Man, he looked disappointed about something. I hope that other guy can cheer him up.’

—

Bulk Biceps was… an impressive sight. I might be able to surpass Applejack and Rainbow Dash in pure strength for a little while, but I wasn’t sure about that guy. He was a mountain of muscles, had a huge chin, and very tiny hooves. Rob Liefeld would approve.

There was a lot of impressiveness overall in the car I was currently in. The Crusaders’ routine was very nice, several pegasi were doing pushups with their primaries, and I saw one mare being flexible in ways that looked outright scary.

I walked over to the next car. These were Ponyville ponies, and in my experience, they don’t steal, at least not often, but I still didn’t want to leave my guitar unguarded for too long.

“Hey, just do it,” I heard someone say in a low voice behind me, as I took my seat in the isle, and laid down to have a little shuteye. “What’s the worst that could happen?”

A little while later, I was lying down across the seat with my guitar on top of me, plinking away with my left hoof, and my prosthetic foreleg out assisting in some adventure.

The thing is, I was actually right-handed, and so were my parents, who taught me how to play, so I had a right-handed guitar. My left hand had to become my dominant one when I lost my right one of course, but by now I was remembering how to use my right arm as the dominant one. Only they were forelegs with hooves now of course.

It was actually very good practice. Twilight should play the guitar with her magic. A real guitar wizard does some crazy stuff with both hands at the same time when he or she is playing a guitar, but, other than that, notice how people use their dominant hand to do the relatively simple task of strumming the strings, while using their left hands with the often more complicated goal of snaking their fingers in the correct way to get the proper tunes out.

I’ve heard it explained that your dominant arm is the stronger one so your other arm has to compensate by being the clever one, and that’s why that’s the one doing the most coordination-intensive job.

So, I was using my more-subtle-than-it-was-strong kind of magic to strum the strings, the “strong” task of playing the guitar, which was good practice for me. Twilight could’ve done the same when she was learning magic, only press the bands with her magic instead, the “clever” task of playing the guitar to train up some fine motor-control of her great strength.

My tiny boombox had the volume turned down, and was resting near my ear, as I hadn’t developed headphones yet. My muzzle was pointed to the ceiling, but I had my eyes closed, with a hint of a satisfied smile on my lips as I softly sang to my equally soft playing.

It’s amazing what sounds you react to while playing music. You can become absolutely deaf to the chugging of a steam train or the soft movement of people walking past, like I was, and still pick up the subtlest thing, like the acoustics subtly changing from what it was a few minutes ago.

I stopped with an internal sigh, hoping that it wasn’t someone scowling at me and wanting me to stop. I played quietly for that very reason.

Next to the isle was Rumble and the mohawk stallion, and I let out another internal sigh, this one the relieved kind. They didn’t look annoyed.

“Hey, Rumble,” I said, giving them a friendly smile.

He opened his mouth, but settled for just waving at me with a foreleg.

The stallion bumped into him softly and smiled down at him. “Hey, bro. The lady said ‘hi’. Say something back.”

’Older brother? I guess he looks pretty young, but so do ponies over a hundred and fifty years old. Can they tell each other’s age beside child, adult, and far senior? Because I’m really struggling here.’

Rumble looked up at him nervously, but I let out a small laugh before he could respond.

“Lady?” I asked. “Are you gonna hold my sunbrella for me while I step off the train? I can find you a hat for you to tip if you want.”

“Hah!” he said, smiling, then move next to the couch. “Mind if we join you?”

“Not at all,” I said, sitting up and being careful not to bump my guitar too hard against my hind leg prosthesis, which, unlike the other one, I was wearing at the moment. It had a textile cover the same color as my coat of course, but I still hadn’t conjured up a toughening-enchantment for my guitar that I was sure wouldn’t mess with the sound.

Rumble and his brother went to sit down opposite me. “I’m Gabrielle,” I said. “Gabrielle Desrochers.”

“Thunderlane,” the stallion said. “And you already know my little brother, Rumble.”

“Yep,” I said, easily.

“That’s an interesting name though,” Thunderlane said. “Were you raised by gryphons?”

“I already told you she wasn’t,” Rumble muttered under his breath. I don’t know if he wanted me not to hear it or not, but he obviously didn’t know about my keen hearing.

“Oh, right, sorry,” Thunderlane said. “It’s just that in the newspaper, it said that you might’ve been.”

“What newspaper?” I asked, genuinely.

“Canterlot Times did an article on you. I have a copy with me,” Thunderlane offered, then fished out a rolled up newspaper from under a wing. I eyed it with some suspicion, because you kinda wanna know when you’re talked about in the news. “It talks about some reclusive inventor that made impressive replacement body parts.”

“How do you know it was me?” I asked, with a hint of smarm.

At that time, Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle ran past, laughing and ducking from the harmless rays firing at them. Scootaloo ran after them, wielding my prosthetic leg, out of its blue cover, like a gun. They were playing laser tag with my new, adjustable search/signal light system I had recently installed into it.

Thunderlane wordlessly pointed towards them as they ran towards the back of the car and into the next one, then pointed to my empty shoulder.

“Oh, right,” I said, evenly. “Well, what does it say?”

Thunderlane opened the paper, cleared his throat, then started reading.

“Can you walk on three legs? Of course you can. Can you walk on two? Maybe a while if it’s the right ones.” I got a small smile at that. “Can you imagine living your life with missing limbs? Perhaps no legs at all? Fleetingly, perhaps, but can we really fathom what that would be like? Now, it seems like we might never have to wonder if we don’t want to.

“Prosthesiouuuh, that word, arteficial limbs, have been available since before living memory of course, and while I would never dismiss the effort and dedication that their creators pour into them, having to get by with plastic and metal imitations of real limbs is a cruel fate to suffer.”

Thunderlane had stopped reading, and I looked up from tuning my guitar to see him and Rumble looking at me with cautious curiosity.

I shrugged. “Yeah, I had those,” I said, and nodded. “It’s best to treat the subject carefully. It’s often an emotional one, but I’m gonna be frank and say that it could drive me up the walls.”

“Uhm, talking carefully about it or using them?” Rumble asked, which kinda made me stop, since I don’t remember having heard his voice clearly before now.

“Both, actually,” I said.

Thunderlane picked up the newspaper again. The article told about the alleged capabilities of the prostheses, all of which were accurate, and how the ponies at the institute didn’t talk about the inventor because, “They haven’t said that they don’t want to remain anonymous,” and how she plans on visiting Baltimare to find two recipients of the new technology. Rider and Sunlit, I assumed.

“Oh, here’s the part I was talking about,” Thunderlane said. “While I never met the inventor in person, some details were revealed by the interviewees talking amongst themselves, that the inventor might be a single individual.”

“Not entirely true,” I commented.

“And that they might come from outside of Equestria. I speculate that the inventor might be a gryphon or a minotaur,” Thunderlane quoted, then looked up at me.

“Ah, well, no,” I said. “I wasn’t raised by gryphons.”

“But you did invent your… what’s that word? Prostuuh… your metal legs?” Thunderlane asked.

“Well, yes,” I admitted.

“Told you,” Rumble told his brother,

“That’s amazing,” Thunderlane said.

“It’s magic,” I said, evenly. “Also, I had friends who helped me.”

“It’s still amazing.”

“Yeah, friendship is pretty magical, I’ve found,” I said.

“Heh,” Thunderlane said, and picked up the newspaper again. “It says here that the prototypes were foal-sized, so that if you find a foal with prosthetic right legs, he or she might know the inventor.”

I nodded. “Yeah, they’re probably right there, technically.”

“So if you’re not raised by gryphons, where are you from?” Thunderlane asked.

“Oh. some medium sized run-of-the-mill town somewhere,” I said. “Nice place, but Ponyville is nicer. Though I miss the sounds sometimes, the seagulls helped wake up and the foghorns helped me sleep.”

“Coastal town, then?” Thunderlane asked. “Is your family there?”

I gave them an assuring smile. It didn’t hurt at the moment. I already had my guitar out so that didn’t blindside me. “No, they’re gone,” I said.

Thunderlane’s and Rumble’s faces and ears dropped at that, but I had a plan ready. “How about you?” I asked. “Are you two Ponyville natives?”

“We are. Parents are in shipping and receiving in the weather service,” Thunderlane said, as his ears slowly righted themselves, grabbed Rumble around his neck, then pulled him into a playful armlock and gave him a noogie. “Little baby brother here helps me out on the distribution team like a big stallion too.”

“Thunder!” Rumble whined.

Their behavior brought a smile to my face. I didn’t have any siblings, but my parents sometimes filled a similar role, having a more buddy-like relation with me at times, especially when they were teaching me music. I’m not sure everyone has that range when being a family.

I idly plonked a few tones on my guitar when Thunder let go. There was a bit of an awkward pause building, but Thunder nudged his brother and mumbled something to him.

“Uhm,” Rumble started. “I, uh… we liked your music.”

“Aw, thank you,” I said, and smiled appreciatively at him. “I wouldn’t call it my music though.”

Rumble was just looking down at his hooves, but Thunderlane nudged him again.

“Uhm,” he started again. “Whose uh, whose music is it then?”

I shrugged. “Well, it’s by two people from over… back where I’m from.”

‘Well, not exactly, but compared to another world, you could say that it’s where I’m from.’

“A ma— mare and a stallion, a couple, called Night and Blackmore.”

“Ah, that sounds more like pony names,” Thunderlane said, nodding. “Thestrals, I bet.”

I hadn’t met any thestrals yet, but from what I’d learned about Equestrian culture so far, he could be right.

“You uh, you play with your unicorn magic?” Rumble asked.

“And my hoof,” I said, waving it at him. “Hey, can pegasi play instruments with their wings?”

“I’ve seen one pegasus use five drumsticks at the same time,” Thunderlane offered.

“That counts,” I said.

“But why, uh, why aren’t you using your, uh,” Rumble started, then tapered off, and looked down at his hooves again, blushing.

I looked at him worriedly. Years ago, back when I was coming to grips with losing my arm and leg, I couldn’t always tell what reaction I would have to people bringing it up. People might’ve been understanding, but I simply don’t wanna tear up in front of others, and the most reliable attitude I could take towards it was an almost aggressive indifference. “Whatever,” was my motto, and my psychologist eventually made me realize how difficult my behavior could be to people who were only being considerate, and how hurtful it could be for someone to have their consideration thrown back into their face.

“Hey, it’s fine,” I said, and smiled at him. “It’s nice of you to be considerate, but you don’t have to. My foreleg is otherwise occupied, this is good practice, and this thing is a little bit too big for me,” I said, looking down at my guitar.

I looked up at Rumble. “As for the obvious question, it was my parents’.”

Rumble looked down again. “I’m sorry,” he said.

“Don’t be,” I said shortly. “And you can call my prosthesis whatever you want, fake leg, metal leg, cyber part. It’s fine.”

Rumble didn’t look up, but he had a small smile when he spoke next. “They’re really cool,” he said.

“Thanks,” I said, smiling at him.

“How do they work?” Thunderlane asked.

Rumble and Thunderlane looked on in fascination as I detached my leg, then recoiled just a little bit and looked at it uncertainly as I hoofed it over to them. Thunderlane eventually took it in his hooves after I waved it a bit at them, and Rumble scooted over to have a better look at it.

“It’s hollow,” Rumble observed.

“But not empty,” I said.

“What do you mean?” Thunderlane said, looking up at me.

“Notice how thick the chassis is?” I said. They nodded. “That’s hollowed out, and there’s where the enchanted gem dust that moves it is. Also, be careful not to dent my harmonica, it’s in there somewhere.”

Rumble and Thunderlane looked at me for a second at that. “How does the enchantment knows what to do?” Rumble asked.

“It’s attuned to my arcanomorphic form,” I said.

“What’s that?”

“It’s uh, it’s a magic field that represents your physical form,” I said. “When you stay afloat by just casually flip your wings? That’s you using your arcanomorphic form to do some pegasus magic, enforcing your will on the physical world.”

“... Oh,” Rumble said, in comprehension.

“And it turns out,” I said. “That losing a bodypart doesn’t mean losing that bodypart’s arcanomorphic field, lucky for me.”

“That’s really cool,” Rumble said. “Can you, uuh…”

“Sure,” I said, and smiled, taking the leg again and putting it back on. “I would’ve thought you’d have seen this enough in school.”

Rumble cowered a little bit. “You’re always—”

“Hey, Gabe,” Apple Bloom suddenly said beside us. “Rainbow Dash wants to see our routine again, so we better head that way.”

“Yeah, here’s your leg back,” Scootaloo said, and hoofed me my foreleg. “Thanks.”

“No problem,” I said, putting it back on. “Break a leg.”

“Yeah!” Bulk Bicep called out in the distance, perhaps not in response to us, but we all laughed anyway, and the Crusaders pranced away.

“So anyway,” I said, and put my foreleg back on. “It responds to my wishes perfectly. I control it just like I did my real one before I lost it.” I slowly waved it back and forth and wiggled my hoof at Rumble. “So if you ever find yourself missing a limb, I got you covered. I’m even working on artificial eyes and ears. I haven’t looked into organs, but I will eventually.”

Both Rumble and Thunderlane looked on in fascination. “That’s so cool,” Rumble said, and Thunderlane nodded in agreement.

“Yeah,” I said, then gave them a serious look and pointed at them. “Don’t actually go lopping parts of yourselves off though. I can make replacements but phantom pain is still a very real thing.”

Thunderlane held up his hooves. “Don’t worry, we won’t,” he said, chuckling. “Actually, I’m gonna see how it’s going for the team. You gonna stay here keeping Gabe company, bro?”

“I uh,” Rumble started, then Thunderlane gave him some sort of look. “Uuh, sure.”

I didn’t know what they were on about, but then again, I never had siblings, so I didn’t know what kind of unspoken communication was going on there.

Rumble shifted in his seat. He looked tense about something. I figured he had more questions about my disabilities or prosthesis, but didn’t want to ask. Some people, a lot of people actually, took quite a while before they were comfortable discussing disabilities. I would’ve thought being restored to, and in many cases surpassing, standard capabilities, would make it easier for people to talk about, but maybe seeing me lying there without my foreleg overwrote that.

“So you help out on the weather team then?” I asked, strumming at my guitar.

“Uhm, yeah,” Rumble said. “Sometimes.”

“What’s that like?” I asked, casually, politely wondering, but not pushing, clearly signalling that he can talk or not talk about it, I’m fine with either. “I never knew anyone working with the weather where I lived before.”

“Oh,” Rumble said. “Well, it’s kinda cool. Rainbow and Thunder pay me bits for it, and when it’s storm-season, we fly through the discharge zones, and you can kinda shoot lightning with your wings.”

I gave him a wide-eyed look. Magic made ponies tough in many ways, especially when it comes to weather, and especially for pegasi. Ponies could take a lightning strike and not be actually hurt, and pegasi could take one and only feel giggly. “Awesome,” I commented.

Rumble blushed. “Yeah,” he said, slowly.

“But Rainbow Dash is the head of the weather team, right?” I asked.

“Yeah. She’s awesome at it,” Rumble said.

“So… it’s not that she’s the boss because she’s got contacts in Cloudsdale or something?” I asked.

“Uhm, I don’t think so,” Rumble said, not seeming quite sure what I was getting it. “Everypony knows she’s the best flier and the best weathermare in Ponyville.”

“Oh.”

‘Good.’

“That would’ve been very unlike her.”

“Oh, yeah, it would,” Rumble agreed. “Somepony else asked that once, and Thunder said that Rainbow can’t, uh... ‘charm her way out of a wet paper bag’.”

That made me chuckle. “I think he’s right,” I said. “It’s pretty cool that you help out the professional weather team though.”

Rumble looked down and blushed even brighter, and at this rate I was thinking that the poor colt might need some more praise in his life. “Thanks,” he said, then looked up at me after a while. “Could you, uhm… could you play some more? I really liked it.”

“Sure thing,” I said, and smiled. I mostly played for myself, but it was still nice to hear that people liked it.

I powered up my boombox. It didn’t have a user interface yet, so I had to do it with my magic. I had spent the last week putting in music from my computer down in Twilight’s basement, now I just needed some headphones and I’d have what I always wanted. I spent a lot of time attuning my magic to my legs, which happened just by using them, so what I really wanted was a walkman with some headphones and a nice day to have a good trotting session every once in awhile through the great outdoors.

What I’m getting at is that I had a bunch of music with me. I powered up the music player and raised the volume enough for Rumble to hear, then, this time using both my forelegs, I started playing.

I had wondered before whether I should share the art I had with me from Earth with ponykind. It didn’t seem very pressing, since I had no way to distribute it en masse, but I was happy to see the reactions. Twilight, Spike, the Crusaders, and friends had really enjoyed some movie nights, and now Rumble really seemed to be enjoying the music.

In fact, a while after I had started softly singing, I looked up at him, away from the neck of my guitar, and he looked absolutely spellbound. He made half a motion to get up, but changed his mind. I didn’t realise that he would like it that much. I switched over to strumming with my magic, and patted the cushion beside me with a smile.

He made another half motion to move, but just stopped himself and blushed for a while, before just relaxing into his seat and listening again. I smiled and closed my eyes, losing myself in the soft tones of the guitar. I didn’t sing out very loud. In fact, I was singing pretty softly. That didn’t stop me from missing what happened around me.

After a few minutes, the song ended, and for some reason I hadn’t opened my eye during the whole song. When I did, I recoiled in shock.

Rumble was looking at me, looking absolutely captivated.

Along with the rest of the car.

Everyone had gotten up from their seat and were standing beside our isle of seats, looking at me in utter silence.

After a moment, someone started slowly stomping, and then the rest of the gathered ponies started stomping their hooves to the floor and sitting on their haunches and clopping their hooves together, some even whooping in excited approval.

The roles were reversed now. Instead of Rumble, I was the one who shied away, and blushed fiercely as I tried to not make it too obvious that I was trying to hide behind my guitar.

Spike was there too. “Whoa,” he said, in a low voice.

There was a simmer of approval from the crowd. Murmurs along the lines of, “What’s her name?” “I’ve seen her around in town,” “She’s that filly with the metal hooves,” and, “I’m pretty sure I’ve seen her play before but I can’t remember when,”

“Wow, Gabe,” Lily Valley said, and smiled widely. “Does Lyra know you can play like this?”

“Uuh, I don’t know,” I said.

‘She might’ve been unconscious the last time I played in front of people.’

“Well you should show her,” Roseluck said, standing next to Lily and Daisy. “You could play together.”

“Uhm, maybe,” I said, in a low voice.

The flower trio looked at each other, confused, before the whole crowd “naaw”-ed at each other.

“Aaw, Gabe, you don’t have to be shy,” Lily said, soothingly to be point of patronizingly, and the rest of the crowd murmured in agreement. “You were great. We all liked it.”

“Yeah, what would the world look like if people were too embarrassed to share their music?” Daisy said.

"She's right, Gabe," Spike agreed. "You don't have to be scared from sharing your music."

By now I was mostly fighting back a scowl. ‘Bold talk, Spike.’

“Uhm, well, thank you,” I said, not being able to keep out a touch of coolness in my voice.

“Hey, you could perform in the musical ceremonies of the games,” Spike eagerly suggested.

“No,” I said, with as much conviction I could without sounding angry, before anyone could murmur in approvement again.

“Oh,” Spike said, looking a bit confused, along with everyone else. “Well, okay. If you’re sure.”

“Yeah, well, uhm,” I started, looking around at everyone. “Thanks for the compliments, but I think I’m gonna pack up for now,” I said, and started putting my guitar into my hardcase. “I need to rest my hooves.”

The crowd dispersed, looking only slightly disappointed. When they’d left, I looked around and noticed that Rumble must’ve left with them.

I let out a sigh, and, having nothing better to do, propped my head up against the armrest, hoping to turn this rest into a nap.

—

Everyone was filing out of the train in a calm and orderly fashion.The Crusaders and I brought up the rear, along with Spike, who was carrying a sports bag larger than he was, filled with kettlebells by the looks of things.

Spike and the Crusaders were talking about something, but I wasn’t listening. I was busy looking around at the city.

I had been admiring the place through the windows since it had been visible, but now I was seeing it in detail. The whole city gleamed in the sunlight. It was perhaps a little too bright, but it felt more like a winter brightness, where everything gleams and glitters in the sun, rather than the summer brightness with the heat visibly radiating off the roads.

I tapped my hoof against the glass-like floor, or ground, whatever you’d call it. It made an even more pronounced clacking sound with my prostheses than the floor of Canterlot Castle did. ‘Interesting material. Looks difficult to maintain, but also very resistant to wear and tear. I’d like to see how they do it when they need to patch up potholes, if there are any.

‘This is a cold climate, and coming from a subarctic zone, I know you want something that can stand the cold, or be easy to repair. Preferably both.’

I looked closely at the skyline. ‘Obviously planned layout indicated that building, rebuilding and/or repairing is an undertaking. The buildings must be excellent for enchanting, so the difficulty of installing modern conveniences might not translate here, if it’s done with magic. That’s gotta be a relief for some people. Those 16th century buildings back home were probably a pain to install city grid access points and radia—’

That’s as far as my trail of thought went before two glittering stallions in armor ran by, and sweeped Spike with them, with him shouting in protest as he was carried of into the distance.

Me and the Crusaders just looked on in confusion.

“Were those guys dressed in armor?” I asked, cautiously.

“Uhm, yeah,” Apple Bloom said.

“Hmm… do you think they arrested him?”

“No,” Sweetie Belle said after a while. “I don’t think that’s how arrests work.”

“Oh… must be something official then,” I said, and shrugged it off.

I wasn’t very worried. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t dragon discrimination. Spike had told me the story about how he helped, or according to him, Twilight and friends helped him, save the Crystal Empire, and since Twilight didn’t correct him or even disapprove of how he told it, I assumed that it was mostly true. So it wasn’t an irrational fear of wyrms. Modest of size and ferocity as they may be.

Someone cleared his throat behind us. We turned around and saw a pegasus in armor looking at us patiently.

“Yes?” Scootaloo asked, after a while.

“Are any among you known as…” he seemed to struggle a bit here. “Gab… relle… Elooner…”

“Gabrielle Eleanor Desrochers?” I said, questioningly, and a bit deadpan.

“Uh, yes. That,” the stallion said.

“Yeah, that’s me,” I said.

“Ah,” the stallion said, and stood at attention, looking straight ahead. “Private Racing Stripe, madam, Imperial Stormtrooper.”

The mention of that name tugged the side of my lip into a small smirk. “What’s this about, private?” I asked.

“I am to find out if this visit is an appropriate time for you concerning the ceremony,” Racing Stripe said.

I raised an eyebrow at him. “Ceremony?”

“The accolades, madam,” he said, in a tone that might’ve been clarifying to anyone who knew what he was talking about.

I shook my head slightly in confusion. “Uhm, private, back up a bit, and please speak freely… what ‘accolades’?”

Private Racing Stripe widened his stance a bit and looked me into the eye with a careful expression. “Uhm, your knighthood, madam,” he said, and looked at my blank expression before carefully continuing. “Grand craftmaster Inkwell submitted you for a knighthood for noble accomplishments in service to the realms. You were supposed to have received a letter by dragonfire informing you about the ceremony.”

‘Oh by the surly beard of Mrifk,’ I muttered in my head. I looked behind me to where Spike had been carried off, and saw the faces of the Crusaders giving me large grins.

I shrugged at them with a sheepish smile and a shrug, before turning back to Private Stripe. “I think there may have been a hiccup at the postal service.”

—

I walked up to the balcony, and reared up to peek over the railing, down at what everyone else was looking at.

‘My mistake, seems like Spike can handle the spotlight.’

“Isn’t it gorgeous?” Spike asked, as we looked down at his statue from the balcony.

“You already said that it was,” I pointed out.

“Yeah, but what do you think about it?”

‘It’s garish.’

“It certainly fits the rest of the aesthetics of the city,” I said.

“Yeeaah...” Spike didn’t seem to register the words, only that I said something positive, just as planned.

I might’ve shaken my head at him, but it didn’t really bother me. It was mostly interesting to observe. For one, he had lived in the shadow of amazing ponies who had pretty much saved the world, or at least pony society, several times, for a long time. He was also mentally less mature than me, and he was a dragon, narcissism was apparently a prominent trait among wyrms.

“So you’re Gabrielle,” a melodic voice sounded behind me.

I turned around to face another alicorn. She was pink, with a multi-toned mane, and a large stature, wearing regalia and a tiara. She was like a middle step between Celestia, Luna, and Twilight. While Twilight had the stature only slightly larger than a normal pony and normally walked around in only her coat, and the sisters were almost intimidatingly large, dripped with magic, and wore magnificent yet stylish regalia, Mi Amore Cadenza were somewhere between the two classes in size, and wore smaller regalia.

“I am,” I said, smiling at her. “And you must be Princess Cadenza,” I continued, then bowed down.

I had barely lowered my head to the floor before a golden-clad hoof placed itself under my chin, and gently lifted my face up to look at the princess’.

She studied me for a moment. “I thiiink…” she said, before she smiled and quickly pecked me once on each cheek. “This is an appropriate greeting where you’re from?”

That hadn’t been a regular thing for ages. “Uuh, well, where my mother is from, yes,” I said, impressed. “My father would probably have greeted his king with a handshake though.”

“Handshake?” Cadence said. “Twilight told me about the people she met on the other side of the mirror. Apparently that’s not where you’re from, but still very interesting.”

I looked around at the crystal city. “Frankly, I find Equestria the interesting world. I like it here.”

Cadence tittered a bit. “I’m glad you think so,” she said, and lowered her voice. “And I’m glad you forgave Twilight. Small mistakes rattle her enough, this would be really hard on her if you hadn’t.”

I smiled at her. Of course she’d care for Twilight, being her old foalsitter. “It was an accident and she’s a friend. Of course I forgive her.”

Cadence smiled back at me. “And thank you for postponing you knighting. We’d have time for it, but the Equestria Games takes up a fair share of our attention.”

“Ah yeah, that,” I said, scratching the back of my neck. “Well, it’s kinda out of the blue, and I’m not sure exactly what it entails.”

“Ask Twilight,” Cadence said. “She had one.”

“Really?” I said, looking at Twilight walking around inside the room.

“Knowing her, she’s probably forgotten it,” Cadence said.

—

“Well, we have plenty of rooms,” Cadence said to me and the Crusaders as we, Spike, Twilight, and friends walked through the hallways for visiting guests and dignitaries. “But we’re in the middle of restoring the castle, would it be okay for you fillies to share a room?”

I looked back at the Crusaders, who shrugged easily at me. “I’m fine with it,” I said.

“Alright. There’s room enough for all of you, but you’re gonna have to share two beds,” Cadence said.

“I’ll share with Sweetie Belle!” Apple Bloom shouted at the same time Sweetie Belle shouted, ”I’ll share with Apple Bloom!”

We all looked at them curiously. I shifted my gaze to Scootaloo, who shrugged at me.

Apple Bloom opened the door to the room we were going to sleep in. It was a rich room, a bit like a luxury hotel, only with more pillows and filled bookshelves. Two large beds dominated the room. The beds, being large, and us, being fillies, meant that we could treat one side of the bed as a single bed for us.

“This looks nice,” I commented, as I leaned my guitar-case towards the wall on the side of the bed.

“Yeah,” Scootaloo said, as she opened the bathroom. “Hey! Check out this bathtub! I challenge you guys.”

“Challenge us to what?” Sweetie Belle asked.

“I’dunno, who cares?” Scootaloo said, from the bathroom.

“Is it a jacuzzi?” I called to her.

“Uhm… yes.” Scootaloo called.

“Alright, I accept,” I said. “I wanna try a crystal jacuzzi.”

“Can you play something while we try it?” Apple Bloom asked.

“Maybe, but I’m not playing my guitar in the tub,” I said.

“Can’t you enchant it?” Scootaloo asked, as she came out of the bathroom.

“Probably,” I said. “But I wanna be absolutely sure it won’t damage it in any way before I try it. It’s irreplaceable.”

We walked out to the hallway again. Rarity was standing in the opening to her room, giving Spike instructions. “Over there, Spiky-wiky. No, no, yes! There.”

“Hey, Twilight,” I said. “Do you have a knighthood?”

She looked a bit taken aback at that, and put her hoof to her chin. “Uhm, maybe…” she started.

“She does,” Spike called from Rarity’s room. “You got one before we went to Ponyville, for the teleportation spell, remember?”

“Oh, that’s right,” Twilight happily recollected. “That got me an award.” She beamed modestly.

Twilight’s friends just looked at her in silence.

After a while, Rarity walked up and cupped a surprised-looking Twilight's cheeks in her hooves. “Darling,” she said, speaking slowly, as if addressing a child. “You have to remember to tell us these things.”

—

Spike, The Crusaders, Rainbow, and, a bit reluctantly, Fluttershy, left shortly thereafter to report to someone called Ms. Harshwhinny. Rarity wanted to check out the castle, while Twilight was deep in conversation with Cadence as they walked elsewhere, and everyone just kind of dispersed.

A meal was to be served later, but my hunger was pushed to the back as I walked around, taking in the sights. Cadence had told me where to go to find Armor. Private Armor, not her husband, whom I was going to meet later.

I wanted to check out the castle too, just like Rarity was doing, but since she’s a great friend, I didn’t want to be around her while she did it and struggle to keep myself from rolling my eyes all the time.

So I walked down the corridor, in the middle of which was a both functional and ornamental-seeming portcullis. Two guards were stationed on the other side, their backs turned against me. I double-checked, and could see the cutie mark on the trooper to the left, then pounced him.

“Coup de grâce, private!” I hissed at him, playfully and loudly, as I smacked his helmet off, grabbed his neck, and held my hoof against him as if it was a weapon.

Armor reared up and struggled for a short moment, before he placed my voice, then stopped, craned his neck and looked back at me, surprise clear in his eyes, and let out a laugh as he pulled me into a hug with a wing.

“Hahaa!” he exclaimed. “Gabe! Finally decided to drop by?” he asked, as he pressed me against his neck.

I nuzzled his cheek. I didn’t really have any quips ready, though I only kinda felt that I should’ve. “I missed you,” I said.

“I missed you too,” he said.

“Naaaw,” someone cooed from the side. I opened my eye and looked at Armor’s fellow guard, an earth pony mare in armor, transferring her weapon from her mouth back to her hoof. “Relative of yours, Codpiece?”

We dignifiedly disengaged, and I jumped down from Armor’s back. Armor cleared his throat. “Gabe, this is Private Oak, Oak, This is Ambassador Desrochers,” he said.

Private Oak’s eyes widened in realization. “Oh, I see,” she said, and smirked. “The inventor. Nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too,” I said, and bumped hooves with her.

Her eyes tracked my hoof from the moment I started moving it. “So it’s true?” she said, then started slowly nodding. “Very impressive.” Then stood up straight. “Well, madam, if you want to steal Private Armor away from his post, I can hold down the fort.”

I gave a slightly sheepish grin at that. “Yeah, I was actually looking for a tour guide,” I said.

Oak stood at attention. “I’ll act the rear guard then, madam,” she said.

Armor looked at me, with an amused expression. “I don’t get any say in this?” he asked.

“Nope,” I said, and pointed down the hall. “Forward march.”

Armor chuckled, and started moving down the hall. I quickly jumped up on his back, and settled in, just like old times.

“We’re not supposed to have helmets unless the headroom is high enough,” he commented, as we moved towards a section with lower ceilings.

Obviously, I grabbed his helmet and tried it instead. It didn’t really fit since it wasn’t adjusted for unicorns.

“So where to next?” he asked.

“I was thinking of raiding the pantry, or checking out the library,” I said. “I’m a gem enchanter in a city of crystal. This might just be a hunch, but there may be something interesting there.”

“A lot of it is restricted while the stuff there is being copied, but you may be able to have access anyway,” Armor said.

“If not, you can always show me your place,” I said, jokingly.

“The barracks?” Armor said, and almost laughed. “You don’t wanna see that. A bunch of sweaty, half-dressed stallions exercising and grunting.”

That sounded a bit familiar. “... Hey, I have that movie,” I said, happily.

We made our way down to the library. It might’ve been a more interesting tour, if there was more to show off.

Oh, the castle had plenty of fascinating and interesting things to see. It’s just that there were no real stops between us and the library. It was just chambers and stuff, dedicated to all manners of things. Flugelhorns, prominently.

I mean, I thought it was all pretty fascinating stuff, but a normal corridor was about the same level of fascinating as a chamber dedicated to some random thing when you’re in an empire of crystal ponies. Like that crystal hallway, with an open crystal door to a crystal lavatory, being worked on by crystal ponies, with crystal hats and crystal plungers. Don’t ask me how that works though. I’m just glad the toilet, floor, and pipes weren’t see through.

“And this is the library,” Armor said, then gestured towards the orange crystal pony standing over by a shelf. “And this is Lexikon, the royal librarian.”

Lexikon looked up at us, or at least it seemed that way. He was an older and a bit frail-looking stallion, or as frail as a crystal pony can look. His white mane was flat against his scalp, as if he had just spent a full day having it licked in place by a manticore.

“Eh? Your Majesty? Is that you?” Lexikon asked, in a surprisingly steady voice, peering at us through lenses like bottle bottoms. “Your mane looks out of place.”

Armor turned his back towards me. “He needs glasses,” he whispered at me.

“He has glasses,” I whispered back.

Armor just shrugged. “My point stands,” he insisted.

“Also, your mane seems to be wearing your helmet,” Lexikon said.

I idly wondered if it felt weird for a crystal pony to see their world through lenses. It might be a bit like having artificial flesh as part of a prosthesis. ‘Now there’s a thought.’

“Mister Lexikon, allow me to introduce to you, Gabrielle Desrochers,” Armor said.

“Oh, private, it’s you,” Lexikon said, and peered extra close at us. “Well, nice to meet you, Mr Desrochers, it’s not often we get gryphons in here. Feel free to ask if you need any help finding anything, and please don’t bother the bard,” he continued, walking back to what he was doing before.

“Mister Desrochers?” I asked Armor.

Armor just shook his head in a don’t-worry-about-it manner.

“Also, bard?” I asked.

“Oh, yeah, it’s some sort of spirit… thingy,” Armor said. “Apparently, it, or he I think, was a prisoner of Sombra, and he was here when the Empire vanished, then Prince Shining Armor and Twilight found him wandering around in the caves beneath the castle. He’s also supposed to be a bit shy, so if you see a big, swirly thing walking around in the corner of your eye—”

Armor stopped when we heard a deep, rumbling voice, humming a slow, merry tune, from somewhere between the shelves.

“... It’s just him. Also, he sings,” Armor finished.

“Oh. Now I’m a bit envious,” I said. “I wanna be a bard too.”

“You are a bard… kinda,” Armor said.

“Thank you,” I said, perkily. “Now, let’s see what we can find in here.”

‘The Crystal Palace also has caves beneath it? I approve. Also, Twilight’s residence technically also has a cave beneath it.’

The library of the crystal palace was disorganised, which might’ve been frustrating, if I wasn’t simultaneously catching up with Armor again. It did have a fireplace, just like Golden Oaks, which hinted at a lot when it comes to the use of enchantments in the Crystal Empire.

I had made some progress, memorizing stuff about heating enchantments, and even more interestingly, storage for magical energy to fuel activated enchantments, like magic batteries. That one I was going to have to come back with a pen and paper to research it in detail sometime, since it would be great for use with the arcano-dispersive shocker in my foreleg.

Armor had taken to the skies and was scanning the spines of the books out of my line of sight, which, frankly, was most of them, and I had wandered off to look through the shelves a few aisles down.

I paused by something which looked interesting, when I heard the deep tone of the crystal bard singing again.

“Mrrurr-wrur-uhrhur,” he hummed happily to himself. It brought a smile to my face, it was just a simple little tune, but the voice was deep and comforting, like sitting in a massage chair made of soundwaves.

I looked to the side where the voice was coming from, and ended up only seeing the inside of Armor’s helmet, since I had forgotten to give it back to him. I adjusted the helmet, and saw a big, white, and somewhat swirly shape.

He was a large creature, equine in only the most vague sense. Four small, stubby legs protruded from a huge shape, a bit like a mix between newly fallen snow and a marshmallow. The upper parts narrowed a bit, where a face adorned some sort of head, and crystals stuck out of the head, vaguely like hair. Small, wispy things acted like arms, as he calmly inserted books into a shelf, seeming utterly content with his task.

I’ve always found situations like these difficult. Do I walk up and greet the only individual in proximity, or would they like to remain undisturbed?

Looking around, I realized that looking through the aisles like I was doing, meant that unless something really caught my interest, I would end up walking right by him. ‘Besides,’ I reasoned, ‘this is Equestria, and you don’t shy away from social stuff here.’

No books did catch my interest, and when I was close enough to this “crystal bard”, him still humming away happily, I turned to him.

“Hello,” I said.

He stopped humming, and stopped his book mid-shelving, to look at me. His face was little more than a mouth, and two enormous blue eyes. He looked at me with an expression I knew anywhere. It’s the same one you saw when you forgot to announce your presence to Fluttershy from far enough away. It was a strange sight, on something so much larger than me.

“Mwwruu… Hello,” he said, shying away from me.

‘Okaaay, perhaps I shouldn’t intrude,’ I thought, as I slowly started turning around.

That’s when Armor flew around the corner and landed next to me, two tomes in his forearms.

“Hey, Gabe, I found these— oh! Hello there.”

The crystal bard said nothing to Armor, just seeming to want to curl up somewhere and hide. I couldn’t help but feel bad just for being here, like my presence had hurt a puppy somehow. He just looked at me, looking both sad and frightened with his large, expressive, and steadily watering eyes.

I slowly made to turn away, saying, “Well, sorry to have bothered you, we’ll just get out of your hair.”

The crystal bard seemed to hesitate, despite looking worried, and nervously rubbing his smokey appendages together. “Mwwruu,” he somehow managed to mewl despite his deep voice. “You smell like… him.”

That made me stop. “... Him?” I asked.

The bard just fidgeted, before seemingly steeling himself. “Rrrhu… Sombra."

“... I remind you of Sombra?” I asked.

“Mwwrhuu… yes,” the large ghostly thing said, before looking hesitantly hopeful. “You’re… not with him?”

I slowly shook my head. “No, I barely know of him,” I said. “Don’t see how I could be associated with him. I’m not from around here.”

The tears that had been welling up in the bard’s eyes stopped, and he looked at me and Armor, and the books we were holding, with relief. “Whrruuuould you like some help to find some books?” he asked hopefully.

—

We excused ourselves from the library shortly after that. Then there was an early dinner, which wasn’t much of a dinner according to me, since the Empire hadn’t had any contact with omnivores for a long time, and so had little other than salads available. I didn’t really pay much attention to anything during the dinner however, I was distracted by what I’d heard in the library.

So I supplemented my meals with biscuits as I took a walk down the halls of the castle. What the strange crystal ghost-bard-creature told me had me deep in thought, and appropriately enough, I found myself in a room with a statue of Sombra. There were plenty of old statues, decorations, banners, and things like that from his reign that no one had bothered getting rid of yet, and there were things from before that which Sombra apparently also hadn’t bothered getting rid of. Most of it was just shuffled away in chambers, gathering dust.

Slowly chewing at a tube of biscuits, but without any tea, I looked up at the image of the former king. He stood proud and tall, a crooked yet impressive horn poking out of a both wicked and effective-looking armored headpiece, and a mane both majestic and intimidating was captured in the moment, flowing in a forgotten breeze, along with his large cloak.

‘He certainly strikes an impressive figure, in a way,’ I thought as I lay in front of him, biscuits crunching in my mouth.

“That is true,” A voice came from behind me, making me realize that I’ve been talking out loud. I wasn’t startled though. The speaker was practiced enough not to startle anyone if she didn’t want to.

“I was in the library earlier,” I told Celestia as I looked back at her. “One of his formers… servants, told me that I reminded him of… him.” I gestured towards the statue.

“Oh?” Celestia said, calmly yet curiously.

“Yeah. He was upset, to put it mildly, when he was thinking about him,” I said, and gestured towards the statue of the dark majesty. “I didn’t really have the heart to push him, but it made me curious.”

“I can imagine,” Celestia said, lying down beside me. “What are your thoughts as of yet?”

“Hmmm. Well, nothing that sounds more plausible than anything else, considering how little I was told,” I said. “But… I was similar to him to someone who may or may not be able to perceive things I can’t.”

“And what does that tell you?” Celestia calmly asked.

I considered that for a little while. “Well, as I understand it, Discord says that I’m different, spiritually or something, from ponies, and Sombra’s origins are… ‘shrouded in mystery’, one might say? Maybe that’s where the likeliness comes from. He was different from ponies. Maybe he was even human once?”

Celestia said nothing for a while. I looked up at her and saw a look of contemplation on her face, as she looked unseeingly straight ahead.

“An interesting notion, but improbable,” she said. “I’m mainly thinking in terms of the alternate world I told you about.”

“Ah yeah,” I said. “Yeah, that wouldn’t make any sense according to Twilight and Starswirl. They say that Earth is a solitary world, with no influence from or to other worlds.”

“There are ways you remind me of him, though,” Celestia said, and looked me in the eye while smiling.

“Really? How?”

“Well, it’s true that you’re both different from ponies in here,” she said, and poked me gently in my chest with a wing, then wrapped it around me. “I didn’t exactly get to know him.” she nodded towards the statue. “But I knew a Sombra, and I cared for him a lot, as I do you.”

I tensed up at that. Something in my chest told me that I had to be careful here, and I realized that it wasn’t trepidation— it might’ve been regret.

“Uuuhm,” I said, looking down at the floor and thinking for a moment, before scooting closer to her. “Celestia, back when I… rejected you… I might have made a mistake.”

Celestia leaned her head down and softly nuzzled my neck. “You were tearing open an old, deep wound, so that it could heal right. You’re still healing. I understand if you’re not sure what you want. Rest assured, I will accept whatever you choose.”

I snuggled into her side.

I wouldn’t not lean back into her even if I wanted to. “Thank you,” I said.

“Now,” Celestia said after a while. “The opening ceremonies are about to start. We wouldn’t want to miss that, would we?”

—

Twilight’s brother was impressing me so far. He could shout loud enough to be heard all over the stadium, effectively drowning out the cheer from the audience, while sounding both clear and steady, and not screeching in the least. There might’ve been some magical arrangement behind that, but I didn’t know for sure.

“Now, please welcome, the delegation from Ponyville!” Shining Armor shouted from the field.

“Whooo!” I shouted, along with Rarity, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and the rest of the tens of thousands of ponies in the audience, as Scootaloo burst through the arrangement that Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle held up, followed by the rest of the team.

Like I said, I’m not much of a sportsperson, but I’d shout down the stadium if it helped my friends.

Then came the time for Spike’s lighting of the fire.

I won’t go into detail. Spike, frankly, looked pitiful as he struggled with breathing fire. I didn’t judge him, Fluttershy’s wings lock up when she’s startled, I sometimes stutter, just about everyone has some embarrassing reaction to scary situations.

‘C’mon, Spike! You’ve spent a whole afternoon heating frying pans for me!’

And then the fire lit up in spectacular fashion. I didn’t join in the cheer until it was dying down, I was busy breathing a sigh of relief.

The rest of the games for the day was a pretty standard affair. Rainbow and Fluttershy weren’t competing in anything today, so I was only mildly interested after theirs and the Crusaders’ part in the show. Still, seeing it live does add to the experience, so I wasn’t exactly bored or unhappy.

Afterwards, I congratulated the Crusaders and the rest of the gang on their performance, but when Twilight revealed that she was the one who lit the fire, well, things got a little embarrassing.

That evening, there was dinner, which was, technically, a banquet. Cadence had to spend some time calming down the kitchen staff, who had been freaking out for a while there when they learned that their rulers, and all the actual princesses, were all having dinner at the same time.

Luna’s sweet tooth aside, none of the assembled royalty were all that into extravagant affairs. That was mostly the nobles’ thing, and there were few nobles in the Empire. They mostly hung around in Canterlot, where they tried covering up that gaping hole between themselves and the real power that Celestia and Luna wielded by pretending extra hard that the power they did have was great. Hence, the extravagant banquets that were frequent there.

But there weren’t any nobles here. If there were any here to see the games, they were likely found in expensive hotels. Luna suggested that it was in large part because Cadence and Armor were the rulers of the Empire, and few if anyone among them knew how to play sycophants to the two “elevated commoners”. She could be blunt like that, but Cadence and Armor just nodded agreeingly, and while it wasn’t said out loud, it was clear that both them and Celestia encouraged this state of affairs.

“Well, at least they have goals they strive for,” was what I had to say about the whole thing, as I dipped my piece of bread in oil and sprinkled a pinch of salt on it, while everyone else, the princesses, Shining Armor, Twilight and friends, the Crusaders, Spike, and Studded Armor, were still enjoying salad I had grown bored of long ago. Some of them were giving me some vaguely worried looks whenever I used salt though, and I don’t know why.

“They’re not all that bad,” Cadence said placatingly. “A lot of them are just as hardworking as everypony else, and a lot of them support the arts.”

“Okay, that’s always nice,” I said.

“Yeah, and speaking of art,” Shining Armor said. “You gotta show me those legs of yours.”

“Sure thing,” I said, and promptly removed my foreleg and floated it over to him. “Here’s one.”

His eyes widened, and he almost recoiled out of his seat. He looked around at the amused looks he was getting from people not already engaged in their own conversations, before hesitatingly grabbing the leg in his own magic. Having parts of yourself be detachable had never been this fun.

Shining took the leg and gently, almost reverently, tried turning it around.

“You don’t have to be so careful with it,” I said. “It has every toughening enchantment I know on it, and even if it didn’t, it completely lacks any weak points.”

Shining bent the leg experimentally, then started turning it around much more enthusiastically when he noticed how robust it was. “What’s this thing in here?” He asked, looking into the lower part through the opening in the hoof.

“Arcanodispersive shocker, a searchlight, and a experimental grappling hook launcher. Don’t worry,” I said, as he quickly turned it away. “I haven’t developed magical energy storage units for it, so unless you attach it to me, the powerful stuff doesn’t have enough juice to fire.”

“You said you didn’t make the chassis?” Armor said slowly, as he inspected the forms on the metal parts under the cover.

“No, that was Scrap Armor in Ponyville. Studded Armor’s uncle,” I said, through a mouth full of bread, indicating Codpiece sitting next to me with my head.

“Sergeant Scrap Armor? The quartermaster of Far Watch?” Shining asked.

“That’s him, Cap,” Armor said, nodding. “He now works full-time with smithing and supplying.”

Shining silently stared at me and Armor for a few moments, before turning to Cadence. “Honey,” he started, like he was about to ask her for the moon and stars. “Can I—”

“Yes, you can talk shop by the dinner table,” she cut him off, sounding a little tired, but clearly faking it, judging by how amused she looked.

Shining pecked her on the side of her muzzle (and I was pretty sure I saw a small glow radiating from her at that), jumped out of his seat, enthusiastically sauntered over to us with his chair and my leg floating behind behind him, then plopped down next to me and Armor.

“Alright, tell me everything,” he said.

Shining Armor was a fun guy. Getting to have a good, close look at him also practically confirmed something that I had been suspecting. I thought ponies in general looked appealing in many ways, but now I was getting fairly good at judging what makes a pony good-looking, and seeing what every mare in Ponyville said was the exemplar of good looks also made me certain that my Armor, Studded Armor, was a very handsome stallion.

Shining also turned out to be a pretty big nerd. His sister was a nerd, of course, but she seriously needed to swat up on the awesome kind of nerdery. Unlike her, Shining was completely on-point when I talked about the concepts of armored airships, mechs, submarines, power armor, and jetpacks.

In turn, he talked to me about magic in defence, especially self-defence, and which martial art I might be the most suited for. The concept of having super-strength in my right legs opened up a slew of possibilities, and he had some pretty good insight into how to best use it.

“How about your eye?” he asked. “Is that magic too?”

“No,” I said, and touched the side of it. “I’m having ideas, but I haven’t gotten to it yet.”

“Ah, well, tell me when you do. Did you ever meet Sandstone, private?” Shining asked, turning to Studded Armor.

“Mm, twice,” Armor said through his salad, and nodded.

“Who?” I asked.

“A retired corporal,” Shining said. “One of the few who was seriously injured in the changeling attack. Completely lost her sight.”

“Oh,” I said, my ears wilting.

“Actually, uh, she’s totally fine. Which... was a bit weird for the doctors,” Shining said. “Anyway, I just mean that you probably have a willing patient in her.”

“Uh, okay,” I said, not entirely convinced. “Are you sure she’s fine?”

“Totally,” Shining said. “She spent weeks at medical before the doctors were certain that it wasn’t some escape mechanism. It’s her special talent you see. She was, and actually still kinda is, a bit of morale officer. Everypony around her feel like they can take on anything the world has to offer. Apparently, so does she.”

“Oh,” I said, slowly turning the potential application for that over in my head. “Wow. Lucky her, sorta, I guess.”

“Yeah, I know what you mean,” Shining said, then chuckled. “There’s one other whose hind leg hasn’t been the same, but that’s pretty much all the serious stuff.”

“Not to wave away the injuries you just talked about,” I said. “But those sounds like pretty mild results for an invasion.”

“Changelings are vile creatures,” Shining said darkly, before his expression mellowed a bit and he let out a sigh. “But... they were out to capture, not hurt.”

Studded leaned over to me. “Cap’s pretty ticked off at the changelings, but he can act as stoic as he want, he and Princess Cadenza are everypony’s heroes after they kicked ‘em out of Canterlot.”

“I heard about that,” I said, nodding. “I don’t… wanna sound dismissive of the uh, ordeal, but I kinda wish I’d seen that.”

Shining just chuckled. “Don’t worry, I know what you mean. It wasn’t that great of an ‘ordeal’. The two I mentioned were the only ones seriously hurt.”

“And everypony were comparing scars for weeks afterwards,” Studded said, smirking at the memory.

“Did you get any?” I asked.

“Nothing cool, compared to what happened to me,” he said, and lifted up his right foreleg. “Split my hoof and got a scar in my frog, but other than that,” he said, showing the line where the fuzz were angled strangely, “I just got a bunch of bruises.”

I looked at the scar contemplatively, and saw mental images of Studded Armor being surrounded by insectoid ponies (I had only seen pictures of changelings), backed up against a wall, bruised and beaten, but weapon raised high and face in a defiant snarl. It wasn’t real, but I still couldn’t help but feeling some admiration for the image of the brave stallion in my head, and something more, as he would need help to heal and recover from his trying ordeal...

“Hey, it’s not that bad,” Studded said, and slowly lowered his hoof while looking worriedly at me.

“Oh uh, yeah,” I said, then tried to discreetly look around me.

Shining had gone back to studying my prosthesis in his hooves, and the only one I noticed looking our way was Cadence, who was resting her head on her hooves with an happy-looking expression that I couldn’t really place.

“I can’t get over this,” Shining said, then finally tore his gaze from my prosthesis. “Twilight said that you’re from another world and that you mature faster than ponies, but I still can’t believe that a filly figured this out.”

“Same here, frankly,” I said. “I’m just lucky I did.”

“Alright, you gotta try and explain how this works,” Shining said, and hoofed the leg over to me, the cover having been removed.

“Sure,” I said, activated it, put it back on, and started explaining how it works, while using it to eat with so that Shining could see it in action.

Like most people, he didn’t really understand how it worked. He got the concept, but the details of how it was tied to my arcanomorphic field and the mesh of magic-screening barriers worked went right over his head.

“I gotta be honest with you,” Shining said. “it’s very comforting, knowing that there’s somepony out there who can fix you up again if something really bad should happen.”

“Agreed,” Luna said, and raised her glass, having joined in on the conversation a while back. “Back in troubled times, it was sometimes truly frustrating to frequently have our comrades in arms have to step down from injuries when their minds and skills were at their peak.”

“I heard that prostheses were known technology a long time ago,” I said.

“Well, yes, but the past is quite a stretch of time. The knowledge faded long ago, during a long time of peace,” she said.

“It stresses you out sometimes,” Shining said. “That performing what you’ve trained for risks you not being able to do it anymore.”

I nodded in sympathy at that. Luckily, I hadn’t set my sights on a job requiring high physical capacity ten years ago. “Well, I’m happy to fix up anyone who needs it,” I said.

“Indeed,” Luna said. “And so we come to the subject of your accolades. We understand that you wished to postpone them.”

“Well, it was a bit sudden,” I said. “And I’m not sure exactly what it entails either.”

Luna put her hoof to her chin and thought for a moment, before Shining took over.

“Uhm, I don’t really remember everything, but it’s some ceremonial privileges,” he said. “Let’s see… being able to bypass waiting times in establishments that were funded with startup money from the crowns, access to certain wings in the castle, allowed to own property in certain restricted zones and territory… you’d also be allowed to solemnize marriages and preside over wedding ceremonies.”

I recoiled a bit at that last part, and hoped it would never come up.

“So Twilight can do all those things?” I asked.

“Yeah, and so can I,” Shining said. “It kinda never became relevant in Canterlot, I can’t imagine it would become more so in Ponyville.”

That was actually a bit comforting. “Explains why I didn’t know she had one,” I said.

“She’s not a flaunter, and neither are you,” Studded said.

“Indeed,” Luna said, and nodded. “Despite having helped several ponies so far, and submitted your creations to the institute, you’ve kept it practically secret.”

“I guess,” I said, then picked up the covering from the table. “That’s mostly Rarity’s contribution.”

“Case in point,” Luna said, then let out a yawn. “And now, we shall soon retire. Adjusting to the day takes it out of a mare. I imagine you two shall as well.”

Studded and I slowly glanced at each other, before turning back to Luna. “Uuh, we… will… eventually but uuuh…”

Luna seemed to realized what she just said, and shook her head. “Ah, yes, no, of course. We uh… we bid you a good night,” she said, and briskly walked away.

Studded and I looked at each other again, before slowly turning away, cheeks glowing, and saw that this latest exchange had gone unnoticed by everyone except a confused Shining Armor…

… And Cadence and Celestia, who were sitting beside each other on the far side of the table, leaning against each other while silent laughter wracked them, hooves hiding their muzzles and tears slowly building in the corners of their closed eyes.

—

The Crusaders, still having a surplus of energy from their time in front of the audience, were running ahead down the corridors. I wasn’t exhausted, but I still felt it would be a bad idea to try and discourage them from using the last of their reserves, seeing as I would be sleeping in the same room as them.

Someone who wasn’t sharing the Crusaders’ enthusiasm however, was Spike, as he lagged behind everyone else.

I slowed down, almost to a crawl, and let Spike catch up with me.

“Oh, c’mon, Spike,” I said, in what I hoped was an encouraging tone. “We all know you can breathe fire, and the torch lit up when you were up on the ladder. No harm done.”

Spike didn’t look up, and took a moment before he answered. “Yeah, but… the crystal ponies look up to me, I wanted to show them that I can be who they want me to be.”

“Yeah, that word, ‘show’,” I said. “That’s what it was, a show. You’re still Spike, you still saved the Empire and everyone in it.”

Spike still didn’t look up. “I just wanted it to be me that did it. I got all those applause, without doing anything.”

We fell into silence, the only sound besides from the crowd ahead of us was the muffled steps on the carpet.

What he said made me think of stories of Hollywood divas. Of when you hear of a ‘movie-star’ who’s pampered endlessly whenever the camera isn’t rolling, and who gets stunt-doubles to do everything impressive. I’ve wondered how much it would eat at your pride to know that you’re so celebrated for so little.

“I guess. I’m sorry, Spike,” I said. “But, you can fumble sports ceremonies as many times as you please, saving someone still makes you a hero. Saving a nation’s gotta feel pretty good, right?”

That coaxed a little smile out of the corner of his mouth. “I guess,” he said, before his eye lit up, and he finally looked up at me. “Hey, you played music on the train.”

That caught me a bit off-guard. “Uuh, yeah,” I said.

“Ponies love music,” Spike said, seemingly half to himself, looking straight ahead. “And you weren’t frightened at all.”

I looked at him suspiciously. “Only because I didn’t notice—”

I didn’t get farther than that, before Spike started jogging ahead. “Thanks, Gabe!” he said.

“Uuuh, okay,” I said, uncertainly, and sped up to catch up with the Crusaders.

—

“I need to get one of these back to the farm,” Apple Bloom said, resting her head on the side of the jacuzzi, held above the soft bubbling. “That old barrel bath we sometimes use has nothing on this.”

“Seconded,” Scootaloo said.

Sweetie and I looked at them. “I didn’t think you guys would be so happy about pampering yourself in luxury,” Sweetie Belle noted.

“Yeah, especially you, Scoots,” I said.

“Whatever,” Scootaloo said. “I’m confident in my filly-ninity.”

“That’s not a real word,” Sweetie Belle said.

“It is now,” Scootaloo countered flippantly.

Sweetie and I smiled and shrugged at each other, and went back to cleaning Apple Bloom and Scootaloo’s back.

This was something I hadn’t learned of before now. Me being a unicorn, living with a unicorn and a dragon, this hadn’t really come up, but ponies were A, very social and trusting, B, considered decent when not wearing clothes, and C, bodily challenged.

Let me clarify, all types of ponies could reach every part of their bodies. However, pegasi, and especially earth ponies, had to bend their necks in ways that weren’t comfortable for any length of time when they wanted to reach their backs, and cleaning involved soap, and soap doesn’t taste good, and while they could use a loofah with a handle, the arrangement to get around this had now already passed the point where the already minor hesitations about getting someone to help them with cleaning were now no longer relevant.

So I was gently scrubbing Apple Bloom’s back with my left foreleg (I had removed my prostheses. Not that they weren’t waterproof, it just felt like a waste to have more stuff to dry off) while Sweetie Belle did Scootaloo’s, after I had, without meaning to, tickled Scootaloo’s wings one time too many.

“You’ve never had your back cleaned?” Sweetie Belle asked me.

I shook my head. “Uhm, no,” I said. “I mean, I’ve cleaned it myself.”

“We’ll switch places later,” Apple Bloom said.

“Aah, you don’t need to do that,” I said.

“Yeah but, it feels weird to get the disabled pony to help you and not do the same,” Scootaloo said.

We eventually remembered room service, and after soaking for a bit longer with a snack and something cold to drink, we, reluctantly, got out, dried off, and went to bed, sharing two beds. I was lucky that Scootaloo was so quick to forgive, after I had burst out laughing earlier, when she had dunked her head and in the water and splashed her wings off. I try not to laugh at people, but she looked too much like a duck at that.

—

“So. You’re in the former domain of the—” the voice snorted, “Dread King Sombra.”

“Yes,” I said, calmly walking through some sort of museum, showing what I knew of the history of the Empire, the presence either walking along with me, or just being there in some way. “Interesting place, and a lot of similarities between this and human stories, about darkness from ancient pasts coming back terrorize the people of the present.”

“Before your friends stopped it. This time,” the voice noted. “Either way, an interesting concept for stories.”

“They’re often really good,” I said, stopping to look at a large model of the city behind a glass panel, with soothing ambient light and a beautifully painted backdrop behind it. “I remember one series of movies based on famous books some… ten, fifteen years ago. They were all the rage, and made it seem like someone had taken a science fiction & fantasy convention and sprinkled it across normal society.”

The voice let out a deep chuckle. “Lucky them that it was all imagination.”

“Not purely imagination.” I turned my gaze to another model of the Empire, this one with a sinister dark red ambient light, and backdrop painting of a blood-red moon. “We have some pretty dark chapters in our history as well,” I said, and focused on a large statue of Sombra in the center of the city. “I guess that’s why so many are always vigilant for people showing the most fleeting signs of… ‘old hatreds’ I guess you can call it. It got annoying sometimes, but I could understand, to a point.”

I felt the presence also focus on the statue of the old king, and let out a long contemplative hum. “Fool,” it sighed, judgingly, but sounding too tired to put any passion into it.

I looked towards the side curiously, only seeing an empty museum hall of course.

The voice eventually continued. “Such efforts, such accomplishments, motivated by what? Malice? Ambition?”

“Perhaps,” I said, and shrugged. “Who knows? Although what else motivates people who do something like that? Megalomania, maybe, but in this case it just sounds like a fancier word for malice and ambition.”

“So would you say someone motivated by love would do better?” the voice asked.

That would be a bit of a heady topic to be ambushed with on other situations, but this was a dream, and in dreams, that is not much of an issue.

It didn’t mean that I had an answer ready.

“I don’t know,” I said, eventually. “I don’t know how someone motivated by love would do something like this,” I said, gesturing to the display with the subjugated Empire. “But I don’t see how it could be any worse... so maybe it would be better. What do you think?”

I felt the unseen presence contemplate the question for a few moments. “I don’t know either,” it said, and turned its focus back to the statue of Sombra. “Perhaps we are all fools.”

I contemplated the words for a few moments, thinking back to words of wise people who might have had some insight. “Perhaps, but like what one of my favorite story tellers would probably say, we can try things out, and learn from that. The scientist in me would agree that that’s a good idea.”

I felt a smile grow on the unseen presence, or I would, if I could perceive a form for it. “A fine sentiment.”

I woke up in a dark, unfamiliar room, my two remaining limbs tightly constrained.

I tensed up in a brief moment of unease, before I realized that the strange room was the suite in the crystal castle, and the restraints was actually Scootaloo, fast asleep and holding me tight on my left side.

Gently angling my head, I could see Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom sleeping in the other bed, and not hugging each other.

I let out a sigh. They left me with the sleep cuddler. The only comfortable position I could figure out was to put my head where Scoots didn’t breathe on my face, and where I didn’t breathe on her ears and making them twitch and her squirm, which meant putting my head on top of hers.

After a while, I bobbed my head concedingly. ‘Okay, I think I can see why this is an appealing position for some. Also, you’d better not be a drooler, Scoots.’

—

I looked at the security guard in the ridiculous outfit with a deadpan stare, as the audience were trickling out onto the ledgers by the side. I thought I had been very understanding throughout the whole exchange, but his insistence had turned this into a duel of polite snarkiness, and while he had put up a good fight, I was still winning.

I normally wouldn’t be this passive-aggressive, but this was one of the few things that could really annoy me: when people think that their authority somehow means that they know what they’re doing.

“Like I said, miss, the next events require us to shield the arena from outside magical influence,” the guard said.

“Yes, you did say that, but I want to know if this is an arcano-scrambling mesh, or if it’s a thauma-disruptive matrix,” I said.

‘I would’ve let you off the hook, but now you will admit that you don’t know.’

“It’s not my job to reveal the specifics of this unit,” he insisted, but his hesitation before answering spoke volumes.

“Then get someone down here who is qualified to do so,” I said. “I need to know if this has lasting effects on any thaumatically or arcanically infused objects, and what happens if the objects reject magical tampering.”

I didn’t say anything with a smug tone, the end result would be all the sweeter if I didn’t.

The guard let out a sigh, and rubbed his temple. “Alright, look, little missy, your magic items won’t be affected after a few hours, and what you’re talking about is military grade stuff, you don’t have any of that.”

I did another quick magical scan of the archway I was supposed to step through. “Fine,” I said. “But I want you to say out loud, that if something happens to this thing from me walking through it with the stuff I have on me, I won’t be held responsible.”

He let out another sigh, and slowly said, “It won’t break, and you won’t be held responsible.”

“That was unspecific, but I feel I have the moral upper hand here,” I said, then stepped through.

The magical aura building up like a net around me started concentrating on my horn, before its attention was drawn towards my prostheses.

The guard’s expression was starting to shift to worried-looking from the display of magical light, as it struggled with my legs, before sputtering for a while, then popping like a soap bubble. Then the archway it came from let out a long-winded groan, like a gradually slowing turbine.

The guard, slack-jawed, lowered his sunglasses, and looked at the archway in silence.

“Do I need to say ‘told you so’?” I asked, but before his expression could warp into a snarl that he could aim at me, I waved my hoof to get his attention. “Hey-hey? Get your supervisor.”

—

I walked out to the stands of the stadium, and took a look around me. Tens of thousand, perhaps hundreds of thousands, ponies were waiting for the show to start, chatting, and looking for seats, and each other. Seeing so many ponies with their vast variety of color schemes was a spectacle in and of itself..

Obviously, I was annoyed with the “security” I had been talking to just now, since they separated me from the Crusaders, but I had a few tricks up my sleeve, also, unlike most ponies, technically a sleeve.

I made my way up to the top of the stands, and put my metal foreleg up to my mouth.

“Blue Thunder calling all agents.”

No response.

“Blue Thunder calling all agents, come in.”

“This is Orange Lightning with the rest of Bravo Team, responding to call. What’s your status, Blue Thunder? Over,” Scootaloo’s voice answered, despite talking through a full-duplex type communication.

“Got held up by security, but they finally realized that they were out of their depth. Over,” I said.

A few ponies looked at me curiously, but most didn’t notice me talking above the din.

“But they let you in with all your stuff? Over.” Sweetie Belle asked.

“Affirmative, White Flash,” I said. “They didn’t want me to at first, but after a while they called in a technician to assess the whole deal. He figured out who I was from the article in Applied Magics, and told the others I just had to walk over to the princesses to be let in anyway. Over.”

“Hah! That’s awesome. Over,” Scootaloo said.

“Yeah, I can’t use unicorn magic, but at least my legs still work. Anyway, what’s your position, Bravo Team?” I asked, looking out across the crowds spreading out in all directions. Ponies’ colorfulness wasn’t exactly helping to pick out individuals in this case. “Also, everyone’s present, right? Over.”

“Yep, Red Storm present,” Apple Bloom said. “We’re on… row eight, and it says five by the big entrance thingy.”

“Vomitorium,” Sweetie Belle helpfully added. “Over.”

“Copy that,” I said, scanning the area for the correct entrance.. “I suggest we engage in radio silence not related to rendezvous to not draw attention to our magical stuff. Over.”

“Affirmative. Over and out,” Scootaloo said.

It turns out that Scootaloo had gotten the communicator into the stadium since the Crusaders had just sauntered in through the athletes’ backstage section, just like they had all other days. No one had stopped them, and so they’d bypassed the new security.

After some amount of searching, I managed to find the Crusaders. On the way, I had been pretty sure that I had seen Rainbow Dash standing next to me, but it turned out it was just some of the audience members having been arranged in the correct color combination by chance.

“Hey, hey, Gabe!” I just managed to hear Apple Bloom call from my blind side.

I turned and saw them waving at me, and made my way over to them with a smile.

“Finally,” I said. “I didn’t miss anything did I?”

“Nope, I think the competitors are gonna come out and sing the anthem soon,” Scootaloo said, not being embarrassed in the least from seeing me, since I’d managed to squirm out of her grip before she had woken up earlier in the morning.

“Oh, neat,” I said. “Do you guys know the lyrics?”

“It’s kinda strange that you don’t know music for once,” Sweetie Belle noted.

I shrugged good-naturedly. “Can Rainbow sing?”

“Rainbow can do anything,” Scootaloo said.

“We’re about to find out,” I said. “And now I might finally see if gryphons can twitter.”

Scootaloo sniggered.

Then Spike came out on the field, and less said about what happened next, the better.

‘Oh, Spike,’ I internally groaned at the… singing.

Everyone around us were stunned by the display. The Crusaders and I were instead cringing, our ears flat against our heads, and sometimes glancing up over our hooves, hoping that a giant monster would attack, or that something would happen to make people forget this display.

—

The games were getting more and more entertaining as time went on. There was of course always the novelty of watching magical ponies perform, although the long-range dashes looked uncannily like a popular source of gambling back on Earth.

Aerial triathlon was made very interesting thanks to Rainbow Dash’s participation, but unicorn biathlon was my favorite.

Spike’s absence was a bit of a downer throughout the whole thing though.

He wasn’t very susceptible to cheering up, as we noticed when we checked in on him during the last days of the games. Instead, he was just packing everyone’s bags.

The Crusaders walked out of the room after we had checked in on him, but I stuck around for a while longer.

I guess I felt a bit more obliged to try and help. I live with him, after all.

That didn’t mean I knew what to say, but I tried my best.

“You know you’re still a hero, right?” I said.

Spike just let out a sound like a kicked dog.

“That’s what you get statues for,” I insisted.

“At least you can sing and play music,” he finally said, in an almost lifeless tone.

My ears slowly lowered themselves. ‘... Oh.’

I opened my mouth to say something, but nothing came out except a silent stammer.

‘Well, yeah, but that’s because I pract— No no, that’s not what he needs to hear. It doesn’t matter? Obviously it does to him. I thought it sounded nice? Yeah, come up with a more transparent lie than that, I dare you.’

“Do you want me to leave?” I asked.

Spike sighed, and didn’t answer for a moment. “I don’t know,” he said.

“... Are you mad at me?” I asked, hesitating a bit.

“No,” he said. “You didn’t tell me to do anything.”

That made me let out a small sigh of relief.

I walked up to him and put my foreleg around him. “Thanks,” I said.

Just as I was about to pull away, he leaned into my cheek for just a moment.

I let go of him, and walked towards the door. “I’ll check back later,” I said.

—

Security held me up again. The guard from before had called down the same technician as the other time, who oversaw my magic suppression. I had to remove my legs, and he carried me through the archway, whereupon I’d get my legs back and off I went.

Since it was the final day, the Crusaders were on the athletes’ area, prepping for the closing ceremonies. I’d forgotten to ask, Pinkie, Rarity, and Applejack where they were seated, when I heard Pinkie's voice from somewhere below me.

“Hey, there’s a spare seat here if you’re interested,” she said.

I looked around in confusion at the seats below me, before my attention was drawn to my prosthesis, where I kept my communicator.

“Pinkie? Is that you?” I asked.

“Sure is!” she said. “Where are you?”

“Over at the… central east entrance,” I said, and futilely scanned the area for them. “Where are you?”

“Up to the right of you,” Pinkie said.

I looked around the corner of the entrance, and saw Pinkie, Rarity, and Applejack waving at me, enthusiastically in Pinkie’s case.

I made my way up to them, then sat down next to them.

“Howdy, Gabe,” Applejack said. “How did you find us so fast?”

That made me look at them in confusion.

“Uh, Pinkie told me,” I said. “Did Scootaloo give you her communicator?”

“What communicator?” Pinkie asked, a big smile on her face.

After a few seconds, my brain let that tangled mess of logic go. “Uuh, whatever,” I said, and sighed. “Hey, I gotta rest my eye for a moment. All this looking at distant things makes me tired. Tell me when the exciting things starts.”

“Of course, darling,” Rarity said, and patted the spot on the bench not to her.

I was vaguely aware that things were going on. Pinkie was babbling about things, athletes were introduced, and on and on.

“Hey, Gabe, you want some popcorn?” Pinkie asked.

I opened my eyes, and stretched a bit. “Yeah, I could go for some.”

“You can start with the ones I spilled in your mane if you want,” Pinkie helpfully said.

“Thanks,” I yawned, and brought a few of them to my mouth.

Rarity groaned and Applejack sniggered at her.

“How’re you doing, Gabe,” Rainbow asked from my side.

“Uh!” I breathed, and jumped at her voice. “Rainbow! Have you been there long?”

Both she, and the Crusaders had joined us on the benches. The Crusaders sniggered a bit at me, but I just let them.

“Pretty long, yeah,” she said, and sniggered. “You look bushed.”

I shrugged. “Yeah. Travelling, eating different food, being surrounded by babble and cheering all day, sleeping in an unfamiliar room…”

‘Sharing the bed...’

“I don’t know about you, but all that makes me tired.”

Then there was also the thing where I could finally relax with some cloud cover. The clouds that were used in the unicorn biathlon were still overhead and dark with snow despite the pleasant temperature.

“Heh, I get ya,” she said. “But I get used to things fast, and I’m used to listening to cheering. Don’t worry, we’ll have you back in your quiet, cozy little library soon.”

“Trying to embarrass me, Rainbow?" I asked, smirking at her. “Not working, especially since I know how much you like your beauty sleep.”

“Hey, I…” Rainbow Dash said and trailed off. “Yeah okay, you win.”

“Tell me about this next event instead,” I said.

We got a quick rundown of the medal count, and the sports. Twilight walked past, wearing her tiara as she had whenever she was out in public these last few days, but she was busy looking for Spike.

Now, this next event rivalled the biathlon for me. The competitors were firing magic arrows which covered what they hit in ice, and the first one to cover their target completely in ice was the winner.

“Always with the crystallizing around here,” I noted.

“Seems appropriate, don’t you think?” Rarity said.

“I guess,” I said, as a one of the arrows suddenly flew straight up, into one of the clouds.

We watched in curiosity, then mounting horror, as who knows how many tons of water suddenly found itself as a big block of jagged ice.

Rainbow didn’t even put on a determined face before shooting up towards the monstrosity cruising towards stands on the far side of the arena.

“Somepony cut the disabling-spell!” I heard Shining Armor shout.

“There isn’t time!” the same security guard which had held me up shouted.

‘Oh, you worthless waste of space!’ I thought, as I took off, down towards the edge of the stands where the heavy railing lined the edge of the arena.

Even the princesses’ unicorn magic was disabled, and judging from what I’d seen Twilight doing, if they broke through the spell, they risked an explosion that would hurt everyone in a wide radius around them, or shoot a beam at the ice block so powerful it would pretty much turn it into a big bomb.

Just as I was about to reach my grappling hook towards the block of ice, and lash the rope around the railing, I heard Spike shout something.

What happened next would be the talk of the Empire for years afterwards. Spike jumped off of a series of pegasi, and shot out an inferno through his mouth so massive that I was pretty sure that the parts of the ice in direct contact with flames went from solid matter to plasma in an instant.

The green inferno just kept spewing out of his mouth, before he landed on the grass, as the now fluid block of ice rained down on the field around him.

Silence reigned the arena for a while, before, and I was among the first to start, a massive cheer rose up.

“YEEEAAAHH! GO, SPIKE!” I shouted, loud enough for my voice to crack, and I simply didn’t care, although my voice was pretty much drowned out by the din.

—

There were simply no end to the celebrations. Ponyville won the medal count, the audience had loved the Crusaders’ opening, and of course, Spike had lived up to his title of “brave and glorious”, in front of one of the largest gatherings of ponies annually.

“Those were some really nice fireworks,” Armor said, as I sat resting on his back, with Celestia and Luna standing next to us as we watched Spike receive a medal from Cadence.

It was a quiet little affair, inside the palace, with just Spike’s friends, the royals, and a few flunkies.

“They were,” Luna admitted. “Although they pale in comparison to the spectacles that pegasi of old were fond of.”

“Those could be a bit dangerous,” Celestia said.

“We suppose,” Luna said. “Although speaking of which, what say you, Gabrielle? We heard that you are still working on restoring our little ponies when they’re injured, are you ready to receive your award?”

“Oh, uh, kinda, I guess,” I said. “I have some vision arrangements that I want to look into first. This guardspony, uh, what was her name?”

“Sandstone,” Armor said.

“Yeah, her,” I said. “I wanna see what I can do for her. I gotta remember to ask Shining Armor if she lost her eyes or if she just scarred them. Perhaps some lens arrangement would be better,” I said, putting my hoof to my chin in contemplation, already losing myself in ideas.

Luna just shook her head slowly at me. “You remind us of Starswirl,” she said.

“She does,” Celestia said, with a warm smile, before chuckling to herself. “He always said that he’d made arrangements for ponies to keep advancing magic, and his creation was what brought you here. I suppose he was right.”

“Heh, that is pretty funny,” I said.

After a while, I asked Armor, “Are you heading back to Canterlot?”

Perhaps it had been the relative lack of sleep lately, but I didn’t quite have the focus to stop myself from having a slightly pleading tone.

“Yeah, soon. My tour here is almost up,” he said, and turned his head to me. “Cap said that a knight should know how to fight. Ask me to and I’ll teach you.”

I glanced at Celestia and Luna, who had moved away to congratulate Spike, then slowly moved in to peck Armor on the lips.

He recoiled before I could though, and I couldn’t help but give him a slightly hurt look.

“Uuh, sorry,” he said, sheepishly. “It should be okay, it’s just that… last time, you gave me stomach problems.”

I would’ve felt vaguely insulted if I hadn’t been so surprised. “Oh, right,” I said. “Twilight said that I should be careful with that.”

“Yeah, doc said that I had an influx of foreign bacteria,” Armor said. “But, uuh, it should be okay now. Also, you supposedly made my digestion stronger,” he said, looking a bit sheepish again.

“Careful around us predators,” I said, with a slight grin, as I put my hoof around his neck, holding him in place this time. “I make you sick, huh?” I said, intending to pay him back for that.

Gaiden

Author's Note:

Thank you to Eckaji, Snuffy, and ThemaskedFerret for their help in proofreading and editing.

Part 2 is slowly coming to a close, but we have a bit more slice of life to go through before anything else is ready to happen

Comments

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

Concerning some of the feedback and observations I've received from previous chapter, I have this to say:

You want shipping!? I'll give you shipping!

[Szalhi]

man, I literally hyperventilated when I saw this on the front page.

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8139845 Sorry for the delay, it's been practically ready for release for two days now

Also, with your use of the word 'literally', I hope you're okay. I'm out to amuse, not harm

[Greatazuredragon]

“That’s amazing,” Thunderlane said.
“It’s magic,” I said, evenly. “Also, I had friends who helped me.”
“It’s still amazing.”
“Yeah, friendship is pretty magical, I’ve found,” I said.

Gabe is just as adorkable as Twilight sometimes.

“Uhm,” he started again. “Whose uh, whose music is it then?”
I shrugged. “Well, it’s by two people from back… back where I’m from.” ‘Well, not exactly, but compared to another world, you could say that it’s where I’m from.’ “A ma— mare and a stallion, a couple, called Night and Blackmore.”
“Ah, that sounds more like pony names,” Thunderlane said, nodding. “Thestrals, I bet.”

... and now I have the image of a bat pony death metal band in my head...

“Hey, Twilight,” I said. “Do you have a knighthood?”
She looked a bit taken aback at that, and put her hoof to her chin. “Uhm, maybe…” she started.
“She does,” Spike called from Rarity’s room. “You got one before we went to Ponyville, for the teleportation-spell, remember?”
“Oh, that’s right,” Twilight happily recollected. “That got me an award.” She beamed modestly.
Twilight’s friends just looked at her in silence.
“Darling,” Rarity said after a while, speaking slowly, as if addressing a child. “You have to remember to tell us these things.”

Two peas in a pod.

Awesome chapter, great work.

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8139858 Always glad when my veterans like my chapters

By the way, Blackmore's Night isn't exactly death metal

[Greatazuredragon]

8139871 I know, but a bat pony fits more a death metal setting, I think.

[DoctorDerpy]

New chapter yesssss!

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8139880 Ponies and metal. You know, it's still in the planning-stage, but you might enjoy a fic that I'm working on in my head

8139882 Hope you'll like it

[ssokolow]

Me, Twilight, and the crusaders were about file in

"I, Twilight, and the crusaders were about to file in"

("Me was" makes no sense, so "Me, X, and Y were" also makes no sense.)

[HoneyBadgerr]

This chapter was thoroughly awesome. Seeing Gabe becoming an unintentional heartthrob is hilarious.

[Majk]

Awww Stud is back.
Now that she's working on eyes, i kinda want to see her own shooting magical lasers.

[Golanth]

8139810
I'm conflicted, I don't know if I prefer Rumble or Armor

[lazyreader19]

Yay new chapter! Oh how I missed this story

but we have a bit more slice of life to go through before anything else is ready to happen

hey, no rush! I'll never grow bored of this delicious pie of life you're peddling

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8139896 Thank you. Always something that slips by

8139906 Gabe: "Heartthrob...? Me? Sorry, but you're better off talking with a cardiologist, I'm radiologilist."

8139907 If I say 'prosthetic tail', what do you say?

8139929 I don't know either. Obviously, what this story needs is a harem

8139940 Think of how satisfying it would be to go back to a slice of life after an appropriately big adventure

[Majk]

8139948 I'll ask if prehensile tentacles are a viable attatchement.

[Filraen]

I had some interest in seeing it, but it was overshadowed by my curiosity about the empire itself, but more on that later, back to the human body.

The sentence feels weird with so many commas,

I liked the whole conversation with Rumble and Thunderlane, Gabe could easily navigate the chat and wow this crowd of two.

“Well you should show her,” Roseluck said, standing next to Lily and Daisy. “You could play together.”

Wow, that's a good change of pace for those three since the first time.

“Yeah, what would the world look like if people were too embarrassed to share their music?” Daisy said.

Oh, right. Improvised musicals is a way of life there.

Yeah, I can totally see Twilight having a knighthood and forgetting about it.

A good thing I see is that any time you throw a Shout Out it only stays enough time to be acknowñedge and then you quickly move on.

... and that's how much I can get to read now, I'll finish the chapter later.

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8139971 In the words of Antoine Dodson: "Well, obviously."
But what tools/weapons would you like in it?

8140003

A good thing I see is that any time you throw a Shout Out it only stays enough time to be acknowñedge and then you quickly move on.

I try going for precision shots when using pop culture-references if that's what you mean. If there was another type of shoutout in this chapter, I've forgotten it

[Nova Blaze]

Full disclosure, the chapter title made me think of "The Black Cauldron". And if She does the eyes, I would love to see one of the early prototypes kinda leak magic making a sort of fire from the eye.
t03.deviantart.net/OlrwT5aSb6EGuhl4sayFzQhLwck=/fit-in/700x350/filters:fixed_height(100,100):origin()/pre00/ddf1/th/pre/i/2016/160/d/f/sans___undertale___you_re_gonna_have_a_bad_time__by_walkingmelonsaaa-d9kg0tl.png

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140030 That's Undertale, right? I haven't played that. At least not yet. The name of the chapter actually comes from an old Warhammer game called Shadow Of The Horned Rat

[Nova Blaze]

8140034 Ah, well see, never played Warhammer. I've shown my age with that connection, haven't I?

[Stormcaller]

Oh sweet Celestia thank you, I sorely need a good story with a long chapter to read right about now.

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140037 With you knowing of the game or not knowing of it? More telling is your name and avatar

8140040 *Puts a hand in front on Stormcaller's foreheaf* You're healed!

[Nova Blaze]

8140042 While true, I meant the fact that I know what the Black Cauldron is. Still have the VHS and everything.

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140044 Haven't seen it, but I'm looking at pictures of it now. Reminds me of Rankin & Bass' version of LoTR but with better character design, or Ralph Bakshi's version but without rotoscoping. I'm not sure removing those things would in itself add to the entertainment-value though

[badninja]

I am surprised that Gabe kept a straight face when she was introduced to the Imperial Stormtrooper. I would have done a double take and commented about them being out of armor and something Star Wars related, today being May the Fourth and all. Fun chapter and I hope Gabe will have more fun with Rumble in future chapters!

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140068 "Aren't you a little short for a stormtrooper?"

This being released on May 4 is actually unintentional. I was hoping to release it yesterday and the Star Wars-element completely slipped me by

[Drunk Thoughts]

Good stories like yours is like a bag of cocaine, it's great, make you feel like you're in another world, but too much quantity is bad, but you still want more because it make you feel great, but you know you have to wait because you don't want to become an addict, but then you really want more, so you decide to make excuse that because you inhale other drugs, you will not become addicted, then you start smoking weed(short stories) but then your weed stash ran out, so you decide to sniff glue(bad, clop, second arse written stories), but then your brain start failing and you later fall into a coma, dying slowly as your body rot on the inside, waiting for you to be buried so your outside can rot aswell. You later wakes up realizing you have sleep on the computer and late for school after reading a shitty clopfic and realize you waste an entire day reading horse fucking eachother

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140083 What an elaborate comment, and very flattering too. Thank you

[Crescent Glaive]

Dang.... no next chapter button

*demented giggling*
Guess i need to wait then....
i2.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/facebook/000/005/722/TheLuna.jpg
Just patiently wait for Knight Enchanter Snake Tape to return to us once more with an awe inspiring story....

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140098 You'll be pleased to know that I really do feel motivated by encouraging comments. Thank you

[gagiotter]

8140105
Here have some more motivation and encouragement:
I love this story and it every new chapter makes my day way better. Thank you very much for spending your time on giving us (and the fandom in general) something to look forward to.

EDIT:
And how bad of me to forget to thank everyone else who helped. So thank you editors and proofreaders as well!

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140116 Aaw, thank you. I might start jotting down notes for the upcoming chapter as soon as today

Edit: I'd prefer a PM
EditEdit: Unless you plan on editing your comment after I edit the story.

[Alaborn]

What he said made me think of stories of Hollywood divas. Of when you hear of a ‘movie-star’ who’s pampered endlessly whenever the camera isn’t rolling, and who gets stunt-doubles to do everything impressive. I’ve wondered how much it would eat at your pride to know that you’re so celebrated for so little.

I wonder that too. Costumers and makeup artists define how you look. Scriptwriters put words in your mouth. Directors tell you how to act and what you're feeling. The actor is just an empty vessel for all these other people.

Probably why there are so many awards shows in Hollywood.

[Orbiting Kettle]

Yay, new chapter!

It's always a pleasant surprise finding them among my tracked stories.

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140123 There are actors who're just captivating to see on screen, but take Stallone when he was at his 'peak'. There were supposedly quite the elaborate arrangements for his luxury and comfort on the set of Demolition Man. Plenty of tales of rock stars being like that in the 70' and 80's too, but at least most of them put a serious amount of hours into practicing their craft. Sly didn't exactly convince people with his performance in Demo-man. I use Sly as an example because from what I saw of Creed, he's really gotten this whole acting-thing down lately

8140132 And I'm always pleased to hear that I make someone happy

[nocara]

Oh finally! Dunno what happen later but I was not able to find some good update for weeks!
Awesome slice of life, I like them :)
Also poor Rumble xD

[zoruatrainer66]

Maybe she could enchant a prosthetic eye to have infrared/ultraviolet (or even thermal/x-ray if you want to get crazy) vision on top of normal vision, like a mental command?

Prosthetic ears could act as parabolic microphone or have echolocation, again with a mental switch?

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140175 Thank you

Do you think Rumble will be okay with some sort of harem-arrangement with Gabe and Armor, perhaps even Scootaloo?

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140178 I had considered enhanced vision, but I hadn't considered hi-tech ears. Good idea

[Detsella Morningdew]

I think I facepalmed at least seven times during this chapter.

And laughed out loud at least ten.

This chapter had pretty much everything I like in a story.

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140195 Glad you like it

I can only think of three facepalms though, and I can never remember how many laughs I put in it, and how many works when people read it

[Misdirection]

Nice update!

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140281 Thank you

[Vadelent]

So it really is alternate universe Sombra after all. Neat.

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140297 Could be, but don't forget who they talk about in the last scene of the chapter, and who facilitated Gabe coming to Equestria

[Detsella Morningdew]

8140207 Pretty much all the facepalms were from Gabe's obliviousness.

Some scenes required several.

[PinkiePieFox]

[Snakeskin Ducttape]

8140307 Obliviousness? Gabe's skills of observation are like that of a hawk.

Gabe: "They are?"

Sure they are *pats Gabe on the head*.

8140310

[katarjin]

8139810 my shipping side is quite happy but the rest of me hopes you didn't have to change your plans to do it.

[Eternal Pain]

Hehe, shadow of the horned king. Was that an intentional reference for Warhammer shadow of the horned rat?