• Published 10th Sep 2015
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Mandatory Motherhood - dargondarkfire



Woke up, everyone's gone, and I'm some kind of alien horse. Well, not everyone, I did find another: a baby. A baby alien horse that treats me as her mother.

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Chapter5: May 30th - June 8th (tiny update to Buffalo Wy.)

Author's Note:

Alright sorry for the delay guys. I wanted to put this out sooner but Holyme has IRL issues:pinkiesad2:, he should speed up once he gets a better computer chair and his classes finish up. he has gotten about 1/5th through the chapter.

if you see mistakes or questions please let me know via PM if they are large, and please point out where they are, just one or a handful of words is very little to go off of.

SeverSerenity has been very generous and has offered to make chapter art for MM!:pinkiehappy: Thank you so much, She has several planned for chapter 5 but only 1 finished at the moment, she will finish the rest once finals are over.

Finals are rushing up on me, and I'm burnt out!:ajsleepy: having a hard time focusing on my work. (doesn't help when I'm told to answer a few questions scattered across an hour and a half long video she linked the class.:facehoof:

So can't wait for final to end, because I will be heading to EverFree NW in Seattle! If your going look for me! Say hi! Give a hoof bump! Shower me with gifts! (i'm joking on this last part! Um, unless you really want to that is... Just don't shower me with heavy object please!:fluttercry:)

I don't want to make you guys wait much longer so here is chapter 5!

Mandatory Motherhood
By Dargondarkfire
Ch. 5

Dream log 2. I have mentioned before that after the change I remember every dream I have when I wake up. It feels… disorienting. My dreams, they feel, well... They feel almost real. However, even if I know I’m dreaming, I can’t fully manipulate them like a lucid dreamer, they seem to have a mind of their own.

Most dreams I have seem to be nonsensical predictions of the future that happen years after the dream occurred. Here is an idea of what I mean: many years ago, I had a dream about my folks and grandparents eating together at a table. They all start arguing and, well, the best way to put it... is things got weird. I didn’t remember anything after I woke up, but several years later, on a fourth of July evening, I found myself sitting at a very familiar restaurant table with my parents and grandparents, minus the weirdness and the arguing.

If my dreams are showing me an abstract vision of the future, I hope I’m not going crazy, since I literally had an argument about spacetime physics with a floating blue watermelon. Why would I remember that bizarre dream I had about two years ago? I will never know. I had a couple interesting dreams last week. I’ll try and explain them briefly.


The first dream that sticks out happened like this. I was shifting back and forth between a human male and a female unicorn while running through empty streets. I had no clue what was chasing me, but I kept hearing a voice screaming “Don’t let them take me!” I have no clue who was screaming but it sounded like a female. My dream ended when I and was engulfed by shadows. I woke up to find Starla laying across my muzzle, making it difficult to breathe.

The second dream that sticks out was a lot more interesting. I found myself in a hallway made of crystal. It wasn’t your endless corridor type of dream, but it was a rather long hall with a few doors on the sides, and large doors at each end. I felt like I wandered forever in that place, and none of the side doors opened except for the ones that gave access to bathrooms made of crystal, or a broom closet that had nothing but a single broom in it… Which waved at me before closing the door.

There were rooms at the end of every hall that seemed to vary in shape and size. At some point, I found a door that looked like transparent mercury, and through it I could see a very tall blue pony with wings and a horn. She looked shocked to see me. When she spoke I couldn’t hear anything, and after she noticed this she got upset and tried talking even more, which caused the door to ripple and shake unstably. It wasn’t until the door solidified and shattered that I heard her scream, “No!” But the door and the pony were now gone, leaving a very large, empty chamber behind it.

I continued my search until I came upon the only furnished room in the entire place. It was a large room that made me wonder if someone had taken my ideal man cave out of my head and made it real. It was like a combination study-magic laboratory straight out of a fantasy movie. One of its notable features was a rather large and ornate hardwood table, which was covered in figurines that depicted familiar characters and creatures from fantasy and sci-fiction universes, along with various dice and books. Sitting at the table was a shrunk-down Optimus Prime, Gandalf, Tony Stark in his Iron Man armor, Bat Man, and a bipedal black dragon with feathered wings playing a mix of old maid, D&D, and random anime trivia with their left hands while playing video games at the same time with their right hands.

I was just about to say buck it and ask to join until I woke up, however something caught my eye. In the center of the room, on a small pedestal, floated a hoof-sized crystal that had a blue flame in the center of it, and mist poured out of it as it slowly spun in place. I took a step towards it, which caused the chaotic mix of gamers to suddenly go quiet and stare at me. If that wasn’t creepy enough, I could suddenly hear sobbing. Then I could hear someone talking. It started as a whisper at first, but it steadily grew louder. “Help! I don’t want to be alone anymore. Don’t leave me alone…”

I really have no clue what was going one, but the voice continued to get louder until it was screaming the same thing over and over. The screaming got unbearable and eventually the dream shattered around me, causing me to jolt awake. Colgate did not enjoy getting flung off the bed, which wouldn’t have happened if she hadn’t been lying on my back. It did feel rather nice to have her next to me, however.


May 30th-June 7th. A lot has happened over the past week. May 30 and 31 were rather uneventful, other than that stuff happens that allows Colgate to dodge her questions to dodge my questions. Every time I ask either Starla starts crying or one of Amore’s pack members goes crazy over something. It’s like the universe literally won’t let me get any answers!

June 1st. Colgate agreed to go and search the Camplex for a motor home. I thought our trip would be easy, but I was wrong. The Camplex was packed like a sardine can, with motorhomes parked bumper to bumper. The worst thing was that I could smell something off. It wasn’t a bad stink, but the odor was similar to what I smelled before Gums and his little pack had attacked us.

It wasn’t long before a feral pack found us and we managed to barricade ourselves in a nearby motorhome. The dogs showed no sign of leaving us alone for several hours, I was just about ready to try charging into a brawl with them⎯Yes that would have been stupid of me⎯ when Colgate opened the fridge to look for a snack and the stench of rotten meat filled the motor home. With a very quick toss, from Colgate’s magic, the dogs were occupied and we slipped away. Too bad this wouldn’t work very well in other places.

We pulled some meat from other motorhomes and left them on the ground, which kept the dogs busy while we searched. We wasted so much time between waiting out the dogs and raiding fridges of their spoiled food. By the Maker, I wish I had a camera drone, then I could have safely looked around. I don't know how I would operate it though, since I no longer have thumbs!

I was beginning to lose hope that we would find an RV with solar panels. Just when I wanted to give up, Starla jumps off my back and takes off running. The sun was beginning to set, there were feral dogs roaming nearby, and Starla wanted to play tag!

When I finally caught up, I found her jumping around someone’s pink flamingos, in front of a spacious area that had several motorhomes I could never hope to afford with my retail paycheck. I’m starting to notice a pattern with Starla: every time I get frustrated that I can’t find something, she takes off at the blink of an eye and ends up leading me right to it. This time was no different. I just wish she could do it without giving me a heart attack.

Off the top of my head, and the manuals I checked, there was a Newmar King, Monaco Dynasty, and... an Element Palazzo, I think it’s called? It’s really cool-looking and Colgate thought it was a spaceship at first. Had there been no wheels I would have played along. Frankly, I’m surprised she has any idea of what a spaceship would look like.

I decided to claim the Featherlite Vantare, as it had the better engine between the two units that had solar panels installed. At least, that is what the pamphlets I checked seemed to indicate. Plus, it has a gorgeous interior. I thought we might have scored a luxury car as a bonus, since these units are listed as having a slide-out garage compartment, but the owner of this one seems to have had it modified for a slide-out porch and extra cargo space. Probably better this way, having more supplies is better then an extra gas guzzler.

I really wanted to take it back to the house right now, but — like I said earlier — the Camplex is packed tight and even this area, which was more spacious for the luxury motorhomes, was still packed tight. We'll have to come back for it with a plan on how to get it out of the Camplex, since there wasn't much daylight left to work with.

Getting back to the SUV was much easier than finding our way to the motor home. We only ran across one dog, who was limping and didn’t pay us much mind. I wondered if Amore and some of her pack would have kept the feral dogs away, if I had brought them along. The rest of the day was pretty uneventful.

Except for dinner, when Colgate and I got into a rather intense argument and she refused to let me sleep on the bed. I mean, really. Are we a married couple, now? Colgate is rather pretty and does… Sorry, I told her how nice it would be to find some other survivors, which she agreed on. That was until I told her how I need to find Starla’s mom, or an actual mare to take care of her, which was when she told me that I should be Starla’s mom.

I keep telling her that Starla needs a real mom, not a guy stuck in a mare’s body. Colgate is adamant that I’m her mother now and she won’t give me a solid reason for why I must be her mother. Ugh! Why doesn’t she understand? I-I can’t be her mother. Yes, I have taken parenting classes and taken care of young children, even as young as Starla, but not for longer than thirty-six hours at a time!

No one is ever prepared to be a mother the first time.

Even so, I’m a guy and it’s unfair to Starla. She has a mother out there somewhere! That’s another thing: when I told Colgate that, she said something about the chance of them meeting in their lifetime being slim and that I shouldn’t worry about it. When I asked her what exactly she meant, she turned pale. How does this work with fur? It’s driving me crazy wondering about it. I tried pressing for details on what she meant, but she avoided answering and we just ended up arguing stupidly, like kids would, and only stopped once Starla started bawling because we upset her.

Would it be so bad to be her mom?

No. I mean, Yes! I’m a guy! It makes no sense for me to be her mom! I think Colgate would be a better mother than me!

I do like Starla, I even love the little sweetheart, but I can’t be her mom. Whoever I find to be her mother, I’ll try and stay with them and be a father figure for her… As much as I can be with this body. I-it just wouldn’t feel right. She deserves to have an actual mom. Maybe I could be her aunt?


“Chris, who are you talking to? It’s four in the morning.” I can barely see Colgate drowsily walk into the room.

“I—The voice recorder… I think?” I look at her from upside down. “Why are you on the ceiling?”

“What? No, Crystal: I hung you up by your hind legs from the ceiling fan, remember?”

I look down at my hooves. “Oh, that makes sense now. I was starting to worry that I had developed a split personality”

I think her eyes widened in shock, but it’s too dark to tell. “Okay, this was a bad Idea. I let my anger get the best of me and I had a good laugh, but it was clearly a bad idea to leave you up there.”

“Oh, thank you, Colgate! I’m sor—oof!” I made a loud thump as I hit my head on the floor.

“Crystal?! I’m sorry! Are you alright, Crystal? Crystal?” She checks Chris’s pulse and sighs with relief. “Thank Celestia, er… Wait, you're knocked out, so I don’t have to worry about you asking who Celestia is. It’s probably safer if you don’t know.”

Colgate levitates Chris onto her back and takes her to the bedroom.


June 8th. I just spent half an hour figuring out how to delete several hours of silence after, well... I fell asleep. I think. Last night was a little fuzzy. Starla is napping in the bedroom, and Colgate is packing up the supplies because we are going to leave Sheridan now. Oh, wait, I didn’t get to that part last night. I’ll fix that right now.

June 2nd. We spent the morning going to the grocery store and loaded as much of the spoiled meat as we could get into six large coolers. The stuff reeked, but it wasn’t the worst thing we would smell that day. When we were leaving, Amore and several of her pack were sitting outside waiting for us. I had no clue what was up until she moved her head as if she wanted us to follow and headed across the parking lot towards the PetCo.

Colgate quickly tossed the coolers into the truck and used it to follow her. This made me realize something: Amore’s pack has been surviving entirely on the dog food that we have pulled out of the grocery stores, Walmart, and Kmart. One big bag can feed a dog for a while if they don’t overeat, but Amore’s pack has at least forty members now. There are two places left, that I know of, that sell pet food: PetCo and the Co-Op. And, maybe, the receiving area in Walmart. I hadn’t thought to check how much food they had left.

Colgate used her tools and unlocked the front doors. When we pushed them open, I began to wish that we had left this place alone. A hundred or so animals had been inside, unable to eat and drink from their enclosures, and with no one to clean up after them while they still lived. The best way I could think of to describe the smell to anyone would be a morgue that someone had used as a bathroom, then turned the refrigeration off, and left all the storage doors hanging open. Even the dogs didn’t want to go in once the smell hit them.

We should have let the dogs get the food out themselves, but they wouldn’t be able to get anything off the higher shelves, and the bags would rip apart if they tried to get them across town. So, we helped and loaded them onto the truck. Okay, it might not have been so bad if I had been smart and had a couple of the dogs watch Starla. She has been having a hard time adjusting to the formula. It’s not sitting very well with her without actual breast milk mixed into it. She couldn’t take the smell for more than a few minutes before she threw up on me. By the maker that was horrifying!

On top of that, out of every animal in the place that could still be alive, the pet store’s only survivor is a scarlet macaw. He hassled us as we worked, by throwing things at us from the upper shelves. I thought he was going to attack Starla when I had found a spot that didn’t smell so bad, that she could rest in while we finished working.

I found myself wondering if the laws of the universe were being played with by a clown or something: because, as soon as the bird got close to Starla, she grabbed and hugged him. The poor bird has been following us around ever since. I can’t get him to go away, so I told him if he uses the hardwood as a bathroom I’m going to have roasted macaw for dinner. He has listened so far, and won’t go away, so I’ve started calling him Archie. I always wanted a pet parrot when I was a child.

Archie is a very sweet bird, and very smart. I don’t know if whatever changed us made him any smarter, or if he was already this smart. He can talk and you can have a limited conversation with him, mostly consisting of: yes, no, bird, danger, and pony. The last one he just picked up. He doesn’t spend much time with us, though: he disappears for most of the day, then shows back up around the evening and finds some place to roost. I don’t mind that so much. I just wish he would stop trying to use my horn as a perch!

Sorry, got a little sidetracked there. As I said before, the plan was to go to the Camplex and get the motor home, but the little side trip had kept us occupied till lunch time. Which included having to go back to the house and shower, because I didn’t want vomit to harden in anyone’s fur. We still had water, but that wasn’t going to last much longer. So, we got our showers taken as quickly as possible, grabbed a bite to eat, then headed to the Camplex.

We spent the next five hours moving motorhomes around, so I could safely drive my desired motor home back to the house. The coolers of meat almost didn’t last long enough to finish the job, but the dogs gorged themselves on the meat till they were stuffed and then slept. I did notice that the feral look they had and their hostile scent seemed to decrease with the offering of food. As I watched them eat for the first minute or so, I recalled the food issue with Amore’s pack. They were friendly to us right now, but I worry what will happen once we run out of food to give them. I’ll keep an eye on things for now. If they start looking at us like we are food, then we will say goodbye to the town I have lived in for twenty two years.

Dinner wasn’t anything special: just a cold can of green beans for Colgate and myself, while Starla got formula. The oven at the house is useless since it’s an electric unit. What is worth mentioning, and I’ve been so excited to share, is that Colgate has started teaching me magic.

She gave me a rundown of the basics. For the most part, the spell most used by any unicorn is levitation, which is cast mostly by instinct and one’s will. Other spells require runes in some manner, via a mental or verbal incantation, engraving, or drawing at the start. With time, practice and use, almost any spell or rune can come to an individual instinctually.

Spells can go out of control if one is not careful and continue to draw magic from the caster, possibly to the point of killing them. Levitation and light-producing spells are not immune to this rule. Avoid overpowering a spell, as doing so will usually cause the spell to go out of control, have undesirable effects, explode, or have a combination of the three outcomes. In maybe three to six months I can try lifting a living being about the size of a mouse with levitation, but nothing else until I have at least a year or two of experience without another unicorn watching me.

We are going to focus on meditation, sensing the magic around me, and levitation. She is also going to teach me the basic light spell and the runes it requires. Once I can levitate things, without destroying them or making them vanish, she will begin teaching me the runes used in spell casting. I don’t know if I should consider myself lucky or cursed that she has a book of all the runes with her. It’s a very thick book. When I questioned her as to why she carries one with her, she told me that she needs to double-check her runes from time to time.

As expected, I didn’t do very well for my first lesson. I ended up being able to keep a feather floating for six seconds by the end of it, before I got tired and collapsed. Unfortunately, the feather is now a bunch of shredded fuzz, but, hey, a little progress is still progress.

Unicorns can draw magic from both within and without themselves. It gets confusing from here, but if a unicorn over drains themselves, or experiences extreme magic exhaustion it can kill them, or any power in general. A pony can live without magic however, but from what colgate explained about about the time it happened to her, not how it happened just how the event left her, she had a hard time moving, she couldn’t draw or control magic, and she felt extremely tired and vulnerable.

Colgate ended my lesson by explaining magic capacity. Using magic is like using a muscle: the more you use it the stronger it can get and the more magic you will have. She warned me that tiring myself out is good and healthy, but if I push myself further things will become risky for myself and possibly others around me. While grim, the final note of the lesson was this: “No matter how much magic you have, no matter how powerful you are, when you use your magic for others you will accomplish more compared to what you can achieve for your own sake no matter the cost.”

June 3rd. The water stopped, so no morning shower. I wondered how long it would take before I started smelling like a horse. The answer, two days. But that’s beside the point. We needed to refill the gas tanks of the trucks and the RV. Pumps, however, do not work without power. No power, no gas; no gas, no transportation. I’m counting my blessings that the construction depot we visited had some trailer-pulled generators, along with manuals, that were fueled and ready to go.

Colgate is thankful that she can’t be electrocuted through her magic, and I’m thankful we didn’t get blown up or fry the wiring when we connected the generator up to the truck stop’s power grid. Neither of us has ever hooked a generator up. It was a learning experience, to say the least. There wasn’t much for supplies inside, other than water, dried and canned goods, and snacks. I don’t know what I was expecting, but I could have really used a slushy right then.

With the RV and refrigerated truck fueled up, I did the last count of our supplies for the trip. Everything should last, but I hope I can find more of the formula that Starla is drinking. I only found three containers in the whole town and the second one is half gone. Maybe I should have gone with the cheaper stuff, but no one was there to stop me from taking the top-quality stuff. If I can’t find more, I dread how hard it will be to switch her to a new formula.

I’m starting to wish I was lactating just to keep Starla fed easier. Not that she hasn’t stopped trying to feed on me. However, my mammaries have swollen noticeably now. I really hope this isn’t some bizarre, swelling bruise from Starla, or an infection of some kind. They aren’t huge like a human woman would have, but they are not flat anymore, maybe an inch or so lower than usual.

That was a weird topic, sorry about that. Anyways, once we were finished I was shocked to see Amore and five other pack members sitting in front of the RV. Starla was overjoyed and Colgate shared my confusion. They apparently wanted to come with us, because as soon as we opened the doors a Scottish Terrier and Dalmatian — who I think came from the fire station — jumped into the truck, while Amore, the Border Collie, and a poodle jumped into the RV.

I figured trying to get them to stay behind would be more of a hassle than it was worth, and I felt a bit safer with them. And, hey, poodles are great dogs. My grandmother raised several of them. They are also hunting dogs, which very few people realize. I told Colgate to roll down the window if they get rowdy. She was confused by that at first, but ended up very happy about the recommendation later on.

I don’t know who was swerving more on the drive between Colgate and myself. She’s still really new to driving and this is the first time I have driven something this big, not counting getting the motor home out of the Camplex.

We took a break in Buffalo, Wyoming. I didn’t find any more of the formula that Starla is drinking at the IGA, and there were no signs of looting anywhere. There was also a very distinct lack of animal life in town, especially since Buffalo is right next the Mountains. I couldn’t smell anything dangerous, so I figured everything was fine. Colgate snoozed in the shade while I watched Starla play with her stuffed unicorn. Eventually, she began to chase a butterfly around after escaping from a diaper change.

It wasn’t long before the wind started blowing from another direction and I began to smell something off and it wasn’t the dirty diaper. I started looking around for whatever was causing the smell before I saw something that freaked me out: a badly-injured dog came limping around the side of the grocery store, and soon after a bear slammed into the poor canine and ended its life.

I quickly grabbed Starla and woke Colgate up before hightailing it out of the little town. What happened as I tried to get onto the on-ramp to the highway must have rivaled the bear, maybe even surpassed it. I heard Amore and her pack freak out and run towards the back of the RV and I saw a bright light reflecting off the front windshield I took a peek back, and I nearly ran off the road because of what I saw: Starla was starting to whimper and her horn was glowing a very bright light blue. She was having a magic surge.

I quickly pulled over, parked the motorhome and hurried back to Starla to see what was wrong. I couldn’t figure out what to do and her horn just kept getting brighter and brighter. I had no clue what to do and I was afraid something bad would happen, so I pulled Starla into a hug. This was not my brightest idea. I could just barely hear the door open as Colgate came in wondering what was happening, and I think I heard her gasp just as Starla began wailing. That's when I felt something like lightning and ice hit my horn

I woke up an hour later with a sobbing Starla pressed against me. I noticed something odd as soon as my thoughts cleared, it felt like I could understand Starla. She felt like she lost something, and after looking around I realized why: we left her stuffed unicorn back in the grocery store parking lot. Colgate was kind enough to drive back and see if she could get it. Just for convenience, I'll tell you that she did get it back. She drove by and yanked it away from the bear, who had been sniffing at it, then drove down a few random streets to lose the bear before coming back.

I was worried I was turned into a cactus or something from Starla’s surge, because of a story Colgate told me about a friend of hers. Luckily, other than feeling like frozen lightning had hit me, I can now feel Starla’s “thoughts” — kind of — emotions and desires probably fits better, and I was left mostly uninjured or changed. The kitchen counters are slightly blackened, but Colgate says that her medical cleaning spell should fix that, and Archie, who had decided to sit and watch instead run and hide, lost all the color from his feathers aside from blue.

Poor fella was dazed, but alive and unhurt. Colgate really tore into me, telling me how stupid it was for me to do what I did. Starla was really quiet for a while, but once she got her stuffed unicorn back, and I promised her I wasn’t hurt, I could tell she felt better. I guess she is starting to understand words or she can understand people by the tone of voice she hears.

Having this connection to her is weird. I can tell when she’s hungry, upset, or if she needs her diaper changed without trying going through what my mother called the parental guessing list. The color of Archie’s feathers still haven’t come back. On the bright side, I don’t have to worry about him hurting Starla if he gets jealous for attention: he refuses to get within five feet of her now.

I Wonder if this connection to Starla is going to end anytime soon. Colgate said the effects from a flare are completely random, but don’t usually last longer than a few hours. She, unfortunately, doesn’t know any spells to undo what her flare did. So, until it wears off we are stuck with our changes. I guess it’s not so bad, but if this connection doesn’t go away once I find Starla a mom, this is going to be awkward.

Starla refused to leave my side for the rest of the drive to Sheridan, but once we arrived her mood picked right back up to being a hyperactive baby and she wanted to see everything. I lead us off at the first off-ramp and took us through the town. If there was anyone left behind in the town I figured we would see signs of looting. Unfortunately, we didn’t see any damage anywhere. I lead us to the town’s only truck stop and we hooked the generator up. It was easier this time around.

We refueled and I shocked Colgate when I started the motor home back up. She thought we would stay here, but I… I wanted to stay somewhere specific — probably for the last time. Colgate followed me back into town, then up the large slope of the valley the the town was built in, where we arrived at my grandmother’s old home. She hasn’t been with us for sixteen years, but my father kept it maintained and slowly remodeled it. It’s not a very big house. It’s actually an old settler’s shanty that was just remodeled and added onto over the years. My father was obsessed with it for some reason, and he kept spending money on the place. Wish he had put solar panels in, however.

The large gate to the alley that my father locked off from the city stood as motionless as ever, but it still opened with the remote I brought from home. I guess my dad spending the extra on a solar backup for the gate was a good idea. Anyone who listens or reads this is probably wondering how my dad legally blocked off a city alley. The funny thing is that the city never legally owned it: the city had illegally annexed it from my grandfather’s land and demolished his garage while doing it. My father found this out when he checked the records at city hall, on top of the fact that the alley wasn’t even listed in the city records.

The city, of course, had a hissy fit over it, but they let him be when he showed them the evidence and then offered to sell them the alley. The city backed off when they saw how much he wanted them to pay to ‘reclaim’ the alley from him.

I never liked this place much, because it creeped me out. It even creeped out my uncle on my mom’s side. It always felt like something was watching you here, and if you did something it didn’t like it felt like it was staring you down. I always thought it might have been grandpa. He died before I was born and my dad said he wasn’t a kind man. My uncle, however, thought it was a hostile or maybe even demonic spirit.

I was waiting to feel that same presence when I took my first step into the house. I was rather surprised and relieved when I felt absolutely nothing in the home. Colgate was confused, but I told her it was nothing to worry about and she dropped the issue. We settled in and then I made good on my promise to Colgate.

We searched around town with a car we liberated from one of the neighbors until the sun set, but we didn’t find anyone. After dinner Amore played with Starla while Colgate gave me another magic lesson. It was around eleven thirty or midnight when the howling began and Starla began to freak out. It took an hour to get her to settle down and we surrounded her on the bed in my parent’s room. I just realized, this is the first time Amore or any of the other dogs have entered a house. What’s so different about this house that they are willing to enter it?


June 4th-6th. There's not much to say about the last few days. We searched and searched but we found no signs of anyone. The local dogs have evidently figured out where we are and there are several attempted holes around the fence line. They all gave up at the cement foundation and the howling has become more distant now. There are some patches of blood where different groups evidently got into fights around the fence. It rained all day on the fifth and sixth.

Most of the time was spent taking care of Starla and magic lessons. Colgate told me I’m making fairly good progress and taught me the spell for light, so that I’m not overloading my horn to see things around me. I didn’t get it right. It wasn’t that it didn’t work, but — somehow — I was making tiny fireworks instead of a ball of light floating next to me.


June 7th. Colgate and I agreed that this was getting us nowhere. So, we spent the day raiding the stores for whatever we could find. Half of the truck is now loaded with dog food, while the other half is full of canned and dry goods, which shared its space with the medicine that we have been keeping cool. I loaded the storage hold of the motor home with camping supplies, dried meals, and a ton of emergency rations.

The Walmart here has a very large section of emergency food kits, though a good portion was meat products and the only thing we might be able to eat from that is the powdered clam chowder. I’ve never liked clam chowder, and I doubt the powdered kind will taste any better. However, there are plenty of emergency rations that we can eat, like tomato soup, rice and just-add-water bread mixes

Some of the emergency kits also have seeds. Colgate said we will need an earth pony to grow them for some reason. Is growing plants and food something only earth ponies can do? That makes no sense! As humans, we grew all kinds of things without needing to be a specific race to do it. When I asked Colgate, she simply said: “I’ve never tried and I have only seen earth ponies grow plants.”

Other than adding walking lessons to nightly training, nothing else happened. Except I seemed to have accidentally grabbed a BBQ pork camping sandwich among the french toast sandwiches from the sporting goods department at Walmart and Colgate tried it without realizing what it was, which lead to me laughing and then the two of us arguing. I don’t remember much of what we said other than it being a heated exchange about me trying to make her eat pork, and then it switched to me wanting to find Starla a real mom and blaming Colgate for hiding things. One thing led to another and I ended up slapping Colgate. She retaliated by tying me upside down to the ceiling fan. Thank the maker Colgate couldn’t turn the ceiling fan on.

Too long.


June 8th continued. Well, I think Colgate has just about finished brushing her teeth. The poodle licked her face as she was yawning and she had flipped out, which led her to brushing her teeth for the last half hour or so. Before we leave we’ll top off the tanks and get the generator unplugged and hitched back up to the motor home. We’ll stop back in Gillette, then we are going to head to Casper.

Talk with ya later.


“Bwah-hooo!” Starla yells as she runs around the corner and tackles into Chris with a hug.

“Hello, Starla. Have the doggies been keeping you company while we get everything ready and I finish catching up on my journals?” I rub her back before she jumps away and hops in front of the recorder. “Do you want to say something to the recorder, sweetie?”

Starla gives a happy squeal and began to babble. “ Oooba-boofa ub-uh mm-whaoo vah-wawa bah-ganah eeee! Mama yeeehh guh-mawhoo eeeee!”

I blink and stare at Starla, because of what I think she just said while babbling. “What was that, Starla?”

She turns and smiles at me before shouting. “Bah-boooo!”

Yes.

I shake my head and scoop Starla up. “I am definitely hearing things again. Guess I can risk an Advil or two. Come on, let’s see if Colgate is ready yet.”

Stubborn mare.