Tales of a Wizard: Flesh Masks

by Applechip

Chapter 11

Our flight back to Canterlot was, for the most part, a quiet one.

Michael and the battalion had remained behind in Manehattan to do any last minute clean up and intelligence gathering. I had instructed that some of the odd bodies we’d found to be taken back to the castle on one of the soldiers’ chariots for study. The foals were to be given a proper burial. While they were busy with that, I was taking a chariot ride with Twilight and her friends back to Canterlot castle.

Everypony there, with the exception of Fluttershy, had killed for the first time, or assisted in killing in Rarity’s case. They sat silently as they contemplated how they were supposed to feel. They were all sitting in various spots of the chariot and nursing whatever bruises they’d accumulated. We’d all taken off our arms and armor and deposited them in the chariot’s storage compartment.

The silence was only interrupted by Fluttershy fussing over the wounds in my face.

“Fluttershy I’m fine! Save your supplies, I don’t need them.” I tried to push away Fluttershy as she approached me with a towel and bandages.

“You’re not fine. You’re still bleeding,” she responded. Her voice wavered, as though she was on the verge of tears.
“It’ll be okay. I’ve gone through much worse.”

“B-but I…” her voice trailed off.

“Save the supplies for a real emergency Fluttershy.”

“No!” she suddenly yelled at considerable volume, then huddled back down and hid behind her mane. “P-p-please, Harry… J-just let me help.”

Then I got it. She didn’t want to work on me for the sole purpose of healing my wounds. She just needed something to do, she needed to keep busy. Because if she sat still, then she’d start thinking about what she’d just been through.

I put a hoof on her shoulder to calm her. She stopped shuddering and looked up at my bloodied face.

“Alright fine, you can help me,” I said in as soft a voice as I could manage. I then adopted a more jovial tone, “Though would you mind leaving the scars? Scars are awesome, don’t you think?”

From a corner of the chariot Rainbow gave a weak laugh.

Fluttershy smiled up at me and began collecting her supplies again. “Thank you. Would you lie down, and try not to move please.”

I complied and allowed the yellow pegasus to begin mopping up my face.

Though only a temporary solution, Fluttershy and her desire to keep busy did bring to light a new problem. Twilight and her friends had just gone through a traumatic experience. They were learning exactly what they were capable off, and in one of the worst possible ways. How they reacted over the next few hours would be crucial to how much of an impact this event would have.

While there was no way to avoid the coming emotional crisis, I could perhaps lessen that impact, and I had a decent idea on how to do it too.

“Hey Pinkie, what are you doing over there?” I said without moving my head.

Pinkie was curled into a little pink ball in a corner of the chariot. Her coat and mane were several shades darker than normal. She lifted her head to look at me at my words.

“Uh, nothing, just thinking about… stuff,” she answered back.

“Well stop it, and come over here. I wanna ask you something.”

She got up and shambled over to me. She curled up again near me and set her head close to mine so I could whisper to her.

I waited until Fluttershy left to get more supplies from her suit in the chariot’s storage before I whispered my idea to Pinkie.
“Are you sure Harry?” she asked me, her coat visibly lightening as she asked.

“Yeah, after we land in Canterlot run off and gather whatever you need. I’ll get the others.” I smiled back at her.

She smiled for the first time since leaving Manehattan. “Okie dokie lokie.”

Pinkie bounced back to her corner of the chariot, her fur resuming its usual color. Just as she left Fluttershy came back with a new towel and a small white case. She poured water from a canteen onto the towel and resumed trying to stem the still slightly bleeding cuts.

“Hey girls, I need your attention for a moment.” They all sat up and looked at me. Fluttershy’s ears swiveled down to better hear me even as her eyes remained focused on my cuts.

“What is it Harry?” Twilight asked.

“When we get back to the castle I want you all to mee-eeaaAARGHH!” I screamed as Fluttershy poured alcohol over my open wounds. You’d think I’d been attacked again from my reaction.

I reflexively jumped to my hooves and did a ridiculous little dance as I flinched away from Fluttershy. Most of the mares started laughing a little, while Fluttershy shied away still holding the bottle of alcohol.

“I-I’m sorry, but I had to sterilize it before I could continue,” Fluttershy whispered after she set the bottle down.

“Warn me next time!” I moved back over and lay down again so that Fluttershy could continue.

She moved back over to me and resumed sterilizing my cuts. Now that I knew it was coming, I didn’t dare flinch or make any sounds of discomfort in front of the mares. It’s a guy thing.

“Like I was saying, when we land I want you all to meet me in my room,” I said to the mares.

“Whatever for?” Rarity asked.

I hesitated for a moment, “Call it, a meeting of the minds. I just want to have a talk with you all.”

“It’s a little late ain’t it?” Applejack asked.

In truth, no it wasn’t. The events in Manehattan, while traumatizing, didn’t take very long. And we had landed there just when to moon started to rise. It couldn’t be later than nine or ten at the latest. Still going through combat is tiring.

I heaved a sigh as Fluttershy mopped up the last of the blood and alcohol from my face. “I know that you all must be exhausted, but I still want you to meet me. It’s important.”

“Alright, if you say so,” Applejack responded, and the rest of her friends gave their respective nods of agreement.

Fluttershy leaned in closer to examine my cuts. “These are too deep. They’re going to need stitches.”

Wait, what?

Fluttershy took out a curved needle and surgical thread from her med kit. She held the needle in the feathers of her wings as though they were fingers.

“Don’t you think we should wait until we’re on the ground first?” I said hopefully, a pleading smile appearing on my face.

She dipped the needle in some alcohol, sterilizing it. “The wounds are too large to just leave open. The longer we delay the more likely it is that they will get infected.”

Oh no, nononono. I’ve had enough sharp things in my face for one day.

During my mini-panic session I felt a soft hoof rubbing my shoulder. I looked up into Fluttershy’s face, being careful not to make direct eye contact, lest I trigger another soulgaze.

“Please don’t worry, I have very steady wings. You’ll be alright.”

Something in her calm voice and reassuring touch steadied my heart rate and relaxed my tense muscles. She reminds me a lot of Michael where it’s important.

She continued to massage my shoulder as she approached my face. Despite her best efforts at calming me I couldn’t help but get a little panicked as her needle came closer to my face.

A little voice piped up in the back of my head as I began a mental argument with myself. Dude, calm down she knows what she’s doing.

Excuse me, but we’re a couple hundred feet up in the air and she’s about to play seamstress with my face!

Hey, you’re the one that freaked out in front of the girls with the alcohol. Now this is your punishment, suck it up and earn some man points.

My thought processes, and consequently my introspective argument, were interrupted when Fluttershy’s surgical needle finally pierced the tender flesh around my wounds.

Why do these mares keep hurting me?

---

“You are one tough pony, Dresden,” Applejack complemented me, a slight chuckle in her voice.

I winced as I disembarked our chariot in the Canterlot castle grounds. Fluttershy’s impromptu stitching session had lasted the remainder of the trip. She had finished the last stitch just as we began our descent. And true to her word, she made it a painless as possible. I managed to bite my lip and hold still through her work, but the areas around the cuts were now red and very sore.

“Remind me how tough I am the next time I decide to get my face cut open. Then maybe I’ll decide to run instead,” I shot back. Applejack smiled faintly, but the smile didn’t go past her mouth. Her ears drooped and her eyes looked haunted.

Pinkie however bounced right up to me and practically pressed her face against mine. Personal space obviously means nothing to this mare.

“I’ll see you in a bit Harry!” she said at full volume as though we were across a large room from each other and not a few millimeters apart. Then without a further word she zoomed off toward the castle.

Rainbow moved to hover above me, “What was that about?”

I smiled up at her, “You’ll see in a moment.” I turned to address the rest of my team. “Let’s grab our gear and put it up in the armory before we do anything else.”

“Couldn’t we have the guards bring it in?” complained Rarity.

We probably could, but I needed to buy some time for Pinkie. “Do you want the guards to walk for you too, or chew your food?”

Rarity’s face adopted a look of wonder. Undoubtedly fantasizing about a life where everything would be done for her.

“Don’t answer that,” I snapped before she could open her mouth to answer. “It’s our gear, and it’s not the guards’ job to cater to our desires.”

“Very well,” she pouted.

“Commander!” called a deep male voice.

I turned and saw a golden armor clad pegasus flying towards me. It stopped in the air just in front of me.

He saluted quickly then gave his message. “Commander, Princess Celestia wishes for a debriefing on the situation in Manehattan.”

Oh finally! I can get some answers out of that tightlipped-

I paused and looked back at the weary faces of my team. I let out a short sigh and said, “No.”

“Commander?”

I faced the guard again. “No, I’m not seeing her tonight.”

“But Commander… the princess-“

“Can wait until the morning,” I interrupted him. “I have something else that needs my immediate attention. You can tell her that we’ll speak with her over breakfast.”

“Yes sir.” He saluted again and sped back towards the castle.

Twilight walked over to stand beside me. “Harry, are you sure about that? If the princess wants to see you, then you need go see her.”

I looked at her and smiled, “No Twilight, I don’t. Like I told the guard, there’s something else that needs my immediate attention. Besides, what’s the point of having free will if we don’t occasionally spit in the face of authority? Now come on, let’s get our stuff.”

We each unpacked our gear from the chariot’s storage and made our way inside. I carried my overcoat and Pinkie’s armor in a large bag over my back. We walked into the barracks and dropped all of our stuff on a table in the center of the main armory.

Applejack and Rainbow set their metal armor apart from the rest of our cloth equipment, and I set Pinkie’s armor with down with theirs. Applejack visibly had to suppress a shudder as she touched her chained lasso and set it next to her armor. Her face adopted a sickly green tinge.

Rainbow seemed to be doing everything in her power to not be shaken by recent events, or at least to not show it. She strutted around like nothing was wrong at all, she smiled and continued to boast about her flying abilities. But that in itself was a clear indication that she was experiencing inner turmoil. You don’t go through combat like we did for the first time and just walk out of it again without being changed. Not to mention that she was doing her best to avoid looking at her crossbow.

Rarity and Fluttershy had adopted a similar defense mechanism against their own demons. They had become noticeably more withdrawn over the last hour or so. This wasn’t much of a change for Fluttershy, as this was her defense against most everything. But Rarity had barely said a word since we left Manehattan, and was decidedly avoiding eye contact with everypony. Even though she hadn’t actually killed anything, she had been faced with creatures out of a nightmare. I could only assume that she was trying to figure out how such creatures could exist in her life.

Twilight however, was in the most danger of losing herself. The rest hadn’t seen the bodies Twilight had found. They hadn’t seen what happens when we’re too late to save others. After Twilight set down her overcoat in the armory, I got a good look at her face. She was studying the coat but wasn’t actually looking at it, her eyes were unfocused and her thoughts were drifting. I could see it in her eyes; she was being haunted by that shed, and what she found in it. She couldn’t get the image out of her head, and if my personal experience is worth anything, she never would be able to forget it. No matter how much she might want to.

Before we left I placed a note on the metal armor telling the smith to repair any damages that were on them. With our gear stored away, we made our way up stairs to my quarters. I stopped outside and waited for the rest to catch up.

“Now can you tell us what the hay we’re doing?” Applejack grunted.

I stepped away from my door, gestured a hoof towards it, and bowed my head. “After you.”

She sighed opened my door, and was assaulted by a hyper active Pinkie and some loud music.

“Pinkie, I thought we agreed to keep it quiet!” I yelled over the music.

“Oh right, sorry!” She zoomed back inside and the music died down significantly.

We all made our way inside and stopped to look at the last minute party favors Pinkie had thrown together. There was a tray piled high with cupcakes on the floor next to my desk and two large barrels with faucets sat on the desk itself. On my bed was a sizeable collection of board games and something that looked like a stereo system was at the foot of my bed.

“Harry, what is this?” Applejack asked.

I cocked an eyebrow at her, “You’re friends with Pinkie and you don’t recognize a party when you see one?”

“We’re not exactly in a partying mood harry,” she responded.

I smiled at her and nodded, “I know, I know. But trust me, after what you’ve been through you need this, you all do.” I raised my voice at the last few words. “Besides, Pinkie promised that we’d do a party soon. Now I’m collecting, right Pinkie?”

“Right!” she called through a mouth full of cupcake.

“Good.” I walked over to the pile of board games and pulled out a chess board. “Now sit down, grab a cupcake, and help me find the pieces to this.”

“This is what you brushed off Princess Celestia for?” asked Twilight.

I grinned at her, “Like I said, it’s more important.”

They grumbled amongst themselves for a bit before agreeing and sitting down in the middle of the room. Pinkie began passing around cupcakes and mugs of what looked like cider she got from the barrels. By the time everypony had one of each, I’d finally dug out the chess pieces and sat back down.

I challenged Pinkie first, as she was the most willing and I wanted a rematch after the several lost games during our first party. We set up the chess board and began playing. The others moved closer around the board and watched.

The party was beginning to have the desired effect. Through simple proximity and focusing on single objective, Twilight and her friends were forgetting about their troubles, at least momentarily. More importantly it was building their self-esteem for the coming crisis.

They even began laughing at my continuing failure in my game against Pinkie. A few times they would whisper some advice to me. Twilight’s advice usually proved invaluable, Rainbow’s and Applejack’s on the other hoof, lead to my king getting surrounded by Pinkie’s pieces.

“Oh come on!” Rainbow exclaimed from right above me after my king fell. “Where’s that strategist we saw earlier?”

I held up my half empty mug. “Maybe he’s at the bottom of this mug. Let me check.” I tilted back the mug and downed the rest of the cider, as they began laughing. The mug was replaced with a full one almost instantly by Pinkie.

The laughter died down a bit quicker than usual and the mares began looking solemnly at each other again.

“You might as well ask. I can see the question on your faces,” I said, my eyes flicking between each of them, stopping for a fraction of a second longer on Twilight.

They all looked shocked at my abruptness, and then began whispering to each other. I waited patiently for them to finish, sipping at my new mug of cider. After a minute they stopped and Applejack moved forward to speak.

“Harry, this… all of this business with the Red Court, the fighting, the…“ She stopped midsentence, unable to complete the thought. She let out a quick sigh before she resumed. “Just, does it get any easier?”

I thought about my answer for a long moment. I could’ve lied and tried to assure them that everything would be alright. But I have a terrible poker face, and it would’ve been useless to try and lie to the Element of Honesty. So I went for the blunt truth.

“No,” I said simply. “In fact it gets harder in a many respects.”

That answer seemed to sap them of what little hope they had gained. I was about to speak again, but was cut off.

“But how do you live with it all?” Applejack shouted, tears beginning to flow from her eyes. “They were ponies once and we… and I…”

I put a hoof in the air to stop her, she paused and they all looked at me. “It helps if you don’t think of them as ponies, because they aren’t, not anymore. They have the same memories yes, but the pony they were, died a long time ago. They are simply monsters in a pony body.”

“But what about when you can’t tell them apart! I think about what we just did and all I see is the ponies they were, and what I did to them!” Applejack yelled, tears now flowing freely down her face and the entirety of her body had begun to shake violently.

The others had similar reactions. Fluttershy hid behind her mane and began shaking as well. Rainbow landed and just looked at her right hoof. Pinkie’s colors drained from her and her mane deflated. Rarity lay down next to Fluttershy. And Twilight just froze in place, becoming a fuzzy purple statue. Her eyes unfocused as she went back to that shed.

I wasn’t expecting this. I didn’t think that the concept of this kind of violence would be so alien to them. Thus their psychological defense against such stress would be underdeveloped. It didn’t change my answer however.

This situation was probably the single most depressing moment of my life. Seeing them all in the grips of psychological torment was enough to rip my heart to pieces. Despite all of this, I started laughing. I laughed a deep and genuine rolling laughter. I laughed at the sheer irony of the solution to their dilemma.

They all looked up at me in complete shock at my reaction. Even Twilight broke out of her waking nightmare to look over at me.

I moved my eyes over each of them, refocused my attention on Applejack, and smiled as warm a smile as I could. “Then, my dear Applejack, when the line between right and wrong starts to blur. Then you find a few friends, play a board game, and eat a cupcake.” I levitated a cupcake over and placed it on the ground in front of her.

They just gaped at me, not understanding meaning.

I smiled calmly at them. “There is no shortage of nasty in my world, in the Nevernever, or even in this world. And if there is one thing that I have learned, it is this: You cannot fight my fight by yourself.” I slumped over slightly, the burden of too many bad memories weighing me down. “I have been running from or fighting against a wide variety of monsters for most of my life. A moderately peaceful life like the ones you all have been enjoying has only been a distant dream for me. My life is full of bad memories of people that have been lost to creatures I’d been too slow to stop. Or even people that have become those creatures and I wind up having to kill those that I’m meant to protect.”

They gasped at my words, Fluttershy even shuffled a little away from me.

I continued with my lecture. “I have become a bit calloused as a natural defense against most of it, but there are times when I have trouble separating the monsters from the victims. The best way to prevent yourself from going insane when this happens is to unload your worries with a few friends. I know your natural instinct in that situation is to try to figure it out yourself and to not make those you care about worry, but that is a mistake. It’s a mistake that I’ve made a few times, and lives were destroyed because of it.”

A whisper echoed in the back of my head, Susan. I hammered that memory back down. There was nothing more for me to say about her.

I shifted on my cushion and once again looked over them all. “The pain you’re feeling is natural, good even. It reminds you that you’re still capable of such emotions. But when it becomes too much to bear, just find a sympathetic ear.” I paused for a moment before saying, “”And if any of you tell Michael a word of what I just said, I will deny it all.”

They hesitated for a moment, and then as one began chuckling to each other.

“What, what’s so funny?” I asked, glancing at each of them in turn.

Twilight smiled warmly at me, “It’s just that, what you just said sounded a lot like one of our friendship reports to the princess.”

I smiled back and adopted a very smug tone of voice, “Well I am full of surprises.”

“Now with that attitude, I don’t expect you have too many sympathetic ears back at home,” Applejack teased, her tears had stopped and she was smiling at me. “What do you do in that case?”

I beamed and held up my mug, “Ah, in that case, I drink copious amounts of alcohol. Alcohol has this magical ability to make all my worries and fears drift away.” I paused looking dreamily into the air. “Then it replaces them with new worries and fears like, liver failure and so on.”

They roared with laughter and each took a swig from their respective mugs.

“Speaking of which, what is this?” I asked Pinkie. “It tastes like cider, but feels stronger.” I had only just begun my second mug and my thoughts were already becoming fuzzy.

Instead of Pinkie, Applejack answered me. “That’s probably because it is cider but stronger. I’d recognize this taste anywhere, this is my brother’s personal cider brew. The princesses always buy a few barrels from him every cider season.”

I took another heavy swig, and the dull throbbing of my stitches subsided. “Well next time you see him, give him my complements. This is delicious.” I turned to face Pinkie. “Hey Pinkie would you get a game we could all play?”

She obliged by pulling out a box labeled Ponyopoly, and began setting it up. I snickered at the name but chose to ignore it, and enjoyed my cupcake.

We sat, ate, drank, and talked together. Their moods cheered up immensely as we played the board game and continued joking. Within fourty minutes Pinkie had owned almost half of the properties on the board, and Rainbow and I were in massive amounts of debt to her.

“Okay, I give up!” I cried out and threw my hooves in the air. I had just landed on one of her hotels and declared bankruptcy. “How are you thish good at whatever game you play?” My words slurred a bit as the fuzziness in my head grew.

“I don’t know, I’m just lucky I guess,” Pinkie answered back.

Rarity laughed and swayed slightly on the spot. “She almost always wins at party games. We think it has to do with her talent.”

Twilight gave me a nudge with her hoof as she rolled the dice. “Hey Harry, we’ve told you plenty about us, but we don’t really know much about you.”

“Yeah, tell us about our master strategist commander,” Rainbow teased.

“Do you have any family?” Twilight continued.

A little thrown off at the sudden personal questions, I hesitated for a bit.

Aww, what the hay. Twilight’s already saved my hide once, they deserved a few details.

I shook my head slightly. “There’s not much to say about me personally. My mom died giving birth to me, and my dad died of an aneurism when I was six.”

Applejack looked up and had a solemn expression on her face. She removed her Stetson and placed it over her chest. “I’m sorry Harry. I know how much that must hurt.”

I shrugged my shoulders, “It’s alright. Can’t miss what you never had right? I never knew my mother, and I only have a few wisps of memories of my dad, so there’s not much to be sad over.”

Fluttershy didn’t say a word. Instead she abandoned her Ponyopoly pieces and flew over to sit at my left to offer me some comfort. I didn’t want it, but I couldn’t turn her away either.

Damn those adorable eyes.

At this point the game lay forgotten among the mares, wrapped up as they were in my history.

I took another long pull from my mug before continuing. “Anyway after my dad died I was adopted by a man named Justin DuMorne around the same time my magic started to awaken and… well… I don’t really want to get into that right now. Let’s just say it didn’t end well.”

That was the understatement of the century. At least that mind bending psychopath won't be causing any more trouble.

“How old were you when you left Justin?” Fluttershy whispered.

“I was still just a kid going through school. The White Council, the group of wizards I work for back at home,” I commented quickly. “They, uh… placed, yeah let’s go with that. They placed me under the care of an old fart of a wizard named Ebenezar McCoy. We lived on a small country farm and he mentored me in magic until I left and started doing my own thing. I’ve been more or less on my own ever since.”

Rainbow shot me a suspicious look. “What do you mean ‘placed’?”

I shook my head once and looked at her. “It has to do with how I left DuMorne. It’s something of a touchy subject.”

She dropped the subject at that, but still shot me a few suspicious looks.

“What about this Ebenezar fella? You said ya’ll lived on a farm?” Applejack asked.

I smiled at her, “Yeah, you’d probably like him. He’s like you in a lot of ways actually. He’s gruff, tough, and very straight forward. He hates dancing around an issue when he can just cut to the chase. Except he’s, well…”

“A unicorn?” Twilight offered.

That sent me to laughing like a drunken idiot. The mental image of my old mentor Ebenezar McCoy, Senior Council member of the White Council, as a colorful unicorn popped into my head. It was just too much, even if I was in that exact situation. I just kept laughing and collapsed to the floor.

Pinkie hopped in between Fluttershy and me, and began laughing like a maniac as well. She evidently did not need an explanation to join in on the fun.

I pulled myself together after about a minute of sustained laughter. “Well I imagine he would be if he came here. But no, I meant to say that he’s a human.”

Twilight blushed slightly, “Sorry, sometimes I forget that you aren’t a pony.”

“Well he still sounds like a nice guy,” Applejack commented.

I nodded, “Yeah, he’s always had my back if I ever asked him. He was never as honest as you though, granted it’s kind of hard to match the Element of Honesty.”

Though she missed the full meaning of my words she did frown a bit, sensing the deeper meaning. My old mentor taught me a little of how to perform magic, but more importantly he taught me why I should perform magic. He taught me that magic I use comes from a mortal’s emotions, from our lives. And thus that using magic to end a mortal’s life is a perversion of that magic and a crime against nature.

But he’d been lying to me the entire time. Since day one he had been the White Council’s appointed assassin called the Blackstaff. He had the council’s permission to violate the very rules that he drilled into my head as he saw fit.

“Do you have any other family?” Twilight prodded.

I rubbed a hoof behind my head, “Not really. I don’t have any grandparents that I know of. I do have a half-brother, Thomas Raith, but the relationship is a little complicated.”

Rainbow zipped in front of me. “Whoa hold up, you have a brother and you haven’t mentioned him before now?”

“You never asked,” I said with a straight face.

They looked from me then to Twilight. Applejack let out a sigh and smiled. “Sweet Celestia, they’re the same.”

“What? What is it?” I was starting to get annoyed.

Twilight shook her head, “It’s nothing Harry. They’re just messing with us. Aren’t you… Oh dear, I think Rarity is out of it.”

We all turned and saw that the white unicorn was now fast asleep and drooling into the carpet. At some point the combination of magical overexertion and alcohol had taken its toll, and she had passed out.

I tried, and failed, to stifle a laugh. “Just leave her. We’ll take care of her later.”

Twilight turned back to face me. The worried expression on her face probably would’ve worked better if the alcohol wasn’t making her eyes go out of focus. “What’s wrong with your brother? Maybe I can help.”

I shook my head, “He can’t really be helped, Twilight.”

“Of course we can help, what’s his problem?”

“Well for one he’s back in my world, but more importantly… because he has something of an inner demon.”

Various forms of “What?” came at me from all angles.

I raised my hooves and nearly fell over backwards from the sudden dizziness, “Calm down and let me continue. I don’t want to go into much detail, because they’re his secrets to give. But I can say that fights against his demon every day of his life.” I slouched a little, and felt a purple hoof pat me on the back. I smiled and continued, “I help him in any way I can, but there’s not much I can do besides moral support.”

“It must hurt not bein’ able to help your brother,” Applejack said. “I don’t know what I’d do if Big Mac got hurt an’ I couldn’t help him.”

I nodded my head, “It does suck.” I crammed those painful feelings to the back of my mind. “But he’s a tough guy I’m not worried about him.” I felt a proud grin spread across my face. “Why I’ve even seen him charge into a group of reds and cut them to ribbons with his saber.” I poked a hoof at Applejack. “I’ll bet you can’t hold a candle to my brother’s skill.”

She sat up straighter and frowned at me. “Oh yeah? Well I’ll tell you what, the next scrap we get in I’ll put down enough of them reds to put even your brother to shame.” She smirked at me, “What do ya’ think of that?”

Rainbow immediately butted heads with Applejack. “I think I’ll bag enough of them to put both of you to shame. What do you think of that?”

Applejack shifted her focus to Rainbow. “I think you’ve got an awful big mouth and just one crossbow.”

Twilight shifted next to me as Applejack and Rainbow got into a heated argument about the effectiveness of their weapons.

“You do lead an interesting life, don’t you Harry?” she said.

“It never gets too boring.” I smiled at her, “That’s why I take my pleasure where I can get it.” I downed the rest the rest of my mug, and the fuzziness in my head grew to high quality pain medication levels. “Speaking of which, I think I’m drunk enough to try dancing. Pinkie, would you turn up the music?”

Pinkie obliged and the room was filled with a dull bass beat. The rest of the night was a blur of laughter, dancing, talking, cupcakes, and many more mugs of Big Mac’s cider.

The center of my room became the dance floor where Fluttershy, Pinkie, Twilight, and I bobbed in no particular rhythm to the music. Applejack and Rainbow started challenging each other to a variety of physical challenges like hoof wrestling and a cupcake eating contest. And Rarity kept drooling into the carpet. At some point Pinkie had instigated an all out cupcake food fight. When we ran out of ammunition we went back to laughing and dancing.

The last thing I remember is tripping over my own hooves and face planting into purple fur. Then my alcohol addled brain slipped into unconsciousness.

---

Light pierced through my eyelids and stabbed at my brain.

“Mmmmmmm… not ready… don’t… fuzzy,” I babbled to no one in general.

I lay on my side and tried to cover my face as best as I could with my forelegs, as I did the rest of my body began waking up as well. As my brain started registering various nerve endings, I noticed that a few things were off. One, I wasn’t on my bed; whatever I was on wasn’t anywhere near as comfy as that. Two, there was a sharp pain on the left side of my face that throbbed in time with my heart beat. And three, there was something moderately heavy on top of me.

Without moving my head I opened my eyes to try and make sense of what was going on.

When did I get an orange pillow?

Right in front of me, maybe two inches away was what looked like a massive orange fuzzy pillow. My confusion intensified as I saw the pillow rising and falling in time with a soft whinnying. It took my still addled brain a solid five count to make the necessary connections.

Applejack lay before me snoring a little with her back to me. Her tail twitched slightly above my head while she slept, her own head was down near the hooves of my hind legs. Without lifting it I angled my head to try and get a better idea of where I was. I saw that we were still in my room and lying in the center of my floor.

I looked a bit further down and saw Rainbow fast asleep and lying on my tail, preventing any movement in the appendage. The back of her head was nearly pressed against Applejack’s face, while her body was curled up into a ball and positioned an inch or so away. Her free wing fumbled around in the air and she mumbled under her breath as she continued dreaming.

I finally tried lifting my head from the carpet, and immediately regretted it.

Holy mother of… ohhhhh, my head!

My vision blurred and started spinning. Pain surged through my head with every beat of my heart, and I was overcome with a strong feeling of nausea. I massaged my temples with my hooves to try and lessen the pain. And seeing as there were only ponies near me instead of garbage cans, I clamped my mouth shut and fought back any waves of sick. I did not want to re-experience my first, and last, high school party.

When the immediate effects of the hangover subsided, I raised my head to get a look at what was on top of me.

Twilight was resting her head and most of her upper body on my side as though I were a large cushion. Her forelegs were wrapped around my midsection and she wore a contented smile on her face as she slept.

Despite my most manly of men reactions to such acts of cuteness, I large portion of my brain abandoned all pretense and just went, D’awwww.

I shifted a little, trying to wriggle out from her grip. Twilight groaned in protest at my attempts of freedom and tightened her forelegs around me.

“No… Smarty Pants, I’ve finally got you back,” she mumbled under her breath and buried her face in my fur.

It took me several confused seconds to remember that she was referring to her childhood doll she told me about in Sugarcube Corner and not me. I continued looking around the room as my brain was finishing waking up.

Pinkie was lying on the floor behind and slightly above me. She was sprawled on her back with her hooves waving in the air above her. A small smile played on her face as she snored.

Hells bells, she even giggles when she snores.

Rarity hadn’t moved an inch from last night. She was sleeping in the exact same spot and position as she was when she lost consciousness. She was a good foot or two away from the rest of us.

I dimly realized that we were in the pony equivalent of a pile of sleeping dogs, of which I was in the center. Only Fluttershy seemed to have the presence of mind to collapse on the nearby bed.

Before I could figure out how to disentangle myself without waking the others, the door leading outside opened and Michael stepped into the room. He took a quick look around, taking note of the six sleeping mares.

He found me and cocked an eyebrow. “Well Harry I-“

“Shhhuussh,” I cut him off, waving my forelegs around. I placed my hooves back over my throbbing head. ”My hair hurts.”

“You’re covered in hair, Dresden, its called fur.” Michael smiled warmly.

I looked back up at him, “I stand by what I said.”

Something finally clunked into place in the back of my head. I only then realized the full awkwardness of my situation. I was on the floor of my room, surrounded by mares, one of which was on top of me, and we had all been drinking.

“Michael, I swear, nothing happened,” I said desperately.

I began running through my memories of last night. Most of them were fairly whole and intact, but there was a massive empty spot in my memory just after I stopped dancing.

Oh boy… did something happen last night?

He smiled and shook his head. His body shook a little as he suppressed a chuckle. “I know nothing happened Harry. I got here just after you passed out.”

Oh thank you…

“Rainbow said, and I quote, ‘Just leave him. We’ll take care of him later’.” Michael looked over the mares again. “I see that didn’t work out as planned.”

I cast an eye over at the two barrels sitting on my desk. “Yeah, I think we may have overindulged in a particular drink.” I twitched my head over at Twilight, who was still holding my liver in a death grip. “Would you give me some help here?”

Michael took one look at Twilight’s grip and took a step back. “No thanks, I’m good. Marriage has taught me never to be the one to wake up a hung over woman. Besides you’re their commanding officer.”

Oh you evil little…

He flashed me a knowing smile. “When you get them all up and presentable, Celestia is waiting in the dining room.” Michael turned and left my room, closing the door behind him.

I sighed and turned my attention back to Twilight. I carefully used my magic to separate her forelegs just far enough to let me slip out of her grip. Now freed from my new job as a pillow, I set Twilight on the ground as carefully as possible. Despite that, Twilight now had a definite frown on her face and her forelegs moved around, as though searching for her Smarty Pants.

I navigated over to my door with the intention of leaving to take a shower before I woke up the slumbering mares. Something on the nearby wall caught my eye as I made my way out though.

“Oh come on!” I grumbled loudly.

I turned back to Twilight and her friends and stamped a hoof hard into the ground. All of them abruptly shot up or either began grumbling and moving around.

I raised my voice so as to get them up even faster. “Come on, come on get up! Celestia wants us in the dining hall. But first things first, who punched a hole in my wall!”

Comments

[Syncidence]

Why is there always property damage?! Damnit Dresden, get it together.

[Sarpedan]

1029154
mate, parties are strange like that, last time i passed out at one i woke up with a mobility scooter in the kitchen and a parrot
absolutly no-one i know owns a mobility scooter and god only knows where the bird came from

[Applechip]

1029318
Now that sounds like an interesting party.

[dbanksischillin]

So. harry got drunk and someone punched a hole through the wall. Dang it Rainbow Dash

[Destructorspace]

1030226 Nah, I'm calling Fluttershy. (Or AJ, but Fluttershy is funnier)

[One-Of-Three-Names]

This definitely deserves a favorite and a comment. I just read through the whole thing and I want to say that your writing has improved significantly since the first few chapters. In fact I would suggest going back over them to attempt to fix the dialog, it's almost cringe inducing.

All in all, fantastic stuff. My second favorite Dresden Crossover for sure. Keep it coming!

[Beyond the Horizon]

I'd be surprised if there wasn't any property damage. Harry'd be losin his touch mahn!

[NaughtSought]

Now this is a great chapter! Onwards we go to the next!

[2wingo]

A similar thing happened to Michael Caine after he went on a weekend-long bender with Peter O'Toole. They woke up in the apartment of 2 girls they'd never met before and found out that they'd been banned for life from a local restaurant. They both decide to never try to find out exactly what had happened.

[A Wild Magikarp]

Dresden is a bad influence on le ponies. But he makes for a good time! And an excellent pep talker.

[cyberlord4444]

1029154 Because he's Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden, he's kinda proud of it.