Guardian of Equestria

by Armyidiot

Royal Competition

"So, Heaross, are you ready for the Running of the Leaves?"

"I'm sorry, the Running of the what?"

Twilight rolled her eyes for a moment. Ever since Heaross came to Equestria, the differing cultural norms had confused both of them to no end, since some of their traditions translated easily, yet others were as baffling to the other as the number of things Heaross could do. "The Running of the Leaves." She explained. "Every year, near the end of fall, all of the ponies in Ponyville make their way to Sweet Apple Acres to race. We run through the orchard where the leaves have started falling and shake them off by racing. The science behind it is really fascinating, but to most it's just a race that helps bring winter along."

"Huh." Heaross said. "In my world, we just let the leaves fall whenever they do and rake them up into piles." As an afterthought, he added, "It's actually kind of fun to jump into the big piles of leaves since they crush and spring back so easily."

"That does sound like fun. Anyways, wanna compete in the race?"

"Eh, why not?" Heaross responded with a shrug. "Today has been pretty lackluster. Anyone else who's going to race?"

"Rainbow Dash and Applejack normally compete, most of the other ponies in Ponyville do for that matter, and a few who come from out of town. Princess Celestia normally comes to watch the race." Twilight tapped her chin for a moment before adding, "Spike and I will be providing commentary throughout the race, so there's that."

"Sure, I'll compete. Sounds like a good time."

The Princess and her Guardian set forth from the library then, heading towards Sweet Apple Acres. Arriving, they saw a rather large crowd of ponies milling about, some with numbers over their cutie marks while others were waiting in a line to get a number. Looking around, Heaross noticed Applejack and Rainbow Dash in a conversation near the starting line. Heaross got the most malicious grin as he called out to the mares, right over the crowd's noise, "You two should kiss!"

As expected, the entire crowd shut up and looked towards the now blushing mares. Heaross was struggling to contain his laughter. Then, to his surprise, Applejack shouted, "BUCK IT!" And grabbed Rainbow Dash, pressing her to the ground in a very fierce kiss. It lasted for all of five seconds while the crowd deafened itself with it's unanimous applause and cheering.

"Well," Heaross admitted, "That just happened."

"Yes, yes it just did." The trained Grandmaster had to repress every single alarm and response his body had to not jump in fear and surprise at Celestia's sudden appearance. Despite this, she still noticed he was surprised. "Did I manage to frighten you, Heaross?" The sly grin showed she knew that it would.

"In a sense, yes." He turned to her then, saying, "So, Celestia, did you come here to watch the race, or do you think you can beat me in a race?"

"I know you're bating me, Heaross."

"So?"

Celestia let out a small chuckle, before answering, "I normally prefer to watch, but I don't think anypony would object to me entering the race. So that's why," She said, pulling out a couple number cards, "I already prepared for you." She gave him a card, before putting the other one on herself.

Heaross peeled a sheet of wax paper from the card, revealing the sticker, before switching armor to his normal workout gear and pressing the sheet to his back. Number 31, Heaross. He was glad his workout gear just consisted of a plain white tank top and sweats, with some running shoes. Interestingly enough, Heaross noticed Celestia look away from him with a small blush on her face. "Is something wrong Celestia?"

"I... I did not realize that under your armor you actually have a very pleasing physique." She could not look him straight in the face, instead opting to look right at his abs.

Oh. Well, this could get awkward. Switching back to the Ultra Guardian Armor, Heaross asked, "Is that better?" He noticed later that the card he had put on him had somehow moved to cover the back plate of his armor.

"Very."

"Alright, folks!" Called out a voice from high above. "It's time for the annual Running of the Leaves!" Looking up, Heaross noticed it was Twilight in a large balloon with Spike right beside her. "I am your announcer, Twilight Sparkle."

"And I'm her co-announcer, Spike!"

"And let's get ready to race!" As the balloon moved around the race track, Heaross, Celestia, and every other pony that had shown up came up the starting line. "Let's go over the rules one more time just in case any of you forgot. Pegasi, no wings. Unicorns, no magic. Humans, you can't use any of the benefits from wearing your armor or weapons!"

"Oh, come on!" Heaross shouted up.

"Alicorns, same story as Pegasi and Unicorns."

"Dammit!" Celestia cursed to the sky. The crowd milling around the track got a hearty laugh out of this.

"To everypony, do not change the track signs, do not place obstacles in the other competitors ways, and no breaking away from the track down a different path. Doing any of these is grounds for immediate disqualification."

Heaross sighed a bit, saying, "At the least, it is a fair race."

"True, but I do wish we could use our powers." Celestia returned.

"You should be glad I'm not Robina. That woman could run this track three times over and still be waiting at the finish line for everyone else." Heaross shuddered a bit at the thought. "I've seen that girl bend in ways that should be impossible."

"Get your head in the race, Heaross!" Celestia warned. "It's about to start."

Shaking the lewd images from his head, Heaross readied into a good racing pose, right foot first. "See you at the finish line."

"I'll be seeing you when you get there." Celestia snarked back.

"Ready..." Twilight called out.

"Set..." Spike called out.

"GO!" They both shouted at last.

Heaross immediately sprung, bolting past most of the other competitors, Celestia hot on his trail. Banking around a corner, he sprung his momentum forward, down the path. Celestia managed to catch up to him, racing evenly. As the racing duo came across the obstacle of a river diverging two different parts of the way, they both easily jumped across, Heaross landing easier, keeping his momentum going. Celestia tumbled a bit, losing her speed, though managed to catch back up. Turning through more corners and turns, the pair kept pace with each other, still pressing the limits of their speed.

The next obstacle, being a giant boulder set directly in the middle of the path, did little to dissuade either competitors, as while Celestia jumped over the massive rock, Heaross literally punched straight through it, forming a clear tunnel through it. Bursting out of the other side, an eruption of rocks and dust going around, Heaross watched long enough to make sure none of the rocks obstructed the path or hit Celestia. Making sure that he didn't just break any rules, Heaross rushed on after the alicorn.

Catching up, the Guardian and the Princess saw the finish line. Chancing a glance at each other, they both grinned and poured every single ounce of speed they had left. The pair were neck and neck, kicking up dust as they ran, wearing some of the biggest smiles anypony had ever seen. With a shout, they burst from the forest and past the finish line. Still wearing the same goofy grins, Heaross and Celestia looked up to Twilight who had been watching the entire time. With a shout of amazement, Twilight said, "It's a Tie! Guardian Heaross and Princess Celestia crossed the finish line at exactly the same time!"

Heaross had an incredulous look on his face at the happenstance, glancing at Celestia who wore the same expression. Settling for a competitive smile, Heaross raised a fist to Celestia, who bumped it with her hoof. "I have to say, you're pretty fast without the magic or wings."

"You too, Heaross. Makes me wonder what the result would be if did this without the restrictions." Celestia wore a warm grin, obviously bating Heaross.

Not taking the bait, Heaross answered, "We'll simply have to find out some other time." Popping his neck, Heaross said, "This was fun. We should compete more often."

"That we should. Maybe we should setup an event dedicated to those who want to challenge the Princesses in some form."

"It would provide a more direct interaction with your subjects, at least, those brave enough to attempt challenging their ruler." Heaross grinned at the idea, thinking of the possibilities.

Turning their attention back to the finish line, they saw a few stragglers from the giant pack of ponies make their way across the finish line. As the last pony finally made it across, Twilight called out from above, "With number 86 across the line, I can officially say this Running of the Leaves is over! Thank you everypony who turned up to race and help stomp the leaves off of the trees." Turning towards Heaross and Celestia, currently taking a break and sitting on the ground, Twilight announced, "Our winners of this year are Guardian Heaross and Princess Celestia, who tied! Please, everypony give them a round of applause!"

Taking that as his cue, Heaross stood up and took a bow to the ensemble of racers. Celestia followed suit, to the roar and the stomping of the crowd. Rising, the human and alicorn shook hand and hoof, promising no ill will. Whispering, Heaross said to Celestia, "Come by my house at 11, I have something I want to share. Bring Luna, I'll bring Twilight."

"I will." Ending the extended shake, Heaross and Celestia turned back to the crowd of ponies before them and waved. As he looked out over the crowd of ponies, the warrior noticed Applejack and Rainbow Dash in the back, making out. He smiled, letting them have their moment. They did tie for third, after all.

---

Several hours later, Heaross and Twilight were relaxing in his house when some unknown pony decided to knock at the door. Opening it, they found Celestia and Luna standing at the door, wearing curious smiles. The friends greeted each other warmly, taking seats around the living room. "Okay, now for that surprise I promised!" Heaross excitedly exclaimed. Opening a portal, he stepped in only to return caring a wooden cask containing some sort of sloshing liquid. Embellished on the front of the wooden barrel were the words "Guardian's Finest" in big, fancy lettering.

"The Guardian's Finest?" Luna questioned.

"Yes," Heaross proudly stated, "This is the Guardian's Finest. I promise you, there is no better tasting ale, beer, wine, whatever you name, this is better."

"Not even Apple Family Zap Apple Cider?" Twilight asked.

"I was able to get a taste of that by paying an enormous amount of money." The Guardian admitted. "I promise you, this is better." He repeated. He then slammed a spout into the bottom of the barrel, managing to not spray all over his living room. He pulled out four large mugs from atop a few shelves, filled them up and passed them around. "Anybody have a toast they want to say?"

"To friends, to family, and to a damn good drink!" Luna shouted. She thrust her mug into the air, meeting with the others in a loud smack. Pulling back, all four drained their mugs at different rates, Heaross finishing first followed by Luna, then Celestia, and finally Twilight. There was a moment of silence before something went *FWUMP*.

Looking, Heaross saw it was Twilight, passed out onto the floor. "I may have neglected to say that it's also very probably the strongest alcoholic drink you'll ever taste." The lavender alicorn immediately came to with a loud gasp before swooning back onto the floor, clutching her head. She moaned in pain for a bit, sitting up with her eyes closed. A moment after that and she was looking fine, aside the disheveled mane. Looking to the other alicorns in the room, he asked, "Did she just go through the entire process of a hangover in less than a minute?"

Celestia answered with, "Alicorns have extremely increased metabolism."

"Ah."

Filling up the mugs again, he passed them out and advised everyone to drink it a bit slower. Camaraderie thick in the air, the group of four enjoyed both the ale and the stories told many hours into the night. "So, as I was saying-" Heaross said, only to be interrupted again by Luna's laughter. He let her calm down enough so he could ask, "What is so funny?" Not minding the way how his shoulder plate somehow got on Twilight, Luna's regalia being backwards, and Celestia somehow sitting on the ceiling. Despite all of that, not a single drop was spilled on the floor.

"L-look above you!" Luna managed to get out before erupting into more laughter.

Completely shitfaced, Heaross looked up only to find a sign saying "this guy fucked an alicorn" emblazoned above his head, glowing a bright purple light. It took all of five seconds for him to realize what was so funny and proceeded to crack up laughing himself. Five minutes after that, he took the sign and sat on it to prevent the alicorns from dying of laughter again. "Okay, as I was saying," he said, glaring at Twilight, who tried to wear an innocent expression which was failing due to the rosy blush on her cheeks, "I have a story about Artix. The paladin asshole who is my best friend. So, this guy, hates necromancy, hates undead, hates practically anything related to it. So, I come up to him one day and say 'Artix, I'm sorry but you need to know. I'm secretly a vampire.' So what does he do? He says right back to me 'Yeah, and I'm a werewolf.' At the time, I wasn't a vampire, I finished that spy mission ages ago. I had, however, procured a set of fake fangs that looked almost perfectly real. So, I show him the fangs, and he goes completely fucking nuts over it, swinging his battleaxe at me and screeching about evil and crap. I take out the fangs, show him, and he just shuts right up. After a moment, he says, in the most innocent fucking voice I've ever heard, 'Heeeeyyyy, friend.' Robina had been watching this entire thing, and when she finally stopped laughing, she said, with the straightest of faces, 'Run.' He was fucking gone. I have never, ever seen that man run faster in my entire life."

After the laughing had finally stopped, Celestia said, "I have a story about court. Now, you all know how court was before the revision. Occasionally though, since I personally saw to every court case, there were a few ponies who were impossible to not laugh at. One such case was the story of a pony named Windy Breeze. He was Cloudsdale's weather informant, and he had to explain to me exactly why the entire weather factory was shut down. In his exact words, 'Princess, I have never seen a bigger cock in all my life. It was so massive, everyone was drooling at the sight of it. The factory had to be shut down due to massive cock syndrome, your highness.' I had to teleport to my room and stayed there for the next ten minutes laughing, just so I didn't appear overly rude. When I finally was able to return to court, Windy Breeze was so confused as to why everypony else was laughing. That pony deserved a bucking medal."

More laughs were shared around, as well as a couple blushes, as Twilight stepped up to tell her story. "So, Shining Armor and I got into a fair amount of trouble when we were younger. One of the funniest instances was when he was training for the guard and had taken me for a tour around the guard barracks. When I saw all of the weapons inside, I immediately started rattling off different facts about the weapons, including their origins. Since I was about 13, I had very little experience with sex and that was limited to what I knew from books. As such, many sex jokes and innuendos went right over my head. I started to list the origins of the mourning star, which included it being used as some couples 'pleasure object.' Since I had no idea what that meant, I asked Shining Armor. You all can pretty much infer where that went. Soon after, he and I had to be escorted out by his commanding officer and I still didn't know what I did wrong. So I ask the commanding officer, and he goes, no joke, 'We have weapons, not dildos.'"

It was Luna's turn to tell a story, but when the others looked, she had passed out on the floor with her mug sitting on chest fluff. Taking that as her funny story, Heaross, Celestia, and Twilight let her sleep.

---

A/N: Remember that dark tag? Here it comes knocking. Fair warning, things get pretty heavy here.

---

Heaross found himself in the Dream Realm again. He had no idea as to why, but judging by the lack of Luna roaming the halls, he could guess why. Deciding to find the alicorn's dream, he set off, finding the door soon after. Generally, Heaross would be more careful about entering someone's mind, since you can hurt them inside of it. He decided to do away with caution, because the screams inside sound like he just used the Terror set on someone.

Bursting inside, he found Luna, as a foal, cowering under a large facsimile of Nightmare Moon. Neither did much, aside from Luna screaming and crying in the corner where she was trapped. Nightmare Moon just stared at her with an evil grin on her muzzle. Acting quickly, Heaross cut through the illusion of Nightmare Moon, dispelling whatever night terrors Luna had been experiencing. He picked up the foal, cradling and scratching her ears and sitting in the corner. Slowly, she quieted, until all that was left was some hiccuping.

"H-Heaross, why are you here?" She quietly asked. Her voice was still her own, slightly unsettling the warrior.

"Because I don't care to see my friends hurt or scared."

"B-But-"

"No, no buts." He cut her off. "It doesn't matter what happened in the past, as long as you are trying harder for the future. Yes, you may have made some mistakes, but the blame doesn't fall entirely on your shoulders."

"How can you say that, when you've seen what I did?"

"Because that Tantabus," He softly said, slightly surprising Luna, "Is of your own making. A way to remind yourself of your mistakes, hmm?"

"Yes, it is. I made such a grievous mistake all those years ago, and I won't allow myself to do it again." Her tears slowly started falling again.

"By using a Tantabus?" When she nodded, he said, "Luna, I have made mistakes worse than what you did. Your sister forgives you. Twilight, Applejack, Rarity, all of them forgive you. So why can't you forgive yourself?"

The mare of the moon remained silent, tears dripping from her muzzle.

"It's the guilt, isn't it?" She nodded, still silent. "Let me tell you a story about someone who almost let guilt ruin them." The foal looked up at him, paying attention. "He was a fine man, who had practically anything he could want. One day though, he found something that could save his little brother and his family from an accident that could kill them." Heaross started to tear up, eyes dripping. "It was a simple spell, not too hard to do. Something messed up however, causing the end of his entire family. It was a miracle that he survived, let alone unscathed. His family however, was gone. Forever. The guilt of the situation destroyed him, leaving him barely eating or moving. If it wasn't for his close friends and need for redemption, he would have wasted away, leaving a husk of a man and a forgotten family name." The Guardian was almost sobbing now, biting his lip to stop from openly crying.

"Heaross..." Luna breathed out.

After taking a few deep breaths, he shakily responded, "Don't pity me. I don't want or need it. I've moved on since then, and I'll eventually find some way to bring them back."

"But you haven't forgiven yourself either, have you?" Luna asked.

After a few more shaky breaths, Heaross stably answered, "No, I haven't. How do you forgive yourself for killing your own family?"

Luna leapt from his lap and transformed into her normal state from the foal form she had while Heaross stood up. Turning, Luna managed to balance on her hind legs long enough to wrap her forelegs around his neck and shoulders in a hug. Heaross easily accepted it, breathing heavily. They remained so for a fair few minutes, comforting each other in their misery of the past. Eventually they separated, wiping away tears. "Wanna go mess with Celestia and Twilight?" Luna asked.

"Please."

Author's Note:

Whew, this chapter's end did not want to go so easily! I had one hell of a time trying to figure out how to end the chapter, especially how to convey Heaross' emotions while keeping his emotional control mostly intact. This took a lot longer than I initially wanted it to, and I'm still not happy with it. But if I don't get this shipped out then I never will.

Heaross and Celestia have raced, leading to a tie between the two, Heaross bursts open a cask of the Guardian's Finest, shares it with friends and some stories told. He helps Luna recover from her own guilt while explaining his, and revealing what happened to his family. Poor guy, hope something good happens to him.

Thanks for reading guys, point out any mistakes I made! Battle On!

This is going way too fast, soon I'm going to be revealing Guardian secrets...

Comments

[Azure5555]

Ah but who is the better gymnist? Surehunter, or Veronica?

[Armyidiot]

8603373
Who are Surehunter and Veronica? If you mean Robina and Valencia, Robina wins by a very large margin.