Meta Gamer in Equestria: Odyssey

by reflective vagrant

Chapter 14. The Grim Situation. (The Warm Welcome, Part 5)

I was sitting at the interrogation table, locked up as usual save that I was permitted to have one hand free. I was also clothed in a simple but durable set of clothes, complete with a shirt and a set of shorts that were so well fitting that no belt was needed for them to stay in place. Across from me was the usual lineup of the scholar, Starlight Glimmer, and Miss "oh I'm angry all the time and you need to fear me," Captain Emo Sparkler Fountain, for lack of a better name. Not that I didn't have a healthy dose of fear of her. Now that being able to communicate with them let me see how transparent some of her act was now, I could tell that she never needed to be all moody for me to have that fear. I knew that if I misbehaved or tried to escape, she would be allowed to hurt or even kill me. That was reason enough.

"So let me get this straight," Starlight Glimmer interrupted me as I was explaining the details of how I had gotten there. "You have no idea how you got to Equis, let alone Equestria, and you expect me to believe that this isn't your real body, but the rendition of a character you made on a game of Ogres & Oubliettes and while your character can cast spells, you can't? Not only that, but his spellbooks are somehow written in our language, but you still can't read them despite them being your spellbooks?"

"One, I indeed don't know how I got here. Two, I don't expect you to believe me. If I wasn't stuck with these sensitive fins for ears, I'd be hard pressed to believe it myself. Three, it's not called Ogres & Oubliettes. It's called Dungeons and Dragons. Four, to be honest, I managed to figure out how to cast one spell since I got here, but it's been useless to me so far. Five, I didn't know they were in your language until you told me just now. And finally, six, I don't know for sure if the books are his, as I couldn't read them. I could probably recite a good chunk of the names of the spells written in my character's books and I'd actually hope they wouldn't match what's in those books because I honestly want to be wrong about all this."

The two ponies that had endeavored to establish communication with me stared at me with looks on their faces just as confused as I expected them to be.

Captain sparkler horn closed her eyes and rubbed her head with a hoof. I could tell that she wasn't liking the answers she was getting from me. "I've been given firm instructions to lean as much as possible for giving you the benefit of the doubt but..."

She looked up at me with a deadpan expression. "I find it more likely for a mule to have a foal than that story being true. So you're right. I don't believe it."

The room went quiet as she held her eyes questioningly at me. I felt tempted to spout out "it's the truth," but the words just wouldn't come. I couldn't even twitch my jaw to start the first syllable. This wasn't because what I told them wasn't the truth, it was, but because I could see that she was so set in her choice not to believe me it felt like that if I dared utter them, then instead of listening she'd twist it around and take it as an admission of guilt. The one thing I could tell was genuine within all her grandeur and loathing was that, in her eyes, my mere presence seemed to be a crime. Silence was the only thing I felt I could even find a stalemate in.

She took in a sharp, raspy, irritated breath and let it out with a sigh.

"It's clear I'm not going to get anywhere playing nice with him," she said coldly to Starlight while still looking me strait in the face. "Now that I've tried the nice way, I'm filing the paperwork for authorizing more extreme methods to get the truth out of him. He's all yours until I get back, Starlight. Have fun." With this, she turned around and went for the door.

Starlight's face had a mixed expression at her partner's response. One of both excitement, and worry.

I heard Captain Sparkler grumble in a voice that trailed off as she went down the hall. "All these rules about playing nice, at a time like this? Even the Storm King's paperwork wasn't thi..."

Both Starlight and I stared at the door for a few seconds after Captain Sparkler left. After that, we turned our eyes to make eye contact just as awkwardly.

Finally, I sat up and she composed herself. To break the ice, I asked, "So. Now that you know I'm a shapeshifter, aren't you concerned I might break out or something? If anything I see less security than before."

Starlight casually had a titter and addressed my question offhandedly, "Oh, we've known about that since before you arrived-"

My eyes went wide and my breathing stopped for a few seconds.

"-here in Ponyville. Zecora has been keeping an eye on you for us ever since you were found in the Green Hills Forest on the far side of the Everfree."

My mind was grinding for a moment as I managed to mutter "Who's Zecora..?"

"She was actually the only one that convinced the royals to not capture you on the spot. But when you ventured into civilization we had to act."

"Hey!" I shouted for a brief moment, causing her to stop. "Who is Zecora?" I asked again more firmly.

"Oh, right. Language barrier." Starlight rubbed the back of her head for a moment with a blush. "Zecora was the wise mare in the forest that had been trying to communicate with you through drawings."

My mind did a double take for a second as I held up my one free hand to have her pause for another question. "Zecora is the zebra shaman in the woods?"

Starlight bobbed her head back and forth for a second. "Well, technically she gave up that title when she left her homeland to travel and is simply a medicine mare now, but yes. That's her."

My body went livid for a moment as I held myself still. A few seconds later, I brought my hand inches in front of my face, grasped the thought I had and then pulled it aside, both mentally and physically.

"I'm going to just compartmentalize the thought of her secretly..." I took a deep breath and moved my hand to the side as if setting something down. "...that thought for later."

I stowed away as much anger as I could and asked Starlight, "So if you guys knew about me, why did I get attacked and why did it take so long to get communications established?"

"We didn't know if we could trust you. To be honest, even Zecora thought you were faking ignorance on a lot of stuff. When we found your spell books were written in Equestrian and you had managed to speak a few words to the local guards, it didn't look too good for your cause. As for communication..."

She blushed a bit. "I was only able to establish it by reverse engineering one of the spells in the spellbook you had and splicing it with some spells I knew. Then I had to modify it with some classified spells that required you to be present to make it a two way spell." She turned her gaze slightly down. "So we had to keep you at weapons point to make sure you couldn't steal any classified information."

I slumped down and just let my head do a dull thud on my forearms. "Damn it," I cursed softly. "That was one of his spells, Comprehend Languages. Those are his books." I rolled my head to the side and whimpered.

She glanced back at the door for a moment again then leaned down towards me. "If it's any consolation, while I may not believe that entire story you told us about being from a board game, I do believe you at least don't know how you got here and you don't know Equestrian without the amulet I made. But I'm not the one in charge of you, she is."

I didn't know if I could believe her or if she was just playing good cop, bad cop, so I couldn't feel completely at ease. But it did feel great to actually talk to someone again, to hold a somewhat normal conversation that didn't rely on dirt drawn pictures and crude sign language.

"So. When we first met, I got the gist that you had a lot of questions for me. What do you want to know first?"

"Well, I really want to know about where you're from, but I think it's best for now if you explain to me how your abilities work. I can work with the board game metaphor if you're more comfortable using that."

I rolled my eyes and held my free hand to my nose to better handle the mild migraine. "It's not a board game and it's not a metaphor. The basic premise is..."

* * *

"So you don't draw from a pool of Æther for your spells, but rather have pre-made lumps of magic energy set aside to fuel them and when you're out you're out until you have a chance to rest for the night? That's just... weird."

"Yea. I suppose it is. But if you happened to be a blend of a sorcerer and a warlock, you could play the abilities off each other to have a large stockpile of magic energy given enough time because warlock magic works a bit different. But it tended to taper off in effectiveness after level 8 or so. It was just a nifty novelty for-"

My conversation was cut off when Captain Sparkles burst through the door.

"I have you now!" She declared as she marched towards the table, multiple guards with weapons in toe behind her. "I've been authorized to use more invasive methods to extract information from our prisoner."

She looked directly at me and said. "This is your last chance to come clean before I stop pulling my punches and bring out the real suffering."

Starlight went up to her and interjected. "And who in their right mind would actually-" She was cut short as a scroll was promptly shoved in her face.

Starlight quickly read the scroll with her eyes going wide as she reached the bottom. "This is a..!" she exclaimed as she looked back at the captain.

"This is the lesser of two evils, Starlight! You have your orders! Now follow them or I'll be forced to have somepony less qualified do it!" the captain barked at her before returning her gaze to me. "So what will it be? Do you have anything else to add to your story?"

I could only cower in front of her futilely while multiple spears were poised to be thrown at me if I tried anything.
"Just that it was all true??" I squeaked with nothing better to say.

"Oh! Oh! It's true, is it?" she started to rant vividly. "I suppose it's also true that for the last month we haven't been at war, trying to defend our lands from weird ape like beings like yourself that seem dead set on exploiting our resources in their own wars? That you really did just happen to arrive only weeks before the rifts to another world open and our valued solders, many with family at home, had to not lay down their lives to hold the front lines? I think not!"

All I could do is stutter, "Wait. You're at war!? With who!?"

She just ignored me and nodded to Starlight, who took a weird piece of chalk from the captain in her levitation and came towards me. Her eyes welled up in tears as she marked my face with the chalk then set it on the table and lit up her horn.

"Please believe me when I say I'm so, so sorry."

A heavy weight seemed to fall around my head and eyelids as I quickly fell asleep.

---

I found myself on an island in the middle of a void, almost like the night sky but with no horizon. The funny thing is, I could swear I felt something watching me, like I had a big neon orange flag taped to my back saying "Here I am! Look at me!"

And that's when I saw it, flying out of that void and materializing at the edge of my island. A tall dark blue horse pony with wings, a horn and a flowing main that looked even more like the night sky than the void behind it.

It zeroed in on me and screamed louder than what a creature of that size should have been able to, "Greetings strange mortal of foreign shores! After moons of eluding us in thine sleep, the markings have finally allowed us to find the pattern of thine astral form! No more can thou hide from us! Thou shalt be judged by the undeniable truth from thine own dreams! Before the next rising of our sister's sun, no secret of thine soul shall have escaped the Princess of the Night!"

Comments

[Liqwidice]

Ouch. Well Luna's in for a rude shock.

[reflective vagrant]

8940294
... Oh the irony of your words.