The Ballad of Jack and Sylvia: an Equestrian Odyssey

by Venter

Dates and Jailbreaks

Four Days Earlier

Rainbow Dash studied herself in the mirror. She was in the filly's room of The Bale, a popular Ponyville restaurant specializing in hay dishes, having invited Jack to dinner. Her multicolored locks were windswept; not because she had been flying recently, but because she often shook her head when nopony was looking simply to recreate the effect. Her magenta eyes were large, but not nearly as large as Rarity's (and without the impeccably groomed eyelashes). Her body was pure lithe muscle - slender, without the raw strength of Applejack's haunches or the softer curves of Pinkie's flank. In short, it was an athlete's body. She was proud as hell of it when she flew, but secretly part of her felt like it held her back when it came to courtship - not that she'd ever admit that.

Snap out of it Dash; you're here with a friend, nothing more. He's not into you. Hell, you shouldn't be into him. He's an alien!

An alien with remarkably nice eyes. And broad... what did Fluttershy call his withers again? Oh yeah... shoulders.

An alien who was a complete jerk to all of your friends. And to you!

When he first got here maybe. He was scared... confused... upset. But he warmed up to you pretty darn quick. Even put on that formalwear Rarity made him tonight.

"He's just not interested." Dash spoke the final line of her internal monologue aloud, as though to forcibly get the last word on herself.

"Rainbow Dash, I don't mean to intrude. But what has put you in such a bad mood?" A familiar voice said, accompanied by the soft sound of running water. Zecora had come in at some point and was washing her hooves.

"Zecora? The hay are you doing here? Don't you live out in the Everfree?" Rainbow Dash responded, going beet red under her light blue coat.

"The forest is where I call home. But sometimes for dinner, I like to roam. And for my friends I do my part, so tell me, what troubles your heart?" Zecora's rhyming trick of speech was weird on the best of days, and given Dash's state of mind she found it annoying.

"It's nothing, okay?" Dash responded. Zecora gave her a knowing look, which only amplified the pegasus's blush. "Just talking to myself."

"If you do not wish to tell, your answer I will not compel. But lest something be amiss, I will say only this. When it comes to the heart of a stallion; it cannot be conquered with the force of a batallion. But if you're bold enough to dare, it can be done by a single mare." Zecora turned to leave the bathroom.

"He's not a stallion!" Rainbow Dash blurted out. As hard as it was to suppress her pride, she desperately wanted to talk to somepony about this before going back out to face him.

Zecora smiled knowingly at her. "If a mare you sooner prefe-"

"I said he isn't a stallion." Dash cut her off hastily. "He's... not a pony at all. It's... it's the human. Okay? I guess I'm just a freak." Tears began to well up in the pegasus's eyes.

Zecora walked back over to Dash, brushing a tear from Dash's face and putting a hoof on her foreleg consolingly. "Neither a pony am I, plain to see, yet I've brought pony stallions back to my tree. Ignore your mind; this isn't it's part. Instead you need to trust your heart. Your fears and doubts might lead you astray, but your heart will ever show you the way." The zebra said.

Dash began to regain her composure when a knock came at the bathroom door, accompanied by yet another familiar voice - this time a deep bass with a country twang. "Zecora, food's here."

"Is that... Big Mac!?" Dash had to stifle a chuckle; the idea of the workhorse on a date just seemed... wrong.

"I said those things not just to teach... I also practice what I preach." Zecora grinned back at her before leaving back into the restaurant proper.

Dash took another moment to think over the advice her friend had presented. It all seemed to make sense, though part of her was still doubting. A zebra and a pony were different species, true, but they had -alot- more in common physically than a human and a pony. Still, the core of Zecora's advice was sound, and all the lingering doubts were simply products of her mind - they had to be discarded so she could trust her heart. With a deep breath, Dash left the filly's room and returned to their table.

Jack waved her over, a smile on his face. "Good timing, the food just got here." There was a large plate of cajun spiced sauteed hay and oats in front of Rainbow's seat, and a bowl of potato-leek cream stew in front of Jack. She still didn't get why he would go to a place like The Bale and get one of the only non-hay based dishes, but she chalked it up to human weirdness.

As it turned out, Jack and Dash shared a common tendency to eat quickly. It wasn't even fifteen minutes before both dishes were bare and Rainbow was calling for the check. Jack still didn't have a bit to his name, so Dash was going to have to pay for it. The idea didn't sit particularly well with him; it was old fashioned and perhaps outdated, but he always liked to pay for a date.

Wait... the fuck!? No. No no no no no. I didn't think that, I'm not doing that... I don't date ponies.

You also didn't -like- ponies. And now here you are eating dinner with one... one you've been hanging out with. Slippery slope, huh?

That's different. I hang out with my dog back home; that doesn't mean I date her.

But your dog doesn't talk. Your dog doesn't have a fully fleshed out sentient personality, as much as she might seem like it sometimes. That's a bullshit argument, and you know it.

Fine then, how's this for an argument - I'm spoken for. Gwen wouldn't exactly be thrilled to find out she got replaced by a blue horse.

Gwen? You don't even know if she's waiting for you. She sure seemed like she was looking for a reason to leave... and a week long disappearance in the woods might just give her an excuse.

"Bit for your thoughts?" Rainbow asked, snapping Jack out of his internal strife. She had payed for the meal while he was lost in thought, and was already rising to her hooves to leave.

"Oh nothing... just thinking about home" Jack replied. There was a tinge of pink to his cheeks which led Dash to believe there was more to it than that, but she didn't press the issue. They stepped out of the restaurant and into the cool Ponyville night air. "C'mon, I'll walk you back to Fluttershy's" Dash offered.

They walked in a slightly awkward silence through the streets toward the edge of town; it was late enough that they were alone for almost the entire route. Once they hit the grassy fields on the edge of Ponyville Dash stopped. "Lets rest here for a bit; I'm tired." She said. Jack raised an eyebrow; it wasn't like the pegasus to be tired, especially not from such a short walk. Nonetheless he obliged her, carefully spreading his cloak on the grass before sitting beside her. Rarity would -kill- him if he got grass stains on the tux.

Jack looked up, taking in the night sky. The moon was nearly full, casting a silvery glow over everything around them. The stars were both familiar and alien to him at the same time; he recognized the familiar canvas of an inky sky with pricks of light, but the constellations and patterns were all completely foreign. Dash followed his gaze, completely comfortable with the stars. Like all pegasi (with the possible exception of Fluttershy) she felt an innate connection to the sky, and the night sky was no different. After a few minutes of resting in silence, Dash worked up her courage and broke it.

"Pretty awesome sky, huh?" She asked. Jack simply nodded. "I like to look at it pretty often" She continued.

"Me too" Jack replied, a bit of a whimsical sound in his voice.

"Ever think your special somepony might be looking at the same star as you? I mean, it's the same stars ponies see in Appleoosa and Manehatten that we're looking at now." Dash was blushing visibly in the moonlight; this was as close as she could bring herself to admitting her crush.

"Yeah. I don't think she can be though... the stars might be the same across this world, but between worlds they're very different. I remember her pointing out constellations to me back home... I can't find any of them here." Jack sighed. Thinking about Gwen hurt more than a bit. As fond as his memories of the good times were, their recent strife and his own self doubts were making it seem more and more likely that he wouldn't have a 'special somepony' to go back to. Dash, meanwhile, fell into silence. It took her a few minutes to replay his words in her head, each one of them like a weight dragging her sky high aspirations back down to earth.

Zecora was right. The heart of a stallion - or a man - could be conquered by a single mare. And Jack's had already been won.

Four Days Later

Jack awoke with a splitting headache. A week ago it had been due to a hangover; today, it was from Dash's kick to the back of his head. A week ago, he had been naked and on an amazingly comfortable bed. Today, he was wearing his tattered blue cloak and lying on a cold stone floor. As his surroundings swam into view he realized that he was also behind iron bars, reinforced with what looked like a magical forcefield being generated by a nearby white unicorn stallion with a dark blue mane. Sylvia was already awake, sitting on the floor near the bars and pleading with the Stallion to let them go.

"I'm telling you Shining Armor, you're making a mistake!" She sounded obviously frustrated. Her pleas were falling on deaf ears. A faint clop of hooves descending stairs echoed through the dungeon, and Rainbow Dash came around the corner. "She's right, Shining Armor. They didn't do it." Her voice sounded a little hollow. "Just spoke to Twilight; they're innocent."

Shining Armor snapped to attention. "Twilight's awake!?" He said in surprised disbelief, turning and galloping upstairs. Rainbow Dash fetched the keys from the nearby guardpost, gripping them between their teeth and unlocking their cell. "C'mon, lets get you two back to Ponyville. We need to meet with the others and get to planning." Jack and Sylvia got to their feet and walked out of the cell, Jack still stumbling a bit as consciousness fully reinstated itself.

As they climbed the stairs Sylvia found herself puzzling over a few anomalies in Dash's behavior. She was looking at Jack frequently. This wasn't completely unusual; she had seen Dash sneak glances at the human boy before. But these looks were different - almost like she was hungry. Secondly and far more ambiguously, she was getting a weird 'vibe' off of Rainbow. She was still quite sensitive to emotions after awakening her power; Dash, however, was giving off none. If anything, there was a conspicuous absense; it felt like a cell phone with no signal. Sylvia made a mental note to look into that once they were well away from the dungeon - for now, she was just glad to be out.

Jack was looking considerably less pleased. It was nice to be vindicated, but it didn't do anything to help the fact that the one pony who he consistently got along with - who he had even entertained romantic feelings for - had turned on him and knocked him out cold. Every time Rainbow turned to look at him he averted his gaze. Within minutes they were outside of the castle, and walking toward the main gates of Canterlot.

Twenty Minutes Later

Rainbow Dash was galloping as hard as she could toward the dungeons from the east. Shining Armor was doing likewise from the west. In their haste they collided into one another, falling to the pavement in a tangle of hooves, his horn narrowly missing her foreleg.

"Dash!" He yelled

"Shining Armor!" She yelled back.

"We have a serious problem!" They both yelled in unison.

Shining Armor glared at her. "Why would you lie to me about Twilight? And where the hay are the prisoners!?"

Dash gave him a confused look. "I don't know what you're talking about with Twilight... I was just visiting her maybe thirty minutes ago tops! She's stable, but not much else has changed. As for the humans... that's what I was coming to tell you about! Somepony said they saw them heading for the gates. How did they get past you?"

Shining Armor rubbed his head for a moment before responding. "So wait a sec... you're telling me you didn't just come down into the dungeon and tell me that they were innocent, and that Twilight was awake?" He asked

"I have no idea what you're talking about." She stared at him, a look of confusion in her eyes. "What does this mean?"

A grim look of realization spread across Shining Armor's face. "It means this just got a whole lot more interesting, in a very bad way."

Author's Note:

I'm not dead! :-p. Was in Wisconsin for a week, and then had to deal with all of the usual start of semester nonsense. I expect to go back to at least semi-regular updates now though.

On another note, I wanted to clarify one thing - when I say cloaks, I don't mean simple back coverings. I mean more like greatcloaks, the sort with a built in mantle which can be held shut by a clasp. So even if they're only wearing a loose cloak, they aren't wandering around fully exposed all the time :-p.

Comments

[NightmareKnight]

Kind of like the kind you would see a wandering merchant in olden times wear. And the whole changeling thing is definitely unexpected. But maybe you shouldn't have skipped over anything about Sylvia gaining powers. We know about her magic, but only that she grew a plant. Anyways, I don't want to sound like I'm complaining, so I'll leave you on a good note. I definitely enjoyed this chapter, and I am looking forward to more.

[Wan-wanniche]

This review brought to you by Authors Helping Authors.

Grammar (out of 10): 9 out of 10. When a character speaks, a new paragraph is started. I have the same bad habit, so don't worry too much about it. Most people don't really notice.

Pros: Quick moving, easy reading, and accurate character portrayals

Cons: The first two chapters move a tad bit too quickly. Although I like the pacing overall, the first two chapters seem somewhat abrupt.

Two, sometimes you assume that the reader is going to follow you from your introduction of a concept in the story to 'the next logical step', is the best way I can think to put it. Look over these five chapters a bit, and see if you gestalt from initial concept to the next logical assumption. Ex: Sylvia has magic= Sylvia knows magic.

Three: Again, I like your pacing. But sometimes it seems (as a writer) you are in a hurry to get it all down on the page before you forget, or while you have time. That's fine, but remember to go back and make sure it doesn't feel rushed when you read it.

I won't swear to you that it will be a favorite of mine, but it certainly has the potential to be a ripping good yarn. I wait with anticipation!

Oh, and thank you for your review of The Dragon that came to Tea.