• Published 3rd Feb 2012
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Order-naries - CTVulpin



Four OCs, seven magic Gems, a Chaos Demon, Season 1 canon only, imported from FF.net

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Chapter 5

The boys and Applejack finished their (private) baths rather quickly and met up outside the spa, having nothing else to do other than wait for the others.

"So," AJ said, breaking the awkward silence, "I guess that's one down, six ta go?"

"Basically," Ashen Blaze said, pulling out the Diamond and looking it over, "Although, if we stick with the average, Tau'rin will have two or three of Gems by the time we locate him."

"What's this Tau'rin like?" Applejack asked.

"Evil," Soul Mage said, "loves Chaos, and hasn't needed to change his basic plan much in all this time. He'll try and find some pocket of darkness or underground overlord-wannabe to attach himself too, hunt the Gems as quietly as possible, and then try to launch some all-out, world-conquering plan once he can come up with one."

"And that points us right to him," Ash said, "Usually, by the time we meet, all seven Gems are in play, there's a big fight, and the combined energies fling us along just as the power of the Gems overwhelms Tau'rin's limited sanity and reality starts breaking down. It would be tedious if each world didn't give us a new set of people to rope in and different rules to work around. And even then…" His voice trailed off, and he gave the Diamond a spin with his magic, then stopped it and stared intently at it. The Gem began to glow faintly, and then a beam of light shot into the sky.

"What was that?" Gale asked, coming out of the spa, followed by Twilight.

"Just seeing if I could activate the Diamond through unicorn power," Ash said, stowing the gem away, "Where are Heart and Rarity?"

"Still in there," Gale said, inclining her head toward the door, "The two of us decided to forgo the mud facials and whatnot."

"You look good anyway," Soul said, "You should clean up more often Gale."

"Thanks," Gale said in a deadpan, giving the yellow unicorn a slight smile.

"Let's head over to the library," Twilight said, "They said they'll meet up with us there when they're done."

"Sounds good," Ash said, walking off.

As they walked down the streets of Ponyville, Twilight noticed that there weren't very many ponies out about their business, which was strange for the early afternoon. The weather was partly cloudy, but it looked like the weather pegasi were sticking to the schedule of no rain. There weren't many reasons Twilight could think of that would leave the streets so empty, and a glance over at Applejack told her that the earth pony was having similar thoughts, and both of them were probably coming to the same conclusion. The Order-nary ponies were taking in the sights but didn't seem to realize that things weren't quite normal. Twilight took the lead as they neared the library, but as she started to grip the door handle with her magic, she heard a soft "excuse me" to her left. She turned to look and saw Fluttershy peering around the side of the tree. "Sorry Twilight," she said in her soft tone, "But, could I have a word with you? Oh, and you too Applejack. If you don't mind." Twilight and AJ exchanged a look.

"You three go on ahead," Twilight said to the Order-naries, "We'll be right with you." She and Applejack walked over to the shy pegasus. Ash spared them a glance, and then walked up to the door and opened it. Before he could think, he was hit in the face by a mass of confetti accompanied by the sound of party horns.

"What the skeb?" he exclaimed in surprise. He and his friends walked into the library, which was full of ponies and decorated with balloons, streamers, and a banner declaring "Welcome to Ponyville!"

As the three ponies looked around, Pinkie Pie popped up in front of them and yelled, "Surprise!" Ash yelped and backed up into Gale. "Do you like it?" Pinkie asked, smiling broadly as she leaned forward toward Ash, "I usually hold parties at Sugar Cube Corner, but I figured you were more likely to come here." She dashed over and threw a front leg around Soul's shoulders, gesturing to all the guests with the other. "And just look, practically every pony in Ponyville's here to meet you! Now you'll have lots of friends."

"Uh, thanks," Soul said, forcing a smile onto his face, "This is… quite the surprise."

"Not too unlike my first party," Twilight said from the door. The Order-naries turned around to look at her. Fluttershy was standing behind her, hanging her head shyly.

"Sorry," she said, "Pinkie insisted I make sure that one of you opened the door instead of Twilight."

"Yep!" Pinkie said, releasing Soul and starting to bounce in place, "It's always best when the guests of honor spring the surprise. Now come on, I'll introduce you to everyone!" She bounced away, and then stopped and looked back, "Oh, and don't worry about Spike Twilight, I put him up in his bed so no pony knocks him into something by accident." She resumed her bouncing, heading for the nearest group of ponies.

"Well," Gale said, "If she went to all this trouble, let's enjoy ourselves." Soul nodded, grinning, and the two of them followed the bouncing pink party pony. Ash followed them at a slower pace for a bit, and then veered off toward a table of refreshments. He loaded a plate with a couple of muffins, then plucked a few books off a nearby shelf, and worked his way through the crowd and up the stairs into the living area.

"Oh dear," Fluttershy said, watching him go, "I don't think he likes this."

"Reminds me of me," Twilight said, "Which is strange; he seemed so out-going up till now, if a bit grim."

"What should we do?" Fluttershy asked.

"I don't know," Twilight asked, "Let's give him some time, maybe he'll come back down on his own soon." Fluttershy nodded and the two friends went to join the party.

When Rarity and Gold Heart showed up about an hour later, the party was in full swing. Having missed the introductions, Heart went to find Gale, which didn't prove too difficult since she'd gathered quite a crowd around her at the Bean-bag Buck game. Bean-bag Buck involved launching small bean bags from a line on the floor and trying to get them into one of the buckets arranged against the wall. Most ponies would toss the bag with their front hooves, or with magic in the case of unicorns, but Gale had decided to take the name literally; she had her back to the baskets, sparing only a brief glance at them now and then, and would then kick a bag into the air with one rear leg and buck it toward the baskets with the other. She never missed the smallest, highest-value basket. Heart watched her with a smug smile for several minutes, and then flew over the crowd to join her friend.

"Hi Heart," Gale said, making another perfect kick, "I like your mane."

"Thanks," Heart said, bouncing her now slightly-curled brown mane on one hoof. "Say, shouldn't you give some other pony a chance?"

"Maybe," Gale said, prepping another bean-bag, "but no pony wants to challenge me."

"You could try to be less perfect," Heart said, watching the bean-bag sail into the basket. Gale rolled her eyes. "How about this then," Heart said. She spun around and pointed a hoof at a random spectator, a brown-on-brown stallion with an hourglass cutie-mark. "You sir," Heart said, "pick a basket, any basket, and we'll see if Gale here can hit it."

"Uh," the pony said, pointing to a mid-sized basket on the right, "That one." Gale looked at her new target, and then looked away, kicked up a bean-bag, and bucked it straight and true into the mid-sized basket.

"Anypony else want to challenge the unerring accuracy of Gale?" Heart asked, flying up to look over the crowd. Several hooves went up.

Meanwhile, Rarity found that Soul and Pinkie Pie had acquired a small audience of their own. The two of them were holding a conversation which had started with Soul being confused about the origin or morality or something ridiculously deep about the game of pin-the-tail-on-the-pony, but which had quickly become a sort of game where Soul tried to follow Pinkie's meandering and often abrupt changes of topic without getting "thrown." He seemed to be doing remarkably well, although he broke down into laughter shortly after Rarity joined the group. "Excuse me," Rarity said after the yellow unicorn had caught his breath, "but has anypony seen Ashen Blaze?"

"He went upstairs almost the moment he got here," Twilight said, walking over from the food, "I think he's still up there."

"Well," Rarity said with a toss of her mane, "That simply will not do. I shall go have a word with him right now." She walked away with a determined and regal air in her posture.

"OOOoo," Pinkie said, eyes wide and sparkling, "I think she likes him!"

"What?" Soul asked, giving the pink pony a look of total confusion.

"One point for Pinkie," a lime-green, white-and-blue maned pony said.

"That doesn't… you're keeping score?" Soul sputtered, transferring his gaze to the speaker. "Never mind," he continued, shaking his head and looking back at Pinkie, "what do you mean she likes him?"

"Exactly that, silly,' Pinkie answered, "Our little Rarity has a crush on Ash!"

"Oh," Soul said, looking worried, "That's not good. Ash has never been good with… closeness, the girls and I notwithstanding."

"Should we stop her then?" Twilight asked.

"No," Soul said after some thought, "If she really has feelings for Ash, he'll be the one to set her straight."

Rarity found Ash lying next to Twilight's bed reading a book. He glanced in her direction when he heard her hoofsteps before returning to his book. Rarity stood in silence, not quite sure how to address him. Part of her wanted to scold him for ignoring her and the party, but another part was afraid of angering him, and yet another didn't mind being alone with him. Finally, after a few tense minutes, Ash put the book down, closed his eyes, and said, "I am starting to wonder about what language I'm speaking."

Rarity blinked. "Excuse me?" she asked, confused.

"Barring a few logical changes to common expressions," Ash continued, "The words I hear register as English, and my team and I have had no trouble speaking to anypony. However," he lifted the book and turned it so Rarity could see the spine, "I can't decide if this script is English, Imperial, or something else entirely. And yet, the words make perfect sense to me. Quite the riddle."

"I… I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about," Rarity said as Ash's words swam about in her head, trying to find something familiar to latch onto.

"That's what you get when you walk in on my studies," Ash said. He opened his eyes slightly and smiled. "Don't let it bother you Rarity, confusion does not suit your face. Although, you may need to get used to it while my team and I are around." He stood up and set the book on the bed. "Am I correct in assuming you were chosen to convince me to join the party?" he asked.

"I came on my own," Rarity said, "The others seemed content to let you be alone."

"My team knows me, and the rest made a good judgment," Ash said, walking over to the basket-bed holding the petrified Spike, "I'm really a solitary critter at heart."

"Is that so?" Rarity said, "Well, you certainly had me fooled. Up until now you've been nothing but a gentlecolt to me and my friends, apologizing for every little inconvenience you think you're causing." Ash snorted in amusement, "Ok, my house being destroyed is a big inconvenience," the white unicorn continued, "but never mind that right now. You even seemed eager to have us along on your search."

"Did it ever occur to you that I'm simply using you?" Ash asked, looking up from the stone dragon, "You in particular with your gem sense, but also Applejack for her simple hospitality, Twilight for her knowledge of magic, and the pegasi for Heart's sake. Haven't you considered that if we weren't in such need, we wouldn't have much to do with you?"

"Your friends are having a good time downstairs," Rarity said, "and you get along with them so well."

"I need them," Ash said, "first and foremost they are my team, my anchors to reality and the only ones I can count on to quench my temper. They're my friends as well, but that's something we've grown into."

"Oh, I see," Rarity said, eyes narrowing, "You think you're too good to spend the time making new friends."

"Ha!" Ash laughed sardonically, "Good?" He walked over and looked Rarity right in the eyes. "If you knew me even a little, you'd hesitate to call me…" he trailed away, eyes suddenly going wide with surprise. His horn began to glow and he vanished from sight in a flash. A loud yelp cut through the party noise downstairs and Rarity ran down the stairs, reaching the ground floor just in time to see Soul run out the door with Ash hanging onto his back like a scared cat. Everypony stopped what they were doing to watch the undignified exit, and then several sets of eyes turned to look at her. Rarity was used to having lots of eyes on her, but this was entirely the wrong kind of attention. She felt her cheeks grow hot as the desire to run and hide grew strong in her chest. Fortunately, Fluttershy flew over to her, giving Rarity a reason to not give in to the fear.

"What happened?" the yellow pegasus asked, concerned only for her friend.

"I honestly don't know," Rarity said, seeing that Twilight, Heart, and Gale were also coming over, "I tried talking to him, but he was being so negative that we started to argue. For a second I thought he was going to explode again; he was staring at me so intently, but then he just teleported away."

"Wait," Gale said, "staring? He was looking you in the eye?"

"Yes," Rarity said, not sure where the brown earth pony was going.

"For how long?"

"A few seconds," Rarity said, "At least three, maybe four?" Heart and Gale exchanged surprised looks.

"What's the record again?" Heart asked.

"Two, not counting berserkers," Gale responded. The two ponies glanced at Rarity and then dashed out of the library, leaving the others with various expression of confusion.

"All right," Twilight said after a second, "There is no way I'm letting that go without some sort of explanation."

"Me too," Rarity said, joining her lavender friend as she headed determinedly for the door. They paused briefly upon encountering Pinkie Pie, who looked like her hair was about to deflate. "Don't mind us Pinkie," Rarity assured her, "It's a fabulous party, and we'll be back to enjoy it as soon as possible."

Pinkie was silent for a few seconds, but then her smile returned and her mane poofed out more. "Okie dokie loki!" she said and bounced off to brighten some other pony's day.

Twilight and Rarity left the library and walked into the middle of an argument between Soul and Ash, which Heart and Gale were standing well away from. "Are you insane?" Soul was shouting, "How could you possibly think alienating the only creature we've met who can come close to filling PC's role was a good idea?"

"Do I question your decisions about who to let close to you?" Ash retorted.

"If you think it's interfering with the mission, yes!" Soul said, "You have before and you know it, so don't get all high-and-mighty on me!"

"Well, what would you have done? I swear, one more minute and she'd have…" Ash's rant was cut short as he saw that Twilight and Rarity had shown up. He blew out a long breath and dropped his head a little. "Botherment," he muttered.

"Hi girls," Soul said dully, "Sorry you had to hear that." He looked at the expressions of worry and confusion on Rarity's face and the determined set of Twilight's eyes and gave Ash a smirk. "Looks like you've got some 'splaining to do," he said. Ash just glowered at him.

"Oh, you boys," Gale said, stepping between them, "I'll take this, you two go off and cool down." The male unicorns shared a quick, stony glance and walked away. "Ok," Gale said, looking at Twilight and Rarity, "first, I think Ash owes you an apology or two Rarity. Just make sure one of us is around when you try to get it."

"I just want to know where that melancholy came from," Rarity said.

"He… hasn't had an easy life," Gale said slowly, "He doesn't really open up to people very easily, and even then it takes incredible circumstances to make him say anything about his life before meeting us. The real problem is he never really forgives himself for his mistakes unless he can completely reverse their consequences. If it weren't for Soul, Heart, and me supporting him, I think he'd lose the will to keep going."

"Oh my," Rarity said, looking over at Ash, who was engaged in a quiet, and apparently civil, conversation with Soul.

"So, what was the big deal about his eyes?" Twilight asked.

"I'll answer that," Ash said, coming over with Soul to rejoin the group, "Ordinarily, nothing can meet my gaze for more than a few seconds, except for those under some sort of mind control. However, it seems that detail wasn't included with this pony shape. Soul here actually beat me in a staring contest just now." A smug smile crossed the golden-yellow unicorn's face for a moment. Ash turned to Rarity and gave her a small smile. "It wasn't the way I'd have preferred to learn the fact, but I guess it did spare you from a full-on tantrum from me." He bowed his head. "Forgive me my foul humor."

Rarity regarded the penitent unicorn for a few minutes, and then said, "Think nothing of it. Now, there is still a party in your honor occurring; will you attend it?"

Ash raised his head, a ghost of a smile on his lips. "I'll give it a try I guess."

"Very well," Rarity said, moving to stand beside him, "Then let us go."