When a human falls into Equestria in the ancient castle in the Everfree Forest, while trying to find supplies in this harsh new environment at night he feels like something is watching him every night even though he's all alone hopefully,
"why do these things happen to me first losing my job now im stuck in this castle just barely surviving day to day"
Joseph (or just joey for short) upon being fired from his current job as on his way home when a black hole appears in front of him for just a second is transported to a desolate castle in the middle of nowhere luckily, he knew how to survive in a forest, unbeknownst to him there is one resident in his new temporary home
“It’s always the first few days that are the hardest but I can gladly say I’m doing okay with what I got”
upon reminiscing upon what happens not even six days ago when that hole just appeared. It was so sudden it opened and closed next thing he knew the man was thrown from the walkway on the way home from his well old job even remembering the fact going into the factory that morning to work and upon being accused of performing below the parameters of the job he was assigned to even though he was trying his best fix what the other handlers couldn’t it was so infuriating to know he got blamed for something he didn’t even do.
“At least I still have a place that’s covered and I’m not in the rain and in this damn forest and I got food and water”
the man spent the first few days trying to find rations and some kind of liquid to drink that wasn’t deadly, Thanks to his time in the scouts surviving in the wild shouldn’t be hard so foraging for fruit and meat to keep his energy up which was going extremely well but each night was where things got odd, every night while he was making his evening meal the man had felt like someone or something was watching him. But this was the reality, not those crappy Paranormal Activity movies everyone was so terrified of, The man chuckled in humming a tune while his fish was being cooked over the small fire he made in the castle foyer.
“just a few more days then I can head into that castle on the mountain”
Whilst the man was sitting around the fire a shadow lingered dancing along the walls watching this thing eat and rest in this forsaken place like it was nothing, this was what the shadow found strange this bipedal creature had shown up and made this place a home for up to a week now. The shadow stayed at a distance but kept observing him during the days and mostly slept during the nights, he didn’t seem to be an immediate threat right now for now the shadow chose to observe him at least until he left.
A few days had passed until the man was resting up for the trek up that oddly shaped mountain making a knapsack hopefully giving enough prep time and supplies he could make it towards the monument since this was his last night he decided to set an alarm on his now useless phone of his and maybe a few songs since it was still at full charge laying back in on the stone floor he pulled the makeshift blanket he found out off the banners he pulled out his phone playing one of the few songs on his phone.
his voice rang out in the barren castle just enjoying this time of peace he felt like nothing could stop him from upping the volume in his voice as the song go even more intense and stronger as he let out more of the lyrics in a roar up into the night like a wolf howling towards the moon the man let his pride and emotion run free for the first time in forever.
all this passion along with the words this man was singing made the shadow feel at ease but also more confident in the plan is made. as the man gave out the second verse the shadow had taken shape forming an equine shape behind the man as he rose back to his feet letting the power of his song take him as he belted out the next verse while he sang the shadows from solidified. the man turned around and went absolutely silent as an ebony horse about his height with teal snake-like eyes and between the two figures until the horse did something h didn’t expect, she spoke.
“Um hello”
Well in a rational mind it was time to freak out but this man has seen some extremely weird things in the forest spanning from space bears and wood-wolves all trying to actively kill the man so this was new in a good way. The man slowly approached the equine inspecting the new being that had made itself known just in this last few minutes, did his singing bring this creature to him or was it here all time truly something new had come across his path hopefully this horned Pegasus or winged unicorn won’t try to kill him at least not painfully. upon closer inspection, the being was wearing armor that was not dented much but it still shows that this horse has seen some kind of battle but it wasn’t much to go on so taking a leap of faith the man decided to do the best thing to do, respond.
“Um... Hi”
The two beings just sat there looking at each other waiting for the other to make a move aggressive or otherwise. after a few tense minutes of waiting for both lean towards trying to goad the other in speaking than at the same time, they both spoke
“who and what are you?”
Again more silence waiting for the other to speaks
“My name is Joseph and I’m a human or Homo Sapien if you are being technical. I am Twenty-One years old and I am male from a planet called Earth more specifically The United States. What about you since you are unlike any other creature that I’ve seen since I got here?”
The equine had stayed silent for a maddeningly long time staring at the human male trying to read the man making sure that there was no deceit in the words he had spoken. after processing his words she carefully chose her words as she offered her response
“My name is Nightmare Moon and I am the ruler of this castle and the princess of the shadows and I am what is called an Alicorn both capable of flight and magic as you can see with my wings and horn.”
She spoke her sentence clearly and calmly flapping her wings but as she tried to take flight she hesitated and fell back to the floor chuckling as the man fell back on the floor in surprise as he got up to a kneeling position showing the respect to this supposed “princess of shadows” maybe if he stays in her good graces he will be allowed to stay in her home at least temporarily.
As the ebony alicorn (as she called it), and the human bowed out of respect, the silence of the forest could be heard outside the crumbling walls. after a minute of silence, the human stood up looking into the eyes of the mare,
"Listen, your highness, I honestly didn't know there was anyone else here and with a forest that has tree wolves and space bears of those really massive blue hourglass spiders this was the best form of shelter I could find, if I knew where a town was, I would have gone there. But even with my knowledge of forests, I don't recognize any of the flora or fauna. So before you kick me out can you please tell me where I am exactly ?."
the mare stood there, stalwart probing the manes stare trying to find ant traces of deceit. "Very well human I shall indulge you this information, you are currently in the Everfree Forest, home to many fierce and dangerous creatures of Equestria, the country your currently residing in has a dominant population of ponies the come in 3 races: Unicorn, Pegasus, and the earth pony. Right now the closest town is a little hamlet called Ponyville where those ponies that ruined my chance at taking m kingdom back from that princess who had the GALL to banish me with the elements we used to weird together!" as she said her last sentence, her hoof came down of the eroded floor making the ancient stone splinter and crack. This caused the human to flinch from the sheer raw power this pony was capable of.
recovering from his flinch the human started to process what Nightmare moon had said' "Your joking Equestria I'm actually on another planet?! Where I come from this Equestria doesn't even exist if I thought I was getting punked I would call it here but being in this forest going on a week now this is just my life now. The human's body slumped over for the first time in since he got to this psychotic world he broke down. Even though he hated the inhabitants of his world were war hungry and the current leaders were about as useful as monkey flinging there owns crap at a wall, that was his home. After a few minutes, Joseph got up and started to collect his stuff "look I really am sorry I trespassed on your land your highness I shall leave now and make my way to somewhere where I won't be seen." Ten minutes past as he's packing what little inventory he owned his iPod, that was laying out in on the for started to play.
It was his alarm but before he could reach for it Nightmare moon gave it a perplexed look "what is this sorcery how does such a little device give out such amazing sound And this piece, its written about my stars. YOU HUMAN! What is this called?!" the human quickly shuffled next to her. "its called starlight it's by a band from my world called Starset it's personally its one of my favorite songs plus I've been more of a night owl than a daytime person." his response surprised her "so you hate the sun too?" she asked sitting down on the stone floor. "It's not that I don't hate the sun I know its needed to keep balance on the world but I personally like the calmness of night" she used her magic to make a small fire in front of them stretching out "can you play more of this Starset?" the human took his iPod back and navigated it towards his music " I have more than eight hundred songs on here I bet I can find more than just this you'd probably like," he said excitedly,
"well then, we might as well get started then" she responded as the two sat near the fire and the human started plying his entire playlist t had gotten dark by then so it was the perfect time to binge some great tunes
The two companions sat in the collapsed entrance hall of the castle, for hours the only thing that could be heard was the music resonating from the now synched up twin speakers. Ever since his alarm had accidently gone off, Nightmare Moon had sat and listened to his music with peaceful smile, her head bobbing to the beat of this unknown, but incredibly welcoming music.
After a few songs, Joey had to turn off the device, much to Nightmares annoyance. “Human, why did you turn off those soothing Melodies?” She asked harshly. The human cringed not wanting to anger the alicorn princess.
“Because, these thing have a thing called batteries, they only have a limited time before they have to be recharged, so I have to conserve it as much as I can so I can have more later, And my name's Joseph by the way, I would appreciate you using it.” he replied annoyed that the alicorn had yet to actually call him by his name.
Nightmare Moon had risen to her full height, which upon recollection, she noticed she was almost the same height as him.
“I commend you for the bravery to standing up to us, Joseph but if we may, can we come up with a compromise?” she asked oddly hesitantly.
The human had returned to the fire nearby, curious to what Nightmare Moon was going to ask. “Go on..”
“if, we allow you to take refuge here in our home, will you reciprocate with your lovely music?”
“I would be willing to do that if my battery life was infinite, but I cannot do this.” Joey responded. As he finished he sentence, Nightmare Moon had snagged the device pressing the same button she saw her new roommate had pressed restarting the device, after a few minutes of inspection Nightmare Moon had flashed her horn on the device, upon returning it to the human he noticed it was fully charged.
“How did you know to do that?” the human asked shocked. The alicorn let out a laugh.
“Since you mentioned this IPod, requires a charge, I simple used a charging spell that was on the same frequency as the electricity it was producing.” Joey sat there in shock, he was worried the one thing he enjoyed from his world would be forever gone, now thanks to this Mare he could never forget his music.
In the heat of the moment he had grabbed the alicorn, pulling her into a firm hug. Nightmare was about to repulse Joey but she had forgotten how comforting hugs were, and missing a thousand years worth of hugs hit her hard, she wrapped her hooves around the human reciprocating the hug.
“if your willing to keep this charged I'll gladly stay.” both had stared at each other for a few moments before noticing they were still.embraced, the two quickly separated as Joey restarted his music from the very beginning of his playlist.
“Good thing I have over three thousand songs.” he thought to himself.
The two companions now rested around the fire.
“Tell me about yourself, Moon..” Joey said after a few minutes of silence. Nightmare Moon had tensed up after the question was asked.
“There is nothing for me to say, my true identity is long gone, just leaving myself to wallow in the forsaken castle for eternity.” she replied sullenly.
“Humor me..”
A few moments it's if silence pass as Moon takes a minute to collect herself.
“My name is Nightmare Moon yes, but I am the embodiment of the ruler of this nation, her name was Luna, a thousand years ago, Luna and her sister Celestia rose the sun and moon respectively, all was in balance until a unicorn named Sombra had declared war on Equestria from his empire in the fire north.”
Celestia and Luna tried to reason with Sombra but he had been driven mad by dark magic, so we.. I mean they, fought with the unicorn king. It was going fantastic, but Sombra did something to us. After the battle that's when Luna was being fed corruption from an unknown source, which brought me into existence. After years of bottled up frustrations, in a fit of rage Luna released it all on Celestia declaring war on the sun itself. Which in turn lead to.my banishment along with luna.”
A thousand years of sadness and guilt, along with the corruption turned us both into a monster, upon our return Celestia was captured and our campaign was reassured, but Twilight Sparkle and her friends wielded the Elements of Harmony, and separated Luna and myself, upon the guise they destroyed me. When in actuality I sit here now weakened and bound to the forsaken castle.”
“is there something binding you to this place?”
“No, but if I were to go out and be seen by anypony, the Elements of Harmony would track me down and destroy me.”
Joey shook his head. “so it's more for your safety, what if you tried to show these “elements” that you weren't truly evil?” “After all if I can ha her a guess, this sombra character did something that was affecting your mind, do you feel any kind of madness in your mind right now?”
Nightmare Moon shook her head. “The only thing I feel now is the guilt of the things I shouldn't have done.”
Joey moved closer wrapping his arm around the mare.
“Then how about this, tommorow we go find a town, somewhere close by, you go incognito and we figure out how you can truly apologize to Celestia and Luna..”
Nightmare Moon sat in Silence. “Truthfully, I don't want to do that, I know what Will happen, I will either be arrested or executed on the spot, treason is penalty to death, and I know lots of ponies will want my head.”
“that was a thousand years ago, what if you try again, this time with a friend by your side..”
Moon gasped. “Are you truly serious, I am your friend?” the human shrugged his shoulders.
“Well considering we’ve gotten at each other's throats already. And you were so willing to share your life story I don't see why not.”
Nightmare, for the first time in so long felt warm on the inside. “Thank you, Joseph.” the human had focused his gaze on the fire.
“it's what friends do.”
Morning
Joey had woken up at dawn, the fire had long gone our and the music had been turned off before the pair went to bed, across the remnants of the fire. Nightmare Moon was resting, her breathing was slow, and her name wasn't moving, this was the this time the human had truly noticed the obsidian mare she might look a little rough around the edges but if you sat and talked to her, you could see she had a heart of gold.
The human had gotten up and started packing his stuff trying to not wake his friend, by the time he had finished Nightmare had awaken from her slumber.
“Morning you..” Joey said casually as his homemade bag was being sealed up. Nightmare on the other hand, wasn't exactly enthusiastic about being up during the day.
“Five more minutes. Too early.” she murmured. Her hooves crossed under her chin, in an oddly adorable fashion.
Joey let out a chuckle. “But the sooner we get out of here and get to the town you were talking about, the sooner we can get some actual food, not having to forge around for scraps like wild animals.”
Moon's ears a visually perked up as she stretched her hind legs and front legs like a cat, with a wave of her magic, Nightmare Moon was ready to leave this hellhole, forever.