1

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Twilight Sparkle is a filly on a field trip with her class. She and her fellow students from Princess Celestia's School for Extraordinary Unicorns are being escorted through a nature preserve at the base of Mount Lot by the princess and several teachers.

The students "Oooo!" and "Ah!" as the princess gestures to various plants and animals as she speaks about them.

Twilight jots down the common names, the scientific names and a clear description of each on her notepad dutifully with her pencil. She leaves space for further annotations of each she can add later on when she can further study if each species is common, uncommon, rare, threatened or endangered.

A guard comes up and whispers something into Princess Celestia's ear. A grim expression momentarily crosses her face. She quickly puts her motherly smile back on and turns to the class. "I'm sorry, My Little Ponies. A matter has come up that requires my immediate attention. Stay with your teachers and I will return shortly." She nods to the teachers, whom splits up the field trip into smaller groups and continues the princess' lessons on Equestria's wildlife.

Twilight uses momentary chaos to slip away. She had never seen Princess Celestia have a grim expression before, even when the news was bad. This piqued her curiosity. She tramped down the trail that the princess had went down, her hooves kicking up little puffs of dust in the soil as she went along.

Twilight could hear Princess Celestia talking to somepony just ahead around a sharp bend in the trail, but she couldn't hear what was being said. Slipping into the trees, she silently wove through the underbrush. She could hear the tail end of the conversation.

"That's the second one poachers have gotten to in the past three years, Captain Iron Shoes." Princess Celestia clearly sounded displeased and irritated.

"At least we caught them before they could finish butchering the carcass.", Captain Iron Shoes replied

Twilight mused on what she had heard. She had read about poachers before. They were ponies, griffons and other creatures who illegally hunted rare, endangered and/or exotic animals, often for their feathers, hides and organs to be sold illegally. She had heard her parents one evening talking about a recent raid by the Canterlot police on a clothing store that was selling hats made with feathers from the rare and endangered Jubjub Bird that had been attained illegally. Her mother had been forced to retire early from the Canterlot police force when a criminal armed with an unregistered thunderbolt rod had seriously wounded her. That had inspired her BBBFF, Shining Armor, to join the Royal Guard. This had prompted her to push forward. Maybe she'd see her brother at work.

What Twilight Sparkle experienced would be burned into her memory for the rest of her days. The air was mixed with the smells of ozone from magical weapons, singed flesh and blood. Medics tended to two of the guards' wounds. The four poachers, a unicorn, a pegasus, a griffon, and a minotaur, had been chained together and were currently being herded into a caged wagon by a combination of Nature Rangers and Royal Guards. Nature Rangers and Royal Guards were photographing, documenting and loading into nearby wagons snares made of chord, spring-loaded black iron traps, an assortment of bladed implements and platinum rod magical weapons. On a rack made of branches and chord was a drying, mostly hairless hide. There were images that appeared to be made of ink embedded into the hide, two looked like stylized swallows and one was an eagle standing atop a globe and anchor, the eagle had a long ribbon in its beak with strange writing. Laying on the ground was a creature, bright red and bloody from where it had been skinned. She knew what she was looking at from a picture in one of her natural history textbooks, a maned ape.

Twilight felt sick to her stomach and tears stung her eyes. Why? Why did they kill and skin one of the rarest creatures in Equestria's history? She couldn't stay here. Everything about what was going on was wrong. She began to back away from her hiding spot. If she had been paying attention to what she was doing, she wouldn't have bumped into a slender tree and disturbed a mockingbird's nest.

Twilight yelped in fright and scampered out from the trees where she had been hiding as the pair of angry mockingbirds flapped around her head, squawked repeatedly and pecked at her.

Princess Celestia turned her head to the commotion and a look of sadness crossed her features. She trotted over to her protege and shooed the mockingbirds away. As the pair of angry birds flapped back to the trees, one stopped and blew a raspberry at the pair of ponies. The princess draped a wing over her protege, shielding the filly from the repugnant imagery. "Twilight, you should have stayed with the class. This is no place for foals."

Twilight's ears pinned back and she ducked her head. "I'm sorry.Please don't be mad at me, princess." She sniffled and tears welled up in her eyes.

Celestia flicked her protege's tears away with a feather. "I'm not mad, Twilight. I'm not happy you saw all this awfulness. Nopony should have to see something like this, especially a foal."

"But why did they kill such a rare animal?"

Princess Celestia grit her teeth. "Some ponies--", she spat that word out like it was poison. "...like to kill rare animals for their hides because they think wearing them is fashionable, and they think their meat and organs can be used for bunk medical treatments."

"L-like how poachers chop the horns off of rhinoceroses?"

"Just like what bad ponies do with rhinoceros horns. Let's get you back to the field trip, I'm sure the teachers are looking for you."

As the pair rounded the bend on the trail, Twilight heard somepony call out, "We've got a strange weapon here!"

*burp*

Green flames spewed from the purple and green dragon's mouth. A scroll materialized from the flames.

*zzzz-snrkt* Twilight woke up on one of the reading couches she had fallen asleep on. She had been exhausted from helping Applejack with apple bucking season. The earth pony mare had worked herself nearly to collapse. Sometimes that mare could be more stubborn than a whole herd of donkeys.

Sitting up, Twilight rubbed the sleep from her eyes. She saw Spike gripping the scroll in his claws. She recognized the wax seal stamped with the royal solar symbol, a message from Princess Celestia. Lighting her horn, she levitated the scroll from her little brother, broke the seal, unfurled it and began reading the message.

Dear Twilight Sparkle,
I am sending a pegasus chariot to collect you and your friends. The guards are under orders to bring you and your friends with utmost haste to Lavender Lace Laboratories in Manehattan. I cannot disclose at this time what has been found other than it is both most fortuitous and most worrisome.
,Princess Celestia

Rarity had swooned at the mention of Manehattan, swooned at the sight of the chariot, and now that it was making a lazy loop over the city, she swooned again.

"The glitz! The glamour! The sophistication! The culture!", she placed a hoof to her forehead and did an overdramatic swoon.

The pegasi guards simply rolled their eyes at the overdramatic actions of the white unicorn.

"Rares! This city ain't all that. Or didja forget that Ah lived here for a short time?", Applejack said in a nonplussed tone.

"Not all that?! Not all that?! This is Manehattan! The second grandest city in all of Equestria! Briddleway! Bronclyn! Saddle Row!"

"An' home to some o' the rudest ponies you'd ever meet. The only reason why the ponies in Canterlot aren't ruder is b'cause they're all too busy sniffin' their own farts. No offense, Twi."

Twilight waved off Applejack's comment. "No offense taken, Applejack. Mom used to say that the Canterlot royals had their noses jammed so far up their own plots that they would have to cough just to take a shit."

Twilight's friends goggled at her. The pegasi guards snickered at the comment, they'd share that tasty morsel of the princess' prized purple protege using curse words around the barracks, probably much to the displeasure of Captain Shining Armor.

The chariot set down on the curb in front of Lavender Lace Laboratories. Royal guardsponies surrounded the building on all sides, preventing entry or exit to all but approved ponies. Manehattan police had set up a three-block cordon tokeep the crowds back. The official story given to the press was that Princess Celestia had come to tour the facilities.

As the element bearers exited the carriage, one of the princess' many assistants approached them. The stink of cigarette smoke clung to the mare's fur. "Princess Celestia is awaiting you six inside. This way, please.", she said in a gravelly voice that spoke to how many cigarettes she had probably smoked before they arrived.

Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy flapped their wings to waft away the smell of cigarette breath. Pinkie Pie and Rarity waved their hooves in front of their noses. Applejack recognized the smell as the preferred brand that Granny Smith partook of when she thought nopony was looking. Twilight simply chose to breathe through her teeth as she smiled at the aide, she knew how stressful being an assistant to Princess Celestia was and how many had turned to smoking and drinking to deal with the stress, she hated the smell of cigarettes.

The assistant led the six through the front door of the building. Guards had checkpoints setup scanning everypony for magical weapons, hidden cameras or secret microphones. Twilight scanned around the place hoping to catch a glimpse of Shining Armor, and pouted slightly when she didn't see or hear her BBBFF.

One-by-one the six mares stepped in front of the pair of platinum rods, thick as a hoof and walked through. They shuddered at the fur-crawling sensation of the scanning spell, though harmless, the mild static discharge across their fur was uncomfortable.

Once through, a contingent of guards escorted them to where the princess was waiting. She was standing in front of a two-way mirror. She gestured at the group to hurry up. "Twilight!", she said in an excited, but hushed tone, "They've found a live maned ape!"

Twilight ran over and looked through the two-way mirror. Laying in the gurney was a maned ape. Its mane was a bright red. The bright red mane extended to its face. The sparse, curly fur on its barrel, forelimbs and around its genitals were the same color as its mane. "It's a male." She noted that the sparse red fur on its hind limbs was straighter. She took note of the stitches and staples holding wounds closed on its barrel, and the cast on its left hind limb. "How did it get injured?"

"A trio of griffon poachers chased it into the city where they proceeded to stir up a panic. When the police arrived on the scene, the poachers fled and Big Red fled into the alleyways."

Twilight quirked her head to the side. "Big Red?"

"That's what the medical staff has named him, because of the color of his mane and fur, and because of his size."

Rainbow Dash blew a raspberry. "Only eggheads could come up with such a lame name. He needs a much cooler name that would reflect his coolness and awesomeness and radicalness like Doomageddon the Great or Sir Stomps-a-lot."

Twilight rolled her eyes at her multi-spectral friend. "Anyways. When the police subdued him, is that how he got injured?"

"Those are wounds caused by gouge-spears and clamp-traps.", Fluttershy said with an angry growl and snort. "If I ever see them meanie pants, I'll kick them to death!" She noticed the surprised looks her gave her, well except for Applejack and retreated behind her mane. "I-i-if that's okay with them."

"Ah'm with Fluttershy on this'un.", Applejack said. "Poachers killed my pa. He ran a whole mess o'em off our property when Ah was a filly. They came back an' left some strangle-snares high enough to nab a pony. Big Mac found 'im caught up half-up a tree, the life choked outa 'im. He ain't been right since. In my opinion they all need a short drop with a sharp stop an' tossed in a hole."

Celestia cleared her throat to get the attention of all in the room. "While I agree with Fluttershy and Applejack's view on the matter, they must be brought to justice through the courts. If we allow vigilante justice to be carried out, how long before somepony has a lynch mob sicced on them just because they're an earth pony, a pegasus or a unicorn in the wrong town." She paused to allow the weight of her word to sink in before continuing. "We cannot leave him here. We don't know how many accomplices the poachers have, or if they're already in the city. I could order a full contingent of guards to remain here at all time, but Manehattan could ill afford the resources needed to maintain a no pony's zone around the building indefinitely. As soon as the medical staff clears him for transport, I'm having him transferred to Ponyville under the care of Dr. Flora Fauna. It's isolated enough that the poachers would have to go out of their way to track him and close enough to Canterlot that if something were to happen, emergency response can be there in an hour as the pegasus flies."

***

That evening the medical staff at Lavender Lace Laboratories had declared Big Red stable enough for transfer. Three pegasus-drawn covered carriages left the building, one bound for Canterlot, one bound for Ponyville and the last bound for Whinnyapolis. In truth none of the carriages carried anypony or even a maned ape.

Princess Celestia stayed in Manehattan for a short time longer, creating a spectacle as she used her magic to paint the sky brilliant colors as she set the sun. She then strode out to the throngs of her subjects, shaking hooves and kissing foals. A guard disguised as a civilian approached the princess holding a photograph of her and a scroll with a poem that was a coded message. The message was from Luna and the disguised guard was one of her Night Guard, it read, "The carriages bound for Canterlot and Ponyville were tailed by a pair of poachers each. When they were approached by the Night Guard, they fled. The carriage bound for Whinnyapolis was attacked by a squad of poachers. The Night Guard managed to capture two of them." Celestia made her usual show of asking the stallion their name and signing the picture with a flourish that was the secret short-hoof that she and Luna had developed many, many centuries ago to send secret messages to one another that said two simple words, "Message received."

Celestia bent her head down to whisper to one of the Royal Guards. He nodded his head and moved back through the column of armored guards. A moment later an armored pegasus took flight from the rear of the column of guards and headed towards Lavender Lace Laboratories.

That night a pair of simple pegasus-drawn covered wagons marked with the logo of a local moving company left the city on a northerly route. Once well away from the city, the pair of wagons made a wide loop to the south, headed towards Ponyville. One wagon held six sleeping mares. The other wagon held the comatose maned ape.

It had been a week since Big Red had been brought to Ponyville. Doctor Flora Fauna had kept a constant vigil over him and each of the element bearers had assisted her in medical care, though Pinkie had been relegated to the observation room as she kept trying to throw "wake up parties" for the comatose patient.

Twilight was looking over the police reports about the capture of Big Red that the princess had sent her. The Manehattan police had tried to use stun rods on him, to a minimal effect. The stun rods had slowed him down, but they weren't able to immobilize him. It was him succumbing to his injuries that led to his capture.

Twilight looked over the medical reports. Big Red had lost a lot of blood and attempts to heal him using spells and magic potions had reduced effects. To keep him asleep so they could operate, they had to apply sleeping potions to an overdose level. The levels of potions applied would have caused a pony's body to completely shut down.

Twilight scoured the library for what she needed, "Maned apes in the mist by Dr Allhoof". It wasn't a thick book, but it was the most comprehensive one on maned apes. She cracked the book open and read the primer for the first chapter.

Concerning the maned ape, there are three known subspecies. The four-fingered maned ape, the five-fingered maned ape and the six-fingered maned ape. The four-fingered maned ape is affected normally by all forms of magic. The five-fingered maned ape is resistant to magic. The six-fingered maned ape is completely immune to all known forms of magic. Of the three, the five-fingered is the most common.

"Resistant to magic. Resistant to magic." Twilight rolled the words over in her mouth and looked back over the reports the princess had sent her. There it was in black-and-white. Stun rods didn't immobilize him, only slowed his down. Healing spells had a reduced effect on him. It took an overdose of sleeping potions to keep him under, and that didn't kill him, instead putting him into a comatose state.

Twilight went back to reading the book when the library door burst open and Applejack ran in.

"Twi, he's awake!"

"Who?"

"Big Red! He's awake!"

2

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Twillight, with Spike on her back, ran alongside Applejack to Doctor Fauna's. Upon entering the veterinarian's building, Doctor Fauna and Fluttershy met them both.

"I heard Big Red's up! How's he doing?!" Twilight pranced in place. "Ooooh! I'm so excited! What kind of readings have you done? What's his brain case look like? Have you determined how intelligent he is? Mmmf-mmmmf-mmmf!"

Applejack covered Twilight's mouth with a hoof. "Easy now, Twi. Take a breath and reel it back in for a moment. No need to drown the doc in questions. Me-n-Fluttershy-n-the doc were here when he woke up an' she wanted to wait a couple o' hours 'fore gettin' you to make sure he wasn't dangerous or nuthin'" She removed her hoof from Twilight's mouth. "Just start with a couple o' simple an' slow questions first. No needin' to ear rape nopony right outa the gate."

"How was he when he woke up? Was he aggressive or scared? Has he tried to escape or attack anypony?"

Doctor Flora Fauna flipped through the pages on her clipboard. "First he sat up. He appeared to be a little out of it and disoriented."

"I know I would be if I had that much sleeping potions put in me and I just woke up.", Fluttershy said.

"Let's not try and equinize an animal before we determine its level of intelligence. For all we know he's barely smarter than a rock.", Twilight chastised.

"I dunno. Rocks can be pretty clever.", Pinkie said, appearing seemingly from nowhere.

"Yah!" Twilight literally jumped in fright, her head smacking into the ceiling tiles. When she landed back on the floor, a section of ceiling tile was embedded on her horn. After popping the ceiling tile off her horn, she turned and faced the pink mare. "Pinkie! Don't sneak up on me! You nearly gave me a heart attack!"

"Plus if you keep scaring her, I don't think my ceiling can afford it.", Doctor Fauna said looking up at the ceiling.

"I was just saying that rocks can be pretty clever. Most ponies think that all they do is lie around, but back on the rock farm, we had one field where the rocks would slide around on their own. We had to put a fence up because they would sneak up when nopony was looking and try to trip them."

Pinkie, that's... You know what? Never mind. Doctor Fauna, you were saying that after he woke up, he was disoriented. What happened after that?"

"He rubbed his eyes, looked around the room, looked at the cast on his leg, tapped on it a couple of times, then looked at the IV in his forelimb. At first I thought he was going to rip it out, but instead he ran his paws along the tube, then gingerly pulled it out."

Twilight mused for a moment. "That shows a baseline level of body awareness to not rip it out. Spike, are getting these notes down?"

"I am now, Twilight.", Spike said, pulling out a quill, inkpot and piece of parchment from Twilight's saddlebags. He muttered quietly as he wrote down the cliff notes version.

"He seemed to be a bit distressed. I thought he was in pain or scared. He got up from the gurney, using the IV stand to prop himself up and shuffled around the room. He found a bucket that the night janitor had left in there, picked it up, placed it in a corner and...urinated in it.", Doctor Fauna.

"Well that shows a higher level of awareness.", Twilight said.

"Smart monkey peed in bucket.", Spike muttered as he scribbled down notes.

Twilight rolled her eyes at her little brother. "So what did he do next."

Doctor Fauna paused for a moment as she flipped through the pages on the clipboard. "What he did next was a little unexpected. He pulled the sheet off the gurney and wrapped it around his waist."

"You shoulda seen it, Twi. It was almost like he made a skirt for himself. If Rarity had seen it, she woulda had a full on conniption.", Applejack said.

"Orangutans have been seen in zoos ripping up the cloth in the hammocks in their habitats to make crude dresses or placing a big leaf on their heads if they saw ponies wearing clothes or hats. It doesn't mean they were making clothes or hats, just copying what they were seeing.", Twilight said.

"But we were on this side o' the mirror, Twilight. There weren't nopony for him to see an' copy. He just pulled the sheet offa the bed, folded it up an' wrapped it around his waist, like he was tryin' to cover up his bits an' pieces.", Applejack said.

"Smart monkey made clothes.", Spike muttered as he scribbled down the notes.

Twilight gave an annoyed huff at Spike's murmurings. "Spike, if you aren't going to take proper notes, just go home."

That was the bit of news the young dragon was waiting for, but he needed to play it off like he wasn't wanting to hear it. Giving a faux annoyed huff, she jammed the stopper back into the inkpot, then dropped it and the quill back in Twilight's saddlebags. "Fine! You made me skip breakfast anyways!" He tossed his arms up in faux frustration and faux stormed off to the door.

Applejack rubbed the back of her head awkwardly. "Uh...yeah. Ah need to get back to the farm, got chores to do. See y'all later. Oh, and Twi, try not to ear rape the doc." Catching up to Spike, she leaned over and whispered whispered in his ear. "Spike, Ah think you were about to give Twi a full on fit with your half-plotted notes."

"Nah! I was just doing it because she really did make me skip breakfast and was pressing her buttons so I'd have an excuse to go home, eat some breakfast and get a nap.", Spike said showing Applejack the notes he had taken.

The mare goggled at the extensive notes the dragon had taken. "Spike...you're...that's...absolutely genius! Ah'll have to 'member to do that next time Twi ropes me into takin' notes for her."

Twilight levitated an inkpot, a quill and a piece of parchement from her saddlebags. "So what did Big Red do after that?"

Doctor Fauna looked back the way Spike had left. "Is Spike going to be okay?"

"Hmm? Oh yeah. He's just a bit grumpy because he didn't eat any breakfast. After he gets something to eat, he'll be back to his usual cheery, helpful self."

Doctor Fauna scratched her chin. "So Spike is just hangry?", she muttered. "Oh! After that he let out some chattering hoots. I think he was separated from his troupe and was trying to call out to them. He then paced around the room, occasionally giving chattering hoots. Then he laid back down on the gurney." She gestured back to the observation room. "He's still there if you want to observe him."

Twilight, Fauna, Fluttershy and Pinkie walked to the darkened room on the other side of the two-way mirror. Big Red was standing at the foot of the gurney. It was clear he was looking at his own reflection as he ran his fingers across the stitches and staples that were holding the wounds closed on his body. He then brought his hands up to his mouth, licked a finger on each and brought them up to the small patches of fur above his eyes, smoothing them down. He then drug his fingers through his mane and facial hair.

Twilight diligently scribbled down what she observed. He appears to have a sense of basic grooming. Not unheard of in species of apes.

Big Red extended his forelimbs, curled his hands into fists with the forefingers pointing forwards and the thumbs extended upwards. He winked an eye, clicked his tongue and twitched his thumbs.

Twilight quickly scribbled down what she observed.

Big Red then began flexing his forelimbs, making his already large, muscular form bulge. He let out an excited hoot and grunts as he flexed his forelimbs in front of him, making the large muscles in his chest, shoulders and withers bulge and ripple. He then brought his right forelimb across the front of his chest, making the muscles of the upper and lower bulge. He raised the forelimb to his face and kissed the muscle on the upper part of the limb. Big Red then raised both forelimbs to wither-height, crooked them until his fists were level with the corners of his eyes, making his muscular physique look larger. He let out some oddly musical-sounding hoots as he bounced the muscles in his chest to the beat.

It appears that Big Red regards his reflection as a rival. He gave a threat or territorial display in an attempt to look larger.

Pinkie giggle-snorted. "He kinda acts like Bulk Biceps!" She stood on her hind legs, flexed and imitated the white musclebound pegasus. "Yeah!"

Big Red stopped flexing and tilted his head to the side. He gave a series of chattering hoots.

"Pinkie! Shut up!", Twilight whispered hoarsely.

Big Red gave another series of chattering hoots. Twilight held her breath. Did Big Red hear Pinkie? Big Red hobbled forward, leaned forward to the two-way mirror, placed his hands on it in a cupped arch and laid his forehead on his hands, blocking out the light from the observation room. It was clear that the maned ape was looking directly at them. He had a confused and surprised look on his face.

Big Red leaned away from the two-way mirror and gave a short, confused-sounding hoot. He leaned forward again, cupping his hands over his eyes.

Pinkie waved at Big Red. "Hi there!"

Big Red leaned away from the two-way mirror. He slapped himself lightly on both sides of his face, gave a series of chattering hoots and pinched his side. He leaned back to the two-way mirror again, cupping his hands over his eyes. He slid back and forth over the two-way mirror, taking a long look at each mare. He leaned away from the mirror. It was clear he was agitated. His chattering hoots matched his body language. He spun a finger around an ear as he continued his agitated chattering hoots. He hobbled around to the side of the gurney, gave a series of loud chattering hoots as he placed his fingers to his forehead and extended his hands up to the ceilings. With a frustrated shout, he flopped onto the gurney. A pained hiss escaped his lips as he grasped his broken leg.

Twilight scratched out her previous line and began a new line of notes.

The subject known as Big Red appears to have displays higher levels of intelligence, along with reasoning and problem solving skills at least on par with ravens and crows. Further research is needed. Displayed on page two are illustrations of Big Red's actions I've observed.

Twilight marked the page with her notes with a one, then marked the next page with a two. She began drawing down simple sketches of Big Red's various actions.

"Pinkie Pie, what you did was very irresponsible!", Doctor Fauna scolded. "What if what you did caused Big Red to become violent? We'd all be hurt or worse. Out!"

"Pinkie, you can stay.", Twilight said. "What you did wasn't optimal, but it allowed us to determine a baseline for his intelligence. What do you think, Fluttershy?" She looked to where her friend was sitting, only to find the butter-yellow pegasus was missing. "Flutterhsy?"

Big Red looked up from the gurney with a questioning hum at the sound of the lock on the door to the room clicking. He gaped at the yellow-furred, pink-maned mare walking slowly across the floor.

Twilight, Pinkie and Fauna watched in silence as Fluttershy walked slowly across the room to Big Red, calmness and confidence oozing across her.

Big Red sat up on the gurnery, gave a series of soft chattering hoots and clicked his tongue as he extended a hand palm-up.

"It's okay big big guy. Nopony is going to hurt you. Those meanie-pants poachers can't get you here. I'm a friend.", Fluttershy said in a soft, even, calm and friendly tone.

Once she reached Big Red's hand, he began dragging his nails through the fur of her cheek and moved up to scratch behind her ear.

Doctor Flora Fauna flipped the switch on the intercom. "Fluttershy, is everything okay? Is he friendly?"

Coos came back through the intercom, followed by, "Right there! Don't stop! Don't stop!"

Big Red moved to the floor. Trilling and the rapid clacking of a hoof came through the intercom. Twilight and Fauna moved to try and get a better look at what was going on.

"It sounds like he's rutting her.", Doctor Fauna said.

Twilight rushed around to the door of the observation room. Flinging it open, her eyes went wide. Big Red was sitting on the floor scratching Fluttershy's back, who trilling and twitching a hind leg, making her hoof clatter on the floor. She blew out a sigh, her worst fear allayed.

Big Red stopped scratching Fluttershy's back, reached out with his other hand palm-up, gave a series of soft chattering hoots followed by tongue clicks.

"You should try this, Twilight. It feels reeeeeeeaaaaaaly good!", Fluttershy said as she climbed into Big Red's lap. He began to pet and scratch her neck.

"What's going on in there, Twilight?", Doctor Fauna asked over the intercom.

"He's...grooming her. I'm going to try an experiment." Twilight walked up to Big Red and nudged his hand aside. She began to lick and nibble behind his ears, grooming him in a similar fashion her mother used to groom her when she was little.

Big Red let out a series of hooting, ape-like laughter as he pushed her away.

A mischievous smile spread across Twilight's lips. "It looks like somepony's ticklish." She began to prod with her hooves and nibble with her teeth at his ribs. Fluttershy joined her.

Big Red squealed and gave hooting laughter as he tried to fend off the tickle assault from the two mares.

"Tickle fight!", Pinkie shouted as she barreled into the room and joined in on the tickle assault.
Doctor Fauna had moved to the door and quietly chuckled at the three mares and one male maned ape wrestled on the the floor in a tickle fight as she jotted down notes.

Big Red managed to successfully fend off Fluttershy and Pinkie long enough to pin Twilight on her back. He let out a series of gruff chattering hoots as he smiled mischievously.

Twilight stared at Big Red's sharp incisors and canines. It was clear he was a predator. Before she could put together a coherent chain of thoughts, his fingers dug into her ribs. She squealed and wiggled and screamed and laughed as she tried to escape the tickle assault on her. She kicked her legs trying to fend of those dastardly digits tickling and tormenting her. One of her hooves accidentally collided with his nose.

Big Red let out a gruff hoot as he rocked away from her. He placed a hand defensively over his mouth and nose.

Twilight laid her ears back tight against her head and scampered away.

Big Red moved his hand from his face and gave a short, gruff hoot at the blood staining it. Blood trickled from his left nostril. He pinched his nostrils shut and leaned forward. Fluttershy came over to help him, but he waved her off with a series of short hoots.

"Is...is he stopping his own bleeding?", Twilight asked.

"It looks like it and acting like a typical stallion by refusing help when he's hurt, probably hooting something like 'I don't need any help. I'll just trot it off.'", Doctor Fauna said.

"We shouldn't try to ponyfy animals--"

"You are Princess Celestia's protege for fuck's sake. I know she taught you Ponysedao1-damned advanced science. So think like a scientist.", Fauna interrupted.

Twilight grumbled under her breath about being interrupted. She closed her eyes and entered into her mind-palace. She moved the notes into an orderly fashion, combined with her observations. She tossed out impossibilities. She finally came to one conclusion...he possessed at the very least high-level sentience, possible low-level sapience. That would mean that Fluttershy's special talent wouldn't help her with a truly intelligent creature that didn't speak ponish. She reopened her eyes. "We're going to need to do more tests. Brain scans. Examinations of his speech organs. Logic and problem solving tests." It was clear as the horn on her head, the making of a simple piece of clothing to protect his sensitive parts. He wasn't doing a threat display, he was showing off to himself. The chattering hoots were some form of speech and not an ape trying to call out to its troupe. A feeling of shame filled her, she didn't try and stay objective. The books on the maned ape were going to have to be rewritten. Her eyes went wide with sudden realization. Those poachers weren't illegally hunting a rare creature, they were committing murder.

Gerard alighted in the poaching camp. He had hunted for that maned ape for the better part of a week with his fellow hunters. It was clear that the princesses had taken custody of it and moved it somewhere else.

Griffons and the larger, more aggressive cousins of diamond dogs, iron wolves, milled about the camp. Some of the creatures were skinning the rare and magical animals and monsters they had killed, others were stuffing organs into jars filled with pickling brine. Greasy smoke lifted from fires where exotic meats were being cooked or cured.

Gerard reached into his hunting pack and pulled out two items, the knife that maned ape used when he ambushed their hunting party and nearly decapitated Greta with, and the scrap of khaki cloth he had ripped off the ape when it fled. The griffon clenched his talon tightly then stuffed the objects back into his hunting pack. He lingered for a second at the flap of the tent, then stepped in. Sitting behind a desk made of crates was his father, Gordon. The old grizzled griffon wore a vest made of tanned maned ape hide, around his neck was a necklace of maned ape knuckle bones, around both forelimbs he wore a pair of bracelets made of strange hollow brass cylinders. To top it off, Gordon had a patch on his right eye.

"Did you get that ape?"

Gerard shook his head. "No. It killed Greta, escaped a snap-trap and ran on a broken leg into Manehattan. We gave chase, but the police showed up and we were forced to get away. The princesses took custody of it. They even used empty carriages as a trap. The Night Guard caught Gaul and Gregory."

Gordon spat on the ground in contempt. "Fucking alicorns! They think every rare creature is their property! If Gruff wasn't such a coward, he should have launched an invasion when the moon bitch showed up instead of trying to negotiate a trade deal once everything blew over and settled down. I trust you're still looking for it?"

"No. Its trail has gone cold. I'm sure it'll pop back up again sooner or later. After all, it's just a stupid animal."

Gordon gave a cold chuckle. "Oh no, hatchling. They're as smart as you or I." He walked over to a long wooden box, flipped the lid open, pulled out two objects and dropped them on his desk.

Gerard looked the two items over. The first was a white bandanna with a red solid red circle with red lines stretching out in all directions, it reminded him of a stylized sunrise. The second was an oddly-shaped block of wood with a metal tube and a little handle near the back of the tube. The tube had some strange writing stamped into it and a stylized chrysanthemum flower.

"That is from the first maned ape I ever hunted. The bastard took my entire hunting party and gave me this." Gordon flicked at the eye patch. "He cut down five of us with five blasts from this thunder stick, then shoved five little brass cylinders into it. Once his thunder stick stopped working, he threw an iron ball that exploded in a flash of fire, smoke, thunder and shredding particles. Then the bastard led us on a merry chase where he was hunting us as much as we were hunting him, until it was only me left. He dug a hole to hide in, covered it in branches and leaves, and laid in it waiting for me. When he sprung out of the hole, he had attached a sword to the front of his thunder stick and tried to spear me with it after pinning me on my back. Had to rip out his throat with my own talons." Gordon flexed his talons and pulled out a sword. It had an odd loop on the back of the blade guard. "Kept this as a memento to never again underestimate my prey. It also comes in good for gutting'em. How many fingers did your ape have?"

"Five"

"Good! Those are the smart and dangerous ones. The four-fingered ones are fast as gazelles and are only dangerous if they've spent enough time around ponies to absorb enough magic to manifest their own. Their hide are also the same color as pony fur. The six-fingered ones are fast as leopards, strong as minotaurs, but are only dangerous if you let it corner you on your own. Fortunately they're only smart enough to pick up something heavy and blunt. The five-fingered ones aren't as fast or as strong, but they're whip-smart. Sometimes they appear with thunder sticks, sometimes with iron or bronze armor and swords and spears, sometimes with stone weapons. I even heard a story of one that showed up wearing a red shirt and had a weapon that fired a beam of light that made anything it stuck vanish. If the ponies took it in, then it may have already bonded with them. They have a weakness for furry creatures, use that weakness to track it."

Gerard left his father's tent and approached a pack of five iron wolves. He pulled out the two items from his hunting pack and let the wolves sniff it.

Gordon stepped out of the tent and shouted, "Remember, the hunt isn't over until it's dead or you're dead!"

It had been three days since Big Red had been moved to Ponyville Hospital.

Twilight stood in a dark room with Princess Celestia behind a two-way mirror as a psychologist, an earth pony stallion named Ink Blot, test his cognitive and problem solving abilities.

First the psychologist placed down a small slate on the table and drew out a grid for a game of crosses and naughts. After Big Red won six games in a row, the psychologist began trying to beat him. Twenty more games passed by, each ending in a tie or a victory for the maned ape.

Ink Blot moved the slate from the table and replaced it with a simple foal's puzzle toy, consisting of a large polyhedron and three small sticks. The polyhedron had little slots and held several pieces of candy in a little tray in the center. The purpose of the puzzle was to use the little sticks to slide the pieces of candy around one-by-one until they popped out.

Big Red picked up the puzzle toy, looked it over and gave it a rattle. Ink Blot was about to show how the toy worked, but Big Red waved him off. The maned ape placed the puzzle toy back on the table, picked up one of the sticks and began picking at the end with a nail. He raised the end of the stick to his mouth and blew. Looking over his work, he gave a small grunt.

Ink Blot blinked in disbelief as Big Red used the improvised tool to take the screws from the puzzle toy, pulled off one of the panels off and dumped the candy into his hand.

Ink Blot placed a more complex puzzle on the table, a twist cube. It was covered in brightly colored stickers on all six sides and the individual lines could be twisted in any direction.

Big Red picked up the cube and began to twist the rows with his nimble fingers. After several minutes he had four sides complete, with just a single sticker on two faces out of order. Big Red simply peeled off the two offending stickers and put them on their correct faces, completing the cube.

Ink Blot decided to go with a puzzle game that was much harder to cheat at, memory. He laid the twenty thick cardboard squares face-down on the table and started a timer.

Big Red finished the game of memory with plenty of time to spare.

Ink Blot them placed a pencil and a standard secondary education entry test on the table.

Big Red picked up the written test. He squinted his eyes at the test, then flipped it over. He wrote down something, walked over to the two-way mirror and placed what he had written against the glass, facing the two ponies.

"That script looks like it was written with a combination of the Minos, Roam and Saddle Arabian alphabets.", Twilight said. "That gives me an idea." She left and returned ten minutes later with Cheerilee.

The schoolmarm had been instructed to help establish a basic line of communication with a creature that didn't speak or read ponish.

Cheerilee stepped into the room and was momentarily taken aback at the sight of Big Red. She quickly recovered and sat down next to him.

Celestia flipped a switch on the intercom. "Thank you for your assistance, Professor Blot. You will be compensated for your time. Please submit your findings to the castle at your earliest convenience."

"Thank you, princess.", Ink Blot said in a nasally tone. "When you said you asked me to test an unusual creature, I wasn't expecting something out of myths. You'll have my findings in three days." He packed up his things and trotted out the room.

"Miss Cheerilee, you may begin when you're ready.", Celestia said through the intercom.

Cheerilee wrote down the eighty-six symbols of the ponish alphabet. She passed the pencil to Big Red, laid down a fresh piece of paper and indicated for him to write down his alphabet. She at first thought his alphabet had fifty-two characters until she realized by the spacing that they were in pairs of larger and smaller symbols, a few looked like their larger symbols. He then picked up another piece of paper and wrote out the same twenty-six pairs in a different script. After a few hours the pair had written down three hundred common words on index cards complete with simple illustrations.

Twilight mused over the two alphabets that Big Red had written down. It wasn't unheard of for nations to have more then one alphabet, heck pre-classical ponish used twelve different alphabets. She looked over the words he had written and noted something...they used the same number of symbols for each word. It was the same alphabet, just two different scripts. Maybe the former was a common script and the latter was a more formal script. The modern ponish alphabet used three different scripts depending on how formal the occasion was.

3

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It had been three days since Big Red had gone through the testing with Ink Blot, and establishing that he could write and had an alphabet with Cheerilee. He had been released into Twilight's custody. It would be a few days until the courts would decide who would be his guardian to prevent anypony from taking advantage of or harming him. She had made a set of flash cards for him similar to the ones for ponies who were non-verbal used, only smaller so his nimble fingers could better manipulate them, so he could communicate more accurately his wants and needs.

Because the hospital had no wheelchairs that could fit Big Red's height and body alignment, they fashioned a pair of crutches for him from a few old IV stands so he could better walk around while his leg healed. He had made for himself a toga-like garment from one of the bed sheets, to the dismay of the hospital staff. Twilight promised to compensate them for the cost of the bed sheet, just send her the bill.

Twilight was walking alongside Big Red through Ponyville, Spike riding on her back dozing in the warmth of sunlight. They were heading to the dentist's office so that his teeth could get looked at. Ponies who were trotting by on the way to whatever business they were doing would stop and gape at the tall creature who was walking with the princess' protege. Many of them whispered and murmured among themselves.

"Is that some sort of minotaur trotting with Twilight?"

"I think that's some kind of yeti or 'squatch."

"Is it dangerous?"

"Nah, it ain't no kind of minotaur. It ain't got no horns and no hooves."

"What are those noodly, wiggly bits at the ends of its hind legs?"

"It's not any yeti or sasquatch I've ever seen. The fur's too short and not shaggy enough."

"Did somepony shave it? Did it have mites or fleas? Is that why it doesn't have much fur?"

"I made muffins this morning before going out. I've got an interview at Quills and Sofas this afternoon. Do you think Davenport would like one?"

Twilight noted the whispering and murmuring of everypony. She looked up at Big Red. He was turning his head back and forth. At first she thought he was looking at the town, or looking for somepony. Then she noticed his eyes darting about. He wasn't looking at the town, for somepony, or even at anypony. He was looking for something. He was scared. What was to be scared of in Ponyville? Then it hit her. He had been the victim of poachers nearly two weeks ago. This was a fear response. It was as clear as the horn on her head, the way he gripped the improvised crutches, the ripple of the muscles visible under his bushy red facial mane, the way he was raised up on the front portion of his good walking appendage at the end of his leg(she still didn't have a name for them), the slight increase in his breathing.

Twilight gently laid a hoof on Big Red's leg to get his attention away from the town.

Big Red jumped slightly, then looked down at her and let out a series of chattering hoots.

Twilight lit her horn and telekinetically lifted the pouch on his hip holding the flash cards for him to communicate with.

Big Red tentatively took the pouch from the aura, opened it and began picking through the cards.

'Me no danger'

"Spike, give me my set of flash cards." The soft snoring of the baby dragon taking a late morning nap was the response Twilight received. "Spike, wake up!" She reached back and nudged the dragon dozing on her back.

"*zzzz-snrkt* Huh? Wuzzat!"

"My flash cards, Spike."

"*yawn**smack-smack* Yeah, yeah. Keep your fur on." Spike dug through Twilight's saddlebags, pulled out the flash cards and passed them to her.

Twilight rolled her eyes, took the cards in her magic and shuffled through them.

'You safe no threat town pony protect'

Big Red seemed to visibly calm down.

'Where go'

'We go' Twilight quickly shuffled through the flash cards. 'Tooth doctor'

'What go tooth doctor'

Twilight sighed. She had done her best to recreate the flash cards from memory, obviously her memory was a bit flawed...or the flash cards were only capable of relaying information in pidgin ponish and were meant to be supplemented with Equestrian Sign Language. "Spike, I need your help. You always won family charades night."

"Zzzz."

Twilight reached back with a hoof and shook Spike."Wake up!"

"Zzzz--*snort* Huh? What now, Twilight?"

"You always won family charades night. Do you think you can use your skills to better communicate why we're going to the dentist."

"But I thought that's why you made the flash card, so you could easily talk with him."

"The cards are limited on what information I can convey. They're meant to be used in concert with ESL"

Spike gave a questioning look.

Twilight gave her best "really" face, then sighed. "Equestrian Sign Language. They're meant to augment ESL to help ponies understand sign language."

Spike jumped off of Twilight's back. "I'll have you know that I'm also the undefeated Canterlot Charades Champion three years running." He cracked his claws. "Alright, let the master work." Spike began using his charades skills as he mouthed the words 'We are going to the dentist.'

Big Red eased himself down to the ground in front of Spike, cocked his head to the side, let out a questioning hoot and gestured with his hands.

"He asked 'Why?'"

"So we can better determine what he eats and so we can have his dental records on file in case something happens or he needs work done."

Spike began signing and gesturing out the message.

Pinkie came pronking up. "Hi Twilight! Hi Spike!" She froze midair, hovering in place for a few seconds. "Oooo! Are we playing charades? Me next! Me next!" She began doing a set of odd signs and gestures, then buffed a hoof against her chest fluff. "Beat that!"

Twilight facehoofed. "Pinkie. We're not playing charades. We're using Spike's charades skills to better communicate with Big Red on why we're taking him to the dentist."

"More like I'm using my charades skills to tell him why as your flash cards kinda aren't doing it."

"You don't use charades to talk to somepony who doesn't speak the same language as you, silly! You use two-minute pictures!" Pinkie pulled a white board, an easel and a marker seemingly from nowhere, and set them up on the ground. She popped the cap off of the marker and placed one end in her mouth."Sho hwhy are oo kaking im koo she denkish?"

Big Red looked obviously confused and disturbed as he tried to figure out where the white board and easel came from.

Twilight simply patted him on the shoulder.

Big Red scratched Twilight on her neck.

Twilight leaned into the scratching as she cooed and her eyes fluttered slightly. The scratching felt good, better than it had any right to. She suddenly became aware of the ponies staring at Big Red and her. Her cheeks turned pink with embarrassment. She leaned away from Big Red and cleared her throat. "I'm trying to tell Big Red that we're taking him to the dentist to get his teeth examined so we can better determine what he eats, and to get his dental record on file in case he ever needs any work done. Can you accurately draw that out?"

"Eashy peashy wemon shpeashy!" Pinkie began quickly drawing out the images on the white board. When she had finished, there was a surprisingly intricate series of drawings depicting a pony getting their teeth examined, photographed, and of papers being put into a file. She spat the marker onto the easel. "Not bad if I say so. And with three seconds to spare." Pinkie checked a watch on her fetlock that hadn't been there a moment before.

Big Red studied the drawings, tapped his chin thoughtfully as he nodded, then let out a short series of chattering hoots and gestured with his hands.

"He said 'Why didn't you say so?'", Spike stated.

Twilight's left eye twitched. Individual hairs sprung loose from her mane, some of them curling. "But...but I did! Could it be that I misremembered how the flash cards were supposed to be?" She trembled as she slumped down on her belly and muttered to herself, "I'm going to get sent back to magic kindergarten for this!"

Pinkie quickly wiped off the white board and drew a picture of Twilight with a hand petting her.

Big Red nodded and began scratching Twilight behind her ear. She cooed at the scratching. He began scratching down her neck, causing her to lean into him. He began scratching down her back. Once his hand reached to the middle of her back, she rose to all four legs, arched her back into his scratching and stood on her tip-hooves.

"Mmm! Oh yes! Right there! Don't stop! Don't stop! Don't stop don't stop don't stop!"

Onlookers in the crowd fanned their faces. Some licked their lips.

Once Twilight had calmed down, Big Red Stopped scratching her back, rose up to his good leg with a long grunt and secured the makeshift crutches under him. He then gave Pinkie's ears a quick scratch, patted her on the head and gave her nose a boop.

"You are welcome!", the pink party planner said as she pronked off, the white board, easel and marker having disappeared.

Spike held up a fist to Big Red. The maned ape made his own fist, bumped his knuckles against the dragon's, then pulled his fist back quickly wiggling his fingers as he made a noise that sounded like an imitation of a balloon popping, an earthquake and wind rushing.

The crowd watched as the three walked off in the direction of the dentist's office, whispering and murmuring to one another.

"I gotta figure out how to get me some of that!"

"Those wiggly bits seemed to stop a full-on Twilighting."

"Where did she find such a creature like that? You think Princess Celestia sent it to her for emotional support?"

"Did you see how big its withers and forelimbs are? I gotta work out more."

***

Doctor Pearly Whites held a dental mirror in Big Red's mouth to examine his teeth.

"Hmm...let's see here. I count eight incisors...four on the top, four on the bottom, normal for a pony. I'm not sure if that's normal for a...whatever you are, so I'm going to have to assume it is. Four canines, two on the top and two on the bottom...hmm, ponies only have two on the top. Not sure if that's normal for your species, so I'll assume it is. Let's see...four premolars on each side...eight in total. Ponies have twice as many. Again, I'll have to assume that's normal for your species. Let's see...one...two...three...four...five...molars on each side...wait, he has two more on the bottom than on the top, that's ten in total. Again, not sure if that's normal for your species...so I'll assume it is. And what do we have here? Looks like somepony had some cavities filled. Tsk tsk tsk! Did somepony eat too many sweets?"

Twilight who had been taking notes, paused in what she was doing. "He's had cavities filled?! How can you tell?"

"He's got some sort of ceramic serving as fillings, they're a slightly different color from the rest of his enamel. Let's see...one...two...three. Whoever did this was highly skilled, the fillings fit tightly with almost no visible lines between the enamel and the fillings."

Twilight ran her tongue across her two teeth that had gold fillings.

Doctor Pearly Whites pushed the dental mirror further into Big Red's mouth. "Looks like you've had some dental surgery. That would explain why you have two fewer molars on the top."

"Did he have them pulled?"

"No, it looks like they were cut out." Doctor Pearly Whites pulled the mirror out of Big Red's mouth and laid it on the tray. "Considering that his jaws are shorter than ours, they were probably removed to prevent crowding. Sometimes it happens in ponies. They'll have an extra permanent tooth or two and have them removed to deal with crowding issues." He picked up a bite gauge. "Alright, I need you to bite down hard on this for me."

"You'll have to demonstrate it for him, he doesn't speak our language.", Twilight interjected.

"Not a problem.", Doctor Pearly Whites said. "I sometimes have to do this for foals when they first visit my office." The stallion made an over-exaggerated show of opening his mouth, then biting down while pointing to the two small flat levers and the small dial.

Big Red opened his mouth and the dentist gently inserted the bite meter, then signaled for him to bite down hard.

Doctor Pearly Whites looked at the meter as the arrow moved on its face. "Interesting."

"What is it?"

"He's got the bite force of about half of what a five year old foal generates. Most adult ponies generate a bite force of about seven hundred hoof-force units. Heck, even foals of five years of age can generate a bite force of about two hundred hoof-force units. I would have figured since his teeth indicate he's an omnivorous predator, he'd have a bite force similar to a pony." Doctor Pearly Whites ran his hooves along Big Red's jaws, inspecting the muscles. "Between how short his jaws are and that the muscles are much smaller, that accounts for his weaker bite force. In my professional opinion, he's an omnivorous predator that eats soft stuff."

"Do you think he eats*urp* carrion?" Twilight felt sick to her stomach at the thought of possibly keeping rotting hunks of meat around.

"It's a possibility. Of course he might be like a griffon and eat raw meat. Or maybe he eats fish like many pegasi and sea-going ponies do. He might also prefer his meat cooked like the minotaurs do. I'm not a dietician, so I can't say for certain. Maybe you can lay out different types of things prepared in different ways to see what he likes and go from there." Doctor Pearly Whites pulled a lollipop from a jar and patted the maned ape on his forelimb. "For being such a good colt, this is for you."

Big Red took the lollipop from the dentist and popped it in his mouth.

"Well we know he likes lollipops.", Pearly Whites chuckled as he went over to the sink to wash his hooves.

"Why do you keep candy around?"

"To ensure repeat customers. A stallion's got to eat."

Twilight rolled her eyes and walked out of the dental exam room.

Spike was sitting in the waiting room, kicking his legs. "He got a lollipop. Can I have a lollipop?"

"No, Spike. You can't have a lollipop. You didn't see the dentist today, so you don't get one."

Big Red pulled his hand from behind his back revealing three lollipops stuck between the fingers of his fist by their sticks. He plucked one his from fist and gave it to the dragon, who happily sucked on it.

"Spike, you're going to rui-mmf...mmm!"

Big Red stuck one of the lollipops in Twilight's mouth. As the unicorn looked up at him, he gave a briar-eating grin around the lollipop.

Twilight pulled the lollipop out of her mouth and said, "I guess that's your way of saying 'Shut up and enjoy a lollipop.'" She turned to open the door, still sucking on the lollipop.

With the unicorn momentarily distracted, Big Red pulled back one of the folds of his improvised toga and snickered at the secret stash of stolen sweets stuck away.

Pearly Whites turned back to his dentist chair and noticed the lollipop jar. All had been taken but one. "I'll have to keep a close eye on that one.", he chuckled as he popped the last lollipop in his mouth.

***

Twilight sat in Fluttershy's cottage explaining to the yellow pegasus about what the dentist had found out about his teeth and possible eating habits.

Big Red and Spike strode along the shore of the creek that ran in front of the tree that had a cottage built into its hollows. The maned ape stopped to pick through some small stones along the bank until he found one he was looking for.

"Whacha got there, a cool rock?"

Big Red threw the flat rock at the surface of the water, making it skip several times across the surface.

"That's so cool!" Spike picked up a small stone and threw it at the surface of the water, but because it was the wrong shape, it sank with a *ker-plunk*.

Big Red picked through the rocks on the shore until he found a flat, slightly oblong one and passed it to the dragon. With a series of chattering hoots, he held his thumb and forefinger in a hook-shaped manner, then demonstrated how to throw it by flicking his wrist and extending his forefinger. He held one hand with the palm facing up, he brought his other hand with the palm facing down to the first, making little skipping demonstrations.

"Oh, I see. I'm supposed to toss this little flat rock so it hits the water flat." Spike threw the flat rock, it skipped once across the surface before sinking with a *plunk*. "Whoa! That is so cool!"

Soon the two were skipping stones up and down the little creek. Spike was able to make his stones skip five or six times, while Big Red was able to make his stones skip almost a dozen times.

Rainbow Dash landed on the grass not far away from Spike and Big Red. "Hey Spike. Hey Big Red. Whachu two doin'? skippin' stones?"

"Yeah! Big Red showed me how to do it." Spike threw another stone.

"Six skips...not too bad. Here, let me show you how it's done." Rainbow picked up a stone in her hoof and threw it at the water. "Eleven skips! Beat that!"

Big Red picked up a stone, rinsed it off in the creek and threw it.

Rainbow's eyes went wide with surprise."Th-thirteen skips?!"

Big Red brushed imaginary dirt from his nonexistent sleeves in an over-exaggerated manner, then grabbed his imaginary collar and popped it.

Rainbow sputtered at the smug display. She flew up in the maned ape's face, pressing her forehead against his. "Bring it on! And don't think that just because you're a colt, I'm going to take it easy on you!"

Bid Red let out a series of chattering hoots.

"That better be monkey-talk for 'Oh, it's on!'"

Soon Rainbow Dash and Big Red were in an impromptu stone-skipping competition. When the blue pegasus would win a round, she would fly up in the air, do a dance and chant, "Oh yeah! Uh-huh! Uh-huh! Uh-huh!" When the maned ape would win a round, he would let out a whooping hoot, would do a shimmying dance on his good leg and shake his plot at the rainbow-maned pegasus. Their little victory displays urge each other to compete against one another even fiercer.

Rainbow Dash and Big Red each skipped a stone down the little creek simultaneously.

*skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip* *whack-whack* "Ow! Consarn it!" Applejack had been wading through a fetlock-deep ford in the creek when she heard small splashes. Looking over she saw a pair of small skipping stones a split second before they hit her in the ribs. Big Red and Rainbow Dash had shocked looks on their faces, the former held a hand over his mouth, the latter held a hoof over her mouth. "Gonna leave a bruise.", the earth pony muttered as she waded out of the shallow water and trotted down the bank to the two.

Rainbow Dash rubbed the back of her head as she chuckled nervously. "Uh...sorry AJ. We didn't see--"

Applejack held up a hoof to cut her friend off mid-sentence. "Y'all didn't mean nuthin' by it. In th' future, jus' make sure there ain't nopony crossin' where y'all're havin' a stone-skippin' competition." The corner of her mouth quirked up in a smirk. "'Sides, everypony knows that th' Apples are th' best at skippin' stones." She picked up a small, flat stone and hurled down the creek.

*skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip--skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip-skip* *thunk* *plop*

Rainbow Dash, Spike and Big Red gaped and blinked in disbelief. Applejack had skipped a stone all the way down the creek and bounced it off of the bridge in Ponyville.

The earth pony huffed on a hoof and buffed against her chest fluff. "Toldja! Ain't nopony better at skippin' stones than an Apple.", she said smugly.

At that moment Twilight and Fluttershy came out of the cottage.

"AJ? Rainbow? What are you two doing here?", Twilight asked.

"Jus' skippin' stones an' boastin'."

"Uh...what she said."

Big Red let out a series of chattering hoots as he moved a hand in a series of jerky motions, followed by a sharp, quick, short chop accompanied by him clicking his tongue loudly.

"You shoulda seen it, Twilight! Applejack skipped a stone down the creek all the way into Ponyville until it hit the side of the bridge!", Spike said excitedly.

"Spike isn't too bad a skippin' stones himself.", Rainbow said as she gave the dragon a noogie.

"Where'd you learn to skip stones, Spike.", Twilight asked.

"Big Red showed me how." Spike picked up another small stone and skipped it across the water. "You should try it, Twilight. It's really fun."

Twilight picked up a stone in her magic and tossed it at the water. *ker-plunk* Because it wasn't a flat one, it simply sank. She tried again a few times, but because she kept choosing stones they weren't flat, they kept sinking. "Ugh! Stupid stones won't skip!" She levitated a dozen stones and threw them at the water in frustration.

"I gotta get back to th' farm. I got some chores that need finishin'. Ah only stopped by because they were skippin' stones.", Applejack said in an uncomfortable tone, then trotted off.

"I gotta get back to the weather team. My break's over." Rainbow Dash leapt up into the air and flew off.

Fluttershy signaled for Big Red to follow her into the cottage.

Big Red walked with the timid, yellow pegasus to the door. *thunk* He didn't duck fast enough upon entering the door and bumped his forehead on the lintel. He rubbed his forehead and grumbled.When Fluttershy came over to help, he waved her off with a grunt. After he got his wits about him again, he placed a hand on the lintel and ducked under. Fortunately the ceiling was just high enough so he didn't have to stoop, but he did have to make sure that he didn't bounce around too much to prevent himself from bopping the top of his head. He had to turn himself slantways to get in as pony-sized doors were a bit narrow for him.

Fluttershy directed the maned ape over to the couch.

Big Red let out a long grunt as he sat on the sofa. After placing the crutches off to one side, he stretched out his good leg, leaned back and placed both arms across the back of the couch.

Twilight quickly wrote down notes about how he sat.

It appears that due to his height, Big Red has to duck to enter into doorways. Because of his breadth, he must also turn himself partially sideways when entering doorways. The only reason why this wasn't an issue at the veterinarian's office or the hospital is because the emergency entrances are always built double wide to accommodate trauma teams assisting an injured pony. Any home he were to live in will have to have special considerations to its construction for his specific body alignments. During his stay at the hospital he had been housed in an unused trauma room and upon his release the nurses had rolled him out of one of the emergency entrances on a gurney. Big Red sits with his plot and flanks directly under his spine with his hind legs extended to the front.

Twilight thought about her time at school. Lyra Heartstrings had sat in a similar fashion. She wondered if her unicorn classmate ever had any dealings with maned apes.

Fluttershy gently lifted Big Red's broken leg, pulled the coffee table closer, laid a pillow on it and gently laid the broken limb onto the pillow. She then made her way to the kitchen. She returned with a cold compress made from chipped ice and a dish towel. She placed the compress on the maned ape's forehead and moved his hand over to hold it in place.

Big Red let out a sigh as the cold compress helped with the pain and swelling. He started scratching Fluttershy's back, who in turn started trilling. She climbed onto his lap and curled up, letting small trills as he scratched her back.

Fluttershy rolled onto her back and Big Red started rubbing her belly. She gurgled happily and kicked her hind legs.

Twilight cleared her throat. "I think it's time we started our experiment, Fluttershy."

Fluttershy pouted and stuck out her bottom lip. "But Twilight*gurgle*, this feels so*gurgle* gooooooooooood!*gurgle*"

Twilight lit her horn and telekinetically pulled the pegasus from Big Red's lap. "You can get your belly rubbed later, Fluttershy. We need to find out what he likes to eat first."

Fluttershy whimpered as she gave puppy dog eyes to Twilight and Big Red gave the unicorn a nonplussed look.

"Ugh! Fine! Five more minutes then we need to figure out what he eats."

Fluttershy let out a squee as she flapped over to Big Red, landed lightly on his lap and rolled onto her back. She was happily gurgling and kicking her hind legs as he rubbed her belly.

Once the five minutes were up, Fluttershy reluctantly rolled off of Big Red's lap. As she began to walk off, she felt a gentle tug at her tail. Turning her head back, she was pleasantly surprised when a lollipop was shoved in her mouth. "Fank oo!"

Twilight and Fluttershy laid on the kitchen table several covered plates holding different foods, apple slices, steamed hay, irises, boiled and grilled carrots, shredded lettuce, whole cabbage leaves, slices of raw meat, a hunk of spoiled meat(Twilight wound up losing her lunch in the garbage can at that one), spiced oats, a chunk of cheese, slices of bread and a daffodil sandwich.

Fluttershy motioned for Big Red to come into the kitchen. He rose from the couch with a long grunt. Once he entered the kitchen, narrowly avoiding bumping his head on the doorway between the two rooms, she gestured for him to sit at the table. He eyed the covered plates, quirked an eyebrow, then sat down at the chair with some difficulty.

Fluttershy uncovered the dish with the spoiled meat first. Twilight's face turned green as she fought to keep from throwing up again. Big Red gagged and recoiled from the sight and smell of the spoiled meat.

"We know he doesn't like spoiled meat.", Fluttershy said as she picked up the plate holding the spoiled meat and hurled it out the window. A pair of vultures landed and started ripping chunks from the rotting meat, gobbling it down.

"Thank the gods!", Twilight exclaimed. "I don't think I could stomach keeping hunks of spoiled meat around."

Big Red began pulling the covers off of the other plates.

"You're messing up my experiment!" Twilight tried to stop Big Red from uncovering the plates, which got her a sharp flick on the snout and a barking hoot from the maned ape.

Big Red picked up the plates holding bread, meat and cheese, and walked over to the stove.

"b-be careful, Big Red. The stove is hot. Let me help you.", Fluttershy said.

Big Red waved her off with a series of chattering hoots. He searched through the drawers and cabinets. he placed a spatula, a long sharp knife and a table knife on the counter. He opened the icebox and pulled out the butter. Lighting the stove, he pulled a pair of frying pans from the rack and laid them on the range.

Twilight stared wide-eyed as she furiously scribbled down notes and illustrations.

Big Red let out a series of chattering hoots as he pointed to the sliced apples on the table. Fluttershy nodded and fetched them for him. He cut thin slices from the hunk of cheese, cut the seeds from the apple slices and smeared butter on one side of several pieces of bread. Soon the kitchen was filled with the sound and smell of grilled cheese sandwiches, with and without apple slices, cooking.

Once the sandwiches had been fried to a golden brown on both sides, Big Red moved them to a clean plate he had fetched from the cabinet. Big Red let out a series of chattering hoots as he pointed to the cabbage leaves and carrots. Fluttershy once again nodded her head and fetched them. Putting the frying pan he used to fry up the sandwiches in the sink, he pulled a pot from the rack, he filled it with water and placed it on the range to boil. He then started slicing up the hunks of meat into small strips and chopping the carrots into small bits. As the water in the pot started to boil, he dropped the cabbage leaves into it. He dropped a couple of dabs of butter into the frying pan, and put the meat and carrots in once the butter had melted. He stirred the meat and carrots with the spatula, occasionally flicking the frying pan to toss the cooking ingredients in the air.

Big Red moved the boiled cabbage leaves to another plate, moved some of the fried meat and carrots onto them, and rolled them up.

The smell of cooking food drew Spike into the cottage from where he was skipping stones. "Something smells goo-ood!"

As Big Red moved the plates to the table, he looked at the plate of shredded lettuce, and rubbed his chin as he hummed. He extended a forefinger upwards as he let out a short hoot. He grabbed a bottle of vinegar, a bottle of oil, some spices he liked the smell and taste of, and a clean empty bottle. He combined the vinegar, oil and spices into the bottle, pressed his palm over the spout and shook up the dressing.

Big Red placed four plates on the table, then placed two fried sandwiches, one with apple slices, one without, one each plate, then placed the plate with the fried meat and carrots wrapped up in boiled cabbage leaves in the center. He then poured the vinegar and oil dressing onto the shredded lettuce and transferred a bit to each plate.

Twilight found she liked the grilled cheese sandwiches without apple slices the best. She tried a small nibble of the fried meat and carrots, but found that she didn't like meat that much. The lettuce with the oil and vinegar was fine, though she preferred creamy dressing. She topped off the meal with her favorite, daffodil sandwiches.

Fluttershy like both types of grilled cheese sandwiches. She liked the fried meat and carrots wrapped up in the boiled cabbage leaves. Being a pegasus meant she had higher protein needs from the other two tribes of ponies, so it wasn't unusual to see one eating fish or sometimes meat.

Once all had eaten, Spike let out a loud burp.

"Manners, Spike.", Twilight scolded.

Bid Red rubbed his belly and pressed his fingers in like he was pushing something around. He let out a long, loud burp that reverberated off the walls. He let out a series of chattering hoots as he gestured with his hands.

"He said 'It's not bad manners, it's good food.'", Spike interpreted.

Fluttershy let out a soft, dainty burp. "It was very good. Thank you." She began clearing the table.

Big Red helped her move the dirty dishes to the sink. He picked up the plate of spiced oats and dumped them into a clean sack as he let out a series of chattering hoots.

Fluttershy didn't understand what he was trying to say, but it was clear that he wanted the oats for something later, so she nodded and began washing the dishes.

As the shadows began to lengthen, Fluttershy escorted Twilight, Spike and Big Red down to the bridge that crossed the creek in front of her cottage. Walking down to the bank of the creek, she looked down. "They skipped all my good stones!", she grumbled. "It's going to take me months to find more good skipping stones!" She picked up a flat stone and skipped it down the creek.

Gerald stood in the alleyway between two abandoned buildings on the edge of Canterlot. He had left the iron wolves and is hunting at the camp halfway down Mount Lot so as to not scare any of the unicorns. He was waiting to hear from his contact, a rather puffed and stodgy unicorn known among poachers and black marketeers as "The Broker".

***

A young unicorn stallion wove through alleyways, going from the mansions and manners of the upper city, heading to the lower city. He didn't notice groups of ponies wearing the purple and gold armor shadowing him.

As the young stallion turned the corner in the mid-city where the laborers live to slip down an alley, he didn't notice a unicorn Royal Guard lighting his horn until the sleeping spell hit him.

As the Royal Guard secured the scene, a carriage pulled by a pair of ponies wearing the gold and silver armor of the Solar Guard pulled up.

Prince Blueblood, the adoptive nephew of Princesses Celestia and Luna stepped out. "I see you've caught our quarry. Does he have anything on him?"

A unicorn guard pulled a slip of paper from the unconscious unicorn's tunic. "Sire, he's carrying a message. Probably from The Broker."

Blueblood took the note from the guard and read it.

Gerald,
I am unable to come in pony as I am currently indisposed. I am sending one of my hired hooves to deliver this message to you. Though I am as of yet unable to discover the exact location of the maned ape, I have found it is somewhere in Central Equestria. The three most likely locations are the Lot Valley, the Everfree Basin, and the Rockville Plateau. I would have better information if you and your ilk had not made such a ruckus in Manehattan and drew the attention of the Royal, Solar and Night guards, so I must move very carefully to not draw the attention of the princesses. My buyers are growing impatient. You have six months to find the maned ape and bring its fresh carcass to me for processing, or I shall have to call in favors with another, more dangerous contact.
The Broker

"Has the origin of the messenger been confirmed?"

"Yes, sire.", the guard sergeant replied.

Blueblood let out an exasperated sigh. "Too bad. I liked him." Lighting his horn, he cast a duplication spell, making three identical copies of the original. He levitated a bottle of cheap whisky from within his chariot, pulled the cork out, poured some on the original letter, causing the ink to run and smear a little, he then walked over and poured the remainder over the unconscious unicorn's tunic and head, then dropped the empty bottle on the ground.

Blueblood passed the original letter to a Royal Guard. "Make sure you rub that whiskey into his mane and fur, place a tracking spell on him, return the letter where you found it, thump him in the head a couple times, not enough to injure or bruise him, just enough to give him a headache and cast a delayed reawakening spell on him. Make sure you're not here when he wakes up." He passed one of the copies to the guard sergeant. "Give this to Captain Armor. I'll personally deliver these to the princesses myself. And remember, I was never here. If the press were to get wind I was cavorting where the commoner rabble lives, they'd have a field day." He stepped back into his carriage and knocked on the side, alerting the Solar Guard he was ready to leave. "Such a shame, JS. I really liked you."

***

The young unicorn stallion woke up on the ground in the alley. He winced in pain as he placed a hoof to his head. He reeked of cheap booze. He didn't remember drinking.

That night dozens of ponies wearing black cloaks milled around the edges of Ponyville. They were the princesses best trained guard, they were the knife in the dark, the Black Guard.

Luna sat on the throne. Nopony ever came to night court. As her magic slowly returned, she had regained much of her original height, though she still had months more before she would regain her full strength. She still struggled to raise the moon and had to rely on Celestia to help. Though her mane and tail had yet to regain its ethereal quality, it had begun to flow in light blue waves moved by magical winds only alicorns could feel.

As alicorns age, they gain new abilities. Luna decided in the calm and still of night court she would begin to further stretch those new magical muscles. She closed her eyes and reached out with her magic. She stood in a black void surrounded by silver orbs...the dreams of sleeping ponies.

Luna dove into dream after dream. Though she couldn't mold and shape the dreamscapes of sleeping minds, or even directly communicate with the sleeping ponies, she still could whisper to them, could manifest as a mote of a light, a shadow or a reflection. She celebrated alongside her subjects accomplishments and successes, wept with their sorrows, and frolicked in the meadows with foals...she especially loved those dream as they reminded her of a happier and simpler time.

Luna came came across an unusual dream. As she went to push through the membrane, it resisted her like a rubber sheet stretched across a doorway. She tried aligning her magical vibrations to it, it still resisted her. Finally she was forced to pour magic into her dream-self and brute force her way in. What she saw surprised her.

The was Big Red, though the mane on his head and face were shorter, there was no mistaking that bright red hair. Standing by his side was another maned ape, her skin was the color of ebony wood and the mane atop her head was black as a raven's feathers and curly, like sheep's wool, her belly protruded, she was with foal. Between them was another maned ape, a smaller one, their foal. Another female. Her skin was the color of coffee with cream and her mane hung down in deep brown waves. Luna tried to use her magic to glean information from the dream like she had done with her little ponies, but the dream resisted too much and she was forced to instead listen to gain the information.

"Daddy?"

"Lilly-Anne?"

"When is mommy going to have her baby?"

The dream shifted and Luna found herself standing in a chilly room. The ebony-skinned female was laying in a silver padded box. Big Red was holding a little maned ape foal in his arms. His older foal, Lilly-Anne, stood by his side tugging on his sleeve.

"Daddy? Why is mamma sleeping in that silver box? Is she gonna wake up soon?"

Big Red knelt down, tears leaking down his cheeks. "No, baby. Mamma got sick. The doctors tried to make her well, but they couldn't. She's not sleeping, she's...she...in heaven now and she'll be waiting for us."

A hand came to rest on Big Red's shoulder. He stood up, there were three other maned apes, two males and a female. Two of them, their manes were the grey-white of old age, the other, a male was of a similar age, with a blonde mane. The female with the white-grey mane took the foal from his arms and took Lilly-Anne by her hand. "C'mon, let's go talk to Auntie Stacy as daddy talks grown-up with Grandpa James and Uncle Greg."

As soon as the foals were gone, Big Red fell to his knees and wept loudly.

The other two males dropped to their knees and hugged him as tears leaked down their faces.

"I don't know how I'm going to make it without Darla.", he said between heaving sobs. "I'm just glad she didn't suffer when the aneurysm burst."

"Just let it out, Dave. Don't hold it in.", the older male said.

The dream shifted again and Luna found herself standing on a gravel pathway. Bid...Dave was kneeling on the ground in front of Lilly-Anne.

"Be good for Uncle Greg and Auntie Stacy. Help take care of your brother, Julius."

"Where are you going, daddy?"

Dave pointed. Luna looked and gasped. There was a chain of mountains in the distance, they had a slight purple tint.

"See that big mountain there? There's a little cabin by a stream about halfway up. By the stream is a patch of flowers. They're called black-eyed Susans. I'm going to pick some for mamma's grave."

"Can I come with you?"

Dave chuckled softly and sniffled. "Not this time. Now don't pout. I'll take you and your brother up there real soon."

"When will you be back."

Dave held up four fingers. "Four days."

The dream shifted one last time. Luna found herself standing on a mountain path. Dave was wearing hiking clothes. He stopped walking, took off the pack on his back, pulled something out, cut a hunk of it with a large knife he drew from his hip and popped it in his mouth, chewing it up before swallowing. Suddenly the sky turned from a clear, bright blue to a roiling pitch black. Winds both scalding and freezing blew furiously. Strange colored lightning flashed from cloud to cloud. Leaves, twigs and pebbles levitated up from the path. Dave ran for a small cave off the path. There was a deafening crack and a blinding flash.

Luna stood by Dave as he sat up from the ground. He was in a low-lying.

"What the fuck?"

A pair of multicolored ponies approached him letting out chattering nickers.

With a flash the dream ended. Luna wobbled on the throne and collapsed to the floor.

"Princess!", a Night Guard exclaimed, running over. "Are you okay?"

Luna let out a series of chattering hoots.

The guard stepped back unsure of himself. "Princess?"

Luna shook her head. "We art sorry, guard. We were simply disoriented and confused after getting ejected from the dream realm."

"Are you okay?"

"We art but a bit disoriented and tired. We thank thee for thy concern, but we art well." Luna rose to wobbly legs and the guard helped her up. "Please summon Our sister. We shalt receive her in Our chambers."

Several minutes later a tired Celestia knocked on the door to Luna's room.

Luna opened the door. "Tia! Come in! Come in! We have news of the visitor to our lands."

"Twilight has been keeping me informed of his well being."

"We hast managed to delve into his dreams and learnt his tongue and origins."

"What?!"

4

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"Sister, We hardly need thou to foalsit Us.", Luna said, giving her fellow diarch a sidelong glance. "We shall be able to enter his dreams again."

A concerned grimace spread on Celestia's face. "I wished I had an alicorn to stand guard over me when my powers began to grow and branch out, to bolster my magic as it faltered. Instead, once I had drained my wellspring, I lingered for days in a coma on the very edge of death, only to awaken in my own coffin as it was being lowered into the ground." A halfhearted chuckle escaped her lips. "The looks on the faces of those nobles and mourners as I shattered the lid of the coffin. I had to spend the next three centuries disassembling the religion that popped up in the wake of that, and even now the wraith of it still clings to the collective consciousness of our little ponies. We may not be mortals, but we are not immortal." A deep sadness spread across her face. "I failed you once, I shall not fail you again. I cannot bear to be separate from you again, so I shall stand guard over you and bolster your wellspring if it were to waver."

Luna gently placed a hoof on Celestia's wither. "'Twas not thou whom failed Us, 'twas We whom failed thee. We should have come to thee when We were feeling envious of thou instead of letting it fester until it became rage and hate."

Tears welled up in Celestia's eyes and spilled down her cheeks. "No, Luna. I saw that you were suffering and alone on your nightly vigil for years and chose to ignore it. It was only when things got so bad that I could no longer ignore it, but then it was too late, the darkness that I had allowed to fester was rapidly consuming you. The sun may shine brightly, but it casts long shadows and one can get so caught up admiring all that celestial wonder that it's easy to not allow yourself to not see those who are caught in the shadows. I was a foolish, young mare, the eldest daughter of a weather farmer, too caught up in the gold and the glamour and the lavish lifestyle as princess of the sun that I willingly blinded myself to the suffering of those who were supposed to be under my protection." She began to weep bitterly.

Luna wrapped her forelegs and wings around her sister, hugging her tight. Both shared bitter tears. Once their tears had been cried out, Luna asked, "What happened to mother and father?"

Celestia hung her head in shame. "They had withered from age. And I, Celestia, mighty raiser of the sun, banisher of the shadows, mistress of mages and the sole ruler of all Equestria, had simply forgotten about them until I needed advice. Wind Sprint had grown old, having great-grandfoals of his own, wanted nothing to do with me. I had rightfully earned the scorn my younger brother, your older twin by three minutes and no amount of penance would ever erase my sins. So I watched them from afar, subtly guiding and protecting them."

"So what happened to our grand nieces and nephews?"

"Thunderbolt died without an heir shortly after the formation of the EUP fending off an incursion against griffon bandits. Hail Storm had always identified as a mare, something that didn't sit well with the community leaders. They ordered her to be flogged and hanged. Once the EUP had arrived to get the situation under control, she had already been badly beaten to the point where her wings were useless and was already on the gallows with a noose around her neck. It took her months to recover and she wound up marrying a unicorn named Blue Sea."

"Wait, Blue Sea? As in the ancestor of Blueblood?!"

"Yes. The very same. I made sure to foster a strong sense of justice and duty in that bloodline, though they have a propensity towards superiority complexes and are...well...more than a bit foppish. Hail Storm and Blue Sea adopted an orphaned colt because medical knowledge at that time had not advanced as far as it has today. The third great-grandfoal of Wind Sprint, Spring Showers, married the great-great-grandson of Smart Cookie, White Smith. I had kept track of them for six generations until they moved across the sea and I had lost contact until two hundred and fifty years ago when they arrived here in Canterlot as seed collectors and sellers, utterly exhausted from their long trek. At first I thought they were just a band of caravaners and travelling merchants until I locked eyes with Bright Smith's eldest daughter, Annette Smith. It was almost as if I were staring into the eyes of Wind Sprint, she looked so much like him. I nearly broke down weeping right then and there. I immediately bequeathed to them Smart Cookie's clan's ancestral lands in the Everfree Basin that had remained unclaimed for hundreds of years. They wasted no time, planting orchards and fields throughout the basin, minus Whitetail Woods and Everfree Forest, even before they started construction on their house. Annette Smith married a naturally gifted, though simpleminded apple merchant named Apple Juice--"

"And thus Sweet Apple Acres and Ponyville came to be!", Luna interrupted. "Pray tell, sister, why haven't thou given them noble title and the privileges that come with it?"

"I did. You can check the registry. The family's title is County of the Everfree. I offered the title and all it entails to Bright Smith shortly after he settled down and he refused it. After his death, I approached Annette. She turned it down, saying..." Celestia cleared her throat and did her best Granny Smith impression. "Ah thank'ee kindly princess. But Ah don't need no fancy-schmancy titles and whatnot. Jus' gimme rich soil, apple tress full-a fruit an' plenny-a foals to chase 'round, an' Ah'll be happier'n a hog in mud."

"That family has Wind Sprint's stubbornness and Smart Cookie's pragmatism.", Luna stated.

"Indeed they do, Luna. Indeed they do."

Luna settled down onto the cushion making herself comfortable. "Let Us delve into the dreamscape to search for Dave's dream once again." Closing her eyes, she reached out with her newfound powers.

***

Luna moved through the aether of dreams as easily as one would move through a field of tall grass. Reaching out with her magic, she probed through silver orbs searching for the one that resisted her magic.

Luna found herself surprised when she discovered two such orbs. She gently pulled the closer to her so as not to disturb the sleepers and used her magic to feel them. Both resisted her magic in the same ways.

Changing her magical vibrations so that she could perceive the two orbs auras, Luna reached out to them. Though their auras were harder to perceive compared to other creatures of this world, she found after a few minutes that she could make out their auras. One had the gentle pulsing, even-colored aura of a mature mind. The other had the chaotically shifting colors and erratic patterns of a still developing mind.

Luna opted to study the younger mind first. Instead of using her magic to force her way into as she was unsure if doing so would cause harm to a young mind, she instead moved closer to the orb and peered down into it as she did when she first discovered her dreamwalking abilities. At first the orb revealed nothing, just randomly shifting silvery lines, then the lines began to part and reveal information.

Luna observed a young female, quite different from Dave in appearance. She had straight black hair, tannish-yellow skin and narrower eyes. The young female was in a room filled with smoke, the yellow-orange flickering light of flames shown from under the door. The young female scrabbled across the floor on her hands and knees to a closet and hit within. Suddenly there was a flash of light and the young female appeared in some sort of camp. Yellow-orange talons reached out for her and lifted her up to peer into an eagle's face sporting an eye patch.

"Be at peace, young one.", Luna whispered into the dream orb. "Thou art in Mine kingdom. We shalt find thee and rescue thee."

Luna watched from outside the dream orb as large, dog-like paws took the young female from the griffon's grasp, hauled her across the ground and tossed her into a small iron cage. From there it was the usual nightmare terrors a scared young mind would and could create, teeth and claws made of flames and shadows, monsters made of mish-mashed parts.

Luna reached out with her magic and projected feelings of calm in the hopes that enough would reach down into the orb and help dispel some of the terror and nightmares.

The dream orb popped. Whoever this young female is, she had been awakened from her dream suddenly.

"We have seen thine face, griffon. Thou shalt need sleep at some point and then we shall have thee where We desire thee."

Luna braced herself and began to push into Dave's dream. She was prepared for the resistance and began riding the currents of his sleeping mind. She pushed forward at speed when the currents were at her back and hovered in eddies when the currents turned against her so as to conserve her strength.

Soon Luna was on the ground of Dave's dream. She looked around to get her bearings.

Dave was on his hands and knees looking at the pair of ponies who were letting out a series of chattering nickers.

Luna recognized where this was. It was in the village outside Stalliongrad. Back before her banishment, this had been a cluster of villages close to the border of the Crystal Empire, now it was Equestria's shining pearl of the north and housed one of the many garrisons that watched for any signs of Equestria's first and oldest ally's return.

Luna watched as the two ponies, both stallions with bundles of firewood on their backs, stood still and let out chattering nickers. Dave stared perplexed.

"I don't recall there being rainbow horses here in Colorado.", Dave muttered softly. "Of course I don't recall any low lying forests near the Elk Mountains. Maybe that storm triggered a landslide and I hit my head and now this is all a delusion caused by head trauma?" He reached down and pinched his arm. "Nope. Somehow this is real and rainbow horses live somewhere here in Colorado? That can't be the case. Someone would have reported seeing them. Maybe I'm dead and this is the afterlife. But why would the afterlife have rainbow horses?"

Dave rose to his feet and the two stallions backed away, eyes wide with fear and ears splayed back against their heads. "Easy there...", he said softly as he looked at the stallions' hind quarters. "...boys. I'm no threat to you and it's obvious you're the property of some eccentric billionaire."

"Property indeed!", Luna snorted softly.

Dave paused and looked around. The dream shifted slightly.

Luna froze. Did he just hear her? She chose to keep herself hidden and used her newfound powers to obfuscate herself lest his mind was powerful and it decided to attack her.

"Is someone there?", Dave asked as he walked around. "Huh! Must've been my imagination." He brought his hand down to his waist, drew his survival knife and began playing with it. He paused as the knife spun in the air like a top for several minutes."Waitaminnit! I'm being...what's the name of that movie? Inception! I'm being Inception'd! Well since this is a dream, my dream, and movies like A Nightmare on Elm Street have taught me anything, my dream, my rules."

Luna gasped in fright as the dream suddenly shifted. Instead of the pine forests near Stalliongrad, she was in a tight series of pipe-lined tunnels that occasionally released steam. Then she heard something over the rattling of pipes and the hissing of steam. It was low, it was soft, it was feminine. It was...singing?!

Luna followed the sound of soft singing and came across three young female maned apes. They all had light skin and long blonde manes. They wore simple white dresses and skipped rope as they sang the eerie, creepy, sing-songy words.

One, two. Freddy's coming for you./ Three, four. Better lock your door./ Five, six. Better grab your crucifix./ Seven, eight. Better stay up late./ Nine, ten. Never sleep again.

Suddenly Luna felt a presence behind her. She turned around and her eyes went wide. Standing there was another maned ape...a male. This one had no hair, wore a filthy red and green sweater, a dirty brown hat was atop its head, its face was marred with burn scars, and its hand had long nails...no...long finger knives. It let out an evil cackle as it drug its finger knives along the pipes, sparks flew forth as they made a loud screeching along the pipes.

Luna backed away, then turned and started galloping. The floor turned into a quagmire and she sank into it up to her chest. Every instinct in her mind screamed out there was a predator and she pumped her legs as hard as she could trying to move through that quagmire, the whole while that evil beast behind her continued cackling and screeching its finger knives.

A hand came to rest on Luna's neck and she let out an ear-splitting scream.

The dream shifted and Luna found herself in a sun-dappled field. The scent of lilacs drifted on a warm breeze.

"Easy now. Just calm down."

Luna looked over and saw Dave. "That was very mean."

"And you're trying to Inception me, horsey. So I guess that makes us even."

"We don't even know what 'Inception' means in this context."

"Y'know...slipping into my dreams to try and convince trick me into siding with you or giving up secrets. So what'cha looking to find? How many licks it takes to get to the Tootsie Roll center of a Tootsie Pop?"

A-one-a-two-a-three. *crunch* Three!

"Or how I get my shirts so white?"

Ancient Chinese secrets, ay?!

"Or maybe the Krabby Patty secret formula?"

Luna suddenly noticed a tiny green creature with antennae laughing madly as it rubbed two of its little stalk-like limbs together. "Neigh. T'was not Our intention to steal secrets from thee or sway thee to Our side. We encountered thy dream last eve and were curious. We were simply curious and wanted to know from whence thou came. Once we left thy dream, we found that we could speak thine tongue. Tonight we returned to learn more, but We encountered a dream of another of thy kind."

Luna focused her power and conjured the image.

Dave circled the image and studied it. "She looks Asian. If I had to make a guess about the country she comes from, probably Vietnam, Laos or Cambodia. It's hard to be exact unless I can see her in person. She's young. Looks to be about five or six. Probably scared out of her wits and calling out for her mother."

Luna's form wavered.

"Are you okay?", Dave asked.

"Being here is taxing on Our wellspring and Our sister is probably disrupting the spell to pull Us from the dream."

"Before you go, what's your name?"

"Lu--" Luna vanished with a pop from Dave's dream.

"--na.", Luna gasped as she snapped back into the waking world. Her strength gave out and she collpased, a gold aura cradled her before she could hit the floor.

"Easy now.", Celestia said. "Try not to talk. Just breathe slow and easy. Your wellspring began spiking and I had to pull you out. Mind magic isn't my strong point and I had to trace along your magic to pull you out."

Luna took a few gasps. "S-sister...there-there's another--"

"Don't speak yet, Luna. Take your time and gather your strength first.", Celestia said, cutting her sister off. She lit her horn and allowed some of her magic to gently flow into Luna.

After several minutes Luna felt strong enough to sit up on her own. "Sister, there's another maned ape. A young female, probably just arrived. We fear that poachers may have already captured it."

Celestia scowled and lit her horn. In a flash she disappeared. A split second later she appeared outside a cottage made of field stones. She raised a hoof and knocked on the door.

The door swung open and a green earth pony with a dark green mane stood in the frame, her cutie mark was a yellow flower in a terracotta pot drooping over as if it were wilting or trying to hide.

"Pardon me for disturbing you at such a late hour. Is your wife in? I need to talk to her.

"Wallflower? Who's th--", an amber unicorn with a red and gold mane spoke up before going quiet. She narrowed her light cyan eyes at the princess and worked her jaw, almost as if she were chewing on words. "Mother."

"Sunset, I'm sorry to bother you at your home. I know I haven't been the best mother, especially after--"

"After you all but abandoned me when father died and I didn't live up to your expectations. Is that what you were about to say?", Sunset interrupted. "If this is your attempt at an apology, it's a piss poor one, so save your breath. You can't use your courtly masks here, I'm not Blueballs or the anxiety librarian. I know you too well."

Wallflower came over and whispered in Sunset's ear.

Sunset blew out a sigh. "Consider yourself lucky, mother. My wife talked me into hearing you out. Say your peace, then get the fuck off my property."

Shame and sorrow hung on Celestia's face. "What I've done to you was unfair. Just more sins atop the mountain I've already built for myself. I'm sorry to have disturbed you. I'll go now. If you even need me, reach out."

Sunset sighed and blew an errant lock out of her face. "I'm going to hate myself for saying this, but...come in. I know you didn't come here just for a social call. The neighbors have already seen you appear here at my door. They're gonna spend weeks pestering me and my wife. Wallflower already has pretty bad social anxiety. The only one who has worse social anxiety than her is her fourth cousin...what was her name? Butterfly? Flutter...she? Nutter..."

Wallflower whispered into Sunset's ear.

Celestia stepped in the cottage and closed the door

"Ah, yes. Thank you sweetness." Sunset gave her wife a quick peck on the cheek and the earth pony mare's face turned beet red. "Fluttershy. Isn't she one of the ones who gained use of one of your ultimate weapons?"

"Fluttershy's the bearer of the Element of Kindness.", Celestia said. Regret filled her voice "That was one of the elements that originally bonded to Luna." She regained her composure. "But you are correct. I didn't come here for a social call. I know you've probably kept tabs with your old compatriots within the EIA and know about the maned ape that came into my custody."

"Yes, yes.", Sunset said. "As the old saying goes,'There's nothing on the surface of Gaia that the Sun doesn't see.' I'm well aware that you've been keeping tabs on me. So what do--"

Sunset's words were cut off with the creaking of a door. Out walked a female maned ape with turquoise skin. A mass of scars atop her hairless head, the blindfold covering her eyeless sockets, the scars around her mouth indicating her tongue had been cut out and the stump where her right arm had been all spoke in silent volumes of the brutality that poachers inflicted upon her. It was clear she had hastily dressed by the way her dress hung off of her in a lopsided manner. Tendrils of energy extended from the four fingers of her left hand and probed around, touching objects around her. It was clear she was using magic to navigate.

Wallflower trotted over to the turquoise four-fingered maned ape and whispered, "It's okay, Mint. We didn't mean to wake you. Sunset's mom is visiting us and they had a disagreement."

Mint flailed around for a moment and patted Wallflower on her head. One of the tendrils of energy moved across the romm and touched Celestia. "Hewwo, Pwi'cess Cewes'ia.", she slurred out. "I appologi' for my wooks a' speak. Poakers cuk ouk my kounge, eyes, ahm a' cuk my baby fwom my bewwy fow sewwing koo foob mewkanks. 'Ey cuk off my scawp fow iwegaw cwoki'g mewkawks." She wiped drool from her mouth. "I heaw oo fouw' awokew oowan 'ike ee?"

Celestia had heard that the four-fingered variety could speak ponish and if Mint still had her tongue, she could speak more clearly. "You are correct, Miss Mint. We found one similar to you, only he has five fingers and is resistant to magic. My little ponies call him Big Red, though my sister after reaching his dreams has discovered his name is Dave. My sister just found out tonight that the poachers have captured another one of his breed, a filly."

Mint pointed a finger in the direction of Sunset. "Suwsek. Oo wee' koo fin' kak kilb befow 'ey kiww hew."

"So what say you, Sunset Shimmer? Are you prepared to take up the mantle again? To be my sword? To be my justice? To once again be the Solar Flare?"

"I'll do it, for Mint and for that foal they're holding, I'll do it for Equestria, but not for you.", Sunset said in a stern voice. "I'll become Solar Flare. If this turns out to be one of your courtly games or one of your manipulations, then I'll turn my flames on you."

Gordon sat behind his desk made of stacked crates. His hunting company had just recently set up a new camp when this morning he was blessed by the appearance of a five-fingered maned ape hatchling that appeared in front of him in a flash of light. After a quick inspection it was clear this was a young female. There were bound to be a rich collector up around Whinnyapolis or Maretropolis that would want her to as brooding stock for one of the male maned apes they kept as pets, then there were the exotic meat markets and the exotic clothing markets that would want her meat and hair, then there were the fighting pits back in Griffonia that might use her for some quick entertainment. All that would be needed was to send out a contact through the right channels. And of course make sure that the Broker gets to dip his hooves in the bit pot, after all as long as he got his cut, he kept the authorities off your trail.

Gordon felt the feather on the back of his neck twinge. Something was going to happen and he needed to break camp. He hadn't survived this long in the poaching game by ignoring his instincts. Gerald had all of his ferocity, but lacked his instincts. Maybe that would change once he took down that ape. His daughter, Gabby, was too much like her mother, Getty, nice, sweet and too much like a pony. Maybe her cousin Gilda would teach her how to be a proper griffon. Then there was his brother Gustav. All that griffon needed to be a pony was the hooves and the stamp on the flank. Instead of marrying a good, strong, proud, greedy griffon, he had married a pony.

Gordon strode through the camp. "Alright ya chumps, we're breaking camp in an hour! I catch any of you slackin', I'll skin ya myself and sell your hides to diamond dogs!", he shouted. He probably didn't need to shout, but it was good to assert his dominance, especially with the iron wolves. Show even the slightest bit of weakness and he'd find their teeth at his throat.

Gordon stepped back into his tent and began packing up his things. He stepped into his sleeping quarters and saw the maned ape hatchling sleeping fitfully in her cage. That's what this warning feeling was about. The moon bitch found her dreams and told the sun bitch about it and now there was probably a full battalion of EUP heading this way right now to comb the countryside. He picked up a baton and banged it against the bars of the cage. "No nappin'! Can't let them alicorns know where you're at." He felt that twinge in the back of his neck again. This was a feeling he had felt once before about five years ago when he encountered a predator that even the iron wolves feared, a predator that wore the guise of a pony. She was known by dozens of names. She Who Brings Fire the iron wolves called her. The Sun Wolf the 'lings called her. Feather Scorcher the griffons called her. Solar Flare the ponies called her. He had barely escaped her once with singed feathers and he had no desire to face her again.

There were dozens of stories about her origins. Some say she was a fire elemental that Celestia caught and bent to her will. Some say she is a fragment of the sun itself who only listens to Celestia. Some say she sprung fully formed from Celestia's chest during a day of rage. Some say she's a demon from another world. Some say she's the flesh and blood daughter of Celestia. That one was the most outrageous of them all, and Gordon laughed at that last one. He had no desire to even see her again, the whites of her eyes were black as soot, her irises glowed red as coals in a furnace, tongues of flames poured from her mane, tail and hooves like water and licked around the edges of her bronze armor, her sword was polished to a mirror shine and sliced through bodies like a razor blade through a banana.

Gordon hefted the iron cage holding the maned ape hatchling onto his personal wagon. He wracked his brain on where to move the camp to next. It had to be somewhere where it could be defended easily with only one way in and out. The canyons and buttes in the Appleoosan Desert? No. The bison were very territorial and rumors were flying about an oncoming confrontation with the pony settlement there. Plus he'd have to contend with the wingless dragons. The wasteland? No. Scouting parties had reported a small pony settlement of pony cultists and he didn't want to have to deal with the small chance they were Celestians. Sire's Hollow? No. Those weirdos, though harmless, would drop the bit on him in a Manehattan minute. The Too Hot Desert? No. Weird things were going on in Klugetown. The northern tundra? Yes. Once he moved past Stalliongrad and Gratzneigh, there wasn't much there except for yetis and Yakyakistan, and the yaks were extreme isolationists, plus he knew of some hot springs there, he'd have to ensure his patrols and hunting parties avoided the massive frozen plain where odd shadows would occasionally be seen roaming.

5

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Big Red had been staying at Sweet Apple acres for a few days as the Apples had the room. Fluttershy and Twilight had each wanted to take him in, but the basement of the library had too many sensitive machines for precise magical and scientific measurement and the lack of space to properly move them to ruled the library out, and the cottage, though spacious enough to hold many animals, including Harry the bear, lacked the space for an injured maned ape to properly stretch out. The Cakes had no room to spare, what with Pinkie renting out an upstairs room from them and Cup expecting. Rarity wasn't able to spare the room as her boutique took up nearly all of her building, leaving only a pair of rooms upstairs for her and her sister, and she wasn't keen on kicking Sweetie Belle out of her room. Rainbow Dash's cumulo-mansion that she build with her own hooves was completely out of the question, Big Red would have had to have had a long-term cloud walking spell placed on him, and with his magical resistance, it was anypony's guess how quickly that spell would have worn off.

The Apples had converted one of the barns to allow Big Red to live in. Though they lacked any spare mattresses big enough to hold him, they made a suitable mattress for him by sewing several smaller mattresses together. They made him a few pillows by stuffing burlap sacks with hay and pegasus down that was bought from the Ponyvillian pegasi during their spring molt. They sewed several sheets and blankets together to make suitable bed covering.

Apple Bloom after getting over her initial shock of how big Big Red was, whittled a suitable crutch and cane for him in a moment of inspiration. The youngest member of the Ponyville Apples momentarily frowned at her not getting her cutie mark, before her the excitement of wanting to show the maned ape what she made for him.

Big Red let out a pleasantly surprised series of chattering hoots as a toothy smile spread across his lips. Apple Bloom upon seeing his sharp teeth, got initially scared, folded her ears flat to her head and ducked down low as ancient prey instincts bubbles to the surface. That ended when Big Red scratched her behind her ears and under her chin, causing the filly to let out several happy nickers.

***

Applejack trod down the stair as silently as she could, taking care to step over the squeaky tread on the fifth step down. For the past three nights Big Red had limped out of the barn where he was housed and paced around it, clearly upset about something, letting out chattering hoots to nopony in particular and gesturing wildly for about thirty minutes before going back into the barn and seemingly settling back down.

Tonight was the same. Something was clearly agitating him.

Applejack trod across the front room of the farmhouse and into the kitchen. Big Mac was in the kitchen, looking out the window towards Big Red and taking the occasional sip from a bottle of hard cider.

Applejack walked over to the ice box, pulled open the door and pulled out a bottle of apple juice. Cracking off the lid, she took a swig of the sweet juice as she sat down at the kitchen table.

"Somethin's got Red set off again tonight."

"Eeyup."

"Jus' glad that Bloom's asleep, an' Granny, when she lays down, sleeps like a log."

"Eeyup."

"Ya have any idea o' what could be settin' him off like that?"

"Nope."

Applejack blew out a sigh, got up and walked over to the cabinet. Opening it, she pulled one of the packs of cigarettes that Granny thought nopony knew about. She bounced the red and white pack in her hoof for a few second, then grabbed a box of matches.

Big Mac raised an eyebrow at that.

"We still got plenty o' bottles a-number five down in th' cellar?'

"Eeyup. Why?"

"Imma grab two an' go out to Red an' see if he wants a nip o' th' good stuff. Ah know Ah caint understand a single hoot he makes, but if somethin's got him all riled up, maybe a friendly ear an' some good drink between pals might help him a bit. If'n ya want, Ah can grab three an' you can join us."

Big Mac looked at the bottle he was sipping out of for a long moment. "Nah. One's enough fer me. Dun wanna get schnockered. A hangover'll cut into the work tomorrah."

Applejack nodded her head. She hadn't gotten drunk since she was a teenager, when she was using alcohol as a way to try and hide from her grief and pain after her parents died. "Fair 'nuff. Ya wanna join me with Red anyways?"

Big Mac put the stopper back into his bottle. "Yup."

Big Red had turned to go back into the barn that had served at the house for him when he heard the soft thuds of hooves. Turning his head, he saw Applejack and Big Mac walking up towards him. The former had a pair of unopened bottles balanced on her back, and a red and whit pack and a box of matches balanced on the brim of her hat, the latter had a partially drunk bottle balanced on his back. He let out a short series of chattering hoot as he tipped his head at them.

"An' a good evenin' to ya too, Red.", Applejack said as she tipped her hat with her hoof. She dipped her hips slightly to make the bottles slide down her back, she caught them with her tail, then flicked it to send one sailing through the air towards the maned ape.

Big Red caught the bottle out of the air, held it up to let the light of the moon shine through it and gave it a shake.

"Dun worry 'bout it none. It's good hard cider. Sweet Apple Acres' private reserve." Gripping the bottle in her tail, Applejack whipped it around to her mouth, pulled the stopper out with her teeth, spat it into her hoof and took a swallow. Almost immediately she began coughing and sputtering. "Ah think Ah grabbed a couple o' bottles o' th' old stuff." She took a sniff from the lip of the bottle. "Yup! That's th' old stuff!"

Big Red grabbed the stopper in his fingers, twisted it back and forth until it came out with a *pop*. Lifting the bottle to his nose, he took a sniff and let out a hoot. Placing the lip of the bottle to his lips, he took a swallow, it was followed by a wheeze, a gasp, a cough, a shiver and a yip.

"Ah hear ya, brother.", Applejack said as she took another swallow.

Big Red sat down with his back to the barn and took another swallow, followed by a shiver. Applejack sat on her haunches next to him. She pulled the pack of cigarettes and box of matches from her hat. Gripping the paper at the top of the pack in her teeth, she ripped it off to reveal the butts of the cigarettes. Looking around for a moment, she noticed there was no trash barrel nearby, so she flipped her hat upside down on the ground and spat the paper into it.

"Ya want one?", Applejack asked, offering the pack to the maned ape.

Big Red took the pack from Applejack. Hitting the top of it against the side of his forefinger until a couple of cigarettes slid partially out. Pulling out two cigarettes, he offered one to the mare who took it in her lips. After placing the cigarette between his lips, he raised the pack, offering one to the stallion, who waved it off. The maned ape simply shrugged and placed the pack on the ground. Opening the box of matches, Big Red pulled one out, gripped it in his fingers and flicked his thumb across the top, causing it to ignite.

For a split second Applejack and Big Mac stared dumbfounded at Big Red lighting the match with his fingers. The dumbfounded feeling quickly was swept aside when Big Red held the burning end of the match up to the cigarette in Applejack's mouth. She took a drag to ensure the tip was lit before inhaling the smoke and blowing out.

"Bleh! Why does Granny like this brand? It tastes awful.", Applejack said as she rolled the cigarette to the corner of her mouth with her lips. She took another swig from her bottle to wash the taste out of her mouth before taking another drag. "Maybe Ah should buy a pack o' th' good brand fer th' next time Ah drink any o' this stuff again."

Big Red, holding the cigarette between his first two fingers of his hand, took a drag, then blew the smoke out of his nose then his mouth. Afterwards he took a swig from the bottle followed by a small shudder, he let out a series of sad, almost resigned-sounding chattering hoots, gestured out at the night-shrouded world and sniffled.

"Ah wish Ah could understand what yer tryin' ta say, Red." Applejack deciding that she couldn't stand the taste of Granny Smith's preferred brand, snubbed the cigarette and after ensuring the ember was out, tossed it into her hat that was currently serving as a temporary trash bin. She decided to try a simple experiment and began drawing simple images in the dirt with her hoof. "This here's me an' Big Mac an' Apple Bloom an' Granny Smith.", she said as she quickly drew the cutie marks above each simple drawing, minus her sister's as she had yet to receive hers.

Big Red tapped a knuckle to his lips thoughtfully. Standing up, he walked around the simple pony images, studying them.

Applejack felt a bit self conscious, she wasn't the best artist, she was more business-minded.

Big Red let out a series of chattering hoots as he pointed to the crude pony drawing with three apples above it, then pointed to Applejack.

Applejack nodded. "That's me!" She raised her head up as high as she could and placed a hoof against her chest. She couldn't help but chuckle at his impression of Granny, the way he curled his fingers into feeble-looking claws and curled his lips over his teeth. 'Ah guess everypony portrays old ponies th' same regardless o' who they are.'

For the next few hours Applejack and Big Red sat with their backs against the barn that was serving as his house drinking the old hard cider and having one-sided conversations. Big Macintosh had decided hours ago to go to bed, leaving the mare and the maned ape to drink and smoke the night away.

Big Red had sketched out simple stick figures of himself and his children. He seemed sad at that. Then he began sketching out an image of Luna.

Applejack could only gawk at the image of Princess Luna. Big Red began animatedly letting out chattering hoots as he made all sorts of gestures with his. She shook her head, trying to clear some of the booze haze from her thoughts. "Princess Luna's been talking to you? When?" She gestured for Big Red to stop, then gestured to the image of Luna in the dirt, then drew a clock face by it. "Princess...Luna...Speak...To...You...When?", she said very slowly.

Big Red studied the new drawing for a moment with a confused look on his face. Applejack sighed, ready to give up and go back to drinking when he placed his hands together on the same side of his face and imitated sleeping. "She comes ta ya in yer sleep?!" Now it was Applejack's turn to feel confused. She had seen somepony who vaguely looked like Princess Luna in her dreams before. Dreams were just a trick of the subconscious, right?

Applejack was snapped out of her thoughts as Big Red began very exasperated sounding hooting. She looked down at what the new image he had drawn. It was similar to the ones he had drawn before, except this one was depicted in a cage with a crude drawing of a griffon nearby. Big Red clenched his fists as he gave snarling hoots through gritted teeth and angrily gestured at the griffon.

'Oh dear sweet Ponysedao, those poachers stole his foal!' Applejack gave an angry snort. "Dun you worry none, sugarcube. Ah'll make sure ya get yer foal back. Ya have my word as an Apple."

***

The next morning Applejack awoke to the sound of somepony banging on the door. Her head throbbed with pain and her mouth tasted like she had licked a rubbish heap and a charcoal pit. A muffled voice shouted from outside that she couldn't quite make out. "Hol' yer cockamamie horses fer a minute!", she shouted.

Applejack reluctantly sat up and cracked open her eyes. "Waitaminnit! This ain't my room!" She looked around, not only was this not her room, this wasn't even the farmhouse. A snort and a snore caught her attention. Sitting on the floor propped against the wall with his chin to his chest was Big Red. Immediately she rocketed out from under the covers and began sniffing herself. She stank of booze, cigarettes, her unwashed sweat and Big Red's sweat. The one smell she was glad was missing was the stink of rutting, that was something she was glad she wouldn't have to figure out how to explain.

There was banging on the door, followed by Twilight's muffled voice. "Applejack? Big Mac told me you were drinking apple whiskey with Big Red last night. Please don't be ashamed, we've all done dumb stuff when drunk."

"Maud hasn't!", came the muffled voice of Pinkie.

"Yah!" It was clear that Pinkie had made Twilight jump nearly out of her fur...again.

There was a *thump* on the roof, followed by an "OW!"

"Pinkie! How many times do I have to tell you not to sneak up on me like that?!", Twilight screamed from the roof. "You damn nearly gave me a heart attack! Again!" There was scraping on the roof. "Let's see, how do I get down from he--oh no! Oh no! Nononononono! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!"

Applejack was quickly able to deduce what had happened. After Twilight landed on the roof after Pinkie had scared the wits out of her, she had tried to figure out her way down when she slipped on a couple of loose slate shingles and began sliding down. It was going to be only a couple of seconds before she hit the ground.

Big Red woke up at the sounds of the commotion. He looked up at the ceiling then bolted for the door. Applejack was hot on his heels.

Twilight hit the ground hard and laid there motionless in a purple puddle.

Pinkie chuckled uncomfortably at the situation. "Heh-heh-uh...heh?" She held up a foreleg suddenly covered in thirty watches. "Oh my! Will you look at the time! Lookslikeitstimetoopenthestorebye!" As she went to run off in a blur, a lasso caught her by her midsection and yanked her backwards.

"Nuh-uh, Pinkie Pie! We're gonna talk about ya needin' ta stop sneakin' up on Twilight."

Big Red gingerly checked over the unconscious Twilight, making sure she didn't have any spinal injuries before picking her up. He grunted with effort as he slung the unconscious mare over his shoulder and hobbled back into the barn that served as his temporary home.

After giving Pinkie a stern talking-to, Applejack trotted into the barn where Big Red had just laid Twilight down on his bed. The maned aped let out some grumbling hoots as he rubbed his back. He looked at Applejack, let out a series of chattering hoots and traced out a medical cross in the dust on the floor.

***

"Did somepony get the number of that wagon that ran me over?", Twilight mumbled as she came back to the waking world. Her head hurt, two of her legs hurt, everything seemed to be spinning and tipping back and forth. Somepony laid some pressure on her barrel as she came to the world of the conscious.

"Dun try ta get up. Ya took a pretty bad fall."

Twilight recognized that twang. "Applejack? Wh-what happened? Where am I?"

"Yer in th' barn where Red's stayin'. He brought ya to his bed after he checked ya o'er. Ah'm guessin' that means any injuries ya suffered ain't spinal."

Twilight tried to remember what happened. "Why would I have fall--Pinkie Pie!"

"Present.", a morose voice said.

Twilight craned her head up and around. She saw Pinkie sitting on an upturned apple basket in the far corner, her normally bright pink tone was muted and her normally messy magenta curls were hanging loose and smooth. She was also able to see clearly that it wasn't Applejack that was holding her down, but Granny Smith.

"Dun ya try an' move 'round none, deary.", the elder Apple said. "Though ya ain't got no broken bones, ya could still have a cun...uh...a conhooziwhatsit...ya know, swellin' up in your brain-pan."

"Concussion.", Twilight said softly.

"Twilight...", Pinkie said in an unsure tone. "...I'm glad you aren't paralyzed. I Pinkie promise that from now on I won't sneak up behind you." She went through the motions of a Pinkie promise.

"Pinkie, go home. I don't want to talk to you right now."

Tears welled up in Pinkie's eyes. "But...but..."

Applejack nudged an increasingly emotionally distressed Pinkie out the door. "Jus' give her some space for a few days, sugarcube. Ah know ya didn't mean ta scare her so bad that she leapt up onto th' roof an' she knows that too, she just needs a couple of days to cool off. Jus' dun talk ta her fer a couple o' days or else she'll say something in anger she'll regret later."

Pinkie nodded and began plodding off towards town, her head hanging low. Along the way she passed Nurse Redheart and Apple Bloom running up the path.

"Pinkie? You okay?", the youngest Apple sibling asked as she skidded to a stop.

"I'm fine, Apple Bloom.", Pinkie answered in a morose tone. "Twilight's mad at me and is probably gonna hate me forever, but other than that, I'm just dandy."

"It caint be that bad.", Apple Bloom said. "It's like that time when Sweetie Belle accidentally broke Scootaloo's scooter. Yeah Scoots was plenty hot, but after a couple o' days she calmed down an' was able to figure out that her scooter wasn't broken that badly, jus' a lil glue, some fiberglass an' a bit o' resin an' ev'rythin' was right as rain. She even apologized to Sweetie for shouting at her. So just give Twi a couple o' days to cool her hooves an' Ah'm pretty sure she'll be right as rain."

Pinkie perked up at that, her coat's color returning back to its normal bright tone and her magenta mane regaining its messy curls. "You're right! I'll give Twilight a couple of days to cool down before I try talking to her! Besides, that'll give me time to best figure out a 'I'm sorry for scaring you so badly that you jumped up on a roof then fell off' cake!"

"Maybe jus' make her a box o' cupcakes.", Apple Bloom said.

"You're so smart, Bloomie-woomie! You sure you're not trying to get your cutie mark in being a genius?"

Apple Bloom began spinning in circles as she tried to get a better look at her flank. "What would a genius cutie mark look like? A graduate's hat an' tassel? An apple onna desk? A book?"

Pinkie giggled as she pronked off to town.

Nurse Redheart gave Twilight as thorough of an examination as she could given the conditions. She shined a light into the unicorn mare's eyes, poked and prodded everywhere she could. "Consider yourself very lucky, Twilight Sparkle. Other than a nasty bump on the head and severely sprained both hind fetlocks, you're okay. I've seen ponies fall from shorter heights who broke legs and were laid up lame for months. I'd still suggest you getting a magical resonance imaging scan at the hospital just to make sure there's nothing broken." She began wrapping Twilight's fetlocks. "Try not to put too much pressure on your rear hooves for about two weeks. I'd suggest getting a roller chair if you plan on walking more than a few paces at a time."

Twilight nodded, grateful that her injuries weren't more serious. Severely sprained fetlocks were no small matter for a pony, still it was better to be lame for a couple of weeks than to be lame for months. "Thank you, Nurse Redheart."

"Just doing my duty as a member of the Equestrian Civilian Medical Corps."

"On to why I came out here.", Twilight said as she readjusted herself on Big Red's mattress. "I received a letter from Princess Celestia that a new piece of experimental medical imaging technology is being sent to Ponyville General Hospital today. It's called a radio-fluoroscopic imager. I've read several recent scientific articles on this. It uses a small bit of radioactive isotopes in conjunction with a specialized magical crystal lens to take a picture of somepony and see the skeletal structure, and some of the soft tissues underneath the skin and fur. Princess Celestia believes that because it uses minimal amounts of magical imaging, we should be able to get clear images of Big Red's skeleton and should allow us to better determine how long it take for him to heal from broken bones, and I concur with that theory."

"I'm not all that crazy about bringing some machine with radioactive elements in it.", Redheart said. "There was a whole insane health craze about fifty years ago where ponies would take small bits of radioactive materials, stir it into food or water and eat or drink it down. A lot of ponies wound up developing cancer, and there had to be special cemeteries constructed with concrete foundations for each grave so that when the radioactive bodies of the ponies followed that nutso health fad died from cancer or radiation poisoning were buried, the lead from the coffins and the remaining radioactive particles in their bodies wouldn't leech into the groundwater. Now they're wanting to blast ponies with that stuff."

"They're going to only have it turned on a few seconds at a time to image Big Red, then atomic science specialists are going to spend ten minutes going over him with special detectors to ensure he's not received a lethal dose.", Twilight said reassuringly.

***

After Big Red was put through the rounds of radio-fluoroscopic imagery followed by several minutes of scanning with specialized instruments after each imaging and then put through a specialized scrubbing regimen just to be safe, the big glass slides treated with specially treated alchemical substances were sent to special rooms where photography experts developed them.

Twilight and Applejack sat nervously in the doctor's office awaiting the imagery results. They didn't have to wait long as Doctor Caduceus walked in followed by a line of orderlies that were gently pushing in the developed glass images on repurposed linen carts. The desk and most of the filling cabinets had to be moved out of the doctor's office to make room for the various images of the maned ape's skeleton.

Twilight stared wide-eyed at the skeletal images. "Wow!", she said breathlessly. These images are so crisp and clear! I've seen his magical resonance images, they were fuzzy and looked out of focus." She gently traced her hoof along the images of his hand bones. "They look similar to a minotaur's hand bones, only there's more bones and they look a lot more fragile. An injury to those structures would be devastating."

"I thought the same. But what's fascinating is when you look here.", Doctor Caduceus said, directing Twilight's attention to the image with the broken leg. "As you can see here on his hind limb that was broken, it is a serious injury, but it hasn't left him nearly as lame as it would with a pony."

Twilight noted the broken limb in the images. The broken bone in the lower portion of the limb had the beginnings of a bulb of bone. In the medical textbooks she had read, ponies developed similar structures on their bones as they healed. Big Red's bone lump at a week was at the point where ponies would be in three weeks. "Doctor, do you think that his bones are healing faster because they're thinner?"

"A distinct possibility. His bones might be thinner because of whatever natural, genetic and thaumic pressures that drove his species to grow so tall. It would be a great way to add height without adding much in the way of weight. He does weigh the same as an adult mare."

Twilight hummed thoughtfully as she thought on the doctor's words.

Applejack looked closely at the images of Big Red's foot bones. "Ah seen his hind limbs plenty, but the pictures here makes them look like his hands, but also a little like flippers on a fish."

"A most astute observation, Miss Apple.", Doctor Caduceus said. "It's probably an adaptation to help him better stand and walk upright. I think it might be similar to the process that allowed minotaurs to walk upright."

Twilight studied the images of Big Red's skull. "Look at these joints here, doctor. It seems that his skull, like we ponies, are made up of plates that grow together. And look at where his nose meets his snout. There's no bone in it. His nose is much more pronounced on his snout than we ponies. This indicates that it's probably used to heat the air as it comes into the body, considering that the fur on his body is much thinner and sparse."

Sunset paused at the remains of the poacher's camp that had been abandoned for some time. "I hate cold trails.", she grumbled. Pulling off her helmet, she began more closely examining what was left of the remains. Nearby were her hoof-picked team of investigators, forensic examiners, infiltration specialists, and photographers.

Sunset dug through the dirt and detritus. She found a few square-cut nails here, some pieces of burnt planks there, and the shattered remains of a couple of jars. After laying out her findings neatly, she turned her head and called for one of the investigators, "Hey, Blizzard Winds. Come here and confirm my suspicions."

Blizzard Winds, a white-furred pegasus stallion with an ice blue mane and tail and dark blue feather tips, fluttered over. "Yeah, boss! Wha'chu need?"

Sunset gestured at the objects she had laid out. "This looks like a much more organized and possibly larger operation than what most poachers use. This stuff I found from that waste pile over there indicates that they're doing much more than just skinning illegally killed animals, they're also preserving them for shipping."

Blizzard Winds sniffed the remains of the jars. He immediately recoiled his head and rubbed at his nose."Bleh! That smells like a mixture of distilled vinegar, alum and rotgut booze!"

"That's how most poachers preserve cockatrice pineal glands. It's a major ingredient in the production of certain cosmetics and drugs.", Sunset said in a bitter tone.

"But aren't there legit cockatrice farms where the farmers can equinely extract cockatrice pineal extract?", Blizzard asked.

"Yeah, but many claim that domesticated cockatrice pineal extract isn't as potent as wild cockatrice extract.", Sunset replied. "But why would they be harvesting wild cockatrice pineal glands?", she muttered to herself. She gasped when the realization hit her. "Petrification potions! Somepony get me a quill, an inkpot and a piece of parchment!"

Gerald and his iron wolf pack had been searching the buttes, canyons and ridges along the Appleoosa Plateau for any info on the whereabouts of the wagon that may have been carrying his quarry had gone. He prowled around the edge of the frontier town of Appleoosa listening to the locals. His iron wolves were off in the nearby scrublands hunting for food and anything that could be sold on the black market for a pretty bit.

The griffon prowled through the back alleys of the dusty town. He pulled a poncho that he nicked from a clothesline closer about him as he listened and watched.

Gerald stopped at a nearby garbage can. Sitting on top was a three-day old edition of a newspaper, The Ponyville Telegram. He pulled it from the waste bin and began quickly scanning through it for anything unusual that could give him a hint as to where his quarry was. His eyes locked on a headline tucked away in the new happenings section.

Strange new creature in town, ponies perplexed at its preposterous proportions

Gerald read the short three paragraph article. There it was in black-and-white, the tall build, the red mane, the patchy fur, was a description of his quarry. Ponyville was a week away by express train route, two weeks by normal train route. But there was the fact that neither he nor his iron wolves had brought enough bits to afford a train ticket. Plus there was the fact that they had no means to conceal or properly stash their hunting gear. And finally, though it wouldn't look all that unusual for a griffon to be seen riding in a train car, a pack of iron wolves would be outright suspicious. That left travelling cross country. If it was just him, or him and some other griffons, he could fly no problem, using clouds as rest stops and catching thermals, Ponyville would have been a ten day flight. But he had the iron wolf pack, and he knew the risk of leaving them unattended for too long, so it would be a month's trek across the countryside, as long as they ran into no wild weather in the broad wilderness between cities, towns and villages.

6

View Online

It had been two weeks since the Apples had taken in Big Red. It had been a period of adjustment getting the big guy settled in. Though Big Mac may have been initially apprehensive about letting an obvious predator stay with them, when the maned ape showed himself to do really well with Apple Bloom and showed that he had a respectable work ethic, the big lug warmed up to him. The eldest Apple sibling had always been protective of his sisters, especially the younger one.

Big Red was currently out in the south orchard helping Big Mac. Though the maned ape was still hobbling around on a broken leg, an injury that would have left a pony bedridden for at least three months, he was able to set up the empty baskets around the apple trees, and even able to lug a few full ones into the wagons. His paws were very dexterous and very good at pulling bits of gravel or small twigs that would occasionally get stuck in one of the most sensitive parts of a hoof, right between the capsule and the frog, something that when it happened, they'd usually have to limp back to the house and get the special picks to dig out.

Granny Smith was sitting on the rocking chair on the front porch taking a nap. Applejack was in the attic looking for the box that contained the spare blankets. Autumn was less than a month away, and though there would still be warm weather the first few weeks that the leaves first started to drop off the trees, it wouldn't be long before the cold weather and the frost arrived. Though the old barn that Big Red was staying in was warm, especially after the Apples patched up the walls and ceiling, and put insulation in, they even fixed up the old forge that was in it, turning it into a decent enough hearth, a few extra blankets for him wouldn't hurt.

Applejack shuffled around several boxes in search for the one that held the spare blankets. "Ah need ta get Twi up here an' let her go nuts with her insane organization, then maybe Ah'd be able ta find somethin'.", she muttered to herself. She lifted a box that had been up in the attic for a long time, it had been up there for so long that whatever had been written on the side had faded and its cardboard had become brittle. The seam on the old cardboard box gave way and the sides disintegrated, spilling its contents across the attic floor. Old correspondences, land deeds from the founding of Sweet Apple Acres and Ponyville, photographs yellowed with age, faded and tarnished tin types all scattered across the floor. A strange wooden box with a lock built into the front on it fell to the floor with a rattling thunk among the photographs, tin types, land deeds and correspondences, something in the box clattered.

The curiosity getting the better of her, Applejack picked up the box in a hoof. It was heavy, heavier than she expected. She gave the box a shake, something clunked and clattered on the inside of the box, and several somethings rattled and clattered on the inside of the box. She looked at the keyhole on the front of the box. It was small, smaller than any she had seen before. She picked through the photos, tin types, correspondences and land deeds scattered on the attic floor. A small, silver-colored key slid out from between two yellowed pieces of paper and skittered across the floor with a metallic jingle.

Applejack picked up the key with a hoof. It was small, smaller than most pony-made keys she had seen before. She placed the box on a hoof and gripped the key between her teeth. It was difficult at first to line up the key with the hole properly, but after a couple of tries. She gently twisted her head, whoever made this key and box must not have had ponies in mind when designing it. With a few soft clicks, they lock disengaged.

Applejack lifted the lid. Inside was a strange object. The object had a strange handle that had a slight curve, on the back was a strangely shaped lever. In the center of the object was a cylinder with holes drilled through it, under the cylinder was a small curved lever surrounded by a half-loop of metal. At the front of the object was a hollow tube. On the top were three small prongs, one at the front, near the end of the tube and two at the back near the strangely shaped lever. In the bottom of the box were a dozen brass cylinders, many of which had developed a green patina with age, capped on one end by what looked like lead cones. "This here looks like a bang tube the EUP uses, only smaller.", she groused aloud to nopony in particular. Inside the lid was an old black and white photograph, yellowed with age. The photograph depicted a female maned ape, if the outline of teats under the shirt and jacket were to be trusted. Applejack had seen Big Red's chest before, and his teats honestly looked to her like a mare's teats when lactating, so she couldn't be one hundred percent sure. Also in the picture was a picture of a young, heavily pregnant Granny Smith, Pip-pop Apple Bucket when he was still young and handsome, a very young Bright Mac, a very young Apple Sprout(Braeburn's father), and a very young Apple Bud(before she met Orange Julius and changed her name to Orange Marmalade). The poses of all in the photo was in the usual stoic, closely bunched together in the manner common for photographs of the time. The female maned ape was knelt down between granny and pip-pop, with her forelimbs draped over both of them. Bright Mac. Apple Sprout and Apple Bud were all lined up side-by-side in front. On a small raised platform was a small contraption that looked similar to the gliders or the aerial screw-driven machines many ponies fly for recreation today.

Applejack gently pulled the yellowed photograph out and flipped it over. Written on the back in ink, now faded, the words read, 'Second moon of autumn, Sol seven-six-eight. Glider(center), Annette Smith(center-left), Apple Bucket(center-right). Bright Mac, Apple Sprout, Apple Bud(front). This photograph was taken to commemorate the fifteenth anniversary of Annette Smith's and Glider's first ponied flight commissioned by Princess Celestia.'

Applejack flipped the photo back to the front again. "Ah thought Glider was an ol' pegasus friend o' Granny's."

Applejack gently placed the picture back in the lid of the box, closed the lid, locked it back and slid the key into the hatband of her stetson. She placed the box on her back and trotted downstairs to ask Granny Smith about it.

Applejack stepped out of the front door. Granny was sitting in her rocking chair, now awake. The old mare was trying to act like she hadn't been smoking a cigarette, though the cloud of smoke about her head that she was trying to wave away, the thin trail of smoke coming up from behind her back where she was clearly hiding a lit cigarette, and the burnt-out match laying on the sand at the edge of the porch were a dead give away.

"Give it up, Granny. We all know ya smoke. Tartarus, th' whole town knows ya smoke. Ya ain't foolin' nopony.", Applejack said nonplussed. "E'en though th' doc said ya need ta give up those stank sticks.", she grumbled softly.

Granny Smith pulled the still lit cigarette from behind her back, popped the butt in her mouth, took a drag and blew the smoke out of her nose with a huff. "Ah ain't gonna listen ta no fancy-schmancy saw bones! Ah been smokin' Lucky's Brand cigarettes damn near fitty years now, an' Ah ain't never developed no 'phazema or cancer or any o' them other newfangled diseases he likes jawin' on 'bout. Did Ah scold ya bout stealin' one o' my packs or swipin' two jars o' the triple-X reserve so ya could drank an' smoke wit' Big Red? Noooo! So shut yer apple chomper an' lemme puff in peace."

Applejack puffed out a sigh. Granny did have a point about her taking a couple of jars of booze and a pack of cigarettes, that and she was in no mood to argue with the old nag. She pulled the box off of her back and presented it her grandmother. "Granny, ya mind tellin' me what this here box?"

Granny's eyes locked on the box. The cigarette fell from her lips. "Where--where didja find Glider's ol'--Ow! Shit! Fuck! Piss-gutted-hoppin'-slut-fucker!" She danced and hopped in place, brushing a forehoof where the lit cigarette had come to rest on her thigh, then stamping on and grinding into tiny pieces said offending object with a hoof.

"Snrk!" Applejack pressed her lips together, curling them under and held her breath, in an attempt to keep from laughing at the silly spectacle that Annette "Granny" Smith had made of herself.

Granny plopped back into her rocking chair with a none-too-pleased look on her face. "Well, dun jus' stand there wit' yer face turnin' purpler'n Twilight's! Gimme Glider's bang tube!" She snatched the box from her granddaughter's hoof. "Where un'er Celestia's glorious golden sun didja find it?"

Applejack blew out the breath she had been holding in order to keep from laughing at her grandmother and sucked another one back in. "Ah found it while lookin' up in th' attic fer some blankets fer Big Red ta use when th' cold gets here. An old box I was movin' fell apart an' this here locked box fell out."

"Am Ah safe in assumin' ya already opened it or ya wouldn't be askin' me 'bout it?"

Applejack gave a quick nod.

"Gimme th' key an' Ah'll tell ya 'bout th' night Ah met Glider."

The Smith family had established their homestead nearly a decade ago in the year Sol seven-four-nine in the Everfree Valley between the Apple Brandy Crick and the Bobbing Apple Stream, both of which flowed into the Canter River. Further out in the valley away from the homestead was a smattering of smaller homesteads. Many had their own farms where they grew vegetables or other fruits. One homestead was built next to a general store that the Smith family had written up an exclusive contract with to sell half their zap apple jam at. Another homestead grew only oak trees to be sold for firewood, planks, boards, furniture and other oak-based materials. There were even two non-pony homesteads, one owned and run by a family of cattle who sold their milk, and one owned by a small flock of sheep who sold their wool.

Annette Smith, eight months pregnant with her first foal, was tending to the trees. In the fading light of the setting sun, she waddled awkwardly over to the normally barren-looking zap apple trees. The foal in her womb was a big one, it was the size of what a foal at ten months in the womb would normally be.

Annette paused to look up at the softening tips of the branches on the zap apple tree. She allowed her gaze to drift over to the dark and dangerous forest where she had first discovered the zap apples all those years ago. If she hadn't been heavy with foal, she'd have gone back into that forest to traipse around some more and see what she could find. Explorers that had traveled into the forest had told tales that there were bushes of berries that looked like they were made out of crystal, of a narrow staircase that led down a steep canyon wall and at the that canyon had been a cave filled with crystals and a tree made of crystal that shown with an odd shimmering light that held all of the colors of the rainbow, the ruins of an old pony city and a ruined castle. She felt a twinge of pain and the foal in her belly kicked and squirmed. "Now settle down, young'un! T'ain't time fer ya ta come out jus' yet.", she scolded the foal in her womb, as if it would do any good. "Ah know yer ready ta come out an' see th' world. Jus' not yet."

She turned back towards the farmhouse and began the walk back. She knew her husband would scold her for being out so late and being so far away from the house, especially with her pregnancy being so advanced and the foal in her belly being so big. Her retort would always be the same, 'Ah ain't gon' jus' lay 'round th' house like some o' invalid jus' 'cause this here foal's th' biggest one ta grow in a Smith's belly in five gen'rations. 'Sides, ya gotta put a good work ethic in'em 'fore they's born or they'll wind up like them there lazy, layabout, frou-frou ponies up on th' mountain. Ponysedao bless their hearts.'

As Annette was walking back to the farmhouse through the slowly fading light, a bright flash in the sky caught her attention. She looked up and saw what looked like a weird, silver dragon. Its wings didn't flap, its body was a weird cylindrical shape and it had two weird cylinders attached to the undersides of the wings with spinning blades at the front. Smoke poured from the two cylinders and the blades stopped spinning with a sputtering cough.

Annette watched in stunned silence as the weird silver dragon with fixed wings, smoke pouring from the two cylinders, sailed overhead in the direction of the Everfree Forest. She turned to watch the strange dragon, occasionally the blades at the front of the cylinder would turn, only to stop again with a sputtering cough. As the dragon sailed over the forest, two small...somethings fell away from the monster, a second later the two somethings each had a circle of fabric appear above them and they drifted slowly down towards the forest's canopy. The dragon tipped forward and plummeted into the forest's canopy. A few seconds later there was a terrible sound from the forest, it sounded like the shattering of trees and the shearing of metal. In the last few moments of light a big plume of smoke could be seen.

Annette turned to rush back to the house so she could alert her family could be alerted to what she had seen. "Hng!" A painful contraction hit her. "No no no! Not now! Please, baby! Jus' wait until--HNG! GAH!--until I get back to th' house!" She panted, taking desperate gasps of air. Each contraction knocked the wind out of her. Sweat soaked her fur, causing strands of platinum platinum blonde mane and tail to cling to her.

Annette took a few steps, another painful contraction hit her, causing her to stumble and nearly to fall. She took another few steps to a nearby apple tree and leaned against it. She tried to shout for help, another, more powerful contraction forced all the air out of her lungs.

*splash*

Annette felt hot amniotic fluid run down her legs. The foal was coming and she was out here in the fields in labor alone. She tried to take another step. Another powerful contraction struck her. The strength left her legs and she slumped to the ground onto her belly.

Annette was terrified. Who would've thought that Annette Smith, one of the strongest, stubbornest, bravest mares known would be terrified of anything? The same mare who braved the Everfree Forest to find food for her family so they wouldn't starve, the same mare who bested timberwolves, the same mare who had discovered the secret of the zap apples, was terrified? When a mare is in labor was when she was at her most vulnerable, if other ponies weren't around, there'd nothing to discourage a predator from showing up and ripping a mare's belly open to get at the defenseless infant inside. Yet here she was, all alone in the dark, unable to stand, her uterus contracting to force the foal within into her birth canal, and the farmhouse might as well be a million miles away.

In the dim starlight Annette saw a shadow over her. She turned an eye upwards. She saw what looked like a minotaur. It let out a series of chattering hoots and clicked its tongue at her. In the darkness it reached a paw down to her. As another contraction hit Annette, ancient equine instincts welled up from the most primitive parts of her brain and she lunged forward with her muzzle to bite the paw. It wasn't uncommon for mares in such a delicate condition to physically lash out at loved ones and bite them. The minotaur let out a series of soft chattering, almost apologetic and placating hoots as it recoiled its paw.

Annette cried out in pain as another contraction hit her. The minotaur stayed nearby, but kept enough distance between the two of them. The stranger was watching over her, protecting her, but giving enough space so as not to make her feel crowded or unsafe. If she was able to, Annette would have sang her praises to Ponysedao, the most-high god and creator of ponies, Lord Helios, giver of life and king of the harvest, and Lady Artemis, queen of the moon and patron goddess of the night.

Suddenly the minotaur turned to face something, there was a glint of starlight on metal in its paw. A terrifying roar came from behind Annette. A manticore! It had been attracted by the sound and smell of a lone mare in labor. Three peals of thunder filled the air accompanied by three bright flashes. Annette could see in the brief flashes what would be burned into her memory for the rest of her days. The stranger wasn't a minotaur, it was more apish in appearance, though lacking any of the thick, shaggy dark fur. Its pale, pinkish-tan skin and mane of dirty blonde hair were illuminated by the brief flashes.

Just as quickly as the thunder had rang out, it had ended. There was a heavy thump, followed by a series of pained grunts and whimpers. Whatever strange magic the stranger had used had left the manticore mortally wounded. The stranger walked out of Annette's view, there was another peal of thunder and flash of light. The manticore made no more sounds. The stranger quickly returned and knelt down. A hand gently came to rest on her neck. Fingers drug along her mane and fur as fingernails raked along her skin. As the stranger petted and patted and scratched up and down Annette's neck, even stopping to scratch behind an ear. It felt nice. In fact it felt better than nice, it felt goooooooood!

The stranger move in closer, constantly petting and patting and scratching, its hand moving further down her body. The most powerful contraction yet hit Annette and she screamed out in pain. The stranger gently pushed Annette onto her side, pushed her hind legs apart and began groping around her nethers.

There was the sound of galloping hooves. Annette's family came running up as fast as their legs could carry them, all carrying lanterns in their mouths, obviously alerted to something happening on the farm by the thunder and light.

"Get away from mah wife, ya monster!", Apple Bucket bellowed, charging the stranger.

"Apple Bucket!", Annette shouted. "Ya leave'em alone an' git yer plot o'er here an' get this foal that ta were all ta eager ta put in me outta me! Or I swear to Ponysedao Ah'll chew yer fuckin' nuts off!"

"Yes, sweet apple dumplin's." Apple Bucket trotted over to his wife, took one look at the new life that was now part way out of her. His eyes fluttered, his body wavered side-to-side. *thump*

"Did he faint? Oh by Lord Helios' swollen testicles and Celestia's fat plot, somepony please tell me my husband dinnit jus' faint!"

"Yes, he did faint. Went down like a load of bricks dropped from the top of Canterlot Castle.", a motherly voice spoke from the darkness. "And fat isn't how I would refer to my plot. Bountiful, plush, glorious, are the most common adjectives ponies would use on it. More than a few have also said it is 'nip-ably delicious', of course they only say that last one when they think I'm out of earshot and not listening." There was a flash of golden light, momentarily turning night into day. Princess Celestia strode forth, her white fur shimmering in the fading light of the corona of her magical display. She lit her horn, bathing the area in golden light.

The gathered ponies all dropped to a bow, except for Annette Smith, who was currently in the middle of giving birth, and Apple Bucket, who was currently in the middle of being passed out.

"None of that now.", Celestia scolded. "There's a new mother in the middle of giving birth. Now let's see what going on here." She pushed Annette's hind legs apart. "I've got good news and bad news. The good news is that your colt is about a quarter of the way out. The bad news is that he's breach."

The stranger pushed past Celestia and took a long look at what was going on.

Annette got a good look at her savior. Blood streaks stained the side of their head and soaked into their dirty blonde mane, staining the hair a dark, rusty reddish-brown. Its shirt was torn open on one side, revealing its teat contained in a cup-like cloth garment. Female. The apish stranger was female. Did it have a foal? The cloth it wore on its teat was similar to the girdles many nursing mares wore to support their milk-filled teats and protect their sensitive nipples.

The stranger fumbled with the buckle of the cloth belt at its waist. They undid the belt and pulled it off with a series of snaps. The stranger knelt down between Annette's hind legs and looped the belt around the breach colt's hooves.

"Alright, Annette. I'm going to need you to push.", Celestia said.

Annette squeezed her abdomen muscles as hard as she could. Pain like she had never felt before burned within her. She gasped, sucking in as much air as she could. "Ah can't! It's too much! Ah can't!"

"Take a couple of breaths."

Annette did as she was told.

"Now push!"

"Hnng!"

"PUSH!"

"HAAAAA--nngh!"

"PUSH PONYSEDAO-DAMMIT!"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!"

The colt came out and Annette greedily sucked down breath after breath. She quirked an ear listening. Her foal wasn't crying. Why weren't they crying?!

There was a wet slap.

"WWWWWAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH! A-WWWWAAAAAAAAAH!"

The sound of her newly born foal crying rang like the most beautiful music in her ears.

"So Glider, the maned ape, who isn't a pegasus, was there when pa was born?", Applejack asked. "An' she saved ya from a manticore?"

"Yup."

"An' how'd y'all wind up flyin' inna glider?"

"It all started when Thunder Paws. We 'riginally called her Thunder Paws 'cause of her bang tube, turns out it's not that diff'rent from from th' bang tubes th' Royal Guards, th' Border Guards an' the EUP uses, only smaller an' not as powerful. She used ta watch th' pegasi a-flyin' an' a-flittin' up in th' clouds with a-longin' look in her eyes. Almost like she was meant ta be up there with'em.", Granny said. "In her spare time she would sketch plans for a flier on pieces of parchment, along with some sort o' weird runes, almost like she was a-cypherin' sumptin. She would also carve these little flyin' toys outta veneers o' wood. Th' foals thought she was some sort o' wizard."

Applejack though back to the flying toy her father used to use to entertain her and Big Mac when they were foals. 'One day y'all foals're gonna do sumptin' so big an' magical that it'll make this look like nuthin'.' "So what happened to th' big silver dragon ya saw?"

"Turns out it wasn't a dragon, but some sorta big metal machine. Not too different from th' machine that Kitty and Hawke used ta make their first powered flight. Fer weeks th' princess had ponies haul th' pieces of it out o' th' forest by th' wagon load. Turns out Thunder Paws had another maned ape wit' her, a male. Prolly her mate. He died when th' roped on his slow-fall cloth had gotten tangled in a tree an' wrapped 'round his neck.", Granny replied. "It got took pieces an' all up ta Canterlot. Prolly sittin' in some back room o' a museum or in some fancy pony's vault. But back ta th' story. Thunder paws had lived wit' us fer a few years. Ah had a couple more foals. It b'came clear ta us all that she was becomin' more'n more depressed. She would spend ev'ry available minute watch th' weather teams a-sighin', somethimes a-cryin'. It was clear she belonged up in th' sky like the pegasi. But because fer some reason she could never speak Ponish, only do those hoots, we had managed to find way o' talkin' with her that dinnit involve words. We took her up in one o' those flyin' b'loons, th' ones with the gas flame that heats up th' air ta go up. She would stretch out her forelimb an' let th' wind push 'gainst her paw, tippin' it up or down. When Ah mimicked her, she turned my hoof so th' wind would catch it, makin' it go up an' down dependin' on how I twisted my foreleg. An' that's how Ah caught th' flyin' bug. Not long after I got my hooves on a couple o' fancy cypherin' books and an ol' pegasus flyin' manual. It weren't long 'til I figured out what those fancy cypherin' runes were all 'bout. They were all th' laws o' flight an' th' 'quations needed ta deal with th' four forces ta fly."

Applejack sat on her haunches and leaned forward. All ears were now paying attention to Granny.

"Ya see, there's four forces when ya wanna fly. Gravity, lift, thrust an' drag. Gravity is what pulls us all down, so it's a constant. Lift is what lets ya go up, like what those flyin' b'loons that use th' gas flame ta heat up th' air use. Thrust is yer forward movement. Drag is th' air a-pushin' on ya. Too much o' one force and ya come slammin' inta th' ground. Ya see, a pegasus uses their magic ta walk on clouds an' ta increase the surface area o' their wings, but they still hafta abide those four laws. We prolly crashed a hunert different times a hunert diff'rent ways in our first tests with glidin' machines 'fore we found one that worked right proper. It's a miracle we dinnit smash heads open on th' ground or break ev'ry bone in our body on any of th' crashes. Though Ah did twist my hip up right proper on one crash." Granny Smith gave a wistful chuckle and patted her bad hip. "Ol' gal still flares up when storms blow in from th' Everfree. But we had our workin' flyin' contraption. We presented it ta th' princess, along with all o' th' cypherin'. She approved th' first test fer all ta see."

"An' That's when Thunder Paws became Glider?", Applejack asked.

"Yup! Oh how Ah wished ya coulda experienced how flyin' fer th' first time felt, Applejack! Th' first non-winged ponies a-flyin'! Not some unicorn levitatin' themselves with their horn, but honest-to-goodness real flyin'! Inna a contraption designed fer it! Th' wind in my fur an' mane, th' bugs in my teeth! We caught th' hot air a-risin' 'round Mount Lot fer what felt like a thousand times an' it would lift us up a lil bit. Ah knew then why pegasi loved stayin' up in th' air like they did. When we landed, It weren't a purdy one, damn near snapped our contraption in two! But we weren't hurt none an' walked away. Then 'bout a dozen 'Bolts landed 'round us. Turns out th' princess had ordered'em to fly above us jus' in case sumptin' terrible went wrong. We was a-whoopin' an' a-hollerin an' a-cheerin' an' raisin' such a ruckus that we dinnit hear th' princess come up until she joined in. Ah became th' first non-winged pony ta be awarded a flyin' medal they usually give to them there 'Bolts." Granny's expression turned from elated to slightly morose. "But that's th' thing 'bout bein' th' first at sumptin'. Ya can never be th' first at it again. Ah well, that's enough a-jawin' from this ol' nag." She inserted the key into the lock on the box, lifted the lid and pulled the old photo out. "Ah can still remember that day like it jus' happened.", she whispered

"Why was glider written down in th' hist'ry books as a pegasus an' not a maned ape?"

"Our flight happened durin' the tail end o' th' second poacher war. 'Cause maned apes're considered a 'dangered sap--sapie--er, smart critter, th' princess sought to protect'em an' any pony families they was livin' with from th' poacher gangs."

Applejack was familiar with the poacher wars. They weren't normal wars like the first, second and third Griffonia-Equestria Border Wars, the Yak War or the Storm War, they were a tri-nation alliance between Equestria, Griffonia and Minos to capture or kill all the members of the poacher gangs and take down the international critter and sapient trafficking cartels. "Granny, what happened ta Glider?"

Granny's face turned sad. "Them maned apes age faster than we ponies do. They dun age as fast as dogs, they age more like two years fer ev'ry one year we do. By the time yer pa was ol' 'nuff ta start a-chasin' fillies an' e'en tryin' ta get un'er the tail o' a few, she had grown old. Th' ol gal had lost th' pepin her step, but she ne'er lost th' lightnin' in her eyes. We found her one mornin' a-lyin' on the floor o' th' lil house we built fer her. She had gotten up in th' night, fallen an' broke half th' bones in her body. She laid there all night, e'en messed on herself. Th' ol' gal was tougher'n ol' leather, lemme tell ya what. She lingered on fer damn near a month 'fore her body gave out. We buried her in th' family cemetery. Apple Bucket took her passin' real hard. Ah never knew that stallion ta ever take so much as a sip o' anythin' strong 'fore an' he ne'er did 'gain 'til he took ill with black hoof fever. But th' night we buried Glider, he guzzled down at least three full jars o' th' hard cider an' went out ta Glider's lil house. He musta accidentally kicked o'er th' lantern he had with him, cause Glider's home went up in flames an' he came back smellin' o' smoke an' a-cryin' his eyes out." Tears shimmered in her eyes. "But that's 'nuff o' this ol' nag a jawin' 'bout sad ol' times. It's round 'bout time fer Bloom ta be a makin' her way back home from school an' Mac ta start makin' his way back from th' fields, and supper won't start a-cookin' itself." She placed the unlocked box down on the porch, got up and went inside.

Applejack sat down on the porch steps. She plucked a strand of hay from one of the bails on the porch that served as combination seat and makeshift table. She stuck the piece of hay in the corner of her mouth and absentmindedly chewed on it as she thought on the stories Granny had told her. She lifted her head when she heard the sound of hooffalls.

Big Mac and Big Red were walking up side-by-side. The maned ape had bits of apple stuck in his head and facial mane, as well as an apple-shaped bruise on his left forelimb. Big Mac had bits of apple mush stuck in his mane and a shiner on his right eye.

"Y'all look like y'all lost a fight with an apple tree.", Applejack said.

"Hrm.", Big Mac grunted.

"Lemme guess, ya threw an apple at him?"

"Eeyup!"

"Then he threw an apple at you?"

"Eeyup!"

"Then y'all both got into a full-blown apple fight, a-throwin' apples at each other and a-mushin' 'em in each other's manes?"

Big Mac balked for a second. "Yup!"

Applejack looked at Big Red, raised an eyebrow and tipped her head slightly to the side, asking the question without words. The maned ape pointed at Big Mac, made a throwing gesture followed by a splat sound, then another throwing gesture followed by another splat sound.

Applejack let out a chuckle. "Guess it's true, colts dun grow up, they jus' get bigger. Y'all wash yerselves up with th' hose." She pointed to the garden hose coiled up around the spigot at the corner of the house. "An' dun track no mud in th' house or Granny'll flay yer hides."

As Big Mac and Big Red were washing the sweat, dirt and apple mush from themselves, Apple Bloom came trotting up, accompanied by Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle, with Fluttershy "escorting" them.

The yellow pegasus mare looked at the maned ape. She noticed the bruise on his forelimb and flew over with a few flaps of her wings. "Oh my! Look at that bruise!", she crooned over the purple and red apple-shaped mark on his forelimb. She wrapped her forelegs around his forelimb and drug him to the porch. Bumping her hips into his chest, pushing him down into the sitting position on the porch.

Fluttershy plopped into Big Red's lap, who in turn let out a pained groan. She nuzzled her snout under his paw. "Let's see if you've suffered any muscle injuries."

Big Red let out a sigh and a chuckle as he began scratching the yellow mare's mane.

Fluttershy let out soft coos and trills.

"Hey! No fair! How come Fluttershy gets to hog all the big monkey love?!", Sweetie Belle protested, her voice taking a jealous squeak at the end of each syllable. She marched over to Big Red's side and pushed his head under his paw. She cooed and trilled as he scratched behind her ears and stroked her mane.

"Hey! I want in on that monkey love too!", Socctaloo jealously protested.

Fluttershy cooed and trilled and arched into the pets and strokes as she perched atop Big Red's lap. Sweetie Belle and Scootalloo competed for his other paw. The unicorn filly would whine and huff when Scootaloo was getting the petting and scratching. The pegasus filly would groan and whine when Sweetie Belle was getting the petting and scratching.

While Big Red was giving pets and pats and scratches and scritches to Fluttershy, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom took notice of the small open wooden box sitting by Granny's rocking chair. She walked over to it and took notice of the metallic object inside. Scooping it out with a hoof, she began looking it over. She rolled it over in her hooves, looking at the strange mechanisms of the object. "Huh! It kinda looks like a smaller version of the bang tube picture that th' EUP uses in th' history book." She gripped the object between her hooves, closed one eye and stared down the tube.

---

Dave chuckled to himself. Butterfly butt had almost immediately taken a liking to him. She reminded him of his sister's cat, always jumping into his lap when he came over to visit, only heavier. The way Butterfly Butt would occasionally flutter her wings, she would lift some of her weight off of him as she nuzzled and cuddled in his lap as he petted her mane and scratched her neck and behind her ears. The way Candy Mane and Scooter were competing with each other for the petting and scratching from his right hand made him laugh.

Dave noticed that Little Yellow wasn't with the group. She normally was with the other two young dwarf horses competing for his petting and scratching. He panned his head searching for her. Sitting on a hay bale to his left was Cowgirl, gnawing on a piece of hay. The way she would let out soft chattering nickers and squint her eyes at nothing or stare blankly off into the distance indicated that she was in deep thought. Standing in front of the porch to his right was Diesel. The big red dwarf pony was a mountain of muscle and his head came up to Dave's collarbones. He had often mused that Cowgirl and Diesel must be married, what with the way they would often argue, though he could never understand what they were 'saying' as it was all just chattering nickers and loud whinnies. He had also mused that Little Yellow must be their daughter, because of the way Diesel would watch him like a hawk when he would sit with Little Yellow and pet her. Little Yellow had really amazed him, the filly dwarf horse was a wizard with wood, the way she would whittle bits of wood into neat looking things, they would sell for a good bit of money at the farmer's markets back home.

That's when Dave's eyes fell on Little yellow. She was holding a pistol between her hooves and holding the muzzle up to her eye. Fatherly instincts sprang up in him and his muscles started moving of their own accord. Ignoring the pain in his leg, he bolted towards Little Yellow, sending Butterfly Butt tumbling from his lap.

"No!", Dave sternly scolded as he snatched the pistol from the filly's hooves. "You treat every gun you come across like it's loaded! And you definitely don't hold the muzzle up to your eye!" He emphasized every syllable by wagging a finger at the filly and jabbing a finger at the pistol.

---

Fluttershy yelped in surprise as she tumbled from Big Red's lap as he sprang up into his hind limbs. The maned ape moved with a shocking speed as he rushed over to Apple Bloom and snatched the object from her hooves. He held the object in his right paw out to his side and let out a series of staccato chattering hoot as he waved an extended digit at Apple Bloom and sharply pointing at the object.

Apple Bloom's ears lay flat against her skull as she hunkered down. Though she couldn't understand the chattering hoots, she understood when she was being scolded.

Big Mac shoved himself between Apple Bloom and the maned ape.

Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle stared blankly at what was going on.

Applejack sprang up from where she was sitting as Fluttershy shook off the cobwebs and rose to her hooves. The two mares interjected themselves between Big Mac and Big Red, concerned that a fight was about to break out.

"Ain't no need ta start a scrap, Macintosh!", Applejack scolded her big brother.

"It's okay,big guy.", Fluttershy calmly cooed. "I know you were just trying to protect Apple Bloom. Shh! Shh!"

"'Shy, ya dun hafta coddle him like he's a foal. 'Cordin'ta all th' axam'nations by th' docs, he's an adult, he jus' dun speak th' same way we do.", Applejack scolded her friend. She then turned to face her brother. "Ah saw what happened an' Ah shoulda syepped in sooner. Bloom was pointin' that there bang stick up to her face. Ah jus' hope it dun have any charge left in it."

Big Mac paused, looked at the weapon Big Red was holding in his paw, the back at his sister who gave a nervous smile and a sheepish wave. "Hrm." He then gestured towards the house with his head. "Room!"

Apple Bloom got up from where she was sitting and plodded to the front door, dragging her hooves.

Just then Granny walked out the front door with a wooden spoon held between her gums. She spat the wooden cooking implement into a hoof and said, "What in tarnation are ya foals a-doin'? There better not be no fightin' goin' on or Ah'll wear this here spoon out on all o' yer flanks. An' Ah got wooden spoons a-plenty if'n this here one breaks!"

"Ain't nopony fightin', Granny.", Applejack said to her grandmother. "Jus' Mac bein' a bit to o'er-protective. Bloom was holdin' that there up ta her eye and Red here took it from her."

Granny cast a scolding gaze at her youngest granddaughter, who in turn flattened her ears against her skull and dipped her head down. She pointed the wooden spoon inside the house.

As Apple Bloom walked inside, Granny swung the wooden spoon with the skill of a mother and grandmother who had done it many times before.

*smack*

Apple Bloom let out a surprised yelp and scrambled in the house, her hooves clomping on the stairs as she hurried up to her room.

Granny then turned her attention to Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. "You two young'uns git on home now."

Scootaloo scrambled over to her scooter and stepped on it. "Get on.", she said to Sweetie Belle."I'll take ya home."

---

Dave watched as Scooter sped off with Candy Mane holding onto her as they sped off on the scooter. "Silly horses!", he chuckled, marveling at the way the little winged one sounded like one of those minibikes with the two-stroke engines back home. He then pressed the release on the revolver with his thumb and swung the cylinder out. "Oh thank Christ!", he exclaimed, wiping his hand across his forehead, seeing the chambers were empty.

---

Applejack, Big Mac and Fluttershy stared in surprise as Big Red depressed a small switch on the side of the bang stick and swung the cylinder out. There were six round tubes drilled through the cylinder. The way the maned ape wiped his paw across his forehead and let out several relieved-sounding chattering hoots.

"Huh! That must be an older model which holds crystals that contains a single charge, unlike the newer models that have a slot that holds a crystal that contains twelve charges.", Fluttershy said. When Applejack and Big Mac gaped at her, she simply gave a shrug, and said, "What? I read about it in the latest issue of Bolt&Bow Magazine."

"Ya--ya like bang tubes?", Applejack asked.

"Mm-hmm!", Fluttershy said with a nod. "In fact I have three gold medals in the Cloudsdale Junior Clay Disc Competition. Of course that was before *mumble-mumble-mumble."

Applejack quirked an ear towards her friend."Beg pardon?"

"Had a panic attack that landed me in the hospital.", Fluttershy mumbled a little louder.

"Once more.", Applejack said.

Just then Rainbow Dash landed. "Hey guys! I just ran into Scoots. She said there some sorta dust-up here when Apple--Whoa cool! Is that a prototype Hail-splitter?!"

Luna and Celestia sat in Celestia's private study. The younger sister was preparing a spell so that the two of them could enter into a shared waking dream so that the elder sister could begin a new lesson on how to speak better with Dave, or as the ponies of Ponyville knew him as, 'Big Red'.

"Before beginning this eve's lesson, We have a question for thee, sister."

"Go ahead, Lulu."

"We have noticed the strange weapons the Royal Guard and the EUP uses. Art spear, swords and crossbows no longer sufficient to defend the borders of this fair nation?"

"Do you mean the bang tubes?", Celestia asked.

"Verily."

"Bang tubes have been the norm for about three hundred years.", Celestia replied. "It started about four hundred years ago when maned apes would periodically appear armed with bang tubes, some had detachable curved boxes that held hollow brass tubes that were filled with a strange flammable powder and capped with lead cones. There were some that had bang tubes that had a tube built into the bottom, that when a large lever was cranked back and forth, would load one of the lead-capped brass tubes into the discharging tube. There were some that were simply a discharging tube mounted onto a block of shaped wood that you would pour fireworks powder down the front of the tube, stuff in a piece of cloth, stick a lead ball atop that, ram it down with a rod, and then pull back a small lever on the side that held a piece of flint and pour a small amount into a pan to prime the weapon. Of course the fireworks powder would cause so much residue to build up in the weapon that it would have to be extensively cleaned, so the engineers abandoned any attempts at replicating them. The chemists and alchemists could never quite figure out the powder that only let out a few wisps of blue-grey smoke either, so they went with what they understood best, making bang tubes that use magically charged crystals. Depending on the crystal used, the bang tubes a variety of different spells, ranging from near-invisible bolts of telekinetic force, to a cone of stunning energy, to a bolt of lightning, to a bolt of flame. Of course the last two are never used in densely populated areas as the risk for harm or death to bystanders and starting fires is too great. That's how the great Chicacolt fire started." She said the last sentence with a bitter chuckle. She then took in a breath, then let out a sigh. "Then there was the time when two maned apes were found partially fused into a cliff face. They appeared to have died instantly, of course. What was weird was that both were armed with a box that emitted a beam of light that could make a boulder as big as your or I disappear. That was about fifteen years or so ago. The engineers and mages are still inspecting every tiny piece of them in the hopes of figuring out how they work. Is there any other questions before we start?"

"Just one, sister. Why didst thou not tell Us of thine own daughter and instead We had to hear it from niece-Cadenza?"

Celestia hung her head. "Because I am ashamed."

"Of thine own daughter?!"

"Neigh, Luna. Neigh. We--I am ashamed of how I treated her." Celestia looked her sister in the eyes. "I fucked her up, Luna. I fucked her up bad. And now she rightfully hates me."

"We donor understand. Isn't there laws against mating with one'sown foals?"

"That's not what I meant. I sometimes forget that you have been separated for centuries and have missed out on how much Ponish has evolved. I mean I messed her up, mentally. I neglected her when she was a filly, leaving her father and barely interacting with her. When Gumbo Etoufee died of lung rot, she began lashing out. Instead of recognizing that my daughter was dealing with the grief of her father in an unhealthy manner, I instead did the cruelest thing I've ever done. I turned her into a living weapon, she became my flame, my blade, and captain of the Shadow Guard."

Luna gasped. "Didst thou not swear to never create another flame after Tw--"

"Yes, Luna. After Twilight Nova lost control of her powers and exploded, wiping out several villages in the process. Big surprise, Celestia, mistress of the East and Lady of the Sun is a big fat hypocrite!" Celestia sniffled as a few tears leaked from her eyes. "If the Twilight family were to ever find out I was the one responsible for their founder's death, they'd withdraw their support for me in the Parliament of Minor Nobles."

Luna wrapped her sister in a hug. "Neigh, sister. They would also withdraw their support from Us. We assisted thou in making Twilight Nova a living weapon. She not only carried the flame of the sun within her, but the frost of the moon as well."

After the two sisters embraced one another in several minutes of silence, only broken by soft sniffles, the two parted.

"Alright Luna, I think I am ready for tonight's lesson. I hope to become fluent enough in his tongue so that when I summon him here to Canterlot in a few weeks, we can both communicate with him."

"Just one more question before we begin."

Celestia blew out a sigh. "Yes?"

"Canter is the old Unicornian word for keep and Lot is the old Unicornian word for lake. Why is the name of the city the old Unicornian words for lake and keep if there is no lake here?"

"The lake is still here. The plates that serve as the foundation for Canterlot sit about two dozen chains above the lake. The vaults deep beneath the castle are what's left of the old unicorn keep. When I moved from our old castle to here, the keep was called Canter-by-Lot-Platinum. Over time the name got shortened to Canterlot, which basically means Lake Keep. The Canter River that is formed by the overflow channel I had carved means Keep River. Are there any other questions?"

"Neigh. My thirst for knowledge has been slaked this eve."

Author's Notes:

The female maned ape mentioned in this chapter is Amelia Earhart and the dead male maned ape is her co-pilot, Fred Noonan.

Originally when Big Red took the gun from Apple Bloom, I was going to have Big Mac go into ultra-instinct overprotective big brother mode and have him and the human get into a scrap, but decided against it. Instead I went with a toned and instead had Big Mac place himself between Apple Bloom and Big Red, the big lug might be a bit overprotective of his sisters, but he'snot dumb enough to start a fight unless one of his sisters were being harmed.

Sorry if this chapter was a bit on the exposition-y side. I felt a need for some world building and I wanted an excuse for Amelia Earhart and Granny Smith to be close friends that were also involved in Equestria's first flight that didn't involve pegasi-driven chariots, wagons or carriages.

Thanks for reading and I hope you all enjoy.

7

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It had been a month since Big Red had been taken in by the Apple clan. Currently he was being escorted by Twilight Sparkle and Big Mac to Ponyville General Hospital for radio-spectrographic imaging on his leg.

"So Applejack's training for the big Canterlot rodeo?", Twilight asked.

"Eeyup!"

"In two weeks is the big Ponyville Founder's Day hoedown."

"Eeyup."

"Have you asked anypony to join you?"

"Eenope!"

"Nopony's asked me yet." Twilight pushed the mane away from her eyes. "I've never been to a hoedown before." She lifted her head up, fluttered her eyelashes gave a smile. "I sure hope somepony asks me."

"Eh...err...ah...um."

Twilight wait for a few moments while Big Mac balked. When all he said were single syllable non-word sounds, she blew out a dejected sigh and looked at the ground.

Dave watched as Diesel and Star nickered at each other. Though he couldn't understand the brightly colored horses, he could recognize flirting when he saw it.

He could only snicker at Star's awkward attempts at flirting. He recognized that Diesel balked at the awkward flirting Star did and heard the odd chuffing noises Diesel made. His heart almost broke at the way Star looked dejected, Diesel must have rejected her.

Dave nudged Diesel on his side. When the red stallion looked at him, he said, "I know she's kinda pretty, ya know, for a horse and whatnot, but I think you did the right thing. After all I think your wife'd be upset with you flirting with another woman...unless you two have that sort of relationship. Not that I'm judging or anything. It takes different strokes to make the world go 'round." He paused for a moment. "Ya know, I think Imma shut up now before I deepthroat my own foot."

***

Big Mac looked over at Big Red and listened to the chattering hoots the maned ape let out. Though he couldn't understand him, he understood advice when he heard it.

Big Mac nodded and turned his attention back to Twilight. "Ahem. Uh...Twi. Uh, if'n nopony has asked ya to the Ponyville hoedown, might Ah have th' honor ta escort ya? Ah mean after all this'll be your first real Ponyville hoedown an' it wouldn't be proper ta allow a mare whose it's their first time go unescorted an' whatnot."

Twilight perked up at that. "Thank you, Big Mac! I'd--"

"I think she'll have to get back to you, darling!", Rarity chimed in. She nudged Twilight off to the side.

"Rarity, what in the Tartarus are you doing?!", Twilight hissed through clenched teeth. "Big Mac will be my first actual date ever."

"You can't be serious, darling.", Rarity whispered. She looked her friend dead in the eyes and gasped. "Oh. My. Celestia! You're serious!"

"Weeeeeel...there was this one time back when I was still a filly. A colt asked me out to the spring trot. I said yes."

"Well don't keep me in suspense, darling. What happened?" Rarity was all ears now.

"I said yes. Mom took me out to get a new dress and some shiny shoes..."

Rarity leaned forward, anxious to hear how her friend's first date went.

"And then he never showed up. Found out later that he wound up taking Silver Medallion to the Trot. I cried my eyes out, then retreated back to what I knew best, studying. I buried my nose in the books until shortly before I received my marester's in advanced magical theory when the princess sent me here to Ponyville."

"The nerve!", Rarity exclaimed as she fumed.

"It wasn't that bad. I mean, at the time I thought it was. If it wasn't for Princess Celestia ordering me here, I never would have met you five girls. We would have never defeated Nightmare Moon and freed Princess Luna from her corruption."

"That's not what I meant, Twilight." Rarity was fuming. "I'm talking about that colt. What a cad! Asking out a lovely young mare, then standing her up so he could go out with some--some trollop!"

"It's fine, Rarity. I've made peace with it a long time ago.", Twilight said. "if it wasn't for him, I wouldn't have gotten my marechelor's in history or my marester's in advanced magical theory."

Rarity huffed out the last of her anger a ta colt who was a stallion by now, then took in a cleansing breath. "On to the matter at hoof. A lady doesn't immediately say yes when a gentlestallion asks her to an event. She lets the tension build and waits for three days then gives her answer."

"Rarity, I just want to go to the Ponyville hoedown with him, eat some food that's terrible for my health, do a few hoedown things and generally have a good time. You don't have to worry about anything, I'm not going to fuck Big Mac. Yes, he is a handsome stallion and he's nice, but he's not my type. Plus I'm sure Applejack'd wring my neck if I did let him get under my tail."

Rarity asked, "What is your type, darling?"

"There is this guard who protects Cadance. He's a pegasus who has a nice smile, a big barrel chest and a tight plot."

"Oh ho! You're a chest and plot kind of gal, eh?", Rarity said with a tittering snicker.

Twilight felt her cheeks and ears get very hot.

***

Dave watched in silence as Diesel let out chattering nickers to Star. Star immediately perked up. As she started letting out chattering nickers, Blue Diamond interposed and gently shoved Star aside.

As Star and Blue Diamond were doing whispering nickers back and forth, something horses never did back home, Dave nudged Diesel's side. "I think you need to go get your wife, my man. I think you're being conspired against."

Just as Star and Blue Diamond had finished their whispering nickers, the sound of growling hisses grabbed Dave's attention. Running up was a purple and green bipedal lizard the height of a toddle, one he had named Komodo, what with him, he had assumed the lizard was a he, being able to breathe green fire, just like the dragons of myth and legend. The only real life dragons he knew of were those big monitor lizards on the island of Komodo, so he had decided to name the bipedal lizard after them. He held in his clawed hand a scroll.

***

"Twilight! Twilight!"

Twilight looked over to see Spike running up holding a rolled up scroll in his claws. "What is it, Spike?"

"It's a message from Princess Celestia!" Spike handed the scroll over to Twilight who took it in her magic and unfurled it.

Spike held a claw to his side as he gasped and wheezed as he caught his breath. Once his breath was back, he looked up to see the other two ponies and one maned ape. He held out a scaled fist. "Hey Mac, you up for O-n-O this weekend?"

Big Mac gave a hoof bump to Spike's fist. "Eeyup!"

Spike then held a fist up to Big Red. "Hey Red. How are you doing?"

***

Dave looked down at Komodo who was holding a fist up to him. He fist bumped the lizard and made an exploding sound with his mouth as he quickly pulled back his hand, opened his fist and wiggled his fingers. When the lizard looked at him confused, he said, "You got blow'd up, my man! I went full french fry while you stayed potato. It's all good though. You'll catch on soon enough."

***

Twilight quickly read over the scroll. Her ears drooped and her demeanor fell.

"Twilight, darling, whateveris it?", Rarity asked.

"It's a royal summons for Big Red. Celestia and Luna want to see him in two weeks.", Twilight said. "That's when Ponyville Founder's Day is. I'm going to have to go to Canterlot with Big Red so that nopony tries to take advantage of him and miss the hoedown"

"He can go with me.", Spike said. "I've got something to do in Canterlot on that day. I'llmake sure nopony tries to foalnap him or take advantage of him or hurts him and you can attend the hoedown on Founder's Day."

Rarity was all a-twitter. "Ooh, Canterlot! I'm a bit jealous, darling!" She eyed Big Red's makeshift toga that he had made from a bed sheet. "If you're going to see the princesses, I'll have to make you a new outfit. Can't have you seeing royalty with your garments in such a condition." She grabbed his forelimb in her magic. "Come along to my boutique, darling. I have a few ideas that would look absolutely smashing on you!"

***

Dave looked down at his hand and forearm while Blue Diamond was nickering at him. A sparkly blue energy field surrounded the lower part of his limb matching the glowing field around her horn. The field made his skin feel prickly and tingly, it felt like his hand and arm was asleep or that static electricity was crawling across his skin. He flexed his fingers and the field broke. Blue Diamond let out a yelp.

***

"Yipe!" Rarity felt a sudden zap in her horn when Big Red flexed his digits, breaking her telekinetic aura. She rubbed a hoof across her horn.

Big red held up his paws and let out a series of apologetic-sounding chattering hoots.

"That's quite alright, darling.", Rarity said. "I just didn't expect you break my telekinesis is all." She bumped the side of her flank into his good leg. "No matter, come along."

"Rarity...", Twilight said with a slightly dour look on her face. "First we're taking him to the hospital so they can do more radiographic images of his leg and see how his broken bone is healing."

"Quite right! After all what good is good fashion if one's health isn't good first? I shall be awaiting in my boutique for when he is finished."

Gerard had been making good time with his small pack of iron wolves towards Ponyville. He stopped at a stream to refill his canteens. He'd be at the outskirts of Ponyville in about sixteen days or so. He let a malicious smile spread across his beak as he thought about how he was going to kill that maned ape. Tartarus, he might even scalp the ponies who took him in as a message to those thrice damned alicorns.

As Gerard set up camp, two of the iron wolves that had been sent out to forage for meat for food came back wild-eyed and scared. "What is it you simpering mongrels?!", he growled.

The two iron wolves pointed in the direction they had come from. "There-there! In the clearing! Monster!", the first one exclaimed.

"It better have not been some puckwidge or a jubjub bird doing a threat display.", Gerard growled.

"No-no! Not puckwidge or jubjub! They scuryy-scurry or flap-flap away! Not-not see before! It all clear-see through! Made up of bit-pieces of other creatures!"

Gerard grabbed up his gouge spear. If this was a truly never-before-seen creature, then he'd hope he'd get the chance to be the first to bring down. "Now show me where this monster is. I want the honor of being the first to draw its blood."

Gerard followed the first to iron wolves to the clearing. The other three followed close behind him. Entering the clearing, he looked around. "Well? Where is this monster?"

"It was over there-there!", one of the two lead iron wolves said pointing to a tree.

Gerard flapped over to where the iron wolf had pointed. The bark of the tree was an odd color, pink with purple polka dots, in the shape of a griffon's talon. "What in the name of--" His words were cut off by the scared yipping of the iron wolves and the scurrying their paws as they ran in fright. He turned to face whatever had come up behind him and what he saw made his blood run cold.

It was a chimeric creature, easily made up of different body parts of a dozen creatures. though it was see through, he could still make out features. Its body was serpentine in shape, one hind leg of a goat, one of a lizard-like creature, a forelimb of a griffon, the other of a lion, the head and face of a pony with the mane of a donkey, a deer's antler, an antelope's horn, the beard of a billy goat, one bat wing, one feathered wing, a pair of mismatched eyes with red pupils, a dragon-like tail with a strange tuft of hair at the end. The...monster was the only word for it, seemed to take no interest in Gerard, it simply walked by on its hind limbs that made no noise as they hit the ground. The monster was clearly talking to itself...or something that couldn't be seen with the naked eye, but no sound could be heard.

Suddenly the monster stopped and looked straight at Gerard. The griffon's breath stopped in his chest as he stared into the monster's eyes. No, not eyes, twin swirling vortices of madness that flashed and flickered in a chaotic swirl of colors. A panicked scream escaped Gerard's mouth and he took flight, wings beating hard as every instinct screamed to get as far away from this monster as possible.

The translucent, chimeric creature simply shrugged and began to simply trudge off silently towards the northeast.

It'd be a week before Gerard would regain his senses and another week before he was able to round up the iron wolves. He swore to never speak or think of this beast again.

8

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Big Red sat on the examination table naked as the day he was born as the hospital didn't have any gowns that would fit him. His hands covered his genitals, an embarrassed blush glowed on his face and he fidgeted nervously in place as Nurse Redheart checked over his vitals. She took note of his distress and gently patted him on the wither. "It's okay, dearie. No need to be upset or nervous. You're in good hooves. From what I've heard you might be coming out of that cast soon. Though I must say your species is really tough to trot around with an injury that would have left a pony lame for months, even if it does currently impede you."

In a separate room Twilight, Big Mac and three doctors, two of which had come down from Canterlot School of Science and Medicine, were looking at the recently developed glass plates that held the images of Big Red's leg bones.

Big Mac twisted his head from side-to-side trying to make sense of what he was looking at. He had seen images of bones before, when he was still a colt he took a bad spill and fractured his cannon bone, fortunately it was only a hairline fracture. But these images were weird. Unlike the Magic Resonance Imagery that made a clear image of a pony's innards, using either a specially trained unicorn or a device using a specially charged quartz crystal wrapped in platinum wires that could be tuned to each pony's unique magical resonance to cast an image onto a sheet of clear cellulose or specially treated paper, these were odd. Though the bones were clearly detailed, there were some strange shadowy...stuff in the image.

Twilight dutifully and gleefully wrote down notes based on her own observations and the comments that Doctor Horse, Doctor Caduceus and Doctor Thermometer were saying.

"His leg is healing very well.", Doctor Horse said. "It looks like the way a pony's bones knit together, only faster."

"I concur.", Doctor Caduceus replied. "If we could figure out how his species is able to amble about, even with such a devastating injury and heal so quickly from it, this could cause medicine to jump forward quite significantly in the treatment of skeletal fractures."

"I think we could remove his cast and put him a splint and a brace. That might allow him to move about more easily while keeping the bone supported. I don't think there's a need to keep the limb immobilized, and moving around more freely may help his bone heal more properly. What do you think, Miss Twilight?"

Twilight Sparkle scratched at her chin for a moment and hummed thoughtfully. "We'll have to specially make a brace and splint to match the shape of his hind limb, otherwise I concur with you three's conclusion. Big Mac, I know you might be a bit out of your element in all of this, but I'd like to ask, is there anything you'd like to add for posterity?"

"Other'n he's good with th' foals an' is a hard worker, eenope!"

The three doctors, Twilight Sparkle and Big Mac entered into the examination room that held Big Red and Nurse Redheart.

"How are our patient's vitals, nurse?", Doctor Horse asked.

"As I only have his vitals from his previous visits to go on. They seem to be good.", Nurse Redheart replied. "Though I must say on record that he seems to have an aversion to having his genitals exposed, to the point where it's causing him mild distress."

"Duly noted.", Doctor Horse said. "We're going to remove his cast, then get proper measurements so we can make a custom splint and brace for his limb. We're going to have to hold him for a few more hours before releasing him. If either of you have anywhere else you have to be, we can send for either or both of you when we're done here."

"Ah got chores ta do back on th' farm.", Big Mac said. He then turned and strode out of the door.

"I'm going to stay and document everything down. Spike's got everything well under hoof in the library. If there's something he can't handle or gets message from Princess Celestia, he knows where to find me.", Twilight replied.

Nurse Redheart directed Twilight where to stand so she wouldn't be in the way.

Nurse Kisses, a unicorn mare, came into the room, lit her horn and fired a beam, cutting a thin line down one side of the cast. When she was done, she then switched to the other side. Once the cast had been successfully cut down both sides, Redheart and Kisses gently pried the cast away. Big Red grunted in discomfort as a few of the hairs on his limb that had become stuck to the inside of the cast were pulled out.

As the cast was pulled away from the leg, a musty, sweaty, cheesy stink caused the ponies to wrinkle their noses. The leg was noticeably thinner than its counterpart and the skin was visibly paler, with grey, plague-like buildup on parts of it. Big Red let out groans of relief as he vigorously scratched the limb.

Twilight covered her nose with a hoof. "Ugh! What is with the stink and why does his skin look like that? Did he develop some kind of infection? Is that why he lost muscle mass?"

"The smell and the buildup are most likely skin oils and dead skin cells from where he was unable to wash it. The loss of muscle mass is probably from it being immobilized in the cast for four weeks. We'll give it a quick wash down, then begin measuring him for a splint and brace."

When Redheart and Kisses gave the limb a quick sponge bath, the grey plaque-like buildup quickly and easily sloughed off, leaving pale skin with a slight pinkish hue, covered in sparse red fur.

Twilight took a close look at the leg that had recently been released from its cast, mentally comparing the paler complexion to its counterpart. "It looks like his skin has a minor reaction to the light, causing it to develop a very slight brown coloration." She thought about how most ponies wore makeup on the bald patch on their snout that matched their fur color, but usually didn't wear any on their bellies. A pony's skin color was black, almost the shade of charcoal. "I wonder if his skin turning a shade of tan-brown is a way of protecting itself from the sun?" She remembered her lesson on why ponies' skin was such a dark shade, it was an evolutionary throwback to when they still traveled in nomadic herds, the dark coloring would protect them from harsh sunburns during the summer months and allow their bodies to absorb more heat from the sun during the winter months.

"That's a very good hypothesis.", Caduceus replied. "There will have to be some observations made over the winter months to see if his skin lightens."

"I've heard some talk about sightings of maned apes with five digits that had dark brown, tan-yellow or ruddy skin tones. Maybe it's seasonal changes, or natural camouflage, or tribal markings, or slight differences in subspecies?", said Thermometer. "I've also heard of maned apes who have skin and mane coloration similar to ponies, but those are always four digits. Then there are the reports of maned apes with six digits, they always have a dark brown, almost black skin tone and brown manes that are curly with ruddy highlights. Maybe they're differing tribes or competing species? There are almost no medical papers on their anatomies, so it's impossible to determine with the current data."

Twilight quickly scribbled down a personal note to remind herself to look up any and all source materials available on the different colorations and finger numbers of maned apes. She also took time to draw detailed sketches of Big Red's lower limbs, especially the odd digits that stuck off of his oddly shaped paws. They reminded her a little bit of a griffon's hind paws, minus the thick fur, the retractable claws and the pads underneath. They were also longer, looking like less developed, less flexible versions of his forepaws. She quickly scribbled down another personal note to get Big Red on a treadmill once he was fully healed so she could observe in a more scientific setting how he trotted about.

Creating a splint that would properly fit Big Red's hind leg was simple enough. They simply created a plaster mold of his limb, then vacuum molded rigid plastic that matched the front and back that would then be secured by simple rip strips. Making a brace that fit him was a bit more difficult. Shaping the metal bands that formed the main structure, the leather that made up the padding and the belts to secure it, and the rigid plastic to whole give the whole structure some lightweight support was simple enough. Securing the whole contraption to his limb would be the tricky part as he lacked the thick keratin that made up a pony's hoof that they could secure the lower portion with some screws drilled in.

In the end they wound up taking and modifying the design of a wing brace that would be used on pegasi who had certain congenital defects.

Dave watched as the little horses placed rigid plastic splints on the front and back of his leg, then secured it with strips of Velcro. The brace they put on him reminded him of a very popular wrestler from Texas who had a gimmick of giving the middle finger while dumping multiple cans of beer in his mouth, on his face and down his chest.

Once the brace was secured, he gingerly got up from the exam table, first putting weight on his uninjured leg, then ever-so-slowly putting putting weight on his injured leg.

All the ponies in the exam room held their breath as Big Red stood up from the exam table and put weight on his injured leg. He let out a few grunts and grumbles of pain as he walked around the room. On a couple of instances the leg threatened to buckle and the maned ape was forced to brace himself against the wall until he grabbed the crutch Apple Bloom had carved for him, tucked it under his forelimb and then began to amble around the small room again.

"Nurse Redheart, please take our patient down to the physical therapy room. I think giving him a bigger area to move around will give him time to get used to the splint and brace.", Doctor Caduceus said.

Redheart beckoned for Big Red to follow him.

Big Red, leaning his weight on the crutch, followed the earth pony nurse out the door.

*thump*

Big Red staggered back a couple of steps as his forehead hit the lentil of the door. While placing a paw to his forehead, he let out several grumbling hoots that everypony assumed were vulgarities uttered out of pain and aggravation.

Sunset Shimmer prepared to go to the shop of a dealer of contraband goods in Whinnyapolis who dealt in goods taken illegally from various creatures to find any leads on this current griffon that was holding a young maned ape. She applied a bit of temporary dye to her mane, tail and coat. She applied a bit of waterproof makeup to her cutie mark to change its appearance, rubbed a bit of temporary varnish to her horn to change its coloration. She inserted a pair of contact lenses to change the color of her eyes and a set false veneers over her teeth to change the look of her appearance. To top off the look, she put on a fancy sun hat that had several ostrich, peacock and a pair of phoenix feathers, the last of those she had secured from Philomena just before one of her rejuvenative conflagrations many years ago. True she could have used an illusion to change her looks, but if she had to defend herself, she didn't want to risk compromising her cover by having the illusion break.

Sunset looked in the mirror one last time, giving her appearance one last inspection. She applied a bit of slightly darker makeup to her chin, snout and cheeks, giving them a slightly gaunt impression and adding a bit more emphasis to her cheekbones. The use of makeup to alter her appearance was one of the more mundane skills her mother had taught her. Celestia could, with just a slight change to her eyeliner, appear to be more motherly and approachable, or look more stern with a gaze that almost seemed to pierce into a pony's soul, or more elderly and wizened.

Sunset gave a derisive snort. So many ponies in Equestria, even those inbred stuffed shirts that made up the Canterlotian high nobility, thought they had a deeper understanding of their high princess, even that neurotic lavender suck-up who was the current bearer of the Element of Magic. In reality Celestia was a shrewd manipulator, using her many millennia of experience to get what she wanted from a pony, and if they proved to be especially difficult and resistant to her machinations, she'd simply wait for time to take its toll and move on to the next one in line. Celestia could also be harsh, cruel and paranoid, she had untold numbers of spies and enforcers all over the nation to root out criminal organizations, political dissidents and revolutionaries, she also had spies deeply embedded in the societies and cultures of surrounding nations to gather information on any potential threats, or to simply make their leaders more affable to her wants and demands. On the same hoof Celestia could be kind, compassionate and even loving, currently there were nearly a thousand charities, soup kitchens, homeless shelters, food closets and orphanages around the nation that bore her name.

Eveypony across Equestria knew of the various prisons and asylums that would house those who were dangerous away from society. The most infamous of these were the Cookieville Sanitarium for the Criminally Insane that housed those who had mental disorders that caused them to be unable to control their violent urges, Hollow Mountain which was dug out of an extinct volcano out on the far edge of Horseshoe Bay that housed serial rapists, serial killers and mass murderers, the Black Cube in which housed dangerous international criminals kept isolated away from the world, and the worst prison of all, Tartarus, which held those who used magic in a manner that caused great harm and magical beasts that were too much of a threat to the general population to be allowed to roam free. Of course everypony knew of the various prisons and asylums, what they didn't know about was the most extreme punishment for the worst of the worst criminals and threats, petrification. All over Equestria there were tens of thousand of statues and sculptures on display in public squares, parks, museums and the like, most were carved from various slabs of rock, like marble, granite, schist and basalt, but a percentage unknown to all but Celestia, were petrified necromancers, the practitioners of the black arts, cannibals, and if rumors were to be believed, one creature that could warp reality, and the minds and bodies of ponies on a whim.

Sunset knew where thirty of the petrified ponies were held. Their petrified forms were held in the statue garden and shrub labyrinth of Canterlot Castle. She pushed those thoughts aside as they would interfere in her investigation. The shop she needed to visit was in a shady part of the Third Ward.

Sunset passed by increasingly older looking buildings that needed maintenance as she ventured deeper into the Third Ward of Whinnyapolis. Fortunately none of these buildings sported gang graffiti, though there were plenty of unseemly looking ponies hanging out in the various alleys...most were drunks, addicts, ne'er-do-wells, petty thieves and prostitutes, though more than a few were gang members, probably scouting out new territory for the bigger gangs or were members of newer, smaller gangs that had yet to carve out their own turf.

Several of the shady-looking ponies gave wolf whistles and shouted catcalls at the disguised Sunset Shimmer as she passed. When she refused to even acknowledge their presence, a few hurled insults or threats of sexual violence at her. She didn't break her stride, neither speeding up nor slowing down, if any of them were to try and make good on their threats, they would live just long enough to regret their life choices.

Sunset came to a stop across the street from her target, a store that stood out from the aging apartment buildings and warehouses, called Ermine's Exotic Emporium. The real Ermine, or at least the original one, was a failed businessmare who operated a pawn shop on this same location that served as a front for a fencing operation until she ran afoul of a local crime boss and he had run her out of business. She had died bitless in a slum. That was nearly thirty years ago and the shop had changed hooves several times between the ever-fluctuating crime bosses of the city, who used this shop as money laundering schemes or as fronts to sell illegal goods.

As Sunset crossed the street, she ran through her mind the name of the current mare who called herself Ermine. She was a former business associate of a Manehattanite fashionista who was a shrewd and cutthroat businessmare that had several high profile fashion shops on Bridleway. This mare who used the alias Ermine was known as Cross Stitch. The shop, Ermine's Exotic Emporium was a suspected front involved in the smuggling and sale of various products made from illegally harvested magical, exotic and endangered species all over Equestria and beyond, but so far nopony had been able to prove anything. It was also suspected that this shop was also involved in the illegal sales of live rare and exotic creatures.

Sunset paused outside the door, charged up her magic and gave a quick scan of the shop. She was able to detect a single pony, probably the current 'Ermine', and a few dozen creatures in a back room. She powered up a low-power teleportation spell and used it to swipe a hundred bits. Often criminals needed a few bits to, as they say, 'grease the wheels', so she'd use Cross Stitch's own bits to bribe her. She paused for a moment longer to center self and opened the door, the little bell above gave a tinkle.

"Just a minute!~" came a sing-song voice from the back.

Sunset looked over the goods in the shop. Most were counterfeits designed to look like real antiques. There were a few that were the real deal, they were lacking special tags to indicate they were legitimately purchased from licensed dealers...probably stolen and/or smuggled, and passed through who knows how many different hooves, talons, paws or other appendages before arriving that this shop. She made a mental note to pass on the information of this shop to the Equestrian Royal Police, it was a crime to sell fakes as true blue antiques, it was also a crime to sell stolen and/or smuggled antiques.

The mare who was currently using the alias Ermine trotted out from behind a purple velvet curtain behind the counter. "Welcome to Ermine's Exotic Emporium! We have all sorts of antiques and oddities for the discerning eye!"

Sunset slipped into her undercover alias, Starry Night and spoke in an over-exaggerated Canterlotian accent that so many well-to-do ponies opted for to sound cultured. "Why helloooo there! I am throwing a soiree in a few weeks at my manor and am looking for something to make Prince Blueblood absolutely green with envy." Saying the name made her want to spit. For some reason Celestia had adopted that absolute foppish cad as her nephew. Blueblood was overly obsessed with his looks, an insufferable boor, a notorious letch always trying to get under the tail of any mare who suited his fancy, regardless if she was married or single. But he was also incredibly shrewd, a veteran commander of the Yak War, an astute politician who could wheel and deal and slime his way into the good graces of any noble who was being especially difficult for his aunt to sway, the current general of the Solar Guard and commander of the Canterlotian Bureau of Investigation.

Sunset internally scowled. Her mother was a slick and sly pony. Often giving the impression to the public of being a doting and motherly figure, to the houses of parliament as being a competent, if slightly out-of-touch leader, and to the Royal Guard and EUP as being an astute and hooves-off commander. In private is when the real Celestia came out, a cold and calculating alicorn who had seen, alongside her returned sister, the rise and fall of countless civilizations. Sunset had personally seen ancient artworks from extinct civilizations held in her mother's private collection, depictions of Celestia and Luna as their rulers. If the rumors are to be believed, there was an entire civilization of ponies who lived deep in the Forbidden Jungle far to the south who worships the two alicorn sisters as goddesses and made sacrifices of fruits, grains, and sometimes trespassers to them.

'Ermine' made a broad gesture around the shop. "Why but of course. We have all sorts of baubles and trinkets that would make anypony the talk of the town or the belle of the ball. We have plenty of oddities and antiques that would make any noble turn green with envy. If what you're looking for is something more like rare furniture, I have recently acquired some especially exquisite furniture that belonged to the last Sun King of Prance himself. According to my supplier, they were the few sticks of furniture that wasn't burned when the commoners rose up and imprisoned he and his wife before executing them."

Sunset knew that was a bold-faced lie. Her mother had the only surviving furniture from that Prench dynasty. They had been gifted to her by the twelfth Sun King. She shook her head no. "I am looking for something more...exotic."

"Exotic you say?" Ermine gestured for Sunset to follow her. The mare stepped behind the counter and lifted out an ebony box. She lifted the lid to reveal a smattering of pink-colored crystalline fragments. "These are exotic. It's said that they once belonged to an alicorn who lived far to the north. The legends say she was a living, breathing statue made of crystal."

Sunset knew rose quartz when she saw them. This 'Ermine' would have had a better chance at claiming they were pink diamonds. "Mm...no. I'm looking to add to my menagerie."

Ermine's eyes glittered at that prospect. "A rare animal for your menagerie. Oh my my my! Un moment." She walked to the front of the store, opened the door, stuck her head out and looked around. Closing the door, she locked it, flipped the sign around so it read closed and pulled the blinds closed. "You're not a cop?"

"Oh no. I'm not a cop, I promise!" Sunset crossed her heart. If she only knew.

"Before you see my collection, I first require a small deposit, as it were. A show of good faith and as a means to ensure those that I keep under my care are well taken care of." Ermine lifted a hoof and curled it until it was pinched against her cannon, then wiggled it back-and-forth in the universal symbol for 'pay me'.

Sunset pulled the small pouch of purloined bits from under her mane and deposited it onto Ermine's hoof.

The mare opened the small pouch, fished a few bits out and inspected them. When she was satisfied, she deposited them back into the pouch and stuffed it under her mane. "This way, if you please." Ermine walked over to a bookcase. She eyed Sunset before placing her hoof on one of the shelves. She pressed on the shelf and it slid in slightly with a soft click. The bookcase swung inwards on hidden hinges.

Sunset followed Ermine into the hidden room. It was dark, there were sounds of chirps, trills, squeaks, squawks and other sounds.

Ermine pressed a button on the wall and Sunset found her eyes momentarily dazzled by lights turning on. There were cages and terrariums lining the walls. Many of them were empty, looking as if their occupants had been recently removed, either because they had died or somepony had bought them. Two dozen of the cages and terrariums housed sorry looking creatures, some magical, some endangered, all illegal for private ownership.

Gotcha! Sunset didn't let her face reflect her thoughts as she coolly looked around. She gave a faux yawn. "I already have these creatures in my menagerie. I was hoping for something rarer."

"I assure you that I can get my hooves on whatever you are searching for. Just tell me what you want and I can see if I can get you one through my sources."

"A maned ape."

'Ermine' choked in surprise as her expression went from the cool and poised purveyor of rare and illegal objects to one of shock. "A maned ape?! Nopony has ever encountered one of those alive before!"

"It's all the buzz in Canterlot that the princesses recently came into the possession of a live one. I'd like one for my menagerie. It would just stick it in Blueblood's craw if I had one to show off at my upcoming soiree."

Ermine slipped back on her prim and proper mask. "Ahem. Very well. I shall ask around with my usual contacts and see if somepony has seen a live one. Mind you, if they have, it's going to be a substantial cost to capture one as they're very dangerous and difficult beasts."

I got you nailed to the wall now, bitch. Sunset dipped her head in a slight nod. "Money is of no consequence."

'Ermine's' eyes glittered at the promise of money. "Oh, but of course. Just leave where I can contact you and I will send a message once I have been able to locate your maned ape."

Sunset wrote down the address for a vacant lot on the south-side of Canterlot. After she bid 'Ermine' ado, she stepped out of the shop and snickered to herself. When this 'Ermine' tallied up her books for the day, she'd find she was exactly one hundred bits short, the amount she had paid that crook. Sunset had learned from her mother how to cast spells without being seen. It required loading the spell ahead of time and then feeding a small amount of energy into it when she needed to cast it, just a spark, something that would go unnoticed by all but the most skilled mages.

***

Sunset donned her armor. It was the armor that marked her as Celestia's Flame. All who saw it would tremble in fear, especially when its illusory enchantments were activated. Sunset levitated her sword still in its scabbard. It was unusual for Equestrian swords. Instead of the square grip most pony swords had that allowed them to be more easily held in the mouth or fetlock, this had a more oval shape. Instead of a round, shield-like guard or a four-way crossguard of a pony sword, this had a two-way crossguard.

Sunset had remembered the stories her father, Etouffee, had told her about the original owner of this sword. It came from his hometown, Crescent City. According to her father's stories, his family had been the keepers of this blade. It had belonged to the city's savior, oddly enough named Savior. According to the stories, Savior was a strange creature that stood on two legs, like a minotaur, but unlike a minotaur, Savior didn't have fur or horns or hooves, but a long flowing blonde mane. The descriptions also said Savior was a female, having a pair of teats on her chest. This made Sunset think of the four-fingered maned ape, Minty, that she and Wallflower had taken in. It was said that Savior had arrived outside the city when a strange storm with oddly colored clouds hit the city and she was found laying unconscious, wearing strange armor and wielding a strange sword...this sword, if the stories are to be believed.

Sunset drew the sword from its scabbard and looked at the strange runes on the blade as she mused on the story of Savior. Savoir had gotten her name when she drove off a nautilo-kraken that had attacked the city's docks. A year after that Savior lost her life defending the city from another nautilo-kraken that had come out of the depths of Lake Champing. According to the stories, the waters of Lake Champing had turned black from the beast's ink as it did battle with Savior. After the battle was over, the nautilo-kraken's carcass was washed up on the shores of the lake and Savior was found a short distance away sitting under a tree, having succumbed to her injuries. The locals took the armor and sword off of Savior's body and had buried her in a stone sarcophagus in the center of the city. The families who were closest to her distributed her things among one another. The shell of the nautilo-kraken was placed at the city's dock as a way to ward off other sea monsters.

Sunset flipped the sword in her magic a few times as she pushed the memories of the story aside. Right now she didn't have time to waste on stories from her foalhood, she had a crook to to make talk.

Stepping out onto the street, Sunset activated the enchantments on her armor and made her way to the store she had visited earlier that night. As she strode past the same alleys in the third ward, the thugs and ne'er-do-wells who had catcalled and threatened her ran for their lives. She cackled at their fear.

Cross Stitch wracked her brain as she went over her books. Something wasn't adding up. She was one hundred buts short. Somehow somepony had cheated her out of money. She seethed as she counted and recounted her money.

*bang-bang-bang*

Cross Stitch looked up from her counting at the loud banging on the front door of the shop. "We're closed."

*bang-bang-bang*

Cross Stitch grumbled as whoever was banging on her shop's door obviously didn't get the message. "Didn't ya hear'a me the first time, ya mook? I said we'a closed! Now rut off!"

*bang-bang-bang*

Cross Stitch slipped her hoof through the leather loop of the bat she kept behind the counter. "Wadda ya stoopit or sumptin'?!" She had dropped her Whinnyapolis accent all together and allowed her Manehattan accent to come out in full force. She stomped through the store. "Ya had better be gone or when I get done wit' ya, ya'll be leavin' here in the back of a meat wagon!" She flung the door open and immediately regretted it.

Cross Stitch stared in fear and shock into the blazing form that the enemies of Equestria and every crook knew and they knew it by many names, Celestia's Flame, the Sun's Sword, the Sun Wolf. Her legs quaked in terror at the sight, flames licking from under the edges of that terrible armor, smoke and heat shimmers issued from every breath, what little fur was visible looked to be nothing more than glowing coals and black soot, and those piercing eyes, the sclera was black as smoke, black as soot, and the irises glowed red-orange like iron in a furnace. She stumbled backwards to get away from this horrifying sight.

Sunset strode into the store. "Why hello there, Cross Stitch." The enchantment on the armor made her voice sound like it was flames crackling. "A little birdie told me that you're on the market for maned apes." She drew the sword, its blade reflecting the flickering light from the armor's enchantments and making it look like it was ablaze too.

Cross Stitch's pupil became pinpoint when that horrible sword, said to be sharp enough to split a pony in two as easily as a sharp knife would a piece of sponge cake. She scurried backward, tripped over her hooves and tumbled onto the floor unceremoniously. She then scuttled across the floor and under a nearby fainting couch that was made to look like an antique.

Sunset cackled as she walked across the floor of the store, using her sword to knock objects off of nearby shelves as she approached the fainting couch that Cross Stitch was currently hiding under. Raising the sword, she pointed the tip at the fainting couch's seat and plunged it downwards.

The blade of the sword pierced through the couch and embedded the tip into the floor right in front of Cross Stitch's snout. The mare's eyes went wide and she shrieked. She scrambled out from under the fainting couch and ran across the floor.

"Aw, missed!" Sunset withdrew the sword and began lazily twirling the blade in a slow arc. "Don't worry, I never miss twice."

Cross Stitch hurled several objects at the blazing form that all enemies of Equestria and criminal fears. They were easily batted away with magic or the flat of the sword's blade. She hefted a small round, green box with mother-of-pearl inlays that had been hawked as the jade makeup box of the first emperor of Rokugan, in reality is was a cheap imitation that was filled with cheap face powder, she a a whole crate of them in the basement, and hurled it at the blazing form.

Sunset blasted the hurled round, green box with her magic, causing the air to fill with a fine white powder, obscuring the shop. She knew where Cross Stitch was running to, the small room behind the curtain behind the counter. She deactivated the armor's illusory runes, cast a camouflage spell and teleported.

Cross Stitch used the cloud of cheap face powder hanging in the air as a smoke screen and ran to the curtain behind the counter, there was a door in the backroom that led to a smaller hidden room that she used as a break room. She'd simply scramble into it, lock the door, barricade it and wait for this visage of flaming wrath to get bored and look elsewhere.

From her hidden position in the back room Sunset cast a silencing spell so nopony could hear any clinks of her armor and waited. She only had to wait a few seconds.

Cross Stitch bolted through the curtain. She dumped a shelf over so it laid at an angle across the entrance to the room. She fumbled with the latch on the small doorway that led to the secret break room.

Sunset stifled a chuckle. For some reason when she went after criminals, they never tried to break out a window in their homes or illegal shops and try to make a run for it down the street, they always went for a secret room. She followed closely behind the crook.

Cross Stitch slammed the door behind her, shoved a key into the latch and turned it, then shoved several chairs up against the door. Not wanting to pull the small chain attached to the small light fixture hanging from the ceiling lest she alert anypony that she was in here, instead opted to pull out a a candle and a box of matches from a cabinet. Shoving the bottom of a candle into the spout of an old bottle, struck a match and stuck the burning tip to the wick.

That's when Sunset decided to make her presence known. She activated the illusion enchantment on her armor as she dropped the camouflage spell.

Cross Stitch's pupils became pinpoints as the flaming avatar of wrath seemed to materialize out of nowhere.

"You've been a very naughty little filly. Somepony needs to spank your flank." Sunset blew out the candle, filling the room with darkness.

For several seconds the sounds of somepony struggling were accompanied by thumping sounds, and screams of terror and pain.

Sunset used her magic to pull the little chain on the light fixture, filling the room with light. In one corner the unconscious and battered form of Cross Stitch lay in a heap. She took a moment to take some deep breaths and center herself, she had an interrogation to conduct. She conducted a quick search of the shop and found a coil of rope.

Cross Stitch woke up to find herself staring at the pavement. Huh? What? Where am--" She immediately remembered what happened and lifted her head to look around. She was hanging upside-down from a lamppost, A pair of lengths of rope were lashed to her rear hooves and tied to the top of the lamppost, leaving her suspended plot-up. Her forelegs were tied behind her back. "Where are you?!"

Sunset, who had been standing behind Cross Stitch, activated the illusory enchantments on her armor, leaned up to the mare's ear and whispered, "Right here." She walked around to the front to the mare, gently placed the tip of the sword onto her crotch and began to slowly dragging up her belly towards her chest. "Now I know you're a mean and tough criminal with a lot of connections. So here's the deal, I'm going to ask you a question, then you're going to tell me to go rut myself. Then you're going to threaten my mother's and father's lives, maybe even the ived of everypony I love. Then I'm going to split your belly open and pull out your intestines slowly, capsule-length by capsule-length, hoof by hoof and show it to you as I'm doing so. Nopony has ever lasted more than three hoof lengths of their own guts being shown to them before talking, though there was this one minotaur that I pulled three whole leg-lengths before he talked."

"Please don't cut me open and gut me! Plea-hee-hee-hee-ease! I'll tell you anything you want to know! I'll give you all the names of all my customers and associates. Just pleeeeeeeaaaaaase, don't gut me!"

"Aw, you're no fun! At least resist a little so I can cut off one of your ears before you talk. You don't need both of your ears."

Tears flowed from Cross Stitch's eyes. "I was just a failed fashinista that got run out of Manehattan! If I had known that after I agreed to do business with that griffon who owns a bang stick that I'd run into you, I'd have told him to go rut his mother and stuck to selling knock-offs of designer hoofbags."

Sunset lifted her sword from the mare's body and returned to its scabbard. "Keep talking."

9

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Dave ambled around the padded track of what looked to be a workout room for little horses that had injuries that physically impaired them. As he limped around the padded track with the aid of the wooden crutch, he took notice of the different injured little horses that were doing physical exercises on padded equipment, or walking on wobbly legs on treadmills secured by a bar strapped to their bodies, or were performing tasks, such as picking up objects of different sizes with their mouths or wings or hooves and placing them on pegs. This was a physical therapy room. He remembered going to one when back in high school to show moral when his buddy broke his back in a four-wheeler accident that had left the guy wheelchair bound.

"Ow! Fucking goddamn piss-gutting shit!" Dave stepped wrong, which caused a white-hot jolt of pain to shoot up his leg. Hobbling over to the rail that ran the inner circumference of the track to sit down. It barely came up to his hip joint, so it was awkward to sit on. As he rubbed his injured leg and gingerly bent his knee to work out the pain, he looked around the room. Sitting at a table was a grey winged mare with a blonde mane and tail. She had bandages on her head and one of her golden eyes seemed to move independent of the other. Sitting next to her was a smaller horned horse that had the same color fur, eyes, and mane and tail. The smaller horned horse was nearly the spitting image of the winged one. He mused that the smaller one must be the child...foal?...of the bigger one.

She was currently using her wings to pick up a small plastic cup. Occasionally she would miss and her wing would hit the table or she'd accidentally knock the cup off the table. Whenever the plastic cup would fall to the floor, the little grey horned horse would hop up from where she was sitting, pick up the plastic cup with her mouth, hop back to where she was sitting and place the cup back on the table, then let out soft chattering nickers.

"Must've taken a pretty nasty blow to the head to mess up you depth perception that badly."

The blonde-maned mare with grey coat looked over at him and gave him a genuinely warm smile as she waved a hoof at him. Dave grunted as he stood back up. He waved his hand back at her as a smile graced his lips. He continued his trek around the padded track. He rubbed the sore spot on his forehead. He knew it was going to bruise and would probably make him look like a raccoon for a few days. He silently swore that the first chance he got, he'd get his hands on a hacksaw and cut out head holes in every doorway in this horse town.

There came a chattering nicker from behind Dave and a horse with their rear legs in a wheeled contraption quickly trotted by on his right. "Oops, sorry." He stepped to the side as the little horse passed. Though he couldn't understand them, he understood 'Passing on your right.' or 'Passing on your left.'. It was good track etiquette when not competing to let others know when you were passing so you didn't accidentally clip them or have them accidentally bump into you.

Twilight had finished talking with the doctor and was now walking to the physical therapy room. She pushed open the door and walked in. Big Red was limping around the track on the crutch that Apple Bloom had carved for him. Occasionally he would stop and sit on the railing that ran along the inner circuit of the padded track. For a moment she wondered why he didn't sit on one of the benches or chairs around the room, then let her gaze linger on him for a moment longer. She softly said to herself, "He's too tall for one of those seats, plus with his injury, it's probably difficult for him to sit in something that low for him." She made a mental note to inquire at Sofas & Quills how much it would cost to get some furniture made to fit Big Red's measurements.

Twilight trotted up to the padded track and gestured for Big Red to follow her. As the maned ape limped up, she said, "Come on. We're going to Carousel Boutique. I'm going to commission Rarity to make you some better clothes rather than a folded up sheet and have some coverings for your hind paws made. Winter will be here soon and nopony needs you getting hypothermia."

After getting the information from Cross Stitch, Sunset had sent a quick missive to the local Equestrian Royal Police. The ERP had quickly shown up with the Whinnyapolis Metro Police. The streets around the illegal shop were cordoned off to keep the lookie-loos, rubber neckers and snatch-thieves at bay. The sniffling Cross Stitch was cut down from the lamp post, placed in hobbles and led into an armored wagon to be sent off to jail.

As the ERP began to haul out the goods from the shop, Sunset had cast an illusion on her armor, making it look like standard Equestrian Royal Police barding and slipped away. She had the name of the griffon poacher and his last known location. His name is Gordon and according to Cross Stitch, he was last known to be operating outside of Manehattan, the city where that maned ape was captured when it was being pursued by poachers. He would have moved locations long since and his trail gone cold, but clues could be gleaned from his camp...when she found it, that would help to figure out where he was heading to.

Sunset entered into the Shadow Guard secret house, one of many across the nation, that served as her base of operations while in Whinnyapolis. She made her way to the small room that served as her private quarters and pulled a map of Equestria from its case. She studied the map. Manehattan was south of Whinnyapolis. She pulled open the drawer on the nightstand by the gad to retrieve a quill and inkpot. Her eyes lingered on the small keepsake locket, the only personal item she carried that wasn't necessary for her mission. Opening the locket, she looked at the small wedding photo of her and her wife, Wallflower Blush, on their wedding day. Seeing the photo made her heart ache, this was the first time in ten years she had spent this much time away from the mare she loved.

Sunset remembered the day she had first met Wallflower. The green earth pony mare was attending Maretropolis University as a botany major. The moment her light teal eyes had made contact with those brown eyes, she was instantly smitten. Between Wallflower's near-crippling social anxiety and hectic school schedule, it made talking to her nearly impossible. But being the captain of the Shadow Guard and Celestia's sword meant that she'd often accomplish no less that three impossible things a day.

Sunset let her mind linger on Wallflower. Her wife would be thirty-three next summer. Sunset was eighty-seven. Being the mortal foal of an alicorn, plus being heavily imbued with Celestia's magic to become her sword and flame meant she aged slower than other ponies. The only other ponies who understood this were the members of the Twilight clan, Their clan founder had been the sword of Celestia and Luna. The history books had hailed the founder of the Twilight clan as a hero, losing her life thwarting an iron wolf hunting pack. The history books were often wrong, with Celestia being the one who levitated the quill that edited them.

Contempt for her mother rose up in Sunset and she struggled to shove it aside, supplanting it with the memories of of the warmth of her wife's body pressed against her back and her breath tickling the hairs of her ear.

Sunset gently closed the locket and gingerly returned it back to its spot in the drawer. Pulling the stopper from the inkpot, she dipped the the tip of the quill in it, tapped it on the lip of the inkpot to knock away the excess and began marking out locations on the countryside outside of Manehattan where the poacher's camps might have been. She also marked out the location from memory of looking over many, many times the old maps of Equestria where a broken highway paved with crystalline cobbles ran. The old broken highway ran in a north-south route that, according to the old maps, looped towards the Everfree basin. Occasionally somepony would dig up a few crystalline cobbles of that old highway and it would kick off an archaeological dig in an attempt to uncover and preserve something from Equestria's ancient history. As a foal, Sunset had asked her mother about that ancient highway. Celestia would always become cagey and dodgy, changing the topic.

Sunset hated thinking about her mother. Though growing up in the palace in Canterlot, she rarely saw her mother. On the times she did, Celestia was always too tired or distracted to spend any time with her.

Sunset paused what she was doing to look at her left forehoof. She focused on the runes that were etched into it, though hard to see unless the light hit her hooves just right or she supercharged her magic, Celestia had personally etched them into her hooves herself. The thought of this caused phantom itches in her frogs. Celestia had put her through a brutal, grueling and torturous training regimen. The regimen made her physically stronger, faster and greatly increased her endurance, it also greatly increased her magical wellspring which allowed her to use much more powerful spells, and the training made her resistant to torture and interrogation techniques. Each time she completed a tier of the training, Celestia would etch a rune into one of her hooves with a tool made from sun-gold that looked like a very thin ice pick. Once she had finished the training and the last of the runes were etched into her hooves, Celestia funneled solar magic into her body until she thought she was going to burn away into ash.

Sunset had always had a natural knack for mind magic and fire magic. After Celestia had put her through the training regimen, etched runes into her hooves and funneled solar magic into her, her abilities were greatly increased. Before the training she could hear the thoughts of others if she focused her magic on them, now she could see and hear the thoughts of others with just a touch of her hoof, induce fear, panic, calm, or compel others to speak the truth by locking her eyes on them and focusing her magic, she could also induce mass fear or calm in crowds by focusing her magic on the area, not that she needed to use that ability as her reputation when in armor usually did it. Before she could light candles by focusing her magic on their wick or move tongues of flame in a fire place about the room in her magic, now she could unleash waves of flame that could turn a city block to ashes, hurl bolts and balls of flame that could make glass run like water, and fire a beam so hot that it could melt through the door of a bank vault in minutes. These terrible abilities she constantly had to keep in check lest she harmed an innocent bystander, or worse...her wife.

The thoughts of what Celestia had put her through put Sunset in a sour mood. She rolled up the map and returned it to its case. Putting the quill and inkpot on the nightstand, she walked into the small adjoining bathroom to get a drink of water. She looked in the mirror as she filled the glass with water from the sink. "Fuck you, you old nag. You always know how to get what you want from anypony, don't you? If it wasn't for poachers, like the ones who maimed Minty, I would have slashed your throat with my sword. That wouldn't kill you, but you wouldn't be able to talk to anypony for weeks until your voice box healed." She blew out an angry sigh before downing the water in the glass. "I'm not doing this for her. I'm doing this for the innocents that these poachers have harmed or will harm."

Gordon finished erecting the tent that would serve as his headquarters. It had taken him a few weeks travelling along that ancient broken highway, but now he was at his intended destination, a grouping of hot springs atop a plateau that gave him a vantage point of the surrounding terrain. Once camp was finished being set up, he sent three griffons off in the directions of Stalliongrad, Marescow and Whinnyapolis with identical letters. Their orders were to locate one of the employees of The Broker and give them the letter.

Gordon stood on the edge of the plateau and looked down at the broad circular plain that sat at the base of the ice capped mountains that marked the southern edge of the Frozen North. Ponies avoided this plain, telling stories of ghost ponies who seemed to be milling about aimlessly and a smoky apparition that would be floating along the rim of the glaciers. Normally he would have written stories like that off if it weren't the fact that there were watch towers and small forts sparsely dotted around the edges of that frozen plain. The solar princess had ordered them built a long time ago to watch for something, and he didn't know what was to be watched for.

Gordon's eyes traced along the edge of a large glacier and a shiver ran up his spine. It felt like something was watching him.

***

Nguyen Suchen1 lay curled up in the fetal position in this cage. Weeks ago she had given up on wishing to go home. She had given up on calling out for her mommy. All she knew now was this cage, those mean and scary cat-chickens, and those scary dog-monsters. Home was a slowly fading memory.

Her tummy ached and gurgled as it had been days since she had eaten. Those mean and scary cat-chickens rarely fed her, and when they did, it was usually a hunk of bloody, raw meat. At first she turned her nose up at the raw meat, but soon enough hunger overtook her and she would gobble down the raw meat when they tossed it into her cage. She was exhausted, but whenever those mean and scary cat-chickens caught her sleeping, they'd rattle the cage or jab her with the butt of a spear while squawking at her.

When Suchen did get sleep, there would be this nice and pretty dark blue horse who would show up in her dreams, singing soft songs to her, tell her silly stories and reassure her that help was looking for her, that she just had to be brave and hang on.