> Grogar's Bitter Past
>  by DarkLadyTrinket
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Chapter 1
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Once upon a time over a million moons ago the lands of Ungulatia there was naught but darkness, rock, ice and mist. A barren landscape where nothing lived and had gone unnamed and unknown for moons and moons. Until a twinkle in the darkness lit up, twice.

A pale blue mare with cyan, turquoise, medium blue and white-blue hair set hoof upon the land. She stretched her too small wings and lowered her horn to the rock she found herself before.

She flicked her tail. "Where are we, Grogar?" She turned around to ask the second being that had emerged from seemingly out of thin air, a pale blue ram with red eyes and large curly darker blue horns.

"I do not know, Cosmos Sea." The ram bleated and turned his head one way and the other way in search of something. Anything to indicate where they were.

Cosmos Sea shivered, "It's cold and I can barely see anything."

Grogar felt around on the ground and finding two rocks he grumbled. "If we had any timber."

The alicorn closed her eyes and sighed, "I wish we had light." From her horn a glowing light flickered.

The ram gasped. "Cosmos Sea! Your horn is glowing."

"Horn!?" She blinked open her eyes and tilted her head, but she could not see. 

Grogar moved around her to examine her and gasped. "You've got wings! Can you fly?"

"I... I don't know. Would have been nice to have wings before."

Grogar dipped his head in agreement. "It would have indeed. Does your flank still hurt?"

Cosmos Sea lifted her left hindleg. Gave it a couple of shakes. "No. It's like... it didn't happen at all." She placed her muzzle between Grogar's horns. "What about your burns?"

Grogar huffed. "I'm fine," he paused brows furrowed. "Well, that's different. I don't feel a lick of agony."

She leaped back and stared into the ram's red eyes with her own pale violet. "I told you to tell me if you were in pain, we could have stopped to rest."

He gave his entire body a shake as he shook his horns side to side and stomped his feet. "No, we couldn't have. I was their next meal, but you Cosmos Sea, you would have been fine."

"I don't care, Grogar. I care about you, no way was I letting them do that to you."

"Right, and now we're stuck in... some facimile of the Underworld. Maybe we didn't make it?"

"That's silly. Come on, lets find shelter from the cold."

Their sides brushed as they moved, using Cosmos Seas' horn light to guide them.

That night they found shelter, but without any light they knew not when night or day began and came to an end. Nor did they have food or water to sustain them.

"I think we need to find a way out of this place, Cosmos Sea. I wont let you take the fall for helping me."

"I wanted to help you. You're my greatest friend."

"You're my only friend." Grogar placed his muzzle over the pony's nape.

Cosmos Sea lifted her head, and the ram lifted his. Their eyes locked. "You're more than a friend to me Grogar."

The ram gulped. "Really? I'm not a pony."

"What does that matter? I'm not an ewe. But if you don't feel the same, I'm happy to just be your friend."

"Cosmos Sea, my heart was already yours. And if it hadn't been, your bravery and aid would have begun my fall."

The mare smiled and then stood. "I just wish there was daylight," her body shook as it began to glow, light streamed from the tip of her horn and blasted into the sky. A fiery ball of light lit up the sky. 

Grogar's eyes widened at the sight. "That's amazing, Cos-" he turned to look at her only to leap forward when he noticed her legs wobble and she began toppling over. He leaped forward and placed his body against hers to keep her from falling to the rocky ground below their hooves.

"Cosmos Sea?" Grogar whispered once the mare was on the ground and touched his muzzle to hers.

She opened her eyes, "I... I'm alright. I think," her words came out quiet and shaky, entire body paler than moments before. When she tried to get up she slipped back.

"Clearly you are not."

They glanced at one another and then looked up to the sky, only to have to duck their heads to avoid the sting of the fiery ball's light.

"You created a sunstar," Grogar gaped.

"I don't know how."

"Magic. At the cost of your health. I don't like it."

A quiet laugh escaped the mare. "What do you like?"

The ram ducked his head, a slight tinge of pink appearing and disappearing over his cheeks. "Food. Water." He lifted his head. "You."

Cosmos Sea blinked, and a soft smile transformed her countenance giving her back her color. "I do wish we had food and water."

From her hooves to her wings and her horn light lit her entire being up. All of it concentrated into the tip of her horn and where there had been nothing but a pit of rocks water began to flow. Along the banks of the new waterway grass grew and flowers bloomed. On each side of an apple tree grew, reaching across for one another their canopies twisting around to combine them. Below their roots reached across the water and brushed against each others roots and a small island appeared in the middle. Some of the larger rocks surrounded the island.

Grogar stared wide eyed at the sight and then looked back at the alicorn. "Cosmos Sea!"

Her body shook as she closed her eyes, breath coming in hard and shaky. "I... I... don't know what's going on, Grogar."

"I think you should take a rest from this magic. It clearly is harming you in some way."

"You may be right, dear Grogar. I'm quite tired." Her stomach grumbled.

"Then you rest." He turned to stare at the apple trees. "I'll get us something to eat, I hope you like apples."

She giggled. "What pony doesn't like apples?"

"None that I'm aware of."

"Yet."

They both laughed while Grogar knocked his horns against the tree, causing apples to fall. A few were swept downstream, but he managed to kick a couple toward Cosmos Sea and caught one in his mouth and another on one of his curled horns.

Once beside the pony again, the ram lay down and rolled two of the apples closer to her. "Have a bite, Cosmos Sea."

She opened her eyes and blinked. "A golden apple?"

"Yeah. The rest are red."

"You didn't want this one?"

"I'm not the one who collapsed."

"Thank you." She plucked the apple off his horn and put it in front of his hooves.

The two of them chomped down on their apples.

"These are better than the ones we had back home," Grogar said between bites.

"That wasn't home. If it had been, we'd never have been hurt."

He blinked. "You're right. But its where I was born."

"Me too."

"Where we both grew up."

"A big place that kept us separated."

"I'm glad you're with me, Grogar."

"I wouldn't want to be with anyone else, Cosmos Sea."

She touched the end of her muzzle to his and then turned back to finish the golden apple.

Grogar blinked. "You're glowing."

"What?" She stared down at herself. She was giving off a glow, sparkles dancing around her body from hoof to horn, from muzzle end to tail tip. "Why?"

"I don't know. Maybe it was the golden apple?"

A disembodied voice spoke, a clarion of sound. "These realms have long been dead, but now new life has begun to spread, Cosmos Sea do not your alicorn destiny dread, for in you all magic has been imbed, your coming has been foresaid, the center of life here has begun at this riverbed, now that a world of hurt you have fled, forward tomorrow do carefully tread, and may love light the path ahead, it is up to you to forge the first homestead, for you are the center of these lands long dead, your life now has been read, your old life shed, no escape from Ungulatia ahead, into a new era by you lead."

The voice disappeared while Comos Sea pressed her side into Grogar's.

"What... what was that!?"

"I don't know," Grogar ground out, pressing himself against the mare as he looked all around. "Whatever it was, I wont let it hurt you."

In the days to come Cosmos Sea would think of something that she wanted and if she felt it with all her heart and soul, it came to be. More rivers flowed, forming lakes and oceans. More trees and flowers grew and bloomed. Bees began to buzz, butterflies fluttered about. So many plants, insects, and small fish.

Grogar helped by downing trees to build a shelter and planting seeds given off by the trees he downed to replace each one with five seedlings or more.

"You want magic too, don't you Grogar?" Cosmos Sea asked one day as the sun began to dip down the horizon.

"As long as I have you, Cosmos Sea, I have no need of magic. I only wish it did not take so much out of you."

They placed their heads on each other's shoulders.

"I know. But I can't stop it. When I want something so desperately, or longingly, it just bubbles up from deep inside and creates what was missing."

"There has to be an easier way."

"If we could bring ponies, rams and ewes from our previous life..."

"No. I don't think any of them survived."

"The ponies?"

"They were unkind to you. And we don't know how to even bring them here. We couldn't escape even when you've wished it."

She sighed and closed her eyes. "I know. I care for you dearly, Grogar, but I wish we had friends, others to talk to. A family."

Grogar hummed. "A family would be nice. But as a pony and a ram that doesn't seem possible."

She lifted her head and nudged her muzzle against his till their eyes met. "Anything is possible with magic and a golden apple."

"Those apples don't grow often, my heart."

"I know. But I found one earlier. Maybe you should eat it?"

"No, those are for you."

"Thank you, dear Grogar." Cosmos Sea used her horn to bring the golden apple to her and she munched down on it with the ram watching her with furrowed brows.

"Be careful, my heart."

"Fear not, my darling, I only wished to bring life to a family for us."

And before them both as they touched flank to flank, shoulder to shoulder small lifeforms emerged.

At the riverside, a pony with only two front legs appeared, at the other end a tail fin: otherwise known as a hippocamp. Chocolate brown and white with green eyes and darker green hair. At the shore inside the tree, a dryad pony. Standing closer to them, an earth pony, a unicorn, a pegasus, a flutter pony, four smaller flutter type ponies representing each of the four seasons, a gryphon, a chicken, and a dragon.

Cosmos Sea gasped as if she could barely breath.

Grogar nudged her, "No more! I refuse to lose you. Also, this is too many babies to take care of." He stared at them all with wide eyes.

Cosmos Sea pressed against Grogar. "One more."

"You can't."

But it was too late. Her head fell, her body limp save for the shallowest breaths as a little ewe pressed itself against Grogar's front legs.

Grogar knew none of them shared blood, for they were all created with magic by Cosmos Sea. But she had created them so they were her children and for his love of her they were his children too. 

He glared at them all, "If Cosmos Sea is lost," he grit his teeth. 

"I'll be okay, Grogar," Cosmos Sea sighed and slept. Slept for days while Grogar wrangled so many babies. Too many.

Then Cosmos Sea awoke, and she smiled at the pile of babies as she slept next to both tree and river. "Grogar, they love you so."

"And I love you, so I made sure they survived. But they're more than one hoofful."

The next golden apple, Cosmos Sea insisted that Grogar consumed. And not wanting to upset her, the ram nibbled and felt stronger, lighter, younger.

"Ungulatia is our home, Grogar, and I want you to be with me, forever."

"Me too, Cosmos Sea."

Moons and moons passed and more and more ponies and ewes and rams, as well as other ungulates entered the world through magic means.

Then one day Cosmos Sea sighed. "Do you remember how they branded us long ago?"

"I don't like to remember that dreadful place."

"Neither do I, but it would be nice to replace the brand with something else. Something all of us could enjoy."
"Like something that represents you and your personality?"

"Hopes and dreams."

"Talents?"

"Something like that." And as she dreamed that night she awoke to find herself floating even though her wings unlike the pegasi she'd wished to life in the world of Ungulatia didn't allow her flight, something tingled on her flanks. She turned her head and blinked as stars formed, paler than her body. "Wow," she gasped.

Grogar awoke beside her. "What, what is it!?" He leaped up as if altered to some danger only to blink at the sight of Cosmos Sea's flank. "Your brand is gone."

"I know. Isn't it cute?"

"Cutie Mark?"

"Yes, that's what it is. I wonder if the others have them."

They went to investigate. Some ponies had them, while other ponies, especially younger ones had a blank flank. None of the ewes and rams, or other non ponies had any.

"I'm sorry, Grogar..."

"Never mind that, my heart. As long as you are safe and well I am happy. And look, the kids don't seem to care one whit.""

As the moons went by, Cosmos Sea though she remained unaging, fell into a longer and longer sleep. The land swallowed her whole, shortly after she exclaimed, "Grogar, I'm with child. Our child! Together we'll have a little one. I can't wait to see him or her." But before Grogar could respond the disembodied voice appeared to Grogar as vines and roots tangled around Cosmos Sea's legs, horn, tail, and wings.

"Cosmos Sea her duty done, all of Ungulatia she has finespun, her part forerun, shall rest forevermore and cannot be undone, at the center of the world where go none."

Grogar tried to follow his beloved Cosmos Sea, only to be expelled by the roots of the trees. But he would not give up and ate each and every golden apple to extend his life knowing she still lived even if she had been cursed to rest forever at the center of the world she'd brought to life with her heart and soul. But as moons and moons passed and ponies and other creatures began to forget he grew more and more bitter with every loss of their children. In none of them did their blood flow, and they had forgotten Cosmos Sea and so too him. But that they had forgotten her boiled his blood. 

Anger continued to consume him, and he found the metal she had begun to forge for the last gift she'd begun to make for him. A bell. Infused with the last traces of her magic. Ponies were meant to willingly give him a bit of their magic, as tribute to him and his care of the only known Alicorn, Cosmos Sea, and his love of their children, the first generation of each ungulate. But he twisted it into something else.

"They don't deserve the magic if they have forgotten everything. If they have no respect for their history." 

Worst yet, they had all divided. Earth Pony's, Unicorn's, and Pegasi alike. Each arguing with one another leading to great losses and broken hearts. Each driving off the other to far more distant lands than the river where the first life had sprung. Leaving Grogar on his own, for even the rams and ewes had been driven off by all the ponies. Only the Dryads remained. The seapony's - or hippocamps - had left the river. But the dryads were connected to their trees and could not live without them. Grogar left them alone and only tore down trees where none had taken up residence.

But even trees could not live forever and so he was left alone at the home he and Cosmos River had been at peace only for the world to take away his heart and leave him stone cold and filled with bitterness and rage.

"The magic will be mine, and they will bow before me. I will get you back Cosmos Sea," and if he could not, he would take his revenge on those who had forgotten her and the sacrifices she made to bring their ancestors into the world.