> The Lost Power
>  by helix412
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Prologue: The History of the Elements of Power
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Everyone has heard about the Elements of Harmony and how they, along with their wielders, have saved Equestria multiple times over. However, the other half of the history, the whole reason that the Elements succeeded, has been lost.  In the beginning, there was Discord.  He was to keep the world at peace. Unfortunately, from the moment he was created, his mind was twisted, constantly craving chaos.  The Mother of All Things decided that the world needed balance, so she created Celestia and Luna to bring peace and subdue Discord, as she herself lacked the ability to do so.  

After 200 years of peace, Discord had had enough of their attempts to seize his power. The sisters counteracted the chaos he created, so he created three servants, the “Sumes”,  to do his dirty work while he held off the sisters.  He spent two years gathering the materials for his servants of disharmony. Nocturne, the embodiment of fear and unrest, was created from a thorny rose, a thunder cloud and a flare from Celestia’s sun; Thanatares, embodiment of anger and rage, was created from the horns of a bull, the muscle of an ox, and a rock from Luna’s moon; and Contonin, embodiment of sadness and resentment, was created from a tear from Discord, a raincloud, and a feather from each alicorn princess.  When he was finished he looked at his creations, and he knew he was in the presence of what would become the three most feared creatures in Equestria. He sent them off to do their work, with the words “It will fall into disarray, and its leaders with it.” The Mother of All Things looked upon Discord, and regretted that she created this being that would stop at nothing to destroy the world. She couldn’t destroy him, for that was not her place, but she could help the world defend itself.  

After careful planning and preparation, the protective measures were ready: the Elements of Power; Will, Spirit and Strength. A problem, however, quickly became evident. There was no one to accept them, except for the ones who lived on the world below.  While looking for the right ones to wield the Elements of Power, she decided that they would find their own masters.  Thus, she released them on the world, giving them the ability to seek out potential wielders, beings who represented their given traits. Time, however, was growing thin as the Sumes began to gain power.  It didn’t take long for the Elements to find their respective masters, who were avid allies of Celestia and Luna, members of their guard, who followed the sisters in hope of bringing peace to the land of disarray. They would become the key to the fall of Discord and his demons.

One of the guards was a captain of the troops, another was a flight specialist, and the third was an intelligence and reconnaissance agent. They all had something in common: they trusted indefinitely that they had the strength, will, and trust in each other to overcome any obstacle or foe that they might face.

Once the guards received the Elements, they went to the Princesses to tell them about their new abilities. It was already evident by the physical changes that took place as a result of the new powers that they could be used. It was decided that Celestia and Luna would take care of Discord, while the three held off the Sumes.  As the battle began, the guards realized that the Elements had weaknesses, but were able to hold them off long enough for the Princesses to seal Discord in stone along with the Sumes.

Or so they thought.

When the Sumes were presumed gone, the guards were released so that they could live their lives in peace, but were advised to be ready if Discord and his Sumes returned. They vowed to do so and left with the biggest ceremony in Equestrian history.  The Element of Will met an herbalist, built what is now Zecora’s hut, and lived there in peace for the rest of his days.  The Element of Trust didn't enjoy the forest, so he created a cottage on its edge, caring for all who wandered by.  The Element of Strength wanted nothing more than to keep his family happy, and did so by creating a small apple orchard that formed a basis for a future, larger farm.

As the years rolled on, Equestria fell into another period of peace that would stay until Discord returned to have his revenge far in the future.  The wielders of the Elements of Power lived their lives, quiet and happy, and when they died the Elements existed in the form pendants that their families kept safe to be passed down for generations until forgotten.  These pendants held the abilities of the Element along with the natural abilities of the user; one held the strengths of an earth pony, the other magic of a unicorn, and the last the flight of a Pegasus.  Unfortunately, the Elements were lost; one lost to a feud and stolen, another to a careless foal in the new orchard, and the last to somepony’s paranoia, hidden and forgotten.  Thus, the Elements were lost to time until they were needed again to defend the Elements of Harmony and their wielder(s).

A few hundred years later, Nocturne escaped and went looking for revenge on the two sisters. He found Luna as she was raising the Moon, and turned her into a nightmare; Nightmare Moon. The wielders of the Elements of Power were gone by this time, so Celestia resorted to her only other option: the Elements of Harmony.  When Nightmare Moon was banished to the moon, Nocturne went with her, but Celestia feared that the other Sumes were loose and created the Royal Guard in hope that the Elements of Power would find new wielders. None presented themselves. Even then, neither she nor any pony else had any idea where the Elements were.  After the banishment of Nightmare Moon, the Griffon Kingdom, in the north, broke all connections to the pony government, and the fear or war enveloped both countries inhabitants. But no war or conflict ever ensued between the two countries; merely distrust and keeping a close eye on each other.

Although there was mistrust and hatred, there was no real threat to the Elements of Harmony. The Elements of Power simply remained dormant and hidden.  As time passed, the Elements of Power were lost to history, along with any memory of them or the Sumes. Even Celestia's memory about the Sumes faded overtime, the Elements of Power, and her motivations in forming the Royal Guard. But all was finally at peace.

Unfortunately, since there were few ponies capable of recording this moment in history, there was little to nothing recorded on the Elements or their wielders, dooming the knowledge of what they did or why they were created to obscurity. That brings us to the present, where the Elements are about to let their presence be known after their 2000 year sleep...
> Chapter 1:Portals and Problems
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Today was an ordinary Saturday. I was home with Derrick and Joe, a couple of my frends, doing what we always do on the weekends: talk. Nothing fancy, just talk. But we all enjoyed it.  Conversations would typically revolve around what the week was like, then to things at home, and then we always go to the inevitable MLP topic. We once tried to go a week without talking about it. It just wasn’t possible.  Well, today was typical. Derrick was talking about the fan-fic he was writing, and then Joe went on about all the art, and I talked about the music and the PMV’s. Nothing much, just talking. But when the day was over, I could never escape the feeling that something was missing.

I was a smaller built person, and I did appear to be *slightly* ripped, but nothing too extreme. I was the tallest of our group, standing at 6’, and my hair was a darker red and cut short. Many people have told me that my eye color changes based on my mood, and that they’re normally green or brown. If anything was a prominent feature on me, it would have been my legs. If I full-on kicked something, it would most likely break due to the power behind it.  Unfortunately, I was quite a wimp when it came to upper body strength. I didn’t think much of it, since I rarely needed it, but I had enough to lift Joe if I needed to.  If I were to be seen in shorts, then I must have been running or biking. Otherwise, I’d always wear cargo pants, a T-shirt, a sweatshirt (even in the summer), and a pair of sunglasses.  I was normally the craziest of the bunch; granted, I was normally calm on the outside, but I have crazy ideas, and if there is one I’ll do it without question.

Derrick was almost as tall as me, and had longer black hair. It’s very uncommon to find him without a smile and a glint in his golden eyes. Derrick was a swimmer, so he’s way more chiseled than I am, but still nothing to the extreme. His legs, however, were still no match for mine.  Derrick could put many to shame with his smile; that’s Derrick: always happy. If he’s anything but that, then something drastic has happened and it needs to be fixed fast. Derrick is more down to Earth than I am, but he has had his share of crazy ideas. If both he and I get together, the fire department is most likely going to have a busy day.

Joe, on the other hand is probably my opposite, as looks go.  He has quite a bit more mass than both Derrick and I, and if he ever ran, it most likely meant it was the Apocalypse. Granted, he has quite the muscle mass behind him, but what Joe excels at is that he's significantly smarter than either Derrick or I. Now, neither of us are dumb, far from it, but Joe certainly excels at it.  We swear it’s the beard that Joe has become accustomed to having; he knows how to look his best with it. One can always tell when Joe has an idea by the way he strokes his beard, stares off into the distance, and a gets a glint in his brownish eyes.  Joe’s the one that keeps us grounded; if Derrick and I get an idea that’s just nuts, he’ll let us know.


All of us sat there, talking and thinking. Somehow, we began wondering about the scientific possibility that Equestria existed. After pondering for a few minutes, Joe said, “Well, assuming that type III parallel universes exist, it’s not just a possibility that it could be real. It’s in inevitability. We just need to get to the alternate in which it exists. Of course, unconfirmed theories and all that nice stuff.” Joe was always the more intellectual one of us. Don’t get me wrong, we were all smart. It just showed more in Joe. Besides, we all enjoyed thinking about the impossible happening.  
About an hour (and numerous topic changes) later, we heard a crash in my room. Thinking that my dog knocked something over, we wanted to see if he was tangled and we could get him out, not to mention pick up the mess. But when we got there, we saw that there was no mess. 

Just the closet door was blown off its hinges.

Once Derrick got there he said “It’s a good thing your parents aren’t here this week. Otherwise, they would be kind of mad”
Then Joe smirked “Yeah, they’d be… just a little ticked.” I say that all the time when something gets on my nerves, which is surprisingly often. So, it’s become a sort of inside joke.

“OK, funny guys. Could we just please get my door off the floor?” But when I went to pick it up, something caught my eye. There was something in my closet, and when I went to see what it was I was shocked to see something that resembled an Ender portal from Minecraft. “Hey guys, you might want to see this” 

When they saw the portal Derrick almost fell over and, if it was possible, Joe’s jaw dropped to the floor (despite him being oblivious to all things Minecraft).  I was a little nervous, and asked, “Where do you think it goes?” 

“Well, probably the Nether,” Derrick replied a little sarcastically.

Joe was standing right in front of the portal “Well if it does, I suggest that we go to the other side, take a look around.” We liked the idea, but Derrick and I knew what was likely on the other side, and kept our distance. Joe started to approach it, for science I imagine.
Right as he was about to go through, Derrick yelled, “WAIT! If it really IS like the Nether we’re going to need some equipment. I suggest we go home, get supplies, and meet back here tomorrow morning.” We all agreed. Tomorrow morning, we’d see what this was about.

That night I just sat in front of the portal, wondering what could be on the other side. I was tired, but I don’t sleep much anymore. The nightmares I’ve been, which revolve around the binding, torturing, and murdering of me and my closest friends, having been getting worse. I couldn’t bear to see anyone else die in front of me.  It has been a few months since they started. At first they mortified me, and I woke up with major pain where I have been hit in my dream, in a cold sweat and pale.  At first it was just one person getting killed in front of me, but now it’s everyone that I have ever cared about. The way they were killed was the most gruesome thing that I have ever witnessed.  So now all I do is take small naps and draw, but I’ve paid heavily; I have little to no energy, even making walking a struggle on occasion.  Recently I’ve been crashing and end up sleeping for days, where I would wake up in agonizing pain from the monster of my dreams.  So, I went another night without sleeping, just sitting there drawing the portal and all of its wisps as it quietly hummed on.  When I finished I noticed that it was 4:00AM. “Well better get ready.” Ever since I started staying up, I have been talking to myself. Maybe just to keep myself company, but I didn’t mind. At least I knew that I was awake.

I looked at the clock, which said it was 6:12AM. “Well that didn’t take long, but at least I have everything ready.” Everything that I collected for the trip was now lying on my bed: a back pack with speaker system (the aptly named “Bass-Pack”), 25 protein bars, a multi tool, iPod, and my knife.  I had nothing else to do ‘till Derrick and Joe arrived, so I took a shower and got ready for our trip. I put on a pair of cargo pants and a T shirt but, there was something missing. “Where are my sun glasses?” Considering my nickname of “Shades,” it was kind of important that I have them. So, for the next hour I looked for my iconic sunglasses, but to no avail. I went to go scratch my head to find that they were on my head the whole time. Derp. “You’ve got to be kidding me! Oh well, at least I found them.” Now that I was done, all I could do until they arrived was sharpening my already razor-like knife. “Oh, that’s something I could pack. My sharpener ought to come in handy.” It wasn’t anything special, just a basic sharpening stone. But it worked for me, so I went to work till my knife cut paper with almost no effort.  When I was done and had everything packed up, there was a knock at the door. I glanced at the clock, which said 8:45AM, and opened the door.  Derrick and Joe were there, and looked ready to take on the world. Derrick brought some snacks a change of clothes and his Zelda-esque Master sword.

“MAN, was this dull. I couldn’t sleep, so I just sharpened it all night.” I then looked at Joe. All he had was his katana (which he calls “Azura”), and a small bag if clothes.  After we got something to eat, we went back to my room (more specifically my closet), but when we got there, there was a black and blue smog emanating from the portal. We thought nothing of it, thinking it was just part of the portal. 

After a few minutes of just standing there, I said “So who’s going first?” No one said anything, which prompted Derrick to step forward, clearly a little ticked, saying, “I’LL go, since you guys are just going to stand there.” Derrick stepped forward and entered the portal. When he did so, he shot forward and was gone.

All Joe and I did was stand there, not wanting to know what would happen. We eventually decided that we would go at the same time.  We were about to enter when I realized that I was missing something.

“Wait, I forgot some things.” I ran back into the room and grabbed my sunglasses and knife. When I got back Joe looked puzzled, but he said nothing.  When we were ready, again Joe decided that he would just walk in. But I wanted to jump in, so I asked him to go first so that I could enter when he had gone through. He took a deep breath and walked in. Just like Derrick, he was whisked away.  Seeing both of my friends go through the portal worried me. I began to wonder, “What if they didn’t make it? What if there is no other side?” Figuring that I need to know and that it was worth the risk, I got a running start and jumped into the portal yelling “Here we go!”

Entering the portal, there was a feeling of weightlessness. Then I was pulled forward extremely quickly; I didn’t dare breathe, because it felt like the air rushing in my lungs might cause them to explode.  It took only about 20 seconds to reach the other side, but it felt like an hour. When I finally reached the ground, I instantly fell to my knees and blacked out.  When I came to my senses I saw three things standing over me, but I couldn’t initially tell who it was. While my vision was clearing, I saw and accounted for my friends: Derrick, Joe and Twilight Sparkle.

Wait…WHAT?!
	
> Chapter 2: Attack and Impact
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"OK hold it. What’s going on!?” I was beyond confused. I looked around and saw a field with a forest on one side, along with what looked like a forest the other. “Are… are we really here?” I asked Derrick.

“Yep, and I know why the portal appeared in our world.” As he was talking, Derrick gestured to a very embarrassed Twilight Sparkle.

“I’m sorry for putting the portal in your house. I didn’t mean to, but the spell puts the portal at the same geographical point in both dimensions.” Derrick and I were slightly confused, but once Twilight was done, Joe had every ounce of attention towards her begging to learn more, muttering something about wormholes and the survival of the human race. 

Before she started again, I interrupted. “So, could we see the town? I don’t like being so close to the Everfree Forest.” That’s when things started getting awkward. 

“How do you know about the town and the forest? This isn't your dimension; you've never been here before. How would you know about the local landmarks?” I knew this would have to be explained at one point or another, but I didn't realize that it had to happen so soon.  For the next hour, we sat on the edge of the forest explaining how we knew about everything: Discord, the Elements of Harmony, the Mane 6, the Princesses, and Ponyville. While we were talking, I got a strange feeling that something was watching us, but I said nothing.  Even when we were about to leave, I still had that feeling, so I looked into the forest. I saw nothing.

We started walking away, but as we did so, a Manticore jumped from its unseen position in the forest and into our vision.  Being the closest to it, I pulled out my small knife, and I heard Joe and Derrick pull their swords. I also heard some magic charging up after a short delay. This was going to be nothing short of a battle.

I wasn't that far from the creature, maybe 10 or 15 feet. I was scared, but I was not willing to run and risk anyone getting hurt.  At first it was just me and the Manticore, slowly circling each other, but once it pounced I realized just how surprisingly fast it was. I barely escaped one of its front paws. I yelled back to the small group, “Go get some help!”, but none of them moved.  When I called back, Derrick yelled, “LOOK OUT!” I turned just in time to watch the massive creature pounce on me and crush my arm as its paws hit the ground.

Once it hit the ground, my arm was flattened under the weight of the massive creature, and my backpack went flying. Strangely, it didn’t hurt. I looked over to see the paw flat on the ground.  I looked over to the horrified group and wanted to cry out for help, but then the pain hit like a ticked-off freight train. I yelled so hard it hurt, but it also surprised the Manticore enough that Joe and Derrick were able to hold it off while Twilight rushed over to look at my arm. I faced the other direction, not wanting to see the mangled mess that my arm became.  “THIS IS BAD! Very bad! But I think I know something to fix it!” Twilight stood over my arm, obviously quite panicked, and soon it was wrapped in a magical aura. Then more pain hit as I felt the shards of my bones knit back together and my tendons growing in size.  As she performed her spell, Joe and Derrick were trying to drive the Manticore back, but instead did the exact opposite. They were getting closer. Joe and Derrick are good swordsmen, but they were out of practice. The beast quickly blew through their defenses and tried for a swipe at Twilight. 

“Oh, no you don’t!” I reached her first and gave her a shove, breaking her concentration and getting her out of the beast’s reach. Unfortunately, this cleared the path for the claws to go through my chest.  While I couldn’t feel anything anymore, I knew that without immediate attention I would die. I looked to Twilight. She had some cuts, a few of which were bleeding, but none as bad as the four deep cuts in my chest.  Realizing that I was almost dead, Twilight abandoned my arm and started work on my chest with the other two redoubling their efforts to repel the beast.

“This is bad. I’ll need to work fast, but there may be some scarring.” 

I stared up and looked her straight in the eyes. “I’m dying right now! I think some scars aren't that big of an issue!” I said, failing to keep the annoyance out of my voice. 

“This is going to hurt a lot.”

“JUST DO IT!”  I was afraid that at this rate, I would die before I got to see this world.  Twilight began her spell on me, forgetting her cuts. I felt a few warm drips in the wound, but I thought it was just part of the spell. I faced the battle going on. The Manticore had cuts galore, but it kept fighting. Derrick was around its neck, riding it like a bull, and Joe was trying to force it back to the forest, now wielding his sword’s sheath as a secondary weapon itself.

All of this happened in a matter of minutes, but it felt like years. Joe and Derrick finally managed to drive the beast back into the forest. I was fully healed, but my shirt was destroyed and my mechanically-enhanced backpack laid in pieces on the ground. “Dang, I was going to use that,” I said as I looked at the piece of mangled machinery. “Oh well, I can probably fix it.” I picked up the pieces and put them into the bag. 

Derrick sat down for a moment. I imagine that thing was worse than any mad bull we have at home. Joe was exhausted as well, but he felt the need to check Derrick for injuries, being the closest thing to a doctor we had for a friend. He saw none, and then he went to examine my injuries. He noticed that my injuries were taken care of, and then he shifted to Twilight. He saw the cuts she had and immediately pulled a shirt and a bottle of water out of his bag of supplies. He tore a bit of the shirt off, got it a little wet, and offered it to her.

“Less than ideal gauze, but it should still work. We need to clean and apply some pressure to those cuts. Do you think you can press this on the wounds?”

“It’s just a few cuts. I’ll be fine.”

“Never underestimate the power of an open wound. Wouldn't want it to get infected now, would we?”

She gave Joe a look that admitted he was right, put the cloth up to her wounds with her magic, and we started walking towards town.  After a few seconds of awkward silence, Derrick said, “I think that could have been worse.”

I looked down at the marks going diagonally down my chest. “Why yes, Derrick, it could have been worse. I could have died, Twilight could have been crushed, one of you two might have been killed…”

“Ok, ok, I get it. I’m sorry. I was just saying it COULD have been worse. But I’m glad it wasn't.” 

We kept going, with Joe basically interrogating Twilight about the healing spell she just performed.  This continued until there was a loud “BOOM” in the sky. We looked up to see where the sound came from, instead seeing a rainbow shooting across the sky. 

“We haven’t even been here for an hour, and we see a Sonic Rainboom. This experience just became 20% cooler. ” Unfortunately, we were too awestruck to notice that the rainbow was coming straight for us.

It was one of those moments where if you blink, you miss it. Derrick was hit hard by the incoming spectrum, causing him and a cyan Pegasus to hit the ground hard enough to shake it.  Joe ran to Derrick to check on him.

“Hey Derrick, are you OK?” There was no answer, so Joe started thoroughly examining for injuries. After a while, he got up and said, “Wow. No lacerations, no broken bones, no anything, really. Just a bruise on his stomach and a bump on his head. We should still get it checked out once we get back to town.”

Knowing that they’d probably be sore when they woke up, we used some branches that we found and some rope that I discovered in my backpack to make a skid big enough to hold Derrick. I used the remains of my shirt to make a sling so that I could carry Rainbow Dash.  “I hope they don’t freak out when they wake up.” I carried Dash and Joe pulled the skid. Twilight was checking her friend for broken bones or a concussion, but found nothing. Joe kept pulling but never showed any sign of fatigue. Dash was surprisingly light, and while I was still recovering from the attack, I didn't want to put her down. She seemed so comfortable. “So, how much farther is Ponyville?” I asked. 

“About 4 minutes.”

When we walked into town, we attracted many glances. Some were confused, a few scared, but many were just curious.  We kept going, but Twilight stopped us for a moment. “I just remembered I have to go do something for Applejack. Can you find the library from here?” 

I looked around at the scenery. The sun was high and hurting my eyes, so I put on my sunglasses. “I think we can find it.” 
“Outstanding! Here’s my notebook. Give it to Spike so he’ll let you in.” With that, she went on her way, but as we started she yelled back, “Oh, and tell him to read the last page!” I nodded and started walking again.

After a few times getting lost, we finally arrived at the giant tree library. “Finally, we found it!” Joe said as I walked up to the door and knocked. No answer came so I knocked again, a bit more urgently this time. Still no answer. I was fed up so I decided to yell out, “SPIKE!” Then I heard small steps walking to the door.

“Yes?” He seemed frustrated, but his expression changed as he saw us. Knowing how menacing a stranger in sunglasses could be, I took them off.

“Spike, Twilight told me to give this to you.” I handed him the note book, then told him, “She also said to read the back page.” Spike seemed surprised, but read anyway.  When he was done, he asked us inside and showed us a guest room that was behind a bookshelf. 

“Well, here you go.” There were five beds, a fireplace, and a small table. 

“What’s with the secret room?” I asked as we put Derrick and Rainbow Dash into beds.

“Twilight needed more room for books, so she put a book shelf on the door. “Makes it a bit hard to tell that it’s a door.” I was puzzled, but told myself to ignore it. “Twilight wrote that you needed some rest.” I looked at a vacant bed, thanked Spike for his help, and lay down. Joe told me he was going to grab some books, to hopefully fill in the gaps of what we knew. I said that was a good idea, then pulled up the sheets and fell asleep.
	
> Chapter 3: Realization
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Joe's Point of View

After putting my things down on one of the beds, I noticed James was sincere about getting some rest. That was definitely a good idea, given his previous injuries. At least, that’s the logical thing to do.
And that’s what bothered me.
Going to Equestria is clearly impossible in real life; this HAD to be a dream. Still, I very rarely have dreams, and any I DO have are complete gibberish. Yet nearly everything in this one made relative sense. I couldn’t help but wonder what the sudden clarity was about for this one. Then again, we got sent through a magical portal into Equestria. That seemed pretty illogical, so it did fit the pattern. But then the issue of vividness came to the forefront. Never in my life have I had a dream in which I actually felt pain. Yet, when that Manticore attacked, I actually felt its strikes. Furthermore, I actually felt the stress of pulling Derrick along. Not to mention, everything I could see was clear as crystal, unlike the clouded, hazy nature of the rest. I thought I even smelled the grass.
It had to be a trick. The brain can do some curious things. I decided to sort through it when I woke up.
In the meantime, there were books to be read. No sense in not enjoying this while it lasted. Admittedly, I found the Manticore attack earlier a bit odd, so I looked for a book on creatures of the Everfree. Eventually, I found one (should’ve looked under “E” from the start), and began to read from it. I saw that there were “winged scorpo-leonic chimeras”, which sounded a lot like the Manticore we fought earlier. Unfortunately, it gave no reports on any leaving the forest, or even attacking without reason. I decided investigating further would be a waste of time, since I was going to wake up soon anyway.
The book also contained information on a variety of other creatures. I was familiar with some, such as the timberwolves and cockatrice, but there were some I’d not known about, including harpies and even a Terra Drake, a flightless, burrowing dragon. I recalled reading about the dietary habits of the Terra Drake, at which point I started to feel tired. I was a bit suspicious as to how I could be tired when I was already asleep, but I took it as dream logic. I just thought it signaled that it was time to wake up.
I closed my eyes and drifted off into the unconscious void.
A few seconds of black later from my perspective (although probably a few hours in real-time), I started to wake up. I didn’t open my eyes yet; that’s typically the last step I take. I wiggled around a bit, and noticed I wasn’t in my bed. I was sitting up in a wooden chair. There was also a pressure in my lap that seemed a bit hard. A…book?
It followed the events of the dream. Yet, I could tell that I was truly waking up. There was no way it could’ve been a dream from this point on. I thought this was strange, so I decided to see what was going on. I opened my eyes…
“AH!”
It was just as it was in the dream. I was in the library, with a book on the creatures of the Everfree resting on my lap. The world was like it was flash-drawn; outlines filled with a single color. It was a harsh departure from the realism I was used to seeing. Wait…used to seeing…?
“M-MY HAND! IT’S ALL FLASH-Y!”
As the saying goes, you know nothing better than the back of your hand. Someone renovated my anatomy. Where I could make out individual hairs and pores before was now only a solid mass of monotone flesh-tone. It surprised me, and I couldn’t help making a scene. I was in shock as to how radically different the look of the world was. 
After about three minutes of nonstop freaking out, I realized something.
I was in Equestria.
All my shock left me in that instant, replaced with joy. I didn’t care how many physical laws it broke; I was legitimately in Equestria. It’s the kind of thing that doesn’t happen in a lifetime. I couldn’t help but, again, make a scene of it.
“HA! IT DOES EXIST! I OWE YA TWENTY BUCKS, DERRICK!”
I remembered that Derrick and James came through with me. I expected some type of response from Derrick as a result. Yet, there was none.
“Derrick?”
Silence.
“DERRICK!”
I figured he must have been in that secret room from earlier. I went into the room, and saw three figures on different beds: Derrick, lying flat on his back; Rainbow Dash, curled up and shivering; and James, tensing various muscles at random times, seemingly in response to something. But, my business was with Derrick. I started to shake him, first gently, then gradually worsening to the point that the bed began moving. Eventually, it worked.
“Ugh…” He slowly opened his eyes, then put his hands in front of them, as if the light was causing him some type of pain.
“Look around, pal. I owe you twenty buc- *ahem* bits!”
“You’re just now realizing this? You’ve been here nearly as long as I have.” He rubbed his head, as if it were in pain.
“I thought it was a dream! This sort of thing doesn’t make sense, so I assumed this was something it wasn’t. I was wrong! And you know what, Derrick?”
“What?” This was followed shortly by Derrick gripping his head more tightly and letting out an “agh.”
“I’M GLAD THAT I WAS WRONG! I, BARTHOLOMEW JOSEPH ROLLINS, AM GLAD THAT I WAS WRONG!”
I said that a bit loudly, causing Derrick to grip his ears in a futile attempt to block the pain. Until then, I had been oblivious to his signs of distress. I decided to ask him the obvious question I was too excited to ask him in the beginning.
“Y’OK, Derrick?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. My head just hurts a little and I can’t remember the past few…time. Do you remember what happened?”
… I did remember. In my excitement, I had either blocked it out or just not thought about it. Twice today alone, our lives were threatened. Perhaps this isn’t the utopia I thought it was. Two separate events that tried to take our lives…
“Joe? Do you remember?”
“Oh, yeah. Kinda spaced off there. You were hit by a supersonic rainbow pegasus.”
Derrick seemed confused, but I just attributed that to the trauma. He didn’t say anything on the matter, just gave me a funny look and started rubbing his head again.
Then, Spike walked into the room, looking annoyed and tired, carrying a blanket.
“Can you keep it down? I’m trying to take a nap.” He yawned after he was done talking.
“Oh, sorry. I guess I got a little *ahem* carried away there.” It was then that I realized something had been off this entire time. “Where’s Twilight?”
“Dunno. She never told me where she was going.”
“Didn’t she write it down in that notebook?”
“Nope. Just a list of things I had to do.”
“How long was I asleep?”
“Oh, abooooooout… three hours.”
It takes a long time to do farm work, so she could’ve still been at AJ’s. Assuming that’s what she was doing. She only specified that she needed to help AJ with “something.” That could mean a great variety of things. Well, I had no reason to mistrust her, so I assumed she was still at AJ’s, helping her out with… whatever it was that she needed help with.
After that, Spike went back upstairs, leaving Derrick and I to talk. We talked about what this event meant, both for the present and the future, along with various other random topics. We kept talking until we heard several faint, but familiar, voices outside the library.
“That’s a mighty fine story ya got there, Twi. Makes me interested to see ‘em mahself.”
“They’re not… dangerous, are they?”
“Relax, Fluttershy. They saved my life earlier. They wouldn’t even try to hurt us.”
“OOOOOH I can’t WAIT to throw them a party! Do you know what kind of cake they like? Or would they like pie more? What kind of candy do they eat? OOOOH I know! I’ll make them I pie-cake with candy inside! And some of my famous chimicherrychangas!”
“Calm down, Pinkie. We haven’t even met them yet. It might be rude to randomly throw parties where they’re from.”
“A free party? Rude? Hahaha, good one, Rarity!”
The voices gradually got louder until we heard the front door to the library open. From the room we were in, we couldn’t see them when they walked in. Twilight, however, seemed to know exactly where we were and led her friends in. When they first saw us, the reactions were mixed. Applejack simply looked on, mouth agape as if caught by surprise. Rarity fainted, but quickly regained her consciousness. Fluttershy, predictably, ran away a little before being caught by Twilight, and Pinkie stood there with a look and a smile that screamed “New friends!”
Twilight was notably excited to show her friends what she’d done. “Well, here they are! Beings from an entirely separate dimension!”
Derrick looked at them, then simply waved his hand and said “Hey.” Fluttershy immediately screamed and bolted off to the other side of the library. Twilight left, and shortly thereafter came back with a shivering Fluttershy. Derrick took this time to introduce himself to them, stating simply, “I’m Derrick.”
I then took my chance to introduce myself. I stood up (evoking an “eep” from Fluttershy) and put my right arm across my stomach.
“My name is Bartholomew Joseph Rollins.” I bowed. “Although most just call me Joe.” I raised my head so I could see them. “Charmed.” I gave them a smile.
This formal introduction seemed to calm everypony’s nerves, at least somewhat. I got the feeling I had just earned some respect from Rarity, who ever so slightly returned the smile. 
Twilight excitedly looked at her friends. “Isn’t this great! Go ahead, introduce yourselves!”
Applejack was the first to walk up. “Howdy. Name’s Applejack.” She extended her hoof towards us. Derrick was the first to shake, followed by me. “Sorry about the way I reacted, just… y’all are one of the strangest lots I’ve ever seen.”
Derrick was quick to accept. “It’s fine. It’s not every day that extra-dimensional people show up.”
Rarity was next. “*ahem* Hello. My name is Rarity. It’s a pleasure to meet you.” She smiled at us.
Immediately after Rarity finished talking, Pinkie was right behind me and Derrick. I never noticed her move; she was just… there all of a sudden.
“Hi there! My name’s Pinkie Pie! What kind of cake do you guys like?”
I was confused as to how she got there that quickly, but I didn’t question it. “Um… white? Why do you need to know?”
She pulled a notebook and quill out of… somewhere and wrote something down. “Oh, no particular reason.” She giggled, then pointed to Derrick. “And you?”
“Strawberry cake is pretty good.” 
Pinkie wrote something down again, then pointed at James. “And him?”
We didn’t really know, so we just went with more strawberry cake. She took another note, then put the notebook away. “Well, I gotta go do something! Nice meeting you guys!” She then hopped out of the library before any of us could ask her anything, but we all knew what she was going to do. Oughta be fun later.
Last, but not least, was Fluttershy, who found her way into the farthest corner from where we were, hiding and shivering. Twilight did not look amused, and once again moved her over to where we were. Twilight egged her on to introduce herself, which she eventually did, albeit with face covered.
“Um… I’m Fluttershy…”
I was personally hurt that she was afraid of me. I mean, I’m a big guy, sure. But people that know me know me as “the big teddy bear stuffed with marshmallows.” There’s no reason to be afraid of me. I decided I’d somehow show her that. I began to speak in the most calming, soothing voice I possibly could. “Now tell me, why are you afraid of me?”
“Oh…”
“If you’re gonna be afraid of me, you should at least have a reason. Do you have a reason?”
“Well, no, but…”
“But what? If you don’t have a reason, then what’s the point of being afraid of me?”
She was still scared, but she appeared to understand my logic. She slowly stood back up and looked me in the eyes. It looked like it was physically hurting her, but she kept doing it. Eventually, she stopped shaking and inched ever so slightly closer to me.
“Now, what did you say your name was?”
“I’m… *breath* I’m… Fluttershy.”
I extended my hand out to her. She was briefly startled, but after a moment, she gave me her hoof. “Nice to meet you, Fluttershy.” It was the weakest handshake I’ve ever been a part of.
This whole process left only one individual to be identified. Rarity was the one to point this out. 
“So, who is that on the bed over there?” She pointed at James, whose muscle spasms left him looking like a human pretzel.
I went ahead and introduced him. “Oh, that sleeping beauty over there? That’s James.”
Rarity very quietly said, “Um…yes…beauty,” followed by a little nervous laughter.
Twilight then spoke up. “Isn’t this great! Well, now you guys can get to know eachother! I’m sure Princess Celestia will be excited to see how friendship develops in extra-dimensional beings!” She paused. “But, that can wait until later. It’s getting late.” I looked out the window, and was surprised to see that the sun had almost crossed the horizon. “Well, I think everypony should get back home before it gets too dark. See you tomorrow!”
Applejack was the first to leave, followed by Fluttershy, and then Rarity. Once they had left, Twilight told us she was going to write a letter to the Princess telling her about us. She left our room to go find Spike, leaving just Derrick and I. We, again, talked for a while, although we both eventually agreed that we couldn’t wait until tomorrow. We decided that we would go to sleep, and so Derrick tucked into his bed while I walked over to mine. It typically takes me about ten minutes to get to sleep after I close my eyes, which left me plenty of time to think. About being in Equestria. About meeting the Mane Six. But mostly about the attack earlier. I decided that I’d investigate it later, since this was definitely not a dream anymore. The last things I remember were Derrick snoring and the quiet sound of crickets chirping away at the night before I slipped into the unconscious void.
	
> Chapter 4: Nightmares
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

 	“Congratulations. Now you’re here. But, let me ask you a small little question:  what if it all … just … disappeared …?” 
I couldn’t see anything until a single, dim light came on. What I saw horrified me, just like the first time I saw it: Rainbow Dash’s body, mangled, sliced, and twitching in pain while she cried.
I gathered all the strength I could to yell at the strange, but all-too-familiar voice “Why are you doing this?!”
In the dim light, I only vaguely see the tall, dark outline of the being who spoke in that deep, venomous voice. “Simple. Because I enjoy it. I enjoy your pain. Your suffering. Your fear.” I could hear him start to pace around, inching ever closer to me. “It gives me power. I feel invigorated when I do this. It makes me feel …” he crept his face down and smiled, “powerful.” He chuckled. “But, we are done here.” With that, he nailed me to the wall and stepped back to admire his work like a deranged carpenter.  “Now, there is just one thing missing.” He turned his back and threw a match at me. Within moments, I was lit up like a bonfire. Burning.
Then I woke up.
When I woke up, I still felt like I was on fire. This was nothing new; I always felt the last thing to happen in the nightmare when I woke up, and it was generally pretty painful.  After I regained enough of my senses, I crept into the shower (which took surprisingly little time to find). I went in, and cooled off both physically and mentally.  When I was done, I dried off, put my pants and what remained of my shirt back on, and went back to the main room. It was bustling with life and energy; Derrick was talking with Fluttershy and Applejack, Joe was talking to Twilight and Pinkie, and Spike was talking with Rarity.  But after I took a closer look, I couldn’t see Rainbow Dash anywhere. I went back to the guest room to see her still sleeping. But I was concerned; it had been a few days since I had actually slept for an extensive period of time, meaning I was due for a knockout. I walked back to the lobby and pulled Twilight and Derrick into a nearby room to ask something.
“Hey guys…” 
Derrick looked at me as if he hadn’t seen me for a while, and Twilight mirrored the look “Hey James. How are you doing? You hungry?” Derrick and Twilight kept firing question after question until I interrupted.
“Derrick, stop.  I need to know.  How long have I been out?” 
Derrick looked down as if trying to remember when Twilight spoke up “You’ve been asleep since when you got here two days ago.”
That’s when I froze. “Did you try to wake us up?” 
Both had an expression of confusion, but after a while Derrick spoke up. “We tried to this morning. We all did. But you didn’t wake up. And what do you mean ‘us’?”
I was shocked to hear this. “Dash is still asleep, and she sleeps every day, unlike me.” 
“Actually, she doesn’t.” Derrick and I looked at Twilight. Now things were getting scary.
“What exactly do you mean?”
“Well, for the past few months she’s been having nightmares. She’s been staying with each of us just so that there was somepony that she could confide in.  We all tried to cheer her up. But we couldn’t, not even Pinkie Pie. Pinkie’s still trying to get over that.”
So Dash has been having nightmares too…? “What are these nightmares about?”
Twilight looked down. “I don’t know. I’ve tried to find out several times, but she says that it hurts too much to talk about it.” I was going to continue asking questions, but I was cut off by something that I had heard in my nightmares oh-so-many times before; the sound of something screaming.
At the sound, I ran into the guest room to find Dash stuck to the ceiling, crying. “Twilight, I think we’re going to get some answers.”
I was one of the only people capable of reaching the ceiling, so I grabbed Dash around the waist and pulled her down. Once I did, she clamped onto me, still a torrent of tears. Everyone heard the noise, and they were all standing near the doorway (Joe and AJ leaning on opposite frames) trying to see what was going on. Pinkie Pie jumped out from the doorway, asking, “Is Dashie OK?”
I turned from Pinkie to the group that was still by the door. “Could you give us a minute, please?” Derrick nodded and ushered the group out, except for Pinkie Pie.  “Hey Pink, could you give us a few please?” All I got for a response was a blank face and a deflated mane. A sadden Dash is enough of a problem. I couldn’t leave a Pinkamena on the loose. “Hey, could you put a party together? Y’know, to welcome us to Ponyville?” It was like someone threw a switch; she re-poofed, and was bouncy and energetic while bounding out the door to plan the future party.
Once there was no one else there and Dash had calmed down enough to loosen her grip, I pulled away to look at her face. It was stained with tears; her eyes were red and puffy with tears still flowing from them. “Y’OK?” Dash just looked at me as if she was looking at me for the first time (well, it was the first time, but still). “I’m sorry we haven’t met. I know I may look strange, but right now, I just want to help.”
Dash just looked away. “Nopony can h-help me …” I knew what she meant; I didn’t believe that others could help me either. No one could relate to my problem. Until now.
“Why can’t anyone help you?” I kept my tone calm and quiet; Dash was still trying to control her emotions. 
“Because nopony knows what I’m going through …”
I began getting curious, but fear quickly replaced it. “What are you going through?”
Once I said that I got a very dirty look. “Why should I tell you?” Her tone was venomous. 
“Because I know what it is. I know how it feels. The death, the destruction, the hate.” Dash’s expression turned back to sadness, and she began to cry again. “Dash, please tell me what he did.”
She jumped slightly. It must have taken her by surprise that I actually knew about “him.” There was no answer for some time, but then she finally answered. “You know how it feels?” I answered with a nod. “OK. I’ll tell you.”
She began to tell her tale, holding back the tears near-constantly. “I was somewhere dark. I couldn’t tell where; I couldn’t see anything until somepony turned a light on. It shot right in my face. Once my eyes adjusted to the light, I saw that I was strapped in a chair, and I couldn’t get out no matter how hard I tried.  Then this … thing walked in carrying my friends. It said, ‘let’s see how you handle this one,’ and dropped them in front of me. It took Pinkie, trapped her in a big mirror ball, and threw it into the air. The ball crashed back down, leaving Pinkie torn up with Celestia knows how many glass shards in her. Then it chopped off Twilight’s horn and threw her straight up. I couldn’t see where she went, but I never heard her land…” 
She paused for a moment. I could tell this was painful. Once she had somewhat recovered, she continued. “By then, Applejack was tied up and helpless next to a huge tree. It somehow turned one of its legs into an ax, and then it chopped the tree down. It smashed her. Then it trapped Rarity in a big cotton ball, and then lit it on fire. She screamed for me to help her, but I… I… I couldn’t…” 
She again paused and attempted to hold off the tears. She started her story, and she seemed like she wanted to finish it, no matter how painful. “It locked Fluttershy, the same Fluttershy I saved from the bullies at flight camp, in a small metal cage. It kept scaring her and scaring her until I heard a ‘pop.’ Her eyes went wide, she fell and… and…”
Here it comes. 
“She didn’t get back up!” She couldn’t hold back the tears any longer. She stopped for a few minutes, just so she could vent out her pain. I didn’t blame her; I knew the feeling. “I couldn’t stand it. I looked at this thing and asked it why it did this to me and my friends. It gave me the same answer it always has: ‘Simple. Because I enjoy it. I enjoy your pain. Your suffering. Your fear. It gives me power. I feel invigorated when I do this. It makes me feel … powerful. But, we are done here.’ That was when he untied me, took control of my wings, made me fly up really high, then down straight into the ground.”
She began to tear up again. I knew firsthand how destructive these dreams were to someone’s sanity, and that it still hurt once you woke up. 
“Does it hurt?” I was curious; I had to ask. “As in, right now. Does it hurt?”
“Yeah. All over. It feels like I ran into a brick wall.” I couldn’t think of anything to say, so I did the only thing I could think of: I gave her the hug that I knew that she needed. This pushed her to her breaking point. “They were all dead, right in front of me! And I couldn’t do anything!” It took all the energy she had to say that while she sobbed into my shoulder.
“I know, Dash. Trust me. I know.” As she cried, I thought about my own nightmares, and that one speech that she talked about: “Simple. Because I enjoy it. I enjoy your pain. Your suffering. Your fear. It gives me power. I feel invigorated when I do this. It makes me feel … powerful. But, we are done here.” It was the same line I always heard from mine. But considering the current situation, I put the thought in the back of my mind.
After what felt like a few minutes, I pulled back a bit and kept my voice soft, but upbeat. “Come on, can The Amazing Rainbow Dash be seen crying?”
“H-HEY! I…I’m the toughest pony in Equestria!”
“Then come on. Your friends are waiting out there.” 
Unfortunately, that’s when reality hit Rainbow Dash. “Wait … who are you? And how do you know me?!” Here we go again…
I explained everything the same as when we explained things to Twilight.  Once we were done with that, and after I had answered as many questions as I could (many I didn’t want to bring up, but answered all the same), she looked at me and said, “Strange, but as long as you don’t hurt anypony, I’ll tolerate you and your friends.” When she said that, she was being headstrong and full of herself. I couldn’t help but think, “She’s going to be fine; or at least until another nightmare hits.”
As we walked out of the room, the conversations that were proceeding soon ceased. I had to tell everyone that they didn’t need to stop talking for us, and they soon restarted. Dash went over to the group of AJ, Fluttershy, and Derrick; I went over with Rarity, Twilight, and Joe.
“So, might I ask what happened while I was out?” Everyone was eager to tell me. 
Joe told me about how he and Derrick met the Mane 6, and elaborated that I had already been introduced to them. He also told me that Derrick spent most of the day running around town, getting to know the locals and telling them that we were friends, and also dropped by Sweet Apple Acres to help out there, since Big Mac apparently injured himself (again). As for Joe, he hardly left the library, preferring to sift through its volumes for leads on the manticore attack earlier, while regularly checking up on Dash and I looking for any new or hidden injuries.
Twilight wanted to ask me some questions about Dash’s nightmares, but I told her that that was up to Dash to tell. It wasn’t my place to do that.
Rarity gave me a smile and said, “I really do appreciate you and your friends risking your lives to protect Twilight from the manticore.” She handed me a box with her magic. “I noticed your shirt was destroyed from the attack, so I made this for you.” I was more than curious, so I thanked her and opened the box.  Inside was a new shirt. Needless to say, I was grateful; I forgot to bring extra clothing.
“Thanks for the shirt, Rarity.” She thanked me, saying it was the least she could do. The shirt was jet black, with silver designs in the shape of a pair of sunglasses on the front. Once I put it on it felt a little loose, but not inconveniently so. But then the obvious question came to mind. “How did you know how to make this?”
Joe raised his hand and simply uttered, “Yo.” He elaborated that Rarity came by the library earlier needing a human model to help make it. Joe gladly came along, and gave her the design and shape.
“What good’s Shades without his shades? Am I right?” “Shades” was a nickname for me that was used due to my near constant wearing of sunglasses. I quite liked it, so the name stuck.
About five minutes later, Pinkie came back and joined us. After about half an hour, it started to get dark. I began to wonder how I could pay them all back for helping us and giving us place to stay. Then, genius struck. “Y’know, I’ve got my house alone for a few days, so why don’t you all come see our home?” As I said that, I realized that I had been quiet for the past 15 minutes or so, and I got a mixture of confused and excited looks. “Sorry, I spoke what I wanted to think, didn’t I?” Joe and Derrick nod, but everypony there just looked confused. “Sorry, sometimes I speak my mind without realizing it. But the invitation is still out there.” As I looked around the room, all I saw was nodding and smiles. “Outstanding.  I’ll go get things ready. Joe and Derrick can bring you gals in about an hour, K?” Everyone in the room nodded, with Joe and Derrick both glancing at the clock to get a gauge of time. With that, I left for the portal to home thinking, “How am I going to get the place cleaned up for a party?”
	
> Chapter 5: Night Out
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Derrick POV
After James left, there was a small silence. Joe decided to break it, by clapping his hands.
“Well, you’re going to be crossing over into an alien dimension. Kind of a big deal, so anyone got any questions? I’m sure Derrick and I can answer.”
Pinkie nearly instantly jumped forward, with a look of excitement in her eyes.
“OOH! What’s it like?”
I kinda… looked at her, as if I didn’t think she was done asking. But, she sat there quietly awaiting her answer.  It took me a moment to get my thoughts straight, and I looked at Joe to see what he had to say. He simply shrugged and put on a face that asked me to handle this one myself.
“Well, um… There ARE ponies back home, just… not like you guys. They’re kinda… dumb.”
As soon as I said that, everypony seemed to get a bit offended. Joe decided to bail me out.
“What he means is that they’re physiologically incapable of intelligent thought. Their intelligence is on par with the typical animal. Effectively, humans take the role of ponies where we’re from.”
“Right. Anyway, we only have Earth Ponies, if you can call them that. No unicorns or pegasi.
Rainbow Dash flew up and in front of all of her friends, seeming confused.
“Wait, if you guys don’t have pegasi, then how does your weather work?”
I myself was completely stumped. I’d never really bothered to look into it. I turned to Joe, who seemed about as confused as I was. But, he still said something.
“Some Coriolis … pressure … condensation … thing. Complex mathematical jargon, point being, it works on its own. We just gotta hope for the best and hide when it gets nasty.”
They all looked shocked to hear this, Rainbow Dash especially. Twilight tossed a look at Spike, who then grabbed a notepad and quill.
The next hour followed that general pattern; somepony would ask a question, we’d answer it, and they’d be surprised at the answer. After the Q&A, I looked at the clock, which told that it had been an hour since James left. I looked at Joe, who then grabbed his things off of a table and got ready to get up. I decided to make the announcement.
“It’s been about an hour. I think it’s time we get going.”
Joe had to tack some fancyness on there.
“Well then. Allons-y, mes amis!”
Everyone got up and started walking towards the door. We were almost there when Twilight turned around and said something to Spike.
“Spike, you stay here. In case somepony comes for a book or Princess Celestia sends something.”
“Aww… but I wanna go too…”
A look of determination sparked in Joe’s eyes. He slowly started walking toward Spike. “She’s leaving you the responsibility to protect years of accrued knowledge. That’s no easy task. You should be honored.” He put his hand on Spike’s shoulder. “Besides, SOMEone’s gotta hold down the fort. This IS an open library, after all.”
“Well, when you put it THAT way…” He thought about it for a moment, then stood up straight and saluted. “You can count on me!” Joe smiled slightly and subtly pulled his arm back in victory.
With that done, we left the library, and I began leading the way to the portal. It took a few minutes to get there, with all of us discussing what waited for us. Once we had arrived, all but Twilight were in shock at the swirling vortex standing before them.  Mouths were universally agape. I decided to put on one of my derp faces and do one of my signature random rants.
“Excuse me, sirs, but that is where I live. What you’re doing would be like if I walked up to Sweet Apple Acres and declared “HAX” at it.”
It was obvious that I was joking, but none of them seemed to catch on. Regardless, I took the time to suggest that we stop derping off at it and actually go inside.
I pointed at Rarity. “Ladies first!”
“Oh, well, um… I’d hate to be rude, but I think somepony else should go first. Rainbow, darling, would you mind?”
“It’d be my pleasure!” She flew straight in without any second thought.
After that, everypony else seemed a bit calmer towards going in. Rainbow was followed shortly by Pinkie, then AJ, then Rarity, Twilight, Joe, Fluttershy, and finally me.
The second time going through wasn’t nearly as bad. I knew what to expect. Within a few seconds, we were on the other side, greeted by James.


James POV
After an hour of furious house cleaning, Joe and Derrick arrived with the Mane 6. Their initial reactions to seeing the world were more-or-less consistent: They were a bit scared when they realized how they appeared (similar to the Source Filmmaker models), with Fluttershy predictably darting straight back for the portal. She would have succeeded had Derrick not caught her.
Once they got over the initial shock of looking different, they started to look around. They were utterly shocked to see how both we and our world looked, but they overcame that just as quickly. Unfortunately, there was still one shock left.
“*GASP* You seriously LIVE like this!? This place is a DISASTER!”
In getting the rest of the party set up, I had neglected to organize my room to a significant degree. Rarity did not approve.
“Everypony out! I need to fix this!”
She quickly escorted us all out of the room and promptly slammed the door, leaving the sound of furious magic on the other side. It was free housekeeping; I wasn’t about to complain.
Once we were out, it wasn’t long before my dog understood what was going on. He got up and started running toward us from the other side of the hall. Joe cringed a bit, having been “mobbed” by him all too many times. Before he could start bugging anyone, though, Fluttershy walked up and started petting him. He calmed down immediately, and Fluttershy herself became notably less nervous with this newfound friend around. We all walked upstairs into the living room, with Rarity walking out of my room shortly thereafter with a look of satisfaction, bringing all attendees into a singular area.
“Well, here we are in another dimension! This is so exciting!” Twilight couldn’t contain her excitement. She looked around at everything, probably wondering what it was and what it did. Once we got her to calm down a bit, and after I explained all the technology present, we I announced that we could start the party. Joe immediately responded.
“Well, you heard the man! COMMENCEZ LA FÊTE!”
Pinkie immediately grabbed out her party cannon (after screaming “WOOHOO!”) and fired it off. After the initial “BOOM,” there was the distinct sound of glass breaking. It was at that point that I began to question why I did this party in the first place. I looked over toward the nearest window to find it broken.
“Hehe, sorry. I guess I should’ve aimed.”
Twilight must’ve seen the look of annoyance on my face. She looked at me and said, “Don’t worry; I can take care of this.” She got her magic going, picking up all of the glass shards. She put them back where the window was and fused them back together, making it as if nothing had ever happened.
I was impressed, and quite grateful that I didn’t have to clean it up and replace it. “Thanks, Twilight.” I looked over at Pinkie. “And could you hold off on the party cannon? Don’t really want to break anything else.”
At first she looked kind of sad, but she understood. As quickly as she got it out, she put it back into the same unknown place she somehow pulled it out from. After that, we weren’t sure what to do. Dash took this time to state what she thought.
“No offense, but it’s kinda small in here. Could we go outside?”
They all seemed to agree, and Derrick and Joe nodded their heads in approval. The decision had been made: we were taking this party outside. We all walked toward the back door, and one by one left the building. As before, the ponies were completely amazed at what they saw. Once they were actually out in the yard, I had to put out two specific rules.
“OK, I need to tell you a couple things. First, please stay near the house. I don’t really want anyone else knowing you’re here.” Dash seemed slightly annoyed, but knowing her, that was to be expected. “And second, if you see a car come by, try to hide. We’re kinda out in the middle of nowhere, so I doubt it’ll happen, but still. Don’t want anyone seeing you.”
They all seemed confused, so Pinkie asked the obvious question.
“What’s a car?”
Joe took the opportunity to answer this question, by leaning against his car parked in the driveway and putting his hand on it. 
“Thine yonder chariot. Basically, a big, fast, metal thing on wheels, kinda like this. If you see one going down those roads,” he pointed at the two roads my house was on, “just kinda hide behind the trees or house.”
They all nodded. With the rules now explained and in place, we began pondering things to do. My yard wasn’t exactly small, so Derrick suggested a race or two. Rainbow Dash and Applejack immediately agreed, with Derrick and I deciding we could try too. Joe decided he would tell us when to go, with the rules simply being the first one to make it to the other side and back would be the winner. Flying was not to be allowed for fairness. We got in a line, with me on the far left, Derrick to my right, then Rainbow Dash, then Applejack.
“Get ready! Are ya?
We all nodded.
“Alright then. Three!”
I got down a bit into the kickstart pose used by the pros.
“Two!”
I looked over at Derrick. He had mimicked what I did, and had a look of determination in his eyes.
“One!”
I glanced at Dash and AJ. They were staring each other down, visually trash-talking as it were.
“Go!”
We all immediately shot off. Dash and AJ immediately took the lead, with neither having a clear lead. I was third, with Derrick not far behind. It didn’t take long for the Rainbow Dash and Applejack to reach the other side of the yard; they were already there when I was only halfway. I could hear everypony who wasn’t participating cheering the two of them on from the sidelines. Derrick began to catch up, so I stepped it up slightly. At around the time I was ¾ of the way to the other side, Rainbow Dash and Applejack passed me, doing the same with Derrick shortly afterwards. Once I reached the other side, I turned around to see Derrick right on my tail, with the two true competitors back at the halfway mark. It wasn’t long before they crossed the finish line. From where I was, I couldn’t tell who won. Not long after, I made it back to the line, with Derrick crossing at roughly the same time.
Joe, whose responsibility it was to declare a winner, looked a bit perplexed. After thinking for a minute, he made his call.
“We’ve got a couple of ties! Rainbow Dash and Applejack for first, and James and Derrick for third!”
Rainbow Dash didn’t appear pleased with the result. Applejack was a bit more accepting, but it still wasn’t long before she offered to “Go again, sugarcube?”
“You’re on!”
The two of them went again, with neither of them having a clear lead until just near the end, where Rainbow Dash crossed the line ever so slightly sooner than AJ. AJ seemed a bit winded, but Dash didn’t seem affected at all.
“Whoo-ee! That’s some *pant* mighty fine speed ya got there, *pant* sugarcube.”
“Ha! They don’t call me ‘Dash’ for nothing!”
After that, Derrick seemed eager for a rematch himself. He also tried to get Joe in on it, but Joe insisted that he “doesn’t do running.” With that taken care of, Derrick and I got back on the line, and we went again. Just like before, I had a lead before a while, but Derrick gradually caught up. However, I was able to maintain my lead enough to cross the line before he did. I was declared the winner, and put on a face of victory.
“Because yes and just yes.”
After that, we all more-or-less just hung out outside for a while until the Sun went down. Occasionally someone would go inside for a drink or get up and run around a bit, but there wasn’t a definitive group action. Once it started getting dark, I made the offer that we go inside. Everyone seemed to agree, and we went back inside the house, and made our way to the basement. The issue of what to do popped up again, with Joe suggesting something this time.
“Y’think they’re up for a Brawl?”
Everypony seemed confused as to what this statement meant, but Derrick and I knew instantly. I found my copy of SSBB, popped it into my Wii, and grabbed a few Gamecube controllers. While I was setting up, Derrick and Joe took the time to explain it to them. Derrick commenced the explanation.
“This is called a ‘video game.’ Joe, James, and I really like them. Basically, they’re when you take control of a virtual character and you control what they do, what they say, that sort of thing.”
Joe continued. “This specific one is ‘Super Smash Bros. Brawl.’ It’s a fighting game; the point of it is to hit your opponents off of the screen. You do that by attacking them. The more they’re attacked, the more damage they get; the more damage they get, the more easily they fly off. Am I making sense?”
Fluttershy asked the question that they must all have wanted the answer to.
“Um… does anypony get hurt? I don’t want to play if it hurts anypony…”
Derrick took the chance to reassure them. “Oh, no. No one gets hurt. The characters aren’t real. The only thing that can get hurt is your pride if you lose.”
I looked over at the group, and say exactly what I expected: Rainbow Dash standing up tall with a prideful look on her face, followed shortly by, “Good thing that won’t be happening!”
After it was set up and we had gotten to the main menu, it was decided that Derrick, Joe, and I would do a match to show them how it was done. For the match, I picked Samus, Derrick picked Pikachu (who Fluttershy nearly instantly fell in love with), and Joe picked King DeDeDe. As the match went on, we explained what we were doing and how we did it. I could have sworn I heard the scratching of a pen behind us, likely Twilight taking notes on how to play. In the end, Derrick won with an effectively used Volt Tackle.
Once we’d shown them how to play, we gave them the controllers. For a while, they simply played each other, learning the controls and deciding on their favorite characters. Ultimately, Fluttershy decided the game was still a bit too violent for her, so she stopped playing, instead preferring to watch everypony else. Once they were good enough to actually have decent matches, it was clear that they were having quite a bit of fun. They alternated between who played at the end of every match, doing so for nearly an hour. It was at that point that Derrick had an idea.
“This game lets you do tournaments. You think you’d be up for that?”
Rainbow Dash nearly instantly declared that she was up for it. The others shortly followed suit. I told Derrick that I’d be more than willing to pwn everyone, to which Joe laughed, saying that it was his job to show no sympathy. 
Once everyone was in agreement, we agreed on the rules: Three stock, one-on-one matches. For fairness, the only used stage would be Final Destination. Items would be on, and any that appear would be fair game. Fluttershy, still thinking the game was a bit violent for her, would sit out, leaving eight combatants.
Everyone picked their characters for the game: I went for the Pokémon Trainer, Derrick for the Ice Climbers, Joe for Ike, Dash for Sonic, Twilight for Zelda, Pinkie for Kirby, AJ for Captain Falcon, and Rarity for Peach. The bracket worked out so that the first round matches would be Derrick vs. AJ, Joe vs. Twilight, me vs. Dash, and Pinkie vs. Rarity.
The screen shifted from the ready screen to a platform flying through space, with a pair of kids dropping in from above via bird on one end, and a muscular, helmeted man jumping out of a futuristic car on the other. Once the two were given the signal to fight, they rushed toward each other, with the children swinging massive hammers, and the man flying through the sky with a blazing foot. The two duked it out, with the ice flying and the fists flaming. The match proceeded evenly, until both combatants had lost two lives and were both at high damages. One swing of a hammer, and game was called, leaving a pair of happy children. AJ was the first one to lose.
“Those were some mighty fine moves, there. Good job.”
Derrick struck a superhero pose.
Next up was Joe vs. Twilight. Just as before, the combatants were pretty evenly matched. Both had lost two of their lives, and were near the same damage, until the Smash Ball appeared. Joe got to it first, closed in on Twilight, and decisively ended the match with the Great Aether.
Then came Dash and I. Logically speaking, three-on-one would be an easy win. But, just as with the matches before, we were evenly matched. But, as the match was getting heated, a solidly wound-up punch to the gut of a dragon sent it flying far faster than its wings ever could. Dash left the match victorious.
Then came Rarity vs. Pinkie Pie. This match wasn’t as even; the pink puff created a significant lead, and the Princess could do little to fend it off. The match ended with Pinkie winning, the only one this round to do so with more than one life.
Round two began with Joe vs. Derrick. Early on, Derrick had the lead, and was able to take one of Joe’s lives pretty quickly. Joe came back with a vengeance, however, and returned the favor. The two remained even, taking each other out again at roughly the same time. Once they returned, Derrick was able to pile up some damage on Joe, but a quick blow from Joe’s sword sent the children flying away to the point that they couldn’t recover. Joe was moving on to the finals.
Pinkie and Dash had what may have been the closest match of the night. It seemed that every hit one delivered, the other would return shortly after; every KO one made, the other returned upon coming back. In the end, they both powerfully hit each other at the same time, causing them to both go flying off. Sonic was knocked out a fraction of a second before Kirby. Dash simply dropped her controller and looked on in awe at the results screen, in disbelief as to what had just occurred. She protested a little upon regaining her responsiveness, but I urged her that similar things happened to me all the time, and that it was simply part of the game.
This left the finals match between Joe and Pinkie Pie; the blade and the ball. Before the match began, Joe looked over at Pinkie and simply stated, “Let’s do this, mano-a-hoofo.”
The bladesman rose out of a seal on the platform, and the pink puff crashed down on a star from above. Once the two received their signal to start, Ike rushed at Kirby. He was quickly inhaled, then shot out of the puff’s mouth towards the void beneath the platform. Ike was unable to recover, having only taken one hit, if it could be called that. When he came back, Kirby quickly inhaled him again, copied his ability, and used it against him. Through a combination of hammering and Ike’s own volcano attack, Kirby swiftly took him out again. Ike once again returned, and one glace at Joe’s face showed that his time for mercy was over. He rushed towards an airborne Kirby, intending to use his side special move to hit in midair. When he released the button to let Ike go, Kirby used his stone attack and fell right out of the sky. Ike missed, and went far enough beyond the edge in doing so that he couldn’t recover.
Kirby had taken no damage.
Joe’s reaction perfectly mirrored Dash’s from a moment ago; he was in utter disbelief. Unlike Dash, however, he congratulated Pinkie upon coming back to reality, saying that very few people have actually been able to beat his Ike, and that no Kirby had ever done so. He then challenged her to go again, which led to another group of random matches that we all participated in.
We played the game for another two and a half hours, with everyone alternating out based upon who lost the preceding match. We were all having a lot of fun, even Fluttershy, who stayed on the sidelines and cheered her friends on.
After that time, I glanced at the clock, which read 10:00. This led me to wonder something about my guests.
“Hey, what time do you guys typically go to sleep?”
Twilight responded, “9:30 PM. Why are you asking?”
“It’s past then. It’s 10:00 right now.”
Upon hearing this, Rarity gasped very heavily. “10:00?! That’s FAR too late! Where can I find a bed? I need my beauty sleep!”
I told them that I didn’t really have beds for all of them, and that they’d just have to use the couches. Rarity wasn’t too keen on the idea, especially considering she had seen my bed while she was “fixing” my room. I told her she could use it if she wanted to, since I never use my bed when I have company anyway. Once she was settled in bed, I came back to find the rest of them with their eyes closed, either on the floor or on a couch, with Joe and Derrick beginning to do the same. I wished everyone a good night (since I wasn’t about to go to sleep after what happened earlier), and took myself upstairs to read one of my many books. After I made my decision, I sat down on the couch, and opened it up. That was my plan for the night, which I thought was over. But, in truth, it had not truly even started …

> Chapter 6: It Happened One Night
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	JAMES POV

As I read my book, I’d occasionally look away from it for a few seconds, either to look at the clock, or stare into the roaring fireplace. It was during one of these breaks that I heard a slight creak downstairs, as if the door down there had been opened. I thought nothing of it and kept reading for a few minutes, and then heard very slight, as if suppressed, clop sounds on my roof. I could imagine who that was, so I put my book down, and went to investigate. 

I went out the front door, and I heard the faint sound of crying. It was in a familiar voice, the voice I expected. I went straight for the south side of my house, and began climbing up and onto my roof.

After I had climbed up, I looked around to see where she was. Sure enough, there was Rainbow Dash, sitting on the side of my roof, crying. I didn’t think she knew I was there, so I tried to approach carefully and quietly.

She must have heard me; before I got there, she said somewhat angrily, “Leave me alone.”

I continued walking toward her.  Whether she wanted it or not, I wanted to help if I could.  Knowing what the mentality of someone who is going through a tough time and doesn’t want to be viewed as weak you’ll try to fend away help.
“I said leave me alone!”

“Let me talk to you. I’m here to help.”

“I don’t need help!”

I paused. “Then what do you need?”

It took her a while to respond. “I don’t know…”

I walked closer. She didn’t try to keep me back anymore, so I sat down next to her. 

“So, how long has this been happening?”

“Three months. Or, that’s when it started getting bad.”

“You’re lucky then..."  I didn’t get to finish before she turned on me.

“I’m lucky!? Try having a nightmare every time you try to sleep! And it only being able to sit there as you’re friends are… are…” She paused. “And all you can do is sit there while being taunted to do something and you can’t!”

Dash broke down into a new fit of sobs and fell into my lap.  “I shouldn-n-n’t b-be crying right n-n-now.”

I couldn’t stand the self pity anymore, so I tried to help calm her down.  “Dash, it’s OK to cry at this. But unless you’re doing something about it, the tears are in vain.”  She started to calm down as she stayed in my lap while I stroked her mane and ran my free hand through the feathers on her wings.

“And Dash, what I meant by ‘you’re lucky’ is that you've only had to deal with it for three months.” I sighed. “I’ve been going through it for a year.”  Dash shot up, throwing my hands away. I had to catch myself before I fell onto my back.  

“A year!?  How have you deal with this for that long?” I Leaned on my arms and motioned for dash to lie down next to me.

I told her about how much sleep (or lack thereof) I was getting, along with the fact that my emotions were always in a super-charged state.  “And so if say I’m angry I’ll probably kill or destroy whatever I’m mad at.  And never even know that it happened.”  Dash just laid there next to me but didn’t say anything, so I just laid back and looked at the stars till I felt a slight pressure on my chest.  I looked down and saw Rainbow lying on my chest and looking up at me.

“I’ve always felt somewhat safe at my friend’s places, but…never as safe as I feel right now…with you.  you've been through it all, a-and I can relate to that but being here just feels...awesome.”

I couldn’t resist the adorableness, so I wrapped my arms around her, never wanting to let go. “Trust me dash…I’m not going anywhere.”

And for a few minutes (or hours, I lost track), we stayed like that, content in the presence of the other until we heard a loud noise.

The sound caused both of us to jump. I turned to the direction of the sound, which was the front door.  “I don’t know, Dash. But I think that tonight is going to get a little wild.”

DERRICK POV
I woke up in the middle of the night with a dry mouth and very thirsty. I realized that I didn’t have anything to drink since the party began. I decided to get up, go upstairs, and get a can of pop. On my way upstairs, I noticed that AJ was missing, and I could hear someone going through the fridge upstairs. When I got to the top, I saw an orange hat-clad pony going through the fridge. Apparently, she heard me.

“Y’know, I understand that this is odd for y’all and it musta it slipped yer minds, but y’all never gave us anything ta eat.”
“Oh, uh… sorry? I guess we never really thought about it. We were a bit caught up in the moment. You finding anything good?”

She pulled out an apple and closed the fridge. “Yeah, I reckon this is fine.”

“So, will that be good, or is there anything else you want?”

“Nah, this oughta do it. But, I do have a question.” She opened the fridge and pulled out a package of sliced turkey. “Why does this here package say ‘turkey’?”

“Um… Turkey tastes good?”

She gave me a look of disgust, then shook her head rapidly. “I’m just gonna pretend I didn’t hear that…” She then quickly reopened the fridge and threw the turkey back in.

After a moment, she looked at the apple she was holding. “Huh. Looks a lot like ours back home.” She took a bite and smiled. “Tastes the same as back home, too.” She turned her gaze to me. “How’d y’all do that?”

She started walking into the next room, which even from here we could see had a couch and fireplace. My answer to her question wasn’t going to be long, but I wasn’t going to turn down the invitation.

I started walking in the same direction right as she got seated on the couch. I sat down too, and then told her that James, Joe, and I weren’t the ones who grew the apple.

“Well, then who did? I gotta know their secret. Might make next year’s harvest even bigger!” She had an industrious look in her eyes. This was going to be disappointing to her.

“I’m not really sure who did. I’m sure he just bought them at the store.”

“Well, why would ya buy somethin’ if you don’t know where it’s from?”

“That’s just the way things work around here. There’s too many people to feed for it to be as personal is it is in Ponyville.”  She seemed puzzled. “Wait, how many pon- *ahem* ‘people’ are ya talkin’ about?”

“Not sure. Thousands, probably.”

That industrious look in her eyes was getting more obvious by the second. “What do they use? Any fancy machinery or somethin’ like that?”

“Lots. Tractors, combines, plows, and everything in between.”

“Applebloom’s pretty good at makin’ things. Y’think she can—“

“Probably not. These things took years for our smartest inventors to make. I think it’s beyond your limits for now.”

She looked at me angrily. “We’ll see about that come next year’s harvest. With Applebloom’s constructin’ talent and Big Mac’s fancy mathematics, I’m sure we’ll find a way.”

“I’d be glad to help if I can. But, I’m not sure if it can get done in a year.”

She paused a moment, then extended her hoof and smiled at me. “I’m holdin’ ya to that.”  We shook on it.

From there, we changed the subject and began talking about other things, such as family and funny memories of our siblings. Occasionally we’d stop when we heard something on the roof, and Joe came up at one point to ask us something. But after these distractions, we’d resume discussion. Until we both heard a loud noise that sounded like the downstairs door had been broken down…

JOE POV

It never failed. I never seemed to be able to get a full night of uninterrupted sleep; I’d always wake up at some point in the night for some random reason, typically because I was thirsty or something of the like. I’d always open my eyes, look around a bit, then go right back to sleep. I looked over at the clock, which read 12:00 AM. As I looked around half-consciously, I noticed that James, Rainbow Dash, Derrick, Applejack, and Twilight were missing. Knowing James’ problem that I was willing to bet Dash shared based on my eavesdropping from earlier, they were probably outside chatting it up. Derrick and AJ were less of a mystery; I heard them upstairs. That left Twilight unaccounted for, an idea I was less than fond of. I carefully got up as to not wake the whopping third of the party that was actually asleep, and slowly crept my way upstairs to ask Derrick and AJ what they knew.

Once I had gotten up there, I noticed they were sitting next to each other on the couch. I figured I should make my interruption quick.

“Hey, any of you seen Twi around here?”

Derrick simply shook his head, but AJ was more helpful.

“Nope. Can’t say we have. Although I did hear a door creak open downstairs not too long ago. Did ya check that out?”

“I most certainly did not. Merci, mademoiselle.”

She gave me a nod, and I went downstairs to check the back door. Sure enough, it was cracked open slightly. I could also faintly see an outline near the small shack at the other side of the yard. Since at this point I was in no mood for going back to sleep, I figured I’d go out and talk to her.

I quietly opened the door, and began slowly walking toward her. Once I had gotten somewhat close, I quietly uttered out a light, "Hey there."

She was looking up toward the stars. She didn’t look away, so I didn’t think she heard me. Either that, or she was so focused on the beauty above to notice me. I walked closer, and repeated myself a bit more loudly. 

That time, she noticed me. I think. She didn’t really turn away from the stars, but she did jump a bit before simply saying, “Oh, hi Joe,” probably not expecting anyone else to be out that late. I kept walking up to her.

“You DO know it’s past midnight, right? What’re you doing out here?"  This time, she actually turned and looked at me to respond.

“Your world … It’s just so … interesting. I couldn’t go to sleep. I had to see more of it. So, I came out here and started looking at the stars.” She looked down. “I’m not breaking the rules, am I?”

“What? Oh, no, of course not. Anyway, mind if I sit down?”

“No, not at all.” It was hard to tell, but I thought I saw her smile, probably both happy to hear she wasn’t breaking any rules and to have someone who could answer any questions she might have had. And, based on how severely I “stalked” the books in her library, I’d imagine she thought I was the best one for the job anyway. I sat down next to her, and tilted my head up toward the stars.

A few moments went by in silence. Both of us were focused on the stars so intently that we just forgot to speak. But, eventually, I felt like going on a tangent.

“Twenty-five trillion, eight hundred billion.”

She looked over at me in a confused manner, and simply asked, “What?”

“Twenty-five trillion, eight hundred billion. That’s how many miles away the nearest star aside from the Sun is to us. That seems really far, and it is; with our current tech, we won’t be making it to Proxima any time soon. But, in a universe where even light takes thirteen and a half billion years to get from one side to the other, that’s actually really close.” I put my hand on her shoulder. “Comparable to the distance between you and me right now. Heh. If only our spaceships could move as fast as my hand.”

She became a lot more interested as soon as I said that.

“Spaceships? What do you mean by that?”

I decided to tell her in an indirect fashion. I pointed at the Moon and asked, “Y’see that big ‘ol white thing up there?”

“That’s the moon...” She both looked and sounded annoyed, as if I had implicitly insulted her intelligence.

“There’s four things on there: Lots ‘a rock, a lander, a flag, and a few boot prints. Mankind put those last three there when we first went there about fifty years ago.”

She initially seemed confused, but after a moment, it looked like she caught on. “So, you’ve only been banishing your criminals to the Moon for fifty years?”

“Actually, we’ve been banishing them to Cuba, but that’s beside the point. The main point of those voyages was to say we’ve gone to the Moon and learn more about it. In fact, we actually brought rock back from there. Pretty interesting stuff, really.”

She lightly said, “Yeah…” before turning back to the stars. I decided to look up there as well. I could see Ursa Major from where I was. I wasn’t the most capable of identifying other constellations, but at least I could reliably find that one.
After five minutes of silent star-gazing, I was unable to take the silence anymore. I decided I’d ask her something.
"So, how's Shining?"

At first, the question caught her by surprise. The silence was nearly perfect, with only crickets breaking it until I did. Once she reoriented herself, she gave an answer.

"He's really busy. I don't get to see him very often anymore, but he's protecting Equestria, the Crystal Empire, and all they stand for, so that's alright. He sends me letters whenever he can, though. He tells me what he and Cadence up to and how they're doing. It really is touching how well they fit together."

"Yeah. I wish relationships worked that way in real life..."

I could tell that she wanted to question me on what constituted as "real life", but she let it pass. It wasn't the time for that sort of interrogation. More silence followed, only this time I wasn't the one to break it.

"So, what exactly IS that thing you carry around?"

Now I was the confused one. I didn't know what she was talking about until she pointed at the item in question: Azura, my katana. I had put a high amount of focus on having it with me at all times (both for security if something like the manticore attacked and to keep it out of curious hooves and claws), so she was understandably curious about its importance.
"Ah, this!" I unsheathed the katana partially to display it while I explained. "This is a fine item indeed! Granted, not of authentic Japanese make, but still enough to cut through something quite easily."

"What kind of things is it meant to cut?"

...Oh boy. This wasn't going to be fun. She's never seen a human war before, let alone the items used to fight them. There was no easy way to say it. Well, lying never got anyone anywhere...

"Oh, y’know. Wood. Cloth. …People."

Her eyes widened. Considerably. I could tell that every bit of respect she had for me left in that instant. The idea of someone, nay, someTHING that close to her having something specifically designed to kill its wielder's fellow man? She was in complete and utter shock. I had to say something, or else she’d just think of me as a deathtrap.

"But I'd NEVER use it for that unless I absolutely had to. Which rarely happens. Rest assured, it's an instrument of peace, not war."

She ... kinda bought it. She was still nervous, but not immobilized. At least she could say something now.

"But why...why would you need that?!"

I sighed. "To be honest, the only real reason I have it is as a novelty; these things are considered REALLY cool here. But, when that portal randomly opened, none of us had any clue what was on the other side. I didn't want to take any risks. Basically, it's a defense measure, both for myself and others. I only intend to use it when I absolutely need to, and never on anyone I care about. That manticore attack a while back, for example; had I not used this, it would've likely gotten to attack you and... y'know. In a way, you owe your life to it."

She pondered it, but she still needed one extra bit of assurance.

"Are... Are you sure?"

I chuckled a little, then proceeded to say the most binding legal contract I know.

"Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye."

This seemed to calm her down enough. Her trust in me was re-instilled, which I was truly grateful for. While she was still a little nervous, she could at least talk to me again.

"So... What's it called?"

"The sword type itself is a 'katana', based off of traditional Japanese weaponry. It's GONNA cause damage to whatever it hits. Which, luckily, won't be a very long list of things.

"I myself refer to this specific one as 'Azura'. Named after the Daedric Lord of Dawn and Dusk. And, because I think the name is pretty. Don’t ya think?”

She replied “Yeah”, and said nothing more. I let the topic drop; it was going nowhere, and was probably depressing for her.  We continued to gaze up at the stars. The looming, everpresent stars. Even during the day, they're still there, watching behind the Sun's veil of light. The moon was much more modest; it didn't shine so brightly that it attracted all the attention. It let the stars shine through, in all of their glory. It was a beautiful night, and there wasn't a cloud to be seen. The perfect night for something like this. I remembered a few years ago, I wanted to see the Persioid Meteor Shower, only to be obstructed by the sea of clouds that never failed to roll in for such events. It really does get frustrating.

Out of the blue, Twilight asked: "Beautiful night, isn't it? Since your weather controls itself, how often are there clouds at times like this?"

Oh, the tales I could tell…

"More often than not. In fact, just a few years ago..."

I told her about the Persioid, and she told me about the various things she's seen up in the sky. We decided to stay on the general topic of astronomy. She told me about how the Equestrian Sun shines, and told me how awe-inspiring it was to see Celestia raise the sun. This led her to an inevitable question for me.

“If you don’t have somepony like Celestia to raise the Sun, then how does it rise?”

“It doesn’t.”

She looked at me with a shocked expression, obviously not believing me. Admittedly, I could have phrased it better. I guessed I should probably elaborate.

“Well, it does, but it doesn’t. In the context of it rising above the horizon to bring about day, then yes, it rises. But it’s much more correct to say ‘the Earth rotates’ than ‘the Sun rises.’ The Sun stays in more-or-less the same spot; it just appears to move from this perspective. The Earth’s position from the Sun guarantees that one side of the Earth is in day at certain times, the other is in night at certain times. Since the Sun doesn’t move, the Earth has to; it rotates along a central axis. When the part of the Earth that you’re on turns away from the Sun, a sunset occurs and it becomes night. When the part you’re on turns toward the Sun, the opposite happens.” I chuckled a bit. “Y’know, this would be a LOT easier to explain if I had a model or something.”

I hadn’t looked at her since I started explaining. I decided to look at her for a moment, and saw that she was looking intently at me, absorbing everything I was saying. Although, she did look a little confused. She looked at me and said, “Yeah. Having a visual model always helped me learn new concepts.”

The next hour or so followed that general formula: her explaining something to me, asking me a question relating to it, and me answering the question in a long, drawn-out fashion. But it seemed as if she was enjoying learning about the differences between our worlds, and I enjoyed telling her about these things, so neither of us had any complaints.  After a while, she took a break from the questions to simply make a statement.

“To be honest, a lot of the stuff you’re saying is pretty confusing. But, it’s always nice to learn new things, and you’re doing a good job teaching me. Better than if I tried to figure it out myself, that’s for sure!”  She paused briefly.

“Thanks for explaining these things to me. I’m sure the princess will find all of it interesting.”  I smiled and chuckled a little.

"C'est rien, ma chérie."  

After that, we decided we should go back in. We weren’t that far, just across the yard. As I neared the door, though, I noticed that the door to go in was damaged and wide open, as if someone tried to break in. Seemed odd.

“Well Twi, looks like you may get to see Azura in action again.”

> Chapter 7: Blackblood
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter #7 Blackblood

Joe’s POV

By the time Twilight and I found our way inside, we saw two stereotypical cat burglars dressed in all-black with their heads completely covered by what appeared to be ski-masks. However, they were both armed with odd jet-black daggers, with no resemblance to any metal I’d ever seen. They had already cornered everyone when we got there, except for James and Rainbow, who were both nowhere to be found. The assailants didn’t seem like they had noticed us, so Twilight and I started coming up with a plan.

“So, which one do we get first? Or, should we go for a more diplomatic approach?”

“I don’t care, as long as we get this done. Seeing them in all this detail is giving me a headache…”

Three things make me mad. Number one is threatening something or someone I hold dear. In this case, that rule was getting violated beyond belief. I decided I’d try nonviolence at first, and see where that got me. I told Twilight to back away a bit, just in case.

“Good sirs, I will give you one warning.” I noticed that Twilight was charging her horn as I gripped Azura. Upon hearing me, the intruders turned around, revealing next to nothing of their masked faces. However, I could see that each one had a glowing red light where an eye should be. “I’m pretty sure you have the wrong location. We have nothing of immediate value here. If you leave now, I won’t call the authorities or give chase. I would highly advise that you do so.” Twilight’s spell was quickly gaining power, and I started to pull Azura out a bit. Despite this, they didn’t seem deterred in the slightest.
In fact, they both started laughing madly. They began speaking in a cat-like accent, and in perfect unison. 

“No, my friends. We can assure you, we are in the right place. And we are not here to take any items. Your lives are our prize.”

I saw Twilight’s horn go dark and her jaw go agape. I was confused, but she was quick to explain.

“I… I’ve read about you two. Alecti and Alecta, a pair of twins who were banished to Tartarus and stripped of their form after…” She hesitated. “After assassinating the Griffon king two thousand years ago…” She paused yet again to turn to me, and the duo appeared worried at what she was saying.

“If anyone makes it to them, that individual can hire them to do whatever they wish, and acts as their form for the task. However, due to their natural formlessness, they can morph into whatever shape they like for short periods of time. But once they are sent on a mission, there is no known way to stop them. ”

The duo recoiled at this. They turned to each other and spoke in a rushed, shadowy manner. They then turned back to us, once again speaking in perfect unison.

“Well then, it appears that we have no need for these disguises. They are too constricting anyway.”

Their masks turned into clouds of smoke, revealing faces that were exact mirrors of each other. However, what really stood out were their black eyes, one for each of them. The whites of their eyes were entirely black, with glowing, blood-red irises. The black turtlenecks they were both wearing turned into a hybrid between a trench coat and bat wings, with arms that seemed to phase through. They both still held their daggers, which didn’t change in appearance.

“We ask that you hold still. We promise to make this quick.”

I unsheathed Azura and looked straight into the right one’s eyes. “Asking me to go down without a fight is like asking the Sun to take a day off.” Twilight shot a charged blast at him, and was perfectly on target until the other parried the shot the instant before it hit. Although, it looked like the part of the dagger that had been hit had disintegrated. I was notably shocked at how fast it all occurred. They must have felt the need to explain.

“Spending twenty hundred years in the depths of torture gave us plenty of time to hone our skills. Sharpened our reflexes. And perfected our strategies.”

As soon as they finished talking, they charged at Twilight from the front. She was able to teleport away about half of a second before they would have hit, leaving her out of harm’s way and leaving them vulnerable. I immediately took this opportunity to stab one in the back, which seemed to injure it. However, it wasn’t terribly fazed, and it turned around to strike me. I used Azura’s sheath to block it, and then pulled Azura itself out of its back. During this whole ordeal, I had forgotten about the other. It had crept up on me from behind, and had a clear shot at my spine.

“Don’t you dare!”

Everyone turned around, obviously shocked at what we had just heard. The statement came from James, who seemed more than just a little ticked off. However, his eyes seemed to be bluer than normal, with a slight blue light from his hands. Beside him was Rainbow Dash, who seemed just as angry.

“One more move, and it’ll be your last.”

The duo of gothic assassins once again looked worried, as if they were facing the unknown. They spoke in that same rushed manner in an odd language unlike anything I’d ever heard. I wasn’t about to let them form a plan, so I swung Azura’s sheath at the one behind me, which immediately ceased its speaking. Oddly, it flew back a surprising distance, as if it only weighed a few pounds. I used this window to get as far away as I could; knowing James, this wasn’t going to be pretty.

As soon as I was out of the way, James charged at the one that was still standing, catching it off-guard in its confusion. By then, though, the other was getting up. It noticed the danger that its brother was in, and ran to protect it. In turn, I moved as quickly as I could to stop the one who was rushing toward James. Unfortunately, I wasn’t fast enough. James landed a solid kick on the one he was going for, but was immediately afterward stabbed twice in the chest by the one he neglected. 
He let out one of the most bloodcurdling screams I have ever heard.

For a moment, everything froze. James started collapsing. The duo both had the widest of grins. Dash was mortified. And I was infuriated.

The one who had stabbed him left his daggers in and let James fall forward, driving them even deeper. James was still breathing, but only barely. The stabber got up and plunged its hands into itself, pulling out two more daggers. It then looked at its brother, who was still standing in the same spot. Without saying anything, the brother threw a dagger at Rainbow Dash, hitting her in the shoulder. He threw his second, which looked as if it would hit dead-center in the chest. However, a blast of magical energy hit it in the air, turning it into a pile of ash.

I looked at Twilight, who was still in shock from the stabbing. I looked at Rarity, who was cowering in the center of the room like everyone else who wasn’t fighting. Then I looked at James, whose hand was raised slightly, with a distinctive blue aura emanating from it.

He looked straight at the thrower, and said in a very strained voice, “Nobody does that. Not to her.”

This caused the thrower to look exceedingly worried, and with good reason. While James was speaking, he began charging another shot, much more powerful than the last. As soon as James stopped speaking, he fired a huge burst of magic. It engulfed the assailant on impact, who, just like the dagger, became nothing more than a large pile of ashes. James promptly passed out, having used all of his remaining energy. I couldn’t tell if he was still breathing from where I was.

The remaining member of the duo appeared mortified. It stood there, jaw agape, motionless. After a moment of that, it cried out in the shadowy voice, but everyone around could understand it this time.

“ALECTA!”

It turned toward James, who he believed was dead, and then toward the group who had not been fighting. Its non-black eye had gone bloodshot, and its toothy grin had turned into the mother of all scowls. It looked like it was mouthing, “You will all pay for that, every last one of you,” but no sound came out of its mouth. After that odd sequence, it began rushing at the group, dagger-first.

“Oh no ya don’t, pardner!”

Applejack got up and blocked it. She continued doing so until Twilight was able to send off a blast of magic at it. It dodged the blast, allowing it to hit Derrick in the back, which didn’t help his effort to calm Fluttershy.

Seeing the severity of the situation, Twilight and I immediately decided to take more direct action. I went toward Alecti to try distracting it, and Twilight went to Derrick to see if he was OK. I vaguely heard him say that he was. Upon hearing this, I used Azura’s sheath to bonk Alecti’s head. To my surprise, however, it went straight through. The act did, however, draw its attention toward me. It swung its dagger at me, which I was able to block. In its distraction, everyone (except Fluttershy) got up and took a defensive stance, with Pinkie arming her Party Cannon and Derrick readying his sword. Twilight did something to his sword, causing it to glow slightly. I started to giggle when I saw all of that.

Alecti saw that I was giggling, and mouthed out, “What is so funny about your demise?”

“Look behind you.”

It did as I said. It stopped in his tracks when it saw what was going on. It was outnumbered six-to-one, and suddenly realized that that wasn’t working in its favor. It looked like a few beads of black sweat started dripping down its head.

Alecti was outclassed, and it knew it.

Upon realizing this, it decided to abort its mission by jumping through the nearest window. Derrick was quick enough to put his sword on his back and grab onto one of Alecti’s legs as it jumped. The rest of us rushed outside to see what was going on.

When we were got there, we saw Derrick and Alecti fighting as they flew into the sky. They were both reaching for Derrick’s sword, making it a race to determine who could neutralize the other first. Eventually, I could see Derrick had the sword in his hand, which he promptly used to stab Alecti. It became encased in a shell of energy, and then disintegrated immediately. It would have been a picture-perfect ending, if he wasn’t suspended 500 feet in the air without a way to get down other than falling.

At this point, everyone began to panic. Applejack cried out for Twilight to do something. Twilight tried to do that something, but she appeared exhausted. Seeing this, I went quickly (by my standards) to below where Derrick was, hoping to catch him before he landed. The others saw this, and gathered around in an effort to help.

It seemed that at that point that Derrick was going to hit the ground, with our catch being the only thing stopping him. But, about halfway down, an intense light started shining, which appeared to be coming from his back. As the light shone, it seemed to grow to form two wings, roughly 75% as tall as he was. We all heard Derrick yelling at the top of his lungs, but that was secondary at that point. Once the light was gone, a pair of white wings spread out, which started to slow him down. He landed in our catch group, but it still seemed as if he had sustained an injury of some type.

We decided that we should treat now ask later. We got Derrick inside where Rainbow and a now conscious James were struggling to get to each other. With one last painful push, they were in each other’s reach.  James grabbed Rainbow’s hoof, pulled her towards him, and removed the dagger that was still in Rainbow’s shoulder.  He took hold of her shoulder, and appeared to draw a black liquid from it which seemed to go into him, save for a few drops on the floor. He told her he was sorry, and then fainted once again. Dash followed suit shortly thereafter.

Twilight had just walked in, and upon seeing the exchange, took on a look of pure horror. After a few seconds of standing there, she finally spoke up.

“Oh no, this is bad! Very very bad! Well, good for Rainbow Dash, but terrible for him!”

I was curious as to what the issue was, so I asked her, “What’s wrong?”

“’What’s wrong?!’ What isn’t wrong!? If this is what I think it is… with three times the dose…”

“Slow down a bit, please. What even is that?”

“It’s Blackblood Venom! One of the most dangerous toxins in all of Equestria!”

My heart stopped for a few beats. In saving Rainbow Dash, he may have inadvertently killed himself. I realized he probably didn’t know, but I was still never going to let him hear the end of this.

“What does it do, exactly?”

“It takes anything psychologically negative that the victim experiences and amplifies it. Everything from sleep deprivation to emotional outbursts. The longer it goes untreated, the darker he becomes until… until…”

“…Until what, exactly?”

She pointed at the pile of ashes left by Alecta, while looking away and crying a bit. “He becomes one of them!” 

Now I was really worried. He hadn’t inadvertently killed himself; he’d done something infinitely worse. That said, she did say “untreated,” which led me to believe there was a way to stop it.

“Is there a way to fix it? Or to counteract it?”

She paused to gather herself back together. “There is… one way.”

“Go on…”

“If the one who got the venom in the first place dies, the venom itself ceases to exist. But, if the venom is still there after both of them were destroyed, then…”

“There’s someone else working this.”

“Does James have any enemies? Anything that would want him out of the way? That he may have wronged? That he made jealous? That he might have insulted? That he—“

“Not that I know of. Besides, it’s the most dangerous toxin in Equestria. We don’t have anything like that here. Whoever did this could only have come from the other side.”

“He’s only been there a few days. Who could have developed that much of a hatred since then?”

We thought for a few minutes, but didn’t come up with anything. We decided to make it a matter for later, when he could talk to us himself. Besides, we had three individuals on our hands who were dying; there wasn’t much time to think anyway.
Seeing as how Dash’s injuries were minor and the daggers were preventing James from bleeding too severely, we turned our attention to Derrick. Fluttershy took the liberty of maneuvering his short sword (which was no longer glowing) off of his person and around the new wings, while Applejack removed what was left of his shirt so that we could see what was underneath.

Once the obstructions had been removed, I could clearly see what was going on. The sight sent everyone but me into the next room. It appeared that the emergence of the wings split his skin open at their bases, revealing both muscles and bones I’d never seen before (which, under the circumstances, wasn’t much of a surprise). However, that appeared to be the extent of the damage.

I remembered that Twilight had used a healing spell on James before, making me wonder if it could be used for this as well. I called for her to come over, which she did after a moment.

“Think you can fix this?”

She examined the wound for a moment, which clearly nauseated her. “I suppose I could, but it’ll leave scars. Not to mention it takes a lot of energy, which we might need for James. The healing ponies at a hospital can do a lot better than I can.”

Seeing as how I’d always wanted to be a doctor, I figured this might make perfect suturing practice. Besides, bringing him to a hospital probably wasn’t a good idea given his new look. I figured the best course of action would be to treat what I could here, then bring him to the Ponyville hospital as soon as possible.

“In that case, I’m going to need nylon string, a sewing needle, and hydrogen peroxide. I’ll probably need gauze and bandages, too. James has everything you could ever need somewhere or another, so you should be able to find some of everything.”

Twilight immediately went looking while I looked over Rainbow Dash. She only appeared to have a small stab wound from the dagger. It didn’t seem to hit any arteries or break any bones; it was hardly bleeding by the time I got to her. I figured all I really needed to do was clean and cover it.

James, however, was a different story entirely. First of all, the daggers had dissolved for some reason, opening up any blood vessels they may have blocked. The wounds appeared to go deep, although it looked like the daggers had missed the heart and lungs. The bleeding seemed to indicate that something big was hit, though; given the nature of the bleeding, I’d guess one of the Vena Cavas. That made me glad that I’d held off on the healing spell. There was no way I would have been able to fully treat that.

While assessing the damage, I noticed something unsettling. His blood was noticeably darker than normal, as if someone had infused it with a black dye. I figured that was the venom at work, and decided I could do nothing about it.

After I’d performed all of my examinations, Twilight came back with the materials. I told her about James’ bleeding, which she fixed using her healing spell. By the time she was done, the wounds were only about as bad as Derrick’s. That left Derrick and James needing stitches and Dash simply needing a cleaning. 

As I sewed everyone back together with the help of Nurse Sparkle, I couldn’t help but remember one detail that I’d yet to put together: Why Derrick’s sword eliminated Alecti while mine only caused minor damage, if that. I decided to ask her just that.

“So, uh… wha’d you do to Derrick’s sword? To make it work on that thing, I mean?”

“Oh, I just magically enhanced it a bit. It seemed like the only thing that would work.”

“How’d you reach that conclusion?”

“Think about it. Every time a dagger got hit by magic, it dissolved. After one of them attacked James, it made new daggers out of itself. And when the first one disintegrated, it was after getting hit by a strong burst of magical energy.”

“So… they were weak to magic? Kind of a crippling weakness, don’cha think?”

“Not really. In any account I’ve ever read about them, they were only seen running away after they’d done their job. No one ever tried to counter-attack; no one ever noticed them that soon.”

“Stealth assassins, eh? I imagine that’d be there best option.” I looked over at Alecta’s pile of ash and laughed a bit. “I mean, that was their best option.”

With that confusion out of the way, I continued doing what I could about their wounds. Once I’d done all of that, we carried them all upstairs and laid them down.

We got them comfortable after a bit, causing us to learn the hard way about the complications of Derrick’s and James’ new physiology.  Derrick’s wings sat down straight from his shoulders, tucked in naturally. Fluttershy took the liberty of cleaning off the blood, leaving them nearly as clean as Celestia’s. James seemed to hold an electrical field of sorts, which occasionally shocked whoever touched him. Twilight mentioned something about an “MI device” which we would need when we went back to Equestria. Rainbow was still asleep and didn’t seem to be harmed in any significant way, unlike the two others. However, she kept rustling around and shaking. Eventually, she woke up with a start.

“Wha?! Oh, we’re still here… Thank Celestia…”

Pinkie, who had only recently come back inside, bounded over to her and started being Pinkie.
“Hey Dashie, you doing OK?  Sorry about James, but when he gets bett—” 

Rainbow bolted upright silencing the pink party animal.  “Where is he?” She seemed panicked, but visually relaxed when she saw him lying on the couch. “Sorry Pinkie, but I’m kind of tired and I feel…strange.” 

Everyone wanted to know what she was saying, but she just got up, walked over to the couch, and laid right back down next to James.

After that odd incident, it was decided that we’d wait until everyone woke up before we went back and sought more complete help for the injured. Their condition was stable, and we didn’t really want to risk injuring them any more than we had to. With that, I suggested that everyone get some sleep so we would be ready to go the next day.

Everyone nodded and went back to sleep. Applejack went beside Derrick to accompany him. Rarity went back to James’ bed, Fluttershy found a blanket and took a spot on in an open chair, and Pinkie found the nearest vacant couch to collapse on. Twilight and I took a pair of chairs that were right next to each other, where I thanked her for all the help. Within moments, everyone was back asleep and hoping for no further shenanigans.

> Chapter 8: Repercussions
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter #8

James’ POV

“’Twenty hundred years of training’, eh? Perhaps they could have used an instructor…”

After hearing that faint, ominous voice, I opened my eyes, slowly gaining consciousness of my surroundings. I noticed that I could barely see anything, and that I was lying down on a cold, hard surface. I heard a faint voice cry out for help, which prompted me to get up and move toward the voice. Eventually, I ran into what felt like a wooden wall that was somehow cold and wet. I could feel that I had gotten some of the liquid on my hand, which made me lift it up to my face to try to identify it. It smelled distinctly like iron. I tasted a little of it, and it immediately caught me off guard.

It was blood.

As I investigated, the voice, which was definitely on the other side of the wall, seemed to become more distressed. I kept passing my hand over the wall, looking for a door. Finding no such thing, I decided I had no choice but to make one.

The room I entered had slightly more light; it was enough to see what was going on. I wished that wasn’t the case after seeing what was in the room: 

What I saw was Dash strapped to a wall. She looked pale through her fur and one wing was bent at an awkward angle.  Her face was covered in scrapes and gashes, along with a black eye and some torn out mane.  Moving down, I saw more gashes with bone clearly visible at some places.

I felt the need to help, so I stood up and started to walk over to Dash.

“Dash, who did this?”

As I got closer, her good eye’s pupil shrunk to the size of a pin and she started to shake, clearly terrified. She looked away from me, seemingly at something behind me. I could see drops of sweat starting to form. I knew that whatever did this was approaching from behind me. A deep, venomous voice, one I was all too familiar with, then started speaking from behind me.

“It is really hard to find good help these days…” I turned around and looked him in the eye. His one uncovered eye, which was in an ever-present bloodshot state, was just as cruel-looking as I remembered it. I asked him, with much effort, one question that always had bothered me and had never been answered.

“Why…? Why do you do this?”

He laughed for a moment, and then started approaching while staring me in the eyes.

“Let me ask you: Why do you breathe? Why do you eat? Why do you sleep?” He chuckled at that last one, knowing that his influence had made that question only borderline relevant. “You need to. If you don’t, you cannot survive. For me, it is the same. I thrive off of the pain and fear of others. It is what feeds me, sustains me. And as long as there is a mind to torment, I will continue to thrive.”

I was surprised that he actually answered me. I didn’t think he would reveal his motive so quickly. However, he was quick to use my surprise against me.

“You do not show it, but I know it’s there. I can feel it. You can’t help but fear me. And every tiny bit of fear that you feel…” He took a step closer and breathed deeply. “Makes me stronger.”

He had gotten too close for comfort. In an attempt to make him pay for what he’d done, I attempted to kick him. He grabbed my foot mere inches before it hit him, and then threw me in an arc above him using only one hand. I landed back-first on the ground to his left. He walked over, bent down, and looked me in the eyes yet again.

“Does not that very knowledge make you afraid?”

He bent back upright and turned to Dash, as if he was checking to make sure she heard all of that too. He then proceeded to laugh. Maniacally.

I took his distraction to try to sweep him off his feet, but he simply jumped before my legs could meet his. He landed directly on my chest with his needle-like legs punching right in.

“Oh, I love it when they fight back! Makes it slightly more challenging!” He paused to look down at me. “Very slightly.”

He once again began laughing, now doing so even harder than he had before. It was then that I remembered how I had destroyed our would-be assassins and realized how similar he looked to them. I put those facts together, and raised my hand enough to send an electrical shock at him.

For once, something I did actually hit him.

He immediately jumped off of me, and landed a few feet away, one knee on the ground, in a clear state of surprise. The blue ethereal fire that appeared to be coming from his left eye very briefly turned yellow before going back to its signature dark blue. He had stopped laughing and was now hyperventilating.

I got up while he said simply, “Well… that’s new.”

Once I was fully standing (albeit barely, due to the pain) I explained to him what just happened.

“I can use magic now. I don’t know why, but I don’t care. It destroyed those things you sent for me, and it looks like it’ll do something to you.”

I shot another shock at him, but he dodged. He didn’t seem as quick, but he could still move fast enough. I figured if one shot didn’t hit, several at once might. I tried to channel the electricity into a scatter-shot, but I was stopped by the pain in my chest and immediately fell onto my knees.

He smiled and got up. He started walking towards me, and eventually got behind me. I couldn’t turn around to face him. He started speaking nonetheless.

“I’ll have to remember this. This could be fun…” He paused, and I could tell he had his signature grin yet again. “…Later.”

I felt a stabbing sensation from my back. It felt as if a railroad spike had been driven entirely through my body. I fell over. The last thing I saw was him walking over to Dash and doing the same to her.


---------------------------------------------------------------------


A few moments later, I felt a violent shaking. My chest still hurt, but not in the same way as before. It seemed… healed. Not entirely, but it was manageable. My eyes slowly opened, revealing a more-than-worried Dashie trying her best to wake me up.

Eventually, I opened my eyes, which caused a sigh of relief from seemingly everyone. The only ones who didn’t were Derrick, who I couldn’t see, Joe, who seemed surprised that I’d woken up, and Rarity and Pinkie, who were both asleep elsewhere in the house.

With my newly opened eyes, I tried to look at myself to see how badly I’d been injured. Instead, my eyes stopped on my hands, which had arcs of electricity flowing between them. It didn’t surprise anyone, given last night’s events, but it still led to an inevitable statement from Twilight.

“I didn’t even know humans could use magic! This is incredible!”

Joe chipped in, being only slightly less excited. “Dang right it is! And better yet, he’s actually conscious! I’m better than I thought!”

Twilight smacked the back of his head, prompting Joe to reach for it.

“Ow! That hurts, y’know!” She looked up at him with an annoyed look. “Sorry. We’re better than I thought.”

Twilight immediately changed the topic back to my magic, asking how long I’d known how to do it and why I never showed her. It took a bit of effort, but I eventually gave her an answer.

“Not long … and I didn’t … know how.” Every sound came out painfully.
I sat up, with some help from Joe and Dash, to see what had happened. There was surprisingly little damage, but I imagined that there must have been a cleanup to fix everything. On a nearby couch was Derrick, who was lying down on his side with his back facing me. I immediately noticed something odd.

“…Joe… Why does Derrick have wings?”

Joe, who was taking a look at my injuries, didn’t even look up to give his response.

“He died and became an angel.”

“Please … tell me you’re … joking.”

He looked me straight in the eyes with one of the most serious faces he’d ever given me.

“Of course I’m joking. I don’t think things’ve gone that cuckoo yet.”

Twilight looked up at him curiously. “You mean this isn’t normal?”

He responded abnormally seriously. “No. This is actually quite abnormal. First time either of these things have happened, as far as I know.  And I know a lot.” He cracked a smile, and then turned to Twilight. “Any idea how this might’ve happened?”

She shrugged. She didn’t say anything, but she seemed greatly surprised that this wasn’t normal.
Joe read her nearly instantly and offered a solution. “All the more reason to go to a hospital.”

I noticed a flaw in his plan, and immediately made it known. “Won’t they … find this odd? They might … report this to … the government.”

Joe looked at me amusedly. “Y’honestly think I didn’t think of that? I meant Ponyville hospital. They’d probably be more… nice.”

Derrick chimed in with his noticed flaw. “How are we gonna get there? I don’t think James can be walking any time soon, and I’m not sure if I’d make it on my own.”

He cringed, but that was due to Fluttershy caring for his new wings. She, in turn, jumped back a few feet. She went quickly back to what she was doing, albeit much more carefully

Joe turned to me and started speaking in a baby voice. “Do you want me to carry you, Jamey-wamey?”

“Actually … that would be … much appreciated.”

Joe seemed surprised and paused, but quickly regained his composure. “Fair enough.” He turned to AJ. “And would you carry Derrick if he needs it?”

She looked Derrick straight in the eyes. “I would be glad to.”

Joe clapped his hands and stood up. “Well then, what are we waiting for? Time’s a-wastin’.”

Both Twilight and Fluttershy ran over to him and told him we couldn’t yet. They both had their reasons; Twilight told him I was a “ticking magical bomb” in my current state, and Fluttershy noted that Derrick’s wings hadn’t been exercised enough. I was personally offended by Twilight’s claim, and pointed at her to express my disapproval. In doing so, I sent out a bolt that nearly hit Joe and proceeded to singe the wall.

“Dude, watch it! I have no idea what that does, and I’d rather not find out!”

Twilight looked at him with a terrified expression. “See what I mean?! We need to get him under control!”
Joe looked at her with a curious expression. “And how might we do that?”

She thought for a moment, then her eyes brightened and she smiled. Just as quickly, she lost that look in favor of a less happy one.

“There is something I can do, but it can only last for a few days. And it isn’t exactly pleasant for anypony involved…” She shuddered, but soon brought herself back together. “But, we don’t have any other choice.”

She walked over to me and touched her horn to me. After a moment, I saw a bright flash of light, and had a very odd feeling that can only be described as a momentary loss of free will. As soon as I could see again, I saw Twilight sitting next to me, clearly dizzy. It didn’t seem like she was fully conscious. I looked down at my hands, and didn’t see any arcs. I took that to mean it worked.

While all this was going on, Fluttershy and Dashie were working together to get Derrick up and stretch out his wings. They appeared to be resisting the team’s pulls, but eventually Dashie got her side’s wing fully extended. Fluttershy kept fumbling with hers until Dashie came over to help her. Throughout the entire process, Derrick was screaming and flinching. Once both wings were fully out, I could see that they were mostly white save for a few blood spots, and had a span of about ten feet. They immediately started twitching, and soon were making fluid movements. They weren’t going their full range, but it was a start.

A few moments after Derrick started moving his newest appendages, Twilight shook her head and regained consciousness. Immediately after, she simply touched her head and said, “Ow…”

She turned to me, head still in hoof, and said, “We’ll need to do this again in five days, and keep doing it until you can control yourself. The best way to do that is to learn some spells. There are plenty of books in the library you can read.” She closed her eyes and looked down.

“But I’ve … never learned any. How … do I do it?” We both paused until an idea came to my mind. “Can you … teach me?”

She opened her eyes and bolted her gaze in my direction. “Teach you? But I’ve never taught anypony before! I don’t even know how to do it!”

Joe shook his head and laughed. “I’m sure there’s a book on teaching in that tree somewhere. ‘Teaching for Dummies’, perhaps?” She looked at him angrily, and he took on a more defensive look. “Well, just think of how you were taught. Just do the same stuff. You’ll be fine, I’m sure.”

“But … I’m not Celestia. I can’t do what she did…”

He crouched down and wrapped an arm around her. “You’re certainly not Celestia, true. But you are something better.” She turned and looked at him. He simply responded, “You’re you.”

She looked away from him, out into space. She stayed there, silent, for a few seconds. Then she turned to me and said with a look of pure determination, “I’ll try my best!”

Joe took this opportunity to clap his hands and stand up. “Well then, with all that done, what are we waiting for? Time’s a-wastin’.”

We all agreed that it was time to go back. Dashie went to wake Pinkie up, and Fluttershy to wake Rarity up. Once we were all in the same room, we all stepped back into my “Closet to Equestria.”

Once we had reached the other side, we took a moment to recover from the shock and get re-accustomed to the environment. Luckily, there was nothing around to attack us. However, we were on the complete opposite side of town from the hospital. We figured the straight route through town would be best, even if it attracted attention.

We were about half of a mile from Fluttershy’s cottage, putting us about another quarter mile from town. I managed to walk to the outskirts on my own, but from that point, I needed Joe’s support. Derrick, meanwhile, seemed to be walking just fine. AJ was following closely behind him, just to be safe.

Once we got to town, we got stares from everypony. Either they were shocked at my injuries and obvious pain, or they were awestruck by Derrick’s angelic new appearance. A few of them followed us for a bit, but stopped once we got to the edge of town. From there, it was about another half mile to the hospital. Just after leaving town, I had to stop walking, so Joe carried me the rest of the way. Derrick also got tired, and collapsed onto AJ’s back.

Once the hospital was in sight, we all hurried up slightly. They had a pony out front looking for anyone who might need help. She immediately went in and got preparations started. By the time we got in, there were two beds ready in the upper levels. Derrick and I were taken to them immediately, and everyone but Dash was told to stay in the waiting room. After that, they put me in bed, assured me that I was in good hooves, and told me that I’d be out in a few days.