“You okay there, partner?” AJ asked as Calico as he finished his second mug of cider in three solid gulps.

“Just fine. Now then to continue, my team and I were able to return to our base that was about 15 miles away. We had lost two of our own but ended up with the remnants of the team that we were supporting. A lot of good soldiers died that day and I was lucky enough to only be wounded. When I finally got to the medic tent they said it had been too long and that saving the arm that was dangling by nothing more than skin was all but impossible.” Calico said with a hint of despair in his words.

“How did you escape? You mentioned a trump card, what was that?” Rainbow Dash exuberantly asked. Her eyes sparkled a bit like she had just gotten to the best part of her favorite Daring Do novel.

“My trump card was a heavy weapon. I fired a very large incendiary round into the midst of their fire line.” Calico noted the looks on the pony’s faces as they internally questioned what he was talking about.

“Sorry, think of it like…” Calico looked around and noticed the horse head sitting on the table in the middle of the library, “like a self propelled version of that horse head. The difference is that it was smoothed into a dome shape on top and was filled with something that causes fires that burn hot enough to melt darn near anything.”

There was a slight look of horror on all of the pony’s faces at the mention of this. The thought that someone could not only kill, but would use something that did that to kill others was ghastly.

Calico looked down and stared at his near empty mug.

“We scattered. They overtook our base and we had no chance. We were lucky though because so many of my kind made it to escape vehicles and took to the heavens. I grabbed that little ship outside and found a way to make it like home until I landed on a planet that had been doing prosthetics and cybernetics for a long time and they hooked me up with this arm…well both of them.”

Calico looked at his newly attached arm and rubbed his hands together before putting them both down on the table. He took one look into his mug and nudged it a bit. What was going through his mind, no pony knew, but what they did know was that this wolf was indeed, out of this world.

“Twilight would it be too much to ask for one last mug?” He asked almost flatly. His vocal tone was all but gone as he tipped the mug a bit from the top ring using only his finger.

“But what happened next? How did yawl get here?” AJ asked. The puzzle in her mind was slowly being put together but stuff was missing.

Calico shook his head. “No more right now.” It took only a single swig to finish off the last of the cider in his cup. “I’ll tell you all more later. Trust me, you’ll not be left without.”

Calico stood up from his seat and started to gather the dishes.

“You don’t need to do that Calico,” Twilight said as she was beginning to levitate most of the dishes off the table and towards the sink. “I’ll take care of them a little later, they aren’t important right now.”

Not stopping himself, Calico grabbed the last of the dishes and brought them to the sink and placed them in the side that was quickly filling up with water and suds. Twilight had to dang near nudge him with her horn to get him to stop and leave them alone. With a slight amount of resignation, he let it be and walked into the central section of the library, the ponies following soon after.

Calico saw the spot that he had been laying against not but a few hours before, the small amount of blood that had spilled from him still staining the floor. He stepped over and leaned down to rest against the shelf. With closed eyes he let out a breath and tried to relax.

“You alright there, sugarcube?” Applejack asked. She could see something was up but couldn’t quite put her hoof on it.

“I’m…” He couldn’t finish his statement. He couldn’t say anything. All he could do was look deep inside himself for the will that he always had to weather the storm. Finally after a few silent moments he said, “Yeah, I’m alright.”

“Maybe we should give him some time.” Rarity said quietly to the rest of the ponies. It was low enough that any other pony would never have heard anything, but Calico was a wolf with well-tuned hearing. He smirked a bit but said nothing. Some alone time would be nice right about now…not to mention a shower. His fur still had bits of char and dirt all over it.

The ponies all agreed it would be fine to call it quits for the night, but Rarity insisted on one of them staying the night for the sake of protection for Twilight. Rainbow Dash volunteered and things were settled. Goodbyes were said and the other two ponies walked out. Twilight turned from the door that she was now closing with her magic to look at Calico, who was still sitting on the floor leaning against the bookcase with his eyes closed.

“Calico?” Twilight said trying as softly as possible to get his attention. Calico simply hummed slightly to show he was listening. “Are you ok?”

“Yeah, I’m fine Twilight. Nothing to worry about.” His voice seemed sure of this fact and yet…yet… “Twilight, is there a place I can wash up? I’m tired of smelling like a corpse.”

“Yeah, there is a bathroom upstairs. You go get cleaned up and Rainbow Dash and I will set up a place for you to sleep.” With a simple nod Rainbow agreed with Twilight and proceeded to follow her.

Calico headed upstairs and noted the nice large shower and tub basin that would give him that little bit of comfort. Downstairs Twilight and Rainbow worked on setting up a place for the evening guest.

“Twi this seems a little weird.” Rainbow said as she grabbed a few pillows and balanced them on her back between her wings.

“What do you mean?” Rainbow face hoofed.

“Are you really comfortable having a predator sleeping here all night? What if he goes nuts and decides to make a pony sandwich in the middle of the night?” Rainbow by this time was making gestures with her fore hooves while being suspended by her flapping wings, the pillows now nothing but a heap on the ground next to a makeshift bed.

“Somehow I doubt that. He doesn’t seem to be aggressive. Crazy maybe, but not aggressive. I do think he is hiding something though.” Twilight said. Rainbow nodded and nothing more was said for a few. After having made a makeshift bed and setting things up in Twilight’s room for Dash, they decided to do a little reading while they waited. Twilight chose the book that she had been in the middle of reading for a report to princess Celestia and Dash grabbed a copy of the latest Daring Do book.

It was about fifteen minutes before Calico finished his shower and was headed back downstairs. He stopped 3 stairs from the bottom and looked into the library to see Dash and Twilight sitting close to the fireplace that was acting as the primary light source for the room.

“A fire place and a good book. Sounds like a classic plan for a chilly night.” Calico said as he finished descending the stairs.

“Did you enjoy your shower Calico?” Twilight asked as she finally took her head out of her book to look at him despite hearing him come down the stairs.

“Immensely, at least now I only look a mess instead of smelling of one too. I do need to get some new clothes though. My cabinet with my old stuff burned with the cheese sandwich.”

Rainbow looked at Twilight as though she had missed something.

“You kept your clothes in your kitchen?”

“There weren’t many other places I could keep them. Its not like that ship is very large.” Calico said with a frown. It wasn’t very large but it was his home and now it was in ruins.

“Well we could talk to rarity tomorrow to see what she could do. She is an amazing seamstress.”

“Meh I’ll check my ship later, maybe something survived.” Calico said. Twilight noticed one thing about him. He was not wearing the top that had been burnt up and shredded anymore. Without it though much could be seen on his body. He was fit but not bulky. His arms were toned but not swollen like Snowflake the bodybuilding pony.

The biggest things though were the scars his body sported. While they were few in number they were not by any means small. A large gash across his chest and one circling his right side right were his fake arm was attached that went around to his back. Twilight wanted to ask about it badly but didn’t have the heart to. Dashie however…

“Wow what happened to you? You look like someone sent a manticore after you.” Rainbow said unabashedly. Twilight looked horrified as is Rainbow had just insulted him.

All Calico could say was, “huh?”

Rainbow got up and walked over to him and looked closer at his back.

“Your wings are all messed up. When was the last time you preened them?”

Calico had to think back. When was the last time he had touched them? His mind sparked and he suddenly realized when it was.

“About a month before the crash…this is assuming that I wasn’t knocked out for long before I landed in your town hall.” Calico dropped his head thinking about the damages he caused. “Sorry about that again.”

“Hey don’t worry about that, you need to worry about your wings. They are in bad shape. I bet you can’t even fly with them like that.” Rainbow said as she nudged him a bit closer to the fireplace.

“Easy there, Ill take care of them.” Calico said as he sat down cross-legged on the floor about eight feet from the fire. “Besides its not like I fly with these things that often anymore.”

The look on Dash’s face was one of amazement.

“What the hay? Why?”

“When you spend years in space, there isn’t much room to fly around.”

That reason seemed logical considering. Twilight however was running a question through her mind that she had to let out.

“Calico, how old are you? You’ve said you have spent years in space before the war on your home planet then more after you left it.” Twilight asked as she stepped over to be closer and in his line of sight instead of asking questions to his back.

“You would have to ask me a math question.”

The quizzical look that Twilight gave him told him he had best explain.

“I measure my age based on the planet I am on. I do the math based on hours per day and days in a year. I know that this planet moves much faster than mine just from being outside today. So why don’t you tell me those figures and Ill tell you my age.” Calico was soft in everything he said. He was slowly working on his wings trying to get them to look right again. He sadly was failing.

“This is a bit weird but we have 24 hours in a day and 365 days in a year.” Twilight said in a matter of fact voice. She saw the surprised look in Calico’s face and saw as he was tracing his finger on the ground to figure out his answer.

He had to redo it several times.

“Problem?” Twilight asked.

“No just making sure I was right… this is freaking crazy. I felt old before, now I’m archaic.”

“Well how old are you?”

“Umm…I’m roughly twenty seven thousand years old on this planet.” Calico said, still shocked at the answer himself.

“So you suck at math and you suck at preening. Don’t feel bad we all can’t be as awesome as me.” Rainbow Dash said doing her normal show off posture. Her wings were erect and even shining a bit in the light of the fire as she held her head high.

“Wish I did suck that bad at math. I’ve done this calculation hundreds of times. I know I’m right.”

“How is that even possible? You don’t look like you are more than 25 or 30 years old if I was just to go off of how your body structure is.”

“That nice of you to say. However it doesn’t change the fact that I am twenty seven thousand years old."

“How old were you on your planet?” Twilight asked.

“Around eight thousand years old. This planet is moving at almost three and a half times the speed mine did. Crap…I’ll need a cane soon to help me walk.” Calico said with his tongue out and a smile on his face. “Of course I don’t need to tell anyone that I’m that old, I could just give them the eight thousand age.”

Speechless, that is all that Twilight was in that very instant, speechless. How could he be so fine with this? What was wrong with him? Her worst question was how long could she stand to be around him and his insanity. He wasn’t normal and this was going to make for a very long night if things kept up like this.

Author's Note

These last two chapters took me quite a while because I originally had broke down the 4th chapter into two because I thought it would be too long but I was kinda wrong. Anyway, I don't know if anyone is actually enjoying this or if I'm just digging myself into a hole here. I would appreciate any and all comments on this story so I know if i should really continue or if I should just to do small one shot things.