The Rise of the Dragon Prince

I wake up once again inside my cell. A ray of sunlight hits my face and forces me awake. As I rub my eyes I could hear birds chirping outside. One even landed on the window to my cell. It was interesting to hear and see one up close. You don’t really get to see them when you march with an entire army. You tend to scare of any wildlife before you see it.

I let out a sigh before getting to my feet to look outside. I could see guards in a block down below, it was quiet interesting seeing medieval ponies do their morning routines. They kind of do the same thing at forts but what do I know I’m always on the frontline with the main army. I felt a grumble in my stomach and remembered I haven’t eaten in 3 days. Yeah no wonder I’m out of energy.

Just as I thought that, a heard something slide on the ground. I look behind me to see a tray with two apples and a glass of water. The so called meal didn’t really need a tray but really doesn’t matter, I needed the energy or die from starvation.

I took one of the apples and bit into it. This apple had to be the…best apple I’ve ever tasted! I quickly took another bite then another. I soon ate the apple within about thirty seconds maybe more. I put the core on the tray then drank the glass of water. It was really refreshing. Perfect temperature, nice and cold. Compared to the water in a canteen which was about room temperature or higher.

I save one of the apples for later just in case I didn’t get anything else later on. I sat back down, slumped against the wall and took out my revolver. Looking at it up close it seemed to be perfectly fine. I take out the remaining three bullets out of the chambers and start to clean it. Taking the rag from my ammo pouch on my left side and start to clean my gun.

Besides annoying the guard with my tinkering with my sidearm nothing really happened. After my cleaning, I reload the revolver and set it back into my jacket. I heard the cell door click telling me that it was unlocked. I look at the entrance to see Princess Luna and a familiar white blue mane pony with purple armor.

They enter my cell with the door locked behind them and sit in front of me. I was tempted to reach over and punch, who I now know as Shining Armor, right in the face but I knew that will get me nowhere fast.

“Alright monster-“

“I have a name, so use it.” I saw the annoyance in Shining Armors eyes as I cut him off. ‘hey I have to get you back one way or another.’

“We have questions for you and if you want your position to get any better, it would be smart to cooperate.” Shining Armor with more anger in his voice.

Luna was shifting uncomfortably probably due to Shining Armor’s approach. “I’ll answer if I can, not much I could tell you though.” Luna relaxed a bit by my answer.

“First about your rank, how high is it?”

“Higher than yours captain.” I nearly let out a chuckle seeing Shining Armor’s reaction.

“How did you become an officer in Prussia?” I was surprised that this came from Luna not Shining Armor.

“That is a long story.”

“We have time.”

“Not like you’re going anywhere in the first place.” Shining Armor sneered at me obviously with hostility.

I swear he’s making it really hard to hold back myself from punching him in the face and breaking his nose.

“Alright better get comfy this will take a while.” I waited for a second before continuing.

“As you know my name is Justin Date. This would be different if I was born in Prussia. In fact I wouldn’t be able to talk to you due to differences in language, hell it would be hard to pronounce my name. Anyway I was born in a country called the United States of America. Unlike my country its run by a democracy not a monarchy like Prussia. I never knew my parents, I was raised in an orphanage. Some people think that they died shortly after I was born, others say I was abandoned. Besides the fact I hated that place. The women in charge there didn’t give a damn about us. She only cared for the money that the government sent to her for taking care of us. Living there was a child’s hell, we were verbally and physical abused, barely fed even though there was plenty of food, and forced to do labor as the women just lied on the couch doing absolutely nothing.”

I look up to see the two ponies’ reactions so far. Shining of course just sat there with no expression. While Luna had sadness with a bit of sympathy in her eyes. I took in a sigh and continued.

“When I was seven I told myself enough was enough. I ran away from the place, I knew that the caretaker couldn’t careless if I was gone or not. I ran in the middle of the night no caring what dangers lurked in the night. I wandered for a while until I hit the port. Under the cover of darkness I snuck onto a trade ship not caring where it would take me. All I wanted was to be away from that god forsaken place. After a while at sea the ship landed in Prussia and once again snuck into the city. Once again I wandered for days I wandered until I was found by a Captain named Alexander Hueber. He worked at the military academy in the city. I was taken in and studied at the academy for about 7 year and was made a Leutnant or a lieutenant of a jeagar regiment. I quickly rose in rank until I gained my own infantry regiment and my rank of Oberst.”

I once again look at the two ponies looking at me. Shining was in thought while Luna eyes were filled with sympathy. Shining was the first to respond.

“So you were in the military since the age of seven? How old are you now?”

This was kinda odd, the Captain that once looked like he was about to hang me eyes were now in curiosity.

“I’m 19. Before you say that I’m young you should see how young British low rank officers are, their around 14 when they get to the battlefield, I tell you those nobles are nuts sending off a kid like that but then again they really don’t command their just there to learn.”

Luna by now has already left the cell while me and shining armor stared at each other for a moment longer. After that Shining got up and walked towards the cell door before turning back to me.

“Do you mind if we picked up on this tomorrow?”

Wait…..What! Even the guard guarding the cell looked shock at the sudden change in Shining’s attitude towards me. He was not only talking to me without some sort of insult or demand but he was actually asking me something with respect towards me. What in the hell just happened here, did I miss something.

“Umm…sure if you want, it’s not like I’m going anywhere.” This became extremely awkward for me really fast.

Shining Armor gave out a small grin before leaving. ‘What the hell did I say to get him off my back? Whatever gives me one less enemy to worry about.’

I took out the second apple I was saving and bit into it and looked outside the window. I could hear the birds and feel the golden rays of sun hit my face and the fresh smell of air.

“This has become an Interesting development.” I chuckled before I once again let sleep overtake me.