Hal Greenleaf wasn’t a particularly extraordinary earth pony. He was merely average in most respects. He lived in a small house that had little in the way of decoration, though he did own a single painting of the princess that he proudly hung above his fireplace. His plain house could hardly even be considered a house. It was more a cabin on the outskirts of a small, nondescript town. It consisted of two rooms: the main room which had a fireplace, a table with couple of chairs (even though he never had company and had no need for the multiple seats), a set of cabinets, and hook to hang his favorite coat, and his bedroom which simply had a bed and a small stand with a candle for late-night reading.
Hal Greenleaf started most days the same way. He would wake up, masterfully brew a cup of tea, then go into town and run any errands he had for the day. Today however, as he was preparing his morning tea there was a knock at his door.
“Who could that be?” Hal said to himself; the green stallion rarely had anyone knock on his door. He moved quickly to open it, curious about who might want to be visiting him. Though, once he saw who the pony in question was he slammed the door before even the word “hi” could be exchanged.
“Come on! Is that anyway to treat an old friend?” The pony shouted from outside.
“I told you last time that I never wanted any more business with you and I meant it!”
“I brought a gift! Some tea from a zebra tribe that wanted to cook me for dinner.”
Hal thought for moment, then let out a long sigh and reopened the door. Zebra tea was some of the greatest in the world. If he had to listen to whatever nonsensical idea his old companion had conjured up in order to have a taste of that tea, he figured it might almost be worth the trouble. “What do you want, Ace?”
Ace Fortune was a sky-blue pegasus. He often wore a pair of goggles that Hal thought looked silly. He also happened to be an old adventuring partner. Hal had retired from adventuring years ago, but Ace seemed like he would never give up trying to get himself killed.
“The quest of a lifetime!” The pegasus was giddy and his cheerful attitude was already starting to wear on Greenleaf after a couple of words.
“If it’s the adventure of a lifetime you’ll want to find someone else. I’ve already used up half of mine and I don’t plan to waste the rest on another wild goose chase.” The green earth pony was of course exaggerating. He was in fast still quite young.
The pegasus deadpanned. “You know what I mean. Now are you going to let me in or not?”
Hal contemplated slamming the door again for moment but instead decided to let his old friend in. “Fine, come in.” He said as he turned to check on his tea, then turned back, recalling what Ace had said about how he had obtained the zebra tea. “Tried to have you for dinner?”
Ace waved a hoof. “Yeah, it was just a misunderstanding is all. They gave me the tea as an ‘I’m sorry for trying to eat you’ present.”
Hal rolled his eyes and went back to his tea. “Of course they did.” He decided that it was ready and poured himself a cup. “Now what’s all this about another adventure? I told you that I’m done with that.”
“Aren’t you going to offer me some tea?” The pegasus asked as he sat down at the table.
Hal took a sip. “No. Besides, I know for a fact that you don’t drink tea.”
Ace Shrugged. “I would have still appreciated the gesture. But anyway, back to the reason I came.” The lightish-blue pegasus began to rummage around in his bags. This took far longer than it should have and Hal Greenleaf had nearly finished his tea before he finally pulled out an old piece of cloth. “Ha! Here it is.” He said as he placed it down on the table.
The dark green earth pony looked at it with apathy. “What is it?”
“ Aureurbis.” The pegasus said excitedly. Which just drew a questioning stare from the earth-pony across from him. “It’s an ancient city, fabled to have riches beyond anything imaginable and I found a map that will lead us to it.”
“And you actually believe that it exists and that you didn’t just get duped into buying a fake map?” Hal asked incredulously
“Well of course I do! There’s a map. Who makes a map to fake places? Besides, I know you think I’m dumb, but I did my research this time. This one is real. This could be our chance, we could be the richest ponies in the world.” The goggle-clad pony was nearly bouncing with excitement.
“No.” Was the only word Hal had for his former partner.
“Why not?”
Hal couldn’t believe that he would even ask. “Do you even remember the last quest I went on with you? It was a disaster and the ‘treasure’ wasn’t even enough to pay for the costs of the adventure.”
“Oh come on now it wasn’t that bad.”
Hal could feel anger boiling up inside. “Not that bad!?” He shouted. “I was nearly eaten by a dragon. I was hypnotised by snake-like creatures, mauled by a manticore, trampled by an Ursa and I don’t want to even think about that Blue Jay.”
There previous quest was actually far worse than Ace remembered it being. Another former partner named Crackerjack thought it was a good idea to douse himself in dragon urine. The idea was that it would hide his scent. He was the only one of the company of six ponies to do so. What Crackerjack didn’t know was that dragon urine is one of the most flammable substances in Equestria and when the dragon found that the pony had come into his cave smelling of piss, he was less than pleased.
The Blue Jay incident was possibly the most horrific part of the journey for Hal. A giant, mutant, and terribly confused Blue Jay had mistaken him for one of its young. It took him back to it’s nest and proceeded to feed him in that particular way that birds feed their young, by regurgitating into his mouth. This went on for almost a week before the company was able to track down the large bird and rescue the earth-pony.
“The answer is no.”
Ace laid the map down on the table. “Come on, I can’t do this one without you. You’re better with a sword than anypony I’ve ever met.”
“What about the others, why can’t you just have them help you?”
Ace Fortune shrugged. “I would ask them, but they're all dead.”
Hal nearly spit out the last sip of his tea. “W-what do you mean they’re all dead?”
“Well let me think... Ham Hoof fell off a cliff, Backfire blew herself up mixing a potion, funny part was it was meant to be healing potion. Lookout was shot with an arrow during an archery tournament, the referee didn’t even call a foul on the pony that shot him. And well, you know what happened to Crackerjack.”
Hal slumped back in his chair as Ace recounted all the ways his friends had died.
“So you see why I need you?” The pegasus begged.
“Is there no one else you can ask to help you?”
Ace thought for a moment. “Well, I already have a team that’s ready to go, but we’re one short. They’re no newbies, they know what they’re doing; we just someone who's smart and a good with a sword. I couldn’t think of anyone better than you.”
Hal Greenleaf could feel his resolve starting to weaken. His old friend refused to take no for an answer. He may have swore that he was done with adventuring but that was more a promise to himself to keep himself alive rather than actually wanting to quit.
“I know you miss the old days. Do you seriously want to grow old and alone on the outskirts of some nondescript town that doesn’t have a name?”
Hal gave a long defeated sigh. He didn’t want to, but the old life was calling him back. It also helped that most of the ponies in the town didn’t really like him. It would make both them and him happy not to have to see each other for some time. “Alright.”
“You’ll do it!?” Ace flew over the table, grabbing Hal by the shoulders, unable to contain his excitement. He stared unblinking at his friend with a large grin.
“I’ll do it,” The green stallion repeated, “but I get every bit of that zebra tea.”
Hal was suddenly absorbed in a hug that threatened to end his journey before it even started. “Fantastic! I promise you won’t regret it!”
