A True Home

I woke up in the morning, snuggled up to Rainbow Dash. I still couldn’t believe that she had asked me to stay the night with her, even if she was drunk. I just lay there, with an attractive mare using my neck as a pillow. She had a slight snore which was adorable. I couldn’t help but laugh at that.

The laughing caused Rainbow to wake up though. She blinked a few times to clear the sleep from her eyes. She looked up into my eyes and smiled. I didn’t even think she remembered how she got home, let alone who I even was. “Good morning Rainbow. Did you sleep well?” I asked her.

She smiled and nodded. “Thank you for flying me home, and for staying with me last night. It meant a lot to me.” She sadly smiled after that. “It was just that an old friend came back and acted like a jerk to me and my new friends. I felt so lonely.” I knew who she was talking about. She was talking about Gilda the griffin. I nodded in understanding. I was on that moon for all that time, all of that time was spent alone. This also explained why they all went to the bar.

Hey! What about me?!

I sighed and pulled Rainbow closer to me, trying to make her forget the loneliness. She smiled as I hugged her, hugging me back. She pulled back and looked into my eyes again. “I told my friends that I would meet them at Sugar Cube Corner this morning. Would you like to come with me for breakfast?” she asked.

As if answering her, my stomach growled at me. I haven’t eaten since I got here. “I would love to join you.” I said. She smiled and hugged me again when I said that. With that she hoped out of bed and trotted down the stairs. Shortly after that, I got out to and headed down stairs after her. She was waiting for me by the door with her saddle bags already strapped on. “I’m ready to go now if you want.” I told her. She opened the door and flew down towards the gingerbread house below.  I jumped down after her, free falling until I was about fifty feet from the ground and snapped my wings open until I slowed enough that I could land. I walked the rest of the way to Sugar Cube Corner.

When I got to the bakery Rainbow was already inside talking to Twilight about how much better they all made her feel last night. But my friend Sparky was there to, sitting at one of the booths. So I walked over to him to start a conversation. “Hey Sparky, Whats new today?” I asked once I was close enough so I didn’t have to yell. The bakery was small compared to other buildings but had a more filled feal to than my own home, it was almost warmer.

He looked over at me and smirked. “I was about to ask you the same thing. I heard some pony beat Berry at her own game last night. You know anything about that?” he asked.

“Yeah she called me a god, and gave me free drinks in her bar for life. Then after that I flew Rainbow home and ended up sleeping with her.” As soon as the words came out of my mouth I knew I was in trouble. “By that I mean that we actually slept. Just in the same bed.” I corrected.

“I don’t care what you did. She has been mopping around for a week. But today she looks so much happier. Good job.” He smiled at me from his seat across from me. Before he could continue I looked out the window to see a cart being pulled by a blue pony wearing a cape and hat adorned with stars. We both let out a low growl at the sight of the mare.

“I’ve messed up the time line enough so I’m going to let you pick this time. We can either let the girls deal with her like on the show, or we can intervene and have some fun today.” I gave him the option this time because I saved Luna and messed up the time line big time, so now it was his turn.

He looked over at me a wicked smile on his face. “Whats the plan, how can I help, and what do you need?” He asked. I smiled; this was one of those things that I had thought about while on the moon. I had the perfect plan.

“Okay, so do you know the song Magic by B.o.B?” he nodded his head. “well if we sang that song, I don’t think anypony could beat us. So what do you say, you in?” I asked.

“Oh I’m in, but we will need help with the electronics and such. We could ask DJ PON3  if is willing to hook us up.” He smiled. “She owes me one anyways.” He said. I’ll have to ask about how he got said favor at a later date. We nodded at each other again. Simultaneously getting up and walking towards the door.

Seeing as it was our own affairs, I failed to tell the others what we were planning and as a result we were stopped at the door by Rainbow she looked really sad. “Where are you going? I thought you were going to eat breakfast with me.” She sat down looking defeated.

I sat down next to her. “Don’t worry I’ll be back. I promise I will never abandon you Rainbow.” I told her. She looked up at me tears in her eyes and a frown on her face.

“Pinkie promise?” she asked, still crying.

I sighed. “Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye!” I recited cheerfully. She smiled after that. I loved to see her smile, it made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

“I’ll see you tonight then?” she asked. I nodded with a smile. “Okay have fun” she then flew back over to Twilight to continue their conversation.

We continued on our way only stopping once to go to the bathroom. Once we reached her house I realized two things. One, ponies had technology, and two, Vinyl makes great music. Sparky knocked on the door and the music stopped. When the door opened there was a white mare with a shaggy electric blue mane. Sparky introduced me and gave her the rundown of the plan nodding all the while. When he was done explaining the plane she agreed to loan us her stuff so long as we beat Trixie good. I told her she could bet on it.

Now that we had the stuff, we had to mount it all on a cart, luckily Sparky had one big enough back at the barn. So while Vinyl gets all the stuff ready for us, we would be getting the cart to mount it all on to. So we walked over to Sweet Apple Acers making idle chit chat as we walked. About things that I missed while I was gone.

“Since you were gone, I ended up not having a best man at my wedding.” He said. Wait, he didn’t find anyone else to be his best man? That seemed a little extreme to me.

“Why? Couldn’t you find some other pony to fill it?” I asked him.

“It’s not like that.” He sighed. “I don’t make many friends. Yeah I have AJ and the girls but I don’t really have any guy friends. They all seem to think I’m a freak.” I looked at him and saw total hopelessness. “I didn’t have anypony attend my wedding either. If it wasn’t the happiest day of my life, I would have cried.”

I reached over and put my hoof around him trying to comfort him. “That’s no way to feel surrounded by all this candy colored ponies. I mean how many humans can say that they can live the rest of their lives in a magical kingdom filled with ponies?” I looked back over at him to catch a glimpse of a smile on his face. “We should be happy, not mopping around because not many people like us.”

He finally looked over at me and smiled back. “Okay, your right. And in a little while, we can bask in the glory of showing up Trixie. What in the hay could top that?” he asked. I couldn’t think of anything so I just nodded.  About a minute later, we reached the barn he had told me about. When he pushed the barn door open, I saw that, there was indeed a large carte that we could put all the stuff onto. It even looked big enough for us to sing on too.

“This looks perfect, Sparky. Good job. Now all we have to do is hall it back to Vinyl’s place and then were off to the show.” He nodded in agreement. “I can pull it if you want. It doesn’t look that heavy.” I said. He helped me put the straps on around my torso, so that I could pull it. I was slightly worried about not being strong enough to pull the cart, but it felt light, too light. I brushed it off to ask about later and continued to pull it along.

It seemed to me that it took less time to get back to Vinyl’s house, and when we got there, all the stuff we asked for was put out so we could load it onto the cart. It took us some effort to load it all by hoof, Stupid unicorns and their cheating magic. None the less when it was done we spared no time in hurrying over to the crowed of ponies. But it seemed like we were too late to save Rarity from having her mane turned into a green rat’s nest.

Now that we had all the stuff we needed, we could finally put this mare in her place. I turned to Sparky who was busy undoing my harness. “So, you

ready to sing?” I asked. He looked up from what he was doing and seemed to be worried about something.

He sighed for what seemed like the tenth time today. “I don’t know the whole song. I’m sorry; please don’t be mad at me.” He looked like this was really all that big of a deal. I just laughed at his stammering apologies.

“Look it’s not that big of a deal. Do you know the chorus?” I asked. He nodded. “Then you can be my back up singer. That way people can see how cool you are. So stop the water works.” I put my hoof on his shoulder, which gave him a determined look on his face. “All right, now that’s better. Now when the music starts I want you to open for me. Then when it’s past the chorus, I’ll jump in and then we’ll sing together.” He nodded and got up on the cart. He grabbed a mic and I grabbed an identical one that Vinyl had given us. I looked up to see Sparky nod at me, ready for me to start the music. But before I did I had to get everyponies attention. “HEY! TRIXIE! PICK ON SOMPONY YOUR OWN SIZE!” I yelled through the mic. I hit the play button and the music started.

Here is the song.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1oTtzKsJyA

When the song was over I took a second to catch my breath, and when I looked up I saw that everypony was cheering for us. I spoke back into my mic to Trixie. “Top that!” I said. The cheering continued as she got off of her stage and folded it back up into the trailer it was. Sparky and I had won; there was no doubt about it

T

he mare that I had brought up had started dancing with us during the song. I was now taking a better look at her. She had green coat with a dark green mane, she walked up to and tapped me to get my attention. “I wanted to thank you for bringing me up here, captain.” How did she know that I was a captain? Oh, I’m still wearing my armor. I smiled at her and she smiled back at me. “If you ever want to stop by, I work at the café down the street, you should come sometime.” She said. She walked off the stage leaving me to ponder what ponies thought of a captain of the royal guard, was doing singing a song like that.

I wasn’t left alone for long however because Vinyl hoped onto the stage. “Dude, That was awesome. I should have you DJ at my club in Canterlot sometime. My fans would love you.”

“Thanks, that means a lot coming from you. Thanks for letting Sparky and I use your equipment, it really helped out a lot.” I told her. With that she walked away muttering about how she could get me to DJ for her. I guess that could be fun, I could make all the guards go, improve moral and all.

Now that all the fun was done, most of the ponies started to go on about their daily lives. A few stayed back and told me what a good job I did. I thanked them and told them it was fun. When everypony else was gone Sparky walked over to me, “Thanks for doing this with me, I had a lot of fun singing. We should do this again sometime.”

“Totally. Brohoof?” I asked extending my hoof. He seemed surprised at first, but smiled and bumped his hoof to mine. “Hey, could you take the cart back? I have to get something taken care of.”

“Yeah I can do it. I’ll see you tomorrow.” He said. I helped him get strapped into the cart’s harness, so that he could get home sooner. When I was done we said good bye and parted ways. When I turned around I was looking into a set of magenta eyes looking back at me intently. “Hey Rainbow, are you hungry? I missed breakfast, and I know this café that’s just down the street. Would you like to come with me to get something to eat?” I asked.

“Yeah I could go for something to eat.” She said. I hope this makes up for me bailing on her earlier at sugar cube corner. “So was that why you left earlier?” she asked.

“Yeah, it was. Are you mad at me for that?” I asked her.

“No, I’m not mad at all. Trixie was just being a loud mouth and showing everyone up. It was awesome the way you came and beat her like that. I should be thanking you”

“You’re welcome; it was fun singing in front of all those ponies. Maybe next time you could join me.”

“That would be. So. Awesome!” she said.

As we kept walking I finally found the restaurant that mare was talking about. It was called the Hay and Bail. I thought it had a rather catchy ring to it. I lead Rainbow in and a waiter was there to take us to a booth in the corner of the establishment. When we were seated, the waiter gave us menues and went back to his post.

Before I had the chance to open my menu Rainbow Dash cut into my train of thought. “So what made you want to come to this place, it doesn’t look like anything special?” she said.

“A friend of mine told me to come here sometime, so here I am.” I opened my menu to see that it was all in French. Well I guess I’m going to have to point at whatever sounds good. On the other side of the table I herd Rainbow gasp. “Are you alright Rainbow Dash?”

“Have you seen these prices? Are you sure you want to eat here? We could go someplace else, someplace cheaper. We don’t have to eat here you know.”

`I laughed at her, why would I care what food cost? Food is always worth what it cost. I managed to turn my laugh down to a snicker before I said. “Just get whatever you want, okay? I’m buying this meal.” I told her. She visibly relaxed when I said that. Maybe she didn’t have money or just didn’t want to pay it. I was going to pay for the both of us.

When a waitress came by to take our orders, she recognized me as the pony from earlier. “Pardon me, but I don’t believe I caught your name.” she said. I smiled at her.

“Midnight Rain at your service. May I ask your name?”

"You may, my name is Ruby Green, you can call me Ruby.” She said. “Can I take your order?” she asked. I lifted my menu and pointed at random. She wrote it down and moved on to Rainbow Dash, who used a similar strategy to get what she wanted. “I shall return shortly with your meals.” She left me and Rainbow alone to make small talk.

“So do you have to do anything after this, Midnight? Because it’s getting late and you said you would be with me tonight.” It was getting late? I looked out the window to see that the sun was indeed setting. “I was feeling a little tiered and was hoping you could sleep with me.” At that my eyes widened. “What, oh not like that! I meant like actually sleeping. Umm… not that I don’t want to sle…” I put a hoof to her mouth to stop her before she embarrassed herself.

“I know what you meant. But I have to make a quick stop at Canterlot after this.” She frowned. “But after that I’m all yours.” I said with a wink, causing her to blush a light pink. It was so cute I almost dawwed at her. have to stop in Canterlot because I’ve noticed a lack of guards in Pony vile. So I was going to ask Tia if she would mind transferring some other guards here. Then I would leave and come back and snuggle with Rainbow in her nice comfy bed made of clouds. That sounds really nice. But that will have to wait for latter.

Ruby came sooner than I expected with our food balanced on her back. It looked like bread and fruit put into a salad with a light dressing that I couldn’t describe. When she put the food down I thanked her and started on my meal. I let out a sigh of content when I felt food in my stomach, it had been empty for years and now I was finaly having a meal. I was in heaven.

"This is the first meal that I have eaten in forever. Thank you for coming with me. It means a lot.” I told her after I was done. She had finished sooner than I had, and smiled at me.

“I’m glad. I should get home. Are you sure that you have to go to the castle today?” she looked ike she was pleading with me, but as much as I wanted to go back to sleep with her, I had to get this town protected from the ursa that should be in town tonight. I nodded my head, much to her disappointment. “Well, I’ll see you tonight.” She got up and left the booth to head home. I waited for Ruby to come back to see if I needed anything to ask for the check.

She looked hurt. “What gave you the impression I was going to have you pay. I don’t charge friends at my own restaurant. That would be rather rude don’t you think?” so she owned the place as well as worked here. She must be dedicated.

“Well in that case, thank you for the meal, Ruby, it was rather…. Filling.” I said. She giggled at me. “I should be leaving now, Ruby. It was nice to see you.” I said as I got up out of the booth.

“Come again!” she called to me as I walked out the door. When I looked up at the sky, I saw that the sun had set and the moon had taken its rightful place in the sky. It was dark but I could still see the outline of the castle from here. It only looked about an hour’s flight away from here. I Might as well start the flight now. I took flight, flying into the night sky.

I was about half way to the castle when I started talking to Stan.

"So what changed since we got on this planet? last i herd you hated Rainbow Dash."

“I never hated her, I just thought she was the worst of the main six. Never said I hated her.”

“Oh, I understand. You liked her, just not as much as the other five, right?”

“Bingo! You catch on fast.”

"Well I am you, stupid. I just don’t have any remorse.”

“I heard that!”

“Why do you think I said it?”

We continued back and forth about stupid things like meat and how I’m bad company. But once I landed outside the castle Stan “left” me so I could meet with Tia and Luna alone. I had landed outside the castle gate that was being guarded by two night guards.

I walked up to the gate but when I tried to push it open the two guards pushed me back onto my flank. “Where do you think you’re going?” The one on the right asked. Nopony is allowed past this point after dark unless you have clearance. Move along.” I started laughing at him. He really didn’t know who I was. Maybe I should show him. “What are you laughing at boy?”

“Hmmm? Oh! Didn’t you hear? It’s past curfew.” I smiled wickedly. I brought my hoof into the left guard’s face as hard as I could. Then I turned and bucked the right guard in the face. Hard. “Lights out.” I looked down at the two of them. I hope I didn’t do any long lasting damage.

Now that those two were out of the way, I pushed the gate open and walked into the castle. I stopped two passing guards and told them about the two “sleeping” guards at the front gate. They looked between themselves and walked away to the front gate. I continued down the hallway until I found a stair well that would take me to the top of the castle where Tia’s sleeping chambers where.

When I got to the top of the stairs I saw two doors, a black door and a yellow door. I faced the yellow door and pushed it open. Not bothering to knock, I just walked into see Tia sleeping on her massive bed. I walked over to her bed and put my hoof on her shoulder, shaking lightly.

After I doubled my efforts, Tia’s eyes slowly cracked open. “Ugh. What do you want, Midnight?”

"I want five guards to take with me to Pony vile.”

"Take them and go. I want to go back to sleep.” She rolled over, done with the conversation. That was a lot easier than I thought it would be. I shrugged and left her room and walked to where I think I passed the barracks. Once I got back down the stairs it was easy to find the large door that lead to the barracks.

When I pushed the door open, I was greeted with a dark room filled with rows of bunk beds. When I looked closer, I saw ponies sleeping in them. However, in the corner of the room, there was a table with several ponies sitting at it.  I walked over to see them playing a game of cards. When they saw me coming they all sat in their chairs straighter.

“Hi. I’m captain Midnight Rain.” I introduced myself.

“We know who you are, captain. What can we do for you?” a pegasus pony at the far side of the table asked.

“I need five pegasi to come with me to Pony vile. Those of you that come with me will be stationed there until otherwise notified. Are there any volunteers?”

I waited a moment for somepony to step forward. The pony at the far side of the table stood and walked behind me. Then four other pegasi stood and fallowed behind him. “We are at your command, sir.” They all said at once. Well at least I got five of them. I nodded my head at the door that I came through, telling them that we were leaving.

We walked out the door and down the hall that I had come through when I first arrived. When we got to the gat I noticed two other guards had been posted at the gate, but these ones let us walk past. Once we were outside the gate, we took flight towards Pony vile.

“SO, what are you ponies names?” I asked after we had cleared the city. I hadn’t gotten their names yet.

The first one to answer was a white pegasus with yellow eyes and mane. “I’m White Wash. This is Jet Fire.” He said, pointing to a black pegasus with red eyes and mane. He nodded at me.

The next was the first pony that stood up from the table. He was white with a black mane, but had blue eyes. “I’ m Sapphire.” Was all he said to me. Then the other two spoke up. They both had gray fur, with purple spiky manes and eyes.

"My name is Blitz and this is my sister Star Light.” He introduced, smiling at his sister.

“Well, I’m Midnight Rain. Pleased to meet you all. If you didn’t know, I was the one who was sent to the moon. I am immortal and I saved princess Luna. Any questions” I finished. They all looked at me like I was crazy, mouths open and eyes wide. Blitz was the first to recover.

“Not that this is that important,  but where are we going to be staying? Part of the reason we don’t have guards in Pony vile is because there is nowhere for us to stay.” He said. I hadn’t thought about that. But I guess they could stay in my house. It has enough space for all of them to stay there comfortably. Yeah that could work.

“You can all stay in my house. It has enough rooms for you all to have your own. So it’s no problem.” I told them. Nobody else spoke up for the rest of the flight. It was a very quiet flight, filled only with the soft beating of our wings flapping up and down. But when we started to get close to Pony vile, we started hearing screams coming from the town. When we could see what was happening, ponies were running back and forth in panick. I stopped a  pony that was running past us. “Hey, why is everypony running?”

“There’s an ursa in town. We all have to run!” he said. I let him keep running. Then there was a thumping that was getting closer until a blue monster came into our view. It looked like the night sky with the body of a bear. It let out a mighty roar, causing everypony nearby to scream and run for cover.

“Alright, here’s the plan. I want you guys to get everypony back into their homes until its safe.” I told them.

“But what are you going to do, sir?” asked Star Light. I looked at her and smirked.

“I’m going to distract it so you have more time to get the job done. Now go!” They stopped arguing and went to help the ponies get into their homes for safety. I turned to the ursa ready to give them as much time as they needed. “Alright tubby, let’s dance.”

I launched into the air, heading right for the ursa, stopping right in front of its face. We stayed there, motionless for a while. But then this funny idea popped into my head. I reached out my hoof and bopped it on the nose. It seemed surprised that I did that. It recovered and let out a roar filled with spit and bad breath. “Dude, you need a breath mint!” I probably shouldn’t have said that.

It raised its paw and swatted me right out of the sky and into the Trixie’s show cart. I skipped off the ground a couple times after that until I ran into a door that busted open, slowing my momentum. When I opened my eyes I was surrounded by books. “Umm…. Can I help you, Midnight?” I turned around to see Twilight was in the room with me. But before I could answer, Spike came into the library.

“Twilight you’ve got to come, quick!” He exclaimed, out of breath. But the look twilight had when she went back to her book just screamed “no”.

“I already told you, Spike. I don’t want to show up Trixie.” She said. There was a loud roar that seemed to come from all around us. “Was that what I think it was?” she asked.

Before Spike could say it, I jumped in. “Majorly.” With that, we rushed out the door to see that the ursa was crushing a house. You have to do something. My guards and I can’t stop this ourselves. We need you \, Twilight.” She looked at me unsure at first, but then a  look of determination took over her features. She took a stance and started to preform her first spell, making the air fill with a soothing melody. The ursa started to sway before it started falling over. Twilight caught it before it could crush somepony.

Seeing that she had the situation under controle, I went over to the house that had been crushed. Under the ruble, I could hear calls for help. I started pulling off ruble until I found a pony with a heavy beam of would pinning her to the ground. I knew I could lift it, but the pony looked beat up bad. I needed help, and luckily, I say Jet Fire running past.

“Hey, Jet Fire. I could use a hoof here.” I called out to him. He looked over and started running to my aid. “I can lift the beam, but I need you to pull him out.” He nodded. I put my hoofs under the beam and started to lift it, giving enough room so that Jet could pull the pony out. Once we were done, I dropped the beam with a crash. “All right, good team work. Now take him to safety and find him some medical attention.” He gave me another nod and started off to the Pony vile hospital.

Before I moved on I could hear a little filly’s crying. It was still coming from the ruble. I doubled my efforts to make sure that the filly was alright. Once I cleared enough rouble, I found a small filly that had a white coat, and a purple and pink mane. She had been trapped under a large piece of wood. I pulled the wood off allowing the filly to escape. Once out, she grabbed onto my hoof and started crying softly. I pulled her up onto my back so that I could keep moving.

By the time I had rescued the two ponies from the ruble. The ursa was gone and a crowd of ponies surrounded Twilight. I joined the crowd and pushed my way into the center. Before I could say anything, Rarity ran up and pulled the filly from my back. “Sweetie, darling. Are you alright?”

In the cutest voice I have ever heard, she looked up from crying and nodded. “I’m alright, this nice stallion saved me from being crushed.”

Rarity looked at me and smiled. “Thank you, darling. I shall not forget this.” I smiled back at her. It felt good to do something nice for others. I turned and headed out of the crowd and walked over to my fellow guards. They all had their heads down and seemed sad.

“Why the long faces?” I asked once I was in ear shot. They all looked up in relief at me.

Sapphire was the first to speak. “We thought you were dead. I saw you get hit by that ursa and assumed the worst. I’m glad I was wrong.”

“Well, that was a warm welcome. How about I show you to your new home?” I asked. They smiled and laughed at my joke. “Alright, let’s not waste time; I have some place I need to be.” When we got to my house, I turned and hoofed my key over to Sapphire. “Here. I want you to look after this for me. You can all choose your rooms, I will see you all tomorrow.” He took the key and I walked off.

It took me some time, but I found where Rainbow’s house floated in the sky. I began the flight up and started to feel tired half way up. Man I really wanted to sleep. When I got to the door, I knocked and waited for Rainbow to come to the door. “You came back.” She squealed and hugged me. I stiffened at first, but then hugged her back.

“I don’t know about you, but I’m tired. Can we go to bed now?” I asked. ahe grabbed my hoof and started to pull me into her house and up the stairs. Once in her room, I laid on the bed and pulled Rainbow in close. “Good night.” And then I allowed the clutches of sleep take me.

But just before I was completely out, I thought I herd Rainbow mutter something.

“Thank you.”