Chapter 1-0:
Chapter 1-0: Cheating Death
That night in Ponyville the world was alight with flickering lights. Sure Luna’s night was pretty and all, but the aforementioned lights weren’t the stars in the sky above. No, the lights in question were the 400 candles carried by the citizens of Ponyville. Tonight was a night for mourning, as the crowd gathered around the Golden Oak Library.
Six years ago that day, the Town’s beloved Princess Twilight had been working on an experiment. From what had been gathered in the aftermath it was believed that she had been experimenting with mixing the magical properties of potions with spell magic, the result had been more than potent. At around 12:00 that day Spike had just went out for lunch when an explosion of epic proportions rippled through Ponyville, and just like that Twilight was gone, forever.
What remained of the Golden Oak had been made into a memorial, and since then every year on this day the inhabitants of Ponyville, and a few others from across Equestria would gather to celebrate her life and mourn her death. All events proceeded as they always did, candle lit procession, a few words about the accomplishments and impacts of Twilight’s life, and then a prayer vigil offered up to the King, that Twilight’s essence may be granted eternal paradise.
For the five remaining bearers of the Elements of Harmony, today was the anniversary of the day when they lost not just a beloved ruler, but also a best friend. At the time the prayers started things started to diverge from the planned events.
When the ponies should have been focusing their good wishes on Twilight, they were distracted by a meteor shower of such majesty that Luna would later try and fail to recreate. After this unexpected spectacle one of the bearers of the elements, Applejack, remembered that Twilight had an obsession with astronomy, and probably would have spent the last week ranting on about the trajectories, vectors, and other fancy terms describing it, had she still been alive that is. It hurt to remember that, all the things she had taken for granted about Twilight, she now missed more than ever.
As she tried returning her mind to her prayers another interruption, Winona began barking, a tad bit frustrated Applejack “Aw fiddle sticks, ah knew I shouldn’t have brought the dog!” Applejack fumed under her breath. She made her way around the great tree husk to where she had tied Winona to an exposed root. “Girl, what’s wrong? You’re normally so well behaved.” Applejack groan as she put a hoof on Winona. Comforted by her master’s company, the dog stopped barking, and in the silence Applejack heard what had gotten Winona so riled up, breathing. From the crater under the tree came the unmistakable sound of heavy panicked breathing. Applejack cautiously made her way to the edge, just because the elements were gone didn’t mean that she couldn’t try to help, and called down, “Hey, are yall ok down there?” From the gloom came the sound of a gallop, then the swoosh of wings, then, just as she could make out a faint violet magical aura, she was smacked across the face with a large wooden paddle-like object.
Knocked to the ground by the blow, Applejack could taste a distinct coppery taste and her entire jaw hurt immensely. Before she could get back to her hooves, the being from the crater stood over her silhouetted by the moon, and pointed the other end of the paddle, a metal pipe of some sorts, in her face. “Say something only Applejack would know!” The figure demanded. The voice was… It took Applejack a moment, but when it finally clicked, it shock her, violet aura, that voice…
“Twi?” Applejack questioned. the only response she got was a rough poke with the… pipe. Applejack had to think for a minute, what had she told Twi and no one else… “Applebloom is adopted!” She blurted out.
The figure standing over her seemed to processes this for a bit, then, at a barely audible level whispered, “I’m… home…” Then proceeded to pass out.
Applejack pulled herself out from under the unconscious alicorn, and began screaming to the gathering crowd, “Help! Help! We need to get her to the hospital!”
By the next morning every paper in Equestria would be circulating the story of Twilight’s greatest trick, cheating death.
“Hey I think she’s waking up!” An enthusiastic voice chimed as Twilight’s eyes slowly cracked open.
“Now stand back, she may be disoriented and try to attack.” A heavily accented voice cautioned.
Twilight’s eyes where fully open now. She glanced around to take in her surroundings, she appeared to be in one of the overnight wards of the Ponyville General Hospital. When she tried to bring her forehooves to her eyes to wipe the sleep gunk away, she discovered that she had been hoof cuffed to the metal frame.
With a gasp she teleported 2 feet to her right, and landed on top of her friends Pinky Pie and Rainbow Dash. “Ow, sorry about that. Forgot to account for height.” She said sheepishly.
“Don’t sweat it, it’s just good to have you back.” Rainbow Dash said with a wide grin.
“Good to be back! Provided this is actually Equestria…” Twilight said then peaked through the curtains to see what time it was, preventing her from noticing the concerned looks she got from her friends.
“So is there any reason why ya hit me with that stick ya had?” Applejack asked from the other side of the door.
“Oh, sorry about that.” Twilight said when she noticed the bloody tissue AJ had stuffed up her left nostril. “I saw some stuff while I was away, and was a bit jumpy as a result.” She then used her magic to pull her friends in close and hugged them all, “I’ve missed you, I’ve missed you all so much.” Twilight said and allowed her herself to cry.
“One red coat, one metal chest plate, one pair of black pants, one hat, one knife, and one… arquebus?” Nurse Redheart said as she passed Twilight her belongings.
“Thank you.” Twilight replied as she put the coat and hat on, then put the rest of her stuff on her back for ease of carrying.
“Oh that coat is in a just dreadful condition!” Rarity exclaimed, most likely referring to burns, mud stains, and tares it had. “Oh, let me fix it up.” Rarity offered, to which Twilight complied and took off the coat, then passed it to her friend.
“So…” Twilight trailed off, “What did I miss while I was away?”
“Not much.” Rainbow Dash replied, “There was a national day of mourning, the Princess choose a new student, some unrest in Unikraine, which is why Shining can’t be here at the moment, and some guy named Tirek showed up and tried to do something but Discord stopped him.”
“Oh, I would have thought he would have betrayed us.” Twilight replied as they exited the hospital.
“Discord is a nice reformed chaos spirit.” Fluttershy softly interjected.
“Sure.” Twilight replied and rolled her eyes. “Uh where is Spike?” She asked.
“Oh, he’s been living out in the woods with Zecora. Ah told Big Macintosh to fetch him the next time he visits Zecora.” Applejack answered. “Now what have ya’ll been up to for the past six years?” She questioned.
Twilight paused to think about it, “It’s a long story, but I’ll try to tell you guys it all.” Twilight stopped at the door to the library and glanced at the hole where the foundation used to be. “Dang it, my spare key must have been atomized.” She huffed, then pointed her Winchester Model 1876 rifle at the lock, “Royal North West Mounted Police! Search warrant!” She yelled, shot the lock, barged in, then after getting a candle she returned to the door way. “You’re welcome to enter my humble abode, so that I may begin my tale.” She said, and gestured for them to enter.
Chapter 1-1: Medicine for a Lost Mare (Part 1)
Chapter 1-1: Medicine for a Lost Mare (Part 1)
“Ok, now spill, I’ve got tah get back to the farm in a few hours, I still got chores to do.” Applejack said.
“I’m not going to be able to tell it all in one sitting, but I’ll try to tell as much as I can.” Twilight replied as she took a seat one the Library floor. “So, I had the potion completed, and I was rereading my notes to make sure I had the right spell. I guess I was thinking to hard on the spell and accidentally cast it, because the next thing I know…”
Twilight hit the ground. Yes she knew she had wings, but she wasn’t expecting to be in the air. Nonetheless she hit the ground.
Twilight struggled and was unable to get to her hooves. She was in the pitch black, her mind raced as she wondered if she had died. Then as her vision came into focus, she noticed the orange light of some distant fires, and the silhouette of figures darting about in a chaotic manner. “Oh Celestia, what did I do to go to Tartarus?!” she panted, whatever had happened must have sapped her of all strength. She heard a thunderous bang, a musket perhaps, and two silhouetted figures riding huge ponies stormed in, one rode to the figures still darting about, the other rode directly towards her. In what she was sure to be her last moment, she turned her gaze to the endless sky above, full of more stars then she had ever seen before, and blacked out.
-one minute prior-
Officer Roy Mackenzie looked on as the local Cree tribe enacted their annual medicine circle ceremony thing. Roy didn’t exactly understand it, all he knew was that he, and his partner, an auxiliary from the local tribe by the name of Menashen, had been sent to make sure that no one got rowdy, and by the lack of alcohol or guns present, such was highly unlikely. “What’s the point of this thing again?”
Menashen cleared his throat and began, “Well, you see-” His explanation was cut off by a very loud pop, bordering on an explosion. Kind of like the time Ivan and his group tried building a zeppelin. Purple lightning danced around the Medicine Wheel, and the crowd of Cree people where panicking. “Before you ask, this isn’t supposed to happen!”
“You try to get your people back a safe distance, I’m going to see what it is.” Roy said and drew his Colt New Service Revolver, and fired a shot into the air. It’s generally a good Idea to alert people of your presence prior to racing in on horseback. As he raced towards the circle, he notice that something seemed to be moving, his first thought had been that someone had fallen in and maybe got caught by the blast, the truth was much stranger. Wings larger then those of an eagle, on what appeared to be a horned pony. He groaned as he got off his horse to pick up the creature. He didn’t think that there was any protocol for this, so he was just going to take the creature into custody until his superiors could figure something out.
June 24th 1910, New Maribor Outpost, Saskatchawan, Dominion of Canada, British Colonial Empire
Twilight awoke on… something soft. It looked like a normal mattress, but it felt more uniform then her straw bed back home. She tried rolling of the bed, only to find that the bed was also higher then her one back home, and that she had some form cuffs connected by chains on he fore hooves, causing her fall flat on her face. “Ow” she grunted. Who ever had brought her here hadn’t bound her wings, allowing her to navigate by flapping her wings. She soon had to return to her bed as her stomach felt terrible and the rest of her felt weak.
Her room appeared to be a cell of some sort, the wall directly across from the bed was metal bars, and the window above the bed was barred off. The rest of the room was made out of logs from the looks of things. In one corner there was a bucket that smelt rather foul.
By peering out the window she discovered the nature of her, for lack of a better word, captors. Outside was the interior of some sort of walled compound, once again everything seemed to be made of logs. Along the top of the walls a couple tall, bipedal figures in beige coats and some sort of helmet stood on the look out. That told Twilight something. Some form of military had found her. The obvious thing to do would be to try to break out, heck she could see the key ring through the bars! However, being a political figure she knew that an escape attempt could be seen as an act of aggression, so she would be best to simply wait and try to negotiate with the base’s senior officer. Assuming the fort was square, she estimated that the fort facilitated a about a thousand individuals, meaning that the senior officer was most likely some equivalent to a colonel. She had picked up a fair bit of lingo from her brother.
While she waited she occupied her time making guess about the sources of sounds she heard, hypothesizing about the chemical make up of the materials surrounding her, and trying to guess where she was.
She wasn’t waiting too long, as soon enough she was snapped out of her wonderings by the sound of footsteps, and a loud, authoritative voice, masculine voice, “Smith! Mackenzie! Did you both fall asleep on guard duty?!”
Twilight heard the sounds one would associate with a sudden startling wake up, and two stools falling over, and two beings with red coats, black pants, and beige wide brimmed hats stepped into view of her cell. “Dagnabbit! I told ya to not let me fall asleep!” The far one exclaimed, his accent was strikingly similar to Applejack’s.
“I told you the same, eh!” The closer one replied. The one who had awoken them, cleared his throat, eliciting the two to stand at attention.
“You’re lucky we hung the only murder here this morning, otherwise you could have shivs in you right now!” The commander said and stepped into view. “Now you are to escort the horse thing to Lieutenant Colonel McGurie, so he can do a threat assessment.” When the two moved to unlock the door to her cell when he added, “After I do mine.” He said, and stepped into view, he wore the same uniform as the others, with the possible discrepancy of the rank insignia. He took the key, and unlocked the cell, then entered, “Roy, mind lending me your stool?” he asked, to which the near one complied.
Once seated before her he cleared his throat. “I am Sergeant Stuart of the Royal North West Mounted Police. I don’t if you can understand me, I don’t know what you are, for all I know Ivan painted a horse purple and fired it out of a cannon at the natives as a part of one of his crazy schemes. However, what I do know is-”
“What’s a horse?” Twilight asked. Yes, that was the first thing in her mind.
The Sergeant stood up so fast the stool was knocked over. “What on Earth?!”
“Eh, Smith! The thing speaks English!” The nearer one, Roy exclaimed.
“ZZZzzz- Y’all say what now?! And I told ya not to let me fall asleep!”
Twilight looked around nervously, “Uh… Hi. I’m Princess Twilight Sparkle of Equestria. Sorry to drop in unexpected, I didn’t mean to cause any harm.”
The Sergeant set the stool back up, and resumed sitting, “So you’re an alien. I have a globe in my office, and I can assure you that there’s no place called Equestria on it.”
Twilight felt her heart sink, she had hoped that she was still somewhere close to Equestria. This revelation made her feel sick, no wait, she actually was sick. She made her way to that hole in the corner, and threw up.
The Sergeant sighed, “Smith, go to the mess hall, and bring back a bowl of soup and a bottle of Canada Dry.”
“Sure thing.” The farther one, Smith, replied and walked off.
The Sergeant helped Twilight back on to the bed, “Lay on your side, it will make it easier to get up, and will relax your stomach.” He instructed. “You have wings, can you fly?” He asked.
“Yes. Normally I can.” Twilight said, then cringed, her rush to the toilet hole had given her a throbbing headache. “Sorry, I think teleporting here over exhorted my magic.”
“Magic?!” The Sergeant exclaimed, and stood up so fast the stool fell over, again.
Twilight was surprised by the reaction, “What? Do you not have magic?”
“No! Now, besides magic, what else can you do?” He asked, and pulled out a pad of paper.
Twilight groaned and proceeded to tell him of the 40 or so spells that came to mind, the Sergeant writing down each one, and giving her an odd look when she mentioned the mustache spell.
“Hey, I got the soup and ginger ale y’all ordered.” Smith said as he returned, then stopped at the doorway. He passed the food to the Sergeant and returned to his stool.
“This is a bottle of Canada Dry Pale Ginger Ale, ginger is supposed to be good for upset stomachs.” He said and passed her the green bottle. She took note of the Lable, it was in perfect Equish, the crown on it pointed towards the Royal aspect of this nation being important, and the name was supper imposed over what looked like a map. The contents of the bottle bubbled and hissed, she gulped, then took a drink. Favour wise it was actually pretty good, not overly sweet like some of Pinky’s drinks, but not necessarily bitter or bland either. The carbonation however, was a little more intense then she liked, and her first mouth full almost ended up coming out of her nose. “You might want to let that bubble out for a bit before drinking. Try the soup.”
The soup was good, salty, little bit oily, the noodles were nice and soft, as were the carrots and other vegetables. There was tasty one ingredient she didn’t recognize, “Just wondering, what is this stuff?” Twilight asked.
The Sergeant replied, “Chicken noodle soup, Ivan’s mother’s recipe.”
“Chicken! They fed you cute little chickens!” Fluttershy cried, verging on hysterics.
“Don’t knock it until you try it.” Twilight responded eliciting a gasp from all of her friends except Rainbow Dash.
“That’s barbaric!” Rarity exclaimed.
“Is not!” Rainbow Dash retorted. “Gryphons eat meat, and I’ve tried meat, it’s not bad.”
“Anyways…” Twilight said, before this interruption could continue any further.
After finishing the soup, and drinking the, now flat, ginger ale, she lay on her side, staring at her cell bars. Sergeant Stuart had removed the cuffs, then left to get the Lieutenant Colonel.
Her talk with the Sergeant had been encouraging. These humans seemed nice enough. She heard foot steps in the hall out side. “So you say there’s a talking Shetland, laddy?”
“Well…” The Sergeant began.
“Ach, away ye go!” the second voice replied. “I’ll see this thing myself!”
The second voice belonged to a tall, aged man in a beige coat, who had a tired look about him. He didn’t appear beaten, but at a glance he didn’t seem to exude charisma. He entered the cell and removed his white helmet before addressing her. “Well lassie, if you can speak, speak. Otherwise I have work to do.”
Twilight gulped, charismatic or not, he certainly was imposing. “Well I hate to waste the time of such an important figure to this institution, so I’ll make it brief. I am Princess Twilight Sparkle of the Grand Principality of Equestria, Reagent of the Dutchy of Ponyville. I was sent here when one of my experiments went haywire.”
The Colonel seemed horrified, “You’re a dignitary from another nation?” He quickly straightened up his uniform then coughed, “Ahem, sorry about my rudeness before. Is there anything you can tell me about Equestria.
Twilight didn’t want to divulge information on her nation, but then again pretty much everything on Equestria was public knowledge both in and outside of Equestria. “Average sized nation of 389 thousand square miles, and around a million inhabitants. We have two high princesses as our leaders. From what I’ve heard I’m guessing that we’re not of this world.”
“Hmm, ok, one more thing I’d like to know about, then I can tell you pretty much anything.” He said, Twilight nodded. “You’re nation’s military, describe it to me.”
Now it was Twilight’ turn to be taken aback. Why would anyone care about the Equestrian military? “We have around eight thousand ponies in the standing army, and with local militias and reserves mobilized we could maybe field 20 thousand. Technology wise, most of our forces still rely on pole arms and armour plates, but we have begun shifting over to arquebuses and field guns.” She didn’t bother mentioning magic, as it had ceased being an asset to Equestrian Army after the battle of Canterlot proved its faults.
The Colonel looked perplexed, “Arquebuses? As in the guns, mounted on sticks, that rely on matches and fuses to fire a ball?”
“Yes, the Equestrian Army has adopted a pattern that has been popular with hunters for a few years now.” Twilight answered.
The Colonel snickered a bit, “Ok, Twilight, I’m glad to have met you. From my assessment I can agree with Sargent Stuart’s conclusion, you’re not a threat. We’ll probably find you something to do on base, and in the meantime I’ll leave the rest up to Sergeant Stuart, as I have to make sure Ivan doesn’t try converting my yatch into a Sloop of War, again.” With that he exited the room.
Sergeant Stuart, who had been waiting outside of the cell, saluted the Colonel, then turned to Twilight, “Well, since you’re still not a citizen, I guess I’ll just have on of my officers watch over you at all times. Think of it as more of a security detail.”
“Are you going to inform your superiors?” Twilight asked, she didn’t want anymore questions.
“No, I’d lose my job if I told them that a purple unicorn-peagasus-”
“Alicorn.” Twilight corrected.
“-fell out of the sky.” Stuart continued. “So, since New Maribor is already an information void, I figure that you could get lost in paper work, until anything comes up.” He said then turned to someone out of the field of view offered by the cell. “Officer Mackenzie, since you found her, she’s your responsibility.”
There was the sound of Mackenzie, and Smith standing up, “Yes Sir.” Mackenzie’s voice sounded.
“Very well then, I’ll leave her to you then.” The Sergeant said and walked off.
Mackenzie and Smith walked into her cell. “Welcome to Canada eh.” Mackenzie said with a smile.
“You’re like me now, immigrants ‘n’ such.” Smith added.
Twilight breathed a sigh of relief. “Well it’s good to know I didn’t end up in some sort of horrific death world. This place actually seems rather nice.”
“Hey, when you feel up to it, we’ll drop by the town library and try to explain some of this world to you.” Mackenzie offered.
“Canieghdia?” Pinky said, trying to say the name.
“No, Canada.” Twilight corrected.
“Canieghda?” Pinky tried.
“No Pinky, humans don’t add equine terms to everything, it’s Ca-na-da.” Twilight tried again.
“That’s an odd name. What does it mean.” Pinky asked.
“It’s derived from the Native North American word Kanata, which literally means land. Why, because French people.” Twilight explained.
“What’s a French person?” Rarity enquired.
“I’ll get to it, I’ll get to it.” Twilight replied, and suddenly realized the immensity of explaining the last six years of her life. “Eventually…”
