The learning curve

POV Luke Jennigan

As Luke hobbled down the dusty path, he cursed under his breath. How the hell could he have gotten into this, already?

He had barely been in Equestria for two hours, and he had already become a spy for some fucked up species. He felt like he was a character in some messed up piece of fiction, written by a student with nothing else better to do. Maybe he was, he didn't know for certain.

His calf ached like a bastard. Everytime his left foot fell, pain jolted up his muscles like he had spikes in his heels. And it was all his new queens fault, so whenever he sends a letter to her via this 'Lyra Heartstrings' person, he was gonna give her a piece of his mind.

He decided to look around his surroundings more, take his mind off the pain. The path was lined with trees at both sides. They were all the same species, so he guessed that they had been planted there by these 'ponies'.

By looking at the trees, he decided they must be Ash trees. He knew this because Ash were plentiful back in Britain. That, and his nature loving mother unintentionally drilled half the worlds trees into his brain before he was ten years old.

The grass that filled the meadows was kind of long. It looked untouched, yet it lacked the untamed look that wild grass had. And fields seemed go on forever, past the gentle rolling hills that stretched out behind him.

About a mile and a half to both his sides, the hills spiked up into steep mountains that looked like a young child's drawing. With grayish rock rising up, towering above everything else around them, with white snow capped peaks that pointed up into the atmosphere like giant, rocky cones.

And in front of him was more tree stricken pathway. He kept walking down the path until he reached a crossroads. The left pathway broke into a cobblestone road. While the right turn continued down the dirt pathway, to what looked like a farm.

One of those wooden signposts with arrows and names on them was standing at the side of the road. Towards the left, it said;

West- Ponyville 3

And towards the right it said;

North- Sweet Apple Acres farm 1

"Huh..." He thought aloud. He generally didn't go to long without speaking to someone. Whether it be Minecraft, or over the phone, he was usually talking to somebody online when he wasn't face to face. So he liked to think aloud when he had been alone for a while.

"... I could go straight to Ponyville and get started immediately, or I could go to the farm first and get something to eat before I make a public entrance. Hmm, choices."

He thought for a few seconds and then pulled out his wallet. He opened the zip at the back and pulled out a two pound coin. He zipped up his wallet and put it back in his Nike jackets inside pocket.

He inspected the coin closely for a few seconds. On one side, queen. Elizabeth's head stared proudly forward toward the gold outer rim of the coin. Flipping it over, he looked at the Lion that had served as a symbol of England's royal family for centuries. Although some historians claim it to be a Leopard, as Lions had not been discovered at the time of the animals symbolic adoption.

"Heads, Ponyville. Tails, Sweet Apple Acres..."

He sat the coin on his index finger and thumb. He flicked the coin into the air and caught it. He slapped it down on his opposite wrist and lifted his hand.

"To the farm it is, then." He slipped the coin into his jeans pocket, and started off down the pathway North. While he was limping down the dirt road, he noticed it begin to get a little rockier than before.

Which was just exactly what he needed with a sprained calf. And it got progressively worse. By the time he was within one hundred metres of the farm, his leg felt like it had been taken out by a sledge hammer. But he digressed.

So when he got to the door of the farms household, he could barely contain himself at the chance to have a proper rest and something to eat, hopefully.

He knocked on the unpainted but varnished wooden door, and waited. After a while, the door was pushed open by an orange pony with large green eyes and a very country western styled theme to it.

The expression on its face was one of confusion. It looked at him for a few seconds before talking.

"Another one? Ya gotta be kiddin' me."

"What?" Was Luke's reply.

"One of yer' kind turned up ere' only yesterday! Wait, are you ok? Ya got blood on yer' jacket there." She said, pointing at the large bloodstain were his heart would be.

"Well, its a long story."

"Ya died, didn't ya?"

Luke looked up, confused.

"Huh? How did you know?"

"The other fella' said he died before he got here. He had blood all over him! Ah, were are ma' manners? Come on in. My name's Apple Jack by the way."

The mare fully opened the door and gestured him in. As he walked in, the pony noticed his limp.

"What happened to yer' leg?"

Luke thought quickly to come up with something.

"Sprained it after a fall."

"Did ya die because of the fall?"

"No, I died when I was empaled by a metal rod through the heart."

Apple Jack cringed a bit.

"Ah bet that was nasty."

He thought back to the shock of being empaled. It didn't last very long though, rod turned his heart into a kebab. You generally don't last very long without a functioning heart.

"Yeah. Anyway, whose this other guy that came here? Did he say what his name was?"

AJ headed off into the kitchen and came back with a glass of apple juice.

"Uhuh. Said his name was Ben an-"

"Woah, woah, woah, hold on there. He said he was called Ben?"

"-Yes he did. An' why is it worth interuptin' me for?"

Luke took a swig of his apple juice.

"Was he strange in any way at all?"

"Well, it did seem like he were hidin' somethin'. Now I come to think about it. Wouldn't tell us exactly how he died."

"Was he wearing camouflage with a hat and scarf?"

She nodded with yet again, a confused look on her face.

"Yeah, you know em'?"

Now it was Luke's turn to nod.

"Yes I know him. And there's a reason why he wouldn't tell you exactly how he died."

"Why's that"

"He's a traitor. A complete nuthead, the guy murdered four guards at our encampment before he was shot and killed."

She looked shocked.

"He seemed alright to me, ah' had no idea that's what he were hidin'."

"Where is he now?"

"Ah think he's in Canterlot, the capital. With the princesses..."

"Shit..." He whispered to himself. If Ben was this princesses new guard, she needed to know about what Ben did.

"Can you get me to this 'Canterlot' place? We need to speak to the royals about him."

"Aye, ah can. But its a long walk, unless you're gonna take the train?"

Luke hated trains, and all other public transport. He would normally avoid them all together, but he might have to endure it on this one.

"Ok. I think we're gonna take the train."

Suddenly, a head poked out from the wall behind Apple Jack. It had a similarly coloured mane, except not tied up. And it had the same green eyes as well.

"Uh sister, who's that?"

Luke almost laughed at the voice. Unquestionably a stallion, and possibly the lowest voice he'd ever heard in his life.

"Me? I'm called Luke. A guy like me came here yesterday."

The stallion walked around the corner to reveal its whole body. The thing must weigh at least twice his weight. Put it this way, its forelegs were about the size of Luke's. He probably had enough muscle to uproot a good sized tree.

"Mac' you got any free time on yer hooves?" Apple Jack took over.

"Eeyup."

"Good. Cuz' we're gonna need your help with somethin'."

The stallion looked confused.

"What for? There's no work scheduled until tomorrow."

She sighed.

"I just learned that Ben fella' is dangerous. We're gonna go pay him a visit, but we need yer strength just in case. Ya good with that, brother?"

Mac thought for a moment.

"Eeyup."

As the ponies began to rush to the door, Luke stopped them.

"Wait! When I came here, I still had all the objects I had on me when I died." Luke presented his pocket knife and wallet.

"Yeah? So what?" Said AJ.

"So, Ben was armed with military grade equipment when he died. He might be armed, we can't just charge in without knowing what will happen."

The ponies retreated back into the lounge and sat down on the sofa opposite to his chair.

"So... What are we gonna do, sister?" Mac said in his monotone voice.

"Hmm. We can go see if Twilights back from her visit to Canterlot. If she isn't, then we can get Spike to send Celestia a message regarding the details."

"Spike? Who's that? Sounds like a pet name."

"It is. Spike is a dragon. A youngn', but he can write and send messages to princess Celestia."

"Cool!" Shouted Luke. "Sounds like a good idea to me. Lets get going!"

He got up and walked towards the door. His limp had calmed down a bit but it was still niggling at him. It felt like a headache that wasn't painful enough to stop you from doing anything, but just painful enough to slow you down.

He turned to strangely designed door handle, and held the door open for the two ponies.

As AJ walked to the door, he held his arm out and stopped her. She frowned at him and cocked her head.

"Nuh uh uh. Ladies first." He said, nodding to Mac.

AJ giggled a little and looked back at her brother. He just sighed and pushed through them, not arguing to stir up more jokes.

Then the mares smile wore away, realising what it implied to her as well. She looked at Luke with a bored expression and shook her head.

"Such a joker, you are."

Luke grinned.

"I try my best."

Walking past the farm, Luke was in awe at just how many apple trees there were on the farm.

He wondered how long it must take to harvest all the apples. Hours? Days? Weeks? He couldn't estimate accurately, but he dust need to. He knew it would take a long time.

The trees appeared to be arranged into sections. Each section looked to have about one hundred trees in it, and the farm had four of them.

So that's about four hundred trees... Jesus. Maybe I should ask AJ how long it takes to farm all this.

"Hey Apple Jack!"

"What is it Luke?"

"Just thinking about how long it must take to harvest all these apples. I thought maybe you could tell me."

"It takes about a week when me n' Mac buck em all together."

"Buck?"

"Oh, sorry. It's when a pony leans their weight on their forelegs, and uses their hinds to kick the tree and knock all the apples from it."

"Cool. You said a week when there's two of you. How long if you did it alone? Two weeks?"

AJ looked out over the farm as they walked and blushed a little.

"Heh heh. A few years ago, not long after I became friends with Twilight, I tried to prove that I could buck all the trees before the bucking season ended on my own."

"And?"

"I couldn't do it. Eventually, ah was so tired that I struggled to hit the tree, no matter knock the apples out. Eventually I had to get help."

"So you don't know how long it'd take you alone?"

"No, and I wish I never have to find out. It's exhausting."

Thats what she said...

As they walked further down the road, they got back to the junction with the arrow signs again, and headed of to Ponyville.

It was a nice town. It looked nice, anyways. Apart from the over abundance of pink. Someone went crazy with the colour pallet there. The ponies were nice too. They told him about how they saw Ben yesterday, and how much he apparently seemed to hate questions. He told them that it wasn't surprising and Ben hardly liked anything social.

Luke followed AJ all the way through to the other side of town, where they arrived at a large tree that had been hollowed out and had windows installed. It looked quite nice from the outside.

AJ knocked on the door and waited. There was no answer, so she knocked on the door for a second time with again, no answer. She looked back at Luke and Mac. Luke just shrugged.

As she was about to knock a third time, the door was opened by a purple pony with wings AND a horn.

"This is a public library, AJ. Y'know you can just walk in, right?"

She looked pat the orange mare and saw Luke standing with Mac behind AJ. She frowned and raised her hoof to her chin.

"Another one. Interesting... Come in, all of you."

They all walked in and sat at a table in the middle of the room.

"So, what's your name?" Twilight asked.

"Luke Jennigan."

"So, Luke. I'm guessing you got her by dying, correct?"

"Uhuh. I was empaled through the heart by a metal rod."

"Ouch. Bad way to go, huh?"

Luke smiled, but stayed silent.

"You know, another one of your kind came here. And he was-"

"Shot to death, yeah I know. I wasn't even a mile away when it happened."

"So... You know Ben?"

"Yeah, but I wish I didn't. Actually, we came to talk to you about him."

She frowned once again.

"Go on..."

"You know he was shot to death right. But do you know why?"

"No, he wouldn't tell us. I guess you're gonna tell me why."

"Correct. You see, Ben was shot to death in self defence, not murder. Ben killed four guards beforehand and stole military equipment from an armoury."

Twilights jaw hit the table. She gawped for a few seconds and then looked downwards.

"So you're saying he's dangerous?"

"He's mentally unstable, and he could snap at any moment. I don't know if we can trust him."

Twilight jumped out of her seat and called for Spike. The patting of paws was heard, and suddenly, a purple dragon head popped out from the open plan buildings upstairs section. The first thing Luke thought was;

Hey, it's Spyro the dragon!

"What's the matter Twilight?"

Spike had a cool voice. It sounded very young, but awesome.

"Spike, I need to write a letter to Princess Celestia immediately!"

"Hang on a minute!" Spike dashed of to somewhere out of view for a second. He seemingly teleported back, he was moving so fast. He had a sheet of paper and a quill in his claws.

"Hit me!"