The Folly of a Distant Mind

"So, if I understand this correctly... I am just to follow it around," clarified Sturdy Ground with a raised eyebrow.

Luna nodded. "That is correct. Until we overcome the language barrier, he must be kept confined to the castle, but we can't rightly keep him locked in a bubble while we figure it out."

Sturdy nodded sagely. "Instead, you'd rather lock him in a slightly larger bubble."

Luna glared at him. "There are limits to how lenient we may be with an unidentified threat. Besides, at least it'll give him some illusion of freedom. Better house arrest than prison cell."

The unicorn shrugged as they approached the door to Luna's room. "I suppose." As a guard, thoughtful responses were rather low on the list of things that got him paid.

Inside, the situation remained almost exactly as it had been when Luna left. The human, still confined to his little private bubble, had not moved an inch. Celestia, too seemed to have done nothing else but sit and wait patiently for her sister's return. Visible relief flashed across her face as the two entered.

"Ah, good. Now that you have returned, I do believe it is time for us to let this poor man out. I assume you explained the situation along the way?"

Luna nodded, raising a concerned eyebrow at her sister. It was rare for her to lose her patience like this. "Of course. Private Sturdy Ground will accompany the human from a respectful distance, preventing him from leaving the castle grounds and from harming anypony he comes across. Henceforth, he shall hold a twelve-hour shift from six in the evening to six in the morning, at which point a member of the day shift will take over."

Sturdy's eyes bulged. "Twelve hours?! You didn't say anything about that on the way here!"

Luna shot him a warning look, continuing as if she had not been interrupted. "Furthermore, every hour of his shift shall be considered overtime, and he will be paid as such. Is this agreeable, Private Sturdy Ground?" she asked, giving him a slight glare.

Sturdy Ground, for his part, quickly shut up and nodded furiously.

"Good, good, I'm glad we're all on the same page!" Celestia said happily. "With that squared away, shall we lower the shield, Luna?"

Luna resisted the urge to roll her eyes and nodded, dissipating the shield with no fanfare. The three ponies looked to the human expectantly, slightly tense. It was still possible he would be violent.

The man shift, stretched, and pushed himself to his feet. Glancing at the three, the corner of his mouth twitched upwards in mirth for the slightest moment, barely noticeable before reverting to its usual slight frown. He then walked immediately to the nearby bookshelf, snatching the top leftmost book off the shelf and sitting back down. He then began flipping through the pages at an unnatural speed, once again ignoring the ponies entirely.

For their part, Luna and Sturdy just gaped at their guest, while Celestia glared daggers at him. "I don't know why I expected anything else," she grumbled. "I do believe we have found ourselves with the most irritatingly dull creature to ever exist."

Luna couldn't help but nod, still staring nonplussed at the human, now completely engrossed in the book. "I didn't want him to do something violent, but at the very least he could have been exciting about it. Hay, he's not even mad at us for imprisoning him!"

Sturdy Ground, having got over his astonishment somewhat faster, was now feeling rather confused. "This guy... you said he can't understand us, right?" The two princesses nodded in affirmation. "Then how is he reading that book?"

The sisters shut up and stared at the human, now with similarly confused looks on their faces. "I suppose..." Celestia began haltingly, "he must be simply flipping the pages without reading the words. Perhaps he is searching for something he can understand."

Luna added, "Nobody could possibly read that fast, regardless. I do hope you are right, sister. The process of understanding one another will be much easier with both sides mutually working towards it."

Celestia nodded emphatically, smiling just a little too brightly. "Well! It seems everything is squared away here, then, so I shall now take my leave! I am going to bed. Goodnight, and if the human is dead tomorrow I will be rather irritated!" With that, and without waiting for a response from the other two, Celestia teleported out of the room with a flourish. Sturdy chuckled as this cause the man to jump slightly, staring in surprise at the place the white alicorn used to be.

Princess Luna frowned, too worried about her sister to notice the human's reaction. Something about him threw her sister off, to a degree Luna had not seen since Discord's return. What it was, she couldn't tell - the human did not feel unsettling to her, just a bit weird. She would have to ask her sister about it later. For now, however, she had her duties to fulfill. "I, too, must now take my leave. I trust you can handle him for the night?" Sturdy Ground saluted in affirmation, attempting to fall back into his professional mannerisms. "Good. See to it he doesn't do anything bad." As she left the room, Luna suddenly poked her head back in, adding, "Oh, and do try to coax him out of my bedroom, if possible."

Tick... Tock... Tick... Tock...

Sturdy Ground had to admit he was impressed. The human, against all odds, had managed to create a job that was even more dull that guard duty. The unicorn sat disinterestedly, watching the man flip through the pages of his book with unerring speed. Finally, he made it to the final page of the thick text, closing it and replacing it on the shelf. He then immediately grabbed the book next to it, bringing it back to where he had been sitting.

"Oh, that is it!" Sturdy cried in frustration, snatching a deck of cards out of his pocket. Pointing an accusing hoof at the man, who looked at him with slight interest, he proclaimed, "I am teaching you a game, and we are going to play it!"

The human watched in amusement as Sturdy flopped down across from where he was sitting and pushed the book out of the way. Shuffling the deck with practiced speed, the guard dealt two cards to each player, laying the rest of the deck in the middle. Reaching into another pocket with his magic, he brought out a small bag of bits, and set a modest pile in front of each of them. Pushing one into the middle, Sturdy looked to the human expectantly, only to find him doing the same, now much more interested in the game. As his guard flipped three cards from the top of the deck, the man began to chuckle in amusement, pushing a couple bits into the betting pool. Sturdy matched his bet, flipping over another card and tossing a bit into the pile. Still chuckling, the man matched his bet and watched a fifth card be revealed, adding a couple more bits to the pool. Sturdy raised an extra one, which the man matched and they revealed their cards, the man's chuckles devolving into full-on bellows of laughter at this point.

Sturdy Ground, meanwhile, couldn't believe it. The guy knew how to play poker! He spoke an entirely different language, one so foreign even the princesses didn't know it, yet he knew the same games, or at least one of them. That simply didn't make sense, and from the looks of the man's laughter, he agreed. Finally the human pulled himself together and adopted his regular poker face, grabbing the deck and looking through the cards. He may have known the rules of the game, but the deck they played with was entirely foreign. The next few dozen rounds he spent learning what combinations beat others, his pile of bits slowly dwindling. By the time he fully grasped the game, his pile was puny compared to the unicorn's. Still, Sturdy could see the man was good. Once he had a full grasp of what beat what, the human put up a valiant fight, his guard only winning due to a combination of luck and his opponent having started at a rather large disadvantage.

As he shoveled his bits back into their bag, Sturdy gestured to his charge. "Dude, you've got to come with me, I swear it'll be fun." He felt a bit silly talking to someone who couldn't actually understand him, but he was fairly confident his overall message was clear enough. The human hesitated a little, glancing at the book left lying on the floor, before shrugging, putting the book back in its place on the shelf and following the unicorn out of Luna's room.

Sturdy led the man through the twisting corridors, careful to make sure he was being followed. If the only requirement I'm given is that this guy needs to be in sight, I could really get used to this job, he thought with a grin. On their way through the halls, they passed a few ponies, getting a couple strange looks, but not much else. Being the capital of one of the most influential countries in the world and home to the two immortal alicorns who raised the sun and moon, Canterlot was always hosting strange beings from far-off lands, and the ponies who called it their home were used to it, and knew better than to ask questions. Finally the two made it to their destination, Sturdy Ground throwing open the doors to the Guards' Quarters with a flourish. "Welcome to my home," he said proudly. The man looked on in interest, roving eyes taking in every detail. As it was nearly midnight, most of the guards were already asleep, the ones who weren't glancing at the strange newcomer with disinterest. Leading him further in, Sturdy gestured the man to a large table set in the center of a lounge-type room, a handful of guards sitting around it, piles of chips of varying sizes in front of them.

Sitting down in an empty seat, the man taking another, Sturdy gave a grizzled old stallion a grin. "Deal us in, Rough."

Rough Patch, who had the largest pile on the table, glanced at Sturdy Ground with steel-grey eyes. "I don't see any chips in front of you, buddy. Who's the weird one?" he asked, gesturing to the human.

Sturdy shrugged. "He appeared mysteriously in Luna's bedroom. He doesn't speak Equestrian, but he does speak poker." Tossing the old veteran a handful of bits, he added, "half for me, half for the human over there."

Rough shrugged, knowing better than to ask questions about such a situation, sliding both players a small pile of chips. After a quick explanation of the values of each chip, the two were ready to play.

Celestia yawned hugely, sipping her tea as she walked briskly towards the Guards' Quarters. She had gotten up rather early, as she had much to take care of before her official day started. Despite her shorter rest, the sun princess felt invigorated once more. Technically, she did not need to sleep, being an immortal, but she and her sister tended to get irritable when they went too long without sleep, and force of habit meant she preferred a daily night's sleep.

Approaching the door to the Guards' Quarters, the alicorn was reminded of the task at hand. She needed to find a guard fit to take Private Sturdy Ground's role during the daylight hours. Going through the list of guards in her head as she walked in, she made a list of possible choices. Private Iron Skies seemed the best option, a reliable and hardworking guard who wouldn't hesitate to interject if things happened to go awry. Suddenly, she realized the halls were rather devoid of guards, even for such an early hour. Curiously looking through the rooms, she finally found them, all grouped around a large table.

Approaching the gaggle of guards, Princess Celestia asked in confusion, "What in the world is going on here?"

The guards, preoccupied as they were in whatever was happening on the table, had not noticed her, and jumped in shock, collectively hastening to bow and stand at attention, a chorus of "Princess Celestia!"s ringing out. The princess rolled her eyes and gestured for them to be at ease. She wasn't mad, just confused. However, a side effect of her startling them was they had parted, offering the alicorn full view of the table, where a couple of the guards' best poker players sat with miniscule piles of chips, their opponent being... the human?

Sure enough, the man sat in another seat, a huge pile of chips around him. Celestia watched, still confused, as he calmly revealed his cards, resulting in a chorus of groans around the table as he pulled the chips into his own pile. One of the guards at the table, now devoid of chips, slammed his hoof down with a cry of anger, stalking away from the table grumbling obscenities. Celestia just grinned in slowly growing amusement, watching as the man calmly and efficiently cleaned up the rest of the ponies' chips, each guard going out with a similar cry of frustration. Rough Patch was the last to go out, shaking his head slowly in astonishment.

"Sturdy, I don't know where you got this one. He's really something else."

"Fricken' monster's what he is," grumbled one of the more recent losers, nursing his hurt pride.

Just as Rough Patch went to get up, however, a small, ornately designed pouch of bits plopped down in front of him. Looking up in surprise, he saw Celestia herself sit down opposite the human, staring at the man in amusement. "Deal me in, Captain Rough Patch," she said with a grin. Suddenly every guard that had been watching, and a few more besides, crowded back around the table. This was gonna be good.

Rough chuckled, counting out the bits and sliding an equivalent pile of chips in front of her. Noting the amount she had been given, her opponent quickly counted out nearly half his chips and set them aside, leaving himself with the same number as the princess. Sturdy Ground began to count up the chips that had been set aside, converting them to bits and taking the money out of the bit pool, returning the chips to their case. With the playing field now level, the human shot Celestia a cheeky smile.

The immortal alicorn princess grinned, narrowing her eyes. "Oh, it is on."