A Journey of a Stranger

Morning arrived at Sweet Apple Acres and the Apple family is eating their breakfast. Leon comes into the kitchen with his hand gripping on a magnifying glass. Apple Bloom greets him as he sits down.

Leon asks her, “So what’s today menu.”

Apple Bloom says, “Apple waffles, apples, and eggs.”

Before Leon could get something to eat, Applejack says, “Morn’ Leon, I have a few questions I want to...”

Leon sighs and then says, “It is usual for ponies to kill me and/or capture me because I’m ‘a prize of a lifetime’. I don’t like to report these attacks because it advertises me to other hunters where I am and some of them know to play around the law to ‘get’ me. Now let me enjoy of what might be my last meal before kicking the bucket.”

Applejack backed off. Big Mac and Granny Smith didn’t want to say anything and awkwardly are their meals. Apple Bloom had a few simple questions but she didn’t feel like it was a good time to ask them.

Leon quickly eats his breakfast, gears up and, then goes off to the Apple Orchard.

Before he gets deep in the forest, he is stopped by Apple Bloom.

Apple Bloom says with her mouth, “Hey Leon, mail for ya.”

Apple Bloom gives Leon 2 letters. Leon sits on a nearby old stump. He sees the letters are from Lyra and “a friend.”

Apple Bloom asks him, “Who’s a friend?”

Leon asks her, “Don’t you have to go to school?”

She says, “Alright, see ya later.”

Apple Bloom gallops off to school. Leon rips open Lyra’s letter. It says, Dear Leon, Don’t forget about out first lesson today. I’ll be waiting for you.

Leon carefully inspects the letter; he feels the letter, and then pokes a small hole in it. After seeing nothing come out, he opens the envelope and points the letter at an apple tree. After seeing or hearing nothing happen, Leon see that the letter has a few holes at the edges and then he smells it. He smells a familiar scent.

Leon says to himself, “It’s from Willow.”

Even though some of the a are scratched out, Leon attempts to read it anyway. It says, Dear b Stranger, I hear you were in Ponyville, You met a rare ch pony called a hydralings. It is one in many… I can’t talk much about that pony. Anyways, I’m going to be there at… You now what, I will send a s note when I get there. I have to keep the details a surprise. See you soon. Yo From, a friend.

Leon says to himself, “a hydraling…?” He quickly figures it out. “Oh them.”

He puts down the letter and sees what appears to be a metal stranger with a metal suit and mask painted on it.

The metal stranger says in a surprising organic voice, “Hello Mr. Leon of the Iron Needle family, I’m Dice 29. My human leader wants to meet you personally as soon as possible.”

Leon jumps a little and says, “What the Tartarus?”

Dice 29 asks, “Aren’t you looking for other humans? We will be more effective than any other resource at your disposal. I will take over for you until my Emperor says otherwise.”

Leon asks, “We?”

2 metal baseball players (without numbers) and 2 metal heavy weights with vests and pants and blue mittens come out of hiding. At a second glance, Leon notices the metal baseball players are holding luggage.

Leon asks, “Whose bags are those?”

Dice says, “Yours!”

Leon says, “But I have some things to do here before I can go.”

Dice says, “I will take care of that for you.”

Leon says, “So you’re going to play like that. Fine, I will…”

Leon tries to grab his ax and then his scroll case but they]re both gone. He sees them both in Dice 29’s hands, but before he could attack, a baseball hits his helmet and somehow stuns him. Dice turns invisible while the heavy weights come in for the attack. Leon snaps out of his stunned condition and charges with his shield into one of heavyweights and slams him into a tree. Leon and the heavyweight fight with their fists and have a test of strength on Leon’s shield.

The other heavyweight charges at Leon from behind and the two baseball players play rock paper scissors with each other. The 2nd heavyweight gets a hit on Leon’s back before Leon counter punches. Leon quickly finds himself uncontrollably laughing and pointing at a tree, freeing the cornered heavyweight.

Suddenly, 2 darts fly through the air and hit the back armor but they only stick on it. The back heavyweight uses the darts to rip a flap in Leon’s back armor and then hits Leon back again to continue the curse of laughing. 2 more darts hits Leon’s flesh.

Leon gets drowsy and his laughs slowly fade away until he drops on the ground unconscious.

Dice reappears and says, “I guess he’s nothing without his ax and magic. Then again, no creature is ready for us.”

The damaged heavyweight says, as he is holding his jaw, “You weren’t the one being punched by him.”

He turns to a tree and says, “Thank you, snipers.”

The metal snipers in the tree give him their thumbs up.

Dice says on their built in communication chat box, “S7, help Host 4 back to base and S22, help Host 2 with the human.”

S7 responds, “Roger.”

S22 says, “Alright.”

Dice 29 says as he takes Leon’s shield, “If you gentleman excuse me I have a role to play.”

Dice uses a strange flip device to turn himself into Leon. Dice equips Leon’s stolen gear and heads back to the farm. The other metal Strangers take Leon deeper into the forest. Something jumps out of Leon’s pocket and rolls to the farm.