Bonding with the Moon

Chapters

Chapter 1 -- Stardust [E]
Chapter 2 -- Subtlety
Chapter 3 -- Rise & Shine
Chapter 4 -- Questions
Chapter 5-1 -- Tension

Chapter 1 -- Stardust [E]

Author's Note

This is my first attempt at a romance clopfic, so don't expect anything too spectacular.

Chapter 1 -- Stardust [E]

~~ Equestria; Canterlot ~~

Nighttime in Equestria; it was a heavenly part of the princesses' daily routine that made their residence in Canterlot. By day, the castle that hung out on the side of a remarkably tall mountain revealed its true elegance. The white sandstone and granite walls and floors criss-crossed and arched their way all over the foundations, while in contrast the supports underneath didn't look like they could hold up all of the weight. The spires and odd shapes of the castle interior was an even greater sight, with the tall towers marked and crested with awe-inspiring designs and features that accented the true nature of the castle. It was built to support the greatest and most powerful beings that ruled the lands from the arctic north to the southern wastelands, as well as from sea to sea.

Jutting out on the furthest of the castle's support trusses was Princess Celestia's quarters. Much of the interior tower was vacated and reserved for herself. Only a small portion of the tower housed a handful of her royal guards. Celestia was the princess of the sun, and was tasked with the rising and setting of the sun. An enormous responsibility for an otherwise innocent looking creature of unfathomable wisdom.

At night, the castle took on a more meaningful and alluring approach. The fires of the torchlights created a wonderful atmosphere that invoked a sort of beauty all its own. The stars above flickered with pulsating brilliance, aiding to the euphoric mood cast upon the castle interior, as well as beyond.

Celestia's sister, Princess Luna, had a greater role to fulfill. She was tasked with the raising and setting of the moon, which motioned forth the night. She was also a dream walker; she was given the privilege and power to look upon the dreams of the Equestrian commonfolk, keeping a watchful eye on anything strewn out of the ordinary. Some of the memories she hoped she wouldn't dare to see ever again, while others were much more peaceful, unassuming and alluring.

In all cases, Equestria was in a relative state of balance. Nothing went wrong most of the time, and when troubling situations did arrive, they were easily suppressed by the help of instantaneous resources that were at the princess's disposal.

One fateful night, Luna stood out on the balcony of her sister's tower, gazing up at the stars. She tried her best to connect herself with one of the many convoluted stars, yet she could never reach them on her own. She needed someway to reach out to them, but she didn't know how. She then thought that her sister would know.

As if by a mere coincidence, Celestia clambered her way onto the moonlit balcony and stood next to her sister, eyeing Luna rather precariously as she took note of her younger sister's contemplation toward the stars.

"Something bothering you, Luna?"

Luna tore her gaze away from the stars and peered deeply into her elder sister's own eyes. It didn't require words for Celestia to understand what her sister was so distraught about. She was suffering from an internal battle within; she needed somepony to comfort her. Nopony in Canterlot, or, for that matter, Equestria, would dare come to terms with a princess shrouded by her own beautiful night. She understood Luna's pain completely after her return to Equestria-- following the events of Luna's alter ego, Nightmare Moon, and the disheveled confusion that took place in the last Nightmare Night event.

Celestia leaned over to Luna, lightly grasping her with a wing to comfort Luna's wallowing heartache. "There, there."

Luna whimpered silently in Celestia's ear. "Sister, we want to talk to the stars, to share our discoveries, and tell of our stories and experiences with them." Tears ran down her face and doused Celestia's fur in small streams of salt water "Maybe... they could return the favor with their stories and experiences, as well."

"Maybe so," Celestia cooed. "Perhaps you've heard of the ancient tradition of 'rock throwing?'"

As if a figurative light bulb shined brightly above Luna's head, she let go of Celestia's embrace and wiped away her tears. Her sister had provided the answer to her relentless questioning. Rock throwing; sending celestial messages out into the vastness of space in hopes that other sentient beings would happen to encounter them and return with similar messages of their own. It was brilliant, and Luna grinned happily. "An astounding idea, Tia!"

Furling her lips in a wryly fashion, Celestia angled her head up toward the stars. It was quite a distance to reach the nearest floating specks of rock that floated aimlessly in the dark cosmic soup. Fortunately, there was a small cluster of rocks nearby that would serve as the perfect agitators for their first few throws into deep space.

Celestia's horn lit up, grabbing a few rocks all at once. Once she was happy with their hold, she forced her magic upwards, sending the rocks flying out into the deep parts of space, headed towards undetermined locations. She wasn't going to do just three, though. Luna shortly joined in, grabbing one rock at a time and flinging them in an equally random direction-- making sure that two were not accidentally sent back to back from each other. They only needed one rock to convey their messages. Rock tossing proved to be a fun past-time, and both princesses thoroughly enjoyed it. They laughed and giggled together as they threw rock after rock out into the speckled darkness.

After about twelve tosses from each, Luna thought of another idea for her final toss. "Tia. Perhaps we could laden the last rock with a transportation spell? If there was really something else out there, we could perhaps converse with them personally."

Celestia thought hard about Luna's inquiry. "I'm not quite so sure that we should meddle in the affairs of other worlds directly, sister."

"Tiiaaaa..." Luna said, blinking innocently.

Celestia blushed slightly. "Oh, alright." She winked. "But only this once."

Luna giggled gleefully. "T'is fine by us, dearest sister."

Satisfied by Luna's remark, Celestia's horn became enveloped with a stronger magical aura. Luna felt the magical hold grip the rock she held onto. The bonds tightened, embedding a simple spell within the inside of the rock. Once finished, Celestia nodded her head, signalling her sister to toss the rock wherever she pleased.

Luna studied the night sky hard, figuring out which star to chuck the magically imbued space rock toward. She spotted a rather peculiar star. It was a bright yellow, flickering star on close inspection, and it was brighter than any other similarly yellow star in the sky.

"How about... that one?"

Celestia took note of which one Luna was pointing at. "Are you sure? There seems to be other bright stars up there as well."

"This one we have been studiously observing for many decades, even before our imprisonment."

Celestia sensed that Luna was entirely certain of her decision. "If that is what you wish, I won't stop you."

Luna forced out all her magic that she could onto the rock, which was then jettisoned clear out of her grasp within minutes. She sighed heavenly as she watched the twinkling yellow star dance amongst the others in the sky.

"May we hope that we see thee soon, whoever finds our special message."

~~ Earth; Arctic Circle ~~

You know those field trips where you get the chance to go to the one place that you’ve never been to before, and that you’ve always yearned to see?

Well, I got that opportunity, but it wasn’t under normal circumstances.

The NORAD headquarters in Colorado went stir-crazy, when their satellites detected an asteroid cluster bombarding the Arctic tundra—a few miles shy of the North Pole. For me, it was just another ordinary day in the office. The only hiccup was that the circumstances were anything but ordinary.

Several years after the last transmission from Curiosity was received, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (yes, NASA) gave the green light to send a team of astro-geologists and biologists to Mars to investigate a particularly odd discovery of a certain cluster of rocks—just before Curiosity kicked the bucket. In truth, no one was surprised about its impending shutdown after being caked with layers upon layers of Martian dust.

In any case, after the team’s arrival, we were expecting a sample meteorite from Mars several days later. A small cluster of fine algae-like bacteria was found hugging the underside of a small rock on the red planet’s surface. Nothing special to note this time, as Curiosity found many similar samples beforehand. However, one of the astrobiologists noted that the amoebic formation on the rock had a chemical makeup unlike any other Martian sample sent to us.

At least, that’s what I was told by my fellow work colleagues, who kept themselves glued to their tablets and up to date with the latest mission details non-stop.

The team fired up the catapult. The launch was successful, and the shipment left Mars on its way to Earth—no surprises there. It was during the middle of the sample’s shipment that things spiraled downward. Apparently, the space agency on Earth misplaced the location of an unmarked meteorite that was on a collision-course with Earth as well. They didn't even take into consideration that the meteorite's approach path completely intersected the shipment's path.

Talk about dumb luck, eh?

So, as a result of that technical boo-boo, the shipment was bumped off-course—by bump, I mean forcefully ripped apart from the collision, which inadvertently caused the meteorite to split apart. The meteorite wasn't that big to begin with; it was reportedly only eight feet round, but it's still a serious issue since it did cause a massive delay on NASA's side. The fragmented meteorite really rustled everyone’s backsides back in Colorado, since now there were fragments of an unmarked space rock headed straight for Earth.

Fortunately for us, they were expected to land in the middle of the Arctic. No harm, no foul, right?

Of course, that’s what any other person in any other profession would say. Me? Well, I would say the same, but because there was geologically sensitive equipment parked deep into the reaches of the Arctic Circle, who knew what kind of damage could happen?

I happen to be a part of a dozen other groups reporting for clean-up and damage assessment of the meteor strike, working for the United States Geological Survey. The Nautalis II, one of our oldest working and highly prized seismometers, had suddenly gone silent at around the time the meteorites hit the ice shelf—just shy of the North Pole. Several other instruments from different agencies were hit as well, causing a massive tectonic blackout along the Northern ice shelf. It was as if a theoretical bombshell had gone off the hook when those warning alarms went off, sending nearly half of the world into panic and confusion—a sort of faux-doomsday alert.

It was actually quite humorous, come to think of it. We humans were, admittedly, gullible when it came to sudden hysteric and awe-striking sights, such as a massive asteroid cluster striking the Earth. There were so many headlines all over the world, including some truly whimsical articles from a few noteworthy, two-timing news publishers. Titles, such as, “Asteroid Cluster Bombards North Pole; No Presents for Christmas This Year,” and, “Asteroid Cluster Lands in Arctic Circle; Signs of an Impending Apocalypse?” caught my eye. I couldn’t blame them for making such theories, because we were sort of expecting ‘something’ to happen for a good while now. Then again, I personally just wanted to go up to each and every one of those publishers and give them a good ol’ whack in the head.

Maybe it was just the case of frigid cold temperatures starting to wrap around my head. I’ve been to the Antarctic a few times to repair equipment down there. The atmosphere was much different, and I actually got up close to some of the wildlife there. My last trip ended up with me walking up to a faucet from the return trip to wash off a good spray to my pants. Trust me, penguin piss smells horrid, though not as bad as a skunk’s mark.

At least the damn thing didn’t spray me in the face. Oh, god… why did I even think about that?

To get back to the matter at hand, this was the first time that I’ve been to the Arctic and, suffice to say, the stories I’ve heard about it seemed to be just about what I expected. Having gone to the other end of the world and back, I figured that the north end would be just about the same. The only noteworthy difference was that the entire landscape was just one huge iceberg covering the top portion of the world.

That didn’t really phase me much, despite attempting to wrap the back of my mind around a giant floating iceberg in the middle of an ocean. I really only had one task dominating my thoughts: investigate the silenced seismometer and repair it. If it ended up that we couldn't repair it, I would guess that our agency would have to fork out a whole bunch of money to get a replacement. That wouldn’t be so bad, if seismometers weren’t so heavy and sensitive, and if we weren’t in the middle of the Arctic. Transportation was already difficult as is, with the nearest land-based airport being at the northern-most edge of Alaska, between Wainwright and Barrow.

Between our main base and where the instrument was camped, the landscape of the arctic climate was rough. True, it was snowy in the arctic, but because there’s always wind blowing around at one point or another, most of the snow gets stripped off of the hard packed ice, exposing the near-concrete shell. If someone fell out here, it’d be akin to hitting a brick wall.

Several hours of preparations and briefings later, we arrived at the site of Nautalis II. At first, I was just expecting a big old hunk of rusting metal dug deep into the ice, with a huge crater surrounding it or creeping up next to it. I swear, I should question the nerves of the people who first planted the instrument when they first began monitoring the ice shelf’s movements.

Now I’ve dealt with pretty hairy situations before, but the sight before me easily made my previous delves look like icing on a cake. Three gargantuan spires jutted around the diameter of the meteor. Fortunately, the spires had been there for thousands of years, theoretically, so it was to no surprise that they’d still be held up. The crater looked like it was part of a set for some science-fiction thriller. Rings of ice, in all their different shades of blue and white from age, lined the walls and edges of the crater. In the middle was a fragment of the meteorite.

I’m quite surprised that it hadn’t punched a hole right through the ice. I guess it was too thick to begin with, but still.

If it wasn’t for the lovely brunette woman’s observations, who was standing a few feet in front of me in her red parka and her loosely brushed lock of hair, I wouldn’t have noticed the crushed remains of the seismometer that had once been at the surface between the base of all of the spires.

What luck, eh?

“Looks like we’ll have to get a new one, right?” I said, reluctantly.

Erin, the brunette, gazed right back at me, slightly distraught. Her pearl eyes accented beautifully with her hazel brown pupils. If it weren’t for the muddy red parka hanging over her shoulders, I would’ve found it pretty hard not to look at her. We’ve worked together once before, during our last venture to the Antarctic. She almost lost it when the penguin squirted me with a fine mist of territorial cologne.

That little asshole. At least there weren’t any penguins around for as far as the eye could see, so there shouldn’t be any mishaps this time around.

“Looks like it,” she replied, in agreement. If you’ve ever heard how a French Canadian speaks, she would be the perfect example of one; not only that, but the way her voice sounded almost reminded me of a Celtic singer—without the singing, of course.

Something caught the corner of my eye. It wasn’t Erin, or anything else about her, though I did appreciate her subtly tight hindquarters. I’ll never forget that night a few weeks ago just before our deployment out here.

It was the meteorite itself that garnered my interest. Upon a second look, it seemed as though it had some sort of a lightly pulsating lavender aura around it. This I found odd, considering that most residual radiation left unchecked would have caused some strange reactions. It hadn’t even occurred to me that we should’ve carried a spectrometer with us just in case. With our current transportation being limited to snowmobiles, it would've been more of a hassle to bring along.

“Guys,” I said, grabbing the attention of Erin and a few others. “I think there’s something really odd about the meteor.”

That was the best my mind could come up with? At least I could’ve thought of better words to use. At least my simple message was conveyed easily, as they also noticed the meteor’s subtle glow.

To my surprise, Erin was the first to speak. “It’s… beautiful…”

I would have to agree. As far as space rocks go, she was right.

It took me a few seconds for my mind to register her next set of movements. She was already cresting the lip of the crater, gently sliding down the slope of the icy wall with the back of her boots. Now, if it weren’t for the metal claws strapped to the bottoms of all of our boots, she’d be sliding feet-first right onto the meteor at high speed. Getting injured out in the middle of the arctic was the last thing we wanted.

I noticed that the wind began to pick up speed slightly the more she got closer to it. It came to a point where she stood up and walked the rest of the way towards the glowing rock. I decided to follow suit—following safety standards for unidentified objects. I’m not sure what’s gotten into her. Had she never seen a meteor in person before?

The wind continued to pick up speed gracefully. I looked around to find the source of the wind. To the east, I saw a wall of white clouds bellowing out right towards us. It was an enormous distance away from us, but the steady increase in wind speed meant that this wasn’t an ordinary windchill. Fear soon began to fill my heart.

It was an arctic explorer’s nightmare—a blizzard.

Most people would associate a blizzard with a heavier snowstorm not normally forecasted—that is particularly true. Out here, though, a blizzard takes on a completely different, and deadly, form. If it wasn’t for the sheer flatness of the landscape, most people wouldn’t hear the droning of a distant warning siren. Despite being deep in a depression on the ice, I could clearly hear the passing attack call of a Federal Signal Thunderbolt 1000T from our base—a few miles to the south of our position.

Erin, however, was completely locked in with the meteor. I could tell something was really off with her at this point. I couldn’t tell if she heard the siren or if she chose to ignore it. Did the space rock somehow do something to her mind? She almost looked like one of those slow-walking zombies from those old horror movies, except that she wasn’t making any scary, gurgling noises, nor did she have her arms raised up in front of her. Instead, she shuffled her feet along the icy floor, scraping the metal hooks along. I thought for sure that would wake her up from her delusional gait.

She stopped, just feet from the glowing rock. My heart was pounding. Every passing wave of the siren dug in deeper within my own body. It would only be a matter of time before the edge of the storm covered the nearest hilltop, which the base of one was only a few hundred feet away from us to the north. She raised her right arm out towards the rock.

“Erin?” I called out, gently, hoping that a familiar voice would help.

She continued to take a step forward, inch by inch. I could finally see the profile view of her face from the side. She had the most awkward smile and gaze that I’ve never seen before. It almost scared me to death.

“Erin??” I drew closer to her, waving my hand in front of her field of view.

Her mouth closed, yet she still had the same smile. She looked up to me with humble innocence. “Mark,” she said, a slight trembling in her voice. “This meteor… we could be rich.”

Oh god. This was what I was not hoping for. She was taking things a little too seriously now. I mean, I really liked her and all, but this was getting awkward real fast, and scary. I needed to snap her out of her delusional mess. If she really wanted a taste of fortune, it’d be back at base—not in the middle of nowhere, which we really needed to haul our asses out of.

“Erin, we need to get out of here! Can you not hear the siren? There’s a blizzard coming!”

Her face became somewhat disconcerting. She looked out to the direction of the coming clouds. She inhaled, as if she was about to scream at the top of her lungs. Thankfully, she didn’t really do so. It was clear that she was snapped out of whatever daydream she was stuck in, but it was a moment too late for both of us. The ice below us began to crack in several directions.

‘Shit…’

Before either one of us could react, the floor below us gave way, creating another depression that centered itself toward the meteor which sunk deeper into the ice. She was sent sliding towards the center of the depression head-first toward the dark, yet glowing, rock, while I kept my feet pointing towards the ground. Unfortunately, neither of our hooks on our shoes could hold on to something, and I clutched myself tightly. I listened to Erin’s ear-piercing scream, before everything went silent...

~~ Still in the Arctic...? ~~

Aside from the rushing wind, it sounded unusually, and unnervingly, quiet. There was the absence of a woman’s scream, and no droning of any siren. There wasn’t even any shouting from my partners. I was strangely sliding down a snow-packed slope. The snow felt softer than usual. I was just in the arctic tundra not a moment ago, and all of a sudden the landscape changes just like that?

Not only did my surroundings change, but the acoustics as well. I couldn't hear Erin near me, or next to me, or even at all. I didn't hear her sliding down the same slope. Was I daydreaming this time? This was certainly a weird one if I was.

Suddenly, the slope ended at an edge. Well, things couldn't have been any worse than falling to your death in the middle of a frigid cold wasteland. The ambient wind sure picked up, though it wasn't hardly as cold as the arctic. It only took a second before both my feet planted themselves right into the soft snow. It's pretty lucky to land on soft snow compared to ice, though it was likely because of my unusual daydream, which I really started to doubt at this point.

I felt my right leg slightly twitch to the side on impact, though my ankle took more of the force. I screamed at the top of my lungs at the sudden jolt of pain rushing through the entirety of my leg and up my spine. Twisting your ankle was never a good feeling; I may have likely broke it too.

Fortunately, it was only my ankle and not my whole leg. That was more than enough to be able to do me in, though. Once more, I emphasize this all too much, but the point had to get across somehow: getting injured out in the middle of the arctic was pretty much a death sentence. Having reduced mobility meant that I couldn't cover as much ground as I liked, if I could even get up at all.

For a few long minutes, I rolled around in the pillow-soft snow, reeling in pain and panting fervently. There was a benefit to being out in the cold—you didn't need to fish for an ice pack to cover bruises. So, in a sense, I'm a little lucky to be out here. After I was done grunting and cursing like a madman, I pulled back on my snow pants a bit, so that I could get to the boot buckles easier. It was a tough struggle, because it felt like I could just tear off my foot with the boot around it. Fortunately, because it felt somewhat warmer than the North Pole, it made it easier on me to actually unstrap part of my thick fur boots, which are normally hell to put on and take off.

I just wanted to pack some of the snow inside to mend my bruised ankle. When I pulled the top of the boot apart, I scooped up a couple handfuls of snow and packed it all down towards the bottom of the boot. It was definitely cold, but the chilling sensation against the throbbing pain felt euphoric. Thank goodness I still had my socks on to keep the snow away from my skin. Even though the snow was a remedy for this kind of injury, I still didn't want it to come in contact with my skin. It wasn't a whole lot either, so it'd all melt within a few minutes.

I actually started to feel better, as if I could walk on both feet again. I knew that I shouldn't be getting too far ahead of myself. Just because it was a bruise didn't mean that I could walk at my normal pace.

I had to be cautious here, wherever I was. I took a good look of my surroundings, to see if I could spot any familiar landmarks or people. The first person to come to mind was Erin. I glanced carefully in every direction that I could. All I could see was the same flat snowy landscape. The precipitating flakes made visibility very poor, as I could only see a short distance away—by that, I mean less than a mile.

There was no sign of a red parka, or a brunette woman in tight black spandex, or anything that could be even closely related to her. There wasn't any sign of blood or any unusual struggle. Thank god she wasn't mauled by a polar bear.

On that thought, I did the first thing that was on the Arctic Survival Checklist: check for any wildlife. Surely, a polar bear or an arctic wolf could sniff me out for several miles. I saw nothing move across the land; nothing but the swirling white powder, which was picked up and blown around by the gentle wind gusts.

With the threat of wildlife visually nonexistent for the time being, I pulled out my smartphone. Oddly enough, there was no signal to be picked up. The phone relied on satellite signal for reception. There was nothing, not even a single bar. So, I turned to the next best option. What's better than a cellphone?

I took out the small handheld radio, turned it on, and switched it to the agency's broadcast frequency. The radio crackled a bit, and then it went silent afterward. Of course there would be some residual feedback upon setting it up.

"Erin?" I spoke through the tiny microphone embedded within the radio. No response.

"Erin, can you hear me?" Still, nothing. Only the wind managed to howl lightly across the frozen desert.

"Taylor? Ryan?" No response from either. "Anybody??"

You know that feeling where you feel like absolute shit after realizing you're all alone somewhere in a place you don't recognize?

Yeah, I was feeling that right now, only made worse due to the fact that I had neither any cell signal nor any sign of a response through my radio. I turned the channel to the international frequency, in hopes that someone was listening. Again, there was that brief feedback after switching channels, which made my heart skip a beat. I vaguely remembered the emergency distress call format, plus the stress and the subtle pain made it that much more difficult for me to think straight.

"Mayday, mayday, mayday. This is Matt Haraway of the United States Geological Survey maintenance crew. I am currently lost and out of orientation from the rest of the maintenance crew, including senior geologist Erin Shaw. I was last at the site of a meteor crash upon the remains of seismometer Nautalis II." Come to think of it, where the living hell was I? There was absolutely no known geography for as far as the eye could see.

"Repeat, I am separated from the USGS repair managment team. This is Matt Haraway." Once more, there was no response. Aside from the comforting, yet chilling, winds, everything was dead silent. I could feel tears running down my cheeks. The memories of my life began to flip through the back of my mind.

"H... hello??"

Nothing. I slowly lowered the radio down. I looked up at the pearl white skies, letting the soft flakes fall gently on my face. I remembered Erin's soft touch of her hands when she first got close to me. Her velvety red lips felt smooth against mine. I would never look back and regret that day. Now that we were separated by some unknown bond, I couldn't help but think about that tender moment. It was harsh, but I guess reality can be a complete bitch sometimes.

"HELLOOO!??"

I yelled at the top of my lungs, with as much volume as my throat would allow me. It was a shame that the powdery snow absorbed most of my voice, so it wouldn't travel as far. The pain in my ankle began to swell gradually. I knew that I had to walk somewhere. Oddly enough, I could feel the faint presence of the sun's gaze. I took out my compass (thank god I still had this), and checked the reading.

'What the...?’

Okay. I sincerely hoped that Earth's poles hadn't suddenly shifted on me in the past few minutes, because North was pointed in the direction of the sun. Well, maybe I wasn't going crazy, but it was still hard to tell if it was all a daydream and that I was in some sort of a coma from falling onto the space rock. The only hiccup to that assumption was that my ankle was sprained. Usually you'd be yanked out of just about any kind of sleep or nap from a sudden jolt of intense stimuli.

Either I was out cold, or I was really somewhere that I did not even recognize. If the latter was true...

Man, wherever that meteorite came from must be a truly remarkable gem. Maybe Erin's alright, if that would be the case. I wonder if she landed in a different part of wherever this awkward place was.

That would probably explain why my cellphone, radio, and compass weren't working. Lack of a cell signal? Strange. Lack of radio response? Very awkward. A compass pointing towards the sun? Well, I guess that made it easier to find it. Nevertheless, that was the really strange part of all this. Actually being able to feel where the sun was at was something even my colleagues would have had a hard time digesting.

If I wanted any chance of survival, I would have to start by getting out of the tundra. If the laws of gravity applied here, I'd have to go south if I wanted any chance of arriving to some sort of sanctuary. I would not enjoy spending months or even years out in a frozen desert just because of some strange space rock.

So, I headed in the direction that I guessed would be south, walking perpendicular with the sun.

Oh, god.

There are many problems with being alone. First, there's nobody to talk to; that's an obvious no-brainer. There's also no fresh pair of eyes or more keeping a lookout for your surroundings; you could only see in whichever direction your eyes were pointing at. Second, multitasking many essential survival skills by yourself can be very tough, especially when caught out in the middle of nowhere, where the amount of resources may be next to nothing. Third, I'm out in the middle of the fucking arctic. There's no warm body to huddle yourself up to, and no way to keep yourself warm.

For me, this is the worst day of my life, and it well could be my last. The more I walked on, the more that reality sunk in. I tossed the daydreaming theory out the back door once hunger settled in. In dreams, you could be hungry for a little bit and then be satisfied by false stimuli. If you were desperately starving, your body would pull you right out from sleep.

In my case, I don't know how far I walked, but it didn't look like the scenery changed much. I was making progress, but the sprained ankle made my progress agonizingly slow. I really wanted to run, not drag my right foot all the way across the powder-coated flat lands.

At least I had something warm on, but that was beginning to turn into a sponge. Water and cold temperatures do not mix well, especially if that water gets into your clothes. My own brown and gray woolly parka began to sag its increased weight on my shoulders the more I walked. To make matters worse, the batteries on my electronics were dangerously low. If I had to make one last desperate act, I'd have to film myself, parting my soul and my world with a last will, with my phone.

The more I pressed on, the greater the burden became. My parka became so heavy that I could even barely drag my sprained foot off of the fluffy snow. At least I had boots on, but didn't really help much. If I had built my body up a bit more like those guys in the TV infomercials for those personal home gym systems, I'd probably get by just fine without having to worry about a sprained ankle. Too bad I wasn't one of those guys.

I was just a guy in my late twenties, performing odd jobs for the government and getting paid a fortune for doing so-- all the while, risking tooth and bone trying to fix sensitive equipment in the most extreme environments on Earth. At least I was anyway. Now, me and Erin are probably presumed dead or missing, or possibly both. I wonder what the headlines back at home would have read? Man, I was seriously having a tough time trying to concentrate with my damn stomach howling at me. My brain was probably cursing out my gut, and telling it to quit whining like a little schoolgirl.

I must be honest here—it was definitely a lot better when your own body was telling you what's up, even if the problem was blatantly obvious. In my case, fuck yeah it was serious. I needed to find food, like right now.

Trouble was, I was only a few minutes short of really running on empty. With reduced mobility, it made progress that much slower and more difficult. Why did I only have a few minutes?

Well, the sun doesn't stay up in the sky forever. The clouds began to dim, and the light around me started to fade. Fortunately, snow was light enough for me to see, even in perpetual darkness. The only difficult part was that rough features were that much harder to spot. You'd expect to step on a completely flat surface when you end up misjudging its distance and send your whole body weight forward into a divot in the ground.

I think I may have jinxed myself there, for as soon as I thought of that, my bad foot (fuck you, karma) shot down right through a soft patch of powdery snow. This twisted my ankle more, causing me to twirl my entire body in order to suppress the jolt of pain. Unfortunately, this caused me to lose my balance and, already weakened of starvation, caused me to tumble forward onto the soft patch. Thank god it was pillow-soft snow, although now I was completely rendered immobile. Why?

One, my ankle was shy of being broken if I ended up twisting it again in the wrong direction. Two, I was fucking starving. I had nothing else to eat since sunrise at base camp; damn granola bar hoarders. Then again, I probably would've been one myself as well (fuck you again, karma).

If it wasn't for the insatiable feeling of wanting to fall to sleep, I grabbed hold of whatever energy I had left and turned myself around so that I could lie on my back. By some miracle, I managed to free my sprained ankle from its awkward position without snapping it clean from its joint. However, I had another problem. That same leg also had a partially tweaked knee joint, so now I was really rendered immobile. This time, I'm gonna say it as clear as day in my mind: fuck you once more, karma.

With the last of the sun's rays barely making it past the clouds, I saw a shaft of light peer over me through a gap between the overcast skies and the horizon. It was the most remarkable sight I could ever witness. I thought that I would have never seen anything more heartwarming in my entire life, especially with being nearly brushed by death's hand. I tried to take my phone out of my pocket, but since I wasn't moving, I wasn't generating enough body heat to really keep my extremities warm. My fingers fidgeted with the phone, attempting to get a good grip.

The chilling winds didn't really help. I slid the phone out of the front pocket and gripped it as tightly as I could. The battery level was just shy of ten percent. I could try and take a picture. I lightly tapped the screen, which opened up a photo app. At least the phone was working as it should and didn't display an entirely different scene through the camera lens. How awkward would that have been to see a completely different world through the lens of your camera?

The phone emitted a shutter noise and the screen froze to show the image shot. This would have to do. Islowly put the phone back in its pocket, fidgeting around with the snap-on button. My fingers almost felt like meat popsicles at this point.

I gazed back at the last few minutes of light, watching the illuminescence filter onto the rolling slopes of the snow-covered hills. What a life I led. At least I've got up close to the woman of my dreams, so I guess I hadn't really disappointed myself all too much. Then again, I would've preferred dying with her by my side rather than by myself.

There was this strange sensation tugging at my mind—some little voice in the back of my head telling me to close my eyes. It sounded... feminine. It wasn't Erin's voice. It had some sort of archaic tone to it. It was only about as quiet as the wind gusts that blew right over me, yet I could still make out the words. The faceless beauty was apparently singing, something I wasn't even expecting from a brush of death. From what I was told, death's touch was not harmonic at all.

I had nowhere else to go and nothing else to do. In the end, I could only do the one possible thing: obey the voice inside my head. And so I did, and I gently fluttered my eyes shut as the last of the sun's rays disappeared from below the horizon. I settled into a dreamy and heartwarming sleep in the middle of a frozen plush bed, awaiting death's grasp in order to whisk me away from this dreadful grave I had dug myself...

...that is, until something, frighteningly and unexpectedly, remarkable happened...

Chapter 2 -- Subtlety

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Chapter 3 -- Rise & Shine

~~ Equestria: Crystal Empire ~~

Celestia situated her head slightly above the unusual being rather precariously, studying the creature’s strange physical anatomy. Luna held the strange legged creature in her magical aura, which surrounded him from head to toe. She trotted over to one of the palace’s entrances.

“We should get him close to a comfortable source of heat. He is dreadfully cold.”

Celestia and Cadence nodded, worried about the creature’s current health. Being out in the freezing northern landscapes must be physically taxing on such a frail body. Even in the magical bond, Luna could feel the creature shivering.

“I know of where we can put him,” Cadence said. She led the way through the entrance, followed by both princesses with the figure in tow. After ascending the few flights of stairs and back into the lobby, she pranced her way to a guest room next to hers and Shining’s. There was a fireplace in one corner of the guest quarters that was already ablaze.

Earlier, Celestia had treated Cadence’s personal guards to a friendly conversation while her sister and Cadence were out perusing the arctic landscape. She learned a lot about the guard’s everyday routines and of Cadence’s and Shining Armor’s increasing companionship. Aside from a few personal hiccups, they were managing to hold the empire together much better than she had expected.

The embers of the flame gracefully lit up the room, which also reflected off of the furniture. Everything in the room was carved out of the most delicate of crystals—even the fireplace was remarkably crystalline in appearance, aside from the flames. The cushions and the bed were made of the most delicate and finely knitted satiny velvet, which was about as soft as Celestia’s sun-bathed coat. The crystalline reflections colored the room in a gentle amethyst glow, accentuating the bright red satin cushions and comforter.

Cadence slipped the comforter off of the bed and laid it flat on the floor next to the foot of the fireplace. Celestia grabbed hold of a few blankets and a couple pillows lying around various parts of the room. Luna placed the figure on top of the half-folded comforter, making sure that he was placed closest to the fire. Celestia placed a pillow below the individual’s head, just before Luna let go of him completely. She placed the other pillow behind him, letting his back rest upon it.

A small groan escaped his mouth once Luna let go of him. She grinned softly, knowing that she didn’t crush the frail being in her magical bond. It was a heart-touching moment that she would never forget. The fire illuminated the left side of his face with a warm glow, reflecting off of the smooth skin slightly accented by a thin, fuzzy layer of hair along his jaw line and cheeks.

Celestia wrapped him tightly with a single blanket, covering up all but his head. She then placed the other two loosely over him to keep him cozy. It was going to take a while for them to nurse him back to good health; fortunately, they recovered him in time and kept him alive long enough to reach the safety of a comforting sanctuary.

Luna knelt down and pecked his right cheek with a light kiss. Her face blushed with a light red hue below her eyes; it felt like a magical moment for her. She stood back up on all fours and smiled.

“Sweet dreams, visitor.”

~~ ??? ~~

You know, there comes a point where all sorts of delusions fail, be it fantastical, ludicrous, or just flat-out dumb. Many people would tell you what they ‘thought’ they saw as opposed to what they actually experienced. Sometimes their stories are believable; other times, they’re just full of themselves.

Me? I couldn’t decide if what I was feeling was either fantasy or if I was actually having the time of my life. I mean, I start things off with a space rock that seemed to have transported me to some frozen, barren landscape, and then things get worse when I had no supplies on me whatsoever, aside from my electronics, which, unfortunately, failed to work. To top it all off, I just about had an appointment with death’s hand.

Seemed like a certain 'somebody’ had other plans, though.

I think we’d all agree that I wouldn’t be able to tell the rest of my story if I had actually died out there. Somehow, lady luck appeared at the last moment, and I was rescued by a winged unicorn, who, suffice to say, was a bit of a charmer—in a literal sense.

I don’t know what she did to me, but it felt like I was being belly-rubbed over every inch of my body. I don’t know if I was going crazy, but I fucking loved every second of it. It made me feel that much more alive. Come to think of it, I think I am still alive.

I couldn’t tell exactly, because I was in a deep slumber, yet my mind continued to roam around in dreamland. The image of her standing in the middle of the grass field dominated most of my mind. It seemed like I even saw her in certain portions of my dreams. It felt creepy, in a sense. Oddly enough, I felt secure as well. She did save my ass after all, and I got to appreciate hers for the brief moment that I had with her. I had this feeling that we would meet again at some point.

On second thought, why am I suddenly having touchy feelings for a horse? Personally, that just seems wrong on every level… bestiality, you know? Of course, it seemed even stranger for said horse to have human-like intelligence, and flawless beauty that could stun an elephant.

I’d have to admit, though—she was that beautiful.

For now, I just floated on into a wave of distant memories and strange dreams that seemed like they could never end, letting my worries distance themselves from me. In short, it felt like I was asleep for a long time—maybe hours, days, even weeks. I think something was bound to wake me up at some point, though. Maybe it’d be her that would do the honor, or it’d be my stomach.

For the longest time, I just could not get that image of her out of my head. I could’ve sworn I imagined myself ‘kissing’ her on the cheek when I went up to her like that. I even saw an image of her laying down on me, hugging me tightly as if she were comforting me from something. At least I didn’t imagine us doing…

Ouch. Okay, I’m starting to feel something tugging at me. It felt like something was pinching me on my arm. Was it something that I said? Was she somehow spying on me in my sleep, like she did not too long ago—however long ago that was? I didn’t notice any telltale signs of her immediate presence, though she may as well be hunkering herself deep in the back of my mind. Maybe she’s studying the way I think, or perhaps she wants to know if I’m of any great threat to her or the other two mares that I saw.

I know it’s ridiculous to ask questions now when I had next to no clue what was happening around me right now. I feel like it’s never too early to start pondering about possible scenarios. The fact that she rescued me meant that I was worth bumping into, somehow. Maybe all she needs is a little pep talk. In that case, I’d definitely be down for a kind-hearted chatter with a couple of winged unicorn mares. Maybe they could shed some light on what happened to me…

…that is, if they even knew what happened to me in the first place. For all I know, they could just glance at me as though I was some sort of ridiculous storyteller. Then again, that’s just me making peachy assumptions. Judging from her gentle demeanor, it seems like they might not be as harsh as they initially seem.

Let’s hope I’m right.

There’s that tugging feeling again. No sign of her anywhere, yet I could feel something push against my sub-consciousness. As funny as that may seem, I really was feeling all sorts of strange sensations that I thought were never possible.

First, there’s the fact that I can feel the exact orientation of the sun, even while it was on the opposite of the planet. It was as if it was watching me twenty-four seven. Second, there’s the fact that while there are the normal sub-stimuli that occur during sleep, there’s some sort of dominating presence that hung over me like a an invisible and immobile shroud. It made me feel like I was being stalked upon like I was prey.

C’mon, horses hunting humans? Let’s be real about this—horses are, predominantly, herbivores. That does exclude the fact that these horses seem more civilized and have a mind of their own, though there could be more to them that I may have missed to support that fact. Maybe there were humans, or human-like individuals, here as well.

Despite that fact, everything else here seemed quite spectacular and calming. It was the first time that I actually felt peace flowing through my mind. It really helped calm down my senses quite a bit, though I still had quite a bit of stress leftover—mostly due to the fact that I had absolutely no damn clue where I was.

I felt a third tug. This time, it was quite a bit more forceful than the last two. At this point, I could hear the faint sound of her voice this time. It was barely audible at first, then it stopped. I attempted to listen in on the faintest noises, hoping that I could hear her if she was whispering to me. No luck.

Then, out of nowhere, I felt what seemed to be a hoof press up against my chest, though there was nothing physically touching me. A chilling, gentle wind brushed against my ear, almost like a feathery breath. It was at that point that I finally heard her voice, clear as day.

“Rise and shine, our faithful visitor.”

What…?

~~~~~

I never expected to hear a fire crackling next to me when I woke up. Not only that, but it felt like I was wrapped up in the softest silky, almost cotton-like, fabric ever made. It felt just as wonderful as it was when that one mare had me on her belly. Now I’m starting to sound all melodramatic, yet everything here seemed positively exaggerated.

I felt comfortable, to say the least. I didn’t feel wet, and I didn’t feel like any part of my body was frozen over at all—save for my right foot, which actually felt fine despite the fact that I had it deep inside a boot packed with snow. Frankly, I could still feel that my right knee joint and my ankle were still tweaked out of alignment.

At least my leg wasn’t broken. This is the one time where I’ll actually thank karma this time around.

With the confirmation that my legs were still attached, let’s check up on my arms. The fabric wrapped around the entirety of my body, in a cocoon-like fashion. My arms were, frankly, tucked inside the fabric. Luckily, it didn’t feel like they were restrained or strapped down to anything. I could actually move around. At least there wasn’t some sort of old-world voodoo village tribe dancing around me for that matter. I probably would’ve felt a bit less relaxed at that point.

I was also lying down on something soft—a bed, perhaps? Thank god I was lying down on a bed this time! I don’t know how long I could’ve handled sleeping on a horse’s belly, although the feeling of actually sleeping with another individual at this point seemed slightly sensual.

In all honesty, the fact that there was an open fire near me felt comforting. At least there were a few familiarities in the physical scope of things—according to what I felt.

I could smell something pleasant dominating my senses. It smelled like a combination of basil and spearmint. I also heard the clattering of porcelain nearby—as in, ‘I could barely reach it’ nearby. I think somebody was in the same space as I was.

Now would come time for the moment of truth. What would the visual side of the world be like? What was I prepared to see, and what was I not prepared to see?

Well, I was prepared to see those same mares that I briefly saw in person not too long ago. I was also prepared to see myself in some sort of wooden lodge, with a human-like individual sitting next me, clattering two porcelain plates together like cymbals next to my ear. It sounded more like clanging, though—like a bell.

I felt somewhat restrained by the winding cloth that surrounded me. At least it wasn’t strapped tightly around me. Able to move, I slowly but surely moved the cloth outwards, allowing my arms a greater degree of movement. I felt the edges of the cloth rub out from under me, and I felt the relief of pressure from my arms. I was free, at long last, for was seemed to be a couple minutes of getting the cloth unraveled. I swiveled my arms out from underneath the fabric and angled them slightly above my head. I breathed in a significant amount of air and exhaled in a long, satisfying yawn—stretching both my arms and my legs to full extension.

My god, it felt good to stretch myself out.

Aside from the crooked feeling I got from my right leg, I felt the stressful weight of my thoughts lift off of me. For the first time in several years, I felt lighter. It was as if I had much better clarity crawling through my head. Instead of the routinely scrambling thoughts that clouded my thinking and my vision, I could actually think and see straight.

I finally opened my eyes. The filtering rays of the sun blinded me for a minute or two. The stimulus of the bright light reflecting from the, oddly, glossy surfaces actually hurt for a moment. I was able to get a hold of myself, shaking my head and holding myself up with my elbows. I yawned again—this time, it was more of a sigh than an actual yawn.

The first thing that I noticed was the gently glowing fire that I was sitting next to. It had a nice aromatic feeling—it felt quite remarkable. I noticed that the fireplace itself was surrounded by a glass-like wall and mantle. Come to think of it, all of the walls that I could see were all made from some strange textured glass. I wasn’t expecting to be sitting in the middle of a glass house, however that worked out.

I then noticed the doorway where the sunlight was filtering through. Judging by how high the sun was, it felt like it was morning. The doors were also of the same textured glass, shaped and molded to look like a fancy set of windowed double doors.

Oddly enough, the glassy walls weren’t transparent, nor were they even translucent, though they reflected light and objects off of them like finely polished mirrors.

The room I was in was basked in a soft pink tone. I must be honest here—it felt weird being in a girl’s room, but the atmosphere felt inviting despite that fact. I still smelled the heavy scent of herbs and mint, and I quickly glanced over to my right.

The rest of the room was decorated with what looked like various pieces of household furniture made almost entirely of the same glassy material. Unless they were made of something stronger, like diamond, I’m not sure how glass furniture could hold anybody up. I certainly didn’t expect a horse to be sitting on top of a couch.

No, my eyes were not fooling me. Staring back at me with contemplative eyes was the pink mare that I saw last night, I suppose. She was perched perfectly on the silky crimson cushions of the purple-stained glass couch in such a manner that she almost reminded me of the way a dog would sit. She almost looked cute doing so. Her flowing, curly hair of yellow, pink, and violet strands ran down the length of her head, neck, and chest until it barely touched the cushion. Her tail, prepped in the same fashion, wrapped around in front of her hooves. Judging from her height, it seemed as though she was almost as tall as me, if she were to stand on all fours. She certainly seemed intimidatingly frightening at first, yet her glowing violet eyes suggested otherwise.

It looked like she was wearing some sort of oversized golden yoke around her neck (which reminded me more of a life preserver than anything else) and what seemed to be a little, flat crown on top of her head. Was she some sort of prized show horse or something? Where were the human-like beings that assisted in keeping her prim and proper? Were there even any at all? Judging from the pictures that hung on the walls, they all depicted of other horse-like individuals. Was this society run entirely by steeds of mares and stallions?

I’m not sure if she noticed my dumbfounded look when I gazed deeply at all of my surroundings. I mean, this was definitely an eye-opener for me.

I caught a glimpse of a cup that hovered just inches away from her mouth. Her gazed was locked onto mine, yet she still managed to tip the cup towards her slightly. I saw steam rising up from the inside of the cup. I then shifted my gaze to the table that was only a couple feet away from me. On the top was a silver rectangular platter with what looked like delicate porcelain teacups circling around an equally exquisitely crafted teapot.

Wait a minute—this mare was drinking… tea?

And how in the fucking blazes was a teacup hovering just before her??

I know I’ve witnessed some weird stuff earlier in my life and heard of some bizarre stories in the past, but this was definitely off the fucking rocker!

I think I was more entranced by the floating teacup than anything else at this point. I tried to formulate and contemplate how in the living hell it was able to do that. Was there some sort of whirring helicopter blade underneath that enabled it to hover before her? I didn’t see any on the other cups. Let’s see, fishing wire? It’d probably get tangled up in her horn and in the other cups. Antigravity? Magic?

Magic?? Who the fuck was I—Harry Potter?? Of course magic was a bunch of hooey, yet there was nothing, physically, plausible that explained such a phenomenon as graceful and mysterious as this!

"I take it you slept well?"

My whole body froze. I was so entranced by the mysterious floating cup that I barely even registered her voice. It sounded sweet and melodic—higher than the dark blue mare’s voice. It was also clearer than the other mare’s Ye-pseudo-Olde English tone. God, I felt as if that mare took both Webster’s and Shakespeare’s dictionaries and ran them through a fucking blender. At least I understood what she was saying, roughly, so I’d give her some brownie points for that.

In any case, my mind could hardly register the pretty pink mare’s voice that I was at a loss for words. I found it quite odd and fascinating that they even spoke English in the first place. Was that like the most commonly accepted universal language? Well, at least I wasn’t gonna have much of a hard time getting used to their language. That’s an added bonus for time well spent.

I tried my best to respond, yet I only found my own mouth gaping wide open. I heard her giggle, as if I was the most amusing thing she'd ever seen. To be fair, I think I did make an awkward face, but who wouldn't after waking up in a mare's room with floating teacups in front of you?

My eyes slowly gravitated down from the mare’s eyes until I caught sight of the nearest teacup. The scent of the tea, snaking its way from out of the pot, seemed invigorating and captivating. I scooted myself out from under the few layers of the satin crimson fabric towards the table, where I carefully knelt up in a position similar to hers. I made sure to prop my bad leg on a pillow to alleviate any awkward pain.

I could really smell the tea now—it was gentle and effervescent. It didn’t bother me in the slightest. I saw the teapot hover slightly off of the chrome platter. The pot tipped over a small amount, dispensing the hot liquid from the tip of the elephantine neck into the cup. The pot settled back down on the tray with a light tap. The steaming tea presented itself to my eyes. I couldn’t help it much longer.

She spoke once again. “Would you care for some tea?”

Instead of checking if it was all an illusion, I wrapped my hands around the cup, which felt warm to the touch. Okay, so the cup was real, and it didn’t suddenly try and float away from my hand. Maybe it had something to do with that long horn of hers. I remembered reading about common mythology telling of unicorns having magical tendencies, though I never did believe those stories. Now I was really starting to doubt my mythos.

I brought the cup closer to me, taking in a good whiff of the steaming concoction that was held in my hands. The combination of basil and spearmint almost made it smell like eucalyptus extract, except that it wasn’t as potent of a scent. I brought the warm cup to my mouth and took a small sip.

The temperature of the water was a little painful at first, but that was to be as expected from piping hot tea. It was the resulting taste that really took me by surprise. My head was swirling with the delightful, slightly bitter taste of licorice root doubled with the relaxing sensation of spearmint. How did my mind even register basil anyhow? It was probably the first thing that came to mind.

Fuck logic. This was the best thing I’ve ever tasted, since the arctic base camp. I took a little longer sip, giving the tea a chance to cool down before I swallowed it. The sensation of warm, minty water rushing down the back of my throat made all the difference.

I let loose a heavenly sigh of relief, which had a profound effect on the mare sitting on the couch opposite of the table. She giggled lightly, smiling as she did so and holding up a hoof against her chin.

Priceless.

I felt warm and fuzzy on the inside as I saw the mare’s bubbly grin. Her gentle laugh further relieved the tension that was pent up inside me. I felt, surprisingly, welcome around this mare, who had a friendly disposition towards me.

“I’ve never seen anypony that satisfied with our tea before.”

Did she just say “any’pony?’” She smiled at me, blushing as she did so.

Wow. Things took a drastic turn toward the interesting. I really didn’t know what to say now. Seems like they do have a slightly different vocabulary after all. I didn’t want to sound like a literary buffoon in front of her and somehow offend her in some way. I did have to compliment her, though.

Well, here goes.

“I’ve never had tea this satisfying before. This is wonderful!”

Did I just strike a chord with her somehow?

Before I said that, I imagined her looking at me with a pleasant smile and making a subtle complimentary reply back. The sight before me was not at all what I had imagined.

I’m not sure if she had ever seen or heard a human before, based on her ‘pony’ vocabulary instead of ‘body,’ but what began as a bubbly grin morphed into a half-scream and half-giddy smile. She pushed her cheeks together with her hooves, giggling like a goofy schoolgirl. Her eyes dilated to the size of golf balls. I tell you, I’ve seen some pretty interesting reactions before, but this one easily took the cake.

Amazingly, she didn’t drop the teacup from whatever magical bond she had surrounding it.

“So you can talk and understand us after all!”

Yep, suspicion confirmed.

“Cadence? Who are you talking to?”

I heard a masculine voice call out from the other side of the doorway, just beyond the glittering wall. I felt my heart drop after realizing that fact. Almost immediately after, a white-coated unicorn walked through the doorway. Presumably the one that spoke, he had his eyes set on the pink mare, which I assumed to be the one he addressed her as ‘Cadence.’

The stallion had a blue mane with a lighter blue stripe along his length of hair. His tail was also of the same fashion, swaying in the slight breeze as he propped himself on the back of the couch, with his two front, powerful hooves hanging over the backside. This stallion could easily kick my teeth in if I strung off on the wrong chord with him.

Strangely enough, I felt an aura of protectiveness hanging just above me in his presence. ‘Cadence’ smiled and looked at the stallion.

“You haven’t met our new guest, have you?”

“No, I haven’t,” he spoke, carrying his words across the room with such precision that it almost brought me to my knees. Actually, I was already on my knees. Point being, he didn’t seem nearly as aggressive as I had imagined.

The pink mare gasped. She looked back at me as if she just saw something in the window, though literally there weren't any around in this room. “I’m so sorry! I forgot about my introduction!” Recollecting herself, she cleared her throat. “I’m Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, or Cadence if you’d prefer.”

Well, slap my hand and fiddle me like a viola. A princess… pegacorn, I guess you’d call her? What an equally intriguing name as well. That’d make the stallion a… prince?

“This here is Prince Shining Armor—” Called it. “—captain of the royal guard, and my lovingly sweet husband.”

I wanted to gag so hard right now, yet I somehow resisted the urge—that, and I had a mouthful of warm tea in my mouth. So, allow me to briefly explain something here. Humans have adopted the concept of marriage for a very long time. I don’t personally remember when, but whatever. Point being, it’s only natural for me to praise a married couple in their success, since we’ve been doing it for a long time.

Horses, on the other hand…

Last I checked, horses didn’t even understand the basic concept of marriage, at least on Earth. Yes, there was the usual courtship and the mating and the bonding, but there was never any in-between counseling between a mare and a stallion, as far as I was aware.

Then again, I was on a completely different world with a populace of a completely different mindset.

Seems like I’m just gonna have to go along with the flow while I’m here, I guess. I’d hate to ruin the already bubbly atmosphere that was hanging on my shoulders.

“What’s your name, if I may ask?” Cadence inquired.

That question caught me off-guard. I’m not sure why, but maybe it had to be the fact that both Cadence and Shining Armor were looking at me with such unnerving and questionable gazes—it almost felt kind of creepy.

I swallowed a mouthful of tea with an audible gulp. I contemplated whether I should tell them my full name or if I should give them a made-up name. A nickname for myself didn’t seem like a bad idea, though I didn’t want to behave contrary to my true personality. I think the dark blue mare would have realized at some point that I’d be covering myself up with a fake identity, and would probably question me out of my mind.

So, I chose the logical choice, though I just stuck with my first name to be simple.

“I’m Mark. I’m a geologist.”

Maybe a little too simple.

“You study rocks?” Shining Armor said.

Okay, that really surprised me. How in the bloody hell did they understand that word? Did they have geologists of their own here as well?

“Mark,” Cadence repeated with a giggle. “What a nice name. Mark.”

I didn’t know whether to thank her or whether to keep my own trap shut. I had an awkward hunch that the day was just going to drag on with Cadence and Shining Armor begging me to do something entertaining for them, like tap-dancing or something along those lines.

As I set the cup down on the table, another hovered itself in the air, followed by the teapot which poured into the cup that I would assume Shining Armor had his hold on. He raised a brow in question, looking at my cup.

“Want some more, Mark?”

I looked down and saw that my cup was almost empty. I felt bad trying to turn down a friendly offer.

“Please.”

Upon command, the teapot hovered toward me, tipping over and filling my cup till it was almost brimming at the edge. The pot set itself back on the table, and the floating cup made its way in front of Shining Armor. I must say, these two were quite skillful in their use of magic. At least neither one of them tried to strangle me to death.

I grabbed hold of the handle this time, and I raised it in the form of a toast. “Thanks.”

Both their cups rose in a similar fashion. “You’re quite welcome,” he said. Their cups made contact, completing their personal toast.

I honestly cannot remember the last time I had tea quite like this. What a perfect wake-up call.

Author's Note

Expect our resident human to be told about the circumstances of his arrival in the next chapter :pinkiehappy:

Chapter 4 -- Questions

~~ Equestria: Canterlot ~~

The morning after the rescue of the strange bipedal being, Celestia woke up from her deep slumber—already planning her schedule for the day. She felt less tense, despite having only missed a few hours of sleep. Perhaps it was from Luna’s song of encouragement as she woke all of Equestria from another night’s slumber, or it was perhaps the fact that she knew that the being was rescued at the nick of time.

She put on her golden tiara, smoothing out her sparkling hair, and tucked it firmly on the crown of her head. As she was about to bring her yoke to her, she heard Luna’s hoofsteps on the balcony. She smiled.

“Good morning, sister,” she spoke calmly.

“We bid thee good morning as well,” Luna replied.

“Is everypony awake?”

“Yes. All is well.”

“And the guest?”

“He is awake as well.”

Celestia’s eyes glimmered in the soft, orange glow of the sunrise. “That’s good to hear.”

Luna smiled. “Perhaps it would be appropriate for us to greet him.”

“That would be swell. I almost forgot about that,” Celestia blushed.

“When shall we go?”

“When I’m ready,” she hinted toward the neckpiece floating inches from herself. Luna responded with a nod and flew off toward the hall from the balcony. Celestia sighed heavenly, sliding her head through the neckpiece and settled it just above her chest. ‘I do hope he’s having good company with Cadence and Shining Armor.’

~~ Equestr-What? ~~

Well, that was certainly a pleasant wake-up call. I kick-start the morning with a gorgeous pink alicorn (that’s what she referred to herself as) named Princess Cadence. If that didn’t sound weird enough, I woke up to her drinking tea, of all things. Now, that must get other people wondering: how in the cruddy blazes could a horse drink tea? Are they even supposed to? Apparently, this one found it necessary to do so. To add on to that, I felt compelled to join in with her. Why?

I’m not sure if it was her elegant posture—the way she sat on that couch, innocently staring into my own eyes, or if it was the fact that the warm brew smelled so enticing. It was probably the combination of both.

Oh, I don’t want to forget that she's ‘married’ to a white unicorn named Shining Armor. Now, he didn’t look like any ‘knight in shining armor’ in my eyes. She did say that he was the captain of the Royal Guard.

Wait, there’s a Royal Guard here? Did I somehow get transported to an alternate Earth, where Europe is colonized by talking pastel horses? To be frank, they didn’t have any sort of northern European English accent, which would’ve been vastly distinct from American English.

“So, Cadence,” I spoke, totally not in an awkward fashion (okay, I lied there—it was pretty awkward). She looked up at me, enjoying another serving of the intoxicatingly delicious brew from her cup. I must admit, it really was that good. “Where am I exactly?” I still tried my best to not be as awkward as possible. I don’t think it mattered much anyway, because I think she may have expected my tone to be a bit disconcerting, judging by the look on her face.

She took another sip, and wiped her mouth with a handkerchief, in a slightly cute fashion. “You’re in our home. This is the Crystal Empire, which resides in the northern border of Equestria.”

Excuse me while my brain takes a huge dump of ‘holy shit.’ I’ve heard of some interesting and crazy names of fantastical locations in fictional literature. Okay, so it doesn’t sound like I’m in an equine Europe. In fact, I highly doubt that Earth had a city made entirely of crystals and/or diamonds. That’d be one fucking filthy rich city.

There’s also the case that there doesn’t seem to be any indication of dominating wealth or political scandals. I could feel an aura of honest sincerity from these two, which is not what I’d expect from individuals who lived in a home made out of the most expensive material known to man. That got me wondering as to how the rest of this ‘Equestria’ would look like. Do all of their royal figures live in crystal homes, or is there something even more exotic that I’m not aware of? Something tells me that my journey here has only just begun.

Let’s hope I can last that long.

I think I could hear Cadence giggling in the background of my intense thinking. I shook my head and refocused my vision to her husband whispering something in her ear. Probably everyday gossip, like I’m not familiar to that. If it wasn’t for me tilting my head to the side in wonder, they probably would’ve talked each other’s ears off without end.

Cadence looked at me, puzzled. “Is there something on your mind?”

I attempted to say something, raising a finger in the air, as my mouth opened wide. I really did want to say something, yet something else sprang up in my mind. “Well, uh… I’m just… uh, surprised, is all…”

“Surprised about what?” Shining Armor asked.

“Well, the fact that I came here to Equersia, or whatever—“

“Equestria.”

“Equestria. Thank you.” God, these ‘Equestrians’ (if that is theoretically correct) are so nice. I’d bet that we’d get along just fine if they ended up on Earth somehow, if animal control wouldn't get all up in their asses over talking winged horses and unicorns and what have you. It’s just a hunch, but after being rescued and brought back to my senses by these extraterrestrials, I just had that strange feeling that things would turn out alright.

I wonder if they knew about the circumstances of my arrival, though. Damn. I wished I would’ve asked that first.

“So, uh, Cadence,” I said.

“Yes, Mark?”

“Do you know how I got here? Not like in this room, but I mean here—in Equestria?”

She placed her hoof on her chin. “Eh, I’m not quite sure I follow. I do know Princess Luna noticed your presence. That’s about it.” She paused. “She hasn’t told me anything else, yet.”

Great, as if there was one more thing for me to continue worrying about.

“I’m sure we could help put that to rest,” said a voice from beyond the doorway. That frightened me a bit, causing me to sit up straight and look around the room for a second, before catching sight of a tall white alicorn and the shorter dark blue alicorn.

Cadence was sure excited to see them. She jumped out from the couch and approached them with her wings out in full extension—lowering her neck in a sort of formal praise. Shining Armor did the same next to Cadence.

“Good morning, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna,” Cadence said, excitedly. “It’s good to see you again.”

“Good morning to you as well, Cadence,” the white alicorn said, with a placid smile. The darker one also grinned happily. I think her interest was more towards me than the couple, as I could feel her eyes gaze upon me after their cordial introduction.

I felt awful about not showing any sort of formality towards royalty. If I was going to get any sort of respect around here, I’d better follow the leader. I found the courage to stand up tall from my chair on both of my feet. I felt my right leg ache, but it was easy to pass off the pain for that moment.

Before I could even begin to bow my upper body towards the two ‘princesses,’ I heard the voice of the white alicorn penetrate through my ears. Her voice was authoritative, yet gentle and relaxing.

“There is no need for you to bow, stranger.”

I couldn’t dare to look up. Deep down in me, I wanted to obey her, yet I felt a deep obligation to salute to the presence of royalty. It was an internal conflict—my body was fighting that urge to obey which side to go on.

“But…” I stuttered. “It’s impolite not to salute to those of… royalty.”

“Where you’re from, perhaps,” she continued. “You are a guest here. We do not expect you to know of our customs right off the bat.”

Well, I felt a little more relieved. Seems like they’re giving me a little breathing room, given the circumstances I was put through to end up all the way here. I exhaled, letting myself stand upward again.

I can instantly tell that I towered above everyone in the room, except for the white alicorn. It was confusing as to which one was ‘Celestia’ and which one was ‘Luna.’ I also found it odd that they had tattoos on their butts (I guess you’d call them ‘flanks,’ in horse terms). The white one had a tattoo of a yellow sun with orange squirrely lines jutting out from all sides of the circle. The dark blue one had an inky splotch on her flank with a crescent moon adorned in the middle.

If I understood it correctly, I concluded that the dark blue alicorn was Princess Luna, and that the white one was Princess Celestia. I figured, since the world ‘lunar’ came to mind when I thought of the moon. Thank goodness for the process of elimination. Then again, that was only a hunch.

‘Celestia’ walked over to me, carefully looking me over. I could tell that she was fascinated by my appearance. Man, they seemed just as gullible as we do when we spot our eyes on something we’ve never seen before. She held out a hoof, adorned with a golden metallic slip-on, and slid it down the length of my arm. For once, I tossed the whole ‘alien probe’ scenario out the front door.

She stood straight on all fours, all the while maintaining that same friendly smile. “Do you have a name that you call yourself?”

If it wasn’t for the fact that I’d already given my real name to Cadence, I probably would’ve considered giving her a nickname. I’d probably be thrown in jail for lying to a princess. I’m not sure what their level of tolerance for deceit was, so I had to play it fair by whatever means necessary.

“Mark. My name is Mark Haraway.”

“Mark,” she repeated. Her eyes glistened in the basking light of the sun reflected off of the crystalline walls. “What a lovely name. I am Princess Celestia, ruler of Equestria.”

As if my brain hadn’t gone into meltdown enough times already. Not only was she a princess, but she proclaimed herself as ‘the’ ruler of this landscape. This just ushered in a whole new level of strange. At least she didn’t laugh at my name—in fact, she found it quite ‘lovely,’ to quote her use of that word.

The dark blue alicorn, or ‘Luna,’ stood forth and stopped just shy of me next to Celestia. She also had a similar friendly disposition toward me. “If you’re interested in such brief introductions, thou shalt call us Luna,” she said. There goes that Shakespearian conundrum again. In all honesty, it helped me differentiate between the two. At least they didn’t speak in the same exact tone and pitch.

Well, at least another mystery was solved. So, Luna was her name. Made sense due to the mark on her flank, which was also apparent on the other side as well.

“Well, it’s good to meet you both, princesses,” I stuttered, again. I don’t know if it was from the both of them being so unnervingly close to me, but I felt a tad shameful. For one thing, I’m improperly dressed to be face-to-face with those of royalty. I also felt naked underneath the thin cloth robe that I had draped over me. I’d probably be violating some indecency laws if they tried to strip me naked or some shit.

Oh, god. I hope that doesn’t happen in a moment or two.

“It’s good to meet you as well, Mark,” Celestia said. “Now, I know you may have some questions regarding the circumstances of your arrival.”

There’s the smoking gun. Finally, I was gonna get some much-needed answers!

“If you come with us, we’ll discuss all about it.” She ushered toward the doorway, and proceeded to walk out. Luna still stood next to me, making some sort of inquisitive expression.

“Well, art thou going to follow our sister, Mark?”

So, these two were sisters. That was certainly an eye-opener. I trailed behind Celestia, as Luna walked behind me rather closely—almost touching her nose against my back.

I ended up following Celestia out of the mazelike interior of the crystal tower. If I hadn’t kept up with Celestia, I probably would’ve gotten lost; perhaps not, with Luna behind me. We got out onto the base of the underside of the tower, and she approached what looked to be a chariot of immense size. There were rows of armored stallions surrounding us. I felt like as if I made any sudden moves, they’d all be on me in less than the snap of a finger.

To make things more embarrassing for me, I felt all of their eyes gazed upon me. In one brief moment, I almost felt like a criminal who committed some horrible crime. I was brushed out of my train of thought with a gentle bump against my back. Luna playfully bumped into me, causing me to briefly lose my balance. To be honest, she did collide with me rather hard, which felt more like a shove. I thought that was very unusual, especially coming from someone of royalty. You’d think she’d have a little more decency.

As a result, this sent me scrambling on my feet towards Celestia. I tripped on my bad foot, leaving all my forward momentum on one foot. Too bad I was already leaning dangerously forward, or I probably would’ve caught myself. I tumbled toward the ground, expecting to plant my face right on the rough diamond surface.

It was as if much of my body was floating freely in space the next moment. I opened my eyes to find myself a mere few inches away from the ground. My body was still in the same position just before I tumbled forward. I was somehow raised up by some invisible bear hug and it slowly brought me back on my feet. After the grip subsided, I checked myself to make sure I didn’t have any scratch marks in case it was all some sort of illusion.

Nothing. How in the…

“Luna,” Celestia urged toward her sister. “Please be more careful with him.”

I looked back to see Luna snickering silently, all the while blushing like a wild rose. I could make out the faint whispers of her voice, as she cowered to Celestia’s words. “Sorry, sister…”

Yeah. You go, girl. Wait—what did I just say??

~~ Equestria: ??? ~~

If there was anything more impressive than this new landscape I was in, it’d be the fact that there was another planet of intelligent life. What really bought the farm was that these ‘Equestrians’ seemed very kind and peaceful—much different from the movies that I’ve seen. Those movies depicted alien extraterrestrials as groups of aggressive, resource-robbing militants. It was a pretty silly stereotype, to be honest, but the human mind tended to lean toward that pathway, whether it’d be in our imagination or related to the real world.

Personally, I had no problems with stereotypes, as long as they didn’t intervene with my work. Speaking of work, how’d I be able to fit into the labor force here, if things did pan out towards that direction? I think it was a good idea for me to make side plans, in case there wasn’t a way for me to get back home—if that was even possible to begin with. I was in the right path to receive some answers, as I sat next to the two ‘rulers’ of this world.

I was sitting right between them, safely secured by their mass as we were pulled along on an exquisitely crafted golden chariot—dragged along by a fleet of armored pegasus guardians. That made sense for a princess to have her own garrison of troops to defend her in the event that someone or something would attempt to do any harm.

In retrospect, there were lots of familiarities with this world and Earth. There was the fact that while the landscape was completely different and unrecognizable, the general layout of the landscape looked relatively similar to Earth’s surface makeup. Huge expanses of vibrant wild grass plains stretched across much of the land, interrupted by small groves of wildflowers and trees, which looked remarkably similar to the deciduous trees found on Earth.

In the distance, there was a large forest that covered much of the foothills to the right. To the left, large mountains towered above the landscape, exposing the solid stone layers of the crust. To top it all off, the gravity of this place didn’t feel like it was crushing me, nor did I feel nearly weightless. It was actually quite similar to Earth’s gravity. I don’t think I’d have much of a hard time adjusting to this world, physically.

Socially adapting to this world, however, was going to be a bigger challenge. First impressions are always everything, at least that’s what I was told. Taking that into consideration, it seemed like my first impression of this place seemed pretty spectacular. For the most part, the princesses seemed pretty modest, though their behavior (especially Luna) did not come across as lady-like. They didn’t seem like the perfect, pretty princesses that I’d used to hear/read about in ancient folklore. Then again, they were horses—albeit slightly shorter than the average horse that I was used to seeing.

Not to mention colorful. As far as I have seen, their coats were dyed with a single, dominant color. I’d no idea if they were born like that, or if they just decided to randomly dip themselves in a vat of ink. I’d like to think the formal, since ink would eventually wash off, and it’d be quite uncomfortable taking a swim in a chemical bath. Also, their manes didn’t look like the normal, short, thick hair that you’d commonly see on a horse’s neck and tail. These ‘Equestrians’ had long, multicolored hair, almost accentuating their feminine side. The stallions also had unusually long manes, though the only stallion I truly saw in full color was Cadence’s husband. The rest were either obscured by armor, or were never seen.

I still couldn’t get that out of my mind. I hope I didn’t end up getting married with an Equestrian. That’d probably be pretty strange. Can you imagine a human and a horse bonding together for life? Yeeaaahh, time for me to switch gears now.

If it wasn’t for my constant train of thoughts and observations of the two princesses next to me, I probably wouldn’t have noticed that we were rapidly closing in on one of the mountains. I couldn’t tell if my eyes were deceiving me, but it looked like there was a castle-like structure built on the side of the steep mountain-side, completely riddled with cliffs that dropped off towards the base of the mountain. Was it even humanly possible to construct such a monument?

Apparently, it was possible here.

As we got closer to it, the architecture and decorations of the castle and its various structures became clear. It wasn’t surrounded by a thick protective wall, though being supported on a near-vertical cliff face was probably enough of a defense for it as is. The white walls which made up the various structures, big and small, tall and short, made it look like that one elven capital city—you know, the one in the Lord of the Rings trilogy? I forget the name of it…

Anyway, point being, this city looked amazing. I could barely even come up with any more words to describe it.

I’m not sure how long it took, since my mind was reeling from the precious pearl walls of the castle structures, but I felt the abrupt movement of the chariot landing in the middle of a courtyard, of sorts. There was a bigger procession of armored stallions, compared to our departure from crystal-land, in an even greater array of colors—mostly obscured by their gold or silver armor plating. They all shared that same distinct stare of loyalty and discipline. I definitely would not want to mess with any one of these stallions.

“We’re here,” Celestia said, tearing me out of my brief daydream of deep thinking. I swear, I’ve never daydreamed like this at all before. I was definitely gonna have to get used to this new way of thinking if I was going to learn anything new.

After all, humans are unique in that they can adapt to just about any environment. Being thrown out in the cold, though, takes some pretty extreme adaptation skills to endure.

With that said, I really had that overarching question in the back of my mind: how did I get here exactly, and why?

Well, how I got here was somewhat of a no-brainer, but specifically I wanted to know how it was made possible. Did something similar happen to them here? Did they get hit with an unexpected meteor shower that rained fragments of glowing space rock from some distant debris field or planet?

That’d be kind of scary and interesting at the same time, if it was from a planet. Perhaps the planet blew up, and, somehow, infused the leftover material with charged particulates that gave the rock its ‘special’ quality.

Now I’m just stepping far into the realm of the impossible. I really need to step back a bit and let reality sink in.

Regardless, my mind filled up with all sorts of theories. Let’s hope that these two princesses have some sort of an answer before I go completely bonkers. Anything would do, really.

Celestia beckoned me to follow her and Luna up a curving stairway that followed the side of a tiered flowerbed. I could identify tulips and lilacs among other things. Our progress was slow, but it allowed me to keep up with them, despite having a sprained ankle. It wasn’t as bad now—I could get around no problem. If I had to run (which I don’t really see any need to do at the moment), it’d probably be a little more difficult to keep my footing.

We got to the top of the staircase, and their pace quickened to a trot. Okay, looks like I’ll have to put in a little more effort to keep up with them. They trotted over to one of the large buildings, adorned with stained windows that were decorated with an assortment of symbols and characters. They almost looked like windows you’d normally see in a church. Was that what it was?

I’m not exactly a religious guy, though I did respect other people’s beliefs. I just hope that they weren’t gonna pull me into some sort of pagan cult of killer horses and offer me as a sacrifice to their ‘god.’ Great, now I’m losing my own mind already.

I walked through the threshold of the long building, which had no doors. A little interesting how that would work out. I guess since horses don’t have hands, it’d be pretty difficult for them to open doors. The inside looked even more spectacular than the outside. There was a long, purple carpet that stretched on for the entire length of the building. For every fifteen feet, roughly, there were even more stained windows—each depicting different images. Were they some sort of event calendar?

I walked up to one of the windows, depicting both princesses and six other, smaller ‘ponies,’ I guess. Did they do something important, or was that holiday coming up? Above them were symbols that took similar placements as all of the figures. Obviously, there was the sun and the crescent moon, but there were also butterflies, balloons, diamonds, apples, and a white cloud with a multicolored lightning bolt coming out of it. Engulfing those five symbols was a six-pointed magenta star surrounded by five regular stars in random positions. What did those symbols mean? They didn’t look anything like I’ve seen on Earth. Did these ‘Equestrians’ worship more than one god?

“Mark?” I heard Celestia from behind. It frightened me for that split moment, causing me to jump slightly. “Oh, I didn’t mean to scare you like that.”

“Nah, that’s fine,” I said, letting my mind settle a little bit. “I was a bit engrossed by this stained window.”

“Oh,” she said. She walked up next to me, staring at the window. The way she looked at it, to me, meant that she had seen it a whole bunch of times before—possibly. “These are the Elements of Harmony. They help establish peace and order across Equestria.”

She made it sound fascinating, as if I was some sort of student. To be honest, she did come across as a mentor of sorts. Oh, man. I am gonna have such a lore trip here. It was probably only a small taste, but a good start it was. Damn, I wished Earth had something like this. At least we weren’t completely blind-sighted—there was a small taste of pleasantries and harmony where I lived. This really started waking me up.

Here comes that question, though. I looked up to her in understanding, absorbing the knowledge she gave me. I held a new face—one of question, and one that seemed awfully familiar to her somehow.

“Celestia, do you know how I was brought here, and possibly why?”

I don’t know if she froze or if it took her a while to register the question. Did I not ask in the right way? And what is it with her always smiling at me? It seemed as though Luna was only smiling half the time I’ve been around her. Was Celestia always this happy—the ‘Little Miss Sunshine' around here?

“That is why we brought you here—to discuss about the circumstances of your arrival.”

Wonderful. “Well, my world was hit by an unexpected meteor shower, which caused some minor damage to equipment we had set up in our arctic region. Were you hit by a random meteor shower as well, with glowing rocks?”

“That was no random rock, and I’m surprised that it was split apart.”

What? “Umm, I’m not sure I follow, princess…”

“There was an old tradition that was passed down by our ancestors that they called ‘rock throwing.’ It was a form of communication with distant worlds by sending messages infused inside nearby rocks. Your world had intercepted one of these messages, which we also imbued a special power within.”

Okay… what?? “Uhh… so, in essence…”

“We were the ones that brought you here—or, rather, you found our message and you were brought here through the spell that was embedded within it.”

Holy shit. Did I just hear that or was I imagining things?

“Uhh… princess? What do you mean by… that?” You’re gonna have to cough up an explanation if I’m going to understand the situation. “W… Why did you… throw rocks at other planets?”

I think my whole view of reality has been up-ended rather drastically. I mean, why would you throw rocks at other planets? Were they also feeling left out like we were? Did they also have the ‘are we alone in the universe’ question?

It’s quite obvious that question no longer applies for either one of us now. There’s also the fact that these Equestrians aren’t your stereotypical ‘run-of-the-mill,’ big-headed, probe-a-holic, aggressive extraterrestrials.

Now it was Luna’s turn to speak. “We had a hunch that there would be others out in the stars that, like us, would value harmony as a way of life.”

Well, we aren’t the most harmonious creatures ever to live on Earth, but I could sort of get the picture down. That still didn’t explain why they chose to hurl hundreds of space rocks into deep space just to get their message across. Didn’t they think about the end result if they had somehow managed to get a reply in the form of aggression from any one of those stars?

Now I feel that we humans are the less gullible kind. These Equestrians, fool-heartedly, stepped out into the unknown, clearly oblivious to the fact that: A) they didn’t know what the hell was out there, and; B) they didn’t even expect what kind of a reaction they’d get. I know I might sound a little repetitive at this point, but the point had to get across. I mean, if you're just blindly sling-shotting rocks out in space, there's the potential to do some damage to something out there—maybe even pissing someone off and sending a 'less-than-kind' message back.

Oh, the hilarity of an alien shouting incoherent insults at another...

Then again, I’m oblivious to the fact that these Equestrians have ‘magical qualities,’ so they could as well defend themselves pretty well against some threats—maybe even dump them out into the arctic where I ended up. Speaking of ending up in places…

Where the hell did Erin go, if she didn’t wind up in the same place as I did?

As far as I was concerned, they seemed rather intrigued with me. Had they found her first before coming to get me? Was she still lost, in a completely different locale? Things just didn’t add up.

After all this hard thinking, I finally managed to get a grip with myself. “Well, Luna, I’m gonna be frank with the both of you. Where I’m from, we aren’t exactly a ‘harmonious’ society. There are a lot of good parts to our lives, but there’s been a few...” Oh, how shall I say? “…conflicts.”

“Oh?” Celestia said.

“Pray tell, Mark. What ‘conflicts’ dost thou speakest of?”

Well, that wasn’t the reaction I was expecting. I thought that they’d despise of me right off the bat, yet now they seemed even more interested in me than just a few minutes ago. Seriously, what the fuck is up with these Equestrians? Did they not understand the concept of ‘consequences to their actions?’

And for the fucking love of god, could you please cut the pseudo-Shakespearian shit?? I’m not even sure what side of the planet she was born on, but it was really getting on my nerve at this point.

“Uhh... maybe that wouldn't be the best subject for me to touch up on...?” Considering that they believed in harmony and all that jazz, blasting them with information about civil wars, world wars, and the European Holocaust, for instance, would possibly frighten them out of their wits. Then again, they could likely just ship me back into the freezer for the rest of my life and pretend that I didn’t even exist. Then again, who am I to know for sure?

Either way, I felt that the possible outcome would be less than promising for me, if I treaded further away from subtlety. At this point, I had to play it cool and not cross any boundaries—most importantly, I couldn’t even dare cross my own dignity with theirs.

“Fair enough, Mark. I suppose our train of discussion shall continue down a different path.”

What…? Okay, let me back up a bit now before I get too carried away here.

“Right. So, you said that you were the ones that sent out the rock, right?”

They both nodded.

“And that rock had a ‘special power’ attached to it?”

They both nodded again.

“If that’s possible, is there a way for me to get back home?”

Celestia’s smile transformed to a frown. My stomach felt like turning inside-out.

“Well, yes, and no.”

I really hated those kinds of scenarios. I mean, seriously—it’s always the bad part that sounds worse than the good part. She could’ve just said no for fuck’s sake, and let that be the end of the discussion.

On the bright side, I’ve been looking forward to a vacation for quite a while. The only problem with that was that this was going to be a, potentially, life-long vacation.

So, here I am—I’m in Equestria, brought here by two, potentially, magically powerful mares, and now ‘sunny-bum-drums’ says that there might not be a way for me to get back. I guess they can only extend their powers so far. All extents of power had its limits. God, there are so many fucking similarities with this place that I already feel like I’m still on Earth—almost like nothing’s changed.

It’s like Planet of the Apes, except with horses instead! How about Planet of the Steeds?

In any case, I did the best I could to give her a questioning look without as much as a twitch in my eyes in frustration. Seeing my (totally legit) game face, she continued. “There was the possibility of you being able to move between worlds with the rock, but since you said that it fell on your world in fragments, I’m afraid that the spell can no longer function in the same way as it was intended.”

So, in short, the space rock became a one-way doorway to magical, colorful pony-land. Wonderful. Did that also mean that it had, unintentionally, spit me out into the middle of the freezer, instead of somewhere less harsh? Maybe that explained why Erin didn’t re-appear next to me.

I’d probably be having a much harder time deciphering all of this information if I had gone through alone. Maybe having two life forms falling through the rock would make things a little more complicated with the princesses. I had to say something about that.

“There was, actually, one other that came in with me as well.”

Now this really got them interested. Celestia looked up at me. “There’s another like you?”

“Yes—well, if you mean the same species, yes; in terms of gender, no. She was with me when the ice below us cracked and sent us both to our, potential, doom. That's kinda how we ended up here in the first place.”

“The other is a ‘She'??” Luna screamed. Was it just me, or did she seem legitimately concerned? I guess they were even more caring than I had recently thought. Before I could even say anything, Luna had disappeared, just like that, into a fine, dark mist. Damn, just like Batman, except he disappeared without any trace.

Celestia peered into my eyes, with a concerning look crossing her face. “Don’t worry, Mark. Luna will make sure that she is recovered safely. I must ask, though…” she paused. “Are you two married, by any chance?”

I wanted to laugh so hard; I really did want to, yet I felt a small amount of shame fill my heart. Goddamn, all of this sympathy just hurts my brain. Were these ‘Elements of Harmony’ starting to affect me somehow? “No,” I replied, calmly.

She cooed, innocently. I had to admit, that was pretty cute. That question was also pretty damn cute. It made me wonder if Erin would even consider marrying me. I mean, she was a pretty decent gal—scratch that, she was drop-dead gorgeous. The only thing that really irked me about her was the fact that she would think ahead of herself and lose track of her surroundings. What I had experienced with her staring at the space rock was actually the coup de grace of that unusual trait of hers. I’d never seen her behave in that way. It was almost shit-scary, now that I remember.

I wonder how she would react now if we were, somehow, reunited out of fate in this new world. Perhaps it’d be dumb luck. In any case, I’m starting to think that maybe an extra-long vacation would be so bad. At least I’d be able to spend the rest of my life, with the woman of my dreams, in a vibrantly pleasant paradise…

… hopefully, if all the cards played out right…

Chapter 5-1 -- Tension

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