Shards of glass

I walked towards the group singing around the fire, sporting a friendly smile and I waved at them. "Hello!" I said, and they turned to look at me. "I was wonder- GAH!" I yelled as the pony on my right, who was also the largest of them all, slammed into me and sent me flying.

I flew for a good couple of feet before coming to a rest by a tree, dazed and in pain. The pony nearest to where I used to be zipped over, and in a flash overturned every nook and cranny that could hold anything. I almost felt violated by the way she searched my body. She ended it with a bop on the nose, then shouted.

"He's got nothing!" Yelled the pony who searched me, before she zipped back to the others. They all nodded, then the one farthest from me, a pegasus, stood up and started to speak.

"Sorry about the rough welcome, but these days, if you let your guard down you'll find someone taking everything you've worked to save. The name's Night, this fellow next to me is Entry." he said, pointing to the cloaked pony on his left. He continued to his left, pointing to the brute of a unicorn that had clobbered me not two minutes ago. "This good chap is Tanker, and next to him is his twin brother Tinker." Tanker grunted in response while his almost dwarf-like unicorn twin smiled at me. He then pointed to the pegasus who seemed to be tending to the fire and a smoking pot on top of it. Must've been food. "My good friend Amber, and the mare who searched you is Hoodlum." He said, introducing the final mare, who just sneered at me in return. "What brings you to these parts?" Asked Night.

"Well, I was wondering where the nearest to-" I started, only to be interrupted by Tartarus.

"We are looking for some things we lost, mainly small pieces of glass, and we were wondering if you had seen any?" He asked before we saw that they had seemed to only just notice Tartarus, and they backed up a step before deciding to respond.

"Yes, as a matter of fact we have seen some, but first we must ask you another question." he said pointing at Tartarus. "How the hell did that parasprite talk?"

"I'm sorry, I don't know what a paraprite is." I said in response, almost immediately earning a weird look from Night and his posse.

"Did you hit your head? How did you get this far without knowing what a parasprite is? I'm surprised that nasty little bugger hasn't gone berserk and eaten everything you have. Unless... he already has." Said Night sceptically as he looked at my side and my lack of supplies.

"I can assure you good sir, whatever a parasprite is, I'm not that." Said Tartarus.

"Hey, I haven't seen a parasprite that has talked. As long as you keep that thing away from the food, you can stay." They walked back to their fire, with us following.

"So, about the piece of glass?" Tartarus said.

"Ah yes, your piece of glass, I'd be happy to give it to you, but that would leave us with quite a predicament. You see, that little piece of glass is keeping all the critters away, and we'd rather not part with our beast o'way just yet. Seeing as we would have quite the 'infestation' problem."

"What would be the infestation problem exactly?" Tartarus asked.

"Why they would be you, in case you didn't get the memo, your kind devours everything in its path. If the swarm, or even one parasprite sees a scrap of food, it eats without remorse and in a number of seconds. And if it gets too hungry, it doesn't get too picky about what it eats, living or not. Usually, we would be dead by now, either by starvation or a even more horrible death. But, luckily for poor old us, we found a neat little piece of glass, the same one you say you're looking for. For some reason or another, the little buggers seem to avoid it like the plague. We go out without it," he looked over to the pony named Entry. "What was the chance that we would even be able to make it out alive again?" The pony looked up, then made a symbol with his hooves. "Two percent, and we don't exactly plan on leaving."

Tartarus nodded, or more like bobbed up and down. "So, if we were able to keep them away without the glass, would you give it to us?" He asked.

Night laughed, and after he had finished, he said to us, "If you could find another way to keep them away, I'd be more than glad to give it to ya. This thing may keep them away, but it feels like it's taking our energy in return." He looked over to their bag of supplies warily. "Plus, it gives us the creepiest feeling, like there's a monster breathing down our back...just watching us." Said Night in a silent, disturbed tone. I looked up at Tartarus, thinking. It didn't take much to put two and two together and guess that he was most likely the source of that discomfort. "But hey, while you're here, you can have some dinner, we've got plenty of extra."

I sat down, pondering, if what they were saying was true, immortal or not I too was going to need a way to get past the parasprites. Maybe I could convince them to head to town with the piece of glass.

"So, why don't any if you want to head back to civilization?" I asked the group, Night taking it upon himself to answer that question for all of them.

"We've all got our reasons. Hoodlum has stolen from the pockets of so many powerful people she's the only small time crook to have a reward of over a thousand bits. Alas, she got a bit too cocky, and tried to steal the regalia from Celestia's own head! Got herself a dreadful time in the clanker. Tinker and Tanker worked as a team, making large scale heists of the most secure places, broke into stuffy noble's vaults. Unfortunately, one noble was a bit more prepared than the others, had a trap set just for them. Entry worked as an accountant for almost every important pony, and on every single giant purchase they made he took a bit of their money, only a couple bits. He covered his tracks well, and had amassed a large fortune just as big as those he worked for, was almost ready to retire and everything too. Unfortunately, some detective or PI got a whiff of what he was doing, and unraveled all of his work. I pity him, one of the nobles was really mad, cast a mute curse on the poor bastard. Smart as any high profile genius and can't speak a word."

I looked to Night and the only pony he's not mentioned yet. "What about you and Amber?"

"Us? Well, depending on your view, we either did the least or the most evil. When war broke out between Celestia and Luna, we chose the wrong side. Found myself a natural profession for war and strategy and rose the ranks fast, before I knew it I was leading a sizable chunk of her army as one of her generals. What I didn't have in strength, I made up tenfold in strategy and leadership. Soon Amber showed up, Luna thought he would be a good lieutenant. She was correct, and he showed talent in giving troops moral support and as a great cook. Only downside was that he wouldn't hurt a fly, froze up in battle like a mouse looking into the mouth of a lion, and would faint at the sight of a drop of blood." Said Night as he looked to his war buddy, who had begun to blush in return of the embarrassing details that had been spoken of. "Didn't really matter though, he could calculate the enemies plan like he was in their head, and planned the whole thing out before it even happened, I only really took charge the small amount that his plans didn't work. Before we knew it we were at the front of the war, cutting through Celestia's front lines like paper. He knew every man who was under his charge by name..." he stopped talking and looked over to where Amber was cooking stew silently. "And has mourned every one."

I looked to Amber, and I noticed it. His eyes. Though he was smiling, I could see in his eyes all the pain and suffering he has seen, all the death... It's like he wants to cry, but he has no more to give. Nobody should have to endure that kind of pain, so how can he?

Night turned back to me and continued his story. "Anyways, we marched to the capital in one final push, we had victory in our grasp. Luna was now standing right beside us, looking over our strategies and leading the troops with us. Defense after defense fell, and soon we were in the palace. Then, in a second, everything crumbled. Blood Dancer, the Griffon King himself, and his army swept in from the rear. Nightstalker, one of our own generals, turned against us and killed his lieutenant. We could've survived it, but Celestia herself flew in and tackled Luna, engaging in a duel that everyone knew how it would end. Our section was the only one that held out for more than a minute, hour after hour, our troops held out against the battering, soon even Celestia joined in, and I had the honor of fighting her myself. Could barely hold out, but I knew that as soon as I fell, so would my troops. I had to keep fighting, for them. Dodging, slicing, I fought like I had never had before. But of course she was an alicorn, and I, a simple pegasus. Eventually she wore me out, and as the last of my troops fell, so did I."

A most delicious smell wafted over, and Night's story was interrupted by Amber hitting his spoon to the pot, signaling dinner was ready. Wooden bowls were arranged with soup inside each of them. Stumps of trees served as seats. I took up my bowl, and after seeing everyone else do the same, I sipped from the bowl, and it was as if liquid straight from heaven was flowing down my throat. "This is delicious!" I exclaimed. Amber grinned, and sipped from his own bowl, I could tell he took his cooking very seriously.

"It's a gift alright!" Hoodlum said. "Parasprites or not, we would have starved without him."

"Hey, you wanted to know why we can't give you the piece of mirror?" Tinker said looking up from a small cube like object he was tinkering with.

"Yeah, parasprites right?" Tartarus said.

"Look behind you." He said, darting his eyes to the spot behind where I was sitting.

We turned around, and almost fell out of our seats, a giant swarm of small round things with wings, not unlike Tartarus, was amassing all around us. But they never crossed a line made out of small twigs encircling the camp.

"Crazy right!" Said Tanker, laughing wholeheartedly at how I fell out of my seat.

Entry nudged Night and made a series of movements with his hooves when he had his attention. Night nodded when he finished and looked at me soon after. "Entry asked how you got here, and now that he mentions it, I'm curious too. How exactly did you manage to get past that?" He said, motioning over to the swarm of parasprites.

"That's a funny story, really. Ya know how you asked if I hit my head?" I said.

"Don't tell me, you have absolutely no idea?!"

"None at all, I swear. I just woke up here, near you guys." It was sort of true at least, I'm not completely lying to them.

"Just how hard did you hit your head?" Tinker asked me, not looking away from the cube in his hooves.

"Hard enough that I didn't know who Celestia and Luna are, much less that there was a war between them. Heck, I don't even know my own name!"

Entry made another series of movements with his hooves, to which Night gladly translated again. "Entry said that's pretty hard alright."

I took another swig of my soup, swirling it in my mouth to really get all of the taste before swallowing. "Hard enough to feel like I fell down a canyon." I said.

We all finished our soup, then Night continued his story. "After the battled had concluded, I was so tired. Everyone else on our side had surrendered and denounced Luna as soon as she lost to her sister, and like pigs, they groveled at Celestia's hooves. Fuckin' yellow bellied cowards, the lot of 'em. Me and Amber were the only ones who refused to denounce her, and believe me, they wanted us to. They did everything they could think of just to get us to say something along the lines of ‘I was brainwashed!’ or ‘I was forced to! Luna is evil, she made me side with her!’ But of course we refused, and we became the scapegoats. Life sentences in the highest security prison in all of Equestria was our punishment. All of us," he said pointing to the rest of the group. "Found ourselves in the same cell, and we thought we would be there until we shrivelled away and died."

"What happened?" I asked, almost on edge from Night's story.

"The man in the cell next to us, he was someone we could agree was insane. He always muttered, and would spontaneously do crazy things, like climb up his cell walls. One day, he stops muttering, and sits down. The guard near him walked over near him, thinking that he was safe, after all, he didn't have any magic, and it wasn't like he could bend alloy steel bars in a room that nullified all magic inside it. We all thought that, but as soon as the guard stepped near, he launched himself into the air, and bent the bars like they were tinfoil. Poor guy didn't even have time to react, he was dead before he hit the ground. Luckily for us, the keys rolled over to our cell, and Tinker was just small enough to fit his arms through the bars. We expected a fight, figuring that our neighbour had been taken out already, but all we saw was carnage, the beast had killed every single guard in it's path. Course, we knew that when life gave you lemons, you make lemonade, and we walked out of the most secure prison without a single defence pointed at us. The beast was easy to track, what with the massive trail of blood and limbs, so we went the opposite way. We raced to shelter and safety, picking up news all throughout. Apparently the beast ran into a dragon's cave, and found itself between the elite guard and one of the most powerful beings known. Heard it put up a fight, even clawing one of the dragon's eyes out and killing three guardsmen before it died. Alas, with our distraction dead, they quickly realized that we were gone, and then focused their search on us. By that time, we were already in here, an impenetrable natural forest. With a piece of glass being the master key."

He yawned, and flopped down on a blanket. "And that is how the Hattens arrived here. Now, I'm going to get some shut eye, while you try to find a way to stop those." He said pointing to the swarm of parasprites before heading to a spot near the fire and falling into sleep, his group following that same motion.

I too started drifting to sleep, wondering just what I had been told. The names resonated with me, but I couldn't point it just out. Celestia, Luna...who were they to me in the past? I stared at the moon, and noticed that it almost looked like a pony was in it. The more I looked at it though, it was similar to the feeling Night and the others have had since getting our glass, like it's watching me back... Just what have I gotten myself into?