James decided to stay downstairs for a while, considering the circumstances. Nightmare Moon was rather angry at him for some kind of reason he couldn't figure out.

However, he had some work to do. First, he put the washed clothes to dry, then he cleaned the lone plate and put it back where it belongs, and only after cleaning his teeth he allowed himself to call it a night.

So, the man sat on the rather comfortable armchair, spending what's left of night there. It was rather unusual for him, yet he slept like a baby.

He awoke at one in the evening. Despite being winter, the sky was clear, and the sun shone brightly through the windows of the dining room.

James stretched himself. He did his usual routine, even if he wasn't really awake. He did morning exercise, then had a shower, cleaned his teeth, and he finished everything with a light breakfast, consisting of some apples, orange juice, and a bowl full of buckwheat porrige.

After finishing his morning routine, James realized that the mare was still in his house, and he hasn't returned her clothes to her yet. He went to the bathroom and took her clothes. He quietly went upstairs and looked into his bedroom. The windows were covered by curtains, and only dim light illuminated the room. The set of armor was placed neatly near the bed. On the bed, Nightmare Moon was lying on her back, sleeping rather peacefully and completely nude.

"What's with all that nudity?" James muttered to himself. And at that moment he could fully inspect her with his eyes. He had no shame about it, he never considered looking at the opposite gender rude even if they're nude. After all, it should be considered a compliment because it is good if there's something that can be stared at without disgust.

So, he looked at the body of the mare. Her black fur covered everything, including the intimate areas. Her nipples had no fur, however, and were slightly lighter in shade than the fur. The mane and tail were still looking like a night sky, but they were moving on their own a little, almost unnoticeable. James also noticed a mark on the mare's flank — a crescent moon in a purple blot.

"Maybe that has something to do with what she's said earlier." James muttered quietly. "Maybe she isn't tolerant to the sun, it hurts her... Maybe that's why she didn't like my statement about the night.

"I think I would be staying awake during the night, but it's really cold outside at that time, not even taking in the fact that nothing can be seen without a flashlight or night-vision goggles. That is not the city with street lights, for sure...

"Wait, why did I come here in the first place?" he asked himself, scratching his chin. "Oh, right! I came to place her clothes somewhere."

James silently moved through the room and placed Nightmare Moon's clothes somewhere where she will be able to see them. Unbeknownst to the human, she was listening to him since he came into the room. She also watched him when he didn't look her way.

"Job's done!" he told himself. "Now, I need to get out of here before she wakes up..."

Slowly, he sneaked out of the room, stepping slowly and carefully. Thankfully, all floors of his house were covered by soft carpets, which muffled all footsteps. But it made no difference at that moment because Nightmare Moon was already awake.

"I thought he was nocturnal." she thought. "Perhaps I was wrong... But he had the signs! He was awake during the night, he hath pale skin! What is wrong with him?"

James was putting on his clothes to go outside. He was going to catch that hare he wanted to eat. He had some canned meat stored somewhere, of course, but nothing is better than fresh meat.

He picked up his rifle, then he felt that someone was behind him. He turned around and faced Nightmare Moon. She was dressed in her clothes this time.

"Where art thou going, James?" she asked in even voice.

"Good morning to you as well." the man grumbled in reply, loading the mag into the SVD. "I'm on for a hunt."

"I thought thou'rt a herbivore." Nightmare Moon raised her brow.

"I am an omnivore. I can eat practically anything, including meat." he replied, putting on his scarf.

"And what is that?" the mare pointed at the rifle. "Some kind of spear?"

"No, it's a rifle."

"And what, pray tell, is this "rifle"?"

"It will take some time to explain how it works." James shrugged. "I need to hunt, and that means I have no time right now."

"But I want the answer." Nightmare Moon scowled. "Now."

"You can demand all you want, I will give you answers only when I return." he frowned. "Until then." he nodded, then exited his house.

Finally, Nightmare Moon was sure she was all alone in the house. She decided to explore it a little before James comes back. She wasn't fine with him refusing to answer her, but she decided to wait.

First, she looked around at the first floor. The mare decided to go to the kitchen first and see what is stored in the cupboards. The first one contained some plates, spoons, knives, and forks. The second one had some cups and glasses, as well as cleaning supplies. The third one stored salt, sugar, pepper, some other spices as well, and a few magazines Nightmare Moon almost left unnoticed.

"Hmm, some sort of a newspaper?" she thought, taking one of them in her hands. "No, it... hm, why do James store'th images that seem to depict nude human females?" she chuckled. "Huh, I remember when I found an art of me in the guard's hall. Some talented artist had too much imagination, he drew me in nude, taking his another art as a base... I still remember how red his face was when I discovered that."

She decided to go through the magazine. It had some information about the depicted women, nothing of particular interest to Nightmare Moon. The mare put the magazine back where she found it, and closed the cupboard.

She decided to go to the dining room. However, she found nothing interesting there.

Finally, Nightmare Moon went upstairs to James's bedroom. She decided to look into the large wardrobe that occupied one of the walls. She opened the first section and saw an electric guitar, amplifier, a set of drums, and a synthesizer.

"What is that?" she thought, taking the synthesizer in her hands, looking at it from different sides. "Why doth he keep a keyboard instead of a whole piano, harpsichord or whatever else he might be playing?"

She noticed a cord coming out from one of the corners, and some buttons on the face of the synthesizer.

"Hm, what doth that big button labeled ON do?" she thought, then pushed the button. An electric click sounded, and some diodes started glowing, as well as the ON button.

Carefully and softly, Nightmare Moon pushed one of the keys. She elicited a nice sound of a piano.

"Wondorous!" she grinned. "A whole piano in this small rectangular device!"

She also noticed a few other buttons. Piano 1, Piano 2, Organ 1, Organ 2, Strings, and Harpsichord. She eagerly pushed the Organ button, and then pushed one of the keys. The accurate sound of organ sounded from the synthesizer.

"Excellent!" she said aloud, almost squee'ing in delight. "A whole orchestra in one small keyboard! The organ isn't accurate, as there is only one row of keys and no pedals, but that shall suffice, for I have never seen such a device with so many functions!"

She decided that she would definitely play the synthesizer later. She carefully put it back where she found it, and took an electric guitar in her hands.

"Why is its shape so strange?" the mare thought. She played a chord, eliciting rather low sounds from the guitar. Not really satisfied with the result, she put the guitar back, then closed the wardrobe.

Nightmare Moon walked to the table she's been sitting at recently. She noticed a big black rectangle, and something she thought was a very dark mirror. Both rectangular devices had ON buttons. In her curiosity, she pushed both.

The black rectangular started humming rather loudly. An image of INTEL appeared on the screen suddenly. The mare jumped in surprise, shielding her eyes from rather bright light coming from the screen.

A few seconds later the computer was ready, Windows 7 desktop appeared.

"What in Tartarus is this?" the mare asked loudly. Warily, she looked closer at the screen. The background was a misty forest, and there were about thirty different icons on the desktop, their titles were: My Computer, Trash, Steam, Skype, Witcher 3, Fallout 3, Fallout NW, Fallout 4, TES 5: Skyrim, Doom, and a lot of other games and software. The mouse cursor was visible in the center of the screen.

Warily, Nightmare Moon touched the screen. However, it didn't react to her touch. She tried to move the cursor, yet there was no reaction again. Accidentally, she brushed against the computer mouse with her elbow. The cursor moved, and she noticed that. Tentatively, she slightly grasped the mouse and moved it on the table. The cursor followed the same course as her hand.

"Some kind of magic I'm not aware of..." she muttered. She let go of the mouse. "No, I should wait until James comes back. Maybe he hath the knowledge of this strange machine."

James was silently moving through the dense and snowy forest. The weather was freezing, his scarf and eyelashes were rimed. He tightly held his SVD, his eyes were searching for prey. He was following a slightly visible trail of a hare. He was hoping he'll be able to catch it.

However, he didn't think about the hare. His thoughts were of Nightmare Moon. He was afraid she'd already done damage to his house or found something personal he wouldn't like anyone to find. But he didn't think about it as much as about the mare herself. Not even a day has passed since she appeared in his life, but he was already tired and even irritated and annoyed. He is unsure of how his life goes on now. He didn't know what will happen, he didn't know what place will Nightmare Moon take in his life. Overall, he was very confused. His usual flow of life turned somewhere he could have never expected.

Suddenly, he noticed a hare in the distance. His line of thoughts ended, replaced by cold calculations. He raised his rifle and aimed at the hare. It was perfectly still, seemingly in its own thoughts. James held his breath and pulled the trigger slowly. A loud shot of rifle sounded, echoing through the forest. The hare was killed instantly, being hit in the head by the 7.62x54 bullet.

"Finally, some fresh meat." he sighed, putting his rifle behind his back. He will think of his life later.

Nightmare Moon's ears perked up as she heard a muffled sound of a rifle shot. She raced to the nearest window to see what is going on outside. However, all she could see were traces of James, they went deeper into the forest.

She had been watching the trail for about half an hour before James came back. He had a bloodied body of a hare in his right hand.

***

James sighed as he closed the door behind him, cutting the cold out, not letting it go further into his house. He was half-expecting Nightmare Moon to actually greet him at least in some way. Instead, she just stared at the dead animal in his hands.

James carried it to the kitchen where he placed it on the table.

"Hey," he spoke, gaining attention of the mare. "I'm going to skin it, and then separate the meat from the rest of the body. It isn't the most pleasant sight to see."

"Eck!" she gagged. "Ugh, I better be off somewhere away from this!"

"Alright, then."

***

After James did everything with the hare and cleaned the blood from the table and his hands, he put the meat to fry. He was going to enjoy the taste of fresh meat.

Nightmare Moon had gone upstairs a while before the cooking began, so James decided to go see what she was doing there. When he entered the room, he saw that his wardrobe was slightly opened, his computer was running.

"Well, it seems you didn't waste your time here by not touching anything without my permission." he scolded her, then sighed. "Fine..." he walked to the computer and turned it off, and then went to the wardrobe and looked inside. Everything he remembered seeing there before was there. "You should ask permission before you touch anything that is mine. You wouldn't like your stuff being touched, would you?"

"Thou art scolding me like a mother scolds her foal." Nightmare Moon huffed.

"Not my fault, you're acting like one." James snorted. "Why are you so demanding? Listen, you can always ask nicely, and it is likely that I'll fulfill such request. We're civilized people, right?"

"I still don't trust thee." the mare replied. "Thou hast many devices I have never seen before, thou act'st strange, thou look'st strange! How can I trust thee?"

"You don't have to trust me." James rolled his eyes irritably. "But I never even once raised my hand to hit you, even after you hit me with that plate. You act like you must be treated like some world empress. I don't know why you do that, but please, stop! Do you understand that you make the situation worse for both of us? I'm still trying to figure out what must be done so that I won't go insane from everything that happens around me! I just want us to be, I dunno, some kind of friends, but not enemies!

"Sure, you can continue acting like you do. Maybe you have a reason for this, maybe it's something else. I just..." he sighed. "I don't know what to do with you. You,re an alien! Well..." he sighed again. "Nevermind, I don't think you're even listening to me." with that being said, he went downstairs. Nightmare Moon stared at him as he went. She was never told any of those things before.

A few hours later.

James and Nightmare Moon haven't spoken to each other since he spoke to her last. After that, he tried his best to pretend that everything is normal and that the mare isn't there at all.

Under the stare of the mare, he has eaten the hare, then cleaned his rifle thoroughly, then put it into a case. But the man wasn't in the best of moods at that moment, refusing to talk to Nightmare Moon. She called him a few times, but decided that it would be best to let him be because he was obviously very close to getting angry at her. For some weird reason, she didn't want that.

Nightmare Moon was thinking of everything that happened recently. She sat on a comfortable armchair in the dining room, watching the scenery through the window. She remembered her life when she was Luna. She remembered how hard she tried to be nice to everyone, but most just wanted her for the power she held, and others feared her for her connection to the night. Of course, Nightmare Moon wasn't completely Luna, nor will she ever be, but she is a part of the lunar princess, at least in some sense.

She remembered the day of her last defeat clearly. When the beam of the Elements hit her, she felt like she was ripped away from Luna, and transformed into another living being with memories of Celestia's sister but with the attitude and appearance of Nightmare Moon. She knew she had no way back to Equestria, and she didn't really want that. But the desire inside her grew. The same desire Luna had when the resentment and bitterness were poisoning her loving and caring heart.

Desire to be loved.

So, Nightmare Moon came to a realization that something must be changed. And when you want to change something, look at yourself. Maybe it is you who needs change.

And she knew it.

Author's Note

Some would say that it is too early for the two to develop romance. Don't you worry, there's plenty of story ahead!