Santa Rosa

Chapters

It began with a bang...
Reformation for Two
The Soldier's Arrival
Vikander, the Dead King

It began with a bang...

With one little breath, the fire went out.

He looked at the extinguished candle and sighed. All around him many candles, both new and almost out of wax, burned brightly in the little grotto where he sat.

He spied a simple ceramic vase that had fallen to its side. The vase had been blown over by an errant gust of wind, in a spot that wasn’t very safe for the vase on its own. In the vase two roses were slowly dying, the water having left the vase when it had tipped over. He walked to the vase and grabbed it at the top, making sure the flowers stayed inside.

He walked out of the grotto into the path that led outside. The air was cold, as a light breeze brushed the dead grass and the barren trees that stood upright along the sides of the path. He looked to the right to see a little spigot that dripped every second, and walked off the path towards it, pulling the vase close to his chest. It quietly clanged against the dog chain like collar around his neck.

He pulled the lever of the spigot up, causing water to gush down in a torrent, splashing his naked and sprained feet. With a snarl of pain, he pushed the lever down a small bit, and the water fell at a much more manageable pace. Nodding his head in satisfaction, he held the vase in his hand as he moved the opening under the water, letting the vase fill up before he pushed the lever fully down to stop the spigot.

He walked back towards the grotto. His feet still dripped with very cold water, and he wanted to get the whole thing done quickly so he could get inside his house to wrap them before the winter bite sets in. So, when he set the vase down, he set it down in a different area than where it was before, and pushed it firmly against the ground, as the soil itself was somewhat frozen. He shifted the flowers a bit before nodding his head again, and stood back up.

With nothing else seemingly out of place except himself, he walked out of the grotto and went on the path again, going past the spigot and following the path down to the collision of metal, brick, and plastic that stood up tall and sporadically at the end of the path.

“Angel! Hey, Angel!” he heard someone cry his name. He turned to the source of the voice before seeing a man with long hair like a woman but very frizzy, with tan skin and wearing jeans and, despite the weather, only a white t-shirt. He didn’t wear shoes either, just like he did. He approached him with a basket of bread and started talking, but Angel’s eyes stared at the basket.

“Angel, oye! What have you been doing, my friend?” the man asked.

“I was helping to clean up the grotto a little bit. Some candles were out of wax and had only the fuse burning, so I blew them out, then I refilled a vase of roses someone left in there,” Angel explained.

“The grotto? That’s nice of you to do, but, why all the candles today?” the man asked.

“I don’t know, at least this time around. It was a woman and her baby daughter, police found them dead in a ditch near Alexei’s shop.”

“Ah, another memorial then?” the man inquired. “Was the girl?...”

“She wasn’t someone you and I know, but she was married; word around is that she was a recent refugee from El Salvador.”

“A Salvadorian? You don’t think her husband is that new officer in the local police, huh?”

“Uh, no. She might have been a widow, actually, because no one else came up as someone of her family or even as friends. She apparently had been a shut-in at her apartment. Alicia might have known her, we could ask her more about… Sujer?” Angel grew uncomfortable with how the man looked at his stomach.

“When was the last time you ate?” Sujer asked.

Angel finally stopped staring, and altogether looked away. “One, or, uh, two days…”

Sujer gasped. “Three days! Uh uh, mister, you’re coming home with me tonight. Alicia will cook and you will eat!”

“Ah, but I don’t like having to be a burden on you two. It’s an old habit from the Muertos Reyes days, I promise I’ll find something later!...”

“Your monthly allowance is more than this country’s economy, and yet you don’t eat anything unless we have to force you, now you’re coming with me. Right. Now!” Sujer glared at Angel, who cringed at his tone and his eyes. Sighing, Angel nodded, and Sujer walked away while waiting for him to follow.

After walking a few steps, he turned around while holding one half of a full loaf of bread. “Here. Take and sate yourself with this,” he ordered.

Angel looked at him in confusion. “Sate?”

“I mean that you eat this to help yourself a little bit until we get home,” he explained.

Angel looked at the bread with some slight curiosity before snatching it away from him.

“And don’t eat too fast! You remember what happened last time? I had to clean up your fucking mess in the market, and you embarrassed us in front of the lady near the bank, and not to mention that…”

“So, how have your days been?” a woman with blonde hair, a lighter skin tone, and blue overalls walked from the kitchen to the room where Angel and Sujer were sitting. She carried a large pheasant roast in one hand while a small plate of a simple salad rested on the other. With one smooth glide, she slid both items onto the table, with the pheasant landing in the middle and the plate landing near Sujer.

“They were well, Alicia. I helped to clean up the grotto a little bit today,” Angel answered.

“Oh, Angel,” Sujer piped up, “I wanted to tell you something today, about what I saw with the Capital soldiers lurking around one of the old gardening warehouses, but I got sidetracked by the talk about the murders.”

“Ah, yes, a very tragic event, that one. Although, I am intrigued. Why would someone want to murder a woman who stayed in her house all day with her baby?” she asked.

“It’s over my head. Best I can come up with is that her husband murdered her and left the country, leaving us to deal with his mess,” Angel replied. “Back in Equestria, there’s all sorts of magic they could use to track him, but here we don’t have anything on him, or even who he was, since no one has ever seen a man walking inside the apartment.”

“Oh right, Equestria. Truly a place of wonder, ain’t it?...” Alicia said in a mocking tone.

Angel laughed briefly. “I told you, I’d love to show you the land, but this asshole here,” he pointed to Sujer in the middle of biting a particularly big leaf from his salad, “gave the princess a reason, exactly this,” he flicked the chain on his neck, “not to bring any more people in the castle until she says she’s ready for another human.”

“Right, a big white horse princess with magic powers and wings ruling over a land of talking small horses that can use magic and fly sounds like a perfectly reasonable acid trip. I thought you had said you were out of the drug selling business, hmm?”

At the last sentence, the small grin ever present on Angel’s face faded, and he turned his head with a small frown towards the window, giving the outside world a thousand yard stare.

“Angel? Oh, don’t be like that. You know I didn’t mean anything from that.”

Angel turned back to her with an angry stare. “I’ve shown you the golden bits, Alicia, and even Sujer believes me whole-heartedly, even telling you why we can’t get the chain out. You’re bordering on cognitive dissonance about Equestria, like you just have to deny everything even though it’s all in front of you. What the hell is wrong with you?”

“‘Cognitive dissonance’, eh? Big words from a bloke like you,” Alicia seethed. “What’s wrong with me? Oh I’ll tell you what’s wron’!” She glared angrily right back at Angel. “For two weeks ah’ve got two tenants to this apartment along with me, they’ve been toget’er even though they tell me they only met each other only a week before I met ’em, they look like they’s from the gutters, yet one of ‘em has the cash to literally buy this damn coun’ry and won’ tell me a single drop of his past other ‘an that ‘e ran with the most ruthless and brutal cartel this coun’ry’s ever known, and that he apparently can go ta some random bloody place he call Equestria, where everyone’s a goddamn pony and ‘ey solve their problems with rainbow fucking magic. And yet, some ’ow, this arsehole keeps telling me about it like he’s gettin’ the same acid trip or whatev’r the ‘ell kind of drug he’s been takin’ even though ‘e looks completely fucking clean, and on top of it all, ‘e just expects me to accep’ tat ‘atever ‘e wen’ through durin’ ‘is time in tha Dead Kings made ‘im completely lose his fockin’ mind!”

Angel and Alicia glared at each other, daring themselves to try something. Sujer only stared at Alicia with a confused look. “Wow. Your accent really comes through whenever you get angry.”

Both of them looked horrified at Sujer’s comment, before Angel shook his head and sighed loudly.

“Sujer, shut the fuck up. Alicia,” Angel looked back at her with a neutral expression, “Tomorrow I’ll take you, no matter if the princess says no.”

“I don’t take drugs anymo’, Angel. Remember what I told you aboot why I came ‘ere?”

“You wanted to get away from London, yes, but I promise you, it won’t involve anything of the sort. Just… just trust me, Alicia. I’m not crazy, I guarantee you that.”

“…Fine. Let’s ‘ave a tea party ’en with your princess.”

Angel gasped. “Shit, the tea! Sorry, but I have to go!”

He started to run out to the front door when he heard his name. “Angel, wait! What about the warehouses?”

“Tell me later!” Angel yelled back as he ran outside into the night.

“I do have to say, Angel. Alicia sounds like a mare, er, woman that I would trust with others’ secrets, but never my own,” Princess Celestia chuckled.

In the Royal Castle of Canterlot, the Princess was currently drinking tea with a colt that was just shy of being a full grown stallion. His mane was black, short, and frazzled. His coat was a dark beige, like of a wooden sculpture or furniture being given its first coat of paint before it dried. His eyes, contrary to the rest of his body, blazed a brilliant blue. In his left ear, there was an entire piece of the ear missing, and one would wonder if it was due to an animal attack.

On his neck, a collar usually seen on wary dogs was hanging right at the top of his neck, held in place at the base of his skull by some special nail that had caused scar damage around where it was pushed into his skin.

“What do you mean? She’s stubborn enough to not even believe me even when I showed those Equestrian bits you give to me every fucking month!” Angel exasperated.

“Language, Angel. If you were to tell anypony that you knew of a world beyond their wildest dreams where technology is so advanced and yet it is a violent world full of guilty beings, I doubt you will be believed. I both like and dislike her, because she can be stubborn. She stays to herself when pressured, but sometimes she is too strong-willed and thus doesn’t listen to reason.” Celestia explained. “A habit that all of us at some time fall into, I’m afraid. It will be an interesting night when I meet her.”

“Wait, you mean...?”

“Well, if she is going to give you trouble about your past simply because she doesn’t believe in your ability to Transport, then perhaps I shall lift my ban on visiting humans if only so she can see.”

Angel looked incredulous before he hugged Celestia with a big smile. “Thank you. I promise she won’t be as much trouble as Sujer was.”

Sujer, while he was spying the aforementioned building and seeing a couple soldiers with batons entering the warehouse, felt his ears warm up.

“Yeah, fuck you too Angel,” he muttered under his breath.

“I do hope so, Angel. Ever since you controlled your Transport as a colt, I’ve always held a bed for you here in the castle, and it broke my heart when you simply didn’t come back all those years ago. I understand you do not wish to remember those years the same as I do, and if Alicia is going to, as Sujer would say, “act like a bitch”, then I suppose I have some words for her for talking to my, well, to whom I consider a son.”

“Celly...” Angel whined. “Please don’t scare her off. She is the one that holds the deed to our apartment, even though I’m paying all of the rent for us.”

Celestia chuckled. “Well, if you get kicked out, you know you could always return here. Like I said, you have a special bed here in the castle, and I’m sure a brief meeting with the guards will help them understand you’re a resident.”

Angel shook his head. “I’m a human, Celestia. Even though the last few years were hell, I have to learn how to live on Earth…” he scratched his head. “And I have way too much shit to atone for,” he muttered.

“Again, language. And why do you wish to stay in Las Rosas?” The princess wasn’t worried for Angel living in that violent town. She knew he could defend himself, especially that first day when he came back, saving that mare from some of her own guard that were acting out of conduct. Using their authority they brought in other guards to arrest him and give him the death penalty to get rid of him quickly, but as soon as she heard about the defendant’s cutie mark of a weird red lotus, she had to go see them immediately.

Celestia always hoped in her mind that Angel would come back to Equestria one day, and there he was, a bit bruised, but not as injured as the other guards that were in the prosecution, who looked like they needed their own medical leave that was as long as what war time guards used to have. As soon as he saw her, he smiled, and Celestia knew it was him by that smile.

No pony ever smiled like he did. It was smile that could only be found on someone that knew true pain and suffering, and yet had the audacity to laugh at it.

She had noted that the smile seemed more authentic that day, and she would realize it was because of the last few years, where Angel, back on Earth, had become in his own words, “a selfish monster whose only food was pain and innocent blood.” He always had a flair for the dramatic, Celestia told herself, but those words were still etched into her mind months later, where she and he were having some tea before she went to Ponyville to start the Summer Sun Celebration.

And also lure her there, but right now she didn’t want to think about that plan yet.

“…I would also like to say that, for me, it would be my friends. For Sujer and Alicia, it would be because they want me to stay near them, particularly because I’m paying rent, but also of other things too.” Drat, she zoned out of what Angel was saying about her question. Well, maybe she’ll ask later, when she wants others to know. “But, to be honest, I’m not really sure. The town is named Las Rosas for a reason, princess. All that holds up the beauty of the petal is the stem, covered in sharp thorns. But everyone in that town is still looking to find their petals, their purpose for suffering the thorns in order to have the flower…”

“And what is your reason for suffering the thorns?” the Princess asked. She inwardly chuckled at his dramatization of his life. She taught him a little too well in fine arts all those years ago, it seemed.

“I cannot answer that with an answer that I will consider true to my heart. I do not know what my purpose is, Celestia, even after all these years, and I am scared of that fact…”

The Princess smiled. “You are not the only one who feels they do not have a direction in their life. Believe me, there are many in my realm who feel lost, even in their own home, and I wouldn’t doubt that there are many lost in your world. You are still young in your lifetime, colt. 19 years, yes? And with your birthday coming up you’ll be 20 too… Regardless,” she put down her teacup, “Let’s talk about happier things. How is Sujer, by the way?”

“Sujer is fine, he’s still up to his usual tricks. I think he wants to raid a warehouse of gardening supplies, see if there’s anything useful to take and pawn off. Or at least find out what some Capital soldiers are hiding in there, from what he told me he had seen.”

“I trust that you will not accompany him this time?” Celestia asked as she levitated another cup of tea up to her lips.

“Huh? Oh yeah, yeah, I won’t, don’t worry,” Angel brushed off the question, and against her better judgment, Celestia decided to drop the subject. She believed anything involving Sujer was always going to end in pain. And a loss of wealth.

“Well, it is late enough as is. I suppose Alicia will want you to sleep in their house for the night. Unless, of course, you wish to stay here in the castle, Angel. Remember, I have that bed ready for you, in that room you used to stay in…”

“While I do appreciate the times I’ve slept with you, Celestia, I still have a couple things to do back home before I sleep,” Angel nodded with a smile. Celestia mentally slipped at the first half of Angel’s sentence before reassuring herself that it was probably a quirk of Angel taking from Sujer’s way of speaking Equiish, or as they call it, English. That, or their language didn’t recognize double entendres as her own language did.

Suddenly, a loud bang echoed throughout the room. Celestia and Angel looked to see a mare almost as tall as the princess appear in the doorway and march up to them. The mare was black as the night and her dark blue mane was ethereal as it fluttered in a non-existent wind. She wore lighter blue armor that stood more to entice fear than to act as actual protection.

Celestia opened her eyes and gasped.

“Well now, sister, it has been too long since we’ve last met, has it not?” the mare asked before she cackled into a long laugh, pronounced with thunder from unseen lightning.

“Princess, get back!” Celestia finally shook herself out of the shock of seeing her sister and looked to see Angel, whom had ripped a leg off a wooden chair and waving it around as a club, ready to fight this new menace.

“Angel, wait! That is…” she hesitated, “…Nightmare Moon. She is a foe that I battled about one thousand years ago. She is my sister, and please, Luna, you must snap out of this madness!”

“Luna? She is no more, dear sister. Nightmare Moon has seen to her demise, and soon she will see to your defeat as well!”

“I don’t know what you’re seeing. All I’m seeing is a walking corpse with anger issues,” Angel twirled the makeshift club around his hoof, thanking his luck that he had 15 years to practice using his hooves.

“Anger issues? Why, you would dare to have that attitude towards me, colt?” The mare marched up to Angel, a snarl on her lips.

“Of course I will. You’re the one I’m going to drag back to their grave anyway, so why bother being scared,” Angel spat.

“Why you little...!” Nightmare Moon shot a blue pulse of magic directly at Angel. On instinct, the human-turned-colt lifted up his club to defend himself when he was violently pulled away by some golden force. He soon found himself almost muzzle-to-muzzle with Celestia.

“Angel, this is not your fight. I have a plan for this, but I wasn’t expecting to act so soon. Do not worry about me or Equestria though. Transport and come back tomorrow evening. Everything will be fine then.”

“But, Celestia!...”

“No ‘buts’, my little colt. I do not want you to get hurt again. Just… please…” Celestia blinked, and Angel swore he saw a tear on her left eye, “Trust me for this.”

“…Fine, but call your guards to help you with this battle, seeing as strangely none of them are here.”

“Oh, they were easy. A little nap on the job never bothered anypony, has it? Then again, they are also having their worst nightmares, so I suppose it can hurt!” Nightmare Moon laughed. The two ponies gawped at the dark mare marching up to them, her horn blazing in a blue aura as she charged another attack. “Is this colt important to you, Princess? If not, then I suppose you would not mind if I did this!”

She lowered her head as she fired off another magical blast at the colt, Celestia too surprised at the sudden attack to pull him out of the way.

With only a split-second to react, Angel closed his eyes, and felt the air change around him as the magical charge came closer…

Author's Note

After a substantial re-write, the HiE fic I've been planning for two months is finally here!

Now to substantially re-write all the other chapters I had been working on sporadically...

In any case, I hope you guys like this one!

Reformation for Two

Angel woke up with a jolt and a fear he hadn’t felt in ages.

“Princess!” he yelled into the dark room. His eyes quickly scanned around. The room was darkened, the only lights coming from a few small windows at the top of the wall opposite him, and a thin sliver of light coming from a door near the windows.

Angel sighed. This was the room he had designed in his mind to always be his backup room in case he needed to Transport out of Equestria back into Las Rosas. It was in a basement that was hidden away in a backstreet alley. No one ever came through here.

Equestria!

Angel quickly worked out a plan in his mind. He would grab Sujer and Transport with him back to Equestria. He knew both of them were good fighters on their own, they should be able to beat…whatever it was that attacked the castle.

He quickly ran towards the door, but stopped before he reached the handle. The Princess’s words echoed in his mind.

“I have a plan for this… Do not worry about me or Equestria…Transport and come back tomorrow evening…”

Mierda, I can’t just leave her there!... Angel sighed as he opened the door to step outside. I’m sorry princess, but I will not wait. I’m going to bring everyone…

After about an hour of walking down decrepit brick streets that were not paved for the cars that drove through them, he found himself entering the open market area of the town.

Sujer is probably at his house, I can find him and tell him about what’s happened…

He took a couple steps before he looked up at the bright blue sky for the first time since he Transported.

What? Morning? But it was only early evening when the castle was attacked! Time is the same here and there, this is not possible…

Engaged in his own thoughts, Angel did not see the incoming car until mere seconds before it would hit him. Diving out of the way, the driver yelled obscenities at Angel as he scooped himself up from the dusty ground, and walked quickly back onto the sidewalk.

Bah! I’m getting distracted… I need to find Sujer, and quickly.

It was easier said than done.

Angel looked around to find he wandered right into the heart of the market district, where vendors, through the not quite chilling cold, were yelling and screaming to get their wares sold.

“Naranjas! Naranjas aqui!”

“Carne, carne, asada y lomitos…”

“Zapatos! Zapatos de Francia! Zapatos de Italia!”

“Perfume aquí! Vendo perfume aquí!”

“Th’patos de Milan! Th’patos de Paris!”

“Gafas! Relojes! Gafas y relojes!”

“Tarjetas. Tarjetas para el partido…”

A block away from Angel, the vendors were selling different wares.

“Japon! Nihon! Fudo!”

“Kovriki! Kovriki!”

“Diamante! Diamante hier!”

“Lahm! Lahm!”

“Ah, Angel!” a voice cried out from the cacophony. “Can you help me to bring drinks out of truck in back?”

Angel turned to the Russian that was calling out from before. “Alexei? What drinks?” He entered the shop where he heard his name.

Alexei was a Russian that fit most of the bill of what most Las Rosas inhabitants would think Russians would be: happy but stout, bald and scarred, and always looking for a reason to get drunk. Preferably on Russian made alcohol.

Scattered around inside the shop were rugs, blown glass, and painted vases. Blue paint tape was stuck on each individual item with a price on top of the tape. The cashier’s counter was simple and wooden, but the light scratches and dents on the sides of the table suggested that the owner of the shop had met some less than pleasant company before.

Most of the dents were on the customer’s side.

“Just some of the imports my brother has finally been able to get me. Is a new drink that has my country tripping over itself just to have a sip. You want some later?” Alexei asked.

“Thank you, but I do not drink anymore, Alexei. Eh, do you know of where Sujer has gone?” Angel came back and forth with the aforementioned imports, already feeling a mite queasy from just the stench of one bottle that was shattered during its shipping.

“Sujer? Well if he isn’t selling his movies, than he is probably at that bank down the street. It is the start of sum- er, winter here, yes?”

Angel mentally facepalmed. Of course it’s the start of winter. He told me he would go and take everything out of the bank when the cold weather starts coming in.

Angel noted that the Summer Sun Celebration back in Equestria was an invert of seasons to the town while he ran out of the shop, leaving a bewildered Alexei behind.

“Eh? What’s gotten into the kid? And why is he looking for that dumb Sujer?”

“Look. I don’t care if you need to raise the price, I saw it as 15 pesos and I want it as 15 pesos!”

Right outside the bank, Angel stopped to see a spectacle happen between one woman street vendor and a casually dressed white man arguing over an item that Angel couldn’t see.

“But, señor, it never have that price! Always it, eh, have 30-“

“I know that it’s worth only 5 pesos, so I’m being reasonable with 15. I have contacts, you know…”

Huh. An American tourist? But then where is?...

“Hey, Americano. What do ya think you’re doing?” Seemingly out of nowhere, a man appeared right behind the tourist. He was only slightly taller than Angel, with hair that was longer than most women and greasier than a fast food sandwich.

“Eh, who the hell are you?” the tourist asked as he turned around to meet the new man out of nowhere.

Some of the onlookers started to chuckle in anticipation of what was about to happen.

“Me? Oh, I’m just the guy that’s behind you. Nothing more, nothing less,” Sujer said.

The tourist snorted. “Look bud, I don’t know who you are, but you better step away. I have contacts, and I don’t wanna…”

“Everyone has contacts, American. I have a friend who can call upon another government’s leaders on a whim, that security guard in front of the bank has a friend who’s in the Capitol, and the woman you’re technically robbing has a son who is a sergeant in the Capitol’s army,” the man leaned in, “Here in Las Rosas, everyone knows everyone. All of us are here because we never liked the people in our countries trying to act like they own the world. So watch your mouth, tourist. What is it your people say? ‘We don’t take kindly to your kind around here.’”

The tourist glared at him for a full minute, the air growing relatively silent as the crowd that had gathered watched in anticipation of what either person was going to do.

They gasped as the tourist suddenly lurched forward and sent a fist into Sujer’s stomach, making him yelp in pain as his body crumpled over.

“Listen here, you filthy South American trash. When I say I have contacts, I mean I have contacts that go far beyond your measly friends in semi-high places, especially in the Capitol,” the tourist leaned in close to the man’s ear, “So why don’t you do yourself a little favor, and stay out of my way. Oh, and I’ll be taking this as compensation for the troubles you caused me today.” He lifted a wrapped object that was seemingly a vase, but Angel and the tourist knew better.

The tourist turned to the vendor. “I’ll make sure to tell my friends about the wonderful prices this stall has, then. Wonderful, aren’t they?” Lifting his fist out from under the man, the tourist walked away to a corner right nearby the bank that led to a back alley. A few minutes later, screeching tires pierced the air as a car more built for speed than for regular driving sped out and away from the corner.

The vendor rushed over to the man, who was now on one knee trying to support his injury to the chest. “Estás bien, Sujer?”

“Ah, it was just the diaphragm he hit. I could survive a bruise to that, I think. By the way…”

Sujer outstretched his right hand, holding a plain brown wallet, American dollars poking out the top.

“I believe this is yours now.”

Dark chuckling resonated as the crowd dispersed, with some saying “crazy bastard” in various dialects and languages. The vendor grabbed the wallet and gave her thanks to Sujer, before putting a sign in front of her stall and walked towards the bank. She nodded in recognition to the guard, who smiled when he saw the wallet, being witness to the entire scene only minutes before.

“Hijo de puta! One of these days, they’re going to carry a gun and then what will you do!?” Angel ran up to Sujer, who was rubbing his chest as he rose up from his injured position.

“Bah! I’ll just take the gun from them…” Sujer wobbled in sync to Angel’s steps as they walked away from the bank corner, moving farther away from the market district. “Oh, and I was almost caught last night by the Capitol soldiers near that warehouse. I did find out though that they’re holding some human prisoners inside.”

“What? You stupid little… Ugh, now’s not the time. We have problems,” Angel stepped in front of Sujer, stopping them both.

“As usual,” Sujer replied.

“Something attacked the castle last night. I Transported out as the princess asked me to, and now it’s suddenly morning!”

“It’s the afternoon, Angel. And what do you mean by castle? What princess asked you to…” Sujer stopped talking and blinked, “Celestia! She’s in trouble!?”

“Yes! No! I don’t know!” Angel paced in front of Sujer. “She told me before I Transported to just come back tonight, and that she had some sort of plan. I’m just…really worried about her…”

By then, Sujer had stopped holding his chest, and he held a hand to his chin in contemplative thought. “What was your plan when you got to me?” he asked.

“Uh, I was going to grab you, and maybe Alicia. We’d go back and try to stop whatever is attacking the castle…”

“And save the day, just like in the fantasy books and movies. Angel, do you think we’d be able to take on something that Celestia had to plan for however long to defeat it?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean I don’t think us three will be able to beat whatever it was that attacked the castle. I’m not sure how Alicia can hold herself up, and besides, you know we all are just Earth ponies when we go through, right?” Sujer leaned on a nearby wall on the sidewalk. “If Celestia says she has a plan, then we can trust that her plan will succeed. I mean, you saw how she managed to wrangle that peace treaty in the summit with the Northern Griffons a week ago, right?”

Angel deadpanned at Sujer. “Yeah, and also at that summit you showed the griffons what guns were and how they worked, and now their war machine is trying to produce those sorts of guns. With success.”

“With limited success, remember, but that’s not the point. I think we can trust that Celestia has a good plan for whatever happened. Tell you what,” Sujer laid a hand on Angel’s left shoulder and smiled, “Why don’t we go right now and visit? Maybe whatever it was that attacked was already dealt with during the night.”

“But…she said to come in the next night…”

“Oh what’s a couple hours difference going to make? C’mon, it’s been some time since I’ve been in Equestria, and I’m real hungry for those snack cakes that Celestia’s kitchen has.”

“With good reason it’s been some time,” Angel shook off Sujer’s hand. “You know she still doesn’t forgive you for this.”

Angel flicked the dog chain collar on his neck, feeling the nail that was stuck in his neck.

“Ugh, doesn’t she get how that was an accident?! It was that mare’s fault!”

Angel crossed his arms. “That’s two reasons that conflict with each other, Sujer.”

“Ahhh, let’s just go. If she incinerates me on the spot at least I did something good today.”

“You pickpocketed someone when he clearly has access to people and resources that can wipe you out and wipe out everyone you know and love.”

“But I don’t love anyone though….”

“I mean like friends you idiot! We could be in danger as well if that tourist finds out what you did to him!”

“Sooooooo… That means we should be gone before he comes back, then?”

Angel gaped at Sujer, and tried to form words, but any argument he could come up with died before he could say it.

“Fine. But at your funeral, I’m not tossing a coin into your grave!” Angel grabbed Sujer’s arm and dragged him around to another corner and into a back alley.

“Hey hey, watch it! Injured guy here!…”

Angel stopped and glared at Sujer.

“Uh, I’m all healed up and ready to go when you are?...”

With a nod, Angel held Sujer’s arm. As quick as light, the two young men simply blinked out of existence.

“Ah, this is more like it,” Sujer said as he breathed in heavily. Sujer, in a pony form, looked almost the same as he did a human, his same long and greasy hair glossing down over quite a bit of his back. It was a wonder how it didn’t simply fall to the floor. His fur color was the same as his tan skin color. Angel and Sujer were almost complete carbon copies of each other, if it wasn’t for Angel’s collar and Sujer’s hair.

“Well, there’s no fires, and I don’t hear screaming. Whatever attacked the castle is now either defeated or simply moved someplace else,” Angel reasoned out loud.

The room that the duo were in was an area that Angel had imprinted into his mind whenever he transported casually into Equestria. It was a spacious and round room, with a dome ceiling; perfect in case he needed to Transport while in midair from being thrown across the room.

Angel learned the hard way that whenever he transported, Newton’s laws still applied to his motion when he blinked into existence in the castle.

“Mister Angel! Mister Sujer! Welcome back!” A guard stationed in front of the only door in the room greeted the two human-turned-ponies with a smile that put both of them on guard.

“Uh, hello, sir…”

“Spear Head! Private Spear Head sir! I was stationed here so as to wait for your return, Mister Angel! We have some very important news for you, but the Princess wishes you to first visit her in her apartments. Please follow me, sir, and Mister Sujer may come along as well!” The happy and smiling guard turned around and marched out the door, leaving no room for questions inside the dome room.

Outside, in the hallway, a section of the wall slid open to reveal a guard and two similarly colored earth ponies, who only trotted a few steps before the wall slid back into place, as if it had never moved at all. Meanwhile, the guard was trotting at a brisk pace, perhaps too fast of a pace, as the two humans had trouble keeping up.

“What’s up with this guard going so, huff, fast? And why is he smiling all the time? And how does he know us?” Sujer asked.

“It must be super important for Celestia to see me, I guess. As for his smiling, I am not sure, but I have a guess.”

“What do you guess?”

“I recognize him as the pony that guarded the chamber Celestia and I were in last night. He might be thinking that I have something against him, and is trying to be all cheery about it.”

“Cheery? Is that even a word?”

“Blah, Equiis is a lot like English. I think sometimes I confuse between the two, and end up saying the wrong things. But you know what I mean, yes?”

“Uh…yeah, but how does he know me? I’m pretty sure I never seen ‘im in my life.”

“Celestia must have known I would try to panic and get everyone else with me.”

“Oh yes, she expected Alisa-”

“Alicia.”

“-to be with you two as well. No matter anyway though, all we need is, heh heh, getting you two to meet the princesses!” the guard interrupted the two humans in their now mid-run conversation.

“Wait, princesses? And why are we going so fa-ahhhhh-AST!”

Before they knew it, the guard dived out of the way, letting the two humans fail to stop themselves and bust through the wooden ivory door that led into Celestia’s bedroom. Tumbling over each other, the duo landed with Angel on top of Sujer as stars revolved around their heads.

Angel was the first to start recovering his senses, and faintly saw a dark shape loom over him.

“Sister? Is he the Angel you were speaking about? And his friend as well, whom you refer to as the ‘Annoying one’?”

When Angel’s sight finally focused, he saw a creature that mostly resembled the creature that attacked last night. Thinking it was the same creature but now weaker, he gritted his teeth and thought of the closest thing that was hard and sturdy.

Unfortunately, this was Sujer’s head.

With a mighty yell, he grabbed the ears of his friend and pulled them up, using the top of Sujer’s head and ramming it into the lower jaw of the creature, making it yelp and stumble back in pain.

“ENOUGH!” a loud and booming voice echoed throughout the room, leaving ringing in the ears of any who were in the vicinity of the voice. Both the creature and Angel covered their ears in pain while Sujer simply passed out from all the trauma he suffered in under a minute.

“Angel. Welcome back…” Angel looked up to see his friend, Princess Celestia, walk up to him with a disappointed frown, before turning back to the creature and nuzzle it in affection, to his horror and surprise.

“Are you okay, Luna? I should have known the guard would have been scared of anything about you, and try to get away from his duties as soon as possible. I didn’t mean for this to happen.”

Angel laid on top of an unconscious Sujer, who was starting to bruise on the top of his head. He was shocked that his princess was talking in a loving manner with the same creature that had attacked them last night.

“Angel…This is Princess Luna. I have taught you the tale of Nightmare Moon, yes?” Celestia asked.

“Uhm, uh… yes, but… Princess, get away from that thing!” Angel gestured away from the two. He was legitimately more scared of the Sun Princess’s well-being than of the Princess of the night herself.

This is good. He might be able to forgive her and accept her faster than the others, the Princess thought.

“Yo tengo una vaca lecheeeeeeera…” Sujer mumbled as he slowly woke up. Feeling a slight edge of pain on his head, he moved his arms quickly to cover his head. “Ow. What happened…”

Unfortunately, he moved his hooves too quickly, and his left hoof missed the top of his head. He hit his jaw instead, and with the hoof of an earth pony and accuracy of a half-awake being, Sujer fell back down.

He was unconscious again.

“Sister, hath that pony harmed himself enough to render hisself asleep?” the creature known as Luna asked.

“Yes, Luna, he did. And it is not the first time either…” Celestia sighed before turning to Angel, who had leapt away from Sujer before he flailed his arms to hit himself. He kept a distance from the creature, the Princess’s behavior being the only thing stopping him from fully unleashing himself on the creature.

He didn’t know how powerful Luna was, nor her past. He didn’t care at the moment.

Deciding to focus on one migraine before going on to the headache, Celestia stepped forward. “Angel, that legend of Nightmare Moon was, as you saw last night, true. And the history of the legend is also true. I had a sister 1000 years ago, before my failures as a sibling turned her to darkness. But, she has returned, and I assure you, she is now reformed.”

“Reformed? I doubt that princess…” Angel snarled. He bent down low, ready to pounce at a moment’s notice.

“Angel,” Luna suddenly spoke, freezing the collared pony-human in place. Angel glared at her, but flicked his ears forward, eager to hear what vile insults and lies the creature would spew.

For most, the words would hurt, but Angel would only call it another tough but regular day.

“We art sorry for our actions,” Luna said. This made Angel completely freeze, his expression locked in a confused stare. He expected horrible words, not words of sorrow.

Most never asked for his forgiveness.

“We know our actions have caused harm to thee, and we know the night before had left thee in a fitful state for my sister’s health, as we understand you and her share a special friendship,” Luna went on. “But, we…I am not the creature that hath attacked last night. Darkness controlled my being, telling mine own mind lies of acceptance from the citizens of my night. I…we, mine sister and I, wish to ask for your forgiveness for those events.”

Angel looked back and forth. He couldn’t see any change in Celestia’s eyes, as he was trained to look for in hypnosis magic, so he knew that the Princess was sincere along with the creature…

No. She was Luna. She was the Princess’s sister, and, if the legend was any evidence, the Princess of the Night as well, compared to Celestia as the Princess of the Sun.

One thing still remained on Angel’s mind. “How did you…reform? What took out the darkness inside of you?”

And could it ever help me?

Celestia chuckled. “It would seem my personal student managed to finally find a few other ponies to call her true friends for the first time.”

Angel couldn’t help but drop his jaw in shock. “Twilight finally got out of that stupid observatory?”

“Indeed,” Celestia answered with a smile. “It seems her destiny was meant for so much more than we had imagined. I would be glad to explain to you last night’s tale over some tea, if you have the time. You may even become friends with Luna.”

“I would love to, Celestia,” Angel calmed his stance and, for the first time that day, smiled.

Walking over to the table where Celestia and Luna were before the two humans entered, Angel served himself some of the tea before listening to the Sun Princess’s tale of Twilight and her new friends’ heroic bravery, using the mythical Elements of Harmony to banish the evil from Luna. The Moon Princess recanted the tale of the two sister’s teary reunion, both at when Celestia was finally freed from Nightmare Moon’s cage to meet her in the courtyard of the old Sisters’ castle, and when the sisters met again after the awards ceremony where Twilight was honored for her heroism. With familiarities out of the way, the Collared Stranger of Las Rosas and the Princess of the Night talked with one another, hearing one another’s stories of their lives, and quickly becoming friends as Celestia had hoped.

And of course, Sujer was still unconscious, courtesy of a secret spell Celestia had casted while the two weren’t looking. The spell was meant to keep him asleep until Angel had to Transport back to Earth.

Might as well avoid the inevitable headaches.

Author's Note

Ahhh, I already know that Luna's dialog will be hard to write...

Welp, gonna have to deal with it.

Next chapter will bring in a new character that's the most interesting personality I've made in a while.

Comment, like, and give me feedback on what you think is cool or could be fixed up!

The Soldier's Arrival

All he could see was blinding light. In that brief second of white vision, he remembered everything.

He remembered trying to race to the apartment to save his family, but his car was deliberately wrecked by a bigger truck.

He remembered the men in the other vehicles dragging him violently out of his car.

He remembered being in that chair for however many days, strapped in and never allowed to leave.

He remembered them laughing about how they killed them. How they left them in a low ditch. How hilarious ironic that the town did a memorial for her even though they didn’t know what sins she had done in her life.

He remembered the fresh hell the “soldiers” put him through.

Then finally, he remembered the screams, the gunshots, the gasoline, the soldier holding a gun at the door, and grazing his far right cheek, apparently trying to stop another prisoner from attacking him. The prisoner was subdued and then shot in the back of the head, before the encroaching fire came in and scared the soldier off. With his face burning as much as his legs were being licked by the flames, he accepted his death with gratefulness that the worst was over.

Is this heaven? Or just where I am to be judged and sent down to hell again?

The blinding light finally grew dimmer, and he could see the room. It was walled and had a ceiling, all white as snow, and he could smell the faintest hint of rubber.

In front of him, to his great surprise, stood a being beautifully white and radiant, their hair a mixture of colors flowing in a non-existent wind, and wings suddenly stretched out. The creature gasped right as he did.

“¿Eres un ángel?” he asked.

“An-hell?… Oh! You must mean if I am an angel!” the being said. It was a feminine voice, but one he could understand as being wise with many years.

“Eh? You use English? And why are you not an angel?” he asked in confusion.

“If you allow me to explain, and if you know Equiis, or rather… English, as you call it, than you may understand. You do know English, yes?”

“Yes, I lived in a country where English was used. But, where am I then, if not in Heaven or Hell?” Everything out of him always ended with a question, he noted.

“Heaven? Oh yes, like Sujer said… The first thing I must tell you is that you are not dead.”

His mind reeled back everything he could say in surprise. Two conflicting emotions passed through his heart. On one hand, he was still alive, a fact nearly all living creatures could rejoice about whenever they get that close to death as he had. On the other… he wouldn’t be getting to see them again so soon.

“I… but I thought that…”

“It was a, er, ‘man’ who saved you and brought you here. Actually, two ‘mans’ saved you. I shall ask for them to come in.”

The man marveled at the next scene before him. The being rose its head, and he realized it was also a unicorn, her horn glowing in a strange yellow aura. Soon, it dispersed, leaving the winged unicorn being to look at him with a smile he wouldn’t forget.

“…and even you saw it. If he ain’t dead, he’s still dead out there. We can just keep him…” Two creatures that he likened to really small horses trotted in, stopping their conversation as they turned with surprise to see him awake.

“Mierda, you’re alive!” one of the creatures said. “We had thought you had died when we found you in that fire, and almost burned ourselves while we tried to save you.”

“You saved me? But then…” he hesitated, “where am I?”

Angel, Sujer, Princess Celestia, and Princess Luna all stood by a distance away as a nurse performed a check-up on the burned stallion in front of them.

“You are real lucky it wasn’t burned all the way through your skin, sir. Otherwise the magic treatments wouldn’t have been much help.”

“Magic treatments?” the stallion asked.

The nurse looked confused just as the stallion was before turning back to the group of ponies. “Angel, is he…?”

“Yes, we saved him from our world. Only magic could have helped him survive his injuries, so we had to bring him here instead of one of our hospitals.”

“My… injuries? I thought I was just burnt,” the stallion said.

“It isn’t just burns you have, mister…uh, what’s his name?”

Angel and Sujer shrugged as they sat down. “No idea. Oye. ¿Cuál es su nombre?”

“Fernando Kaznudo, but people call me Kaz,” the stallion answered.

“Kaz? Never heard a name like that,” Sujer remarked.

“Well Mr. Kaz, your injuries are summed up as another question. What isn’t broken?”

“What do you mean?”

“Multiple lacerations, multiple fractures along the spine, all of your legs were broken, you had a deep slice leaking blood from your cheek which we quickly sealed up, and multiple fractures on any bones that aren’t broken or bruised. On top of that, you have second-degree burns.”

The room was deathly silent as Kaz tried to look at his body, only to find that all of his being was covered in braces and bandages, leaving everything that had happened to him up to his imagination.

“Just…one more quick question. How am I not feeling any pain right now?”

“Oh, that’s just because of the magic!”

“…Oh.” It wasn’t the response he would accept as anything at all tangible, but he figured that whatever painkillers this place used, they had to be strong enough to be called ‘magic’.

Unfortunately for Kaz, they meant actual magic.

When they finally took off the braces for his arms a couple hours later, he gasped in shock in seeing that he had no more hands. The surprise put him in a fit, and they called for a unicorn to subdue him. Since Celestia was technically the closest magic user, she lowered her horn to cast a sleep spell, right in front of Kaz.

The next day, he was told what he needed to know about magic in this world by Sujer, as he found the long haired colt was named, and anything else that Kaz asked about the area. He still had trouble processing the whole idea of living, and with more new information piling on him, he was sure his mind would snap at some point. He asked for a mirror, apparently frightened by a nightmare the night before, and he saw that he had completely changed. He wasn’t human anymore, but a creature like the others were, a pony as the princess called him.

Princess. And here he thought he was done with royals.

“Why didn’t you tell me I was one of you guys?!” he asked Sujer.

“Thought you would figure it out yourself. We saved you from that fire, so we must have been human before we came here. A smart man would have realized that he himself should be changed too. Tch, honestly, where’s your head been?”

“In another world, apparently…” Kaz laid back in his bed, staring at the ceiling as the full force of everything that had been exposed to him crashed down. Seeing as he wasn’t talking, Sujer, to emphasize the change, trotted out of Kaz’s room.

He didn’t see it, but Sujer had shivered and briefly looked back in anger at Kaz. He had to be taken prisoner for some reason, and he was sure he wouldn’t like the answer.

A few days after the revelation of his new pony form, Kaz was deemed able to walk. Hobbling on fours was hard enough for him, since he was only used to walking upright, but it was nearly impossible once the painkilling spells were weaned off him, and he swore he could still feel the cracks in his bones. On top of that, they still insisted the bandages were kept on him, so he still didn’t walk well. After a week, however, he finally managed to feel somewhat right on walking on all fours, and his injuries were rapidly healing faster than he thought possible.

Seeing as how it was the beginning of summer (Kaz never thought he would know a hot July ever again), he wanted to walk outside more and more, but both the nurses and the two humans turned ponies told him he shouldn’t. When asked why, the humans told him he wasn’t ready for the outside world yet, and the nurses only told him it was orders from above.

He wondered if the humans had more authority here than they showed. They looked innocuous enough, the one colt with a dog-chain like collar named Angel and the un-naturally colored lotus tattoo on his flanks with the other long-haired colt named Sujer, his flanks having a familiar star with a random face on it, always following behind him.

Another thing he noticed about these ponies: they all had what Angel called “cutie marks”. Apparently they signified what that pony’s talent or fate was to the world (Sujer just explained that they were magical butt tattoos). The idea that fate was more dictated than back home made him uncomfortable. Nevertheless, he took to asking any new pony he met in the castle medical wing what their cutie marks meant, which led to some interesting conversations that taught him even more about the world that he suddenly found himself in.

One day, the princesses, whom he now knew as rare beings known as alicorns, requested he would dine with them. Walking almost as normally as a pony with a limp on their left hind leg would, he strode in the main dining hall of the castle, escorted by the guard that had given him the invitation. He was still bandaged on some of the more major injuries, but he hoped he could act regal enough to make a good impression.

At the table sat the two princesses and the two humans, along with three more guests that he had never seen before. There was a white stallion with a two-toned blue mane wearing what Kaz assumed to be an officer’s uniform sitting next to a pink mare with a vibrant and curled mane. Another mare, a sort of pale pink color, with brunette hair, sat next to the two humans, seeming to be uneasy about being in the present company. The table seats were all filled except for the seat opposite Celestia, on the opposite end of the long table.

“Ah, Mister Kaznudo, you accepted the invitation,” Celestia said.

“Of course I did. Have you even tried the food they give in that hospital?” Kaz joked, making some of the ponies chuckle. Celestia inwardly relaxed, content that it seemed Kaz was healing both physically and mentally, if his joking manner was any sign of his recovery. The white officer stallion laughed the loudest.
“Hah! You should try the rations we give to recruits! That really hardens their stomach up if the physical training doesn’t!” the stallion laughed harder.

Kaz chuckled as well. “Training rations? I’d say field rations must be worse then, huh?”

“You’ve had field rations?” the stallion asked at the end of his chuckles.

“Well, not exactly. Our ‘field rations’ were ‘whatever we could get’,” Kaz said. He looked up in slight remembrance, before shaking his head at whatever memory popped up.

The stallion lifted his brow while still smiling. “Whatever you could get? You were in an army or something?”

The mention of an army made Kaz tense up before sighing. Celestia subtly lifted her brow in curiosity. “In a way, I guess I was in an army. I mean, now we are an official army, but when I was there, you could have called me a rebel.”

All of the native ponies and the pale pink mare next to the humans were visibly shocked. The humans themselves glared in intense suspicion.

“Why are we all eating together anyway? Is it something special?” Kaz asked, unperturbed at the moment by the sudden hostility.

“Yeah. My birthday. And as a present I want you to tell us everything about yourself,” Angel seethed through his glare. “How do you know English even though when we searched around back on Earth, we know you came from El Salvador with a now-dead woman and child?”

Kaz flinched before fighting back with his own glare. “They were my wife and daughter, and we’re from Nicaragua.”

“Wait,” the light pink mare next to the stallion officer piped up. “Your wife and daughter are… dead?”

“Yes, killed by those soldiers that captured me…” Kaz seethed.

“And that’s another thing,” Sujer said with his own glare. “Why were you captured? The Capitol usually doesn’t do much outside of its territory and leaves everything to respective police. Why were soldiers then torturing prisoners like you in a random warehouse?”

“Because they weren’t soldiers.” Kaz briefly noted the blue maned stallion cocked his head in confusion. “They were people that had stolen uniforms so no one would question them if they were ever discovered.”

“Then who were they?”

“Los Muertos Reyes. You ever hear of them?”

The room went deathly silent. Both princesses and the two ponies next to Angel all looked to the chained colt as he looked down at the table with a tired expression. After a few tense seconds, he looked back up with a pained expression, no longer expressing anger at Kaz. “Yes. I know of them. Why did they want you?”

“Ah, I was close to figuring out where exactly their leader was. I worked briefly in the police, as I showed I had army experience, and my first and only case was tracking down a petty thief. That thief made me start a search around the Dead Kings, along with some other officers. As soon as they knew about the search, however, they went after us. Most of us were either single or had the idea of hiding our families before we were captured, but I wasn’t as smart…” Kaz looked down in sadness. “Mireya and Maria… It’s my fault I wasn’t there in time to save them…”

Sujer still glared. “That doesn’t answer any of our questions. How were you captured?”

“I…” Kaz took a moment to compose himself, “I was driving back to the apartment when my car was, uh,wrecked by a big truck. They took me to that warehouse, where they tortured me for information about the local police chapter I was in. They kept me there until there was a fire, and one tried to kill me before he killed another prisoner and ran away. After that I… I think that’s when you saved me.”

Angel nodded. “Sujer saw the fire and ran back to us. We already knew something was wrong with that warehouse, so we ran and saw that it was burning, and some trucks were racing away. Alicia was sure that she heard screaming, so we busted through a thatched part of the wall to see a bunch of chairs and dead men, with one guy burning in his chair. His face was…” all the humans shivered, “melted, so there wasn’t a way to save him. However, Sujer saw you lying on the ground groaning in another room, so we busted through to try and get you out. Alicia told us you wouldn’t make it in a local hospital with your injuries, and I had the idea to bring you here. It was a bit of a mess at the castle as everypony around brought you quickly to the medical wing, where you stayed unconscious for a day.”

“It was also Alicia’s first day too,” Sujer laughed. “She had no idea that Angel was right about there being an Equestria. She had so much trouble trying to walk on all fours!”

“Didn’t you also have trouble walking as well, Sujer?” Angel asked.

“Yeah, but it took me maybe a couple hours, while she took a whole day! We had to leave her in the room with some random doctor trying to teach her how to walk when we first went in to see Kaz.”

“Shut up Sujer…” the pale mare next to the humans glared at Sujer.

Kaz stared at the mare with a neutral expression. “I suppose you are Alicia then?”

“Alice, but I get called Alicia,” the mare replied. “Back home I live with these two assholes in Las Rosas, and before that I was from London.”

“Get her angry, that’s how you get the accent…”

“Shut. Up. Sujer,” Alicia glared at the long-haired colt

“Oh!” the white stallion stood up, if standing up on all fours can be a thing for Kaz, “I’m sorry sir, I forget my manners. My name is Captain Shining Armor of the Royal Guard, and this is my lovely marefriend, Princess Mi Amore Cadenza.”

“I usually go by Cadence, if you don’t wish to say my mouthful of a name,” the pink alicorn chuckled.

“Mi Amore Cadenza? That doesn’t sound like a name in English or, uh, Equiis for that matter…” Kaz muttered in confusion.

“You are right. I don’t know much of my parents, actually, as my mother and father left me here at the castle. I was born an alicorn, and I suppose my parents didn’t think they could handle the responsibility of being caretakers of a potential ruler, so they gave me to the princesses. They were very much from a far-away land, or so Auntie says.”

Kaz didn’t pay mind to Luna’s utterance of “as if she’s an orphan, Celestia…” under her breath.

. “By the way, you still haven’t told us how you know English. Angel knows English because he was, well, taking his early education here apparently, while Sujer knows English from when he was a seminary,” Alicia said.

“A seminary? For the church you mean?”

“Yeah, back in my city of Buenos Aires. It didn’t work out…” Sujer scratched his head while looking away from the group. “I… uh… I made an enemy with someone and they ratted me out about something I thought I wouldn’t have to worry about…”

“And that thing was?...”

“Meh, not important now. So what about you, then?”

“I…” Kaz again hesitated, more so from Sujer’s quick subject change than being put on the spot for his story. “I was born in the United States. My mother and I lived in the state of Arizona, I took schooling there…” Kaz looked down at the table with his own tired expression. “I never want to go back. They never wanted me and my mother there. Practically drove us and others out of that town, and scattered us. My mother and I ended up in Nicaragua, where I left her to go join the local revolution.”

“Nicara-what?” asked Luna. While the lunar princess was still trying to re-integrate back into modern pony society, she had even more trouble trying to understand the humans and their world, which seemed both alien and fascinating to her.

“What year did you join?” Angel asked, tentatively ignoring Luna’s question. He mentally made a note to tell Celestia to start teaching her some of the basic information about Earth.

“This was 1977, three years ago. I was 27 at the time, and I thought I was at the end of my road. Didn’t want to go on living much more, and constantly I kept selfishly signing my squad up for suicide missions, just so I could go throw myself at a grenade and hope maybe I’ll be remembered as someone who sacrificed himself for some cause I didn’t even believe in much myself.”

“Your squad? You commanded soldiers?” Shining Armor asked.

“I was a captain, like you. But I don’t think I was a good one, like I said.”

“Did you ever care for your soldiers?”

“I…guess so? At least whenever I could, sure. I’d make sure all rations, whatever we got, were properly shared, so that even the two kids that we had in our unit still got food.”

“…You had kids in your unit?!” Shining was aghast.

“Their parents died in an attack from the government, they followed us around so we decided to just take care of them ourselves,” Kaz sighed sadly. “Unfortunately, one of them got killed when we were ambushed. He decided to hold a point, some random hill out of all the others, and just gave what he had in his backpack. We couldn’t hold them off, and had to retreat without him.”

Both Shining Armor and Cadence stared at him in horror, while the princesses looked at him with sadness, and the humans with understanding.

“Kaz, you should know this by now, but if you don’t I’ll tell you. Equestria, well, hasn’t seen a war since hundreds of years ago. The royal guard that Shining commands is more for show and peacekeeping than for battle,” Angel explained.

Kaz was aghast. He looked around the room, and the native ponies’ faces confirmed what Angel said. Peace for hundreds of years? That was only a pipe dream of some philosophers, and regular peace at all was a hopeful wish for a soldier like Kaz. The more and more he learned about Equestria, the more he wanted to live his life out here instead of the cruel and unforgiving world of Earth.

Living in Equestria… that brought up a point that he spent last night thinking about.

“So what’s going to happen, once I am completely recovered? Do I head back to Las Rosas to show my squad I’m still alive, and then try to end the Dead Kings?”

All the ponies, including the humans, avoided eye contact with Kaz, which made him suspicious. Finally, Angel coughed and dared to look at Kaz.

“Kaz, trust me when I say this… officially, you’re dead. The Dead Kings will have made sure they have you listed as dead, and if you come back to Las Rosas…”

“…They’ll just want to finish the job,” Kaz finished. Seated down, he put his arms up to his head, resting his ‘hooves’ over his eyes. If he wanted to live, he would have to stay here, and become a citizen of the land he now currently resided in.

Immediately, several ideas popped up in his mind on what to do in Equestria. He already let both the princesses and the apparent leader of the guards that he was a soldier, he could easily find himself working in the same business again. But… he only knew war, not peacekeeping. The FSLN always had enemies everywhere, and here there hasn’t been a major conflict since perhaps before even the Americas were discovered. Would it be that the work was more like the police work back in Las Rosas? Or maybe, since all he saw of the guards were as security to VIPs, it would be like his first job in the country, doing guard work in Puerto Estigroza?

Puerto Estigroza… no. There was still at least one thing he needed to do back on Earth before he could resign himself to living as a pony.

“I still have to visit my mother, at least for one last time. She lives at the port town, east of Las Rosas. I brought her with my family when we left Salvador. She’s too old now to work for herself, I always had to save up some of my money to send to her. I have a friend there that can take care of her if ever something happened to me.”

Angel looked down in concentration, trying to think about what Kaz asked as everypony else looked at him.

“Estigroza? That’s real close to the heart of the Dead Kings. If anyone from Las Rosas saw you, they would alert the others and then it’s all of us dead.”

“Is that the only loose end you have?” Sujer asked.

“…Yes, I suppose. Why?” Kaz took a moment to realize what Sujer meant by loose end. He hoped that there was maybe a way to get there and back safely with whatever magic the princesses had.

“Welp, I’m down for it. I think having a soldier in our little crew of human ponies might do us well. Course, he did say he was a rebel, so I’d watch your back Shining-”

“Shut up, Sujer,” Angel warned. “Kaz… look, I need you to understand this. If we go and see your mother, we have to be as quick as we can. I am the only one who can travel between the two worlds, unless if we manage to find one of the old portals that Celestia had sealed up years ago.”

“Wait, portals?...”

“I’ll explain later about our history with this world. Right now, I can say that I can take you, and I’ll stay with you until we find your mother. You don’t know the Dead Kings like I do.”

“What do you mean by-“

“Another time. Sujer can come with us to make sure where we need to avoid the Dead Kings if they’ve got anything secret that I don’t know. He may be a jackass, but he can see things that a lot of us can overlook…”

“…are you sure you want to risk your life a final time?” Alicia completed Angel’s warning. The rest of the table looked at Kaz as he weighed his options.

On one hand… er, hoof, he makes sure that his mother can spend her final years in relative peace, in both her life, and in the thought that her son is okay. On the other hoof, if he goes and the group gets caught, he can die and then finally be re-united with his family, if only just briefly if he is to be condemned.

Both were chances he was willing to take.

“Yes. I want to go back to Earth,” Kaz affirmed the group. At that moment, the ponies were reminded they were gathered together for a celebration, as the servants strode in with the food and the main pastry of a birthday, the cake.

“Oh right, I forgot it’s Angel’s birthday. Welp.” Sujer stood up from his seat. “If I can have your attention, please?”

“You’re the one talking, you already have our attention,” Alicia remarked.

“That I am. Well, as you all know, unless you forgot like I did because we were determining whether or not one of us should go back to kill himself for his old hag…”

“Sujer…” Celestia warned.

“…We’re here for our dear old pal Angel’s birthday. He turns 20 today, so that means our country is also 20 years old. Angel here was the first person born in Las Rosas, if you didn’t know, and it was a few hours after the Argentines said to our Capitol, ‘Fine, just take the land’. Took some blood and, well, actually it took a lot of blood for that little civil war really, but it also took heart, and thus our little town of Las Rosas is a bustling place full of people who just want to say ‘Fuck you, my country in someplace, you ain’t worth breaking my back over’. And so that’s how we have random Russians and Americans and Argentinians and Europeans and Asians and…” Angel breathed in heavily, “and thieves and workers and fighters of all ages. In a way, we’re like Equestria. We decided to put our differences aside and work together for our peace, except it was because we were tired of all the bullshit of world politics and nationalism. Maybe that dream didn’t grow up as well as we wanted to, if the Dead Kings are any indication, but, well, as my grandfather used to say before he beat me, ‘Guess what? We’re here now. Make of it what we thought of it, or make of it what we needed of it. Now shut up and eat what you have or I’ll hit you with this bottle’”.

Everypony stared at Sujer incredulously, even the servants stopping to understand what in the world the long haired colt just said. Angel stood up and began arguing with Sujer about trying to stop scaring others with his ramblings, but soon all the noise was tuned out as Kaz looked downwards at his food, focused on a different matter.

Trust him that he knows the Dead Kings? Portals that the Princess sealed up? Sujer having a secret that got him kicked out of the seminary? This world is a heaven with a slight twinge of the insanity of Hell. How could I trust someone like Angel when clearly the reason why he should know so much about the Kings is because he was a part of them? And how long has Angel and the rest of them been here with Celestia and the others? Angel getting his ‘early education’ here… So has he been here ever since he could move between the worlds? And what of the Princesses? Sure, I know that governments have to keep their secrets from their citizens, but from what I understand of Equestrian history, that white alicorn and her sister may be older than the Ancient Roman empire, if not even more. Who knows what secrets they may know of us humans, if apparently they had access to portals? And what is Sujer hiding? What got him kicked out of the seminary? I’d never even expect Sujer to try to be a priest, the way he acts. How did he even get to Las Rosas from Buenos Aires, with Argentina locking down the borders severely? And why did Alicia, or Alice apparently, leave Britain for Las Rosas? What secrets is she hiding? Whatever the cases may be, once we get back I’m going to find out what exactly they’re keeping from me.

Kaz glanced back over to the other side of the table, where Angel and Sujer, and somehow Shining and Alicia, were now in some sort of fighting that involved a lot of lettuce leaves and plates being smashed and swung against each other. Even with a magical horn, Shining still looked like he struggled with the London woman, whose ferocity as she leapt to and fro to pummel him surprised Kaz for a brief second.

He stared back down at his food, a simple salad that nonetheless looked delectable, even though Kaz was far from a vegetarian. With neutral interest he picked up his fork with his right hoof (a technique that still fascinates him even after he learned it from Angel a couple days ago, whereby items can just magically stick onto any hoof of a human-turned-pony), and ate his salad as he watched the birthday fight happen.

It shouldn’t be too hard to get answers.

Vikander, the Dead King

"Alright, so!" Sujer began, arms held up as he nervously glanced at the guns. "I know that you all want to kill us, and you probably have good reason to, but what if I said we can make all of this not worth your time and instead set you all up for life? Eh? Any takers?"

The gunmen still held up their rifles.

"Well I tried."

"Angel..." a voice echoed in the room. From within the riflemen's ranks, a tall figure strode out to meet his sudden prisoners. Like a man lost from 1944, he wore a black buttoned up coat that reminded Kaz and Sujer of an SS officer. "How nice to finally meet you again."

"Vikander..." Angel spat. "What are you doing here?"

"I should ask you the same. You said you would only stay in Las Rosas, and wouldn't dare to come back home. And yet," Vikander held up his arms in a mocking showmen fashion, "here you are. Back home to me."

"We just wanted to visit a friend's mother, nothing more, nothing less. Now let us go. We don't have any fight with you."

"Maybe you don't," Vikander said, turning his head towards Kaz. "But he does. I am not sure how you survived, captain Kaznudo, but you have very much become a thorn in my side with your activities."

"Vete a la mierda," Kaz replied.

"Oh, so testy. Rebellious, even. A true veteran of the Sandinistas, I'm sure. But tell me, captain, why would you fake your death from us and then come to the one place we would have kept eyes on to make sure you wouldn't come back? A survivor of wars would have known it was a trap."

Kaz spat to the ground, keeping his eyes on the closest rifle that he could conceivably grab and take to protect himself. "I owed a debt to her to make sure my mother was safe. I didn't know you would stoop so low to stalk an older woman—"

Angel, ignoring the conversation, was also looking for a way out. He had the easy way out of Transporting back to Equestria, but he wasn't going to leave all his friends behind. Yet as much as he could look at the gunmen and around the living room of the house that suddenly was shot up by the riflemen before they stormed the room, he couldn't figure any way out that didn't involve someone on his side dying.

"And that is why I am still surprised that you are so weak minded even as a veteran. All these men here? They were once rebels too. They believed in a cause once. Then that cause betrayed them. And now, I have taken them, I help them look towards a new cause, one that can stand as a united peoples against the nation bullies of the world. Did you know Angel believed that cause once?"

Kaz looked to see Angel hang his head low, hearing his sins be put to words. Vikander kept speaking, "Absolutely hated anyone related to the Americans or the Soviets. Capitalists and communists alike were felled by his hand. I honestly seemed to think he had a thing against white skinned people in general, but when he one day left us saying he didn't agree to our cause anymore, we were heartbroken. He was the best of us, you know."

"You had me kill every last cartel boss that stood in your way. You had me kill their families, so their wives or their children wouldn't come seeking revenge. YOU MADE ME KILL KIDS!" Angel yelled, leaving his sins bare for all in the room. "What unification is there in killing the innocent? I left because you changed, Vikander. Look at yourself now, especially with that Nazi coat! You've become your father!"

Before he could react, Angel felt a fist connect to his right jaw, sending him down to the ground. His head swam in semi-conciousness, his brain fighting to stay awake.

"DO NOT COMPARE ME TO PAPA!" Vikander screamed, holding his hand up for another punch. "I WILL BURY YOU SO FAR UNDERGROUND YOUR BONES WILL BE MADE INTO DIAMONDS BEFORE THEY WILL EVER DIG YOU BACK UP!"

"Kaz, now!" a voice yelled, Vikander turning to see Sujer utilizing the commotion to attack a soldier and commandeer his rifle. He ducked down just in time for the rifle to fire off an automatic hail of bullets and spray the other soldiers, looking away for a brief moment while Kaz kneeled down to grab Angel. Before Vikander could get back up to control the situation, Kaz grabbed Angel and his mother, with Sujer diving down to grab Kaz's ankle.

And before Vikander could look back, the three men and one woman he had been tracking simply blinked out of existence.

"OK. That. Was. Too close," Sujer said, readjusting to having to walk on 4 legs so quick after standing on 2 legs and raising his arms up high in the air. He could feel his blood pumping down into his arm again after holding it up for so long.

"You're telling, argh, me," Angel agreed, still feeling his jaw ache from Vikander's fist. They Transported back into Equestria, dropping into the backup room in the castle. Angel was splayed out on the floor, Kaz dropping his hoof right after Transporting to tend to his mother, who knelt down on her front legs.

"Mama? Mama, ¿estás bien?" Kaz asked, looking over his mother and frightened for her.

She stared into the ground, visibly shaking more and more as her legs buckled underneath her. "Los solderas. El jefe. Esas armas..."

She fell down onto the floor, causing Kaz to scream in fear. Angel and Sujer quickly got up to check on the poor woman.

As was usual with the human transformations, there wasn't a varied colored difference between humans like there was between ponies, so Kaz's mother had much the same coat and mane color as the rest of the humans. Oddly, she already had a cutie mark on her, a strange cactus flower bloom adorning her flanks as she fell on her side. She didn't look that old compared to Kaz himself, and Angel briefly wondered how old the woman was. They didn't exactly have much time to even say hello before the Sujer suddenly noticed the guns outside and told everyone to get down from the hailstorm of bullets that followed.

"She's still breathing, look at her barrel," Kaz explained, pointing his hoof towards where her stomach would be. "She just fainted, thank God. We have to get her to a hospital."

"We got one here in the castle. Kaz, Sujer, wait here. I'll go grab the Royal Guard to take her."

"And that's how we ended up here, Celestia. I don't know if Vikander will realize what happened, I don't think he saw us Transport, but he's almost certainly going to track down Alicia so he can get to me. I need to go back to get her."

"But, Angel," Celestia sighed, shaking her head at the rashness of her longtime human friend. "You could get hurt again. Are you sure you want to go back now?"

"I need to, Celestia. For Alicia's sake. No doubts about it. Tell Kaz and Sujer I'll be back soon."

Before the princess could voice any more concerns, Angel blinked out of her reality. She heard a small pop when Angel Transported, and she could only help but blink again at the strange dimension hopping power that Angel wielded.

Taking a few breaths to calm her nerves after being de-briefed about Kaz, Sujer, and Angel's harrowing trip to Puerto Estigroza, she walked back into the infirmary that held Kaz's mother, who she found out was named Arely. It was ironically enough the same room that had held Kaz when he was recovering from the worst of his injuries.

"Hey, you're back. Where's Angel?" Sujer asked. He stood next to Kaz, who was holding the hoof of his mother as she layed on the infirmary bed, taking shallow breaths as the IV system next to her worked their magic to heal whatever ailment Arely had.

"Angel debriefed me on your trip, and he seems to have the idea that Alicia might be in danger after he became involved in stopping one of the Dead Kings' attacks by escaping with you all. I tried to persuade him to wait a bit before he went gallivanting off to be a hero again, but he is both stubborn and impatient these days."

"Seriously? And he didn't think to bring me so at least I could go home? That bastard..." Sujer seethed. "Welp, guess I'm stuck here then. I'm gonna go help myself to whatever desserts you guys got in the kitchen."

Before Celestia could voice more concerns, Sujer trotted out into the hallway away from the infirmary, leaving the Princess and Kaz a bit flabbergasted. Kaz sighed, "That kid can be real selfish, huh?"

"It is an unwelcome example of your species, I'm afraid to say, Kaznudo," Celestia replied. "Your mother, is she okay?"

"Yeah, she'll be fine, her nerves just got to her during that whole ordeal. I mean, home shot up, bunch of men with guns holding her up, some random kids alongside the son she believed was dead, and now this world? She was just a simple woman, even a handgun would get her anxious. She never liked me being in the FSLN back in the day."

"You've told me that the other night. That you were with this 'FSLN'. Who are they, if I may ask?"

Kaz sighed and looked down, seemingly thinking on where to begin. "Do you know of communism, princess?" he asked.

"I know of the term, yes, though it has been literal lifetimes since I've seen such a government in action. Stalliongrad, before it swore fealty to Canterlot, was a communist city-state. In recent times it has turned into a more socialist political climate, but the true communists are few and considered essential traitors in all but law to the crown. Some towns in my kingdom are decidedly socialist, while others are more libertarian or even meritocratic in principle. I have worked more than a thousand years to bring my ponies into a state of harmony, not just with each other but in the whole world, even with other pony-run countries, if not countries ruled by different species. Back in the olden times, however, much of Equestria was highly politicized, on both ends of the spectrum."

Kaz could only whistle in sympathy. "Whew. Got it a lot better than on Earth. Our species is so highly politicized we have two nations who have agreed in unspoken terms to destroy the whole world if one doesn't get what they want from the other. And we've gotten close to annihilation before. Well, as I was saying, you know communism. The FSLN aren't exactly communists, but they were sympathetic to them, especially with a country called Cuba, who is a thorn in the side of one of the two big countries I mentioned before. The FSLN were also not happy with that same big country practically controlling their country's government like a puppet, and wanted to establish independence for themselves. I joined up because when my mother and I fled America after an incident, we had landed in the country and I was desperate to find some sort of cause to believe in. The FSLN were also fighting America, the same as I was just by my existence there, so to me it felt like just revenge for how they treated my family. I ended up being a successful captain, and by all odds a small jungle group of rebels actually won the war. It wasn't long though before the idealistic nature of the FSLN gave way to other humans simply wanting power and wealth all over again, so my family and I had to flee yet again. I married a woman and just had a son before we fled, but you know how that ended once we landed in Las Rosas..."

Celestia nodded, bowing her head in respectful mourning. "I am aware, and I am sorry for your loss."

"Yeah... Do you mind if I can be left here alone? I'd like to collect my thoughts a bit about the whole situation before heading to my bed. The doctor said Mama would wake up early tomorrow after the calming anesthetics they gave her wore off."

"Of course," Celestia answered. "I shall be in my quarters, teaching Luna more of the common vernacular and some of the new history of Equestria since her absence, if you need me."

Celestia bowed her head, before turning around and walking out of the room. The sterile floors and bleak lights did not do much to calm Kaznudo's nerves on their own, so he continued to kneed his hooves around his mother's leg, as she laid in bed sleeping off her own nerves.

"What am I going to do now, with you here and the Dead Kings out there?" he wondered out loud...

The door violently swinging open woke Kaz up from his nap on top of his mother's bed, and he looked with bleary eyes to see a bunch of nurses and doctors filling up an empty bed with a red body.

Rubbing his eyes to wake himself up better, he flinched when he recognized the red body as a bloodied Angel, his eyes closed and his barrel barely showing any signs of breathing. A mask was hooked up to his muzzle to fill up with oxygen, as the nurses quickly bandaged and wrapped up some parts of Angel as two surgeons worked to pick out some things out of the colt. Kaz could only blinked as he looked at the objects they were pulling out of Angel.

Are those... bullets?

Before he could stand up to investigate the commotion himself, Sujer suddenly appeared in his vision. He flinched back in surprise, eyes wide open as he exclaimed a little.

"Kaz!" Sujer practically shouted. "They shot up Angel! Alicia's dead!"

Author's Note

So, apparently, I had this saved as a chapter of this old story far in the archives of my Google Drive. I've already re-done the characters in this story into a different one of mine (Romance, Mortality, and Cyborgs), but I decided to touch up the old chapter I had and post this as a sort of nostalgic trip of my own through old ideas.

Who knows. Maybe I'll come back to this story one day. I'll bring it back into On Hiatus instead of cancelled for now.