My Little Fortress: Friendship for the Blood Godby jaked122ChaptersPrologue for a slaughterThe Unicorn EffectThe Terrors of the DwarvesPartiesCider and The EverfreeEverfreeManticoreStars and SundaughterNot Going HomeBureausMagicMemorancePrologue for a slaughterTholumom Lathonudlerned has been very unhappy recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has had a mediocre drink recently. He has looked at a masterful engraving of his family and been saddened. He has slept in a decent Alder bed recently. He has complained about the inclement weather recently. He has been angered at his conscription recently. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. Tholumom stars into his mug of ale. The ale is utterly tasteless. Another mediocre drink from the workshop of Addortalin Nuggadogon. He looks around the bar, dwarves are legitimately happy here. He keeps to himself, the pain of his life would only make the others unhappy. “Tholumom, Get over here! You are on active duty!” Tholumom grumbled into the ale, not even the omniscient narrator could make out what he said. “Now what?” “You don’t need to know to get into uniform.” “I am in uniform you idiot.” “I am your commanding officer.” “You? Ha! I’ve had more experience than you, and all I’ve done is fight a few hundred cubic-meters of rock and dirt.” Tholumom smiled when he said this. There was enough of a grudge between him and this other dwarf Urist... whatever it was it translated into ass licker. “This time it is actually serious.” “So we won’t be doing something pointless for a noble who doesn’t need protection from moths?” “Well... No, we aren’t doing that.” “Good.” Tholumom looked at the other dwarf, Urist, his beard was braided tightly enough to be a hazard if cut. he began to talk, interrupting the possibility of doing such a thing. “You don’t want the incidents of three years ago to be repeated.” Tholumom’s face became bright red, not the happy-drunk red-- the angry-drunk red. “Don’t talk about that! I’m done with that.” “Unless you want that to happen again, get your ass down to the Admantine tube. We need to be on guard, if we aren’t demons will break through and kill the fortress, every single dwarf that lives through that will have the same terrible experience as you.” His eyes narrowed on Urist. “You don’t know what that experience was.” “I can gather that it isn’t pleasant.” “You have no idea. I’ll go.” Tholumom finished off the mug, the barrel, and then another barrel for good luck, after all, combat could cause dehydration. Urist led him through the staircases that merged and diverged through the entire fortress. The sterilized, once dangerous cavern system, they passed a few legendary dining halls, and the minecart system used to deliver the heavy stones throughout the fortress from their original resting places in the newly mined out sections. The fortress seemed to go on forever, it went down to the mantle of the earth itself, not that that made it particularly impressive. The pits of hell were just a few meagre Z-levels beneath them, and there was the true prize, Slade. Slade was even harder to obtain than admantium, if the fortress received a commission for admantium, then Slade would certainly mean true, lasting greatness. There was a catch for either of the metals or stones. The entire legion of hell would have access to the fortress. The others in the massive squad were brandishing their war-axes, Tholumom grasped his hammer. The events of three years ago brought back bad memories whenever he used a war-axe. When he stepped into the line, the commander decided that his nobleness would give a speech on the goal of today’s engagements. “You idiots are going to keep the demons back while we build flooring over the pits, preventing them from getting in.” It was the shortest speech that anyone there had ever heard, for anything, at this fortress, or another. Either way, the troops were rendered speechless by this lazy oratory. The sub-commander walked up the the commander and whispered to him. “WHAT DO YOU MEAN THAT I SHOULD GET OUT OF PUBLIC SPEAKING?” more whispering. “Whatever, you, miners, get on with this BS.” “Shouldn’t we have some cage-traps set up? Just in case we fail?” Tholumom said. “Nah, we can’t possibly fail.” Tholumom waited for the ceiling to collapse, but, unfortunately, that was too easy. The hammering of pickaxes on stone continued for hours. Finally, something crumbled. A horrible stench rose up from outside the crack. The commander woke up from his nap. “Masons, get on that job!” The masons arrived quickly, and began to build a staircase down to the floor of hell. “Attack, Charge, Charge!” The group gave a roar. Dwarven roars are known to resemble the mating call of many of the variety of demons in hell, including number 53 and 41. Unfortunately, the other demons follow those two types around, meaning that 1 through 53 would come. Tholumom was the last dwarf left in hell. The others had either fled, or died. Even now, he swung his silver hammer at the 53s and 41s, they flew into the slade walls, exploding into gore. Inside his head, he could hear nothing but the thoughts relevant to battle. This cognitive process was known widely as the Martial Trance; and was often heralded as the final advantage that dwarves had over the other races. The demons continued to flow towards him. A 32, made entirely out of tentacles grabbed him, throwing him into the pit. The martial trance broke once he realized that he was falling. The strange glow of the eerie pit illuminated him as he fell. Darkness never came... No, there was light. The light grew brighter and brighter. Soon it was daylight again. There were no demons to be found. Needless to say, after seventeen long weeks underground, this was not an easy transition for Tholumom to make. As the atmosphere began to blue with the natural absorption spectra of oxygen and nitrogen, he began to vomit from the fear, the exposure to natural light. Soon there was moderately sized vomit sphere moving with him. This fact bothered him slightly less than the fact that he had just fallen into the infinite depths of the earth to emerge in the upper atmosphere. Unfortunately, to his knowledge, none of the dwarves that have managed to fall from such a height survived; they had a tendency to explode on impact. The world beneath him began to resolve itself out of fog. An ocean, or a lake. Either way, Tholumom was pleased to see it. “I remember swimming as a child... My father had to throw me into the pond. I was lucky that I didn’t drown.” he thought to himself. His skills were rusty; the plight of so many dwarves, so few used a large number of skills; they were built to work in a single system, a place where they only needed to work at one job at a time, nothing else had to be known in order to survive. They weren’t an ant colony; they could learn more professions than one, but that meant more work than they needed to do. Of course, Tholumom thought to himself, if he survived, then he would have to learn a lot of skills to last more than a day or two. He grimaced, that did not sound like much fun. he was rusty in everything, including mining. The last few years had not been kind, but admittedly, they were still nicer than the sensation of slamming into the water. The water was fresh, cool, and unlike at home, it made no attempt to smash him into a wall. Seagulls flew overhead, it was peaceful. This was mostly due to the fact that the dwarf in leather armor was unconscious, floating facing towards the sky, completely unaware of the beasts that swam beneath him. Not that the beasts really mattered; they were a rather distant bunch of aquatic beasts, scary-sure, dangerous-not particularly, willing to get involved with this strange creature—most certainly not. So the dwarf just floated there; his center of buoyancy just happened to be encouraging his metabolic processes to continue unabated, and not to assume that he was going to drown. Metabolic processes are a psychosomatic bunch, so the encouragement pretty much guaranteed that he was alright. But this isn’t about those metabolic processes, is it? Well… Okay, so if they are okay, then we have a story, regardless of how stupid it might be. Needless to say, the dwarf was rescued. No, there were not a bunch of benign merpeople trying to help him back to land(which was probably a good thing due to the genocidal habits that dwarves developed in response to the high price that goods made out of their bones engendered). That was probably fortunate, because Tholumom had not heard about how the price crashed after every single fortress expanded towards their sea in order to harvest the merpeople’s bones, thus he would find a perfectly good reason to start that practice over again here. No, he was rescued by something that he would find even more detestable: a purple unicorn. The Unicorn EffectTholumom Lathonudlerned has been very unhappy recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has had a mediocre drink recently. He has looked at a masterful engraving of his family and been saddened. He has slept in a decent Alder bed recently. He has complained about the inclement weather recently. He has been angered at his conscription recently. He has been frustrated with his failure in combat recently. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. His nose is broken. His arms are bruised. His hand is bruised. His legs have gashes. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. The dwarf slept in a bed, catatonic, except of course for the involuntary retreating into his mind, he was of course, completely unconscious; the natural response to dwarves in pain was always to faint, and for once, that probably saved him a lot of heartache. As far as he was concerned, he had been saved by one of the vilest animals in existence: the unicorn. Unicorns, those disgusting horses ridden into battle by those damned tree hugging elves. The same unicorns that were known to use their horn to skewer the unsuspecting dwarf in all of their righteous goodness. This creature, whose similar looking relatives of Tholumom’s world, had been the only creature to bloody the misfortunate and stupid dwarven settlers who had sought to avoid evil, by moving to its antithesis. The other creatures of the “righteous” or “good” regions of the world were far less dangerous to the fortress. The unicorn was the only creature of that region that was known to really scare the dwarves, who continued to hunt it, because of the value of their bones. The world of the dwarves had been quite dangerous after all, motivated by profit and the whims of gods who refused to respond to any adventurer with the faith to really try talking to them. Fortunately, Tholumom had never believed in the first place. His late wife had worshipped a god known as the “Flying Trout” who was associated, or so they said, with gold, silver, mountains, and fertility. Whatever connection that a flying fish had to do with any of those things was anyone’s guess. It had given her comfort, and that was no help to him when he was unconscious. Twilight, as the unicorn was called, was surprised to have found any creature so far out in the water. The fish were a bunch of pussies, not that she would refer to them as such; she would probably say that they have a highly tuned sense of “Self-preservation”. She was even more surprised to find that this thing was still alive, whatever it was just so happened to float in such a way that it could breathe. A creature such as that, which can fully pass out in water and live, was pretty special, even in a land filled with three whole races of magical multi-colored horses. So Twilight had decided to take the obvious land-dweller back with her on the boat. The expedition so far had been a resounding failure. Nothing that they could make was able to descend to the bottom of the ocean and survive. Even Twilight’s magic seemed completely ineffective for gathering information about what was really down there. This creature, whatever it was, was far more interesting than the failure of all of the bathyspheres which Twilight had managed to either get her hooves on or conjure. “Spike, any word from Celestia?” “Yeah Twilight. She says, and I quote ‘Why did you stop studying friendship? Get back to Ponyville.” “Did you send her the letter I wrote ahead of time for when she said that?” “Yes Twilight, she sent me the same letter except ‘get back to Ponyville’ was underlined.” The purple dragon glanced over to the creature that lied in bed, barely breathing. “Is he going to be alright, Twilight?” “I hope so Spike. He’s injured, but as far as I can tell, there’s nothing life threatening about the injuries.” “Have you figured out what he is yet? Twilight?” “No Spike, you’ll be the second to know when I do.” “So are we going to listen to Celestia?” Twilight gave the small dragon a look of exasperation, “Of course we listen. I wouldn’t want to go back to-“ “Magic Kindergarten.” Spike groaned. “You have to understand that not every failure can send you back to that place. In fact, no failure will send you back to that place. The only place where they can send you is maybe back to the same grade that you were in when you failed.” “You don’t know that.” Twilight’s eyes almost started twitching, which signaled that Spike either needed to accept his “sister’s” insanity, or press on and accept the consequences. “I’ve read that damned book about the Equestrian School system. Of course I know that! Celestia is a nicer teacher than most, not to mention that she is your teacher, not anypony else’s. She only teaches you. She can put whatever emphasis you need on whatever subject you don’t understand. She won’t make you go crazy.” “Spiiike!” “What?” “No.” Twilight had picked that one up from Rainbow Dash. It was the most annoying way that anypony could think of to turn around a conversation and generally peeve that pony. “Whatever Twilight. I’ll just go tell Captain Gruff to turn us around and bring us back to Ponyville.” “That’s probably a good idea. Too bad, I guess I’ll have to accept knowing more about the surface of friendship than the bottom of the ocean.” She sighed. “There’s probably not much down there in the first place.” “Why would you want to know about the bottom of the ocean in the first place?” “I thought that I could learn something about what was down there that nopony had ever known or seen before. I guess you’re right though, the magic of friendship has to be more interesting than the bottom of the ocean.” “I’m going to tell Captain Gruff to turn us around.” “Good idea Spike, thanks for your help.” With that, the small purple dragon with green frills left the cabin. Twilight sighed, “I guess that we’ll just have to wait to learn about you.” She said this to the creature in the bed, which lied asleep. The mouth drooped open, exposing its prodigious size. “Dear Celestia. What are you?” The mouth was big enough to trap a scootaloo. Not that the owner of the mouth would necessarily do that. She hoped. Inside of Tholumom’s body, epithelial cells reproduced quickly to overcome the wounds that were sustained. In his hands, veins knitted themselves back together. In his nose, cartilage began to produce scar tissue, ensuring that it would look slightly wrong for the rest of his life. His liver was beginning to notice a lack of alcohol to digest; naturally this would be what would awaken the dwarf. His eyes fluttered open, revealing a blurry room. He noticed the sunlight in the room and thought “not again”, before throwing up. The vomiting actually served to shake his eyes back to working order. Tholumom was in a wooden room, with wide, clear windows. It was clear that he had been adopted by a prosperous civilization, probably funded by the various pieces of armor that goblins often left behind after their deaths. There was something that was missing; the stains of blood on the walls, the omnipresent smell of vomit and feces. The elves, who believed in latrines and baths, were not as clean as this. Not to say that the elves aren’t a bunch of hypocritical cannibals, they were still the cleanest creatures that he had ever met. Then he noticed what it was built out of… Wood. The association that it brought to every dwarf’s mind was the same capricious cannibal traders known as the elves. He frowned, if he had been adopted by humans, his life would not be too bad, if they was elves, then he might as well eat himself right now. Of course, if it was elves, it would be some kind of damned tree house. He relaxed; nothing the elves built was made with the kind of care or material that resembled planks. He looked out the window, seeing a branch with a multitude of bird nests on it. Tholumom was not sure, but birds didn’t nest at such high densities, at least no kind of bird which he had ever laid eyes on. The dwarf put his hands behind his head, relaxing for the first time in a few months. “Spiike! Did you send Celestia our apology letter?” “Yes Twilight, She already said that it was okay.” “That’s good.” She paused. Tholumon thought that she sounded like a nice girl, perhaps human, but certainly not of his age group, at most she was sixteen years old. He couldn’t wait to meet his rescuer… What kind of name was Spike though? That sounded strange, even to a dwarf whose first name means “Deep dark” or maybe “dark deep” either way he couldn’t remember how the old ancestral dwarven language worked. “Perhaps you should check on our guest, I mean, after Fluttershy patched him up, he should be fine.” For some reason, the name “Fluttershy” sounded appropriate and normal, not like Spike, whose name only had one syllable. “Maybe I should meet this Fluttershy, I’m sure that she’s a nice girl. Though that Spike character sounds very annoying. Twilight sounds nice too. Maybe I won’t be interrogated when she realizes that I’ve woken up.” The door across the room opened to reveal the purple dragon standing there. “I love dragons, they always amused me when the beast-master or whatever his title was trained one to barbecue the goblin infantry.” “Hi there mister.” “Hello there purple dragon. It’s a long way from the mountainhome to see such a specimen as you.” “What’s a mountainhome?” “Damn, I might actually have to elaborate on where I lived.” “It’s a mountain filled with dwarves, gold, wealth, and vomit, especially vomit.” “That sounds disgusting.” “Yes, but who trained you to speak so well? I’ve never heard of such an incredible beast-master that was able to teach a dragon to talk. The best I’ve seen have only managed to train the dragon to barbecue elves and goblin infantry.” “What?” “You certainly can’t talk on your own. You must have been trained at some point?” “I’ve only been toilet trained, if that’s what you mean. I learned how to talk on my own.” “What’s a toilet?” “With one, you would have had a vomit-free mountainhome.” “That’s impossible, we would have found a way of vomiting in such a way to make it ineffective.” “Why would you search for that?” “That’s the drinking game that dwarves play whenever they are about to pass out.” “That sounds unhealthy.” “Doctors have told us that, at least human doctors have. They never did have the body chemistry to process large volumes of alcohol.” “I’m afraid for your health mister.” “I’ve drunk more than enough to kill you a thousand times over. I’m not even a heavy drinker.” “I’m going to get Twilight.” “Thank you lad, I’ve been wanted to talk to her, I gather that she rescued me from the ocean?” “Yes.” With that short answer, the dragon walked out. “I can’t believe he fell for that drinking game. We throw up because our eyes are adjusted to absolute darkness. Not because we can’t hold our drinks.” Tholumon laughed. It pleased him to have landed so far from the ridiculous insecurity of his world. Of course, what walked through the door was a creature of unimaginable horror. A creature that he had been taught to fear for its pointy horn, its scary eyes, and the ferocity which it can attack with unprovoked. It was the Unicorn. The Terrors of the DwarvesTholumom Lathonudlerned has been very unhappy recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has had a mediocre drink recently. He has looked at a masterful engraving of his family and been saddened. He has slept in a decent Alder bed recently. He has complained about the inclement weather recently. He has been angered at his conscription recently. He has been frustrated with his failure in combat recently. He has been terrified by a unicorn recently He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. His nose is broken. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. The unicorn advanced to him. It was purple, not even the most terrifying stories of his elders had a purple unicorn. “Hi there, are you okay?” The unicorn asked him. The dwarf had broken into a cold sweat. Tholumon gasped at his belt, the warhammer had been removed, along with the pickaxe. In fact, he was naked. This fact only bothered him because he shared a room with a horse with a piercing weapon on its forehead. “Stay away from me you monster!” “What? I saved you. Why don’t you trust me?” “Your kind has butchered my family, killed my livestock, and destroyed entire societies with the dangerous point on your forehead.” He picked up the nightstand. “I will destroy you!” He jumped off the bed. The unicorn did not move. “AHHHHHH!” “NOPE!” He stopped midair. “I can see that you are clearly not ready to meet me. I hope that our next meeting will not end this way. Goodbye.” With that she left the room. The purple dragon came back, “I see that the meeting didn’t go well.” “Yeah. You seem to be right there, buddy.” “What does that mean?” “You’ll know when you are older.” “Okay then…” The purple dragon left the room, leaving the magically levitating dwarf to manage his nightstand weapon in peace. The next day the purple unicorn returned. “I see that you have not tried to fall yet.” “That was an option?” “No, but I’m glad to see that you are still alive, especially after not eating or drinking for several weeks.” “That is the constitution of my race.” The dwarf said, smiling. “I’m sorry about yesterday. Care to start over?” “Fine with me, just put the nightstand down where it was yesterday, and I’m sure that we’ll be great friends in no time.” The Unicorn sounded somewhat sarcastic. “You must see, madam, or is it lady? Either way I’m sorry about confusing you for the creatures with the same horn in my world. Those blasted horses.” “I’m a pony.” The statement hung in the air. Conflicting greatly with the typical didacticism that Twilight normally spoke with. “Where I come from, a pony is but a breed of horse that is smaller than the wild steed.” “You aren’t where you came from.” “Fair enough, but what evidence do I have that this is not the road to the gods? That this is not merely the afterlife as promised by the priests of the Flying Trout?” “Since when does a Flying Trout have priests?” “Since around the year 62 of my world, dear. When the Flying Trout first took his form among mortal dwarves, and gave them hope for their salvation in his worship. Of course, I was never the kind to worship a god who refused to reply, so I let my practices slide a bit.” “What kind of god would refuse to answer to their subjects?” “All of them. The flying trout, the demon of the goblins, of course, they also have a demonic deputy, giving, if anything, more credence to their purpose. But the greater question is, what kind of god do you have, what gives him or her the right to talk with their subjects?” The dwarf laughed. “You must be kidding me. A god that actually talks with their subjects?” “Yes, in fact I’m her chosen student” the unicorn gestured towards herself with a hoof. She was clearly proud of herself. “What kinda fortress are ye running here?” The dwarf’s eyebrows furrowed. “Where there can be people who are actually students by profession? That seems a bit strange doesn’t it?” “Not really. I’ve been Celestia’s chosen student since I was a filly.” She closed her eyes for a moment, either remembering something or hiding from the dwarf’s reaction. “Besides, this isn’t a fortress, this is a town, a town called Ponyville.” “Wow really abstract name there dear. My own fortress was called ‘The Ideas of Mourning’” he sighed before muttering something about how the fortress had little but sadness. “Did it really have all that much mourning?” Twilight’s face saddened at this. “Not really. I was the only one who felt it. Five of my friends died, my wife and daughter perished in an invasion. I’m the only one who felt all that. “That sounds awful.” “You can’t even imagine, my little purple pony-horse.” The glow of the magic cut out, leaving Tholumom to fall to the floor. “Why did I scare you?” “You heard what I said about unicorns killing my civilization’s hunters, right?” The unicorn nodded. “Yeah, our most disliked ‘allies’, the elves, ride them into battle against us when they believe that we have committed a crime against nature by chopping down trees. They pierce us with their horns, leaving many to die in their wake. All for a little timber” He laughed, “But of course, looking at you more closely, you are not that kind of unicorn. Your horn is not particularly sharp, you are purple, and you have a mane that resembles what a little girl of my world would have as a haircut.” He paused looking at the semi-stunned state of the unicorn before him. “Which compliments your freakishly large eyes very well by the way.” “I’ve never seen another pony act that violently. I’ve also never seen an felf riding another pony into battle.” “That would be a good thing my dear, for the elves are the only race that doesn’t worship a demon that persists in the practice of eating their enemies.” Twilight was once again stunned. “Are- are you serious?” “Unfortunately Miss..?” “Twilight Sparkle” “Miss Sparkle, I am completely serious. Of course, they never seem to realize that we have quite a few traps set up to murder them if they are aggressive.” Twilight blinked at the word murder. “Kill them if they are trying to kill you, doesn’t that sound somewhat extreme?” “Not really. We enjoy our life, and whether or not we choose to use the equally inexpensive and effective cage trap is none of their concern. They’d die anyway… If in a hundred or so years.” “How are you so immune to death?” “Its pretty easy when you see people die around you every day. It doesn’t hurt any less when it’s a friend, or lover… most dwarves can absorb the pain in seeing at least three loved ones die before they go crazy.” Tholumom grimaced. “Now I think I’ve talked enough. I’m actually quite thirsty, and hungry.” “Would you like hay sandwiches?” “What?” “Hay as in-” “For horses. I’m an omnivore. I guess I can understand you ponies not being omnivores, but I am.” “Well, I’d appreciate if you didn’t act on your omnivorous urges while you are here. Of course, we do have eggs.” “Yes, you are a female, thus you have eggs. Unfortunately that doesn’t help me figure out what I’m going to eat.” “You can eat eggs from a chicken.” “I wonder why I assumed that you were talking about the other kind of egg. Anyway, that sounds good. After all, I’m not part of my old civilization, so my values should adjust to meet the civilization that I am in.” “You’re saying that like it will be easy.” Twilight rolled her eyes. “Come on, let’s see if I can’t make you something edible out of an egg.” She started out of the room. “I’m never going to get used to that voice from a horse.” Tholumom said to himself. “I’m not a horse!” Twilight groaned. “Definitely going to take a long time to become used to this. I wonder where they brought my hammer and pickaxe to?” Author's notes: If you liked this initial bit of a story, I like to hear about it, of course if you didn't I'd like to know why. Dislikes aren't helpful to anybody but the reader, comments about why you didn't like it is helpful to the author, and eventually the reader himself. PartiesTholumom Lathonudlerned has been very unhappy recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has had a mediocre drink recently. He has looked at a masterful engraving of his family and been saddened. He has slept in a decent Alder bed recently. He has complained about the inclement weather recently. He has been angered at his conscription recently. He has been frustrated with his failure in combat recently. He has been terrified by a unicorn recently. He has eaten a decent omelet recently. He is thirsty He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. When he is angry, his hands clench into fists. When worried, he tends to use threats often. His nose is broken. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. “And that’s how Equestria was made.” The pink pony said to the dwarf. “I must learn how you grew rocks. If I was at home, my people would love to know how.” The omelet was enough to sate the dwarf’s hunger. Spike prepared it on a relatively normal stove-top, similar to the kitchens at home. The kitchen; however was larger, and contained an area for eating, not that dwarves really used their dining rooms, a simple chair would do, or perhaps even just standing over the barrel in the stockpile as they ate whatever they found to their liking. The dwarf sat at the table, in a chair that was frilly, beyond the aesthetic frivolity of the elves, but made well enough for the dwarf to justify sitting on it. Across from him the pink pony slouched over the table, examining him. “Silly, that doesn’t work in other worlds.” “What?” “Rock farming only works in Equestria.” “That’s too bad. It would do great services for my people.” The dwarf sighed. “We are the most skilled masons, blacksmiths, and craftsmen in my world, we can make almost anything; we are limited only in time and resources. We make things that last forever, but we make things of impacable beauty and complexity. Our artifacts-“ “What’re those? They sound like they taste good.” The pink pony bounced around a lot. Tholumom wondered if she was one of those creatures whose strength could never be exhausted. “No.” The dwarf wore a scowl. “Eating an artifact, unless it was an artifact meal, would get you killed by any reasonable dwarf.” “That’s silly.” She laughed. “If everypony was that stern, then we wouldn’t have any fun around here, not even in one of my famous parties.” “I’d love to attend one of those. Do you hold them in legendary dining room?” “What would make a dining room legendary?” “The worth of everything in the room would cumulatively be worth somewhere around ten thousand copper coins.” “Well… I don’t know how many bits there are to a copper coin, but I’m sure that we have at least a grand dining room.” “Pinky, I never explained the degrees of worth to a room’s worth, how did you figure that out?” The purple unicorn walked in to the kitchen, “Don’t ask that of Pinkie. The answer eludes the bet of us, and drove me mad for a while.” “As in throwing a tantrum, or melancholy?” “I would not know the difference.” “Silly, a tantrum would involve you lashing out at other ponies and their property, you’re still around, and haven’t thrown yourself into a water filled ditch, so you weren’t melancholy.” Twilight’s mouth gaped open. Tholumom laughed. “Pinkie, I don’t even care that you seem to have knowledge about my world. I love you, you funny pony.” Tholumom had heard stories about the seers of elves, not good stories, but stories that testified to their extensive foreknowledge of the events of the future. Naturally, elvish seers never told anyone anything helpful, but they divined what had happened to people who visit them. This is, oddly enough, the only stable source of income that elves have ever managed to wrangle. “Are you sure that you aren’t an elvish seer?” “Yes I am silly. I’m an earth pony.” “I know, I know, but you know about the future, and the nature of the world that I come from.” “That’s my Pinkie Sense.” “Sounds useful.” Twilight broke in again. “You have no idea. The entire town listens to her arbitrary warnings that really don’t shed any light on the nature of the prediction.” Tholumom looked at her strangely, “You don’t seem like the type to accept that kind of superstition. Or at least if those questions you were getting to were any indication of who you actually are, you like to know things.” “I’m a student of Celestia. Of course I have to ask questions, but mostly I study magic.” Grinning proudly at the dwarf, the dwarf found himself uncomfortable. “You aren’t a necromancer are ye? That kind of magic doesn’t deserve the study that they put into it.” “No, of course not. I wouldn’t dare mess with the cycle of life and death.” “Good, if you were a necromancer, your skull would make a wonderful totem. I’m glad that I don’t have to do that to my rescuer.” The dwarf’s expression morphed back into a smile as he expressed his gladness that Twilight was, not, in fact learning how to bring back legions of the undead to haunt the living. The pink pony continued to smile throughout the explanation, despite the obvious threat to her friend. “What is this fixation on death and punishment?” Twilight was, naturally, concerned after the aforementioned threat. “I mean, your world can’t possibly be that harsh.” “No, it’s far worse. If you disappoint the nobility, ye would be hammered into either a terrible death, or near death. Our medicine can be useful, but due to the continual plight of the soap-makers, you are almost certain to die of an infection from the wounds of your hammering. All because the nobility forgot that the fortress was not situated in an area where glass isn’t possible to obtain.” Tholumom’s face glowed bright red. His hands clenched into fists, almost as though he desired to fight. “Besides, who are you to judge our culture; I don’t know what the situation is like in Equestria, but in the world of the Everlasting Pulley, you can’t imagine the kinds of challenges that my race has to deal with on a daily basis. Perhaps it is our fault; nevertheless, we have lived like this for nearly four thousand years.” Faltering, his voice began to fall. “And perhaps, with our ways, we’ve finally caused our end.” Finally hitting a whisper “But that doesn’t matter to me, what I had perished… long before…” “Are you okay?” Twilight was concerned for the dwarf, she still wanted to know more before he went “Melancholy” and threw himself into the Everfree river. “Aye. I’ve had a long hard time before I came here. Filled with innumerable joys and sorrows, angers and calms, lovers and enemies. I’ll live a bit longer.” A smile bloomed on his face. “Besides, if what this small pink creature has told me is true, a party would bring me great joy.” Twilight stared at him. “I guess that I can allow a party. Just so long as you allow me to pick your brain about what happened to you,” she stared off into the distance. “and your civilization.” “Certainly Miss Sparkle, I’ll tell you about the issues that I am incredibly sensitive about, and I’ll also tell you about that world that I lived in before now.” The pink pony laughed before suddenly becoming incredibly serious, a scowl spread across her features, and she glared at Twilight. The dwarf considered intervening in this obvious fight, but realized that the fight between the two would be more interesting than anything that he foresaw happening otherwise. “Twilight, how can you not see that he doesn’t want to talk about his civilization, family, and world?” “I’ll be nice about it Pinkie. If what he said is true, then he is the last bastion of his culture, world, and, indeed, species, I need to write it down, his history is no less valuable than ours.” “If I can interrupt, I can accept that, just so long as I get a drink. Preferably with alcohol.” “I guess that’s not too much to ask.” Twilight said, rolling her eyes. “What? Do you have something against booze?” “No… Well… maybe… kinda…” Conflicted, Twilight attempted to balance her open-mindedness with her dislike for mind-altering drugs. “Let me explain what you are trying to say, Miss Sparkle, you don’t like to drink alcohol because it impairs your ability to think clearly, but other than that, you have no specific objection to it.” “I guess.” The unicorn shrugged. “Do I really have to drink?” “Common enough excuse, perfectly valid reason to avoid alcohol, but where I come from” The dwarf smiled and put his leg up on the unmentioned chair that he had been sitting on, “it is more commonly used by humans who realize that they can’t handle the same kind of alcohol intake as a dwarf.” “Yeah, don’t try to start a drinking contest with Applejack.” “Is that the name of a pony, or the alcohol itself?” “Applejack is the element of Honesty, she also happens to be the local apple farmer, and naturally, the cider producer of the town.” “I’m sure that she’s honest enough.” The dwarf laughed, “But she does realize that she is named after an alcoholic beverage, right?” “All I’ve ever had was cider... “The unicorn shrugged. “Gah! How can you ponies live without an endless variety of booze, all of which has virtually the same effect?” Mock horror dripped from the voice of the dwarf. The pink pony walked out with the unicorn. “It always helps when the booze is actually good.” Tholumom thought about this for a second; then shrugged. “Where I’m from, that never really mattered.” He followed the two out from the kitchen. Cider and The EverfreeTholumom Lathonudlerned has been very unhappy recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has looked at a masterful engraving of his family and been saddened. He has slept in a decent Alder bed recently. He has complained about the inclement weather recently. He has been angered at his conscription recently. He has been frustrated with his failure in combat recently. He has been terrified by a unicorn recently. He has eaten a decent omelet recently. He has had an excellent drink recently. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. When he is angry, his hands clench into fists. When worried, he tends to use threats often. His nose is broken. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. “And that’s why we make our cider the old fashioned way.” The earth pony with three apples as her cutie mark said amiably. She sat on a bale of hay in a barn that was of pleasant composition to the dwarf, though the idea of painting wood was new to him. Generally structures lasted long enough to outlive the dwarves that constructed them. “Why would that sour your appreciation for new ways of doing things? Just because one way that is new does not work, doesn’t mean that all new ways will fail.” The dwarf shook his head at the orange pony in the Stetson. “You wouldn’t understand. My family has been doing it for around a hundred years, since the founding of Ponyville actually.” Having said this, she hoisted a mug of cider to the dwarf. The dwarf looked at her hooves suspiciously as she passed it to him, not quite sure how she was holding the mug. “Mhm… Either way, you make great cider Applejack.” The dwarf opened another barrel and drank. “Yah know that yah’ll be paying for that, right?” The orange pony frowned as he drained a barrel of cider, one that would have fetched a hefty price of three hundred bits. “Jeez, I know, I know. Don’t get your ponytails in a bunch.” The dwarf snickered at his awful pun. “Ah’d never put up with you, Ah don’t see what reason Twilight could have fer keepin’ ya around.” “Nice little vote of confidence. I will help out around the farm, or somewhere. Do you happen to know anyone who needs a miner, or perhaps someone to crush things with a hammer?” The dwarf’s evasiveness brought an unhappy look to the apple farmer. “Ah don’t know anypony that would need either of those things.” “Are the creatures of the Everfree valuable in the products that may be harvested from their bodies?” “Ah wouldn’t recommend it. Maybe. You could always talk to Zecora about that, though I don’t see how such a weakling like you could possibly combat the dangerous creatures of the Everfree.” The pony spat into the dirt. “Those abominations are the only reason that we don’t have a stable supply of Zap Apples.” “I’d challenge you to a drinking contest, but I’d imagine that you want payment for the cider I’ve already consumed before you’re willing to allow me the honor of beating you with my dwarven alcoholic tolerance.” The dwarf wore a smirk on his face the entire time, Applejack smiled. “Now that yah mention it, I can see why you aren’t despised by everypony in town already. Y’all seem ornery enough to take on a hydra-“Tholumom laughed, “What’s so funny about a hydra?” “I’ve seen worse.” The dwarf grasped towards his belt, “Damn… Forgot about that.” “Forgot about what sugahcube?” “Twilight and her friends decided that it would be a good idea to take my war-hammer and pick axe.” The dwarf shrugged. “Maybe they thought that being naked was the right way for me to recover. Maybe it was, but I still need to get back my hammer and pick axe.” “Well don’t go anywhere yet, you owe me a few hours gathering apples before I can let that cider barrel off my mind.” “Really? my hammer would make an easier job of that.” “Well Ah don’t want you to ruin my trees for the harvest.” “Fair enough. How do I get the apples down?” “You buck the tree” “Is that a euphemism, because it sounds like something that humans would say when they really meant-“ “True, but not what Ah’m talking about right now.” “Okay then. So when I buck an apple tree I do what?” “Kick it to shake the apples free.” The dwarf looked strangely at this diminutive creature. The orange pony claimed to have a strength that would impress most of the most elite dwarven military groups, certainly above the caliber of himself. “Are you sure that I can’t do something else for you, like dig out a labyrinth of tunnels beneath your farm for the storage and fermentation of cider?” “I’d like to have you do that too, but Ah’m afraid that I can’t imagine that working out well.” Applejack was more than a little bit cynical about the abilities of this creature who had just drank enough cider to make three ponies pass out. The dwarf was, of course, offended. “Dwarven mineshafts are as safe as being out in the open air. In most cases, significantly safer.” The dwarf beamed, proud of his only contributions to his race. “Sure, but that doesn’t mean that I feel like I can trust you with the safety of mah farmhouse.” She added after a moment, “yet.” the dwarf glowered at Applejack. “Now come on ya wierdo, don’t be like that. Ya should know by now that I don’t feel the burn of glower-power.” “I’m sure that when I repay you five-fold, I’ll probably earn that trust.” The dwarf’s goofy smile as he said this only served to make Applejack laugh. “Sure, yeah right, five-fold.” “Don’t worry, I’ll come through eventually. After all, I do have around ninety-five years left in my life before senility might begin to make my connection to the world tenuous.” “So you dwarves, you live a long time?” “The oldest I’ve heard of was around one hundred seventy years old. What a wonderful old woman, twelve kids, all of whom have grown up and applied themselves. They even promised her that they would promise to finish a mood, contribute to the future of the fortress, and confine themselves to a single child at a time. Not something that you often see in my culture, but seeing it, I’m surprised that everybody didn’t pick up those ideals.” “Save your philosophy for later Thol.” The pony gestured outside the barn, “You need to start workin’ the trees.” Applejack then led the dwarf to the orchard. When she explained what she wanted him to do, he winced. He had an entire hill to clear of apples, without even the convenience of a hammer or ladder. When he brought this issue up with Applejack, she laughed, comparing his physical constitution to Twilight. Naturally, he did that one thing that dwarves were designed to do as the last defence; pick up a rock, and call it a weapon. There just so happened to be a boulder lying around, named Bill. Tholumom knew that it was named bill because on it, there was a message engraved on it, “my name is Bill.” faintly, probably produced by some dabbler learning the ropes of engraving. And so he picked up Bill, moving like a glacier up and down the hill, slamming it against the trees, breaking at least ten out of the hundred or so(too bad those trees were the largest), but somehow he managed to eventually break all of the apples from their stems. The dwarf stood at the top of the hill, admiring the destruction that he had wrought-- along with the destruction that he managed to avoid. Broken trees were littered across the various paths of the orchard, he did not think that this could be anything but expected, so he did not attempt to clean the trees up. The apples littered the ground in much the same manner as the clothing of defeated goblins and kobolds littered certain parts of the fortress. Once again, he chose to leave the apples on the ground, but this was more due to his lack of knowledge about where the orange pony wanted the apples to end up. the dwarf did not think of the various barrels and tubs that were often already half-full of apples as he passed them on his way out of the orchard. Instead of reporting the job’s completion to Applejack, the dwarf instead chose to go back to his temporary quarters at Twilight’s. He lounged around the library, occasionally even reading a few words at a time from a book. Twilight was busy, studying for some kind of exam; she put too much forced concentration into her study for it to be a mere casual, unnecessary interest. The dwarf however, had no motivation to study so intently, indeed he merely desired to collect his armaments, maybe even put on some clothes. The dwarf whistled a tune as he searched the library, very slowly undoing all of the work that Spike and Twilight had put into organizing the non-book items. After ruthlessly dismantling the ground floor and the second floor, he finally found the hammer, pick axe, and associated leather armor in the corner of his own room. Afterwards, the dwarf found it hard to stay put, several years of mostly idling had left his muscles weaker than they should have been, his mind unfocused on the tasks that were presented to him, and a general rustiness in his mining skill. His hands ached from their lack of use, and his back hurt from the literal slump which had impressed itself not only upon his mind, but upon his back. Having suited up for his digging expedition (for the sake of dwarven science), he heard something that sounded unusual, but not familiar. Strangely enough it seemed to match the general description of Applejack’s voice, exceedingly angry though. “CONSARNIT TWILIGHT, WHERE IS THAT DANGED DWARF?” The voice rumbled throughout the library. The dwarf had two things come into his mind, first the possibility of accepting his fate from that orange pony with a hat, or fleeing. Strangely enough, Tholumom chose the former option despite the tendency of his race to wall themselves into a room of magma in order to avoid work. He walked out of his room, through the hallway, then descended the flight of stairs to the ground floor. Applejack was indeed there, a vein throbbed on her head. “Hiya Applejack.” “Y’all weren’t seriously going to try and get away with what ya did to mah orchard, are ya?” “Nah, I did what you told me to do, nothing more, nothing less... Except perhaps for breaking a few trees.” The dwarf exposed his teeth in order to do something he once did quite often, smile awkwardly. “Sorry about those trees though, I suppose that I should have told you?” “Darnit dwarf, what in all of your dumb cogitation gave you the impression that I wouldn’t mind a ‘few’ of my trees being broken? Are ya reallah serious?” The dwarf pressed his index fingers together, recalling the gesture he once made often as a child, whenever his mother caught him doing something wrong he would simply express the guilt, not through words, but through the contact of his two fingers. “I’m sorry Applejack, I told you that I could not hope to kick the apples down, so I enlisted the help of Bill.” Twilight’s eyes went wide at the mention of that rock. “How could you possibly know about Bill?” “He was just lying around in the orchard, the name Bill was scrawled on it in virtually unreadable engraving.” The dwarf shrugged. “I don’t know who engraved it, but it was clear that they had very little experience in the ways of manipulating rock.” “Don’t ya mean ungupulating?” “If I meant to use my fingernails to perform a task that requires skill, then I would use that word. Unfortunately, as far as I can tell, there is little difference between your foreleg extremities and your hindleg extremities, so I suppose that I can give you credit for using the word that is correct for you ponies.” The dwarf shrugged when Twilight lifted an eyebrow at him. “What? Sometimes I just feel the need to make sure that the etymology of the word fits what I am doing.” “Etymology smetymology,” the orange pony dismissed the dwarf’s argument, “I don’t care about the apples on the ground, Applebloom and her friends, as it turns out, have found that they can do that without messing up, so y’all are off the hook for that. Those trees that you broke, I need ya to replant them and remove the trunks.” “I understand Applejack... Now that I have my pick axe, can I dig you that extensive cellar system?” “Bucking hell! What do Ah have to say to get ya to leave the ground beneath my farm alone?” “Let me dig you the finest cellars from here to Appaloosa!” “Not today dwarfy.” Twilight finally found a reason to interrupt. “You will be going over your civilization with me in the afternoon. In the evening, you have a party that you asked for from Pinkie.” “Fine Applejack, Twilight, I’ll just take care of planting some new saplings for you Applejack. I should be back in time for your whatever it is Twilight.” “Saplings? Who said anything ‘bout saplings?” “Do you really intend to have me plant full grown trees?” The dwarf sighed, expecting the worse from the orange earth pony in front of him. “Yes... but-” the orange pony paused at the expression of dismay that the dwarf showed. “-You can actually just dig my cellar tomorrow.” The dwarf looked somewhat pleased with himself at this point. “Dammit! Just plant some more trees in their places and I’ll have no problem with you! Stay away from my cider!” Applejack stormed off suddenly out the door, causing Twilight to wonder why Applejack was so mad at the dwarf, what did the cider have to do with anything? “What was that about?” “I think that your friend underestimated the amount of cider that dwarves typically consume.” “How much is that?” The unicorn attempted to obtain a parchment and quill covertly. “Come on now Twilight, if you’re going to take notes, do it, don’t pussyfoot around it because I might not be in a good mood. The average dwarf can consume around sixteen gallons of alcohol at once. I can consume around eighteen which places me around the top three percent of drinkers in all of the mountainhomesphere.” “Where does all that go?” “Into our blood. We absorb food and drink very rapidly.” “How long do dwarves typically go between drinks and meals?” “Sometimes a day, sometimes a month. It really depends on the situation, I know that dwarves that are injured, or have bled out recently typically need to drink more water to stave off dehydration.” The sound of scratching on parchment was incessant by now. Vaguely Tholumom knew that she was extrapolating a lot more information than she should, expanding upon points in notes when notes themselves are meant to be short and to the point. “Are you enjoying writing out more than what I say?” Twilight nodded. “Good then, I wouldn’t want you to get worked up about the sheer volume of notes that you put yourself through.” The scratchings on partchment only intensified after he said that. He sighed, “Did you just-” twilight nodded “That’s what I thought. Just please, don’t overdo it. I wouldn’t want the blood of a scholar on my hands.” Oddly enough, or so it seemed to the dwarf, the purple unicorn perked up at this. “So the water is stored in the blood?” The dwarf nodded. “As far as I can tell, it is in yours too.” Twilight shot him an angry glance, which went ignored as he looked out the door gruffly, considering whether he should do what Applejack desired, or do something else. “Are your people ruled by a monarchy or a-” Twilight was interrupted by a crash from the kitchen, “Sorry Tholumom, but I need to check on Spike” As she said this, a moan issued from the kitchen. She galloped away. The dwarf chuckled “So that’s what animal traps are for.” EverfreeTholumom Lathonudlerned has been content recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has eaten a decent omelet recently. He has had an excellent drink recently. He has had the satisfaction of learning what an animal trap does. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. When he is angry, his hands clench into fists. When worried, he tends to use threats often. His nose is broken. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. The dwarf returned to the library, feeling exerted after his twofold labor on that day. That Applejack, that one single pony had forced him to work harder than the final confrontation with the demons of hell. He opened up the door, barely able to concentrate, but happy to have succeeded in travelling this far in such duress. The inside was dark, an unexpected treat, “Wow, just like home in the fortress. Poorly lit as always. Come on, turn on the lights you ponies.” A groan emanated from the darkness. “Party pooper.” The lights turned on, revealing Pinkie Pie’s disgusted expression. “Come on Tholumom Lathonudlerned, Deep Dark, you ruined the surprise, but you didn’t ruin the party.” The dwarf smiled at her. “But, my dear, we have only just begun our celebration of a new life and a triumph against death. I can hardly ask for the pleasure of being surprised in addition to that. I’m sorry about that, but I don’t like surprises. Not to men-” The dwarf recoiled as he found a slice of cake shoved into his mouth. “Come on, enjoy the party. You’ve had enough work shoved upon you by AJ.” The dwarf considered the possibilities of what was occurring, but realized that the cake shoved into his mouth was probably meant to stop him from protesting, rather than asphyxiate him. The entirety of Ponyville had gathered in the library to greet the dwarf. Not surprisingly, it was a little bit more cramped than it usually was. All of Ponyville’s party goers were in the library, it was a small town, by any measure except perhaps for the dwarf’s own settlement at first. The memory of that was shrouded by the cider, the exhaustion, and the piece of cake that the dwarf chewed slowly. Like a sea before a goblin demonic leader, the party split in two, letting a single pony pass. A strange, bright unicorn, minty green, her eyes wide, and a strange wide smile on her face. She passed through the crowd. “Can I talk to you, Tholumom?” The dwarf lifted his eyebrow at her seriously, “Where did you learn my name?” She gestured towards a party banner that he had not noticed before. “Okay then, I can see that you have something to talk with me about.” “Yeah... I kind of said that, directly.” the dwarf looked thoughtfully at the young mare, though he was not entirely sure how he recognized her as being young.. “Good, because asking indirectly would be strange. “ “Can I talk to you alone?” “Sure miss?” The young mare led the dwarf to the empty kitchen. “Lyra.” she said her name shaking her flank towards him, exposing a lyre cutie mark. The dwarf was not impressed. “Was that supposed to arouse me?” The dwarf’s face was unamused, suddenly. His eyes looked down into the Unicorn’s, startling her with their hardness. The mint unicorn cringed at the question. “No, not consciously, at least.” The dwarf placed his hands behind his head and yawned. “What was it that you wanted to talk about with me?” “I wanted first to extend my greetings,” the unicorn stood up on two legs, concentrating on her hooves, her horn glowed, and the dwarf’s eyes went wide. “Dear Armok! You can stand on two legs! I’ve never seen such a thing as that!” “What?” “You can stand on two legs! That’s impressive.” The dwarf patted the mint green abomination on her head. “You should show this to the others! I’m sure they would like it!” The Unicorn’s face soured. “You haven’t seen what I can do yet!” her voice was nearly full of desperation. “What is that then?” “I can turn my hooves into hands!” the dwarf looked down at the unicorn’s forelegs, finding that they did indeed end with hands. “That’s marginally less impressive.” “Can you at least give me the courtesy of shaking hands with me?” “What? That’s not how we greet each other where I’m from.” “Show me then.” The dwarf grabbed the unicorn’s hand and curled it into a ball, then hit it with his own knuckles. “That’s how you do it in the mountainhome.” The unicorn was stunned. “Are you okay Lyra?” “That’s what we do...” The mint green unicorn whispered softly, as though in despair. “Did you have any other questions?” Lyra stared off into the distance, an impressive feat considering that she was in a small kitchen inside of a tree. She suddenly snapped out of her daze when the dwarf began to wave his hand in front of her face. “Have you met any humans?” The dwarf had met a few. None that had found him of any interest, neither being very wealthy nor the broker of his fortress, he had very little time to talk to them. “I’ve met a few. Were you looking to have a greeting as a human would have it?” “Yeah.” Lyra looked sheepish and began to fiddle with something on the ground with her legs. “What could possess you to learn about them? They weren’t that interesting. They had very little that we did not, we had more then them in general, and we were smarter, stronger, and a little bit faster. None of that affects the fact that they dominated the peaceful plains of our world, which added up to quite a large amount of land.” “What made them humans?” “They were slightly more lithe than us, taller, not so thin as the Elves, they were decent with tools, but when they could just get a caravan together and head to our civilization, they tended to trade with us rather than learn the artisanship themselves. They were decent traders, and they rarely sold you out to the goblins they noticed around your fortress. Overall, I heard that they were relatively decent creatures. They kept a culture based around servitude of the rich, who would pay for soldiers and guards to defend your village in exchange for some fraction of your crops. What mystifies me is what a nice mare like you could find interesting about those humans, they had little time for music, my dear lyre player, they were more interested in the wealth that they could achieve, than what they could bring by spending it.” “They didn’t like music?” “They traded instruments, but never did I see a guard, merchant, nor any other human that came to our fortress play upon any of their instruments.” The dwarf cringed at the hands that the unicorn had given herself, they would be large on a seven foot tall ogre. “But to your interest, let me shake your hand, in order to avoid being strangled by them.” “What do you mean strangled by them?” the dwarf leaned down to her forelegs, measured them. “You have given yourself hands that are twice as large as is the typical proportion in an average human or dwarf” “I- I thought that having large hands was a good thing.” “Perhaps, but the fact that they don’t fit your body is too disturbing to make that any better. You should reduce the size, trust me, unless you are a mechanic, long hands such as that will get you nowhere. Though I’m surprised that Twilight has never experimented with that transformation, she seems like she would be interested, if only for the concept.” The dwarf toyed with the idea of introducing it to her, perhaps on his own. Lyra was either too shy to do so herself, or had a reason to keep her hand spell hidden. “They would think I was weird if I told them what I know.” Lyra’s eyes were tearing up, fortunately, she had gotten rid of her hands, so the dwarf wasn’t so afraid to hug her, not that he did. “Now Lyra, I’m curious if my humans and your humans are the same. You probably have some research material, you seem like a smart filly, or mare, or whatever the age-gender specific word is for you, otherwise your own opinion would have been eliminated by the ceaseless destruction of your beliefs as a child. I’m sure that you have gone through the constant and mechanical refinement and quality assertion process that is youth.” The Dwarf looked away, staring off into space, perhaps recalling some half-remembered insult that a friend once hurled at him for questioning whether or not the Elves deserved what the dwarves gave them. “You went through that too as a colt too, didn’t you?” “Nah, I went through it as a boy.” The dwarf was not aware that colt and boy were virtually the same in meaning when applied to this context. “What would you do then, if you were in my situation?” “Lyra was quite involved at this point, drawn in to the deception that is the dwarven thought, but in this case, it was truth.” a deep voice boomed through the kitchen. “Shut up pinkie!” Lyra yelled. “Sorry.” The reply crept in from beyond the kitchen. “That’s odd, she was wrong there.” The dwarf was naturally confused. The dwarven mind is commonly known to have relatively little natural inclination towards deception. In fact, it takes training to make a dwarf a good liar, which means that no dwarf who lies is a bad liar. Either way, Pinkie Pie had failed in her normal omniscient presentation of facts that she could not possibly know. “I’d be willing to show you my research materials at some point.” Lyra smiled at the dwarf, pleased that she finally found a good fellow to have a discussion about humanity with. the dwarf smiled, “I’m sure that at some point in the next three months, I can find time to work with you on your quest.” The smile of the dwarf was warm, but also showed its size, enormous, odd because the size of the head was not any larger than what would be expected. Lyra thought about the implications of such a large mouth, so large that a scootaloo might fit inside, which as she thought immediately afterwards, was a strange way to formulate a comparison of size in the first place. The dwarf rejoined the party, leaving the unicorn alone in the kitchen, pondering the possibilities that the dwarf could open up for her. After a few minutes of thinking, she wandered back to the party. “What do you mean that manticore venom isn’t valuable?” The dwarf looked down at the small vial of bodily fluid which he had bashed out of a manticore, it should be worth something. After all, he had beaten a dangerous creature to death to obtain it, right? The hut in the woods was small, with a single room with a cauldron in it. Perhaps Tholumom thought, Zecora was one of those alchemist thingies which could refine poison into something worth more than its weight in gold. “That fluid in your hand, which of payment you do demand, is not venom.” The zebra sighed. “You don’t seem to understand, of what prices you demand, there are better ways to earth your wealth, certainly without risking your health.” “I’m sorry, I guess that I’m not a butcher by profession.” Tholumon smashed the vial on the rim of Zecora’s cauldron. “You silly little thing! Be cautious of what you swing. Else you’ll end in tears, perhaps greater than your only fears.” Zecora grasped for words, but by the relative lack of meaning in her second line of her couplet, she was running out of things to say. “What was that then?” “How can you be so unobservant? Ack! you know no more than a brain dead rodent!” The caudron had begun to bubble in the last minute or so while the dwarf was busy not noticing the cauldron’s boiling. A large eye coalesced out of the boiling cauldron. It glanced around, locking on to the dwarf. When Tholumom noticed that, he paused, considering whether or not he should say hello. “Hello, floating eye thing.” The eye blinked. “You must be deaf.” (If the cauldron’s eye is not read as Plankton, then you are doing it wrong) “No you damnable dwarf. I do not accept greetings from a lowly life form as yourself.” The dwarf drummed on the rim of the cauldron, amused. “Aye, but you did respond. Also I happen to be your creator, so if anything, I’m the superior creature.” “You are a mockery of a biologist. You dropped a flask of urine into this cauldron, you pitiful fool. You couldn’t possibly have any idea that a simple flask of urine would result in my creation.” “Of course I did. All dwarven alchemists are trained purposely to create contemptuous creatures inside of random cauldrons with whatever they have handy.” “You’re lying.” “Yes. Because Dwarven Alchemists don’t exist.” The dwarf laughed. “So I’m not superior?” The cauldron bubbled, furrowing its single eyebrow. “No, my cauldronite, you’re not, perhaps you should stop existing.” “I believe that you are correct.” The cauldron seemed resolved in its tone. The eye in the cauldron disappeared in a puff of logic taking the cauldron with it. “Of such a cauldron you have broke, never should I have spoke.” “I owe you something too, don’t I?” “Yes my minion for the week, do not fear for it shall not be bleak.” “I don’t suppose that you would like a system of catacombs underneath your house for whatever you might need a system of catacombs for?” “I have no need for caves my friend, instead there is something you must rend. Beware its teeth its flashing eyes, for in the darkness they surprise.” “That sounds like fun.” “Fun it may be, but it will be harder than bucking a tree.” “What is it that you want me to... rend?” “A manticore, no more.” “Sure.” “Do you ask anything of me?” “Not really. You should tell me where it is, but beyond that, I can handle it.” “And of those ingredients that I will ask of you?” “I don’t know.” “Well, it would make a nasty stew.” “You should probably tell me about those too.” The dwarf sighed, sitting down on the floor, next to the cauldron’s stand. He could expect an earful. ManticoreTholumom Lathonudlerned has been content recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has eaten a decent omelet recently. He has had an excellent drink recently. He has had the satisfaction of learning what an animal trap does. He has enjoyed combat recently. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. When he is angry, his hands clench into fists. When worried, he tends to use threats. His nose is broken. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. The dwarf stumbled into the basement of Zecora’s treehouse. It was impossibly large; leading him to believe that it had to be a natural cave system that the zebra had tried to convert into a safe basement. His torch burned slowly on his helmet, to which it was fastened. The light could barely penetrate a few meters into the gloom before it was snuffed out by the fog that precipitated from the bottom of the forest’s floor. There was the sound of rushing water nearby. The dwarf frowned. Zecora should not have tried to convert this cave to a basement, it was still very active in terms of animal life, in fact, it was worse than his own fortress’ attempt to turn their cave into a safe place. This cave was tainted, it was in a biome that was savage, the fog itself smelled of half decayed corpses. The dwarf considered Zecora for a moment, wondering if she was a witch, he brushed the idea aside, Zecora didn’t have enough books to be a proper necromancer. The manticore in here was more than a normal manticore, it had to be undead. Anything that died in this cave would be brought back as a zombie in time. Those zombies would only cause the dwarf suffering. He could back out, but that would be an insult to his own honor, not to mention the honor of the ever-dubious Umbral Dyes. He sighed, this would be a bad job. The manticore screeched. It was not undead, the smell of rotting corpses was in fact from rotting corpses, not the necromantic magic that the dwarf expected. He could not say that he was relieved about the lack of undead manticores though. The beast was as tall as most of the structures in Ponyville. Faced with a monster the size of a house, the dwarf was not particularly intimidated. The forgotten beasts of his world were far more toxic and evil than this thing, even with its scorpion tail and rather awful breath. Of course, he thought, the knowledge that his race had defeated greater horrors gave him no advantage in the fight that he was about to take part in. He felt his mind slip away, the burdensome thoughts of the normal day evaporated under the pressure of imminent combat. His hands rippled across the weapon, finding the right place to hold the hammer. Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale. He opened his eyes, sucking in the darkness, he saw every detail he needed for the fight, no more. He tightened the grip, closed his eyes, and let his cerebral cortex do what it did best: move. Left arm extend, angle upwards, apply counter force on torso. Legs retract, bear load, lean forward, legs extend. Calculate distance, leverage right arm, left arm down. Bear load, adjust legs, prepare legs for landing. The creature screamed, but his memory captured it without context. His eyes saw the blood spew from the arteries of the beast, but never assigned any other sense to go with them. The blood formed the shape of a spear impacting the creature as it sprayed out. The scream formed a horror that could taunt the dwarf at any time without trigger, as it had no context. The vision of the creature’s eyes glazing over as the last of the blood emptied out, the almost soulful stare, as though it had simply asked the dwarf why. Without context, the images of the manticore attempting to inflict wounds on the dwarf could not be held to be images of the same manticore that died, examining him as though he had committed a sin. Death in this world, well, it bothered him. Back in the Ideas of Mourning, death was constant, expected(even if it was not welcomed), but here, the notion that death was just as constant plagued him. He had killed the other manticore, without the same moral crisis, without the same feeling of wrongness, but now, the contractual killing seemed something that should be abhorrent. The sensation was alien to him. There was noone else here to hold him up, to glorify his kill, which had been a product of a simple mistake, who would know that manticore urine mixed with mystery Zecora potion would end with the cauldron disappearing? It was his fault that he ended up killing this relatively innocent predator, which, despite his own omnivorous pride, he knew would end up hunting the more troublesome, smaller predators that might otherwise come to live in Zecora’s basement, and that he could not protect her from the wrath of the smaller predators as well as this very large one. He sighed, the basement was sketchy enough, now all that he needed to do before he would leave was to remove the liver, spleen, and venom gland of the manticore. Grudgingly, he removed the diagram showing where the various organs were from his pocket, Zecora really did want something more than manticore urine this time around. The dwarf pulled out a knife, beginning the grisly process. He was still no butcher, cutting into organs that he would have wanted to avoid, namely the colon, the appendix, and the gizzard. How he managed to do this was beyond his own powers of failure-mode description. Each time, a new and terrible scent wafted out, distinct from blood, and each other. The Colon was unpleasant, but the smell of the appendix had an unsavory sweetness to it, maybe the ponies really did feed cupcakes to their animals, as the yellow pegasus said. That, of course, was silly, nobody in their right minds would bother taking care of the animals without a reason to do so. The gizzard popped, spewing the scent of rotting meat into the air. The dwarf grimaced, this was taking a lot longer than expected. The dwarf did obtain the organs that he was tasked with, eventually. The liver, spleen, and venom glands weighed him down as he returned, listlessly to the treehouse where Zecora eagerly awaited his return, or he hoped that she did. It would be cruel to kill a creature that, for once, had no desire to consume his flesh as its next meal, especially one that was a bit beyond the culinary tastes of the dwarf, or a common human, goblin, or even Elf. Perhaps if the dwarf put some spices on it and called it Goblin... The dwarf halted the thought with a strong disgust, he was already outside the tree, its windows glowing their ethereal shades of blue or green, or purple, but never yellow. He entered, the zebra was doing something or other, but Tholumom could barely focus on the area around him. In his deep thought, his eyes focused on one point, his brows furrowed, as though to help his concentration. When Zecora looked at the dwarf, she could have sworn that some kind of mountain was growing out of his head. “What seems to have happened...” Zecora did a short imitation of the dwarf himself, before continuing without a rhyme. “Are you okay? It certainly seems that you have not enjoyed what you said would be like play.” “Why? Why Zecora, why did I have to kill that manticore?” “So killing is not in your nature?” The dwarf glared at her. “I was never like those kids at home. They were always talking about the ‘day when they’d get their first kill’. They were mad. I preferred to avoid violence, I think that I’ve forgotten about it until now. Those... Whatever.” Zecora believed that the dwarf should have been crying by now, “So you are not okay?” The dwarf could barely walk, so as his race often did, when confronted with a philosophical dilemma, he sulked back to the library. The pouch full of bits that a guilty Zecora had given him jingled on his belt. He had gone into the Martial Trance before, hadn’t he? Tholumom’s nights as a child were often filled with stories of the warriors who came out of the Martial Trance victorious, wise, and powerful. The dwarf had gone into the martial trance before. First during the Goblin Siege that resulted in the death of his wife, then during the fight against the soulless demons that haunted the bowels of the world. The first time, obviously, he had fought for himself alone; that was the function of the Martial Trance, its curse. It saved the life of an individual, but in that state, nobody could care for anything but themselves. And in this selfish adaptation of biology, the savior of the adventurer as it might be, it was beginning to take on a character that called to question the ancient reasonings of the dwarves. If he was not a dwarf in his reasoning, what could he be? He didn’t worship demons, so he couldn’t be a Goblin; he did not eat the corpses of his enemies, so he would stand out as an elf; there were too many idiosyncrasies that made humanity an implausible option. No, Dwarves were relatively accepting of beings until they tried to kill them, unfortunately, the assumption that an unknown being was not in fact trying to hug you when it started walking towards any given dwarf was foreign to most of the surviving species as a whole. Was it his fault that he fell back on the evolution proven assumption of hostility. Could nature be blamed when the creature accused, the committer of a heinous injustice towards a relatively innocent party. Eventually, The dwarf gave up on the thought. There was little that could be gained by self reflection when there was no word for what his words brought him too, except perhaps for guilt. But the dwarf wondered, what could that mean? Was it a guilt about the manticore’s unnecessary death? The mercenary career that he had committed himself to without forethought? Or was the guilt spawned by his betrayal of beliefs? The dwarf shook his head, those were not issues that any being before him, after him, or even his peers could answer. The feeling he felt now was not congruent with the self-loathing aspects of his species, it was not the dreaded melancholy, which would invariably lead to his death by self-inflicted drowning. His thoughts were interrupted by a shady pair of pegasi looking generally shady, if the dwarf wasn’t certain that they were only imitating the fashion of sneaking that goblins employ, he would be worried, they were doing such an awful job of sneaking, that, in fact, it was clear that they were trying to go for, what was it that the stupid human teenagers said, “Swag”? He would have written them off as ponies pretending to be pickpockets if it was not for the suits that they wore. Oddly enough, their sneaky-esque posture did not provoke the traditional Dwarven Response. Instead, he was intrigued by the fact that they had been following him, especially after he had entered the Library. “Spiike! Would you mind preparing three of any particular type of drink which you are able to prepare?” The dwarf shouted. “Does that mean coffee or-” The reply flowed out from the kitchen, carrying the dragon’s sense of bravado, clearing exposing Spike’s confidence about his ability to prepare sub-standard drinks for anypony that was around. “Whatever it is, it will do. We have some guests.” “Did Twilight say that you could boss me around however you like?” “Yeah Spike. She did say that you were as much my slave as her’s.” “I’m not her slave. What would give you-” “Really? You do the housework, your catalogue the library, with the help of your overseer, you cook, you take letters and notes for her. You were taken care of by her after being snatched by Twilight at some point in the past-” “Okay-Okay! When you put it that way my life makes a lot more sense. Does that explain why I love Twilight?” “Stockloam syndrome.” The dwarf felt no need to continue his explanation after that awful reference. “What?” “Nevermind dragon! Make me some variety of foul herbal concoction to make your masters cringe.” “O-Okay...” Spike trailed off, backing off into the sink, where he was told to clean dishes by his mistress, uncertain of how seriously to take the new realization that he was essentially acting as a slave. The dwarf sat down at a table near the door. “So, do you ponies want to talk to me, or steal my children?” One of the pegasi glanced over towards the dwarf, “We aren’t here for you. We are here to bring Miss Sparkle to an urgent meeting with Princess Celestia.” The pegasus stifled a smile at the strange creature, professionalism was apparently important, even when dealing with a relatively immature creature of unknown genus, species, or income range. “Why were you following me around then?” The dwarf had seen the way that they skulked around, it was rude for any person to come in another person’s house, but government agents could not enter anyone’s house without some reason, or at least a strong familiarity. “We weren’t, just because you happen to be staying here for a small amount of time, does not make you our quarry.” “Okay then.” The dwarf, despite his belief that the pegasi was lying, felt left out of the loop all of the sudden. It was odd enough that these government agents were not interested in an alien(who has been defeating beasts behind the border of the country), but they were interested in some kind of magical-savant-egghead with a horn and purple(or as she would refer to herself as “Lavender”) colored pony with no appreciable talent for anything beyond a temporary suspension of the physical laws of the universe. What could she do that he couldn’t? Other than the whole magic thing, nothing, maybe she can process grass in her digestive process, and she was purple, maybe lavender, either way she had a far cooler color scheme than his own pale skin with brown hair, brown eyes, and other relatively normal humanoid color schemes. Maybe she was a more interesting character, but why should that stop him? He knows that he can swing an warhammer, with extreme prejudice, occasionally even without any kind of prejudice. He knows that he is a not only a decent miner, but one of the best, probably better than that skill that Rarity probably keeps in a closet, trying to avoid(one whose special talent involves gems does not simply go around making dresses without them). The other pegasus which the dwarf had failed to notice when he climbed up the stairs, returned with the purple pony in question. “So, Stalky Cloud, how has your family been doing?” “Sean has been doing fairly well at his school, but I’m a bit concerned with Polly.” “Really? I thought that girl was too nice to get into any kind of trouble, what kind of trouble is it anyway?” “She’s gotten into parrots.” “Yeah, but unfortunately the birds that we see around the Canterlot-Cloudsdale suburb are not known for their cleanliness. There’s been some bad cases of Southern Flu around there recently. I’m not willing to let her risk that infection, she could be out of school for weeks.” “I’ll see if I can’t get Zecora to whip up something to help with that, Stalky. I’m sure that she’ll be okay.” “I know Twily, but I can’t put the thought aside, you know as a father.” “Come on Stalky, let your kid explore a bit, otherwise she might just join the Cutie Mark Crusaders, and we both know how that would work out for Ponyville.” They both shared a long laugh. Tholumom’s jaws and eyes were open as wide as possible. How could Twilight have such a good relationship with a sketchy government agent. Stalky looked back at him, glaring, “We didn’t come for you, but you are coming along.” “Oh. Okay.” And so the dwarf’s self-confidence and sense of self importance was suddenly restored. If you happen to see any formatting anomalies, tell me, google docs is acting quite odd, as of late. Stars and SunTholumom Lathonudlerned has been content recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has eaten a decent omelet recently. He has had an excellent drink recently. He has had the satisfaction of learning what an animal trap does. He has felt guilt for his part in ending life recently. He has received pay recently. He has felt left out of the loop recently. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. His eyes are brown, his hair is brown, his skin is pale. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. There are few ways to make a dwarf more uncomfortable than placing him in a carriage flying through the sky. The fact that it was flying was almost as unnatural to the brown haired charleton as the fact that it was a carriage, it was even stranger and less useful than those wagons that merchants of all civilizations used to carry large amounts of useless trinkets that apparently had a use “Just past the next town over” perpetually denying any use. Then again, rock mugs were an effective way of making a large number of worthless projectiles perfect for defending against a goblin horde, nobody used them for drinking because rock, as it turns out, tends to be a bad material for making waterproof containers out of. The dwarf was ripped away from the relatively mundane and uninteresting thoughts about the idiosyncrasies of his world’s economy by the sudden invasion of the results of turbulence into his inner ears. Then his breathing was interrupted by the sudden reflex that every living thing that does not fly has to such extreme turbulence, he threw up. Twilight watched the dwarven spectacle with a mixture of disgust and horror, really a fitting mixture giving the retching sounds that could probably be heard on the ground. It would be fortunate if the sound of the dwarf’s pained moans and splatters didn’t cause the pegasi pulling the sky carriage to get sick as well. “Are you okay Tholumom Lathonudlerned?” The unicorn struggled to say the name, but managed in the end. “Your name is really, really long. Is there anything shorter that I can call you by?” The dwarf finished emptying the imaginary contents of his stomach onto the floor of the carriage, and sat back on the bench. “You can call me Thol if you want.” He paused, thinking about something pertaining to his situation, Twilight observed. “What do you think that the princess wants anyway? I hope that she hasn’t called me up because she thinks that I’ve been shoplifting.” “I doubt that, even though I’ve seen you stealing from various food stalls, I doubt that Celestia would care enough, especially since you had no money in the first place.” “That never stopped the hammerer.” The dwarf mumbled to himself. The dwarf perceived Twilight’s confusion at the mention of the Hammerer, but chose to keep silent, ignoring her curiosity. A heavy cloud cover loured over the castle that was affixed to a mountain in a manner that was familiar to the dwarf. Certainly the rulers could not be so bad if they had a proper appreciation for the beauty that a building defying gravity, hugging the side of a mountain, allowing its occupants to look out over the land they possessed, then what judgement could he find being from another culture that appreciated the same style of building, be it a bit less, decadent. The gleaming gold on the castle seemed to amplify the reflected lightning as the carriage passed underneath the thunderstorm. The prospect of thunder was not enticing to the dwarf, especially seeing that he was, in fact, hurtling through the air at around thirty seven world tiles an hour, not that a tile is a good unit of measurement for distance, but that did not occur to the dwarf as the twenty-million-urist lightning bolt struck the ground beneath the carriage. Twilight shrugged. This storm was perfectly safe, its lightning was meticulously planned, or at least that’s what Celestia told her when she refused to come out from underneath her bed for three days as a filly. Of course, now that she knew Rainbow Dash, maybe she should return to the safety underneath her bed. The carriage landed safely. Somehow. The dwarf was presented, upon leaving the carriage, with a sight of a large white horse that seemed to be a few colors short of a rainbow. The dwarf thought of a rainbow, bringing to mind the fact that he had not yet met Rainbow Dash, whose collusive antics with Pinkie Pie had made the dwarf slightly interested, but far more wary of the supposedly multi-colored pegasus. Of course, this thought was interrupted by the simultaneous occurrence of a sudden sheet of rain, and a large lightning bolt striking the Alicorn. The dwarf’s mouth hung open as the lightning seemed to draw out the strike, as if to pain the creature which it maimed. The creature dispelled the lightning bolt, breaking the arc. The creature smiled at the dwarf, its pale magenta eyes examining him kindly. Tholumom, however, had a different reaction to such a demonstration of power. Namely sliding underneath the carriage, hiding from the god-creature. Perhaps it was just another goblin ploy? Their law-giver demons were the only creatures which ruled any civilization which could withstand such a blow from the lightning. Meanwhile somewhere else... “Hey Dashie I was going through Twilight’s stuff and found this stick thingy and I thought that only Rainbow Dash could know what it was so I went looking for you all over Ponyville and I got tired so I ate a cupcake and it was good and then I found you so I decided I would ask what you think this thingy is?” A pink pony asks, pointing to a stick topped with a crescent moon of iron which she had materialized with behind Rainbow Dash. “What do I look like, some kind of egghead?” Rainbow Dash made an attempt to hide the box with ‘swag’ written on it crudely. “I bet that it has something to do with farming or mining.” The pink pony mused examining the pick with her eye telescoping towards the tip of the pick. Her tail twitched five and a half times, "Hmm... Somepony will use four periods instead of three in his ellipsis." “Naah. That couldn’t be. It seems to be a bit too awesome for either of those.” The Rainbow pegasus ignored the latter part of the comment; a pink grammar checker was of no use to the surprisingly athletic egghead. Back at the castle.... The large white creature lowered her head to look underneath the carriage, get a better look at the strange dwarf which was hiding there at the moment. The dwarf retreated a bit further back into the carriage, avoiding the large white Goblin-Law-Giver-Horse thing which had absorbed a lightning bolt with no trouble. He could not best something such as that in normal combat, or in any given combat, no matter how abnormal the combat could be. Tholumom Lathonudlerned is deathly afraid of Alicorns "Come on out Tholumom. Please. I only want to talk to you about your world. Or, more specifically, how you got here." The white Alicorn that Tholumom did not know the name of used a genuinely concerned tone, perhaps she did care for the dwarf a bit. What did that matter? She was obviously a Goblin-Law-Giver! Tholumom knew that there was no way that such a creature could care for such a lowly being as himself. "Stay away Demon! I'll gut you if you come closer!" The dwarf desperately yelled at the creature, praying, for the first time in his life, to the Everlasting Trout. The dwarf grabbed at where his axe should be, but found only an empty loop in his belt. "Dammit! the only time I actually need my warhammer, it's not even here!" He whispered frantically to himself as sheets of rain continued to pour down on the top of the castle landing strip. Meanwhile in that other place... "Hey Dashie, look at this hammer I just found while once again going through Twily's things." "Pinkie, why are you going through Twilight's stuff again? Isn't that kind of breaking a friend's trust?" "She never asked me to promise that I wouldn't go through her stuff when she isn't around." "Okay... Wow, that hammer is pretty cool." "I bet that Applejack could use that for repairing her barn. She'd be all like-" The pink pony began to go through the list of awesome actions that Applejack would do with this hammer, breaking boards into the correct lengths with a single swing of a hammer, forcing nails in so fast that the wood would explode, killing a few Timberwolves, turning them into the door of her new barn. Ironically, the last action, being the most difficult, was also the only one that the warhammer was meant to be used for. Back at the castle... After thirty or so minutes trying to plead with the dwarf to come out, bearing assurances that he would be fine, reassurances from Twilight that Celestia was a benign ruler, and not a demon, whatever that was, and generally trying to make the dwarf come out of his hiding spot under the carriage, Twilight was beginning to suffer from hypothermia from the rain, Celestia was getting bored, and the royal guards had facehoofed so many times that they were dazed. "Okay, Tholumom, if you don't come out, I'm going to move the entire carriage off of you, and you will be apprehended by those royal guards, whose brains are now damaged due to your absurd antics." Celestia's voice was not filled with the same kindness as before, ponies were getting hurt trying to make the dwarf be reasonable. "Never Demon!" The dwarf howled in desperate fury. It would have been intimidating if magic didn't exist, and two of what are arguably the most powerful magic users in the world on that rooftop were struck magic-less. Glowing, the carriage began to rise above the dwarf. When it had cleared him entirely, Celestia threw the carriage off of the castle. Blueblood's estate: Blueblood surveyed his gardens carefully, they were beautiful in the rain. He felt at peace there, sitting under the roof of his new Gazebo, while sheets of rain came down upon his plants. Behind him a crash sounded, he turned around to see his house with a new addition, a pegasus carriage stuck half-buried into his bedroom. He shrugged, he didn't have enough money to build that addition to his bedroom, the carriage would do just fine. Now to find those contractors which he had fired previously. Once again, back at the castle.... "So, you aren't a demon?" The dwarf looked up to the flowing maned creature above him, which happened to, at this point, be glaring at him. "No, I suppose that I am not a demon." "Why didn't you say so?" Tholumom laughed. "Most creatures that can survive being struck by lightning tend to be dragons, amorphous elder-god horrors which exude gaseous poison from their pores and originate from the deepest pits of the earth, or, seeing as you are neither of those two, a demon. That theory seemed pretty good at the time because you are the ruler of the realm and the goblins of my world are also led by a demon, so it made sense at the time that it could, potentially, be the same here." "I'm actually a bit more like an elder-god horror than anything else." Celestia let the line hang in the air for a moment; if she failed to capture this incredibly stupid and annoying creature’s attention for very long, she would kick herself. "What?" The dwarf was surprised causing Celestia to smile, he had fallen for her obvious lie. "Come inside, my student seems to be in danger of dying from the cold." Celestia motioned towards a pale unicorn that sat shivering in the cold rain, glancing between Celestia and Tholumom drearily. "That's never happened to a dwarf. Usually you have to freeze them entirely before they take serious damage." Tholumom studied Twilight where he stood, but did not bother helping her. Celestia looked at him for a moment, it was rather rude to allow somepony else to suffer while they were completely comfortable. "Tholumom, don't you think that it's appropriate that you help Twilight? After all, you seem to be her friend." "Yes... That sounds like a good idea actually." Tholumom grumbled, once again he was reduced to the level of a small child in the eyes of an elder, who looked down upon him with her knowledge and wisdom, and saw an error immediately in his actions. He cursed himself a bit, it made a lot of sense for him to help Twilight, so it was doubly insulting when Celestia reminded him of it. "Sorry Twilight." "It's okay." Twilight's teeth chattered, turning her three syllable sentence into a twenty syllable sentence. "Come on, Tholumom, Twilight, let us go in." Celestia pushed a door open with her magic shortly followed by the mismatched duo. Meanwhile in the Everfree Forest The howl of the timberwolves reverberated in their woodwind fashion, an orange pony runs through the forest. "Applebloom! Where are ya?" it frantically screamed, eyes darting left to right as she ran down the trail into the forest. “Applejack! Help me!” The voice of a filly pierced the air, piercing the orange pony’s heart with its shrillness. A howl from a wolf reverberated across the forest, chilling Applejack’s bones. The farmer ran to the Everfree, eyes wide with fear, her sister could soon enough be no more. A glint of steel shown down from the heavens, flies into a tree. A gleaming steel hammer sticks out of a knothole, threatening a family of owls. Applejack did not have time to think about the owls, so she removed the hammer, it couldn’t hurt, could it? Applebloom had managed to climb up a tree, just in time to be surrounded by vicious wolves made out of wood. Naturally, this was a result of her endless quest for a cutie mark. Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo had managed to escape the wolves, promising to bring somepony back to help her. “Abblepoom! mm ging to sieve do!” The filly’s sister ran into her line of sight, carrying a large hammer in her mouth. “Applejack, seems like a bad time to repair the gazebo, doesn’t it?” The pony swung the hammer at the wolves, denting them slightly, but not to the point where even fluttershy could accept their being hurt. Oh yeah, also Applejack injured her hind legs doing some kind of generic farm work that would sound out of place in an orchard, probably bucking ploughs. Finally, the orange pony rolled a 20 on her hit check. Unfortunately, that lead to splinters flying out of the timberwolf, striking the others, which also happened to be the victims of other twenties, causing a massive thermo-timberwolf chain reaction, killing all of Ponyville in the explosion, especially Applebloom. The pink pony finished telling her tale to the orange farmer. The sheer strangeness of such a story made it incredibly difficult to hold back laughter, or a far more probably uncomfortable silence. “And that’s what your life would be like if you had this hammer AJ.” The rainbow maned pony was stunned. It wasn’t everyday that Pinkie took a tool that they were examining, somehow brought them to Sweet Apple Acres, then explained exactly what would happen if Applejack started using the tool. “Uh, Sugahcube, I don’t quite know how to tell you this, but we aren’t playing Ponies and Paladins, if I rolled a twenty in real life, there would be a useless die on the ground right near the wolves.” “Aren’t you just a little bit concerned about the fact that your little sister was about to die in that story? You being the one who was responsible for her death.” Applejack shrugged. “It’s not like Ah’d ever do anything like that in the first place. Applebloom knows her way around the forest, not to mention that her little group is more dangerous than the average pack of them timberwolves.” “Applejack! Stop ruining my campaign!” Pinkie’s voice carried a conquering tone, assured by the natural confidence of laughter. Her voice carried the confidence of laughter, but lacked the triviality which she normally poured into her conversation. The three of them found themselves in Applejack’s barn, hunched over a table with several sets of die lying anemically beneath a layer of dust. “Now Rainbow Dash, it’s your turn.” Rainbow Dash glanced uncomfortably at Applejack, who nodded at her. “I guess that I’ll make a spot check.” Meanwhile in a room in a precariously perched castle on top of a mountain. The room was tall. Almost six meters tall. A fireplace gently roared with a well contained heat. Revitalizing a lavender unicorn whose hypothermia was a cause for alarm. Near the fire, Twilight, Princess Celestia, and Tholumom sat at a relatively unadorned table, whose surface provided a firm resting place for a strangely shaped pot which would be virtually impossible to determine whether or not there was a similar one in orbit around the sun. Tholumom was draped over a red and gold couch, nearly asleep. The other two talked about things that were normal for students and their teachers to discuss at length, such as the purpose of life, the meaning of harmony, and other perfectly boring subjects such as the origin of the Alicorns. “So that’s how Alicorns work?” Twilight was stunned. Who could have thought that it was so simple, just a single ritual away from godhood. “I mean, why aren’t there more of you if it’s that simple?” “There’s a good reason for that Twilight, but it seems that our guest has a few questions of his own.” Princess Celestia turned towards the dwarf, who had been half asleep during her explanation of whatever an Alicorn is. “Your Highness, I honestly can’t imagine where you got that idea.” Tholumom grumbled. Last time he had seen royalty was when the fortress found the adamantium vein. The upper echelon of nobility tended to move around following the adamantium, of course, that also meant that the fall of civilizations also tended to follow the discovery of adamantium. Anyway, this was still more interesting than that speech which the king had managed to spew for over five hours. “Well, as a miner I’m sure that you’ll be interested in the mineral deposits that exist around Equestria. Our country is famed for its unusually rich supply of magic gems and precious metal.” The princess took a swig of her tea. The dwarf sat up, making a check intentions check. Unfortunately, its hard to understand the expression on someone’s face when only one of her eyes remains uncovered by a billowing mane. “Yes, that is a somewhat interesting subject, your Highness.” “Please, just call me, Your Royal Highness Princess Celestia.” The casual manner which she said this in made it sound as though she was telling him that ‘your Highness’ is too formal. Too bad that her name and title just grew a few syllables. “Okay Your Royal Highness Princess Celestia, what of the minerals and ore in the ground. I know that Canterlot is situated above a vast kimberlite and lamproite vein. In fact, I don’t think that I’ve ever seen both simultaneously in the same vein. Not to mention the massive gems which Twilight has mentioned while in the throes of a nightmare.” “Why were you listening to me while I slept?” Twilight’s tone became accusatory. Tholumom rolled his eyes. “I’m sorry about that, it was a bit strange, wasn’t it? Anyway, you remind me a bit of my daughter, she loved books too. She loved the stories of the past. She also loved learning how things worked. She was a brilliant child. And I couldn’t save her.” The dwarf sighed, but didn’t continue. “I’m sorry Tholumom.” Celestia’s tone became soothing. "Would you like to talk about her?" “Yes. Actually I would.” daughter“This is the story of how my daughter was born.” Tholumom spoke in a quiet, calm, measured fashion, as though he was trying to make himself easier to listen to. “Hey Tholumom!” The other miner shouted from across the room. The meeting hall was large and lively on this day, its polished stone gleaming in the half-hearted rays that made it through the entrance tunnel. Lanterns glowed in a friendly impotence, casting rings of light on the floor. Tholumom was talking to his wife, whose radiance was all he could be sworn to protect. Zustashmabdug had interrupted that. Tholumom motioned for him to come across the room. Zustash obliged him. “The boss has another section for us to mine out. He says that he wants you to start the preliminary digging.” Tholumom shuddered, the boss didn’t request particular workers unless it was a job which carried dangers. “Is the digging dangerous?” Tholumom asked. Zustash shrugged. “I don’t know. The boss just had me notify you. If it helps, it’s on the eastern side of the fortress” “That’s not too bad I suppose.” Tholumom was not intimidated, the geology on the eastern side was made up of mostly igneous rock, strong stuff. “Will you be alright, my love?” His wife nodded, “I might be pregnant, but that doesn't mean that you have to worry for me constantly. I’m a dwarf, we’re built of stout stuff. Go off and take care of the bosses’ work, I know you’ll be okay.” He kissed his wife goodbye. then headed off to the eastern side of the fortress. The eastern side of the fortress was used more as a storage space than a living or working space. As a result, the lanterns were dim, and the stone floors had never felt an engraver’s touch, leaving them rough and ugly with the marks of the pickaxes that opened the cavity in the first place. Tholumom squinted at the marked wall. Felt it with his hands, it was not quite the same feeling as the other walls. The area in the fortress is too dark to see, so he confines his tests to feeling the rock. The rock is not out of place enough to make him worry, so he begins his excavation process. He has taken four hours to dig in five meters, he laughs as he thinks about how he must be a bit rusty, it should have taken him two hours. The work is not exhausting for him, he has done it all his life, and found it to be the best that he could ask for. He gets another meter into the stone before breaking through to the other side. “That’s not right.” The dwarf pauses to get his bearings, the side of the mountain should be at least fifty meters away. He glances into the darkness, and hears the sound of rushing water. Dammit. Underground rivers. It is impossible for the dwarf to continue, digging, but that stops being the priority when a wet slapping noise begins to echo around the cavern. Tholumom knew at that point, that he had found carp. “But carp aren’t carnivores.” Twilight mentioned exhausted by the absurd story. “That doesn’t mean that they can’t drag you down into the depths of the river to drown.” “No, I’m pretty sure that carp don’t do that.” “Anyway, I ran back to the center of the fortress, terrified. When I got there, I found that my wife had given birth to my daughter. A wonderful bundle which brought me happiness for the next nine years.” The dwarf finally smiled, “She also motivated me to purge the fortress of the carp, so I lead a squad of soldiers to the river, this time we brought lanterns so we could see the damned creatures, and we slaughtered them.” the dwarf paused for a moment. “Of course, they killed seven peasants, most of whom had been conscripted into the military beforehand, so it was a rather successful battle.” “Seven out of how many soldiers?” Twilight had produced a notepad again, somehow. “I think that there were twelve soldiers that day, including me.” “How many carp were there?” “three.” “So, for every kill, you lost three and a third soldiers?” “Yeah.” “That’s a terrible ratio! How can you even bother fighting when you’re that bad at it?” Twilight’s expression was of mathematically induced horror. Sort of like the expression that dwarves got when they calculated the chances of surviving to their twenties. “Well... We can’t really swim, and since the carp have this tendency to pull us into the water, if they succeed, we typically die.” The dwarf shrugged, “just the way we live. Or something” “Have you ever considered learning how to swim?” Twilight’s tone became condescending, the princess shook her head at her student. Apparently if you weren’t Prince Blueblood you couldn’t get away with condescension of that kind of magnitude. Meanwhile in Blueblood’s estate “Sir, your special diplomatic summary of the Crystal Kingdom has arrived today.” “But Preppy Heights, I thought I told you I wanted the Crystal Empire summary.” “Sir, I already explained that there is no Crystal Empire other than the one which is synonymous with the Crystal Kingdom.” “Preppy, I know that you went to some kind of school which had a population of forty-two and a strong association with sub-ivy league colleges, but I know more than you.” The condescending moron placed his tea cup back onto the table inside the pegasus carriage which he had cleverly attached to his house by means of Crazy Glue. “Absolutely sir, who am I to question the inner workings of a stallion whose brilliance caused him to use mayonnaise instead of Crazy Glue to fix a pegasus carriage which randomly crashed into his bedroom onto his house?” Preppy Heights felt, as did everypony who knew Blueblood, to shove him and his ‘brilliant architectural masterwork’ out of the window which it had replaced. “Now you see my point.” Preppy Heights rolled his eyes, he really couldn’t remember how he got this job in the first place. “Also look into a material I’ve heard of called Slade, I want a chandelier made out of it.” “Absolutely sir.” “Twilight, I know that you have a problem when things don’t make sense, but you have a lot to think about.” “And now something bad is going to happen because you said that before the changeling invasion. Out of all the times you have said that, something terrible has happened.” “Come on Twilight, that’s probably not going to happen. Anyway, we just don’t like swimming, we can do it, but it practically takes a dwarf getting thrown into waist deep water to teach us.” Twilight shoved a hoof into her head, making the dwarf wonder whether or not self-mutilation was a common theme here. “Okay, Tholumom, there is also a more pressing matter at hand here, there is a volcano that is dangerously close to eruption, if my geologists are right at least. If what you’ve told Twilight is true, then your kind know how to deal with that, maybe even prevent it?” Tholumom furrowed his brow in thought for a moment, was it really right to give up the treasured secrets of the state to these horses? “Well... I could build a long channel to direct the magma to a center of industry, which could use it to smelt ore without coal, or potentially, generate elarctracity, was it? without coal or a moving water source. It wouldn’t prevent an eruption, but it could move enough magma out of the volcano to make it less dangerous when it happens.” Celestia raised an eyebrow at this idea. “Twilight, does that make any sense to you?” Twilight shook her head, “I think it might work, but... What if it goes wrong? How many ponies could suffer?” “Not more than a hundred.” Tholumom yawned. “I don’t see why other races see it as dangerous, it is safe if you know how to handle it. Just like that Elictracity thingy, right?” “Tholumom, the word you are looking for is electricity.” “Applejack, it’s your turn, three of the orcs are dead already, but there are two more left.” “Pinkie Pie, I can in fact listen to you narrate the story, I know.” “Come on Applejack, I really want to do something else, let’s finish this battle so we can leave.” Pinkie Pie glared at Rainbow Dash, “You know I love you Dashie, but if you keep on ruining my campaign, then we’ll have a problem.” Rainbow Dash shuddered at the thought. “Okay, Ahm going to take out one of the orcs.” “Which one, the one with the bowtie, or the one without the bowtie?” “Ah don’t care.” “But if you don’t care then what is there to care about?” “Not Ponies and Paladins.” Pinkie Pie flipped the table that the trio was using, throwing the various roleplaying supplies to the floor of the barn. “Well then, I guess it’s on to GURPS.” “What?” Applejack and Rainbow Dash chorused. “Come on you guys, we haven’t even wasted an hour playing PnP, why don’t we try the other system?” “I’d really like to do some... flying.” Rainbow Dash glanced pleadingly at Applejack. “And I have to buck some Apple trees.” Pinkie glared at them. “You two are finishing one campaign with me.” “Why would we need to build forges in this manner in order to utilize the lava taken from the volcano?” Twilight’s question caused Tholumom to think of the various humans that have asked the same question, of course, they never really tried hard enough to think about it. “Lava’s convection currents in the air are so hot that it is possible to seriously injure yourself just by standing near it. I would recommend that you use a fairly small aperture for whatever ducts you use to bring in the heat.” Tholumom sighed, “Or you could build it like you suggested and find the corpses of twelve good ponies dessicated and burnt by the heat and flame.” Celestia glanced between them. “Tholumom, the reason that Twilight sees your process as flawed is due to our production methods taking place on a larger scale than you must have been accustomed to back on your world. I don’t think that you understand the idea of a blast furnace, and while your species’ method is fine for small scale, our smelting takes place at such a larger scale that the wages of the ponies which would be employed would outweigh the benefits of not needing an external fuel source.” Tholumom raised an eyebrow before taking a sip of tea from a flagon, drawing Twilight’s attention to his strange choice of drinking vessels. “You sure do know a lot about industry for a princess whose very way of life is existentially separated from the practical applications of such.” he took another sip from his strange choice of drink holder. “I really appreciate this mug, it doesn’t even spill as much as ours.” “Thol, that’s not a mug. That’s our serving container.” “Oh, so that’s why it seems perfectly sized. hmm.” He finished the flagon and placed it back on the table. He grinned as he marvelled at how whatever drink they had given him had caused him to become drowsier, completely opposite to the revitalizing effect of alcohol. “You can keep it Thol.” Celestia’s smile probably caused a windigo to “D’aww” as some say. The dwarf’s eyes lit up like Pinkie’s in a candy shop, or any shop for that matter. “Really?” Celestia nodded. “I love you forever Princess Celestia.” He clutched the flagon greedily in his arms, then hugged the royal Alicorn warmly. The mere sight of it could have caused Chrysalis’ heart to grow three sizes that day, or possibly feed an entire army for a month, but what Chrysalis did with her food was outside the subjects which anyone in the room could possibly make a valid judgement about. “I have a favor to ask then...” By the way a flagon can be: Or if you prefer: Not Going HomeTholumom Lathonudlerned has been content recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has eaten a decent omelet recently. He has had an excellent drink recently. He has had the satisfaction of learning what an animal trap does. He has felt guilt for his part in ending life recently. He has received pay recently. He has felt left out of the loop recently. He has had the pleasure of talking to a nice pony recently and obtained a flagon for his troubles. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. His eyes are brown, his hair is brown, his skin is pale. “Please refrain from killing the local wildlife, regardless of how imposing or misguided it might seem.” Princess Celestia’s tone became a little bit less cheerful. “I wasn’t planning on it.” Tholumom’s pulse slowed a bit. The tea must be working then. “I was worried it was something serious.” “It is actually quite serious. We do not allow the natural world to take its course, and while the Everfree is the only place where this would not have you arrested as a miscreant; I’m afraid that you can’t even do it there, seeing as the actions you have already taken might be enough to cause the Everfree to expand.” “Princess, I understand your concern, but that isn’t how nature works. You see-“The princess interrupted him. “It’s been nice seeing you two, but I’m afraid that I have some rather important business to attend to.” Celestia finally walked out of the room, leaving the two rather confused guests to fend for themselves as they attempt to make their way through the probably booby-trapped castle. Twilight lead the bewildered, tipsy dwarf out of the castle to a new Pegasus carriage that was waiting for them. The carriage ride back was uneventful, completely void of any sort of vomiting or retching. Tholumom stared out the window, oblivious to the fact that he should be discomforted by the combination of air travel, shifting horizon, and the fact that the sun is in the sky, producing a rather lovely sunset of at least twelve different hues of orange. The two arrived at the library. The dwarf found himself thinking about the similarity between his daughter and Twilight. All I see are similarities, but where are the differences? Is it possible that I’ve forgotten them? Day turned to night. Sleep is an uneasy process for the dwarf. Dreams came and went, leaving odd mixes of his memories and imagination. But then, there was persistence. Forests are not places where dwarves thrive. Tholumom found himself enjoying one. Babbling brooks carried water across rocks, a small symphony. Insects flew gracefully from plant to plant, another chorus. And the dwarf feared. And the dwarf rubbed his hands together and the dwarf found hooves. And there was peace for the dwarf and the dwarf failed to notice. (Enough parataxis already) The movements he made were fluid and simple. His trot was measured and careful, just as agile and natural as any other movement he had made. His mind rationalized something along the lines of “Must be a pony overdose” but he knew that such a symptom would be unlikely to be noticed along with the various organ failures that would occur with a pony overdose. It didn’t matter. He knew that he would find a family again. His painful memories of gathering the corpses scattered outside the fortress seemed like a nightmare or a fantasy; it couldn’t be real, could it? It doesn’t matter, voices call out to him from the outside, promising him peace for a sacrifice of something that he can’t remember. It won’t matter, he gallops out into a field, and his princess awaits his presence. It will not have mattered; she is a matron, concerned for him, why would she demand slade cups? They are rather heavy after all. It had not mattered, his family would be found alive if he simply accepted the corruption of his being. Even his flagon agreed, his family would exist again after the change. But was it right, myths of Planepacked circled his mind, the history of the world engraved into a microscopic level, recursively recording its own image, and the image of every other thing upon the world. He recoiled at his dream. The matron dissolved into the tea. And it spoke to him. “There is truth in what I offer you. I might not be like anything that you know, but that is what makes me existentially more innocent than your people's. I appreciate you receiving me so well, often the offer to replace this would be met with violent resistance from the mind." The dwarf/pony shrugged. "Whatever. Are you actually serious about your offer?" "There are many strings of destiny involved, but I can see that if you follow mine, you will find yourself having another daughter much like your last one, which you so dearly loved, a wife whose presence will force you to recall what you once had and smile, as you realize that the similarities make up for the lack of legitimate detail. Can you really say that my offer doesn't make up for what you've lost?" The tea simmered slightly, working itself up for no legitimate reason. "No, I cannot say that. But will it be a mere illusion, as your dream has been?" "The dream was your own, in order to penetrate it; I needed to use Planepacked as a focus for your mind. I do not make it a habit to follow those unsavory habits of the Bureau." "What?" "Nothing you should worry yourself with. Anyway, I've refrained from changing your mind state in any way, other than bringing you to a conscious level suitable for making decisions that can change your life for the better." The ground beneath the Dwarf/pony grew lighter and the dwarf found himself considering it. "You should know that the time grows short, soon your dream will break, and then you will be without my guidance until the next time." "Whatever. Sure. Please help me!" The pony/dwarf clasped his hooves together and went on his belly to plead the spirit guide. There could be no task of importance greater than this. His life had a chance to resume its normal course. Could anyone at home ever fault him for this? The only ones who could are dead. "You will have life that will be reclaimed; you have tasks to complete and time to fill." The tea paused. "There will be much tea drinking." "That sounds positively terrifying." The dwarf/pony shuddered at the thought, much tea drinking. "Doesn't it though? It really isn't so bad." The ground began to shine upwards, becoming painful to look at directly. “See you soon Tholumom.” His vision was filled with the filtered red of the inside of the eyelid. The dwarf rubbed his eyes, and then opened them. His hands were still there. Just as normal. There was little to suggest anything important had happened the night before. Perhaps it was nothing, the kind of dream that only the intoxicating Tea could induce. Of course, his beverages typically failed to talk to him in his dreams. The room was filled with the morning light; which a few months ago, would have been symbolic of a cave-in rather than a new day to go about. And all this tranquility could be shattered so easily. “TWILIGHT! Stop trying to use the transformation magic. If you continue, you might get stuck as something silly like a cloud or a full grown dragon, both of which you would probably want to avoid.” The purple dragon yelled. It was early in the morning, but considering the conversation, Tholumom thought that it would probably be a terrible waste of time and energy to ignore the possibilities. “Spike, come on, I’ve come a long way since the cloud incident. Besides, I never intended to use it on you.” It occurred to the dwarf that they were yelling at each other, arguing over irrelevant points about something that probably contained sentiments related to magical safety or something. Magical safety is nonsense, magic is unpredictable by its nature, and while Twilight seems to have an unusually firm grasp on it, it can very easily go the wrong way. Preparing magic safely involves more learning what is actually needed to accomplish than the natural talent or power, or wards, or faraday cages, but that does not necessarily guarantee any safe performance. That was what it said in one of Twilight’s books, probably one that she never got around to, which would be good fortune for the dwarf’s plan. Acting without thinking, Tholumom attempted to run before he removed himself from the bed, accidentally learning how to use a bicycle in the process. After a few moments of that, he finally decided to swing his legs out of the bed; he doubted that there would be any new inventions in getting out of bed today. After a few moments dealing with a few confounded sheets, probably a new invention designed in order to keep him attached to the bed; an incredible invention. It would also be unfair to forget this mattress, which left these pleasant kinks to work out of his spine; a wonderful chorus of pops would end up issuing from him as the day progressed, sort of like having a musician follow him around and hit him with a flute. The dwarf did manage to escape from the myriad bondage which affixed him to the bed against his will. The day was new and the smell of breakfast pressed itself upon the nose. Which in itself did not seem to be all that unusual, considering that breakfast always has an emphasis on oats and cereal, generally derived products thereof. The breakfast was, for once, not the object of the dwarf’s pursuits. No, that was a new way of life; the reclamation of what he lost a mere nine years ago. Oddly enough, this also goal is to be pursued through experimentation with unusual, difficult, and all around dangerous magical techniques which Twilight is probably itching to use. The purple unicorn was hunched over a book, reading something with her eyes a few inches from the page while she scribbled on a page held in mid-air by magic. A problem then, she could go at this for days before she would finally relent and find time to do something else. Or not, she could just end up finding what she was looking for within the next hour. The solution was simple enough, just interrupt her. Then she noticed him. “Hi Tholumom, what’s up?” She put away the book and her notes; it couldn’t be Twilight, she never cleaned up after anything. “I heard something about transformation magic.” The dwarf paused, “You know? When I was woken by the sound of you two arguing about something regarding safety?” “Yes you did.” Twilight continued to smile at him. Her smile seemed a bit off. But then again, how can that kind of smile not be off? “Do you know any?” “Yes, but I was looking for a subject to practice on.” “Is that safe in any way?” "Not in particular, but where's the fun if there’s no risk?" It still sounded wrong to Tholumom. "Are you sure that you are feeling alright, Twilight?" "Of course, so what was it that you wanted to do with transformation magic?" Twilight smiled. Tholumom felt a sudden headache. That was uncommon for the dwarf, his mental resistance to annoying people, things, and ponies tended to be strong enough for that not to happen. "I was wondering if I could potentially; try out being something a bit more native to this world, perhaps the common race?" The dwarf uttered; almost half-hearted in his speech. To him the question sounded like a defeat, that his life as a dwarf wasn't enough, and that pain could get to him. "That might be possible, let me see." Her horn glowed then sputtered out. "I guess not." "That simple then?" There had to be something off with her. She would normally have gone into a detailed explanation of why the spell failed, not to mention that her magic was green instead of red. The dwarf clenched his hands; her failure, compounded with his now splitting headache was starting to get to him. "What? I have my limits; my magic isn't good for everything you know." The Twilight-like object's tone grew more irritated. "Do you know my name?" The dwarf asked coolly. It was possible that this is still Twilight, but that possibility dwindles. "I'm sorry honored guest, but it seems to have slipped my mind." The definitely not Twilight said sarcastically, her voice dripping with a venom uncharacteristic of the purple unicorn. "You obviously aren't Twilight, but before we have this conversation, let me get my pickaxe.” Before the not-Twilight could respond, he ran upstairs and obtained his pickaxe. He dashed downstairs and resumed his confrontation. "You were going to say?" "Fool. You've fed me enough for today. Your fatherly affection did not go unnoticed, and we have taken the love you have given to Twilight. And now I am strong enough to oppose you." The not Twilight dissolved into a green flame, giving way to the black carapace of the typical changeling. "I doubt that." The dwarf laughed. “But you flatter yourself too much insect, you are quite strong enough to be difficult for me to slay, but you are alone, without your hive to back you, you are virtually powerless.” "You doubt the power of the hive?" "No, I doubt the power of an individual thief in comparison to an enraged dwarven warrior." "Fool! You cannot oppose the hive!" The changeling snarled at the dwarf, narrowing its eyes towards the strange biped. "The hive is all well and good, I don't care about the sanctity of love across Equestria, I just care about the pony you have taken and replaced." The dwarf’s rolled his eyes. The possibility of a fight, while interesting and fairly normal in the daily life of a dwarf in a fortress as large as the Ideas of Mourning; itdid not appeal to Tholumom at the time; it simply wouldn’t do to splatter Twilight’s books with the congealed green ichor that would no doubt ooze from the changeling’s corpse. "The element of magic must not be released, if she is, then we will surely fail ourselves." The changeling bristled at his own speech. "Stop using 'we' you are an individual. You want to survive. You cannot survive if you go against me, and all of the warriors you can bring upon me are nothing compared to the focused mind of a dwarf surrounded. I cannot allow you to take away the closest thing I have to my Daughter.” Okay, so a purple unicorn could not be very much like a pale female dwarf who weighed about five stones, but their personalities were similar enough. "Individuals are weak the hive is -" "Strong, I get it, but surely you have an individual drive, perhaps a white picket fence and a pleasant house. A loving changeling wife and accepting neighbors." "We are like insects and we do not aspire to that kind of life" "Of course you do, I've seen hundreds of beings like you make wise choices. I'll let you live if you tell me where she is." A lie, but a comforting one, assuring the changeling that it has goals outside of the mutual desires that it shares with the hive. "You... have me right. I do want a white picket fence and a wife and accepting neighbors. But can I hope for that without the hive's health?" The dwarf's brain almost froze at such a strange desire for an insect horse to have; fortunately it had frozen once before and learned that such action was typically followed by a large space of amnesia. "You're even worse than the goblins. At least they guarantee equal rights to their slaves. They never ask for white picket fences either, you damned changeling." The truth was that they guaranteed three meals a day and offered free baths with soap, but they did work the average slave to death within the first five days, but those five days tended to be filled with clean armpits and a distinct lack of vomit. "Doesn't slave imply that they are forced to work?" The dwarf smiled, the insect horse had managed to fall into the most obvious trap in the dwarven Rhetorical arsenal; the bullshit call. "Does being a member of a hive imply that you are part of it?" How could this question fail to confuse an insect? Apparently it could fail to confuse an insect very easily. "Yes." And the most obvious rhetorical device of the dwarves fails once again. "And does that mean that you will tell me where Twilight is?" A pause. "Yes." "Really?" "She's out getting groceries with Spike you clot." Tholumom inhaled, lowering his pickaxe. "Did you really have to give that whole super villain speech? I would have been satisfied with slightly less bullshit than that. I knew that you freaks weren't as brutal as you like to pretend you are." It wasn't even very original. Most goblin leaders could make a better super villain speech than this insect, but then again; they probably had at least a few hundred thousand more neurons than the insect. "So you want to be friends?" The dwarf smiled. "Sure, just keep your mouth closed and we have a deal." "We can't have a deal for friendship you foal; it has to be understood implicitly by both parties." The insect looked at the dwarf hesitantly. It considered the possibilities, a friend, something that could build a house, the possibility of more love coming out of it. "Sure friend, just keep your mouth closed, I'd like to avoid throwing up the love you accidentally gave me." It decided to go after the anonymity which this dwarf could offer. "Fair enough, one can't expect a tick to return stolen blood." The changeling gave the dwarf an icy glare. They both laughed. "At least one doesn't expect a tick to vomit the blood on its host because it's put into the light." The dwarf gave a false pout, and they laughed again. The dwarf had made friends with the changeling. Eventually they both ended up recounting stories with each other over a pot of tea. The tea whispered softly, “Your first task is complete.” He has made a friend recently. Meanwhile at Blueblood’s castle… The castle green was graced by a single tree. On this tree was a dubious construction of glue, nails, and boards that were sharper than the nails on average. In this construction a dubious noble looked down upon his estate approvingly; the view was, in his mind, spectacular. A slightly worried, but less dubious servant, entrusted to care for this particular noble, attempted to get him down, another rainstorm was on its way, not that the tree house needed that to fail, it creaked enough already. “Sir, I think that it is time for you to come down from there; you might catch a cold.” Preppy Heights was once again stunned by his employer’s incredible ignorance. “Come on Preppy, I know what I’m doing. This is my tree house after all.” Blueblood dashed the servant’s hope to get him down peacefully. “Sir, the last time you said that, you ended up suffering from tetanus for three weeks.” The servant attempted to appeal to the noble’s desire to maintain a fairly decent standard of health. “And that’s what the inoculation was for, Prep. Surely you know that my immune system can handle virtually everything that is thrown at it.” The servant sighed and whispered, “I hope its methods are overridden.” “Come on now, Preppy, you aren’t even a character in that story any more. Stop making references to it.” Blueblood grasped a hammer weakly in his magic, swinging at the wall. “Sir, you aren’t qualified to even break that wall, now get down.” And the servant sighed again. “At least He isn’t Pinkie Pie.” “Surely you can’t mean that Heights; Pinkie Pie is the finest mare in the entire land of Equestria. When I finally finish building our house we will move in together and have many foals. And then six years later I’ll forget to shave and trip into a moving carriage.” Blueblood gave a sincere smile, believing every word of what he had said. Preppy Height’s mouth just hung open. “Anyway, you’re supposedly competent at household tasks, would you mind helping me?” It was too polite of a question. Blueblood probably knew that Celestia had asked the servant to help prevent his untimely death, be it falling debris from a dubious tree house or a certain white mare whose presence at the gala had been nothing short of a disaster. Fortunately, the latter threat had failed to materialize as Princess Celestia had believed it would. “Sir, I would be honored to lend my help to a master carpenter such as myself.” One who’s most amazing accomplishment is the liberal application of foaming glue. “Wipe your hooves on the way in.” Blueblood said. Another ridiculous demand from the world’s worst employer. “Absolutely sir, I would never dream of dirtying your latest masterpiece with the filth which only my disgusting hooves could track in.” Though it does look like it could use a good mud floor; seeing as all of the nails point upwards. The supposed prince cast down a rope ladder, which the servant began to climb reluctantly. “Come on now, we don’t have all day.” It almost seems as though the prince has failed to realize that nopony has given him a task in the last four months out of spite. The servant entered the unusually clean and well put together hatch on the bottom of the treehouse. Pushing it open with his head, he opened his eyes, expecting a horrific show of carpentry sufficient to make the most hardened contractor cry out in desperation. His eyes opened, ready for the horrors that were no doubt going to be presented to them, instead he found a well-constructed room with understated elegance, with a slightly out of place dance floor in the middle. Once again, Preppy Heights found himself in a dubious box that was larger on the inside than the outside. And this time I won’t have a three month vacation from this moron. The servant pulled himself inside completely “Sir, I think this is rather unrealistic for a stately nobleman such as you to have built.” “My cutie mark is a crown, not only because I am a prince, but because I am also the king of carpentry.” Blueblood explained, examining his hooves, attempting to look disinterested. “Sir, I must certainly say, you have outdone yourself. How can I be of service to you when you have already taken care of so much?” Preppy actually found himself in awe of what he was seeing here, nothing could quite explain it. “Could you fix up the outside, my housing mortar was set on ‘dubious exterior’ and there isn’t much I can do to fix that, other than setting it to ‘obliterate’.” Blueblood patted what seemed to be a miniature artillery piece which he had probably found somewhere in a landfill or something. “Sir, I’ll have it done as soon as possible.” Preppy opened the hatch and started climbing down, “Also, if I may say, you and Miss Pie should be suitable together.” “Of course we will Prep, I have a mortar, and she has a canon cannon, what could possibly go wrong?” Preppy Heights has recently experienced a terrible joke. “More than you could imagine, Sir.” The servant closed the hatch behind him. Blueblood looked around the room cautiously. “I wonder if he realizes that I am aware of his attitude towards me.” Blueblood could not even fire this servant; Celestia had sent him here to protect him from “His own constant follies” or something of the sort. It really did bother him that his own great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great aunt could find him to be so irresponsible. That one particularly lustful unicorn at the gala two years ago was perfectly justified in finding his behavior horrible, but it was a calculated risk. She really did fail to catch the subtle message (in this case that he had no desire to date her, let alone fulfill her fairytale fantasies when his dream mare was within sight). Her spontaneity; her friendly personality; the fact that marriage to her would be fairly politically precocious, not to mention fun; Blueblood loved her for all of these things. “And that’s how I learned that Chrysalis was never even going to use the love from Equestria to benefit her hive.” The changeling’s voice carried the frantic confessional tone which indicated that caffeine is a stimulant, a strange fact because the dwarf felt slower after drinking it. “That’s fascinating.” The words came out slurred, the caffeine disrupting the alcohol tolerant gates in his neurons. “Anyway, I think I’ve stayed too long, I need to get back to the hive, you know, someling might find my absence strange or something.” “That’s probably a good idea, see you later buddy.” The insect that had spoken and thought quickly left the dwarf whose thoughts had plodded along at a glacial rate. The door closed, leaving the dwarf to nod off on his own caffeine induced slumber. The flagon was in front of the dwarf/pony. “You did well with that task, though your reaction to me is unusual, opposite of most living creatures of this world, in fact.” “I’m not really from this world, am I?” The dwarf/pony suggested, taking his musings seriously. The flagon managed a shrug. “You know that better than I do. You were on the right path; Twilight would be a good first step, but not even the caffeine fueled computational power of my Brownian motion can look that far into the future.” The dwarf deadpanned. The dwarf has been confused by a suspicious flagon of tea recently. “I don’t follow.” “Neither does anyone else. Your mind is in better shape than I had expected, considering the state of your body in general.” The flagon opened and a wisp of steam entered the dwarf’s nose. “Ugh. Chai tea. Disgusting.” The dwarf/pony muttered. The flagon nodded. “Made to enhance the senses using an unsavory mix of spices. I hope you enjoy your newly healed nose.” “What’s the next step?” The pony/dwarf rubbed his healed nose. “Ask the real Twilight, she does have a spell that will allow you to achieve the life I’ve promised. But she will be reticent, tell her that it is not like the Bureau, it should be persuasive enough to work on her.” The light emanated from the ground again, accompanied by a loud squeak. “Good bye Tholumom.” “Spike, I told you that I could transmute Tomatoes into gold.” The voice of the real Twilight entered the dwarf’s ears, bringing him to open his eyes. The sun had set, tea kettles were strewn about the library floor; giving the unusual impression that there had been some kind of cave-in underneath the teapot stockpile. Either way, it brought back memories of the mug stockpile; it had taken days to pick them out of the fields. The thought was interrupted by the recognition of Twilight’s potential meltdown; after all, the entire library’s floor was covered by teapots; certainly not a suitable state for a fairly well maintained public building to keep its floors in. So it would have to be put off as something else. Tholumom struggled to think of what. Twilight entered, her eyes locked onto Tholumom. “Hi Thol, how was your day?” “I had tea with a changeling and found it pleasant.” The dwarf croaked out through parched lips. “That sounds… Unusual…” Twilight examined the teapots strewn throughout the room. “Either way, it’s probably dead considering the amount of tea you probably shared with it. You should probably drink some water, you look, dehydrated…” It was at that point the dragon entered the room in order to point out the extent of the problem in a somewhat less polite manner. “What the hay is going on here? Teapots everywhere; a nearly desiccated dwarf carcass; a pickaxe lying in a sexual position? Twilight, what did I tell you about transformation magic?” A look of such pure disgust appeared on her face that it accomplished a few very unusual things; it convinced the Jedi order that their bathrooms required cleaning; it caused a few false positive across the various avatar temples (shooting down a few pigeons with their emitted beams of light and heat); and it caused a revolt in seventeenth century France, and instigated a monolith to uplift monkeys in order to prevent this kind of disgust from happening in the future, however the dragon was apparently immune to such expressions. “That dragon is annoying.” The words that dribbled from the dwarf left with such a rasp that Spike’s scales looked a bit less polished than before. “I think it might be a good idea for you to get him some water Spike.” After Spike left, Twilight stared at the dwarf. “You look really sick Tholumom.” Tholumom Lathonudlerned is severely dehydrated. “Is there anything I can do to help?” The dwarf smiled inwardly. Spike left the room. Of the infinite number of ways to put it: it was a mess; Twilight would be convinced that there would be long lasting tea stains in the floor for weeks; whether or not there are actually stains in the wood floor: this dwarf has already left Spike with more work than most dragons accomplish within the first hundred years of their existence (not to say that a hundred years are long for a dragon). But, seeing as fetching water is a fairly simple task, he was able to do so while considering his situation. Meanwhile at Blueblood’s unusually sketchy tree house… “Preppy, seriously? You can’t use bricks to build a tree house.” Blueblood hung halfway out a window, insulting the stodgy construction technique that his servant had attempted to use. Too bad it was a tree house; the house actually looked quite nice in brick. “Sir, you gave me thirty bits; you told me to go to a Masonry store and buy some materials. They did not sell any wood, as you had ensured me that they would. Unfortunately, you also told me not to come back empty handed.” “Hmm. I must have forgotten to make it a possessive. I meant Masonry’s shop, he’s a carpenter.” “His name doesn’t make any sense.” “Well, you don’t exactly have anything to do with your name either. He is built like a brick wall, though, so the name does fit, kind of.” The Prince hung out the window, holding a cup of Chai Tea in his hooves. “Why are you using a rope system to hold yourself up anyway? You only need to load the housing mortar with the material and set it to ‘Redecorate’.” “Sir-no buck that! You idiot! I quit.” The servant let himself down to the ground. “Finally!” The noblepony withdrew back into the tree house. “I wonder what I should do next.” The servant pondered as he trotted out of the estate. Preppy Heights has enjoyed cursing at his former employer today. “Spike, it’s been half an hour, where’s that water?” Twilight’s words took on a strange dual edged nature, full of concern and annoyance. After a second or two, a reply hurtled back. “I’m getting it Twilight; it’s not exactly easy to deal with thinking out my life while getting this overdue houseguest water.” Twilight’s eyes angled upwards before initiating a slow, turn, occurring in discreet steps, indicating that the ocular muscles were struggling with the whole concept of rolling. “Spike, I’ll get you some turquoise if you hurry up.” “But Twilight, turquoise is barely even a semiprecious gem!” The dragon walked in quickly with an eager smile on his face, making his attempt to sound unimpressed rather unimpressive. Even that stopped when he looked at the dwarf; the body had become even more desiccated, leading the dwarf’s ragged breaths to drag on all of the various types of rock dust which he had managed to inhale of the course of his life. “You dragon, you should be content eating granite, not the finery which should be gracing the splendor of the fortress.” The dwarf’s voice wavered, the shriveled flesh moving until his index finger pointed squarely at the dragon. “It’s okay Spike, just give him the water before he actually dies.” “Sure. I expected to see a zombie pony, not a zombie dwarf.” The dragon handed the dwarf a pitcher of water, which the dwarf examined studiously before deciding to drink over the handle. The water fell upon the dwarf’s face and splashed off it for the most part, only allowing the dwarf a single gulp of the water. To the unicorn and the dragon, something inexplicable occurred: the dwarf’s flesh regained suppleness, filling with water. “I feel better already.” The dwarf said simply. “What just happened?” The dragon asked. It was not every day that an unusually desiccated dwarf was healed instantaneously by imbibing a small amount of water. “I drank some water. That’s all, dragon.” The dwarf set about picking up the teapots that lay around the room. Twilight pulled Spike onto her back and walked into the kitchen. “Spike, we might have a problem.” Twilight whispered to the dragon. “What do you mean Twilight?” “He knows about the Bureaus.” “What could possibly make you think that he knows about those failures? Why does it matter anyway?” “He wants to be a pony. He told me so; whatever reason he came here, he has come into contact with the Bureau before, because he assured me that if I performed the spell, it would not turn out like the Bureaus.” Twilight’s voice was heavy with a frantic energy. “Do you know what that means?” “Twilight, he doesn’t seem to know what happened at that time; I can’t honestly believe that those creatures could become so misanthropic to each other over that little choice which you ponies gave them.” Twilight’s eyes watered slightly. “Come on, it wasn’t your fault Twilight; who could know that the choice would lead them to their ruin? We tried to help them, and even though none of them survived, in any form, you did what you could for them.” “No Spike! It probably means banishment to the moon, again.” A whisper followed. “But I didn’t stop it when I saw the signs. I could have stopped it. I know I could have.” “No, Twilight, you didn’t stop it because you were assured by most of them that they would be able to resolve it internally; they expected it to work out better than it did, and that’s not your fault, they were wrong.” “Can someone be held accountable for something they did with incorrect information? No, they can’t. Can they know with all the certainty that it was not, in fact, their fault? No, they can’t.” The dwarf leaned on the door frame. “Twilight, I have no idea what a conversarium or whatever these things were, but I know that if you were part of them; you managed whatever part you held with due diligence, taking in whatever information that you had been able to gather, and you acted on it with only that knowledge.” “How are you supposed to feel, when an entire world dies on your mistake? What solace can I take, when I’ve failed, not only a few friends, but every single living thing that exists upon a world, whose land, while spoilt, harbored a life that loved it?” “You accept it. I did. If I had simply tried a bit harder, my fortress could have, at least, walled hell off from the outside world.” The dwarf shrugged. “I fell after three hours of combat with demons. If I had held out a few minutes longer, the wall could have been built. Even then, I know, that the fortress above never saw the danger coming until it was simply too late to stop it.” “But did you watch the world die before you; knowing that it was your mistake that caused the destruction?” “No, I did not. But you have to be strong enough to overcome your mistake. I can’t ask you to do the spell or whatever that I just asked for. I can see that you need some more time; I have time; I can wait for you.” The dwarf stroked his beard. “Though I would like to hear the story, if you wouldn’t mind.” “I’ve been waiting for someone to tell for a while, you know, so my autobiography won’t be too stupid or academic sounding.” This might not be my best writing, if you see any issues, I'd prefer that they be reported. Anyway, thanks for reading. BureausThe Saga of the Bureau began one day three years after the Summer Sun festival that celebrated the return of Princess Luna, formerly known by the derisive title “Nightmare Moon”, during which our normally most cogent Princess Celestia decided to do something which lacked the typical benevolence and choice which is the basis of her regime. Princess Celestia, 3 ANMM, made the pronouncement that Equestria would begin the long period of migration through universes that had once been a long standing cycle. She gathered all the denizens of the realm whose fidelity to state were sufficient to motivate the migration. The important thing to note is that the entire land of Equestria is moved to the new universe; so that included most, if not all of the various ponies who had not settled to the outer lands possessed by other races than our own. She did not, as I learned later, actually perform the ceremony which usually accompanies the migration. There was something off immediately when we reached our destination; Equestria was now surrounded by an ocean. This ocean stretched thousands of kilometers in all directions. We were on a world that was going to be unaware of us for a long time. A fact that saddened our Bright princess. She sent scouts out; the pegasi are perfect for the task, given an inflatable rubber raft and a week’s provisions, they were able to endure a journey of around six hundred kilometers before they found land larger than a small island. The small islands were composed of silicate sand, various calcium based compounds from the erosion of a large number of coral reefs. Anyway, our princess set up a boat, something the pony society as a whole had mostly ignored; boats are useless without a large body of water and the presence of something that is too heavy to be flown by the far more efficient pegasi. She did this because the typical flying carriages would be too surprising to a race which seemed entirely stuck upon the ground. Therefore, using techniques passed down from our forbearers, we constructed the finest vessel ever produced by ponykind, it was almost two hundred hooves long, fifty wide, the largest pony built vehicle ever produced. “Sorry to interrupt, Twilight, but I was hoping for more of a personal narrative, this is fun and all, but most of your history text books are slightly less boring than this… Story.” The dwarf finished his construction of a book lounge. “You have a real story, one that you lived through, how can I learn to appreciate the trials that you have endured if you treat it like a historical text?” “Fine, fine! I’ll just rewrite the whole thing later” I was almost overwhelmed by the ocean. It surrounded us, it seemed too large for anything to tame it; and we had to cross it the slow way. “What do ya’ll think will be out there?” By this point, I knew it was a rhetorical question; it was not hard to imagine that they were fairly like us. The griffons were fairly similar to us when you think about it, they are easier to comprehend than the dragons, but that’s mostly due to their extended lifespans. “I don’t know, but at this rate, we’ll never get there. Why did we have to use this ship again?” Whether by Derisive tone, or the sheer impatience, it was not hard to imagine Rainbow getting antsy on the boat; there wasn’t that much to do, mostly because Rainbow couldn’t wait until the boat was built before she read the most recent Daring Doo book. “Rainbow Dash, you know just as well as the rest of us that the distance is difficult for most pegasi.” Rarity read a magazine, probably for the twentieth time. “Anyway, it hasn’t even been a full week yet Rainbow Dash, Why don’t you read that book that you were praising so much?” “I already read it.” She grumbled. “Why did anypony build a ship in the first place?” “You can skip to what happens when you meet whatever race you are talking about. Sorry Twilight, but you just need to focus on the interesting things, not necessarily for your book or whatever, but it tends to be more difficult to listen to someone telling you a really boring story in person.” “I don’t give a pony; just let me finish the story.” “Wait what?” A low reverberation swept over the ship. Our scabrous captain grumbled about hailing calls and appropriate protocol, apparently nautical tradition reached back for a much longer time than I had expected. Metal ships painted white, spewing dark smoke, approached our too small vessel. “Ah do not like where this is going.” Applejack said succinctly. I shivered; these creatures had extensive industrialization. The briefings that the Princess gave us indicated that in the past, most races that have been encountered were not particularly industrialized; giving us an advantage. Now that cannot be said to be the case; these ships lacked the haphazard ingenuity seen in Equestria, such as the dubious constructions of the Flim-Flam brothers. They were made of iron, or something similar enough that an all wooden ship would no doubt look archaic to them. “Can we reply to them?” I asked our scabrous captain. “Missy, I know what I’m doing. I’m also captain of this ship, so don’t contradict me.” “What? I wasn’t contradicting you; I was asking if we are able to respond to their hailing.” “Oh, that… Probably, should we?” “Yes!” I became frantic. I could feel myself breathing harder than necessary. He pushed past me calmly. Somehow, his haste reassured me that I was in good hooves. “Sir, one of the forward watches has found a ship!” The officer burst into a cabin whose mahogany desk, polished to perfection, conflicted sharply with the captain who possessed it. An older man, gruff white beard, barely trimmed. The beard alone would lead anyone who did not know the man to believe that he was some kind of Thoreau, living in the woods for unspecified periods of time; that was before taking into account that he wore full dress uniform, even while putting his feet up on his desk, and drinking whiskey. “Why does that concern me? We are travelling on common trade route. We don’t actually own the Pacific, yet.” The captain shrugged, “What makes it odd? I know you haven’t gotten this excited over most of the ships we’ve passed.” “Well… Sir, it’s made out of wood, it seems to be partially gilded in gold, and the crew seems to be a bunch of… well according to Ensign Clark, multicolored horses. It is a sailing ship sir; nobody’s used one that large for the last ten years.” “Officer Mulligan. Hail them; you know the protocol, you certainly don’t need my judgment as to whether we investigate this. After all, by Executive order #432, we are to investigate all ships carrying unusual creatures that we have not yet exploited. That is a bit irrelevant because that protocol was in place so that you don’t have to bother me with your cockamamie watchmen’s reports. Do you understand?” “Absolutely sir!” The panicked officer left the cabin, prepared to yell at the appropriate crewmen. The captain chuckled and went back to sipping a bit of whiskey. “That kid will never get far if he doesn’t learn to laugh it all off.” The mast creaked as a bell rang heavily across the sea-laden air. The ship groaned as it tacked into the wind, pushing forwards towards the other vessel. Colorful whirls appeared on the other ship; communication commencing. Ignorant of the communication, we continued sailing towards them. Our understanding at the time lead us to only pursue the most obvious method of contact, crossing vessel to meet them face to face. We were aliens. The only communication I could imagine would be to meet them face to face; speak until we understand each other. Then I could learn from them. Applejack chatted with a sailor. Assured that nothing could go wrong. Pinkie Pie prepared her cannon. For the party that could go wrong. Fluttershy cowered moved by fear. Comforted by Angel, that nothing could go wrong. Rainbow Dash rustled feathers, preparing for a fight. And yet I knew disaster awaiting us to do it wrong. “Nice application of Epiphora.” “…” Rarity prepared. For vanity could not do her wrong. And I stood near the helm, pondering it all. Perhaps it would go right after all. Sea spray bridged the canyon between the ships. Hooks deployed, barbs caught. Reeled in, Vessel sought. Flags spin. Cannon shot. Cracks and booms extend from the horizon. The other ship takes up staves. Rifle shot. What have we done? They board us, ignore us. Too stunned to speak, we watch. Looking down the length of wood and iron, what is it they have in mind? They search the ship, but fail to find what they are seeking. They discuss the possibility of smugglers, hiding in the woodwork. What would they smuggle? I approach one, bars on his chest. I have no idea what it means. “Hi.” Eyes soften. Staff lowered. “What in tarnation?” uttered blindly. “I’m Twilight Sparkle. But do you have a name?” He stared at me for a moment. “Just call me Officer Mulligan.” “So what ended up happening?” “I don’t actually know. Something about a trading chest I think, maybe a trading cabinet, either way, they were bringing us to a place they called “The bureau of foreign trade”. The closest branch was in San Francisco.” “Let me guess, when you got there, the ground began to shake and belch flame?” The dwarf mused awkwardly, twirling his beard. “Sounds like a large earthquake, almost certainly unrelated to your arrival, at least personally, it is possible that the arrival of a large landmass created a pressure on neighboring tectonic plates, causing a large faultline to shatter.” He shrugged. “How did you know?” “Easy, you and your friends are nice, none of you is important enough to precipitate an event such as that.” The dwarf laughed, “But honestly, I doubt that was your fault.” Spike walked in, yelled “Ha! It’s a pun because you said a word twice!” and left. Twilight shook her head. “Sometimes I wonder what goes through Spike’s head.” She sighed. “That wasn’t the problem though.” The dwarf’s eyebrow did an impressive imitation of a worm rearing up to strike at a bird. “What was then?” “We tried to use the Elements of Harmony to fix the problem.” The street around us shattered as the ground shook, buildings began to crumble or burst into flame. Rainbow Dash looked at me, eyes filled with hubris. “Well, I’ve got this covered.” She pulled out the various Elements of Harmony and distributed them. “Why do you have these Dash?” I was a bit more than curious; usually we had to recover the Elements of Harmony, confronting the problem head on before finding them in an obvious place. “I figured that nothing could go right with the boat, so I brought them along just in case. Anyway you can thank me later.” If you’ve ever been struck by a candlestick, you know what it is like to use the elements of harmony. They aren’t painful, but they are annoying. The sensation, beyond that is indescribable, power flows through you in a way that is difficult to comprehend. Waves of the typical pinkish-white light travelled throughout the ailing city before a white flash made it very difficult to understand what happened next. Regardless of this effect which seemed to only have the effect of making it impossible to quantify the operational mechanism of the magic used by the Elements of Harmony. The city which appeared to us afterwards seemed wrong, somehow, too wholesome. Too colorful, it didn’t alter the structure of the city significantly, but the subtler characteristics seemed off. The bodies of the apes, which had littered certain parts of the street only a second before were gone. Replaced by ponies. The others were astonished at first, but after snapping out of it, they were enraged. Especially Officer Mulligan “You… ponies… What have you done?” The officer was almost without words, his face was white, I’m not quite sure why though. “Twilight, the blood vessels in the face constrict when there is an abundance of fear, conserving blood for the possible fight or flight that may occur afterwards.” “Interesting.” “You’ve killed all of them.” He gasped, “You’ve ruined our city. What do you have to say for yourselves?” “We didn’t kill any of them. They’re getting up right now, see?” Applejack pointed her hoof towards one of the new ponies who was working on getting on their hooves. I couldn’t quite make sense out of it. The Elements of Harmony have never acted in this manner before. The “new” ponies would have to be interrogated to find out whether or not they retained any of their personality as a human, if they didn’t, then we would have been responsible for killing thousands of humans on our first interaction with them. “They aren’t human, the only thing that humans transform into in their lives is corpses. I don’t know what you’ve done to the corpses, or the city for that matter, but they certainly aren’t right.” Rainbow dash crossed her forelegs, “Well, they had already transformed into corpses, and now the buildings look about right.” Rarity and Fluttershy were both trying to stay out of the conflict. Pinkie Pie, being Pinkie Pie, bounced around behind us, interacting with and frightening the “new” ponies. “You don’t seem to understand, there is only room on this continent for one species of intelligent mammal.” Officer Mulligan threatened, shaking his finger at us. “Hey Twi, you want to try using the Elements of Harmony again?” It was tempting, I wondered what effect they would have this time. None of the possibilities were particularly friendly, or, at the very least, advantageous to our relationship with the humans. “Men, surround them, we must detain them for their trial later.” “Um, sir… would it be possible for us, if you don’t mind, to send Dash here to contact our own government? It would be, um, advantageous to our trading relationship.” Officer Mulligan began to stare down Fluttershy. Possibly a mistake. “And it might ease tensions between our species if we could um… obtain appropriate representation and perhaps trade for the mistake which has saved the minds of so many humans.” So it wasn’t a mistake. Officer mulligan scratched his chin, I doubt that he had ever had such a large decision to make before in his life. His men pointed their rifles at us, I didn’t really want to learn how they worked if I was on the receiving end. “I’m really sorry, Sir, we didn’t know what these things would do, we just expected-“ “What? That they would magically fix everything?” I nodded. “Are you dumb or something?” “These things are as much a mystery to us as they are to you.” I admitted. I realized that I had a nervous smile, which I then suppressed. “So I can add weapons testing as the crime inflicted on our city.” “Shut up Mulligan!” The voice came from behind him. A grey Pegasus wearing a uniform trotted up to him. “Who the hell are you?” “Well, now, that’s hardly the way to be talking to your captain.” The Pegasus snarled. “I should have you court-martialed for mutiny. They saved my life. I don’t even think they understood that they would have that effect, but I’m your captain, and son, you had better recognize that.” He laughed. Officer Mulligan just stood there slack-jawed. “Well… That’s one way to settle it.” He mumbled to himself. “Well, Sir, should we still call on the federal government to tell them what has happened. Also, if you would not mind answering me, were you dead?” The Pegasus nodded. “Mulligan, you should probably contact the federal government, I’m sure that when they see the work they’ve done here, they might even award them a medal.” “Did that ever happen?” “No, they didn’t like the idea of what they called ‘Another minority’ living in the bounds of their country. Their government was apparently full of jerks. They were also concerned about something they called ‘Religious implications’, whatever that means.” “What happened to the ponies that were created that day?” Twilight’s expression darkened. A tear dropped from her left eye. Her legs started to tremble. “They rounded them up, called them aliens. They put them in a military base, and then promptly refused to acknowledge the existence of our government, us, or the universal rights of sentient creatures. Well, until the seventies.” “Is that the world that we are in now?” “No, we left them to stew in a terrifying “Nuclear holocaust” of their own making. Supposedly, they are not doing too well today.” “Would it be a good idea to visit them?” Twilight shook her head. The dwarf laughed. “Well I knew that much already.” Meanwhile on the aforementioned world… A man with a head wrapped in cloth, respirator donned, walked across the barren desert that had once been a similarly barren desert. The main difference was that before, there was a distinct lack of homicidal Technicolor Equines. He carried a gun, but knew that it would do little good if any of them had the desire to end his life. A scorpion, a small one, crawled across a rock in front of the man. For some strange reason, he felt a strong urge to smash it with his pistol and eat the remains, careful to avoid the venomous stinger. His stomach rumbled, urging him on once again. He submitted to the urge, smashed the scorpion, sat down on the rock to enjoy the spoils of being significantly larger than the arthropod which he had just smashed sufficiently well to make himself feel better, being the apex predator of the planet. Eating a scorpion is like eating any other large insect, not bad if cooked properly, but this was not one of those times. He cursed his stomach for giving him such awful advice. Something fell to his feet. He looked down. It looked like it was made out of wood. It had a short stem which curled up a bit, leading to a cylinder with scales which had some purpose which he could not quite imagine. He picked it up, and bit it warily. It tasted like Pinesol. He spat it out. Where the hell had this come from, he thought. “How dare you insult the Great and Powerful Trixie by refusing to eat her pinecone!” The man wondered why whoever was talking was referring to themselves in the third person, but was caught off guard by the pinecone comment. Odd, he thought, it doesn’t look like a cone at all. He reconsidered his action, and bit into the pinecone again. This time it tasted like Pinesol. The man wondered where he had tasted pinesol before. It didn’t matter, if his probable hallucination was insulted he would attempt to sate it. “Finally, someone who recognizes a pinecone for the fine culinary dish that it is.” “But where’s the dish? all I got was this food of questionable digestability.” He turned around, a blue Technicolor Equine was staring at him with improbably large binocular eyes. He had seen proper horses before, and he was sure that they neither came in the blue color, or had such impressively binocular vision. More significantly, they didn’t have light up dildos sticking out of their heads. The man thought again, where had he seen a dildo before. He was having one of those days with improbable vocabulary springing to mind. “So I see that my hallucination is visual too. Hi, nice to see you.” He stuck out his hand, why not? After all, how could a Technicolor Equine with a dildo attached to its head be offended by a confused gesture? “Charmed, I’m real though. I am the Great and Powerful Trixie.” “Oh, so you’re the one who was insulted that I didn’t ingest this piece of wood. Cool.” The man smiled, showing her the splinters now stuck in his gums. “Yes.” The man smiled at her. “So, you free tonight? cause I’m willing to bang any hallucination, other than that annoying Geico Gecko.” “Do not suggest that the Great and Powerful Trixie would degrade herself by mating with such an inferior life-form.” “I don’t have to be inferior.” “No… I suppose you don’t.” Her head-dildo glowed. He suddenly felt like eating a pinecone would not be the worst he could do for food. “So, sexy, you want to come to my place?” “Sure.” The man heard his own voice, and it didn’t quite sound right. It sounded a lot more like the hallucination in front of him. “Well, then, I see that I’ve lost it completely, let’s go to your place, do you have water there?” The blue-dildo-headed horse nodded. “Nice.” The two Trixies walked to a shack, filled with eight more Trixies, all suitably confused, and aroused. “Yeah, they have a bit of a Trixie infestation. Not the most pleasant thing to deal with, especially considering that it’s getting worse every day.” “Fine.” The dwarf smiled after a moment. “So, can I be a pony or not?” The dwarf smiled, clenched his fists and held them out as though he was holding on to his anticipation. Twilight nodded. Next Time on My Little Fortress: Friendship for the Blood God: Confusing time-travel plots, Confusing jokes, Discord? Author's Note So yeah, I didn't even plan on continuing this. I'd like to imagine this.is by far the best chapter, I'm almost certainly wrong, so have fun. Also Trixie Infestation... Something about that. MagicThe cobblestone floor, lined with cracks, was adorned with intricacy of geometry, with lines crossing circles, which overlap with other circles. The dwarf looked upon it, eyes drinking in the symbols, mind coming out of it without comprehension. He looks again at the floor, the illumination provided by the lamp flickers, malevolent shadows flicker across the floor. Chasing diagrams, wolves seeking flesh. The disturbance stops, the wolves retreat into the corner, sated perhaps. The dwarf wiped his finger on one of the lines, the texture was oily: It was indigo. The dwarf sniffed at his finger, and moved it closer to his mouth. “I wouldn’t do that if I was you.” A voice came from behind him. “Why?” the dwarf’s face twisted into a stupid grin. “Would I get magical powers or something?” “No, you would die.” “Wonderful. And I thought everything was rainbows and magic.” “That’s why you would die.” The dwarf’s eyebrows furrowed, he grumbled, and wiped his finger on his pants. “Well then, I suppose that it’s time for you to take off your pants.” The dwarf disrobed disruptively. Obviously making little difference to either of the creatures in the room, though, had Rarity been there, there would have been more room and potential for disturbance, of course, that does not excuse the fact that Rarity did in fact feel disturbed by some variety of sixth sense that related to the process of undressing disruptively. Flames leapt from Twilight’s horn, tangerine radiance casted across the diagram. The heat caused the dwarf’s skin to glisten. “Now what?” There was silence, desolate, hidden underneath the roar of the flame. It was the kind of silence which drove men and dwarves alike to their solitary melancholia, and then to madness. At some points, it was said that it was the silence of the passing which drove the ghosts to return and haunt the dead in the fortress, the silence implicit in failing to honor the dwarf who had died, a tomb, a slab with a name, some kind of memorial to honor the dwarf. Without this minor anchor, the spirit drifted to the same. This silence was worse than that, worse than having the world wretched from you, worse still than being forgotten, it was the silence of impending doom. “You need to be immolated.” Twilight’s voice became a whisper. “It is necessary for the spell. There can be no change without a price, in this case, the fee is steep, it requires the pain of a lifetime, or the life itself, I’m sorry Tholumom. I really am.” “What about the Elements of Harmony, what of them? They did not take life for life in the city did they?” Tholumom shouted. It did little to help his desperation, but it did cause his vocal cords to become sore. “They did, they took the pain of the dying, and the essence of the dead to fuel them, they took the energy in the burst gas mains, and all else. They saved the lives of those involved, they even seemed to give them their lives back, but they did take it to begin with.” Twilight sputtered, “How dare you think I am not using the best methods I have for you. I’m only doing this because you asked for it, listened to my story, the one that pertained to my reticence in doing what you asked. Of course I’m doing the best I can for you.” “That’s not what I meant, I meant that you did not use the pain which I have already, I’m far older than you are; I have hundreds of painful experiences for you to draw on, some that I can’t even accept.” Tholumom said. He inched closer to Twilight, and wrapped his arm around her. The flame stopped. Her eyes shot open, “You are right.” She whispered. Her right eyelid closed slightly, twitching. “Don’t worry Twilight, I’m miserable. It would not be so bad to burn for this, but why create new fuel when there is already fuel there to burn?” Her right eyelid lifted up to its normal state. “So you don’t run out of fuel.” Twilight said as though it were a matter of fact. “If you burn misery, why would you miss it?” Tholumom smiled. “Because, you are acutely aware of your pain when the spell acts on you, more so than you already have.” Tholumom’s left eye twitched. “No, no, that’s fine. Just do it before I change my mind.” “This is absolutely dreadful! I can’t figure out what’s bothering me!” The wail carried over most of Ponyville. Colgate, who had stopped to buy carrots, suddenly turned towards the sound as it passed over her, though, she did get on with buying carrots soon afterwards. In the Carousel Boutique, Rarity tore through drawers and shelves, seeking something. Spike went through his mental checklist. Estrus? No, I can’t smell pheromones. Undressing? Why would that bother her? My presence? I hope not. Gem growth underneath the Carousel Boutique? Probably. “Rarity, could it be that this could just be another incident of gem growth underneath the building?” Spike suggested. Rarity’s horn glowed, a giant diamond showed through the floor. Spike thought to himself that it was impressive just how big it was. Also that it looked delicious in the same way that a giant donut sign looked delicious. “No, that’s the same size as it was yesterday. No, the feeling is a bit like the time that you walked in on us dressing.” Rarity mused. Spike frowned, thinking cynical things about the state of mind which Rarity must find herself in. “Wow Rarity, that’s a bit strange.” The horrors of Tholumom’s life flashed before his eyes. That there is no order save what death imposes upon the world. That he was delusional in attempting to order it at all, because, as all things are, he is ultimately mortal. Being a dwarf, this did not daunt him, being a pony, it did. For a moment, he was aware of every single part of him, overwhelming him with knowledge and information. It dissipated with a flash of pain, leaving him only with the inferiority of memory. Oneiric valleys stretched before him, beckoning him to run, the mountains behind him served as refuge for something. Whatever they were, they were not what he should seek. Another wind blew, driving him from the forest, to the plain. He resisted, but the wind blew harder, freezing him until he allowed it to work within him. A searing bolt from the heavens stung him, and he saw between the lines, in all their beauty, but there was something missing, something which was obscene and lost within the miserly energy conservation of the universe. A freedom dominated him imitating tyranny. Another dimension opened up to him, and shut before he could make sense of what was inside of it. Memories of his daughter floated in his mind, and her loss impressed itself upon him, fleeting shapes of the dimension lost to him imitated her before resolution could be attempted. His wife called him in shapes and colors which he had names for. Shadows chased him in the visage of goblins after spawning underneath the sparse furniture in the basement. Reality shifted. The ceiling was higher than it had been. The impossibility of raising himself became apparent as the situation became clear to him; he was already standing. “I thought I was short before.” Regardless of the recent weather, or, more correctly, because of it, Rainbow dash swerved through clouds over Las Pegasus. The Pegasus was not entirely certain why the city was known as “Las Pegasus”, but she was sure that it contained more diamond dog prostitutes than Pegasi. Despite the inevitability of resuscitating in the early hours of the day and discovering that there was indeed such a thing as too much fun, as proved by last night, she had decided to visit anyway. It was the invitation to her father’s wedding to a new mare. She had not heard about this till recently, the fact that her father had been dating at all eluded her, though, it did explain, to some degree, why her mother had shown up to her house and stayed there for a few months, before finding herself a nice “Not Doctor” Whooves, who, on most days, went about the town going by another name, Time Turner. Doctor Whooves has a nicer ring to it, doesn’t it? The scatterbrained Pegasus quickly realized that there was also something that was new to her; something called getting lost in one’s own thoughts. What a wonderful day this was, not only was her father getting married to some mare he met only a few months ago, but she was discovering more about the possible states of her existence. Regardless of the immanence which Rainbow Dash found pervading her day, she found herself understanding the necessity of concentrating on her current task; clearing out a few clouds. It was easy to get lost in thought, or so her colleges told her, when clearing cirrus clouds. Stringy, but quite large, and high up, they are not difficult to remove, but require a lot of concentration due to the smaller mass of the cloud and their reluctance to fuse when pushed into each other. Regardless of their general harmlessness, she was finding them more difficult than she normally did. She began to wonder if she had purposefully sought out the weather department in Las Pegasus in order to avoid her father, and his fiancé. In this state of self-reflection, she finally relented in her pursuit of the obnoxious Cirrus clouds. They never actually carried rain anyways. Someponies just like the clear blue sky. She decided that those ponies would have to just deal with it. She started her way back to her father’s hotel room, she might as well say hello to the stallion. It had been a long time after all. “Maybe you should just move your hooves-” “No, no, I got it.” “I don’t see how, you’re still on the ground.” “I think I’ve been doing this longer than you have.” “This all just seems a bit new to you.” “I don’t know. I don’t think that it is that different.” “Your hooves seem to disagree with you.” “Left forehoof to blue.” “How am I supposed to do that? Blue is behind me.” “I don’t know, I’m not the one playing twister.” “Spike, that isn’t very helpful.” The room was tense. The multicolor dots taunted Tholumom with their rubbery difficulty. It was a balance between reaching the dots as prescribed by the wheel with the indicated body part, and avoiding touching Twilight in ways which he was not comfortable with. In any case, he was finding himself sprawled out over her, he found himself repulsed by the possibility of knowing her more closely than he already did. “Spiiike! I still can’t figure it out.” As the wail passed over Ponyville once again, not a single pony turned their head or paid any heed to it. It was just that kind of day. The kind of day when Rarity was making a big deal out of something, something which most were used to, if not resistant to. Unfortunately, one of the downsides of being attracted to the finicky Unicorn was having to listen to their problems. Today, it had the flavor of kibble and lemons. “Rarity. Please, calm down, intuition can’t possibly be right all the time…” Spike’s voice became a whisper, “unless you’re Pinkie Pie.” “I know that Spike. I just can’t shake the feeling that somepony is playing Twister-“ she grabbed Spike, “Without me!” she screamed. “Why would that offend you Rarity?” Spike asked, knowing that Twilight had been playing Twister with another pony that he had not recognized. “Because, I always win at it.” “Okay Rainbow Dash.” “Spike even Rainbow Dash knows that I am the best at Twister, across all of Equestria, I am the best at Twister. If I had not found fashion before that, or mining, or whatever else I live off of, I would have a twister board as a Cutie Mark.” Spike chose to ignore what had just been said. “Okay Rarity, I’ll tell them that they should invite you to play next time.” “What? You would know about somepony playing Twister and not tell me? Spike I’m hurt, I thought you loved me!” tears streamed down her face. “I thought I could trust you, how dare you! Never look at me again!” Spike backed towards the door and left, not taking his eyes off of the upset Unicorn. “So I see that you told her about Twister. Never tell Rarity about twister. She’ll forgive you eventually, but don’t let yourself be seen by her in the next month.” Pinkie Pie appeared next to him, and hugged him. “I’m sorry about your relationship with her.” “I don’t know Pinkie, I think I still have a chance.” “I’m sure that there is some remote chance of that happening Spike.” The joyous pink pony jumped off into the sunset. “I guess that it’s just Pinkie being Pinkie.” The keycard reader made little sense to the rainbow maned Pegasus as she stared at it. It failed to coincide with the general opinion that most ponies had, that technology should be accessible to all of the races of ponies. Unfortunately, this seemed to be one of those places where the Diamond dog prostitutes made money opening doors which most ponies visiting (around two thirds if the general rule of equal numbers holds up). Fortunately, this was not an issue, she could knock; she could fly out onto the balcony. But knocking was the most likely option to work. She sighed. She had not talked to her father for a long time. It was bad blood. Of course, blood is always thick. The disagreement was never clear to either side of the argument. She did not care for her father. He never cared for her. No matter how much she tried to get respect from her father, he never respected her. Memories of flying with him, his cool expression, as she tried to gain his love. Spinning across the sky, outrunning her father, outmaneuvering him, outsmarting him, even the sonic rainboom did little to impress him. He was a waste of time, an activity which all the time in the universe could not complete. And no amount of questioning could ever resolve what exactly it was that her father wanted from her. A son. The answer was clear enough. It was the one thing that she could never do for him, be his son. She was fine with that, she knew from the emergence of that knowledge that she was not able to be his son. She didn’t want to. Too much work. Too much change. But, why would he have invited her to this wedding? Perhaps it might be to rub it in her face. It would be no different than before. The same old man, doing the same old thing, nothing will have changed. Maybe a few grey feathers. She knocked. “One minute.” It was a voice which she could not quite place: The voice of a mare, muffled by the strange material of the door. The door swung open. And she was surprised. “Mom?” “Hi honey, I’m glad to see that you came.” She said. Her mother smiled like she did when she was a filly. The warm, comfortable smile had returned, alien to these latter years. It was the smile that only existed when her parents loved each other. Another thing alien to these latter years. “I thought that you were dating Doctor Hooves.” “Who? You mean Time Turner? He doesn’t go by Doctor Hooves anymore.” “Mom, the distinction is lost on me.” “You wouldn’t know, being a young woman as you are, about the importance of titles. Anyway, he never really did achieve any level of doctorate, so it offended him when he came to terms with what he was, a pony who was really good at managing time.” The rainbow maned Pegasus rolled her eyes. What the hell was a doctorate? It barely mattered anyway. “Who’s getting married anyway?” “Your father and I are remarrying. We finally came to our senses after such a long separation. I think that we can appreciate each other now.” “What? But Dad is just… Just…” “Too arrogant? Is that it? Dash.” His mother was moved gently out of the way by a black bodied, red maned Alicorn. He just so happened to have a cutie mark striking some unknown evil in the face, killing it. “Dad!” “Dash. I understand that I was wrong. I was wrong in how I treated you, and when I finally extended that to your mother, I was miserable, so were both of you.” He sighed. “I just want to love for the time which I have remaining.” “Do you mean for the rest of eternity?” Dash barely made out. “No. the immortality test came back, I’m going to die in four years, three days, eleven hours, six minutes, and twelve seconds. Honestly Dash, I would not recommend getting that test.” “But then, who will protect Equestria from all of the implausible disaster scenarios which may come up in the future?” “It’s up to you, Dash. You and your friends. I’m sure that they can handle it just as well as I could, if not better. Just so long as you are a team. Also, I am certain that there will be more people-I mean ponies that like you and your friends than those who like me.” “Why did it take you this long if you defeated Discord in three minutes without using magic with your hooves tied up?” “I can’t even imagine a good answer to that question Dash. I’m just unwilling to make myself vulnerable.” “You know what Dad, you just suck.” Rainbow Dash decided that it was probably not really necessary to stay for the wedding. Her father had done too much for soft words like those to repair. But inside the Pegasus bristled a sense of self-confidence that surged under the soft words. Somehow, she knew, that her father was not so spectacular after all. Also, perhaps that it might finally be time to don the bandanna and admit her sexuality. Not that the two were innately connected. That is, that they are both causally intertwined in the existence of the other. As in the freedom from the concerns which he once had are so removed from him that he cannot even begin to think about being concerned again. Author's Note Finally. A new chapter. Anyway, I'm not used to writing for Rainbow Dash, so, creative license I guess? MemoranceIt was not typical. There was just something inexplicably wrong about it. Something that turned the entire experience of playing Twister as a pony back upon itself, making it worthless to recall. Something about it screamed at the former dwarf that there was something too unwholesome to merit explanation. It was terrifying. As useful as it was for learning how to control his body again, it was like the half remembered dream of witchcraft or nightmares. This, as it were, did not originate with "Nightmare Moon". An awful realization covered Tholumom; given what he was, the last link to his past had been cut entirely. Nothing could ever pull him back there save the inquisitive sparkle in Twilight's eyes. The brightness with which they regarded the world of waking was as though it were a dream too vivid to forget. And yet he knew that there could not be peace. He knew that there would never be a time which he could look upon his action and say without a question that he had completed his duty to the fullest, and thus had no point but to serve his own ends. Like some child spun off into a cognate world of its own, simply through his own miswanderings. And yet, throughout all his questionings, there could be no inquiry into which the nature of his time here might be made clear, simply through the virtue of the impossibility of proving that what must be taken as an assumption be true. There was no way for him to prove to himself that he had ever been a dwarf. Sometimes, even memories seemed to have been altered. His wife was never the one which he had known before, simply another pony. Somepony whose name eluded him. Just as the life as a dwarf had eluded him as he tried to remember. He knew those memories were false. Twilight Sparkle assured him that they were. What reasons could he have not to trust his own daughter? But then she isn't his daughter, is she? No, another memory spun by the spell to encourage him to take the new form with grace and acceptance. Tholumom looked at the lavender pony. She might as well be his daughter. That would be losing the truth. Just because there is not a reason why something can't be a certain way does not mean that it must be that way. Ultimately, he knew that there were no reasons that he could not simply forget about his previous life. But then what? A narrative half remembered would scream at him to run, and then he would die by the fiery breath of a dragon. Something that he would have used in order to save himself and others would be lost. Why? Why though? It would be no better than acting as though he had been a pony for his entire life. No. that can't be the answer. That must never be the answer. There is no reason which it should be the answer to adversity. The simple seduction of the lotus eater, which sought to draw him into a blind which there would be no recovery from, had caught him. A binding would appear around his wrists (now only recalled to illustrate a metaphor), and tie him to a pole. Goblins would throw fruit at him. It would be among the most awful times which he could ever know. At last, there would be a change. But into what? What thought would save him from these fears? Nothing. Save for getting on with his life, taking both lives into account and acknowledging both would yield life experience that he could not have otherwise. Safety in dualism of thought. Dreams of dwarves and ponies both, turned to flesh and made alive. And yet inside this would be a dichotomy of nature, which would take the kindness and natural gentleness of the pony and corrupt it with the angst that a dwarf must feel in order to accept the life which they lead for themselves. That in this, there might be some glint of hope with which to change the tide for him. But in the end, there would be nothing save the dream of a better day. Nothing more or less. But would that dream of sleep and peace endure for him? A greater urge pushed him away from these thoughts. Hunger. It was not hard to imagine the hunger that a horse would feel, especially given that he was one, a great gnawing in his stomach. "Twilight, would it be possible to get something to eat?" The words emerged with a confidence that was kinder to him than his own mind was. It was absurd. "Sure Tholumom, I'll get started with Spike to get some lunch made. It's an important day for you. Though, now I must ask you to seek residence with some pony else. I'm sorry, but I don't want to give other ponies the wrong impression about our relationship. They are quite gossipy after all." Tholumom's face burned. "Why would they think that?" "Mostly because the best which they can conceive of includes producing a new variant of the ubiquitous romance story which stars me and my brother. All false of course, but there are ponies out there that like to write things without thinking about them very much." Twilight's expression became dour as she said that. "I see your point Twilight." That does, in fact, seem unreasonable to me. It really didn't. Why would they make up such saucy rumors? Unless of course it was to placate the pointless guile that must exist I the mind of the gossip. The loss of the truth is a more damaging effect than any goblin invasion. "Thanks for the validation Tholumom. I doubt that you could understand fully, but I do really appreciate what you've done for me." the dwarf wondered whether Twilight could appreciate what she had done for him. Giving him a new life is impressive. And it shall never come to pass again. A voice whispered in his head. It doesn't matter. There are more significant problems in store for him, ones that he can deal with more effectively than he did in his last life. At what cost. Emotional pain could justify a little bit of peace, but it could never buy it for a permanent time. The implausibility of continuation becomes apparent as one is aware of their own limitations in the realms of reality, and thus in the realms of spirit and mind. All things descend from reality, spirit from mind, and mind from body. There is nothing to the body save for the chemistry there, and thus the same is true for the mind. Just because there are layers of abstraction which allow the mind to be placed in a separate realm than the body, does not preclude or distance one from the fact that there is nothing more to the mind than what is in nature, a large vat of complex chemistries. All of which tend to decay into entropy. This fact was, of course, lost to the dwarf as he considered the whole situation. "Okay Twilight." "I'll bring you some oats. Others had reported that oats had become more pleasant to them as they changed, so we'll see if that is true." "Twilight..." The thought died on his lips like so many others did in the fortress: with a twang of bitterness. So he was just an experiment for her now. He understood the kindness which those words covered up, that it was just another fact. It made no difference to him. Good intentions or not, the words were no less toxic than they would have been if they had been spoken by any scientist studying a statistical set of data. "Twilight, I just have to make sure that you aren't using me in an experiment of any kind right?" "Well... Tholumom, I really didn't want to think about it that way, but after this whole experience, you are the only source of data that has remained so open to anypony in this position before, so yeah, you weren't an experiment before. Now I would like to ask a few questions, you know, see how you adjust after a few days." The former dwarf scowled. A mixture of defeat and a type of understanding filled him. It made sense for what Twilight wanted to do, but at the same time, it provoked a deep distrust in him, as though it were a personal threat. "You know Twilight, I'm not quite sure that I'm okay with that arrangement." "I understand Tholumom, you feel used if you end up doing this. I wouldn't want to feel that way either, so I understand completely." "But can I trust you?" "What would cause you to question whether or not I've betrayed you?" "Because I wanted to escape from a life full of pain. The pain is there, just confused. It is even worse, as I must contemplate what this actually means for me." "You expected that to result from this? This can only complicate your life, learning everything you need to survive in that body will be painful." Her voice was too calm. "Why didn't you clarify that then?" "Because, the way this works, you can't actually use magic on you to alter anything for the next three years, otherwise there could be nasty interference, and if that happens... Well you certainly couldn't know. Besides, I haven’t had a good magical challenge in far too long." The former dwarf scowled. Deception. It worms its way into ignorance and plants a seed that grows into a thorn bush. Impossible to excise. Impossible to amend. The world is of concrete things when only anger exists. Nothing is abstract enough to merit explanation. Regardless of the mental pricks he had to endure, he needed to get through it. The situation was his fault. The thorn bush blossomed. “Twilight, I need to leave.” “But Thol-“ “But nothing Twilight. I need to go right now.” The lavender unicorn blocked the door. “I can’t let you do that.” Tholumom felt a pressure build into the back of his skull. Anger and fury welled up in him visibly. His horn burbled with a viscous magic error. Green flashing red. His vision turned red as it became too much to bear. “Tholumom, no!” Light blasted from Tholumom’s horn, striking Twilight with a sickly aura. She faded away as all else did. The dwarf awoke and shot up in his bed. He wiped his head in the darkness of his bedroom, his brow was covered in a cold sweat. A body lay next to him, breathing comfortably. She stirred softly and her eyes opened wearily to look into the darkness of the room, she rose as well. “Are you okay Tholumom?” He sighed. “I’m okay, it was just a nightmare, go back to sleep Totmondur. I love you.” “I love you too Tholumom.” The sound of his wife’s gentle breathing began again. He shook his head and lied down again. Such colorful ponies, what a silly idea. Tholumom Lathonudlerned has been content recently. He has awoken from an unpleasant dream, but taken solace in the presence of a loved one. He is disappointed that his friends did not actually exist. He did not know what to make of his experience as a pony. Tholumom is very healthy. He has enjoyed good mead recently. He is not convinced of the authenticity of the reality which he finds himself within. The morning bell failed to ring, mostly due to the lack of any agreed upon time to wake up at. In this regard, a dwarven fortress was very lenient. Nobody would fault each other if they slept in, missed their guard duty, and allowed goblins to ransack the fortress. This was, fortunately enough, almost unheard of. Goblins liked to sneak around, and, as it happens, are not good at it. They do not notice the dwarves, or other creatures ahead of them until they bump into them, at which point, the farmer or lumberjack which they have bumped into is quite likely to die by their superior fighting ability (if only because dwarves do not like to have to defend themselves unless they are soldiers). None of this was of concern to Tholumom. Too much occurred for a single night of rest to produce. Dreams that spanned months, personalities that seemed too independent to have in basis in reality. It did not deter him from his task, clearing away a bit more stone to expand the stockpiles. Expanding them for the good of dwarvenkind. Famine would not be what struck the Ideas of Mourning out of existence. It would simply have to be something else. That is, naturally, all well and good. The limestone was hard, but not particularly difficult to remove with the skill which he possessed after a few months of working at it constantly. This was not the worst thing that the dwarf could imagine. Sure the dreams were more colorful, darker, and generally more real, but still, who could ever blame them, they were dreams, of course they were more real than the average day. "Sometimes I wonder, do we really have the best culture? Sometimes I think that the dwarves have got it right." A goblin, with mace in a scabbard, said. This was one of the common hobbies of the ambushers, musing about the state of their culture in relationships to other ones. "Hey! Shut up! If they find us they'll-" A crossbow rested on the back of the goblin who countermanded the other one. He was interrupted, because, as, most new ambushers found out, this was the only way to distract themselves from the constant danger which they are placed in on a daily basis. "Yeah, we know, kill us all on sight, without mercy or consideration. It's what you get for 'having slaves' in an unusually liberal society." "Shut up. If the Law-Giver heard you, you would be-" The same crossbow-goblin responded, assuming that mentioning that the demonic leader would not approve would stop the political discourse. Of course, he was wrong. "Dead. I know. It really does pay to have a Demon at the head of your civilization." The Segway was used on virtually all of the newbies, it worked on nearly every single one, and shifted the focus of the conversation into the benefits and downfalls that come from living in a civilization based on the induction of other cultures into one, which happens to be lead by a demon. Generally regarded by other civilizations as being an anomaly, but for the goblins, they knew that they would survive just as long as any other civilization could. After around twenty more of these exchanges, the opinion solidified: Goblins are simply better. They are better at keeping their citizens working, better at keeping them in line, and even better at assimilating children into their culture. At least they would not be kept in mines until the very sight of the sun forced them to vomit in an unnatural adaptation to having useless eyes in the darkness. The debate continued and eventually, the goblin ambush party agreed: The dwarven hammerer is the byproduct of a monocultural nihilism that separates dwarves from the more reasonable races, such as humans, or Goblins. Naturally, however they also conceded that sometimes, possessing a legal system which only occasionally kills the criminal is beneficial when the populace is depleted in whatever projects that the dwarves deem necessary. Such as a giant, magma-shooting statue that towers nearly a mile tall. The typical Goblin speed at a good sneak (about a mile an hour) was not exceeded as they approached the fortress. This fortress was not particularly well established. There were only around thirty dwarves in the fortress, not all that many, but enough to be at the point where they start making mugs. Also children. Children started being born as the population reached this point. The goblins mused about the coincidence, but came to the conclusion that there was not enough of a connection. Unfortunately for the Goblins, this point in the fortresses’ life was also when guards started to be placed on duty, trained, and equipped with effective weaponry (not that the woodcutter’s axe lacked such effectiveness). Often they were set to patrol the exterior of the fortress. “You know, sometimes I think that the Goblins have the best government.” “Yeah, but they can’t debate about that can they?” “I wonder what it is like being led by a fearsome demon into battle instead of an overfed king?” “Probably pretty nice.” The Goblins listened in on the conversation that eventually led the two guards to the same conclusion as the goblins, that the Goblin society was probably superior, but that the dwarven hammerer is an absurd remnant of a monocultural nihilism, and of course, there are too many damned cheese makers in the fortress. The Goblin ambush party waited until the guards left, then proceeded into the fortress: It was only a matter of time. Totmondur held her daughter. She carried the child everywhere, doing everything with the small child, really only an infant. The child had just learned how to speak. “Mommy, where are we going now?” “Well Ingtak Kebul, we’re going to bring back in some wood from the tree mommy just cut down.” “Why do you cut down trees momma?” “Because we use their bodies to build things out of, like that bed, sweetie.” The best part of this job was taking the wood to the stockpile. Well, today it was, Igntak would be able to see her father doing his job as he expanded the stockpile as well. She would ask questions and Tholumom would be able to answer whatever her questions were, even satisfying them. They reached the stockpile. It was a huge room, not tall, but wide. The entire bounty of the fortress contained within it. It was empty. It was not often that dwarves came down here; it was desolate and relatively poorly lit, lonely even with a friend. The sound of a pickaxe ringing as it struck at the rock echoed in the chamber irregularly, giving the impression that there might be an army of dwarves digging away the limestone. There wasn’t. The only one in here was Tholumom. It did not take the Goblins long to figure out where the stockpile was, whether it was because of their rumored ability to sniff out the most valuable things in the fortress, or the relatively easily read maps available to anyone at the fortress’ entrance, no one could say. The goblin detested the darkness that seeped with the emulsions of the ground itself. Whether or not a demon with many tentacles stalked the similarly darkened halls of their fortresses were in fact (as a few human cultures believed) in the habit of raping unsuspecting females. It wasn’t true, and considering what the Law-giver could do to the unsuspecting wanderer, that would almost be a mercy. The goblins were not in such a mood for that. “Tholumom?” Totmondur yelled into the darkness of the stockpile room. It echoed for a moment, joining the army of dwarves striking the rock with picks, and then the pick silenced. “Totmondur?” The reply returned. The male dwarf slunk out of the darkness and approached the pair. “It’s nice to see you two.” “Daddy, why are you expanding the stockpiles?” “Ingtak, the stockpiles are where we keep products of our fortress, such as food. If the stockpiles are larger, then we can store more food for things like drought or goblin sieges.” “Why would Goblins siege us?” “Well… I’m not really sure. I think it has something to do with spreading their superior social constructs over us. Honestly though, I don’t know.” “Bingo!” “Who said that?” The goblins melted out of the darkness. “Hi. We’re going to ‘Spread’-” the goblin made a strange motion with his middle and index fingers on both hands, “our culture here. Hand us the child!” “How ‘bout no!” Totmondur put down the child and took the battleax which she generally used in order to cut down trees. “How ‘bout yes?” The goblin in front which had spoken moved out of the way and a spear wielding goblin stabbed her in the chest. She dropped the battleax, a gesture generally agreed to mean “Damn! my lungs have been punctured by your skill”. The goblins grabbed the child and ran. Tholumom could do nothing, he was paralyzed by fear. He got on his knees to examine his wife. His wife coughed. “Why are you tending to me? Go get your daughter. She's the one you want to save.” The world faded again. “Tholumom? Are you alright?” The former dwarf took a long time to respond. "Twilight. What just happened?" "You experienced one of your many tragic moments, I would guess. All that hateful magic conflicted with the general formula required for the spell I used to be successful. So, instead of leaving you in a disfigured, half-dwarf half-pony state, it simply put you out and reminded you of what you were trying to escape from." Tholumom once again, took a long time to respond to the purple unicorn. "Is there any way to get through these memories faster?" Not that I would recommend, it doesn't matter anyway: You would still have the unpleasant three year recovery time. Most magic will be fine, just so long as it does not stimulate passion. Or utilize passion. Either of which would cause unpleasant side effects. Mostly including various mutations, possible instantaneous changelings transformation, or potentially godhood. Which, trust me, is not very much fun either." "So, nothing that I could ever potentially want?" "That is precisely what I just said." "Nice." "Is that sarcasm I hear?" "Yes. Twilight, in fact it is." "Why did you use sarcasm? Doesn't that just negate the point altogether?" "Twilight, sometimes I love you." The dwarf responded to the pointless logical construct. "What about the rest of the time?" The former dwarf did not reply. There could be nothing so careless as a response to that kind of question. "I like you Twilight. You remind me of my daughter. That's why I like you. You are very much like her, that is what I mean." "Why would you say that?" "Because it... I can't say yet. Memories too long repressed allow even the names or natures pass through into the grate which belies the endless pits." "It doesn't really matter." Her face seemed to contradict what she said. "Twilight. I will tell you when you are ready, and I am certain that what I must say contains no lies which the omission of memories can deceive into truth." "What happened to you Tholumom? What is it that you relived?" Her voice contained more concern than anything else. Kind of her, really. "I cannot really say. Suspicions arise out of the dust of the dead. Some of what I believed dead may have returned after all. If it is true..." Tholumom's voice trailed off. "Needless to say, my suspicions have an unbelievably low chance of turning out to be true." He left something unsaid, For the sake of what is her past, if true, will change my relationship in ways that I can't imagine. The dwarf realized that there was nothing that could be done to change the past. Nothing worthwhile at least. The past remained fixed in a way that would only lead to the current situation if he tried to change it. It would be more beneficial, he thought, to remember the past. It is only possible to change the perception of the past, resolution of the situation is the only beneficial one that can be achieved in a satisfactory way. "I can't imagine what your motivation is here. I'm not your daughter. I can't be." "Memories seem to postulate that you are far more like her than you would guess. The first evidence of this is the meaning of her name. Ingtak Kebul, was her name. Twilight Sparkle is its translation." "No, what I mean is that your daughter, family, and then civilization died around you. I cannot be her." The former dwarf shifted uncomfortably. "I very much doubt that there is a coincidence here. All of my friends made fun of me for giving my child that name. She did not die when my wife did, nor was she around for the death of the Ideas of Mourning. She was taken by the goblin ambushers who took my wife from me. As far as I know, she was not killed in their escape attempt." "That still does not change the fact that your daughter was a dwarf, whereas, I am a pony." "Obviously not. That would require exactly the same amount of effort that you put into me." The eyes of the lavender unicorn twitched. She said nothing anyway. She walked away, back into the kitchen. There was a banging of pots and pans before Spike walked out of the kitchen briskly, rather incensed. "Dude? What did you say to her?" "Spike. I don't want to hurt that girl." "Then don't." His eyes narrowed at the dead-sea colored pony in front of him. There was something familiar about him. The dragon's anger faded as he drew more blanks. "Who are you anyway?" "Think about it Spike. Those tea-kettles certainly must have been annoying to clean up. I certainly couldn't blame you for harboring a strong distrust of me after that." There was a silence that hung in the air longer than it should have. "Oh. Hi Tholumom. You still suck." "I know." "Have you considered trying your luck as a vacuum cleaner?" "What?" "It's a cleaning machine used to remove dirt from the floor using suction." "Oh, so, since I suck, I should try being a "vacuum cleaner" because, due to my natural suction, I would be exceptional at it." "Wow. Most people and ponies lack the density required to miss that joke." "So, I'm sufficiently not-dense enough to understand your joke." "Yes. That is the point." "Wow, you must really suck at making jokes." "No, you're just good at ruining them." "I guess that my skill must be better." The dragon whispered that he thought otherwise and then walked off back into the kitchen, where the disturbed lavender unicorn attempted to beat the food into being cooked. Tholumom began wonder whether sharing his uncomfortable revelations was the right thing to do in the moment. It was clearly not, but for what purpose would regret serve? Obviously it would not serve much of one. The sounds of a frantic stirring continued. Clangs began to emerge from the kitchen. Questioning somepony's life story seems to be among the list of customs which are commonly referred to as taboo. Not so much because of their potential to offend, but that attempting to insert oneself as a parental figure for someone who already has one, and, is, by their parent's testimony, not adopted. Especially if the claim is then backed by obscure and arcane reasoning(which happens to be the best kind of reasoning in general), then there is an instantaneous identity conflict which emerges out of the necessity to accept what is said as fact while also clinging to an identity which is rapidly evaporating around them. The former dwarf knew this from experience, children in the fortress tended to be rather cruel. Needless to say, even mentioning his theorizing is an understandable enough reason for Twilight to develop a well deserved resentment of his presence. Spike, having not accepted his place as a slave in this society was hardly a better to turn to for this kind of support. All caused by simply opening his mouth. He decided that eating wasn't worth it. He was not appreciated here, and it would be a disservice to Twilight and Spike to stay. He thought things like, At least when I have some proof, I'll be set. Tholumom is a unicorn: An industrious magic user. He has been confused recently. His anger as of late has become a concern recently. He is not certain what to make of his experience so far. He is very strong. He has no magical talent whatsoever, but he plans on working on that. He lacks any real kinesthetic sense with his body. He is sensitive, and finds himself speaking with an unusual articulation as of late. He has no musical skill whatsoever. A strange stallion stalked the underused streets of Ponyville, not that there was such a thing: The town was simply too small for any particular road to remain in existence if it was not used fairly often. It was, in other words, not a fortress with hundreds of dwarves whose skills were so tied up in maintaining the flow of material to a few master craftsdwarves whose production was so fast that the rest of the fortress typically got little work done. Thus, it seemed as though it was just the right size for the strange stallion. His dark blue coat lacked any shine, his eyes were half opened: as though recovering from a long bout of sleep. Nonetheless, his eyes still showed through with incredible intensity. In my mind, nothing could escape his gaze. In reality, however, I saw that his eyes barely shifted, their blue irises never moving, showing absolute concentration on some point in front of him. His flank had a depiction of a pickaxe striking a stone. Something about his mark seemed wrong, as though it was dissolving. He was losing his talent. Whatever it was, he could no longer do it. Something must have changed in his heart, a hole opened by some mechanism of wayward emotional instability. "Scootaloo, what the hay are you writing?" The clacking of a typewriter stopped suddenly. The voice seemed to have silenced the machine. The orange Pegasus stared at it blankly, as though her ability to use the machine, much like the stallion's cutie mark, evaporated with the words. Her silent spell was broken by the glacial realization in her rear brain that there was something to become mad about here. The anger advised her frontal lobes to inform the offender that they should back away and return to their territory. The frontal lobes, knowing that would sound unusual, pinpointed the reason, but her speech center missed the point and decided to inform the interrupter that she should go back to what she was doing and let her be. "Sweetie Belle, get back to being the dictionary, or whatever it was that you were trying out." "Scoots, why would I be a dictionary?" The orange Pegasus stared long into the green eyes of the interrupter: There was some coyness in her words. As though the joke between her friends was lost upon her. It was amazing that she hadn't already made a chicken joke to compensate for such imbalance. "Come on you Dodo, you know that this isn't your special skill." Naturally it had come to this, and the rear brain screamed at the frontal lobe to kill the offender, but the frontal lobe decided to ignore both the information from the auditory system as well as the absurdity that was inherent in the general premise as well. The speech center fell back on another joke. One that the offender would not understand. "Why would you be a giraffe?" The words came out, causing a large amount of confusion in the Pegasus' frontal lobe, where all of the available connections to memory were used for a single moment to determine where the impulse had come from. There was none. "You don't make any sense." The orange Pegasus quietly agreed. It was time to state the intent, the frontal lobe decided. "Never mind, I'm being an author." The frontal lobe was not pleased with the effect. It was inarticulate, but the speech center was so unpredictable today that it did not desire to risk another run-in with it. So it simply allowed that to slide. "What are you writing about then?" Finally, the frontal lobe acquired the proper mode of attention, inquisitiveness, it was a pleasant topic. Now how to describe it? "That strange looking pony over there." Good enough, short enough that it might be enough to pique the former offender/interrupter's(downgraded from current state of either due to following the proper conversational path) curiosity in a positive way. "You mean the one with the 'dissolving cutie mark'?" The frontal lobe decided that it had probably not intended for this to occur, and quietly cursed the visual lobe of the offender/interrupter(upgraded once again after missing out on the intended conversational path). The frontal lobe felt like making the offender/interrupter feel foolish and communicated this to the speech center, whose response, required no particular precision. "Yes Sweetie-belle. Who else could it be?" The speech center was obviously affected by the rear-brain's irritation at the unicorn. The frontal lobe determined that it would try to force the speech center to actually consider more eloquent options, rather than what it had tried before. The Pegasus as a whole decided to pursue this further, because, even the speech center was aware of its own weakness. "Geez, at least I'm not probably in the process of writing bad romance stories." The rear-brain of the Pegasus decided that this was the final straw and attempted to override the control of the frontal lobe and strangle the dual offender/interrupter/insulter. The visual lobe of the Pegasus, consulted the memory store, and upon finding the offender/interrupter/insulter in memory delegated the task of handling adjustments made to muscle action to the hippocampus, which upon receiving the information, found itself wondering whether or not to actually allow this to go through to the cerebellum, or to send an interrupt to the rear brain so as to make the Pegasus merely grimace, rather than strangle her and/or rip her throat out. The frontal lobe was also satisfied with this arrangement and added a few words to the marshmallow-like unicorn. Who reacted in horror, and the rear-brain in the unicorn must have found justification to strangle the orange Pegasus. He felt his identity slipping away, memories remained, but the skill, for example, for mining, seemed to suddenly leave his body. Something was taking it. Tholumom realized that it would probably be a good idea to find something to do, something to become, because, he knows that work is the only way to avoid the melancholy of contemplation. Sweat on the brow, as it seeps into the eyes, purifies the mind. It also stings. Besides, there seemed, even in this small town, to be enough nobles and similarly inclined ponies, any of whom might have some needless work to do. From the budding industrialists, to the economic majors, even Ponyville contained the necessary investors to improve upon his ideas, to pay him, or simply to contract him for whatever work they could endorse. All of these positives evaporated when his stomach once again reminded him what it felt like to be a starving horse. The appropriate response, he decided, was to barter with the nearest purveyor of foodstuffs which he could locate. Perhaps he could find some work there. After a considerable delay(of nearly forty-five minutes), the clanging of the pots and pans stopped in the Library's kitchen. The purple and green dragon strolled out holding a large pot of oatmeal, the traditional breakfast food in Equestria since the time of the three tribes. "Twilight, I hope that we weren't too harsh with him, he looked like he could lose it any minute." "Tholumom is a perfectly reasonable pony, I'm sure that he took it well, and accepted it as a de-facto rebuttal to his claims." "Well, where is he then?" The next half hour was spent looking for the unicorn, whose whereabouts seemed to lack the attribute of being included in the general area which was designated as "the library". "Spike, I'm not sure that he is stable. We need to find him, if he lapses again, outside, nopony will know what to do." "What would that even be, Twilight?" "Get him to the hospital. The momentary lapses could eventually continue into a longer, less stable flashback which would represent an intersection of reality and his traumatizing memories. He might think that, for example, Bon-bon was his mother or something." "But she's not into-" Twilight's interruption was sudden, and frantic: the concern of somepony who felt genuinely responsible for somepony else. "That's why it could go wrong." "I wouldn't wish that on anyone!" They both went out into the wider world to find the wayward unicorn. The oatmeal slowly solidified onto the pot, creating a buildup of crust which, any reasonable being would wish to avoid. Author's Note So yeah, hopefully this isn't too annoying. Anyway, enjoy your over six thousand words.
Prologue for a slaughterTholumom Lathonudlerned has been very unhappy recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has had a mediocre drink recently. He has looked at a masterful engraving of his family and been saddened. He has slept in a decent Alder bed recently. He has complained about the inclement weather recently. He has been angered at his conscription recently. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. Tholumom stars into his mug of ale. The ale is utterly tasteless. Another mediocre drink from the workshop of Addortalin Nuggadogon. He looks around the bar, dwarves are legitimately happy here. He keeps to himself, the pain of his life would only make the others unhappy. “Tholumom, Get over here! You are on active duty!” Tholumom grumbled into the ale, not even the omniscient narrator could make out what he said. “Now what?” “You don’t need to know to get into uniform.” “I am in uniform you idiot.” “I am your commanding officer.” “You? Ha! I’ve had more experience than you, and all I’ve done is fight a few hundred cubic-meters of rock and dirt.” Tholumom smiled when he said this. There was enough of a grudge between him and this other dwarf Urist... whatever it was it translated into ass licker. “This time it is actually serious.” “So we won’t be doing something pointless for a noble who doesn’t need protection from moths?” “Well... No, we aren’t doing that.” “Good.” Tholumom looked at the other dwarf, Urist, his beard was braided tightly enough to be a hazard if cut. he began to talk, interrupting the possibility of doing such a thing. “You don’t want the incidents of three years ago to be repeated.” Tholumom’s face became bright red, not the happy-drunk red-- the angry-drunk red. “Don’t talk about that! I’m done with that.” “Unless you want that to happen again, get your ass down to the Admantine tube. We need to be on guard, if we aren’t demons will break through and kill the fortress, every single dwarf that lives through that will have the same terrible experience as you.” His eyes narrowed on Urist. “You don’t know what that experience was.” “I can gather that it isn’t pleasant.” “You have no idea. I’ll go.” Tholumom finished off the mug, the barrel, and then another barrel for good luck, after all, combat could cause dehydration. Urist led him through the staircases that merged and diverged through the entire fortress. The sterilized, once dangerous cavern system, they passed a few legendary dining halls, and the minecart system used to deliver the heavy stones throughout the fortress from their original resting places in the newly mined out sections. The fortress seemed to go on forever, it went down to the mantle of the earth itself, not that that made it particularly impressive. The pits of hell were just a few meagre Z-levels beneath them, and there was the true prize, Slade. Slade was even harder to obtain than admantium, if the fortress received a commission for admantium, then Slade would certainly mean true, lasting greatness. There was a catch for either of the metals or stones. The entire legion of hell would have access to the fortress. The others in the massive squad were brandishing their war-axes, Tholumom grasped his hammer. The events of three years ago brought back bad memories whenever he used a war-axe. When he stepped into the line, the commander decided that his nobleness would give a speech on the goal of today’s engagements. “You idiots are going to keep the demons back while we build flooring over the pits, preventing them from getting in.” It was the shortest speech that anyone there had ever heard, for anything, at this fortress, or another. Either way, the troops were rendered speechless by this lazy oratory. The sub-commander walked up the the commander and whispered to him. “WHAT DO YOU MEAN THAT I SHOULD GET OUT OF PUBLIC SPEAKING?” more whispering. “Whatever, you, miners, get on with this BS.” “Shouldn’t we have some cage-traps set up? Just in case we fail?” Tholumom said. “Nah, we can’t possibly fail.” Tholumom waited for the ceiling to collapse, but, unfortunately, that was too easy. The hammering of pickaxes on stone continued for hours. Finally, something crumbled. A horrible stench rose up from outside the crack. The commander woke up from his nap. “Masons, get on that job!” The masons arrived quickly, and began to build a staircase down to the floor of hell. “Attack, Charge, Charge!” The group gave a roar. Dwarven roars are known to resemble the mating call of many of the variety of demons in hell, including number 53 and 41. Unfortunately, the other demons follow those two types around, meaning that 1 through 53 would come. Tholumom was the last dwarf left in hell. The others had either fled, or died. Even now, he swung his silver hammer at the 53s and 41s, they flew into the slade walls, exploding into gore. Inside his head, he could hear nothing but the thoughts relevant to battle. This cognitive process was known widely as the Martial Trance; and was often heralded as the final advantage that dwarves had over the other races. The demons continued to flow towards him. A 32, made entirely out of tentacles grabbed him, throwing him into the pit. The martial trance broke once he realized that he was falling. The strange glow of the eerie pit illuminated him as he fell. Darkness never came... No, there was light. The light grew brighter and brighter. Soon it was daylight again. There were no demons to be found. Needless to say, after seventeen long weeks underground, this was not an easy transition for Tholumom to make. As the atmosphere began to blue with the natural absorption spectra of oxygen and nitrogen, he began to vomit from the fear, the exposure to natural light. Soon there was moderately sized vomit sphere moving with him. This fact bothered him slightly less than the fact that he had just fallen into the infinite depths of the earth to emerge in the upper atmosphere. Unfortunately, to his knowledge, none of the dwarves that have managed to fall from such a height survived; they had a tendency to explode on impact. The world beneath him began to resolve itself out of fog. An ocean, or a lake. Either way, Tholumom was pleased to see it. “I remember swimming as a child... My father had to throw me into the pond. I was lucky that I didn’t drown.” he thought to himself. His skills were rusty; the plight of so many dwarves, so few used a large number of skills; they were built to work in a single system, a place where they only needed to work at one job at a time, nothing else had to be known in order to survive. They weren’t an ant colony; they could learn more professions than one, but that meant more work than they needed to do. Of course, Tholumom thought to himself, if he survived, then he would have to learn a lot of skills to last more than a day or two. He grimaced, that did not sound like much fun. he was rusty in everything, including mining. The last few years had not been kind, but admittedly, they were still nicer than the sensation of slamming into the water. The water was fresh, cool, and unlike at home, it made no attempt to smash him into a wall. Seagulls flew overhead, it was peaceful. This was mostly due to the fact that the dwarf in leather armor was unconscious, floating facing towards the sky, completely unaware of the beasts that swam beneath him. Not that the beasts really mattered; they were a rather distant bunch of aquatic beasts, scary-sure, dangerous-not particularly, willing to get involved with this strange creature—most certainly not. So the dwarf just floated there; his center of buoyancy just happened to be encouraging his metabolic processes to continue unabated, and not to assume that he was going to drown. Metabolic processes are a psychosomatic bunch, so the encouragement pretty much guaranteed that he was alright. But this isn’t about those metabolic processes, is it? Well… Okay, so if they are okay, then we have a story, regardless of how stupid it might be. Needless to say, the dwarf was rescued. No, there were not a bunch of benign merpeople trying to help him back to land(which was probably a good thing due to the genocidal habits that dwarves developed in response to the high price that goods made out of their bones engendered). That was probably fortunate, because Tholumom had not heard about how the price crashed after every single fortress expanded towards their sea in order to harvest the merpeople’s bones, thus he would find a perfectly good reason to start that practice over again here. No, he was rescued by something that he would find even more detestable: a purple unicorn.
The Unicorn EffectTholumom Lathonudlerned has been very unhappy recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has had a mediocre drink recently. He has looked at a masterful engraving of his family and been saddened. He has slept in a decent Alder bed recently. He has complained about the inclement weather recently. He has been angered at his conscription recently. He has been frustrated with his failure in combat recently. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. His nose is broken. His arms are bruised. His hand is bruised. His legs have gashes. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. The dwarf slept in a bed, catatonic, except of course for the involuntary retreating into his mind, he was of course, completely unconscious; the natural response to dwarves in pain was always to faint, and for once, that probably saved him a lot of heartache. As far as he was concerned, he had been saved by one of the vilest animals in existence: the unicorn. Unicorns, those disgusting horses ridden into battle by those damned tree hugging elves. The same unicorns that were known to use their horn to skewer the unsuspecting dwarf in all of their righteous goodness. This creature, whose similar looking relatives of Tholumom’s world, had been the only creature to bloody the misfortunate and stupid dwarven settlers who had sought to avoid evil, by moving to its antithesis. The other creatures of the “righteous” or “good” regions of the world were far less dangerous to the fortress. The unicorn was the only creature of that region that was known to really scare the dwarves, who continued to hunt it, because of the value of their bones. The world of the dwarves had been quite dangerous after all, motivated by profit and the whims of gods who refused to respond to any adventurer with the faith to really try talking to them. Fortunately, Tholumom had never believed in the first place. His late wife had worshipped a god known as the “Flying Trout” who was associated, or so they said, with gold, silver, mountains, and fertility. Whatever connection that a flying fish had to do with any of those things was anyone’s guess. It had given her comfort, and that was no help to him when he was unconscious. Twilight, as the unicorn was called, was surprised to have found any creature so far out in the water. The fish were a bunch of pussies, not that she would refer to them as such; she would probably say that they have a highly tuned sense of “Self-preservation”. She was even more surprised to find that this thing was still alive, whatever it was just so happened to float in such a way that it could breathe. A creature such as that, which can fully pass out in water and live, was pretty special, even in a land filled with three whole races of magical multi-colored horses. So Twilight had decided to take the obvious land-dweller back with her on the boat. The expedition so far had been a resounding failure. Nothing that they could make was able to descend to the bottom of the ocean and survive. Even Twilight’s magic seemed completely ineffective for gathering information about what was really down there. This creature, whatever it was, was far more interesting than the failure of all of the bathyspheres which Twilight had managed to either get her hooves on or conjure. “Spike, any word from Celestia?” “Yeah Twilight. She says, and I quote ‘Why did you stop studying friendship? Get back to Ponyville.” “Did you send her the letter I wrote ahead of time for when she said that?” “Yes Twilight, she sent me the same letter except ‘get back to Ponyville’ was underlined.” The purple dragon glanced over to the creature that lied in bed, barely breathing. “Is he going to be alright, Twilight?” “I hope so Spike. He’s injured, but as far as I can tell, there’s nothing life threatening about the injuries.” “Have you figured out what he is yet? Twilight?” “No Spike, you’ll be the second to know when I do.” “So are we going to listen to Celestia?” Twilight gave the small dragon a look of exasperation, “Of course we listen. I wouldn’t want to go back to-“ “Magic Kindergarten.” Spike groaned. “You have to understand that not every failure can send you back to that place. In fact, no failure will send you back to that place. The only place where they can send you is maybe back to the same grade that you were in when you failed.” “You don’t know that.” Twilight’s eyes almost started twitching, which signaled that Spike either needed to accept his “sister’s” insanity, or press on and accept the consequences. “I’ve read that damned book about the Equestrian School system. Of course I know that! Celestia is a nicer teacher than most, not to mention that she is your teacher, not anypony else’s. She only teaches you. She can put whatever emphasis you need on whatever subject you don’t understand. She won’t make you go crazy.” “Spiiike!” “What?” “No.” Twilight had picked that one up from Rainbow Dash. It was the most annoying way that anypony could think of to turn around a conversation and generally peeve that pony. “Whatever Twilight. I’ll just go tell Captain Gruff to turn us around and bring us back to Ponyville.” “That’s probably a good idea. Too bad, I guess I’ll have to accept knowing more about the surface of friendship than the bottom of the ocean.” She sighed. “There’s probably not much down there in the first place.” “Why would you want to know about the bottom of the ocean in the first place?” “I thought that I could learn something about what was down there that nopony had ever known or seen before. I guess you’re right though, the magic of friendship has to be more interesting than the bottom of the ocean.” “I’m going to tell Captain Gruff to turn us around.” “Good idea Spike, thanks for your help.” With that, the small purple dragon with green frills left the cabin. Twilight sighed, “I guess that we’ll just have to wait to learn about you.” She said this to the creature in the bed, which lied asleep. The mouth drooped open, exposing its prodigious size. “Dear Celestia. What are you?” The mouth was big enough to trap a scootaloo. Not that the owner of the mouth would necessarily do that. She hoped. Inside of Tholumom’s body, epithelial cells reproduced quickly to overcome the wounds that were sustained. In his hands, veins knitted themselves back together. In his nose, cartilage began to produce scar tissue, ensuring that it would look slightly wrong for the rest of his life. His liver was beginning to notice a lack of alcohol to digest; naturally this would be what would awaken the dwarf. His eyes fluttered open, revealing a blurry room. He noticed the sunlight in the room and thought “not again”, before throwing up. The vomiting actually served to shake his eyes back to working order. Tholumom was in a wooden room, with wide, clear windows. It was clear that he had been adopted by a prosperous civilization, probably funded by the various pieces of armor that goblins often left behind after their deaths. There was something that was missing; the stains of blood on the walls, the omnipresent smell of vomit and feces. The elves, who believed in latrines and baths, were not as clean as this. Not to say that the elves aren’t a bunch of hypocritical cannibals, they were still the cleanest creatures that he had ever met. Then he noticed what it was built out of… Wood. The association that it brought to every dwarf’s mind was the same capricious cannibal traders known as the elves. He frowned, if he had been adopted by humans, his life would not be too bad, if they was elves, then he might as well eat himself right now. Of course, if it was elves, it would be some kind of damned tree house. He relaxed; nothing the elves built was made with the kind of care or material that resembled planks. He looked out the window, seeing a branch with a multitude of bird nests on it. Tholumom was not sure, but birds didn’t nest at such high densities, at least no kind of bird which he had ever laid eyes on. The dwarf put his hands behind his head, relaxing for the first time in a few months. “Spiike! Did you send Celestia our apology letter?” “Yes Twilight, She already said that it was okay.” “That’s good.” She paused. Tholumon thought that she sounded like a nice girl, perhaps human, but certainly not of his age group, at most she was sixteen years old. He couldn’t wait to meet his rescuer… What kind of name was Spike though? That sounded strange, even to a dwarf whose first name means “Deep dark” or maybe “dark deep” either way he couldn’t remember how the old ancestral dwarven language worked. “Perhaps you should check on our guest, I mean, after Fluttershy patched him up, he should be fine.” For some reason, the name “Fluttershy” sounded appropriate and normal, not like Spike, whose name only had one syllable. “Maybe I should meet this Fluttershy, I’m sure that she’s a nice girl. Though that Spike character sounds very annoying. Twilight sounds nice too. Maybe I won’t be interrogated when she realizes that I’ve woken up.” The door across the room opened to reveal the purple dragon standing there. “I love dragons, they always amused me when the beast-master or whatever his title was trained one to barbecue the goblin infantry.” “Hi there mister.” “Hello there purple dragon. It’s a long way from the mountainhome to see such a specimen as you.” “What’s a mountainhome?” “Damn, I might actually have to elaborate on where I lived.” “It’s a mountain filled with dwarves, gold, wealth, and vomit, especially vomit.” “That sounds disgusting.” “Yes, but who trained you to speak so well? I’ve never heard of such an incredible beast-master that was able to teach a dragon to talk. The best I’ve seen have only managed to train the dragon to barbecue elves and goblin infantry.” “What?” “You certainly can’t talk on your own. You must have been trained at some point?” “I’ve only been toilet trained, if that’s what you mean. I learned how to talk on my own.” “What’s a toilet?” “With one, you would have had a vomit-free mountainhome.” “That’s impossible, we would have found a way of vomiting in such a way to make it ineffective.” “Why would you search for that?” “That’s the drinking game that dwarves play whenever they are about to pass out.” “That sounds unhealthy.” “Doctors have told us that, at least human doctors have. They never did have the body chemistry to process large volumes of alcohol.” “I’m afraid for your health mister.” “I’ve drunk more than enough to kill you a thousand times over. I’m not even a heavy drinker.” “I’m going to get Twilight.” “Thank you lad, I’ve been wanted to talk to her, I gather that she rescued me from the ocean?” “Yes.” With that short answer, the dragon walked out. “I can’t believe he fell for that drinking game. We throw up because our eyes are adjusted to absolute darkness. Not because we can’t hold our drinks.” Tholumon laughed. It pleased him to have landed so far from the ridiculous insecurity of his world. Of course, what walked through the door was a creature of unimaginable horror. A creature that he had been taught to fear for its pointy horn, its scary eyes, and the ferocity which it can attack with unprovoked. It was the Unicorn.
The Terrors of the DwarvesTholumom Lathonudlerned has been very unhappy recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has had a mediocre drink recently. He has looked at a masterful engraving of his family and been saddened. He has slept in a decent Alder bed recently. He has complained about the inclement weather recently. He has been angered at his conscription recently. He has been frustrated with his failure in combat recently. He has been terrified by a unicorn recently He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. His nose is broken. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. The unicorn advanced to him. It was purple, not even the most terrifying stories of his elders had a purple unicorn. “Hi there, are you okay?” The unicorn asked him. The dwarf had broken into a cold sweat. Tholumon gasped at his belt, the warhammer had been removed, along with the pickaxe. In fact, he was naked. This fact only bothered him because he shared a room with a horse with a piercing weapon on its forehead. “Stay away from me you monster!” “What? I saved you. Why don’t you trust me?” “Your kind has butchered my family, killed my livestock, and destroyed entire societies with the dangerous point on your forehead.” He picked up the nightstand. “I will destroy you!” He jumped off the bed. The unicorn did not move. “AHHHHHH!” “NOPE!” He stopped midair. “I can see that you are clearly not ready to meet me. I hope that our next meeting will not end this way. Goodbye.” With that she left the room. The purple dragon came back, “I see that the meeting didn’t go well.” “Yeah. You seem to be right there, buddy.” “What does that mean?” “You’ll know when you are older.” “Okay then…” The purple dragon left the room, leaving the magically levitating dwarf to manage his nightstand weapon in peace. The next day the purple unicorn returned. “I see that you have not tried to fall yet.” “That was an option?” “No, but I’m glad to see that you are still alive, especially after not eating or drinking for several weeks.” “That is the constitution of my race.” The dwarf said, smiling. “I’m sorry about yesterday. Care to start over?” “Fine with me, just put the nightstand down where it was yesterday, and I’m sure that we’ll be great friends in no time.” The Unicorn sounded somewhat sarcastic. “You must see, madam, or is it lady? Either way I’m sorry about confusing you for the creatures with the same horn in my world. Those blasted horses.” “I’m a pony.” The statement hung in the air. Conflicting greatly with the typical didacticism that Twilight normally spoke with. “Where I come from, a pony is but a breed of horse that is smaller than the wild steed.” “You aren’t where you came from.” “Fair enough, but what evidence do I have that this is not the road to the gods? That this is not merely the afterlife as promised by the priests of the Flying Trout?” “Since when does a Flying Trout have priests?” “Since around the year 62 of my world, dear. When the Flying Trout first took his form among mortal dwarves, and gave them hope for their salvation in his worship. Of course, I was never the kind to worship a god who refused to reply, so I let my practices slide a bit.” “What kind of god would refuse to answer to their subjects?” “All of them. The flying trout, the demon of the goblins, of course, they also have a demonic deputy, giving, if anything, more credence to their purpose. But the greater question is, what kind of god do you have, what gives him or her the right to talk with their subjects?” The dwarf laughed. “You must be kidding me. A god that actually talks with their subjects?” “Yes, in fact I’m her chosen student” the unicorn gestured towards herself with a hoof. She was clearly proud of herself. “What kinda fortress are ye running here?” The dwarf’s eyebrows furrowed. “Where there can be people who are actually students by profession? That seems a bit strange doesn’t it?” “Not really. I’ve been Celestia’s chosen student since I was a filly.” She closed her eyes for a moment, either remembering something or hiding from the dwarf’s reaction. “Besides, this isn’t a fortress, this is a town, a town called Ponyville.” “Wow really abstract name there dear. My own fortress was called ‘The Ideas of Mourning’” he sighed before muttering something about how the fortress had little but sadness. “Did it really have all that much mourning?” Twilight’s face saddened at this. “Not really. I was the only one who felt it. Five of my friends died, my wife and daughter perished in an invasion. I’m the only one who felt all that. “That sounds awful.” “You can’t even imagine, my little purple pony-horse.” The glow of the magic cut out, leaving Tholumom to fall to the floor. “Why did I scare you?” “You heard what I said about unicorns killing my civilization’s hunters, right?” The unicorn nodded. “Yeah, our most disliked ‘allies’, the elves, ride them into battle against us when they believe that we have committed a crime against nature by chopping down trees. They pierce us with their horns, leaving many to die in their wake. All for a little timber” He laughed, “But of course, looking at you more closely, you are not that kind of unicorn. Your horn is not particularly sharp, you are purple, and you have a mane that resembles what a little girl of my world would have as a haircut.” He paused looking at the semi-stunned state of the unicorn before him. “Which compliments your freakishly large eyes very well by the way.” “I’ve never seen another pony act that violently. I’ve also never seen an felf riding another pony into battle.” “That would be a good thing my dear, for the elves are the only race that doesn’t worship a demon that persists in the practice of eating their enemies.” Twilight was once again stunned. “Are- are you serious?” “Unfortunately Miss..?” “Twilight Sparkle” “Miss Sparkle, I am completely serious. Of course, they never seem to realize that we have quite a few traps set up to murder them if they are aggressive.” Twilight blinked at the word murder. “Kill them if they are trying to kill you, doesn’t that sound somewhat extreme?” “Not really. We enjoy our life, and whether or not we choose to use the equally inexpensive and effective cage trap is none of their concern. They’d die anyway… If in a hundred or so years.” “How are you so immune to death?” “Its pretty easy when you see people die around you every day. It doesn’t hurt any less when it’s a friend, or lover… most dwarves can absorb the pain in seeing at least three loved ones die before they go crazy.” Tholumom grimaced. “Now I think I’ve talked enough. I’m actually quite thirsty, and hungry.” “Would you like hay sandwiches?” “What?” “Hay as in-” “For horses. I’m an omnivore. I guess I can understand you ponies not being omnivores, but I am.” “Well, I’d appreciate if you didn’t act on your omnivorous urges while you are here. Of course, we do have eggs.” “Yes, you are a female, thus you have eggs. Unfortunately that doesn’t help me figure out what I’m going to eat.” “You can eat eggs from a chicken.” “I wonder why I assumed that you were talking about the other kind of egg. Anyway, that sounds good. After all, I’m not part of my old civilization, so my values should adjust to meet the civilization that I am in.” “You’re saying that like it will be easy.” Twilight rolled her eyes. “Come on, let’s see if I can’t make you something edible out of an egg.” She started out of the room. “I’m never going to get used to that voice from a horse.” Tholumom said to himself. “I’m not a horse!” Twilight groaned. “Definitely going to take a long time to become used to this. I wonder where they brought my hammer and pickaxe to?” Author's notes: If you liked this initial bit of a story, I like to hear about it, of course if you didn't I'd like to know why. Dislikes aren't helpful to anybody but the reader, comments about why you didn't like it is helpful to the author, and eventually the reader himself.
PartiesTholumom Lathonudlerned has been very unhappy recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has had a mediocre drink recently. He has looked at a masterful engraving of his family and been saddened. He has slept in a decent Alder bed recently. He has complained about the inclement weather recently. He has been angered at his conscription recently. He has been frustrated with his failure in combat recently. He has been terrified by a unicorn recently. He has eaten a decent omelet recently. He is thirsty He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. When he is angry, his hands clench into fists. When worried, he tends to use threats often. His nose is broken. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. “And that’s how Equestria was made.” The pink pony said to the dwarf. “I must learn how you grew rocks. If I was at home, my people would love to know how.” The omelet was enough to sate the dwarf’s hunger. Spike prepared it on a relatively normal stove-top, similar to the kitchens at home. The kitchen; however was larger, and contained an area for eating, not that dwarves really used their dining rooms, a simple chair would do, or perhaps even just standing over the barrel in the stockpile as they ate whatever they found to their liking. The dwarf sat at the table, in a chair that was frilly, beyond the aesthetic frivolity of the elves, but made well enough for the dwarf to justify sitting on it. Across from him the pink pony slouched over the table, examining him. “Silly, that doesn’t work in other worlds.” “What?” “Rock farming only works in Equestria.” “That’s too bad. It would do great services for my people.” The dwarf sighed. “We are the most skilled masons, blacksmiths, and craftsmen in my world, we can make almost anything; we are limited only in time and resources. We make things that last forever, but we make things of impacable beauty and complexity. Our artifacts-“ “What’re those? They sound like they taste good.” The pink pony bounced around a lot. Tholumom wondered if she was one of those creatures whose strength could never be exhausted. “No.” The dwarf wore a scowl. “Eating an artifact, unless it was an artifact meal, would get you killed by any reasonable dwarf.” “That’s silly.” She laughed. “If everypony was that stern, then we wouldn’t have any fun around here, not even in one of my famous parties.” “I’d love to attend one of those. Do you hold them in legendary dining room?” “What would make a dining room legendary?” “The worth of everything in the room would cumulatively be worth somewhere around ten thousand copper coins.” “Well… I don’t know how many bits there are to a copper coin, but I’m sure that we have at least a grand dining room.” “Pinky, I never explained the degrees of worth to a room’s worth, how did you figure that out?” The purple unicorn walked in to the kitchen, “Don’t ask that of Pinkie. The answer eludes the bet of us, and drove me mad for a while.” “As in throwing a tantrum, or melancholy?” “I would not know the difference.” “Silly, a tantrum would involve you lashing out at other ponies and their property, you’re still around, and haven’t thrown yourself into a water filled ditch, so you weren’t melancholy.” Twilight’s mouth gaped open. Tholumom laughed. “Pinkie, I don’t even care that you seem to have knowledge about my world. I love you, you funny pony.” Tholumom had heard stories about the seers of elves, not good stories, but stories that testified to their extensive foreknowledge of the events of the future. Naturally, elvish seers never told anyone anything helpful, but they divined what had happened to people who visit them. This is, oddly enough, the only stable source of income that elves have ever managed to wrangle. “Are you sure that you aren’t an elvish seer?” “Yes I am silly. I’m an earth pony.” “I know, I know, but you know about the future, and the nature of the world that I come from.” “That’s my Pinkie Sense.” “Sounds useful.” Twilight broke in again. “You have no idea. The entire town listens to her arbitrary warnings that really don’t shed any light on the nature of the prediction.” Tholumom looked at her strangely, “You don’t seem like the type to accept that kind of superstition. Or at least if those questions you were getting to were any indication of who you actually are, you like to know things.” “I’m a student of Celestia. Of course I have to ask questions, but mostly I study magic.” Grinning proudly at the dwarf, the dwarf found himself uncomfortable. “You aren’t a necromancer are ye? That kind of magic doesn’t deserve the study that they put into it.” “No, of course not. I wouldn’t dare mess with the cycle of life and death.” “Good, if you were a necromancer, your skull would make a wonderful totem. I’m glad that I don’t have to do that to my rescuer.” The dwarf’s expression morphed back into a smile as he expressed his gladness that Twilight was, not, in fact learning how to bring back legions of the undead to haunt the living. The pink pony continued to smile throughout the explanation, despite the obvious threat to her friend. “What is this fixation on death and punishment?” Twilight was, naturally, concerned after the aforementioned threat. “I mean, your world can’t possibly be that harsh.” “No, it’s far worse. If you disappoint the nobility, ye would be hammered into either a terrible death, or near death. Our medicine can be useful, but due to the continual plight of the soap-makers, you are almost certain to die of an infection from the wounds of your hammering. All because the nobility forgot that the fortress was not situated in an area where glass isn’t possible to obtain.” Tholumom’s face glowed bright red. His hands clenched into fists, almost as though he desired to fight. “Besides, who are you to judge our culture; I don’t know what the situation is like in Equestria, but in the world of the Everlasting Pulley, you can’t imagine the kinds of challenges that my race has to deal with on a daily basis. Perhaps it is our fault; nevertheless, we have lived like this for nearly four thousand years.” Faltering, his voice began to fall. “And perhaps, with our ways, we’ve finally caused our end.” Finally hitting a whisper “But that doesn’t matter to me, what I had perished… long before…” “Are you okay?” Twilight was concerned for the dwarf, she still wanted to know more before he went “Melancholy” and threw himself into the Everfree river. “Aye. I’ve had a long hard time before I came here. Filled with innumerable joys and sorrows, angers and calms, lovers and enemies. I’ll live a bit longer.” A smile bloomed on his face. “Besides, if what this small pink creature has told me is true, a party would bring me great joy.” Twilight stared at him. “I guess that I can allow a party. Just so long as you allow me to pick your brain about what happened to you,” she stared off into the distance. “and your civilization.” “Certainly Miss Sparkle, I’ll tell you about the issues that I am incredibly sensitive about, and I’ll also tell you about that world that I lived in before now.” The pink pony laughed before suddenly becoming incredibly serious, a scowl spread across her features, and she glared at Twilight. The dwarf considered intervening in this obvious fight, but realized that the fight between the two would be more interesting than anything that he foresaw happening otherwise. “Twilight, how can you not see that he doesn’t want to talk about his civilization, family, and world?” “I’ll be nice about it Pinkie. If what he said is true, then he is the last bastion of his culture, world, and, indeed, species, I need to write it down, his history is no less valuable than ours.” “If I can interrupt, I can accept that, just so long as I get a drink. Preferably with alcohol.” “I guess that’s not too much to ask.” Twilight said, rolling her eyes. “What? Do you have something against booze?” “No… Well… maybe… kinda…” Conflicted, Twilight attempted to balance her open-mindedness with her dislike for mind-altering drugs. “Let me explain what you are trying to say, Miss Sparkle, you don’t like to drink alcohol because it impairs your ability to think clearly, but other than that, you have no specific objection to it.” “I guess.” The unicorn shrugged. “Do I really have to drink?” “Common enough excuse, perfectly valid reason to avoid alcohol, but where I come from” The dwarf smiled and put his leg up on the unmentioned chair that he had been sitting on, “it is more commonly used by humans who realize that they can’t handle the same kind of alcohol intake as a dwarf.” “Yeah, don’t try to start a drinking contest with Applejack.” “Is that the name of a pony, or the alcohol itself?” “Applejack is the element of Honesty, she also happens to be the local apple farmer, and naturally, the cider producer of the town.” “I’m sure that she’s honest enough.” The dwarf laughed, “But she does realize that she is named after an alcoholic beverage, right?” “All I’ve ever had was cider... “The unicorn shrugged. “Gah! How can you ponies live without an endless variety of booze, all of which has virtually the same effect?” Mock horror dripped from the voice of the dwarf. The pink pony walked out with the unicorn. “It always helps when the booze is actually good.” Tholumom thought about this for a second; then shrugged. “Where I’m from, that never really mattered.” He followed the two out from the kitchen.
Cider and The EverfreeTholumom Lathonudlerned has been very unhappy recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has looked at a masterful engraving of his family and been saddened. He has slept in a decent Alder bed recently. He has complained about the inclement weather recently. He has been angered at his conscription recently. He has been frustrated with his failure in combat recently. He has been terrified by a unicorn recently. He has eaten a decent omelet recently. He has had an excellent drink recently. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. When he is angry, his hands clench into fists. When worried, he tends to use threats often. His nose is broken. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. “And that’s why we make our cider the old fashioned way.” The earth pony with three apples as her cutie mark said amiably. She sat on a bale of hay in a barn that was of pleasant composition to the dwarf, though the idea of painting wood was new to him. Generally structures lasted long enough to outlive the dwarves that constructed them. “Why would that sour your appreciation for new ways of doing things? Just because one way that is new does not work, doesn’t mean that all new ways will fail.” The dwarf shook his head at the orange pony in the Stetson. “You wouldn’t understand. My family has been doing it for around a hundred years, since the founding of Ponyville actually.” Having said this, she hoisted a mug of cider to the dwarf. The dwarf looked at her hooves suspiciously as she passed it to him, not quite sure how she was holding the mug. “Mhm… Either way, you make great cider Applejack.” The dwarf opened another barrel and drank. “Yah know that yah’ll be paying for that, right?” The orange pony frowned as he drained a barrel of cider, one that would have fetched a hefty price of three hundred bits. “Jeez, I know, I know. Don’t get your ponytails in a bunch.” The dwarf snickered at his awful pun. “Ah’d never put up with you, Ah don’t see what reason Twilight could have fer keepin’ ya around.” “Nice little vote of confidence. I will help out around the farm, or somewhere. Do you happen to know anyone who needs a miner, or perhaps someone to crush things with a hammer?” The dwarf’s evasiveness brought an unhappy look to the apple farmer. “Ah don’t know anypony that would need either of those things.” “Are the creatures of the Everfree valuable in the products that may be harvested from their bodies?” “Ah wouldn’t recommend it. Maybe. You could always talk to Zecora about that, though I don’t see how such a weakling like you could possibly combat the dangerous creatures of the Everfree.” The pony spat into the dirt. “Those abominations are the only reason that we don’t have a stable supply of Zap Apples.” “I’d challenge you to a drinking contest, but I’d imagine that you want payment for the cider I’ve already consumed before you’re willing to allow me the honor of beating you with my dwarven alcoholic tolerance.” The dwarf wore a smirk on his face the entire time, Applejack smiled. “Now that yah mention it, I can see why you aren’t despised by everypony in town already. Y’all seem ornery enough to take on a hydra-“Tholumom laughed, “What’s so funny about a hydra?” “I’ve seen worse.” The dwarf grasped towards his belt, “Damn… Forgot about that.” “Forgot about what sugahcube?” “Twilight and her friends decided that it would be a good idea to take my war-hammer and pick axe.” The dwarf shrugged. “Maybe they thought that being naked was the right way for me to recover. Maybe it was, but I still need to get back my hammer and pick axe.” “Well don’t go anywhere yet, you owe me a few hours gathering apples before I can let that cider barrel off my mind.” “Really? my hammer would make an easier job of that.” “Well Ah don’t want you to ruin my trees for the harvest.” “Fair enough. How do I get the apples down?” “You buck the tree” “Is that a euphemism, because it sounds like something that humans would say when they really meant-“ “True, but not what Ah’m talking about right now.” “Okay then. So when I buck an apple tree I do what?” “Kick it to shake the apples free.” The dwarf looked strangely at this diminutive creature. The orange pony claimed to have a strength that would impress most of the most elite dwarven military groups, certainly above the caliber of himself. “Are you sure that I can’t do something else for you, like dig out a labyrinth of tunnels beneath your farm for the storage and fermentation of cider?” “I’d like to have you do that too, but Ah’m afraid that I can’t imagine that working out well.” Applejack was more than a little bit cynical about the abilities of this creature who had just drank enough cider to make three ponies pass out. The dwarf was, of course, offended. “Dwarven mineshafts are as safe as being out in the open air. In most cases, significantly safer.” The dwarf beamed, proud of his only contributions to his race. “Sure, but that doesn’t mean that I feel like I can trust you with the safety of mah farmhouse.” She added after a moment, “yet.” the dwarf glowered at Applejack. “Now come on ya wierdo, don’t be like that. Ya should know by now that I don’t feel the burn of glower-power.” “I’m sure that when I repay you five-fold, I’ll probably earn that trust.” The dwarf’s goofy smile as he said this only served to make Applejack laugh. “Sure, yeah right, five-fold.” “Don’t worry, I’ll come through eventually. After all, I do have around ninety-five years left in my life before senility might begin to make my connection to the world tenuous.” “So you dwarves, you live a long time?” “The oldest I’ve heard of was around one hundred seventy years old. What a wonderful old woman, twelve kids, all of whom have grown up and applied themselves. They even promised her that they would promise to finish a mood, contribute to the future of the fortress, and confine themselves to a single child at a time. Not something that you often see in my culture, but seeing it, I’m surprised that everybody didn’t pick up those ideals.” “Save your philosophy for later Thol.” The pony gestured outside the barn, “You need to start workin’ the trees.” Applejack then led the dwarf to the orchard. When she explained what she wanted him to do, he winced. He had an entire hill to clear of apples, without even the convenience of a hammer or ladder. When he brought this issue up with Applejack, she laughed, comparing his physical constitution to Twilight. Naturally, he did that one thing that dwarves were designed to do as the last defence; pick up a rock, and call it a weapon. There just so happened to be a boulder lying around, named Bill. Tholumom knew that it was named bill because on it, there was a message engraved on it, “my name is Bill.” faintly, probably produced by some dabbler learning the ropes of engraving. And so he picked up Bill, moving like a glacier up and down the hill, slamming it against the trees, breaking at least ten out of the hundred or so(too bad those trees were the largest), but somehow he managed to eventually break all of the apples from their stems. The dwarf stood at the top of the hill, admiring the destruction that he had wrought-- along with the destruction that he managed to avoid. Broken trees were littered across the various paths of the orchard, he did not think that this could be anything but expected, so he did not attempt to clean the trees up. The apples littered the ground in much the same manner as the clothing of defeated goblins and kobolds littered certain parts of the fortress. Once again, he chose to leave the apples on the ground, but this was more due to his lack of knowledge about where the orange pony wanted the apples to end up. the dwarf did not think of the various barrels and tubs that were often already half-full of apples as he passed them on his way out of the orchard. Instead of reporting the job’s completion to Applejack, the dwarf instead chose to go back to his temporary quarters at Twilight’s. He lounged around the library, occasionally even reading a few words at a time from a book. Twilight was busy, studying for some kind of exam; she put too much forced concentration into her study for it to be a mere casual, unnecessary interest. The dwarf however, had no motivation to study so intently, indeed he merely desired to collect his armaments, maybe even put on some clothes. The dwarf whistled a tune as he searched the library, very slowly undoing all of the work that Spike and Twilight had put into organizing the non-book items. After ruthlessly dismantling the ground floor and the second floor, he finally found the hammer, pick axe, and associated leather armor in the corner of his own room. Afterwards, the dwarf found it hard to stay put, several years of mostly idling had left his muscles weaker than they should have been, his mind unfocused on the tasks that were presented to him, and a general rustiness in his mining skill. His hands ached from their lack of use, and his back hurt from the literal slump which had impressed itself not only upon his mind, but upon his back. Having suited up for his digging expedition (for the sake of dwarven science), he heard something that sounded unusual, but not familiar. Strangely enough it seemed to match the general description of Applejack’s voice, exceedingly angry though. “CONSARNIT TWILIGHT, WHERE IS THAT DANGED DWARF?” The voice rumbled throughout the library. The dwarf had two things come into his mind, first the possibility of accepting his fate from that orange pony with a hat, or fleeing. Strangely enough, Tholumom chose the former option despite the tendency of his race to wall themselves into a room of magma in order to avoid work. He walked out of his room, through the hallway, then descended the flight of stairs to the ground floor. Applejack was indeed there, a vein throbbed on her head. “Hiya Applejack.” “Y’all weren’t seriously going to try and get away with what ya did to mah orchard, are ya?” “Nah, I did what you told me to do, nothing more, nothing less... Except perhaps for breaking a few trees.” The dwarf exposed his teeth in order to do something he once did quite often, smile awkwardly. “Sorry about those trees though, I suppose that I should have told you?” “Darnit dwarf, what in all of your dumb cogitation gave you the impression that I wouldn’t mind a ‘few’ of my trees being broken? Are ya reallah serious?” The dwarf pressed his index fingers together, recalling the gesture he once made often as a child, whenever his mother caught him doing something wrong he would simply express the guilt, not through words, but through the contact of his two fingers. “I’m sorry Applejack, I told you that I could not hope to kick the apples down, so I enlisted the help of Bill.” Twilight’s eyes went wide at the mention of that rock. “How could you possibly know about Bill?” “He was just lying around in the orchard, the name Bill was scrawled on it in virtually unreadable engraving.” The dwarf shrugged. “I don’t know who engraved it, but it was clear that they had very little experience in the ways of manipulating rock.” “Don’t ya mean ungupulating?” “If I meant to use my fingernails to perform a task that requires skill, then I would use that word. Unfortunately, as far as I can tell, there is little difference between your foreleg extremities and your hindleg extremities, so I suppose that I can give you credit for using the word that is correct for you ponies.” The dwarf shrugged when Twilight lifted an eyebrow at him. “What? Sometimes I just feel the need to make sure that the etymology of the word fits what I am doing.” “Etymology smetymology,” the orange pony dismissed the dwarf’s argument, “I don’t care about the apples on the ground, Applebloom and her friends, as it turns out, have found that they can do that without messing up, so y’all are off the hook for that. Those trees that you broke, I need ya to replant them and remove the trunks.” “I understand Applejack... Now that I have my pick axe, can I dig you that extensive cellar system?” “Bucking hell! What do Ah have to say to get ya to leave the ground beneath my farm alone?” “Let me dig you the finest cellars from here to Appaloosa!” “Not today dwarfy.” Twilight finally found a reason to interrupt. “You will be going over your civilization with me in the afternoon. In the evening, you have a party that you asked for from Pinkie.” “Fine Applejack, Twilight, I’ll just take care of planting some new saplings for you Applejack. I should be back in time for your whatever it is Twilight.” “Saplings? Who said anything ‘bout saplings?” “Do you really intend to have me plant full grown trees?” The dwarf sighed, expecting the worse from the orange earth pony in front of him. “Yes... but-” the orange pony paused at the expression of dismay that the dwarf showed. “-You can actually just dig my cellar tomorrow.” The dwarf looked somewhat pleased with himself at this point. “Dammit! Just plant some more trees in their places and I’ll have no problem with you! Stay away from my cider!” Applejack stormed off suddenly out the door, causing Twilight to wonder why Applejack was so mad at the dwarf, what did the cider have to do with anything? “What was that about?” “I think that your friend underestimated the amount of cider that dwarves typically consume.” “How much is that?” The unicorn attempted to obtain a parchment and quill covertly. “Come on now Twilight, if you’re going to take notes, do it, don’t pussyfoot around it because I might not be in a good mood. The average dwarf can consume around sixteen gallons of alcohol at once. I can consume around eighteen which places me around the top three percent of drinkers in all of the mountainhomesphere.” “Where does all that go?” “Into our blood. We absorb food and drink very rapidly.” “How long do dwarves typically go between drinks and meals?” “Sometimes a day, sometimes a month. It really depends on the situation, I know that dwarves that are injured, or have bled out recently typically need to drink more water to stave off dehydration.” The sound of scratching on parchment was incessant by now. Vaguely Tholumom knew that she was extrapolating a lot more information than she should, expanding upon points in notes when notes themselves are meant to be short and to the point. “Are you enjoying writing out more than what I say?” Twilight nodded. “Good then, I wouldn’t want you to get worked up about the sheer volume of notes that you put yourself through.” The scratchings on partchment only intensified after he said that. He sighed, “Did you just-” twilight nodded “That’s what I thought. Just please, don’t overdo it. I wouldn’t want the blood of a scholar on my hands.” Oddly enough, or so it seemed to the dwarf, the purple unicorn perked up at this. “So the water is stored in the blood?” The dwarf nodded. “As far as I can tell, it is in yours too.” Twilight shot him an angry glance, which went ignored as he looked out the door gruffly, considering whether he should do what Applejack desired, or do something else. “Are your people ruled by a monarchy or a-” Twilight was interrupted by a crash from the kitchen, “Sorry Tholumom, but I need to check on Spike” As she said this, a moan issued from the kitchen. She galloped away. The dwarf chuckled “So that’s what animal traps are for.”
EverfreeTholumom Lathonudlerned has been content recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has eaten a decent omelet recently. He has had an excellent drink recently. He has had the satisfaction of learning what an animal trap does. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. When he is angry, his hands clench into fists. When worried, he tends to use threats often. His nose is broken. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. The dwarf returned to the library, feeling exerted after his twofold labor on that day. That Applejack, that one single pony had forced him to work harder than the final confrontation with the demons of hell. He opened up the door, barely able to concentrate, but happy to have succeeded in travelling this far in such duress. The inside was dark, an unexpected treat, “Wow, just like home in the fortress. Poorly lit as always. Come on, turn on the lights you ponies.” A groan emanated from the darkness. “Party pooper.” The lights turned on, revealing Pinkie Pie’s disgusted expression. “Come on Tholumom Lathonudlerned, Deep Dark, you ruined the surprise, but you didn’t ruin the party.” The dwarf smiled at her. “But, my dear, we have only just begun our celebration of a new life and a triumph against death. I can hardly ask for the pleasure of being surprised in addition to that. I’m sorry about that, but I don’t like surprises. Not to men-” The dwarf recoiled as he found a slice of cake shoved into his mouth. “Come on, enjoy the party. You’ve had enough work shoved upon you by AJ.” The dwarf considered the possibilities of what was occurring, but realized that the cake shoved into his mouth was probably meant to stop him from protesting, rather than asphyxiate him. The entirety of Ponyville had gathered in the library to greet the dwarf. Not surprisingly, it was a little bit more cramped than it usually was. All of Ponyville’s party goers were in the library, it was a small town, by any measure except perhaps for the dwarf’s own settlement at first. The memory of that was shrouded by the cider, the exhaustion, and the piece of cake that the dwarf chewed slowly. Like a sea before a goblin demonic leader, the party split in two, letting a single pony pass. A strange, bright unicorn, minty green, her eyes wide, and a strange wide smile on her face. She passed through the crowd. “Can I talk to you, Tholumom?” The dwarf lifted his eyebrow at her seriously, “Where did you learn my name?” She gestured towards a party banner that he had not noticed before. “Okay then, I can see that you have something to talk with me about.” “Yeah... I kind of said that, directly.” the dwarf looked thoughtfully at the young mare, though he was not entirely sure how he recognized her as being young.. “Good, because asking indirectly would be strange. “ “Can I talk to you alone?” “Sure miss?” The young mare led the dwarf to the empty kitchen. “Lyra.” she said her name shaking her flank towards him, exposing a lyre cutie mark. The dwarf was not impressed. “Was that supposed to arouse me?” The dwarf’s face was unamused, suddenly. His eyes looked down into the Unicorn’s, startling her with their hardness. The mint unicorn cringed at the question. “No, not consciously, at least.” The dwarf placed his hands behind his head and yawned. “What was it that you wanted to talk about with me?” “I wanted first to extend my greetings,” the unicorn stood up on two legs, concentrating on her hooves, her horn glowed, and the dwarf’s eyes went wide. “Dear Armok! You can stand on two legs! I’ve never seen such a thing as that!” “What?” “You can stand on two legs! That’s impressive.” The dwarf patted the mint green abomination on her head. “You should show this to the others! I’m sure they would like it!” The Unicorn’s face soured. “You haven’t seen what I can do yet!” her voice was nearly full of desperation. “What is that then?” “I can turn my hooves into hands!” the dwarf looked down at the unicorn’s forelegs, finding that they did indeed end with hands. “That’s marginally less impressive.” “Can you at least give me the courtesy of shaking hands with me?” “What? That’s not how we greet each other where I’m from.” “Show me then.” The dwarf grabbed the unicorn’s hand and curled it into a ball, then hit it with his own knuckles. “That’s how you do it in the mountainhome.” The unicorn was stunned. “Are you okay Lyra?” “That’s what we do...” The mint green unicorn whispered softly, as though in despair. “Did you have any other questions?” Lyra stared off into the distance, an impressive feat considering that she was in a small kitchen inside of a tree. She suddenly snapped out of her daze when the dwarf began to wave his hand in front of her face. “Have you met any humans?” The dwarf had met a few. None that had found him of any interest, neither being very wealthy nor the broker of his fortress, he had very little time to talk to them. “I’ve met a few. Were you looking to have a greeting as a human would have it?” “Yeah.” Lyra looked sheepish and began to fiddle with something on the ground with her legs. “What could possess you to learn about them? They weren’t that interesting. They had very little that we did not, we had more then them in general, and we were smarter, stronger, and a little bit faster. None of that affects the fact that they dominated the peaceful plains of our world, which added up to quite a large amount of land.” “What made them humans?” “They were slightly more lithe than us, taller, not so thin as the Elves, they were decent with tools, but when they could just get a caravan together and head to our civilization, they tended to trade with us rather than learn the artisanship themselves. They were decent traders, and they rarely sold you out to the goblins they noticed around your fortress. Overall, I heard that they were relatively decent creatures. They kept a culture based around servitude of the rich, who would pay for soldiers and guards to defend your village in exchange for some fraction of your crops. What mystifies me is what a nice mare like you could find interesting about those humans, they had little time for music, my dear lyre player, they were more interested in the wealth that they could achieve, than what they could bring by spending it.” “They didn’t like music?” “They traded instruments, but never did I see a guard, merchant, nor any other human that came to our fortress play upon any of their instruments.” The dwarf cringed at the hands that the unicorn had given herself, they would be large on a seven foot tall ogre. “But to your interest, let me shake your hand, in order to avoid being strangled by them.” “What do you mean strangled by them?” the dwarf leaned down to her forelegs, measured them. “You have given yourself hands that are twice as large as is the typical proportion in an average human or dwarf” “I- I thought that having large hands was a good thing.” “Perhaps, but the fact that they don’t fit your body is too disturbing to make that any better. You should reduce the size, trust me, unless you are a mechanic, long hands such as that will get you nowhere. Though I’m surprised that Twilight has never experimented with that transformation, she seems like she would be interested, if only for the concept.” The dwarf toyed with the idea of introducing it to her, perhaps on his own. Lyra was either too shy to do so herself, or had a reason to keep her hand spell hidden. “They would think I was weird if I told them what I know.” Lyra’s eyes were tearing up, fortunately, she had gotten rid of her hands, so the dwarf wasn’t so afraid to hug her, not that he did. “Now Lyra, I’m curious if my humans and your humans are the same. You probably have some research material, you seem like a smart filly, or mare, or whatever the age-gender specific word is for you, otherwise your own opinion would have been eliminated by the ceaseless destruction of your beliefs as a child. I’m sure that you have gone through the constant and mechanical refinement and quality assertion process that is youth.” The Dwarf looked away, staring off into space, perhaps recalling some half-remembered insult that a friend once hurled at him for questioning whether or not the Elves deserved what the dwarves gave them. “You went through that too as a colt too, didn’t you?” “Nah, I went through it as a boy.” The dwarf was not aware that colt and boy were virtually the same in meaning when applied to this context. “What would you do then, if you were in my situation?” “Lyra was quite involved at this point, drawn in to the deception that is the dwarven thought, but in this case, it was truth.” a deep voice boomed through the kitchen. “Shut up pinkie!” Lyra yelled. “Sorry.” The reply crept in from beyond the kitchen. “That’s odd, she was wrong there.” The dwarf was naturally confused. The dwarven mind is commonly known to have relatively little natural inclination towards deception. In fact, it takes training to make a dwarf a good liar, which means that no dwarf who lies is a bad liar. Either way, Pinkie Pie had failed in her normal omniscient presentation of facts that she could not possibly know. “I’d be willing to show you my research materials at some point.” Lyra smiled at the dwarf, pleased that she finally found a good fellow to have a discussion about humanity with. the dwarf smiled, “I’m sure that at some point in the next three months, I can find time to work with you on your quest.” The smile of the dwarf was warm, but also showed its size, enormous, odd because the size of the head was not any larger than what would be expected. Lyra thought about the implications of such a large mouth, so large that a scootaloo might fit inside, which as she thought immediately afterwards, was a strange way to formulate a comparison of size in the first place. The dwarf rejoined the party, leaving the unicorn alone in the kitchen, pondering the possibilities that the dwarf could open up for her. After a few minutes of thinking, she wandered back to the party. “What do you mean that manticore venom isn’t valuable?” The dwarf looked down at the small vial of bodily fluid which he had bashed out of a manticore, it should be worth something. After all, he had beaten a dangerous creature to death to obtain it, right? The hut in the woods was small, with a single room with a cauldron in it. Perhaps Tholumom thought, Zecora was one of those alchemist thingies which could refine poison into something worth more than its weight in gold. “That fluid in your hand, which of payment you do demand, is not venom.” The zebra sighed. “You don’t seem to understand, of what prices you demand, there are better ways to earth your wealth, certainly without risking your health.” “I’m sorry, I guess that I’m not a butcher by profession.” Tholumon smashed the vial on the rim of Zecora’s cauldron. “You silly little thing! Be cautious of what you swing. Else you’ll end in tears, perhaps greater than your only fears.” Zecora grasped for words, but by the relative lack of meaning in her second line of her couplet, she was running out of things to say. “What was that then?” “How can you be so unobservant? Ack! you know no more than a brain dead rodent!” The caudron had begun to bubble in the last minute or so while the dwarf was busy not noticing the cauldron’s boiling. A large eye coalesced out of the boiling cauldron. It glanced around, locking on to the dwarf. When Tholumom noticed that, he paused, considering whether or not he should say hello. “Hello, floating eye thing.” The eye blinked. “You must be deaf.” (If the cauldron’s eye is not read as Plankton, then you are doing it wrong) “No you damnable dwarf. I do not accept greetings from a lowly life form as yourself.” The dwarf drummed on the rim of the cauldron, amused. “Aye, but you did respond. Also I happen to be your creator, so if anything, I’m the superior creature.” “You are a mockery of a biologist. You dropped a flask of urine into this cauldron, you pitiful fool. You couldn’t possibly have any idea that a simple flask of urine would result in my creation.” “Of course I did. All dwarven alchemists are trained purposely to create contemptuous creatures inside of random cauldrons with whatever they have handy.” “You’re lying.” “Yes. Because Dwarven Alchemists don’t exist.” The dwarf laughed. “So I’m not superior?” The cauldron bubbled, furrowing its single eyebrow. “No, my cauldronite, you’re not, perhaps you should stop existing.” “I believe that you are correct.” The cauldron seemed resolved in its tone. The eye in the cauldron disappeared in a puff of logic taking the cauldron with it. “Of such a cauldron you have broke, never should I have spoke.” “I owe you something too, don’t I?” “Yes my minion for the week, do not fear for it shall not be bleak.” “I don’t suppose that you would like a system of catacombs underneath your house for whatever you might need a system of catacombs for?” “I have no need for caves my friend, instead there is something you must rend. Beware its teeth its flashing eyes, for in the darkness they surprise.” “That sounds like fun.” “Fun it may be, but it will be harder than bucking a tree.” “What is it that you want me to... rend?” “A manticore, no more.” “Sure.” “Do you ask anything of me?” “Not really. You should tell me where it is, but beyond that, I can handle it.” “And of those ingredients that I will ask of you?” “I don’t know.” “Well, it would make a nasty stew.” “You should probably tell me about those too.” The dwarf sighed, sitting down on the floor, next to the cauldron’s stand. He could expect an earful.
ManticoreTholumom Lathonudlerned has been content recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has eaten a decent omelet recently. He has had an excellent drink recently. He has had the satisfaction of learning what an animal trap does. He has enjoyed combat recently. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work. He is not self-conscious. He is reserved. He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. When he is angry, his hands clench into fists. When worried, he tends to use threats. His nose is broken. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. The dwarf stumbled into the basement of Zecora’s treehouse. It was impossibly large; leading him to believe that it had to be a natural cave system that the zebra had tried to convert into a safe basement. His torch burned slowly on his helmet, to which it was fastened. The light could barely penetrate a few meters into the gloom before it was snuffed out by the fog that precipitated from the bottom of the forest’s floor. There was the sound of rushing water nearby. The dwarf frowned. Zecora should not have tried to convert this cave to a basement, it was still very active in terms of animal life, in fact, it was worse than his own fortress’ attempt to turn their cave into a safe place. This cave was tainted, it was in a biome that was savage, the fog itself smelled of half decayed corpses. The dwarf considered Zecora for a moment, wondering if she was a witch, he brushed the idea aside, Zecora didn’t have enough books to be a proper necromancer. The manticore in here was more than a normal manticore, it had to be undead. Anything that died in this cave would be brought back as a zombie in time. Those zombies would only cause the dwarf suffering. He could back out, but that would be an insult to his own honor, not to mention the honor of the ever-dubious Umbral Dyes. He sighed, this would be a bad job. The manticore screeched. It was not undead, the smell of rotting corpses was in fact from rotting corpses, not the necromantic magic that the dwarf expected. He could not say that he was relieved about the lack of undead manticores though. The beast was as tall as most of the structures in Ponyville. Faced with a monster the size of a house, the dwarf was not particularly intimidated. The forgotten beasts of his world were far more toxic and evil than this thing, even with its scorpion tail and rather awful breath. Of course, he thought, the knowledge that his race had defeated greater horrors gave him no advantage in the fight that he was about to take part in. He felt his mind slip away, the burdensome thoughts of the normal day evaporated under the pressure of imminent combat. His hands rippled across the weapon, finding the right place to hold the hammer. Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale. He opened his eyes, sucking in the darkness, he saw every detail he needed for the fight, no more. He tightened the grip, closed his eyes, and let his cerebral cortex do what it did best: move. Left arm extend, angle upwards, apply counter force on torso. Legs retract, bear load, lean forward, legs extend. Calculate distance, leverage right arm, left arm down. Bear load, adjust legs, prepare legs for landing. The creature screamed, but his memory captured it without context. His eyes saw the blood spew from the arteries of the beast, but never assigned any other sense to go with them. The blood formed the shape of a spear impacting the creature as it sprayed out. The scream formed a horror that could taunt the dwarf at any time without trigger, as it had no context. The vision of the creature’s eyes glazing over as the last of the blood emptied out, the almost soulful stare, as though it had simply asked the dwarf why. Without context, the images of the manticore attempting to inflict wounds on the dwarf could not be held to be images of the same manticore that died, examining him as though he had committed a sin. Death in this world, well, it bothered him. Back in the Ideas of Mourning, death was constant, expected(even if it was not welcomed), but here, the notion that death was just as constant plagued him. He had killed the other manticore, without the same moral crisis, without the same feeling of wrongness, but now, the contractual killing seemed something that should be abhorrent. The sensation was alien to him. There was noone else here to hold him up, to glorify his kill, which had been a product of a simple mistake, who would know that manticore urine mixed with mystery Zecora potion would end with the cauldron disappearing? It was his fault that he ended up killing this relatively innocent predator, which, despite his own omnivorous pride, he knew would end up hunting the more troublesome, smaller predators that might otherwise come to live in Zecora’s basement, and that he could not protect her from the wrath of the smaller predators as well as this very large one. He sighed, the basement was sketchy enough, now all that he needed to do before he would leave was to remove the liver, spleen, and venom gland of the manticore. Grudgingly, he removed the diagram showing where the various organs were from his pocket, Zecora really did want something more than manticore urine this time around. The dwarf pulled out a knife, beginning the grisly process. He was still no butcher, cutting into organs that he would have wanted to avoid, namely the colon, the appendix, and the gizzard. How he managed to do this was beyond his own powers of failure-mode description. Each time, a new and terrible scent wafted out, distinct from blood, and each other. The Colon was unpleasant, but the smell of the appendix had an unsavory sweetness to it, maybe the ponies really did feed cupcakes to their animals, as the yellow pegasus said. That, of course, was silly, nobody in their right minds would bother taking care of the animals without a reason to do so. The gizzard popped, spewing the scent of rotting meat into the air. The dwarf grimaced, this was taking a lot longer than expected. The dwarf did obtain the organs that he was tasked with, eventually. The liver, spleen, and venom glands weighed him down as he returned, listlessly to the treehouse where Zecora eagerly awaited his return, or he hoped that she did. It would be cruel to kill a creature that, for once, had no desire to consume his flesh as its next meal, especially one that was a bit beyond the culinary tastes of the dwarf, or a common human, goblin, or even Elf. Perhaps if the dwarf put some spices on it and called it Goblin... The dwarf halted the thought with a strong disgust, he was already outside the tree, its windows glowing their ethereal shades of blue or green, or purple, but never yellow. He entered, the zebra was doing something or other, but Tholumom could barely focus on the area around him. In his deep thought, his eyes focused on one point, his brows furrowed, as though to help his concentration. When Zecora looked at the dwarf, she could have sworn that some kind of mountain was growing out of his head. “What seems to have happened...” Zecora did a short imitation of the dwarf himself, before continuing without a rhyme. “Are you okay? It certainly seems that you have not enjoyed what you said would be like play.” “Why? Why Zecora, why did I have to kill that manticore?” “So killing is not in your nature?” The dwarf glared at her. “I was never like those kids at home. They were always talking about the ‘day when they’d get their first kill’. They were mad. I preferred to avoid violence, I think that I’ve forgotten about it until now. Those... Whatever.” Zecora believed that the dwarf should have been crying by now, “So you are not okay?” The dwarf could barely walk, so as his race often did, when confronted with a philosophical dilemma, he sulked back to the library. The pouch full of bits that a guilty Zecora had given him jingled on his belt. He had gone into the Martial Trance before, hadn’t he? Tholumom’s nights as a child were often filled with stories of the warriors who came out of the Martial Trance victorious, wise, and powerful. The dwarf had gone into the martial trance before. First during the Goblin Siege that resulted in the death of his wife, then during the fight against the soulless demons that haunted the bowels of the world. The first time, obviously, he had fought for himself alone; that was the function of the Martial Trance, its curse. It saved the life of an individual, but in that state, nobody could care for anything but themselves. And in this selfish adaptation of biology, the savior of the adventurer as it might be, it was beginning to take on a character that called to question the ancient reasonings of the dwarves. If he was not a dwarf in his reasoning, what could he be? He didn’t worship demons, so he couldn’t be a Goblin; he did not eat the corpses of his enemies, so he would stand out as an elf; there were too many idiosyncrasies that made humanity an implausible option. No, Dwarves were relatively accepting of beings until they tried to kill them, unfortunately, the assumption that an unknown being was not in fact trying to hug you when it started walking towards any given dwarf was foreign to most of the surviving species as a whole. Was it his fault that he fell back on the evolution proven assumption of hostility. Could nature be blamed when the creature accused, the committer of a heinous injustice towards a relatively innocent party. Eventually, The dwarf gave up on the thought. There was little that could be gained by self reflection when there was no word for what his words brought him too, except perhaps for guilt. But the dwarf wondered, what could that mean? Was it a guilt about the manticore’s unnecessary death? The mercenary career that he had committed himself to without forethought? Or was the guilt spawned by his betrayal of beliefs? The dwarf shook his head, those were not issues that any being before him, after him, or even his peers could answer. The feeling he felt now was not congruent with the self-loathing aspects of his species, it was not the dreaded melancholy, which would invariably lead to his death by self-inflicted drowning. His thoughts were interrupted by a shady pair of pegasi looking generally shady, if the dwarf wasn’t certain that they were only imitating the fashion of sneaking that goblins employ, he would be worried, they were doing such an awful job of sneaking, that, in fact, it was clear that they were trying to go for, what was it that the stupid human teenagers said, “Swag”? He would have written them off as ponies pretending to be pickpockets if it was not for the suits that they wore. Oddly enough, their sneaky-esque posture did not provoke the traditional Dwarven Response. Instead, he was intrigued by the fact that they had been following him, especially after he had entered the Library. “Spiike! Would you mind preparing three of any particular type of drink which you are able to prepare?” The dwarf shouted. “Does that mean coffee or-” The reply flowed out from the kitchen, carrying the dragon’s sense of bravado, clearing exposing Spike’s confidence about his ability to prepare sub-standard drinks for anypony that was around. “Whatever it is, it will do. We have some guests.” “Did Twilight say that you could boss me around however you like?” “Yeah Spike. She did say that you were as much my slave as her’s.” “I’m not her slave. What would give you-” “Really? You do the housework, your catalogue the library, with the help of your overseer, you cook, you take letters and notes for her. You were taken care of by her after being snatched by Twilight at some point in the past-” “Okay-Okay! When you put it that way my life makes a lot more sense. Does that explain why I love Twilight?” “Stockloam syndrome.” The dwarf felt no need to continue his explanation after that awful reference. “What?” “Nevermind dragon! Make me some variety of foul herbal concoction to make your masters cringe.” “O-Okay...” Spike trailed off, backing off into the sink, where he was told to clean dishes by his mistress, uncertain of how seriously to take the new realization that he was essentially acting as a slave. The dwarf sat down at a table near the door. “So, do you ponies want to talk to me, or steal my children?” One of the pegasi glanced over towards the dwarf, “We aren’t here for you. We are here to bring Miss Sparkle to an urgent meeting with Princess Celestia.” The pegasus stifled a smile at the strange creature, professionalism was apparently important, even when dealing with a relatively immature creature of unknown genus, species, or income range. “Why were you following me around then?” The dwarf had seen the way that they skulked around, it was rude for any person to come in another person’s house, but government agents could not enter anyone’s house without some reason, or at least a strong familiarity. “We weren’t, just because you happen to be staying here for a small amount of time, does not make you our quarry.” “Okay then.” The dwarf, despite his belief that the pegasi was lying, felt left out of the loop all of the sudden. It was odd enough that these government agents were not interested in an alien(who has been defeating beasts behind the border of the country), but they were interested in some kind of magical-savant-egghead with a horn and purple(or as she would refer to herself as “Lavender”) colored pony with no appreciable talent for anything beyond a temporary suspension of the physical laws of the universe. What could she do that he couldn’t? Other than the whole magic thing, nothing, maybe she can process grass in her digestive process, and she was purple, maybe lavender, either way she had a far cooler color scheme than his own pale skin with brown hair, brown eyes, and other relatively normal humanoid color schemes. Maybe she was a more interesting character, but why should that stop him? He knows that he can swing an warhammer, with extreme prejudice, occasionally even without any kind of prejudice. He knows that he is a not only a decent miner, but one of the best, probably better than that skill that Rarity probably keeps in a closet, trying to avoid(one whose special talent involves gems does not simply go around making dresses without them). The other pegasus which the dwarf had failed to notice when he climbed up the stairs, returned with the purple pony in question. “So, Stalky Cloud, how has your family been doing?” “Sean has been doing fairly well at his school, but I’m a bit concerned with Polly.” “Really? I thought that girl was too nice to get into any kind of trouble, what kind of trouble is it anyway?” “She’s gotten into parrots.” “Yeah, but unfortunately the birds that we see around the Canterlot-Cloudsdale suburb are not known for their cleanliness. There’s been some bad cases of Southern Flu around there recently. I’m not willing to let her risk that infection, she could be out of school for weeks.” “I’ll see if I can’t get Zecora to whip up something to help with that, Stalky. I’m sure that she’ll be okay.” “I know Twily, but I can’t put the thought aside, you know as a father.” “Come on Stalky, let your kid explore a bit, otherwise she might just join the Cutie Mark Crusaders, and we both know how that would work out for Ponyville.” They both shared a long laugh. Tholumom’s jaws and eyes were open as wide as possible. How could Twilight have such a good relationship with a sketchy government agent. Stalky looked back at him, glaring, “We didn’t come for you, but you are coming along.” “Oh. Okay.” And so the dwarf’s self-confidence and sense of self importance was suddenly restored. If you happen to see any formatting anomalies, tell me, google docs is acting quite odd, as of late.
Stars and SunTholumom Lathonudlerned has been content recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has eaten a decent omelet recently. He has had an excellent drink recently. He has had the satisfaction of learning what an animal trap does. He has felt guilt for his part in ending life recently. He has received pay recently. He has felt left out of the loop recently. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. His eyes are brown, his hair is brown, his skin is pale. He has begun to wonder whether all this death is worth it. There are few ways to make a dwarf more uncomfortable than placing him in a carriage flying through the sky. The fact that it was flying was almost as unnatural to the brown haired charleton as the fact that it was a carriage, it was even stranger and less useful than those wagons that merchants of all civilizations used to carry large amounts of useless trinkets that apparently had a use “Just past the next town over” perpetually denying any use. Then again, rock mugs were an effective way of making a large number of worthless projectiles perfect for defending against a goblin horde, nobody used them for drinking because rock, as it turns out, tends to be a bad material for making waterproof containers out of. The dwarf was ripped away from the relatively mundane and uninteresting thoughts about the idiosyncrasies of his world’s economy by the sudden invasion of the results of turbulence into his inner ears. Then his breathing was interrupted by the sudden reflex that every living thing that does not fly has to such extreme turbulence, he threw up. Twilight watched the dwarven spectacle with a mixture of disgust and horror, really a fitting mixture giving the retching sounds that could probably be heard on the ground. It would be fortunate if the sound of the dwarf’s pained moans and splatters didn’t cause the pegasi pulling the sky carriage to get sick as well. “Are you okay Tholumom Lathonudlerned?” The unicorn struggled to say the name, but managed in the end. “Your name is really, really long. Is there anything shorter that I can call you by?” The dwarf finished emptying the imaginary contents of his stomach onto the floor of the carriage, and sat back on the bench. “You can call me Thol if you want.” He paused, thinking about something pertaining to his situation, Twilight observed. “What do you think that the princess wants anyway? I hope that she hasn’t called me up because she thinks that I’ve been shoplifting.” “I doubt that, even though I’ve seen you stealing from various food stalls, I doubt that Celestia would care enough, especially since you had no money in the first place.” “That never stopped the hammerer.” The dwarf mumbled to himself. The dwarf perceived Twilight’s confusion at the mention of the Hammerer, but chose to keep silent, ignoring her curiosity. A heavy cloud cover loured over the castle that was affixed to a mountain in a manner that was familiar to the dwarf. Certainly the rulers could not be so bad if they had a proper appreciation for the beauty that a building defying gravity, hugging the side of a mountain, allowing its occupants to look out over the land they possessed, then what judgement could he find being from another culture that appreciated the same style of building, be it a bit less, decadent. The gleaming gold on the castle seemed to amplify the reflected lightning as the carriage passed underneath the thunderstorm. The prospect of thunder was not enticing to the dwarf, especially seeing that he was, in fact, hurtling through the air at around thirty seven world tiles an hour, not that a tile is a good unit of measurement for distance, but that did not occur to the dwarf as the twenty-million-urist lightning bolt struck the ground beneath the carriage. Twilight shrugged. This storm was perfectly safe, its lightning was meticulously planned, or at least that’s what Celestia told her when she refused to come out from underneath her bed for three days as a filly. Of course, now that she knew Rainbow Dash, maybe she should return to the safety underneath her bed. The carriage landed safely. Somehow. The dwarf was presented, upon leaving the carriage, with a sight of a large white horse that seemed to be a few colors short of a rainbow. The dwarf thought of a rainbow, bringing to mind the fact that he had not yet met Rainbow Dash, whose collusive antics with Pinkie Pie had made the dwarf slightly interested, but far more wary of the supposedly multi-colored pegasus. Of course, this thought was interrupted by the simultaneous occurrence of a sudden sheet of rain, and a large lightning bolt striking the Alicorn. The dwarf’s mouth hung open as the lightning seemed to draw out the strike, as if to pain the creature which it maimed. The creature dispelled the lightning bolt, breaking the arc. The creature smiled at the dwarf, its pale magenta eyes examining him kindly. Tholumom, however, had a different reaction to such a demonstration of power. Namely sliding underneath the carriage, hiding from the god-creature. Perhaps it was just another goblin ploy? Their law-giver demons were the only creatures which ruled any civilization which could withstand such a blow from the lightning. Meanwhile somewhere else... “Hey Dashie I was going through Twilight’s stuff and found this stick thingy and I thought that only Rainbow Dash could know what it was so I went looking for you all over Ponyville and I got tired so I ate a cupcake and it was good and then I found you so I decided I would ask what you think this thingy is?” A pink pony asks, pointing to a stick topped with a crescent moon of iron which she had materialized with behind Rainbow Dash. “What do I look like, some kind of egghead?” Rainbow Dash made an attempt to hide the box with ‘swag’ written on it crudely. “I bet that it has something to do with farming or mining.” The pink pony mused examining the pick with her eye telescoping towards the tip of the pick. Her tail twitched five and a half times, "Hmm... Somepony will use four periods instead of three in his ellipsis." “Naah. That couldn’t be. It seems to be a bit too awesome for either of those.” The Rainbow pegasus ignored the latter part of the comment; a pink grammar checker was of no use to the surprisingly athletic egghead. Back at the castle.... The large white creature lowered her head to look underneath the carriage, get a better look at the strange dwarf which was hiding there at the moment. The dwarf retreated a bit further back into the carriage, avoiding the large white Goblin-Law-Giver-Horse thing which had absorbed a lightning bolt with no trouble. He could not best something such as that in normal combat, or in any given combat, no matter how abnormal the combat could be. Tholumom Lathonudlerned is deathly afraid of Alicorns "Come on out Tholumom. Please. I only want to talk to you about your world. Or, more specifically, how you got here." The white Alicorn that Tholumom did not know the name of used a genuinely concerned tone, perhaps she did care for the dwarf a bit. What did that matter? She was obviously a Goblin-Law-Giver! Tholumom knew that there was no way that such a creature could care for such a lowly being as himself. "Stay away Demon! I'll gut you if you come closer!" The dwarf desperately yelled at the creature, praying, for the first time in his life, to the Everlasting Trout. The dwarf grabbed at where his axe should be, but found only an empty loop in his belt. "Dammit! the only time I actually need my warhammer, it's not even here!" He whispered frantically to himself as sheets of rain continued to pour down on the top of the castle landing strip. Meanwhile in that other place... "Hey Dashie, look at this hammer I just found while once again going through Twily's things." "Pinkie, why are you going through Twilight's stuff again? Isn't that kind of breaking a friend's trust?" "She never asked me to promise that I wouldn't go through her stuff when she isn't around." "Okay... Wow, that hammer is pretty cool." "I bet that Applejack could use that for repairing her barn. She'd be all like-" The pink pony began to go through the list of awesome actions that Applejack would do with this hammer, breaking boards into the correct lengths with a single swing of a hammer, forcing nails in so fast that the wood would explode, killing a few Timberwolves, turning them into the door of her new barn. Ironically, the last action, being the most difficult, was also the only one that the warhammer was meant to be used for. Back at the castle... After thirty or so minutes trying to plead with the dwarf to come out, bearing assurances that he would be fine, reassurances from Twilight that Celestia was a benign ruler, and not a demon, whatever that was, and generally trying to make the dwarf come out of his hiding spot under the carriage, Twilight was beginning to suffer from hypothermia from the rain, Celestia was getting bored, and the royal guards had facehoofed so many times that they were dazed. "Okay, Tholumom, if you don't come out, I'm going to move the entire carriage off of you, and you will be apprehended by those royal guards, whose brains are now damaged due to your absurd antics." Celestia's voice was not filled with the same kindness as before, ponies were getting hurt trying to make the dwarf be reasonable. "Never Demon!" The dwarf howled in desperate fury. It would have been intimidating if magic didn't exist, and two of what are arguably the most powerful magic users in the world on that rooftop were struck magic-less. Glowing, the carriage began to rise above the dwarf. When it had cleared him entirely, Celestia threw the carriage off of the castle. Blueblood's estate: Blueblood surveyed his gardens carefully, they were beautiful in the rain. He felt at peace there, sitting under the roof of his new Gazebo, while sheets of rain came down upon his plants. Behind him a crash sounded, he turned around to see his house with a new addition, a pegasus carriage stuck half-buried into his bedroom. He shrugged, he didn't have enough money to build that addition to his bedroom, the carriage would do just fine. Now to find those contractors which he had fired previously. Once again, back at the castle.... "So, you aren't a demon?" The dwarf looked up to the flowing maned creature above him, which happened to, at this point, be glaring at him. "No, I suppose that I am not a demon." "Why didn't you say so?" Tholumom laughed. "Most creatures that can survive being struck by lightning tend to be dragons, amorphous elder-god horrors which exude gaseous poison from their pores and originate from the deepest pits of the earth, or, seeing as you are neither of those two, a demon. That theory seemed pretty good at the time because you are the ruler of the realm and the goblins of my world are also led by a demon, so it made sense at the time that it could, potentially, be the same here." "I'm actually a bit more like an elder-god horror than anything else." Celestia let the line hang in the air for a moment; if she failed to capture this incredibly stupid and annoying creature’s attention for very long, she would kick herself. "What?" The dwarf was surprised causing Celestia to smile, he had fallen for her obvious lie. "Come inside, my student seems to be in danger of dying from the cold." Celestia motioned towards a pale unicorn that sat shivering in the cold rain, glancing between Celestia and Tholumom drearily. "That's never happened to a dwarf. Usually you have to freeze them entirely before they take serious damage." Tholumom studied Twilight where he stood, but did not bother helping her. Celestia looked at him for a moment, it was rather rude to allow somepony else to suffer while they were completely comfortable. "Tholumom, don't you think that it's appropriate that you help Twilight? After all, you seem to be her friend." "Yes... That sounds like a good idea actually." Tholumom grumbled, once again he was reduced to the level of a small child in the eyes of an elder, who looked down upon him with her knowledge and wisdom, and saw an error immediately in his actions. He cursed himself a bit, it made a lot of sense for him to help Twilight, so it was doubly insulting when Celestia reminded him of it. "Sorry Twilight." "It's okay." Twilight's teeth chattered, turning her three syllable sentence into a twenty syllable sentence. "Come on, Tholumom, Twilight, let us go in." Celestia pushed a door open with her magic shortly followed by the mismatched duo. Meanwhile in the Everfree Forest The howl of the timberwolves reverberated in their woodwind fashion, an orange pony runs through the forest. "Applebloom! Where are ya?" it frantically screamed, eyes darting left to right as she ran down the trail into the forest. “Applejack! Help me!” The voice of a filly pierced the air, piercing the orange pony’s heart with its shrillness. A howl from a wolf reverberated across the forest, chilling Applejack’s bones. The farmer ran to the Everfree, eyes wide with fear, her sister could soon enough be no more. A glint of steel shown down from the heavens, flies into a tree. A gleaming steel hammer sticks out of a knothole, threatening a family of owls. Applejack did not have time to think about the owls, so she removed the hammer, it couldn’t hurt, could it? Applebloom had managed to climb up a tree, just in time to be surrounded by vicious wolves made out of wood. Naturally, this was a result of her endless quest for a cutie mark. Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo had managed to escape the wolves, promising to bring somepony back to help her. “Abblepoom! mm ging to sieve do!” The filly’s sister ran into her line of sight, carrying a large hammer in her mouth. “Applejack, seems like a bad time to repair the gazebo, doesn’t it?” The pony swung the hammer at the wolves, denting them slightly, but not to the point where even fluttershy could accept their being hurt. Oh yeah, also Applejack injured her hind legs doing some kind of generic farm work that would sound out of place in an orchard, probably bucking ploughs. Finally, the orange pony rolled a 20 on her hit check. Unfortunately, that lead to splinters flying out of the timberwolf, striking the others, which also happened to be the victims of other twenties, causing a massive thermo-timberwolf chain reaction, killing all of Ponyville in the explosion, especially Applebloom. The pink pony finished telling her tale to the orange farmer. The sheer strangeness of such a story made it incredibly difficult to hold back laughter, or a far more probably uncomfortable silence. “And that’s what your life would be like if you had this hammer AJ.” The rainbow maned pony was stunned. It wasn’t everyday that Pinkie took a tool that they were examining, somehow brought them to Sweet Apple Acres, then explained exactly what would happen if Applejack started using the tool. “Uh, Sugahcube, I don’t quite know how to tell you this, but we aren’t playing Ponies and Paladins, if I rolled a twenty in real life, there would be a useless die on the ground right near the wolves.” “Aren’t you just a little bit concerned about the fact that your little sister was about to die in that story? You being the one who was responsible for her death.” Applejack shrugged. “It’s not like Ah’d ever do anything like that in the first place. Applebloom knows her way around the forest, not to mention that her little group is more dangerous than the average pack of them timberwolves.” “Applejack! Stop ruining my campaign!” Pinkie’s voice carried a conquering tone, assured by the natural confidence of laughter. Her voice carried the confidence of laughter, but lacked the triviality which she normally poured into her conversation. The three of them found themselves in Applejack’s barn, hunched over a table with several sets of die lying anemically beneath a layer of dust. “Now Rainbow Dash, it’s your turn.” Rainbow Dash glanced uncomfortably at Applejack, who nodded at her. “I guess that I’ll make a spot check.” Meanwhile in a room in a precariously perched castle on top of a mountain. The room was tall. Almost six meters tall. A fireplace gently roared with a well contained heat. Revitalizing a lavender unicorn whose hypothermia was a cause for alarm. Near the fire, Twilight, Princess Celestia, and Tholumom sat at a relatively unadorned table, whose surface provided a firm resting place for a strangely shaped pot which would be virtually impossible to determine whether or not there was a similar one in orbit around the sun. Tholumom was draped over a red and gold couch, nearly asleep. The other two talked about things that were normal for students and their teachers to discuss at length, such as the purpose of life, the meaning of harmony, and other perfectly boring subjects such as the origin of the Alicorns. “So that’s how Alicorns work?” Twilight was stunned. Who could have thought that it was so simple, just a single ritual away from godhood. “I mean, why aren’t there more of you if it’s that simple?” “There’s a good reason for that Twilight, but it seems that our guest has a few questions of his own.” Princess Celestia turned towards the dwarf, who had been half asleep during her explanation of whatever an Alicorn is. “Your Highness, I honestly can’t imagine where you got that idea.” Tholumom grumbled. Last time he had seen royalty was when the fortress found the adamantium vein. The upper echelon of nobility tended to move around following the adamantium, of course, that also meant that the fall of civilizations also tended to follow the discovery of adamantium. Anyway, this was still more interesting than that speech which the king had managed to spew for over five hours. “Well, as a miner I’m sure that you’ll be interested in the mineral deposits that exist around Equestria. Our country is famed for its unusually rich supply of magic gems and precious metal.” The princess took a swig of her tea. The dwarf sat up, making a check intentions check. Unfortunately, its hard to understand the expression on someone’s face when only one of her eyes remains uncovered by a billowing mane. “Yes, that is a somewhat interesting subject, your Highness.” “Please, just call me, Your Royal Highness Princess Celestia.” The casual manner which she said this in made it sound as though she was telling him that ‘your Highness’ is too formal. Too bad that her name and title just grew a few syllables. “Okay Your Royal Highness Princess Celestia, what of the minerals and ore in the ground. I know that Canterlot is situated above a vast kimberlite and lamproite vein. In fact, I don’t think that I’ve ever seen both simultaneously in the same vein. Not to mention the massive gems which Twilight has mentioned while in the throes of a nightmare.” “Why were you listening to me while I slept?” Twilight’s tone became accusatory. Tholumom rolled his eyes. “I’m sorry about that, it was a bit strange, wasn’t it? Anyway, you remind me a bit of my daughter, she loved books too. She loved the stories of the past. She also loved learning how things worked. She was a brilliant child. And I couldn’t save her.” The dwarf sighed, but didn’t continue. “I’m sorry Tholumom.” Celestia’s tone became soothing. "Would you like to talk about her?" “Yes. Actually I would.”
daughter“This is the story of how my daughter was born.” Tholumom spoke in a quiet, calm, measured fashion, as though he was trying to make himself easier to listen to. “Hey Tholumom!” The other miner shouted from across the room. The meeting hall was large and lively on this day, its polished stone gleaming in the half-hearted rays that made it through the entrance tunnel. Lanterns glowed in a friendly impotence, casting rings of light on the floor. Tholumom was talking to his wife, whose radiance was all he could be sworn to protect. Zustashmabdug had interrupted that. Tholumom motioned for him to come across the room. Zustash obliged him. “The boss has another section for us to mine out. He says that he wants you to start the preliminary digging.” Tholumom shuddered, the boss didn’t request particular workers unless it was a job which carried dangers. “Is the digging dangerous?” Tholumom asked. Zustash shrugged. “I don’t know. The boss just had me notify you. If it helps, it’s on the eastern side of the fortress” “That’s not too bad I suppose.” Tholumom was not intimidated, the geology on the eastern side was made up of mostly igneous rock, strong stuff. “Will you be alright, my love?” His wife nodded, “I might be pregnant, but that doesn't mean that you have to worry for me constantly. I’m a dwarf, we’re built of stout stuff. Go off and take care of the bosses’ work, I know you’ll be okay.” He kissed his wife goodbye. then headed off to the eastern side of the fortress. The eastern side of the fortress was used more as a storage space than a living or working space. As a result, the lanterns were dim, and the stone floors had never felt an engraver’s touch, leaving them rough and ugly with the marks of the pickaxes that opened the cavity in the first place. Tholumom squinted at the marked wall. Felt it with his hands, it was not quite the same feeling as the other walls. The area in the fortress is too dark to see, so he confines his tests to feeling the rock. The rock is not out of place enough to make him worry, so he begins his excavation process. He has taken four hours to dig in five meters, he laughs as he thinks about how he must be a bit rusty, it should have taken him two hours. The work is not exhausting for him, he has done it all his life, and found it to be the best that he could ask for. He gets another meter into the stone before breaking through to the other side. “That’s not right.” The dwarf pauses to get his bearings, the side of the mountain should be at least fifty meters away. He glances into the darkness, and hears the sound of rushing water. Dammit. Underground rivers. It is impossible for the dwarf to continue, digging, but that stops being the priority when a wet slapping noise begins to echo around the cavern. Tholumom knew at that point, that he had found carp. “But carp aren’t carnivores.” Twilight mentioned exhausted by the absurd story. “That doesn’t mean that they can’t drag you down into the depths of the river to drown.” “No, I’m pretty sure that carp don’t do that.” “Anyway, I ran back to the center of the fortress, terrified. When I got there, I found that my wife had given birth to my daughter. A wonderful bundle which brought me happiness for the next nine years.” The dwarf finally smiled, “She also motivated me to purge the fortress of the carp, so I lead a squad of soldiers to the river, this time we brought lanterns so we could see the damned creatures, and we slaughtered them.” the dwarf paused for a moment. “Of course, they killed seven peasants, most of whom had been conscripted into the military beforehand, so it was a rather successful battle.” “Seven out of how many soldiers?” Twilight had produced a notepad again, somehow. “I think that there were twelve soldiers that day, including me.” “How many carp were there?” “three.” “So, for every kill, you lost three and a third soldiers?” “Yeah.” “That’s a terrible ratio! How can you even bother fighting when you’re that bad at it?” Twilight’s expression was of mathematically induced horror. Sort of like the expression that dwarves got when they calculated the chances of surviving to their twenties. “Well... We can’t really swim, and since the carp have this tendency to pull us into the water, if they succeed, we typically die.” The dwarf shrugged, “just the way we live. Or something” “Have you ever considered learning how to swim?” Twilight’s tone became condescending, the princess shook her head at her student. Apparently if you weren’t Prince Blueblood you couldn’t get away with condescension of that kind of magnitude. Meanwhile in Blueblood’s estate “Sir, your special diplomatic summary of the Crystal Kingdom has arrived today.” “But Preppy Heights, I thought I told you I wanted the Crystal Empire summary.” “Sir, I already explained that there is no Crystal Empire other than the one which is synonymous with the Crystal Kingdom.” “Preppy, I know that you went to some kind of school which had a population of forty-two and a strong association with sub-ivy league colleges, but I know more than you.” The condescending moron placed his tea cup back onto the table inside the pegasus carriage which he had cleverly attached to his house by means of Crazy Glue. “Absolutely sir, who am I to question the inner workings of a stallion whose brilliance caused him to use mayonnaise instead of Crazy Glue to fix a pegasus carriage which randomly crashed into his bedroom onto his house?” Preppy Heights felt, as did everypony who knew Blueblood, to shove him and his ‘brilliant architectural masterwork’ out of the window which it had replaced. “Now you see my point.” Preppy Heights rolled his eyes, he really couldn’t remember how he got this job in the first place. “Also look into a material I’ve heard of called Slade, I want a chandelier made out of it.” “Absolutely sir.” “Twilight, I know that you have a problem when things don’t make sense, but you have a lot to think about.” “And now something bad is going to happen because you said that before the changeling invasion. Out of all the times you have said that, something terrible has happened.” “Come on Twilight, that’s probably not going to happen. Anyway, we just don’t like swimming, we can do it, but it practically takes a dwarf getting thrown into waist deep water to teach us.” Twilight shoved a hoof into her head, making the dwarf wonder whether or not self-mutilation was a common theme here. “Okay, Tholumom, there is also a more pressing matter at hand here, there is a volcano that is dangerously close to eruption, if my geologists are right at least. If what you’ve told Twilight is true, then your kind know how to deal with that, maybe even prevent it?” Tholumom furrowed his brow in thought for a moment, was it really right to give up the treasured secrets of the state to these horses? “Well... I could build a long channel to direct the magma to a center of industry, which could use it to smelt ore without coal, or potentially, generate elarctracity, was it? without coal or a moving water source. It wouldn’t prevent an eruption, but it could move enough magma out of the volcano to make it less dangerous when it happens.” Celestia raised an eyebrow at this idea. “Twilight, does that make any sense to you?” Twilight shook her head, “I think it might work, but... What if it goes wrong? How many ponies could suffer?” “Not more than a hundred.” Tholumom yawned. “I don’t see why other races see it as dangerous, it is safe if you know how to handle it. Just like that Elictracity thingy, right?” “Tholumom, the word you are looking for is electricity.” “Applejack, it’s your turn, three of the orcs are dead already, but there are two more left.” “Pinkie Pie, I can in fact listen to you narrate the story, I know.” “Come on Applejack, I really want to do something else, let’s finish this battle so we can leave.” Pinkie Pie glared at Rainbow Dash, “You know I love you Dashie, but if you keep on ruining my campaign, then we’ll have a problem.” Rainbow Dash shuddered at the thought. “Okay, Ahm going to take out one of the orcs.” “Which one, the one with the bowtie, or the one without the bowtie?” “Ah don’t care.” “But if you don’t care then what is there to care about?” “Not Ponies and Paladins.” Pinkie Pie flipped the table that the trio was using, throwing the various roleplaying supplies to the floor of the barn. “Well then, I guess it’s on to GURPS.” “What?” Applejack and Rainbow Dash chorused. “Come on you guys, we haven’t even wasted an hour playing PnP, why don’t we try the other system?” “I’d really like to do some... flying.” Rainbow Dash glanced pleadingly at Applejack. “And I have to buck some Apple trees.” Pinkie glared at them. “You two are finishing one campaign with me.” “Why would we need to build forges in this manner in order to utilize the lava taken from the volcano?” Twilight’s question caused Tholumom to think of the various humans that have asked the same question, of course, they never really tried hard enough to think about it. “Lava’s convection currents in the air are so hot that it is possible to seriously injure yourself just by standing near it. I would recommend that you use a fairly small aperture for whatever ducts you use to bring in the heat.” Tholumom sighed, “Or you could build it like you suggested and find the corpses of twelve good ponies dessicated and burnt by the heat and flame.” Celestia glanced between them. “Tholumom, the reason that Twilight sees your process as flawed is due to our production methods taking place on a larger scale than you must have been accustomed to back on your world. I don’t think that you understand the idea of a blast furnace, and while your species’ method is fine for small scale, our smelting takes place at such a larger scale that the wages of the ponies which would be employed would outweigh the benefits of not needing an external fuel source.” Tholumom raised an eyebrow before taking a sip of tea from a flagon, drawing Twilight’s attention to his strange choice of drinking vessels. “You sure do know a lot about industry for a princess whose very way of life is existentially separated from the practical applications of such.” he took another sip from his strange choice of drink holder. “I really appreciate this mug, it doesn’t even spill as much as ours.” “Thol, that’s not a mug. That’s our serving container.” “Oh, so that’s why it seems perfectly sized. hmm.” He finished the flagon and placed it back on the table. He grinned as he marvelled at how whatever drink they had given him had caused him to become drowsier, completely opposite to the revitalizing effect of alcohol. “You can keep it Thol.” Celestia’s smile probably caused a windigo to “D’aww” as some say. The dwarf’s eyes lit up like Pinkie’s in a candy shop, or any shop for that matter. “Really?” Celestia nodded. “I love you forever Princess Celestia.” He clutched the flagon greedily in his arms, then hugged the royal Alicorn warmly. The mere sight of it could have caused Chrysalis’ heart to grow three sizes that day, or possibly feed an entire army for a month, but what Chrysalis did with her food was outside the subjects which anyone in the room could possibly make a valid judgement about. “I have a favor to ask then...” By the way a flagon can be: Or if you prefer:
Not Going HomeTholumom Lathonudlerned has been content recently. He has mourned for the loss of loved ones recently. He has eaten a decent omelet recently. He has had an excellent drink recently. He has had the satisfaction of learning what an animal trap does. He has felt guilt for his part in ending life recently. He has received pay recently. He has felt left out of the loop recently. He has had the pleasure of talking to a nice pony recently and obtained a flagon for his troubles. He is slow to anger, but often feels depressed. He is not particularly sociable. He cannot find happiness in his work He has a wonderful kinesthetic sense. He is very strong. He possesses an incredible endurance. He recovers quickly from sickness and injury. His eyes are brown, his hair is brown, his skin is pale. “Please refrain from killing the local wildlife, regardless of how imposing or misguided it might seem.” Princess Celestia’s tone became a little bit less cheerful. “I wasn’t planning on it.” Tholumom’s pulse slowed a bit. The tea must be working then. “I was worried it was something serious.” “It is actually quite serious. We do not allow the natural world to take its course, and while the Everfree is the only place where this would not have you arrested as a miscreant; I’m afraid that you can’t even do it there, seeing as the actions you have already taken might be enough to cause the Everfree to expand.” “Princess, I understand your concern, but that isn’t how nature works. You see-“The princess interrupted him. “It’s been nice seeing you two, but I’m afraid that I have some rather important business to attend to.” Celestia finally walked out of the room, leaving the two rather confused guests to fend for themselves as they attempt to make their way through the probably booby-trapped castle. Twilight lead the bewildered, tipsy dwarf out of the castle to a new Pegasus carriage that was waiting for them. The carriage ride back was uneventful, completely void of any sort of vomiting or retching. Tholumom stared out the window, oblivious to the fact that he should be discomforted by the combination of air travel, shifting horizon, and the fact that the sun is in the sky, producing a rather lovely sunset of at least twelve different hues of orange. The two arrived at the library. The dwarf found himself thinking about the similarity between his daughter and Twilight. All I see are similarities, but where are the differences? Is it possible that I’ve forgotten them? Day turned to night. Sleep is an uneasy process for the dwarf. Dreams came and went, leaving odd mixes of his memories and imagination. But then, there was persistence. Forests are not places where dwarves thrive. Tholumom found himself enjoying one. Babbling brooks carried water across rocks, a small symphony. Insects flew gracefully from plant to plant, another chorus. And the dwarf feared. And the dwarf rubbed his hands together and the dwarf found hooves. And there was peace for the dwarf and the dwarf failed to notice. (Enough parataxis already) The movements he made were fluid and simple. His trot was measured and careful, just as agile and natural as any other movement he had made. His mind rationalized something along the lines of “Must be a pony overdose” but he knew that such a symptom would be unlikely to be noticed along with the various organ failures that would occur with a pony overdose. It didn’t matter. He knew that he would find a family again. His painful memories of gathering the corpses scattered outside the fortress seemed like a nightmare or a fantasy; it couldn’t be real, could it? It doesn’t matter, voices call out to him from the outside, promising him peace for a sacrifice of something that he can’t remember. It won’t matter, he gallops out into a field, and his princess awaits his presence. It will not have mattered; she is a matron, concerned for him, why would she demand slade cups? They are rather heavy after all. It had not mattered, his family would be found alive if he simply accepted the corruption of his being. Even his flagon agreed, his family would exist again after the change. But was it right, myths of Planepacked circled his mind, the history of the world engraved into a microscopic level, recursively recording its own image, and the image of every other thing upon the world. He recoiled at his dream. The matron dissolved into the tea. And it spoke to him. “There is truth in what I offer you. I might not be like anything that you know, but that is what makes me existentially more innocent than your people's. I appreciate you receiving me so well, often the offer to replace this would be met with violent resistance from the mind." The dwarf/pony shrugged. "Whatever. Are you actually serious about your offer?" "There are many strings of destiny involved, but I can see that if you follow mine, you will find yourself having another daughter much like your last one, which you so dearly loved, a wife whose presence will force you to recall what you once had and smile, as you realize that the similarities make up for the lack of legitimate detail. Can you really say that my offer doesn't make up for what you've lost?" The tea simmered slightly, working itself up for no legitimate reason. "No, I cannot say that. But will it be a mere illusion, as your dream has been?" "The dream was your own, in order to penetrate it; I needed to use Planepacked as a focus for your mind. I do not make it a habit to follow those unsavory habits of the Bureau." "What?" "Nothing you should worry yourself with. Anyway, I've refrained from changing your mind state in any way, other than bringing you to a conscious level suitable for making decisions that can change your life for the better." The ground beneath the Dwarf/pony grew lighter and the dwarf found himself considering it. "You should know that the time grows short, soon your dream will break, and then you will be without my guidance until the next time." "Whatever. Sure. Please help me!" The pony/dwarf clasped his hooves together and went on his belly to plead the spirit guide. There could be no task of importance greater than this. His life had a chance to resume its normal course. Could anyone at home ever fault him for this? The only ones who could are dead. "You will have life that will be reclaimed; you have tasks to complete and time to fill." The tea paused. "There will be much tea drinking." "That sounds positively terrifying." The dwarf/pony shuddered at the thought, much tea drinking. "Doesn't it though? It really isn't so bad." The ground began to shine upwards, becoming painful to look at directly. “See you soon Tholumom.” His vision was filled with the filtered red of the inside of the eyelid. The dwarf rubbed his eyes, and then opened them. His hands were still there. Just as normal. There was little to suggest anything important had happened the night before. Perhaps it was nothing, the kind of dream that only the intoxicating Tea could induce. Of course, his beverages typically failed to talk to him in his dreams. The room was filled with the morning light; which a few months ago, would have been symbolic of a cave-in rather than a new day to go about. And all this tranquility could be shattered so easily. “TWILIGHT! Stop trying to use the transformation magic. If you continue, you might get stuck as something silly like a cloud or a full grown dragon, both of which you would probably want to avoid.” The purple dragon yelled. It was early in the morning, but considering the conversation, Tholumom thought that it would probably be a terrible waste of time and energy to ignore the possibilities. “Spike, come on, I’ve come a long way since the cloud incident. Besides, I never intended to use it on you.” It occurred to the dwarf that they were yelling at each other, arguing over irrelevant points about something that probably contained sentiments related to magical safety or something. Magical safety is nonsense, magic is unpredictable by its nature, and while Twilight seems to have an unusually firm grasp on it, it can very easily go the wrong way. Preparing magic safely involves more learning what is actually needed to accomplish than the natural talent or power, or wards, or faraday cages, but that does not necessarily guarantee any safe performance. That was what it said in one of Twilight’s books, probably one that she never got around to, which would be good fortune for the dwarf’s plan. Acting without thinking, Tholumom attempted to run before he removed himself from the bed, accidentally learning how to use a bicycle in the process. After a few moments of that, he finally decided to swing his legs out of the bed; he doubted that there would be any new inventions in getting out of bed today. After a few moments dealing with a few confounded sheets, probably a new invention designed in order to keep him attached to the bed; an incredible invention. It would also be unfair to forget this mattress, which left these pleasant kinks to work out of his spine; a wonderful chorus of pops would end up issuing from him as the day progressed, sort of like having a musician follow him around and hit him with a flute. The dwarf did manage to escape from the myriad bondage which affixed him to the bed against his will. The day was new and the smell of breakfast pressed itself upon the nose. Which in itself did not seem to be all that unusual, considering that breakfast always has an emphasis on oats and cereal, generally derived products thereof. The breakfast was, for once, not the object of the dwarf’s pursuits. No, that was a new way of life; the reclamation of what he lost a mere nine years ago. Oddly enough, this also goal is to be pursued through experimentation with unusual, difficult, and all around dangerous magical techniques which Twilight is probably itching to use. The purple unicorn was hunched over a book, reading something with her eyes a few inches from the page while she scribbled on a page held in mid-air by magic. A problem then, she could go at this for days before she would finally relent and find time to do something else. Or not, she could just end up finding what she was looking for within the next hour. The solution was simple enough, just interrupt her. Then she noticed him. “Hi Tholumom, what’s up?” She put away the book and her notes; it couldn’t be Twilight, she never cleaned up after anything. “I heard something about transformation magic.” The dwarf paused, “You know? When I was woken by the sound of you two arguing about something regarding safety?” “Yes you did.” Twilight continued to smile at him. Her smile seemed a bit off. But then again, how can that kind of smile not be off? “Do you know any?” “Yes, but I was looking for a subject to practice on.” “Is that safe in any way?” "Not in particular, but where's the fun if there’s no risk?" It still sounded wrong to Tholumom. "Are you sure that you are feeling alright, Twilight?" "Of course, so what was it that you wanted to do with transformation magic?" Twilight smiled. Tholumom felt a sudden headache. That was uncommon for the dwarf, his mental resistance to annoying people, things, and ponies tended to be strong enough for that not to happen. "I was wondering if I could potentially; try out being something a bit more native to this world, perhaps the common race?" The dwarf uttered; almost half-hearted in his speech. To him the question sounded like a defeat, that his life as a dwarf wasn't enough, and that pain could get to him. "That might be possible, let me see." Her horn glowed then sputtered out. "I guess not." "That simple then?" There had to be something off with her. She would normally have gone into a detailed explanation of why the spell failed, not to mention that her magic was green instead of red. The dwarf clenched his hands; her failure, compounded with his now splitting headache was starting to get to him. "What? I have my limits; my magic isn't good for everything you know." The Twilight-like object's tone grew more irritated. "Do you know my name?" The dwarf asked coolly. It was possible that this is still Twilight, but that possibility dwindles. "I'm sorry honored guest, but it seems to have slipped my mind." The definitely not Twilight said sarcastically, her voice dripping with a venom uncharacteristic of the purple unicorn. "You obviously aren't Twilight, but before we have this conversation, let me get my pickaxe.” Before the not-Twilight could respond, he ran upstairs and obtained his pickaxe. He dashed downstairs and resumed his confrontation. "You were going to say?" "Fool. You've fed me enough for today. Your fatherly affection did not go unnoticed, and we have taken the love you have given to Twilight. And now I am strong enough to oppose you." The not Twilight dissolved into a green flame, giving way to the black carapace of the typical changeling. "I doubt that." The dwarf laughed. “But you flatter yourself too much insect, you are quite strong enough to be difficult for me to slay, but you are alone, without your hive to back you, you are virtually powerless.” "You doubt the power of the hive?" "No, I doubt the power of an individual thief in comparison to an enraged dwarven warrior." "Fool! You cannot oppose the hive!" The changeling snarled at the dwarf, narrowing its eyes towards the strange biped. "The hive is all well and good, I don't care about the sanctity of love across Equestria, I just care about the pony you have taken and replaced." The dwarf’s rolled his eyes. The possibility of a fight, while interesting and fairly normal in the daily life of a dwarf in a fortress as large as the Ideas of Mourning; itdid not appeal to Tholumom at the time; it simply wouldn’t do to splatter Twilight’s books with the congealed green ichor that would no doubt ooze from the changeling’s corpse. "The element of magic must not be released, if she is, then we will surely fail ourselves." The changeling bristled at his own speech. "Stop using 'we' you are an individual. You want to survive. You cannot survive if you go against me, and all of the warriors you can bring upon me are nothing compared to the focused mind of a dwarf surrounded. I cannot allow you to take away the closest thing I have to my Daughter.” Okay, so a purple unicorn could not be very much like a pale female dwarf who weighed about five stones, but their personalities were similar enough. "Individuals are weak the hive is -" "Strong, I get it, but surely you have an individual drive, perhaps a white picket fence and a pleasant house. A loving changeling wife and accepting neighbors." "We are like insects and we do not aspire to that kind of life" "Of course you do, I've seen hundreds of beings like you make wise choices. I'll let you live if you tell me where she is." A lie, but a comforting one, assuring the changeling that it has goals outside of the mutual desires that it shares with the hive. "You... have me right. I do want a white picket fence and a wife and accepting neighbors. But can I hope for that without the hive's health?" The dwarf's brain almost froze at such a strange desire for an insect horse to have; fortunately it had frozen once before and learned that such action was typically followed by a large space of amnesia. "You're even worse than the goblins. At least they guarantee equal rights to their slaves. They never ask for white picket fences either, you damned changeling." The truth was that they guaranteed three meals a day and offered free baths with soap, but they did work the average slave to death within the first five days, but those five days tended to be filled with clean armpits and a distinct lack of vomit. "Doesn't slave imply that they are forced to work?" The dwarf smiled, the insect horse had managed to fall into the most obvious trap in the dwarven Rhetorical arsenal; the bullshit call. "Does being a member of a hive imply that you are part of it?" How could this question fail to confuse an insect? Apparently it could fail to confuse an insect very easily. "Yes." And the most obvious rhetorical device of the dwarves fails once again. "And does that mean that you will tell me where Twilight is?" A pause. "Yes." "Really?" "She's out getting groceries with Spike you clot." Tholumom inhaled, lowering his pickaxe. "Did you really have to give that whole super villain speech? I would have been satisfied with slightly less bullshit than that. I knew that you freaks weren't as brutal as you like to pretend you are." It wasn't even very original. Most goblin leaders could make a better super villain speech than this insect, but then again; they probably had at least a few hundred thousand more neurons than the insect. "So you want to be friends?" The dwarf smiled. "Sure, just keep your mouth closed and we have a deal." "We can't have a deal for friendship you foal; it has to be understood implicitly by both parties." The insect looked at the dwarf hesitantly. It considered the possibilities, a friend, something that could build a house, the possibility of more love coming out of it. "Sure friend, just keep your mouth closed, I'd like to avoid throwing up the love you accidentally gave me." It decided to go after the anonymity which this dwarf could offer. "Fair enough, one can't expect a tick to return stolen blood." The changeling gave the dwarf an icy glare. They both laughed. "At least one doesn't expect a tick to vomit the blood on its host because it's put into the light." The dwarf gave a false pout, and they laughed again. The dwarf had made friends with the changeling. Eventually they both ended up recounting stories with each other over a pot of tea. The tea whispered softly, “Your first task is complete.” He has made a friend recently. Meanwhile at Blueblood’s castle… The castle green was graced by a single tree. On this tree was a dubious construction of glue, nails, and boards that were sharper than the nails on average. In this construction a dubious noble looked down upon his estate approvingly; the view was, in his mind, spectacular. A slightly worried, but less dubious servant, entrusted to care for this particular noble, attempted to get him down, another rainstorm was on its way, not that the tree house needed that to fail, it creaked enough already. “Sir, I think that it is time for you to come down from there; you might catch a cold.” Preppy Heights was once again stunned by his employer’s incredible ignorance. “Come on Preppy, I know what I’m doing. This is my tree house after all.” Blueblood dashed the servant’s hope to get him down peacefully. “Sir, the last time you said that, you ended up suffering from tetanus for three weeks.” The servant attempted to appeal to the noble’s desire to maintain a fairly decent standard of health. “And that’s what the inoculation was for, Prep. Surely you know that my immune system can handle virtually everything that is thrown at it.” The servant sighed and whispered, “I hope its methods are overridden.” “Come on now, Preppy, you aren’t even a character in that story any more. Stop making references to it.” Blueblood grasped a hammer weakly in his magic, swinging at the wall. “Sir, you aren’t qualified to even break that wall, now get down.” And the servant sighed again. “At least He isn’t Pinkie Pie.” “Surely you can’t mean that Heights; Pinkie Pie is the finest mare in the entire land of Equestria. When I finally finish building our house we will move in together and have many foals. And then six years later I’ll forget to shave and trip into a moving carriage.” Blueblood gave a sincere smile, believing every word of what he had said. Preppy Height’s mouth just hung open. “Anyway, you’re supposedly competent at household tasks, would you mind helping me?” It was too polite of a question. Blueblood probably knew that Celestia had asked the servant to help prevent his untimely death, be it falling debris from a dubious tree house or a certain white mare whose presence at the gala had been nothing short of a disaster. Fortunately, the latter threat had failed to materialize as Princess Celestia had believed it would. “Sir, I would be honored to lend my help to a master carpenter such as myself.” One who’s most amazing accomplishment is the liberal application of foaming glue. “Wipe your hooves on the way in.” Blueblood said. Another ridiculous demand from the world’s worst employer. “Absolutely sir, I would never dream of dirtying your latest masterpiece with the filth which only my disgusting hooves could track in.” Though it does look like it could use a good mud floor; seeing as all of the nails point upwards. The supposed prince cast down a rope ladder, which the servant began to climb reluctantly. “Come on now, we don’t have all day.” It almost seems as though the prince has failed to realize that nopony has given him a task in the last four months out of spite. The servant entered the unusually clean and well put together hatch on the bottom of the treehouse. Pushing it open with his head, he opened his eyes, expecting a horrific show of carpentry sufficient to make the most hardened contractor cry out in desperation. His eyes opened, ready for the horrors that were no doubt going to be presented to them, instead he found a well-constructed room with understated elegance, with a slightly out of place dance floor in the middle. Once again, Preppy Heights found himself in a dubious box that was larger on the inside than the outside. And this time I won’t have a three month vacation from this moron. The servant pulled himself inside completely “Sir, I think this is rather unrealistic for a stately nobleman such as you to have built.” “My cutie mark is a crown, not only because I am a prince, but because I am also the king of carpentry.” Blueblood explained, examining his hooves, attempting to look disinterested. “Sir, I must certainly say, you have outdone yourself. How can I be of service to you when you have already taken care of so much?” Preppy actually found himself in awe of what he was seeing here, nothing could quite explain it. “Could you fix up the outside, my housing mortar was set on ‘dubious exterior’ and there isn’t much I can do to fix that, other than setting it to ‘obliterate’.” Blueblood patted what seemed to be a miniature artillery piece which he had probably found somewhere in a landfill or something. “Sir, I’ll have it done as soon as possible.” Preppy opened the hatch and started climbing down, “Also, if I may say, you and Miss Pie should be suitable together.” “Of course we will Prep, I have a mortar, and she has a canon cannon, what could possibly go wrong?” Preppy Heights has recently experienced a terrible joke. “More than you could imagine, Sir.” The servant closed the hatch behind him. Blueblood looked around the room cautiously. “I wonder if he realizes that I am aware of his attitude towards me.” Blueblood could not even fire this servant; Celestia had sent him here to protect him from “His own constant follies” or something of the sort. It really did bother him that his own great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great aunt could find him to be so irresponsible. That one particularly lustful unicorn at the gala two years ago was perfectly justified in finding his behavior horrible, but it was a calculated risk. She really did fail to catch the subtle message (in this case that he had no desire to date her, let alone fulfill her fairytale fantasies when his dream mare was within sight). Her spontaneity; her friendly personality; the fact that marriage to her would be fairly politically precocious, not to mention fun; Blueblood loved her for all of these things. “And that’s how I learned that Chrysalis was never even going to use the love from Equestria to benefit her hive.” The changeling’s voice carried the frantic confessional tone which indicated that caffeine is a stimulant, a strange fact because the dwarf felt slower after drinking it. “That’s fascinating.” The words came out slurred, the caffeine disrupting the alcohol tolerant gates in his neurons. “Anyway, I think I’ve stayed too long, I need to get back to the hive, you know, someling might find my absence strange or something.” “That’s probably a good idea, see you later buddy.” The insect that had spoken and thought quickly left the dwarf whose thoughts had plodded along at a glacial rate. The door closed, leaving the dwarf to nod off on his own caffeine induced slumber. The flagon was in front of the dwarf/pony. “You did well with that task, though your reaction to me is unusual, opposite of most living creatures of this world, in fact.” “I’m not really from this world, am I?” The dwarf/pony suggested, taking his musings seriously. The flagon managed a shrug. “You know that better than I do. You were on the right path; Twilight would be a good first step, but not even the caffeine fueled computational power of my Brownian motion can look that far into the future.” The dwarf deadpanned. The dwarf has been confused by a suspicious flagon of tea recently. “I don’t follow.” “Neither does anyone else. Your mind is in better shape than I had expected, considering the state of your body in general.” The flagon opened and a wisp of steam entered the dwarf’s nose. “Ugh. Chai tea. Disgusting.” The dwarf/pony muttered. The flagon nodded. “Made to enhance the senses using an unsavory mix of spices. I hope you enjoy your newly healed nose.” “What’s the next step?” The pony/dwarf rubbed his healed nose. “Ask the real Twilight, she does have a spell that will allow you to achieve the life I’ve promised. But she will be reticent, tell her that it is not like the Bureau, it should be persuasive enough to work on her.” The light emanated from the ground again, accompanied by a loud squeak. “Good bye Tholumom.” “Spike, I told you that I could transmute Tomatoes into gold.” The voice of the real Twilight entered the dwarf’s ears, bringing him to open his eyes. The sun had set, tea kettles were strewn about the library floor; giving the unusual impression that there had been some kind of cave-in underneath the teapot stockpile. Either way, it brought back memories of the mug stockpile; it had taken days to pick them out of the fields. The thought was interrupted by the recognition of Twilight’s potential meltdown; after all, the entire library’s floor was covered by teapots; certainly not a suitable state for a fairly well maintained public building to keep its floors in. So it would have to be put off as something else. Tholumom struggled to think of what. Twilight entered, her eyes locked onto Tholumom. “Hi Thol, how was your day?” “I had tea with a changeling and found it pleasant.” The dwarf croaked out through parched lips. “That sounds… Unusual…” Twilight examined the teapots strewn throughout the room. “Either way, it’s probably dead considering the amount of tea you probably shared with it. You should probably drink some water, you look, dehydrated…” It was at that point the dragon entered the room in order to point out the extent of the problem in a somewhat less polite manner. “What the hay is going on here? Teapots everywhere; a nearly desiccated dwarf carcass; a pickaxe lying in a sexual position? Twilight, what did I tell you about transformation magic?” A look of such pure disgust appeared on her face that it accomplished a few very unusual things; it convinced the Jedi order that their bathrooms required cleaning; it caused a few false positive across the various avatar temples (shooting down a few pigeons with their emitted beams of light and heat); and it caused a revolt in seventeenth century France, and instigated a monolith to uplift monkeys in order to prevent this kind of disgust from happening in the future, however the dragon was apparently immune to such expressions. “That dragon is annoying.” The words that dribbled from the dwarf left with such a rasp that Spike’s scales looked a bit less polished than before. “I think it might be a good idea for you to get him some water Spike.” After Spike left, Twilight stared at the dwarf. “You look really sick Tholumom.” Tholumom Lathonudlerned is severely dehydrated. “Is there anything I can do to help?” The dwarf smiled inwardly. Spike left the room. Of the infinite number of ways to put it: it was a mess; Twilight would be convinced that there would be long lasting tea stains in the floor for weeks; whether or not there are actually stains in the wood floor: this dwarf has already left Spike with more work than most dragons accomplish within the first hundred years of their existence (not to say that a hundred years are long for a dragon). But, seeing as fetching water is a fairly simple task, he was able to do so while considering his situation. Meanwhile at Blueblood’s unusually sketchy tree house… “Preppy, seriously? You can’t use bricks to build a tree house.” Blueblood hung halfway out a window, insulting the stodgy construction technique that his servant had attempted to use. Too bad it was a tree house; the house actually looked quite nice in brick. “Sir, you gave me thirty bits; you told me to go to a Masonry store and buy some materials. They did not sell any wood, as you had ensured me that they would. Unfortunately, you also told me not to come back empty handed.” “Hmm. I must have forgotten to make it a possessive. I meant Masonry’s shop, he’s a carpenter.” “His name doesn’t make any sense.” “Well, you don’t exactly have anything to do with your name either. He is built like a brick wall, though, so the name does fit, kind of.” The Prince hung out the window, holding a cup of Chai Tea in his hooves. “Why are you using a rope system to hold yourself up anyway? You only need to load the housing mortar with the material and set it to ‘Redecorate’.” “Sir-no buck that! You idiot! I quit.” The servant let himself down to the ground. “Finally!” The noblepony withdrew back into the tree house. “I wonder what I should do next.” The servant pondered as he trotted out of the estate. Preppy Heights has enjoyed cursing at his former employer today. “Spike, it’s been half an hour, where’s that water?” Twilight’s words took on a strange dual edged nature, full of concern and annoyance. After a second or two, a reply hurtled back. “I’m getting it Twilight; it’s not exactly easy to deal with thinking out my life while getting this overdue houseguest water.” Twilight’s eyes angled upwards before initiating a slow, turn, occurring in discreet steps, indicating that the ocular muscles were struggling with the whole concept of rolling. “Spike, I’ll get you some turquoise if you hurry up.” “But Twilight, turquoise is barely even a semiprecious gem!” The dragon walked in quickly with an eager smile on his face, making his attempt to sound unimpressed rather unimpressive. Even that stopped when he looked at the dwarf; the body had become even more desiccated, leading the dwarf’s ragged breaths to drag on all of the various types of rock dust which he had managed to inhale of the course of his life. “You dragon, you should be content eating granite, not the finery which should be gracing the splendor of the fortress.” The dwarf’s voice wavered, the shriveled flesh moving until his index finger pointed squarely at the dragon. “It’s okay Spike, just give him the water before he actually dies.” “Sure. I expected to see a zombie pony, not a zombie dwarf.” The dragon handed the dwarf a pitcher of water, which the dwarf examined studiously before deciding to drink over the handle. The water fell upon the dwarf’s face and splashed off it for the most part, only allowing the dwarf a single gulp of the water. To the unicorn and the dragon, something inexplicable occurred: the dwarf’s flesh regained suppleness, filling with water. “I feel better already.” The dwarf said simply. “What just happened?” The dragon asked. It was not every day that an unusually desiccated dwarf was healed instantaneously by imbibing a small amount of water. “I drank some water. That’s all, dragon.” The dwarf set about picking up the teapots that lay around the room. Twilight pulled Spike onto her back and walked into the kitchen. “Spike, we might have a problem.” Twilight whispered to the dragon. “What do you mean Twilight?” “He knows about the Bureaus.” “What could possibly make you think that he knows about those failures? Why does it matter anyway?” “He wants to be a pony. He told me so; whatever reason he came here, he has come into contact with the Bureau before, because he assured me that if I performed the spell, it would not turn out like the Bureaus.” Twilight’s voice was heavy with a frantic energy. “Do you know what that means?” “Twilight, he doesn’t seem to know what happened at that time; I can’t honestly believe that those creatures could become so misanthropic to each other over that little choice which you ponies gave them.” Twilight’s eyes watered slightly. “Come on, it wasn’t your fault Twilight; who could know that the choice would lead them to their ruin? We tried to help them, and even though none of them survived, in any form, you did what you could for them.” “No Spike! It probably means banishment to the moon, again.” A whisper followed. “But I didn’t stop it when I saw the signs. I could have stopped it. I know I could have.” “No, Twilight, you didn’t stop it because you were assured by most of them that they would be able to resolve it internally; they expected it to work out better than it did, and that’s not your fault, they were wrong.” “Can someone be held accountable for something they did with incorrect information? No, they can’t. Can they know with all the certainty that it was not, in fact, their fault? No, they can’t.” The dwarf leaned on the door frame. “Twilight, I have no idea what a conversarium or whatever these things were, but I know that if you were part of them; you managed whatever part you held with due diligence, taking in whatever information that you had been able to gather, and you acted on it with only that knowledge.” “How are you supposed to feel, when an entire world dies on your mistake? What solace can I take, when I’ve failed, not only a few friends, but every single living thing that exists upon a world, whose land, while spoilt, harbored a life that loved it?” “You accept it. I did. If I had simply tried a bit harder, my fortress could have, at least, walled hell off from the outside world.” The dwarf shrugged. “I fell after three hours of combat with demons. If I had held out a few minutes longer, the wall could have been built. Even then, I know, that the fortress above never saw the danger coming until it was simply too late to stop it.” “But did you watch the world die before you; knowing that it was your mistake that caused the destruction?” “No, I did not. But you have to be strong enough to overcome your mistake. I can’t ask you to do the spell or whatever that I just asked for. I can see that you need some more time; I have time; I can wait for you.” The dwarf stroked his beard. “Though I would like to hear the story, if you wouldn’t mind.” “I’ve been waiting for someone to tell for a while, you know, so my autobiography won’t be too stupid or academic sounding.” This might not be my best writing, if you see any issues, I'd prefer that they be reported. Anyway, thanks for reading.
BureausThe Saga of the Bureau began one day three years after the Summer Sun festival that celebrated the return of Princess Luna, formerly known by the derisive title “Nightmare Moon”, during which our normally most cogent Princess Celestia decided to do something which lacked the typical benevolence and choice which is the basis of her regime. Princess Celestia, 3 ANMM, made the pronouncement that Equestria would begin the long period of migration through universes that had once been a long standing cycle. She gathered all the denizens of the realm whose fidelity to state were sufficient to motivate the migration. The important thing to note is that the entire land of Equestria is moved to the new universe; so that included most, if not all of the various ponies who had not settled to the outer lands possessed by other races than our own. She did not, as I learned later, actually perform the ceremony which usually accompanies the migration. There was something off immediately when we reached our destination; Equestria was now surrounded by an ocean. This ocean stretched thousands of kilometers in all directions. We were on a world that was going to be unaware of us for a long time. A fact that saddened our Bright princess. She sent scouts out; the pegasi are perfect for the task, given an inflatable rubber raft and a week’s provisions, they were able to endure a journey of around six hundred kilometers before they found land larger than a small island. The small islands were composed of silicate sand, various calcium based compounds from the erosion of a large number of coral reefs. Anyway, our princess set up a boat, something the pony society as a whole had mostly ignored; boats are useless without a large body of water and the presence of something that is too heavy to be flown by the far more efficient pegasi. She did this because the typical flying carriages would be too surprising to a race which seemed entirely stuck upon the ground. Therefore, using techniques passed down from our forbearers, we constructed the finest vessel ever produced by ponykind, it was almost two hundred hooves long, fifty wide, the largest pony built vehicle ever produced. “Sorry to interrupt, Twilight, but I was hoping for more of a personal narrative, this is fun and all, but most of your history text books are slightly less boring than this… Story.” The dwarf finished his construction of a book lounge. “You have a real story, one that you lived through, how can I learn to appreciate the trials that you have endured if you treat it like a historical text?” “Fine, fine! I’ll just rewrite the whole thing later” I was almost overwhelmed by the ocean. It surrounded us, it seemed too large for anything to tame it; and we had to cross it the slow way. “What do ya’ll think will be out there?” By this point, I knew it was a rhetorical question; it was not hard to imagine that they were fairly like us. The griffons were fairly similar to us when you think about it, they are easier to comprehend than the dragons, but that’s mostly due to their extended lifespans. “I don’t know, but at this rate, we’ll never get there. Why did we have to use this ship again?” Whether by Derisive tone, or the sheer impatience, it was not hard to imagine Rainbow getting antsy on the boat; there wasn’t that much to do, mostly because Rainbow couldn’t wait until the boat was built before she read the most recent Daring Doo book. “Rainbow Dash, you know just as well as the rest of us that the distance is difficult for most pegasi.” Rarity read a magazine, probably for the twentieth time. “Anyway, it hasn’t even been a full week yet Rainbow Dash, Why don’t you read that book that you were praising so much?” “I already read it.” She grumbled. “Why did anypony build a ship in the first place?” “You can skip to what happens when you meet whatever race you are talking about. Sorry Twilight, but you just need to focus on the interesting things, not necessarily for your book or whatever, but it tends to be more difficult to listen to someone telling you a really boring story in person.” “I don’t give a pony; just let me finish the story.” “Wait what?” A low reverberation swept over the ship. Our scabrous captain grumbled about hailing calls and appropriate protocol, apparently nautical tradition reached back for a much longer time than I had expected. Metal ships painted white, spewing dark smoke, approached our too small vessel. “Ah do not like where this is going.” Applejack said succinctly. I shivered; these creatures had extensive industrialization. The briefings that the Princess gave us indicated that in the past, most races that have been encountered were not particularly industrialized; giving us an advantage. Now that cannot be said to be the case; these ships lacked the haphazard ingenuity seen in Equestria, such as the dubious constructions of the Flim-Flam brothers. They were made of iron, or something similar enough that an all wooden ship would no doubt look archaic to them. “Can we reply to them?” I asked our scabrous captain. “Missy, I know what I’m doing. I’m also captain of this ship, so don’t contradict me.” “What? I wasn’t contradicting you; I was asking if we are able to respond to their hailing.” “Oh, that… Probably, should we?” “Yes!” I became frantic. I could feel myself breathing harder than necessary. He pushed past me calmly. Somehow, his haste reassured me that I was in good hooves. “Sir, one of the forward watches has found a ship!” The officer burst into a cabin whose mahogany desk, polished to perfection, conflicted sharply with the captain who possessed it. An older man, gruff white beard, barely trimmed. The beard alone would lead anyone who did not know the man to believe that he was some kind of Thoreau, living in the woods for unspecified periods of time; that was before taking into account that he wore full dress uniform, even while putting his feet up on his desk, and drinking whiskey. “Why does that concern me? We are travelling on common trade route. We don’t actually own the Pacific, yet.” The captain shrugged, “What makes it odd? I know you haven’t gotten this excited over most of the ships we’ve passed.” “Well… Sir, it’s made out of wood, it seems to be partially gilded in gold, and the crew seems to be a bunch of… well according to Ensign Clark, multicolored horses. It is a sailing ship sir; nobody’s used one that large for the last ten years.” “Officer Mulligan. Hail them; you know the protocol, you certainly don’t need my judgment as to whether we investigate this. After all, by Executive order #432, we are to investigate all ships carrying unusual creatures that we have not yet exploited. That is a bit irrelevant because that protocol was in place so that you don’t have to bother me with your cockamamie watchmen’s reports. Do you understand?” “Absolutely sir!” The panicked officer left the cabin, prepared to yell at the appropriate crewmen. The captain chuckled and went back to sipping a bit of whiskey. “That kid will never get far if he doesn’t learn to laugh it all off.” The mast creaked as a bell rang heavily across the sea-laden air. The ship groaned as it tacked into the wind, pushing forwards towards the other vessel. Colorful whirls appeared on the other ship; communication commencing. Ignorant of the communication, we continued sailing towards them. Our understanding at the time lead us to only pursue the most obvious method of contact, crossing vessel to meet them face to face. We were aliens. The only communication I could imagine would be to meet them face to face; speak until we understand each other. Then I could learn from them. Applejack chatted with a sailor. Assured that nothing could go wrong. Pinkie Pie prepared her cannon. For the party that could go wrong. Fluttershy cowered moved by fear. Comforted by Angel, that nothing could go wrong. Rainbow Dash rustled feathers, preparing for a fight. And yet I knew disaster awaiting us to do it wrong. “Nice application of Epiphora.” “…” Rarity prepared. For vanity could not do her wrong. And I stood near the helm, pondering it all. Perhaps it would go right after all. Sea spray bridged the canyon between the ships. Hooks deployed, barbs caught. Reeled in, Vessel sought. Flags spin. Cannon shot. Cracks and booms extend from the horizon. The other ship takes up staves. Rifle shot. What have we done? They board us, ignore us. Too stunned to speak, we watch. Looking down the length of wood and iron, what is it they have in mind? They search the ship, but fail to find what they are seeking. They discuss the possibility of smugglers, hiding in the woodwork. What would they smuggle? I approach one, bars on his chest. I have no idea what it means. “Hi.” Eyes soften. Staff lowered. “What in tarnation?” uttered blindly. “I’m Twilight Sparkle. But do you have a name?” He stared at me for a moment. “Just call me Officer Mulligan.” “So what ended up happening?” “I don’t actually know. Something about a trading chest I think, maybe a trading cabinet, either way, they were bringing us to a place they called “The bureau of foreign trade”. The closest branch was in San Francisco.” “Let me guess, when you got there, the ground began to shake and belch flame?” The dwarf mused awkwardly, twirling his beard. “Sounds like a large earthquake, almost certainly unrelated to your arrival, at least personally, it is possible that the arrival of a large landmass created a pressure on neighboring tectonic plates, causing a large faultline to shatter.” He shrugged. “How did you know?” “Easy, you and your friends are nice, none of you is important enough to precipitate an event such as that.” The dwarf laughed, “But honestly, I doubt that was your fault.” Spike walked in, yelled “Ha! It’s a pun because you said a word twice!” and left. Twilight shook her head. “Sometimes I wonder what goes through Spike’s head.” She sighed. “That wasn’t the problem though.” The dwarf’s eyebrow did an impressive imitation of a worm rearing up to strike at a bird. “What was then?” “We tried to use the Elements of Harmony to fix the problem.” The street around us shattered as the ground shook, buildings began to crumble or burst into flame. Rainbow Dash looked at me, eyes filled with hubris. “Well, I’ve got this covered.” She pulled out the various Elements of Harmony and distributed them. “Why do you have these Dash?” I was a bit more than curious; usually we had to recover the Elements of Harmony, confronting the problem head on before finding them in an obvious place. “I figured that nothing could go right with the boat, so I brought them along just in case. Anyway you can thank me later.” If you’ve ever been struck by a candlestick, you know what it is like to use the elements of harmony. They aren’t painful, but they are annoying. The sensation, beyond that is indescribable, power flows through you in a way that is difficult to comprehend. Waves of the typical pinkish-white light travelled throughout the ailing city before a white flash made it very difficult to understand what happened next. Regardless of this effect which seemed to only have the effect of making it impossible to quantify the operational mechanism of the magic used by the Elements of Harmony. The city which appeared to us afterwards seemed wrong, somehow, too wholesome. Too colorful, it didn’t alter the structure of the city significantly, but the subtler characteristics seemed off. The bodies of the apes, which had littered certain parts of the street only a second before were gone. Replaced by ponies. The others were astonished at first, but after snapping out of it, they were enraged. Especially Officer Mulligan “You… ponies… What have you done?” The officer was almost without words, his face was white, I’m not quite sure why though. “Twilight, the blood vessels in the face constrict when there is an abundance of fear, conserving blood for the possible fight or flight that may occur afterwards.” “Interesting.” “You’ve killed all of them.” He gasped, “You’ve ruined our city. What do you have to say for yourselves?” “We didn’t kill any of them. They’re getting up right now, see?” Applejack pointed her hoof towards one of the new ponies who was working on getting on their hooves. I couldn’t quite make sense out of it. The Elements of Harmony have never acted in this manner before. The “new” ponies would have to be interrogated to find out whether or not they retained any of their personality as a human, if they didn’t, then we would have been responsible for killing thousands of humans on our first interaction with them. “They aren’t human, the only thing that humans transform into in their lives is corpses. I don’t know what you’ve done to the corpses, or the city for that matter, but they certainly aren’t right.” Rainbow dash crossed her forelegs, “Well, they had already transformed into corpses, and now the buildings look about right.” Rarity and Fluttershy were both trying to stay out of the conflict. Pinkie Pie, being Pinkie Pie, bounced around behind us, interacting with and frightening the “new” ponies. “You don’t seem to understand, there is only room on this continent for one species of intelligent mammal.” Officer Mulligan threatened, shaking his finger at us. “Hey Twi, you want to try using the Elements of Harmony again?” It was tempting, I wondered what effect they would have this time. None of the possibilities were particularly friendly, or, at the very least, advantageous to our relationship with the humans. “Men, surround them, we must detain them for their trial later.” “Um, sir… would it be possible for us, if you don’t mind, to send Dash here to contact our own government? It would be, um, advantageous to our trading relationship.” Officer Mulligan began to stare down Fluttershy. Possibly a mistake. “And it might ease tensions between our species if we could um… obtain appropriate representation and perhaps trade for the mistake which has saved the minds of so many humans.” So it wasn’t a mistake. Officer mulligan scratched his chin, I doubt that he had ever had such a large decision to make before in his life. His men pointed their rifles at us, I didn’t really want to learn how they worked if I was on the receiving end. “I’m really sorry, Sir, we didn’t know what these things would do, we just expected-“ “What? That they would magically fix everything?” I nodded. “Are you dumb or something?” “These things are as much a mystery to us as they are to you.” I admitted. I realized that I had a nervous smile, which I then suppressed. “So I can add weapons testing as the crime inflicted on our city.” “Shut up Mulligan!” The voice came from behind him. A grey Pegasus wearing a uniform trotted up to him. “Who the hell are you?” “Well, now, that’s hardly the way to be talking to your captain.” The Pegasus snarled. “I should have you court-martialed for mutiny. They saved my life. I don’t even think they understood that they would have that effect, but I’m your captain, and son, you had better recognize that.” He laughed. Officer Mulligan just stood there slack-jawed. “Well… That’s one way to settle it.” He mumbled to himself. “Well, Sir, should we still call on the federal government to tell them what has happened. Also, if you would not mind answering me, were you dead?” The Pegasus nodded. “Mulligan, you should probably contact the federal government, I’m sure that when they see the work they’ve done here, they might even award them a medal.” “Did that ever happen?” “No, they didn’t like the idea of what they called ‘Another minority’ living in the bounds of their country. Their government was apparently full of jerks. They were also concerned about something they called ‘Religious implications’, whatever that means.” “What happened to the ponies that were created that day?” Twilight’s expression darkened. A tear dropped from her left eye. Her legs started to tremble. “They rounded them up, called them aliens. They put them in a military base, and then promptly refused to acknowledge the existence of our government, us, or the universal rights of sentient creatures. Well, until the seventies.” “Is that the world that we are in now?” “No, we left them to stew in a terrifying “Nuclear holocaust” of their own making. Supposedly, they are not doing too well today.” “Would it be a good idea to visit them?” Twilight shook her head. The dwarf laughed. “Well I knew that much already.” Meanwhile on the aforementioned world… A man with a head wrapped in cloth, respirator donned, walked across the barren desert that had once been a similarly barren desert. The main difference was that before, there was a distinct lack of homicidal Technicolor Equines. He carried a gun, but knew that it would do little good if any of them had the desire to end his life. A scorpion, a small one, crawled across a rock in front of the man. For some strange reason, he felt a strong urge to smash it with his pistol and eat the remains, careful to avoid the venomous stinger. His stomach rumbled, urging him on once again. He submitted to the urge, smashed the scorpion, sat down on the rock to enjoy the spoils of being significantly larger than the arthropod which he had just smashed sufficiently well to make himself feel better, being the apex predator of the planet. Eating a scorpion is like eating any other large insect, not bad if cooked properly, but this was not one of those times. He cursed his stomach for giving him such awful advice. Something fell to his feet. He looked down. It looked like it was made out of wood. It had a short stem which curled up a bit, leading to a cylinder with scales which had some purpose which he could not quite imagine. He picked it up, and bit it warily. It tasted like Pinesol. He spat it out. Where the hell had this come from, he thought. “How dare you insult the Great and Powerful Trixie by refusing to eat her pinecone!” The man wondered why whoever was talking was referring to themselves in the third person, but was caught off guard by the pinecone comment. Odd, he thought, it doesn’t look like a cone at all. He reconsidered his action, and bit into the pinecone again. This time it tasted like Pinesol. The man wondered where he had tasted pinesol before. It didn’t matter, if his probable hallucination was insulted he would attempt to sate it. “Finally, someone who recognizes a pinecone for the fine culinary dish that it is.” “But where’s the dish? all I got was this food of questionable digestability.” He turned around, a blue Technicolor Equine was staring at him with improbably large binocular eyes. He had seen proper horses before, and he was sure that they neither came in the blue color, or had such impressively binocular vision. More significantly, they didn’t have light up dildos sticking out of their heads. The man thought again, where had he seen a dildo before. He was having one of those days with improbable vocabulary springing to mind. “So I see that my hallucination is visual too. Hi, nice to see you.” He stuck out his hand, why not? After all, how could a Technicolor Equine with a dildo attached to its head be offended by a confused gesture? “Charmed, I’m real though. I am the Great and Powerful Trixie.” “Oh, so you’re the one who was insulted that I didn’t ingest this piece of wood. Cool.” The man smiled, showing her the splinters now stuck in his gums. “Yes.” The man smiled at her. “So, you free tonight? cause I’m willing to bang any hallucination, other than that annoying Geico Gecko.” “Do not suggest that the Great and Powerful Trixie would degrade herself by mating with such an inferior life-form.” “I don’t have to be inferior.” “No… I suppose you don’t.” Her head-dildo glowed. He suddenly felt like eating a pinecone would not be the worst he could do for food. “So, sexy, you want to come to my place?” “Sure.” The man heard his own voice, and it didn’t quite sound right. It sounded a lot more like the hallucination in front of him. “Well, then, I see that I’ve lost it completely, let’s go to your place, do you have water there?” The blue-dildo-headed horse nodded. “Nice.” The two Trixies walked to a shack, filled with eight more Trixies, all suitably confused, and aroused. “Yeah, they have a bit of a Trixie infestation. Not the most pleasant thing to deal with, especially considering that it’s getting worse every day.” “Fine.” The dwarf smiled after a moment. “So, can I be a pony or not?” The dwarf smiled, clenched his fists and held them out as though he was holding on to his anticipation. Twilight nodded. Next Time on My Little Fortress: Friendship for the Blood God: Confusing time-travel plots, Confusing jokes, Discord? Author's Note So yeah, I didn't even plan on continuing this. I'd like to imagine this.is by far the best chapter, I'm almost certainly wrong, so have fun. Also Trixie Infestation... Something about that.
MagicThe cobblestone floor, lined with cracks, was adorned with intricacy of geometry, with lines crossing circles, which overlap with other circles. The dwarf looked upon it, eyes drinking in the symbols, mind coming out of it without comprehension. He looks again at the floor, the illumination provided by the lamp flickers, malevolent shadows flicker across the floor. Chasing diagrams, wolves seeking flesh. The disturbance stops, the wolves retreat into the corner, sated perhaps. The dwarf wiped his finger on one of the lines, the texture was oily: It was indigo. The dwarf sniffed at his finger, and moved it closer to his mouth. “I wouldn’t do that if I was you.” A voice came from behind him. “Why?” the dwarf’s face twisted into a stupid grin. “Would I get magical powers or something?” “No, you would die.” “Wonderful. And I thought everything was rainbows and magic.” “That’s why you would die.” The dwarf’s eyebrows furrowed, he grumbled, and wiped his finger on his pants. “Well then, I suppose that it’s time for you to take off your pants.” The dwarf disrobed disruptively. Obviously making little difference to either of the creatures in the room, though, had Rarity been there, there would have been more room and potential for disturbance, of course, that does not excuse the fact that Rarity did in fact feel disturbed by some variety of sixth sense that related to the process of undressing disruptively. Flames leapt from Twilight’s horn, tangerine radiance casted across the diagram. The heat caused the dwarf’s skin to glisten. “Now what?” There was silence, desolate, hidden underneath the roar of the flame. It was the kind of silence which drove men and dwarves alike to their solitary melancholia, and then to madness. At some points, it was said that it was the silence of the passing which drove the ghosts to return and haunt the dead in the fortress, the silence implicit in failing to honor the dwarf who had died, a tomb, a slab with a name, some kind of memorial to honor the dwarf. Without this minor anchor, the spirit drifted to the same. This silence was worse than that, worse than having the world wretched from you, worse still than being forgotten, it was the silence of impending doom. “You need to be immolated.” Twilight’s voice became a whisper. “It is necessary for the spell. There can be no change without a price, in this case, the fee is steep, it requires the pain of a lifetime, or the life itself, I’m sorry Tholumom. I really am.” “What about the Elements of Harmony, what of them? They did not take life for life in the city did they?” Tholumom shouted. It did little to help his desperation, but it did cause his vocal cords to become sore. “They did, they took the pain of the dying, and the essence of the dead to fuel them, they took the energy in the burst gas mains, and all else. They saved the lives of those involved, they even seemed to give them their lives back, but they did take it to begin with.” Twilight sputtered, “How dare you think I am not using the best methods I have for you. I’m only doing this because you asked for it, listened to my story, the one that pertained to my reticence in doing what you asked. Of course I’m doing the best I can for you.” “That’s not what I meant, I meant that you did not use the pain which I have already, I’m far older than you are; I have hundreds of painful experiences for you to draw on, some that I can’t even accept.” Tholumom said. He inched closer to Twilight, and wrapped his arm around her. The flame stopped. Her eyes shot open, “You are right.” She whispered. Her right eyelid closed slightly, twitching. “Don’t worry Twilight, I’m miserable. It would not be so bad to burn for this, but why create new fuel when there is already fuel there to burn?” Her right eyelid lifted up to its normal state. “So you don’t run out of fuel.” Twilight said as though it were a matter of fact. “If you burn misery, why would you miss it?” Tholumom smiled. “Because, you are acutely aware of your pain when the spell acts on you, more so than you already have.” Tholumom’s left eye twitched. “No, no, that’s fine. Just do it before I change my mind.” “This is absolutely dreadful! I can’t figure out what’s bothering me!” The wail carried over most of Ponyville. Colgate, who had stopped to buy carrots, suddenly turned towards the sound as it passed over her, though, she did get on with buying carrots soon afterwards. In the Carousel Boutique, Rarity tore through drawers and shelves, seeking something. Spike went through his mental checklist. Estrus? No, I can’t smell pheromones. Undressing? Why would that bother her? My presence? I hope not. Gem growth underneath the Carousel Boutique? Probably. “Rarity, could it be that this could just be another incident of gem growth underneath the building?” Spike suggested. Rarity’s horn glowed, a giant diamond showed through the floor. Spike thought to himself that it was impressive just how big it was. Also that it looked delicious in the same way that a giant donut sign looked delicious. “No, that’s the same size as it was yesterday. No, the feeling is a bit like the time that you walked in on us dressing.” Rarity mused. Spike frowned, thinking cynical things about the state of mind which Rarity must find herself in. “Wow Rarity, that’s a bit strange.” The horrors of Tholumom’s life flashed before his eyes. That there is no order save what death imposes upon the world. That he was delusional in attempting to order it at all, because, as all things are, he is ultimately mortal. Being a dwarf, this did not daunt him, being a pony, it did. For a moment, he was aware of every single part of him, overwhelming him with knowledge and information. It dissipated with a flash of pain, leaving him only with the inferiority of memory. Oneiric valleys stretched before him, beckoning him to run, the mountains behind him served as refuge for something. Whatever they were, they were not what he should seek. Another wind blew, driving him from the forest, to the plain. He resisted, but the wind blew harder, freezing him until he allowed it to work within him. A searing bolt from the heavens stung him, and he saw between the lines, in all their beauty, but there was something missing, something which was obscene and lost within the miserly energy conservation of the universe. A freedom dominated him imitating tyranny. Another dimension opened up to him, and shut before he could make sense of what was inside of it. Memories of his daughter floated in his mind, and her loss impressed itself upon him, fleeting shapes of the dimension lost to him imitated her before resolution could be attempted. His wife called him in shapes and colors which he had names for. Shadows chased him in the visage of goblins after spawning underneath the sparse furniture in the basement. Reality shifted. The ceiling was higher than it had been. The impossibility of raising himself became apparent as the situation became clear to him; he was already standing. “I thought I was short before.” Regardless of the recent weather, or, more correctly, because of it, Rainbow dash swerved through clouds over Las Pegasus. The Pegasus was not entirely certain why the city was known as “Las Pegasus”, but she was sure that it contained more diamond dog prostitutes than Pegasi. Despite the inevitability of resuscitating in the early hours of the day and discovering that there was indeed such a thing as too much fun, as proved by last night, she had decided to visit anyway. It was the invitation to her father’s wedding to a new mare. She had not heard about this till recently, the fact that her father had been dating at all eluded her, though, it did explain, to some degree, why her mother had shown up to her house and stayed there for a few months, before finding herself a nice “Not Doctor” Whooves, who, on most days, went about the town going by another name, Time Turner. Doctor Whooves has a nicer ring to it, doesn’t it? The scatterbrained Pegasus quickly realized that there was also something that was new to her; something called getting lost in one’s own thoughts. What a wonderful day this was, not only was her father getting married to some mare he met only a few months ago, but she was discovering more about the possible states of her existence. Regardless of the immanence which Rainbow Dash found pervading her day, she found herself understanding the necessity of concentrating on her current task; clearing out a few clouds. It was easy to get lost in thought, or so her colleges told her, when clearing cirrus clouds. Stringy, but quite large, and high up, they are not difficult to remove, but require a lot of concentration due to the smaller mass of the cloud and their reluctance to fuse when pushed into each other. Regardless of their general harmlessness, she was finding them more difficult than she normally did. She began to wonder if she had purposefully sought out the weather department in Las Pegasus in order to avoid her father, and his fiancé. In this state of self-reflection, she finally relented in her pursuit of the obnoxious Cirrus clouds. They never actually carried rain anyways. Someponies just like the clear blue sky. She decided that those ponies would have to just deal with it. She started her way back to her father’s hotel room, she might as well say hello to the stallion. It had been a long time after all. “Maybe you should just move your hooves-” “No, no, I got it.” “I don’t see how, you’re still on the ground.” “I think I’ve been doing this longer than you have.” “This all just seems a bit new to you.” “I don’t know. I don’t think that it is that different.” “Your hooves seem to disagree with you.” “Left forehoof to blue.” “How am I supposed to do that? Blue is behind me.” “I don’t know, I’m not the one playing twister.” “Spike, that isn’t very helpful.” The room was tense. The multicolor dots taunted Tholumom with their rubbery difficulty. It was a balance between reaching the dots as prescribed by the wheel with the indicated body part, and avoiding touching Twilight in ways which he was not comfortable with. In any case, he was finding himself sprawled out over her, he found himself repulsed by the possibility of knowing her more closely than he already did. “Spiiike! I still can’t figure it out.” As the wail passed over Ponyville once again, not a single pony turned their head or paid any heed to it. It was just that kind of day. The kind of day when Rarity was making a big deal out of something, something which most were used to, if not resistant to. Unfortunately, one of the downsides of being attracted to the finicky Unicorn was having to listen to their problems. Today, it had the flavor of kibble and lemons. “Rarity. Please, calm down, intuition can’t possibly be right all the time…” Spike’s voice became a whisper, “unless you’re Pinkie Pie.” “I know that Spike. I just can’t shake the feeling that somepony is playing Twister-“ she grabbed Spike, “Without me!” she screamed. “Why would that offend you Rarity?” Spike asked, knowing that Twilight had been playing Twister with another pony that he had not recognized. “Because, I always win at it.” “Okay Rainbow Dash.” “Spike even Rainbow Dash knows that I am the best at Twister, across all of Equestria, I am the best at Twister. If I had not found fashion before that, or mining, or whatever else I live off of, I would have a twister board as a Cutie Mark.” Spike chose to ignore what had just been said. “Okay Rarity, I’ll tell them that they should invite you to play next time.” “What? You would know about somepony playing Twister and not tell me? Spike I’m hurt, I thought you loved me!” tears streamed down her face. “I thought I could trust you, how dare you! Never look at me again!” Spike backed towards the door and left, not taking his eyes off of the upset Unicorn. “So I see that you told her about Twister. Never tell Rarity about twister. She’ll forgive you eventually, but don’t let yourself be seen by her in the next month.” Pinkie Pie appeared next to him, and hugged him. “I’m sorry about your relationship with her.” “I don’t know Pinkie, I think I still have a chance.” “I’m sure that there is some remote chance of that happening Spike.” The joyous pink pony jumped off into the sunset. “I guess that it’s just Pinkie being Pinkie.” The keycard reader made little sense to the rainbow maned Pegasus as she stared at it. It failed to coincide with the general opinion that most ponies had, that technology should be accessible to all of the races of ponies. Unfortunately, this seemed to be one of those places where the Diamond dog prostitutes made money opening doors which most ponies visiting (around two thirds if the general rule of equal numbers holds up). Fortunately, this was not an issue, she could knock; she could fly out onto the balcony. But knocking was the most likely option to work. She sighed. She had not talked to her father for a long time. It was bad blood. Of course, blood is always thick. The disagreement was never clear to either side of the argument. She did not care for her father. He never cared for her. No matter how much she tried to get respect from her father, he never respected her. Memories of flying with him, his cool expression, as she tried to gain his love. Spinning across the sky, outrunning her father, outmaneuvering him, outsmarting him, even the sonic rainboom did little to impress him. He was a waste of time, an activity which all the time in the universe could not complete. And no amount of questioning could ever resolve what exactly it was that her father wanted from her. A son. The answer was clear enough. It was the one thing that she could never do for him, be his son. She was fine with that, she knew from the emergence of that knowledge that she was not able to be his son. She didn’t want to. Too much work. Too much change. But, why would he have invited her to this wedding? Perhaps it might be to rub it in her face. It would be no different than before. The same old man, doing the same old thing, nothing will have changed. Maybe a few grey feathers. She knocked. “One minute.” It was a voice which she could not quite place: The voice of a mare, muffled by the strange material of the door. The door swung open. And she was surprised. “Mom?” “Hi honey, I’m glad to see that you came.” She said. Her mother smiled like she did when she was a filly. The warm, comfortable smile had returned, alien to these latter years. It was the smile that only existed when her parents loved each other. Another thing alien to these latter years. “I thought that you were dating Doctor Hooves.” “Who? You mean Time Turner? He doesn’t go by Doctor Hooves anymore.” “Mom, the distinction is lost on me.” “You wouldn’t know, being a young woman as you are, about the importance of titles. Anyway, he never really did achieve any level of doctorate, so it offended him when he came to terms with what he was, a pony who was really good at managing time.” The rainbow maned Pegasus rolled her eyes. What the hell was a doctorate? It barely mattered anyway. “Who’s getting married anyway?” “Your father and I are remarrying. We finally came to our senses after such a long separation. I think that we can appreciate each other now.” “What? But Dad is just… Just…” “Too arrogant? Is that it? Dash.” His mother was moved gently out of the way by a black bodied, red maned Alicorn. He just so happened to have a cutie mark striking some unknown evil in the face, killing it. “Dad!” “Dash. I understand that I was wrong. I was wrong in how I treated you, and when I finally extended that to your mother, I was miserable, so were both of you.” He sighed. “I just want to love for the time which I have remaining.” “Do you mean for the rest of eternity?” Dash barely made out. “No. the immortality test came back, I’m going to die in four years, three days, eleven hours, six minutes, and twelve seconds. Honestly Dash, I would not recommend getting that test.” “But then, who will protect Equestria from all of the implausible disaster scenarios which may come up in the future?” “It’s up to you, Dash. You and your friends. I’m sure that they can handle it just as well as I could, if not better. Just so long as you are a team. Also, I am certain that there will be more people-I mean ponies that like you and your friends than those who like me.” “Why did it take you this long if you defeated Discord in three minutes without using magic with your hooves tied up?” “I can’t even imagine a good answer to that question Dash. I’m just unwilling to make myself vulnerable.” “You know what Dad, you just suck.” Rainbow Dash decided that it was probably not really necessary to stay for the wedding. Her father had done too much for soft words like those to repair. But inside the Pegasus bristled a sense of self-confidence that surged under the soft words. Somehow, she knew, that her father was not so spectacular after all. Also, perhaps that it might finally be time to don the bandanna and admit her sexuality. Not that the two were innately connected. That is, that they are both causally intertwined in the existence of the other. As in the freedom from the concerns which he once had are so removed from him that he cannot even begin to think about being concerned again. Author's Note Finally. A new chapter. Anyway, I'm not used to writing for Rainbow Dash, so, creative license I guess?
MemoranceIt was not typical. There was just something inexplicably wrong about it. Something that turned the entire experience of playing Twister as a pony back upon itself, making it worthless to recall. Something about it screamed at the former dwarf that there was something too unwholesome to merit explanation. It was terrifying. As useful as it was for learning how to control his body again, it was like the half remembered dream of witchcraft or nightmares. This, as it were, did not originate with "Nightmare Moon". An awful realization covered Tholumom; given what he was, the last link to his past had been cut entirely. Nothing could ever pull him back there save the inquisitive sparkle in Twilight's eyes. The brightness with which they regarded the world of waking was as though it were a dream too vivid to forget. And yet he knew that there could not be peace. He knew that there would never be a time which he could look upon his action and say without a question that he had completed his duty to the fullest, and thus had no point but to serve his own ends. Like some child spun off into a cognate world of its own, simply through his own miswanderings. And yet, throughout all his questionings, there could be no inquiry into which the nature of his time here might be made clear, simply through the virtue of the impossibility of proving that what must be taken as an assumption be true. There was no way for him to prove to himself that he had ever been a dwarf. Sometimes, even memories seemed to have been altered. His wife was never the one which he had known before, simply another pony. Somepony whose name eluded him. Just as the life as a dwarf had eluded him as he tried to remember. He knew those memories were false. Twilight Sparkle assured him that they were. What reasons could he have not to trust his own daughter? But then she isn't his daughter, is she? No, another memory spun by the spell to encourage him to take the new form with grace and acceptance. Tholumom looked at the lavender pony. She might as well be his daughter. That would be losing the truth. Just because there is not a reason why something can't be a certain way does not mean that it must be that way. Ultimately, he knew that there were no reasons that he could not simply forget about his previous life. But then what? A narrative half remembered would scream at him to run, and then he would die by the fiery breath of a dragon. Something that he would have used in order to save himself and others would be lost. Why? Why though? It would be no better than acting as though he had been a pony for his entire life. No. that can't be the answer. That must never be the answer. There is no reason which it should be the answer to adversity. The simple seduction of the lotus eater, which sought to draw him into a blind which there would be no recovery from, had caught him. A binding would appear around his wrists (now only recalled to illustrate a metaphor), and tie him to a pole. Goblins would throw fruit at him. It would be among the most awful times which he could ever know. At last, there would be a change. But into what? What thought would save him from these fears? Nothing. Save for getting on with his life, taking both lives into account and acknowledging both would yield life experience that he could not have otherwise. Safety in dualism of thought. Dreams of dwarves and ponies both, turned to flesh and made alive. And yet inside this would be a dichotomy of nature, which would take the kindness and natural gentleness of the pony and corrupt it with the angst that a dwarf must feel in order to accept the life which they lead for themselves. That in this, there might be some glint of hope with which to change the tide for him. But in the end, there would be nothing save the dream of a better day. Nothing more or less. But would that dream of sleep and peace endure for him? A greater urge pushed him away from these thoughts. Hunger. It was not hard to imagine the hunger that a horse would feel, especially given that he was one, a great gnawing in his stomach. "Twilight, would it be possible to get something to eat?" The words emerged with a confidence that was kinder to him than his own mind was. It was absurd. "Sure Tholumom, I'll get started with Spike to get some lunch made. It's an important day for you. Though, now I must ask you to seek residence with some pony else. I'm sorry, but I don't want to give other ponies the wrong impression about our relationship. They are quite gossipy after all." Tholumom's face burned. "Why would they think that?" "Mostly because the best which they can conceive of includes producing a new variant of the ubiquitous romance story which stars me and my brother. All false of course, but there are ponies out there that like to write things without thinking about them very much." Twilight's expression became dour as she said that. "I see your point Twilight." That does, in fact, seem unreasonable to me. It really didn't. Why would they make up such saucy rumors? Unless of course it was to placate the pointless guile that must exist I the mind of the gossip. The loss of the truth is a more damaging effect than any goblin invasion. "Thanks for the validation Tholumom. I doubt that you could understand fully, but I do really appreciate what you've done for me." the dwarf wondered whether Twilight could appreciate what she had done for him. Giving him a new life is impressive. And it shall never come to pass again. A voice whispered in his head. It doesn't matter. There are more significant problems in store for him, ones that he can deal with more effectively than he did in his last life. At what cost. Emotional pain could justify a little bit of peace, but it could never buy it for a permanent time. The implausibility of continuation becomes apparent as one is aware of their own limitations in the realms of reality, and thus in the realms of spirit and mind. All things descend from reality, spirit from mind, and mind from body. There is nothing to the body save for the chemistry there, and thus the same is true for the mind. Just because there are layers of abstraction which allow the mind to be placed in a separate realm than the body, does not preclude or distance one from the fact that there is nothing more to the mind than what is in nature, a large vat of complex chemistries. All of which tend to decay into entropy. This fact was, of course, lost to the dwarf as he considered the whole situation. "Okay Twilight." "I'll bring you some oats. Others had reported that oats had become more pleasant to them as they changed, so we'll see if that is true." "Twilight..." The thought died on his lips like so many others did in the fortress: with a twang of bitterness. So he was just an experiment for her now. He understood the kindness which those words covered up, that it was just another fact. It made no difference to him. Good intentions or not, the words were no less toxic than they would have been if they had been spoken by any scientist studying a statistical set of data. "Twilight, I just have to make sure that you aren't using me in an experiment of any kind right?" "Well... Tholumom, I really didn't want to think about it that way, but after this whole experience, you are the only source of data that has remained so open to anypony in this position before, so yeah, you weren't an experiment before. Now I would like to ask a few questions, you know, see how you adjust after a few days." The former dwarf scowled. A mixture of defeat and a type of understanding filled him. It made sense for what Twilight wanted to do, but at the same time, it provoked a deep distrust in him, as though it were a personal threat. "You know Twilight, I'm not quite sure that I'm okay with that arrangement." "I understand Tholumom, you feel used if you end up doing this. I wouldn't want to feel that way either, so I understand completely." "But can I trust you?" "What would cause you to question whether or not I've betrayed you?" "Because I wanted to escape from a life full of pain. The pain is there, just confused. It is even worse, as I must contemplate what this actually means for me." "You expected that to result from this? This can only complicate your life, learning everything you need to survive in that body will be painful." Her voice was too calm. "Why didn't you clarify that then?" "Because, the way this works, you can't actually use magic on you to alter anything for the next three years, otherwise there could be nasty interference, and if that happens... Well you certainly couldn't know. Besides, I haven’t had a good magical challenge in far too long." The former dwarf scowled. Deception. It worms its way into ignorance and plants a seed that grows into a thorn bush. Impossible to excise. Impossible to amend. The world is of concrete things when only anger exists. Nothing is abstract enough to merit explanation. Regardless of the mental pricks he had to endure, he needed to get through it. The situation was his fault. The thorn bush blossomed. “Twilight, I need to leave.” “But Thol-“ “But nothing Twilight. I need to go right now.” The lavender unicorn blocked the door. “I can’t let you do that.” Tholumom felt a pressure build into the back of his skull. Anger and fury welled up in him visibly. His horn burbled with a viscous magic error. Green flashing red. His vision turned red as it became too much to bear. “Tholumom, no!” Light blasted from Tholumom’s horn, striking Twilight with a sickly aura. She faded away as all else did. The dwarf awoke and shot up in his bed. He wiped his head in the darkness of his bedroom, his brow was covered in a cold sweat. A body lay next to him, breathing comfortably. She stirred softly and her eyes opened wearily to look into the darkness of the room, she rose as well. “Are you okay Tholumom?” He sighed. “I’m okay, it was just a nightmare, go back to sleep Totmondur. I love you.” “I love you too Tholumom.” The sound of his wife’s gentle breathing began again. He shook his head and lied down again. Such colorful ponies, what a silly idea. Tholumom Lathonudlerned has been content recently. He has awoken from an unpleasant dream, but taken solace in the presence of a loved one. He is disappointed that his friends did not actually exist. He did not know what to make of his experience as a pony. Tholumom is very healthy. He has enjoyed good mead recently. He is not convinced of the authenticity of the reality which he finds himself within. The morning bell failed to ring, mostly due to the lack of any agreed upon time to wake up at. In this regard, a dwarven fortress was very lenient. Nobody would fault each other if they slept in, missed their guard duty, and allowed goblins to ransack the fortress. This was, fortunately enough, almost unheard of. Goblins liked to sneak around, and, as it happens, are not good at it. They do not notice the dwarves, or other creatures ahead of them until they bump into them, at which point, the farmer or lumberjack which they have bumped into is quite likely to die by their superior fighting ability (if only because dwarves do not like to have to defend themselves unless they are soldiers). None of this was of concern to Tholumom. Too much occurred for a single night of rest to produce. Dreams that spanned months, personalities that seemed too independent to have in basis in reality. It did not deter him from his task, clearing away a bit more stone to expand the stockpiles. Expanding them for the good of dwarvenkind. Famine would not be what struck the Ideas of Mourning out of existence. It would simply have to be something else. That is, naturally, all well and good. The limestone was hard, but not particularly difficult to remove with the skill which he possessed after a few months of working at it constantly. This was not the worst thing that the dwarf could imagine. Sure the dreams were more colorful, darker, and generally more real, but still, who could ever blame them, they were dreams, of course they were more real than the average day. "Sometimes I wonder, do we really have the best culture? Sometimes I think that the dwarves have got it right." A goblin, with mace in a scabbard, said. This was one of the common hobbies of the ambushers, musing about the state of their culture in relationships to other ones. "Hey! Shut up! If they find us they'll-" A crossbow rested on the back of the goblin who countermanded the other one. He was interrupted, because, as, most new ambushers found out, this was the only way to distract themselves from the constant danger which they are placed in on a daily basis. "Yeah, we know, kill us all on sight, without mercy or consideration. It's what you get for 'having slaves' in an unusually liberal society." "Shut up. If the Law-Giver heard you, you would be-" The same crossbow-goblin responded, assuming that mentioning that the demonic leader would not approve would stop the political discourse. Of course, he was wrong. "Dead. I know. It really does pay to have a Demon at the head of your civilization." The Segway was used on virtually all of the newbies, it worked on nearly every single one, and shifted the focus of the conversation into the benefits and downfalls that come from living in a civilization based on the induction of other cultures into one, which happens to be lead by a demon. Generally regarded by other civilizations as being an anomaly, but for the goblins, they knew that they would survive just as long as any other civilization could. After around twenty more of these exchanges, the opinion solidified: Goblins are simply better. They are better at keeping their citizens working, better at keeping them in line, and even better at assimilating children into their culture. At least they would not be kept in mines until the very sight of the sun forced them to vomit in an unnatural adaptation to having useless eyes in the darkness. The debate continued and eventually, the goblin ambush party agreed: The dwarven hammerer is the byproduct of a monocultural nihilism that separates dwarves from the more reasonable races, such as humans, or Goblins. Naturally, however they also conceded that sometimes, possessing a legal system which only occasionally kills the criminal is beneficial when the populace is depleted in whatever projects that the dwarves deem necessary. Such as a giant, magma-shooting statue that towers nearly a mile tall. The typical Goblin speed at a good sneak (about a mile an hour) was not exceeded as they approached the fortress. This fortress was not particularly well established. There were only around thirty dwarves in the fortress, not all that many, but enough to be at the point where they start making mugs. Also children. Children started being born as the population reached this point. The goblins mused about the coincidence, but came to the conclusion that there was not enough of a connection. Unfortunately for the Goblins, this point in the fortresses’ life was also when guards started to be placed on duty, trained, and equipped with effective weaponry (not that the woodcutter’s axe lacked such effectiveness). Often they were set to patrol the exterior of the fortress. “You know, sometimes I think that the Goblins have the best government.” “Yeah, but they can’t debate about that can they?” “I wonder what it is like being led by a fearsome demon into battle instead of an overfed king?” “Probably pretty nice.” The Goblins listened in on the conversation that eventually led the two guards to the same conclusion as the goblins, that the Goblin society was probably superior, but that the dwarven hammerer is an absurd remnant of a monocultural nihilism, and of course, there are too many damned cheese makers in the fortress. The Goblin ambush party waited until the guards left, then proceeded into the fortress: It was only a matter of time. Totmondur held her daughter. She carried the child everywhere, doing everything with the small child, really only an infant. The child had just learned how to speak. “Mommy, where are we going now?” “Well Ingtak Kebul, we’re going to bring back in some wood from the tree mommy just cut down.” “Why do you cut down trees momma?” “Because we use their bodies to build things out of, like that bed, sweetie.” The best part of this job was taking the wood to the stockpile. Well, today it was, Igntak would be able to see her father doing his job as he expanded the stockpile as well. She would ask questions and Tholumom would be able to answer whatever her questions were, even satisfying them. They reached the stockpile. It was a huge room, not tall, but wide. The entire bounty of the fortress contained within it. It was empty. It was not often that dwarves came down here; it was desolate and relatively poorly lit, lonely even with a friend. The sound of a pickaxe ringing as it struck at the rock echoed in the chamber irregularly, giving the impression that there might be an army of dwarves digging away the limestone. There wasn’t. The only one in here was Tholumom. It did not take the Goblins long to figure out where the stockpile was, whether it was because of their rumored ability to sniff out the most valuable things in the fortress, or the relatively easily read maps available to anyone at the fortress’ entrance, no one could say. The goblin detested the darkness that seeped with the emulsions of the ground itself. Whether or not a demon with many tentacles stalked the similarly darkened halls of their fortresses were in fact (as a few human cultures believed) in the habit of raping unsuspecting females. It wasn’t true, and considering what the Law-giver could do to the unsuspecting wanderer, that would almost be a mercy. The goblins were not in such a mood for that. “Tholumom?” Totmondur yelled into the darkness of the stockpile room. It echoed for a moment, joining the army of dwarves striking the rock with picks, and then the pick silenced. “Totmondur?” The reply returned. The male dwarf slunk out of the darkness and approached the pair. “It’s nice to see you two.” “Daddy, why are you expanding the stockpiles?” “Ingtak, the stockpiles are where we keep products of our fortress, such as food. If the stockpiles are larger, then we can store more food for things like drought or goblin sieges.” “Why would Goblins siege us?” “Well… I’m not really sure. I think it has something to do with spreading their superior social constructs over us. Honestly though, I don’t know.” “Bingo!” “Who said that?” The goblins melted out of the darkness. “Hi. We’re going to ‘Spread’-” the goblin made a strange motion with his middle and index fingers on both hands, “our culture here. Hand us the child!” “How ‘bout no!” Totmondur put down the child and took the battleax which she generally used in order to cut down trees. “How ‘bout yes?” The goblin in front which had spoken moved out of the way and a spear wielding goblin stabbed her in the chest. She dropped the battleax, a gesture generally agreed to mean “Damn! my lungs have been punctured by your skill”. The goblins grabbed the child and ran. Tholumom could do nothing, he was paralyzed by fear. He got on his knees to examine his wife. His wife coughed. “Why are you tending to me? Go get your daughter. She's the one you want to save.” The world faded again. “Tholumom? Are you alright?” The former dwarf took a long time to respond. "Twilight. What just happened?" "You experienced one of your many tragic moments, I would guess. All that hateful magic conflicted with the general formula required for the spell I used to be successful. So, instead of leaving you in a disfigured, half-dwarf half-pony state, it simply put you out and reminded you of what you were trying to escape from." Tholumom once again, took a long time to respond to the purple unicorn. "Is there any way to get through these memories faster?" Not that I would recommend, it doesn't matter anyway: You would still have the unpleasant three year recovery time. Most magic will be fine, just so long as it does not stimulate passion. Or utilize passion. Either of which would cause unpleasant side effects. Mostly including various mutations, possible instantaneous changelings transformation, or potentially godhood. Which, trust me, is not very much fun either." "So, nothing that I could ever potentially want?" "That is precisely what I just said." "Nice." "Is that sarcasm I hear?" "Yes. Twilight, in fact it is." "Why did you use sarcasm? Doesn't that just negate the point altogether?" "Twilight, sometimes I love you." The dwarf responded to the pointless logical construct. "What about the rest of the time?" The former dwarf did not reply. There could be nothing so careless as a response to that kind of question. "I like you Twilight. You remind me of my daughter. That's why I like you. You are very much like her, that is what I mean." "Why would you say that?" "Because it... I can't say yet. Memories too long repressed allow even the names or natures pass through into the grate which belies the endless pits." "It doesn't really matter." Her face seemed to contradict what she said. "Twilight. I will tell you when you are ready, and I am certain that what I must say contains no lies which the omission of memories can deceive into truth." "What happened to you Tholumom? What is it that you relived?" Her voice contained more concern than anything else. Kind of her, really. "I cannot really say. Suspicions arise out of the dust of the dead. Some of what I believed dead may have returned after all. If it is true..." Tholumom's voice trailed off. "Needless to say, my suspicions have an unbelievably low chance of turning out to be true." He left something unsaid, For the sake of what is her past, if true, will change my relationship in ways that I can't imagine. The dwarf realized that there was nothing that could be done to change the past. Nothing worthwhile at least. The past remained fixed in a way that would only lead to the current situation if he tried to change it. It would be more beneficial, he thought, to remember the past. It is only possible to change the perception of the past, resolution of the situation is the only beneficial one that can be achieved in a satisfactory way. "I can't imagine what your motivation is here. I'm not your daughter. I can't be." "Memories seem to postulate that you are far more like her than you would guess. The first evidence of this is the meaning of her name. Ingtak Kebul, was her name. Twilight Sparkle is its translation." "No, what I mean is that your daughter, family, and then civilization died around you. I cannot be her." The former dwarf shifted uncomfortably. "I very much doubt that there is a coincidence here. All of my friends made fun of me for giving my child that name. She did not die when my wife did, nor was she around for the death of the Ideas of Mourning. She was taken by the goblin ambushers who took my wife from me. As far as I know, she was not killed in their escape attempt." "That still does not change the fact that your daughter was a dwarf, whereas, I am a pony." "Obviously not. That would require exactly the same amount of effort that you put into me." The eyes of the lavender unicorn twitched. She said nothing anyway. She walked away, back into the kitchen. There was a banging of pots and pans before Spike walked out of the kitchen briskly, rather incensed. "Dude? What did you say to her?" "Spike. I don't want to hurt that girl." "Then don't." His eyes narrowed at the dead-sea colored pony in front of him. There was something familiar about him. The dragon's anger faded as he drew more blanks. "Who are you anyway?" "Think about it Spike. Those tea-kettles certainly must have been annoying to clean up. I certainly couldn't blame you for harboring a strong distrust of me after that." There was a silence that hung in the air longer than it should have. "Oh. Hi Tholumom. You still suck." "I know." "Have you considered trying your luck as a vacuum cleaner?" "What?" "It's a cleaning machine used to remove dirt from the floor using suction." "Oh, so, since I suck, I should try being a "vacuum cleaner" because, due to my natural suction, I would be exceptional at it." "Wow. Most people and ponies lack the density required to miss that joke." "So, I'm sufficiently not-dense enough to understand your joke." "Yes. That is the point." "Wow, you must really suck at making jokes." "No, you're just good at ruining them." "I guess that my skill must be better." The dragon whispered that he thought otherwise and then walked off back into the kitchen, where the disturbed lavender unicorn attempted to beat the food into being cooked. Tholumom began wonder whether sharing his uncomfortable revelations was the right thing to do in the moment. It was clearly not, but for what purpose would regret serve? Obviously it would not serve much of one. The sounds of a frantic stirring continued. Clangs began to emerge from the kitchen. Questioning somepony's life story seems to be among the list of customs which are commonly referred to as taboo. Not so much because of their potential to offend, but that attempting to insert oneself as a parental figure for someone who already has one, and, is, by their parent's testimony, not adopted. Especially if the claim is then backed by obscure and arcane reasoning(which happens to be the best kind of reasoning in general), then there is an instantaneous identity conflict which emerges out of the necessity to accept what is said as fact while also clinging to an identity which is rapidly evaporating around them. The former dwarf knew this from experience, children in the fortress tended to be rather cruel. Needless to say, even mentioning his theorizing is an understandable enough reason for Twilight to develop a well deserved resentment of his presence. Spike, having not accepted his place as a slave in this society was hardly a better to turn to for this kind of support. All caused by simply opening his mouth. He decided that eating wasn't worth it. He was not appreciated here, and it would be a disservice to Twilight and Spike to stay. He thought things like, At least when I have some proof, I'll be set. Tholumom is a unicorn: An industrious magic user. He has been confused recently. His anger as of late has become a concern recently. He is not certain what to make of his experience so far. He is very strong. He has no magical talent whatsoever, but he plans on working on that. He lacks any real kinesthetic sense with his body. He is sensitive, and finds himself speaking with an unusual articulation as of late. He has no musical skill whatsoever. A strange stallion stalked the underused streets of Ponyville, not that there was such a thing: The town was simply too small for any particular road to remain in existence if it was not used fairly often. It was, in other words, not a fortress with hundreds of dwarves whose skills were so tied up in maintaining the flow of material to a few master craftsdwarves whose production was so fast that the rest of the fortress typically got little work done. Thus, it seemed as though it was just the right size for the strange stallion. His dark blue coat lacked any shine, his eyes were half opened: as though recovering from a long bout of sleep. Nonetheless, his eyes still showed through with incredible intensity. In my mind, nothing could escape his gaze. In reality, however, I saw that his eyes barely shifted, their blue irises never moving, showing absolute concentration on some point in front of him. His flank had a depiction of a pickaxe striking a stone. Something about his mark seemed wrong, as though it was dissolving. He was losing his talent. Whatever it was, he could no longer do it. Something must have changed in his heart, a hole opened by some mechanism of wayward emotional instability. "Scootaloo, what the hay are you writing?" The clacking of a typewriter stopped suddenly. The voice seemed to have silenced the machine. The orange Pegasus stared at it blankly, as though her ability to use the machine, much like the stallion's cutie mark, evaporated with the words. Her silent spell was broken by the glacial realization in her rear brain that there was something to become mad about here. The anger advised her frontal lobes to inform the offender that they should back away and return to their territory. The frontal lobes, knowing that would sound unusual, pinpointed the reason, but her speech center missed the point and decided to inform the interrupter that she should go back to what she was doing and let her be. "Sweetie Belle, get back to being the dictionary, or whatever it was that you were trying out." "Scoots, why would I be a dictionary?" The orange Pegasus stared long into the green eyes of the interrupter: There was some coyness in her words. As though the joke between her friends was lost upon her. It was amazing that she hadn't already made a chicken joke to compensate for such imbalance. "Come on you Dodo, you know that this isn't your special skill." Naturally it had come to this, and the rear brain screamed at the frontal lobe to kill the offender, but the frontal lobe decided to ignore both the information from the auditory system as well as the absurdity that was inherent in the general premise as well. The speech center fell back on another joke. One that the offender would not understand. "Why would you be a giraffe?" The words came out, causing a large amount of confusion in the Pegasus' frontal lobe, where all of the available connections to memory were used for a single moment to determine where the impulse had come from. There was none. "You don't make any sense." The orange Pegasus quietly agreed. It was time to state the intent, the frontal lobe decided. "Never mind, I'm being an author." The frontal lobe was not pleased with the effect. It was inarticulate, but the speech center was so unpredictable today that it did not desire to risk another run-in with it. So it simply allowed that to slide. "What are you writing about then?" Finally, the frontal lobe acquired the proper mode of attention, inquisitiveness, it was a pleasant topic. Now how to describe it? "That strange looking pony over there." Good enough, short enough that it might be enough to pique the former offender/interrupter's(downgraded from current state of either due to following the proper conversational path) curiosity in a positive way. "You mean the one with the 'dissolving cutie mark'?" The frontal lobe decided that it had probably not intended for this to occur, and quietly cursed the visual lobe of the offender/interrupter(upgraded once again after missing out on the intended conversational path). The frontal lobe felt like making the offender/interrupter feel foolish and communicated this to the speech center, whose response, required no particular precision. "Yes Sweetie-belle. Who else could it be?" The speech center was obviously affected by the rear-brain's irritation at the unicorn. The frontal lobe determined that it would try to force the speech center to actually consider more eloquent options, rather than what it had tried before. The Pegasus as a whole decided to pursue this further, because, even the speech center was aware of its own weakness. "Geez, at least I'm not probably in the process of writing bad romance stories." The rear-brain of the Pegasus decided that this was the final straw and attempted to override the control of the frontal lobe and strangle the dual offender/interrupter/insulter. The visual lobe of the Pegasus, consulted the memory store, and upon finding the offender/interrupter/insulter in memory delegated the task of handling adjustments made to muscle action to the hippocampus, which upon receiving the information, found itself wondering whether or not to actually allow this to go through to the cerebellum, or to send an interrupt to the rear brain so as to make the Pegasus merely grimace, rather than strangle her and/or rip her throat out. The frontal lobe was also satisfied with this arrangement and added a few words to the marshmallow-like unicorn. Who reacted in horror, and the rear-brain in the unicorn must have found justification to strangle the orange Pegasus. He felt his identity slipping away, memories remained, but the skill, for example, for mining, seemed to suddenly leave his body. Something was taking it. Tholumom realized that it would probably be a good idea to find something to do, something to become, because, he knows that work is the only way to avoid the melancholy of contemplation. Sweat on the brow, as it seeps into the eyes, purifies the mind. It also stings. Besides, there seemed, even in this small town, to be enough nobles and similarly inclined ponies, any of whom might have some needless work to do. From the budding industrialists, to the economic majors, even Ponyville contained the necessary investors to improve upon his ideas, to pay him, or simply to contract him for whatever work they could endorse. All of these positives evaporated when his stomach once again reminded him what it felt like to be a starving horse. The appropriate response, he decided, was to barter with the nearest purveyor of foodstuffs which he could locate. Perhaps he could find some work there. After a considerable delay(of nearly forty-five minutes), the clanging of the pots and pans stopped in the Library's kitchen. The purple and green dragon strolled out holding a large pot of oatmeal, the traditional breakfast food in Equestria since the time of the three tribes. "Twilight, I hope that we weren't too harsh with him, he looked like he could lose it any minute." "Tholumom is a perfectly reasonable pony, I'm sure that he took it well, and accepted it as a de-facto rebuttal to his claims." "Well, where is he then?" The next half hour was spent looking for the unicorn, whose whereabouts seemed to lack the attribute of being included in the general area which was designated as "the library". "Spike, I'm not sure that he is stable. We need to find him, if he lapses again, outside, nopony will know what to do." "What would that even be, Twilight?" "Get him to the hospital. The momentary lapses could eventually continue into a longer, less stable flashback which would represent an intersection of reality and his traumatizing memories. He might think that, for example, Bon-bon was his mother or something." "But she's not into-" Twilight's interruption was sudden, and frantic: the concern of somepony who felt genuinely responsible for somepony else. "That's why it could go wrong." "I wouldn't wish that on anyone!" They both went out into the wider world to find the wayward unicorn. The oatmeal slowly solidified onto the pot, creating a buildup of crust which, any reasonable being would wish to avoid. Author's Note So yeah, hopefully this isn't too annoying. Anyway, enjoy your over six thousand words.
