Author's Note

Sorry it's taken so long to get a new chapter out. Won't bore you with my life story.
*strange rustling noise in the background*
The hell was that?

Chapter 16

(present day)

After Mira finished bandaging me we sat at the table out on the balcony for a while and just quietly watched the city.

I sat and watched the sun set, gently toying with a braided silver necklace, thoughts drifting about my mind.

“Thinking about ‘her’ again?” Mira asks, watching me play with the necklace out of the corner of her eye.

With a sigh I let go of the necklace and stare quietly at the ground for a bit.

“Yeah, I was just wondering if she would have enjoyed this sunset.” I say as I look up to watch the sun finally dip below the horizon.

I must say for a bitch of a hostess she truly is an artist when it comes to sunsets. In Equestria. The failing light of the day painted the world in golden hues as it started to fade. As the bottom of the sun touched the land off in the distance the clouds begin to go from white to gold to burnt orange before burning a passionate red.

Then night came and swept darkness across the land, turning that red to a deep comforting purple. The light of the sun continued to fall under the march of the night but night was not met with cries of terror and pleas for rescue. It was met with laughter and song. Joy and companionship. The city’s battle cry was a joyous song of life and love. It embraced this time. It knew that it was safe.

“Mira. They aren’t ready.”

“I know Walker.”

Silence ruled supreme for quite some time before a knock at the door dethrones it.

Getting up I walk to the door. “Who dat be?”

Reaching the door I open it and see a bat pony before me. ‘He’ is about 6ft tall with good muscle build. He has hard amber eyes that look very annoyed for some reason.

“I said Princess Luna wishes to speak with you in the throne room.” ‘He’ says.

“I’m half sorry if this offends you, but are you male or female. I don’t want to piss you off by assuming” ‘He’ just turns and walks to the middle of the hallway. “I’ll take that as you got forced to do this.” Turning to tell Mira, I see her getting into bed. “Whatever. Sleep tight Bug.”

“Get bent Flesh Sack.” She replies with a yawn.

I close the door behind me so she can sleep. Not everything can run on eight hours of sleep a week. Yeah after the dragon blood shit my whole body is just all sorts of screwy.

I do still need sleep but I can do a ton of it at once then not worry about it for a while. I can’t sleep for a hundred years but I can sleep three whole days away at will. Of course than I’m awake for the next two weeks. No god damn ‘in-between’ in my life anymore.

Before I even realized it I was standing in front of the doors to the throne room watching them open.

Luna is sitting on the throne with a slight but hopeful smile on her muzzle. “Walker, We wondered if thou…I was wondering if you still wanted to talk.”

I smile and clap. “Good catch and sure I ain’t got shit to do tonight. What do you want to talk about?”

She adopts an adorable thinking pose while sitting on the throne. Suddenly a very childlike smile spreads across her muzzle. “I wish to hear a tale of your actual exploits.” Her expression sours. “I have had enough of Sisters insistence on your day to day activities.” Her smile comes right back. “I want to hear about one of your more memorable adventures.”

I chuckle slightly. “As you wish my Princess.” For an added bit of flare, because she deserves it, I bow deeply and cross my right arm over my chest.

“I do so enjoy a good tale.”

Digging through my days spent on this planet I find a suitable tale. “This is several years after where I left off.”

~~~~~~

(1yr 6months ago)

CRUNCH!!!!

CRACK!!!!

“Oww motherfucker! How long have you been torturing for? A week? Seriously my no armed grandma could do better.” I say and spit blood at his feet.

Maybe I should back up a little more.

(6 weeks prior)

Sitting around a table in the old birds ‘war room’ we were discussing a plan of attack.

You see bandits have been springing ambushes on a major trade route between Gryphonia and Minos and finally we had been given the go-ahead to put them down.

What? It’s still too far forward? Geez let me just catch you up real quick.

After training with Koodak Ironvigor for two years I got picked up by a wealthy griffon friend of his.

The griffon wanted me to be part of his personal guard after seeing how well I fought during the pit fights. I’ll tell you about it later. Suffice it to say that I had spent my nights fighting to the death and my days training in blacksmithing and weapon mastery.

'I was trained in all of them. No, not completely, I’m not a machine. Now do you want me to tell my tale or continue explaining superfluous things?'

'Thank you.'

'Where was I? Right. So we sat around the table looking over maps of the area.'

“I’m telling you, we ambush the ambushers. It’s sad that some more will die but we will find their base and take them all out in one fell swoop.” Spouts Argus. He is a crow/panther griffon. Good guy but tends more towards the stealth approach on everything. Being stealthy on a mission is all well and good but at the cost of others lives is kind of a no-no for me.

“I agree we should ambush them but it should not be at the cost of others lives. We were given the job to MINIMIZE casualties not create new ones.” I say. Being the voice of reason is surprising.

“I say we just begin patrolling and take them down when we find them. Torture a couple of them and we’ll get the location of their hide out.” Says Hard Core. He is really hardcore. Naw he’s pretty cool for a minotuar. At least he ain’t beating my ass daily during ‘training’. A bit in your face with his ideas but eh.

“That would take forever. It would be like trying to find a needle in a hay stack barehanded. You’ll do it but it’s gonna suck.” Retorts Argus.

I turn and look at Mira. “Here we go again.” I say with an eyeroll. These two argue like a married couple.

Do this stealth.

No. Beat them in the face with a hammer.

It never ends with these two. They never compromise, and they always blame it on the other when their plan fails.

Mira just stares at the map. “I have an idea.” With the following silence you would assume that it was because she almost never has one but nay-nay. Mira is the BOSS before a mission starts. I mean she takes shit from no-one. When she speaks we all listen.

Except me of course but that is just because I know I can get away with it to some degree.

“We use both. Well sort of. Look, the bandits strike from this area right?” She points to a canyon pass between to the two lands. Ideal for ambushes due to the narrow path, the cliff walls of the valley are littered with ledges for someone to lie down on and hide for an ambush. Most of these ledges are at least a hundred feet off the ground meaning they are hard to reach without wings. An arrow will get there but shooting up is a real bitch.

There is another way but it takes you over either mountain that makes up the canyon. Which would lengthen your trip by several days and in certain conditions the mountain route is impassable.

“We send our own “merchant’ through there. We load him down with supplies, nothing to crazy but enough to skirt suspicion. We boost security in other places along the route. But this place we leave alone for the most part.”

“As you know being a changeling I can detect emotions. Meaning along as I am within range I can track someone’s emotional state. We have our merchant get taken by the bandits. Which brings me to the final part, whoever we pick must NOT fight back and allow themselves to be captured.” She looks right at Core. “In that regard I suggest Walker.”

“WHAT!!!!!!”

Her choice has caused yet another argument.

Your basic eagle/lion combo griffon stops the argument just by lifting a clawed paw.

He is our actual boss. Zephyr Bloodwinds. He is that bastards griffon friend.

“Mira, why do you vote Walker to this position?” He asks calmly.

“Out of all of us present he is the only one capable of handling himself in such a situation. Not to say that the other couldn’t fight if it came to that but Walker would know when to fight and how to take the inevitable abuse.”

With a raised eyebrow Zephyr asks another question. “What makes you think they won’t try to kill him?”

“Simple, because he is a human. They could sell him for a huge reward to the ponies. He is literally more valuable alive to them than dead. That guarantees they will bring him to their base camp. Also the fact that we can track him means I can sneak in once we locate their base and begin to sabotage and take potentially useful information.” She explains. Fuck I hate this idea. Oh well, it’ll make a good story later.

“Alright. You have my permission to begin your mission.” Zephyr stands up. “You have till tomorrow morning to get everything you need together.” He looks around the table. “None of you have permission to die. If it gets too hairy you leave. No heroes.” He walks out and lets us finish setting up the finer details.

I decide to sleep since I already know what I’ll need to do.

The next morning finds me wrapped in a cloak, wearing the world’s most uncomfortable harness ever.

“…half days and you’ll be there.” Mira says.

Probably should have been paying attention. “Okay half day. I got it.”

I begin pulling the carriage behind me. This is why I fucking hated this idea. Damn bitch stuffed my face this morning to give me lots of energy for the walk. She said it was so that once they started torturing me I would begin healing sooner, in case she couldn’t get there in time to stop it. We both know that it won’t be till long after I have eaten though that the torture will begin.

My mind mostly wanders during my trek down the road. It’s very boring.

'There are sedimentary rock deposits all around me. Umm… they were grey? Why do you want to know what the area looks like anyway? Don’t you want to hear about me beating the crap out of things?'

'I don’t care if I suck at telling stories. You keep interrupting anyway. Now shush.'

After twelve hours passed I realized Mira said ‘days’ not ‘day’. So I made camp that night under the stars. Thank you for such beautiful nights Princess. I have to say since I don’t sleep much anymore stargazing has become quite the pass-time for me.

'The next day was more of the same, just a long boring slog down the trail. There was a rock with a salamander on it that I poked with a stick. Happy?'

It wasn’t until the third day that I finally saw the beginning of the valley pass. Hiking the harness a bit higher on my body I pull the cart with a bit more purpose.

I keep an eye out because this is when things are likely to be at their worst. I have to make sure I avoid the first volley of arrows or its game over.

It was midday when I reached the likely ambush site. I figure if it’s going to be around here I should set up for ‘lunch’. I unbuckle the harness and toss it into the carriage. Damn thing chaffed my ribs a bit.

After a bit of stretching I grab the canteen in the back and take a swig. I wipe the sweat built up from the walk off my forehead before deciding to take a second drink. Just as I’m about to take my next drink the canteen is launched out of my hand with an arrow sprouting out of the side.

“Well, well, well, what do we have here?” Asks some random bandit with a bow pointed at my face.

He is looks like an Earth pony. Not a bad build to him. His coat, mane and tail are the same color as our dust and sand surroundings. “You have an interesting color scheme there friend.” I say.

“Thanks, now why don’t you just get down on your knees like a good colt, so we don’t have to rain Tartarus down on you.”

I look around me and spot at least five other bandits on the cliffs around us. *Something’s wrong.* “All of you for little ole me? I’m touched.” I sink to my knees and put my hands on my head. *There should be way more than that in the area, are they just not showing themselves?*

Several more walk out straight out of the boulders surrounding us. “Illusion magic to create fake scenery. Anyone who doesn’t know the area would never suspect it. Clever.” This is really bad, if the others don’t spot it they will be in for some shit.

A minotaur wrapped in leather straps hits me in the stomach with the butt of his axe. “Shut weakling.”

“Ugh!”I bend over a little. Fuck that hurt. I look back up at him. “Dark brown lower body.Half horn on right side.”

“What are you muttering about?” The minotaur asks before backhanding me to the ground.

Copper floods my taste buds. “Double headed axe. Upper torso covered in straps. Just making a mental note of what you look like so I can kill you once I have the chance.”

He laughs. “You think your puny body is enough to even scratch me?”

I throw a shuriken I keep in my boot and open up his right cheek. “I do believe that is a scraAAAHHHH!”

My results in an arrow being lodged into my right shoulder from behind.

“Go ahead try something else. I will make you life a living Tartarus BEFORE the Princesses get a hold of you.” Says that dusty dick.

I spit at his hooves. “Fuck you dust butt.”

After that everything turns black.

~~~~~~

Sometime later I am awoken by a bucket of freezing cold water.

“HOLY SHIT THAT”S FUCKING COLD!!!” I holler.

“Welcome to my camp.” A voice sounds out from behind me.

“Your customer service could use a little work.” I groan while taking in my surroundings.

Looks like a tent. Wool wrap instead of animal hide. Based on the distance to the walls I’m guessing I’m tied up right in the middle. There is nothing near me except a stool about a foot and a half away.

“I’ll let my crew know that you don’t approve of our services.” Says the guy who I’m assuming is their leader.

“So let me guess. Your plan is to torture me till I give up all that I know, and then trade me to the Equestrian Government for a huge sum so you can all live like kings the rest of yours lives?” I say trying to look behind me.

THWACK!!!

“Oww-ie!”

“Please don’t try that again. I can’t have you seeing my face and ruining everything now can I?” Boss man says with a slight lilt to his voice. Guess the dick is enjoying this. Also can’t believe that the idiot just gave me such a huge piece of information.

“So you must be pretty well known to be worried about me seeing what you look like.”

All I get in response is a shot to the kidney. “AAAHHH FUCK!!! Fuck that fucking tickles!”

This time it’s much worse.

I feel a searing pain slip in between my ribs and by god is it agonizing. Lucky for me Mira was right, they don’t want me dead. The knife slipped in between the ribs but it’s shallow. Not enough to kill but bad enough to hurt.

“No more out bursts please. It would not do well for us to deliver you too worked over.”

I grin at that. Looks like torture will be lighter than Mira or I expected. “Aww and here I thought you wanted to give me preferential treatment.”

Two more punches land on my back. Each one hitting where he just stabbed with some fair precision. “You are certainly hardy. By the looks of your body I would wager that you have had some decent training.” Warmth begins to spread across my back. “Hmmm. Interesting it would seem extreme temperature of heated iron does not affect you.” I can hear the sound of a quill scratching against parchment.

Pain blossoms across my back. It starts at my left hip and ends just below my right shoulder blade. “Physical wounds still seem to cause the pain receptors to light up.”

I can hear him muttering to himself about the torture methods he is using and some ways to improve my responses to it. The fuck? Is this dick really studying me right now? Oh fuck this shit.

I close my eyes and begin to focus myself inwards. Not really a place I like going.

'What now? Why don’t I like going into myself? Do you want me to finish this or not?'