Darkness, that was my world for a couple of minutes. Then came a sharp pain all over my body, like I phased out of existence and now was being put back together cell by cell. I regained touch. I was lying in what felt like dead grass and dry dirt. I could feel the smell of decaying trees, and that distinctive scent when it's about to rain. My vision returned as a green and yellow blur.

‘So, how is it like to shadow shift for the first time?'

My focus adjusted and the blur turned to two cocky looking eyes, eyes I knew too well. ‘Painfull.'

Ishwa was hanging on top of my head, upside down, her face almost glued to mine, she laughed and slid down my snout, floating ahead of me, a catalog and glasses appeared out of thin air. She put the glasses on and started searching for something in the catalog.

‘Maybe next time you should ask a spirit of air or a Spirit of Fate for help, instead of a Spirit of Shadows… You could even have made a wing talisman and fly over here!' She said, throwing the glasses and catalog away only to disappear into thin air again.

‘I didn't have the ingredients for a wing talisman, neither could I have summoned a greater spirit like a Spirit of Fate. I tried summoning a Spirit of Air but something went wrong for some reason.' I deadpanned, looking at Ishwa with accusatory eyes while I stood up.

‘What could possibly be that?' Ishwa said, wearing a white dress and a golden halo.

Now that the pain was gone and my senses were coming back again, I took in my surroundings. Withering trees with a few yellowing leaves swaying in a cold breeze. I looked up, the sky was completely gray, it was going to rain soon. I needed to find shelter. ‘We better get moving before a storm catches us unprotected.'

Ishwa levitated to my saddlebag, it was bigger than a camping pack, with the traditional two packs on the sides and a third one in the middle. One could almost carry its entire house inside it, and by the noticeable bulge it had from all the random things I was carrying from my homeland it was really heavy! Sitting in the middle section with a beach chair and umbrella, she announced, ‘Lead the way!'

*** *** ***

The road was a constant of twists and turns of an old river, dried long ago. A moment later, Ishwa grabbed a scroll and quill and asked, ‘Let us review what we have in our inventory, shall we?'

‘A Spirit of Chaos, wants to make an inventory?' I was surprised by such notion, a being that spread chaos wherever it went wants to organize something?

‘If you remember, my part of our deal requires that I protect you and "keep you safe", to do so, I have to know what you have in that black hole you call a saddlebag in case you need it in battle.' Exclaimed Ishwa whith a dismissive wave.

‘Yeah, because making me carry bad luck everywhere I go is a pretty good way to protect me.' I smirked.

‘Well, that was your part of the deal, deal with it. Now let us begin.' Ishwa retorted, showing her long serpentine tongue.

The walk continued for some hours, Isha's checklist only lasted for fifteen minutes, so the rest of the trip she spent asking "Are we there yet?" When she asked it for the 500th time, The path ended in a denser part of the forest, in a nearby tree was a glyph carved into its trunk, a zebra glyph.

‘Isn't that a glyph to mark a nearby encampment?' Ishwa asked, teleporting closer to inspect the carvings.

‘Looks like it, let's follow it.' Deeper into the forest we went. Following the glyphs, not long after, we found what we were looking for, an old zebra scout team's encampment. It was composed of a single dome made of wood, clay and foliage for camouflage, big enough to house a squad of ten to twelve zebras. Judging by the brown - grayish leaves, it was pre-war.

‘What is it doing here in the middle of nowhere?' Ishwa seemed confused.

‘If it's here, there must be a pony city nearby…'

Sure enough, three ponies walked around the hut, a yellow unicorn, a blue earth pony and a white earth pony, their clothing was… weird, kinda pointy and crappy, like they stitched pieces of rag together and added spikes. They saw me and stopped in their tracks.

Ishwa sat on my back and said, ‘Time to see if your Equestrian is good.'

"Hello pony friends, please do not be alarmed, let us share some stories over some drinks and games" With a wide smile, I approached them, getting a closer look, I found something strange, they had pinprick eyes and crazy smiles, eyeing me like they hit a jackpot.

Suddenly the unicorn draws a shotgun, firing at me.

‘Take cover!' Ishwa shouted, flying high into the sky to get a more tactical view.

I threw myself to the side, most of the shots stopped by my hide armor. That shotgun had to be old and in disrepair, anything stronger than that would have pierced my barding.

‘Two coming your way from the sides!'

‘Got it.' Counting to three I positioned myself and bucked hard to the left, hitting the white pony in the face, the blue pony dove me from the right, with a knife in his mouth. I forced my back legs to the ground in a sitting position, grabbed his mane with my teeth and threw him with my hooves. He fell on top of the white pony, knocking him to the ground again.

"I'm gonna kill you!" Screamed the unicorn between mad laughter. Charging me from the right, spraying lead everywhere, I tried to get out of the way, but one of his shots hit me in the hind left leg. The pain was sharp, my leg felt like burning, full of tiny holes from the lead. In my haze, I didn't notice the earth ponies were back up.

"Mother fucker!" The white pony kicked me in the side. I heard a snap, my rib was broken! Breathing was hard and painful. While I was grasping for air, the blue pony kicked me in the face, knocking me to the ground. Before I fell on top off my saddlebag I turned and landed on my broken rib! Moaning in pain, I tried to protect my saddlebag with my hooves.

"You're dead now BITCH!" He pulled the trigger, but the gun jammed.

I could smell a strong scent of gunpowder and took cover in a fetal position. He pulled the trigger again, the shotgun exploded! Killing him and the blue pony next to him. The white pony was sent to the ground in pain, shards from the shotgun pierced his chest, but not deep enough to be lethal.

‘Dagger!' I shouted to Ishwa, who swiftly levitated to my bag, grabbed the dagger, and threw it to me as I was up and running for the fallen pony.

With my dagger now tied to my tail dreads, I was on top of the pony before he could react. Fear resided in his eyes as he saw their friends heads turned to a red pool of gore on the ground. "Please don't kill me! I don't want to die!" he cried.

I looked around, he had no weapons, he had no friends and probably didn't want to fight anymore. With a flick of my tail, I slashed him on the side, a superficial wound of warning. "Go away." I stepped away from him.

He ran as fast as he could, disappearing behind the trees. With the threat gone, my adrenaline rush subsided, only to be replaced with a pounding pain. My leg was shot, my rib was broken, my nose was bleeding, everything hurt! I limped to a nearby tree and sat down under it.

‘Such a warming welcome hum?' Ishwa brought my bag close to me. Once close, she got a white - yellowish powder wrapped in leaves and a flask with pink liquid.

‘Yeah, no wonder we blew each other centuries ago…' I applied the powder to my leg, feeling a sharp sting as It made contact with the wound. When I drank the potion the pain was quickly gone. ‘At least we have a place to stay.'

‘Better go inside, it's starting to get dark.'

‘Can you scout the place for me please?'

‘Eh, that's what I'm here for isn't it?'

A few seconds later, the pain was much more bearable. My nose bleed stopped and my rib was ok. I tested my leg, putting weight on it, it still hurt, but now I would be able to run if necessary. While waiting for Ishwa to return, I searched the bodies, they were caring some empty syringes and a lot of bottle caps (bottle caps? Ponies are so weird). My search was interrupted when I heard Ishwa call.

‘Hunm… Zhau?'

‘Yes?'

‘You better see this…'

Weird. I put on my saddlebag and walked to the door, Ishwa was waiting for me next to it. With a slight crouch, I slowly opened the door. The inside was a small room filled with twelve beds with lockers on their feet and random garbage spread everywhere. There were two wooden doors, one to the left and one up front.

Ishwa looked worried at the front door. ‘That room…'

If a spirit of chaos is worried, there can only be trouble in that room. I rested my bag in the clay wall, readied my dagger and opened the door in one quick swing.

That was a mistake, the smell was unbearable, there were rotting corpses everywhere! Body parts were pinned to the walls like some kind of monument, a hollowed torso laid on a table, and the ground was a pool of blood (Did they eat these ponies?!). In the corner of my vision, I saw a little twinkle, there was a small crystal shoved in the eye socket of a severed head.

‘That looks like a memory prism, you're not planning on getting it, are you?'

‘... that may have valuable information.'

‘Gross. I'll keep watch then, wash your tongue after you take that thing out!'

I approached carefully to not trip on any… pony. I examined the crystal and took it with the point of my teeth, trying my best to not let my tongue touch it. Once out of the room, I closed the door behind me, never to be open again.

‘What now?'

‘Maybe we can find something useful in those lockers, I'll search the ones to the right, you get the ones on the left.'

I wiped the blood out of the memory prism with my hide armor, placed it in my bag and went to scavenging. From the twelve lockers, three were locked, six were empty and the remaining three were filled with trash and random equipment parts.

That left the door on the left wall. I gestured to Ishwa to scout the room for me. When she returned and confirmed it was safe I tried opening the door. Locked.

‘Must be hard not being able to simply phase through objects right?' She smirked.

‘Well… the wooden door is centuries years old, but the clay walls are as old, I'm afraid I might break the walls if I buck the door, especially with you around.' I joked, not willing to take the risk, I went to my bag and retrieved my dagger, with luck, I could take the door out of its hinges.

Emphasis on luck, because as soon as the door was free, it fell inwards and crashed into a chemical station, breaking everything.

‘Why?' I whined.

‘I ask that myself from time to time.'

The room was some kind of workshop, with worktables, reloading benches, and a late chemical station. Who would put the most fragile set of equipment just behind a door?!

‘Forget it, it's late, and I have to sleep for the healing powder to make effect so I'll see what is left of it tomorrow. Can you keep watch as I sleep?'

‘Aw come on, that's so boring!' Ishwa complained, crossing her arms and turning around.

‘Please.'

‘Ok, ok!'

With that, I flipped the mattress to the other side, (despite being on the dirt, somehow the underside was cleaner than the upper side) and went to sleep.

*** *** ***

"Look at all this stuff, we found a motherload!"

"What's inside the chest?"

"Who cares? Let's just kill him and sell his stuff in the city"

"Shh! I think I saw him move…"

I woke up to whispers coming from inside the house, Ishwa should be…

She was sleeping just next to me… Great. Turning around I spotted the white earth pony from yesterday, grabbing my saddlebag while his friend advanced towards me.

"Rise and shine sleepy head!" said the new brown earth pony, grabbing his makeshift lance and running towards me.

Fuck. I rolled to the side avoiding his plunge. Looking around, there was nothing I could use to defend myself. ‘Ishwa!'

‘What? I'm awake!' She jumped.

The brown pony charged me again, throwing me to the wall, cracking it.

‘Go to the workshop room, find a weapon!' She flew fast toward the room, when the brown pony shoved me again, knocking the air out of my lungs. He tried to stab me, but I was able to dodge it, (well, not "dodge it" more like slid to the side while trying to catch my breath).

‘There's nothing there!' Returning from the room, Ishwa was panicking.

Looking at the lockers, I remembered. ‘There was an empty syringe in the locker, get it!'

The brown pony tried to stab me again but hit the crack in the wall instead, his spear was stuck. I kicked his back legs, knocking him on top of me and I locked my legs around his neck, choking him.

Desperate for air, he tried to hit my sides multiple times. I kept blocking until he kicked my wounded leg, making me weaken my grip.

He headbutted me and flipped, now I was being choked on top of him.

‘Here!' She threw an empty syringe to me. I grabbed it with my mouth and stuck the needle in his foreleg, feeling him loosen his grip, I rolled to the side, got his spear and pierced his right shoulder, pinning him in place.

‘Let's get out of here.'

‘Your bag's not here!'

And neither was the white pony…

Sprinting out of the hut, I saw the white pony running into the woods with my saddlebag strapped to his back.

*** *** ***

The chase was on!

The terrain was uneven and hard to travel, the trees were making it hard to maneuver, but the weight of the saddlebag was slowing him down!
He made a sharp turn right, I almost got him, but there was a sudden bump on the ground that made me trip and fall.

‘FUCK! Ishwa, what direction is he going now?'

Flying high to spot him she said, ‘He's still going right, downhill, there's a small slope you can jump and catch him!'

‘Got it.' I was on my hooves and running in a split of a second, I saw the slope and jumped, not even bothering to see if it was safe to jump. Sure enough, I was just ahead of him!

Bracing for impact, I rolled when I hit the ground, raising a small cloud of dust from the dry, compacted dirt. I spun around and charged the white pony, giving no time for him to react.

"PLEASE, I'M SORRY! DON'T HURT ME!" He begged.

I let him go once, he's not running away now.

I hit his head with my hooves, again and again until he passed out, he wasn't dead, just unconscious.

‘You know what they did to those ponies back at the hut, are you sure you want to let him live?' Ishwa asked with an arched brow.

‘I don't take lives that are not necessary, now let's try and find the city.'

I checked my saddlebag, everything was safe, putting it on, I turned to walk when I noticed a weird machine, just hovering there in the middle of the road.

"Wow, that was… intense?" it said with its metallic voice, surprising me.

"You can talk?"

"Well, I just did, didn't I?"

"Sorry if I was rude, but please give me a clue, what are you?"

It took a moment for it to answer. "Wow, that rhyming brings back memories, I'm not a robot if that's what you're wondering, I just hacked this sprite-bot, my name is Watcher."

‘Ominous.' smirked Ishwa.

"Well, hello watcher, my name is Zhausikuitri or Zhau for short, pray tell me, is there any city around or the sort?"

"Come again?"

"I'm in dire need to find a city, maybe you can help me and have some pity?" I tried again.

"Oh, the city is south of here, this way" Watcher said, hovering in front of me as I began to follow him.

‘Can we trust this guy? He just sneaked up on us in the middle of nowhere!' Ishwa had a good point.

‘I don't know, but it's not like I have better options.'

"From where did you come from?"

"Zebrica was my home…"

"That explains the rhyming, how long have you been in Equestria?"

"I arrived just yesterday."

"Well, it seems you already have armor, and know how to fight, and I'm happy to give you some directions, but if you want to survive in the Equestrian wasteland, you'll have to make some friends." Watcher instructed.

"I already have a friend, even though she sometimes annoys me to no end."

'Hey!'

Watcher seemed to consider me for a moment, not being able to see Ishwa. "Uhum… well, there's always more opportunities to make new friends."

After a short while, the trees gave way to dry plains, stretching as far as the eye can see, in the middle of said plain I saw a city. Watcher wasn't lying after all.

"Well, my time is running out, good luck out there."

"Thank y-" Before I could finish, the sprite-bot began playing a loud parade music and hovered away.

‘What the fuck?'

‘I know right? Well, we're almost to the city.'

‘Finally! There's nothing to cause chaos here, I need to mess something up!'

‘Try not to destroy the whole thing, I have items to sell.'

‘I'll see what I can do.' An evil smile on her face.

Now that I was closer to the city, I could see it was an old world pony military encampment. Walls made out of train cars and other scrap metals were raised around collapsing buildings. The gate was protected by two makeshift watchtowers, each housing two or three guards.

As I came closer to the gate, all guns were pointed at me. "Stop right there zebra!" A gray earth pony mare with green mane ordered, judging by her barding, she had to be head of the city security.

‘Well, let's see how many bullets you can take before you drop dead. It was nice knowing you…'

Moments later, the mare opened the gate, she walked toward me with two guards behind her.

"Surrender your saddlebag for inspection." She gestured to the guard on her right, who took a step forward.

"May I ask why?"

"Farside City regulations, besides, we don't trust outsiders, especially zebras."

I unstrapped my saddlebag and handed it over to the guard. "Have my people offended you?" She didn't like that question.

"Your people are a threat to everypony in this place, now, hand over any guns you have on yourself."

"I am not armed."

She gave me a nasty look, not believing me one bit, she ordered the other guard to search me. After he didn't found anything, the guard with my saddlebag handed some masks, potions and my chest to the commanding officer.

"What the hell is this shit?" She asked, throwing the masks in front of me.

Picking it up I answered. "Gifts from my homeland, they can scare critters and protect your plants."

"And what about these? Drugs are not allowed here."

"Ah, these are quite good, you can mix then into a fine soup, they are concentrated juice from vegetables and fruits, you can even drink it if in the water you dilute."

She opened a bottle and took a sniff. Feeling the strong scent of apples, she closed the bottle again, putting it away.

"And the chest?"

"That is a family treasure, if you be careful with it, it would be a pleasure."

"Open it."

"The key, I do not have, it was lost during an attack"

She looked to the guards on her side, they were suspicious.

"Please, I mean well, I am just a simple merchant with wares to sell." I plead gazing directly at her eyes.

Rolling her head, she dumped everything back inside my saddlebag, handed it back to me and stepped aside.

"Go on, get out of my sight"

"Thank you."

"Do anything stupid and you're a dead zebra."

I nodded and went inside.

‘My god, ponies are such jerks!'

‘I can understand their worry, being so close to the borders, but yes, that was a bit jerkish. Well, now that we're inside we need to find a place to sleep tonight.' My stomach rumbled.

‘Maybe we should visit the market first…'

‘Well then, to the market!' Ishwa proclaimed, suddenly wearing the old zebra soldier uniform, brandishing a sword forwards.

Footnote: Level up! (2)

Skills Raised:
Melee Weapons: 19
Speech: 22
Unarmed: 43

New Perk:
Adept Wanderer: You gain an additional 10% whenever experience points are earned.

Author's Note

Here you go guys, Chapter one!

Thank you for choosing Shadow Spirit air lines, we hope your flight was enjoyable!

I hope you liked it!

Please let me know of anything you think I should improve in, so I can make better stories for your enjoyment!

bye!

PS.: I'll be releasing new chapters as soon as they're ready, my hopes is that I can write at least 1 per month.

-T.M.W.D.

Chapter edited by: EverfreePony