In the strangely built home of Sunset Shimmer

Sunset Shimmer was sitting on her bed, reading a book on different kinds of mythological dragons throughout history. It had been months since gaining her odd new power from the strange man, but only now did her interest in her new tattoo pet start to rise, so she got a brand new book on different kinds of dragons to see if she could determine what kind of dragon Scales was.

“ugh... hey buddy can you come out for a quick second? ” she asked seemingly to herself, extending her hand which caused her familiar reptilian pet to shoot out of her hand, flying around the room with grace. After several seconds of flying, Scales landed right next to her on the bed, stretching out its legs like some kind of dog coming out of a deep sleep, much to Sunset’s enjoyment.

“Hey Scales, can you stand still for a minute? I need to get a good look at your wings.”

Then like it understood her perfectly, the dragon stood up on its four legs, stretching its wings out. Despite Scales being no bigger than a puppy now, its wings gave it an extra two feet in both length and width. Scrutinizing the book, Sunset groaned once again in frustration as she tossed the book to the side, laying her head on the pillows.

“I mean, you look like some pictures of the Italian dragon Thyrus, but the most similar looking pictures of it still don’t look like you that much!”

Suddenly a knock came from the door downstairs, alerting Sunset who quickly resummoned Scales back into her arm. Sunset was fortunate that she wore a jacket, it was the perfect way to hide her new tattoo after all, and quickly put it on before running down to the door, fixing her hair while doing so. As she reached the door, she suddenly felt a chilling cold at her feet, despite the fact that she was wearing shoes, which left as soon as it appeared. She also noticed that the tiny hairs on her arms were sticking up like she had just rubbed a balloon on her arms, again despite not doing so.

“Who is it?!”

She got no answer from the door, slightly frustrating her.

“HELLO?!”

Again no answer, frustrating her even more. She decided to open the door if only to punch whoever was taking up her time.

“ARE YOU DEAF OR SOMETH-”

When she opened the door, she found that no one was there. Peeking her head out and looking around, she saw no one else on the street other than the random stranger walking down the road. Groaning again, she slammed the door and turned around, massaging her face with her hands in annoyance.

“Must have been a prank by those “CMC” kids. But how did they find out where I live?”

“I think you have more pressing matters at the moment” A metallic, raspy voice answered, making Sunset jump in fright. “Like the man standing behind you contemplating whether I should kill you or not.”

Sunset turned around to see what looked like a man in a suit of strange looking armor, head to toe in strange chrome colored metal plates that gave it a somewhat crude look. Its helmet had a strange faceplate, the only thing discerning it from the rest of the helmet being two parallel lighting bolts which she could only assume was its visor, which glowed bright blue.

Sunset went for her phone, which she left charging on a table next to her, but with the snap of the stranger’s hand, she was forced to reel her hand back in pain as a jolt of electricity shot out of the phone.

“Are all teenagers this stupid? I mean seriously! Even if you did grab your phone, do you really think you could call those pathetic weaklings you call law enforcement in time?”

Sunset was lost for words as the stranger approached her, a flurry of emotions rushing through her. The stranger stopped right in front of her, the sound of tiny mechanisms could be heard working inside the armor.

“Now I’m not going to sugarcoat anything I’m about to say. I’m not your friend, I don’t have your best interests in mind or heart, I honestly loath at the thought of working with a kid like you, and if you were anybody else, I would most likely stab you in the back the moment I would think your usefulness came to an end.”.

Sunset could only look with both confusion and shock at the stranger's bluntness.

“BUT...and this is a big but, not as big as yours, but regardless you have what I can’t have so it only makes sense that I work with you. Now I understand this a lot to take in, but as a sign that I won’t kill you, I’ll teach you how to use your new powers.”

Now understandably confused, angry and somewhat offended, Sunset decided to finally speak up. She took a step forward, balling her hands into fists. “Wait wait wait wait! WHO ARE YOU?! AND HOW DO YOU KNOW ABOUT SCALES?!”

“Oh! How could I be so rude?! The name’s Snowfall Frost, and believe me, my little HUMAN, I know so much more about you than just your little dragon pet.”

Despite her attempt to gain the most basic of knowledge about him, she was only rewarded with even more questions. Snowfall Frost was a character from a Hearths Warming story she was told as a foal, the very thought of the holiday gave her a brief moment of nostalgia. But the moment was fleeting as she remembered Snowfall being a female, living in a completely different time period, and not in a strange, almost alien suit of armor.

“My armor may not be current gen, but even this suit detects the strange energy reading coming off of you along with Marksen’s esper. I’m actually surprised you weren’t found out sooner! But I do want to know something first if you don’t mind, which you probably do but let’s just ignore that.”. Then out of what would have been the calf of his leg, a compartment popped out revealing a small box of what appeared to be cigarettes. Pulling one out, he pointed it at Sunset.

Before she could even wonder what he was doing, the sound of several loud gears filled the room as the lower part of Snowfall’s helmet detached itself from the rest, lowering itself to where it was in front of the neck, revealing part of his face, much to Sunset’s horror. The skin was ghostly white as if the man had never been in the sunlight before, and it appeared as though the man had no lips, his teeth all visible for all the world to see. Sunset was naturally taken aback by this, taking a step backward, only for Snowfall to take a step forward. But most disturbing at all was that his voice sounded the same even after taking off the portion of his helmet as if his voice was always that metallic.

“I need to know, can you truly wield the power you have. I need to know, are you a baby rattlesnake who has yet to learn how to control it’s venom or are you just a dog with an oversized bark? Show me what you got, and if I’m impressed enough I’ll tell you everything you want to know.Or leave and prove that you are just as pathetic as the others.”

Sunset just looked at the man with first confusion, but then determination. Her gut feeling told her to run, find help, anything to get away from this man, but her conscious told me otherwise. She needed to know, for with knowledge comes power, and she craved power above all else.

“Hey kid, while you’re at it, light my cigarette, will you?”

Sunset looked at the cigarette with caution, giving Snowfall a suspicious glare, but still reluctantly took the cigarette. Closing her eyes as she focused her energy on the cigarette. Her arm started to glow bright red, a faint humming coming from her hand. A tiny fire suddenly appearing on her hand, almost instantly lighting the cigarette. Snowfall quickly took it back and put it in his mouth, somehow holding it like he still had lips, like it was levitating. After breathing some of it in, Snowfall but the cigarette back in his hand, breathing out a tiny cloud of smoke. It was only now that Sunset noticed that Snowfall’s lips were...healing itself, the process almost like watching a spider spin its web but at three times the normal speed, but that wasn’t the oddest thing she saw. She saw the cloud of smoke start to spin. It spun faster and faster until Snowfall reached his hand into the cloud, making it dissipate immediately. In his hand was a red crystal-like object that looked to be the size of a baseball in the palm of his hand and casually tossed it to Sunset, who caught it in her hand. It was warm to the touch like a fresh blanket out of the dryer, and it brightly glowed several shades of red when it touched her, it’s glow almost hypnotizing to her.

“Thanks kid. Now I want you to take a bite out of that, it will show me if you’re ready.”

“Wait... take a bite? Like, eat it?!”

Suddenly, Snowfall Frost fell on his knees, growling like some kind of animal. His body started to glow bright blue, only to quickly fade away.

“ Ugh! Not now! Sorry about that, anyhow I got to go. Meet behind that dumpster fire of a building you call a school tomorrow. That is... if you survive the process.”

It was only now that Sunset had enough. This “Snowfall Frost” had broken into her home and was acting like he knew everything about her, and now was giving what felt like vague threats while seemingly in pain. she needed answers and she needed them now! Before Sunset could try to get more answers out of him, Snowfall started to seemingly melt into the floor, the lower face plate covering his mouth as he sunk.

“Oh and remember Sunset Shimmer, Hliet Forsettean pliht.”

Before he fully melted into the floor, he took his right hand and made some kind of two-finger salute, tapping his hand against his chin three times before completely sinking into the floor. For a brief moment, Sunset saw something that appeared to be some kind of odd shadow on her floor rush past her, exiting the room at lightning fast speed. Sunset didn’t want to move, cautious that this was some kind of trick, so she slowly went and grabbed her phone, which didn’t shoot bolts of electricity at her now. Fully sure he was gone now, Sunset stared back at the crystal, a million questions going through her head. Yet one question echoed through her mind, a question that was more important than the rest. Looking down at her arm where Scales resided, her face filled with both fear and confusion.

”How much does this Snowfall Frost know?”

It was late in the afternoon when Twilight, Spike, “Heart Breaker” and I made it to Canterlot, walking off of the train to take in the view. I looked at the castle, wincing while looking at the honestly ridiculous city. Seriously, who builds a castle, especially THE CAPITAL CITY on a cliffside and then build a high-class city right next to it? All it would take would be one big earthquake and bye bye Canterlot and the princesses.

“I’ll never get used to the sight of that castle I swear,” I said, stretching my legs as the other passengers pass us.

“You worry way too much Signal, Canterlot has been here for thousands of years and not once has anything horrible happened...to...ehehe” Twilight nervously giggled, most likely recalling the events of the “Canterlot Wedding” that I either slept through or just missed out on.

“I heard about it while coming to Ponyville, still can’t believe a changeling managed to defeat Celestia in combat. And to think my job is to stop things like this from happening” Sapphire said, looking slightly ashamed.

“Well, no use dwelling on the past. By the way, Sapphire, if that’s your name then why did you use the name “Heart Breaker” when we first met?”

Twilight looked at me confused, only for Sapphire to put a hoof on her. “That was the codename given to me by some Canterlot officials. But since this was somewhat of a vacation for me, I decided my real name would be better. Anyways, shouldn’t you be going to princesses Twilight?”

“OHMYGOSH OHMYGOSH! I NEED TO HURRY TO CELESTIA! C’MON SPIKE WE NEED TO HURRY!” Spike quickly got her side, suspiciously quite now that I realized, and hurried off towards the castle. “YOU TWO HAVE FUN! MEET ME AT THE ROYAL COURTYARD IN TWO HOURS!”

I scratched my hoof against my head in “Who takes two hours to take a test?”

Sapphire walked up next to me, slightly grinning as she watched her sister run off. “Twilight was always like that, she always liked to have extra time on her hooves if she could.”

We stood there for a couple of minutes, an awkward silence filling the air around us despite all the noise from the Canterlot ponies doing their daily routines. But despite the awkward silence, it was actually somewhat nostalgic for me as It reminded me of when I was training to become a Purifier and I would climb on top of the radio tower after practice. I would just sit there, where I would block out our instructor's screams and cries at the trainees to work harder and just focus on the winds that blew up there. In fact, it was on top of that radio tower that I first asked Veronica to be my potential soul mate, where she accepted my offer only to then playfully push me off the tower. The only reason I got out of there ok was due to the fact that my Esper could fly and catch me, something that was strangely looked down upon at boot camp there.

“Hey Signal, can I ask you something?” Sapphire asked, finally breaking the silence between us. “I mean you were kinda hounding me with questions on the train so I just thought it to return the favor.”

“Sure go ahead, shoot,” I said casually. I don’t know if it was because she had the same voice as my wife, acted a lot like my wife, or that she gave off the same vibes as my wife, but I strangely felt off guard around her, like I could relax for once despite the current situation.

“Your wings. I noticed them the moment we first met but I didn’t want to sound rude to somepony I didn’t know but now I feel like I can ask. Why are they so big? I’ve never seen pegasi wings that big before in my entire life. And on top of that, how good of a flyer are you?”

I lowered my head to the ground, my cheeks blushing in embarrassment. “Well...to answer your first question, I honestly don’t know. Like you mentioned before, I got amnesia here at Canterlot so I have no idea about how my wings got so big. And to answer your second question... I um......I can’t fly...”

Sapphire moved her head closer to mine, her ears slightly flickering. “I didn’t catch that last part Signal, could you speak up?”

I moved my head away from hers, my ears lowered to my head. “I... can’t fly ok...”

It was pretty embarrassing to tell other ponies, but despite my wings impressive size, I could barely get a foot off the ground. It turned out that my wings were in fact, too heavy for my body to flap correctly to create lift, it would be like trying to balance two iron support beams twice your size while trying to make them fly. It was pretty depressing when I found that out, but I wasn’t one to let something keep me down for long.

“Oh... so does your body not have the strength to create the lift needed to fly? I guess that would make sense looking at their size compared to the rest of your body. Though I bet if you found some way of distributing the weight of the wings throughout the body or some kind of device to help handle the weight, you could be flying out there with the others.”.

Yet another thing this “Veronica” had in common with mine, her natural affinity for technology. If something was broken and had wires, levers, or any of the sort Veronica would know how to fix it, she even used to carry around a pistol just to break it so she could repair it when she was bored.

“I suppose so, but even if I had something like that, I would still have to figure out how to control my wings.” I motioned my body towards her, showing my massive wings, where she saw the large belt that kept my wings tucked against my body, but even then I could feel the tiny twitches and spasms of my wings trying to break free. “Its honestly like these wings have a mind of their own.”

“Interesting... you know that does remind me of this one unicorn I met while exploring the areas beyond Equestria. She had a broken horn that gave off sparks of magic randomly, kinda like how your wings act. We didn’t talk much beyond a simple greeting, so while I don’t know how she got that injury, she does give me an idea.”

It was a tiny relief for me to know that I wasn’t the only pony to suffer from things like this, but it was fleeting as I imagined what could have gotten a pony such an injury like that. But I then noticed that Sapphire’s eyes slightly widened followed by a tiny grin.

“I know an Earth Pony who is the best with metal and mechanical problems, and it just so happens that he lives here in Canterlot as a blacksmith.Want to go see him?”

It surprised me to learn that there was an earth pony living in Canterlot. From what I understood, Canterlot was a primary unicorn based city, not to say that pegasi or earth ponies didn’t come here, but so few non-unicorns actually resided full time in this city. It was just like the social classes on Earth, suppose some things do never change.

“We’re actually nearby his shop, and I do need to pick up my armor since one time a manticore thought it would be fun to bite holes and gashes into it while I was deep in the Everfree forest. Don’t ask how I managed got away, I would rather not say.”

“Eh, why not?”

After that we started to walk, going down the many roads of Canterlot. The smell of fresh, fancy kinds of food filled my nose, and the sound of snobby rich folk filled my ears as we passed by the many shops. After some time walking, We stopped in front of an odd shop. Now, most shops in Canterlot looked very visually similar, in both design and color, but this shop was just...odd. It was much taller than most of the other shops, dwarfing the biggest shops by around two or three stories, and it was just colored black, whereas all other shops used bright colors like white. Outside the shop stood rows upon rows of armor stands, each row wearing different armor. It ranged from the standard yet impractical royal guard armor to silver full plated suits, there were even sets of armor for what looked like griffins and yaks of all species. A huge sign hung above the door of the store, which read

“Smith’s Armor Emporium”
“protecting ponies for over a thousand years.”

“Must be a pretty successful business if its still in business after over a thousand years.”, I said, looking at one of the armor stands “Say, how well do you know this guy?”

“We met after I started working for the princesses, his family has pretty deep connections with the princess, so he was more than willing to be my sort of personal blacksmith.”, Sapphire explained, walking up to the door. “But don’t get the wrong idea, he still does custom orders for other ponies.”

I hurried up to her, making it to her just as she opened the door, to reveal that the inside had even more armor stands with even more unique sets of armor. It was practically like a maze trying to navigate through the shop, I wouldn’t be surprised if one of these days someone found a skeleton of some poor pony in here, but it seemed like Sapphire knew where to go, turning corners without hesitation. After some time we seemed to finally make it to the end of the maze, the sound of metal banging filling the room. When we turned another corner, we finally made it to the shop's owner. He was hard at work at a furnace, using his bare hooves to bend metal like he was using a hammer. But the moment I saw him, my jaw slightly dropped.

He was massive, almost as big as Big Mac from the looks of it, his shadow practically engulfing us. He had dark brown fur, yet strangely had no tail hair or a mane. He didn’t hear us come in from the looks of it, as he was still hammering the metal, so Sapphire gave a comically loud cough. Hearing the cough, he turned around to see the two of us, a big smile growing on his face when he saw Sapphire.

“Ah! Heart Breaker! How’s my favorite adventurer? Come here for your mithril armor? I just finished it yesterday!” He exclaimed, running over to Sapphire before hugging her.

It was then that I noticed something about him, something somewhat terrifying to me. On his right cheek was a massive scar, in the exact same position as Samuel Vare. He also sounded the exact same as Samuel, except he sounded more upbeat than his human counterpart, which was saying something. His eyes were actually different, being dark green instead of the normal light brown, which was odd. I mean, other than looking like she dunked herself in blue paint, Sapphire was almost perfectly identical to what Veronica looked like, but this stallion only had a couple of similarities to Samuel. I guess that was a part of the reason why I wasn’t as surprised to see him as I was with Sapphire, that and the fact that seeing pony versions of my closest friends starts to lose its shock value after the first time it happens. But I guess it was par for the course for me, not much shocks me anymore.

When I was a purifier, I quickly learned that fighting monsters and cults gets kinda boring. There are only so many ways you can put a twist on “Go to a place, find the monster, kill the monster” or “find the cult, infiltrate the cult, find the monster, kill the monster, kill cult leader”, so in time it became more of a chore than anything else. Veronica would constantly say that “We don’t kill abominations because it’s “fun”, we kill them because it’s our job.”, but I knew she was just as bored as I was. The same was true for when I first came here to Equestria, at first it was all mysterious and amazing, but after a while, I just kinda got used to my life here.

Once the massive Stallion let her go, Sapphire took a deep breath before talking. “Ah, Mithril, upfront as always I see.Yes, I have come for my armor, but also because I thought I would introduce someone to you. Signal Flare, meet Mithril Smith.”.

Mythril walked up to me, his gigantic size daunting, to say the least when up close, and bowed slightly at me. Looking at his him up close I could tell that something was clearly off about his hooves, they weren’t natural. All four of his hooves were made out of what appeared to be silver, but it couldn’t have been silver since I saw him bending what seemed to be steel with those hooves. Not wanting to look rude, I bowed back at him, trying to not stare at his hooves, only for him to laugh.

“Do not worry my pegasi friend, I am used to ponies staring at my strange hooves. I got them made after I got into a scuffle with a pack of Timberwolves when I went to Sweet Apple acres to get my hooves on some Zap Apples, they also gave me this scar on my cheek. But I doubt you came here to hear me talk about myself, why did you bring this Pegasi with you here Heart Breaker?”

Sapphire shrugged as Mithril walked over to her, engaging in small talk, but I wasn’t paying attention to that. What I was paying attention to was a specific set of armor on a nearby wall. Pony armor, or at least what was standard issue for the royal guard, seemed to be made with grandeur in mind instead of practicality, but this set was different. It was practically a full body suit of armor, the only part not covered in metal being the knee’s and elbows, which even then could be easily protected by a simple set of chainmail. The armor was entirely painted with a coat of chrome paint, unlike the normal royal guard armor which was ornate with gold and other such flashy colors, giving it a more dignified look. Now the worst part about the royal guard armor was that the helmets did exactly nothing to protect the face, with ninety percent of the helmet acting as one big open visor, making it useless in actual combat, but this one was SO different. Unlike the royal guards, the visor only covered the eyes, which even then were protected by what seemed to be stained glass, giving me a nostalgic throwback to when I was a Purifier and used the exact same kind of helmet. In fact, minus the advanced technology and color pallet, this suit was practically an inch for inch copy of the armor I used, how that was possible I had no idea.

“Say, Mithril, mind telling me about this certain set?” I asked, pointing at it.

“Hmm? Oh, that set. One day a while ago I was sent several crates worth of rare metal with schematics to make that suit and a massive bag of bits. Took me over a year to finish it, but when I was finally done making it, I realized that I had no address to send the armor to. Now it just sits there, gaining dust. Shame really, I had plenty of fun making it, but nopony is interested in it.”

I looked back at the armor, a look of determination on my face. “How much?” I asked, turning back around to face them. So far I’ve met both my wife and one of my closest friends in their pony forms, it didn’t take a genius to see that a pattern was forming. Since if my closest friends and loved one were showing up here, who was to say that my enemies would start to pop up? Over the years I made plenty of human enemies ranging from corrupt politicians, fallen purifiers, and even strange human/abomination hybrids, each of them a threat in their own right. And comparing them to the threats Equestria has faced in recent memory, they could even be greater threats than they were on Earth. I may have been a pegasus who couldn’t fly, but I wouldn’t just stand there while the villains I knew wreck havoc across the land. Besides, even if I was wrong, the suit looked freaking awesome anyway so it would be a cool keepsake to keep around the house.

Author's Note

Sorry if the ending felt kinda off, I originally had this chapter twice as long, but I felt like extra long chapters would be reserved for either fight scenes or final chapter so maybe the next chapter will come out sooner than I expected.