the Six Heroes

Several days have gone by since the incident in Canterlot where the conflict with Dragonface ended, and from what the six humans heard from Twilight after the incident involving the old Un-Natural, Canterlot Castle is still going under re-construction, and the families of those who were killed during the whole thing were still grieving for their losses. Even Celestia and Luna were still feeling somber about the whole ordeal, not just because of their home being nearly destroyed, or the lives of many of their guards and castle staff had died, but they were also still heartbroken that Dragonface ended his own life. The six humans also still felt bad for their fellow Un-Natural, as they knew what he was going through, and did wish there was another way for him. Over the course of the following days when the group returned to Ponyville, the group have marginally recovered from the events in Canterlot, but the humans could tell that Twilight and the others were still dishearten about the whole thing. During the few days when the group returned to town, the humans managed to find themselves steady employment after looking around, and with Twilight and the others helping them in getting hired. Or actually having ponies of the town approach them and offer them jobs.

~~~~~

Steel decided to take up Granny Smiths offer to work on the farm, and even gotten a room to live in down at the Apple Families house, and almost immediately proven to be a great worker to the family on his first day. It was interesting for Steel to see how Applejack, & her big brother Big Mac got the apples off the trees, just by kicking them. He was honestly surprised that the siblings didn’t seem affected by the act of fully kicking a tree, or that the tree itself doesn’t show signs of being damaged. When Applejack challenged Steel to try bucking the trees, Steel accepted the challenge and gave one of the trees a sweeping side kick, and the moment that he kicked it all of the apples started falling off of the trees branches. In another challenge Steel really surprised the two ponies when he used his power, and with a simple hardcore stomp on the ground, caused twelve nearby trees to lose all their apples. Needless to say, the Apples were able to gather their namesake fruits a whole lot faster than usual, and have more free time. Aside from gathering apples Steel also helped out around the farm, from doing chores, help in gathering crops from the fields, and handling any repairs that need to be done.

~~~~~

While Steel began working down at the farm, Plasma still lives at the inn until the six’s own custom-made house was built. And when it came to work, it was actually one of the towns ponies that approached him, and offered a job. So for the past two days Plasma has been working at the towns local general store, which was called Barnyard Bargains, and his boss Filthy Rich seems to be a pretty fair and decent guy to work for. At least for the time being. The only major problem that the young man had while working at the store, was Filthy Rich’s wife and daughter who frequently came to the store to check how things were going, both of which were just great big drama queens and the type of people that you’d just want to really punch in the face. the two of them were just so grading to be around, as they made passive-aggressive comments towards any customers that came in, or towards Plasma himself. So the young man tries to avoid the pair as much as he could, it also helped that Filthy Rich was quick to scold his wife and daughter when their foul attitudes rose up.

~~~~~

It was no surprise that Circus decided to work at Sugarcube Corner. In fact, when the Cakes learned that the humans were looking for work, they basically offered the job when Circus came in for a muffin one day. Now the blonde haired human lives at the bakery, and actually shares Pinkie’s room which was perfectly alright for the pink mare, as she basically described the whole situation as a permanent slumber party. And despite the room not being big enough for a second bed, Circus just uses his power to separate portions of his body, and places them around the room. With his head laying on the spare pillow on Pinkie’s bed. Aside from his living situation, Circus proved to be very useful whether he was manning the front counter and dealing with customers, or in the kitchen learning and helping with the baking. Circus even taught the Cakes & Pinkie on how to make various treats from Earth. Humans maybe a bit jaded and judgmental, but they know how to make awesome pastries.

~~~~~

Much like Plasma, Wave also still lived at the inn despite even having Twilight offering him her guest room down at the library. When it came to work Wave was approached by a blue earth pony stallion named Noteworthy, who heard that he was looking for a job, and offered him one at the little store that he works at, which was a music store that has on-and-off employees for the most part. But he was offered a full-time employment if he accepted. Wave decided to accept the offer and started working down at the music store, and over the course of the past few days he met the other employees who turned out to be all mares. One was an earth pony that could pass as a British girl named Octavia, then there was a white unicorn that looked like she’s trying to be a DJ’s mascot called Vinyl, and the third employee was actually Lyra. And needless to say when that mare learned that Wave was going to be working at the shop, Lyra became another permanent employee. Whether this was good or bad is up in the air.

~~~~~

Unlike Wave who declined the offer, Snap was more than happy to take Twilight’s offer to live at the library, which made the unicorn very happy. Though the first night wasn’t exactly a quiet night, as the unicorn still had so many questions to ask about the six, and their old world. As for Snap finding work, it was actually Lyra who offered him a job when Wave told her the situation that he and his friends were in. Well, not so much as offer a job, but pointed Snap in a direction where he could get one. Lyra brought the young man to a small candy shop in the midst of the towns shopping district, which is owned and operated by Lyra’s friend and housemate, a cream colored earth pony named Bonbon. At first the mare was a little un-certain about the prospect of hiring Snap, but after a small trial period Bonbon agreed to hire him, and the two started working together. And while his new boss was a little stiff and a bit formal, Snap could tell that she’s a good person.

~~~~~

Lastly there was Burner. Surprisingly to everyone, he was actually living with Fluttershy at her cottage, and it was even more surprising to learn that it was actually Fluttershy who offered him the free room. Now of course Burner wasn’t exactly thrilled about all of the animals that lived at the cottage, especially when various critters kept poking, prodded, and studied him. the worst of the animals was Fluttershy’s pet rabbit, Angel Bunny who kept a close eye on the young man, like he was waiting for Burner to do something terrible. But the cottage was certainly a nice and quiet place, when the animals have calmed down enough, or Fluttershy asked them nicely to leave him alone. When Burner went out to look for work he seemed to be the odd one out, as he couldn’t find anything, or has had a pony offer him a job. But on his second day a mare offered him a job as a waiter at the local restaurant called the Prancing Pony, which Burner accepted and did his work dutifully. Though he still seemed a bit standoff-ish around the ponies of the town, which still made a lot of them feel uneasy around. him

~~Present Day~~

Today was the seventh day since the six humans have started their jobs and making plans for their new lives, and so far things have been going rather smoothly, and the six were actually enjoying the state of their new lives greatly. They didn’t have to hide any longer from the general public, or risk having been found by the Collectors, or being taken to one of the many facilities to be housed and caged like rats for governmental experiments. It was still hard for them to try and get used to living in this new world of talking equines, as they were still adjusting to being around these four feet tall multi-colored talking ponies, who had such human-like qualities to them. But it’s just something the guys will have to get used to, and who knows, maybe one of these days the six could possibly—

“What did you say Circus?! You’re honestly thinking about hooking up with a mare?” Wave asked with a clear shocking tone in his voice, and sharing the same dumbfounded expression that the other four guys around him and Circus were wearing on their faces. Circus just shrugged his shoulders before speaking back up.

“Well it’s not like there’s any human girls in this world, and I doubt any of you want to remain single for the rest of your lives, right?” Circus asked the others getting mixed mumbles, and nods from his friends who still looked a bit apprehensive to what Circus was implying. “Plus you can’t deny that the mares are pretty cute.”

“There’s no denying that fact.” Steel said before taking a bite of his egg salad sandwich. “I mean it’s like they evolved to be biologically cute.”

“Yeah but…can you guys really find one of these mares attractive enough to date one, and maybe one day…you know.” Snap commented as he left his question up in the air, causing all six guys to wonder in how would dating a pony would be like. Or even going further than that if an actual relationship with one progressed far enough?

“We’ll cross that bridge when one of us comes to it.” Plasma remarked as he shook his head of a weird image that was forming, which the others nodded their heads to.

“In the meantime though let’s just try to get by, and try not to get fired from any of our jobs, yeah?” the other chuckled at Plasma’s words while nodding in agreement, or giving some other form of affirmation. Burner then turned away from his friends and looked up towards Canterlot, a questioning look starting to develop on his face.

“How do you think things are going up there?” Burner asked no one in particular as the others looked from their park picnic table towards the far off mountain city.

“Who knows. Twilight says that things are coming along fine, but nothing concrete on how the ponies up there feel.” Snap said before finishing off the veggie burrito with stir fried vegetables in it. After swallowing the food, Snap groaned as he runs a hand through his hair.

“Man I really miss eating meat, I don’t know how vegetarians can get full on just this stuff.”

“You know there is a forest nearby that we could go hunting in.” Steel simply stated, while pointing at the Everfree forest that’s literally a stone’s throw away from the park they’re all sitting in.

“But won’t the ponies have a problem with us eating meat?” Wave asked sounding a bit cautious about the prospect.

“They’ll just have to get used to it. Cause wither they like it or not, we need meat.” Burner simply said as he gets up from his spot at the table. “You guys gonna join me.”

The rest of the guys looked at each other for a brief moment, before they all nodded in agreement. Whether or not the ponies would be alright with this, the six humans needed their intake of meat, though it has been a while since the group actually had to haunt something, which was a few years when they first ran away from their homes, and met up while on the run from the Collectors and the government.

~~Canterlot~~

A myriad of ponies were hovering around the entrance of Canterlot Castle, watching the guards and construction ponies working on the holes in the castle walls, and as well as any infrastructure damage, but they were also trying to get any information out of the guards. But the guards weren’t saying anything to the ponies. As for the castle itself, it was nearly fully re-built with having the holes being fixed, and any halls inside the castle were almost finished in being renovated. While the re-construction of the castle was still underway, Celestia and Luna were in the midst of finishing up with various letters, half for members of family of any deceased ponies, and the other half was for funeral arrangements for said deceased ponies. And while the kill count was only twelve ponies that weren’t either burnt or mauled to death, there were many more ponies that were missing among both the castle staff & royal guards. All of whom Celestia assumed were the ones that Dragonface had ate.

The aged alicorn was still in a distraught and sadden state, not as bad as the first few days after the incident, but her mood was still down, and the private funeral for Dragonface didn’t help Celestia’s emotional state at all. She still felt that Dragonface could’ve been helped, and showed that he could have a more peaceful life in Equestria. He could’ve have been saved from himself, become a more mentally and emotionally healthier being, and not be afraid of his powers. But after witnessing the old human actually take his own life, not even hesitating to do it, the alicorn still couldn’t get the image of Dragonface twisting his head, and breaking his neck out of her mind! But what really made the old Unnatural death even sadder, was what Plasma said. His words echoed in her head whenever she thought about Dragonface.

“You can’t save everyone princess, especially if they don’t want your help because they believe they are beyond redemption and salvation.” Celestia sighed as she fold’s the last letter to the funeral hall, before teleporting it to its specified destination. Once the letter was sent Celestia just sat there at her desk, and stared at her hooves. As she sat there and staring at her hooves the solar princess didn’t notice that the door to her office being opened, or that somepony was trotting up to her, she only took notice when she felt the intruder nuzzling up to her.

“Sister. How are you feeling?” the voice of Luna asked as Celestia turned to look at the midnight alicorn, a small frown etched on her face before she leaned into her sisters nuzzling.

“I am not entirely certain Luna. After this whole, debacle, I am unsure how I feel.” Celestia somberly said as she removed herself from her sister. “It’s just, never have I come across ANY creature that would willingly end its own life. I just, don’t know how to fully handle that.”

“I feel your dismay sister. Never have I witnessed such a thing as well, but…” Luna lamented as a calm breath left her as she tried to collect her thoughts.

“We cannot dwell on past events we can’t change; all we can do is move forward and ensure atrocities such as this never happen again.” Celestia took a sharp inhale before slowly letting out a steady breath while she rubbed her face with one of her wings.

“You’re right Luna. Thank you.” Both sister smiled at each other before nuzzling one another again. And just as the pair were about to leave Celestia’s private office the door exploded open.

“You’re majesties!” a pegasus guards mare came flying towards the two royals, followed by another pegasus who was a stocky and somewhat chubby stallion, both of which had rather worrisome looks etched on their faces.

“What’s wrong my little ponies?” Celestia asked the two pegasi as they skidded to a stop in front of the two royals, with the stallion catching his breath while bowing.

“Names Cover Headline, reporter for the…give me a minute to catch my breath.” The stallion, Cover Headline, wheezed for a minute before managing to recompose himself and continued on with his introduction.

“Sorry. My name is Cover Headline, I’m a reporter for the Manehatten Trumpet news agency. And I’m here because I believe there is a monster lurking in the city!” both sisters looked at each other with slight worried expressions before looking back to the two pegasi.

“What do you mean by monster? And do you have proof?” Celestia asked and instantly the stallion nodded his head before he began rustling through his saddlebags.

The stallion then fished out a folder and offered it to the alicorns, where Luna took the folder in her magical aura and upon opening it found letters, letters of missing ponies, accounts of odd sightings throughout a district of the city. And two photographs of large clusters of rats with something, else amongst them. Neither sister could tell what the odd thing was while they were studying the picture. It was certainly big that much is certain, but other than its overall mass, its features were bearably visible due to the picture being very blurry, or not in focused. But one thing was very clear, the glowing red spots in the picture were probably the creatures eyes. and they gave both alicorns a tiny chill course down their spines.

“Headline? What is this, thing?” Luna asked as she kept the folder levitated between her and her sister, who was still studying the pictures, and reading over the letters.

“We don’t know princess. But I, along with two of our other free-lance photographers, caught sight of this thing in the downtown district. And as you look through the notes, and this map of Manehatten—” Cover Headline said as he pulled out a map of the city from his saddlebags, which had various redlines and circles drawn in a tight cluster in the district in question.

“The sightings of this thing, and the missing ponies, all converge on this section of the city.”

“What do you think sister? Should we investigate?” Luna asked her sister who nodded in response.

“Yes.” Celestia said as she neatly places everything back into the folder, and offered it back to the stallion. She then looked at the guard mare. “What is your name my little pony?”

“Feather Squall ma’am!” the mare said professionally as she saluted to the alabaster princess.

“Feather Squall, I would like you and one other guard to investigate this matter. Mister Cover, can you provide aide to the selected guards for this assignment?”

“Of course princess, besides, I can’t let this whole thing slide by on my watch!” the stallion proclaimed as he also saluted to the princess, which Celestia nodded in thanks before calling any & all guards in her immediate vicinity to gather around her. And within a minute only one guard was close enough to answer the summon and showed up before the princesses, who was then briefed on what the mission she was asking them to undertake.

~~Manehatten~~

After the briefing in Canterlot Cover Headline and Feather Squall headed off to Manehatten, accompanied by their new partner, an earth pony stallion named Dusty Trail, and after an hour and a half of traveling by train the trio have made it to Manehatten. Once they have docked at the train station they all immediately went to the downtown district where these sightings, and reports of missing ponies were congregated were focused in. Following the map, and the letters that listed the specific locations, the three ponies were currently checking the neighborhood that had the most sightings of the supposed monster and the missing ponies. The neighborhood wasn’t as rundown looking like the ones they passed along the way, but it wasn’t exactly a hot spot with activity as there wasn’t exactly a lot of ponies out & about, which was pretty good in hindsight. Because when news of a monster kidnapping ponies, said other ponies no longer left their homes or traveled in this district as the day went on.

“So Cover, where are we going exactly?” Dusty asked the pegasus as he followed behind the two winged ponies.

“We’re heading to the last reported sighting, and hopefully we can find a clue or something for the princesses.” Cover said as he, and the two guards rounded a street corner, and were immediately hit with a foul smelling odor.

“OH MY CELESTIA! What is that—URG!” Feather swallowed the bile that made its way up to her mouth, as her nose was hit with the smell of rotten eggs that’s been marinated in skunk juices, and left in the boiling hot sun to rot. And it was just as bad for the stallions as the mare, as they tried to cover their noses to block out the smell.

“Is this a normal smell in the city?” Dusty asked as he tries to keep his nose plug. Cover shook his head while using his wings to try and keep the smell out of his own nose, which was becoming an act of futility.

The ponies then heard something, probably a trash can, get knocked over from the end of the street. When the ponies looked to where the sound came from, which indeed was a trash can, they saw the briefest of shadows swoosh by the adjacent wall. Thinking that they might have saw the monster, Feather & Dusty leapt to action, with Cover following behind them, and the trio headed down a cramped alleyway as they chased after the shadow. And as the ponies were going through the alleyway they continued to smell that horrible smell, challenging them to keep whatever they had ate for breakfast in their stomachs. But as the ponies exited the alleyway, and galloped down the left lane of the street, a pair of glowing red eyes watched from a nearby storm drain before vanishing into the murky darkness.