Eclipse

An explanation was certainly owed considering we had just dropped in without warning, literally, in this case, and dragged Mason into the absolute mess of a situation we were now in.

That said, it was going to have to wait. Now that the tense stand-off had passed, I move back to check on Lorrie. She’s still out, but her breathing is more natural, and the occasional twitch of her eyes tells me she’s probably close to waking. Considering just how poorly we were affected by the teleport, I find myself wondering if the side effects could indicate something far worse. That hazmat team had been picking it up as radiation. Was that just a fluke of the instruments trying to make sense of the magical energy, or had Luna unwittingly been irradiating us every time she used her horn? Of course with as strong of a reading as it produced for them to locate it from so far away, had that been the case, we would almost certainly have developed severe radiation sickness by this point. A small assurance, if not exactly confidence inspiring.

As if we don’t have enough to worry about as it is. I think bitterly. I’m so lost in my thoughts as I crouch next to Lorrie that I jerk when I hear the crunch of gravel next to me and look up to see Mason standing there.

“The fuck happened to her?” He asks as he takes a final drag from his cigarette before idly flicking away the butt.

Her condition had apparently spurred him to leave the relative safety of the doorway, but I notice that he keeps sneaking wary glances toward Luna. She was keeping a respectful distance, having settled down on her haunches where she’d stopped. Though she seems to be paying attention to us, her ears are flat to her head, and her wings droop limply at her sides. Okay, it’s obvious that she feels bad about losing her temper, but she had stopped herself. So why was she beating herself up over it this badly?

“Well…” I start. How the fuck could I even begin to explain this? “In short, we had feds after us.” I nod toward Luna. “Looking for her. She has some crazy powers, and teleported us all here, but apparently our bodies don’t like being magicked around. My head still fucking hurts, but she took it a lot worse this time.”

“Christ….” Mason breathes, somehow managing to look both sympathetic and disbelieving. “Well, let’s get her inside….”

He moves around to her head, motioning for me to grab her legs before glancing at Luna again. “You can wait here until I figure out what the fuck’s going on.”

“Mason….” I start to protest, but Luna cuts me off.

“No Dave, it is alright. I understand his distrust, and I believe a bit of solitude is just what I need right now.” She turns her attention to Mason. “I apologize again for my actions. Believe me when I say I do not mean you any harm.”

She offers him a regretful smile as she levitates up the dropped shotgun, giving it a disapproving look before floating it into the cabin and setting it down gently.

“Right, well that’s a start, err….Luna was it?”

She nods silently.

“Good. I’m glad we have an understanding here.”

Mason turns back to me. “Alright, ready? 1…2…3…lift!”

Between the two of us, it takes little effort to haul Lorrie off the ground and carry her into the cabin. Luna makes no complaints or comments as we pass by her, content to sit and watch idly. Though, I can’t help but notice her troubled expression and flattened ears. Why was she beating herself up so badly over this? Sure, things hadn’t gone as smoothly as we could have hoped for, but her response hadn’t been completely unjustified….

As we move inside, I’m instantly assaulted by the scent of burnt tobacco. The place is relatively small, mostly consisting of one big room that was a combination of an open kitchen and living space, with a loft for a bedroom overhead. A couple of doors branched off of the main area, one leading to a small bathroom, and the other to a second bedroom.

It had been several years since I’d been here, but I certainly couldn’t forget a number of us sharing that cramped room for the night after Mason had thrown a party to celebrate the cabin being completed.

One other thing that stands out is the head of a large buck mounted proudly just under the loft’s railing. That could be a problem. I hadn’t even mentioned to Luna that humans ate meat at all, and as soon as she came in that fact would be staring her in the face. Quite literally in this case.

But that would be an issue for later as we set Lorrie down on the large sectional couch that took up a good portion of the living room. At this point Mason is in full medic mode, his face set in a frown as he looks her over.

Now out of the dark, I’m able to get a better look at him. Not much had changed over the years, though he had grown his hair out a bit, to the point where the disheveled black locks nearly reached his shoulders. The same could be said about his beard. Though a bit more well groomed, it’s far longer than the short, styled look I remembered. Altogether, it gave him a wild look that made me think ‘mountain man.’

“Hmmph.” He snorts, finally breaking his concentration. “Well, she doesn’t seem too bad off as far as I can tell. Probably just needs to sleep off whatever the hell happened to her.”

As if trying to confirm his assessment, he snaps his fingers next to one of her ears, causing her to groan weakly and turn her head away from the sound. “But on that note, how exactly did you get into this mess anyway?”

“Well…”

I start from the beginning with the snowstorm, trying to rush through it as fast as I can without leaving out too many details. Mason ocasional butts in to ask for more details at a few points. Frustratingly, most of his questions are aimed at things I don’t understand all that well myself. Luna’s theory on how she’d gotten stuck here for example. It had been clear they were circumstances she didn’t fully understand herself, and as such my limited comprehension of magic, and parallel universes only muddles the topic further.

Curiosity and disbelief seem to fight for dominance on Mason’s face as I go on. The latter taking the lead when I mention our ‘alien’ comes from a world that bears a striking resemblance to a children’s cartoon.

By the time I wrap up our discovery by the government, and how they’d managed to find us by tracking Luna’s magic, he looks a bit more concerned. His frown only deepens as he sits in silence for several moments, apparently digesting everything I had gone over.

“Well, I should be able to find out if you were actually exposed to radiation or not.” He finally says as he gets to his feet. “But one thing just doesn’t sit right with me. Do you really think she’s telling the truth about being this ‘Princess Luna?’”

“What do you mean?” I question, fixing him with a puzzled look.

“What I mean is, she obviously looks the part, but how could it be possible that a cartoon is somehow an almost 100% accurate depiction of her world?”

He leans in close, lowering his voice to almost a whisper as if worried that she could somehow overhear us. “It would be the perfect disguise, right? For an alien I mean. They pick up our broadcasts, take a form that would be cute and familiar to us, and…..”

“And what?” I ask flatly. “I know it’s crazy, but come on….” I trail off. As ridiculous as his suspicion is, it does give me pause. Of course some kind of alien intelligence posing as a pony is ridiculous, but any more so than an entire fictional world being real? Sure, they say that sufficiently advanced technologies could be indistinguishable from magic, but why go through that effort just to deceive us? Nope. Somehow that’s even more ridiculous than ‘inter dimensional cartoon pony princess. Barely.

“Nah.” I continue. “She hasn’t given us any reason not to trust her or doubt her story.” And you really need to lay off the conspiracy forums. I silently add.

“Look. I have no love for the government, but you’re really prepared to throw everything away to help this ‘pony?’” Mason replies, forcing me to follow as he walks across the room to open up a closet and begins rummaging around.

“Pretty much already have…..not like I can just give up and go home at this point. Lorrie either. I really feel bad for forcing this on her…..if we leave now, it’s probably not too late for you….”

He brushes me off with a wave. “Don’t be ridiculous. You know I’d feel like shit if I just tossed the lot of you out in the cold like that….aha!””

With a look of satisfaction, he shifts a few items aside and pulls out a small handheld radiation meter. Because of course he had one of those.

Mason fiddles with the dials for a moment before passing it over me and watching the gauge intently.

“Hmm…well, whatever it is, it’s definitely not radiation.” He says as he finally pulls the meter away before moving over to repeat the process with Lorrie and getting the same result.

“Well, if you’re satisfied, can we get her in out of the cold now?” I ask, beginning to grow a bit irritated with his over cautiousness, despite my growing sense of relief at hearing I’m not about to die from radiation poisoning.

Mason doesn’t look up from his work as he shifts over to inspect his returned shotgun that now rested against the wall by the front door. He checks it with the radiation meter before shutting it off and setting it down.

He lets out a long sigh. “Might as well. Don’t want piss the alien off any more than I already have, right?”

“Hey! She not like that, and you shouldn’t call her an alien.” I retort angrily. Even if it is technically true.

“Alien, pony, whatever. Just because I agreed to help, doesn’t mean I have to like it.”

I suppress the urge to press the issue any further, instead simply pushing past him and heading back outside.

Having spent a good deal of time in the warm cabin without thinking to do much as take off my jacket, the cool night air feels refreshing as it washes over me.

A few clouds had moved in, bathed in a silver glow cast by the moon as they drift lazily across the sky. It doesn’t take long to find Luna. She had only moved a short distance to sit on the driveway rather than the damp ground, and is faced away from me, gazing idly up at the moon.

“Hey…” I greet softly as I approach.

“I take it that things have not progressed as smoothly as you had hoped.” She replies, not shifting her gaze. It’s not so much a question, as it is a statement of fact. Great, she’d probably heard a good portion of our conversation..

“He’s agreed to help at least. Reluctantly maybe, but it’s something.”

She lets out a distinctly horse-like snort in response to that.

I move up to stand beside her. Standing, she was only about chest height to me (if you don’t count her horn), but seated as she is puts us nearly eye to eye. Though she still doesn’t move, I notice an ear swivel toward me.

“Why are you being so hard on yourself for going off on him anyway? I mean, he was….”

She holds up a hoof to silence me. “Because, the last time I let my emotions get the better of me. My anger. My jealousy……I gave in and let them take over completely. I became corrupted….broken down until I was no more, and Nightmare Moon stood in my place. I turned on my subjects, and my own sister….nearly killing her for my own selfish desires. I may have been a prisoner in my own mind, but I still remember every detail, every action, and it is not something I wish to relive….something I cannot allow to happen again.”

Okay…that’s a damn good reason. I hadn’t seen much of Nightmare Moon in the episodes I’d watched with Lorrie, though she had filled me in on some of the details. Though seeing the depth of pain and regret in Luna’s eyes as she spoke, I doubt the family friendly program could’ve done it justice.

Yeah, I had pain and regrets about things I had done in my life. Hell, I could even say people had gotten killed because of me. Of course, my actions hadn't threatened the fate of the world itself, but I can’t help but feel a strange sense of sympathy toward her. I’m torn between a desire to drown myself in alcohol until it’s pushed out of my mind, and an urge to hug her close and wish for it all to be better.

Without thinking, I find myself draping an arm across her shoulders and pulling her close. To my surprise, I feel a long feathery wing curl around me and hug me back. She had hugged me in the dreamworld before, but as we sit there held closely together, it becomes clear that it couldn't compare. It couldn't replicate just how warm her body is, or how soft her coat feels against my skin. I can even feel her soft breaths begin to calm as we sit there, followed shortly by the gradual slowing of her rapid heartbeat until it fades to a dull, steady rhythm. We're all stressed, but I feel she needs this more than any of us. The odd one out, with no one but strange alien creatures to turn to for reassurance or comfort. Things were almost certainly going to get worse before they got better, but that's not something we need to think about right now. No more words are shared between us as we simply sit there and watch the moon, the cause and possible solution to everything we're facing, make its way innocently across the night sky. Having spent so much of my life focused on work and pursuits that now seemed so trivial in comparison, I had never taken the time to appreciate just how beautiful it was.