JUL 10 Friday.

I stare at the two mares in front of me thinking about what they just told me. :Why the fuck?: To say I'm confused would be an understatement.

My second thought is suspicion and concern, this reaction is so sudden that I can't stop my face from showing a slight frown before returning to normal. These two are probably Changelings and maybe criminals, bringing them near Celestia puts me on edge. Celestia is a friend and becoming one of my close friends, I won't just put her in danger. But after a moment I squash those thoughts.

Celestia is far more capable than me in almost every way, she doesn't need my protection and I should really be more worried about myself right now. So what do I do? I think it's still best if I bring them to Celestia, yes there is risk but this entire situation has risk and she's better equipped to handle this.

At least they will come willingly instead of me having to trick or foalnap them. But that brings up a new problem, how do I get them to Celestia? I could just tell a guard, but I don't have any proof that I know the princess on me. We could just walk to the palace, but that's going to take a long time.

If I did either of these then I'd need proof or time and I'm short on both, and if I had to pick I'd go with option one. But if I need to go home and get proof they have to come with me, so why not just have Entropy take us all right to Celestia? Well, I'd have to reveal Entropy and where I live to two unknowns.

But as long as I get them to Celestia they won't be able to use that knowledge against me. All my options are far from desirable, but I think heading home and having Entropy take us to Celestia is the safest option for us. That and I recognize the cafe we are in, and my home is a lot closer than the palace is from here.

With a rough plan worked out and a silent moment to steel my frayed nerves. I really don't want them coming home with me, but it's by far my safest option even if some things are revealed, but secrets don't matter if you're dead. And considering I don't know who's after us they might try to kill me. Once my mind is made up I look over at the mares across from me and speak.

I spent almost a full minute thinking this through while staring them down, and both of them were clearly uncomfortable at this point. "Why do you need to meet the princess? Why is this important enough to need her help instead of the guards?" They seem a little relieved that I finally spoke, and they look at each other again.

After a moment the unicorn mare speaks. "We need her help, and going to the guards isn't an option. We... We need a chance to explain a few things and we don't think the guards will hear us out, but the princess might." She goes silent again and the pegasus breaks the silence.

"We don't have time for this, here is this enough to prove it's important?" The pegasus seemed to have lost her patience in her worry and does something very surprising. She holds a hoof in between her and the unicorn mare so nopony else but I can see it.

Then there is a slight flourish of green flame and her hoof turns black, I can see the holes in her limb as the black chitin reflects some light. I struggle in-between pretending to show surprise and keeping my calm and stony facade up, In the end I settle for widening my eyes slightly and raising my brows.

"Cherry! By magic, what are you thinking?" The unicorn scolds her while glancing around to make sure nopony saw what happened.

"He's definitely not a normal pony, you saw how well he's handled all of this, he barely even reacted to my hoof. And they could find us again any time now, we don't have time to argue about this." She explains quickly with zero patience, before looking back to me. "It's a matter of life and death, can you help us? Please?" She's basically pleading with me at this point, she even has a slightly pleading look.

And her look and tone of voice do pull on my heartstrings a little, but I keep my blank face and don't respond for a moment. After pretending to think about it, I answer her. "Yes." I see the pegasus look hopeful and the unicorn looks surprised at my answer. "But to do that we need to find somewhere safe, I live nearby but that means we need to get there safely and without being followed."

The unicorn looks suspicious at my answer. "I'm thankful for the help, but why do we need to go to your home? Why not the palace?"

I don't take offense to her suspicions and just answer, but I need them to come with me to my home. "I can help you, but we can't just walk up to the palace and knock. But if we get to my home I have a way to send a message to somepony higher up, and they can help us all more than I can." I lie about needing to inform some superior, she stares me down for several moments before slowly nodding.

I could probably just take us all to the palace, but we're still being hunted and the longer we walk around the more dangerous it is. So I'm lying to get them to follow me home, from there I can get us to Celestia easily. I have no problem lying to these two for our safety.

I look over at the other mare who also nods her agreement. "Ok then, we'll all walk out in a moment. Keep your eyes open for anypony following us, if you do see anypony tell me but don't make it obvious." I don't say anything else and just stand up to walk over to the counter and pay our bill.

They stand up from the booth and wait for me by the door, and a minute later we are walking through the dark streets of Canterlot. While we walk I make sure to focus on my life magic while I think about what I've learned so far. Well, I can say for certain that these two are Changelings.

And that they are probably being hunted by other Changelings, if the bracelets I saw on all of the ponies that chased us mean anything. I have no idea what is happening, but the fact that they are going to Celestia with the deliberate intention of revealing what they are is good enough for me to somewhat trust them, just a little bit. Mostly because you only take a risk like this unless you have no other option left.

But the idea of Changelings fighting other Changelings brings up even more questions. I thought they all lived under the rule of Chrysalis, so this is either some of her Changelings defecting, or there is more than one hive of Changelings. I have no idea what the implications of that second idea are, but either way things are going to get really messy soon.

It's not too late and the sun only set a short while ago, so the streets are still decently full of ponies and well-lit. That's good for us, makes it easier to blend into the small crowds. I'm very on edge as we walk, so it doesn't take me long to notice we're being followed again.

I only sense one source of life magic this time, but we've turned down a few streets now and it's still following us. I don't turn but speak to the two mares behind me, "Don't react, just keep walking like nothing is wrong. You understand?"

After a moment the unicorn voice answers me, "Yes we understand, but why?"

"We're being followed again." I hear a slight misstep from one of them, but nothing else happens and we keep walking. "I think there is only one of them, and we need to get rid of them before we get to my home." Neither of them responded to me voicing my concerns.

I'm forming a rough plan as we keep walking. There is only one of them, which probably means they are either following us to find out where we are heading and then going to report back to somepony, or they are keeping an eye on us while somepony else gets reinforcements. Either way, we need to get rid of them fast.

As we walk I see an alleyway, it could work but it will be a big risk. Not seeing a better option I voiced my plan, "We'll head into that alleyway and hope they follow us, if they do we will jump them and try to knock them out."

The voice that speaks up first is the pegasus. "Really? That's the plan? Buck! Fine." She seems less than enthusiastic about my plan and so am I. The unicorn doesn't answer me, but she also doesn't voice any disagreement. We turn into the alley and start looking around.

A few trash bins on the left, and two wooden crates on the right with a few feet of room in between, both are several dozen feet down the alleyway. "You two hide behind those, I'll hide behind the crates," I say while pointing at the trash bins. They give me unsure looks but still do as I instruct, they must really be desperate to go along with me so much with so few questions.

We hide as best we can, and I feel the source of life magic nearing the alley entrance. I peek out from a small gap in between the two wooden crates and see an uninteresting unicorn stallion. He looks down the alley and curses. "Buck they ran." He says just loud enough for me to hear him.

He is starting to speed up while moving down the alleyway, but just as he nears where we are hiding he looks at the trash bins, after a moment he starts to skid to a stop and backpedal. :FUCK, he saw something: I don't have time to plan and just jump out with my dagger held to my side in my field.

At the same time the two mares also move, they push the trash bins out of the way and throw something at him, but it misses. The stallion is not too surprised having seen something that tipped him off already, but at this point we're too close for him to run down the empty alley without cover. I see his mouth open with a light hiss and do the first thing that comes to mind, I've never used my field on another pony before, but let's see what happens.

I try to grab one of his four hooves and pull it to the side as hard as I can. Turns out I overdid it, I heard a slight crack and the pony fell to the floor with a pained shout, I don't give myself time to think about what I just did and rushed over to him.

The problem is I'm not sure how to knock a pony or changeling out, last time was pure luck. I may be stressed, worried and running on pure adrenalin at this point, but I don't want to kill them by accident. I lunge at him and try to wrestle him to the ground to restrain him, but he fights back and takes a swing at me with his good foreleg.

I duck under it and backup a little as the stallion gets his footing under him, but while dealing with me he wasn't paying much attention to the mares. The pegasus mare takes advantage of this mistake and rushes over quickly to him before taking a swing at him.

Her form is horrible and the swing is sloppy, but the stallion is disoriented and in pain, so he doesn't see the mares rushing at him until it's too late to move out of the way. The mare is probably running off a lot of adrenaline and fear right now, and that helps her hit him surprisingly hard.

The blow lands square on the side of his head and lays the stallion out on the cold street, he doesn't get up for a few seconds as we all wait with bated breath. Once he doesn't move for a while I cautiously walk over and start checking on him, I hit him lightly on the chest but get no reaction. And then I push on his injured leg a little just to make sure he's not faking it, but still no reaction.

He's still breathing so I guess he's knocked out or has a concussion, I'm not one hundred percent sure but I think so. I look over to the two mares and see that they are both fine, the unicorn looks shaken but ok, and the pegasus looks a little worried. I've felt what she's probably feeling before and tried to calm her down, "He's just unconscious, but we need to move now."

He's seen us and we can't just leave him here. His disguise, transformation? Doesn't matter, the point is he still looks like a pony and that gives me an opportunity. The stallion is smaller than me so I haul him over my shoulder and place his belly down on top of my back. The mares looked confused at my actions, "We're near my home, if we leave him here he could wake up and they could start looking around this area."

I go quiet trying to force my tired mind to form an excuse as to why we're carrying around an unconscious stallion, but I come up with nothing. So I do the only thing I can and turn to the two mares. "Can either of you think of an excuse as to why I'm carrying around an unconscious stallion?"

Asking for help does take away some of my calm and in-control facade, but I need ideas and I've reached my limit on improvising bull shit on the fly. After a moment the pegasus speaks up, "We could say he's drunk and that we found him like this somewhere?"

The unicorn cuts in. "No, if a guard stops us they might ask us to take him to a hospital or to come with them. We could say he's our friend who got too drunk and needed to be carried home with us?" She offers.

I roll that idea around in my head for a moment before nodding to them. "It will have to work, come on we're close now," I say while walking towards the entrance of the alley.

It's not the best idea but I can work with it, and I'm sure as hell not leaving him here. I think of something else and look over to them, "One of you sticks close to me and tells me if he starts to wake up or moves, you have to keep a close eye on him." I stress the second part as the mares look at each other.

I start walking out of the alley and the unicorn walks up next to me, while the pegasus follows right behind us. My apartment isn't far now and it will only take a few minutes at most, but my luck has been shit today and it's not changing now. Two guards on patrol are down the street from us and coming closer.

The mares also see them and start to look concerned. "Let me do the talking, and back up my story if they ask you anything," I tell them without stopping in my stride. My mind is getting tired of the constant worry and faking my calm while shoving down my constraint panic and fear.

This entire thing has brought my mind to its limit and I'm not sure how much longer I can keep this all up. As I expect the guards to see us and walk up to us, I greet them with a tired look and a slight nod. "Ya, we know," I say impatiently, the guards look confused and a little annoyed at my words, I then pretend to look embarrassed about what I just said.

"Sorry, we've had three other guards come up to us and ask about him." They seem to look less annoyed when I explain that with an embarrassed tone.

"And what is going on with him?" The guard asks while looking at the stallion, they don't seem that suspicious, more curious than anything.

I give an exaggerated sigh. "My friend here isn't the smartest. We all went out for a fun dinner night and some drinks, me and those two" I say while pointing at the mares, who are doing a decent job of looking just as tired and done with this as I am. "Needed to go and grab something from her home" I pointed to the unicorn mare. "And when we came back my brick brain of a friend had gotten himself drunk."

As I start explaining this like I've explained it three times before, the guards start looking even less annoyed and more amused. "We came back to a bill and him nearly blacked out at the bar. So we decided to drag him home with us and let him sleep it off, but he was too drunk to walk straight so I've been carrying his flank for a few blocks now.

I say all of this in a, I'm fucking done with this shit, tone of voice, as I talk I keep sounding more and more annoyed at my supposed friend. "And he fell asleep as we walked." Once I'm done with my explanation one of the guards lets out a slight chuckle, but cuts it short by a look from their partner.

The guard looks at me and nods. "Sorry for bothering you, but it's just something we need to do when we see things like this. Are you near your home?" The guard asks.

I nod to them tiredly. "Ya not far now, a block or two at most."

They give me a slight smile and nod. "Get home safe." The guard seems amused but is also serious about his goodbye. I just give them a tired nod and start walking again, after we're a decent distance away I hear the guards faintly laughing. We keep walking in silence before finally mercifully arriving at my apartment building.

The two mares with me seemed to have relaxed some when they saw we were actually going to an apartment building. I have to trudge up the stairs with the stallion on my back, and it takes several minutes to reach the right floor. Once we reach my door I take out my key and open the door. "Don't touch anything." I tiredly tell them before entering and turning off the shield around my apartment.

I leave the front door open and walk into my apartment. :So close to safety, but still not there yet: I remind myself while dropping the stallion on the floorboards like a sack of potatoes. I turn to the mares, "Watch him, if he starts to wake up, hit him until he stops." I no longer have the energy to keep a professional tone and just start walking to my bedroom.

As expected Entropy is sleeping on my bed and looks rather mad that I'm home so late. I whisper to her while closing the door behind me, "Quiet, we have guests." I tell her before she can make a sound, I immediately cast the illusion spell on her and motion for her to climb on my back.

I quickly take out some paper and ink before writing a short note to Celestia.

I don't have time to fully explain, I have two mares with me and an unconscious stallion.

I'll explain more when we arrive. Send guards to the room Entropy delivers mail to along with a medic. I'll have Entropy take us there exactly fifteen minutes after Entropy returns. When we get there I need to talk to you without them present before anything else.

Once it's done I look over to Entropy. "Do you remember Celestia's bedroom?" I ask Entropy quietly, she tilts her head and gives me an uncertain look. "Philomena knocked me over for grapes." I try to use an example to jog her memory, and after that she gives me a nod and a quiet chirp in response.

"Good, take this there now. Only give it to Celestia and nopony else, If she's not there, start looking around." She looks at me and takes the letter in her beak. "Come back right after you give it to her." And after a moment Entropy disappears with the hastily written note.

Once she's gone I walk back into the main room and check on the stallion, he's still breathing and out cold. After that I turned to the mares, "I sent a message, we'll be leaving in fifteen minutes." They both look a little skeptical but still nod to me. They haven't said much this whole time and I think it's them not trusting me, but that's fine we're nearly in the clear anyway.

They sit down while looking around my home, it's a little uncomfortable having them here, but we'll be gone soon enough. It's the most tense wait of my life, I'm constantly thinking about how things could go wrong. But thankfully it doesn't take long for Entropy to return and fly out of my bedroom before landing on my back.

The mares stare at Entropy for a few moments but don't question me about her. I check the time with a spell while taking the small torn piece of paper from her claws. We'll be ready, stay safe. I smile at it and look at the mares.

We watch each other and the stallion while waiting in dead silence. The minutes stretch out unbearably long, but eventually, it's time to go. I tiredly pick the stallion up again and look at the mares, "There are three things you'll need to remember before we leave." They look confused again but nod for me to continue.

"One, this will feel very odd, and it's very important that you don't panic" I let that sink in before containing. "Two, don't attack anypony or make any sudden moves when we arrive. Three, be very respectful." They still look a little lost and confused but both nod again after sharing an unsure look. "Good." I walk up next to them and turn to Entropy, "All of us to the mailroom." Entropy is silent as she looks at the mares and back to me.

Two full minutes of nothing happening, and right before the mares are about to ask something, everything goes completely black.

Author's Note

Thanks for reading. :}