Brothers or Strangers

Chapter Four

The Beast

It was a normal day for the ponies in Canterlot, though rumours of a disturbance of peace in the eastern part of the city, that caused quite a bit of damage to several shops and other buildings. Something about a disagreement between a unicorn and an alicorn.

Suddenly a pony rushed through the crowd of ponies that were standing in the street; they didn’t even get time to react when another pony pushed his way through.

Soundflux tried to get away from Aura who had been chasing him tirelessly for about half an hour now, running all over Canterlot. Soundflux suddenly got a “brilliant” idea.

“What if I lure him into an alley and just as he’s about to catch me I’ll be of into the air” Soundflux thought to himself with a smug grin on his face.

Aura had to slow down to be able to make the turn into the alley.

It was a dead end, just as Soundflux had hoped. He backed up against the wall and tried to look as scared as he could.

“I got you now you, hat thief” Aura said as his horn started to glow with its usual green hue.

“Can’t we talk about this?” Soundflux said.

“It’s too late for negotiations” Aura said as he fired a small fireball at Soundflux, only to scare him.

Unfortunately Soundflux saw it at another point of view; to him it looked as if he had launched one of his usual fireballs. And without thinking he put as much as he could between him and the ball of fiery death, however, the only thing he managed to get between them was Aura’s top hat, instantly burning the entire top of it while setting fire to the rest.

Now Soundflux was staring, through the burning remains of what was once a hat, right at a unicorn, staring right back at him with anger in his eyes.

“Uh oops?” Soundflux said sheepishly.

“You... Are... Dead...”

“N-Now hold on just a minute, it wasn’t me who burned the hat”

“I DON’T CARE!!!” Aura yelled as he fired a large jet of green fire at Soundflux. “Aw shoot” Soundflux said as he bolted to the air, barely dodging it.

“You know, I’ll just meet you at the train station” Soundflux said as he looked down at the unicorn, as he flew away.

Soundflux could have sworn he heard a small explosion.

_____________________________________________________________________

Soundflux was waiting at the train platform, there weren’t many ponies there today.

Suddenly Soundflux heard the familiar sound of fire.

“This is for my hat”

Soundflux just barely dodged the fireball as it went flying past his shoulder.

“You know, I’m getting tired of this. Can we call a truce?” Soundflux said as he turned around to face Aura “I promise I’ll get you a new one”

“Promise?”

“Promise”

“Alright then, but you should know that the fireball that missed you hit the train tracks and sort of broke them” Aura said calmly.

“WHAT!?!” Soundflux said as he quickly turned to inspect the damage to the tracks.

Sure enough, a large portion of the tracks was there no longer.

“Uhm maybe we should get out of here, I think there are some guards coming this way” Soundflux said as he slowly backed away from the tracks.

“Good idea, but how will we get to Ponyville then?”

“Well i could always fly, but since you don’t have any wings”

“We’re walking. Great” Aura said with a sigh.

“Oh it should only take an hour or so”

“Yes but it may already become dark before we get there” Aura said as he pointed at the sun which was almost setting.

“We’ll set up camp for the night and walk the rest tomorrow” Soundflux suggested.

“Alright fine, but I’m blaming you for all this” Aura said pointing his hoof at Soundflux.

“ME?!? You were the one who blasted the tracks with fire!”

“Yeah but if you hadn’t dodged it, it would never have been blasted”

“You... are a mean little pony”

“Thank you, I try my best” Aura said as he bowed.

_____________________________________________________________________

Moments later Aura and Soundflux were walking towards Ponyville.

“This will be fun” Aura said sarcastically.

“See? I knew you’d like it”

“Do you know what sarcasm is, Soundflux?”

“Can you eat it?”

“Never mind”

The two ponies continued to walk in silence.

After a while of walking the two ponies could see Ponyville in the distance.

“See Aura? I told you we could make it”

“Let’s just hurry and find an inn so we can get some rest”

“Hey, what’s that?”

Further up ahead the road was an abandoned wagon filled with hay, but no trace of whoever owned the wagon.

“Why would anypony just leave a wagon filled with hay out here in the middle of nowhere? It’s getting dark soon, should we see if we can find the owner?” Soundflux asked as he turned to Aura.

“No let’s just ignore it and get to Ponyville as fast as we can, I’m tired and I want to sleep”

“Too bad, we’re checking this out” Soundflux said as he put his hoof down.

“Alright fine we’ll check it out” Aura said as he rolled his eyes in annoyance.

The two of them walked around the cart a couple of time to search for clues, the only thing they could find was a mark on the wagon, three apples forming a triangle. And a set of hoofprints, leading into an ominous looking forest.

“You know what I think happened?”

“I’d rather not know”

“I think somepony kidnapped the owner of the cart”

Aura facehoofed “Let’s look at the cart, do you see how large it is? And that it’s filled with hay? There is no way that somepony capable of pulling such large weights would get kidnapped, without leaving more distinct marks”

“Well, do you remember those hoofprints we saw? Maybe the pony pulling the cart went into the forest”

“Hmm I guess that makes sense, but now that we know what happened, let’s go” Aura started walking.

“No” Soundflux said as he put his hoof down.

“What do you mean by “No”?” Aura said as he turned around.

“Somepony might be in trouble and we have to help”

Aura sighed “You do know we don’t have time to help everypony we see right? And for all we know, the pony pulling the cart could be... you know”

“Dead?”

“Yes, that”

“We still have to try”

Soundflux started following the trail that led into the forest, Aura sighed again and reluctantly followed.

The forest was dense, not much of the light shone through the trees.

“I have a bad feeling about this place” Aura muttered to himself

“What was that Aura?”

“Nothing”

Suddenly Soundflux heard something; he stopped dead in his tracks.

“Do you hear that?”

“Hear what?”

“Shh” Soundflux said as he bolted of further into the forest.

“HEY! Wait for me”

They came across a small clearing in the forest, in the clearing they could see a mare fighting a beast three times her size.

“Ah tried tah be nice, but ya leave me no choice”

The orange earth mare was battered and bruised, but she was still full of energy.

Suddenly she bucked the giant beast in the stomach. The beast was knocked back and lost it’s breath, but quickly recovered.

“Aw shucks” the earth pony said as she readied herself for the blow.

The beast raised its claw and was just about to strike, but just before it had the chance to end the fight, its claw was stuck mid-air.

“Okay, this is where the fun stops” Aura said as he stepped out of the bushes and looked at the orange mare.

“Ah don’t know who y’all are, but thank you” the orange mare said as she tipped her hat.

“Don’t thank me yet, the problem is still here”

Suddenly the beast broke free of Aura’s magic chain, and charged right at him. Without flinching the unicorn blasted the beast with a magic pulse powerful enough to blast all the way back to the mare.

“HEY! watch it, you almost hit me”

“Sorry”

The beast got back onto its legs, but suddenly something grabbed its tail and lifted it up into the air. Aura walked over to the beast.

“So miss mare, what should we do with this fellow?” Aura said as he studied the beast.

“Don’t hurt him too much, it’s not his fault he got into this, I shouldn’t have been out here this late to begin with”

“Well alright then” Aura said as he turned and aimed for the middle of the forest.
With a blast, the beast flew across the sky.

“Wow, you sure that won’t hurt him?”

“Uhh, he might be sore in the morning”

Suddenly Soundflux ran out of the bushes.

“Whoo, way to go Aura, you’re the best”

“An alicorn? Here?” the orange mare said as she bowed.

“Oh come on now don’t do that, he’s not royal... as far as we know”

“But he’s an alicorn, aren’t all the alicorns are royal?” she said getting back up.

“Not him, at least I don’t hope so. Anyway, what is your name?”

“Ah, where are mah manners. Name’s Applejack”

“Pleased to meet you Applejack, I’m Aura and the alicorn there is Soundflux” Aura said a she pointed his hoof at Soundflux “Watch out, he’s a hat thief”

Applejack grabbed her hat as she stared at Soundflux.

“It was once, and your hat was stupid”

“It was not”

“Was too”

“Gentlecolts, calm down” Applejack interrupted.

“Anyway is there anything we can help you with?” Aura said as he looked around at the clearing they were standing in.

“Oh don’t worry about me, ah can find back home from here” Applejack said as she took a few steps but stumbled into Aura.

“Looks like that fight with the beast wore you out, where do you live? We might be heading the same way” Aura said as he caught Applejack just before she fell.

“I live at sweet apple acres right outside Ponyville”

“That’s where we’re headed” Soundflux said as he trotted towards the way they came.

“Well ah... thank you kindly then”

“Don’t mention it, I assume you would want your wagon?”

“Oh you can just leave it, ah can get mah brother to get it in the morning”

“Don’t worry about it, I can haul it with my magic”

“WAIT!!!” Soundflux shouted.

“For the love of... What is it now Soundflux?” Aura said as he rubbed his forehead in annoyance.

“Did you really pull that giant wagon, without any help?” Soundflux said as he turned to stare at Applejack.

“Uh, yes”

“Wow, you must be really strong”

“Thanks, ah guess”

“Soundflux you amaze me, anyway let’s get going before something else decides to attack us” Aura said as he and Applejack started to walk.

Applejack who was too tired to walk on her own had to support herself against Aura.

“Ah hope you don’t mind if ah use you for some support”

“It’s no problem at all Applejack, in all honesty, I’m surprised you can still walk. What was that beast? I’ve never seen anything like it”

“It was a manticore, they normally stay in the Everfree forest, but ah guess he must have strayed”

“What were you doing in these woods anyway?” Soundflux asked as he looked at the dark trees around him.

“Ah stopped for a pause when ah saw something in the woods, thought it was somepony who was lost, so ah decided to check it out”

When the trio made it back to the wagon, Aura used his magic to lift Applejack onto the wagon and placed her on one of the bales of hay. Grabbing the cart with his magic Aura started to pull.

“This cart is heavier than I thought, Soundflux help me out”

Soundflux grabbed the wagon and it suddenly got a lot easier to pull.

_____________________________________________________________________

As they arrived at the farm, they were greeted by a small filly with a large bowtie.

“Hello, uhm who are you?” she asked curiously.

Applejack got up from the wagon.

“Applebloom get Big Mac; tell him he needs to take care of this here cart”

“Oh hey sis didn’t see you there, who are these two?”

“Just get your brother”

The little filly bolted of in direction of the barn.

“Sorry about mah little sister, she likes to ask a lot of questions”

“Oh don’t worry about it, now where do you want this wagon?” Aura asked as he turned to see the earth pony trying to climb down, Aura motioned to Soundflux to help her.

“Thank you. You can just leave the wagon here, mah brother will get it in a second, but could you just help me inside?”

“Sure thing”

Aura helped Applejack inside and sat her on a chair next to the kitchen table.

“There you go” Aura said

“Thank you for all the help, ah don’t think ah would have survived another five seconds had it not been for you”

“You’re very welcome” Soundflux said as he looked out the window he saw a large stallion pull the wagon into the barn “WHOA!!! That guy is HUGE!”

“Heheh that would be mah brother”

“Are you sure he’s a pony? He’s the biggest stallion I’ve ever seen”

“You saw Celestia and Luna” Aura said with a flat expression.

“Well yeah, but they’re alicorns, and princesses”

“Hold on a minute, you two met the princesses?”

“Yeah it’s the reason we’re here. We’re looking for a unicorn called Twilight” Aura said as he turned to Applejack.

“What do you need Twilight for?”

“You know her?”

“I’m the element of honesty”

“What?”

“Twilight's not just the princess's student, she’s also the element of magic”

“Uh-huh, is that some sort of game you made up or?” Aura said with a confused look on his face.

“No, it’s not a game. Do you know what the elements of harmony are?”

“Yeah, it’s what Celestia and Luna used to defeat Discord many years ago”

“Exactly, except with princess Luna banished on the moon the elements wouldn’t work because she was the second bearer. And when she returned, the elements had to find new bearers, which turned out to be me, Twilight and four others, we are the bearers of the elements of harmony”

“Oooh, I get it. So you do know Twilight” Soundflux said as he turned away from the window.

Applejack facehoofed “Yes i know Twilight”

“Oh sweet, could you tell us where we can find her?” Soundflux asked exitingly.

“Yeah she lives in the Ponyville library” Applejack replied.

“Why does that not surprise me” Aura said with a flat expression on his face.

“What do you mean?” Soundflux asked.

“It’s the princess’s number one student, and she lives in a library, why does that not surprise me?”

“I guess it makes sense” Soundflux said as he returned to look out the window.

“Anyway, it was nice meeting you Applejack and we really should get going” Aura said as he turned towards the door.

“Are you sure you can’t stay and get something to eat? You must be hungry” Applejack asked.

At the word “eat” Soundflux sprung away from the window and was right in front of Applejack “Did you say food?”

“Uuh not really, ah said eat”

Soundflux turned to Aura to give him the best puppy eyes he could muster.

“Maybe another time Applejack, but thank you for the offer” Aura said.

“Aww” Soundflux slowly walked towards the door, with his head hanging low.

“We need to get going, we need to catch up to lost time”

“Well don’t let me hold ya back then, but remember you’re always welcome back” Applejack said with a smile.

“Thank you Applejack” Aura bowed lightly and then went outside where Soundflux was waiting.

“Are you sure we have to leave now? Can’t we at least get one slice of pie? It looked delicious”

“Yes, we’ve already wasted enough time”

“Aww”

The two left the farm and headed into town.

After walking around town for a while, Aura stopped and facehoofed.

“I forgot to ask where the library is, or what it even looks like”

“Maybe it’s a giant tree”

“Are you stupid or something?”

“No look” Soundflux said as he pointed to a giant tree growing in the middle of the street. And sure enough it said library on the sign next to the door.

“Well... Wow” Aura was dumbfounded.

“Told you not to worry”

“Let’s just go in” Aura said as he walked slowly towards the wooden library, there was light in most of the windows, so somepony had to be in there.

Aura walked up to the door and knock lightly on the door. Moments later a small purple baby dragon opened the door.

“Sorry buddy, but the library is closed for tonight, you will have to come back tomorrow”

“SPIIIKE! Don’t be rude. Hold on I’ll be there in a minute” said a voice from inside the library.

Moments later a purple unicorn appeared.

“Aura?!”