Reality Is an Illusion, Albeit a Persistent One.

No Good Deed...

Walking outside I’m greeted by what reminds me of an old western style town, ya know, a straight dirt road with buildings on your left and right. All I needed now is a tumbleweed and a gust of wind to pick up dust and said tumbleweed. Taking a moment, I looked around the wooden village to see what all the hubbub is about.

“Where pony?” Turning to the screaming, I saw a group of five dogs. One had a blue tinged knife, wore a red vest, sported a short black and yellow spotted mohawk, and reminded me of a hyena. Two had spears while the other one had a net.  The final dog wore a brown coat of fur, had a wolf like appearance, and kept his claws near some sort of utility belt that held vials of various colors. His face was partly hidden behind the shadow of a purple hooded vest and green goggles. A poor zebra in the mohawk ones grasp rattled something off in his native language, before being thrown away from the group.

*Whap!* “Idiot,” the one with vials slapped the mohawk one and spoke. “Me said we need translator, now how we find pony?”

“Hit me again, I stab you!” The mohawk one let out a snarl, but was cut off by another hit to the head, this time in the shape of a fist.

I let them continue their verbal and physical brawl while I thought of a plan. ‘Ok so Arceus said that I can use some abilities. Perhaps I could form a shadow ball to throw at them... Wait a minute.’ Looking around, I noted a tan zeppelin with a red balloon floating above some trees off in the distance. ‘So that’s their means of transportation, I could use the ship to get to Equestria.’ Taking another glimpse at the group, I saw that the one with vials had pinned the mohawk one. ‘Lets go with small attacks. Scratching, biting, punching and kicking. Don’t want them to know what I am capable of, so no powers and no illusions unless I have no other choice. Following pack mentality, I’ll take out the leader first and use him as a bargaining chip. Feeling that my plan was secure, I whistled for the dogs attention.

“*Whistle* Oi, Wranger!” The dogs stopped arguing amongst themselves and their attention snapped to me. Ever so slowly, I saw their faces turn from one of angry questioning to shocked confusion. “Glad to see you’re done with your little ‘lovers tiff!’”

After a moment of silence, the one with the vials jumped off his perch atop the mohawk’s head and spoke. “We here to find pink pony!”

I put one of my claws to my chin, and started to ponder while walking towards them. “Pink, pink. Pink?” I looked at one of the dogs with a spear in a questionable manner, he nodded in response. “Pink.” After walking a few more feet, I decided to pull them along. “About yeigh high?” All nodded, “horn in on it’s head?” More nodding, “blue mane and tail?” I swear they were like those cheap gas station bobble heads.

“You see?”

“Afraid not.” I put on my best troll face as all of them glared at me.

“Enough!” The vial one got up and took a step forward, pointing an accusing claw at me. “Me think you lie, me think you seen pink pony!”

“And who are you to call me a liar?” I raised an eyebrow at the offending dog.

“I Tear, Gamma of pack!”

‘Gamma, that’s greek. So that means he’s third in command... Oh goody goody.’

“Oh no, not Tear.” Closing the distance a bit more, I’m now a little out of arm's reach. “Please oh great and powerful gamma, don’t kill me.” Laying the sarcasm on thick, I can see the dog visibly fuming at my response. “If I’m going to die, then at least let me pick up my favorite rock.”

Reaching down to the sandy earth, I smiled as Tear stepped forward to try and punch me. ‘Underside of jaw exposed, go for uppercut while using leg strength to go for a knockout punch.’ Flexing my legs, I leapt up and managed to land a right uppercut in the soft part underneath his jaw. After knocking him to the ground, I dropped the act and turned towards the rest of his group, all of them had a shocked expression on their face.

“Huh, guess diamond dogs have glass jaws.” Shaking my paw, I tried and relieve some of the pain from hitting Tear.

“What you do?!” Looking back at the group, I saw the mohawk one drawing his dagger and pointing it at me. I then looked at the unconscious dog, and back to the mohawk one.

“I thought the two of us could have an exchange of riveting dialogue before I disarmed you in a painful and humiliating fashion.” It was obvious at that point he was struggling just to understand what I was saying, that gave me the chance to rush the dog and grab his meaty paw clenching the dagger. In one swift motion I popped his elbow joint with a well placed punch, and grabbed the dagger as it dropped. Now holding the weapon, I kicked the dog back to the group, causing him to topple the lot as they tried and catch him. Reacting quickly, I picked up the unconscious leader and brought the dagger to his throat. “Upupup!” All the dogs halted  as I brought the knife closer to his throat.

Now two things to remember when you have a hostage. One: make sure they are important, don’t want to grab someone disposable now do you? Two: make sure they aren't as heavy as this bitch! Standing in a half circle, I watched as all the dogs presented me their best  death glares. “First off: I did warn you about what was going to happen, and since you didn’t listen you get to wallow in pain and self pity.Secondly: you four are going to take me to that Zeppelin over there.” One of them turned and looked at the object in question. “Then when we get there, I’m going to bargain with your Alpha or Beta, whomever is there at the moment. Take over your ship, then sail... Or I guess fly in this case, into Equestria. Savvy?”

All of them gave me a placid look of confusion, mentally face palming, I explained. “Savvy means do you understand?” All of them give me the ‘oh!’ face and nodded in agreement. “Good, now then. Take me to your leader.”‘I’ve, always wanted to say that!’

Dusty Tomb’s POV

After a few minutes of silence, I noticed the illusion that Rorschach had put on me fading away. ‘Oh no!’ Throwing his rule to the wind, I rushed out the hut and see what had happened. ‘Please don’t be dead please don’t be dead please don’t be dead please please please! Do not be dead!’ Exiting the hut I was only marginally comforted by the familiar intact look of the zebra village.

Spinning around, I couldn't see any signs life in any direction. Looking back to where I had spotted the dogs earlier, I saw an unmoving zebra in the dirt. Rushing forwards, I made my between the huts to the zebra, hoping it was Rorschach. Upon getting there, I saw that it was one of the village inhabitants instead. Slightly discouraged, I made sure the zebra was still alive. After getting a positive on his pulse, I began to set his head back down, only to have him wake up.

“What, who?”

“Be still, you took a nasty fall, I’m trying to help you.”

“You! They were looking for you!”

“I know, but they are gone now.”

“The monster went with them!”

“What?”

“The monster hit the leader, then took the dagger from the other and held the leader hostage.” I stopped what I was doing and looked him in the eyes, terror on my face.

“What do you remember?”

“The blue one put the dagger to the leaders throat, said some things to the dogs. Then left following the dogs with the leader, dagger still pressed to his neck.”

Eyes widening, I bolted down the road and to the tall grass.

“Halt!” I skidded to a halt as I saw the village chief come out of his hut, with a sizable portion of the village in tow. “What are you doing?”

“I need to go help him! If he goes there alone, then the others will overpower him and then... then!” I started to cry, breaking down in the middle of the village. “Oh dear Celestia, he’s going to get beaten then either die or get taken into slavery!” While crying the entire town started to murmur at my words. As the whispers became less subtle, the chief stomped his hoof into the dust and silenced them.

“He’s sacrificing himself, he’s giving you a chance to leave.” I stood there for a minute, then collapsed to the earth. Tears flowing from my eyes as sobs escaped past my lips. That thing, no. Rorschach, managed to defeat the leader, take him hostage, and sacrificed himself to save me.

‘I promise... I won’t let those dogs take you away to wherever they take slaves.’

“What was that thing?”

“That thing,” I stood up and glared at the villager who asked the question. “Has a name, and his name is Rorschach! He saved me, and saved the little zebra from before. And we just treated him like a beast...” Nothing else was said as I walked back to the hut. Shuffling through the huts, I vowed then and there to remember Rorschach and to do everything in my power to never let anything like this happen to anypony ever again.

Gotta say, traveling with a pack of disgruntled dogs while carrying their really heavy leader through a jungle really sucked. Ten minutes after we left the village, I found out the hard way that I don’t appear to have sweat glands, and I’m now panting like characters from the old looney toons cartoon. On the plus side, I hadn’t had to deal with any escape attempts... Yet.

Halfway to the Zeppelin I began to notice that the three not wounded kept looking back at me, waiting for me to make a mistake and reclaim their leader. After about the twentieth time this happened, (I lost count around fifteen) I decided I’d had enough of this.

“Hey ugly,” All of them turned around. “Good reaction times, you guys must have practice!” Their death glares intensified as we continued to walk. “I see what you’re doing, and I want you to know that next time I see one of you turn around-.” I removed the dagger from the leaders throat and moved it to his left ear. “I’ll take off one of these.”

I didn’t have much time to react before the supposedly unconscious leader grabbed my claw with the dagger and flipped me over him, before placing a foot on my chest and holding me down. “You good, but stupid.”

“In all honesty *grunt* this was the first time I had control of a hostage.” The leader pried the dagger out of my claw and took it for himself.

“You two,” he turned to the two with spears. “Hold him.” The leader released his hold on me while the other two took an arm and a leg on either side of me.

Deciding to be a smart ass, I tried to get under his skin. “Oh come on Tear. I got a cheap shot on you, you got one on me. Why don’t we just call it even and go home for the day, I’ll tell ya what, why don’t we come back tomorrow for round two?” One of the dogs holding me punches me in the gut. After regaining my lost oxygen, I glare at it and respond. “I’ll make sure to make your death slow and painful.”

The leader ignored me and turned to the one with the mohawk. “You idiot, you let thing take weapon and threaten me.”

“I sorry, but thing was fast and-.”

“No! You fail us, you fail Alpha, you fail pack!” The leader took the dagger and plunged it into the dogs gut. The stabbed dog took a step back before the leader removed the dagger from his stomach. The mohawk dog fell to his knees, clutching his stomach before he was stabbed again in the eye and fell to the ground unmoving. “You disgrace, you die in waste.” The leader just stood there, still looking at his kill.

“You-you killed him?” I broke the silence. “Why did you kill him, all he did was-”

“He disgrace pack, he let you live and lost weapon.” The leader loosely held the dagger in his paw. “He Beta, he brother.”

‘Oh shit, I think I just pissed off my only way of getting out of here.’

“We tired of dealing with him, he no longer beta, he no longer part of pack.” The leader then turned to me, dagger held tightly in his grasp. “We should kill you here, now!” He puts the dagger to my throat. Then he just stared at me, peering into my soul through the scratched green goggles of his. It’s kinda funny, staring him down, I heard a soft cry of fear from somewhere. Even though that was one of my closer experiences with death, I looked him in his goggled eyes and showed no fear. “You will strong, good. We need that in slave.” The next thing I know I heard a shattering sound and a green gas filled my vision. I felt the sensation of falling into a familiar darkness.