Rowan's Experiences with Equestrian Life

by NLR Lightning Bolt

Rating: everyone
Tags: Princess Luna, Original Character, Comedy, Adventure, Discord, Princess Celestia, Human, Twilight Sparkle, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Length: 5812

A human finds himself stuck in the middle of some confusing circumstances

By - NLR Lightning Bolt
Edited by - Ferrosxlupus

Rowan's life was normal, he had no wife, no kids, and he enjoyed living alone until an alicorn filly showed up on his doorstep and completely turned his life around. Now he's forced to try to help an alicorn get home while another will do everything in his power to stop him.

Published 2013-01-26 00:00:01 UTC
Last updated 2013-04-18 00:48:13 UTC

Prologue

Prologue

"Do you really think it will work?" asked the very skeptical unicorn while he looked at the open spell book in front of him that could barely be seen in the dark room. "Of course it will work, I have been working on the spell for quite a while you know" replied the well known draconequus after he had looked up from the brightly colored comic book he was in the process of reading, "Oooooo, cant you just think of all the chaos it will cause if Celly and Lulu don't screw it up again." The unicorn chuckled as he remembered the last time he tried to help Discord escape from the stone prison the princesses had put him in. "Yes I was surprised that they managed to catch you even though they weren't even connected to the elements" Discord scowled at the unicorn as he started to move to the middle of the room where they had set up a crystal pedestal that had several objects that couldn't be seen due to the lack of light in the room. "Yes ha ha very funny I would like to see how you would do if you were forced to fight the Elements of Harmony," Discord snapped.

The unicorn turned back to Discord who was still sitting in a chair in the far left corner of the room and looked at him with a hurt expression in his eyes. " Discord I'm hurt by your lack of appreciation for the work I've put in to help you get free from the princesses. If I hadn't of arranged the field trip to the castle gardens that the school went on in the first place, the three fillies that freed you wouldn't have even been there."

Discord stopped reading for a few seconds while he looked at the unicorn with a surprised look on his face. " You were the one that arranged the field trip?" Discord said while the unicorn continued to rearrange the objects on the pedestal.

"Why of course Discord you really didn't believe that it happened by accident did you? And you and me both know that I have very strong connections to the Ponyville schoolhouse," the unicorn replied after moving away from the crystal to look at the spell book again.

"Well then I extend my deepest gratitude," Discord sarcastically remarked.

"Well if you're done reading your book then I would appreciate it if you could shed some light in here I can barely see two hooves in front of me at the moment."

Discord quickly snapped his fingers and a small red were-light began to glow directly above the pedestal giving the room a red glare. The room was a twenty hoove by twenty hoove square with Discord's chair in the far left corner of the room and various spell books and objects scattered around the right side of the room, but in the middle there was a circle drawn on the ground and there was only the pedestal in its boundaries. On top of the pedestal there were three objects, a piece of stone from when Discord was frozen, a vial of blood, and a feather.

The unicorn was now clearly visible in the light, he was a light blue in color with a slightly darker blue mane and a dark cloud with several lightning bolts coming out of it on his flank. He looked over the pedestal and thought he was missing something. Discord finally decided that he should get up and inspect his friends work he automatically knew what was missing and flicked the unicorn's horn with his claw. The unicorn flinched in pain and clutched his horn while looking at Discord with a hateful look on his face. "What?" Discord asked as he put the chip of unicorn horn he had managed to break off on the pedestal, " You were missing a unicorn horn." "Okay but warn me next time okay." the unicorn said while feeling the chipped section of his horn.

Discord now had his turn to chuckle " Do you really think you would have let me if I had warned you?"

The unicorn glanced at Discord and then turned his head towards the ground while he realized what Discord had meant. "No I wouldn't of, but now that we have everything we can start the spell!" The unicorn said as he started to pace with anticipation.

Discord nodded and stepped out of the circle as the unicorn began to concentrate and sparks started to fly off of his horn. The circle began to glow a bright red as the objects on the pedestal began to rise. The stone reformed itself into a hollow ball and the vial broke as the blood filled the ball. The horn and the feather attached the the ball as it began the reform itself into the form of a very small alicorn filly. The filly was as dead as a rock but as the unicorn stopped the spell Discord rushed over to the body as began to inspect it.

"You did it. You actually managed to do it," Discord mumbled while he began to prod the body with his claw.

"Of course I did it," the unicorn said with a confused look on his face, "it was your spell after all."

Discord looked at the pony with a smug grin on his face, "Actually I made up the spell a week ago," Discord said while he inspected the body with his magic.

"WHAT?!" the unicorn yelled as he began to turn a deep red in his anger, "you mean to tell me that you decided to go with the plan even though you didn't even know if it would work!"

Discord ignored him as he saw that even though the filly wasn't alive it had all of the necessary organs it needed in order to live, it only needed someone to start its heart. He laughed at the irony that he was going to cause so much chaos with something that had the wings of princess Luna and the blood of princess Celestia.

The unicorn stopped rambling in his anger after Discord started to laugh and asked what was so funny.

" Oh nothing," replied Discord as he wiped a tear from his eye before he went back to being serious, "but we really should continue don't you think?"

The unicorn agreed and began to cast a spell that would shock the filly's heart and make it beat. After he cast it a storm cloud began to appear and it began to get darker and darker until a lighting bolt struck the filly's chest and its heart began to beat.

Right at the moment that the heart began to beat the door to the room burst open and a legion of royal guards scrambled into the room, but before they could do anything the unicorn had teleported away and Discord had grabbed the filly and through it into a portal that he had just conjured up but before he could jump in he was tripped by a glowing, rainbow-colored mane that wrapped him up and turned him to where he was in the face of one of the ponies he feared most.

"What did you do?" princess Celestia asked as she slammed Discord into a wall, scattering the spell books there.

Discord laughed and replied, "I have no idea what you would be speaking of Celly."

"Do not play with me Discord I want to know what the spell was supposed to do." Celestia snapped, growing impatient with Discord.

"Oooooo are we playing a game Celly! I really do hope It's a good game you do now how I hate being bored" Discord remarked as Celestia became even annoyed with him.

"You know very well that this isn't a game Discord!" Celestia yelled while Discord not to laugh at how red Celestia's face was becoming, " Now I will ask this one more time what was the spell supposed to do!!!"

"Ohhh, you mean that spell. Well I could tell you but that would ruin the fun of it now wouldn't it Celly' Discord said.

"I will stop you!" Celestia swore.

Discord looked at her with a smug little grin on his face. "Its already done."

Author's Note

Based on the time before My Little Pony Friendship is Magic Season 3 Episode 10 and Discord's reforming.

Chapter 1 - Introduction to Rowan

Chapter 1 - Introduction to Rowan

It was a bright Friday morning when Rowan found himself returning from the world of pleasent dreaming. I slowly stretched on the bed and looked over at my alarm clock wondering what time I woke up at. It said 7:23. I was about to go back to sleep until I realized something, I was going to be on a podcast with some of my friends at 8:00 today. I quickly got up and went over to my closet to get on something nice for the podcast. I looked over all my clothes thoughtfully until I realized that it wasn't a video podcast it was only sound and I didn't have any planned visitors. I was putting on one of my favorite shirts and some blue jeans when I pondered the idea that maybe I could have a surprize visitor, but I quickly pushed that idea to the side since I lived in the middle of the scottish wilderness where it was a thirty minute drive to the nearest town.

After getting dressed I quickly grabbed a strawberry poptart from the pantry and plopped down in front of the laptop. I quickly signed into skype and checked the clock. 7:53 "I hope I'm not too late." I checked my contacts list and sighed with relief as I saw that every one was still online and soon my laptop was ringing as I saw that I was getting a request for a call. I let out another sigh because they wouldn't send me a call request if they had already started the podcast. I quickly accepted the request and almost instantaneously I heard three voices shout out of my computer. "Took you long enough!!"

I jumped back and knocked my chair over after the ferocity of their voices had scared me senseless. After I had my wits together I replied. "Well I'm sorry if my alarm clock didn't go off, but you could at least be happy I managed to make it on time." I heard one of them begin to mutter to themselves, it was probably Tyler seeing how he is known for these types of things. "Well I'm happy you made it on so we could tell you the news." Erica, my only female friend casually said after Tyler had quit muttering. I was now curious what the bad news was, "What bad news?" I heard a gasp from who I assumed was Brian, "You mean you haven't heard?" Brian said after he had quit gasping. "No I haven't heard," I replied with a little spite slipping into my tone.

I heard another gasp from Brian, "It's all over the news." I rolled my eyes and told him that I haven't been on the news channel today since I had rushed to get on Skype. Erica then said that a large storm was forming off of the European coast. "All of Glasgow is being evacuated," she added. Tyler then decided to explain to me that the podcast was canceled since both he, Brian, and Erica lived there. "Oh, I'm sorry guys I didn't know," I replied. After they all said thanks I invited them all to my place since I lived east of Southampton. They all declined except for Brian who didn't say anything because he was debating whether or not to go to his sister's house in London. He finally accepted my invitation since he and his sister didn't get along very well.

We all said goodbye and I made a quick run to the store to stock up on supplies before the storm hit. When I got back I noticed Brian's car parked outside of my house and smiled. I always enjoyed having Brian over, but when I passed his car my enthusiasm dropped as I saw what he had a sticker of. I burst into my house, slammed the groceries on the kitchen conter when I noticed Brian sitting on my couch watching the one show I despised more than anything. My Little Pony

He put on a false grin when he saw I was home, "Um. Hi Rowan did you have a nice trip to the store?", Brian said while he slowly backed away from my cold rage. I was a deep red when I walked over to the TV to turn it off, but once I did I turned back to Brian who had begun to sweat. I began to mutter, but I did manage to get a few intelligable words out before I burst with anger, "When...Did...You...Start...To...Watch...This?" Brian's sweating got more intense as he tried to squeeze a reply out of himself. "Well it started a week ago when Erica came over and we watched it, but when she left I just kept on watching it until I fell in love with the show."

I tried to calm down but it didn't help until Brian went and got me some ice cream out of the kitchen. After I had calmed down me and Brian talked, both of us trying to stay away from the topic of My Little Pony, until we heard the sound of rain pitter-pattering on the window. After watching a few of our favorite movies we headed off to bed.

After what seemed to be a matter of minutes a loud crack of thunder and what sounded like a scream woke me up. I quietly slipped out of my bed after another crack of thunder and another scream pulled me out of my waking state again. I began to slowly walk down the stairs of my house as I followed what seemed to be a slight wimpering sound that was coming from my front door.

I slowly walked up to the door and gripped the handle as another crack of thunder called another scream from outside my door. I slowly opened the door, but once I did I soon felt a cold sensation on my left leg. Once I looked down to see what it was I was in shocked. There pressed up against my leg was a soaking wet pony.

Author's Note

Yes I made the main character a brony hater, but don't worry his viewpoint will change.
Or will it?
Also I would like some feedback after every chapter to make sure I'm doing okay.
If you have any ideas don't be afraid to comment!
Until chapter 2 see ya next time

Lightning Bolt117

Chapter 2 - A Pony?

Chapter 2 - A Pony?

I was frozen in place. I had never seen an animal quite like this before, or at least not one that wasn't on my TV or on the computer. I couldn't move I didn't know if it was from the realization that I have a pony that I had only seen on a telivision screen or from the fact that the pony had quit shivering and was now slowly turning around to see what it had pressed up against. The pony turned around and froze when it saw that it was no longer outside in the stinging rain. I tried to move as slowly as possible as I tried to close the open door in order to keep the wind and the rain from entering the house. The pony gave a little jump as it heard the door close, but when it started to look around to see what had closed the door it happened to look up.

I began to sweat as the pony pulled itself off of me and started to back away slowly. I attempted to take a step forward to stop the pony from backing away, but as I stepped forward the pony let out a sqee and ran to hide behind the coffee table in the living room. As I looked at the table the pony slowly started to come out as it smelled the candy bar I had quickly grabbed on the way to the door. I offered the bar to it and it quick ran up and snatched the bar from my open hand.

Seeing how this was the first time the pony hadn't been pressed up against me or running away, this was the first time I could clearly see the pony without anything in my way. It was a dark purple in color with a slightly lighter purple mane and light blue eyes. It started to nussle my hand after it finished the candy bar as if it wanted more. I looked at it and said that I didn't have any more. Its ears went down like it knew what I meant, but I knew that was impossible unless my suspisions were true and this pony was from a TV show, but I wouldn't be able to confirm that until Brian woke up.

I started to debate whether or not I should wake up Brian, but I decided against it since he did like his sleep and while I walked over to the kitchen I noticed that the area that the pony had been in had a layer of mud on it. I then looked at the pony that had begun to follow me and it was coated in mud. I sighed once I realized that I was going to have to give it a bath.

The hard part of all of this was going to be trying to get the pony into the bathtub and washing it. I walked over to the bathroom with the pony close behind, but as I turned on the tub the pony's eyes widened and it slowly backed from the tub, and started to turn towards the door while I managed to close the door before it got away. It saw me close the door and it started to shake with fear. I tried to reasure that it's okay, "It's okay, I'm not going to hurt you." It seemed to know what I said and started to calm down, but when it looked at the water beginning to fill the tub it gave another shudder of fear.

I then knew that it was only afraid of the water, but it wasn't going to be able to get out of taking this bath. I quickly scooped the pony up and before it could get away dropped it into the water. It squirmed while I started to scrub the dirt and grim out of its coat, but I held fast and eventually the dirt started to come off and I could start to feel the softness of its coat. As I continued to clean it I noticed a hard substance coming off of its forehead and when I started to brush its mane off its face I could clearly tell it was a horn that was coming off of its head. The horn confirmed the fact that this pony was from my least favorite show.

Dammit. Right when I was beginning to like the pony it has to be from a TV show. I continued to clean it and then I noticed that it also had wings. "Great, not only do a have a My Little Pony in my house but I have some kind of mixture between two impossible creatures; a unicorn and a pegasus." I started to mumble to myself while I was cleaning the pony. "Now I'm going to have to wake up Brian and wait for who knows how long while he calms down before I can talk to him." The pony was giving me a sad look when I realized that since it was from the show it understood me. I stopped my mubbling after I realized that and looked at the pony again.

It was looking at me with one eye and a grin on its face. "You can understand me can't you?" It looked up for a few seconds and then nodded. "Of course you could," I said with a sarcastic ring to my voice. "Well can you talk?" It just looked at me. "I'm going to assume that's a no."

It rolled its eyes and looked at me with a pleading expression. "You want food don't you?" I got another nod for that. I walked into the kitchen while it followed me to the fridge and started to inspect its contents. I looked at it while it looked at the fruits I had a thought. "Ummmm, can I ask you something?" It gave me a look so I decided to continue, "Are a girl or a boy?" It just pointed at the pink picture I had on the fridge and I assumed it was a girl.

"Okay so what do you want to do I guess?" Since I couldn't ask it anything until Brian woke up I decided to just figure out her personality. She pulled out a mixture of fruits and vegetables and hopped up on the table to start eating. We just sat there while we talked, well I talked while she listened and nodded a few times. After a while we just sat there quietly while she ate. I was about to go wake up Brian when a heard a loud "Thump" to my left. I looked over and saw Brian's body passed out on the floor. The pony looked at him then back at me.

"Great now we have a freaked out My Little Pony fan to deal with."

Chapter 3 - Recalling Past Events

Chapter 3 - Recalling Past Events

Canterlot was always a quiet place at night. Celestia doubted if there was anypony that had decided to stay up this late at night, other than the two princesses and the New Lunar Republic of course. She sighed as she began to recall the events that had occured earlier that day.

"Your Highness!" shouted Celestia's watch commander, Dark Bolt as he slammed the door to Celestia's private study open. Celestia looked up from the report on how the treaty with the griffin ambassador was going. "Yes Dark Bolt, what is it?" Dark Bolt was a midnight blue unicorn with a red mane and his cutie mark was a red shield with a flaming sword on it. He started to pant and leaned against a column to help support himself. "One second your Majesty, I'm a little tired from the run here." Celestia waited for a few seconds while the commander began to catch his breath. "Commander Dark Bolt is there a good reason that you have disturbed my studies?" Celestia said while she gave her commander a glass of water. "Thank you and yes there is; Discord's statue has gone missing!"

Celestia stopped what she was doing to turn to the commander. "How could that have happened commander?"

"The guard on duty at the time reported seeing another guard and a unicorn fighting in front of the statue, but when he tried to stop them the unicorn and the statue disappeared in a flash of light."

"I hope you realize commander that this is bad." Celestia replied as she readied her teleportation spell. Dark Bolt nodded respectfully as he replied, "I know your Highness. I have realized this and have began to search the castle for any sign of magic." Celestia completed the spell and Dark Bolt found himself outside of the throne room. "So Dark Bolt what happened to the guard found arguing with the unicorn and what progress have you made on the castle search?" Celestia asked as she led Dark Bolt into the throne room.

"I'm sorry your Highness the guard was killed from the teleportation spell the unicorn used and the castle search hasn't gotten that..."

"Dark Bolt!" a pegasus guard yelled as he interupted the commander.

"Yes, what do you need?" Dark Bolt replied as he turned to the guard annoyed that he had been interrupted.

"The unicorn has been spotted leading Discord into a room in the dungeon of the castle and the guard has been assembled outside of the door," the guard mumbled, not expecting the princess to be with Dark Bolt.

Dark Bolt jumped up from his seat and started to run over to the door, "Why haven't you arrested them yet?"

"We were waiting for your word commander," the guard replied.

Before they could do anything the two ponies found themselves in front of the door to the room with the pricess imbetween them. Celestia then said, "I believed it would be easier if I was the one to talk to Discord" Dark Bolt nodded and turned to the guards. "Are we ready?"

"Yes Sir!"

"Then lets go..."

Before he could say anything else a dark presence came over the group. Celestia's look hardened and she began to get a reddish tint to her coat.

Dark Bolt backed away from Celestia as she said, "Commander I beleive it would be best if we went in the room now." Dark Bolt stopped and nodded to an Earth pony guard as he squared up to the door and began to run at it as Dark Bolt yelled out, "Breaching!"

Celestia rubbed her forehead with her hooves as she started to get a headache from the days events.

"Sister!"

Celestia turned to find her sister Luna coming in with another unicorn that was cloked in a dark blue robe in tow. "Hello my sister what can I do for you today?" Celestia said as she tried to hide the discomfort of the days events from her sister.

"Do not play games with me Tia do you think that events like these would slip from my view. Even if Discord and his accomplise didn't use dark magic to do whatever they did I would have been informed by my second-in-command," Luna yelled.

Now that Celestia had a better look at the pair she recognized the other pony as Lightning Bolt, a close friend of Luna and one of the heads of the NLR. She paciently waited as her sister continued to ramble on about how inconsiderate Celestia had been about trying to hide Discord's release from her sister. As her sister finally stopped to take a breath Celestia started to speak, "Lightning I believe you should go as I try to talk some sense into my sister." Lightning nodded, "As you wish your Magesty." As he turned to leave Luna put her wing in front on Lightning Bolt and held him back.

"No Tia, whatever you need to say to me can be said in front of him," Luna said while she glared at her sister. Celestia motioned for the two of them to take a seat. They all sat down and Luna quickly told her sister that they had heard the story from a night guard who had been at the castle at the time. "How did he know that Discord had escaped the spell was a powerful spell to be sure, but it was only temporary. Before Discord said anything he turned back to stone." Celestia said with a puzzled expression.

Before Luna could reply Lightning cut in and quickly said, "Rumers travel quickly in a castle. It doesn't take a genius to know when to listen to them," and in a voice only Luna could hear, "Careful your Nightestry we don't want to give away the NLR's secrets do we?" Luna replied in the same voice, "Trust me Lightning. I trust my sister wont betray me, and for the last time call me Luna." Lightning nodded and mumbled to himself, "Yes Luna because it was perfectly expected when Celestia betrayed your trust and banished you to the moon wasn't it." Both the sisters turned to the unicorn with puzzled looks on their faces. He simply shook the feeling off and looked with a bored look on his face to the pair. "Don't you think we should begin?"

The princesses looked at each other and nodded, Luna showing no signs of the anger she had when she came in. "So Discord is a statue again and the accomplise he had is nowhere to be seen. Am I correct?" Lightning stated. Celestia turned to him and nodded, "Yes Discord is stone again and unfortunately the unicorn he had with him is gone."

Luna now had to interupt her sister, "How could the unicorn have gotten away?"

Lightning simply said, "As far as I know the unicorn teleported away from the site before he could be apprehended, but what I want to know is this." Celestia looked at him waiting for the rest of the sentence he had started. "Do you know what the spell was trying to do?" Celestia was taken aback by his question, "What do you mean?"

Luna began to yell at her sister again, "The spell that Discord was trying to complete when you arrested him. What did it do?"

Celestia was about to reply when Lightning's eyes widened. "You don't know do you? The portal Discord made after you came in was to get rid of the evidence wasn't it?" Celestia kept her head low to the ground now when she replied, "Yes, the evidence was destroyed in the portal. We have very limited knowledge about what the spell did or what he could do with what he made."

Luna narrowed her eyes at her sister, " The spell was completed before you entered was it not?" Celestia nodded. Luna sighed and began to wonder how her sister thought she could take care of this on her own, "Do you have any spell experts on the site currently?" Celestia looked at her sister and raised an eyebrow, "No, my only expert is out of town until Tuesday of next week." Luna nodded to this and motioned for an unicorn to enter.

The unicorn was a bright red mare with an orange mane. Her cutie mark was a red flower with fire behind it. Lightning looked at her with a surprized look on his face, "Fire Bloom what are you doing here?" Fire Bloom didn't reply but she went over and sat behind Luna. Celestia looked over to Lightning and then to Fire Bloom, "You know each other."

"Yes Fire Bloom is the NLR's magic researcher, that I have recruited to help you find out what the spell did," Luna said. Lightning glared at Luna with anger for a second before returning to his blank expression and looking back to Celestia.

Celestia looked at the group and smiled, "Well then I do believe we should get to work then."

Chapter 4 - The Spell

Chapter 4 - The Spell

"Can you two stop fighting about who was the subject of the spell already!!!"

Celestia and Luna both looked back to Lightning and Fire Bloom as they both glared at the two with looks of frustration. Celestia casually glared back and replied, "If we do not find out who was affected by the spell we may never find its purpose" Luna nodded and said, "Good point dear sister."

Fire Bloom's eye began to twitch as she said as calmly as she could, "It would not matter who the person affected was if nopony was affected at all." The two sisters shared a glance of confusion as Lightning said, "I believe I can explain this Fire Bloom." She nodded and Lightning pushed the spell books he and Fire Bloom was looking at over to the sisters. "If you look at any and all of the spell books you can see that none of them have anything to do with transferring powers, but more with..." Lightning then glanced over to Fire Bloom for help.

She smiled and said, "Creating them?"

Lightning grinned at her and continued, "Yes, creating them. The spell as far as we can tell created something that Discord describes her as," he points to a specific scribble on the tomb Celestia had near her, "'...a sprout of chaos that will end my quest...' and as you know Discord's said 'quest' is to have chaos rule across Equestria." Luna and Celestia both looked surprized at the fact that while they were arguing they actually did something of importance.

"So if it created something, what was it?" Luna asked. Lightning was about to reply when they all heard Fire Bloom said, "A filly." The three ponies looked at her and motioned for her to continue. "Discord created a alicorn filly out of pieces of both Celestia and Luna to give it blood and wings. Then used a chip of a unicorn horn for obvious reasons and...apparently combined with a piece of stone from which he was imprisoned, it gave it an uncontrollable urge to cause chaos in large cities and to cause unnecessary confusion."

Luna and Celestia's eyes went wide with terror as Lightning started to pace back and forth while mumbling incoherently to himself. Luna glanced over at Lightning shortly before turning her gaze to Celestia. "Sister this is bad."

Celestia turned back to Luna and nodded, but before she could talk Lightning stopped pacing and looked at Luna. "Bad? Of course it's bad. Not only could there be a chaotic filly running around, but it could be anywhere since he threw it into a portal." Before he could continue Luna cut in.

"Lightning you are a good friend. You helped me with my speech problems and was my first friend from Canterlot after I was banished, but I know one thing for certain."

Lightning looked at her. "And what's that?"

Luna walked over to him and calmly said, "Discord. Can. Not. Create. Life."

Lightning laughed at that and replied, "Good thing too, because heaven help the pony that has to deal with that problem."

Luna laughed with him as Celestia got up and said, "Well since we have figured out what the spell did I guess we can go now."

Luna stopped laughing as she said seriously, "Why are you guessing Celestia. We can go or we can not. There is no guessing." Luna was about to pursue the subject when she felt a hoof on her shoulder as Lightning said calmly, "It's only an expression Luna."

Him and Luna left while engaged in a heated conversation discussing the necessity and stupidity of expressions, but before Fire Bloom could leave Celestia stopped and said, "I need your help with something." Fire Bloom looked at Celestia with a confused expression. "And what is that?"

"I need someone to keep an eye on the NLR."