An unexpected visit

"What was that!?" You say to the purple unicorn in front of you as a low grumbling noise sounds from above.

"Probably just the birds again. Seriously you should stop worrying, this is the fourth time you've asked about the grumbling sound." It is then that everything goes wrong.

You feel something tickling your neck and look back to find nothing there. You then look up, which you regret immediately as sand and gravel hits your eyes.

"Aah! Fu... *sigh* Dammit!" You decided you'd swear the least possible in this land of peacefulness, although you don't feel very peaceful at all.

"What's wrong Plane?" Twilight says as she sees you trying to blink and tear out the dirt.

She also looks up, but she's smart enough to cover her eyes with her hooves to keep any dirt from getting in, if her mane didn't already block all of it.

"Uhm... Plane? I-uh think we-uh need to start running very soon. Like about NOW!" Twilight grabs you with her magic as she starts to sprint through the trench, dragging you along. After realizing what's going on you start to run for yourself, instead of letting Twilight do all the work.

Being bipedal and having a lot longer legs than the pony you quickly catch up to her and decide she's going far to slow. You pick her up using the energy of the adrenaline now coursing through your veins and bolt from side to side, dodging falling rocks in the process.

"I..*huff* Told... *Huff* You... *Huff* Not.. *Huff* To... *Huff* Jinx... *Huff* Us! *Cough*" You say through strained breaths which are the result of sprinting for over two whole minutes at full speed.

You drop the purple pony and let yourself fall to the ground to try and recover some energy lost in the run. You take deep breaths trying to absorb as much oxygen as possible as you start to feel your muscles acidify from the lack of it.

After five minutes you feel confident enough that you can sit up straight again, without throwing up. And then you look at Twilight, who had been watching you the whole time, looking aghast about what happened a few moments earlier. You were almost killed in a landslide, you saved your guide, only because of a physical difference in species.

"I-uh... Thanks? I guess?" Is all Twilight manages to say.

You find this particularly amusing, since she mostly knows how to deal with high pressure situations rather well, or so at least so you thought .

"Yea... No problem. You saved me first anyway, which in turn means that you just saved yourself." You state while thinking about what happened.

"I think I should probably be more careful with things I say than." Twilight noted as she looked back to the road, which was now filled with dirt a boulders piling up a few metres. It was going to be hard to get back to Ponyville now.

"Are you sure we will reach the Minotaurs' capital tomorrow, because I am getting tired of the walking." You say, getting a confused look in return.

"How can you get tired of the walking? I put a spell on you to prevent that from happening!" She was now scanning you, if her spell was somehow done incorrectly or if it just didn't work.

"I'm not tired Physically at this point. It's just that it gets so boring after a while. I'm Mentally tired... get it?" You try to explain how you feel but this is the best you can manage to think of at the moment.

""You think you're the only one that's getting tired!? How do you think I feel!? I can only bring so many books with me, and I've already read them all by now! I'm bored too you know! Now STOP WHINING and START MOVING that LAZY FLANK of yours!" It seems Twilight has also reached her limit and dislikes the trip just as much as you do, only she was better at hiding it.

"Sorry. I didn't know you felt the same way. You were just so calm the whole time I just presumed... You know... *Sigh* never mind..." You start walking again in the general direction of the road only to be blocked by Twilight.

"I'm... sorry too. I didn't mean to loose my temper like that. It's just that I miss home a bit, and my friend for that matter. But I especially miss Spike, I wonder if he's doing okay with me being away for so long." Twilight looks more depressed than you even felt at this point. You don't know if this will work but you've seen Pinkie do it a couple of times now and decide to try it as well.

You kneel down to be the same height as the unicorn in front of you, you open your arms widely and then wrap them around the purple pony and pull her into a tight hug, making her squeal in surprise. This makes you only hug her tighter. After she relaxed a bit you let her go, slowly.

"Feel better?" you ask with a soothing voice you never knew you had.

"Yea... Thanks." Twilight replies while a tear escapes her eye.

"Shall we continue walking?" You ask still sitting down and looking straight into her big violet eyes.

"Can we just stay a bit longer like this? I-it feels... nice." She says while looking down at the ground in a way which reminded you of the yellow pegasus, Fluttershy is her name you remember.

"Sure." You say, again with that voice. "I think we could both use some rest after that avalanche, even if we're enchanted with infinite physical energy."

You throw a smile at Twilight, which is returned with one of her own. It makes you feel you have a true friend. And it makes you feel at home. Home...

'They say home is where the heart is, right? But now I don't know where my heart is. What do I do?' You think to yourself, asking god, or whatever it was that made this happen, what your next step should be. You feel very confused about everything, especially now, that you've actually saved someone's, or somepony's, life and being so close to death yourself.

This place feels closer to home than you've felt about your apartment back on Earth. And the friends here feel like real friends. Not fake ones that only befriend you to take advantage of your wealth or intellect. At first you wanted to go back home, you even tried to find stuff in Twilight's library about inter-dimensional travel, but now you don't feel the need to return that much any more.

"Hey Plane. It's getting dark, we should set up camp and sleep. Let's not walk this night. I'll refresh the spell tomorrow rather then now, probably also better for our bodies." Twilight took something out of her saddle bags and started to put a spell on it. The thing quickly materialized into the shape of a huge tent, fit for at least ten grown Humans, let alone for how many ponies.

The next day arrives sooner than expected, too soon, and more roughly than expected too.

You're awoken by a loud *Clank* and then an earth-shattering roar blasts through the tent, making the tent literally collapse.

"The hell is going o-mngf..." Someone puts a gag in your mouth and you look up to see a sturdy looking creature.

The creature is definitely humanoid, bipedal and even wearing some sort of clothing, which look more suited for the Antarctic than a hot dry canyon, even if it is night.

You get dragged out of the collapsed tent to see Twilight, also gagged up and hooves tied together, laying on some sort of cart.

"Tmmfg hnmmf ghmmn?" You desperately ask Twilight, but since you're gagged you can't actually ask her what's going on, no matter how hard you try.

"Bmmnnn mmmnm!" Twilight replies, apparently having understood what you said.

The weirdest thing is that you actually understand what she says. So you're now captured by minotaurs, and the gags they put on you are completely useless since Twilight can understand your mumbling and you can understand hers just as well. You can't think of why. You ask another question to Twilight, maybe she knows more about the minotaurs.

"What's happening, where are they taking us?" You ask Twilight through your gag, only making undistinguishable sounds, which the pony can understand... somehow.

"I don't know. Maybe they were watching you the whole time. Who knows!" She replied only to get the both of you stared at by five minotaurs, who now realized you two were actually able to speak to each other.

"SILENT! YOU NO TALK! WE GO KING!" The largest of the five shouted at you.

Did he say king? Isn't that where you were going in the first place?

"Weren't we going to the King already?" You quietly ask the pony who you were now sitting next to, atop the cart.

"Yeah. I guess we can just let them do all the work." Twilight shrugged, "Saves us the trouble." as if being kidnapped by five creatures with a WWA-Fighter's body and a Bull's head who sounded very Russian isn't such a big deal.

There's nothing you can really do than go with the flow at this point, maybe even get some rest, the night hasn't ended yet either and you think it best to just sleep off the initial shock of being kidnapped, and to stop denying that fact.

You wake with a pleasant morning sun on your face, warming you to a comfortable temperature. Groaning you try to stretch yourself a bit, only to be reminded that your hands are tied together behind your back and that you're not as comfortable as you first thought.

You turn around and feel your sore muscles complaining that they really need to stretch. Facing Twilight you see she's also awake and just as uncomfortable as you. Right then is that you feel your jaw muscles, even more sore than your shoulders as you try to say something to Twilight while still gagged.

Twilight looks around her before meeting your eyes and then starts. "These guys walk really fast. We're almost there already." She says with a hint of surprise in her voice.

You now also look around to see a totally gargantuan castle in the distance. It stands at least three hundred feet tall and is made of what looks like obsidian or black marble. Spikes protrude from almost each corner, and what's even more intimidating is the huge black dragon statue resting on the highest central spire, looking ready to strike down an entire army with just one sweep of his enormous claws.

You shrink back a little at the sight of this great fortress only to get Twilight trying to comfort you.

"Sure it looks big and intimidating, but it can't be THAT bad. Right?" She says only making you feel even more jinxed than when you were walking through the canyon, before the avalanche.

After another half hour of sitting on the cart you reach the gates to the massive, light-absorbing, structure. One of the minotaurs stepped forward and spoke something into a small hole in the wall and the three-foot thick obsidian gates slowly opened with a scraping sound of rock against rock.

Going through the gates you notice elephant-like creatures manning the chains needed to open and close the gates. Only the animals are about thrice the size of any earthly elephant and they have six tusks instead of two. They also have horns resembling the ones triceratops had.

The cart is pulled through what you expect is the main street, as you see multiple minotaurs walking to n' fro, not even taking a second glance at the newcomers being led toward the main castle. After observing a little more carefully you notice that it isn't that they aren't not interested, but rather averting their gaze as quickly as possible, as if scared of something, or someone for that matter.

The main castle, situated in the middle of the huge fortress, slowly dooms over you as the minotaurs pull you toward it at a steady pace. The archway into the castle is guarded at both sides by three large minotaurs in full armour and armed with a two-handed battle axe, several other weapons on theirs backs and in their holsters. The leader of the five minotaurs transporting you nods at the guards and then continues on into the castle.

When your eyes finally adjust to the darker inside of the castle you are welcomed with the sight of horrific statues of mutilated and tortured creatures, all with fear in their eyes. So much for a warm welcome, not that you expected one after being kidnapped.

After not too long of taking a few turns you are pulled off of the cart and thrown through two big doors into an even darker room. Once your eyes adjust again you see that it is a big hall, resembling an dark and gloomy version of Equestria's throne hall in Canterlot. Taking a better look you see that you weren't very far off at all, in front of you you count thirteen chairs, or thrones.

Six on the left, six on the right and one raised slightly higher than the rest, at the place where Celestia's throne is also situated in the similar looking hall.

You hear whispers and only now notice that what you thought were statues in the chairs were actually living and were now probably talking about their captives which lay in front of them.

Your gags get removed and you are able to stretch your jaw muscles a bit again.

"Well good morning to you too..." You say with a crackly voice for not having drunk enough throughout the day.

This made all eyes in the room focus on you and only seconds later you get hit on the head with something hard.

"YOU NO SPEAK UNLESS TOLD!" A loud voice boomed from right beside your ear, and you could hear Twilight audibly gulp at this.

You wonder why these minotaurs are so hostile. You've heard about one minotaur who apparently trained Fluttershy to be more assertive, Iron Will was his name you remember, but that didn't turn out all to well. Are they still mad about that maybe?

"Do you know why you are here?" The one sitting on the highest throne asks, with a gentle yet tough voice.

"We came here to ask you about something we read in a book." Twilight says with her lecturing tone.

"And what would that be?" Another minotaur asks.

"We had the book with us but your guards took everything of ours from us when they captured us. If you return it than we can show you." You now say looking at your capturers behind you, before Twilight can reply.

"We have book here." One minotaur says, who had not spoken at all during the time they had caught you, and handed the book over to the closest one sitting in a chair.

He looks at the title and immediately looks at the the two of you.

"Did you try to learn our magick?" He has a very British accent, almost like rarity's, and doesn't sound at all like the other, Scandinavian-sounding minotaurs.

"Sadly, yes. I had totally forgotten to read the warnings fir...."

"DO YOU KNOW THE CONSEQUENCES OF WHAT YOU HAVE DONE!?" The British one now stands up and walks over to you, only to be halted by the apparent king.

"STOP! Let it speak. I want to know what it has to say." The British one slowly backs off to his throne and lets you continue your sentence.

"As I was saying. I had forgotten to read the warnings first. I thought that all the hazards were listed with each spell. I have not even mastered the first I was working on until I saw the 'warnings' chapter in the table of contents. I quickly went through them until I found this one." You take the book back in your still tied hands and lay it on the floor.

You quickly flip through to the page in question and start reading what you had read to Twilight.

"'If you are Homo Sapiens you are strictly forbidden, by the Minotaurian government, to divulge in the practises of magick. If you ignore this warning then you are to be executed immediately.' When we found out about this we immediately packed our bags and went on our way here, until we got kidnapped by these guys here." You shoot a glance at the kidnappers behind you again, to make sure they're still there.

"It appears that since I'm a human or scientifically a 'Homo Sapiens' then I'm to be executed. So we came here to ask why this is the case." You now feel nervous as you just told them they are allowed by their law to kill you, which doesn't seem like a good idea now that you think about it.

"Yes... It seems you ignored one of our more heavier laws. But I have question for you, Human. Did you read release date of book?" You can't see the face of the Minotaur King, but it sounds like he is laughing.

You look at the book and try to find the release date. You look at the front, back, sides and almost every page before giving up.

"I can't find it. Sorry." You say with a defeated sigh.

"We, the Minotaurs, are very strict when it comes to archiving, even more so than you ponies." He says eyeing over Twilight. "An undated book is very rare in our Kingdom, since everything has been dated since more than fifteen hundred years ago. This means that this book is at least that old, and probably older still. If it has our ancient language in it than it is at least two thousand years old.

"Our laws have changed significantly over this period of time, so you will not be executed." Now you can really tell he has a smile on his face.

"I am aware, however, of what happened in the past, which was the reason of this law. It is also the reason I had you taken to me as soon as possible. It was only luck that you were already on your way here when my team encountered you.

"I am going to make you an offer. One you cannot refuse. You are to be assigned an expert on Minotaurian magicks and you are to be her subject until you learn to properly control it." He is back to being serious as he now stands up and walks over to you.

"B-but I already have control. Twilight gave me her memories in order for me to learn." You look at the big figure now standing right in front of you.

"But isn't it strange that this started happening since you started practising. Am I right? And you have to vent your magick at least once every minute, just not to explode. Right? Your magic is a lot different from pony magic, so different in fact that the pony way of controlling it can have the opposite effects on your magic.

"Minotaurian magick resembles yours more, but is still not exactly the same. You will be taught by the best but you will eventually have to make your own form of magic." Finally he's done lecturing, but he has given you a lot to think about.

"Does that mean Plane has to stay here!?" Twilight was now trying to get out of her restraints, which are loose enough for her to be able to stand, but not do much more than that.

"Calm down little purple pony. He does not have to stay here, but his master will have to come with you if you decide to go back to your home. I presume you have made yourself at home already? This means she will become part of your home as well." The King seems to have a lot of fun with this. As if he's been waiting for this a long time.

His personality reminds you a bit of Pinkie. He's too happy for such a dark place, which makes him seem quite random. And did he just say 'She'? Your master is going to be a woman? This ought to be good.

"When will I meet my 'Master' then?" You ask the king who has placed himself back into his throne.

"Right now I guess. Viridiana, could you please introduce yourself to this human." He nodded to one of the minotaurs on his left as she now got up and went to stand in the middle of the hall. Before she speaks however, your restraints are finally removed and you can stretch again.

After a good stretching and popping of your joints you stand up and look at an impatient minotaur in front of you.

"Mai neem iis Viiriidiiana Auraviisss." Viridiana says, apparently not a Master of the English, or Equestrian, language. "I wiill bee your Masterr oontiil yoo knoh aour magiickss." There's something about her voice that does attract you though, it must be that hiss.

"Pleasure to meet you Viridiana Auravis. I am Plane Walker and I guess I will be your student until said otherwise." You say, trying to sound well educated and even taking a bow to your future master, getting Twilight to roll her eyes a little.

First impressions are always the most important, and if that doesn't go well at least try to make a good second impression.

"Now that that is settled, LET'S LUNCH." The king booms through the hall and everything gets moved by servants to set up a large table to hold the lunch.

You hadn't really noticed how hungry you are actually starting to feel at this point. You haven't eaten all day, you even skipped your breakfast, because of that stupid kidnapping.

Stretching once more you take a seat at the now fully served table and hungrily start on your brunch.

A.N.

Again my apologies about last chap being so short. I hope this makes up for it a little.

And again, if anyone has suggestions just let me know. You'll see if I use it, and I will then also mention you at the end.

Anyway, have fun reading and

/)

Yours Faithfully,

Porqupine.