“What do you mean you don’t have any? This is a newly formed town; it should basically be built on the stuff.” I was arguing with the pony running the local shop; Stinking Rich.

“It’s simply that we don’t have any. If you’re so desperate, why don’t you make your own then?” he said back to me as he restocked some of the shelves.

“Fine then” I left the store to try to solve my newest problem, this town had no alcohol whatsoever. You would think that an old fashion town like this would have the ponies singing and dancing all night long while enjoying the occasional pint, they still did that just without any alcohol.

I, however, was not coping very well. The nightmares were only getting worse and worse. For each night that passed I remembered more and more of the horrible things that he did… and the horrible things that I did. I tried to ignore them as much as I could but I was genuinely afraid to go to sleep at this point. I left these thoughts behind as I continued my walk towards the farm at the outer edge of the town. I needed to deliver some tools I had made, and I just wanted hang out with Granny Smith. I laughed too hard the first time she introduced herself, I understood the pun behind her name but still, a young mare named Granny still sounds wrong.

The farm came into view as I walked out of town, and I began to look around to see if I could spot her. It was the time of day when they would usually work the fields. I could hear the occasional thump that was probably just her father doing some applebucking. As I closed in on the farm I spotted the mare I was looking for. Her coat was a light shade of green with a cream colored mane, and she was harvesting corn by the looks of it. Luckily she hadn’t spotted me, so I tiptoed closer to her.

She was humming to herself as she picked the corn and threw it into the basket at her side. I leaned in close and released an ice cold breath at the base of her neck, which caused her to drop the corn she had in her mouth and let out a loud shriek

“What the hay do ye think yer doing?” she turned and glared at me.

I leaned down and picked up the corn that she had dropped. “Oh you know you love it Granny”

She just huffed and continued picking corn. “Fer the last time just call me Annie, everypony does. Granny makes me sound old.”

“Hehe, don’t blame me, it’s your parent that gave you that name. Oh, here” I put down the small sack that was filled with assorted tools. “I finished your order. I even tossed in a couple of special ones in there, just for you.”

She facehoofed and shook her head. “Forgive me if I’m a little hesitant, but the last time ya made something special, yer work burned off the fur on poor Jonathan’s legs. Why would ya make something like that anyway?”

“Hey, it was just supposed to help keep his hooves warm. How was I supposed to know that those horseshoes would set his legs on fire? Besides, I actually tested out these tools beforehand. So don’t worry, nothing’s going to randomly combust or explode this time.” Even though my frost breath isn't that strong I still managed to freeze the gems enough to bind the magic to them for enchanting. Unlike Melandra who only needed to freeze them for a minute, I had to do it for an hour or two, but it still got the job done.

“If ya say so.” She opened the sack and inspected my work. “And what’s special about them this time?”

“Well a bit of this and a bit of that. They won’t wear down, so as long as you don’t lose them you won’t have to get new ones… ever” I swear I could see dollar signs appear in her eyes when I said that.

“Incredible, we will save so much money on this, thank you soo much” she got up on her hind legs and gave me a big hug.

“It’s no problem. Anything for you guys, you were so accepting of me when I came here so it’s the least I could do to repay you.” I picked up the casket which was now brimming with corn. “Let’s go back to the farm with these before heading off; I got some interesting ideas this time.”

“Don’t you have any more work to do?” she asked as we walked towards the barn.

“Nah, I finished it already. Most of the work I do is for you and your family anyways. Switching subjects though, is it long until winter sets in?” I had noticed that it had been getting gradually colder lately.

“No it shouldn’t be long. I think it’s scheduled to start snowing sometime next week. Why? Not a fan of winter?”

I let out a small laugh. “Oh on the contrary, it’s my favorite season.” We had reached the barn and I set the little casket with corn in a corner and Annie put the bag with the tools down. “So, how about we just head down to the lake today? I feel like just lying around and doing nothing.”

“Ain't that what ya do all day anyways?” Ooh she was getting a little cheeky.

“Huh what’s that?” I said with as much surprise as I could fake and looked out towards their orchard.

“What?” she stopped completely and began looking too, giving me the perfect opportunity to curl up my tail. I used it as a whip and gave her a nice smack on her flank. The moment my tail made contact with her bottom she completely froze and slowly turned her head towards me with a look that could melt even the largest of glaziers.

I heard a small voice inside my head as she stared at me, I recognized it as my voice of reason and it said “Run. For the love of everything that is holy, RUN!” I took its advice to heart and bolted down towards the lake outside of Ponyville. I took a quick glance behind me, oh my god, she is catching up.

With a laugh I jumped out into the lake, only to be tackled midair. The water was very cold, and normally I would be freezing, but cold doesn’t bother me anymore in this dragon form. Annie on the other hand… I grabbed her and swam to the shore as I could feel her shivering in my arms.

“you okay there?” I said to her as we had gotten out of the lake.

“Y-yea, only a l-little cold.” She was stammering, and shaking. I sat down beside her and embraced her. I knew that my body warmth wouldn’t do much, but one of my spells, one I learned by accident; would be perfect for this.

At first when I did it I thought it was some sort of heat spell, but a quick look in the Draconicon proved me wrong. As I sat there holding her I could feel the cold seeping out of her and into me. It was a spell that worked two ways, I could steal the heat of something or I could steal the cold. She was calming down as her temperature got back to normal and I let go to see that she was blushing immensely.

“Better now?” I asked the young mare that sat beside me.

“Y-yes, I feel fine… I’m sorry, it was my fault” she hung her head low as she said it.

I reached under her chin and raised her head so she was looking at me. “Nonsense, if it was anyone’s fault it was mine. I was the one who started it anyways”

We sat there for a while and talked about all sorts of things, but eventually came to the topic that I wanted to discuss.

“Booze?” she asked me with a deadpan expression

“That’s right. This town is completely dry, so why not make some ourselves?” I said with enthusiasm.

“I guess, but do you know how to make it? Cause I have no clue.”

“I have some recipes lying back home I’m sure we can use. And you have a lot of fruit and such that we can use. I mean, what do you guys do during winter anyway?” I had looked in the Draconicon and found some recipes for a lot of different kinds of alcohol. Apparently some of the dragons that had previously owned it were quite the booze hounds.

“Well, we have only been through one winter here. But last time we lived off what we harvested and the money we made, during the summer and fall.”

“So, in other words you do nothing. Well this is perfect then. The income from the booze sale would help you through the winter.”

She held her hoof to her chin and looked to be deep in thought. “Well it would help with some extra income, but where will we sell it?”

Yea there was that. We could just sell it directly from the farm or… “A bar. You make the alcohol up at your farm, and I’ll build a bar where we can sell it. I got more than enough bits to fund it thanks to a certain dragoness anyway.”

We discussed how exactly we should do it. I didn’t need any payment for them using the bar I was going to build as long as I got free booze. Annie just had to convince the rest of her family before we could get started.

“Well its getting a little late, I think we should head back” The sun had just disappeared behind the mountains in the distance, creating a magnificent sight as the sky had a red glow to it.

I got up, ready to go but noticed that she was still sitting. She was looking down and fiddling with her hooves. “Jake, can I ask you something?” she said with a quiet voice.

“Of course, you can ask me anything.” I had an idea of what she was going to say. But I really hoped that I was wrong.

“Well you see… there’s this stallion” and I was right.

I decided to play along for now. “Ok, and who’s this stallion then?”

She fiddled a little more with her hooves. “Well, he’s new in town. And I sort of like him…”

“So, who’s the lucky stallion who had caught your eye? Its Jonathan Apple isn’t it? You want me to ask him for you or something then?”

“… No its alright.” she stood up. “I think I’ll just head home for the evening. Goodnight Jake.” and with that she headed off back to the farm.

I wasn’t stupid. I knew who she was interested in; she had been throwing me hints for a while now. It wasn’t that I didn’t like her, I truly enjoyed spending time with her, she quickly became one my best friends since I came to Ponyville. But I still had that nagging feeling in the back of my head, the feeling that it was simply wrong because she was a pony. Slowly I started heading home, while thinking about what I should do, and how horrible I was for just ignoring her feelings like that.

The week passed and we ended up with some horrible weather towards the end. Because of the storm that was raging outside, I was stuck inside. And with nothing better to do I decided to experiment a little. It had been days since I last had slept and it probably wasn’t wise of me to be doing anything that involved magic at this point, but my work kept me distracted, and I needed something to distract me at this point.

“And I’ll add a quarter of the memory spell and just a hint of levitation…” I didn’t really have a system to this. I just added a bunch of random things to see what would happen. You would think that I had learned my lesson after the last time when my buster sword replica sank into the ground like it was water and just disappeared, never to be found again. But no, this time I was making another blade for my glaive. I had added just a bit of every spell I had on hand and was genuinely surprised when it didn’t immediately explode.

So I stood there with the new blade, ready to fasten it to my staff. I was just inspecting it, trying to find out exactly what my enchantment had done to it. As far as I could tell it didn’t look like it was special at all. Maybe all the spells canceled each other out in the end I thought. But then something happened, small mouths appeared all over the blade and it started eating itself. It was horrifying to watch but there was little I could do, and just in a couple of seconds the entire blade was gone. It was horrifying and entrancing at the same time.

“Well that was unexpected” I said as I stared at the place where the blade was just a few seconds ago. “I think I’ll write the recipe for that one down. It’s mostly useless but hey, it’s not everyday you create something that eats itself.” I sat down and was about to start writing but was suddenly interrupted by a loud banging at the door. Sighing to myself I got up and went to open the door.

I wondered who could be out in this kind of weather; whoever it was would be soaked to the bone. As I got close I could hear somepony crying on the outside and opened it immediately. There stood Annie, together with her soaked mane and teary eyes it was the saddest sight I had seen.

“J-Jake, she’s g-gone. W-we can’t find her anywhere” I could barely make out what she was saying between the sobs.

I kneeled down and hugged her in an attempt to calm her down. “Who’s gone, what happened?” I asked her while holding her tight.

“S-Sunny, it’s Sunny she’s missing. She was supposed to be home yesterday but she never showed. Y-ya gotta help me find her Jake. I, I can’t lose my family.” Her older sister, it had been a while since the last disappearance, but I never thought that it was somepony close to me or my friends that would go.

“Shhh, don’t you worry we will find her. Where was the last place you saw her?” I hadn’t actually met her sister; she had always been away when I had been visiting the farm.

“She was coming back from a visit to Fillydephia, but she never returned. We searched everywhere for her but found nothing. Y-you gotta help me find her.” She had calmed down a little at this point.

“Of course I’ll help you find her. But searching in this storm would be pointless; I doubt that you could even make it back to the farm in this weather.” The storm had only grown worse since it had started. By this point you could head the trees creak as the wind shook them. “Are you going to be alright sleeping here” I asked the mare I was holding. But she gave me no answer. I looked down to see that her eyes had closed and she was sleeping peacefully. She probably hadn’t slept since her sister had disappeared. I picked her up and gently carried her to my bed where I put her down. “Sleep tight” I said while stroking her mane. “And don’t you worry, we will find her”

I only had one bed in my house; I hadn’t really had a reason to get another. So I just laid some spare blankets on the floor to give me something soft to lie on. I didn’t want to sleep but I knew that I needed to. I would have tried to go a little longer but she needed my help, and I would be no good if I wasn’t well rested, I would just have to tolerate the nightmares… and him. I lay there shivering with a blanket covering me for what felt like hours. I couldn’t, I just couldn’t go to sleep. I had thought that the things he did to me were bad, but I had started to remember other things, things that he forced me to do. I had killed… I had killed so many.

As I laid there shaking in fear I felt something move beside me. I turned over to see that Annie had gotten off the bed and had sneaked under the blanket and was now laying curled up to me. I pulled her close and laid my tail around her. She didn’t say anything she just snuggled closer. With the comfort of a friend, I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep, no nightmares came to me that night.

I woke up the sound of somepony knocking at my door, Urgh, who can it, be at this hour I thought as I pulled the blanket off me. I didn’t want to get up; it was so tempting to have just stayed sleeping with that warm mare cuddled up next to me. She looked so cute laying there curled up into a ball, completely free from her worries as she slept. I’m not falling for her am I? ... God dammit brain I had to deal with that later, now I had somepony waiting for me at the door.

I got some pants on and went to meet the early fucker. “What do yo… Melandra?” In front me stood the dragoness in her silver Pegasus disguise.

“Hello there Jake.” she greeted back as she walked past me.

“By all means come in” I grumbled under my breath as I closed the door behind her. “So, is there any particular reason for you showing up out of the blue?” I asked the dragoness in disguise who was currently rummaging through my cabinets.

“Not really, Canterlot has just become rather boring lately. So I thought I would pay you a visit and see how you were doing.” She stuck her head out of the cabinet. “Come on, I can smell some meat. Where are you hiding it?”

“Shhh, not so loud. I have another visitor, and I don’t think she will take so lightly to that.” I said and took another look at the sleeping earth pony in my room.

Melandra trotted over to where I was standing and looked at the sleeping guest. “What is this? You have barely been here a couple of weeks and you are already bedding the town’s mares, shame on you” she said in a playful tone.

“Harr harr, no it’s not like that. She is just a friend. She came over yesterday crying because her sister has gone missing, just like all those other ponies. The storm was so bad so she couldn’t go home, so I just let her sleep here” I explained.

Melandra looked at the sleeping mare and then back to me. “And you let her sleep on the floor while you took the bed? What sort of a stallion are you?” she was actually getting a little agitated.

“Whoa, you got the wrong idea here. She fell asleep in my arms as she was crying, so I carried her to the bed and put her down. I was the one sleeping on the floor… she just sort of, joined me. It was nice actually.”

“Is that true?” she eyed the mare curiously. “Well isn’t this just sweet. I was going to ask you if you wanted to do anything today, but I guess you will be busy.” Was she… disappointed?

“We are going to look for her sister, but you are welcome to join us. It would improve the chances of finding her at least.” I went over to wake the sleeping mare.

“Might as well, I don’t have anything else to do… you know that the chances of finding her are slim to none right?” she said with a somber voice. “None of the ponies that disappeared have turned up again.” It was saddening but she was right.

“I know, but we can’t just give up. Ponies don’t just disappear into nothing. She has been taken somewhere and I intend to find out where.” I shook Annie a little bit. “Time to wake up, sleepyhead.”

She groaned before sitting up and rubbing the sleeping gunk out of her eyes. “Morning Jake.” she looked at Melandra who was standing beside me and blushed as she threw the blanket off herself and stood up. “H-hi, and you are?” she said, still a little bit flustered.

I was about to answer for her but she cut me off. “Silver, my name is Silver Wind. And you would be?” I was about to argue with her until I remembered that the fact that she was a dragon was supposed to be a secret.

“My name is Granny Smith, but ya can just call me Annie” she said while trying to fix her messy bed hair, she looked kinda cute with it.

I think Melandra noticed that I was looking at Annie with a slight blush, because she had a wide grin on her face as she stared at me. “Well how about we grab something to eat before we start the search?” I said to my two guests.

“Wait, she is helping too? That’s great, thank you so much” Annie beamed.

“Yea, I just came by to visit Jake but as he’s helping you I might as well join in.”

I cooked up something for all of us to eat. I might not be the best chef there is but even I could make some pancakes without burning down the countryside. We started to systematically search all the area surrounding Ponyville after we finished breakfast. As the day passed, more and more ponies joined in on the search.

The sun was at its highest point in the sky as we were searching through Whitetail woods. We had split up a bit to try to cover a wider area when Melandra waved me over.

“What’s up? Found something?” I asked as I got closer.

“No, nothing yet but there is something you need to know.” she looked around, we were the only ones within hearing range. “Earlier when I told you that none of the ponies that had disappeared had been found I wasn’t completely honest” I raised an eyebrow at this but allowed her to continue. “A couple of days ago one of them showed up in Canterlot. I haven’t seen anything like it since the war. His horn had been severed at the base and his cutiemark had been cut off and another had been stitched on in its place. He was taken to the hospital immediately but died later from magic poisoning. It’s not simply disappearances; somepony is foalnapping ponies and doing horrible things to them.”

I was stunned for a second, this seemed way too familiar but I did not want to believe it. He was dead after all. “And why didn’t you say so earlier?”

She looked to the side where we could see Annie in the distance. “I didn’t want to risk her hearing it, it’s better if she didn’t know that her sister was foalnapped by some maniac. It would just make her worry more over things which she has no control over.” I wanted to argue with her, to say that she deserved the truth… but she was right. There was no reason for her to know… not yet anyway.

We searched for the rest of the day but found nothing, not that I expected to anyway. Every day for a week we would scour every area in proximity to Ponyville in hope for some sort of clue but to no avail. Annie refused to go home to the farm during this time, she said that she couldn’t go back without her sister, a feeling I knew all too well. Melandra stayed the entire time too, just to disappear during the nights and reappear by morning. I could only imagine that she found some cozy cloud to sleep on, the things were heavenly.

But as the week came to a close Annie refused to stop searching, she became more desperate for each day that passed. She was getting to the point where she was becoming self-destructive. She refused to eat; she only slept when she collapsed. Leaving me to carry her in and laying her on the bed, only for her to crawl back out to lie next to me. I eventually stopped sleeping on the floor, deciding if she would just join me there was no reason that we couldn’t just use the bed.

I woke up that one morning with Annie using my chest as a pillow, and a certain dragon in disguise standing in the doorway with the biggest grin I have ever seen.

“It’s a little creepy to know that you’re looking at me sleep you know.” I said while untangling myself from the bed.

“I just came in. But it’s cute to see how close the two of you are you know.” she wiggled her eyebrows at me with a knowing grin.

“Hey it’s not like that.” It kinda was like that, I just refused to believe it “She just needs some comfort… I even tried sleeping in the other room, but she simply refuses to sleep alone it seems.” I took a deep breath. “Do you think you can leave us alone for a moment? I need to convince her to stop searching, and it’s probably not going to be pretty. I found her in the woods yesterday, passed out. It… she just needs to get herself together.”

Melandra stood there for a moment before nodding. “Alright, I’ll go on a little hunt while you sort things out here. Just be careful alright. She is incredibly fragile right now… don’t mess it up.” I heard her close the door, and could see her taking to the air, flying towards the Everfree forest.

I looked down at the sleeping pony. I did not want to do this, but it was necessary. Or so I told myself.

“Hey Annie. Time to wake up.” I said gently poking her in the side.

She mumbled a little before her eyes shot open. “Oh no, what am I doing here. I need to get out and find her.” she got up and tried to get past me but I stopped her. She struggled as I held her.

“Calm down Annie. Calm down.” I continued to hold her for over half an hour before she stopped struggling; now she was sobbing into my chest just saying her sister’s name over and over again. I started stroking her mane which seemed to calm her down a little.

“You alright?” I asked the pony in my arms, only to get a nod in reply. “That’s good. The guards are still looking for her; just let them do their job alright? Right now, your family needs you. And you need them. So how about we get you over there?” I tried to put her down, but she just held on harder.

“No, don’t make me go please. I… I love you.” It finally came out. I couldn’t keep ignoring it after she just said it like that.

I pulled her away from me and looked her directly in her eyes and sighed. “I know. You made it kinda obvious. But you are not in a right state of mind right now.” I simply wanted to say I love you too but this was the right decision. “Go home to your family, spend some time with them.”

“B-but, don’t you love me?” She started tearing up again. This was exactly what I wanted to avoid.

I put one of my hands to my forehead and groaned. “I like you, I really do. But as I said you are not thinking clearly right now.” I put both my hands on her shoulders. “You need to go home to your family… after a week, if you’re still feeling the same, come back and we will deal with it then.” It was the right thing to say, but obviously not what she wanted to hear. She didn’t say another word, she just ran out the door with tears in her eyes. I ran after her but stopped just outside as she was well on her way to the village already. I just stood there, staring off into the distance.

“Let go of me and answer the riddles three dammit.” It came from behind me and I did not recognize the voice.

I turned around to see Melandra flying over my smithy, holding a creature by its tail in her mouth. It was at least double the size of Melandra in her pony form. Most of its body reminded me of a lions, but on its back were two huge wings that had a deep blue color, one of them was bent in a very wrong way. Its mane was also mostly blue with white lines running through it, and it had a human…ish sort of face. It’s a goddamn sphinx. I thought in disbelief.

“Hey, Jake I found something interesting. “ Melandra said, still holding it by the tail.

I facepalmed and groaned, hard. This week has had a severe lack of wtf moments. I’m glad that you took it upon yourself to fix this Melandra. I thought as I stared at the sight before me.

Author's Note

New Character tag added now. Granny smith: there is no young tag for her, so it will just have to do.