Jason hated his boss. Over a year in a job, and his employer had never noticed his efforts, never noticed his above and beyond attitude. Normally, he wouldn't care. Normally, he would have been happy to avoid contact with his boss, who had professed to rule the office by fear, which in hindsight wasn't the worst scenario. Work was finished, lazy employees were fired, etc. It was even rumored that his boss was feared by some of the unions. There was also a rumor that he had a hand in the union leadership change about a year ago.

However, this wasn't what had Jason fuming with rage, not even close. His so called "friend" had played a "joke" on him, opening several windows on his computer of questionable origin while Jason was on his break. Naturally, the one day the boss actually noticed anything related to Jason was when his computer was in a compromised status. Jason had had a fun time trying to explain the truth of the scenario to his boss, who literally didn't blink throughout the fifteen minute long conversation. Anyway, he was "suspended" from his job, told to leave until further notice, and was now driving home in his beat up pickup, thinking about several creative ways he could kill his friend. He turned up the music.

"Well, at least I have some free time now," he sighed, "Hooray...".

Thinking about his life, he realized that extra free time would just give him more time to do nothing. He had been robbed a month ago, and although the insurance company agreed to pay for everything, until his possessions were replaced, his house was strangely eerie and boring. He could care less about his material possessions, though, because for some reason, the burglar had stolen several photo albums of his family. He remembered how angry he was at the man that took some of his only family memories. Irreplaceable family memories.

That's another thing. His family. He kept getting angrier as he thought about all of the shit that had happened to him. All of them were killed in a bank shooting eight years ago, when he was only sixteen. He had never let it affect him, but it still weighed heavily on his heart. He remembered how lonely he was in the months following their deaths, the feelings of uselessness he felt over not being able to save them. How he had been the one who had told them to go to the bank, and cash in a birthday check for him. How it was really his fault that they were dead.

He didn't have much of a social life either, rarely doing things with friends, and hadn't had a girlfriend in about six months. Ever since he left college a year ago and got a job, he had become extremely busy in his accounting for long hours, and was usually exhausted when he got home, so he had come to see a love life as a near impossibility. He could at least take comfort in the fact that he was making money, and would be able to slack off later in life. At least, until today.

He focused back on the road, in time to see a car in front of him continue to swerve erratically. 'Damn drunks,' he thought, wondering if he would be graced with a front seat in the inevitable collision. Noticing a bumper sticker on the drunk man's car, he leaned forward, mumbling under his breath. "How's my driving?" it said, "Call 1-800-EAT-SHIT." Jason chuckled. He started reading other similar bumper stickers on the car in front of him. He was so focused, in fact, that he didn't see a van that had crossed the grass median to escape some cops a few thousand feet ahead of him.

"Aaand we're back with live reports on the high speed chase currently taking place on Highway 680," the radio said. Jason looked at the radio, and it continued, "and the escapee has apparently attempted to avoid arrest by crossing the median line."

Jason thought for a moment, looked up, and saw the van heading straight for him. Time seemed to slow down. 'Well, shit,' he thought, 'what a great last day on this planet.' He couldn't help but feel sorry for himself, and then get angry. He had gone through so much, it almost seemed fitting, like a final, cruel joke, to be the only innocent casualty of a freak incident.

"Cue sounds of crumpling metal"

Jason drew a ragged breath as he began to think again.

"Ugh, my back"

His back hadn't hurt this much in a long time, he thought. But wait, he was under the impression that in order to think, he would have to be a living being. 'How could I have survived that? There's no way that's possible, even if I was wearing a seatbelt.' He thought. Jason continued to lay on the ground, starting to become aware of his situation. Two things he knew for sure, he wasn't on the road or in a hospital bed, and it almost sounded like he could hear wildlife. Was he off the side of the road? How could he have possibly gotten thrown that far? Last thing he remembered, he was in the fast lane. And yet, he didn't feel hurt, just the opposite in fact. He felt fine, better than he had before the crash. His bum shoulder didn't hurt anymore, something he hadn't gotten a break from in years. Sure his back was a little sore, but that would probably wear off.

The early afternoon sun's rays warmed his body as he decided that he may as well have a look around. He opened his eyes, flinching from the sudden influx of light. Managing to open his eyes long enough to adjust, he attempted to move his limbs, but immediately thought that maybe he wasn't as uninjured as he had previously thought. A black blurry cylinder in front of his face moved. Instinctually he tried to get away from the thing, and found that it had come with him. He tried to smash it with his other hand, but was greeted by another blurry cylinder of the same, matte black color. He tried to grab one with his fingers, but nothing happened. Flailing the cylinders around, it took Jason a moment to realize that these things were his arms, so he did the only logical thing, and freaked out.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH" he screamed, flailing the appendages around, "WHERE ARE MY HANDS?!?!?! WHERE ARE MY HANDS?!?!" He looked up and was greeted by a blinding sun. He put his arms up to the light, and could clearly see perfectly round holes protruding through them. "WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED?!?!?! WHAT KIND OF A CAR CRASH WAS THIS?!?!"

After twenty or so minutes of yelling and screaming, Jason's logical mind started to regain control, allowing him to at least partially question the scenario. 'So lets see,' he thought after he calmed down, 'I'm not actually in pain from any of these injuries, nor am I even in the same place, so I'm either dreaming or high or in some sort of limbo.' He decided to see if he could find anything more interesting than the field he was in, looking around for signs of civilization. He saw some small plumes of smoke, like one would find from a wood-burning fire, coming from an unknown source behind a small forest.

"I shall go that way," he proclaimed, to no one in particular. He tried to stand up, but found that he was unable to, falling on his face. Something else was wrong, of course, because something had blocked him from directly hitting his face. With an air of nervousness, he raised his hand to his forehead and found some sort of jutting, thing. It felt like a horn, but also felt like it was horribly disfigured. Deciding to ignore and suppress the terror and confusion building back up in his body, he dragged himself to a lake, only a few feet away, and looked at his reflection. He flinched and managed to resist the urge to yell for a few more minutes.

A matte black face with large fangs stared back at him, with a sharp, ragged horn and bug like wings. Pure blue eyes replaced his old green irises, and didn't seem to have any kind of pupils. His old, human features were gone. His brown hair, his nose, and his ears were all replaced by features of his new body, which was that of a small, black, technicolor horse-like thing.

Looking around, the environment seemed to have the same color scheme, with thick outlines and unnaturally bright colors. Jason ran his hoof down a blade of grass, finding that the texture was still the same, even though it looked completely different. "Weird," he exclaimed, continuing to move the grass around.

Twenty minutes later, when he was done staring at the surrounding environment, he had come to a conclusion. 'Okay,' thought Jason, 'so this is the reflection of a changeling from that show that I watched a while ago. What was it called?' He shook his head, trying to focus. 'So that reflection is me,' he punched himself 'and this is real, so... um' He was silent for a moment, contemplating the ramifications of this new development. 'So I crashed into another car in a head-on collision, never felt the pain of death, and woke up here, the setting for a TV show about intelligent ponies, with no injuries. Not the worst thing that could happen, I suppose.' He looked at his arm, seeing the ground through its holes. 'Definitely not the best thing though'.

"So I'm a changeling," he paused, thinking out loud, "and last time I checked, changelings are arch enemies of ponies. What a gift," he sighed, "and as far as I know, there's no way to get back, no way to see my friends ever again." Jason felt a pang of loneliness, remembering the recent things his friends did together. Then he remembered the "practical joke" that had basically taken his job. 'Maybe this is better off,' he thought, 'after all, most of my ties to that world are gone, and it's not like there's anything I can do to get back, as far as I know.'

Deciding he had wasted enough time, Jason got up shakily onto his hooves, ignoring the impulse to freak out again. He started to walk, attempting to emulate the movements of actual horses. Foals walked, what, three minutes after birth? Why couldn't he do the same thing, especially if he had the coordination of a man in his twenties?

As he finished the thought he face-planted again, groaning as he swept some of the dirt out of his face. He set off for town yet again, concentrating as he put the hooves forward. At least the back legs were rather easy to control, they were basically like his old legs. The front legs kept moving in strange ways, especially with these stupid backwards facing elbows. He hit the ground again, this time falling onto his shoulder. He sighed, getting up again. After a much larger amount of time than it should have taken, he finally arrived at the edge of the forest, which he assumed was the Everfree. he thought for a moment. "The Everfree," he scoffed, "couldn't possibly be that bad." He realized that he was talking to himself again. He really needed to stop doing that.

Without any further thoughts, he entered the forest, immediately annoyed with the multitude of bushes and brambles he was forced to forge a path through. It didn't take him long to realize that while he felt scratching along his skin, he wasn't actually feeling pain. He looked back to see his sides covered with several white scratches, yet no blood. Thinking about the punch before, he couldn't seem to remember much more than a heavy tap, even though he had put a fair amount of power behind the swing. Concluding that his armor, chitin if he recalled correctly, was stronger than he previously thought, he simultaneously decided that he needed a disguise. Actually, that kind of went without saying, but even so.

Thinking about the best way to blend in, he immediately thought of a colt. He figured that no one really cared what kids said, the were always pretty much ignored. He knew some kids that got away with saying some really stupid stuff, completely unquestioned by any adults. He figured with all that working for him it would be easy enough for him to stay under the radar. Thinking about the form he wanted, he imagined a dark grey pegasus colt with a lavender mane. Possibly not the best color combination, but then again, at least there weren't any annoyingly bright colors.

'How do I do this?' thought Jason, realizing that he had no idea how to do anything related to changelings. After a few failed attempts involving arm flails and attempts at magic words, he re-imagined the form he had created, concentrating harder this time. He imagined his form changing into the form of the colt. Heatless green flames licked over his body, leaving new fur in its wake. When Jason opened his eyes, he noticed that he was much closer to the ground.

"This is weird," he thought, realizing that his voice had become rather high pitched. He hated having such a high pitched voice already. He looked at his flank, seeing the absence of a cutie mark. 'Fine with me,' he thought, 'One less thing to explain.' As an after thought, 'this should be interesting if I meet the CMC', he chuckled. He touched his new fur. "Shit this is soft! I've never felt anything anywhere close to this soft!" He yelled, before realizing that yelling in a hostile forest probably wasn't the best idea. He tripped over a root and hit his face again, groaning into the ground.

He shook it off and immediately went back to marveling over his new fur. However, he was still attempting to walk at the same time, and bumped into a low branch. After he was done yelling at himself for getting hurt once again, he realized that he had actually come off completely unscathed. It seemed as if his armor was still under his disguise of the colt. 'Interesting,' he thought, 'I wonder if the horn still works? How did they levitate things in the show?' he didn't know. 'Imagining that they were floating? Yeah that sounds corny enough. I'll try that then.'

He closed his eyes, imagined a specific rock floating, and opened his eyes. The rock didn't budge. He tried again, straining harder, with the same results. He figured that somehow he needed to get magic through the horn, he just wasn't sure how exactly. Jason spent a few minutes concentrating on what he wanted to happen before he finally relaxed, annoyed that he couldn't get any spells to work. He shut his eyes and turned, feeling a slightly cold sensation on his forehead.

He looked over and saw the same floating rock enveloped in a light green aura. He really didn't know what he'd done exactly, but evidently magic didn't work all that well under pressure. Not without practice, anyway. It was kinda hard to explain something that he had no experience with. Looking up at the space his horn should occupy, he saw a kind of ghost aura of a corresponding green color. "So that still works." He briefly thought about the other spells he could preform, and the rock hit the ground. "I guess it needs some concentration," he chuckled.

'What about wings?' he realized. He twisted his neck to look at his now feathered wings, and sighed. "Why couldn't I have at least had those in my regular form, instead of those bug-like things? Ugh, whatever." He started flexing random muscles in his back until his wings splayed out, with a much smaller wingspan than he had expected. There was no way something like this could actually fly. "Okay..." he said, clearly unimpressed. With another flex, he brought them forcefully down, making him lift slightly off of the ground and throwing him off balance.

One thing about wings, they were strange to control, for one thing. There was just no way to describe the sudden addition of limbs, although they definitely weren't comparable to arms in any way. Lifting them back up, and repeating the process, not getting much further than he had the first time. He tried flexing them in different ways, getting them to warp and bend, he assumed to better cup the air. He tried again, furiously concentrating on not only the actual flapping of the wings, but also the new slight warping he needed to create with every flap of his wings.

He was able to hover after a few attempts, and slowly gained altitude a few attempts later. Jason steadily improved his abilities in the small clearing, gliding and banking around, until he lost control when he attempted to try what he expected would be an easy trick and smacked into a tree.

"Okay," he groaned, "that one hurt." It wash't hard for him to decide to stick to the ground for a while, at least until the trees cleared up.

He continued walking, levitating small things from time to time, until he came across a road.

"Ponyville, 1/2 mile" read a sign

"Awesome," exclaimed Jason, "this is going to be too easy."

"Bored, bored, bored..." Jason groaned as he slowly walked the half-mile distance. "This shouldn't take this long! I should at least be able to see the town by now!" He looked at his hooves. "Stupid dwarf legs..." He chuckled for a moment, and tried to make one of them longer, to no avail. "Guess it only works with full transformations." He tripped and fell on his face again. "Fuuuuuuuck."

He got up and started trying to figure out how worthwhile it would be to just become a regular pony for the walk. Nah, that'd probably just cause more complications. Oh, how he hated complications.

Jason was roused from his musings by the unmistakable sound of a breaking stick, making his ears swivel towards the offending area. Managing to ignore the ear movements for the time being, he immediately locked his vision on the area from which he thought he had heard the noise. However, there were no further sounds, and he decided that it was nothing to worry about. He continued to walk on, attempting to figure out how to voluntarily move his ears, to no avail. A few steps later, he heard the crackling of more broken foliage, and repeated his previous actions of turning and staring. In the darkness of the forest, however, he could have sworn he had seen a set of yellow eyes looking back at him.

"Hopefully I'm just losing my mind," he scoffed. "Never thought I'd be saying that in a positive way." Against his better judgement, he moved to the opposite side of the path and continued to stare into the shadows for several more seconds before deciding to move on. "God dammit I'm going insane," he sighed and turned around, continuing to walk. "I'm getting pretty good at this walking stuff though, haven't tripped in almost three minutes. I've been talking to myself for much longer than I want to though..."

Something snarled. Jason turned around, just in time to see some sort of giant wolf running straight at him. He reared up, putting his forelegs in front of him for protection, wedging one into the back of the wolf's jaw. "Well, shit." The wolf bit into his left arm, and Jason cried out in pain, yet the wolf seemed unable to do any real damage because of the hidden chitin. Jason wildly punched at the beast, repeatedly hitting it in the nose. The process continued until Jason regained enough of a thought process to punch the wolf in the eye.

The wolf released his arm in pain, briefly nursing it's eye. The wolf was unperturbed, however, and simply backed up and pounced again, this time missing its target as Jason rolled out of the way, getting a stone painfully stuck in his arm. Managing to get to his feet, Jason attempted to levitate the wolf and try to fling him away, but couldn't seem to gather the power to do so.

"Great, so now I figure out my limitations," he scowled. The wolf, now back to its feet, almost seemed to smile as it neared Jason. Jason turned and ran, not particularly looking for a fight in the first place.

"Dammit I can't fight that thing!" He looked back to see that it had closed the distance between them considerably already, and was still gaining. "Oh fuck!" Then some good luck came along, and he tripped again, sliding a short distance on his face before coming to a halt in front of the wolf. In possibly his clearest thinking so far, he transformed back into his changeling form. He had grown considerably larger, was now slightly taller than the wolf, and looked much more menacing, he hoped. The wolf lunged again, and time seemed to slow. He wasn't ready to dodge, and the beast was too close. Jason closed his eyes, clenched his teeth, and tried the levitation spell again, not sure why he expected to find different results.

Waiting a few seconds, and finding that he had not been tackled or killed, Jason opened his eyes, and stared at the face of a VERY pissed off, but luckily immobile wolf. Chuckling to himself, Jason moved the wolf upwards, and flung him back into the forest, honestly not weighted by the probable fate of the wolf. "That would have to be the most anti-climactic ending to a fight I've ever seen."

Jason had been in a few fights during high school and college, and was proud to say that he had won all but one, in which someone pulled a gun on him. It always went the same way. Some large guy would get pissed off by him, and because he was tall and lanky, would think they had found someone that couldn't fight back. However, this overconfidence was always their downfall, because while Jason actually knew martial arts, they only knew brute strength. 'Lotta good those human fight tactics are going to do now...' he thought.

"Well, now that that's over," Jason said as he transformed back into colt form. Looking himself over, he noticed that the bite wound and some other large, bloody scratch marks were still there. Curious, he shifted into an adult pony, finding the same cuts, albeit bigger, and slightly more painful. "Weird," he said as he thought back over the conclusion of the battle. "Why could I levitate the wolf the second time?" he wondered, "Oh well, I guess that's not really that important, although my true form might be stronger. Or it could be that the form I was in didn't have a horn. I guess that makes sense."

He started walking again, finally seeing the town as he moved over a hill. "Ugh, finally. Half mile, my ass!" He looked back over his injuries. Thinking for a moment, he laughed "In a supposedly peaceful world like theirs, it sure will be funny to see their reactions to a beat up kid. I guess this could be good for the disguise, though."

Jason felt strangely drained after the fight, and immediately thought of food. He didn't really feel the specific feeling of hunger though, and just felt a more empty feeling, really. He couldn't figure out what to do, until his mind pieced together the scenario. "Oh no," he exclaimed "I need love to survive." He sighed. "Well, this complicates things, to say the least. I guess, though, love is kind of a broad emotion, including love from friends and stuff. Maybe all positive emotions are 'edible', so to speak. Eh, couldn't possibly be THAT hard." He paused. "I really need to stop talking to myself."

"I hate walking." He paused, and slapped himself. "Wings, you idiot, wings." At that, Jason stretched his wings to their full span, which was still hilariously small, before taking off towards Ponyville.

Flapping his wings a little faster, Ponyville approached as Jason landed on a hill overlooking the city. He touched down behind a fallen tree and pushed his back against it, much like a soldier would press his back against a wall of sandbags when attempting to stay below cover. He tried to slow his heart rate from the fight with the wolf, only partially succeeding as parts of the fight flashed through his memory. He turned his thoughts to planning his entrance, casting an unhappy gaze at the long, bloody scratches on his side. He raised his arm to inspect the damage that the wolf's teeth had caused and flinched a little. It was definitely not a pretty sight. Besides the fact that it was bleeding heavily, he could swear he saw bone in the wound. He didn't think he had regular bones. Maybe the chitin changed color? This lack of any knowledge about himself was starting to get annoying.

Turning his attention back to the task of entrance, he re-thought his decision about his current form. "Okay, so I want to do what when I enter? I need ways to get out of crappy situations should they arrive, so I need magic. Unicorn then, I guess. Jason watched as the necessary transformation occurred, his wings retracted and disappeared in a flare of green flames, while a horn extended from his forehead. "I'll never get tired of that," he mused to himself. "Now lets see... Oh yeah! plan of action!" He looked at his wounds, which were still there, much to his annoyance, but had seemed to stop bleeding. "If I do get caught, what would be useful to escape?" he asked himself "Teleportation would be nice, and I guess if I'm totally revealed I can fly, although there's no telling how far I'd get like that... hmm." He paused. "Okay, first stop, the library to try to learn that spell. Then I guess I need to try to get some love, so I could just find the CMC if they're out and about, possibly try and make some friends. They'll probably notice the lack of a cutie mark before I even see them." He chuckled.

And so, with his master plan in place, Jason set off down the hill and into the marketplace. As he walked, he couldn't help but notice the concerned and even mortified looks that he was getting from some of the ponies that walked by. He chuckled. His leg looked like hell, but even though it should have forced him to limp from the pain, it only felt like a deep paper cut. More ponies stared. It was almost like he could FEEL their pity. 'Oh wait, changeling, duh.' Jason was starting to feel uncomfortable with being such a center of attention and the receiver of all of the ponies' emotions, and decided to break into a trot. One of the ponies gasped, expecting the small colt to fall onto his face or hurt himself with the increased effort on his mangled leg. Finally exiting the marketplace and losing the stares of most of the ponies, he noticed a treehouse in the distance, and, assuming that it was the library, took off in that direction. He passed Sugarcube corner, and noted its location, along with the location of Carousel Boutique, which was only a couple of blocks away.

As he was trotting, he began to think about how much easier it was than a jog as a human would have been. Chalking it up to the new, horse like form, he continued on. He looked at the ground. Cobblestone. But his hooves weren't making hardly any noise as they moved over the hard material, only a faint clip-clop noise, as if he was listening to it through a wall. He stopped trotting, then picked up a hoof and slammed it into the ground as hard as he could. Instead of a loud, resounding CLOP, he barely got a noise louder than before.

"Nice! Silenced hooves!" Jason remembered back to all the times where he had decided to scare his friends and family members as a kid, and was almost always foiled because of the noise he made sneaking up on people. The only person he had ever succeeded in scaring was his grandfather, which he was proud of until his mother told him that he was deaf. Then he was grounded for scaring his deaf grandfather. Like he should've known. He lost his hearing in the war, but had developed an ability to read lips and read faces, which was probably why he never knew. It was also the first time he had met his grandfather. The odds were definitely stacked against him that day. A true underdog story. He chuckled, and then ran face first into the door of the library.

Shocked out of his stupor, he raised his hoof to knock on the door, and ran his hoof into it a few times, slightly annoyed when it didn't make any noise whatsoever. "Really hooves," he said to the one he had used to knock.

The door opened, and inside was a light lavender unicorn with a navy blue mane that had streaks of pink and purple running through it. Twilight Sparkle, if he remembered correctly.

They both stood there for a while, as Twilight looked at the most mangled foal she had ever seen. It was weird, but he felt almost like he could tell what she was feeling, which in this case was a mix of pity, nervousness and...fear?. 'Must be a changeling thing,' he thought. Jason cleared his throat, giving her a smile. That seemed to make her even more nervous.

"Um... Do you have any books on more advanced unicorn spells?" he asked. She continued to stare for a few more seconds before she finally responded.

"Sure, um, right this way" she replied, walking into the library while shooting a few worried glances over her shoulder. She levitated some books over, and he transferred them into his magical grasp. God he loved floating things.

"Where can I read this?" he asked. Twilight pointed to a chair in the corner, and he brought the top one of the pile over and sat down, cracking the book in front of him, labeled "Magic and its Uses, Volume VI, Spells Q-S." He was about to start reading when Twilight cleared her throat.

"S-so, um, sorry for asking, but what happened to you?" She asked while gesturing towards his foreleg and side.

"Well I was in the Everfree..."

"Alone?!?!" she practically yelled. He had somewhat expected this reaction, and forced himself to keep down a chuckle. The anger that he could feel radiating off of her may have helped a little.

"Yeah. Anyway..."

"What were you thinking?!? You could have been killed!"

"Well was I?" He paused. "I didn't think so. Now if you'll let me continue, I was walking and was attacked by a wolf, but I fought it off. There. End of story." He opened the book back up that he had apparently closed, and opened it to the first page.

"W-well, at least let me get you some bandages..." she said.

"Ugh, you don't need to--" he noticed she had already left the room. "Where was I?" He asked himself as he flipped through the pages. "Ah. Teleportation. Here we go."

Teleportation is the general ability that a unicorn professes to achieve allowing the spellcaster's body to create a rift in space time and... He decided to skim, in interest of leaving the library in less than a week. He picked up a while later.

The actual process of teleportation changes with the user, but is most often achieved by the user as simply concentrating on a new venue that is very well known and concentrating on the idea of appearing there. WARNING: do not attempt to teleport without a destination or to a partially unknown destination because of the risk of...

Looking back up from the book, Jason saw Twilight re-enter the room with an incredibly large first aid kit floating beside her. Before he could protest, she had already retrieved the gauze and wrapped it around his arm, after the liberal addition of anti-bacterial solutions. After the burning pain had subsided, he returned his attention to her.

"Thanks." he said, and got up to attempt teleportation.

"Hold on kid, you're not leaving until you tell me how this happened."

"Didn't I already do that?"

"Yeah, but I'm referring to the circumstances that led into this mess. Why were you even out in the Everfree?"

'Shit' he thought, 'how could he forget to come up with a backstory before he came here? How stupid was he?' He had to think, and think fast to get out of this. Even then, he wasn't that good at coming up with quick, believable lies. 'Lets go, zero years of drama school.' "Well, I was just exploring, and..."

"Just exploring!?! JUST exploring?!?! Has anypony ever told you about the dangers of the forest?" 'She bought it. Perfect,' he thought. This was easier than he had hoped, especially now that he could tell whether or not people doubted him, because apparently that counted as an emotion, and he could only feel it when she briefly doubted he had actually fought a wolf.

"Well sure, but I may have ignored them."

"Whatever, but NEVER do this again. Do you hear me?"

"Yup. Now listen I have to go pick up some stuff from the market, so...yeah see you later I guess." Thinking that it would be a good time to try the teleportation spell, he concentrated on the area right outside the library door, and imagined the travel occurring. He heard a small pop and felt a whoosh of air, and found himself to be outside the library. "Heh. I could get used to that. Still too easy though." He started walking towards the market.

Back in the library, immediately after Jason left...

"What! how did he do that?" Twilight yelled out after the mystery colt warped away. "It took me years to even THINK about teleportation, and now this little kid comes in here and does it immediately?" She sighed. "I'll just chalk that one up to 'strange experience in general' and leave it at that." And with that statement she went back to reorganizing the library books to her new version of the Dewey decimal system.

"What do you mean 'why aren't you in school?'" Jason asked a rather large unicorn stallion that had stopped him on his way to the market.

"Playing a little hooky there are we? We'll see who has the last laugh." he said as he levitated Jason in the air and started walking to the school house. Figuring that the stallion was serious, he couldn't get over how weird it would be on earth if some guy picked up some random kid and decided to take him back to school. He wondered if child molesters existed here.

One surprisingly short walk later, the stallion opened the door to the quaint, one room school house, and burst in, much to the surprise of Mrs. Cherilee and the rest of the students, most of which, he recognized. When Sweetie Belle, Scootaloo and Applebloom saw him they shared some exited whispers, and then became silent. Must be the whole 'not having a cutie mark' thing. The stallion levitated Jason back to the floor and released his magical grip.

"I caught this little bugger trying to cut class." he said awkwardly and matter-of-factly.

"Okay then little guy," Mrs Cherilee said, looking as confused as Jason, "take a seat over there and I'll continue." Almost snickering at the absurdity of it all, he sat down in a chair next to Scootaloo and some other pony. Checking out his surroundings, he noticed Scootaloo and silently cheered, as she was one of his favorites from the show. Cherilee seemed to be getting up the nerve to continue speaking, so Jason stared at her, slouched in his chair, and retook his general sitting position from high school, as if to say, 'Go ahead, just try and teach me'.

"So, class, apparently we have a new student," She said, attempting a glare at the stallion before she realized that he had left. "Would you care to tell us your name?" 'Crud! I didn't think of that either,' he thought 'just need to buy some time'
"Moe" he blurted out.

"Moe...Moe..." she rolled the name around in her mouth for a minute, then asked, "and your last name?"

'Gotta keep a straight face...' "Lester" The classroom was silent for a few moments before nearly all of the students burst into laughter at the teacher's expense. Jason cracked a smile. Kids were so easy.

Scootaloo turned to him. "You're not half bad, new guy!" she put her hoof up, and he bumped his into it with a satisfying clack. When the laughing finally died down, he had come up with a real name. Good timing, because Cherilee looked like she was about to explode. So much for good impressions...

"Your REAL name this time, please," she warned.

"Oh, yeah, um, Blaze"

"Last name..."

"Don't have one"

"Okay, class, say hello to your new classmate Blaze." A sea of hellos and other greetings was heard. "Now we're going to go around the room and I want each of you to introduce yourself." One mind-numbingly boring set of introductions later, Cherilee decided to get back to teaching.

"Why does he have all of the cuts and bandages?" a filly in the back asked in a sarcastic manner, "was he just being too clumsy like those other blank-flank losers?" A few ponies actually laughed. Jason turned around, and saw a very smug looking Diamond Tiara.

'How did I not expect that?' he thought.

"Well?" she pestered.

"Fine, I'll tell you. I was in the Everfree..." he paused, waiting for the collective, slightly annoying now, gasp to wind down, "and then some wolf attacked me. Ya happy now?"

"Yeah right, you were probably running the whole time."

'She doesn't give up, I'll give her that...' "Actually I killed the thing." Another gasp. He rolled his eyes. Cherilee stood up.

"Diamond Tiara, I would like to see you after class." Jason heard a gasp and a growl, realizing he had really pissed her off. 'Mission accomplished!'

A bell rang. "Alright my little ponies, recess!" 'Weird being back in elementary school,' he thought, 'especially since I just finished college.'

Walking outside, he was immediately swarmed by the CMC, albeit expectantly.

"Is it true that you took out a wolf all by yourself?" Scootaloo spoke up.

"Ya..." replied Jason. The small group huddled for a moment and exchanged hurried whispers before turning back to him. This time Sweetie Belle spoke up.

"Do you want to join the" *dramatic pause* "Cutie Mark Crusaders?" They had all struck goofy poses that he guessed were supposed to look intimidating or adventurous, or something.

"Sure...I guess..." Scootaloo elbowed Sweetie Belle in the side.

"Oh yeah, but you have to pass 'Initiation' first." she said.

"Okay, what is it?" he asked, genuinely curious. Appleboom spoke up.

"So here's what y'all has ta do..."

"So here's what ya'll has ta do..." Applebloom started before Scootaloo cut her off.

"Play a prank on Mrs. Cherilee!" She squealed, fluttering her wings.

"Well consarnit Scootaloo ah wanted to tell Blaze about it!" Applebloom protested.

"You always tell people about stuff, now its my turn!" Scootaloo countered.

"No, ah always start to tell them, but then ya interrupt me."

"No I don't."

"Yes ya do." Jason deadpanned.

"No I don't." Sensing that this wasn't going anywhere fast, Jason decided to cut in.

"Wait", replied Jason, "is that it? You guys acted like you wanted me to kill somepony. Give me twenty four hours. Heh heh."

"What are you going to do?" inquired Sweetie Belle.

"I guess, the important question is, what have you guys already done?"

"Well, we did the tacks on the chair trick, along with the one where the back of the chair falls off, and some other corny ones that these two made me do." replied Scootaloo

"Pfft, those are the easy ones. You need it to be overly complicated for it to be funny. Do you guys know what gunpowder is?" Jason started smiling malevolently.

"Uhh... not that ah know of," answered Applebloom

"Excellent..." Jason said as he tapped his forehooves together malevolently.

"Hey you stupid blank flank, because of you I got detention." Diamond Tiara said rather matter-of-factly, with Silver Spoon in tow.

"Oh no, not her," Sweetie Belle whined.

Jason turned around to face Diamond and Silver Spoon. "So?" That seemed to throw her for a loop, and she stared at Jason for a few seconds before replying.

"You know, my father is a very powerful man and you don't want to make him angry..." she warned.

"What, afraid to get your hooves dirty, afraid you can't face up to me? Do you need to hide behind your father this whole time or are you actually going to try something yourself for a change?" Jason had already decided to incite something, because frankly, she made it too easy. "Here, I'll give you a free shot." he pointed to his cheek, which he had turned towards her, confident in his armor to protect him. "Come on, what are you, chicken?" he paused, "Any day--" Bam. He felt a hit to his jaw, not that it really hurt, but he had managed to start a fight. Objective complete. He turned his head back to diamond, having not stumbled, and gave her a toothy grin. "That's it, eh? Pathetic."

Another punch. Just as wimpy as the last one. His head snapped to the side again, just long enough for him to not see Silver Spoon broadside him. He hit the ground. Hard. "Hey, two one one, no fair." complained Jason. "Like that's really going to help your odds..." He looked up to see a VERY enraged Diamond Tiara, and another hoof headed strait for his face. It still didn't hurt that much, and it was kinda funny watching her attempts at fist fighting (Hoof fighting?). He started laughing. Diamond got even more pissed off.

"Why. Can't. I. Hurt. You?!?!" She yelled. Applebloom tried to push Diamond off of Jason, but Diamond simply turned and punched her in the cheek. Jason abruptly stopped laughing. He was about to push Diamond off and punch some sense into her when an enraged Cherilee walked up.

"Diamond Tiara! You get off of Blaze this instant!" she shouted.

"B-but, Mrs. Cherilee, he started it!" she yelled back.

"That is no excuse. Your father WILL hear about this, young lady." As an afterthought, "Don't you dare move from that spot." She directed her attention at Jason. "Blaze, are you alright? How in Equestria are you unharmed?"

"Just hard headed, I guess, but you should really be asking Applebloom that question," he replied and pointed. Cherilee turned to Applebloom and winced. A large bruise was forming in the middle of her cheek, next to a small cut. "Oh you poor thing, are you okay?"

"Yeah ah'm fine ah suppose, but it still hurts like all gettout. And ah was just tryin ta help Blaze over here when she punched me." Cherilee looked even more angry than before, grinding her teeth together and taking short looks at Diamond.

Jason looked at the cut, and wondered how fast things healed here. 'Things must heal pretty fast, considering how Rainbow Dash got out of the hospital with a broken bone in only a few days.' He thought about Applebloom's cut and bruise, about how if he could teleport and levitate things, that he could probably heal a cut and a bruise. Because how hard could it be? He decided to try, chanelling a fairly large amount of magic through his horn. The cut started to mend, and the bruise faded. Cherilee noticed Applebloom's rapidly healing face, and looked to Jason in astonishment.

Jason suddenly felt fatigued. Very Fatigued. He shook himself around, suddenly feeling cold, and noticed that Applebloom's face was back to normal. "Did I do that?" he asked. 'This is just getting ridiculous...how could it be this easy, well that wasn't that easy actually, but how could it be that simple? Better question, how much energy did I use to heal that? How much could I possibly have left?'

Cherilee's chuckling jolted Jason out of his worries, and back to the real world. He would have to worry about energy later. "It would appear so, Blaze, although I've never seen healing magic from such a young pony before." She turned her attention back to Diamond. "What do you have to say for yourself?"

"Um...well...uh...he called me a chicken!"

"That's no excuse to hurt somepony, Diamond Tiara, and as a result, you will be in detention until I get a hold of your father and we have a little chat about what to do with you." Diamond's anger returned with a vengeance, and turned to throw one more insult, feeling smug that no harm could come to her, with Cherilee so close.

"He's probably just some orphan anyway. You hear that? Your parents didn't love you!!!"

"Shut up Diamond," Cherilee growled.

Jason, however, was sent into a rage. She could do anything to him except insult his parents, even if it was just a happy coincidence. He had been the one that failed them, they had done nothing wrong. He let out a yell comparable to a battle cry and sprinted at Diamond. She turned in time to see him flying through the air at her, an expression of absolute fury on his face, and her eyes widened considerably more than he would have thought possible, not that everyone didn't have huge eyes already... Diamond was knocked onto the ground, and he was on her in a second, flailing his arms randomly towards her face, landing several hits before anyone could react. He slightly transformed, making his muscles bigger, and hitting her harder, not caring if anyone noticed. "Never. Insult. My. Parents!!!!"

Twilight was on her way to Sweet Apple Acres with Applejack, where they were going to try out some new type of apple pie that Applejack couldn't stop talking about, which was a funny change to her normal, 'mare of few words' personality.

"Listen when ah say this Twi', this pie is a hoof better then the old bunch, ah can't believe we didn't think of it before! We used some uh the zap apple jam in the pie this time, and you haf'ta take a gander of it!! Sorry for soundin a might like Pinkie, but hopefully ya can see why ah'm a might excited."

"Well if its as good as it sounds, then I think I can survive a few minutes of rambling." She looked at the schoolhouse as they passed it, and thought of several bad memories from magic kindergarden. She shuddered.

"Are ya cold there, Twi?" Applejack asked, a little worried.

"No, just recalled some memories of school."

"Not fun huh? Personally, ah didn't really like it either, so ah guess we're in the same boat, but ah suppose you were in a different school entirely, so shows what ah know."

"It was kind of a nightmare until Celestia took me under her wing," she sighed.

"I guess if ya hadn't gotten through kindergarden ya would've never gotten to be the Princess's student"

"Yeah, I guess it could have been worse, especially when you put it that way, but..." She could have sworn she heard yelling and screaming from the school yard. "Did you hear that Applejack?"

She listened for a moment. "It's probably just foals bein' foals."

"I guess, but it sounded like..."

"Never. Insult. My. Parents" a loud thud and screaming was heard.

"Ah think we best get over there before anypony dies."

"That might be smart." Both of them galloped off towards the school house.

Smack. Punch. Smack. Jason had lost count of the blows he had flung at Diamond, he heard some muffled voices swirling around him, someone was trying to pull him off of Diamond. He was finally ripped off of her as a purple aura enveloped him and rose him into the air. He flailed around, trying to get back to Diamond, but could not escape the magical grip, and turned his head to stare at the pony that had picked him up. It was Twilight, of all ponies. 'Great, just the pony I wanted to see.' he thought. She looked at him, and recognition flashed over her face.

"Hey you're that pony from earlier."

'Oh no, she recognizes me. Gotta get away, don't know how I'd answer questions about this one without giving things away...' he struggled some more before he realized that he wasn't getting anywhere fast. "Um, I don't know what you're talking about." Looking around, he saw that Diamond had actually struggled to her feet, her face a mess of cuts and bruises.

"Yeah, yeah, now I remember, you came in for that spell. And I still had to ask you some questions." She looked at Diamond and winced. She narrowed her eyes, "And so, what, you beat up this filly for fun? What kind of foal are you?"

'Yeah she missed the first part i guess,' he paused, 'gotta escape, gotta escape, what to do, what to do, Magic! I'm to slow at this. First the wings, now forgetting about magic in a world that literally runs on it, it's just pathetic. Well, better get to it.'

Jason charged up his magic to try to escape, discharging a large amount of energy towards the front of the aura. There was a huge blast of air, and he flew backwards towards town. He hit the ground hard, and rolled for a surprisingly long time. 'Must've been going pretty fast, I guess,' he thought, although he felt no worse for wear. Spitting the dirt out of his mouth, he looked at his hooves just in time to see his disguise flicker and disappear, returning him to his normal form. "What the Hell?" He spit out some more grit, looked up and saw a VERY enraged Twilight and Applejack walking towards him, and turned around to see a small crowd of townspeople staring at him.

"Well, shit."

"Well, shit."

Twilight was still walking towards Jason, with smoke trails literally coming off of her back, he assumed from rage. "You think you can come here and just steal love from innocent ponies!?!? You're worse than your stupid queen, and probably just as overconfident." She was still walking straight at him, Applejack at her side.

He looked at his hooves. 'Great, I get here AFTER the wedding, just my luck..' He looked up, to see twilight STILL walking. 'How far was I blown away?' he turned around, and faced an angry crowd of ponies, presumably the townspeople that had been staring at him only moments before. 'Well that explains why she's walking...guess she thinks I'm trapped.' He chuckled. 'And she thinks I'M overconfident.' Some of the villagers had grabbed random things off of the street to use as weapons, and one was carrying a dirt clog. "Ooh I'm scared now, don't kill me with that wad of dirt bro." A chunk of dirt went whizzing over his shoulder. Jason's expression turned to one of disbelief. 'Wow. Ponies can throw. How do they...' Jason was suddenly picked up by a purple aura, somewhat expectantly. He turned his head, smiled, tried to flip her off before he realized he didn't have fingers, and teleported.

He heard another pop and whoosh, and appeared outside of Twilight's library, because frankly, it was the only well known place he could teleport to, and even though he hadn't read the whole section in the book, it still didn't sound like a good idea to teleport to an unknown spot. 'What if I accidentally teleported inside of a wall, or even a pony? What would happen then?' He preferred not to think about it, instead focusing on the wave of fatigue that was washing over him. He ignored his tiredness and ran inside. When he saw that there was no one around, he transformed into a light brown pegasus stallion with a light red mane. He really liked having wings.

"Where the hell is spike? I haven't seen the little guy at all, not that him providing an extra obstacle to my getaway would be good, but still." He thought for a moment. "Oh yeah, he sleeps a lot. Or he could be stalking Rarity. Well either way...ugh, god dammit" He shook his head. "Priorities, what to do, what to do..." he looked around "I should really get something on changelings, because honestly, I know nothing about my own species." He trotted over to the nearest bookshelf, and stared at the books. "What the hell kind of a system is this? What's the pattern here?" Remembering the pressing time scale, he sprinted around to different bookshelves, yet found no hints on the system, nor any books he was looking for. "You can't honestly tell me that she doesn't have a book on changelings. I mean, this is Twilight we're talking about here." he noticed a few books on a table, one of them open. He pushed the open book closed, and looked at the cover. He deadpanned. A Brief History of Changelings, read the cover. "I really hope this doesn't mean she was already on to me, because that would explain her lack of questions earlier. She is supposedly pretty smart though, so I guess it's easily possible." He shuddered a little. He didn't like being the ignorant one.

He tucked the book under a wing, slightly surprised at how small it was, at least compared to some of the other books he could've taken. Deciding he had wasted enough time, he magically opened the door after a few tries with moving the doorknob, and sprinted out.

The Town in the direction of the schoolhouse was quickly turning into a disaster area. Not in the sense of burning houses and dead babies, but more in the sense of ponies running everywhere in a complete panic. "Oh yeah, I caused this," Jason congratulated himself, with a metaphorical pat on the back after realizing that a normal one was now impossible. Then things unsurprisingly went wrong.

Twilight was making a bee-line strait for the library, now in full gallop, with the mob from before following closely. 'Yep, she had her suspicions, I guess.' He watched as she threw open the door to the library, and finding no one, screamed in anger. 'not sure how she knew I would go to the library though. Am I really that predictable? Apparently.' More smoke rose off of her. Then, she seemed to realize something, closed her eyes, and charged up her horn. The horn's glow quickly grew in intensity, becoming blindingly bright, forcing Jason to look away. Jason was worried, to say the least. After a few more seconds, he decided that the best move in this situation would probably be to run, especially considering that one of the most powerful beings in this world was charging up some sort of unknown spell, probably directed towards him.

He sprinted away, turning to look in time to see Twilight release a huge shield like wave. While he may have had no idea what the spell did, whatever it was it couldn't be good, and it definitely pertained to him specifically. The expansion of the "shield" started slowly, but then sped up considerably, quickly gaining on Jason. He couldn't out-run the spell, and it passed over him, with no apparent effect.

"He stopped running, wondering what the point of the spell was. "What was the reason for her to use all that magic to do nothing? I mean--" He felt nauseous. The feeling got worse and worse until he felt like he was going to throw up, but after a few retches, found that nothing was coming up. It wasn't like he had eaten anything anyway. He suddenly felt dizzy and fell onto his side, noticing the flickering of his hoof out of the corner of his eye while his ears rang, drowning out all outside noise. "Oh no, no, no..."

He started to feel a horrible burning pain, starting from his hooves and moving up his body, removing the disguise as it went, yet there was no green fire, and the transformation progressed much slower. He started screaming and flailing his hooves around, writhing on the ground, trying to smear the pain into the dirt. It almost felt like someone was peeling his skin off, and that all of his bones were getting stretched, reshaped and bumped into one another. After the burning sensaton and the feeling of shifting bones had mostly left his body, some of the dizziness passed as well, and he tried to get up, attempting to look himself over. His vision swam. 'No blood or gore, so apparently I'm fine. I don't feel fine.' He looked to his side to see an approaching crowd of ponies, probably having been alerted by Twilight. 'Lesson learned. Forced transformations hurt. A lot.' he thought. He stood there for a moment trying to get over the pain and move, before he remembered the large concentration of ponies nearby that wanted to cause him bodily harm.

Fear took over his body. He got up and sprinted as best he could, falling once as he tried to accelerate. He went straight towards a close street corner, and turned down another street. In full panic mode, he ran through several groups of colorful blobs, and made one of them angry when he knocked something over. When the blobs saw him, they all seemingly stopped and stared, seemngly amazed at the blatant presence of a changeling. He made a few more turns onto new streets, somehow not managing to hurt himself, and then cut into an alleyway. He saw what looked like a doorway, and sprinted towards it, and fell into a pile of garbage. "Wha..." His vision cleared slightly. What he had thought was a door was actually a small space between a dumpster and the wall of the alleyway. He quickly moved the dumpster closer to the wall, moved behind it, and patched up the openings with inconspicuous piles of garbage. He flopped onto the ground, panting. He checked himself for injuries, and finding nothing of interest, resumed his panting. The book about changelings fell out from under his wing. Jason briefly turned his attention towards the book, silently acknowledging its presence, yet too tired to question how he had managed to hold onto it.

Jason laid there for a moment, thinking and trying to recover, still feeling nauseous. Now he felt ridiculously fatigued and sore to boot, even more so than that time he had ran a marathon. Realistically, he shouldn't have been this tired. "I must be running out of love." he felt a feeling of despair hit him. "Some changeling I am, a few hours and I'm revealed to the whole town. AND I'm running out of energy because I couldn't manage to steal hardly any love from anyone. Not that that's a bad thing, I guess." He looked at his surroundings, the trash bags, the rusty back side of the dumpster, and sighed.

"This fucking stinks."

Jason coughed and rolled over. His mouth tasted like blood. His everything hurt. "Look on the bright side, at least you're safe, well kinda, that has to mean something," he said to himself. He coughed again, wincing and holding his stomach in pain. "This is worse than that time I got shot." The pain flared up again, and Jason groaned. He rolled back onto his back, groaning again. He should have probably avoided running, deciding that the pain had been made worse by his hasty escape.

"Maybe if I slept a little..." Jason shifted the garbage around, finding the most comfortable position he could, and closed his eyes. A while later, he was completely passed out.

"What do you mean 'you don't know where he went'" Twilight yelled at one of the ponies that had come back with the still angry mob. "He's black, has holes in his hooves, and looks like a giant bug. HOW could you have lost track of him?"

"Well, first of all, he ran like a bat outta' Tartarus, and last time I checked, none of us in this tiny mob are particularly fast. Shouldn't you have ensured that he couldn't get away? Because I seem to remember that he was in your grasp at least once." The pony shot back.

"There's no way to stop teleporting by just using a levitation field!" She composed herself. "It also seems like there's something off about this one. He had a surprisingly large amount of power, and doesn't act like a changeling. Sometimes he does the exact opposite of what a changeling should do in his situations, besides the fact that he didn't steal the position of a pony that was already in Ponyville. Something just doesn't add up." She explained. "So I guess it makes sense that he's hard to catch."

Applejack walked up to twilight, an annoyed look still on her face. "Twi, did we catch him?"

"I hate to say this, Applejack, but no, he got away." Twilight looked at her hooves.

"Well consarnit, that bastard was near my sister, what if he did somethin' to her?!?! When ah get my hooves on that changeling ah swear ah'm gunna..." she made a series of twisting and pulling motions with her hooves, the meaning of which escaped Twilight. Applejack seemed to regain her composure. "Why's this little bugger so much more slippery than those ones from Canterlot? Ah mean we took out tons of those guys with out any trouble."

Twilight pulled open the door to the library. "Here, come on, I was doing some research earlier, we can see if we can find anything new." The pair entered, closing the door behind them, Twilight moving to a table where she was doing research earlier. "Weird, I could've sworn I had it right here." She looked through the bookshelves, attempting to find the book. "Where is it?!?! I'm usually so organized, I don't lose anything ever!! Oh no! What if this is just the beginning?!?! What if I become somepony who loses things all the time? What would I do! Where would I--"

"Calm down Twi, ah'm sure its here somewhere."

"But I'm sure I left it on this table. I mean, where could it--" She paused. "You don't think he took it, do you?" She looked at Applejack with a bewildered expression.

"Who, the changeling? Now wha would he do that?" Applejack queried.

"I don't know, but most of his other behavior doesn't make sense either, at least not with how changelings usually live." She replied.

"Well how do they normally act? Ah mean, he seemed like a normal changeling, tricking innocent ponies, stealing their love..."

"Yeah," Twilight started, "but normally changelings replace a pony and dispose of them, and this one tried to create a new pony. I've never seen anything like this before." She thought for a moment. "Come to think of it, he didn't come in with intricate knowledge of his own background, when a normal changeling would have known almost everything about the pony they were replacing. He didn't even have a changeling accent when he spoke in his true form. Then he steals a book about his own species. It's just strange." Applejack changed the subject.

"Well how can we find him? We can't just have a changeling running free in Ponyville. From what you said, he could be capable of anythin', and we definitely can't figure out what his next move will be, on account of him bein' so unpredictable ."

"Well, I could use a tracking spell if he was a pony, but changelings have natural magic that prevents those sorts of things from working correctly."

"So basically, what you're sayin' is that we have to wait until he turns up again? That there's no other way ta find him?"

"Unfortunately, yes. Until he reveals himself again, however or whenever that is, we can't find him." Twilight put a hoof to her chin and thought. "But...we could talk to the people he had contact with, and maybe find out something helpful."

"Well, school's still in session, we could go there and talk to ma sister and her friends, an' se what they know."

"Sounds like as good of an idea as any, Applejack, maybe we can find out some sort of pattern to his behavior." Applejack nodded, and they both left the library, closed the door behind them, and turned straight towards the schoolhouse.

A piece of paper fluttered down onto Jason's face. He unconsciously tried to brush it off, but ended up hitting himself in the nose. He jolted awake, thinking that someone had been attacking him. He flailed his arms in the probable direction of the culprit. Finding no one inside his fort with him, he cautiously tried to sit up. He noticed that the sun was consideably lower that it had been before, and he assumed it was around three or four O'clock.

Sitting up, he noticed that most of the nausea was gone, but a fair amount of the sharp pain in his gut had remained. He looked around, and saw the book that he had stolen earlier. Dragging himself over to where it lay, he read the cover again. A Brief History of Changelings He opened the book to the first page.

Changelings are a race that has resided on this planet for about the same time as ponies, although interaction between ponies and changelings has been kept fairly low until recent times. This is mostly due to the previous food source of changelings disappearing. Changelings have always needed love to function, but the people from whom they derive this sustenance has changed. Previously, the changelings fed off of the ponies from Herundul, a country south of the approximate location of their hive, which is to the west of Equestria. This food source allowed them to become fairly powerful, until the Griffon Kingdom declared war on Herundul over the quality of rock imports. Herundul was conquered, and the changelings were forced to find another food source. The griffins were not usable for this task because of the size difference between the griffins and changelings, and therefore the inability for changelings to accurately impersonate griffins.

The changeling hive is a wonder of teamwork and speed in which tasks are completed. A hivemind that is believed to exist between changelings allows the communication of ideas and information over huge distances in little time. However, while residing as a part of the hivemind, a changeling has much less free will. This allows the changeling Queen to exhibit a huge amount of control over her children, and coordinate huge efforts and tasks. Very few changelings have ever been severed from the hivemind, and even fewer have survived the separation and the nervous-system overload that takes place soon after.

Jason skipped a few pages.

While most changelings are much the same in size and stature, there are subtle, yet recognizable differences that indicate gender. While it is true that any changeling can take any form, a mindset forms for changelings to try to stick to only male, or only female ponies. Not all of the drones are the same, even though many of them look like exact clones of one another. Generally, most changelings are normal, possessing small amounts of magical abilities, although these can be increased exponentially by the supply of love on hoof. Occasionally, though, a changeling is born with increased healing abilities, generally when the hive is low in numbers, although it is unsure what is different in the developmental stages of these drones. These drones are slightly larger, a fair amount more powerful than the other drones, and also tends to also have a longer lifespan.

Jason closed the book. "Well this explains a lot, like why magic was so easy, why I could heal Applebloom..." 'There must be more here about healer changelings...'

Twilight walked up to the door of the school house, with Applejack in tow. "So who do we need to talk to, Applejack?"

"Well, if'n ah remember correctly, the closest to the incident were mah sister, Sweetie Belle, Scootaloo, and Cherilee, at least, that's what ah can recall..."

"I think you're probably right, so lets just bring those four out here, ask the questions, and leave." Twilight said as she opened the door.

Cherilee looked up from her desk, and noticing the two, got up to meet them by the door. She had her class writing some sort of essay.

"Did you get him?" She asked, sounding hopeful.

"No, he slipped away, which is why we're here. We want to see if we can get information on behavior and things like that." Twilight replied.

"Oh, okay, well I saw a little of him, but besides teaching, I guess I didn't see that much."

Applejack spoke up. "Well if we could pull you and mah sister, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo outside and ask a few questions, ah'd sure appreciate it.

Cherilee nodded. "Scootaloo, Applebloom, Sweetie belle, can you come outside with us for a moment?" The CMC nervously got up and headed to the front of the room, following Applejack, Cherilee and Twilight outside.

"I didn't do it! It was all Scootaloo's idea!" Sweetie Belle protested once they had gotten outside, jabbing a hoof at Scootaloo.

"None of you are in trouble," Cherilee said and the CMC let out a collective sigh of relief. "Unless you should be..."

"Anyway..." Twilight continued, "We're looking for information on the new student that came in today who called himself Blaze and turned out to be a changeling." She paused, contemplating what to ask, while pulling out a pad of paper and a quill to take notes. "So what happened?"

Scootaloo spoke up. "He made a few hilarious jokes in the classroom." Cherilee looked at Scootaloo with a disapproving gaze. "Oh and argued with Diamond Tiara about how he got his injuries." Twilight looked at Cherilee, who nodded, signifying that what Scootaloo had said was true. "Then we had recess, and we noticed that he didn't have a cutie mark, so we asked him to join the Cutie Mark Crusaders, and he agreed. So we said that to get in he had to prank Mrs. Cherilee."

"Did he say what he was going to do?" Twilight asked

"Yes, I'd be very interested to see what he was going to do to me." Cherilee growled.

"Yeah, well he asked us what we'd done, then told us something about gunpowder and complicated pranks."

"Do any of ya'll know what this 'gunpowder' stuff is?" queried Applejack

"I've actually never seen it in any of my books." Twilight recalled, sounding slightly worried.

"Anyway," Scootaloo continued, "Diamond came up to us after that, and Blaze basically dared her to stop hiding behind the power of her father and do things herself, and gave her a free shot. She punched him, but he didn't seem to feel it, then Silver Spoon knocked him over, and Diamond kept punching him, and..."

"Wait, I want to tell this part!" Applebloom protested

"Fine," conceded Scootaloo, "Go ahead."

"Okay, so anyway, ah decided after a while that enough was enough, 'specially since Blaze was laughing the whole time, so ah tried to push Diamond offa' Blaze, but she punched me." Applejack looked furious.

"I swear, when ah find that filly ah'm gonna....wait, Applebloom, are ya fibbin'? Ah don't see a bruise on your face if she supposedly punched ya."

Cherilee spoke up. "Well, you see, I saw Applebloom get punched, and Blaze underneath Diamond, so I stopped the fight. Then, you know what, Blaze was completely fine! It was the weirdest thing!" Cherilee got several looks of bewilderment from the group before continuing. "Then Blaze healed Applebloom's face, which I thought was strange for such a young pony. I took Diamond away, but while we were walking, she said something to the extent of: 'You're and orphan and your parents don't love you' and Blaze started punching the crud out of her. And I guess that's when you guys showed up."

"Whatever happened to that little filly?" asked Applejack

"Oh, well we sent her to Ponyville general just to be safe, but she got released."

"Well that's good ah guess..."

"Um, Applejack, lets go back to the library and process this," Twilight said while gesturing with her pad of notes.

Jason closed the book in disgust. Almost a hundred pages, and no info about changeling healers. Only some stuff about them being extremely rare and occasionally powerful, but nothing on origin, weaknesses, other skills, or anything. "Some history book this turned out to be." He had, however, figured out some about ways to combat regular changelings' disguises, such as the use of certain spells and the ability to 'short out' their disguises by hitting them with large amounts of random, unassigned magic. Now he knew what to avoid. Apparently, Twilight's spell had been one of those select few, in this case, stripping his disguise.

"Ugh." Jason rolled over, breathing heavily. His stomach was feeling better, and his fears of permanent injury had been sated. The scratches on his sides were merely scars now, and had apparently healed at some point. Thats probably where a lot of his energy went. Jason rolled back over, and looked up at the sun. It was only a few hours from sunset. "How has it only been a day? Hard to believe..." He lay there in silence for a few minutes, watching the shadows grow. Suddenly, the serene silence was broken.

"aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh." BAM! Splat!

"What was that?"

"Hey Twi, where's Spike? I haven't seen that little guy all day." Applejack asked as she walked into the library, followed by Twilight.

"I think he's helping Rarity with some dress design, to spend time with her probably." She rolled her eyes. "Like anything is really going to happen between those two..."

"Anyway, about that changeling..." Applejack said, trying to turn the discussion into something important.

"Yeah, it's weird..." She said while flipping through her notes. "I've never seen a changeling attempt anything non-melevelent. And healing your sister fits that bill."

"And that thing about parents was strange...Ah mean, ah didn't know changelings had parents." Twilight stared for a moment.

"They don't. That's probably part of his disguise." she said.

"Uh, Twillight, what do ya mean by that?" Confusion passed over her face.

"Well, think about it, it would further his disguise. It's not like he's actually a changeling with parents. That's impossible anyway." She thought for a moment. "The weird thing is though, I'm surprised that he would draw so much attention to himself. Generally changelings slip by with as little noticeability as possible, but this one almost seemed to draw as much attention to himself as he could."

"Well ah guess that makes sense, well not the second part, but ah still don't know why he would heal Applebloom."

"Think about it Applejack, you're less hostile to him because of it, I'd say he got exactly what he wanted out of that healing, and probably got some gratitude from your sister too."

"Consarnit, Twi, why didn't you tell me this earlier?!?!"

"Because stealing gratitude is harmless. It's much weaker than love, and the changeling isn't a threat to your sister anymore." she explained.

"But you're sayin' that he healed mah sister just to gain my favor?" Another look of utter confusion appeared on her face.

Twilight shrugged. "That's what I think, yes."

"And no other changeling has ever been seen healing somepony else?"

"Nope, this is the only time its come up."

"Weird..."

Jason got to his feet as quietly as he possibly could, attempting to ignore the pain in his gut as he moved. He carefully reared up on his hind legs, and nearly lost his balance. He cursed under his breath. He peered over the dumpster, but had yet to see anything. He decided to risk leaving the safety that existed behind the dumpster and attempt to find the thing that had presumably crashed into the wall, but had yet to make any other noises. He tried to move some of the trash out of the way to get a clear path, but only succeeding in making an inordinate amount of noise. Deciding he would never be able to hunt any kind of no deaf animal, he resolved to quickly push through, ignoring the noise.

Finally free, he turned to look back to look at the damage. There was a dent in the brick wall, with a crumpled pony laying on the ground, at least fifteen feet below. Jason moved closer.

"No way..." He whispered. "No. Fucking. Way." The sky blue pegasus with a prismatic mane didn't stir. Jason walked up to the crumpled body, turning it over. "Rainbow Dash. I knew it." She was still breathing, luckily. Judging by the depth of the dent, it didn't take an expert to figure out that the mare had been traveling pretty fast before she collided with the wall. It also didn't take an expert to figure out that she wasn't just knocked out, if the bones protruding from one of her forelegs and the blood was any indication.

"Great. How am I supposed to..." Jason punched himself. "Wow. Healing. Just wow." He tapped his chin, deep in thought. "Okay, so this is a lot more serious of an injury than a punch to the face, so hopefully I have enough energy left for this." He focused some magic through his horn. "Here goes nothing..."

"Hey Applejack," said Twilight, prancing back from the library door. "Look what I just got in the mail!"

"What is it, Sugarcube?" queried Applejack, cocking her head and attempting to figure out what was inside the small box that Twilight had in her magical grip.

"I replaced the book that was stolen!" Twilight replied excitedly, quickly tearing the box off with a pair of scissors. "So now we can figure out more about our suspect."

"How did ya do that so fast?"

"You could say that being Princess Celestia's personal student had its benefits..."

"Well quick, Twi, stop wastin' time! Lets get to it!" Twilight opened the book, and they both began to read.

Twenty minutes later...

"Hold on a minute sugarcube, this here book says that there are these healer changelings. Ya don't think that--"

"Now Applejack, those are an old myth, they've never been proven to exist."

"But Twi, that thing healed ma sister, and while ah resent it for bein' near her, ya can't debate that it is mighty fine at healin' things."

"Well, you may have a point, but until we have further information, we have to assume that it's just a regular changeling."

"But Twi--"

"Listen, Applejack, if it matters so much to you, I can send a letter to the Princess about it." She sighed, and inhaled. "Spiiiiiiike" Twilight yelled out, causing a groan from Spike, coming from the other room. After nearly a minute, he walked in, looking groggy.

"What is it now, Twilight? If you don't mind, I'm tired from helping Rarity, and I just want to sleep."

Twilight rolled her eyes, remembering that Spike had volunteered for the job with Rarity. "Fine, Spike, just take a letter and you can go." She sighed.

"Okay, go ahead," Spike said after gathering the necessary writing supplies.

"Okay."

Dear Princess Celestia,

Although I have already informed you of the status of the changeling threat in Ponyville, along with measures that have been taken to resolve it, I am writing again to ask a very specific question after new information has come to light. We have concrete facts backing up the idea that the changeling from earlier today possessed advanced healing abilities. However, this coincided with the myth of healer changelings, and I have adamantly stated that they are just that: myths. This is why I am writing, though, to see if this hypothesis is actually true. If you could help clear up these issues, that would be much appreciated.

Your faithful student,
Twilight Sparkle

"There. Send it Spike." A ball of green flame enveloped the letter, and then raced off towards Canterlot. She turned to Applejack. "Now we just have to wait, so that you can see that I'm right," Twilight said with a smug smile.

"Ah guess we'll see about that, sugarcube," Applejack replied, looking equally smug.

"Agh!" Yelled Jason, his magic visibly trailing off of his horn and onto Rainbow Dash. He was quickly running out of energy. He punched his horn a few times to try to get the spell to stop, but whatever he did, the spell continued it's transfer.

The protruding bones on Dash's leg retracted and popped back into place, as did the other bones, earning a few retches from Jason. It was one of the most disgusting looking things he had ever seen, healing movements looking as jerky as an old movie. "At least she doesn't seem to be in pain..." As abruptly as the spell had started, it ended, just after the last of the minor lacerations had disappeared. Jason collapsed. "Note to self: never, ever, do that with anyone else ever again. His stomach growled. Jason moved to get up, hearing stirrings from Dash. Deciding to let her know of his presence, he spoke. "That was some crash there. You alright?"

The only response was a loud groan and a snort from Dash. "I've had worse." She said flatly. She turned her head, and upon seeing Jason, went stiff. She stared at him for a moment, allowing him to struggle to his feet, before she got up. Jason opened his mouth to say something, but Dash had sprinted towards him, pivoting around on a fore hoof to buck him. "Oh shit!" Both of Dash's rear hooves impacted him with a loud CRACK, sending him into the wall, which he promptly slid down, back into his garbage heap. Dash was back on him in an instant, punching his face, and jarring him around.

"You think you can just come here and try to do THIS," she gestured, "to ponies?" She yelled, sending another punch into his face.

"What, heal them?" Dash stopped punching for a moment, then decided against stopping, and punched him again.

"And why, WHY would a changeling help ME?" she yelled. "Frankly, It'd be easier for you to just get me out of the way."

"Because," He spit out some blood. He was starting to get hurt. 'Guess this armor isn't so impervious to everything.' "You were just left for dead here. I couldn't let you die."

"And why..." *Punch* "is that?"

"Because you were bleeding heavily, and it looked like you broke half the bones in your body. I'm a sucker for mares with broken bones. " he spat out between punches.

"I don't have any broken bones. This trick isn't going to work." *punch* *crack*

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!! SHIT!!!!!!" Jason yelled. She had cracked some of the chitin on his face. "This isn't a trick, you whore!!! You still have the scar on your foreleg from a protruding bone! Can't you see? I can't even fight back because of how much energy I used to heal YOU! Some ingrate you are, about to gladly kill their savior because of the reputation that changelings have AS A WHOLE. You make me sick." He spat at her, partially clearing his mouth of blood.

She looked shocked. She stopped punching him, and let him drop to the ground. Jason slowly lifted a hoof up, and touched it to his face. It came away completely covered in blood. He looked at Dash's hooves, which were also covered in blood. He tried to roll over and get up. He tried to look at her face, but his vision started to darken. "I--"

He passed out.

Notes: God dammit, I can't write long chapters for shit. Oh well, hopefully its clear why I had to end it there.

Jason jolted awake, looking around quickly. Something was wrong. The ceiling was white. The floor was white. The walls were white. Jason hated the color white. He noticed that there was a blanket over his lower body, over top of the softest bed he had ever felt. "No way..." He whispered to himself. Then he tried to move his arms. They were tied to the bed posts. "There's always got to be a catch." He tried pulling harder on the ropes, but nothing happened. "Well, that was anticlimactic." He tried to figure out some sort of elaborate scheme for escape, but nothing came to mind. He was already getting bored. "At least my legs aren't tied...that would be beyond weird." He tried to sit up, but immediately slumped back down, feeling huge pain in his chest. He argued with himself for a moment over whether or not he should look, before curiosity won and he looked down. He wished he hadn't. There was a huge crack in his chitin, and every time he moved, or even took a breath, the crack slid around, extremely painfully. So he did the only sensible thing a human minded changeling can do in that situation.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!" He touched the crack. It moved a little. "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!" Rainbow dash walked in, looking tired and pissed, and stared at the changeling. Jason turned and saw her. "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!" He struggled backwards, hitting his head on the bed frame. The crack on his face shifted. Instead of yelling some more, a feeling of heavy nausea fell over him and he got as close to the side of the bed as he could and retched repeatedly. Nothing came up. He got tired as the last of any adrenaline he had had in his system wore off, and he slouched back, coming to grips with his injuries. He stared at Dash, who looked like she was getting the courage up to speak. A strange thing for her to do realistically. Needing to gather courage, that is.

"Hey, um, sorry for beating you up yesterday..." She said. Jason looked at her, a puzzled expression on his face.

"What, that's it?" She looked at him, a confused expression on her face. "You're just going to forgive ME? A changeling, a sworn enemy of the land of Equestria?"

"Well, after you saved my life, or at least my leg, and then I beat the crap outta you, it was really the least I could do, bringing you here." Now it was Jason's turn to look confused. He was surprised enough that someone had taken him in and helped, but from the element of loyalty? No way this was real.

"So, If you owe ME, why am I tied to the bed here?" He asked, sounding annoyed.

"Well, I don't know if I can really trust you to not, you know, seek revenge, and kill me." she replied.

"Oh no, THE Rainbow dash is afraid of changelings..." he teased.

"How do you know my name?" she narrowed his eyes.

"Um, the fact that I'm a changeling might have helped that." He chuckled.

"Oh..." she seemed to be at a loss for words.

"Can I get a mirror or something? It's kinda hard to concentrate when all I can think of is this crack in my face." 'Never thought I'd say that before...' Dash got up and went through a door. Well, really more of a hole in the wall, cloud house and all, and returned a few seconds later with a handheld (hoofheld?) mirror. "Here. Just put it into my hoof."

"Into...Oh! Derp. The holes..." Jason nodded, and she slipped it through. He examined himself. There was a crack running up most of the side of his chest, along with the one on his face, which ran from just above his jaw line to his eye. Both were caked with blood.

"Well let me be the first to say that I look like complete and total shit." He continued to look himself over, before handing the mirror back. "Thanks." he said. As Dash retrieved her mirror, a sharp plastic edge on the handle poked the inside of his hoof. "AAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!" He flailed his hoof around, managing to dislodge the offending object. "Holy fuck that hurt." Dash looked like she felt guilty. Jason knew, because he could feel that she felt guilty. He didn't think he would ever get over this whole, sensing emotions thing.

"Oh crap! Sorry, did I do that?"

"No, but for future reference, these things are sensitive."

"How did you not know that already?"

"Do you think I just sit around all day and put things through my hooves?" She didn't respond. He chuckled at the mental image. "Anyway, why are you keeping me here? It's not like I can really do anything tied to the bed like this..."

"Okay." Jason looked at her, she seemed to be having a battle with herself over what to say. "Okay, here's the deal. I'll let you stay, on account of you trying to save me, but you're going to have to tell me everything, and if you go back to being a regular changeling, I swear..."

"I never was a regular changeling." Jason blurted out, before he could catch himself. Dash looked at him wide eyed, waiting for a follow up. Finding none, she spoke up.

"What do you mean? Were you always trying to help ponies? Is that what you mean by 'not normal?'"

Jason was torn on what to do. He could tell her literally everything, or he could make more things up about his life as a changeling. Deciding that he apparently sucked at the whole 'making up a backstory' thing, and his full backstory would come out anyway, he decided to risk banking towards the other solution, accepting the idea that she may think he was crazy. She had already accepted a changeling into her home after all.

"No," he started, "I literally wasn't a changeling."

She looked bemused. "Oh, ha ha, very funny." She saw Jason's serious look, though, and froze. "You're serious, aren't you...were you a pony before all of this?

"Um...no" This was going to be harder than he thought. "Do you know what a human is?"

"Oh, yeah, I think there was a group of them that lived to the north of Equestria, at least before they were wiped out by the Griffins. Primitive little guys, those. Twilight taught me about them. They were briefly referenced in a Daring Doo book. Not that I study all the time or anything." She looked around nervously, seemingly afraid that someone would see her. "Anyway, I don't see why that's--" She turned to him. "No..."

"Unfortunately, yes. Weirder still is that I come from a different planet." He sighed. "And now I'm stuck here."

"Yeah right... I guess I could understand the human part, but the different planet part: not so much. Good try though." She looked away, chuckling.

"I can prove it." Jason blurted out. She turned back to him, and smiled.

"Go ahead, prove me wrong."

"Get me something to write on."

She fetched him a clipboard and some paper, along with a pencil. Picking up the pencil in his magical grip, he proceeded to draw a map of the world, to the best of his ability. The levitation part seemed to improve his drawing skill, but only barely. Jason named all the continents, drew a few country borders, and showed him the location of his home, along the North American pacific coast.

She Laughed. "You're going to need more than just a few names to make me believe you."

Jason thought for a moment. "Well, that complicates things, I guess, but I'll keep trying." he named several countries, explained their current political regimes, leaders, etc, before he explained his life up until he was transported to Equestria. He looked up to see a dumfounded Dash.

"Okay I believe you."

"Really?"

"Yeah, you said all of that without even skipping a breath. Only a completely and totally insane person could come up with their own world and know that many details about it, and frankly, you just don't look like you're that insane."

"That insane?"

"You're still pretty weird." Jason gave her an annoyed look. She laughed.

"Well anyway, now since you believe me, I can tell you about some cool stuff. Much cooler than what I have been talking about at least. Drumroll please." He paused, formulating his thoughts. "You, as Rainbow Dash, like fast things, right?

"Well yeah, of course."

"And you're well aware of how humans are slow, almost comically so?"

"Ya..." she replied, unsure of where Jason was going.

"Well, to combat this slowness, the humans on my world built machines to speed up travel, and I figured you'd be interested in them, in terms of speed if not anything else."

"Would I ever! It's not everyday that you meet an alien with entirely new ways get around quickly. It's a lot better than listening to stuff about boring old pegasus flight. That's really the only fast way of getting around here..."

"Glad you feel that way. Lets see... first off, we had cars, which were like big, metal machines that powered themselves, and drove on wheels." He started to draw one on the clipboard. "Some--"

"How fast are they?" she asked, exited.

Jason laughed. "I was getting to that. Anyway, a fair amount of these cars are slow, economical cars, just for getting people around." She sighed. "For the record, those tend to go to a little over one hundred miles per hour. Then there are sports cars, which are a step up, and then super cars. The fastest one right now, I think, is the Bugatti Veyron Super Sport, maxing out at a little over two hundred and fifty miles per hour. And it's road legal, if that means anything to you. Here's a kinda good drawing of it." It was actually pretty good, which was strange, because it had always been an ongoing joke with his friends about how even his stick-men looked strange.

"On the GROUND?!?! How is that possible?"

"Big engines. The Veyron has over a thousand, you'll get a kick out of this, horse-power. You should know more than anyone that at those speeds air resistance is like plowing through a wall, and then some. It doesn't help that they have to install parts on the car to take the air rushing past and push the car into the ground, because otherwise it would just fly up into the air from all of the lift it creates." He chuckled. Another funny mental image.

"Wow. I mean, I've gone faster, but something that big traveling at those speeds, it's nothing short of incredible! It'd be cool to go to your world and try some of those things, I have to say."

"There are some other pretty amazing ones that are mainly based on acceleration, rather than top speed. One of these, called the Ariel Atom V8, or something like that, goes from zero to sixty miles per hour in one point eight seconds, and all it does in the process is remove your face!" She stared at him, looking mortified. "That was a joke..." He heard a sigh of relief.

"Something that heavy can accelerate that fast?"

"Yeah. It's pretty weird, speeding up that fast. It's like taking off in a rocket."

"Ooh, what's that? How fast does that go?"

"Remind me to tell you later."

"Awww..."

"Don't worry, I haven't even gotten to the best part yet: planes."

"You mean that you people got flying machines working? Awesome!" She was getting a little Pinky-esque.

"Yeah, they have these really powerful engines that allow them to take off, because unlike you, planes were never able to hover. At least, until recently. They have stationary wings." he started sketching another picture.

"Well how do they fly? Seems like you're trying to pull a fast one on me," she said. "You can't fly without flapping wings."

"All you need is enough velocity. You get to like, mach one right, top speed?"

"Huh?"

"The speed of sound?"

"Oh, yeah. It's called a sonic rainboom. It's really awesome!"

"So I've heard." he chuckled. "We have those where I come from, except without the colors. Some of the fastest military jets reach speeds of, dramatic pause, mach four or five."

Dash's Jaw dropped. She quickly noticed, and replied "How is that possible?!?! How do they not tear themselves apart?"

"I dunno, I'm not a jet expert. Here's a picture."

"Wow, you just blew my mind. That's just insane! I want to fly so bad right now!" Her stomach grumbled loudly. "Well, maybe later, I guess I am pretty hungry." She started to leave the room before face-hoofing, and turning back around. "Ok, well, I'm probably going to regret this later," She came over and untied the restraints, helping Jason up from the bed. "Want some food?"

His stomach grumbled. "Hell yes." Dash laughed and walked out of the room and down a flight of spiral stairs. Jason followed her, but stopped a few steps down, feeling a little dizzy. "Well, shit." His vision darkened as the blood ran out of his head. His eyes shut off entirely, while he tried to stick a hoof to the wall, which apparently wasn't where it was a minute ago. He lost all remainders of his balance, and proceeded to roll down the stairs. Still conscious, he couldn't help but think about how soft the stairs were, before crashing into a much less soft pillar at the bottom. He regained his vision after a moment. "Think on the bright side, Jason," he said to himself. "Holy shit I got down those stairs fast." 'There we go, I feel better already.'

Rainbow dash was looking down at him. "What happened?" she sounded worried.

"Well when I got up, basically my heart wasn't ready for the shift in height and the necessary adjustment in blood flow, and coupled with how much less blood I had, it didn't end well. If that makes sense."

"Oh...yeah, sorry again." she paused. "So Jason eh?"

'When did I... oh yeah, just a second ago. Yeah."

"Hmm, a strange name, but I like it. Let's go eat." They got up to go into the kitchen. Dash went and grabbed a few random food items from something that looked a lot like a fridge, although how something made out of cloud could function mechanically was beyond him. She came over to a cloud table and sat down, gesturing for Jason to join her. He pulled out one of the cloud chairs and sat down, staring hungrily at the food.

"You know what, Jason," Dash started. He looked up. "You're not half bad."

"You're not half bad."

"Glad to be seen that way, for a change." Jason took a bite of an apple that had been passed to him. He stared at it. The apple tasted good, but not any sort of taste he had ever experienced before, and it definitely wasn't the taste an apple should have. "What the hell? Pass me that carrot." he grabbed the carrot that she had passed to him, and he took a bite. It tasted exactly the same. "These taste exactly like one another..." he sighed, already missing his old taste buds, which had apparently been replaced by these new ones that thought everything was delicious.

"So that apple tastes like that carrot to you? Lucky you, I hate carrots."

"Yeah... I miss my old tastebuds..." He tried a sandwich, he tried some milk and some orange juice, with the exact same results. In desperation, he grabbed a small candle that was on the table and took a bite out of it.

"What are you doing?!?! Are you insane?"

Jason spat out the bite of candle, which had tasted terrible. "I get it now. It's like something that tells me whether or not stuff is edible. I guess that's a good adaptation to have. He set the candle back down, bite marks and all, and relaxed contentedly. The food had eased his hunger, even if he was supposed to feed on love. He doubted that it actually did any more than delay the inevitable starvation.

"So, um, I have some leftovers and I'm not really sure if they're good, and I was just wondering if--"

"Don't push it." Jason interrupted, pausing to think. "On another subject, though, what are you going to do with me?"

"Well I can't just release you on the town, so I guess I'll either have to keep you here, which I don't really want to do, or I could bring you to this thing me and my friends were going to today, because it's not like you can really escape me, the fastest flyer in Equestria!"

"That's as good of a plan as any, I suppose. But this time, we need to figure out a backstory behind you being my friend, because last time I may have decided to wing it, and it didn't end well, and it's not like I'm gonna go around telling people that I'm actually an alien."

"What do you mean by last time?"

"Huh? Oh! Well, I have been hanging around Ponyville for a while..."

Her eyes narrowed. "So I was right about you stealing love from ponies!!!"

"No! Nothing like that! The most I got was some gratitude from Applebloom, but that was after I healed her face."

"What did you do to her that needed heeling?"

"Not me, I didn't do anything. It was Diamond Tiara. She was the one to punch Applebloom. Then she kinda got me mad and I may have beaten her up. At least she deserved it..." Dash seemed to relax.

"Well I guess I can't blame you for beating her up, it's not like anyone really cares anyway..." They both went silent for a moment. Jason was the first to speak.

"So how did you end up crashing into that wall?"

"Oh, heh heh, well I was doing this really awesome trick, where there's a flip mixed with a corkscrew while consistently changing the angle of the axis that the flips are on. Thats what the flight book said anyway. I've really been struggling to come up with new ideas for tricks, so I looked there, not that I read all the time or anything. Anyway, on the sixth flip I overcompensated for the new angle, and corkscrewed early, and lets just say, I left my mark after that one."

"And what happened after I passed out?"

"Oh, well I basically tried to stop the bleeding for a while, before realizing that I had no idea what I was doing. Then I had a fight with myself over what to do about you, because I didn't really know what I could do. Anyway, by the time I had decided to bring you back here, it was dark. Basically I just flew you up here after that, and then went to sleep, at least until some loud guy woke me up..."

"Oh thanks. You try waking up tied to a bed with CRACKS in your body." His gaze softened. "Thanks for deciding to save me though. I'm not sure what I would've done otherwise..."

"I'm sure that you would've been fine..."

"Do you know why I was there in that dark alley?" He asked.

"No, I guess not."

"Well after I got caught, long story short I almost got away cleanly until your friend Twilight hit me with some spell." He sighed. "Said spell forced my body to change back into this form, and let me tell you, it hurt. A whole lot more than anything you can imagine. So I was stuck back there with a whole bunch of pain, couldn't transform as a semi lasting effect of the spell, and was running out of love."

"Wow...I had no idea..."

"It's fine now though, thanks to you, so let's not worry about it anymore."

She nodded. "Fair enough."

"Back on subject, this is why I need a complete backstory, preferably one with several historical events we shared, so that it becomes all the more believable, and all of that doesn't happen again. So first things first, appearance." Jason got up from the table, and moved to a semi clear spot in the room."

"Ooh wait, before we start, transform into me!"

"Ugh, fine." The familiar green flames enveloped his body, leaving a sky blue pegasus in its wake.

She didn't look too surprised. She walked around Jason, humming thoughtfully, before returning to her original position. "That was pretty spot on, good job. I'd have to say, if I was someone else, I wouldn't know the difference."

"Well this is strange," said Jason. "It's weird enough having a new body, but having the body of a mare..." He trailed off.

"Is there a problem with being a mare?" Dash growled.

"Oh. No, it's just that I used to be a male where I came from, remember?"

"Oh, yeah, that." She looked sheepish. "Sorry."

"No prob." He transformed back into changeling form.

"You know, you're pretty tall, even for a stallion."

"So I've heard. Now, what do you want me to look like? Remember that this is a semi permanent disguise. No pressure." He paused. "And I refuse to be a mare. It's just too strange."

"Okay, just do something random, and I'll tell you what to change."

"Always gotta make things hard, don't you..."

"Well what else would I do with myself? Hurry up, I just remembered that we gotta be at Sugarcube Corner in an hour." she tapped her wrist.

"Mares..." Jason said as he shifted into a slightly shorter light grey pegasus stallion with a black mane. Briefly looking himself over, he added slightly hacker gray flares at the ends of his wings.

"Mhm, okay," she said as she observed Jason's new form. "Pretty good, but the first thing that stands out is: where's you're cutie mark?"

"Well, I figured those things need backstory too, so I didn't make one yet."

"Okay, fine, but you need to bulk up a little, slightly elongate the ears, and exaggerate the jaw line a little more." Jason looked at her with a look of amusement. "What?"

"Are you just telling me what you want to see in your 'dream stallion'?" He tried to do air quotes but failed miserably, hooves and all.

"No..."

"Okay then, since I'm NOT awesome looking, can I at least get a mirror to look at the damage?" She smirked and hoofed him a mirror. He tried to grab it, but it just fell onto the floor. He looked at his hoof, then Dash. She shrugged. He sighed. "How am I supposed to pick things up with FLAT hooves?"

"Try harder?" She smiled.

"It's all so clear to me now, thanks for all the help." He tried again, and again, and again, making himself look like a stallion who was trying to kill his mirror. 'Wait, what if it's like magic, and I have to kinda just think that it works...' He picked up the mirror. "I still don't see how it--" the mirror fell, and Dash laughed. Jason deadpanned, picking the mirror up again, this time with his magic. He turned it towards himself, and took a nervous look. His face lit up. "Hey, I don't look half bad! Too bad this crack in my face made a scar, though, he tapped his face. Makes me look pretty badass though. Have I ever told you you have good taste in stallions, Dash?" She punched him in the shoulder, blushing.

"So how about that cutie mark? What're you good at?"

"I can build small explosives pretty well..."

"Like fireworks?"

"Like weapons. You could say that it's illegal, but you know, they're good for knife fights with hobos over shopping cart rights." She looked at him, a shocked look on her face, before he sighed. "Fine, I'll be serious. No one here ever gets my humor. Basically everything I'm good at involves technology or limbs that I don't have anymore, so I'm stuck on what to do."

"Well what do you think about in your free time?"

"Besides world domination? That's a toughie. Hmm. Back where I came from, I was quite the strategist. We could derive something from that." He was beginning to think that this was a lost cause.

"Well, you could have a chess piece as a cutie mark, that could work."

"Hmm, good, but I'd like something to add to it, if you know what I mean. I guess I'll give it some partial camouflage colors, in honor of the fact that I'm a changeling. Boop." The cutie mark appeared. "There it is, you can now be amazed." She looked at the cutie mark, and finding no obvious problems, moved on. "You know, all this reminds me of my country's military. What do you guys have here in terms of a standing army?"

"We have a few hundred royal guards," she said, looking proud. Jason scoffed, confusing her.

"My country has a military of easily over a million men, all armed to the teeth with devices that can kill someone from hundreds of feet away, in less time than it takes to blink." Her jaw dropped.

"And I thought our military program was large. We don't even have a population the size of your army."

"Pretty cool huh. Oh, and they use those planes to fight also. They're one of the most important things in warfare."

"Nice!" She looked around quickly, seemingly panicked, before turning back to Jason. "Hey, guy, we have to be at Sugarcube Corner soon, and we should probably not be too late. There's no telling what Pinkie would do."

"Okay, then we need a backstory. So far, I'm a strategic, military oriented guy who was your friend since before you came to Ponyville. When did we supposedly meet?"

"Cloudsdale. The only other pony I knew there that I still see regularly was Fluttershy, but after she found all of her little animal friends, she stayed near the ground, while I stayed in Cloudsdale, so we have a few months to work with there. Let's say I literally ran into you during my brief stint on the Cloudsdale weather patrol, while you were also involved. We became good friends, but then I left for Ponyville, and you had to leave for Manehattan, where you were earlier born and raised by your parents Shine and Glamour."

"Okay, so what were specific things we did in Cloudsdale?" Rainbow looked at the clock again.

"Um, lets say we just did general stuff, like flying around, but if need be, I'll make up a reference that makes sense, and you can just be like 'oh yeah I remember that' or something."

"Are you sure you're not part Changeling and you just didn't tell me?"

"What?"

"You came up with that backstory in no time flat. It was pretty awesome."

"What's you're name going to be?"

"Ha, I thought of this. I was thinking about Alternis. It has a nice ring to it, don't you think?"

"Actually, I kinda like it. It's still not a normal pony name, but it's a lot better than Jason." She looked at the clock. "Oh ponyfeathers! We're gonna be late! Hurry up!"

"What's the big deal?"

"Last time I was late Pinky acted like I was hours late, and wouldn't stop yelling at me, and I don't want to go through that again."

"Fine" Jason said, walking out the door.

"Hey, wait up!" Jason stopped at the end of her cloud yard, looking down. The could house was slightly to the side of Ponyville, probably at least a half mile up. Below, he could see lots of tiny colorful dots moving about, bustling in the tiny town. Dash walked up behind him.

"Betcha never seen the town from up here have you?"

"Can't say I have." He continued looking around, before looking back at Dash. "Hey."

"Yeah?" She looked over. Jason smiled.

"Race you to that cloud..."

"Hey Twilight! The Princess wrote back!"

"Ugh, Spike, why did you have to wake me up so early? Why did the Princess write back so early? Oh my god, what if it's urgent? Spike, quick, give me the letter." Spike started to walk over to Twilight, before she impatiently levitated the parchment out of his claw.

Dear Twilight Sparkle,

I am surprised that you have information that indicates the presence of a changeling healer. I would like to first mention that they are not myth, although a concrete sighting has not been reported for nearly fifty years. These changelings are far more powerful than regular changelings, and tend to have greater conscious thought, because the hive mind does not seem to be as much a part of them as it is with others. Hopefully you and your friends ran it out of town, because they can tend to be even harder to expose than regular changelings, because they are better able to adapt to their situations. It does strike me as odd that the healer would come alone, they are generally not associated with non-invasion related plans.

Your proud mentor,
Princess Celestia

Twilight looked up from the letter, unsure whether to be annoyed that she was wrong, or scared that a changeling might still be in town. Opting for the latter, she immediately realized that if the changeling wasn't run out of town that day, it was likely that he may never be exposed again. "I can't believe I blew my only chance! Ugh, what will I do now?!?!" The worst part about this whole scenario, she decided, was the inability for her to do anything to specifically expose the changeling. She sighed. She hated not being able to do anything. Not knowing what else to do, she went downstairs to the smell of Spike cooking eggs.

"Race you to that cloud," Jason challenged

"You're on," Rainbow Dash replied, crouching into a better starting position.

"Ready, Set, Go!" They both jumped off the line, and from the beginning, it was clear that Jason wasn't going to win. He was only in charge of by how much he lost. Not too far in, he started to feel fatigued, and his wounds started to act up. Jason groaned. With the cloud nearing, Jason put on a new burst of speed against his better judgement, arriving a few seconds later than Dash.

"I won," she boasted, striking a pose, "Just more proof on how awesome I am."

"Hey, come on, I gave you a run for your money, especially considering how injured I am."

"It wasn't even close." She stuck out her tongue at him. Jason frowned. She sighed. "I guess you're right though, we need to have a rematch when you get better. I'll still win, though."

"Don't we have somewhere to be?" Dash seemed to snap out of her ego, looking worried.

"Well hurry up then, I would've been there already if I didn't have to wait for you to catch up." She gloated, eliciting some chuckles from Jason.

"Someday, that ego's going to be your downfall."

"Yeah, whatever. Let's go."

"Oh, fine, I'll humor you and your OCD"

"Ugh, you can never be easy, can you?"

"No." He started flying towards Sugarcube Corner, which he could see in the distance, attempting to not injure himself further.

They arrived at Sugarcube Corner only moments later, pushing through the door. A tiny bell sounded the entry of another customer. Jason looked around, seeing a few of Dash's friends at a table, specifically Fluttershy, Rarity, Pinkie, and Twilight. Only Applejack was missing. They both walked up, a few 'hi's" being offered before Jason was noticed, provoking some awkward stares and strange glances.

"Hey guys, this is an old friend of mine that just came into Ponyville, his name's Alternis." Jason waved. "Alternis, this is Twilight Sparkle, Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie." She said, gesturing to the respective ponies. Pinkie suddenly jumped up from the table faster than jason thought was possible, and ran over to Jason, shaking his hoof furiously.

"I've never seen you in Ponyville before, I guess that's because you just moved here isn't it?" Before he could answer, or even nod, Pinkie continued. "Ooh, I need to throw you a 'Welcome to Ponyville' party, and everyone'll be invited, and I'll bring my special punch and It'll be so much fun and mhrmmrned..." Jason stuck a hoof in her mouth, turning to the others at the table.

"How long till she stops?"

"Couldn't be that much longer," Twilight responded with a shrug.

"Okay then." He took his hoof out of Pinkie's mouth, and was met with another barrage of words.

"and did I ever tell you that I know everyone, and I mean everyone in Ponyville?"

"No."

"Oh, okay." She pranced back to her seat, and sat down happily. She really looked like a drug addict. Maybe she was? Naaah...

"Darling, aren't you the handsome one." Rarity said, coming over to look at Jason. "I could get you the most glamourous clothes, you have so much to work with!"

"Um, thanks?"

"You're very welcome, darling. I'm just surprised that someone as obtuse as Dash would know someone like you." She trailed a hoof down his neck, then noticed the scar on his face. "Oh, goodness darling! What happened to your face?"

"I just got cut by a knife by some mugger in Manehattan. No big deal."

"You couldn't be more wrong, darling. This scar destroys the perfection that otherwise exists on your face." She continued to trail her hoof up and down Jason's neck.

Deciding that this had become weird enough, he backed up a little, blushing slightly. "Okay..."

"Rarity, stop pestering our guest. He just got here." She turned to Jason. "Sit down." Twilight magically pulled out two chairs, and Jason and Dash sat down. "So how did you end up in Ponyville with Dash?"

The first thing Jason noticed about her was doubt. 'So she's still on high guard after what happened earlier, I guess I better not screw up.' "Well, basically, Dash and I met in Cloudsdale a couple years back on the weather patrol, but when she left for Ponyville, I left for Manehattan, where I've been living between then and now. Anyway, I got fired from my job in Manehattan, and came here to look for a new one. Dash here was nice enough to let me stay at her house."

"Mhm, I see." She didn't seem any less critical of him. "How did you get your cutie mark?"

"Oh, that. Well, I beat everyone I knew at every large strategy game I had, and after I won a mock war with some of my friends when I was a kid, I got this baby." He gestured.

"Why does it have all those weird colors?" Pinkie asked.

"Well, part of my strategy is the use of constant unpredictability and guerrilla tactics, so you could say that the camouflage works well with that notion." At this point, he was really just making things up off the top of his head. Hopefully he wouldn't screw up later and forget what he said today.

"I'd say that's reason enough to have some food!" Pinkie exclaimed, running into the kitchen, returning moments later with a platter covered in cupcakes. "Here you go, Everypony!" Jason took a cupcake, looking it over. It was as flawless in appearance as possible. He took a bite.

It tasted like the candle. Confused, he tried to swallow it, but then, halfway through, decided to spit it out. He ended up with cupcake mush in his throat, and choked. He started coughing, and threw a glance at Dash. She seemed to know what was going on, he hoped. She threw and inquisitive glance back, and he shook his head slightly. Coughing some more, he finally managed to cough up the offending cupcake chunk into a napkin. It was covered in greenish slime. He was glad he had caught it. He noticed a trash can, and tossed it over.

'Why was a PINKIE cupcake supposedly inedible? They're supposed to be the best baking in Equestria. Maybe it has something to do with the diet for a changeling?'

"Mares and Stallions, that is how you make a first impression!" Dash exclaimed.

"Thanks for all the support, Dash" He managed to get out between further coughs.

Applejack walked in. "Sorry, Ya'll, but ah had to finish bucking some more apple trees before ah could come here."

"Never you mind, darling, you're here, and that's what matters." Rarity said.

Jason turned around. Applejack looked confused. "Hey, I'm Alternis, I'm a friend of Dash. Pleased to meet your acquaintance." He shook her hoof.

"Ah'm Applejack. Any friend of Dash's is a friend of mine." She smiled.

"So, now that we're all here, lets get this party started!" Pinkie yelled.

"Pinky, we aren't here for a party, this was just supposed to be a nice breakfast between friends." Twilight said.

"Hey, Dash, mind if I leave and have a look around town? I don't want to intrude, and if I'm going to be living here I might as well know what Ponyville looks like." She nodded her approval, passing him a few bits. He frowned. "I don't want to mooch off of you too much..."

"Nah. It's cool, I have more than I know what I can do with. Cloud houses don't exactly have water bills or mortgages."

"Well," he spoke louder, "I'll leave you guys to it, I'm going to go have a look around town."

"Well ah hope to see ya again soon, Sugarcube." Applejack replied. A few other responses of similar subject were heard, except from Fluttershy, who had yet to say anything. Jason briefly toyed with the idea that he was feared, before saying another goodbye, and pushing open the door. Too bad he really had nothing to do... He thought about what he could possibly do before he came up with a plan. A good plan. A mischievous and crafty plan. Looking around, he saw a shop sign with a hammer and anvil, and made a bee line towards the place of business.

Jason walked through the door, catching the eye of a pony that was covered in soot. "I take it you're the blacksmith?" He ventured.

"Yup. The one and only."

"Well I have a bit of a weird order, if you can fulfill it." He took a deep breath. If anyone knew what he wanted, it would be the blacksmith. "I want a twenty pounds total of 75% saltpeter 15% softwood charcoal, and 10% sulfur, by weight. Will that work?"

"Weird order is right, but sure, I can hook ya up. One sec."

"Good, Good" The blacksmith returned a few minutes later with a few small bags. Jason grabbed them in his mouth, and set them by his feet. "How Much?"

"Well, that stuff isn't in any real demand, so how about four bits?" Jason hoped he wasn't being ripped off, but four bits for twenty pounds of supplies sounded fair enough. He grabbed the small bag that Dash had given him from beneath his wing, counted out the bits, and handed them to the blacksmith.

"Thanks."

"Anytime."

Jason walked back out of the shop, and looked for a botanist shop. There was one right next store to the blacksmith, so he walked in. "Well that's convenient..." There was a pony he didn't recognize behind the counter, and he walked up, setting the bags on the floor. "Do you sell mortars and pestles?" he asked.

"What kind of botanist shop would we be if we didn't?" she pulled one out from behind the counter. "That'll be three bits."

"Here you go then." Jason pulled out some bits and passed them over. The pony smiled, and handed him the necessary supplies. He left, and started trekking back to Dash's cloud house. He decided to pass through the marketplace, seeing if there was anything else he wanted. On the way, he noticed Big Macintosh behind the Apple family stand, and bought a few apples. He thanked Big Mac, and continued walking. Another stand caught his eye, and he walked over. It was a stand that sold timers. "Well I guess everyone has to have a special talent," he said to himself before arriving. "Hi there, I'd like to buy a few of your timers." The pony's face lit up, and she pushed over four timers, while jason passed over a corresponding pile of bits. "So how's business?"

"Not so good, actually," She replied, sighing.

"Well I hope things go better for you," Jason said encouragingly before turning and taking to the air.

"Wow. Things are cheap here," he said, realizing that he had bought all of that with only thirteen bits. He flew up to Dash's house, and laid out the supplies on the table.

"First things first, mix the powders and the charcoal, but not too roughly, using the mortar and pestle" He did just that, creating an ample supply of grey powder. "There we go. Gunpowder." he took a knife, and carefully hollowed out an apple, cutting up from the bottom. He filled the apple partially with gunpowder, then placed inside the timer, which he had partially taken apart, so that the primitive wiring was frayed and would be powered only when the timer went off. He placed these wires inside the gunpowder. He filled up the rest of the space with gunpowder, and placed the bottom of the apple back into it's niche. "Ha. Now I just have to wait for Dash, and hopefully I can use this sucker..." He laughed maniacally.

Notes: Okay, so for those of you that actually look at the specific chapter length, it's pretty easy to see that they have gotten steadily longer. Just saying.

In other news, I would like to continue this one-chapter-a-day schedule, but honestly these do take a few hours to write each, and I don't know it I will always have that sort of time, so there may be a few one day gaps every once in a while. One of these may be Dec. 9th. Be warned. Other than that, it doesn't look like I'll run out of plot anytime soon, so I shouldn't get stuck or anything.

Waiting. Jason hated waiting. Too bad there was no good way for him to pull this prank without the help of Dash. He heard some hurried wing flaps outside. Jason turned towards the front door. "Well speak of the devil..." The door burst open, revealing a disheveled and worried Dash. She turned and saw Jason, and visibly relaxed.

"Oh, man, I thought you'd ran off. I was looking all over for you."

"So how was the breakfast?"

"Meh, it wasn't that bad. Wasn't that interesting though. Twilight told me some more about the changeling that invaded town, whoever that was." She smiled at Jason. "Pretty amazing how much trouble you could cause in only a couple hours."

"It was nothing." Jason said, laughing.

"So look at this," he directed Dash over to the table with all of his supplies. "Check out this apple. I used some of my human skills to make it awesome. Hold on a sec." Jason pulled out the bottom of the apple, and set the timer for about a minute, quickly burying it back in the black powder. He replaced the bottom of the apple. "Now just wait. Actually, lets go outside with this." They moved onto the cloud yard, and Jason set down the apple near the edge of the cloud.

"What kind of crack pot plan do you have set up this time?" she inquired.

"Just wait another thirty seconds, and you'll find out."

"Why thirty seconds?"

"Well, it's on a timer, and when time runs out, that's when it does the cool stuff." The apple faintly ticked for a few more seconds before it began to ring.

"Why is it ringing? Is that---" Before she could finish, the apple exploded in a shower of apple juice and chunks. She looked at the space the apple used to occupy, looking dumbfounded. She looked to Jason, who was wearing a huge, goofy smile.

"So how was that?"

"Was that magic? I've never seen anything like that before!" She matched Jason's smile, holding out a hoof. Jason bumped his hoof into hers.

"It's just common science. Took me maybe twenty minutes to gather the necessary supplies."

"Well that's definitely a lot cooler than magic." She paused. "So why did you show this to me? I mean, an exploding apple is cool and all, but what's the point?"

"Oh, yeah, well I may have told the CMC yesterday that I wanted twenty four hours to play a prank on Cherilee, and I know how much you like pranks, so I figured I'd fulfill my promise."

"But don't you think that that would be a stupid thing to do? Wouldn't it reveal your disguise, considering you weren't, well, YOU yesterday?"

"I doubt it, the only people that knew are the CMC themselves, possibly Cherilee and Twilight, because I'm assuming she probably looked into what happened. Anyway, they would probably assume that it was your idea, given the fact that you prank people all the time. And anyway, how funny would it be to have an apple explode in Cherilee's face?"

She chuckled. "I guess that would be pretty funny..." She thought for a second. "You know what, fine, let's go before I change my mind."

"Let me go make another 'apple'." Jason retreated back inside the house, and sat down at his 'work table'.

"You better show me how to make these..."

"Fine, whatever." He picked up an apple, and cut out the bottom, hollowing it out. "First, you make space for the explosives to go," He grabbed a small bag of gunpowder, pouring it in. "Then you basically fill it up with said explosives,"

"How do you make those?"

"Maybe I'll tell you later, I really don't want the secret to possible new weapons to be released into this peaceful place. Most wars on my planet were built on weapons derived from this." She sighed. "Hey, I didn't say I'd never tell you." She seemed to perk back up.

"You better tell me soon." She punched him in the shoulder. "I wanna be able to do stuff like that also."

"Sure, don't worry. Anyways, then you place the timer in, and fray the wires to start the rest of this on fire when the timer goes off. Simple" He held up the finished explosive device, smiling mischievously.

"Simple? That's one of the most complicated devices I've ever seen!"

"Really? The most complicated? Do you have calculators?"

"Oh! they just made one of those. It's still experimental though."

"Well imagine a few million of those combined, and you have the same computing power as one of our least advanced computers."

"How does that even work?"

"Honestly? I don't really know completely, but basically stuff just got progressively smaller. It's not like we have magic or anything to make up for it either, so technology is pretty much our only option of advance."

"Wait, you don't have magic?"

"No... I thought I told you this already."

"Wow, I can't believe life without magic."

"It's pretty much the same as me being away from technology. That's like my kind's magic." They both stopped talking. Jason decided to break the silence. "Alright, anyway, we're ready to go. Should be around recess, doncha think, Dash?"

She shook herself out of her thoughts. "Maybe, so lets get going," she said impatiently. She was really looking forward to this prank. It was something so new, so original, no one would expect it. Jason grabbed the apple, and they hurried out the door excitedly.

The flight to the schoolyard was uneventful, besides a few complaints from Dash that they were flying too slow, because Jason didn't want to hurt himself. Eventually, they touched down, just outside of the school limits. Jason put the apple under his wing, and walked towards the frolicking schoolchildren, with Dash close in tow.

"Looks like we got here just in time." Observed Jason. Dash nodded.

"So how are we going to do this? It's not like we can just walk in there and give her a ticking apple."

"We'll give it to one of the CMC. They would probably do what you want, especially Scootaloo. She can sick it on Cherilee's desk, and that's that." Jason looked around for the CMC, and eventually saw them, in a group under a tree. "There they are. Let's go." He handed her the apple. "It would be too strange for me to hand them the apple, so you'll have to introduce this as a prank that I helped you with."

"Alright, shouldn't be too hard." Scootaloo looked up and saw Dash, and Scootaloo's face lit up. She ran over, her confused friends in tow.

"Hi Rainbow Dash!" She exclaimed excitedly.

"Hey squirt." She noticed that Scootaloo's gaze had shifted to Jason. "This is my friend, Alternis, from Manehattan. He's staying in Ponyville for a while."

Scoots gasped. "Is he as awesome as you, Dash?"

Dash laughed. "No one's as awesome as me!"

"Thanks." Jason said dryly.

"He's pretty cool though." Jason elbowed Dash in the side, and made a whirling motion with his hoof. "Oh yeah, he and I have this apple, and I need one of you to give it to Mrs. Cherilee."

"But why do ya want us ta do that?" Applebloom asked.

"Oh you'll see, you'll see in..." She conferred with Jason for a second before turning back. "Ten minutes." They both started chuckling.

"I'll do it I guess," Scootaloo sighed and took the apple. "This better be awesome."

"Oh don't worry squirt, it'll be like nothing you've ever seen before." They had another round of chuckles. The school bell rang, and Dash shooed the CMC back to their class.

"We really need somewhere to watch."

Scootaloo entered the classroom with the apple, and immediately set it on Cherilee's desk before she walked back in. More children filed in and sat down, and Cherilee got back to teaching the class.

"Okay class," she started, "we're going to pick up where we left off by practicing our multiplication tables." A collective groan was heard from the sea of desks. "Oh come on children, it's really not that bad, you'll have to use these all the time."

Seven minutes of bored students later, Cherilee decided that she had tortured, erm, taught her students enough about math, and moved onto english. "Alright students, now pull out a pencil and some paper, because it's free writing time!" Another groan was heard. "I'm going to put your prompt up on the board and you can start writing." she wrote, If you could go anywhere, where would you go and why?. "When you're finished, turn in your papers on my desk." She sat down, and started grading some math tests. She noticed the apple that was on her desk, and smiled. Then she frowned. The apple was ticking. She picked it up, balancing it on one of her hooves, listening intently. 'I must be going insane,' she thought, 'here I am, thinking apples can tick. It's probably just the clock.' She looked up. The clock was broken. She looked back at the apple, staring.

"BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRIIIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNNGGGGGGGGGG"

The apple exploded, completely covering her face, and in general, the whole corner of the room. The room burst into laughter at Cherilee's expense. She angrily looked around for the culprit, before she saw two pegasi, Rainbow Dash and some other one she had never seen before. With Rainbow's track record though, she could assume that it was her that had initiated the prank, though she had never seen her pull something so complicated before. That must be the other one's doing. She started laughing. It was a pretty good prank, in retrospect.

The laughing lasted several minutes, and the least Scootaloo could say was that she was impressed. She had never seen anything like this. 'Wait,' she thought 'The changeling said that he was going to prank Cherilee in less than twenty four hours, and with something we'd never heard of.' She looked out the window at the two pegasi, who were still laughing and rolling on the ground. "Oh no. He tricked her. There's just too much in common' Her eyes narrowed. "No one tricks my idol," she said under her breath.

"Wow that was great!" Dash exclaimed. "Did you see the look on her face?"

"Ha, ha yeah, that was better than I expected." Jason replied. His stomach grumbled. Dash laughed.

"Lets head back to my place and get some food. You better keep up this time."

"We'll see."

A few hours later...

The School bell rang. Cherilee spoke up.

"Okay children, don't forget to do your homework, have a nice day." She had successfully managed to clean most of the apple off of the surrounding classroom, luckily enough for her.

Scootaloo got up from her chair, a stony look on her face. She gravely walked out the door, before Applebloom and Sweetie Belle. "Hey Scootaloo, weren't we going to go crusading today?" Sweetie yelled after her.

"Maybe tomorrow, Sweetie, something's come up."

"Well, okay then, tomorrow for sure."

"Okay, Sweetie."

She made a beeline for the outskirts of town, situating herself under Dash's cloud house. Did she really want to do this? She wasn't so sure. The changelings in Canterlot were dangerous enough, and she didn't have a love wave to save her this time. But surely once he was revealed, he would be stopped by Dash, and everything would work out. She took another deep breath.

"Rainbow Dash!" she yelled upwards at Dash's house.

Notes:

So...this chapter was short. Sorry. Like I said last chapter, I don't really have all that much time to do this, so that's why the chapters tend to be short. For the record, I WAS going to make this one longer, but ran out of time to do so. I also said last chapter that there might be a gap in chapters this week, where I may miss a day. This will probably be on Tuesday the 12th if I do end up not being able to update. Thanks for sticking with the story, short chapters and all.

Jason arrived at the house slightly after Dash. There wasn't any real race, but if there had been, he would've stood no chance. His side gave a twang of pain, as if to prove his point. As soon as he got inside, he dropped his disguise, much to the confusion of Dash.

"What are you doing?"

"Well I kinda hate not being myself, literally, and I also wanted to see the status on the wounds." He looked at said wounds, and winced. They weren't as bad as before, and had started to heal, but were nowhere near finished healing. The fact that he was healing let him know that he was receiving love from Dash, probably in the form of friendship. "Have I ever told you that I love having you as my friend?"

"Huh?"

"The fact that you're my friend gives me the energy to function and heal, so thanks for sticking with me."

"Oh, well I'm just happy I can help." She smiled. Jason decided to touch his side. He recoiled with a hiss. Dash jumped. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I guess. Apparently these aren't exactly fast healing injuries."

"I wish I could help..."

"You kinda are though..." They stared at each other, goofy grins on their faces.

"Rainbow Dash!" Someone yelled. Jason sighed.

"Do you want to get that or should I?" He asked.

"I probably should, my house and all..."

"Oh yeah, that makes sense I guess." Jason muttered angrily about not having his own house anymore, as Dash got up and opened the door.

'That sounded like Scootaloo.' She thought, and walked to the edge of her cloud yard. Sure enough, Scootaloo was down below, looking up at her. "Hold on Scoots!" she yelled down. She turned to Jason. "Hey, it's Scoots if you didn't already know."

Jason facehoofed. "If she says something about, you know," he gestured to himself, "bring her up." he transformed back to his Alternis form before Dash turned around and jumped down.

Dash reached the bottom, seeing a very impatient looking Scootaloo. "What is it Scoots?"

"I know something important about Alternis." she whispered. "Come closer" She looked around, before continuing. "He's a changeling." Dash wasn't sure whether to feel mortified that she knew, or laugh that she was acting this way. She managed to pull off a mortified expression, and looked to Scootaloo worriedly, trying not to laugh.

"We need to speak in private about this. Here. Hop on, we'll speak up there in my house. Privately."

"You mean I get to see-- I mean yes. Privately." Scootaloo jumped on top of Dash, and she took off. She slowly flew up, trying to figure out a usable plan. By the time she arrived, she had one to use. She landed, and Scootaloo jumped off.

"So lets go in there and come up with a plan." She opened the door, and walked in, looking for Jason. She saw him. "Where's the real alternis?" She yelled at him. He looked confused, and tried to ask her silently what was going on after he noticed the form of Scootaloo behind her. She winked at him. Jason seemed to get it.

"What do you mean? I am Alternis!" He shouted back.

"No you aren't, you're a changeling." She was finding it hard not to laugh. Jason dropped his disguise.

"You may have found out about me, but you'll never find Alternis! Ha ha ha!" Dash growled.

"How could you, you MONSTER!" She pounced on Jason, and pinned him to the ground. She punched him on the unharmed side of his face. Scoots was smiling wildly.

"Go get him Dash!" she yelled from the sidelines.

"Where is he?" Dash punched him again. He laughed harder.

"I'll never tell you!" He squirmed under her weight. Evidently they were good enough actors to fool Scootaloo.

"Tell me!" Another punch.

"Fine! Fine I'll tell you!" He took a breath. "I ate him. He tasted like hay." He said with a strait face. Dash burst out laughing, much to the confusion of Scootaloo, and allowed Jason to get up.

Scootaloo looked between the two of them worriedly. "What are you doing, Dash, kill him, he ate your friend!" They burst out laughing again. Scootaloo seemed to get even more confused, if that was possible.

"Scoots," Dash started, "There never was an Alternis. It was always him." She gestured to Jason. She noticed the look on Scoots's face, and tried to explain further. "He's not a regular changeling. He's already saved my life, and I've only known him a day. He pretty much killed himself trying to save me also." Jason crossed his arms and smirked.

"I seem to remember that the reason I almost died was because you beat me up AFTER I saved your life." He chuckled. Dash stared angrily at him.

"You didn't have to tell her that. I don't want to let people know that I was wrong about something." Scootaloo finally got the courage to speak.

"So you never killed anypony or ate them?" She asked nervously. Jason laughed.

"No. No ponies." Dash shot him a look. He shrugged, as if to say, 'I'll tell you later'. "Anyway, Scoots, how about you don't tell anyone about me, because honestly, I barely escaped last time, and I don't want to go through that again." Jason said, and then walked off, muttering something about not having enough to eat.

"Oh yeah, sure." She looked crestfallen. "Sorry for wasting your time Dash." Dash's smiled, and moved over to scoots.
"But what if he was a changeling and I didn't know? You would've saved me if that had been the case. You were just trying to protect me."

"Thank's for not getting mad Dash!" She looked around. "Your house is so cool!"

"The coolest, Squirt. No pony's house is more awesome than mine."

"Hey look!" Jason yelled from the kitchen. "I stuck a heavy duty knife handle through my hoof, and it works!" he sliced the air a few times. "Welcome to badass town, population, me!" Dash laughed.

"I thought you said you don't put random things through your hooves in your free time?" she teased.

"Well, um, you know what, I have no clever retort for that question. So there." He paused, "But realistically, a knife isn't random, I at least attempted this with a purpose." He looked around suspiciously. "You never know when you're going to need to stick a knife handle into your hoof, you know."

Dash snorted. "I guess you're prepared for the knifes in hooves competition."

"Hey, I'm bound to be found out eventually, and a few knives at my disposal couldn't hurt my getaway chances." Scootaloo, who had been uncharacteristically quiet, had decided to speak up.

"Hey, Alternis!"

"My real name's Jason."

"Oh... Well, hey Jason!"

"Yes..." He thought he knew where this was going.

"Can you, um," She scuffed her hoof along the ground, "you know, turn into me?" Bingo.

"Ugh, what is it with everyone wanting to look at themselves? You ponies are all just a bunch of narcissists at heart." Scoot looked disappointed. "Hey, I was still going to do it, you know." Green fire covered his body, leaving another Scootaloo in its wake.

"Hey Dash," Jason said with Scootaloo's voice, "Remember how I said that being a mare is weird?"

"Ya I guess..."

"It still is." He eyed Scootaloo, who was excitedly examining his new form, much to his annoyance.

"Wow." She said, smirking. "We could confuse so many people with two of me!"

"Sorry to rain on your parade, but I can't exactly be running around as you. That would be too obvious, and the townsfolk would probably kill me if they could."

"But you're not evil!"

"They don't know that, and they'll never be able to trust it from my mouth." Dash tried to say something, but Jason cut her off. "They probably wouldn't trust you either, and would say that you'd been put under a spell or something, so I really can't win." he looked at her. "You know I'm right. If I get caught, I'm not bringing anyone else into it, and that's final. I go down alone."

Dash shook her head. "You know, I'd like to argue with you, but you're probably right. I'll still try to help you though." She sighed. Scoots looked between the two of them, unsure of what to do. Dash noticed her. "Hey Scoots, I guess I better take you home. Hop on."

"Oh, wait, take me to Sugarcube corner, that's where the Crusaders tend to meet when I'm not there."

"Sure thing Squirt. Remember, this is a secret. DO NOT tell anyone. " Scootaloo jumped onto Rainbow's back, fluttering her wings in the process. She walked out the door, sending an apologetic glance back at Jason. He tried to smile, but grimaced instead.

"No worries Dash, you can count on me!" They disappeared as Dash jumped off the cloud.

Jason turned around, steadily getting angrier at the sheer odds stacked against him. He couldn't win, he could only prolong the inevitable, which was either another session of running or actual capture, which was probably more likely this time, considering the ponies were prepared. The funny part was that even though he was innocent, his claims and evidence, even witnesses, would mean nothing. He punched the wall. His hoof went strait through it with only a little of resistance. He sighed, looking at his hoof. "FUCK!! SHIT! GOD DAMMIT!" Jason continued his steady stream of profanity, not even noticing Dash's entrance.

"Dude! Calm down!" Jason jumped, and looked over towards her angrily, before his face softened.

"Sorry, I guess the whole, 'I can't win' part of this scenario finally sank in." He shifted back into Alternis.

"Hey, guy, it's not that bad." She walked over and gave him a hug. Jason was unsure what to do, but after a moment, he put his arms around her, a single tear running down his cheek.

"It's just--"

"Shhhhh" She looked like she was fighting herself over something, before she spoke up. "Hey, you said earlier that you hadn't killed any PONIES, and basically you made it pretty clear you were only talking about ponies."

"So you want to know why I specified ponies?" He sighed.

"Well, only if you want to tell me." She replied. He nodded.

"I've killed three humans." She gasped, pushing him away.

"But, why would you--"

"Listen to what I have to say, and only ask me about it when I'm done with the story."

"Okay, fine."

"Okay then. I lived in a city with a population about that of Equestria. Now, everyone here is generally provided for under an economic system that in theory should never work. Anyways, the fact that some people live in pretty crumby conditions where I come from causes crime. Generally speaking, this is why most crime is in cities, where the most poor and homeless people are. The point is, some of these criminals hold people up in alleyways and other secluded spots at night, and take their money, or even try to kill them. Two of the men I killed did this to me. One had a gun, which is one of those weapons I told you about earlier that uses that explosive. He took my money, and then decided to shoot me, so I shot him first. The other one was much the same scenario, but he had a knife and tried to stab me because I didn't have money on me, so basically I killed that one with his own knife. The last one was a druggie, and was trying to beat me up, so I pushed him over, and his head hit a rock. That one may not have died, but I guess I have to assume he did." He paused, sighing. "So there you go, three deaths, all in self defense."

"Oh... I had no idea."

"Yeah, I still relive those in dreams sometimes. I can never forget the looks on their faces when..." he trailed off, looking at the ground.

"I guess I can't even imagine how you got through all of that. I don't think I would've made it past the first one."

"Kill or be killed, I guess, although I wish it didn't come to that." He sighed. You kinda never really get used to it." he sighed again. "I saw every single member of my family killed in front of me. Although after all of this, I don't really know why I kept going, at least until I got here."

"Why until you got here?"

"Well I have a friend who knows everything about me and STILL wants to be my friend, and I guess that's better than I ever had before."

"You didn't have friends before?"

"I did, they just weren't GOOD friends. Not like you." Jason, eager to change the subject, looked around, noticing that it had become dark outside. "What time does it become dark here?"

"Oh, um, like five, I think."

"Well I guess I'm gonna turn in then, today really took it outta me." Jason turned from Dash, and walked up the stairs, into her guest bedroom. He laid down on the cloud bed, pulled the blanket over him, and stared at the ceiling. His brain was a flurry of activity; there was no way he could hope to get to sleep, even though he was ridiculously tired. He heard a noise by the door and opened his eyes. Even through the darkness, he could quite clearly see the silhouette of Dash in the doorway. He would have to see if he had better night vision as a changeling.

"Um, Hi."

"Hi?"

"Yeah, I'm only gonna say this once, but you look like you need somepony to keep you company." Jason was shocked by the sudden turn of events, never pinning Dash as the sentimental type. He could only nod before Dash climbed onto the cloud bed next to him. She stared a him. "Never been in a bed with a mare before?" She smirked. He nodded. "Better make the best of it..." She smiled and wrapped her fore hooves around his chest, resting her head on his shoulder. He wrapped a fore hoof under her and pulled her closer. "You're so soft..." She gave a contented hum and drifted off. Jason, however, was still unable to sleep. The warmth of Dash next to him helped put his mind to rest, but he couldn't stop thinking about capture by the Equestrians. Resolving to prepare for all he could in the morning, he finally managed to find sleep.

I'm not sure whether or not the auther's note space actually works, so if you have to read this twice, so be it.

Notes: I'm just going to say that basically I screwed up the blank day on the last chapter. It will be Wednesday the 12th if it occurs, not Tuesday. Also, for those of you that enjoy when the Ponyverse is screwed with, man are you going to love the story eventually. Shit gets fucked up. I think that's about it. Oh yeah, and this was one of the first chapters without a cliffhanger.

Jason snorted, and woke up. He opened his eyes to the sight of Dash's face. He jumped, before remembering the circumstances behind his 'predicament'. He looked outside. The sun seemed pretty high, he figured he wouldn't piss her off too much by waking her up. He pushed some loose hair away from her eyes. She shifted, and opened the eye that Jason had most recently moved the hair away from. "Hey," he said.

"Hey," she replied. They stared at each other for a moment, not saying a word. Jason quickly broke the silence.

"So, do you have to do anything today?" Jason inquired.

"No, not really, there's nice weather this week, so I'm basically just on call if something happens."

"Well I thought some more about the possibility of capture," he sighed, "and basically, I realized that if I can't stop it, I can at least be prepared."

"Makes sense,"

"So if you don't have anything to do, do you want to make some explosives with me? I'll even tell you how to make the powder..."

"Of course I do! Why wouldn't I want to make things explode?"

"Fair warning, these will be heavier duty than exploding apples, and could, in entirety, be fairly expensive. Just so you know."

"Didn't I already tell you that I have more money than I know what to do with? It's fine."

Jason sighed. "I would rather work for money. I don't like living off of you."

"Hey, well, captain of the weather team and all, I could probably get you a job. Pays good bits."

"At this point, I'll do anything."

"Heh, good."

Jason clapped his hooves together. "Okay, lets actually get up and do something."

"But it's so warm in here..."

Jason tapped his hoof to his chin. "Hey, how does that work? I mean we're half a mile above sea level, under one blanket, on a cloud. How can this possibly be warm?"

"Is it really a problem that it's warm?"

"Well, no, but If I don't manage to find fault with every part of your world, then I'll run out of things to say, and *gasp* that would be a disaster!"

Dash snorted. "Some disaster." She pulled herself out of bed, with Jason in tow. They made their way downstairs with much less falling and rolling than before, and entered the kitchen. Dash pulled out some more apples, carrots, lettuce, etc. and set them on the table.

"You aren't much of a cook, I take it."

"Ha! No, I burn everything. Looking back, it's kinda hilarious. I'm surprised burning things isn't my special talent."

"Wouldn't that be cool though just ZAP!, and stuff burns." He looked at his hoof, and smiled malevolently. "Hey, you know how there's the green fire when I transform?"

"Yeah?"

"Well how cool would it be if I could have that just pop out on my hooves and stuff? Like, whenever I wanted?"

"I guess the only way to know for sure is if you try..." She adopted Jason's smile.

"Here goes nothing." He transformed his hoof into the hoof it already was, creating a pointless bout of green flame. He snickered. He repeated the process several times, until he got the fire going pretty heavily. "Hey," he panted, this was really taking it out of him. "See if it's hot or something." Dash reached her hoof out towards his, and immediately pulled it back.

"Trust me, it's hot."

"Awesome." He let the fire die out, and slumped to the ground, breathing heavily.

"You okay dude?"

"Yeah, just tired. Transforming is pretty easy normally, but I just used the energy from at least thirty transformations." He took a deep breath. "That's going to come in handy at some point." Dash handed him an apple, and he gratefully took a bite. He seemed to realize something, and dropped his form to look at his wounds. They were no longer cracks, but only deep cuts. Jason cheered. "Dash, look!"

"Hmm?" she turned to look at him.

"Look how healed my side is!" she looked a little grossed out. "Oh yeah, sorry, you're eating." Jason sighed. Dash decided to change the subject.

"So what do you got in store with these new explosives?"

"Oh, so many things, but you're going to have to wait and find out." She sighed.

"You just gotta be like that don't you?"

"Hey, after I tell you all of the stuff from my world, I won't exactly have an ace up my sleeve anymore, now will I?" Dash responded with some angry mumbles. Jason spat out an apple seed.

"That didn't taste good. Not like I expected it to..." He paused. "You ready? We can go get the supplies for this if you are."

"Aren't all the things you need right here?"

"For an exploding apple? Yes. For the other stuff I have in mind? Not even close." He laughed maniacally.

"Fine," she set down her food. "Lets get going." She got up and walked out the door, Jason close behind. "So where first, Jason?"

"The Blacksmith shop." They both jumped off of the cloud, and raced down to the shop, landing a few seconds later. "God I love having wings."

"They're the best, huh?"

"You know it!" Jason pushed the door to the blacksmith's shop open, and walked inside. The same pony was behind the counter, and seemed to immediately recognize Jason.

"Hey, there's that pony with the weird orders!" Dash shot Jason a look. He shrugged.

"Do you have down what I ordered last time?" the pony nodded. "I'll take forty pounds of that, plus five pounds of powdered magnesium."

"Even weirder than last time..." the clerk muttered as he walked into the back room. Dash looked over at Jason inquisitively.

"What's in the--"

"75% saltpeter, 15% softwood charcoal, and 10% sulfur, by weight."

"Oh." The pony came back with a set of bags, before retreating into the back room and grabbing another set.

"That'll be nine bits." Dash flipped him the necessary currency. He smiled and pushed the bags towards them. They both picked up some of them in their mouths, and retreated out the door.

As soon as they got outside, Dash moved to the side of the road, and set down her bags. Jason followed suit. "What else do we need?"

"Let's see, baby powder and small airtight canisters. Do you know where we can get either of those?"

"We can get the baby stuff from Pinkie, because she has to take care of the twins, and there's a pony that sells small boxes to keep stuff in."

"Okay, let's go get that baby powder first." Jason picked up his bags, and walked across the street, and down the block to Sugarcube Corner. He pushed inside, immediately seeing Pinkie pop up from behind the counter, a huge smile on her face.

"Oh! Alternis! Fancy seeing you here! I was just thinking about people that come into this shop, and then you came in! Isn't that such a coincidence? I mean, how weird is that?"

"Pinkie, I just need some baby powder."

"Oh, sure. Here you go!" She had pulled a container from behind the counter, though why she kept one there, he had no idea.

"Yeah, thanks." He tried to flip her a bit, but she vigorously shook her head.

"No need, I'm just glad to help a friend!"

"Okay, well, thanks again." Jason pushed his way back outside, followed by Dash, who had waved to Pinkie before turning to leave.

"Two down, one to go," Dash said happily.

"Wait, we also need flint strike rods. Who has those?"

"I dunno, probably somepony though."

"Fair enough." Jason went by a stall with some hardy jewelry canisters, taking all of the small, well built ones, and flipping the owner a few bits, which she gladly accepted. "Now we have one to go." Jason looked around for a stall that could actually have what he wanted, and saw a camping themed stall. "Really," he said to Dash, "Camping? Who camps around here anyway?"

"Honestly? I have no idea." She replied. Shaking his head, Jason walked up to the cheerful pony, and bought most of her fire starters. She nodded her thanks, and Jason turned around. "Now, we can go build these suckers." He picked up the multitude of bags in his mouth and took off, heading for Dash's house.

After several minutes of awkward flying, he landed in her yard just before she did. Jason looked around for any bystanders, and upon seeing none, took the bags in his magic, including the ones previously held by Dash, and moved them inside. He set them down in various piles, separating the new gunpowder ingredients.

"Dash, come here." She trotted over, eyeing the bags uneasily. "Look at what I do with this." He mixed some of the contents of the bags together and lightly mashed them with the mortar. "You mix them together in the same ratio as before, but make sure not to hit it too hard, or it may explode. No pressure." He handed over the necessary supplies, and Dash nervously got to work.

A few minutes later, she had managed to mix all forty pounds without any explosions, surprisingly enough. Jason took some of the mixture from her and poured it into a canister. He grabbed some of the coarse twine that had been wrapped around the bags, and inserted it into the canister. He punched a hole near the top, pushed the fire starter through, and tied the twine around it, burying the other end in the black powder.

"The idea here is that when you pull this starter out, it should scrape against the metal side of the canister, and create enough sparks to set the twine on fire, because it's ridiculously dry. Then, when the canister hits the ground, the powder shifts, hits the fire, and BOOM." She nodded her understanding. "Now, let's just save one of these, and skip the explosion."

"Awww..."

"Hey, this is better." Jason tipped some of the magnesium into the black powder, and mixed it around. "So basically where I came from there were these weapons called 'Flash-bangs,' and the idea was that they blinded and deafened the enemy for a short period of time, which is what this should do. The black powder one is only loud, and if I wanted it to just be a black powder one, there would be far more explosives in here." He was silent for a moment. "So you wanna give it a whirl?" She nodded her head vigorously. "That's what I thought." He handed her the device. "Pull this pin when you're ready. Pull it quickly, then throw it. Let's get outside. Oh! grab two pairs of sunglasses and get ready to cover your ears."

"This is going to be so awesome!" She ran off, returning moments later with the necessary eyewear. They walked outside.

"Hey, build a backstop out of cloud so that it does't fly off and scare everyone, at least not anymore than it already will."

"Sure thing." she made the necessary preparations, and then retreated towards the door.

"So, toss it on my mark, and then cover yourself behind the doorjamb and block your ears. This isn't shit to goof around with. At least not totally." He cracked a smile. "Get ready." they moved near the door. "Toss the thing underhand, and quickly, I don't know how long the fuse will last, but it's pretty much when it hits something that it explodes."

"Got it"

"Ready?"

"Ready."

"Okay." Jason took a deep breath. "Pull the pin." Dash yanked out the pin. "Toss and cover." She tossed out the bomb, and shoulder-covered in the doorway, with Jason mirroring her on the other side.

BANG

BANG

The small canister exploded in a shower of light and tiny magnesium shards. The sound was louder than anything Jason had ever heard before, even with his hooves covering his ears. The bright light had blinded him momentarily, leaving his head spinning before he had the conscience of mind to lay down.

Riiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnggggggggg

He couldn't hear a thing, only the ringing of his ears keeping him company. He was laughing, but he couldn't hear himself. His vision started to clear, and he looked towards Dash, seeing her laughing as well. The ringing in his ears started to ease up, and he yelled over to her.

"DASH!"

"YEAH?!"

"WHAT DID YOU THINK OF THAT?!"

"THAT WAS, WITHOUT QUESTION, THE DEFINITION OF AWESOME." They both lay there, breathing heavily, waiting for their senses to return. After a few minutes, Jason decided that he could hear well enough to keep up a conversation, and spoke up.

"Now imagine how incapacitated you'd be if that went off right next to you!"

"You really need to carry one of those with you, just in case."

"That wouldn't be suspicious at all..." They lapsed into silence. "Hey, we still have one more bomb to try."

"Really?!?! How many different explosives can you make?"

Jason chuckled. "Just this last one. It's not quite as good as the flashbang, so don't get your hopes up too high. Come watch." He grabbed a new canister and poured large amount of baby powder inside it, with a smaller amount of gunpowder, following the same pattern with the fuse. "This one should, in theory, create a small cloud of dust, but honestly I have no idea if it'll work." He pulled the pin and tossed it outside, being met with a low pop and a large cloud of white dust.

"I think it works." Dash observed.

"And you would be right. Sorry to burst your bubble, but that was the last of the new types of explosives."

"Hey it's fine, it's not like I've ever seen anything like that before anyways." She paused. "You wanna go get some food or something? We can go stop by Sugarcube Corner and see Pinkie."

"Yeah sure. I'll just order a milkshake I guess."

"Oh yeah, you choked on the cupcake. What happened there anyway?"

"It tasted inedible, which I guess is kinda strange, considering how good Pinkie's baking is supposed to be. I just assumed that it was too sugary to be of any nutritional value, and was thus considered inedible." He sighed. "Let's just get going before I get too depressed." Jason trotted over to the door, stopping just outside the door.

"Why did you--" Dash stopped behind him.

"The thing made a hole in your yard."

"Good thing I built it out of cloud, I'll just go grab one, and--"

"Hey, show me how to do it!"

"Huh?"

"Well I showed you a bunch of stuff I know, the least you can do is tell me how to make part of your house."

"Fine. Grab that cloud." Jason hopped into the air, and flew a small distance away, grabbing onto a small cloud. He quickly flew back and presented it to Dash.

"Here you go."

"Now basically cram it into that hole and we're done."

"That's it?"

"Well how complicated could it be?" She smiled. Jason sighed and pushed the cloud into the gap, flattening it to be flush with the rest of the yard. He turned to look at Dash.

"Ready to go then?"

"Sure." She took off, and dove over the edge, with Jason close behind. The first thing that Jason noticed was that there were only a few ponies on the street, and all of them were running in random directions. Dash seemed to also take notice, and looked over at Jason. He sighed.

"The bomb. They're scared about the bomb."

"Well it was louder than pretty much everything else, ever. I guess they have a right to be scared."

"I wonder how much of the light they saw. I don't really want to be forced to divulge any information on what happened or why there are huge amounts of explosives in your living room." He chuckled. "Although I guess no one actually knows that they're explosives."

Dash pushed open the door to Sugarcube corner to see a very disheveled Pinkie Pie. "Dash! You're okay!" She wrapped Dash in a hug. "But where's..." Jason walked in. "Alternis! You're okay too!" Jason looked to Dash for an explanation, but she offered none.

"What do you mean Pinkie?"

"Well, I got a twitch in my leg, followed by an itch on the tip of my left ear, which means loud noises, so I figured it would be a sonic rainboom, so I went outside. Then I looked up and didn't see you, Dash, and I was like, 'but Dashie is the only one who can do the sonic rainboom,' and then there was this huge light on your cloud house Dash! And this huge, loud noise, that was even louder than the sonic rainboom! So anyways I figured one of you may have gotten hurt doing whatever that was. By the way what was that?"

"I'll tell you later." She seemed fine with his answer, and looked back and forth between the two of them. "Soooooo, what can I get you two?"

"I guess I'll take a milkshake." Jason answered.

"And I'll take one of your spicy cupcakes." Dash winked at Pinky. Pinky winked back. Jason shrugged, deciding to ignore the two other ponies. Pinky retreated into the kitchen after her sixth return wink to Dash, and immediately made an inordinate amount of noise. Jason burst out laughing.

"How did she manage to do that less than a second after the door closed? That would have been hard to do even if you were trying to make a mess."

"Yeah, well I guess it's just--"

"Pinkie being Pinkie, I know. You know there has to be an explanation for her acting how she does, and I swear, if I have some sort of vantage point with any additional knowledge I have, I'm figuring out why she acts like this."

Dash laughed, and punched him in the shoulder. "Good luck with that." Pinkie walked back out with their orders balanced on a plate on her head, and slid them onto the table. Jason took a tentative sip of his milkshake, and finding nothing awry, continued to sip it.

"So how's the cupcake?"

"Mhmwnem menrwmme mwner." she said through a mouthful of food.

"Oh really? I'm surprised you could taste the faint nutmeg flavor hidden behind the lemon zest." She laughed, and attempted to swallow her food.

"I said, it's spicy. It's one of pinkie's specialty cupcakes."

"A spicy cupcake?"

"Yeah."

"Weird." She shoved the rest of the cupcake into her mouth and swallowed it whole. Jason looked at her strangely before a pegasus walked in the front door.

"Hey, Dash." The pegasus started. Dash turned to look at her.

"Hey Raindrop, how's the weather going?"

"Well, that's why I'm here, actually," she sighed. "There's a huge storm forming near the edge of the Everfree, and we need all of the on call weather ponies to report for duty."

"Alright." she paused. "Hey Raindrop, how are we looking for job openings?"

"Well, um, we have a temporary slot that Thunderlane left when he injured his wing."

"Great, I'll be interviewing someone for that slot tomorrow." she got up to walk to the door. "See ya later Alternis." She waved

He waved back. "See ya soon." He turned back to the counter and slurped down the rest of his shake. He placed a few bits on the counter and turned to leave. "And so I have nothing to do..." He walked back out through the door, and saw that the street was still mostly empty. He started to cross the road, but was immediately hit by an orange and red blur and flung down the street. "Ugh, SCOOTALOO!"

From down the street, he heard a muffled, "Sorry!" He got up and spit some dirt out of his mouth, making his way over to the crusaders.

"Why are you in such a hurry anyway?"

"Oh hi Alternis!" Scootaloo said, "How's it going?"

"Fine I guess, kinda bored." It looked like Applebloom and Sweetie Belle were starting to extract themselves from the wreckage that was their scooter-wagon combo thing.

"Hey mister, are ya okay?" Applebloom asked.

"Yeah I'm fine, I'm surprised you guys didn't kill yourselves or anything. So where are you trying to get to so fast?"

"Well we heard this huge explosion, and everypony ran for cover, and I was like, 'what if our cutie mark is in explosion investigating'? So here we are. I thought that Rainbow Dash did another one of her Sonic Rainbooms, but I couldn't see the rainbow part."

"Do you guys want to know what caused the explosion?"

"Do you know?" Sweetie Belle asked.

"Yup. I know because it was me that caused that explosion." They looked up at him dumbfounded. He chuckled.

"You're just pulling our legs." Scootaloo punched him in the knee.

"Do you guys remember the exploding apple?" They nodded. "It was like that, only bigger. And louder. And apparently it scared everypony." He looked around as some more of the ponies continued to come back out of their houses.

"Ya did all that? You don't look like a unicorn pony ta me, how'd ya do all that then?"

"Picked up some stuff, put it together, lit it on fire, and then that happened." He gestured towards
Dash's house. "No magic."

"So you're sayin' that ah could do that?"

"Yes, but I'm not telling you the recipe or anything, these things are too dangerous." A unanimous 'Aww' was heard. It was kinda cute. "Hey, this isn't like, 'covered in tree sap' dangerous, this is like 'dead if you screw up' dangerous." They seemed to get the concept.

"When you guys are older I'll show you. I promise."

"Fine." Applebloom crossed her fore hooves and moped. Jason chuckled. "What's so funny?!"

"You reacted the same way as Dash did when I delayed telling her." Sweetie Belle had finished putting the wagon upright.

"Hey guys, lets go try something else, because I don't think we're going to be the Cutie Mark Crusaders Explosion Investigators." Scoots turned around.

"Yeah, um, Cutie Mark Crusaders Stump Removers?"

"Yeah!" the other two yelled before mounting their vehicle from hell and zipping away. Jason shook his head, and started walking aimlessly.

He had only been here for about a day at this point, yet it felt like it had been weeks. Jason was shaken out of his thoughts by some feverish yelling somewhere up the road. It took him a moment to pinpoint the location of it's origin, before he determined that it had come from the one and only Ponyville library. Big surprise. He hesitated over intervening before he knocked on the door. A few seconds later, a bored looking Spike opened the door. He realized he hadn't seen the little guy yet.

"Hey, I'm Alternis, I'm a friend of Twilight, could I come in?" He stared a few seconds before letting him in. At first glance, Jason saw Twilight near a blackboard with several crossed out equations pretty much all over it. She yelled again and turned, throwing a piece of chalk. It bounced off of Jason's face.

"Oh, hi there, Alternis, was it? Sorry about the chalk, I just couldn't figure something out."

"I understand. What were you working on?"

"I doubt you'd understand it, but there is a system of energy used for spells, and I need to try to figure out the total energy of the spell from the energy used per second from this inverted parabolic graph." Jason looked at the board. The units made no sense to him, but he could at least understand the concepts.

"Just take the definite integral of the area under the graph, in the parabolic region." He shaded the area under the graph. "And use the Fundamental Theorem of Calculous to find the exact area of this specific integral." he wrote out the equation and solved the problem only a few minutes later. He backed up from the board, perusing his work. He looked at Twilight. She looked completely dumbfounded. Jason smiled.

"How did you--"

"A magician never reveals his secrets." He turned to leave, having run out of entertainment.

"Hey, you better come back and show me some more stuff eventually."

"Always hungry for knowledge I see. Sure thing, I will." He left the library, and took a turn towards the market. He was quickly running out of things to do.

He arrived a few minutes later, and perused the stalls momentarily before seeing one that had a sign with a picture of a fish hanging from it. Intrigued, he walked over, to find that it sold several different types of shellfish. Ignoring the fact that ponies apparently ate some meat, he bought a few dozen shrimp, and thanked the vender. Man, were they cheap. He picked some assorted spices from another stall, and having deridingly ran out of things to do, he flew up to Dash's cloud house. He set down the bag on the counter, and sat down near the explosives. He pulled out the rest of the canisters, and after a while, had succeeded in making them all into bombs. He wiped his forehead. The sun had descended further towards the horizon, but he doubted that Dash would be back this soon.

He walked outside and jumped into the sky, deciding to attempt a few tricks. It was no wonder that Dash's tricks were all overly complicated, when flips and corkscrews are the easy material. Easy or not, the feeling of freedom was overwhelming to Jason. He could see why Dash loved flying as much as she did.

As far as he could tell, when he finally decided to stop, the sun had nearly touched the horizon line. He went back inside, and managed to figure out how to start the cloud stove, however that works. Jason was in the middle of cooking the shrimp when Dash stumbled in, mumbling about the inadequacy of the weather team.

"Hey, what's that great smell," she walked into the kitchen. Jason pushed her away with his magic.

"It's a surprise. Hopefully you'll like it." She pouted and moved to the work table.

"Where'd all the empty canisters go?"

"I made the rest of them into bombs, they're over there in the corner." Jason said while he spread some spices over the food. "By the way, I'm no chef, but this should at least be cooked correctly." He walked over with the finished food, and dished it onto two plates. Dash decided she had stared at the explosives long enough, and sat down across from him. She looked down at the chopped up shrimp, then up at Jason, and then back to her food.

"What in Tartarus is this stuff?" She frowned.

"Shrimp. Try it."

"You mean like seafood?"

"Yeah. You should try it."

"But, but--" Jason stared at her.

"Fine." She stabbed a chunk with her fork, and put it into her mouth, chewing slowly. Her eyes widened. "This is amazing! I normally can't stand these things! What did you do to them to make them taste this good?"

"A few spices, some lemon juice."

"Well thanks bro." He pushed his plate of shrimp across the table, towards her. She eyed him uneasily. "You don't have to give me yours, you know."

"Yeah, but it all tastes the same to me."

"Aww, you're too good to me." She wolfed down the rest of the plate, and belched. "That was, without question, the best food I've had in a long time."

"Not like you make a lot of your own food though..." Dash punched Jason in the shoulder. She leaned back into her chair, and yawned. "I'm gonna go hit the hay, if you know what I mean."

"Yeah, I think I will too." They both ascended the stairs, and Jason went into the guest bedroom.

"Hey Jason, where are you going exactly?" He pointed at the bed. She snorted. "Come on." Jason shrugged, and followed her down the hall into a much larger bedroom, with Wonderbolts posters covering most of the wall space. She jumped into the bed. "Hop in." Jason climbed under the covers. Dash snuggled up to him, and he put an arm around her. "Why are you so comfortable to lay on?"

"They should probably give me an award." She smiled and closed her eyes. She was cute like that, Jason decided. Maybe living here in constant fear of being discovered had it's perks, he thought as he drifted off to sleep.

Jason jolted awake, having just exited a strange dream he was having. Dash must have already been awake, because she was wearing a look that was a mixture of confusion and worry.

"Bad dream?"

"Strange dream. I just got run over by a giant monkey on a unicycle. Strange doesn't even begin to describe it."

"What's a unicycle?"

"Like a bicycle but with one wheel."

"Oh." How she knew what a bicycle was, Jason had no idea.

"So I hear you're hiring some new member of the weather patrol today," He nuzzled her "Who's that lucky pony?" He smiled.

"Oh, well he's this tall, handsome stallion,"

"Oh is he?"

"Yeah, and he has an annoying sense of humor."

"Why thank you. So does this stallion have a good shot at the job?"

"I believe he does, if he stops referring to himself in the third person."

"And I don't even have to go through the whole interview? Man, I had my resume ready and everything."

"Actually, I still have to ask you a few generic questions, but you definitely have a hoof in."

"Oh do I? Looks like I'm in good with the captain of the Ponyville weather team."

"I wonder why that is."

Jason laughed. "Stop acting so iritable, Dash. Loosen up. I mean look at the positives, you're in a warm bed with a hot stallion, you have a nice job, nice friends, you're in bed with a hot stallion," She punched him. "AND he has a personality."

"You're too much."

"Hey, come on, you love having me around." He looked out the window. "So how's the weather looking today?"

"Pretty good, it could end up a tad overcast by the end of the day, which would give us something to do." Her stomach grumbled. "Guess I'm going to go get some breakfast."

"Guess I'll be obliged to get up also, then."

"I guess so." Neither of them moved.

"This bed is just a really soft trap. I never want to leave it." Dash shoved him out of the bed. He got up to his feet and smiled at her. "You saved me kind mare, and I am forever in your debt." He laughed and left the room before she had time to come up with something to say back.

Jason had a few more apples for breakfast, to the same, monotonous flavor that he was quickly starting to tire of. Dash walked in, and he floated over an apple. "Oh hey this reminds me," he shifted back to his changeling form and looked at the cut on his side. It had become a white colored scar. At least, he assumed it was a scar. He turned to Dash. "How does it look?"

"Good? How does it feel?"

"Fine, I guess." He smiled. "I believe I owe you a race." She pulled off a huge grin.

"You're right. Now I can beat you at your full potential."

"Yeah, but hey, I might surprise you, you never know."

"I doubt it."

"Just eat your apple." Jason looked around, having nothing to do. "I wish I didn't make all of those explosives in one go..."

After Dash had finally finished her apple, they walked out her front door, and lined up in her yard. "Okay," she started, "So the course will go from here to that cloud, then around Applejack's barn, and finally between Carousal Boutique and Sugarcube Corner, so that you end up back here. Got it?"

"Um, sure?"

"Ready?" She dropped her shoulders and widened her stance. "Set?" Jason attempted to mimic her starting position. "Go!" They both shot off the line, headed strait for the cloud. Dash arrived about a body length ahead of Jason, and widened her lead after she made a near-impossibly sharp turn. Jason was forced into a wider path, and continued to lose ground. He put on a burst of speed, and banked around Applejack's barn, starting to gain back on Dash. He had managed to close the gap back down to only a few body-lengths before the final curve, where she made another maddeningly sharp turn, and continued to hold the lead. Jason growled, and started to try to close the gap again. Dash's house was fast approaching, and he was closing the gap too slowly. Dash crossed through her yard and cheered, banking up to try to quell some of her speed, before turning to find Jason.

"Looking for me?" She jumped, and turned around to see a panting Jason.

"Close, huh?"

"Unbelievably so." He shrugged, still breathing heavily. "So how did I shape up to the greatest flyer in Equestria?"

"Pretty good, I'd say, not that I tried all that hard."

"Well how about we go discuss this and that new job over some food?"

"Do you ever stop eating?"

"Is that a trick question?"

She laughed. "Fine, we'll get food. Where do you want to go?"

"Honestly? The only place I know of is Sugarcube Corner, and we've gone there every single meal we've had out, so maybe we should do something new. I have to insist that we go somewhere you want to go, because food makes no difference to me anymore."

"That's really getting to you, huh."

"Yeah, it wouldn't be such a big deal if I didn't already know what the stuff tasted like."

"We could go to the Gilded Griffin."

"Sounds fine I guess." They both turned downwards, and started flying towards town. Dash landed in the square, and entered into a fairly rustic looking venue. Upon entering, Jason immediately noticed the absence of patrons in the restaurant. Deciding that they had just come in at a strange hour, he took a seat at the bar next to Dash. A pony that he assumed to be Lyra walked up, and passed them some menus.

"So how's business?" She seemed to flinch at Dash's question and sighed.

"Not so good. Bon Bon is kinda freaking out about it."

"Sorry to hear that..." Dash said. Lyra sighed.

"Just choose something for both of us."

"I guess I'll take two hay burgers and a side of some hay fries." Lyra noted down the order and nodded, retreating into the kitchen.

"What do they have in the way of music around here?" Jason asked.

"Well, we have these things that ponies call 'Dubstep' style, but it generally sounds like a bunch of wubs with the overtone of fingernails on a chalkboard."

"I know what you mean. We have stuff that's a lot like what you're talking about."

"Oh really? Anyway, then we have classical stuff, and this relatively new other music that they call rock and roll, which is my personal favorite."

"Same here, although rock has been around a lot longer than it has here. Speaking of music, what types of instruments are there that ponies could actually play?"

"We have lots of things with bows, like cellos and violins, then there's drums, and general wind and brass instruments."

"How about guitar?"

"Oh, well only unicorns can play those, so they tend to be fairly rare, but I guess they do exist."

"We should stop by a music store and see if they have one, cuz I could probably blow your mind with some of my planet's rock." Before anything else could be said, Lyra returned with their food and placed it on the counter. Jason nodded his thanks, and then when Lyra was out of earshot, muttered to Dash, "They seriously make burgers out of hay?"

"Yeah, what else would they make them out of?"

"Meat?" She laughed."

"Thats ridiculous."

"That's what I used to eat, and for the record, it was delicious." He took a bite. "All I know about this is that it's edible."

"You're saying you ate meat?"

"Yeah, but it's not like I do anymore, so it's not like I'm going to try to eat you or anything." She sighed and finished off her burger. "How do you eat that fast?"

"I do everything fast. Is it really that much of a surprise?"

"No, I guess it isn't." Jason took the final bite of his burger, and slapped a small pile of bits on the counter. "Lets go find that music store." He got up and opened the door, walking into the street. He looked around for a shop sign related to music, and saw one with a musical note. He checked to see that Dash was still behind him, and then entered the store. Just like the Gilded Griffin, the music store was pretty devoid of ponies. Jason perused the isles of music and instruments, before he found an instrument vaguely modeled after an electric guitar. He pointed to it and turned to Dash.

"The guitar, I take it?" She followed the direction of his arm to the instrument.

"Yup." Jason looked it over, before turning his attention to a primitive amp next to it, along with what almost looked like an overdrive unit. Jason flagged the storeowner over.

"Is that an amp and an overdrive unit?" She looked at him with a confused expression. He sighed. "Does that one change the tone, and does that one make it louder?" She nodded. "How much for the set?"

"Well I've been trying to get rid of those things from years after some crazy pony built them and sold them to me, so how about forty bits?" Jason turned and looked at Dash, who nodded her approval.

"Deal." He handed over the bits, and started taking the equipment off the wall. He strapped the guitar to his side, and did the same to the small amp and overdrive unit to his other side, although rather painstakingly. "He turned to Dash and nodded, and started trying to make his way out the door. Managing to not beat up anything too badly, he got outside and got ready to take to the sky.

"Rainbow Dash!" They both turned.

"Cloud Kicker?" Dash asked. Cloud Kicker seemed out of breath.

"The storm that we tried to subdue yesterday returned, and we need everypony's help if we're going to try to stop this one from destroying Ponyville. Raindrop says that it looks like a developing class G storm." The blood drained out of Dash's face.

"How developed?"

"It looks like around 60%"

"Alternis, take the stuff back to the house and close all the windows, then raise the house a few hundred feet." She turned to Cloud Kicker, "Let's go." They took off, flying towards the everfree.

Dash turned back to Cloud Kicker, and remembered one of Jason's human words. "What did the weather team fuck up this time?"

Jason watched Dash disappear into the early afternoon sky. He sighed, before taking to the sky and heading towards her house, albeit a little off balance, due to the equipment strapped to his sides. He thought about what she said about basically fortifying the house, hoping that she hadn't gotten into a storm that she couldn't handle. He touched down at the house soon after, and unloaded the equipment near his work table.

He set about trying to figure out how the amp and overdrive unit worked without electricity, before a warning label got his attention. "Do not overpower this amplifier unit with too much magic, because it may run the risk of spontaneous combustion." Jason chuckled, and sent a small trail of magic into the amp, creating the sound of some feedback. He plugged the overdrive unit into the amp, and then plugged his guitar into that. He put it around his neck, sitting upright in a chair. Looking at the neck of the guitar, he quickly felt a pang of remorse over realizing that he no longer had fingers. He could depress the strings with magic, sure, but it didn't have that same feeling to it. Maybe now he could attempt harder songs, or at least play the easier ones better. At least he could still strum the guitar effectively. He turned up the amp, and decided to test it by playing one of his favorite songs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbXWrmQW-OE

Having played out the final few measures without even a single mistake, he looked at his new guitar, and smiled. At least he still had one thing in common with his old life, and was happy that they had guitars here. He was pulled out of his thoughts by the realization that he had neglected the things that Dash had told him to accomplish. He bolted for the door, and took to the air, gathering all of the nearby clouds. He carefully pushed them into the windows, accomplishing what was, he assumed, like boarding up a cloud house. He then swooped under the house, and found his job of hoisting it upwards to be easier than he thought. Once the house was up at a 'safe' distance, he returned inside, and picked his guitar back up.

He grinned. Complicated. What was the most complicated thing he could think of? He grinned wider, having come up with another song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pn2-b_opVTo

This was great, he decided. The songs that he had previously struggled to complete, he could now play almost flawlessly, and he had to admit to himself, he couldn't wait to show off to the town, or at least Dash. One more song, he decided, then he had to go find something to do with himself. He thought for a moment, before deciding on another iconic song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBQ0_9IFzU0

Having finished his last song, he pulled the guitar off of his neck, and set it down on the table, cutting off the flow of magic to the amp. He walked out the door, ears still ringing, and started to descend to the town, not really sure of what to do. He landed in the middle of one of the streets, and was greeted by the staring of most of the ponies on the street. "What?" he looked at himself, and finding everything in order, no changeling parts, looked back. A pony walked up to him, apparently the first to gather his composure.

"Was that you playing that music?" He asked.

"Um, yeah."

"What was that? I've never heard anything like it before."

"That was just a smattering of rock music, but normally I guess it would have had drums, a bass and a singer at the very least."

"I could get stuff set up for you if you want to preform a song or two, on the condition that you play it inside my restaurant, so as to draw in customers." Jason considered his proposition. It seemed fine by him, it's not like he really had anything to do.

"Can I get a few bits for preforming?" He figured the least he could do was try to make up for the money he had been mooching from Dash.

"Sure, my good man, I can give you one hundred bits." Jason's jaw dropped. That was more than he had spent on everything in his time here. He quickly agreed, shaking the businesspony's hoof. "I'm glad to see that you want to help me out. Come by in about ten minutes, and I'll have a microphone and an amp set up. Guitar, I assume?"

"Yep." he bid goodbye to the restaurant owner, and took off to grab his instrument. He flew for a few minutes before arriving and trotting in to grab his stuff. It was slightly easier to cart the equipment around now that he didn't need to bring the amp. He skipped tying the equipment to himself manually, and instead used magic to tie it up. He trotted back out of the house, and dove off of the cloud. He arrived back in the square to see the pony from before, who was now smiling ear to ear.

"I see you're eager about doing this." Jason nodded. He knew that he wouldn't be able to do the most complicated stuff, considering he had to use magic to hold down the strings, and that would obviously give away his disguise, unless he used very small amounts of it, or used his hoof for simple things like power chords, however that would work. He would have to insist on dim lighting.

"Sure thing, I can't wait." The pony smiled again, and led Jason into a restaurant that looked fairly fancy in appearance. The pony gestured to the stage, and wandered away, leaving Jason to his own devices. He realized that there were no lights, given the fact that there was no electricity and all, just oil lamps, and the sun was setting, so he should be fine. He looked over the amp that had been provided, and turned up the volume. He plugged in the overdrive unit and his guitar, which he then set down in the guitar stand. He walked over to the owner.

"Is there anyone that can power your amp? I can't really do it, not being a unicorn and all."

"Oh sure thing my good sir, I'll get someone right one it."

"Tell them not to overpower it. It only needs a little energy."

"Will do, sir. When do you think you can preform?"

"After the Amp is set up? Five minutes. Oh, and could you dim the lights a little?"

"Sure thing. I'll leave you to it then." He walked away. Jason walked back over to the stage, and picked up his guitar. He experimentally strummed it a few times, knowing that the Amp was not turned on. A unicorn walked over, and Jason shook his hoof. "You're the guy that gets to power the amp, I take it?"

"That's me," he responded.

"Just don't over-power it, okay?"

"Yup. Can't wait to hear what you have in store for us, bro."

"Oh, you have no idea." The lights dimmed, which Jason took as his cue to say some words into the microphone, and then start the show. "Hey there, everypony, you probably don't know me, because I just moved here, but my name's Alternis, and hopefully you enjoy the music I'll be playing for you tonight." He took an experimental strum of the guitar, confirming that the amp was indeed plugged in, and started his first song.

(music around 40s.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYm-dT24iRY

As the final chord faded out, Jason waited expectantly for something to happen for an agonizingly long time, before the crowd mercifully burst into applause. Jason cracked a smile. This was too easy. As soon as the applause let up, he lead into the next song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yx9UiY-TBMM

The crowd burst into more applause, and he started another song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBvgGXEME8I

The song ended, and there was yet more applause. Jason smiled, and took in the attention. Then he noticed a filly pushing through the crowd to the side of the stage. Scootaloo jumped out of the crowd and ran up to Jason, with tear stained cheeks. Jason dropped his smile.

"What is it Scoots?"

"It's--It's---It's Rainbow Dash, she's in the hospital."

"What do you mean, 'she's in the hospital?!?!'" Jason asked Scootaloo.

"I don't know completely, something about the storm over the Everfree, and some horrible crash she had while trying to keep it from spreading." Jason hurriedly turned to the audience.

"I have to cut this short, guys, sorry." There was a groan from the audience, and Jason turned back to Scoots. The manager came up with a bag, presumably filled with bits.

"Come back sometime." He said, smiling. "Hope everything goes okay."

"Yeah, hopefully, but I kinda doubt it. Thanks for this." He shook the bag, and turned back to Scoots. "Lets go." Jason set down his guitar and trotted after Scootaloo, who had already gotten a fairly large head start. He caught up to her in the street. She was galloping at full speed, which was only a brisk trot for Jason. Finding this movement speed to be too slow, he turned to Scoots, motioning for her to stop. "Hey Scoots, hop on, we're never going to get there like this." He stopped, and helped Scootaloo onto his back, situating her between his wings. "Where to?"

She pointed forward. "Go to the end of this street, and then take a right." He galloped off, careful to keep Scootaloo from falling off his back. "Turn here." He stuck out a wing, and attempted to use the drag to help him make the corner that Scoots had left him unprepared for. Scootaloo almost rolled off his back before he stuck his other wing out to catch her. She quickly recovered, and re-situated herself on Jason's back. "The hospital's right over there." She pointed to a large white building with a red cross on the building's face. He put on a final burst of speed, and upon reaching the building, slowed down and pushed the glass doors open. He walked in to find most of Dash's friends, and the rest of the CMC. Applebloom noticed the duo's entry first.

"Where were ya, Scoots, could you've gone any slower?"

"You try running all the way to that fancy restaurant in town, then all the way back. It's not like I have my scooter; I left it at the clubhouse." Jason ignored the resulting argument, dropped off Scoots, and walked over to Twilight, who was slumped in one of the hospital chairs. He figured that if anyone knew about what happened, it would be her, seeing as no one was behind the front desk.

"What exactly happened, Twilight?" She looked up, a few lingering tears in her eyes, and tried to speak.

"S-she was apparently trying to stop a storm over the Everfree, but the weather team couldn't make a dent, or stop it in any way, and then the storm started to send down a tornado spiral." She took a ragged breath. "The last time Ponyville had a tornado, most of the town was wiped off the map." She paused again. "The point is, Dash flew over to the vortex, in an attempt to stop it before it got to the ground, because there's no way to stop it after it touches down. Let's just say, she succeeded, and Ponyville is no longer in danger."

"But she obviously got hurt, judging by your general demeanor."

"She was flung into the ground by the tornado, and landed on her wings, which were horribly mangled and broken. She's lying in a hospital room right now." She looked like she was going to cry again.

"So is she stable?"

"So far, yes, but the main concern is over the eventual status of her wings. I've never even seen wings that broken before." A doctor walked out into the room, flipping through a pad of paper on a clipboard, and sighed, looking around.

"Is there a Twilight Sparkle present?" Twilight rose from her seat.

"Yes." she walked over to the doctor, who proceeded to whisper some things to her, while making a few gestures. Her expression got steadily worse, which Jason had previously thought impossible. Evidently the doctor didn't have good news. The doctor finished whispering to her, and retreated back into one of the hospital rooms. She slowly walked back to Jason, a mortified expression on her face.

"What's wrong now?"

"T-they said, well the doctor said, he s-said that--"

"Out with it!"

"They said that they have to amputate Dash's wings, he says they're too mangled to save, that even if they could get them back together, Dash would still probably never fly again." She shut her eyes.

"Oh, fuck no!!" Jason pushed past her, attempting to get into the hospital room.

"You can't go in there Alternis!!" She tried to grab him. He threw her back with his magic.

"Get off of me!!" She looked completely confused, sudden burst of magic from a pegasus and all, and before she could react, he turned and threw the hospital room door off its hinges with his magic, slamming it into the wall opposite. The ponies in the hospital room all stared, slack jawed, at what they had just witnessed.

Jason ran inside to find a terrified group of doctors staring between him and the removed door, who looked like they had not started the operation yet, luckily. He moved towards the form of Dash, but some of the doctors tried to stop him. He pushed them up against the walls with his magic, and held them there. He pulled the sheet part of the way off of Dash, and recoiled slightly. She was on her stomach, and sported the most mangled wings he had ever seen, partially covered in blood. Not that he had really seen that many mangled wings, but they were far worse than the last time he had needed to heal her. At least she didn't look too injured other than what had happened to her wings. He sighed, and without another thought, started to heal her, attempting to do so as quickly as possible. Twilight ran around the corner, looking enraged.

"Who are you and what have you done with Alternis?" He sighed. He didn't expect that he was going to lose this new identity so quickly. He could feel his disguise starting to falter with the huge amounts of energy rushing into Dash.

"There never was an Alternis! I thought at least you, Twilight Sparkle, would be able to figure that out." He needed to buy some time, so that he could finish healing her wings. They were currently spasming around as the bones snapped back together and set into the correct places. Jason looked at it with disgust. Twilight followed his gaze, and flinched.

"What are you doing to her?!?! Making her wings worse?" She cast some sort of spell at him. He blocked it with a shield.

"I'm fixing her." He looked down at his arm. Part of his disguise flew off like a piece of burning paper, quickly disintegrating into a small green flame. The transformation slowly spread along his fore arms like a kind of weird rash, and onto the rest of his body, slowly pulling off the rest of his disguise. Dash was almost healed. He was getting weaker by the second. As soon as he finished this spell, he realized, he would be unable to fight Twilight, and would have to immediately make his escape, or face capture. As he thought this, the walls turned a light shade of lavender. He assumed that Twilight was doing something, and he hoped that it wouldn't impede the healing spell. Said spell ended as the last of his disguise burned off, and his shield involuntarily fell. Jason charged up his horn, trying to teleport away. All he was left with was a horrible pain in his head, and no change of venue. The spell Twilight had done with the walls must have crated some sort of prison, or at least an anti teleportation zone. 'Great, so now I have no escape and no power. Things are looking great right now.'

"I'll ask you again, what did you do with Alternis?" Jason stared at her in disbelief, amazed that she was so adverse and suspicious to him when he arrived, and was now assuming that he was never a changeling. He didn't answer, and instead moved some of Dash's hair gently out of her eyes, and smiled slightly. Twilight picked Jason up in her magic, and slammed him into the ceiling, which promptly cracked some of the chitin on his back. The wooziness he was feeling from the teleportation attempt intensified. "Where is he?"

"He doesn't exist!"

"Wrong answer." She slammed him into the floor, creating a crack in one of his legs, and a large dent in the floor. Jason tried to get up, but only managed in partially propping up the front of his body with his uninjured fore leg. He reached an arm towards her, trying to form words but only ended up removing some of the blood that had pooled in his mouth. The action of him stretching out his arm splattered her fur with some blood that had already begun to come through the crack on his arm. He pulled his arm back, and stared at the new crack.

Then he passed out.

Jason came to, feeling basically like shit, and probably looked like shit. His head pounded painfully, and he could feel the cracks on his back and leg throbbing and moving slightly around. It was not a feeling he was fond of. His forelegs had a pressure on them towards his hooves. He opened his eyes, and found himself being stared at by the mane six AND Celestia, in a place that could easily be a part of the palace, judging by the tall stone walls and the stained glass. He chuckled and looked at his cracked hoof. It was tied with some rope to a metal ring, and had a line of dried blood where he assumed the crack was. From what he could see out the window, it was almost dawn. He looked back to Celestia.

"I must be quite the VIP, all the elements and the Princess, all here to see me. I'm honored." His gaze hardened.

"Shaddup you!!" Applejack yelled. She looked like she was going to start yelling again before a stern glance from the Princess silenced her.

"Now," the Princess started, "We have brought you here, mercifully, to interrogate you for information. If you give me what I want, you will get a nice cozy jail cell instead of the normal penalty, death. How does that sound?" The Princess was much taller than the other ponies, but was surprisingly unimposing nonetheless. It was kind of an odd trade-off.

"Fuck you." Jason spat out. The Princess was slightly taken aback.

"Just tell us what we want to know."

"I'm not telling you shit." Jason smiled at her.

"We have ways of getting you to talk..." This was definitely not the kind, affectionate princess that Jason had expected. It kinda made sense though, a leader can't really be effective without an element of fear over the people.

"You sure do make a good Machiavellian leader." He decided to buy time, and try to figure a way out of this mess. He could burn through the rope, and get down from where he was, but it was kind of doubtful that he could possibly fight all of the elements and the princess. Actually, where was Dash? Probably in the hospital room. He hoped she had ended up totally healed, or at least that her wings worked.

"What do you mean, changeling?"

"I mean you rule by fear, disguised in a layer of 'love' towards your suspects." He tried to make air quotes again. "Good thing none of them ever rebel, because where I came from a leader killed over twenty million of his people to keep order." There was a gasp, which was expected, and a few stares at Celestia.

"I do not rule by fear, but by love alone."

"I seem to remember that your personal student was afraid that she would be sent to the moon for turning in a late friendship report."

"How do you even know that?" Twilight yelled. Celestia ignored her.

"Shut your mouth, you are an enemy of the state and have no right to speak unless told to." She paused. "Now, what plan of Crysalis have we foiled by taking you here?"

"No plan. I'm not affiliated with the hive."

Twilight spoke up. "What do you mean, not part of the hive? Every changeling needs the hive mind to survive. Without it, they almost certainly die or turn into medical vegetables."

"Well that's obviously incorrect, because I have never had any contact with the hive, and I never plan to, and last time I checked, I'm not dead, or a medical vegetable. Unless... *gasp* I am a medical vegetable, and this is all a crazy dream devised by my subconscious while I'm in a terminal coma!"

"But my book says--"

"Your book is fucking wrong!!!" He paused. "Next question."

"Are you one of the healer changelings?" Back to Celestia.

"Fuck. Obviously."

"So how do we know that you aren't actually a part of the hive? You could easily be lying."

"Didn't Crysalis' hive just attack here?" She nodded. "I was under the impression that she lost, badly, so why would she send an attack of one changeling? I wasn't even attempting to imitate royalty or anyone close to it, so I couldn't have staged an assassination attempt. Also, if I was an assassin, and part of the hive, wouldn't she just cut me from the hive mind and kill me if I failed, to keep me from ever releasing sensitive information?" He paused. "Could I see a map?" One floated over, showing Equestria with the griffin kingdom to the south, west, and northwest, and several other kingdoms to the north and east. "So, changeling lands are here," he pointed, "in the griffin kingdom to the west?"

"That's what we think, yes," Jason started laughing.

"You people are idiots militarily. Just totally and completely retarded."

"What do you mean, changeling?" She growled.

"Why would I tell you? That would be too easy. Just figure it out."

"I swear, I will kill you right here if you don't speak."

"I dunno, if you killed me, you would never get the information, now would you? It's not like I really have any reason to tell you anything."

"Let me just remind you who's in charge here."

"Oh, yeah, you have all the bargaining chips."

"Why did you heal Rainbow Dash? When the doctors checked her over, they found her injuries had disappeared."

"Who?" Celestia face hoofed. Never had she had to deal with such an annoying prisoner. Of course, most prisoners were afraid of her, or at least afraid of death, unless this guy was just really good at bluffing.

"Rainbow Dash. Blue pegasus, rainbow mane..."

"Never heard of her."

"You know perfectly well who I'm talking about, why did you heal her?"

"The better question is, why didn't I heal this mystery pegasus?" He tried to make a confused look on his face. Celestia turned to look at Jason's cracked arm.

"Hows the arm?"

"Oh it's great, I---AAAAAAAAAGHHHHH!!!" Celestia had pulled the two sides of the crack slightly apart from each other with her magic. Jason smiled at her, attempting to piss her off even more. "Resorting to corporal punishment, I see. You'll still never get any fucking information."

"Oh, I will, I assure you. I will." She cast a spell at Jason, who flinched backwards, but was hit with it anyway. The same pain feeling ripped through his arm. He yelled again, swearing some more. Celestia smiled. It was definitely kinda creepy. "See, no more physical punishment, your brain already knows what that feels like, I just have to tell it to remember that feeling.

"Oh, I see--AAAGHH." The more Jason told himself that the pain wasn't real, the more he felt it hurt. It was like an unfightable nightmare monster, one that just got stronger the more you tried to kill it. He wasn't going to talk, though, even if he had to die, although he was unsure whether or not that was possible from imagined pain. Talking would result in the probable association of Dash into his 'crimes,' and even if there was less of a penalty than death, he wasn't going to ruin her life with possible jail time or worse. After all, it was mostly his fault she was in this mess, he didn't want to have healed her wings just for her to be stuck in jail.

"So how's the tourist industry around here?" Another jolt of pain. "Dammit." He looked at his arm. Every single time she used that spell, he felt like the chitin on his arm was going to pop off. It felt a lot like someone getting their tooth pulled when there was nothing wrong with it, and having it at the brink of being pulled out. "Is that the best you got? I could do this all day." He sneered. Celestia turned to Twilight, who didn't seem particularly afflicted, although the rest of the mane six seemed pretty queasy, and it looked like Fluttershy had left. Shocker. "So am I just hanging around here until I actually talk or what?"

"Have you changed your mind?"

"Umm, well, about that, how do I put this, no." The pain again. It still hurt, but you could only get so far with repetition in torture. He didn't know what was supposed to pass for torture around here, but this was pathetic. Something hit him hard in the cheek. That was new. "Was that a rock? Where did you even get a rock?" he could feel some blood flowing down his cheek. "And that just healed too." he tried to throw up his arms. "Come on!" He chuckled. Celestia looked enraged. "So what crimes am I accused of, exactly, Celly?"

She growled. "Manipulation of ponies, theft of love and replacement of loved ones and therefore abduction of ponies, and theft of government property."

"Is that it?" She seemed taken aback yet again. Apparently he was saying all the things that no one expected him to say, not like it was all that hard.

"The penalty for all of those are only fines or jail time, except for the abduction and murder of ponies, which are both death penalties when one is not a citizen of Equestria."

"So are we done here?"

"You still have sensitive information that I need, if I remember correctly."

"Oh yeah, the stuff that I'm not telling you about. Funny, those things I know, that you don't know. Those are the best things, really." He was getting bored. This was going nowhere, and yet she still tried. Clearly, he shouldn't have mentioned that military stuff, that's when they decided that they actually needed information from him. Like it wasn't obvious. "Have you ever tried to torture someone before? Be honest." She didn't answer. "Big surprise, because this is some of the most uneventful torture, if you can even call it torture, that I've ever seen. And you expect me to talk." He jerked his arm as another bolt of pain ripped through it. 'God dammit it's getting worse, and I'm running out of ideas to buy time, and I still don't have a plan.'

"Quiet, you."

He looked around, still generally bored, trying not to think about the dull pain still present in his fore hoof, still attempting to come up with a usable plan, which at this point, looked like a pipe dream. He noticed a large dot outside the window. Or maybe it was on the window. The dot grew, so it must have been outside, or maybe some sort of incredibly fast growing bacterial colony. The dot took on a pony like shape, and continued to grow, until...

CRASH!!!

The room filled with broken glass from the window, causing the princess and the remaining mane six to try to turn their heads towards the source of the offending noise and falling objects. Some broken glass passed in front of Jason's face, giving him a nice view of the cuts on his face as it passed. The scar from before had broken open and grown to form a longer and more painful crack than before. Jason closed his eyes, and got ready to burn the ropes off in the distraction that the broken window had caused.

BANG!!!!

BANG!!!!

Jason burnt the rope off of his fore arms, and fell to the ground. He landed hard on his injured fore leg, and crumpled on the ground. The ponies in front of Jason were stumbling around, dazed. Celestia was saying something, but Jason couldn't hear it over the ringing in his ears. He was just glad he had had the foresight to shut his eyes.

POP! PIFF!

Smoke quickly enveloped the ponies as Jason got up off the ground, balancing on his three, uninjured legs. Something tapped Jason on the shoulder, and he looked over to see the worried face of Dash. She pointed to the broken window, and tugged on his arm. He winced, but took off with her nonetheless. As he flew through the window, emerging into Canterlot proper, he transformed into his Alternis form, assuming that there would not be posters of the previous form of a captured changeling, and that in the pre dawn hours he would not easily be seen. His hearing began to return, and he was able to hear the general noise from the few townsfolk below. Dash banked, turing towards Ponyville. Jason followed, subtly changing the color scheme and stature of his form.

A few minutes of hurried flying later, the duo arrived at Dash's cloud house, unnoticed by the townsfolk far below, most of them still asleep. Jason hissed when he landed on his injured foreleg.

"What happened to you in there?"

"I'll tell you when we're safe. We have to use this time to prepare." They both ran inside Dash's house.

"So what's the plan?"

"Why did you save me? You weren't going to be accused of anything, I kept all the secrets about you." He paused. "I'll leave, you stay. Chances are, no one saw you, you can just continue your life, like all of this was a bad dream."

"I'm not abandoning you! You didn't let me lose my wings at the hospital, even though that led to you being captured, and you knew it!. I couldn't let you rot in jail if you went through all that just to save my wings. I wasn't even going to die, but you revealed yourself nonetheless. It's not like it was even a bad dream anyway." She sighed. "Now let's get ready and leave."

"Fine." He dropped his disguise. "We need the explosives, and survival equipment. What tools do you have?"

"I have an axe, but that was just for a previous Nightmare Night festival."

"Grab that, grab blankets, grab food. See if you can find nails. I'll go get other stuff." He noticed the belt around Dash that still had some explosive inside some of rope loops. It looked home made. He pointed to the belt. "Make another one of those while I'm getting that other stuff." Jason ran upstairs, and into Dash's room, and threw open the closet. A huge selection of dresses greeted him. Most from Rarity, probably. He grabbed some dark green and brown dresses, along with a small sewing kit with some thread and a needle, probably for simple clothes repairs. He towed them downstairs, grabbing a picture of Dash with her friends and a signed poster of the Wonderbolts on his way out.

As he arrived downstairs, Dash looked up from her ration production to give him a strange look. "How much do you care about these dresses?"

"Not that much, Rarity gave them to me but I only wore them once."

"Cool, toss me those scissors." She tossed them over, and he spread out the dresses on the table. He attacked them with the scissors, making them into several hundred small strips. He levitated the strips into the air, and pulled out the thread and the needle. He arranged the pieces in random patterns, and started sewing them together. He levitated a long piece of unused fabric over to Dash, and wrapped it around her midsection, cutting off the extra. She looked at him with another strange look.

"Don't ask questions, I'll show you later." He made a few more measurements, and went back to connecting the fabric strips. He pulled the last string taught, and stood back from his handiwork. He was fairly impressed, and sewed a few buttons primitively into the bottom with corresponding loops. Dash looked like she had finished the food packing, and had set off looking for blankets and the axe. Jason trotted over to the kitchen counter, and pulled out two of the heavy duty knives. He shoved them into the out-ward sides of his hooves, and took a test slash at a candle. After he had managed to dislodge the candle from the knife, he trotted back out of the room. Dash ran back in with the Axe and some nails in her teeth and the blankets over her back. Jason took the blankets and started shoving them into a nearby saddlebag, along with his newest clothing attempt, the picture, and the poster. She started making a new explosives belt, and Jason levitated some string over, and tied the belt to his side. He noticed his guitar against the wall in a corner. "You brought that back here?" He noticed the overdrive unit next to it.

"No, the guy at the venue that you played at brought them back late last night. He said you were pretty good, apparently. You're going to have to show me sometime."

"Well I'm happy he brought them back." Jason strapped the equipment to himself, and levitated a saddlebag onto his back. This was heavy, to say the least.

"Here." Dash had finished her explosives belt, and Jason levitated it his chest and shoulder, while at the same time bringing several explosives over, and placed them through the loops.

"Maybe some of my ingenuity is rubbing off on you." She punched him, and he stuck out his tongue.

"We'll have plenty of time for this later, Jason, just hurry up and let's leave." He levitated the rest of the supplies to her back, namely the axe, the rations, and the rest of the explosive ingredients.

"Ready?"

"Sure. Where to?"

"The Everfree." She gasped. "Really? It's just a forest. It's a lot like my old world, but without the manticores. We'll be fine." He paused. "The ponies won't follow us in there either, so we have a safe base of operations."

"The forest isn't safe!"

"You haven't seen what I'm going to do yet. Now let's go before royal guards arrive. This would be the first place they would expect us to go." She nodded, and they quickly exited and took off, wobbling a little under the added weight. They flew directly over to the forest, touching down just outside.

"I dunno, Jason, it doesn't look that friendly."

"Come on, I'll watch your back. It'll be fine." They took off again, flying low over a path that led into the forest. The path started to climb, and after a few thousand feet of mountain, Jason decided to take a break. "These supplies are really starting to get heavy."

"Why did you bring the guitar anyway? Seems like a lot of dead weight."

"One of the things people always forget about surviving is that boredom is always an issue, almost as much as food or shelter. When people get bored, they make stupid decisions. That's why I brought this baby. Maybe I can even teach you to play some." She nodded tiredly, and looked around.

"Where are we headed, anyway?"

"Well, seeing as this forest is between Canterlot and Ponyville, I'd like to situate home base somewhere in between, just so that I can keep tabs on what's going on. Also, going up this mountain gives us the high ground." Dash pulled out an apple and took a bite.

"You want one?"

"Huh, nah. I don't want to eat any of the food we do have. It's not like I need it anyway. Not as long as I have you around."

"Really, you don't need any food?"

"I don't think so. I'll tell you what, if I get hungry later, I'll ask for some, but I feel like I just ate a buffet, but without the discomfort."

"Sounds pretty nice."

"You were worried about me."

"Huh, well yeah."

"Like, really worried. Is there something you want to tell me?" he smiled, teasing her. She punched him.

"Not now, we'll have plenty of time for you to bother me later."

"God dammit, you're right." He sighed. "We should probably get moving again." She nodded, taking a deep breath and shifting the saddlebag on her back. They moved further up the hill, flying at a faster pace, until it came to a cliff. Dash flew over and frowned.

"We may have overshot the midpoint just a little." Jason joined her at the cliff, and shared her frown.

"How the fuck did we get all the way to the cliffs over Canterlot? Whatever. It doesn't matter." He turned back to the forest. "Come on. We need to find a tree a little way in."

"Why?"

"Because, we're going to build something in the branches." There were a few minutes of silence as they backtracked, before Jason found a suitable tree to use. "See that one there? Where all those branches come out at the same level?"

"You want to build a platform there I'm guessing?"

"Yup. Pretty much." He levitated the axe off of Dash's side, and looked for a good lumber tree. He found a young oak, and started chopping at it. The tree came down after extended chopping, and Jason turned his efforts to making plank like chunks of wood. He grabbed the nails and his clothing masterpiece, which he presented to Dash.

"What the hell is that?"

"Well, you aren't really that camouflaged right now, so instead of covering you in mud or something, I made you this suit. Snipers in my world wear it. It's called a gillie suit." She grabbed the clothing and tried to put it on after removing her saddle bag and explosives. After she managed to somehow not tear the suit in any way, she buttoned it up and looked herself over. Jason moved the hood over her head. "So how do you like it?"

"How do I use my wings?"

"I made slits in the gillie suit, just move them around until you find them. When you're not flying, though, try to put them back in. They're not exactly the hardest things to spot." She pushed her wings out and took off, hovering off the ground.

"This doesn't look like that great of camouflage."

"Well you have to be on the ground obviously, and around bushes, but it's better than you think." He sighed. "Help me build this thing."

"What do you want me to do?" He sent her the axe after he was done chopping the wood.

"Basically pound in some nails, and I'll levitate stuff up to you and put it into place. Try to be careful, these are the only nails we've got." Dash took off the gillie suit, and draped it over the rest of the supplies, then took off towards the tree. They worked at manipulating the planks and placing them onto the tree for a few hours, by which time the sun had heightened considerably. Dash pounded in the last nail with the blunt side of the axe, and peeked over the side, a few nails in her mouth.

"How does it look from there?"

"Pretty good, we'll need to cover the bottom of it up with some foliage so ponies can't see it from the ground. How much can you see of the sky?"

"Not too much, there's about twenty more feet of leaves before the edge of the canopy."

"Good, I'll bring the stuff up. Can you go get a few clouds?"

"Sure?" She looked confused, but took off nonetheless. Jason moved up the supplies in a series of trips, marveling at how easily they had built the small platform. Dash landed, towing a few clouds behind her. "What're these for?"

"Furniture. Can you craft a bed over there, maybe a sofa if we have space? Any excess we can use for water."

"Geez, I haven't made furniture in a while, but I guess I'll do my best." Jason smiled. This was coming together far better than he had hoped. "Dash?"

"Yeah?" She had already finished most of the bed.

"Thanks for sticking with me. I still have no idea why you still do, I mean, you gave up everything to save me, but thanks anyway."

"Jason," she sighed "there are a few reasons I don't leave, and the most obvious would be due to my element. Part of loyalty is being able to stick with those who still have a reason to control your trust, and after I saw the state you were in in the castle, I knew that I couldn't take their side and turn on you, not that I would have really done that before, but it would have been harder. The other reason is that I couldn't bear to lose you. You're one of the few people I've ever met that actually understands me, doesn't just see me for the tough attitude I put on, and yet doesn't care that I'm not exactly like the guise I put on. I guess it's just that--" Her voice cracked, and she started to cry, tears leaking down her face. Jason wrapped his arms around her, careful not to poke her with either of the knives. which he realized he should have taken out.

"You don't need to say anymore. No one deserves what you had to go through. I know how hard it is." He patted her on the back. "Besides, it's not as bad as it could be, after all, we have shelter, food, water. Each other..." She continued to sob into his shoulder.

"I know, but everything I used to have is gone, and I can't get it back. I wouldn't change what I did, but it's just hard to know that, and I just feel like it's hopeless. Like everything we've gone through was for nothing."

"I'll find a way to get it all back, put you back where you belong."

"How?!?! We're just two ponies? What can we possibly do against an entire nation of ponies, let alone Celestia and my friends?"

"Calm down, and I'll tell you what our options are." She nodded and sat on the cloud bed, wiping her eyes. Jason sat beside her and put a hoof around her neck. He sighed, he'd never wanted her to go through anything for him. "So listen, there was an attack on Canterlot by the changelings. Now, Celestia made it blatantly obvious that the invasion occurred, and even that she and Luna were defeated. There may have not been many casualties, but the more noticeable information is that Equestria was almost conquered by a small army of changelings, insinuating that your country is weak. Although it is weak, realistically, the attack made it seem particularly vulnerable, and when a country seems vulnerable, other countries tend to take advantage. Get my drift?"

"You're saying you think somepony is going to attack Equestria?"

"Not somepony," He took a deep breath. "The Griffins."

The daze had worn off, and Celestia looked towards where their prisoner had hung. He was gone.

"How did he manage to escape again?!?!" Twilight yelled. "He does this every time! How many tricks can one changeling have?"

"Calm down, my student. I don't want a repeat of the episode in the hospital." Twilight tried to protest, but was silenced by a sidelong glare from the Princess. "What were those magical canisters he used? I've been alive a few thousand years, and not once have I seen something like that." Celestia scratched her head. The smoke started to die down, revealing a couple scorch marks on the floor. Twilight got up from where she had fallen and scraped her hoof through the ash.

She scrunched up her nose. "Smells like sulphur."

"I concur, Twilight, but I have never even seen magic leave a by-product besides residual heat changes, sound or light, yet this, thing, did all of those, and left a residue."

"But Princess, what if this isn't magic? That would explain why it doesn't match the description of anything we've seen before. But why this changeling would be able to do something like that is beyond me."

"Remember though, he wasn't a normal changeling." She said. Fluttershy timidly peaked around the side of the entrance of the room, and upon seeing no danger, besides the somewhat scary plumes of smoke floating around her ankles, ran in to see the condition of her friends.

"Um, are you guys okay?" Twilight turned to look at her. "I mean, that is, if you want to tell me. It's just that I heard this giant noise, and then after I came out from under the bench that I had crawled under, and I decided to see if all of you were all right. If that's okay."

"We're fine Fluttershy, those loud noises were just a distraction, they weren't meant to kill. Wait a second." She turned to Celestia. "Princess, one of those went off right next to you, right?"

"Yes, my student."

"And you're fine, uninjured, I mean?"

"My ears still hurt, but I seem to be otherwise unharmed."

"So then why were those things not meant to kill us? I mean, he surprised us with those, and if he was an assassin, he would have just finished the job, but he just created a distraction to get away." She paused. "You know, the more I think about it, the weirder this becomes."

"Waddaya mean, Sugarcube?"

"Well, besides the fact that he clearly didn't try to kill us, nopony can just create things out of thin air, I mean Celestia can, but that's part of one of her Alicorn powers, and those are still small things. We can safely assume that he doesn't have that kind of power. He didn't have any of those canisters on him, so he must have an accomplice. I have no idea who that could be, though."

"I will send out search parties while you piece together the evidence, my faithful student. It's nice to know that his mission isn't to kill us, although it does beg the question, why is he here? He could be gathering intel, in which case our only able directive would be to kill him, even though he has dug himself a deeper hole with this recent endeavor, of which the penalty is also death. There is no way I will allow a possible threat like him to threaten the safety of all of my subjects, especially since we don't know what his plan is."

"And it's still unclear why he healed Rainbow Dash, and why he had no fear of you."

"Yes, that too. Good luck, Twilight, I must get started on sending out those search parties." She briskly walked out of the room, flagging down a royal guard. A whoosh was heard, and a ball of green flame appeared, leaving a message on the floor nearby.

Twilight walked over and grabbed it. "This must be from Spike. I asked him before we left to inform me of Rainbow's condition upon her awakening." She opened the scroll, and her smile quickly turned to a frown.

"What is it darling?" Rarity asked.

Twilight looked up, a worried look on her face. "He says that Dash left the hospital, but no one knows when, or why." Her expression grew worse. "Unless..."

"Sugarcube, ya'll aren't goin' ta say that Dash helped this changeling, are ya?"

"Well I don't know what else it could have been. She must be under some kind of mind control magic, to come here and try to save him like that. Nah, it's not her, that would be ridiculous." A wave of despair washed over her. Dash had always been the one to stay true to whatever cause they were per suing. When Dash was the one gone, everything else just felt hopeless. Where were they without their most loyal, daredevil friend, the only one they thought they could always trust? It was a harrowing development, she had definitely never expected it, and that made it all the worse.

"But what if it was her? That sounds an awful lot like something Dash would do, ignorin' the whole fugitive part. Ah guess ah'm just sayin' that it follows her personality, rushin' inta a situation and all."

"I doubt she would betray us over some changeling, element of loyalty and all." Twilight responded, shaking her head.

"But Sugarcube, there's always the change that she thinks this is the right thing to do, and is going with it voluntarily. Ah'm just sayin'. We're assuming it's her though, and we have no proof for any of that, really. It could be anypony, it's not like we saw the pony that we assume broke through that window. It's not like she was acting oddly these last few days, and we still don't even know if there was an associate. If it was Dash, we have no idea how she would've gotten those weapons." Twilight stared at Applejack, her jaw hanging open.

"I didn't expect all of that from you, Applejack, but you're right. Although, Rainbow was the closest to this changeling these last few days, so she is the prime suspect. I'll contact the Princess and see about bringing some of the guard to Dash's house, just to check. Hopefully she isn't involved, but with her close proximity to the changeling, we have to assume the worst. Her being in possible cahoots with the changeling would explain his willingness to heal her, I suppose, although that seems a little too compassionate and caring for a changeling. Let's leave it out of the question that she herself was a changeling. A changeling wouldn't throw itself into a storm to save an enemy town, at least not when it was that dangerous, so it has to be her." She bit her lip. She wasn't sure what to think. When it had just been the changeling involved, her stance had been easy to take, but now she was facing one of her best friends, and she didn't know if she could bring herself to actually stop Dash if the opportunity came. Her only solace was the idea that Dash may not be the culprit, in which case she would be more than a little angry that her friends had even thought of her leaving.

"At least we know nopony's done anything with Dashie! We should throw a party!"

Twilight sighed. "No Pinkie, no parties. Maybe we'll have one after we catch this changeling menace. We should get some wanted posters up, just so everypony can be on the lookout. Not that we can really have a picture of him, shape changer and all." She sighed. "I'll go talk to Celestia. Stay here, I'll be right back." She focused energy in her horn, and after a whoosh and a pop, she appeared in front of the Princess in her throne room. She bowed. "Princess, I have some information that we have put together about the changeling."

"Very well, proceed."

"We have no concrete evidence backing this up, only speculation, but the only suspect we have right now, assuming there was a pony helping that changeling, is Rainbow Dash. The way I can see it, though, the changeling doesn't seem to be holding Dash under a spell, nor does she herself seem to have been replaced by a changeling."

"Why would she turn on her own country then? Changeling manipulation magic must be involved."

"But Princess, as far as we know, that doesn't exist, nor does it allow the personality of the controlled pony to show through, and no changes were seen in Dash. She must have thought that this changeling was the right cause to follow, so either she knows something we don't, or she's being manipulated skillfully. Or both, I suppose. I'm really not sure what to think."

"Well what do you propose?"

"We should send out search parties to scour the nearby towns, especially Ponyville. I want to go by Dash's house and take a look around. For all we know, she isn't even with the changeling, and we're just taking the easiest way out by accusing her. Also, we should probably tell ponies to be on the lookout for anything suspicious."

"Alright then, I will continue to send out search parties. When you are ready to go to Rainbow Dash's house, just send for me and I will assemble a small escort."

"It's quite alright, Princess, but I would like to do this myself."

"Very well, Twilight, I will trust you to be careful."

"Thank you princess." she teleported back to her friends, who jumped a little when she appeared.

"So what did she say Sugarcube?"

"She basically shared my disbelief about Dash leaving. Oh ponyfeathers I'm worried about her. The only reason I'm not going catatonic right now is because we don't know that she left, and we still know that she still has a measure of free will. I just hope we're wrong about this changeling. It doesn't change the fact that his crimes are inexcusable, he's still the number one most wanted criminal right now."

"So what are ya doin' about it?"

"I'm going to Dash's house and taking a look around. If she's there, things should be a lot easier, although she could still be the culprit. The Princess is still sending out search parties, but I told her to focus on Ponyville and the surrounding areas. Hopefully they returned to somewhere familiar."

"How good of a chance do we have of finding them?" Rarity spoke up.

"Not too good, I'd say. We're up against the fastest pony in Equestria and a master of disguise, well, maybe not a master, but anyway the odds aren't in our favor. The best we can hope for is one of them accidentally revealing themselves, or actually having a search party find something useful. With how unpredictable that guy is though, they could be anywhere. He's smart too; he used mathematical formulas I've never heard of, and they all make sense!"

"Well then, ah guess we better get lookin'."

"Not like there's anything else we can do..."

"But why would the Griffins attack Equestria?"

"Oh you mean besides the fertile soil, huge natural wealth and generally weak army? I have no idea." he dropped the sarcasm. "It's in their history though. I stole a book about changelings from Twilight, because I was being chased by the town at that point, and it had some information on Griffin conquests. They conquered most of the southwest, so it's clear that the Griffins are fairly aggressive. Apparently, the changeling hive used to feed off of a different nation of ponies that also existed to the southwest of Equestria. That was conquered by the griffins after some problems between the changelings and the government. History always repeats itself, and that could mean another repeat here, considering the perceived weakness. They showed me a map, and it turns out that Equestria is half surrounded by their kingdom, making it easy to invade. I could be wrong, but considering their history, I'm probably not. The only question is when."

"We have to warn the ponies! We can't just stand by and let them get murdered!"

"Here's the deal. I agree with you, but we can't literally go in there and warn them, not like they'll believe us. We have to find a way to spell out the message without giving away our position."

"We can use clouds..."

"We'll have to do it at night, but that sounds like something we can do, especially if we display it off the side of Canterlot. Nevertheless, there's still the chance that they won't take it seriously." He paused. "Now that that's sorted out, we have to get some sort of steady supply of food, and probably some firewood."

"Firewood? We're in a tree, we can't have a fire!"

"It's fine, we'll only keep it going while we're awake, and keep it real small. I'll build a fire pit for it, and we'll only use it for necessary stuff, like cooking. Besides, maybe we can expand this, build a roof, etcetera."

"That sounds alright, I guess, but how are we going to get food?"

"Simple. We'll both go out and bring back small amounts of anything that looks remotely edible. I'll test it, and if it's edible, we can take note and gather more. How are we on food, by the way?"

"We have enough for at least a few days." She sighed, "and then it's down to Everfree food." Jason noticed that the knives were still in his hooves, and levitated them out, carefully setting them down a ways away.

"Hey, come on, it's not that bad, there's lots of stuff that I'm sure you've never had before. Try to look on the bright side."

"You're right, I guess this could be a lot worse, and--" Jason shoved a hoof in her mouth, putting the other one up to his mouth and shushing her. He silently walked over to the side of the platform and looked down. He turned his head and mouthed the word 'patrol,' and she seemed to get the concept. Three earth ponies walked by, accompanied by a unicorn. They were all wearing the royal armor, and slowly walked by. Jason held his breath. The patrol was headed towards the cliff, and after they were far enough away, Jason quietly turned to Dash.

"You were saying?"

"A patrol just went by, and you're acting like nothing happened!" he motioned for her to keep it down.

"They didn't find us." He shrugged. "I mean, we should be happy that they went by. It means they aren't going to search this area again for a while, probably."

"What is our eventual plan here?"

"Well, I dunno exactly, I just figured that we should probably get away first, then figure it out in more depth."

"Okay... Well... Yeah I have no ideas."

"Well, I'm going to take a short visit to town, I figure I might as well see what's going on, and how much of an issue they think we are."

"Ugh... Do you have to do something like that?"

"It's not like I need to do it for long, it should take something like ten minutes. I'll get in, walk around, and get out. Is there anything you want me to buy?"

"Buy whatever you want, there's nothing I really need, besides some extra food maybe." Green flames covered his body, as he turned into a pegasus that was a few inches shorter than he normally was, with a navy blue mane and a slightly lighter blue body. He waved goodbye and then took off, disappearing over the cliff. Dash watched him until he dropped over, and then turned to the supplies, taking an apple. Stifling a yawn, she realized that she was much more tired than she had previously thought. She briefly wondered if her fatigue was due to missing a few of her normal mid-day naps, or if it was due to the fact that she hadn't slept most of the night and had needed to save Jason from the royal palace and had spent the rest of the day flying around and building a treehouse platform. She quietly laughed. When she thought about it that way, it just seemed like a stupid question.

She jumped over to the bed and sprawled out, the midday sun effectively blocked by the multitude of branches, creating an artificial dusk. She sighed contentedly. 'This isn't half bad.' She thought as she drifted off, waking back up for a moment as a pang of fear shot through her about the idea of failure for Jason's crackpot 'Canterlot re-entry' scheme. She sighed and tried her best to push her worries away, deciding that there was really nothing she could do at the moment, and finally found sleep.

Much to her displeasure, she was woken in the middle of a particularly interesting dream involving Daring Do by someone shaking her shoulder. "Mhrmhhrmrmrhmhhhrmr" she mumbled, turning away from the thing, and attempting to salvage her dream. The thing came back, the evil, unrelenting thing, and Dash mumbled some curses under her breath before turning back over and opening her eyes.

Some random pony looked down at her. She pushed him away, trying to push herself backwards across the bed while she tried to figure out what was going on. Dash could remember that for some reason she was supposed to stay quiet, although her muddled mind couldn't figure out why that was the case or why she seemed to be in a tree. The pony dawned a slight expression of realization, before green flames covered his body and a changeling emerged. Dash calmed down, memories rushing back to her, before she got up and slugged Jason in the shoulder.

"For your sake, I hope that you forgot I hadn't seen that form before."

"Yeah, it's kinda hard to keep track of what which ponies see anymore. I'm just happy I haven't screwed up yet. Well, at least not majorly. By the way, I would probably only prank you if we weren't in a situation where waking up with foreign people in your face could mean capture. Well more likely capture than normal anyway, I mean, how well meaning could a stranger in your house be? Actually, I'm never going to prank you like that, I take it back."

"Okay then, so what went so wrong that you came back with a different form? And what's that on your back?" Jason levitated the saddlebag off of his back, and maneuvered it over to the rest of the food, where he opened the flaps to show off a large quantity of food.

"The other pockets have canned food, and a can opener."

"I meant, what's that other thing on your back?"

"Oh, this thing? Well I knew that you were still a little homesick and stuff, and it's not like I can literally bring your house here, so I bought this cake, and some other stuff from your house." He said, taking the cake off of his back and setting it down.

"You went all the way to my house?!?! How long were you gone?"

"I got the stuff yesterday." He picked up the unpacked saddlebag, and after pulling out the blankets, pulled out a cylinder of paper and a picture frame. He levitated them over to Dash.

"You brought my signed Wonderbolts poster and the picture of me with my friends." She stared at the picture for a few seconds until a tear fell from her eyes, and she shook her head, trying to snap out of it. Jason walked over and laid a hoof on her shoulder, pulling her into a hug. They stood there for a few minutes as Dash regained her composure. "I just miss them so much already. And it's not like I can just go back and say that I'm alright, either. On top of that is the fact that I betrayed them, as the element of loyalty, and they think I'm a traitor." She looked like she was going to break down again. He couldn't really blame her.

"Shhh... We'll show them soon enough, all we have to do is prove that we're on their side. All they think I've done is replaced some ponies that don't exist, but they should figure out soon enough that those ponies actually don't exist, which would get rid of the murder and replacement charges. Then all I've done is steal love, which I haven't done. All we need to do is get them in a situation where they'll listen."

"Will it really be that easy?" she asked, looking up at Jason with red, puffy eyes.

"It could be, but we'll just have to see when we have the chance. The first thing we have to do is warn them about the griffin invasion, and that should either give them the idea that we're on their side, or they might think it's a trick, in which case the Griffins invade, and we get recognized as being right. After that point, I don't really know what's going to happen, but we'll at least be on slightly better standings by that time."

"But you haven't even done anything wrong! Why would they even want to go after you?"

"I'm a threat. They can't let a changeling walk around without doing something, and given the amount of panic I caused, even though I didn't actually hurt anypony, at least besides Diamond, I'm still feared by the people. I showed up right after the wedding, and that pretty much means that the citizens of Equestria have a kind of mob mentality. It's just a witch hunt, and I'm their witch. I can't argue with words, only sufficiently meaningful actions. That's all that's going to get through to them."

"I have to say, the more you talk about this, the more depressed I get."

"Hey, it's not hopeless. Never forget that." He sighed. "Now, before the sun gets any lower, not that it's that low yet, we have to get some sort of defense system up and running."

"Can't you at least tell me about why you returned in a different form first?" Jason looked at the position of the sun. Deciding he had time, he turned back to Dash.

"Fine," he said as he began his story.

Jason disappeared over the edge of the cliff, and dove towards Canterlot. He had thought that the city was closer to the top of the cliff, yet now it seemed much further away. He continued to dive, before the city got close enough that he had to slow down. He maneuvered into an alleyway and landed, quickly checking his disguise. Finding nothing wrong, he exited onto a busy street, and started to walk around. Most of the ponies were dressed in fancy clothes and dresses, which was a strange thing to see after being around a society that didn't wear clothes for so long. He trotted on, eventually reaching a square with a huge fountain in the center. There were news boards, like places to stick flyers and notices, placed around the sides of the square, and Jason walked up to one.

The first things he noticed were several posters plastered all over the board with a rough sketch of a changeling. The poster said, "Be on the lookout for suspicious activity." Jason chuckled and turned his gaze to a newspaper that had also been pasted to the board. The newspaper headline was, "Rogue Changeling Evades Capture, Continues to Pose High Threat." He read the article and realized just how little information the article actually possessed. It had only mentioned a few vague facts about the loud explosion and some unidentified ponies flying away, along with a few public statements from Celestia. At least they weren't close to being found out.

Jason left the board and walked into a nearby bakery. He noticed that the ponies were looking a little shift, but that they in general didn't seem to be too affected by any of the recent events. He walked up to the counter of the shop, and caught the attention of the yellow maned, green earth pony behind the counter.

"Can I get you anything, Dearie?"

"Sure, I'd like to order a cake, I guess."

"What size and flavor would you like?"

"I suppose something like the twelve inch diameter chocolate flavored cake. Will that work?"

"Coming right up!" She bounded into the back room, and came out moments later with a freshly iced cake. She carefully boxed the cake and handed it to him, and he pulled the necessary bits from the bag he had earned from playing in the restaurant. Apparently Dash had found it on the floor of the hospital waiting room, somehow not stolen, and brought it to her house. "Come again soon," The pony said as Jason left the bakery. He moved to the side of the street and painstakingly secured the cake to his back with some twine that the baker had given him. He walked back through the square, and was about to take off before a rust colored pegasus mare came up to him, looking blisteringly angry.

"So that's it eh, I'm just a one night stand type of mare, eh?" The gears in Jason's head ground to a halt. After a few moments of silence and staring, he only managed to get out one word.

"Huh?"

"What do you mean, 'huh'?!?! I thought you said I was special!!!" She ran over and tried to throw a punch, which Jason caught with his hoof.

"You've got the wrong pony, woman!" Other ponies were starting to stop what they were doing and stare.

"Women? Was that one of your crappy insults?!?!" She shoved him, and the cake on his back shifted, probably running onto the side of the box.

"I just bought this cake, dammit!"

"So you got that for your new toy, then?!?! Tired of me already?!?!" Tears were streaming down her face. She pulled her hoof back and took another swipe at Jason.

"I don't know anything about your stupid little problems!" Jason couldn't cause this kind of a commotion, that much he knew. It wouldn't be good, even if this was some sort of regular occurrence on the streets of Canterlot. He flew backwards, avoiding another punch, before quickly trotting into an alley. The mare screamed in anger and followed him, galloping at full speed. "Holy shit!" He yelled. She was catching up to him quickly, even though he had sped up considerably. how she was running so fast was beyond him. He took off into the air and quickly changed direction, trying to lose the psycho that was this mare.

Expectantly, she took off after him, but didn't seem to have any ridiculous amount of wing power, luckily enough. Jason banked hard, diving into another alleyway, and cut around a corner, where he quickly landed and thought of a new form. The green flames passed over his body, replacing the blues with a white mane and a light green coat. He kept the wings, mostly because he still needed to use them. A horn would be useful, but then he would have to change again before returning. The mare tore around the corner, looking like death incarnate. She blazed past Jason, and pushed through a crowd of ponies in the street. Jason's mane was pushed to the side by the huge wind that the mare had created as she ran by.

After Jason had caught his breath slightly, he walked into the street, which appeared to be more produce oriented than the other one. He found a few food stalls, and bought some apples, various lettuces and flowers, and bread for sandwiches. The mare went by again, this time chasing a stallion that looked a lot like Jason had previously. Jason chuckled. Noticing a food stall that sold canned food, he decided to pick up a few cans of mixed vegetables, along with a can opener. He packed the last of the food into his saddlebag and looked up to the top of the cliff, before his thoughts shifted. Somehow the cake was still attached to his back, although slightly ajar. It was probably hopelessly destroyed at this point, but he righted it on his back nonetheless. Deciding he would say that it was actually modeled after modern art, he shrugged and took off. Needless to say, the trip to the top of the mountain was mush harder than the trip down, especially since he was now carrying an unrecognizable blob of cake dough and some food.

Jason finally crested the cliff, and landed a little ways inside the forest, in the general vicinity of the platform. He looked around for said platform, but took a good amount of time before finding it's position. They had definitely done a good job disguising it, although it only really took a bit of dumb luck for some moron to see the structure. He sighed and landed, hearing another clunk of movement from the cake. Rolling his eyes, he looked around for Dash. Dash was completely passed out on the cloud bed, with one fore leg hanging off the side. She looked cute like that, he decided, not like it was a very tough decision to make. He had a few D'aww moments before he realized that they still had a lot to do before nightfall, and that they only had a few hours of daylight left. He started shaking her shoulder to try to wake her up, and she just rolled over. Then he shook her again and she rolled back over towards Jason, opening her eyes. Her pupils dilated more than he had thought possible before she tried to push herself away from him as fast as she could, before he realized that she had never seen this disguise before, and he dropped it.

"So that's what happened while you were sleeping the day away."

"I can't believe that whole thing with the mare! That's too funny!" She started laughing again, luckily less than before, when Jason had been forced to stop and wait for her to finish rolling all over the bed, clutching her sides. He shot her another disapproving glance.

"Yeah, well it wasn't all that funny for me, I kinda thought she was actually going to kill me there for a while." She managed to stop giggling, and wiped some tears from her eyes.

"So let's see that cake. It can't possibly be that bad, can it?"

"I dunno, there was a lot of clunking back there, and honestly, the fact that there would even be a remotely cake shaped object would be a miracle." Jason pulled the cake box over and cringed. The cake was basically spherical at this point, most of the frosting on the walls of the box. Jason smiled sheepishly, and turned to Dash. "Wow, it survived perfectly!!" he exclaimed, "I'm so glad this modern art style cake made it back exactly how it left the bakery. The baker told me that this one represents his struggle against the monotonous 'machine' of everyday life, and--" Dash punched him in the shoulder. She smiled.

"You're so full of shit."

"I resent that." He paused. "Since when did you start using my swearwords?"

"After I decided that they sound a lot more menacing than 'ponyfeathers' and stuff like that."

"Can't argue with that logic, I suppose. Here, come on, we have to set up some defenses and stuff now."

"But what about the cake?"

"It'll still be here when we get back."

She managed to tear her gaze from the cake box. "Fine, what do we need?"

"Four flash-bangs and some of the twine." she grabbed the necessary supplies and brought them down, where Jason was already waiting, with the axe and some nails.

"So I'll pound these into some of the trees, and I want you to tie the twine to the pin and the canister of those. We're making primitive tripwires, as it were." She nodded and started the preliminary preparations, as Jason found suitable trees and pounded in the nails.

"Okay, so we're making a square around our base, so one flash-bang goes on each span. You do those two, and I'll do these two." he gestured with a hoof. They went to their tasks, and succeeded in stretching out all four of the wires without any accidents. Jason wiped some sweat from his brow, or maybe it was condensation, it was starting to become colder, after all. Dash turned around, seemingly satisfied with her handiwork, and they both flew back up to the treehouse.

"I call first dibs on that cake," Dash yelled as they touched down.

"It was for you, so go ahead." Jason carefully floated over one of the knives. His forelegs had become horribly itchy all of a sudden. He tried to scratch at them, but it was no use, really, with all the chitin in the way. The itch lessened, but was still starting to drive Jason crazy already. A cake blob hit him in the face, jolting him from his nightmare. He looked up to see Dash trying to look innocent, and doing an all-around terrible job. He pulled the blob off his face with a hoof and chucked it back at her. She tried to bat it out of the way, before realizing that it was cake a little too late. She ended up with a fairly large cake splotch all over her foreleg. She giggled, licking some of the cake off her arm. "Hey, fly up there." She complied, looking confused. Jason broke off several blobs of cake with his magic, holding them in an array in the air. "Catch." He tossed one at Dash, who promptly dodged the projectile.

"Ha, missed me!"

"You're supposed to catch it in your mouth, Dash. I meant catch literally." She facehoofed before getting back into a ready position. Jason fired another cake blob at her. She swooped down and caught it. He fired another, and she flew up a ways and caught that one too. "You sure you don't practice this?"

"Just coordinated I guess." They continued the game for a while, before Jason realized that they had almost used all the cake.

"We should save some of this at least, you might as well not eat it all at once." She nodded and descended, crumbs littering her face.

"That was, without a doubt, the most awesome way to eat cake ever!"

"Glad you liked it." The sun had descended to the horizon, leaving the Everfree in a somewhat eerie light. "And so we've run out of things to do."

"Didn't you bring that guitar pretty much for purposes like this?" She asked, prompting a facehoof from Jason.

"Wow. Yes." He dragged out the amp and the overdrive unit, and picked up the guitar, slinging it around his shoulder and sitting on the side of the bed. He plugged the instruments into each other, and turned down the amp, realizing that the volume dial actually went all the way to eleven. He chuckled. He powered the devices, receiving a small amount of feedback. "So you haven't heard me play yet?"

"Nope. I've gotta say, I'm excited. If your people have had this type of music for so much longer than it's been around here, it's bound to be good."

"Hopefully you'll like it. I'll play a few songs, but they're all going to be different sub-sections of rock, so if you hate one, you might love the rest."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MXp413NynFk

Dash's jaw hung open. "I've never even heard anything like that! That was awesome!"

"Glad you liked it, because I have a few more up my sleeve. Here goes nothing."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98W9QuMq-2k

He didn't wait for her to respond, and just transitioned in to his next song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYxkezUr8MQ

As the last chord faded out, Dash barraged him with questions.

"Is all music on your world like that?

"No, most of the stuff nowadays is untalented shit." He sighed. "But there are still a few bands putting out music like this."

"You said before that you would teach me to play some. Would you still do that?" She looked a little overly excited.

"Sure, but I'm not sure how much you'd be able to play, seeing as you need magic or fingers, and you have neither. You could still play a fair amount of guitar though, but without most of the chords. You're pretty fast, you could probably play most of the non chord related riffs."

"Well I'm definitely looking forward to it."

"I've got one more song, and then I'm going to hit the sack. This one pertains nicely to our situation, if I do say so myself." He chuckled.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0J2QdDbelmY

"And that's all I have left in me tonight." Jason declared, prompting a groan from Dash. He let the energy to the amp run out, took off his guitar, setting it down off to the side gently, and fell backwards onto the bed. He pulled himself over to the cloud pillows, and gratefully laid his head to rest. He shivered and levitated the blankets over. Dash rolled into the bed, and laid an arm over Jason. He shifted back into his Alternis form. Dash looked up at him, confused.

"Why do you always change?"

"Isn't it more comfortable to lay on fur rather than chitin?"

"I suppose, but there's nothing wrong with your real form."

"If it appeases you, I won't change during the day, unless it's totally necessary."

"Good," she purred, re-situating herself among his forelegs. "You never did tell me what happened, that you got all these injuries." She gently prodded his injured foreleg.

"Well, Twilight got sorta mad when she ran in and I was healing you, probably because it looked like I was destroying the bones in your wings, and she kinda threw me into the ceiling, and then the floor. That's where I got the arm crack and the cracks on my back." His arm had started to itch again. "Then I got the cracks on my face when they were 'torturing' me, and hit me with a rock or something."

"You went through all that?"

"It wasn't that big a deal," he shrugged, "it's not like they know how to torture people anyways, or they would've attempted to find someone close to me to torture."

"It just makes me feel special that you went through all that just to save my wings." she snuggled up closer.

"I couldn't let you lose your wings. It would be pretty much the same as dying, for you anyways. You'd lose your dreams, your passion, I couldn't let that happen to you." He paused, yawning widely. "Now let's get some sleep. I'm dying over here." Jason shut his eyes, and started to nod off. This whole experience seemed like a dream, he sleepily realized. He had been here for what, four days? Five? All this had happened in that short of an amount of time. It seemed so surreal, like he could suddenly wake up at any time. Thus his last conscious thought slowly exited his head as he finally drifted off to slee--

BANG!!!

Jason jolted out of bead, wide awake.

"You've gotta be fucking kidding me!"

BANG

"You've got to be fucking kidding me!" Jason jolted out of bed, throwing the covers to the side. He mentally berated himself for making noise before he reverted into changeling form and levitated the knives into his hooves. Then he jumped.

He landed quietly on the ground, looking around for the entity that has set off the flash-bang. Even with his imporved night vision, he couldn't see any pony, let alone a manticore or other beast. If Jason had fingers, he would have gripped his knives tighter. He stalked over towards the location where the flash-bang had been hanging and found a section of blackened ground. He looked back up towards the platform, and saw Dash, who was staring into the dark, also attempting to find the source of the breach. Jason shrugged and flew up to her, realizing that the threat must have fled. As soon as he landed, he heard the noise of some breaking sticks. Dash looked at him with a worried expression. He quickly brought out the last of their knives, and some of the twine, and grabbed one of Dash's forelegs. She looked at Jason with a look of confusion before he placed the knife on her lower hoof, facing outward, and started to tie it on. Feeling satisfied with the first hoof, he moved onto the second, mirroring his success.

He reared up and took a few general stabbing motions at the air, showing her what to do. She nodded as another stick broke, signifying that the beast wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. Jason motioned for Dash to stay where she was, and then pointed to the gillie suit. She nodded again, and started carefully putting it on. Jason decided he was glad he'd put buttons down the sides of the fore leg parts of the suit. He had really been almost out of thread, but hey, acting like he wanted it that way was much better, especially when it made him look like he planned ahead.

Another branch broke. Whatever was out there, it didn't exactly seem keen on making itself hidden. Jason navigated to the spot where he had heard the most recent cracking, and saw a small shadow moving quickly away. The thing moved fast, he could give it that. He flapped his wings a few times before taking off and attempting to fly silently, although there was still a slight buzzing emanating from his wings, annoyingly enough for him. The shadow stopped under a log, and almost seemed to be cowering away from him, which considering the bomb and pursuit, wasn't surprising. Jason landed in front of the thing, one arm ready to stab. He lit up his horn, and his jaw dropped.

"Scootaloo?" It was indeed Scootaloo, hidden under a tree and shivering uncontrollably.

"P-please d-don't eat me, M-mr c-changeling. I'll leave, I p-promise. I w-won't tell anyone about y-you, an--"

"Scootaloo, it's me, Jason. Calm down." She seemed to relax a little, although her shivering continued full force. She jumped towards him and threw her arms around his neck.

"Oh, Jason, I was so scared. There was this thing that I ran into and then there was this light and this bang, and I didn't know what was going on, and I thought something was following me, but then you showed up."

"Come on, Scoots, let's get you warmed up. Hop on." Scoots jumped on his back and Jason shivered. "How are you this cold?" She didn't answer. He took off, heading for the platform. He saw dash as he was landing, and briefly flared the horn light to catch her attention if he hadn't already. He touched down, and Scootaloo hopped off.

"So this is where you--" her voice cut out as Dash and her gillie suit came into view. Well, mostly the suit. "What is that thing, some kind of plant monster?"

"Dash, would you be so kind as to do the honors?" She nodded and pulled back the hood. Scootaloo gasped.

"I'm so sorry for calling you a plant monster Dash, I didn't know!" Dash chuckled.

"It's fine, Squirt. At least I know it looks realistic now." She threw a glance at Jason, and then her face hardened slightly as she turned back to Scootaloo. "So what are you doing out here in the Everfree Forest, and more importantly, why this far from home?" Scootaloo mumbled a few words and looked at her hooves. "Sorry, what was that?"

"I said I followed you!" Dash looked dumbfounded.

"How did you do that exactly?"

"Well, you guys landed right outside the forest, and said some things, and then went in. I followed you, because I was wondering if I could get my cutie mark in tracking, because Sweetie Belle is with her parents while Rarity is in Canterlot and Applebloom is grounded, so I was bored. I caught up to you when you were both eating, but then you took off again and I lost you. I've been wandering around here since then." Dash facehoofed.

"Squirt, what have I told you about the Everfree?"

"That it's dangerous and stuff, but I didn't get attacked by anything besides that loud bright thing, so it can't be that dangerous."

"That loud bright thing was me." Jason volunteered. Scootaloo's eyes widened.

"You made that bright light?" He sighed.

"You set off a trap that makes the bright light and sound. It's like an early warning system." He paused. "Scoots, do you even know why we're out here?"

"No..."

"Well did you hear any news about problems in Ponyville?"

"Oh yeah! There was this changeling in the hospital that healed you, Dash!" An expression of realization dawned on her face. "That was you!" She said, pointing at Jason.

"Yup. Then I was captured, taken to the castle, then broken out by this kind young mare over here." He gestured to Dash. "We need to take you home, Scoots. You've already been gone for a day, chances are ponies are worried about you."

"I doubt it, no one cares about me besides Sweetie and Applebloom..."

"And your parents?" Scootaloo looked up at Dash with tears in her eyes. "No way..."

"I haven't had parents since I was born. My mom died giving birth to me, and my dad left me at the orphanage. I can never forgive him for leaving me there. For not even trying to take care of me."

"I know how you feel, Scoots, I've been there." Jason said, and put a hoof on Scootaloo's shoulder, pulling her into a hug.

"No you haven't, no one knows what it's like! No one knows how alone I am!" She tried to struggle out of Jason's grasp, flailing her legs around, but he held firm.

"I may not know how it feels to grow up so young without parents, but I still lost mine, Scoots." She stared at him, before finally breaking down and crying into his shoulder.

"What happened?" She asked through her tears.

"They were killed in front of me when I was sixteen. But listen, Scoots, it isn't the end of the world. In a way you're better off than I was; you didn't form an attachment to your parents. But listen here, the most important thing, as corny as it sounds, it to just never give up. I know you feel empty sometimes, and I know you get lonely, but when you give in to the emptiness it's a million times worse." She sniffled for a moment, and then seemed to regain her composure.

"D-do you think I could stay with you guys for a while?" She asked, prompting Jason to look at Dash. She shrugged.

"You can definitely stay here tonight, but we'll have to discuss letting you stay longer. Technically, we're wanted criminals, and I don't really want to accumulate more charges." She seemed crestfallen, and sniffled again. "Hey, no long faces. I didn't say no, did I?"

"I guess not."

"Okay, good. You can sleep wherever you want." Dash looked confused. "I have to go make the sign telling Canterlot about the attack."

"I'm coming with you." Dash said.

"No. You have to stay here and watch Scoots. I'm the only one with capable night vision anyways. You wouldn't be able to see any of the clouds you'd be moving."

"I hate it when you're right..." She yawned. "When was the last time you slept?"

"At like eleven last night to something like three this morning. It's not too much less than I would get normally though..." He copied Dash's yawn.

"What do you mean normally? That's like eight hours less than you're supposed to receive!"

"Not for humans though. I still have my old brain, and sleeping is just rest for the brain, so I guess sleep habits stay the same. Rest for the body is different, though, I still get tired from physical exertion, same as you." He yawned again. "I really have to do this before I just pass out." His foreleg started to itch again. He hit it into the tree, trying to get it to stop.

Dash ignored his antics. "Fine, go ahead. You better not get captured, or I swear..."

"You'll save me again?"

"I might not be able to. They're not going to take any chances this time. If you're captured, you're done for."

"Yeah, I'll be careful, don't worry. I have the advantage in pretty much every way at night." He turned and took off, leaving a confused Scootaloo and a worried looking Dash.

"Celestia I hope he stays safe," she whispered as he quickly disappeared into the gloom.

Jason loved night flying, he decided. The frigid air, the light of the moon. No worries of being seen. It was liberating really. The moon looked amazing. It was much larger than the moon that rotated around earth, or maybe it was closer. There was also a surprising lack of craters. There were only a few large ones on the otherwise unblemished surface. He looked away from the moon and gave a slight gasp at the sheer number of stars he could see. There were nebulas and other celestial bodies that Jason had only seen on television in computer generated images or zoomed in photos from orbiting satellites. It was unlike any other night sky he could imagine. Then he noticed a star formation that looked surprisingly like the big dipper. Deciding that it was just a coincidence, he shook his head and flew on.

He arrived all too soon at the location he was going to set up the clouds at. Sighing, he quickly looked around for usable clouds, and found several nearby. Apparently it wasn't scheduled to be a cloudless night. He started arranging them into letters over twenty five feet wide. After scouring all the nearby sky for pretty much every cloud in the vicinity, he finally finished the message, and flew back to observe his work. The message read "Griffin Attack Imminent." Hopefully the townspeople would take the sign seriously, and attempt to bolster the guard. He kinda doubted that they would just accept the message as truth and actually make preparations, but it felt good to be able to get this off his conscience. He didn't want to be remembered as the guy that knew an attack was coming and didn't say anything.

Jason yawned again. Apparently the cold air and physical exertion had done little to actually wake him up. He turned to look at Canterlot, and his jaw dropped. 'And people said that it was beautiful during the day...' He thought. The city's gothic architecture had been supplemented by the multitude of torches and magical lighting in a huge variance of colors. A fair number of ponies still walked the streets, attending to who knows what at this hour. Actually, it wasn't that late, it just felt like it was four in the morning to him, considering all the challenges he had been forced to overcome in the last few hours alone.

He shrugged, and left the night time beauty of the old city behind as he started the long flight back to home base.

As Jason dissapeared into the forest to take car of the sign, Scootaloo turned to Dash.

"What was that about an attack?"

"Well Scoots, Jason thinks the Griffins are going to invade Equestria, and he seems pretty sure that he's right. That's why he's out there; he's trying to give them advance warning." Scootaloo had seemingly become disinterested, and had started perusing the meager collection of possessions that Dash and Jason had managed to hold on to.

"Hey, this is the instrument that he was playing when he was in that restaurant! Do you think he would play a song for us?"

"I'm sure he'd be glad to, but he definitely won't play it tonight. He looks like he's about to fall over, and honestly I can't blame him." Scoots seemed a little disappointed, at least until something new caught her eyes. She was definitely an energetic one.

"Why do you have knives tied to your hooves?"

"Oh, I should probably take those off." She started to untie and unwind the rope, attempting to shake a bit of lost feeling into the tips of her hooves. "We didn't know what you were when you set off the alarm, so Jason put some knives in his hooves and tied these to mine, just in case I was attacked. They make me feel pretty badass." Scoots continued to run around and observe things, small 'oohs' and 'aahs' exiting her mouth. She saw the signed poster of the Wonderbolts.

"Wow, Dash, where did you get this?" she pointed towards the poster, an awed expression on her face.

"I got that after I won the Best Young Flyers competition and got to spend a day with the Wonderbolts. They gave me this when it was over. Hey Scoots, do you think that we could actually sleep at some point here?"

"Oh, yeah sure Dash." She re-dawned her disappointed expression.

"Hey, I'll still be here in the morning." Scootaloo nodded and jumped onto the bed, burrowing into the covers. Dash briefly thought about protesting, seeing as they also had a cloud couch. She shrugged and dove into the other side of the bed. "Night Scoots." Scoots mumbled something back, but Dash didn't quite catch it. What she did catch was the soft clopping of hooves on wood. Jason appeared in her field of vision.

"Hey, I made it back." He said. Dash nodded, and Jason quickly levitated the knives away, changed his form into Alternis, and laid down next to Dash. "Where's Scootaloo?" Dash pointed to a lump in the blankets. Jason nodded, and laid down. "Maybe I'll actually get some sleep this time." He wrapped his hooves around Dash and she gave a contented sigh, wrapping a hoof around him. "Night, Dash."

"Goodnight, Jason," she said, but soon realized that Jason was already asleep. She giggled a little before she ran a hoof through his mane and laid down to rest herself. She soon slipped into sleep.

The wind rustled in the trees, causing some birds to chirp excitedly. A group of pinecones wobbled in the breeze, one becoming liberated from the group. The wooden torpedo fell from the treetop, gaining speed and creating a slight whistling sound as it descended. Then it contacted Jason's nose.

He sprang up in bed, still in a tired stupor, looking for the culprit that had whacked him on the nose. He turned around several times before taking proper note of the bed he had so hurriedly jumped off of, and noticed the pinecone. Evidently some part of his antics had awoken Dash, who was also looking around, trying to figure out what had gotten Jason so riled up. He seemed to relax, and pointed a hoof at the pinecone.

"That stupid little piece of shit fell on me." He said. She seemed to think it was hilarious, much to his distain. He retook his spot next to her, attempting to regain some of his damaged pride, and put a hoof around Dash.

"You know, you're lucky that I love having you around so much, or I might actually get mad at you."

"Aww, come here." She pulled him closer. "I'm sorry for always laughing at your misfortune. You just make it so easy."

"Oh, thanks Dash, I feel so much better." He sighed, and a long silence followed.

"Hey," he jumped a little at the sudden noise, and looked up at her. "When this is all over, you aren't going to leave, are you?" He laughed before he realized she was serious.

"Leave you?" She nodded. "Dash, I would never, ever, leave you. You have nothing to worry about." She snuggled a little closer. "Bad past experiences?"

"A few. Apparently most ponies think I'm just a one night stand type of mare. I thought I had some sort of curse for a few years there. Just promise me that you're different, I don't want to be lonely anymore."

"Well, I don't exactly know how no one wanted, well, this," he gestured. "Your sense of humor, intelligence, cunning. And to top it all off you're stunning to look at." She blushed. "I guess to answer your request, I promise." She moved her head towards his, and he mirrored the movement. They could feel each other's breath as they got closer, until

"Eeewww!" Scootaloo had apparently awoken, much to Jason's distaste, and was now staring at them, a disgusted look on her face. They both pulled away.

"Dammit Scootaloo, leave us alone!" She giggled, retreating back to wherever she came from. Jason sighed. "Guess that gives me a good reason to get up." Dash nodded, mirroring Jason's annoyed look. He got up off the bed and pulled her up with a fore hoof, and remembered the intense itch that he had developed. It had gotten worse since yesterday, and had spread up from his fore hooves to his upper chest and neck. He tried to scratch at himself, but nothing seemed to work. He transformed back into changeling form and tried harder.

"Itchy?"

"Yeah, I have no idea how to stop this though, or why it itches. It's not just the injured one healing, so it can't be that." He whacked his arm sideways into a tree, and heard a disheartening crack. "AAAAAAHHHHHHH-- wait that didn't hurt." He pulled his forearm up to his face, realizing that the itch had improved considerably. "What changed? The itch is gone." he waved his arm around a little until a layer of chitin dropped off his fore arm in two almost perfect halves, landing on the ground. He stared at it for a while, and turned to Dash, then back to the chitin. "Well I'm fine, somehow that didn't hurt."

"So, you just lost part of your shell?"

"I know as much as you do. Although the itch is gone." He paused. "Maybe it's like a snake shedding it's skin, although I don't know why a changeling would need to do that." He eyed the new chitin, realizing that he could see his face in the new, shiny black armor. As he looked at his reflection, his arm became more dull and quickly became the same matte black as the rest of him.

"Well, that was strange." He turned to Dash, who had watched the whole process.

"At least I can get rid of this itch now." He walked back to the tree and whacked his other fore arm against the tree at full power, hearing another crack and replicating the arm waves to remove the obsolete chitin.

"Scoots, what happened to you?" Dash yelled. Scootaloo's head popped up from behind a pile of blankets on the bed.

"Right here, Dash!" Dash recoiled a little from the noise.

"Keep it down, kiddo, we don't want anyone to know we're here." She worriedly looked around, hoping nopony had heard Scoots' little outburst.

"Okay, I'll try to be quieter." She hopped off the bed and made a bee-line to the new black things with holes in them that somepony had senselessly left laying around. She picked one up, and tried to fit it over her leg, attempting to figure out it's purpose. "What are these, Dash?"

"Those are parts of chitin from Jason." Scoots recoiled a little from the chitin she had so quickly put over her leg, apparently reconsidering her decision.

"Hey, this gives me an idea. Dash, lift up your fore hoof." She looked confused, but followed his directions. He levitated two of the pieces of chitin over to her lower leg, and fit them overtop her fur. He took some of the twine and secured the makeshift armor in place.

"So this is what chitin feels like. I didn't think it'd be so heavy, at least for how thin this is." Jason secured the other set of lost chitin to her other fore hoof, following the same process with the twine.

"Punch something, see if it fits alright." She nodded and flew over to another tree, knocking the side of her hoof into the trunk. After she left a fairly large dent in the bark she nodded, impressed, and flew back.

"That's some nice stuff you got there. I couldn't feel any of that more than a heavy tap. I wish these holes weren't here though."

"Better than nothing, I guess." He turned to Scoots. "Now about you." He looked at the sun for the first time. It looked like it was about ten maybe? He wasn't really sure. "What should we do?" He asked Dash.

"I kinda feel like we should just keep her here in the event of an invasion by the griffins. I don't really want her to get hurt, especially if we could've saved her by keeping her here as opposed to bringing her back."

"But the problem is about people thinking we foal-napped her, and that would give them a reason to renew the search efforts, along with adding a new crime to the list of things I've supposedly done."

"But Jason," Scootaloo had spoken up. "No one is going to notice I'm gone."

"What about the orphanage staff? I think they would notice a missing foal."

"I haven't lived there for months." Jason stared at her, slightly dumbfounded.

"So you've just been living on the streets? What would possess you to do that?"

"I hated the orphanage! Everypony hated me being around because I was the only one who ever had any reason to be happy with crusading and all, so after we built the Crusader's Clubhouse, I moved in there."

"Why didn't you just ask somepony else for help? Ponyville is filled with nice, charitable ponies."

"I didn't want to live off of someone else, okay? The only thing I have left is my pride. My scooter broke last week, and now my pride and my my friends are all that I have left."

"Oh, Scoots." He hunched over and pulled her into a hug. "Just ask for help sometimes, okay? You won't lose your pride by not going it alone." He got back up and pulled Dash aside. "What are your thoughts on adoption?" He whispered to her. She looked over, thoroughly surprised.

"I guess I didn't give it that much thought, but now that you mention it, it would be a good idea, and Scoots would love living with her idol. But we still have to get back to Ponyville on favorable terms before any of that could even happen, so it's really just a pipe dream."

"You're right." he sighed. "But what will we do with Scoots before then?"

"I say we keep her here. I mean, this has got to be safer than Ponyville in an invasion. There'd be no reason for the Griffins to send troops in here, it's universally known as extremely dangerous, besides the fact that she has food and shelter, and it's well hidden." Jason chuckled.

"I don't get what it is about people thinking this place is so dangerous. I think it's just hyped up fear." He paused. "This brings up the fact that if we did send her back, she'd have nowhere to stay."

"So you're saying we should keep her here because it's actually better than what would happen in ponyville?"

"Essentially, yes." Jason scratched his chin. "What happens if something goes wrong?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume that Canterlot will be the Griffin's target, especially since it has the leaders and was the city previously attacked. In that case, what will we do?"

"You mean like do we sit here and watch or do we fight?"

"Yeah, because if we do fight there's the possibility of injury, death or capture. If neither of us make it back, Scoots is stuck."

"Well we can't just stay here and do nothing!"

"We also can't take on an army alone!"

"What are you guys yelling about?" They both turned to Scootaloo, who had apparently run out of new things to occupy her.

"We were trying to figure out what we're going to do if we're captured or killed out there and what happens to you. If we can figure that out and it spells something other than doom for you, you can stay here with us for a while." Her face lit up, then it turned sour, and finally averaged out in the middle. Jason assumed that she didn't know what to think.

"So that's a maybe?"

"Can you fly, Scoots?"

"Well, um..." she looked down at her hooves.

"She can't fly." Dash said.

"Oh, is that because your wings are small?"

"That's what the doctors say." she continued to look at her hooves.

"Lets just see if they're right about that." He grinned. Dash turned to him.

"How are you going to figure that out?" He gave her a smug expression.

"Have you forgotten that you're talking to Ponyville's resident changeling? Well, past resident changeling?" Green flamed flared out from him, leaving another Scootaloo in it's wake. "If I can fly right now, than you should also be able to. It's as simple as that." He stretched the wings out. "These aren't really that small, you know." After finishing his observations, he got the wings into a good launch position, and then started flapping them. Nothing happened, so he gradually sped up his flaps, until he was just barely touching the ground. He started to lift off of the platform, but then stopped flapping and landed, breathing rather heavily.

"Tough?"

"I started too slowly. I'll just start at as fast of a speed as I can this time. Just hold on." He looked around, noticing a slightly hopeless look on Scootaloo's face. "Why the long face, kiddo?"

"You had so much trouble just getting off the ground. What makes you think that I can even do that, let alone fly?" She looked back at her hooves, until Jason put one of his hooves under her chin, pulling her eyes up to meet his.

"Everything I do, you can do, because I am you right now, so you should be able to do exactly what I just did. Heres to attempt number two." He got back into his launch position and started fluttering his wings as fast as he could immediately, instead of building up to it. He rose off the platform surface rather quickly, much to the surprise of Scoots. He stopped ascending around twenty feet up, and started moving forward, flying around for a while before gliding back down to the platform, finding Scoots with her jaw open.

"How did you do that?"

"The real question is, how did you do that?" Why don't you find out?" He transformed back into his regular form. She nodded excitedly and started flapping her wings, making a rather loud buzzing. She had her eyes tightly shut, and didn't realize that she was not actually making progress. Jason dawned a worried expression on his face, and mouthed the words 'why isn't it working' to Dash. Scootaloo opened her eyes and frowned, looking more than a little disappointed.

"Why isn't it working?" She mirrored Jason's thoughts, starting to look increasingly depressed, which Jason realized was a stark contrast to Dash's rather happy expression. What did she have to be happy about?

"Hey Scoots?" Dash started.

"What, Dash?" She sniffled.

"Flap your wings in slow motion, Scoots." Scoots nodded and slowly moved her wings upwards, then returned them to their lowered position. Dash smiled wider. "Your problem isn't your wings, Scoots, you aren't flapping them correctly. Do it like this." She ran through the correct motions. Scootaloo still looked disappointed. Chin up, Scoots, this is a good thing!!"

"How is it good that I can't fly!?!?"

"Oh, well it would be terrible if your wings were actually too small, but in reality, all you have in your way of flying is a slight necessity to change your tactics. You should be excited that you're so close."

"You really think so, Dash?"

"Of course, Scoots." She paused. "Now, back to what you have to do, you can't just flap them up and down, you have to catch air to push down, and then do the opposite on the way up, otherwise you don't actually achieve anything. Do it a few times." She watched as Scoots ran through the motions, improving the fluidity of them each time. Jason appeared to have gotten bored with the flight school and was strumming at the guitar.

"Want to try again Scoots?" She nodded excitedly. "Well, carry on." She stretched out her wings to their full potential, and started flapping them with Dash's advice in mind. She saw the ground slowly move away from her.

"Remember Scoots, catch the air with your wings." Scootaloo nodded, and followed the advice, starting to ascend more quickly. She was actually doing it! She was flying! Then, in all of her excitement, she lost her concentration, and the rhythm of her flapping was lost, plummeting her back towards earth.

She was falling, the ground was approaching too fast, she tried flapping her wings, but she was slowing down too slowly, she wasn't going to--

The ground stopped moving closer, as she was carefully set down on the platform. She looked up to see a smiling Dash, who she assumed was the one to catch her.

"That was a good first try, Scoots. How'd it feel?"

"I loved it, it was like riding my scooter, but without being stuck to the ground. I loved it."

"Well, that's where I'm going to call this lesson for right now." Scootaloo tried to protest. "No, Scoots. We'll pick up later today, after lunch. Give your wings a rest, and get some food." She looked around to see Jason rolling around on the ground, presumably trying to scratch part of himself. He got up, looking shifty. His eye twitched.

"Get out of the way."

"What?"

"Now." Dash pulled Scootaloo over to the side of the platform, taking no chances, and watched him worriedly. Jason ran at the tree trunk, and jumped, smacking his back into the tree with a sickening crack. Jason ended up on the platform, where he let out a contented groan.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm so okay it's unbelievable. Oh man that was sooooo itchy. Oooh yeah." Dash looked faintly disturbed. Jason got up and walked back to his guitar, knocking off the new back and chest armor plates that had broken off on the way, moving them into the corner. "You can put that on if you want, I'm going to have to knock off more stuff soon."

"It can wait, I'll do it later." Scoots seemed to get an idea, and her face lit up.

"Jason, can you play us some songs?"

"I guess so, sure, although I'm kinda starting to run out of ones I know how to play. Here's a new one." He plugged in the guitar and powered the equipment.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hojV67zpog

"So how was that Scoots? Up to what you were expecting?"

"Even better than that!" Jason smiled at Dash.

"When this is all over, I'm getting a recording contract." Dash chuckled.

"I know I'd buy your stuff."

"Well here's one more song to add to that list."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EB-KdOhSBJ0

"That's where I'm going to stop it right now." Scoots groaned. "I can't just play all the stuff I know and run out, I have to make it last." He paused. "I have to go fix that flash bang line." Jason set down his guitar and jumped off the platform, quickly navigating towards the fallen line of twine and black crater. He was stringing it back up when he heard some shuffling and yelling down the path somewhere. The shuffling quickly turned into hurried galloping as Jason realized that whatever it was, it was coming straight for him. He dropped the rope, attempting to quickly hide it under some leaves, and then quickly flew back to the platform.

He landed, much to Dash's surprise that he had gotten back so soon. "Get down, there's someone coming." The platform became a flurry of activity as all three of them ran for cover, and just as quickly became silent. Jason inched his way to the edge of the platform, attempting to see the culprit of the noise. A few seconds later a very beat up earth pony mare galloped by, constantly looking behind herself. Jason motioned for Dash to look. She saw the mare and shrugged, until a Manticore sprinted by after her, gaining quickly.

Their expressions of slight amusement turned to horror. Jason turned to Dash. "I'm going to save her. I'm not going to just watch as she gets killed by that, thing." He levitated the knifes over and inserted them into his hooves.

"I'm coming with you."

"Fine, but I'm putting the armor on you. Don't do anything stupid." He levitated the knives, twine and armor over and got her suited up. "If the manticore tries to sting you, put this armor in between the stinger and you."

"What about the gillie suit?"

"We don't have time. Let's go." They took off, quickly flying after the duo, which were still in hot pursuit. Jason turned to Dash. "Remember, it's you or him."

The mare got to the cliff and skidded to a stop right on the edge, slumping her shoulders hopelessly. She turned around to face the mantacore, holding her ground. Not like she had any choice. She noticed Jason and Dash flying behind the manticore, and recoiled further in fear. A changling and some sort of hybrid was even worse than just a manticore. Then the changeling did something she didn't expect. It swooped towards the manticore, brandishing a fairly large pair of knives. It seemed to be going for the head, but missed when the manticore moved quickly towards her, accidentally lodging the knife further back in the manticore's side, causing the animal to seemingly lose interest in her and scream in pain. The changeling hybrid came in with another set of knives, but was knocked away by the manticore's tail, sent flying into some underbrush.

"Dash!!!" The changeling yelled, before managing to free his knife from the manticore's side. As soon as he freed himself, he was also whacked by the tail, rolling past the other one, which had managed to free itself from the bushes. He quickly rose and joined his partner as they re-approached the manticore. They briefly conversed before splitting from each other, the regular changeling going straight at the manticore, while the other flew off to the side and disappeared into the forest. The head-on assault changeling attempted to ram a knife into the manticore's eye before said manticore dodged and he was forced to quickly evade the manticore's tail. The end of the tail lodged in the ground, and the changeling stabbed at it, evoking more screams of anger and pain from the beast.

The hybrid changeling came into view from behind the manticore, and it quickly got into a hovering position behind the manticore's head, and seemed to hesitate before ramming the knife in up to the hilt. The manticore went limp and fell to the ground, and the changelings seemed to rejoice, then immediately turn to her. She tried to back up, but only suceeded in slipping off the edge of the cliff.

As the the changelings disappeared from her field of vision, she could've sworn she saw them jump towards her as she descended past the cliff edge. She hadn't fallen for more than half a second before both changelings shot over the side of the cliff, quickly closing the distance to her. She wasn't sure what she actually wanted to happen, whether she wanted to be saved just to be captured and replaced, or if she'd rather die. The choice was made for her as the hybrid changeling grabbed her side, closely followed by the regular one. The hybrid gave her a warm smile, which left her slightly confused, as they gently lifted her back up to the cliff top. They gently set her down at the top and let go of her, much to her surprise. Then the hybrid one started taking off her skin, while the other turned to her.

"Um... hi?"

"Um... hi?" There was no response from the mare. "Hello?" Jason waved a hoof in front of her face. "We just want to talk, then you can go." Still no response, just more nervous shivering. Dash had finished taking off her armor and had made her way over.

"That stuff is like wearing a whole bunch of sweaters, it was terrible." She looked pretty sweaty, he had to say. He turned his attention back to the mare.

"Sooooo...?"

"You, and you, you're those criminals that have posters everywhere. The changeling and Rainbow Dash. I saw a flyer about you two."

"Yup. So what do--"

"Why did you save me? You could've just let me die, a traitor and a murderer, yet you save me. Is this how you treat your victims? You toy with them?"

"No, I never had any victims. They just made that up, along with the charges of stealing love, replacing ponies, and pretty much everything else. It's not like I'm actually guilty of anything."

"How did you survive then? A changeling needs love to survive, so how are you still here if you haven't been sabotaging other ponies' relationships and replacing ponies?"

"Funny how you're questioning the motives of people you think are murderers, assuming that they won't get angry. I'll take that as sign that you don't actually think we're murderers. I don't need to steal love because I have it given to me. I actually built a relationship, so stop assuming that the only way someone would actually want to be around a changeling is if they didn't know they were a changeling. I could be anypony, but she wants to see me like this." The mare looked at Dash, who nodded to back Jason up. "Maybe you should stop assuming that the authorities are always right, and do some of your own research."

The mare was at a loss for words. "Hey Jason, are you okay?" Dash asked, "You didn't get stabbed or anything, right?"

"No. I'll be fine. How about you?"

"Most of the hits were to the armor, so I'm fine too." She turned to the mare. "Are you alright?"

She contemplated answering for a moment. "Yeah, I'll just be going then." She started to limp away. Jason noticed a particularly deep cut on one of her hind legs.

"Hold on a second." Jason said. The mare froze. "Come here." She looked about as scared as when she faced down the manticore when she turned around, but she walked back nonetheless, stopping a few feet in front of Jason. "Stay right there. Don't move." She nodded stiffly, which Jason took as a good of a sign to start as any. As in his previous dabbles in healing, he pushed a huge amount of energy into the mare, watching her face light up as she realized that her injuries were healing. This was nowhere near as taxing as either of the treatments he had given to Dash, but when he was finished he was still fairly fatigued. The constant flow of emotions from Dash was a nice supplement though. "How do you feel now?"

"Like I wasn't chased five miles by a manticore with hideously sharp claws! How'd you do that?" She had seemingly forgotten her fear towards her supposed enemies.

"Healing capabilities. They're pretty taxing." He sat down, and then decidedly resigned to laying on his side in the dirt. "Listen, I don't want to get discovered, so could you come back to where we set up camp, so that we could get some information, then I'll personally take you back to Canterlot?"

She seemed to remember her fear. "Sure. No funny business, right?"

"Why would I heal you if I was just going to hurt you?"

"Fine, but if you even look like you're about to do anything funny, I'm leaving."

"Okay, lets go." He got up and tiredly pointed into the forest, and after a few moments, the mare reluctantly followed behind Jason and Dash as they led the way back towards home base. Jason turned to Dash, a pensive look on his face.

"So you killed that manticore. Nice job going through with it, I wasn't sure if you'd be able to."

"Yeah, well I wasn't sure either, at least not until I remembered your comment. It was you or him, and I just chose the logical one. That really get's rid of any gray area."

"I'm glad to hear that. The first one's always the hardest, although I don't know if this really counts, non-sentient creature and all. Just remember that you did the right thing." He sighed, scuffing a hoof on the ground. "So how are you liking that armor, ignoring the heat and all?"

"It's pretty nice, it doesn't really block my wings much, so that's always good. It's a lot lighter than Canterlot armor."

"And how would you know, Miss Dash?"

"I tried some on. I wanted to see how I would look." She blushed a little. "It was kind of a stupid thing to do."

"Do you have a picture?" She seemed surprised by his question.

"Yeah, why?"

"I just wanted to see how badass you looked. Judging by what I've seen with this armor, probably pretty badass." He looked away from Dash for a moment, missing another flare of her cheeks, and realized that they had arrived directly under their tree. He turned to the mare. "We're here."

"Is this some kind of joke?" He pointed into the tree branches, looking slightly annoyed.

"Oh. So you have to lift me up again, I take it?"

"Yup. Hold on tight." Dash and Jason both put their hooves under one side of her and flew up to their makeshift house, setting her back down.

"This is where you live?" she asked, looking around.

"Considering we left town yesterday, yes." He levitated over an apple. "Food?" She nodded and gratefully took the apple out of the air, immediately taking a bite.

"AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!" Scootaloo had jumped out from behind the pile of blankets, attempting to tackle the invader. Jason caught her in his magical field, sighing.

"Sorry about that, Scootaloo can be a little... energetic."

"Oh, I understand, I have two foals of my own." She paused. "How did you two get a foal anyway?" Her eyes narrowed.

"She followed us out here for some reason." Dash shot her a look. "Isn't that right, Squirt?"

"Yeah, sorry Dash."

"Scoots, she's a guest, not a threat." Jason said, slightly angrily. He set her down, and Scoots stared at the mare, attempting to convey the statement, 'I'm watching you'.

"How long has it been since you've been home?" The off-hand comment caught her by surprise.

She sighed. "I've been lost in these woods for two days, trying to survive on the stuff I could find. If you two hadn't showed up when you did, manticore or not, I would've starved or died of thirst after not too much longer. So thanks for all that you've done for me. If push comes to shove, I'm on your side. You've proved that you're not a ruthless murderer."

"Ruthless murderer? Has a nice ring to it..." He tapped a hoof to his chin.

Dash ignored Jason. "So what's your name?" She asked the mare.

"I'm Stardancer. Never really understood why, but that's what they call me. And your's?"

"Well I'm Rainbow Dash, but I guess you already knew that, and this is Jason."

"Why'd you tell her my name?"

"Why not?"

"No one else knows it! Call me a cynic, but I don't want to release information unless I'm forced to." He turned to Stardancer. "Don't tell anyone our names or our location if you do tell people about us. We could use some good press without the release of extra information, and considering I healed you and there was a mare with a prismatic tail and mane, they'll know it was us."

"Could I tell your names to my family, at least?" She pleaded. "They'll still want to know who it was that saved me." She had finished her apple, and Jason levitated over another one, which she gratefully accepted.

"Fine." He sighed. "So why are you all the way he hell out here anyway?"

"Well, I was with an expedition with some other ponies to find plants that could be of use to ponykind, because nopony seems to grasp the availability of new plant life in the Everfree. Long story short, I was separated from my group two days ago by a hydra, and I've been wandering around here ever since."

"So are you ready to go back home? I can take you there, safe and sound."

"Sure. Thanks again for all the help!" She waved to Dash and Scoots, and turned around to see a red maned, grey pegasus pony.

"Let's go then." He wrapped his hooves as best he could around her torso, and took off a little above the platform to test before flying into the forest proper, sending a wave back to Dash.

Jason flew over the cliff and descended quickly. "Where is your house?"

"It's over there, near that clock tower." She shouted over the noise of the wind rushing by. He navigated over to the general zone that she had pointed out, letting her off on a particularly un-crowded street, then turned to take off. "Wait!" He turned back around, confused.

"What?" She seemed at a brief loss for words.

"Well, my house is right there, and if it wouldn't be too much trouble, I'd like it if I could introduce you to my family." She closed her eyes for the last few words, saying them considerably faster.

"Right here, huh? I hope I don't regret this, because this is kinda stupid, but sure." He couldn't help but feel that this was going to backfire somehow. He followed Star up to her door, where she knocked quietly. No one came to the door until the third set of knocks, when a disheveled looking stallion pegasus with a red coat and light green mane opened the door.

"Hello?" He noticed Stardancer "Star! You're back!" he enveloped her into a tight hug, sniffling a little. "I thought that you were gone for good."

"I could never stay away, Sky." The stallion turned to Jason.

"I assume you were the one that saved my wife from her latest nature crusade?"

"Yeah. Name's Jason." He stuck out a hoof, which the stallion quickly shook.

"Come on in! It'd be nice to hear the odyssey of a story which brought my wife back from the Everfree." He gave her a brief glare, then hustled Jason inside and sat them down in some rather uncomfortable chairs. "So then, let's hear it!" There was a rather uncomfortable silence while Jason tried to figure out a plausible reason a pony would have to be in the Everfree, and shared a few glances with Star.

"Maybe you should show him?"

"And why would I do that?"

"Because you can't explain otherwise."

"Why'd you get me into this situation?" He sighed. Star's husband was looking between them, trying to figure out what was happening, and seeming to come up blank. "How're you gonna make sure he doesn't freak out?"

"Honey, don't freak out."

"Good plan. Seriously though, don't." The stallion nodded. "This is so stupid..." Jason muttered before dropping his disguise. He looked up at the stallion, who had his jaw hanging open in a somewhat comedic fashion. He grabbed his wife and pulled her behind him.

"Dear, that's a changeling, they're extremely dangerous. Get behind me while I take care of this." The pegasus started to walk towards Jason, but stopped when Jason put a shield around himself.

Jason looked at Star. "I told you."

"Listen to me Shy, he and his friend healed me, gave me food, saved me from a manticore... He's not like the rest of the changelings, dear."

"That's what he wants you to think. How do I know you're not an impostor, Star?"

"Ask me any question from when we met."

"What happened on our first date?" He asked, prompting a smirk from her.

"You mean before or after you hit yourself in the face with a hoe?" He looked dumbfounded.

"So if you're Star, then you must be telling the truth, and that means that... you did all that good stuff, so you're not evil." He shot an apologetic glance at Jason, and slumped back into his chair.

"Well it's about time someone sees me as not evil besides Dash..."

"Did you say Dash? As in Rainbow Dash? If she's with you, then you're that rogue changeling on all these flyers I've been seeing! Explain that!" His gaze hardened again.

"Fair enough, the princess gave me my charges, and all of them are wrong, besides resisting arrest. I was accused of murdering two ponies and replacing them, but both of those ponies were made up, and you could even check birth certificates if you wanted to. I was also accused of stealing love, and that never happened, I was just given the love of Dash, who is fully aware that I'm a changeling. Does that explain everything?"

"I guess so..."

"Did you see the sign hanging over town?"

"The one about a griffin attack? That's hilarious, ponies have been laughing at it all day."

"That's not a joke." The stallion's face fell. "I put that there because there's a high chance that there will be a griffin attack. If I were you, I would prepare just in case."

"But the griffins haven't attacked anywhere in nearly a fifty years! Why would they decide to attack now?"

"They want to follow up the Changeling attack, because they think you're weak. The same thing has happened with the rest of the countries they conquered." He looked at a clock on the wall. "Now if you excuse me, I have to return to the woods, Dash is probably wondering what happened to me." Sky remained deep in thought, but finally raised his face, bidding Jason a final thanks and goodbye.

"Thanks for everything. If I can find a way to repay you I will. The last thing I would've expected at my door today was my wife and a changeling giving me news of an impending attack."

"Well I guess I'm one of a kind." They both chuckled. "See ya around." The stallion waved again, and Jason re-formed his disguise as he walked out the door. That was definitely not what he had expected. Oh, wait, it was almost exactly what he expected, minus the accepting stallion. Well, accepting is a relative term, but he had thought he was going to be more hostile to him. Oh well, why shouldn't something go smoothly once in a while? Jason took off, making his way back across the city towards the cliffs before he noticed the same square that he had been in yesterday. He decided to see if there was a paper about the sign, and swooped down.

He landed quietly, not like he had any choice, and made his was over to the board. New flyers for his and Dash's arrest were hung up, unsurprisingly, but a paper with a picture of Jason's cloud words was on the front page, with the caption: "Canterlot Cloud Sign: Prank or Premonition?" A few other papers just passed it off as just a joke, so Jason figured it was safe to assume that the Canterlot ponies had not taken the sign seriously. Shocker.

A few ponies walked by, saying something about the complete lack of validity that the sign possessed, as if on cue. He sighed, he had tried. If they weren't going to listen, it wasn't his problem anymore. Maybe the princess or the guards had actually taken heed, or at least partially prepared. He shook his head and took off again, quickly ascending to the cliff's edge, and passed over the Manticore's corpse, flying straight towards the platform. He landed quietly and dropped the disguise, looking around for Dash and Scoots. Dash was passed out on the bed, and Scoots was curled up in the chair, eating an apple.

"Hey Jason! How'd it go?"

"Fine Scoots. What happened to Dash?" He gestured.

"She gave me another flying lesson, and then said something about an afternoon nap, and fell asleep over there."

"I think I might join her. All the stuff from the last few days was tiring to say the least." He paused. "If I fall asleep Scoots, do NOT do anything that involves you making inordinate amounts of noise or leaving the platform in any way. That means no flying." She looked disappointed, which didn't surprise him. He levitated the guitar over, putting the strap around her neck. "Here, experiment with this." She looked back up at him, overjoyed.

"You're going to let me play it?" She looked at the instrument in disbelief. It looked much too big for her. It was kinda cute.

"So just depress a string or a few strings with this hoof," He moved her left hoof over to some of the strings and pushed them onto one of the frets. "Then, while you're holding those down, you strum." He moved her other hoof across the strings, creating a slightly off tune chord. "Or you can strum only one string." He paused to strum only one of the strings. "I'll leave you to it, Scoots. Don't strum too hard, I don't know if I can replace those strings." She nodded and went back to her off tune strumming.

Jason shifted into Alternis and finally allowed himself to lay down on the bed and rest. He curled a hoof around Dash, pulling her a little closer to himself. The movement awoke her, and she opened an eye to find out what had awoken her. She saw Jason and smiled, reaching her hooves around his back and pulling him closer before resting her head on his shoulder and sighing contentedly. Jason smiled, life was good.

Twilight woke up from her slumber in her treehouse library bed to the sound of chirping birds and light wind, in a generally peaceful environment, which clashed sharply with the thunder inside her head.

She had yet to visit Dash's house. Circumstances had prevented any immediate investigative measures, such as the huge amount of paper that had to be filled out, and her insistence at being the one to visit. The search warrant she had forced to fill out had left her without any hope of catching up if Dash was responsible, and the other pile of paperwork that she had to fill out to put up the posters had already wasted several hours of the day. Then, she had to meet with the princess and explain the status of the operation, then fill out more paperwork. She was right on track to leaving in the early afternoon until she fell asleep in the middle of one of the forms, and awoke just before dusk. Needless to say, she had freaked out a little before she realized, in a surprising moment of clarity despite her fatigue, that the best she could do was catch the last train to Ponyville and stay the night. So she informed the princess of her leave and took off.

During the night, she had studied up on her teleportation and cloudwalking spells, so at least she was ready to go whenever she wanted. Knowing Twilight, that was bound to be as soon as possible. She un-excitedly jumped out of bed, grabbing a quill, some ink, and paper in case she had to take notes, and she just knew that she would. She cast the cloudwalking spell and took a brief moment to wipe her brow. She walked out the door, not bothering to wake Spike. She looked around for Dash's house, and found it had drifted to the side of Ponyville. She took a deep breath, then concentrated on teleporting, hearing the characteristic pop and whoosh before appearing in Dash's front yard. She sighed, silently hoping that Dash was not the culprit. She knocked on the door to the best of her ability, cloud door and all, before just pushing it open. Looking around, she couldn't see anypony. She trotted past the kitchen table, which was covered in small scraps of fabric. She put the small pieces in a small container labeled 'evidence', which she placed in her saddlebag. She sighed. It looked like she had been right about Dash, bringing on a flurry of conflicting emotions. Would she be able to apprehend Dash? Would she be able to resolutely stay on Celestia's side? She reflexively said yes, but there was a bit of doubt that had never been there before when she thought of her loyalty to the Princess. It scared her a little, and brought her back to her previous thoughts about Dash's motives.

What was different about this time? Why did Dash stay loyal in every other situation, just to turn when everypony least expected? The only other time she abandoned her friends was when they had fought Discord, but attempting to pin this on Discord seemed a lot like clutching at straws. She must have had some sort of reason, then. That idea jogged her thoughts.

What if there was a good reason? What if she had been being loyal, and this changeling was much more than any of them knew? It could make sense, healing Dash, not outright hurting ponies. Well there was that one time, but apparently he was provoked. He hadn't replaced Dash as far as any of them knew. So maybe he wasn't dangerous.

That seemed doubtful. He had managed to instill a large amount of fear into Ponyville, twice, along with part of Canterlot. The idea that he was benign seemed a little ridiculous. Then again, the fear from the attack and her hatred towards changelings hadn't exactly helped his relations. Of course, she had no way of finding them, threat to Equestria or not, with the Changeling magic reducing tracking spells of themselves and those in the near vicinity to useless.

She sighed. The more she thought about it, the more questions she created for herself. She closed up another bottle of evidence, this time some tiny amounts of grey powder.

Her friends were definitely not taking this whole scenario very well. They had managed to return to Ponyville a day earlier than she had, but from what she knew, none of them had been doing very well. She sighed again, having run through the entire house and come no closer to knowing motives or direction, although she did at least know with almost total certainty that Dash was involved in the escape with the Changeling. At least they had a prime suspect.

Maybe she could look around the town, that could yield some answers, or at least further information, like when she had met up with Cherilee after the changeling's first appearance. She thought back to his capture, and what little information they had gotten from him. Assuming that everything he said was truth, which was tedious at best, he wasn't part of the hive, and therefore had the possibility of beneficial motives. She could feel herself going in circles.

Why wasn't he part of the hive mind, then? Why was he the one known changeling with no ties to Crysalis? From what he said, he had not been born of her hive either, which brought up even more questions. She pondered whether or not she was ever going to get an answer, before she remembered about her plans with the citizens of Ponyville, and disappeared in a flash of light.

She re-appeared in the middle of a particularly unoccupied part of the market square, drawing a few confused looks. Twilight looked around, trying to figure out who she could actually get information from. The Changeling was definitely keeping his cards close to his chest, but whether that was intentional or not had yet to be discovered. A small newspaper stand caught her attention, and she trotted over, hoping that someone had encountered the changeling or released some sort of intelligence report. Taking a look at the front page, she was shocked to see a picture of huge writing, in clouds, with the message "Griffin Attack Imminent." Once she pushed her Jaw back to where it was supposed to be and got the gears in her head turning again, she immediately tried to figure out if the changeling itself had any ties to the message.

Assuming it did, she thought, then why would it write the massage anyway? Was it just trying to create more chaos, or was he legitimately trying to warn them? He did make that statement about Celestia being 'militarily retarded'. That had to mean something. Whatever the motive, she liked to think she knew how Canterlot ponies acted, and figured they would probably try to pass the sign off as a joke.

If it wasn't the changeling, though, who could it be? Her mind came up blank. It had to be a changeling or a pegasus pony, because those were the only known species who could actually control the weather, not that that really narrowed her search. She would have to send a letter to the Princess regarding these new developments.

"Are ya gunna buy sumptin' or are ya gunna jus' stand there?" The grey earth pony behind the newspaper stand asked gruffly, startling her out of her thoughts.

"Sure, I'll take one." She sighed, pulling out a few bits and handing them to the vendor. "Do you know anypony that had contact with the changeling before he was captured, by any chance?"

"I think that I heard that he played some sorta' in-stru-ment at that there restaurant over yonder." He pointed with a hoof. "You part of the investigation team?"

"I am the investigation team right now, actually."

"Well good luck then." He waved her away as another pony came up to his stand. Twilight walked into the restaurant, attempting to figure out what would take the changeling here. It was a fairly fancy restaurant, and she was slightly surprised that the changeling could even play an instrument. Changelings were usually terrible at music, it seemed, although a lot of ponies were terrible at music, so that didn't exactly aid discovery.

"Can I help you?" Twilight was jostled out of her thoughts again by a mare employee just inside the restaurant. She really had to stop zoning out like this. "Table for one?" Twilight shook her head.

"I'm investigating the changeling that was discovered here a few days ago, and I understand that he played here just before his eventual capture?"

"I believe so ma'am. Would you like to speak to the manager?" Twilight nodded again, and was then taken past numerous tables and a stage by the waitress, arriving at a heavy looking wooden door. "Here we are, dear. Just walk on in." She followed the mare's advice and entered, immediately catching the sight of the pony that she assumed was the manager.

"Here to interview me already, are you? About the changeling, I take it?"

"Yeah, I'll try not to take too much of your time."

"Oh, it's fine, I'm always willing to help a pony in need."

"Glad you want to help. I guess my first question is, why was the changeling even here?"

"You didn't hear it?" She shook her head. "Well he was in that cloud house up there, and then there was just this music that I've never heard before, that just started drifting down. It was like nothing I've ever heard before. Anyway, the pony stops after a few songs, and flies down, and pretty much everypony was staring at him at that point, so I figure, why not make some nice money offa' this? So anyway, I cut a deal with him, Alternis was his name I think? Anyway he played some more of that weird music, brilliant stuff though, and then this foal comes up to him with tears all over and says something, and he stopped the show. He ran off after I paid him and I haven't seen him since."

"Who was this foal?"

"I dunno, some orange and purple pegasus filly." He noticed the expression of realization on her face. "Know her?"

"I think so, although I'm surprised she had any relations with him." She wasn't sure what to feel. On the one hand hoof, she was glad that she actually had a lead, but on the other hoof, she was scared that Scootaloo had ended up in the middle of something, and could be beyond help by now. "Thanks for all of your help," She quickly said before hurriedly exiting the restaurant, much to the surprise of the owner.

This brought in a whole new level of complexity to the situation with yet another innocent involved. The only difference was that this one was in immediate danger. She hurriedly made her way through town, quickly realizing that she didn't know where she was going. Where did Scootaloo's parents live anyway? She noticed Carousel Boutique across the street and decided to pay Rarity a visit. At the very least, maybe Sweetie Belle would know where Scoots had gotten off to.

She knocked on the door a few times before it was opened to the slightly disheveled face of Rarity. Slightly disheveled for Rarity was the equivalent of corpse status for everyone else. Her face lifted slightly. "Oh, hello dear, what brings you by today?"

"I'm trying to figure out information about the changeling, and where he may have gone."

"Any info on Dash?"

"I'm afraid nothing good. I just know that she almost definitely was the changeling's accomplice." Rarity's face fell.

"Well come on in, dear, I can try to tell you anything I know."

"Actually, I need to talk to Sweetie Belle. She may know where Scootaloo is, and she apparently had contact with the changeling." Her statement prompted a severe eye widening from Rarity.

"I sure hope she hasn't gotten into anything dire," she sighed. "SWEETIE BELLE!!!" There was a mumbled response from the other room and a few crashes before Sweetie entered. "Dare I ask what just happened?" Twilight interrupted her.

"So, Sweetie, have you seen Scootaloo recently?"

She scuffed a hoof along the floor. "I haven't seen her since before all this stuff happened. You don't think anything happened to her, do you?"

"I'm not completely sure," She said in as much of a comforting voice as she could. "Do you know where she lives though?"

Another hoof scuff. "Nopony does, she just disappears after we're done crusading. We never have sleep-overs at her house. Applebloom asked about it once, but Scoots refused to answer." Twilight turned to Rarity, who nodded.

"How could nopony know where she lives?!?! For all we know she's gone! She could've been taken by the changeling!!!"

"Darling, that seems like an over-reaction. Why don't you just go to the town hall and find her birth certificate." Twilight nodded, and slowly left Rarity's boutique.

The door flew open, leaving a fuming Twilight silhouetted against the outside light. Rarity didn't seem to pick up on her anger.

"Did you find her house, dear?" she said, not looking up from her work.

"No!! Do you want to know why I couldn't find her house?" Rarity looked up and flinched, realizing the rage Twilight had on her face.

She managed to stammer out: "W-why dear?"

"Because it doesn't exist! She lived at the orphanage until a few months ago! You haven't seen her parents because they've been dead for as long as Scootaloo has been alive! How could none of you care enough to find that out!?!?" Rarity had gone pale. She decided that it was a good thing that Sweetie wasn't there.

"But Darling, how has she survived out there all alone?"

"Beats me, but no foal deserves to have that happen to them. And we let it go on for this long." She deflated slightly. "And now we don't even know where she is. She went missing at the same time the changeling was escaping."

"So you're saying she could've been foal-napped?"

"She could have run off or something else also, but her disappearing at the same time as the changeling seems like too much of a coincidence." She sighed. "Every single time I figure out something new about this, more questions arise. I just hope Scootaloo's alright, wherever she is."

"For her sake, Darling, I hope you're right."

Dash awoke first, feeling fairly refreshed from her light nap. She opened her eyes to see Jason passed out in a mildly comedic fashion. She heard some strange, off tune notes, but couldn't even begin to figure out what was making the noises. She shook Jason a few times, managing to wake him up after the third set of shakes. His eyes fluttered open, and he dawned a smile.

"Did you sleep--" Jason pulled her towards him, planting a kiss on her lips. She briefly struggled, confused at his sudden advancement, before melting into the kiss herself. They managed to pull back apart before Scoots decided to climb over the wall of blankets to investigate any weird noises, and smiled goofily at each other. Dash pulled herself into Jason's shoulder, making a thoughtful hum. A few moments of silence later, he spoke up.

"So, do I constitute being your colt-friend now?"

"Only if I get to be your mare-friend." she mumbled into his fur.

"Ohh, you drive a hard bargain. How do I know you're not trying to cheat me?" He ruffled her mane. She punched him in the shoulder. "Hey, I don't mean it. If anyone's being cheated, it's probably you."

"Only a little." She chuckled. "So what will we do when this is all over?"

"As in us?" he gestured between the two of them.

"Yeah, I mean I don't know how to really follow up all this stuff in the forest without all this becoming boring. It's not like this will ever be a normal relationship."

"Normal is boring."

"Yeah, I guess you're right about that."

"We could always start a band." She pulled herself away to give him a quizzical expression.

"And how would that work?"

"All I need is a drummer and probably a bass player, if that instrument exists here."

"I guess I could help you out with drumming, I used to play the drums before I left Cloudsdale, then I guess I just didn't have time for it anymore." She sighed. "So anyway, if I'm not too rusty, I could do that." They both became silent.

"So how would you feel about taking a short reprieve from normal Everfree life?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well everyone around here is starting to smell a little ripe, and I noticed a little pond on the way here. That could be a nice thing to do with part of a day."

"Sounds like a good break." Another off tune strum. "What the hell is that?"

"I let Scoots use my guitar so she wouldn't be as tempted to try flying or making noise or any of the other stuff she usually does." He looked around. "I think it worked."

"Are you guys talking about me?" Scoots asked.

"Yeah," Jason replied. We were just expressing our surprise over the fact that the treehouse didn't burn down while we were asleep."

"I love the faith you guys have in me."

"She's taking after my sarcasm! I love it." He turned to Dash, and poked her in the chest.. "And you said I wouldn't be a good influence." She chuckled. "Hey Scoots, how would you feel about going to a pond and swimming around in a little bit?"

"Sounds good to me!"

"Well I guess we should get up then." He sighed.

"Yeah, you're probably right." They both got out of the bed and stretched.

"I didn't ever take naps before, but man that was refreshing. I can see why you used to do that all the time."

"That and it was a good way to pass the time. When you get finished with all of your weather duties for the day in ten minutes you tend to have extra time." She paused. "Not like it took me ten whole minutes anyway..."

"So what should we bring for this do you think?"

"We might as well bring some explosives in case of emergency, and some food, and I guess that's it."

"Bring a saddlebag with the knives and gillie suit, just in case. The armor's too heavy, so we can leave that." He leaned closer to Dash. "So what's the situation with Scoots and flying?" He whispered.

"She's still a little wobbly, and gets tired pretty quick, but she's definitely improving."

"That's good to hear." He turned to Scootaloo. "Hey Scoots, you ready to go?" She nodded excitedly and set down the guitar, trotting over to Jason.

"Can I fly there? Can I? Please?" Jason looked to Dash, who shrugged.

"If you can stay above us, in a position where we can catch you, then fine." Scoots danced around a little. It was definitely one of those 'D'aww' moments.

"I'm ready to go when you are," said Dash as she handed Jason the newly filled saddlebag.

"Okay then. Remember Scoots, above us." They all took off, and glided down from the tree. They flew above the path until Jason took a sudden turn over some underbrush and into a clearing that hosted a small pond. He admired the beauty for a moment before hearing Dash and Scoots land, and turning to face them. "So how's that for a nice place to hang out?"

"Well it's definitely something." Dash replied, equally entranced by the clearing's majesty. Jason walked to the shore and took off his saddlebag, which he opened to grab some apples.

"Catch!" He threw an apple to both of them, which they gladly accepted. There they sat for a while, enjoying the food and the view. "So everyone knows how to swim here?" They both nodded. "Good, because I've never swam with this," he gestured to himself, "before. I'd probably be even less able if I was in changeling form, holes in hooves and all." He paused. "Anyway, if I sink, someone save me. I can at least hold my breath for a pretty long time."

"You're always so positive."

"I like to think of it as realistic." There was silence for a few more seconds, before Scoots ran up to the placid waterline and dipped a hoof in.

"This isn't even that cold! I thought it would be, but this is actually pretty warm." Without another word, she dove into the water, and surfaced a few moments later. "Water's great guys, come on in!" Jason nodded and walked up to the waterline, missing Dash's mischievous smile. He put a hoof into the water, shifting it around. Then he was shoved forcibly into the water, face-planting into the shallow bottom.

He came up a few moments later with a layer of silt on his face and shoulders, his expression covered by the muck. Dash was rolling around on the ground laughing.

"Y-you look like Rarity after one of her stupid mud baths!" She broke down into more laughing. Jason smirked, although his expression was still concealed under the mud mask. He walked over to her.

"How about a hug for such a good prank?" Her laughing immediately stopped, and she tried to get to her feet and flee. Jason, however, had already gotten his forehooves around her torso, and kept her from running while he buried his face in her chest and smeared the dirt off his face.

"AAAAAHHHHHH get away!" Scootaloo was giving the pair a strange look from out in the pond.

"I'm just congratulating you, I know how much you love attention." He chuckled when she blushed. "Now come on, let's jump in this pond already." With that he took off and flew above the middle of the pond before bringing his wings to his sides and dropping out of the sky. "Cannonball!!" He hit the water next to Scoots and sent her floating away on one of the waves. He surfaced a few seconds later with a groan. "Fur doesn't help. It still stings." He paused. "At least I float." He looked around for Dash, although she was no longer on the shoreline, as far as he could see.

A blur crashed into the water in front of Jason, causing him to let out a very unmanly scream and recoil, hooves in front of his face. Then he realized that Dash was the one who had crashed, and immediately felt embarrassed. Dash surfaced in front of him and smiled. "Looks like I scared you," she said, noticing Jason's heavier than normal breathing and blush. "Ha."

"Oh, live it up, I'm going to get back at you later."

"We'll see about that." She laughed maniacally. Jason turned his eyes red, and she jumped at his now malevolent appearance.

"I think the odds are in my favor." He chuckled, bringing his eyes back to their normal blue.

For the next few hours, they swam around playing various games, and generally had a good time through the afternoon hours. As the sun sank lower towards the horizon, Jason decided that they had to leave, much to the distress of Dash and Scoots.

"But Jason, Can't we just stay a few more minutes?"

"No, Scoots, the sun is about to set, and I don't think that you really want to try to get to the treehouse in the dark." She sighed and nodded, pulling herself out of the pond and attempting to shake her fur dry. All three of them were shivering; it definitely wasn't as warm out as it was that afternoon. "Cold?" Asked Jason. They both nodded. "Stand near me." They obliged and he rapidly heated up the normally heatless green fire, leaving them mostly dry.

"That whole hot fire thing, can all changelings do that?" Dash asked.

"Probably, but I don't know if they would have thought to." He looked at the sun, which had sunk lower. "We should get going." He grabbed the saddlebag and flung it over his back, along with the belt of explosives. Dash did the same and nodded, and all three took off.

Retracing their steps, they soon reached the treehouse, and at the request of Scoots, landed at the base of the tree. "Do you think that maybe one of you could carry me up?" She scuffed a hoof on the ground, refusing to meet their eyes out of embarrassment.

"Tired Squirt?" She nodded, not raising her eyes. "Don't worry about it Scoots, I'm just happy that you asked and didn't try to make it on your own if you weren't sure that you could do it. Hop on." Scootaloo looked up and smiled, before resuming her normal energetic behavior and jumping onto Dash's back.

After they landed on the platform, Scoots dismounted and they took off their supplies. Scoots made a bee-line for the couch and slumped down on it. She was apparently more tired then he had thought. Dash did mostly the same thing with the bed, while Jason stayed up to attempt to knock off more of the portions of armor that was itchy. After a few attempts, he knocked off the armor on his back legs and shoulders, which was most of what was left, besides his head and neck. He stashed the armor to the side and made his way over to the bed. He laid down and threw a hoof around Dash, pulling a blanket over the two of them. She looked at him for a moment before leaning forward and kissing him. This kiss was much more forceful than the last one, although it still left much to be desired. They eventually broke apart and continued to stare at one another.

"I don't know what I'd do without you, Jason." Dash said softly.

"Same here Dash." And so, with nothing else to say, they drifted off to sleep in each other's arms.

Jason awoke to the smell of smoke, and the absence of seemingly all of the normal wildlife noises. It too him a while to gather his thoughts enough to decide whatever it was, it could't be good. Briefly looking at the sun, he judged that it was at least ten in the morning. He woke Dash, who noticed the smell immediately, and they both vaulted out of the treehouse to try and find the source. Looking around, they could't see a hint of fire in the forest, and so, deciding that their treehouse was safe from immediate harm, started flying down the path to the cliffs. They both peered over, to see a city that had been half reduced to rubble and embers. There were forms moving everywhere, some flying into the city, others seeming to flee, while the city continued to burn.

"Well I can't say I didn't see this coming."

"So how are we supposed to help with that?" Dash asked, gesturing to the burning city. Jason shrugged.

"I guess we better get suited up, because whatever we do, it isn't going to be easy." He turned and took off, heading back towards the treehouse, with Dash just behind him. They made the trip quickly, finding that Scoots had awoken while they were away. Jason landed and started to pack up everything that he perceived they would ever need in the coming battle, while Dash made her way over to Scoots.

"Hey there Squirt, I'm guessing you noticed the smoke?" She nodded. "Okay, well that's Canterlot burning. The griffins attacked, just like Jason thought they would. So far it looks like their invasion is going a lot better than the other one did with the changelings." She paused. "So here's the deal, Scoots, stay here and don't make noise until one of us comes back to get you. You should be safe here, there's enough food and water to last a few weeks. We're going to go into the city and see what we can do." Jason walked back over and started putting the armor on Dash.

"She's right Scoots, these griffins aren't going to be nice if they take you prisoner. There's going to be a few knives left, so use those if you're discovered, or fly off towards Ponyville. You should be fine though." He was surprised at the ease that Scoots listened to and understood them without her confidence or resolve seeming to waver. He made a mental note to ask her what she had had to go through all those days alone, if she was taking this in stride. Scootaloo made a sniffling noise.

"Just come back, okay?" she said through tears.

"Wouldn't have it any other way, kiddo." Jason said back.

He tied off the last part of Dash's armor, and stood back to admire his work. Deciding he had wasted enough time, he fitted the explosives belt to Dash while she did the same to him, and tied the knives to her hooves. As an afterthought, he threw a particularly grimy saddlebag over his back and threw in a few rations. "You ready?" he asked Dash.

"Ready as I'll ever be I guess."

"Okay then, here's our M.O."

"Our what?"

"Basically our operational procedure, our strategy." He paused. "We only have close-quarters weapons, so we're going to stick to buildings that are still standing. Stay in the shadows and around corners until they get close. With the black armor, that shouldn't be too hard, although we should see if we can find something to cover your head." He looked around for a makeshift head covering, and grabbed one of the blankets on impulse, quickly tearing a large strip from it, and wrapping it around Dash's head. "That'll do for now. I'm really glad it's cold out today, considering all you're wearing."

"I feel pretty badass right now, I have to say. Probably about twenty percent cooler." She chuckled.

"If we replace that head-covering with an actual helmet, you'd be right." He sighed. "Now here's the deal. When we're out there, I can't say for sure that you won't have to kill a griffin. In fact, you probably will have to. There's no easy way to take a life, so think of it as a necessary evil; you're killing them to save ponies. They're the enemy, it's you or them." he paused." You can't think about whether or not you should kill them. Hesitation will get you killed. Last thing, remember that these are soldiers that are paid to kill things, you can't reason with them, you can't give them mercy. God knows they won't show you any."

"Well that was a nice, feel-good speech." Dash said dryly. "Let's just get in and out of this, and get back to how things used to be."

"They may never go back after today. Don't forget that." And with those words of wisdom, Jason took off, quickly heading for the cliffs. No words were shared; there was nothing left to be said. Jason landed and peered over the cliff. Not much had changed about the previous scene. He turned to Dash. "Stay close to the mountain as we drop, and land behind cover." He turned away and threw up. "Sorry, adrenaline. Let's go."

They jumped over the cliff and dropped like a pair of stones, unnoticed by the battle raging far below. It was a long drop, giving the both of them a fair amount of time to think in this specific calm before the storm. Jason's mind was swirling with repressed emotions. It was easy to imagine how he would act under the pressure of war, but impossible to easily put those thoughts into action. Sure, he had killed three men. That didn't make it any easier to kill, even if they weren't human anymore. What really disturbed him was how Dash was dealing with this. She had no experience with war or killing besides the changeling attack, and she was never in much danger there, as far as he knew. It helped that changelings were seen as monsters, animals, almost. But now, these were griffins, they had free will, they were intelligent life. He didn't think she would choke, but he worried about how she would hold up later, if she were to develop post traumatic stress disorder.

The ground arrived before he had finished thinking, and they landed behind a pile of rubble, taking a moment to catch their breath. Jason stepped over the body of a Royal Guard and stopped, putting a hoof to his neck. He was alive! He got Dash's attention and pointed to the guard, nodding his head. He dragged the guard through a nearby doorway, propping him up against a wall. Jason looked around, not catching sight of anyone new.

"Dash, he looks fine, just knocked out." Jason took off the guard's helmet, tossing it to Dash. "Take that, then help me hide this guy. We don't have time to wait for him to wake up. They overturned a table and pushed it up against the corner where the guard was still slumped.

"Why can't we do more?" She asked, attempting to rouse the guard.

"The more time we wait, the fewer ponies we can save. We've done all we can, and this part of the city looks pretty quiet." He sighed. "Welcome to war." Without another word, he exited the building and started carefully moving down the street, sticking to the shadows on one side of the street. The white noise that they had previously heard distinguished itself into screams and yells, clashes of metal, crumbling bricks and crackling wood. Jason ducked into a doorway. They were getting close to the city center.

A board in the ceiling creaked, and they both stopped dead. The board creaked again, and Jason pointed towards the stairs, and started to move towards them. He flew over the stairs instead of manually climbing them, creating a low buzzing noise with his wings. Dash followed him and landed silently as they continued to search the house. Jason pushed a door open slightly and ducked backwards. He mouthed the word 'one' to Dash, and they readied themselves behind the door, planning to change in and eliminate the threat before there was any hope of raising an alarm.

Jason counted to three under his breath, and then shoved the door open, revealing a rather surprised griffin. Dash beat Jason to the attack and tipped the Griffin over backwards, pinning him to the ground with a hoof to the face and left arm. Jason held the other one down, and ran one of his blades across the Griffin's throat.

The griffin continued to briefly struggle before going limp, choking on his own blood. Dash pulled herself away, trying to wipe some of the gore off her hooves, to no avail. There was another creak, causing them both to turn to another door. They employed the same tactic as before, and burst into the next room, which was empty.

"Where is the griffin?" Dash whispered.

"I don't know, this is the only other upstairs room." There was a sneeze, and they both turned to look at a large wardrobe.

"A griffin couldn't fit in there."

"You're right, it must be some ponies." He carefully walked over to the wardrobe. "We mean you no harm, we killed the griffin, you're safe for now." He swung open one of the doors to find a couple of scared and disheveled ponies. Too late he remembered how he must look to ponies, knives and blood on his hooves, besides the fact that he was a changeling. The mare of the two opened her mouth to scream, which Jason quickly covered with a hoof. "Are you trying to alert more griffins? We're trying to help, if you'll let us." He paused. "Can I take my hoof away now?" She nodded, and he took it away, still expecting her to scream. The other pony, a stallion, gave her a look and a reassuring hoof on the shoulder, and she seemed to calm down a little. The stallion narrowed his eyes.

"Why are you here? You're those ponies on those flyers that are all over town. Apparently you've definitely made a name for yourselves."

"Yeah, but we didn't do any of the stuff on the flyer, and if you want to get out of this, I suggest you believe me." He turned around. "Dash, what are we going to do with these guys?"

She looked to them. "How is evacuation proceeding?"

"The last message we had on the subject was that the final takeoff zone was captured by the griffins a little over an hour ago, which leaves the only evacuation zone as the caves under Canterlot."

"And how, may I ask, do you get there?"

"The old sewers. They haven't been in use for ages, so they were converted to escape routes a long time ago. Everypony thought that was stupid at the time."

"So where's the closest one?"

"Across the street there's a small maintenance shed, that's where the old entrance is."

"Alright, stay behind us. We'll get you there." The two ponies got up, and they quietly exited the house, making their way onto the street. The battle noise had gotten more distant, although Jason was unsure whether that was a good thing. They trotted across the street, prying open the old, rusty door and pushing the ponies inside.

"Aren't you coming with us?" the mare asked.

"No. We still have a job to do." And with that, Jason closed the door on the ponies and ran off with Dash.

It had been almost an hour since they had left the two ponies at the escape hatch. Almost an hour of sneaking through the streets attempting to get closer to the castle and the remaining guard and leadership. It was probably a stupid idea, but Jason wanted to at least try to halt the continual advance of the griffins, who had by now occupied most of the city, besides the area around the castle. They had just made their way across some roofs, and crossed some of the lines. Things didn't look good, especially with the number of royal guard bodies they had passed over.

At least they had managed to save another five ponies in situations that were much like their first encounter. Not all of them were in inevitable danger, but they had taken the time nonetheless. Their griffin kill count had risen to eleven, all of them taken in house to house, close-quarters combat.

Neither Dash nor Jason were looking particularly well, covered in a mixture of dirt and blood. Some of Jason's chitin was cracked in various places, luckily nothing serious. Dash had a close call with a spear, but that had been deflected by her quick thinking and some of his chitin armor.

"How much further to the castle?" Dash whispered, panting.

"It can't possibly be... that much further." He took a breath. "We've been moving straight towards it for twenty minutes now, it's got to be close." They both jumped to another roof.

"What are we going to do when we get there?"

"I don't know, really, but it's better than not having a goal." They both jumped off the roof and glided to the ground, crossing through a small house and onto another street. Jason's Jaw dropped as he looked at the castle that rose out of the ground in front of them. It was huge to say the least, built without a single flaw, it seemed. He was quickly jolted from his reverie by the crash of glass from another part of the castle. One of the rooms had just lost part of it's window, in this case a large stained glass work. Jason nudged Dash, and they both took off, careful not to attract much attention. They navigated into a good viewing position, attempting to see through the now broken window. There were several royal guards, facing down several more griffins.

"We have to help them." Jason stated matter-of-factly.

"That's more griffins then we've ever faced before!"

"But if we get there quickly, we can save some of those guards, and they can help us fight off the rest of the griffins."

"It's a good thing I like you enough to go along with this stupid plan."

"Just take one out on landing and we'll be fine." She nodded, sighing, as they both took off and aimed for one of the griffins inside.

Jason started first, having immediately picked his target, followed by Dash. He flew towards one of the unbroken windows, speeding up as much as he could in the short span of space. He swirled the green fire around himself, hoping that somehow it would allow him to negate some of the damage.

CRASH!!

The window blew into a million shards as Jason barreled into two of the griffins, slamming them into the opposite wall. Another griffin was taken out only a second later by Dash, who had logically navigated through the already broken window. She stabbed the griffin she had slammed into as Jason turned back to the the two he had hit, one of which was knocked out, the other trying to get to it's feet. Jason sprang forward and stabbed it in the upper chest, in a gap in it's armor, before it had time to react and turned back to the main skirmish. A royal guard fell, followed shortly by a griffin. A griffin tried to impale a downed royal guard, only to be pushed off by Jason and killed by another royal guard. The last two griffins were killed by the remaining royal guards in short order.

The remaining guards turned around, bloodied and bruised, to the changeling and convict that had helped them, most with confused looks on their faces. Jason turned to see Celestia walk into the room, a little more armored then just her normal hoof armor, and cringe at the smell and blood before she saw Jason and Dash. Jason walked towards her.

"Well Celestia! Isn't this a nice twist of fate?"

"What are you doing here, changeling? Don't you have more ponies to kill?" The princess spat. Dash flung off her helmet before Jason could respond, hearing it collide with something across the room. The princess gasped, then narrowed her eyes. "Rainbow Dash, were you and your ally the ones to bring the griffins here? Is that why so many of my little ponies have died today?" Dash spoke up.

"No!!" The princess flinched a little. "All I've done is help your little ponies today! Jason and I here have saved a whole bunch of ponies, and killed the griffins that were about to murder them. He put up that sign that warned you of the attack a day early! You should've been ready!"

"We bolstered the guard and created a group of on-call ponies for the impending attack. We heeded the warning."

Jason butted in. "Clearly not enough! There's a reason why I said that you were militarily retarded, you never had a clue!" He paused. "And about killing ponies, I never did. I came up with new identities! I made them up! Was that so hard for the great, benevolent Princess Celestia to grasp?"

The princess raised an eyebrow, although she didn't move to outright attack him. "What about the stolen love and the foal-napping?" Jason turned to look at Dash, then back to the princess.

"Since we're being honest here, Scootaloo followed us into the Everfree, and we found her after she set off our advance alarm. She also knew that I was a changeling, and she was not taken prisoner, and is currently safe, fed, and warm, all that good stuff. I get love from Dash, I don't steal it, she's always known I'm a changeling. Any more questions?"

"No, that's all I needed to hear."

"Okay the-- Huh?"

"My student already discovered that your identities were false, and forwarded me the information last night. It seems that I was at least partially mistaken about you.

"So then I have your trust, princess?" He asked, prompting a sigh.

"I don't really have any choice at this point now do I? As far as I can see, you've gone out of your way to fight against the griffins; you can't possibly be all evil, and I hope that I was mistaken about you. But know this!" she narrowed her eyes. "If you ever hurt one of my innocent ponies, I will know, and I will end you."

"Okay then, point taken." He shuddered a little. "So I hear all the ponies are being evacuated underground. You coming?" She shook her head.

"My place is here, in the castle. I have to negotiate when we surrender."

"Do not surrender, Princess. That's exactly what they expect you to do. We can still win this." Another building collapsed outside, and Jason turned to the guards, who were still standing awkwardly near the griffins' corpses, one of them poking at one with his spear. "All of you, get to the caves, we aren't going to win today. We may have lost this battle, but we haven't lost the war." They didn't move. "Go!" The guards left in a hurry, moving deeper into the castle and heading for the nearest escape hatch, he assumed.

"Okay then." He turned to Dash "Let's get cracking" The princess cleared her throat.

"Don't prove my trust to be incorrectly placed, changeling." She warned.

"We won't" Said dash. Jason nodded and turned to the door that the guards had gone through followed by Dash. As they wen't through, Jason turned for one last look at the princess before taking his final leave.

Dash turned to Jason. "So did you expect her to actually trust you?"

"Honestly? Not at all. I kinda expected more yelling and an end result of running or capture or something like that." He paused. "I was also kinda surprised that she was the one to renounce her decisions and give me her trust. Apparently she still has a few tricks up her proverbial sleeves. I probably shouldn't have assumed that she would be so hostile to me."

"But why did you say we could win this? They've taken Canterlot, how can we win?"

"Hopefully, there weren't that many casualties, and we should be able to organize a resistance. Considering that everyone around here seems to attack in broad daylight, nighttime raids should be effective. Besides, they've only taken one city of an entire country."

"So we're just somehow going to take control of all of this?"

"I don't know, alright!?!? This whole day has just been improvisation, so we'll either get kicked out or succeed at leading these ponies. I don't even know if I want to lead them, because that would put their blood on my hooves, even if the final result is victory. I'm not sure if I want that." He paused. "It's already going to be hard enough to forget the stuff I saw today, the stuff we both went through..." They both went silent, remembering some of the horrors that they had burned into their memories, from the fallen ponies to the specific griffins that they were forced to assassinate. Dash shuddered.

"Welcome to war is right. I don't know how we could find enough ponies to do that." She sighed. "At least with the princess no longer hostile, we have a chance to get things back to how they were."

"Yeah I guess... whatever normal is for a changeling in Equestria."

"It couldn't be worse than this though." Another pause and sigh. "Although that doesn't really say much. But hey, chin up! After this is all over, you and I are going flying for a few days. I don't mean just regular stuff, we're setting some destination far away, and just taking a few days away from it all." Her expression quickly shifted. "As happy as I am with the chance to get back to my friends though, I'm nervous, to say the least, that they won't consider me their friends anymore."

"I think it's endearing that you care more about what your friends think about you than having to go through whatever else to get back to them. I guess if you do get back, they can't say you aren't loyal."

"You think I still am?"

"Well, yeah, I mean in a roundabout way, you still have their best interests in mind. I just hope they can see that." He looked around, still finding no hints on where the escape hatch was. Dash nudged him and pointed forward hurriedly, gesturing to a shadow that was steadily growing on the wall far in front of them. The shadow took on a more pony-esque shape before they both moved behind pillars to hide themselves from view. The thing's steps started to get louder, until they were close enough to be regarded individually from the echoes. Jason shot Dash a confused look, attempting to figure out who would still be walking around the castle. Dash took control of their obligatory countdown, before they both jumped out from the corner, knives ready to stab the mystery threat. Their faces quickly ran through several emotions before sticking to confused.

"Princess Luna?" Dash exclaimed just before Jason was shoved against the wall by Luna's magic.

"Art thou the changeling that hath ravaged our kingdom?" Luckily she wasn't trying to be as loud as possible, because huge amounts of noise was not what they needed in the middle of a war. Although there were surprisingly few griffins in the castle so far...

"Technically, yes, although I am innocent of murder, impersonation of ponies, and the theft of love." He choked out from behind the pressure of the magical field. Another pony to try to convince. Great. Maybe he should just write the story down, that would save a lot of time. The princess looked to Dash and back to Jason before opening her mouth to speak.

"Art thou innocent, neigh or yay?"

"Yes. I am innocent." As soon as he finished speaking, the magical field dispersed and he was unceremoniously dropped to the ground, leaving a confused Dash and Jason. "Why the sudden change of pace?"

"Our, excuse me, my royal powers include jurisdiction over dreams, in other words the subconscious. Generally I can tell whether or not ponies are lying by looking into their eyes. It hath proved it's usefulness over the years. The fact that you even have a subconscious is surprising enough for a changeling."

"I'm not sure whether to be disturbed that you can tell all that from my eyes or overjoyed that you believe me."

Dash spoke up. "So are you staying here with the Princess Celestia or are you evacuating with the rest of us?"

"We art supposed to be the last one to leave after defeat is ensured. The only one remaining will be Celestia, as per the evacuation orders set up long ago."

"So where is the nearest evacuation hatch?" She pointed a hoof down a hall. "Thanks Princess, I hope to see you down there."

"As do I. This shall be a grand time for you to prove your loyalty, will it not?" Jason and Dash both nodded, and then turned to walk down the corridor.

"Things could be worse I guess," Jason said to Dash.

"If we had known it would be this easy to reconcile with them, we should've done this earlier."

"I think it was more the case of being in the right place at the right time. Who knows what would've happened two days ago. Definitely not anything good." A wave of nervousness suddenly washed over him. "I wonder how Scoots is doing."

Dash sighed. "Good, I hope. I didn't see any griffins attempting to spread out and occupy the surrounding area. She should be fine, I just hope she hasn't done anything stupid."

"Like flying or noise?"

"Yeah, but mostly the flying part. Squirt loves flying almost as much as I do it seems, and with no one to catch her... I'm just worried I guess."

"I'd be surprised if you weren't. I just hope this doesn't go on too long and we can get back to her before she thinks that something has happened to us." He definitely didn't want her having to go through the grief of losing either of them, especially if it was completely un-warrented. He especially didn't want her to decide that she was going to play hero and try to save them. To say that that would be disastrous would be an understatement.

They both lapsed into silence as they walked around, looking for their escape route before finally encountering it in a room labeled maintenance. The door creaked open with a ridiculously loud creak and they both groaned, annoyed that they had been relatively quiet for the last five minutes just to get to a noisy door. They both walked in and creaked the door back into it's closed position, turning to look into the tunnel, which was more of a hole in the floor. The sound of dripping water and a musty stench greeted them, and they took a brief look at each other. Dash spoke up.

"So, do you want to go first, or..."

"Don't like small spaces, huh?"

"Not too much, no. The fact that it's dark doesn't help."

"I can at least light it up with my horn, so we've got that taken care of." A huge crash sounded behind them. "Okay, lets just get going before someone bursts in here." Dash nodded and gulped. "Come on, I'll be right there with you. It'll be fine, I promise." Without another word, Jason jumped into the tunnel, fluttering his wings to keep from falling out of control. He looked back up to see that Dash had reluctantly jumped as well, and was following the light of his horn into the depths. Looking back down, he realized that the ground was fast approaching, and slowed down before coming to a stop on the floor of the sewer, hearing Dash land behind him shortly after. He lit his horn up brighter, and was slightly awed by the girth of the tunnel.

"Wow, you could fly a small plane through here!"

"Yeah, I'm not feeling quite as bad with that claustrophobia anymore."

"How could they possibly think that this would be filled to capacity ever? This couldn't have been designed as a sewer in the first place."

"Well whatever it was, let's just get walking."

"I suppose you're right" Jason shifted his form into Alternis with a horn addition. He was starting to feel sad that he may well never be able to use the form too much anymore, but figured that the Canterlot ponies wouldn't recognize it anyway, unless the elements were there. He doubted that though, they had all apparently left to go back to Ponyville after no immediate sightings turned up. He looked at Dash, who was shaking a little. With all of the armor, he kinda doubted it was due to the cold. He draped one of his wings over her, and she looked over at him, smiling as the shivering lessened slightly.

Time slurred together. For some reason, the constant unchanging environment kept the measurement of time to a minimum. Jason had tried counting, but kept feeling that he was moving through the numbers too quickly or too slowly, and soon gave up entirely. The chill in the tunnel was starting to get to him, which was strange because the temperature itself wasn't uncomfortable, yet he seemed the sewer seemed to chill him to the bone. He tried to warm up, but only succeeded in getting colder as he moved towards their destination. He chalked the cold up to nerves and walked on.

The wing over Dash's back had long since gone from feeling cold on Dash to being his only source of heat. Dash seemed to notice the change in wing temperature and turned to Jason looking worried. "Why does your wing feel as cold as a wet rag?"

"I have no idea, but hopefully it'll get better when I get out of this sewer, because the longer I've been in here, the colder I've gotten." Dash pushed his wing off her back, giggling at his inquisitive expression before putting her wing over his back.

"You probably need this more than I do right now." She giggled again at his blush.

"You're just lucky that I can blush in this form." She poked him in the chest playfully.

"Maybe I just need to try harder when you're a changeling." They shared a brief laugh until Jason shuddered and Dash pulled him closer to her with her wing.

"You know, doesn't that right there look like a light?"

"I dunno, you're the one with the night vision."

"Oh yeah. Let's just hurry up a little and get out of this stupid thing." They both sped up to a trot and hurried their way towards the light, which turned out to be much farther away then Jason had previously thought. Eventually though, the light grew bright enough for Dash to catch sight of it, and soon after grew much larger and brighter until they finally emerged into a huge, hollowed out cave. They looked down over the ledge that they had emerged on, and saw thousands of ponies milling around about fifteen feet below. They were mostly civilians, and Jason caught sight of only a few groups of royal guards to the side of the room that had apparently escaped. Jason cleared his throat, and pulled out a flash-bang. He pulled the pin, and threw it towards the far wall, away from most of the ponies. They both shut their eyes and covered their ears, and...

Nothing happened. "Guess they can't all be winners." Dash said as Jason primed another flash-bang.

"This better work, I don't want to just use up a bunch before we even have to fight anyone." He chucked the second one, both of them taking the same ready positions, preparing for the hopefully inevitable bang.

BANG!!!

The ponies below all went silent, looking around and attempting to find the source of the noise. Jason nodded to Dash, and retreated back from the edge of the ledge and out of view. He nodded to Dash and dropped his disguise as they walked back to the stage.

"Listen up, every pony!!"

The crowd was silent for a time, either looking around in scared manners or just staring back at the changeling and half changeling on the ledge. Whispers started to break out, yet no one actually tried to do anything. Jason cleared his throat again.

"So here's the deal, Canterlot was captured by the Griffins as I'm sure you know. Most ponies, it seems, want to give up and surrender." He realized that he needed a podium to whack when it was appropriate. He stomped his hoof into the ground instead, recoiling a little when he aggravated a crack in that leg. "We aren't doing that. What we should do, should you accept, is go back and take over the city, create an actual counter-attack. We can still win this and send those idiot griffins packing!!!" The crowd once again lapsed into silence until a more bold pony spoke up.

"How can we even trust him? He's that changeling on those flyers!" he yelled. The crowd got rowdier and louder as the other ponies seemed to agree to the notion. Dash pulled out another flash-bang and threw it across the room.

BANG!!!

The crowd once again became silent. "Listen here, those flyers are wrong. I didn't commit any of those crimes." He felt like a broken record. This was what, the eighth time he had to say this? Ninth?

"Oh yeah?" it was the same pony. "You and what army? Huh?" Jason didn't have an answer to that. He jumped a little as some of the crowd seemed to advance to where he was standing, while still staying eerily silent. Ponies started filtering out of the front of the crowd and walking up to the ledge. He gestured to Dash, who moved over to him. The ponies were almost to him, and he was about to teleport and escape, when a mare jumped in front of him. His mind tried to grasp this new development as the mare spoke.

"This changeling saved me from the Everfree, and he didn't commit any of those crimes." She yelled out to the crowd, silencing the whispers that were circulating around.

"Wait a second, Star?" another pony climbed up. "Sky?" The two ponies nodded and smiled at Jason as he realized that the other ponies making their way forward were ones that he and Dash had saved today. He had definitely not expected outside help. Suddenly a sinking feeling hit him. "What happened with the foals?" He was almost afraid to ask.

Star smiled wider. "We sent them off for a few days to visit my mother-in-law in Manehattan, because of your warning. Without that..." She shuddered. Jason and Dash greeted the other ponies and royal guards that had all made their way onto the ledge.

Dash turned back to the crowd. "This army!" She yelled, laughing. There were a few whispers in the crowd from ponies that were trying to figure out why anypony would help a changeling, the same creature that had just attacked en masse not too long ago. A pony voiced their concerns, probably the same one that had said something before.

"Why would you lot help him? He's a danger to Equestria! We should be taking this time to dispose of the threat." The crowd flared up again.

Sky walked to the edge of the stage and cleared his throat. "These 'threats' saved my wife, and probably my foals. He and his friend saved or helped all of these other ponies behind me." A royal guard walked up to the edge of the stage.

"Celestia herself put her trust in this changeling. Don't ask me why, but that's what she said." The pony in the crowd seemed satisfied, surprisingly. Or maybe he was just at a loss for words. Jason finally got his resolve back, and turned to the crowd.

"Now, in terms of troops, I doubt that I can actually legally draft ponies, and I don't exactly want to force people into a war, so here's what I'm going to do. Any recruits will be selected on a volunteer basis. That said, will all ponies under eighteen and all nursing or pregnant mares move to the side of the room?" There was a large shift, leaving a fairly large remaining group. "Good, remember what group you're in, and--

There was a flash of soundless light, yielding an annoyed looking Princess Luna and Shining Armor. They both noticed the changeling and harbored mixed responses before Dash broke the silence. "Princess, are you two the last of the ponies that were in the castle, at least, besides Celestia?" Luna nodded sadly, holding Shining behind her and keeping him from attempting to attack Jason.

"Why don't you go find your wife, Shining. I made sure she got here safely after the attack started." He looked up to the princess, confused, and looked back and forth between her and Jason for a few seconds before he turned and left with an frustrated huff.

"Do you have somewhere private where we can discuss strategy and stuff like that?" Jason asked. Luna nodded and gestured for them to follow her. Sky and Star and the royal guards followed, while the others retreated back into the crowd. She pushed open a door that was flush with the wall and otherwise invisible, leading them into a well lit room. Jason looked around, noticing a large table, which on closer inspection had a topographical map of Canterlot and the surrounding area on it. "Who built all of this?" He asked the princess, still slightly in awe of the detail on the map and the room in general.

"There was a pony that twas the captain of the guard a few hundred years back, so my sister tells me, and he had a fear of invasion that most ponies thought twas ridiculous at the time. I suppose it was a good thing that his accomplishments were kept in working order. There is also a small armory and barracks, although nopony has been stationed here for generations."

"Princess, how much food and water do we have here?" Dash asked.

"Ah, I'm glad you asked. There art approximately a month's supply of food for this many ponies, along with an unlimited amount of water, fed by one of the waterfalls around Canterlot."

"So nothing pressing then," Jason sighed, rubbing his chin in thought. "That makes things a lot easier, but we still can't attempt to outlast them or anything."

"So what art we dealing with? How did it look up there?" She searched his eyes for information, but only saw horror at the memories of events that day. He stammered a little, unable to find a concise answer, before Dash laid a hoof on his shoulder and spoke for him.

"We saw hundreds of griffins on the surface, although we did cover a fair amount of the city. Hopefully that's a large amount of them. We managed to take out several, but our efforts didn't really make any dent."

"I see." She moved to the map, moving several small red chess like pieces around on the board. "This is where the most recent intelligence places griffin troop positions, although many are still dispersed randomly about the city." Most of the little play pieces were placed around the castle.

"Where are we?" Jason asked. The princess levitated over a few blue pieces, placing them on the opposite side of the city. "Well great! We're not near their main troop clusters, so let's just knock out the small forces in the rest of the city." He sighed. "But what about the griffins? What kinds of advantages do they have over ponies?"

"Griffins are half lion, half eagle. Luckily for us, this means that their eyes are that of a daylight bird of prey, so they shouldn't be particularly advantageous at night. Their ears are fairly sharp, and they can sneak around very quietly if they so choose." Shining Armor walked in, Cadence at his side. "Nothing earth shattering."

"Princess," He said, "I still don't understand why we're being friendly to this, beast. Not two weeks ago thousands of his kind attacked Canterlot. We can't trust him."

"Well, Captain, there art two reasons. He hath obviously gone out of his way to save ponies, as the group on stage attested to. Besides that, we don't have much of a choose, do we?"

"Plus," Jason spoke up. "If I were evil, I don't think I would want to go through this much trouble to gain your trust. I'm too lazy for that." Shining glared at him, then turned to Luna.

"Well, princess, I did a headcount and we're down to eighty-three royal guards, five of them officers." He sighed. "Out of three hundred and fifty."

"Looks like you have your work cut out for you, Jason." Dash said.

"Yeah, I guess you're right." He turned to Luna. "What are the routes of the tunnels under the city?" Her horn glowed, and the surface of the map became partially transparent, revealing a web of tunnels that extended like spokes from the evacuation area. "Well that's useful." He looked up. "Shining, can you divide up the royal guards into small effective teams? And Luna, I need you to give some sort of great, empowering speech, and then get volunteers." They both nodded and left. Soon after the white noise from the crowd diminished as Luna started using her royal Canterlot voice. Dash moved to the door and pulled it partially shut, cutting down on Luna's noise.

"Dash, help me with this." She walked over to the table and stared.

"How the hell am I supposed to know what to do with this?"

"I dunno, but it's better if someone finds fault with what I come up with than no one. Like an editor."

"So you're trying to take out the occupation forces without engaging the main bulk of their forces, which is apparently located here?"

"And you acted like you didn't understand." Jason smirked. "Yes, that's what I'm trying to do. I figure if we manage to get a large enough amount of volunteers, we can just attack a bunch of the city at once. Things never actually seem to go to plan, though."

"So what part are we playing in all of this?"

"I dunno, I just figured that we'd take the place of one of the squads. I guess I didn't think about it that much. What do you want to do?"

"I kinda thought the same thing. I don't know how eager I am to get back into this though. We already made it through all this, I don't want one of us to die." Jason turned and put his hooves around Dash, attempting as best he could to comfort her. They were silent for a time, just standing there with their fore hooves wrapped around each other, before Dash spoke. "I don't really want to ruin the moment here, but we should probably get back to planning." Jason sighed, but obliged, releasing her from the hug. While Jason moved the pieces around on the board and created a grid on a piece of paper, Dash took a peek outside, seeing that Luna was still giving her speech. She turned back and saw Jason's piece of paper. "What are you drawing?" He looked up.

"I'm gridding out the city adn labeling the entrances. There aren't that many zones, so we should't need all that many troops. Anyway, like I said I'm skipping the castle zone entirely and focusing on the other parts of town, primarily by the edges. I'm going to assign the zones to squads, whose responsibility it will be to clear them. Do you want to do the honors and pick a zone?"

Dash shrugged. "How about this one?" She said, pointing with a hoof towards a two block strip about half a mile from the castle. "How's that?"

"Okay, sure. Remember, A6, tunnel eleven, sixth exit. That's our stop." He paused. "Got any other plans you want to add?"

"Not really, just that you should probably station the royal guards in the areas closest to the castle." Shining walked in, followed by two other guards.

"Fair enough," Jason responded before noticing their visitors.

"So, changeling, do we have a plan?"

"Yeah, look." The captain walked over to the map, leaving the two guards by the door. "I gridded out the city based on the exits to the sewer. If it's alright, I'd like you to brief your guard squads and tell them that they will be taking these areas, A1 to B4, excluding A6. Those are the zones closest to the castle, and should therefore have the highest potential to have large numbers of hostiles. I hope your guards are up to it." He didn't look happy, although Jason was unsure whether it was because of the fact that he was running off a plan from a changeling, or because he was stuck putting his troops into danger. Probably both. "Last thing. Give them some sort of training on stealth if they don't already have it, because surprise is the only advantage we have." He paused, seemingly out of things to say.

"Oh! See if you can see if anyone knows a spell to aid eyesight." Dash added.

"You know, this plan is incredibly risky." The captain formed a wry smile. "But you know what, it may actually work."

Shining left the map room, making a bee line for his troops. Jason turned back to the map, attempting to find any large flaws in his planning.

"If it makes you feel any better, I'd volunteer." Sky spoke up. Jason had almost forgotten that he had been in the room this whole time; neither him or Star had actually said anything in the time since they had entered. His wife elbowed him, eliciting a quiet "What?" from him and corresponding gestures.

"I'm glad to hear that," Jason responded, "I'll make sure he doesn't end up anywhere too seriously dangerous." She sighed.

"You better not die, honey. No pressure." He turned and nuzzled Star.

"No worries dear."

"Well then Sky, can you go to the group out there and wait with them until we assign squads." Sky nodded and shared a kiss with his wife before moving towards the door. Jason turned to Dash. "So, no big holes in this plan, besides the obvious risks?"

"No, but I hope this works out for the best, it's all just a wildcard bet from here on out."

"At least we, the two of us, can kinda change the outcome. Hopefully anyway. Most soldiers would love to be able to singularly change the outcome of a battle. Not like we're very important, but you get the idea." There was silence from outside as Luna apparently finished her speech. Silence was probably not a good thing; he doubted the ponies were awed into silence. Maybe, if they were lucky, the crowd had become deaf from Luna's volume and ended up missing the fact that the speech had ended.

Some applause started, and slowly grew in intensity, yet never really reached a fever pitch. "Shall we go out and discover the status with Luna's speech and the applause?" Dash asked. Apparently they had been thinking the same things. She walked to the door and pushed it open to a room full of ponies. They moved around the bulk of the crowd, hugging the walls as they made their way towards the ledge, where a proud looking Luna was standing.

"Is that a good sign?" Jason asked Dash, gesturing to the princess's general manner. She shrugged.

"Hopefully she isn't proud of what would have been a great speech a thousand years ago."

"War doesn't really change that much, it couldn't be that different." They finished their walk up to the stage, and greeted Luna. "I hate to ask, but what did you tell them?"

"I informed them of their importance in the survival of Equestria, among other things."

"Thant doesn't sound too bad." Luna shot him a glare and he shrugged. "You were just gone for a thousand years, I didn't know what would happen." He turned to the crowd and cleared his throat, causing the ponies to return their attention to the ledge. "Alright, so can you ponies get in the groups from before?" There was the noise of thousands of hoofs on stone as the room sorted itself out into two groups. "Alright, so before I ask for volunteers, I just want to remind you that as of now, you ponies could easily be the only possible way to take back Canterlot and keep the Griffin threat contained. The fate of this nation rests on your shoulders. That said, I hope you can rationalize joining the resistance as possibly one of the most important things you could well ever do in your life." He sighed. "And you will be reimbursed for your efforts, although that hopefully won't be the reason you join."

"Alrighty, with that in mind, step forward if you volunteer, and the rest of you move to the side of the room and join the other group." Dash followed up. As an afterthought, she added, "If two parents of the same family remain in the volunteer area, it is under your jurisdiction to pick a parent to stay with the foals." A fairly large group left the possible volunteer group. She couldn't help but notice that most of them were well dressed and held a privileged air about them. The Canterlot Elite. The fact that they didn't volunteer didn't surprise her, yet she noticed that a few of the well dressed nobles had stayed as volunteers. Probably those new money nobles, the ones that had come from poverty and built themselves up.

"So here's what we're going to do. Form squads, two ponies of each race to a squad, then elect a team leader who will come by and get your team name and assigned area." Another massive amount of noise as the ponies sorted themselves around into the new groups. The first leader, a large gray earth pony, walked up a few minutes later. "Hey. Name?"

"Irontoe."

"Alright, your company name is Alpha, you are assigned to block G8, tunnel seven first stop." He wrote the information on the stallion's fore leg. "Forward that information to your squad. Next!" Another stallion walked up, this time a unicorn. "Name?"

"Dusk."

"Company Bravo, block G7, tunnel six first stop." He followed the same process of writing. "Bring that info to your squad. Next!" A mare walked up, which was slightly surprising. Jason was about to begin the process again when Shining Armor made his way over. "Hold on a sec." He said to the mare before diverting his attention to Shining. "You ever trained ponies before?" He nodded.

"Yeah, I was the drill sergeant for a while until they found someone louder, but I should be able to train the ponies. Speaking of, the guards look about ready, I stationed them in the barracks to rest and prepare, so that's all good."

"Alright. I'm just assigning militia squads to city blocks, then I'm going to give a brief follow up speech and they're all yours." He nodded again.

"Can't wait." He chuckled as he made his way back over to what Jason assumed to be the barracks. Jason ran through the rest of the squads without further distraction. He had run out of military alphabet letters to use and had given the last squads roman numerals I-X. It sounded cool he supposed. He made his way back onto the ledge and signaled for the attention of the ponies, which were now situated in small groups.

"So, you have your squads now, and as you may know, this is a stealth operation. Don't let the griffins signal an alarm, and stick to the shadows. Every squad has ponies from all three races, so you should use that to your advantage. Find the skills of your members and work out some sort of strategy for who's best situated to do what, because once you get up there, most plans are going to go to hell." He paused. "Now I've said this before, even though it wasn't to any of you. Those griffins up there are trained to kill. Do not show them any mercy, because they will never show mercy themselves. Hesitation and stupidity are the number one killers on the battlefield. Don't be one of the ponies that dies being affiliated with either of those things, and work as a team to make sure none of that happens." He sighed, reaching the end of his speech. "All of you are to report to Shining Armor for basic training, then wait for orders to move out." The ponies stared for a moment before breaking into tentative applause and starting to shift to the back of the room, where Shining stood waiting.

"Nice speech, although hopefully it doesn't scare them before they even get up there to fight," Dash said.

"They should be scared. I don't want them thinking this is just a walk in the park. I mean, I did the same for you and everything went fine there." He paused. "Although I guess you aren't just any pony," He said, nuzzling her neck. She blushed and nuzzled him back.

"Yeah I guess, but I have stuff to get back to, stuff worth fighting for. I doubt that all the ponies here are really doing this for much more than for the bits. That doesn't exactly scream loyalty."

"Well it's all we got. Most of the tough zones are covered by the royal guards and us, so at least that's taken care of."

"I'm taking off these knives. I don't want to have to worry about cutting ponies' hooves off." She said. Jason laughed.

"Yeah that's probably a good plan." He untied the rope around her hooves with his magic and stashed their knives off to the side of the ledge. "How about we take a look at those food supplies?"

"Well I am pretty hungry..." They started walking through the now much emptier room, watching the last of the recruits disappear into yet another room. Apparently a very large room, considering how many recruits they had. They walked past the door and on to another, less hidden door that read, "Rations". Dash pushed the door open and immediately gasped, a sound that was quickly mirrored by Jason. Thousands of cans were shelved in floor to ceiling racks extending hundreds of feet into the distance.

"Hopefully there are can openers around here somewhere..." He said. Dash nodded, still in awe, and she and Jason trotted around the large room attempting to find can openers. As it turned out, the room was long but skinny, boasting only a few isles of shelving. Eventually they found a small length of shelf completely devoted to can openers, and pulled a few off the shelf. After getting lost for a few minutes, they found the entrance again. Jason pulled a can off the shelf and opened it. "Carrot?" He asked Dash. She scrunched up her face.

"I hate carrots. You'll never get me to eat one."

"Is that so?" He shifted into Dash and dangled a carrot in front of his mouth. "Looks like I will, for all intensive purposes, get you to eat a carrot." He dropped the carrot into his mouth and chewed it briefly before his eyes went wide. After a few seconds, Dash waved a hoof in front of his face.

"Jason, you okay there?"

"Yeah, you could say that, considering I can actually taste this!" He started shoving carrots into his mouth. "dh andfk thhrrt ahd fodj." He swallowed. "I never thought I would miss food so much!"

"But why would you suddenly be able to taste stuff after two weeks of no changes whatsoever?"

"Beats me." He had finished off the last of the carrots and moved to grab another can. "Oh, wait." He transformed into Alternis, and took a bite of some green beans in the can he had just opened, before realization crossed his face. "Okay, so here's what happened. Apparently, when I made a transformation into an 'original' pony, I just did stuff with appearances, so apparently I didn't actually make taste buds, until I transformed into you, in which case I'm biologically the same on the surface, so now I have your taste buds."

"So you like the same foods I like?"

"I'm going to assume I do."

"So apparently I like carrots?" She made an over-exaggerated retching motion.

"Maybe? Let's worry about that later and just bring out some more can openers and food for the ponies that aren't training right now." She nodded and started pulling cans off the shelf and into one of the carts that was near the entrance to the room. After they had the cart filled past the brim, Jason got behind it to push.

"Maybe you shouldn't be in my form when we push this out?"

"But what if I want to see their reaction to two Dashes?"

"We can screw with ponies all the time after we get out of here. Plus, it kinda makes me feel strange, and I even know which one of us is fake." They pulled the cart to the door after hopelessly overloading it, and managed to push it through and across the room to the group of bored foals, mothers, and nobles. After overshooting the destination because of a lack of brakes, they stuck a few rocks under the wheels of the cart and started tossing food. The reactions were generally pretty telling, with the foals and mothers looking at the food gratefully while the nobles looked frankly disgusted.

Jason tossed a few can openers to the ponies and moved the remaining cart supplies through the door of the room that the troops had apparently gone through. It was at this point that Jason realized just how crazy the pony that had built all this must have seemed all those years ago. He couldn't say he wasn't thankful though. His only question was hoe he had gotten this much money. Was there slave labor a few hundred years ago? That would cut expenses, to say the least.

As they pushed into the room, the stench of sweat met them and they both flinched a little. "God damn, this is worse than the football locker room. I didn't even think that was possible!"

"What's football?"

"It's like the most complicated sport known to man, and probably ponykind. It would probably take an hour to explain, partially because there's five ways to score points and a huge number of different positions. Then there's plays that are meant to look like other plays and different formations for the same positions depending on the formation of the other side."

"How exactly do you even know what's going on?"

"It just clicks eventually. No other sport I know can have so many different things going on at a time. That's probably why it's so interesting." He paused. "Anyway I'll show you when I have paper and a spare hour." He chuckled. "So then the Canadians, from the country north of mine, go and make a more complicated and completely senseless version of football. Basically you watch it, and as soon as you think you understand it they run a play that completely destroys everything you thought was truth. Like women." Dash shot him a glare. "Technically I didn't say mares. Anyway, there was this one play, and they basically punted the ball back and forth a bunch of times before it went out of bounds. I guess that's why it's not all that popular. They have eight teams and two of them have the same name."

"How can sports be so complicated?"

"I guess it's a lot easier to make sports complicated when you have arms free and can still run and jump and stuff. The whole, 'walking on two legs' was nice. Oh, and fingers. Those are the other reason." Shining stopped yelling at the ponies he was training, and turned to see Dash, Jason and the cart of food.

"Alright, troops. Lunch time." The ponies cheered tiredly and made their way over to the food cart.

"We should leave before we get mauled by hungry ponies," Dash said.

"Yeah, you're probably right." They left the room as the ponies got to the cart and started demolishing the food.

The cave under the mountain was silent. Training had gone to schedule and the ponies were outfitted with weapons from the near endless armory. Everything was in place. Nearly every pony was asleep somewhere around the base, resting up for the impending attack. Most of them were calmly sleeping. Jason was an exception.

Sure he was asleep, but his mind was still thundering with the unheard noise of a dream.

He was in that alley again, the one he had run to after the bank was robbed. He couldn't think, he had no idea where he was going, but on he ran, into the rain, into the haze. One of the robbers ran out the door behind him, advertized by a loud screech of rusty bolts and a door slamming against the wall. After they had killed half the people in the bank, his young, scared mind had managed to infer that they were not taking hostages. That's when he had made a break for the door. He looked at the singed hole in his hoodie sleeve remembering the whistle of the bullet that had caused it.

The man's heavy footsteps drew nearer as Jason pushed a garbage can over behind him, cutting his hand on the metal rim. He didn't stop running to check the injury, he didn't feel it. He was almost to the end of the alleyway, almost to the safety of the cops that he could hear had arrived.

The rain continued to pour down as a gunshot rang out, the corresponding bullet hitting a dumpster as he ran by. Another gunshot sounded, followed by a burning pain in the side of his gut. He fell and clutched at his side, rolling and screaming in pain. With some strength he didn't know he had, he got up and picked up another trash can, throwing it at the man before he had time to react. Another gunshot sounded and a hole appeared on the side of the plastic can. Part of one of Jason's fingers disappeared, just like that. The trash can hit the man at shoulder level, liberating the gun from his hands and sending it flying backwards down the alley.

Jason looked at the mouth of the alleyway and made a split second decision. He turned back towards the robber and ran, jumping over the trash can to get to the gun. Then he tripped and flopped onto the ground. The man had apparently grabbed his foot as he ran by, and was now smiling viciously, murder in his eyes. Jason reached for the gun, only able to get the tips of his remaining fingers on the gun. The man behind him laughed.

"What're you gunna do wit' 'dat boy? You ain't no murderer, you couldn't even pull 'dat trigger." Jason twisted around and reached out his other arm just as the man pulled his leg. He got the gun up and aimed at the criminal, who didn't so much as flinch. Jason hesitated. "I told you kid, ya ain't got the resolve ta--

BANG!!!

The man went limp, a neat bullet hole through his forehead the cause of his death. Jason just sat there looking at the gun in his hands as the rain continued to fall, watching the puddle of blood expand from the bank robber, watching his shirt turn red. Anot-

"Jason!" Someone was shaking his shoulders. "Jason!" He opened his eyes, seeing Dash partially propped up next to him in the small bunk with her hooves on his shoulders.

"What?"

"You've been making a whole bunch of noise in your sleep, rolling around, you looked possessed."

"Bad dream I guess." She stared at him.

"Must be more than that." Jason looked down, trying to figure out what to say.

"Would you be mad if it turned out that I lied to you?"

"I guess it depends. You know you can tell me anything right?" Jason sighed. She was right. He took a deep breath.

"Well remember when I told you that I killed three people out of self defense?"

"Yeah..."

"Well the hobo one wasn't real. That was one of the bank robbers that I killed. The same one that killed my parents." He lapsed into silence. "Sorry I never told you." Dash silently stared at him, although he couldn't tell whether her stare was of rage or compassion. She moved forward and wrapped him in a hug.

"It's fine, that's nothing to be ashamed at not telling me. I don't think any less of you for it. I'm just glad I'm worthy of hearing your past. I know you don't like to talk about it."

"Yeah, you're the first one I've told." She smiled and hugged him tighter. After a few minutes of silence, Jason spoke up. "How long till everyone gets up?"

"A few minutes. We have time." She said into his fur.

"Time for what?" He asked, feigning ignorance.

"Time for--" Alarms went off and they both groaned.

"I thought you said we had more time!"

"Why would you trust me? I'm was late for everything before you came here!" Jason chuckled and rolled out of bed.

"You coming?" She shook her head violently.

"I'm all warm, can't I just stay a little longer?" Jason smiled and pulled her out of bed with his magic while she tried desperately to get a grip on one of the bunk posts. After she was puled free, she turned and gave him a death glare.

"Hey, any other day I wouldn't have cared, but we have this cool attack thing today, and it requires us to get ready on time."

"Yeah, but we're the first ones up!" She complained.

"We were already awake!" Jason grabbed two cans of food as they walked out of the room, opening them with a can opener that he had kept. He handed a can of peaches over to Dash, starting on a can of beans himself. They both trudged over to the ledge and sat down, waiting for the ponies to show up.

A few minutes later, the bulk of the ponies filtered in and sat down with cans of food. Jason waited a few more minutes until the last of the ponies walked in before standing up and clearing his throat. The ponies knew the drill by this point and had already became silent.

"As you know, the attack starts in an hour and fifteen minutes." He looked over the troops, who's numbers had shrunk slightly after some ponies were considered not to be physically fit enough to fight. "You all know the drill, it's been pushed into your head over and over these last thirty six or so hours, and I can't say just how proud I am to see this large of a volunteer army in front of me." He paused. "But that is no reason to forget your training. Use it as a tool for your success. Nothing will go exactly to plan, and the most important part of war is the ability to adapt to every situation. Don't let the enemy do something you don't expect, use your team to avoid that possibility. You have forty-five minutes to prepare, then we all move out and wait for the time to leave these tunnels. If there are any team leaders that are unsure where they're going, come see me. Luna has agreed to rise the new moon today instead of tomorrow, so we have that advantage. Dismissed." There was a cheer before the ponies returned to eating and talking amongst their groups.

"You know, the odds are starting to tilt in our favor here." Dash said with a sly smile. "This may not be as farfetched as any of us thought."

"Thanks for having faith in my plan."

"Considering the fifty fifty odds I gave you a while ago, I have tons of faith." She giggled.

"And what are my chances now, O odds master?"

"Sixty five-thirty five?"

"I can live with that." The next forty five minutes went by much faster than any of them wanted, and soon enough they were all suited up, organized, and on their way. Dash and Jason walked down their tunnel with a fairly large group of ponies, which dwindled as they got closer to their destination. Pretty soon they were directly under their specific hatch.

"How long?" Dash asked. Jason pulled out a primitive watch.

"About a minute, wh--" He couldn't finish as Dash pressed her lips to his, kissing until the watch let out a quiet beep.

"You better make it through this."

"Only if you do." He poked her with a hoof, and she blushed. "Now let's get this block cleared."

"Fine by me."

Jason pulled himself out of the sewer exit, turning around to lend a hoof to Dash. Unfortunately, the entrance was much smaller than the escape hatch in the castle and they were forced to climb up the slippery metal rungs to the top, instead of flying. Jason grabbed the doorknob of the rusty door that concealed the sewer entrance and slowly pushed it open. The door made a quiet creak as they were greeted by the smell of smoke and the sight of a rubble filled street through the small opening that was created. Jason carefully shut the door again as a pair of griffins walked by, lighting the area with a torch. Dash pointed to the guards and made a quiet cutting noise, creating a motion with her hoof across her neck. Jason shook his head, waiting for the guards to turn a corner before swinging the door fully open. They trotted along the side of a row of buildings before cutting into the doorway of one of them.

A griffin inside turned to see them, but before he could make a noise a hoof was over his mouth and he was toppled backwards. Dash drew a blade across his throat silently as they got up to move into the next room, leaving the quiet sounds of choking behind. Dash silently pushed open the door, letting out a sigh when she realized that the room was empty. They went through another empty room and peered out a window onto the next street. Another pair of griffins walked by, chuckling about something.

Jason pointed a hoof upwards, signaling that they should clear the upstairs before leaving. The made their way up the stairs quietly until Jason bumped the side of his hoof into the top step. The dull sound rang out, echoing slightly around the old house. They froze in place, attempting to figure out if the unintended noise had any affect. There was a slight commotion in the adjoining room before the voices once again calmed. Dash and Jason resumed walking, stopping at the door into the occupied room. They counted down and swung the door open.

One of the griffins had seemed to expect this, and threw a punch from the side of the door opening, hitting Jason square in the gut and hurling him into the wall. As Jason recovered from yet another crack in his armor, he saw Dash emerge from the shadows and stab the griffin in the side of the neck. Everything went silent again. Apparently the other griffin or griffins inside didn't have a good vantage point on the action, which had all taken place outside the room. Dash ran in and tackled a rather small griffin with ill fitting armor while Jason readied his knife.

"Wait don't kill me!" The griffin cried out. Jason paused for a moment. "I can help you!"

"And how's that?" He said, not lowering his fore hoof.

"There's an army intelligence station nearby, I can tell you where it is."

"And how do I know that that isn't a trap?" The griffin stumbled over his words. "Here's the deal. I'm going to tie you up, then hide you so that no one else will ever find you. If it isn't a trap, we come back and free you, but until you tell us more I don't think it's worth it to give you mercy."

"The building just down the street. The old church, second floor. There's a bombed-out back entrance on the castle side. Enter there."

"Fine. I'm sure you know that any false information that you give us will result in your death." The griffin gulped and struggled under Jason and Dash.

"There's a general there, he should have bright clothing, like war paint type stuff."

"That's all you know?"

"Yeah." Without another word, Jason grabbed some sheets off of a nearby bed and tore them into long strips, tying and gagging the Griffin. He opened a closet and moved some boxes, shoving the griffin under a huge pile of cloths.

"If I find out you managed to signal for help, I will track you down." Jason said as he dragged the other griffin body behind the bed. "Let's go Dash." He had just noticed that during that whole endeavor, she hadn't said a single word. "You okay? You look a little shaken up."

"I don't know what to think anymore, I mean, part of me want's to kill every griffin for what they've done to the ponies around here, but as soon as I actually have to kill one, the other half of me just screams to give them mercy. It's just hard, you know?"

"Yeah." He didn't really have much else to say. He knew what she was saying, but he had made peace with the idea that some people just didn't deserve to live. The problem was the huge gray line that that idea created, that he could never easily find boundaries for. Every time he killed someone, or in this case, a griffin, he almost felt like he was trying to play god, attempting to decide who had the right to live and who didn't. To say the least, he hated trying to make that decision, especially when it wasn't an easy choice, as it was just now. Dash sighed, pulling him out of his musings.

"So let's get this whole field intelligence thing taken out so we can just go home." Jason nodded his agreement and they left the room. They crouched under the front windows of the house again, watching yet another patrol go by. Jason looked closer and realized that it was the same patrol as before, and that they were still chuckling madly about something. They came dangerously close to the window, allowing Dash and Jason to pick up on part of their conversation.

"She smelled terrible, just like third wife!" The other griffin howled with laughter until the first one punched him. "Is not that funny."

"Sorry man, just trying to pass the time."

"Ugh, just like sixth wife"

"How many wives do you have?"

"Always asking questions like fourth wife..." The griffin's voices faded into the distance as Jason and Dash raised their heads from their hiding places. Dash made her way out the door and along the building front, followed closely by Jason, who had a rock in his magical grasp. He tossed the rock across the street, in front of the griffins, attracting their attention to the rock's landing. They made their moves on the griffins, managing to take them both out silently. Jason gestured to a rubble filled shop, and they dragged the bodies away, hiding them behind one of the shelves.

The next five minutes were spent slowly moving down the street after a much more aware patrol. The patrol took a turn to the castle, in the opposite direction of the church that they had assumed was the place of the field intelligence. Dash noticed another sewer entrance pointed it out to Jason, who nodded. That should come in handy. The duo got to the old church and made their way around back. The griffin was right so far, there was a rather large hole in the back of the church, easily big enough for them to fit through. Jason and Dash peered into the church, attempting to find any of the griffins, although the prisoner's story was starting to look notwithstanding. There was a single griffin sitting in one of the pews, looking towards the front entrance. They both moved inside, slowly moving between pews towards the griffin, who was now slowly spinning her spear. Jason started to move up behind her when Dash jumped up from the pew direcly behind her and slit her throat. Jason stared at her.

"Hey, if this were a game, I've got to win right?" She stuck out her tongue.

"There's also no I in team." Jason responded with a deadpan look.

"Just let me have my fun." She looked at the corpse, dawning a slightly disgusted look. "Well, you know what I mean." She looked around. "I thought that there was supposed to be an intelligence thingy around here or something."

"Yeah, there was..." Jason spotted a door behind the podium. He briefly wondered what religion ponies could possibly warship, especially when they had the equivalent of tangible gods living in the city. Disregarding the mental comment, he made his way to the door, carefully putting an ear up to it. There were definitely griffins inside. He listened for longer, finding he could hear at least three distinguished voices. He whispered the new to Dash before slowly pushing the door open.

No one. Just an empty room, with another door. The voices were much more clear, causing Jason to change his number to at least five griffins. The good news: this was almost definitely the intelligence outpost. The bad news: they had only fought two griffins before, at least when it was just them. Time to switch it up a bit. Jason pulled out a flash-bang, and took a deep breath before signaling for Dash to open the door and priming the grenade. The door flew open and the flash-bang entered in a show of almost flawless timing. The griffins turned their heads from the map they were scouring as the bomb flew straight towards them, bumping into the table.

It didn't go off.

Dash and Jason stood mortified as they looked at the group of rather large griffins get up and grab their weapons. They both took on a fighting stance as two griffins flung themselves out the door. The first two were dealt with before any others could come to their aid. The others, though attacked in a group, partially surrounding Dash and Jason against the wall they had been pushed back to. Dash ran between some griffins, stabbing one in the back leg and distracting another while Jason jumped up and stabbed the distracted one in the neck. His knife got stuck though, and before he knew what was happening, another griffin had grabbed him and threw him against the wall. He slid down to the floor and laid there, slouched and dazed. The griffin, apparently the officer by his attire, walked over and signaled to the others to take care of Dash, while Jason regained a fraction of his thought. Raising his spear, the officer brought it down as Jason raised a hoof to block it.

The spear went neatly through one of the holes in his hoof, finding purchase in the crack he had sustained earlier and plunging into his chest. He screamed in pain as the griffin briefly smiled, only to get stabbed in the side by Dash. He let go of the spear, quickly picked up another one, and turned towards Dash. Jason broke off part of the handle of the spear to free his hoof while Dash took down another griffin. Another griffin raised his spear behind her, only to be silenced by a quick throw by Jason of one of his knives. Jason proceeded to double over and cough onto the ground, leaving splotches of blood.

Dash faced down the officer, the last griffin standing. He lunged with his spear, glancing the blade off her face as Dash reciprocated the action with one of her blades. She briefly recovered before the griffin attempted to strike again. This time she ducked under the spear and quickly ran under it, coming face to face with the griffin. She smiled at him before burying a blade in his chest, then another. She pulled out the blades and pushed the griffin over, making sure that he wasn't ever getting up.

She made her way to Jason, who was lying in a dishearteningly large pool of blood, with tears in her eyes. "I'm not...going out...like this," he said, clutching at the part of the spear protruding from his chest. "I don't think it hit anything... major," He couched, leaving another few splotches of blood. "Nicked a lung though." He took a deep, ragged breath. "I'm just...so tired, all of a sudden," he said as his eyes drooped.

"Don't fall asleep!" He stared at her with an annoyed expression. "You have to stay awake Jason, you're going to make it out of this." She pulled him onto her back and galloped out of the back of the church. "Don't die on me, not like this..." Dash was beyond the point of tears. The adrenaline in her system was keeping her full of rage, although she no longer had anyone to be mad at; she had killed that griffin. She would have sighed if she could get herself to stop grinding her teeth together. She made her way back down the street towards the maintenance tunnel she knew they had passed by. Jason was eerily quiet on her back. "Jason, say something!"

"Something, Ha." he said quietly. Dash could feel sticky wetness seeping between the cracks in her armor, staining her sky blue coat crimson read.

"What did you do before you came to Equestria Jason?" She asked, trying to keep him conscious.

"Can't we do this later?" He yawned, then moaned from the pain the yawn had caused. "I'm just so tired, and.."

"You need to tell me now! You need to stay awake!" She had almost made it to the entrance, just a few more strides, and, there! She flung open the door to see a sign that said: "Closed for maintenance. Sorry for the inconvenience." Dash was, at this point, fuming with rage, no longer listening to whatever Jason was saying about some thing called Happy Wheels. Jason seemed to notice.

"What's wrong Dash?"

"The maintenance thingy's closed for maintenance, ironically." She paused. "Don't stop talking." Jason rambled on, forgetting the previous topic and focusing on one about something called Ping Pong. Dash cut through the house they had cleared, also one of the only on the block not reduced to rubble, and remembered about the griffin upstairs. She ran into the upstrairs room and threw open the closet doors, immediately toppling boxes out and pulling out the griffin. She untied the 'ropes' holding his legs, but kept the gag on. She then re-used the ropes to attach Jason more securely to her back.

"We're going to escape, you're coming with me. If I see even a hint that you may not be on our side, I will not hesitate to kill you." The griffin hurriedly nodded, and they rushed out of the room, immediately heading out the door. Dash ran straight towards a patrolling griffin, not even bothering with stealth. She ran into him, knives held forward, toppling him over. She pulled out the knives and continued to run, followed by an awed griffin.

Wherever her near endless supply of adrenaline was coming from, it was beginning to run out. The pain in her hooves came back to her, and what cuts she did have on her body made themselves well known. She didn't give the injuries a second thought, and sped up, making a bee-line towards the maintenance door that she assumed they had taken here. She flung open the door and looked behind her, checking for the griffin. He shifted awkwardly on his paws when he was presented with the the sewer entrance, but started climbing down the ladder nonetheless. Once she heard him get to the bottom, Dash started down as well, quickly checking the status of the harness attaching Jason to her. He had started talking about how much he wanted a hamburger. She shuddered, and started her descent.

She lost her grip on one of the last rungs and fell the rest of the distance, twisting to land on her chest. She groaned in time with Jason as she slowly rose to her feet, looking around into the darkness.

"Jason, which way?" Jason lazily swung a hoof around.

"There's a light over there, go that way." Dash nodded, stumbling a few steps later.

"Are you...sure you're okay Dash?" He asked.

"Even if I'm not, I still have to carry you back." The became silent for a while. "Are we still going the right way?" Jason was silent for a few seconds. "Jason?" More silence. "Jason?!?!" She took off in a gallop, heading in the direction she hoped was the right way. The griffin managed to keep up with her, although neither of them knew where they were going. After minutes that seemed to slur into hours, a tiny light appeared in the distance, and Dash let out a sigh that she hadn't know she'd been holding in. She put on another burst of speed, sprinting the final feet until she emerged in front of the group of non combatants. They all looked over, and watched as Dash tried to get a hold of her breath, gesturing wildly.

"Injured...spear wound...needs medical attention." She said, continuing to pant. She opened her mouth to say something else, then a wave of fatigue washed over her, and she collapsed onto the ground, unconscious.

As Dash slowly drifted back awake, a few meaningless thoughts passing through her head. A brief thought about the Wonderbolts, then something about hamburgers. What were those anyway? She had never really listened yesterday she he was talking aimlessly, on her back, with a stab wound...

She jolted upright, looking around at the curtains that cut her off from the rest of the large room, attempting to figure out how she got here and what had happened to Jason. All she remembered was galloping into the light and saying something before she woke up here. She pulled a few tubes out of her foreleg, prompting a prolonged beep from one of the neighboring machines. A few ponies quickly parted the curtains, letting out exaggerated sighs when they saw the tubes and wires in Dash's hoof. They left the area before Dash could ask them anything so she got up, pausing a moment to inspect the bandages that covered parts of her hooves and chest.

She parted the curtains, much to the surprise of the nurses. "Where's a patient by the name Jason?" They stared at her blankly before picking up clipboards and madly flipping paper around. After running out of papers to look through they resumed their blank stares. "Do you ever say anything?"

"We don't have a patient by that name." Dash started to get a little more worried.

"Changeling, all black, stab wound?" Looks of recognition flashed over their faces.

"Oh, the changeling. Right this way miss. Tell me, how are you feeling?"

"Fine. How far is it?" The nurse pointed to a curtained off area as they walked by several peacefully sleeping bandaged ponies. "Why is everypony asleep?"

"We put them all under sleep spells so that they wouldn't feel any pain." As she finished her statement she pushed a curtain aside to a hospital bed that held Jason. The nurse saw tears well up in Dash's eyes. "I'll leave you two alone." Dash nodded gratefully and made her way over the bed, still fighting off tears. He had a large cut over one of his eyes, along with a dishearteningly large stain in the sheets overtop of his chest wound. She flinched a little before removing the sheets to see equally soaked bandages. She traced a hoof along his cheek, feeling his shallow breath on her hoof as she moved it along one of his fangs, noticing that it had gotten chipped at some point.

A tear landed on his chest and beaded up before being joined by another and rolling off onto the bed. She tried to talk before clearing her throat and trying again. "I guess I'm not really one for these types of moments. It's probably because no pony has ever actually meant this much to me. I know you can't hear me in there, but you've always been there to pick me up. Here I am in the same situation, and I just--I just can't do anything. Fastest flyer in Equestria and I can't even help." She curled up next to Jason on the bed, brushing a hoof past his ear. "You just have to make it through this like you have with everything else. I think--" She choked back some tears. "I think I love you."

Dash slipped in and out of slumber for the next however many hours, always managing to navigate back to the same nightmare. She always woke in a cold sweat to the unchanging face of Jason. Sighing, she tried to sleep once again; the nightmares were better than the thoughts she had while she was awake. She managed to fall back asleep a few minutes later, her hoof wrapped tightly around Jason's.

The intelligence station suddenly appeared out of the void, thrusting her into a position she knew well from the repetitive dream state. As usual, she was standing next to Jason as the flash-bang bounced off the table harmlessly and the griffins turned their heads in slow motion to the source. The first two griffins were dealt with before more griffins came through the doorway and surrounded them.

The same part played over in her head numerous times in the perfect clarity only a nightmare can convey as she ran between two griffins and threw a knife into one of their legs, turning to stab another. She always turned her head to see Jason slamming into the wall and slumping at the bottom. Yet the events stayed the same, unchanging no matter how many times she watched her own actions, her own failures to protect the one she loved. Yet again the spear entered his chest as Dash futilely tried to make her way over to do something, anything. Yet all she could do was stab the offending griffin, over and over, still seemingly unable to change the scenario to her liking. Then she turned to the griffin with a look of pure rage in her eyes and charged--

--only to wake up again in the same circumstances as before, except there was something different this time. Jason's face twitched and he moved, taking a much deeper breath. Dash made an uncharacteristic squeal of joy before putting her hooves around him.

Jason woke up with a start, immediately regretting his movements as a hot jet of pain rushed through his chest and he cringed. One of his eyes was held shut by something sticky. Some soft warm things wrapped around him, and he tried to pull them off, attempting to figure out what the hell was going on as he moved a hoof to force his eye open. He opened his usable eye, and suddenly Jason's eye was on fire as he looked into a ridiculously bright light. He shielded his head with a blanket as prior events started to filter back. Dash!

He pulled the covers back to see a confused looking Dash on the bed next to him through his one open eye. He opened the other one with a hoof and pulled her into a hug.

"How long was I out?"

"Fifteen hours." He looked a little shocked before he noticed the tears in her eyes.

"Hey, don't cry..."

"I just missed you so much. I don't know how you made it with all that blood. The nurses said you probably wouldn't make it. And it was my fault that you got stabbed." He hugged her tighter.

"It's not your fault. Shit happens, you couldn't have changed anything. You know some stupid spear isn't going to take me out."

"Just never do something like that to me again. I don't want to lose you." Jason leaned forward and kissed her.

"Deal. Stabbing is really pretty overrated anyways." He paused before pushing Dash slightly back so he could look her in the eye. "So what happened when I was out?"

"Not much, a bunch of ponies came back from the surface." Jason quickly sat back up, attempting and failing to ignore the pain in his chest.

"And?!?!"

"I think I can answer that question." Jason jumped as Shining Armor got off of a chair at the end of the bed. "You really had this mare here worried. I hope you know how much she cares about you." Dash blushed and averted her gaze. "Anyway, the results, militia ponies first. Fifteen missing or captured, fifty three injured, forty five killed in action. Known enemy deaths: One hundred and forty nine. Apparently one captured." He glared at Jason. "For my guards, thirty one deaths, forty injuries, five missing or captured. One hundred and ninety known killed. We now control seventy five percent of the city, and are making preparations for attacks on the castle troops. Blocks G3 and E5 remain under enemy control, although it seems your counterattack was still a resounding success." He paused. "Now, in terms of you and Dash, here's the obligatory briefing. How did it go out there?"

Dash laughed. "I guess it doesn't look like it went that well, does it?" Jason shrugged.

"Can I get a mirror?" Shining levitated one over, laughing at Jason's flinch to his own appearance. A crack in his forehead was the explanation behind him not being able to open his eyes, although besides a chipped fang and a few other scratches he looked unharmed. Then he tore his eyes away from the mirror to look at his chest. Luckily somepony had the foresight to wrap his torso in bandages, a large portion of which were stained crimson red. "So what's the situation with this?" He gestured to the bandages.

"Well, it's not like anypony actually knows how to fix a changeling, or what's wrong exactly," Dash sighed. "But basically from what I can tell from your past injuries and what the civilian doctors could tell me, the crack that you had was pushed and expanded by that spear, and anyway lets just say the bandages aren't just there to catch the blood."

"So are you trying to say that the bandages are holding me together?"

"Assuming you don't have an endoskeleton, yes."

"Oh that's cool then, I think I do. I've been cracking by back every time I wake up, so..."

"I don't think I've ever heard anypony say 'I think I have a skeleton.'"

"And you probably never will again." He noticed Shining's stare. "Oh yeah, so basically the short version of the story is, we came out of the hatch, cleared a house, where we killed two griffins and took that prisoner. He basically told us that there was an enemy intelligence station nearby, and that there were high ranking officers inside, so we hid him and basically said that if his information was wrong, no one would be there to find him. So then we went down the street and took out a total of four griffins, moving towards an abandoned church. We killed a griffin guard and found the intel room." He sighed. "Then nothing went to plan and I got stabbed after my knife got caught in one of the griffins' necks. All of them were killed in the end though, mostly by Dash. Then she pulled me onto her back and kept me conscious until after we grabbed the griffin and got into the tunnels. After that I have no idea what happened. With the amount of blood I lost, I kinda thought I was a goner."

Dash picked up the story. "Then I ran like hell and got you here before I passed out in front of all the mares and foals. From what they told me, a few of the mares were doctors and got you and me fixed as best they could."

"And here we are." Finished Shining.

"Alright then, I'm just gunna get up, and then we can..." Both Dash and Shining panicked and tried to push Jason back into the bed. "Hey, if I can't actually walk around I'll lay back down. I'm not going to sit here being useless. I at least want to see the injured ponies." They let up, which slightly surprised him, and he got out of the bed, wincing at the pain. Dash moved next to him in an attempt to give him the equivalent of a crutch, which he gladly accepted. They walked out of the infirmary after he was informed not to disturb any of the still sleeping ponies. They exited into the main room, which hosted the usual mothers and foals, along with a large smattering of bloodied, partially bandaged ponies. Jason and Dash navigated over to the ledge, where Jason managed to get into a sitting position on the edge, signaling for the attention of the injured soldiers. What conversation there was quickly became silent.

"So evidently you all fought and were injured, and I guess I'm just here to honor your sacrifice and say that all of you are hereby awarded a purple heart." The ponies stared at him in confusion. "It's an award given to combatants that survive injuries. Besides that, I hope that some of you decide to stay in the guard, and judging by what happened on the surface, you look like a pretty badass group of soldiers. You all have potential if you decide to take advantage of it." There was a quiet cheer from the injured ponies as Jason was helped up by Dash. "I should probably say something to the mothers and wives that lost family members." Dash nodded.

"Why do you take all this on yourself? I mean, you don't even have to say anything, they already know what happened."

"Yeah, but it was my plan. It's my fault that they died, I put them in the field. It's my responsibility." They had neared the group, a few of which were weeping openly while others just sat silently, staring off into space. Most of the group noticed his presence, meeting him with a mixture of blank looks and contempt. He sighed, a wave of nervousness washing over him before he finally cleared his throat for his address.

"So apparently Shining Armor had already read off the list of casualties, and for those of you with loved ones on that list, you have me to thank for that. It was my plan that put those ponies out there, my plan that got them killed or critically wounded." He paused. "I know it won't alleviate the sorrow that any of you are feeling right now, and trust me, I know how it feels, but maybe you can rest a little easier knowing that these deceased are the reason that the kingdom of Equestria still exists, and that through their legacy any of you can go on to live a life of freedom. It's not much, but these ponies shouldn't just be a cause for grieving, but a cause for awe and remembrance for their ultimate sacrifices, their devotion to their families and country by keeping them both safe." The faces of the mares softened a little, although he only slightly quelled the weeping of some of them.

"That was quite the speech." Jason jumped, letting out a hiss of pain at the sudden tensing of muscles, and turned around to see Luna.

"Thanks princess."

"Call me Luna, there art no needs for formality here. I heard your plan went well, yes?"

"You could say that. The numbers say it did, although I don't exactly feel the same." Luna gazed over the mares. "I see. It takes a lot of courage to take responsibility for the failures of your attack, I did the same thing to most of Canterlot after I was freed from the Nightmare, back when ponies were still afraid of me. It's much the same as with you."

"I guess I never drew that comparison. You're right though."

"Hey princess, what's the process for adoption around here?" Dash asked, prompting stares from Jason and Luna.

"Well that question was, what is it they say? Out of the grey?"

"I think it's 'out of the blue'."

"Ah yes, that question was certainly henceforth from the blue." Now it was Dash's turn to stare. "Just go to the orphanage and pick up the corresponding paperwork, then there's a short approval process, then you have a foal."

"That's all well and good, but she doesn't really live at an orphanage exactly."

"Art thou saying that this foal has been living homeless and alone for some months?"

"Yeah, apparently. We just recently took her under our wing when she followed us into the Everfree."

"Well this simplifies things greatly. Technically she is undocumented, so all you need to have is an interview to see that you are fit parents for this child. That means a steady income, no major medical conditions, and a house of course. I'm assuming you have all these things?"

"Had," Dash sighed, "We kinda left it all with the whole escape thing."

"I see. As far as I can tell though, you two should make excellent parents for this foal. What's her name anyway?"

"Scootaloo."

"A strange name, but my sister assures me that these names are commonplace nowadays."

"Hey Dash, how do you think Scoots is doing anyways?"

"I don't know, but I'm worried. If we control most of the city right now, couldn't we just go up and grab her?" I think it's, what, dusk or something?" Jason gave an exploratory flap of his wings.

"If flying stuff isn't too painful, considering the wound is in the front of my chest, I could go but I sure won't be able to carry much. You'd have to carry Scoots." He sighed. "We would still have to ask Shining though."

"Ask me what?" They both jumped. "You know, for ponies that pride themselves on stealth, you sure aren't very good at hearing me walk over." Jason glared at him.

"We want to briefly leave this base to bring another foal here that we have set up in the Everfree."

"Did I hear that right? A foal in the the Everfree, all by his or her lonesome. How did you even get a foal?"

"It's a filly." Shining gave Jason a glare. "And she's totally safe, in a platform high up in a tree with more than adequate food and water. I actually thought of everything. She followed us into the forest by the way."

"You shouldn't be going anywhere in your condition."

"I heal fast, it'll be fine. Ironically I can't heal myself, but Dash does a pretty good job of that."

"What do you mean, I did a pretty good job?"

"I'm just going to go out on a limb here and assume that being in the possession of lots of love helps me heal, and you have been around me for the last some number of days almost nonstop." He paused, "I guess my point is, I should be fine. Well, fine is a relative term but you know what I mean." He nuzzled her affectionately.

"You have half an hour."

"Huh?"

"Tick tock," Shining started to walk away. Jason pushed his jaw back into his mouth and gestured to Dash to leave. They immediately took off, flying through the a tunnel in the opposite direction of the one they had originally come through. After a few minutes, Jason motioned to Dash that he needed a rest, and they landed on the bottom of the pipe. Jason groaned and let himself fall over onto the ground.

"Why are you trying so hard, Jason? We're still way ahead of where we should be at this point."

"Yeah, but I don't want to leave Scoots worried for any longer. It's been almost two days, she may even think that we're both dead. I don't want to let her think that another two ponies died on her, I just want to get her back here so she doesn't have to worry." He sighed. "I guess we can actually give rational thought to adoption without it seeming like a pipe dream now, huh?"

"Yeah, although I guess I don't exactly know how this will work, all things considered."

"It'll probably sort itself out, but we should really get going again." Dash nodded her agreement and they took off again, only to rest a few minutes later. "How many hours did we walk through here for the first time?!?!" Jason yelled, causing Dash to look down the tunnel for some sort of light. She strained her eyes into the darkness, but as per usual, wasn't able to see anything.

"Hey Dash?" Dash looked towards Jason, who was no longer where he just was. "Dash?"

"Yeah?" She noticed the light of his horn by the ceiling and saw that Jason was upside down, seemingly stuck to the cieling by his hooves. "Did you know changelings apparently stick to walls?"

"Before I ask how, why are you up there anyway?"

"There was this thing that looked like a bit, but it's just a washer." He paused. "Pretty cool though, would've been nice to know about this earlier I guess." He started walking back across the ceiling before losing his grip while walking down the wall and sliding the rest of the way down into Dash, knocking them both over. He groaned. "Why does nothing ever go to plan? You have a nice flank by the way." Dash blushed before shoving Jason off of her and rising to her hooves. She punched him in the shoulder.

"You make it too easy for stuff to fail."

"The counterattack didn't fail." He shot back.

"Yeah, but you came back like this." She gestured, prompting Jason to mumble some things under his breath. "What was that?"

"Nothing. How much further is it until we get out of here?"

"I honestly don't know. See anything?"

"There could be a light over there, or it could just be a spot in my vision. I'm not sure, really." He fluttered his wings. "Let's just get out of here, something about these tunnels just doesn't feel right."

"Are you getting all cold again?"

"Yeah, and I still don't know why. Flying and everything doesn't even warm me up. It's like I have a fever and can't get warm." He took off with Dash at his side. The spot in his vision grew until he could no longer deny that it was an entrance. "Slow down, here's our stop." I hope." They ascended through the opening as the light from the surface gradually increased. They carefully exited the maintainance building into the late dusk light, realizing that they had ended up at the foot of the cliff over Canterlot.

"It's about time something doesn't go wrong for us." Dash said.

"Don't jinx it." They rested for a few moments before taking off again for the top of the cliffs, slowly rising past the crest and resting again until Jason managed to stop panting. "This is the most tiring thing I've ever done before."

"Yeah, it probably wasn't a good idea to let you come with me."

"As if I wouldn't find a way to go anyway." He snickered, trotting into the trees after Dash. They quickly found the treehouse and flew up, both landing quietly.

"Do you see her?" Dash whispered, moving over to the couch where Scootaloo normally slept.

"No, let me check the bed here." He flung off a few blankets before finding Scootaloo, in a little ball of orange and purple. "Aww... Dash look at this." She came over and stared at Scoots.

"Aww..."

"That's what I said." They stared at her for a few more moments. "I guess we have to wake her up then..." Dash nodded, seeming a little disappointed. Jason took a corner of one of the blankets and dangled it over Scoots, brushing it across her exposed muzzle. She batted at her nose with a hoof, mumbling about something inaudible before she seemed to stir, lazily opening an eye to see Dash and Jason hanging over her. Her tired expression turned into one of joy and she jumped up, grabbing both of their necks with her fore hooves.

"I missed you guys so much!"

"Same with us Squirt," Dash said.

"So is Canterlot saved then?"

"Almost Scoots, we're here to bring you somewhere safer until then. Sound good?"

"Yeah!" She noticed both of their bandages, especially the blood stained ones from Jason. "Are you guys okay?" Jason nodded.

"It's just a flesh wound. We're fine, well mostly anyway."

"So you're not gonna die?"

"No Scoots, now grab anything you want to bring and let's go." She nodded excitedly and ran around the platform, picking up a blanket and the Wonderbolts poster.

"That's everything?" Dash asked.

"Yeah!"

"Alright, hop on." Scootaloo climbed on top of Dash and they all took off, heading over the edge of the cliff. "Hey Scoots, hold on tight." Dash yelled above the wind as she dove towards the city, spiraling straight down. Jason chuckled a little at the spectacle as he dove after them, making sure that the bandages didn't decide to blow off in the wind. He flared his wings and leveled out his dive, carefully landing next to Dash.

"That was amazing Dash! How did you do that?"

"Lot's of practice Scoots. That and a little bit of instinct." Jason cut them off from further conversation.

"Maybe we should get below ground before you two decide to discuss the logistics of flying." Dash blushed a little before making her way over to the nearby maintenance door, quickly disappearing into the darkness before a muffled clop sound from below told Jason that they had landed. He carefully descended after them, flaring his horn light before he reached the bottom. He pointed in one direction of the tunnel. "The base is that way. Lets just get the fuck out of these stupid tunnels." He realized what he said and smacked a hoof into his face.

"Hey Rainbow Dash, what does fuck mean?"

"It's a bad word Scoots, you shouldn't use it."

"Shouldn't use the word fuck?"

"Yeah."

"Are you sure I shouldn't use the word--"

"Yes I'm sure." She replied. Jason snickered.

"I got a story for you two. Hopefully you'll be able to understand most of it." He chuckled a little before starting. "So here's the context. This woman I used to work with ran out of space for paper on her desk, so she balances them on a recycle bin. Long story short, she yelled at the janitor the next day for throwing out all these papers, even though realistically it was her fault. Now, she told me and some other people about how her son had been alone this one day in his room, doing whatever it is seventeen year old boys do, and then the fire alarm starts beeping, because it's running out of power. So he's sitting there an he hears the beeping, every minute, on the dot. So after trying to figure out what was going on, his theory was as follows: somebody broke into the house, took one of the chairs, and is now pushing the fire alarm every minute. So he grabs a pistol off the wall, which is a stupid thing to give a seventeen year-old, even if they weren't as dumb as this kid, and-"

"What's a pistol?"

"It's a weapon that fires metal bullets at high speeds. It's pretty lethal." He sighed, "Anyway, he points this pistol towards the wall and decides that he's going to shoot the burglar through the wall, but then decided that there might be two of them, so he better not shoot. And the mother tells us how glad she is that he didn't shoot, because there was an expensive cabinet on the other side of the wall, yet didn't actually question his actions. So the kid, wise as always, decides that he needs to get help, to get the two criminals out of his house, so he climbs out of his second story window in his pajamas and walks to the neighbors house. He woke them up at three in the morning, pistol in hand, and told them the whole story. The mother, showing the conveyance of like genes between generations, told us how proud she is of her son's quick actions, and how well he did in the situation."

Dash was busy laughing off to the side with Scoots. "That really happened?"

"Yeah, it's really too stupid to make up." He paused. "We're here by the way." Jason sighed, glad to be out of the tunnels once again.

"Wow..." Scoots said from Dash's back. "This place is huge!" She continued to look around as Luna made her way over.

"This is the foal?"

"Yeah. Hey Squirt, why don't you go say hi to some of the other foals around here?" She nodded and excitedly rushed off Dash's back, not even noticing Luna's presence.

"You don't want her to hear?"

"I want it to be a surprise. If it doesn't work out, I don't want to disappoint her."

"I wouldn't worry, I will, how you say, tug some ropes."

"Pull some strings?" Asked Jason.

"Yes. Base criteria are an annual bit income of thirty grand, easy access to the house and floorspace of at least sixteen hundred square feet. If you have all that, I'll write up the documents as soon as I can."

"We do."

"Then as far as I'm concerned, you have a new foal." Dash and Jason looked at each other.

"You're serious?"

"Why wouldn't I be?" Dash and Jason shared another look before smiles dawned on their faces and they hugged.

"Do you want to tell her or should I?" Dash asked.

"You tell her, she's your biggest fan."

"Okay fine." She gleefully clacked her fore hooves together. "Hey Scoots, can you come here a minute?" Scoots turned around from some conversation she was having with a filly and made her way over. "How would you feel if I told you that you've been adopted?" Her face fell.

"By who?"

"Us!" Her face did a full turnaround of emotion as the importance of Dash's words sunk in.

"So you're saying that I'm your daughter?"

"Well actually I don't know what you are, but daughter sounds good."

"Welcome to the family, Scoots." Jason bumped a hoof into Scootaloo's shoulder as she bounced around excitedly. He yawned. "I'm going to go sleep. This whole thing's just taken it out of me." He walked into the barracks, to the bunk that he shared with Dash. He turned around to see that both Scoots and Dash had followed him. "I'm assuming that you don't want to sleep right now Scoots, so just don't get into trouble and get to sleep at some point tonight. This bunk above me is yours." She scampered out of the room, leaving only Dash and Jason. "You tired too?" He yawned again.

"Yeah, I didn't really sleep well when you were injured and unconscious." She rolled into bed with him, pulling the blanket over herself. Jason looked at her for a moment before he leaned in and kissed her. He pulled back for a second, seeming to contemplate what to do, before he opened his mouth to speak. "I love you Dash." She smiled and pulled him into a hug.

"I love you too."

Jason awoke to a slightly uncomfortable pressure on his chest. He opened his eyes and sighed, nudging Dash with a hoof. Evidently Scoots had gotten to sleep at some point last night, but hoe guessed she was too tired to make it up to her bunk. She was sprawled over Jason's chest, hooves extending in random directions and hanging over his sides. Dash woke up and let out a quiet 'aww' at the sleeping filly, who briefly stirred, slightly curling her fore hooves, before returning to her slumber. They laid there peacefully for a few more minutes before Jason mouthed the words 'we should get up' to her and made some pointlessly misleading gestures. She somehow understood what he meant and nodded, watching him carefully throw Dash's side of the blanket over the filly before magically lifting her off of him and setting her down gently on a pillow, which she quickly wrapped in her hooves. They both smiled again before quietly making their way out of the room.

Jason noticed a strange smell, which he realized was coming from the bandages that hadn't been replaced since last time he was out, however many hours ago that was. "Dash I need to change these bandages."

"Yeah, I know." She said, getting a wiff of the dried on blood. "That can't be good." He nodded and they entered the infirmary, past several now awake and groaning ponies and the rhythmic beeping of machines. Jason walked up to a nurse, who stared at him with a blank expression.

"Are all of you like this?!?!" Dash yelled before seeming to calm herself. Jason gave her a look before turning back to the nurse, who still had the same expression.

"Would you be able to change these bandages? I really don't know what I'm doing when it comes to anything bigger than a paper cut." The nurse nodded and pulled out a dishearteningly large pair of scissors before slicing off the old bandages much faster than he was comfortable with in a line along his back. The bandages remained stuck to his chest.

"This is going to hurt." She said. Jason nodded as she went to forcibly pull the bandages off. She grabbed a corner and quickly pulled.

"AAAAAHHHHHHH!!!--wait that wasn't that bad."

"This one wasn't actually stuck." The nurse's neutral expression changed to one of slight sheepishness.

"Oh," Jason rubbed the back of his head. "So when are yo--AAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!" The nurse held up the liberated bandages, wincing a little at Jason's yelling. "That was a little worse than I was expecting, to say the least." He looked at his chest to see that the crack had seemed to heal, although he realized he didn't really know what it had looked like yesterday.

"We need to sterilize the wound. Lay down over there." Jason followed her directions as she moved a few bottles around before selecting one that was to her liking. Dash came over and looked at Jason's chest.

"How does it look?" He asked Dash.

"Better. A lot better."

"It sure doesn't feel that much better." The nurse came over with the bottle and tipped it onto the wound.

"What're you doing with that--AAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!" It was like someone had poured liquid fire inside his wound and it was working it's way into every single bit of surface area he had. Some writhing later the pain slightly subsided and the nurse came back over with a roll of bandages. "What was that shit?"

"Minor disinfectant, it's just a little sting." She started to wrap the bandages around his torso.

"Did you think that maybe it would work differently on a changeling?" She flinched a little before finishing a final wrap and cutting off the bandage with her teeth. She left the room without another word as Jason turned to Dash. "What the hell is wrong with her?" She shrugged.

"They're all pretty weird." Jason struggled to get off of the bed before she grabbed his hoof and pulled him up.

"I really hate this whole injured and out of action thing. I just hate having limits that are lower then the ones I knew a couple days ago."

"I know what you mean, I got stuck in the hospital for a few days while one of my wings was healed. It was the most boring three days of my life until Twilight introduced me to books, but I--" She trailed off, creating a brief moment of silence between the two before Jason guessed what she was thinking.

"You miss them?"

"Yeah, I mean we're so close to getting back, but I'm so scared that they won't see past what I've done and see me as a friend anymore." Jason pulled Dash into a hug.

"If they can't see past that, then they aren't good friends. I'm sure your friends will still love you, they'll have to face the facts that you didn't really do anything wrong, and kinda helped save Canterlot."

"Yeah, I guess you're right." She paused. "What do you think happened to our stuff and that griffin?"

"Well Shining got someone to move our stuff next to the bunk this morning, and I have no idea where the griffin is. Here I'll ask this guy." He got the attention of a guard, who saluted. Jason waved him off, fighting a grin. "Do you know where the griffin we took prisoner is?"

"Yeah, he's in that room over there."

"Thanks." They both walked into a new room with several jail cells lining the walls. Jason managed to get past his disbelief that another room was built down here to look around for the griffin. Dash found him in a particularly nice cell near the entrance, passed out with two legs hanging over the side of the bed. Jason raked his hoof on the bars, to his annoyance finding that the griffin had not so much as stirred. He walked over to a wall of numbered keys and grabbed the one corresponding to the griffin's cell, quickly unlocking the door. He walked over to the slumbering griffin and shook his shoulder around until he awoke. Eventually the griffin opened an eye, a slight smile dawning his face when he saw who it was.

"We have a few questions for you." The griffin yawned.

"Alright, if it'll get me out of here, fire away."

"What's your name and status in the griffin army?"

He sighed. "My name's Eravel, and I was just a foot soldier with the griffins. Basically just a punching bag for the hardened soldiers."

"Alright, do you know any other information about troop positions, anything like that?"

"No, since your counter attack they all moved out of my sphere of knowledge. Generally though, we were told to take Canterlot or die trying, so I doubt there's going to be much of an attempt at retreat. We're all pretty much expendable anyway."

"So we're going to have to be a little more serious about this than." He rubbed his chin. "And since they're all in the castle, that doesn't exactly make for an easy victory. Thanks for the information. Until we decide what to do with you, I'll make sure you get an extra blanket and some more food." The griffin nodded as Jason re-locked the door and left the room.

"If what he's saying is right, we have to kill all the griffins, right?"

"Unfortunately, yeah, and the longer we take to kick them out of this city the closer they come to discovering us or bringing in re-enforcements. I really hope the army here didn't get any letters asking for troops out of the city." Jason turned into the map room, which had the pieces located in the same places as before.

"So we have troops all around the castle," Dash moved pieces around on the board. "And all of these in the middle of the city are gone except for these two spots, right?" Jason nodded. "So have we actually attacked since the initial troop movements?"

"I guess not, I should probably ask Shining about that, see what he knows." There was a loud hustling outside, prompting them both to peer out the door at a caravan of ponies and stretchers moving into the infirmary. "Yeah, he's probably attacked." They both trotted into the infirmary, slightly shocked at the new influx of injured ponies. Shining came through the door behind them, wearing a rather stony expression.

"I suppose you may want to know how these ponies got injured?" He asked.

"Yeah." Jason replied.

"Well we were all in our positions, circled around the castle, when the griffins staged a counterattack towards a slightly weak point in our lines. We repelled them, but when we pushed them back to the castle we started getting decimated. There's no way we're getting through those walls with head on attack. In total, nineteen dead, twenty seven wounded, and an almost equal number of known enemy casualties."

"Do we know anything about their total numbers?"

"Not much, just that there are still at least a couple hundred. We could starve them out, but griffin re-enforcements could arrive by then, and that would spell disaster in this situation. We also can't destroy the building because Princess Celestia is in there."

"Why can't anything ever be simple?" A few nurses ran by quickly. "I'll figure something out. We'll tell you when we have something." He followed after the nurses, trying to find the patient that had evidently gotten them worked up. He saw them disappear into some curtains, parting them himself shortly after, then taking a gasp at what he saw. There was a pony in the bed, more bloody than he was yesterday, passed out in the bed. One of the nurses were attempting something with a blood transfusion, rigging it up to an IV while the other put pressure on one of the wounds. Jason gently shoved one of the nurses aside before she gave him a questioning look.

"What do you think you're doing?"

"Stopping the bleeding." Before the nurse had time to react he pushed power through his horn and into the bloodied pony. Dash felt a tugging at her back hoof, and turned to see Scoots.

"What're you doing here Squirt?" She said a little nervously; she wasn't exactly keen on letting Scoots see mortally wounded ponies.

"Trying to find you guys, I got bored. What're you two doing?"

"I'm not doing too much. Jason's trying to heal that pony over there."

"Oh cool!" She scampered over to the side of the bed to watch.

"Scoots wait it's---" She sighed. This could be interesting. Or not. She gave the kid credit though, it took her a full five seconds to get grossed out and leave the bedside, tongue hanging out of her mouth in an over-dramatically disgusted way.

"I-is that pony going to be okay Dash? There's blood everywhere..."

"I hope so Scoots, hopefully he wasn't too far gone. Jason can heal ponies, but he only really accelerates the process; he can't bring back the dead. Although he did say that introducing zombies to Equestria would be interesting, whatever that means." She sighed. "Hopefully he won't almost pass out like before." Scoots shot her a questioning look before Jason walked over, smiling.

"I can happily say that that pony should make a full recovery. Or something, I'm not really a doctor, but he definitely has better chances than before." He said.

"So then why aren't you all tired?" Dash asked.

"Well I kinda directed it, if that makes sense. I just healed the parts of him that were causing him to loose a lot of blood." He tottered a little, almost losing his footing. "That doesn't mean I'm not tired though."

"So what are these zom-bee things?" Scoots asked.

"Ah, Dash told you about that huh?" He sighed. "It's more than a little scary, you sure you can handle it?" She nodded her head, creating a blur of orange and purple. "Alright then. Basically, hold on." Jason leaned over a sink and washed his hooves, splashing some water on his face and briefly shuddered. "Let's get into the main room." They started walking before Jason turned to Scoots. "So, zombies are formed from an imaginary disease that infects someone, kinda like when you get a cold. Basically, the person dies and re animates a few hours later as a zombie. Zombies have no actual intelligence, and just run on instinct to try to eat the living. If a survivor gets bitten and runs away, he or she will also succumb to the disease and turn. Where it gets interesting is the resulting survival against a stupid yet ruthless enemy. The only way to kill a zombie is to destroy the brain, or wait until they rot away years later."

"So how, exactly, would it be interesting to introduce those to Equestria?" Dash asked, looking slightly annoyed.

"Yeah, well pretty much all guys where I come from want to try to survive the zombie apocalypse, and a huge game market is devoted specifically to zombies." Scootaloo was looking at him with an expression that was a mixture between awe and horror. He quickly added: "It's totally fictional though Scoots, just a horror story."

"Can I go as one of those for Nightmare Night?"

"Sure I guess, when is that?" Jason asked.

"End of the week." Dash said.

"You know, the whole time I've been here I never asked the time of year? It was late spring where I came from."

"Where did you come from, Jason?" Scoots asked. He shared a glance with Dash.

"A magical land, far away from here, called America." Her eyes widened.

"And why did you come here?"

"I don't know how I got here exactly. Just kinda woke up in a field near Ponyville. Anyway Scoots, as much as I'd like to spend time with you, me and Dash have to figure out a usable plan to get the griffins out of the castle."

"Can I come?"

Dash looked at Jason. He shrugged. "Sure Squirt, just don't move the stuff on the map. It's really important." They moved into the map room, where Shining Armor was already. "Hey Shining."

"Hey Dash, hey, Jason, was it?"

"Yeah. This is Scootaloo." He gestured to her. "How goes it?"

"Not too good, the only ways I see in are a sewer hatch and a frontal assault, and I don't like the ideas of either of those."

"Yeah, I was thinking the same." He stroked his chin, absent-mindedly wondering if it was possible to grow a beard. He missed having stubble, but then again he hated shaving. "We can't really go for the frontal assault, and we can't besiege them because we don't have time. I'd say that our only choice is the sewer entrance."

"How would that work anyway?" Shining asked "Are you even hearing yourself?"

"Yeah, we'll just get a team together. Get your six best, and we'll all go in, in the middle of the night. Just get as many men as you can spare at the gates, and we'll open them for you. It's like the Trojan Horse, except simpler."

"The what?"

"Basically it was a military plan that worked brilliantly in a scenario much the same as ours. It achieved victory after a ten year long struggle in a single night. Oh, yeah, and it's all we got."

"Need I remind you that you're hurt?"

"I have another twelve hours to recover. I'll be fine." He paused. "Anyway, grab six men and tell them that you're honored to report that they have been drafted as a part of Team Green Bean."

"Team Green Bean?"

"Yeah, and I have code names all sorted out too---" He noticed Shining's stare. "Come on, how funny would it be if foals were in classrooms in ten years and they were like 'Teacher, teacher, can you tell us about Team Green Bean?' or if some old scholars somewhere were discussing it? 'I do say, that Team Green Bean sure left a large societal influence on the Canterlot sphere, do you not agree, compatriot?'" Dash was attempting and failing to hide her laughter, Scoots wasn't even trying. Shining just looked at them all with a look of disgust, which Jason tried to supplement. "Hey, if they find out about something called Team Green Bean they won't take it seriously, think of it that way."

"You know, if we had any other plan and that counterattack of yours didn't succeed, I would never listen to you about any of this." Jason snorted.

"We're way more fun than regular guards. Can't say we don't make things more interesting."

"I'm just glad you don't treat battle itself like a game. Then I'd be worried." Dash seemed to snap out of her good mood.

"Are you sure you want to go back up there Jason?"

"We don't really have any choice." He shrugged. "I don't want to be associated with a lead-from-behind type of general, or whatever military position I have right now."

"But what if something happens to one of you?" Scoots asked.

"Nothing will, and we've already proved we can survive a lot." Jason said. Dash nodded.

"Well in any case I'll go get some ponies together." Shining said, quickly leaving the room.

"Ooh, what's this?" Scoots had started to touch random things on the map. "This is way better than a normal map!"

Jason leaned over towards Dash. "What time is it anyway?"

"Two or something, early afternoon."

"Living in these caves just completely throws off any internal clock I have." They left Scoots to her own devices, telling her not to break anything, to which she quickly agreed. They walked aimlessly back into the main room before Jason suddenly stopped, causing Dash to run into the back of him.

"What gives, Jason?"

"I just had a thought about how weird all of this is. I mean, I get in a car crash that would have meant certain death, then I end up here, in a magical world of talking ponies. I guess I never told you, or maybe I did, but ponies don't talk where I come from. I wake up in a field with a new body and shapeshifting abilities, then I got chased out of town, met you, got chased out of town again, only this time was taken prisoner by the leader of this country. Then you broke me out, and we lived in the forest for a few days where you became my mare friend. Finally we fought through a battle, I got stabbed, and we adopted a filly. And it's been what? Two weeks or so?"

"It's been a good two weeks, mostly." She nuzzled his cheek.

"Yeah, I wouldn't take it back, but looking back, we sure were busy."

"Not busy enough," She kissed him, "If you know what I mean..."

"You really have to tempt me now, don't you?"

"You make it too easy." She chuckled, before they both became silent. Dash sighed. "Seriously, though, what are we going to do with the next six hours?"

With French accent: "Two hours later."

"What the hell was that?" Dash asked.

"I don't know, I couldn't hear it over the sound of my boredom."

"I already know you're bored, you've been telling me about it for the past half hour."

"Yeah, but back where I came from we had so much stuff that was more entertaining then this pebble." He sighed. Flicking it across the floor with his hoof. "This is more boring than the high school exit exam." Dash giggled. "Where's Scoots when we need her?"

"You want to go look for her?"

"I have nothing better to do, so yeah." They tiredly got off the floor and walked into the map room, where Scootaloo still resided. "You know, I like maps as much as the next guy, but this is ridiculous." As they neared the table, it became obvious that Scoots had moved the pieces around on the map and was creating her own battle, sound effects and everything. Jason chuckled, "Having fun there Scoots?" She turned around, looking guilty.

"Uh....sure?" She tried to shield as much of the map from view as she could.

"Don't worry about it, the placement of those things doesn't really matter that much anymore." She sighed, visibly relaxing.

"You're almost as bad at hiding things as Applejack!" Dash laughed. The filly glared at her, causing Dash to laugh harder. Shining peered in to see the three of them, doing nothing important as usual, and got Dash's attention.

"We got some soldiers together." He said. Dash nudged Jason, whispering the news to him.

"Squirt, stay here, we'll be back in a while." She nodded and went back to the map. Jason and Dash left the room, escorted by Shining to a small group of ponies that had been assembled. As he walked by, Jason recognized one or two of the ponies, observing that none of the stallions had anything alike in build or size. Jason walked onto the ledge above them, and cleared his throat.

"Because you're here, that must mean you've shown extraordinary strength, skill or valor in battle, possibly all of those things. But now you've been recruited for a much more important reason. As you may know, the griffins have dug in and are fortified in the castle. There is only one plan of action we can take, and that involves you six, with the fate of this war balanced on your shoulders. I can't even begin to think that all of you will make it out of this alive, but that's why we only chose the best. Now, do any of you refuse to accept this offer?"

Silence.

"Then I hereby welcome you all to Team Green Bean."

(Great name I know)

The six stallions all lapsed into silence briefly before bursting out in laughter. When they had finally gotten a hold of themselves, Jason's straight face told them that he was serious. Before any of them could ask why he had chosen that name he spoke up.

"Team Green Bean doesn't sound like it poses any threat whatsoever, so we went with that name. It was also the first thing I could think of off the top of my head. Now you can brag to everypony that you were a part of the team." He noticed that of the six, the numbers were evenly matched between the different types of ponies.

"Now," Dash spoke up, getting a glance from Jason. "Hey, you always do these speech things, I want to give it a try." She punched him in the shoulder.

"Fine..."

"Anyway, the reason we need such a small, astute team is because we're taking the sewer entrance in, and basically get the doors open for the rest of the army. Evidently we're taking a big risk here, not only putting all of us in the line of fire but revealing the fact that we have a way in from the outside. The last thing we want to give them is direct access to this place." She paused. "We move out at eleven, report back here at nine thirty to get suited up and prepared." The six ponies saluted and trotted off in various directions.

"You know, I don't really want them to salute me, but when they do it makes me feel all important. I'm having trouble waving them off."

"Yeah, it's pretty nice. Anyway, we have three and a half hours to burn, what're we going to do with that?"

"Sleep?"

"You could say anything, and yet you come up with sleep?"

"We are going to be fighting people in the middle of the night, and I'm still not healed, and it gives us an excuse to cuddle."

"Well, when you put it that way..." She yawned. "Apparently I could use some sleep." Her stomach grumbled. "And some food."

"I guess we should get the food first then. It's strange not actually needing to eat, then there's the whole vegetarian thing."

"You won't let that go, will you?"

"I love my meat dammit!" Jason drew some looks from the ponies. He rolled his eyes.

"I'm not sure if that disturbs me. It definitely disturbs these ponies." She opened the door to the food storage and walked in.

"I was being sarcastic!" he yelled to the ponies before closing the door behind him. "Back in my world, people look at you strange if you only eat vegetables, not the other way around. At least I don't have to listen to everyone telling me how wrong it is to eat meat, and the whole 'it has a face' thing. I guess what I'm trying to say is, you aren't really meant to eat meat, so I can see why it's shunned. I'm rambling." He caught a can from Dash.

"Carrots?"

"Nah," He looked at the can in his hand. "Is this canned cake?" Dash nodded like it was no big deal. "What kind of a canned good is cake?"

"I dunno, it's not very good." Jason nodded and grabbed a can opener, quickly ripping the lid off and using it as a spoon. He took a bite before realizing something was off and shifting into Dash. He took another bite and gagged before spitting it into the wall, where it stuck, now tinged slightly green.

"Um?" He said, prompting Dash to look up.

"Why do you always turn into me?"

"Seriously, you comment on my form and not the cake cemented to the wall?"

"I have my priorities."

"Fine. I don't want some other pony walking into the room to find herself, and this way I can admire you twice as much." She blushed. "Plus, I have a pretty good idea what you like." He noticed the carrots she was eating. "Like those." She quickly hid them behind her back.

"Ah dornt knowr whart yourre tarking abart." She swallowed, briefly touching a hoof to her chin. "So basically if you like a food, I like it?"

"Presumably. You don't like this canned cake." He looked at the still cemented cake on the wall, shuddering a little.

"Catch."

"Beans, this is better." He opened the can greedily and started chugging the beans, stopping after he noticed Dash's stare. "As soon as I turn into you I start to get hungry. Must be some sort of safeguard to make sure I eat. AND I enjoy the taste. It was a wonder I wasn't fat."

"Can changelings get fat?"

"I don't know, I mean love isn't really tangible, so it can't really be stored as fat. I don't think so. A fat changeling would look pretty weird though." He chuckled. "Throw me another can. Something fruity." She tossed him a can of peaches. "So how long until winter here? I know it kinda just starts snowing and stuff..."

"A few weeks, we still have Nightmare Night and The Running of the Leaves to get through, then there's a few weather prep days."

"So does regular climate apply outside of Equestria?"

"What do you mean?"

"Like clouds moving on their own, snow falling before winter..."

"Yeah, it's unnatural." She shivered.

"My whole world is like that." Her eyes widened. "Humans are pretty resilient, we put up with it."

"But how?"

"It's always been like that, so we've just adapted." He paused. "You know those explosives we have?"

"Yeah..."

"Okay so back on Earth we have these bombs that split atoms apart in a chain reaction and basically leave a sixteen mile wide crater. It's pretty epic."

"Have you ever used one of them?"

"There were lots of tests, but we only used two. They ended a war much faster, saving somewhere around a million American lives. That was the estimate anyway. Since then we haven't used any in war."

"And that's not magic?"

"No, that's the best part! It's just physics and chemistry on a molecular level. The bombs did end up advancing power generation techniques, we use a very slowed down process to power submarines, which are ships that go underwater, power plants, lots of stuff. I guess you walking into my world would be pretty much the same as how I've walked into yours. It's really different, and mine's probably a little more dangerous."

"Um, you're right? Your world seems a lot weirder than you make it out to be."

"Meh, you get used to it." There was relative silence as they both ingested the food from their respective cans until the door quickly opened. They both looked over to see Scoots in the doorway, looking pretty surprised at seeing two Dashes in the same place.

"Hey Scoots." They said at the same time before looking at each other. Dash winked.

"Which one of us is the real Dash, Squirt?" Jason asked. She looked at him.

"Scoots, over here!" Dash yelled.

"No, I'm the real Dash!"

"No it's me!"

"Scoots, remember that time where you set up that fan club?" They said in almost perfect unison.

"How did you know that?" They both asked.

"AAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!" Scoots turned tail and ran, quickly deciding that if she spent any longer in the room her head might explode. After seeing her leave, Dash and Jason broke into laughter.

"How did you know I was going to say that?"

"Lucky guess. Really lucky guess." Jason fished out another peach piece and sighed. Apparently he had finished off the can.

"Do you want another?"

"Nah, I probably shouldn't just pig out. I have no idea what happens to the food anyway, that's what really disturbs me." He paused. "You done?"

"Yeah." Jason looked at her feet to see three empty cans of carrots.

"You really like those carrots, huh?"

"I swear I didn't use to. Thanks though." She trotted over and nuzzled his cheek, then backed up. "It's weird nuzzling myself." Jason dropped the disguise.

"Better?"

"Much better." She moved over and sat down next to him, leaning her head on his shoulder. Neither of them moved for a few moments before Dash yawned and stretched. "I don't know about you, but I could really use some sleep right now."

"I think I was the one that suggested it."

"It was a good suggestion."

"Agreeing with something I have to say without grudgingly accepting it? You definitely need some sleep." She punched him in the shoulder, then turned to leave.

"You coming?"

"I don't know, what's my incentive?"

"Oh nothing, just a hot mare that coincidentally happens to be your mare friend."

"I dunno...sounds a little too good to be true." She paused for a moment before turning around.

"Was that a compliment or a well disguised insult?"

"It was definitely a compliment." Jason said resolutely, getting up to follow her. "You know, I kinda wish our worlds had more in common."

"Why? I mean besides problems with adaptation..."

"A bunch of my humor doesn't make sense anymore. For example, if I were to say that the Delta airlines help desk is an oxymoron..."

"I don't get it."

"Exactly. That would've been hilarious to anyone flying Delta. I could also make jokes that would piss off millions of people back on Earth here because no one would get pissed off, but they wouldn't be funny. Dead baby jokes would make me look like a serial killer. You can see where I'm going with this."

"Dead baby jokes?"

"Don't ask. I'm going to use that in the middle of conversation sometime to disturb someone. And it will be hilarious."

"I don't understand you."

"That's good, I'm not shallow."

"Well that's definitely a good way to put it." Dash pushed open the door to the sleeping quarters. It was totally deserted. She made her way over to the bed and flopped into it, sprawling her legs out in random directions.

"No one ever sleeps in normal positions around here..."

"If Scoot's had slept in a normal position she wouldn't have been as cute." She giggled. Jason rolled into bed next to Dash, pulling her into an embrace.

"I don't think anything she does isn't cute. She'd probably hate for me to tell her that though." He paused. "So back to that snow stuff..."

"Oh yeah, there's also mountains up north, still inside the border."

"We should go there for a couple days, just rent a cabin, or whatever you do around here, or just build a temporary cloud house. And then I could show you some of the sports we had back on Earth."

"Are they fast?" Jason stared at her incredulously.

"I wouldn't tell you if they weren't." She giggled.

"I'll look forward to it then." She pulled Jason towards her and planted a kiss on his lips. She pulled away after some time and rested her head on his shoulder. After a few seconds, she shifted her head uncomfortably. "You don't think you could--" He quickly shifted his form under her, turning into his usual Alternis alibi. She laid her head back down under his arm and sighed contentedly.

"Have I ever told you that I love you Dash?"

"It may have been mentioned."

"Well I do." He stroked a hoof through her mane, briefly trying to figure out what if would feel like if he had fingers.

"Stop saying sweet things and rest, Jason. You can make me feel loved as much as you want later."

"But that's no fun, I need to bother you about it!"

"You're impossible." Jason chuckled.

"Well, I try..." He felt Dash smirk into his fur. Jason resigned to his fatigue and laid his head down, closing his eyes. They both quickly found sleep, wrapped in each other's hooves

Jason woke up with a start, for some reason thinking that he had missed the attack. He relaxed when he saw the time; they still had ten minutes until they were supposed to meet and get suited up. He pushed his hoof against Dash's shoulder, trying to rouse her. She opened her eyes a few seconds later, seeming to react in the same way Jason had before he laid a hoof on her shoulder, slightly calming her down.

"We got ten minutes to get our stuff and get out there, so as much as I'd like to lounge around in bed with a mare as pretty as you, we should really get moving."

"Why do you always make these decisions about getting up?"

"When my brother was around, he would never get up, and it became my job to pull him out of his bed. It was a lot of fun, mostly because he hated it."

"Fine, I'll get up then."

"It's not like I'm actually pulling you out of bed or anything."

"There was that one time..."

"Yeah, that was fun." She punched him, causing him to chuckle. He looked around, realizing that the sleeping quarters were much more packed than before. Realizing that it was late, he shrugged off the pointless thought and jumped out of bed, grabbing a the armor and weapons in his magic. Dash got up and yawned before walking out the door in a daze behind him. Jason walked up to the ledge and dumped his stuff in a pile, turning to see that five of the six stallions were already present, and another was on his way over.

"So guys, we have forty five minutes to get suited up, then we move out." They were staring at him strangely. He looked at his hoof, was there something on his fur? Aha! Fur! He dropped the disguise, surprising a few of the stallions. He cleared his throat again. "Anyway, forty five minutes. Bring everything you could possibly need in case things go wrong. Move out." The stallions all went into the barracks to get on their armor and to find weapons. Jason sighed before grabbing the explosives belt and wrapping it around himself. He used his magic to quickly get Dash suited up, carefully checking the armor for large cracks that could lead to the same fate he had received from the spear.

"There's just something I love about this armor."

"I know what you mean."

"We should go tell Scoots we're leaving. It probably wouldn't be good to just leave."

"Yeah, we still have a half hour. I'm assuming she's still doing something with the map? I don't see her out here."

"Might as well check there first." They walked over to the door, opening it to find not just Scoots, but several other foals hovering over the somehow undamaged map. Scootaloo moved a piece on the board.

"Bam, pay up!" She laughed as the other foal reluctantly passed her his remaining bits, frowning to himself.

"Scoots?" She quickly looked up from her significantly larger than average pile of bits to see Jason and Dash, suited up for battle.

"Wow, Dash you look awesome!" Dash leaned over to Jason and said something about gambling.

"Scoots, did all these foals agree to this?" She nodded. "And you haven't cheated in any way?" she shook her head. "Alright I'm fine with it." Dash chuckled.

"Looks like we have two military commanders in the family." She sighed. "Scoots, we're going to be gone for a few hours on a mission, but we should be back around daybreak. Don't worry too much."

"Alright, neither of you better die." She warned.

"Sure thing Scoots." He turned to Dash. "You ready?" She nodded. "Lets see if the team is ready." they walked back outside and waited around until the team showed up, a few minutes before they were scheduled to leave. Jason pointed to four of the stallions. "You four are team beta, the other two and us are team alpha." He paused. "Now in terms of code names, these I'll make cool," He started pointing to the stallions. "Archer, Tank, Hunter, Plasma, Steve, Potato. I'll be, uh, Phantom? Dash, you're Blur. Let's move out."

The walk to the castle entrance was a quiet one; no one knew exactly what to expect. Jason stopped below the entrance, and turned to face the team. "I hope you're prepared. Nothing will be pretty up there, even less will go to plan. Welcome to Hell."

Jason rose through the sewer exit, carrying a very uncomfortable looking white maned, purple coated unicorn stallion. Steve, if he remembered correctly. Dash was already in the process of setting down another stallion in the small maintenance room as Jason landed. The other two pegasi came up with the other two flightless stallions, completing their small group.

"Listen," Jason said, "they're hopefully mostly asleep at this point. The castle gate is to the right out of this door, then down another corridor to the left. If something goes wrong, beta team, you guard this exit and stay hidden." He gestured to a large grey earth pony and a smaller blue unicorn." Tank, Potato, D-, I mean Blur, and I are going for the gate. Everyone ready?" They nodded. Jason quickly walked over to the door, slowly pushing it open with his hooves, much slower than he had the last time, when the door had decided to squeak.

After the door was finally opened about a minute later, they all piled out and split up. Luckily the hallway was unoccupied, and they were able to start the plan in motion. Something was actually going right for a change. They carefully walked around a corner, coming into a room that neither Jason or Dash recognized. Quickly ducking behind the doorway, they realized that there were griffins inside. After a few moments of complete silence though, they peered around the corner to see the griffins again, which they now realized were asleep.

Jason swung a hoof, gesturing for them to follow him as he carefully made his way over to a griffin and carefully slit its throat, covering it's mouth with a hoof. The other three did the same with haste, not wanting any of the griffins to be able to fight back before they were killed. Jason stepped back and surveyed their work, wincing slightly at the sheer amount of blood that literally covered the floor. They searched around before leaving the room and walking down a different passageway, hopefully the one that led to the castle gates. They turned another corner, quickly hiding behind some pillars as a pair of griffins walked by. They jumped out and stabbed the griffins as they walked by after realizing that they were on track to the room they had just cleared, dragging the bodies back to lie in the room with all the others before closing the door.

Three more turns in the halls, and they were still no closer, it seemed, to finding the entrance. Jason was having trouble figuring out why exactly the castle needed this many hallways. Another griffin pair walked by, meeting the same fate as all the others. Two more turns and they slowly emerged into a large room, with two thrones at one end and a large door at the other. Tank recognized where they were, having been called in for an audience with the princess at one point, and directed them through the large door, showing them that the gates were just across this next room, past more than a few griffins. Jason pulled them back behind the door.

"What's our plan? We can't exactly go in there and make noise, we need to be quiet so that the army can move in unnoticed."

"So that rules Flash-bangs out," Dash said. "Ooh! What about the smoke? We have a bunch of those, that would be quiet and they wouldn't know that it was an attack right away. They wouldn't know what to think."

"Okay, so we're going to throw a couple of these," Jason took a smoke grenade out of his belt, "and then quietly run in there, sneak up behind them and slit their throats. That's the plan anyway. We don't want them screaming in pain and alerting the other guards. Same with us, if you get stabbed, be as quiet as you can."

"Jason, you ready?" Dash had moved towards the door, cradling one of the bombs in her wings absentmindedly.

"Ready as I'll ever be." He pulled the first pin in time with Dash and tossed the first volley of smoke grenades across the room, hearing a soft popping noise as they landed near the griffins. They primed another set and threw them closer to the door, making a path of smoke to the group of griffins. He gestured to Tank and Potato, silently telling them to follow him as he and Dash dove into the smog, quickly becoming silhouettes and then disappearing entirely. Dash and Jason stuck close together as they ran straight across the room, quickly coming into view of the Griffin silhouettes. Dash took one out as they passed by, nearing closer to the main group.

Two more griffins came into view, the first dealt with in tandem by Dash and Jason, the second one taken out by Potato before either of them could react. Tank punched a griffin, sending him into the wall and watching him slump to the floor unconscious. One of the griffins, becoming slightly aware of what was going on, came out of the haze behind tank and thrusted his spear.

The griffin missed his mark, but still managed to get the spear completely through Tank's upper back leg. Potato took out the griffin while Dash held a hoof over Tank's mouth, muffling his scream as Jason quickly pushed the barbed spear the rest of the way through and preformed a rudimentary healing. While Dash jumped back into the fight, Jason dragged Tank to the side of the room, not quite out of the haze.

"Sit tight." He passed him a spear before turning around and rushing back in. The smoke had started to clear by now, and Jason watched as Potato cut down another griffin at the cost of a deep gash on his side as the griffin's spear went under his armor. Maybe he should've given someone else the name Potato...Nah. He was pretty badass though.

Jason ducked under a spear, breaking it as it passed by his shoulder and watching as another spear appeared out of the griffin's chest. Jason quickly cut the griffin's throat before turning and bucking another onto the ground in front of Dash. A massive weight hit his side, sending him skidding across the floor as a particularly huge griffin appeared out of the smoke, cackling to himself. He walked towards Jason, pausing to brutally knock Potato out of the way without much effort.

He got closer and reared up, spear in his talon as he thrusted his arm forward. Jason rolled to the side as the spear glanced off his armor, chipping part of it clean off as it became imbedded in the ground where he had just been. He couldn't fight this guy if he could just be taken out in a single strike. Potato had been thrown aside like a rag doll, and was slumped against the wall nursing what appeared to be a broken leg.

Jason couldn't get him back into the battle either, that would mean healing him, which meant standing still for an extended period of time. For obvious reasons, that wasn't going to work. He sidestepped another attack, watching as Dash cut down the last of the smaller, less dangerous griffins. Another spear thrust came by, glancing off his other side and throwing him off balance. He turned to see a talon flying at him, smacking him into the far wall.

Dash flinched and jumped onto the griffin, burying a knife in the middle of it's back. The griffin, without so much as a cry of pain, picked Dash up by a fore hoof, smiled slightly, and gripped it tightly as he dangled her just off the ground. A few cracks were heard before she screamed in muffled pain and was hurled across the room, landing next to Jason in a heap.

In the only success of the night, the gates suddenly opened, much to their surprise. Next to the gate winch sat a proud looking Potato, huffing from the exertion of dragging himself over through the pain.

Jason took another look at Dash and shot off of the ground, ignoring the spidery cracks on his chest and back that were already streaming with blood as he quickly ran towards the griffin, who had preoccupied himself with Potato and was currently holding him by his head using one of his talons. Potato's body was swinging about as he tried to pull the talon off of his head. The griffin saw Jason and quickly shook his arm, watching as Potato's body went limp. He threw it to the side and made a fist, punching at Jason, who quickly dodged to the side, only to get hit with another talon fist and slam back into the wall. He tried to get up, but the griffin had already pinned him to the ground, holding the spear poised in his arm, ready to strike.

"You four have given me a lot of trouble, you came the closest to besting me so far, and therefore I almost have respect for you. But you're still weak, and now you're going to urk--" Jason watched in awe as a spear ran itself through the griffin's neck, making him fall to the side into an already forming pool of blood. Tank was sitting against the wall, grimacing as he watched the griffin bleed out from the injury inflicted by his spear. Jason slowly pulled himself to his feet as the first of the guards started to march in, a few of them grimacing at the amount of blood on the floor that they had to step through and all the corpses littering the floor.

Jason checked Dash's pulse and found that she was still alive. He let out a loud sigh before limping over to Potato, checking for a pulse even though he already knew the result. He hung his head, mourning his death before reaching out and closing his clouded over eyes.

Dash had woken up while he had been checking Potato's vitals, and was now fighting the urge to scream out in pain as she gingerly held her shattered fore-hoof up with one arm. Jason stopped in front of her.

"Lay your arm flat on the floor, and I'll heal that and those bumps on your head as best I can. It might hurt to heal you while you're awake, I don't really know. Here goes nothing." He sighed and focused power into her arm and the area around her head trauma. She grimaced as her leg bones shifted back together.

"It doesn't exactly hurt, but it's not a good feeling, that's for sure." Jason watched as the swelling in her leg went down, the color changing from dark blue to bluish-green to normal sky blue as the bone healed completely and the bruising disappeared. She tested the leg by putting some weight on it, before deciding that it had been healed to her satisfaction and trotting over to Jason to kiss him. "Thanks, Jason, how are you feeling?"

"It hurts, but it's nothing serious." Jason sighed. "I'll live."

"If you say so..." She looked at him worriedly for a moment before turning and trotting over to Potato while Jason started working on Tank's leg.

Tank and Jason both tottered over to join her a few moments later, mourning their fallen comrade. "If I may," Jason started, "He was definitely a good soldier, fighting to the end. I doubt this plan would've worked without him, and we would've probably died if he hadn't opened that gate, one way or another." He paused. "I just realized that I don't even know his name, that I never got to know the guy before he passed, and that makes me feel worse than if I had known him for years." He paused, tears coming to his eyes. "I just-- I should've tried harder."

"It's not your fault." Dash said, trying to soothe him.

"I ordered this operation, it's COMPLETELY my fault."

"Yeah, but if you hadn't ordered this operation, the griffins would still be fortified in the castle."

"I guess you're right, it needed to be done." He sighed, still deep in thought. He flagged over a few medics and directed them to the body, briefly whispering to them before they hurriedly took the body away.

"What'd you tell them?"

"It doesn't really matter right now, does it? We should go see what happened to the other four."

"Oh man you're right." They retraced their steps, quickly coming upon the maintenance door and several pools of blood, along with a few trails going around the corner. A few guards were present in the hallway, trying to move a bloody pony onto a stretcher. Jason walked by curiously, stopping when he recognized the pony.

"Steve?" Steve coughed, getting some blood on his hoof. "What happened?"

"A bunch of griffins came by, and we fought off a bunch of them, but they took Archer, knocked Hunter unconscious and then took him, and I think they killed Plasma." He paused. "I don't know why they let me live." He coughed again.

"Hold him still." Jason briefly healed him somewhat before starting to feel weaker. "That should slow the bleeding, I think. It definitely helped, I know that much."

"Alright, well some guards went after them about two minutes ago, but other than that I don't know anything."

"See ya later than Steve." He sighed as the two ponies carried him away and turned to Dash. "Don't you just like how everything gets more complicated whenever it seems like it might end?"

"I think the universe just hates us."

"Well it definitely hates Archer and Hunter. I really hope they aren't being tortured or something."

"Well what the hell are we waiting around for? We have a perfect trail right here!" She pointed to the smears of blood leading away and around the corner. She followed the trail around the corner before Jason could respond, so he simply limped after her without a word.

"Hurry up Jason!" He buzzed past her a few seconds later.

"I can't walk that fast right now and I'm tired, just slow down. Steve said a bunch of guards went by here already anyway."

"Yeah, but what if they couldn't handle it?"

"Then we get there thirty seconds later. I'm not going to be much good in this fight anyway, so hopefully there aren't that many left, and--" His jaw dropped as they turned a corner and looked into a large room filled with battling guards and griffins.

"So there's a few left, nothing we can't handle."

"You keep thinking that." A couple more guards ran past them, immediately entering into the action. Jason and Dash walked into the room, still slightly in awe before a griffin jumped towards them and made them jolt out of their stupor. Jason blocked the spear thrust while Dash shoved a knife into the griffin's chest, knocking him onto his back with a thud. A guard hit the ground at about the same time with another griffin hovering over him, but Dash pushed him off and onto Jason's waiting knives. They took out a few more griffins before the room was finally cleared, leaving more than a few corpses, guards and griffins both.

Dash had started to follow the blood trails again, trotting out of the room, with Jason trying to keep up behind her. He gestured to the guards to follow and managed to get Dash to slow down. They carefully made their way around another few corners and into a room where they found Archer and Hunter tied up and in the corner. They slowly walked over and untied them,expecting some sort of trap. When they managed to get them both out of the room without any traps being sprung, Jason turned to Dash.

"Did something actually just turn out to be easier than it should've been?"

"I think it actually did." She sighed. There was a growl as a griffin about the size of the other large one they had fought walked out of one of the doors in the room.

"Shit... another one?"

"Well at least we kinda know how to fight it."

"We were saved by a stallion with a hole in his leg."

"You have holes in your legs."

"Yeah, but these are supposed to be here!" The griffin walked towards them, swatting a guard out of the way.

"Everypony, scatter!" Everyone ran towards the walls as the griffin looked around, picking it's next target. A guard ran up behind the griffin and buried a spear in it's hind leg, although the griffin didn't seem to notice, simply swatting him aside like the other guards. Jason nudged Dash and she took off, flying overtop the griffin as Jason caught it's attention. A spear whistled past his shoulder, followed closely by a talon as Jason jumped backwards. Another attack came as he sidestepped. He tried to do the same with the next attack, but was hit before he could react, sent sliding across the room.

Dash came down from behind the griffin, raking a knife from the back of his neck to his mid back before she was forced to fly backwards to avoid another strike. Tank readied a spear and threw it at the griffin. He missed the griffin's neck and instead hit him in the side, causing him to yell out in pain. A knife struck slightly closer, imbedding itself near the griffin's collarbone. Jason readied his other knife, levitating it in the air as he prepared to catapult it forward.

The knife made a whoosh noise as it was accelerated and released, hitting the griffin in the upper shoulder. Dash dove again, managing to nick the front of the griffin's neck as he turned to Jason. "Why won't you die?" Jason yelled, peering over at the multitude of spears and knives sticking out of the griffin. Another spear throw flew true, embedding itself into the griffin, who still refused to die. Several more guards ran back into the room and threw spears, many of them hitting the griffin. At some point amongst the volleys, the griffin fell over on his side, panting heavily. Jason walked over and pulled out one of his knives, immediately running it across the griffin's throat.

Dash landed next to him, putting a hoof over his shoulder and leaning her head against his. "Well, we did it."

"Assuming this is the last of them then yeah. I honestly don't think I have much more fight in me anyway."

"You know, your healing doesn't exactly get rid of fatigue that well. I feel like I could sleep for three days straight."

"Once we go meet Shining we're free to go back to base and rest, then hopefully everything goes back to normal, no more griffins in the way to screw that up."

"It's about time we're done with this. It's only been a week here but it feels like I've lost three years of my life."

"Let's hope that's not true. Come on, lets go." They made their way out of the castle without getting lost again, slowly passing under the castle gates and through the pools of blood. They walked under the stars as they walked across the castle grounds. Entering a large building across from the gates, they quickly came across Shining Armor, who winced slightly at their appearance, although he kept his smiling expression.

"Looks like Team Green Bean succeeded."

"Looks like Team Green Bean was a success."

"Yeah, but two of us died. Plasma and Potato." He sighed.

"I'm sorry to hear that."

"Oh yeah? So am I! Potato gave his life getting that gate open!" He took a deep breath, composing himself as best he could. "What happened to Celestia, by the way?"

"We secured her a few minutes ago from one of the side rooms of the castle. She appeared to be mostly unharmed." A door opened and a few guards walked in, followed by a slightly dirty looking Celestia. She walked over, smiling at the three of them as they saluted.

"I'm glad to be out of that room." She shuddered before her expression lightened. "Apparently my trust was not misplaced as it turns out, changeling. I commend you for your efforts. It means more than you know."

"Jason." Dash said.

"Pardon?"

"His name is Jason."

"Alright, Jason, what are you planning to do now that this is all over?"

"Well, I was planning on going back to Ponyville with Dash and Scootaloo, maybe take a little vacation time, get some sort of job..."

"Ah, yes. Jobs." She stroked her chin in thought.

"Princess, you're planning to pursue the griffin military into their territory, correct?"

"It has come up as an idea before, but I was not explicitly planning on it."

"They'll probably just attack again if you don't go on the offensive. They've also just lost a big chunk of their army. I'd say it's the right time for an attack. We'll suffer more casualties if we don't keep them from coming back. Chances are, you don't want a repeat of this." He pointed out the window at the battered and broken city.

"I see." She rubbed her chin again. Jason suppressed a chuckle after imagining her with a beard. "How would you like to control the troop movements?"

"Is that a job offering?"

"Yes, I believe it is." She replied. Jason was lost for words.

"UH....ng..mr."

"He'll take the job." Dash said. Jason nodded. The Princess chuckled heartily.

"Do I get a map like the one underground, but for a larger area?" He asked, attempting to plead with his eyes.

"Yes, I will have one made." Shining gave her a look.

"Do not worry, Captain, you still have your job, all the changeling controls is large scale troop movements and positions, approved, of course by you. I have not assigned him to be on the front lines, I'm surprised he's still standing right now, with all that blood." Jason worriedly looked at himself. True to her word, the recent cracks had yielded a fair amount of blood, although he didn't think it was anything to be worried about. Of course, he clearly couldn't judge risks very well.

"Can I override his judgements?"

"If you have adequate reasoning."

"It's fine with me then."

"Now, pay and benefits. You will of course be in a part time job in peace time, but as of now, this is a full time job. You have at least a few days while we prepare to start this military campaign. During that time a map will be built in your place of residence and you will have time to do with your time as you wish. Pay will be sixty-five thousand bits a year full time, forty-thousand part time."

"Dash, how is that for pay?"

"Let's just say, it's a lot of money."

"Alright, I accept. How about you Dash? It would be your house."

"Meh, we can just expand it, cloud house and all."

"Okay then. We'll be in touch when we get the house back into working order. Right now though, I think I'm just going to go see if Scoots is fine and get some sleep." He yawned. "These pre-dawn battle things really take it outta you, if you know what I mean."

"Before you leave the city though, come by the castle. There are a few things I need to ask you before I let you go." She kept a bright expression on her face, leaving Jason and Dash to wonder if she was actually talking about minor topics or if she just had one hell of a poker face.

"Sure thing princess. You coming Dash?"

She snapped out of her daydream. "Yeah, long day I guess. Well, long night."

"Oh really? What happened?" He asked, causing her to chuckle.

On Jason's insistance, they walked closer to the base above ground before entering the tunnels, passing by several ponies who were already starting to clean up the wreckage in the pre-dawn hours. Jason levitated some rubble into a wheelbarrow as they walked by, watching other ponies start to chip away at the herculean task.

"Have they ever had to rebuild the city before?"

"Not from this state. There were a few attacks that came close, and the city was almost completely rebuilt in six months."

"How? I mean, I know the buildings are pretty simple and it isn't that big of a city, but that's amazing!"

"Well, you know, magic."

"Yeah..."

"So the Princess wanted to see you."

"Yeah, I hope she doesn't want to know too much. I mean, I'm guessing she wants to know about the flash-bangs and stuff, possibly Scootaloo. I'm definitely not going to tell her how the explosives work."

"Why?"

"Well, for one thing, it would throw the economy completely out of whack, using things that were nearly useless prior, inflating their value. Then the technology would spread, and all the nations would equip their armies with the weapons."

"But it would save thousands of ponies!"

"Aha! For a while, it would, then stuff would be back to normal, which would be fine if you could continue to advance, but you did that based on stuff that no one understands. So I'm going to tell her about a different technology, one that's easily producible, useful, and could probably safely bump your society ahead by anywhere from tens to hundreds of years. The little economist inside my head informs me that it also shouldn't screw with the economy too much, definitely not as much as introducing explosives."

"Just tell me what it is..."

"You'll have to be patient. It's not really that mind bending, so don't get that excited."

"Come on, please?"

"No. It's a surprise."

"Ugh, don't you understand that I like to know things?"

"Yes." He chuckled. She poked him in the chest.

"You're just lucky you have alien technology to lord over me."

"I'll give you a hint. What's stronger than iron."

"Nothing."

"Okay, I must just be wrong then."

"So you're saying your people found something stronger than iron?"

"Well, several things, actually, but yeah. I'm not answering any more of your questions. You already weaseled out most of the information anyway." She giggled.

"Well, here's the door thingy." He threw it open, making a loud screech and bang as it slammed into the wall. Dash stared at him. "I kinda had to do that at some point. Opening doors carefully is boring."

"Why are you so strange?"

"Is this a trick question?" He jumped into the pipe and disappeared into the darkness. He yelled up a moment later. "You coming?" She rolled her eyes and jumped down after him, landing after a few moments.

"You know, it's weird thinking that we aren't going to be actually fighting griffins tomorrow." Dash said.

"In a way, I'm kinda gonna miss it. I mean, it was dangerous as hell, but it was definitely... you know I don't really know what it was. It wasn't really fun in any sense of the word, but... yeah I have no idea."

"Exciting maybe?"

"I guess." He paused, chuckling lightly. "I wonder how much more money Scoots won from beating those other foals."

"Judging by the size of her pile of bits, I'm guessing a lot."

"Has it ever crossed your mind that she has her cutie mark in whatever it is she was doing there?"

"Then why didn't she get it?"

"Maybe she's just not taking it seriously or something? You didn't get a cutie mark until you broke the sound barrier, and specifically breaking the sound barrier isn't your talent, it's flying. That's probably why the Crusaders never actually get their cutie marks, besides the fact that they attempt things no one would ever have a cutie mark in."

"Yeah, it's not like anypony actually knows how they work really. It's still kind of a mystery." They emerged from the tunnel into the shockingly empty central room.

"The ponies must've been pretty anxious to get out of here," Jason said.

"Well, it's not like they've had much to do. If I were them I'd be climbing the walls by now."

"It's the last day here, so you might as well make the most of it."

"Sleep?"

"Yeah. Wanna go find Scoots?" She nodded, and they proceeded into the map room. Scoots wasn't there. "She probably went to bed." They crossed the room, walking into the sleeping quarters, finding several more ponies asleep. Jason walked over to their bunk, noticing that one of Scoot's legs was hanging off the top bunk as she slept. He nudged her further onto the bed before moving to get on his own bed.

"Wait!" Dash hissed. He looked back at her, confused. "Don't get into bed like that, I just got a roll of bandages. There's no reason to make ponies think that a serial killer struck." He stared at her briefly before walking over. "Transform first." He obliged, looking himself over to see the strange looking wounds, now looking like someone had cut him up with a scalpel because they had taken the same shape as the old injuries. She trotted over with the bandages balanced on a wing and started to tie them around him, covering most of his torso in the fluffy white fabric before stepping back to observe her handiwork and securing it with a safety pin. "I'm no doctor, but that looks a lot better than before."

"Yeah, it's a real close competition."

"Thanks."

"It's always a pleasure." He beamed at her.

"If I didn't know you I'd be pissed right now."

"That's why I wait to get to know women before getting all sarcastic. If they're still with me I've found the right one."

"Past experience backing that theory up?"

"Well, my first girlfriend was pretty fun to mess with... Nah I'm just kidding, everyone loves my sense of humor."

"You're so very modest Jason."

"Thanks!" Scoots twitched her hanging led and mumbled something. They both laughed quietly. Dash yawned widely, rolling into the bed. Jason fell into it afterwords, jostling Dash around as the mattress accounted for his added weight.

"Hey Jason, are we just kinda strutting into town tomorrow?"

"It's funny, we create plans to win a battle, fight the battle, and now I got nothing to just re-enter a town."

"Ha, yeah. We could maybe get Celestia to send a letter ahead of time."

"Well I don't have any other ideas."

"I'd like to see the look on Twilight's face when that letter pops up. That'd be great!"

"Wow, wait I'm not really sure how she would react."

"Well, yeah, would she be mad that she was wrong, or would she be annoyed that the princess had to point out her error?"

"For someone so studious, she isn't really that predictable." He yawned. "What is it about fighting things all day that just exhausts you?"

"I have no idea." She giggled, poking his nose with a hoof. "It's weird being the only ponies in this place."

"SHADDUP OVER THERE!!!" They both laughed.

"Well, almost." She leaned over and kissed him. "G'night."

"Night Dash." He pulled her closer as she nestled her head into his chest.

"These bandages are scratchy. Stop hurting yourself so I can have a nice soft chest to sleep on."

"Sure thing Dash." She mumbled something incomprehensible before passing out in his arms. Jason decided to follow her lead.

Jason was awoken by a sudden pressure on his chest, followed by another, and another. He couldn't figure out what it was, hoping that whatever it was it would just go away. What was this abomination?

"You guys are alive! You guys are alive!" Scoots was yelling and bouncing on his chest. Yep, that fits the profile.

"Scoots, it's like eight in the morning!"

"So..."

"We got to sleep at like three this morning!" He looked over to see that Dash had been woken in much the same way.

"It's not that big of a deal," She said. "We had to get up to meet the princess before we leave anyway."

"Alright then, thanks alarm clock Scoots." She giggled. "Let's get this over with then. Grab all your stuff Scoots, we aren't coming back here." She nodded excitedly and quickly grabbed the Wonderbolts poster and an apple, along with a fairly heavy looking bag of bits, presumably from the risk-like game she had been playing.

"I've never met the princess before! What's she like?" Jason opened his mouth to answer before Dash cut him off.

"She's a real nice pony, and a good leader."

"Yeah, a real good leader." He started shoving their weapons and small armor pieces into a saddlebag. "Dash? You alright with wearing the chest and back armor plates? I can't fit them in here."

"Yeah sure. Everything else fits?"

"So far, but we should go by the treehouse before we go back to Ponyville, just to grab our stuff."

"I really want one of Pinkie's cupcakes."

"We'll go get some after we drop off all the stuff in your house then."

"Sounds like a plan." She said, watching Jason sling the saddlebag over his back and start trotting towards the door. They exited the room, immediately turing into one of the tunnels and taking the first exit. They landed on the surface of a mostly unchanged Canterlot, taking brief looks at the still prevalent piles of rubble.

"I'm so glad to be out of those tunnels for good." Jason said, sighing in relief.

"Yeah, you and me both." Dash replied.

"Hey Dash, can we fly to the castle instead of walking?"

"I guess so Squirt, if you stay above us like before and all that." She did a little victory dance and jumped in the air, fluttering away towards the castle. Dash and Jason took off after her, quickly approaching the castle gates. They landed and walked across the grounds, quickly trotting under the gate and into the throne room. Jason couldn't help but notice that although the floors had been cleaned of the bodies and gore, they still seemed to keep a slight tinge of red. Hopefully they weren't stained forever by blood, and ironic occurrence a supposedly peaceful kingdom.

Jason immediately assumed a fighting stance, briefly remembering that he was not only in the form of Alternis, but that he was also unarmed. "This is the idea then? You get your use out of us and then just decide to kill us off?" Jason continued to look at the pony standing beside the throne, the one that had captured him initially, Twilight Sparkle.

"What are you talking about, changeling?" Celestia asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Last time I met her, she almost killed me! Why did you bring here here?" Twilight, who had been staring at Jason angrily the whole time, suddenly broke her gaze and looked away.

"I have explained the situation to her, and she seems to understand, albeit a little grudgingly, isn't that right, Twilight?"

"Yes, princess."

"However, I can not completely condone her actions to you, because she was only acting out of the common good of Equestria. Although she did overreact more than a little." She sighed. "Anyway, I am going to send her ahead of you to break the news so that neither of you are hopefully attacked when you re-enter town. I made another copy for you, just in case." A piece of paper floated over towards Dash and a much more relaxed Jason. Dash grabbed the paper out of the air, reading the text to herself before passing the letter to Jason while smiling broadly.

Dear royal subject or subjects,

This letter concerns the recent changeling scare and griffin attack on Canterlot. I find the changeling and his accomplice, Rainbow Dash, innocent of all preceding charges, due to their near single handed retake of Canterlot from griffin forces. They shall be considered royal subjects, and as such enjoy all the rights and protections that a normal pony enjoys. Any attempts at violence on either of these two will be dealt with swiftly and effectively. Without the help of these valiant souls it is a very real possibility that the country would be under griffin control as you read this letter.

I know where you live,

Princess Celestia

"What's this last part?"

"A joke."

"Alright then." He didn't really take the Princess for the humorous type. Jason moved the paper from his face, sharing Dash's smile about the other contents of the letter. "I'll be right back." He walked out the door and handed the letter to Scoots to read, as one of the guards had insisted she be left outside.

"Now onto the next order of business," the princess started, "I would like to keep the elite force of Team Green Bean..." The princess peered over at Twilight, who was unsuccessfully trying to stifle a laugh. "...active and usable in case they are needed. Over the next few weeks Shining Armor will screen the military for grade A soldiers to replace the late Potato and Plasma. I caught wind of Potato being an integral part in the success of the later parts of the battle and have therefore commissioned a statue to be built in the Canterlot gardens in the honor of his ultimate sacrifice." Jason and Dash nodded their agreement. "Because I am keeping the team around, I would like to formally ask you to stay on that team and conduct parts of the training."

Jason froze. He hoped she wasn't asking him to stay in the military year round, he couldn't hope to be able to do that, not with Dash and Scoots. Well, Dash was in the military with him, but realistically he didn't want to live like that with her. Dash seemed to be thinking the same thing.

"Can I ask clarification on what you mean for us to do, Princess?" She asked.

"Of course. I'm asking you to remain on-call if the Equestrian military requires your services. Other than that you will keep your previous military job and hopefully train the team in pre-decided time-sets." Dash looked at Jason.

"One moment, Princess." She leaned towards him, whispering about what he actually wanted to do.

"We are the best, and it is only on call, it can't be that bad."

"Yeah, but what happens if we do get called back?"

"Then we have a team this time, it's not just us."

"You better be right about this..." She pulled her head out of their improvised huddle, turning to the Princess. "We'll stay on call, although if we do get called back there better be a damn good reason."

"Yes, I understand that war is, what do you say, hell?"

"Yeah that pretty much sums it up." Jason replied. The princess nodded.

"Now if it's not too much trouble, I would like to move on to our final order of business, weaponry. I would like to know the origins of your weapons, and if possible the recipe so that they can be used to better the war effort."

"No." The Princess looked shocked. "I thought about this. Me telling you how to make these things wouldn't really accomplish anything in the long run, and it could easily ruin your economy."

"Why do you selfishly keep these technologies away from us?"

"Because I can give you something better. What's stronger than Iron, Princess?"

"Nothing," she replied, not entirely sure where he was going with this conversation.

"Aha, steel is." Her face remained neutral. "And I know the process to make it." Her face lit up. "It's very simple, really, you just heat iron until it melts, then blow nearly pure oxygen through it to oxidize with the impurities and burn off. then you just filter the lighter slag from the surface and pour the steel. The amount of time you blow air through changes the carbon content, and you generally want something around one and a half percent. Got that?" Twilight looked up from a quill and paper that she had inexplicably produced and nodded. "That's all I know about it, but I'm sure that one of your iron forges could be re-tasked to work with making steel. I have faith that you can figure out a working model without too much trouble."

"Yes, Twilight, will you be able to do--"

"Yes of course Princess."

"So are we done here then?"

"Yes, I believe so. Try not to create total chaos when you return."

"I'll try, Princess. No promises." He chuckled, turning to leave. Dash made her way over to Twilight slowly, doubt still in the back of her mind. At long last she managed to stop in front of her. A few moments of silence prevailed, where Twilight tried to formulate words, but apparently couldn't find the right ones. Dash eventually broke the silence.

"I'm sorry, Twi. I'm sorry for everything I put you through, I'm sorry for betraying your trust."

"No, it's my fault, I didn't trust you. In the back of my mind I knew that there must be a good reason you were with this changeling, but I never actually accepted that. I just assumed you had gone rogue." Dash's jaw dropped. In all the scenarios of attempted reconciliation that she had played over and over in her head, none of them had resulted in someone saying sorry to her.

"You were right though, from your standpoint, we looked like threats." She paused, taking a deep breath. "D-do you think we can just put this all behind us and go back to being friends like before?"

"As far as I'm concerned, we never actually stopped being friends." She leaned forward and hugged Dash, who was still trying to figure out how things had gone so much better than she expected. Dash hugged her back, letting a stray tear escape her eye.

"Thanks, Twilight." They continued to hug for a few moments before Dash broke off the hug. "We'll have to catch up later, but I have to get back to Scoots and Jason. They're probably worried about me."

"Jason?"

"He's the changeling."

"Alright, I'll se you later Dash. I can't tell you how glad I am that we're still friends."

"Same here, see ya!" She turned and walked out the door, meeting the stares of Scoots and Jason, who were evidently trying to figure out what had happened.

"Are you okay Dash? Did something happen?"

"Nothing bad, Twilight still wants to be my friend."

"Well I'm glad to hear that!"

"Yeah, me too. So you wanna go get the stuff from the treehouse and move back to Ponyville?"

"I never thought I'd see the day." He chuckled and started towards the door, taking off towards the cliffs.

They touched down a few minutes later, taking a look around their old camp. Jason immediately started to get a saddlebag together with the blankets and gillie suit, which he realized had never been used. Dash got the large plates of her armor on and tied Jason's amp to her sides before he could protest, saying something about the bandages shifting around on his sides if he were to carry it. He reluctantly agreed, and threw the second saddlebag on his back.

"This is weird, the whole going back to town thing. It seems like last time we were there it was years ago." Dash said.

"I know what you mean. And its's only been, what, three weeks?"

"Something like that. That's another thing, it's only been three weeks, and all this has happened? It doesn't really seem possible."

"Yeah. Ready to go?"

"Sure. Hopefully my house isn't ruined."

"Oh no, a house made out of clouds, whatever will we do to repair it?"

"It's harder than you think if the situation's bad enough." Dash replied, deadpanning.

"I'll take your word on that. Come on!" He jumped off the platform with Scoots on his back; she had became rather tired from the journey over here, which she had done completely individually. The trip was quick and easy, after all, it was just a glide down to Ponyville. They flew over the Everfree, admiring how it looked from the air, a sea of green fluff. Ironic that it looked so serene with the dangers it held. The forest started to clear as they floated over buildings towards Dash's cloud house in the distance. After they touched down, they unloaded their stuff before Jason slumped to the floor and Dash tried to figure out the damage to her house.

She descended back down the stairs after her inspection. "Well it looks like the damage isn't too bad. Maybe a few hours of repair and we should be done."

"Hooray..."

"Hey Jason, can we go get those cupcakes now?" Scoots asked.

"Yeah sure." He tiredly got up, scratching his back with a hoof. "Dash, do you have extra bandages? I want to replace these."

"Yup, hold on." She trotted back up the stairs, returning a few moments later with a roll. Jason had already started to remove the old ones. Dash ripped them the rest of the way off, much to Jason's annoyance, and quickly wrapped a new set on, covering a much smaller area than before.

"Now let's go get those cupcakes!"

"So... cupcakes?" Jason asked.

"Yeah!" Scootaloo replied happily.

"Aren't either of you worried that we're just going to get mobbed? I mean even if they don't recognize me in this body, everyone is going to recognize you, Dash. I mean, light blue and rainbow. You're pretty conspicuous." Jason rolled off the floor, making his way to his hooves. "What if Twilight didn't get here yet?"

"I don't know what you're worrying about," Dash started, "it took us an hour to get her from the throne room, and the train ride is only a half hour. Twilight doesn't tend to be late." She pushed a bulging bit of cloud back into the wall, furrowing her brow when it popped back out a few seconds later.

"This is one of those times where I think you should trust my judgement."

"But Jason," Scoots whined, "All I want is a cupcake." She contorted her face in begging, exponentially increaing ehr normal cute factor. His resolve was wavering, to say the least.

"If we go, this is all on you Dash. It'll be your fault. I've done enough running from angry mobs in the past several weeks."

"Yeah, let's just go. I mean, you have the letter." She started towards the door.

"Ugh, this is so stupid." He grabbed a saddlebag and shoved the note inside, mumbling as he threw it over his back. He knelt down to allow for Scoots to jump on his back before meeting up with Dash, who was looking around her front yard, now filled with holes and bumps. She sighed, annoyed that her house had fallen apart this quickly. Ponyville must've had a few storms in their absence, which wasn't good because they weren't scheduled for anything major. Jason tapped her on the shoulder, snapping her out of her reverie, and pointed towards the town.

"Where do you want to land?"

"I guess we could just land in front of Sugarcube Corner, from here that looks pretty deserted."

"Yeah, alright, if Twilight didn't get here than at least we won't have to worry about a crowd of angry ponies." He took a deep breath, realizing that he was more nervous about this than he had been before any military service. He looked to Dash, who seemed surprisingly unaffected. Was he just blowing this out of proportion or something? Or was she just being over-confident? Not like that wasn't one of her personality traits, but still...

He was jolted out of his musings by Dash taking off, buffeting him with cool air. He shook his head, attempting to clear his thoughts before taking off after her. He absentmindedly ran a hoof across the fur of his fore hoof. He liked this particular disguise, which was why he had decided to keep it. It had, he admitted, undergone a few slight changes, the most obvious of which was the horn protruding from his head, yet he had still altered the colors when he was bored, changing the shading at the tips of his wings or just the hue of his entire coat. In the long run he had decided to stick with the same general tones. He never really got used to being able to change his appearance so effortlessly. That's probably why he didn't want to create a new form, this one was one he knew. He wouldn't look in the mirror and have to figure out if it was really him. He hated those moments, more than anything else, which was ironic since changing was what his body was made to do.

He sighed and swooped down after Dash, intently looking around for any ponies that were filtering into the general Sugarcube area. Luckily, there were still only a couple when they landed, and none of them immediately took notice.

"Maybe Twilight did get the letter out." Jason said. Dash nodded, looking nervous. So maybe that earlier overconfidence was just a ruse? Then he saw something that made him freeze. One of the villagers was staring straight at them, or maybe just Dash, and was whispering something to a pony that was directly next to him. The other one nodded his head before getting the attention of a third pony and waving him over. "Or maybe that mob slowly forming over there says otherwise." They sped up their pace. Jason tried to figure out why getting cupcakes was such a necessity anyways. Ignoring the fact that last time he had choked on one, they couldn't possibly be worth this kind of risk. Unless it was all a conspiracy, and the Cake's backed goods were all laced with drugs to keep the customers crawling back. His chuckle died in his throat when he saw that the group of ponies had doubled. They were only a few yards from the door...

...until it opened and Fluttershy exited, followed by the rest of Dash's friends, minus Twilight and Pinkie Pie. They stared at each other for a few moments, before Applejack broke the silence. "Ah see ya came back. My only question is why?"

"Yeah, Twilight isn't here yet." Jason said to Dash. He heard Scoots jump onto Dash's back from his.

"So ah heard about the griffin attack on Canterlot. Was that your doin'?" She narrowed her eyes. "Well was it?" She turned to Dash. "Or you?"

"No." Jason said.

"And why should ah believe you?!?! Yer probably lyin' like ya were before." Jason hurriedly turned and tried to get the letter in his saddlebag, managing to get his hoof tangled in the fabric. He cursed under his breath as Applejack recoiled a bit. "He's tryin to get one of his bang flash weapons!"

"No no no!" He freed his hoof from the bag, bringing the parchment in front of himself. "It's a--" Applejack's back hooves hit him in the chest before he could put up his own hooves in an attempt to protect himself, sending him sprawling across the ground, landing in a painful heap. He peered up, another few cuts on his face and chest, to see that Applejack had begrudgingly picked up the letter on the insistence of Rarity. Her face shifted from annoyance to shock as she finished the letter. Jason sighed in relief and got up off the ground, attempting to brush himself off before making his way back over.

"Sorry about all that." Jason said, rubbing the back of his head with a hoof. "I figured you'd read the letter first or something. Twilight was supposed to be here by now, then you would've known and seeing your friend back after this long would've been better."

"Nah, I shoulda heard ya out there pardner, if ya helped save Equestria ya can't really be that bad," She narrowed her eyes. "but ah'm still wachin' ya. This could just be another trick, as far as ah'm concerned." She patted him on the shoulder, which was a little bit of a reach with the height difference. "Doesn't that hurt?" She pointed to the cuts that had formed on his chest.

"Nah, not too much." Applejack nodded absentmindedly, having refocused on Dash.

"Ah knew you'd come back." She hugged Dash. Rarity and Fluttershy followed suit, the latter pony shedding a few tears. They broke apart from the hug and lapsed into silence. Eventually Applejack broke the silence after focusing on Scoots.

"Well ah have'nt seen you for a few days, mah sister couldn't figure out what happened to ya. We were all mighty worried bout' ya."

Scoots bounced in place. "Dash and Jason adopted me!" Applejack's face contorted in confusion as she looked over at Dash questioningly.

"Yeah," Dash started, "she's been living on her own so we took her in. She followed us into the Everfree, then we ended up asking Princess Luna how to adopt foals and she basically said that she would fill out the paperwork and Scootaloo's ours."

"So ya'll are sayin' that Scoots hasn't had a place to live for months now?"

"Yeah, pretty much." She replied. Applejack looked down at the ground, unsurprisingly saddened by the filly's fate, as did the others.

"Well ah'm glad you would take on the responsibility just to give the filly a good life." Applejack said. Rarity finished reading the letter, and made her way over to the small group after handing the letter over to Fluttershy.

"Darling, how was it up there?"

"In Canterlot?"

"But of course."

"The fashion stores are destroyed, if that's what you're wondering." He said, chuckling. She swooned.

"Oh the injustice!" She attempted to fall over onto a couch that she had dragged over from somewhere, but missed and hit the ground. Jason managed to tear himself away from the inevitably hilarious reaction to turn to Fluttershy, who may have been trying to ask a question.

"What?" He asked unable to decipher her quiet mumbles. She muttered some more things. "Am I correct in guessing that you're asking if we killed anything?" She nodded, taking a few small steps backwards. This was ridiculous, he wasn't that scary. He wondered how the scars on his facd looked, because with all the hits he'd taken there were bound to be a lot of them. "Yes, I've killed some griffins." He nudged Dash, who was chuckling at Rarity's misfortune.

"Yeah, I have too." She looked away. "But Fluttershy, you can't reason with them, this isn't some wild animal that you can charm. If you don't kill them, they'll kill you, and that's just how it is. The war's still going on, so I doubt it's the last we'll see of action."

"Whaddaya mean? You're here now, wha would you need ta go back and fight?"

"Well," Her stomach rumbled. "Can we go inside and get like, a cupcake or something? And maybe get away from all these ponies that keep staring at us?"

"Sure, darling." Jason had already moved ahead, and was holding the door open with a hoof. "What a gentlecolt!" Rarity said as she walked by. Jason rolled his eyes. They walked in and crammed into a booth. Pinkie came by and jumped into the air while gasping melodramatically before landing on the ground and not actually saying anything for a few seconds as she was passed the letter. After less than two seconds of reading, she looked back up excitedly.

"So does this mean we're still friends?!?!" She yelled at Dash, blowing her mane backwards. She put her hooves to her ears to try to block the noise, as did everyone else at the table.

"Yeah, sure Pinkie."

"Yay! I'll have a 'friend is still my friend' party." Jason grabbed her with his magic before she could sprint away.

"No Pinkie, maybe later, but we're tired, and I think I'd pass out in the middle of a party anyways. Dash probably would too." Jason replied.

"Oh, alright, but later?"

"Yeah...sure." He said.

"So what exactly did you do in Canterlot?"

"Well," Jason scratched his head. "I guess I'll just start from the beginning." He took a deep breath. "So we woke up one day in the forest, where we were camped out, to the smell of smoke. We looked over the cliffs above Canterlot, and the city was burning, mostly in rubble. So we got all suited up and battled our way to the castle. When we did finally make it there, the griffin lines were about to arrive, so we escaped into this underground system of tunnels specifically meant for mass evacuation. Anyways, through an incredibly lucky sequence of events I still have yet to understand, we ended up with a fair amount of control over the war effort, and staged a counterattack in the middle of the night to try to retake the city. We drafted a couple hundred civvies and made teams to cover the quadrants of the city that we had divided up. Dash here chose our quadrant, one of the most dangerous in the city because of it's close proximity to the castle, where most griffins were located." He took a deep breath.

"Darling, why did you choose a hard zone to fight through?" Rarity asked.

"I didn't want to wimp out just because I could." She replied. "Now shh, you're interrupting the suspense. Go ahead Jason."

"Alright. So anyways, we go through this house and take out a few griffins, but for some reason one of them didn't want to aid his own army, and he gave us a tip on a field intelligence location. So we went down the street and into this old church, which was mostly empty except for one griffin, and we made our way into the back room, where there were a bunch of highly ranked griffins. I took out one of those things that makes all the noise and the light, you know what I'm talking about, and I threw it into the door as Dash opened it, but it didn't actually go off." There was a collective gasp, causing him to chuckle. "So then we get into this fight, and in the long run I got stabbed in the chest, and Dash got a bunch of scars on her hooves and this one on her cheek." He pointed at the side of her face.

Dash picked up the story. "So then I pulled him onto my back and tried to keep him conscious as I made my way back to the griffin we had taken prisoner, and then ran back through the tunnels and into the base. As soon as I got there I passed out, and woke up a few hours later. Jason here was in and out of it for a while, which wasn't a fun time for me. To speed things up a bit here, he woke up after fifteen hours and learned that the attack had been a success, but that the castle was still held by the griffins. So Jason over here comes up with some idea based on something called the Trojan Horse from some war at some point. Basically, he got together a team, Team Green Bean, and filled it up with the six best soldiers we had. He gave them pointless code names," She listed them off, sighing after she mentioned Potato. "...and we moved out to an escape hatch inside the castle, so that we could open the castle gates and let the rest of the army inside. We split off with Potato and Tank, and had this huge pitched battle by the gate, but there was this giant griffin that was just throwing us around." She looked over to Jason, willing him to pick up the story.

"Yeah, so we were all getting pretty beat up, Tank had a spear through his leg, Potato had a broken leg, Dash's foreleg was shattered and my chest and back armor was ruined, which I guess you can see, looking at all these bandages on my chest. Anyway, Potato crawled over to the gate winch and opened it, but was almost immediately killed by the griffin. I ran at the griffin, but he just punched me back into the wall. As soon as he was about to kill me with his spear, Tank threw a spear that went right through the griffin's neck, killing him. I healed Dash and Tank, but I couldn't do anything about Potato. The rest of the battle concluded pretty fast, and after eight hours of talking and sleep, mostly talking, we left for here. We're both still in the military, so that's why we could be called to go back. We are after all, a third of Team Green Bean."

No one said anything for a few seconds as they just stared back across the table, digesting the information. The door flew open, hitting the adjacent wall with a bang. Twilight galloped over to the table, out of breath while holding a letter in her mouth.

"Beat ya Twilight." Dash teased, poking her in the chest. "What took you so long?"

"The train from Canterlot was delayed, and then I had to stop by the library to drop off my notes on steel."

"Is that just more magic stuff Twi?" Applejack asked.

"No, it's some building material that he knows about. Apparently it's stronger than iron, which is hard to believe. How do you know anyway? I mean, you claimed you weren't part of the hive-mind, which I still don't understand, and then create all these new things. What's your real story?"

"Well... um..." He peered over at Dash, who was twiddling her hooves and looking back at him nervously. "I used to be in a land far from here, called America, but then one day I just kinda woke up here, in Equestria. I still don't really know how I got here, but that's the story. So we had those things back where I was. I don't really like to talk about it." He looked down sadly, hoping they would move on. As luck would have it, they didn't, but Dash did.

"Hey Pinkie, can Scoots and I get some cupcakes now or..."

"Oh, yeah! I took the time to..." They all tuned her out as she sprinted away towards the kitchen, continuing to babble. Jason briefly looked over at Scoots, then over to Applejack.

"What day is it?"

"Monday." She looked at him questioningly.

"School still in session?"

"Yeah," She took a second to figure out where he was going before turning to scoots with a smirk. "Ya'll sending her back?" Scoots stiffened, sending a begging look towards Jason.

"Yeah, she might as well, school isn't that hard here."

"But Jason...." Scoots wined.

"No buts, you go there for like five hours, and have almost no homework. Where I came from I had seven hours of school, then at least two hours of homework. Sometimes I didn't get any sleep studying for finals or midterms. You can go see your friends, it won't be that bad." He paused. "I could give you another exploding apple...nah, already been done." He turned to Dash. "We should lower the house so she can fly up to it more easily."

"Whadda ya mean, fly? Last time ah checked, Scoots couldn't."

"Dash here taught her how."

"Can't say I never did anything for my biggest fan!"

"I think the whole adoption thing may be more important than that." Jason said.

She Scoffed. "I take my victories where I can get them, thank you very much." As she finished speaking, Pinkie raced back out of the kitchen with a platter of cupcakes somehow staying balanced on her head. She set them down on the table and grinned excitedly as Scoots and Dash both took one quickly. Dash was in the middle of demolishing her third cupcake as Pinkie noticed that Jason hadn't grabbed one of the pastries and tilted her head in confusion.

"Why aren't you eating any? Everypony loves my cupcakes, and I mean everypony! Just try one!"

"I don't need to eat." He yawned. He was more tired than he had thought.

"You can't eat?!?!" She gasped loudly, looking like she was going to, well he didn't know exactly. Jason sighed.

"I can, but it doesn't taste like anything, unless I..." He shifted into Dash's form, making the ponies jump. "...shift into the form of a real pony." He took a cupcake and took a bite, recoiling a little at the amount of sugar involved in the recipe, then set down the cupcake and shifted back. "It's strange being me."

"Ah can tell." Applejack said nervously. Twilight had apparently taken notes at some point, and Fluttershy had been scared yet again. Jason yawned.

"Man I'm tired." He put his face into his hooves.

"You and me both." Dash said. "Is it alright if we cut this short guys? If we stay here any longer I think I'm just going to pass out." They readily agreed, and Dash, Jason and Scoots got up to leave.

"Jason, right?" Twilight had come up behind him.

"Yeah."

"Well, um, I know you don't like talking about where you came from, but if you decide to I'd love to know about it. I've even found use for those formulas you gave me before and everything!" She paused briefly. "It's kinda weird going from hating you to realizing that I have nothing to really hate you for."

"Um...Alright, I'll consider the research sometime." She smiled broadly.

"Thanks!" She turned to get back to her friends, bouncing happily as Jason questioned her sanity. They made their way outside, back into the small square in front of Sugarcube Corner.

"So Squirt, I'm guessing you're not particularly tired?"

"Yeah, can I go find Applebloom and Sweetie Belle? I wanna tell them about why I've been gone."

"Go ahead. Just be back by... dinner?" She looked at Jason.

"Sure. That's probably around seven Scoots." He said.

"Okay bye!" She sprinted off towards the center of town, possibly heading for Sweet Apple Acres and the Crusader treehouse. He looked over to Dash, who was in the middle of a yawn. She took off, looking behind herself to see that Jason had taken off after her. They landed in the front yard before going inside through the front door, although in hindsight they could've easily used any of the large holes in the wall. Dash sighed as she looked around, making her way slowly up the spiral staircase. Jason grabbed the saddlebag with the blankets inside, bringing it up to Dash's bedroom without bothering to unpack it.

"You know, this is the first time I've been in here." He said as he walked through the door.

"Well hopefully it won't be the last." She started sculpting the bed back into it's usual shape.

"Don't tease me, I'm too tired to come up with witty comebacks."

"If I weren't so tired I'd be taking advantage of that right now."

"It's funny how we wanted to get back here so badly, and then we can't actually do anything."

"Ironic, huh?"

"Yeah. I hate irony. Fuck it." Dash giggled. "It's weird that you find it funny when I swear."

"Why?" She took one of the blankets out of his saddlebag and draped it over the newly formed cloud bed.

"Because the last girlfriend I had hated it. Like with a passion." He walked over to her, nuzzling the side of her face. "But you're just perfect."

"Oh aren't you the sweet one? Here, help me get on this blanket."

"What, being sweet doesn't excuse me from manual labor?"

"Nopony's as lazy as Rainbow Dash." She replied. "Although recent events kinda beg to differ." She flopped down on the bed after getting the other blanket on, and pulled them over herself. Jason followed suit, getting into the other side of the bed.

"God this is so much softer than that stupid bunk. Not that it made any difference, I can sleep on anything. Trust me." They laid there in each other's arms for a few moments before Dash spoke up.

"So what was it like?"

"What do you mean?"

"Living on earth."

"Boring. I had a job that bored me, not that many friends because of the long hours of that job... It wasn't fun." He sighed. "I'm not saying that the world is boring, it's far from that. We did a lot of stuff to entertain ourselves. People built giant steel train tracks that go around loops and stuff, like one of your flight patterns, and then rode trains around them for fun. It's great. I know this sounds kinda pathetic to you, but there was this one park called Cedar Point in the upper northwest, on lake Erie, if you remember where that is. Anyways, the largest one launches the train at one hundred and twenty miles per hour, up four hundred or so feet. Another is just an old school lift, but it goes three hundred and ten feet up, then ends up going ninety miles per hour. You'd love these things."

"What about now?"

"Well, it's not boring. I have you and Scoots, I'm pretty content. I don't love being a changeling though, that I could do without, although I do like the wings and magic. And I also wouldn't be here if I wasn't. I guess it's just more of me complaining."

"I like it."

"What?"

"You being a changeling, and a prior alien, and all that stuff. It's nice to know someone that isn't like the rest of these ponies, someone with original points of view. Of the ponies here, I doubt even one would have stepped up to take your place through all this, and without you, I would have either given up or died horribly a long time ago, probably the latter." She leaned over and kissed him on the nose.

"And I thought I was supposed to be the sweet one..."

"We can argue about this later." She giggled, yawning again. "Now go to sleep warm, soft pillow." Jason chuckled.

"Fine." He pulled her closer to his chest, nestling his head overtop of hers as they drifted out of consciousness.

Jason jolted awake. "AAAAAAAHHHHHH." He took a quick breath. "Oh god that was a stupid dream."

"MHMhmfds." Dash pulled her head away from his chest and stared at him menacingly.

"Heh, you see, there were these clowns everywhere..."

"CLOWNS?!?! You woke me up about clowns?"

"Well they were laughing, and they had knives, and they were covered in blood..."

"Bloody clowns?"

"Yeah it was in a horror movie once." He shuddered. "I hate clowns. And mimes. I hate mimes."

"Mimes?"

"Yeah, like those people, you know," He started making an imaginary box with his hooves. "Those morons."

"Yeah, sure..." She sighed, laying her head back down. Jason looked out the window at the quickly setting sun.

"Hey, Scoots should be home soon, we've been asleep for four or five hours." He said.

"What's for dinner?" She asked.

"I dunno, apples?"

"I thought you could cook!?!"

"I need time for that. I'm not even a very good cook, that last thing was probably a fluke."

"Just go on without me then."

"Fine. The big warm fluffy pillow will be leaving now." There was a crash downstairs. "Looks like Scoots made it back." He got out of bed drowsily and made his way down the stairs, and into the kitchen. There was a big pile of pots and pans on the ground, which was the only conceivable place Scoots could be. He levitated the pots and pans up onto the counter, walking over to help Scoots to her feet.

"How did you already manage to knock stuff over?" Jason asked, a hint of a smile on his lips.

"Well, I needed a glass for water, and the cabinet was right next to the pans, and I kinda ran into the pot rack and it fell down and here we are." She smiled nervously.

"Want some dinner then Scoots?"

"Yeah, I'm starving! I met up with Applebloom and Sweetie Belle and told them what happened, and they were all like 'Wow Scootaloo, your parents are awesome, I wish my relatives were that cool'. Then we went crusading as the 'Cutie Mark Crusaders Building Inspectors'. That was Sweetie Belle's idea."

"I'm guessing you didn't get your cutie mark?"

"Well of course not! I'm glad I didn't get a cutie mark in something that boring. I honestly thought I was gonna die of boredom."

"You should see my old job. Just dealing with numbers all day. Ugh."

"Why did you do it then?"

"I got paid a lot of money. That was about it." He lapsed into silence.

"So what happened to Dash?" Scootaloo blurted.

"She's still in bed I think." He looked back out of the kitchen to see that Dash was entering. "Well speak of the devil."

"Curse you and your stupid sayings." She walked over and gave him a quick kiss, much to the chagrin of Scootaloo, before preceding to a cabinet to grab an apple. She immediately took a bite. "If I wasn't so hungry I would've just gone back to sleep."

"We'll probably just go back to sleep soon anyways. Scoots gets the guest bedroom?"

"Sure." She took a sip of water, yawning.

"Wait," Scoots started, "I get my own room?" Dash nodded tiredly. "Wow! Back at the orphanage I had to share a room with three other fillies. Which room is it?"

"First door at the top of the stairs." Scoots was already gone, and had disappeared into the room in a span of time that shouldn't have been possible.

"Not a morning person, huh?"

"Nope, which is kinda ironic since I have to get up early for the weather team."

"What happened with that anyway?"

"I'm going to probably meet with someone about it to see if I can get my old job back."

"Well you probably already have a shoe in."

"Yeah, alright. I'm going back to bed."

"Right behind you." They passed by Scoots, who was still discovering things about her room, briefly told her to get to sleep at some point, and moved into the bedroom. They both flopped down and got comfortable, which wasn't hard since the bed was a cloud.

"Hey, so I hate to be the one to broach this subject, but what about us?" Dash asked.

"That's totally up to you, they aren't my friends."

"I'm just afraid what they'll think."

"They just accepted you back, after two weeks of thinking you were a traitor, in twenty minutes. I don't think you have much to worry about." Jason closed his eyes and quickly fell asleep without another word. Dash laid awake for a while longer, staring at the ceiling. She ran a hoof through Jason's mane.

"I just hope you're right."

Jason slowly drifted into the realm of the living, opening his eyes to see Dash with two of her hooves draped over his chest. He carefully pushed them off of himself, attempting not to wake her, considering how the last time had gone. It was light out, and he realized that he didn't actually know when Scoots had school. That probably would have been a good thing to ask someone. He walked out of his bedroom and into Scoots', trotting over to the side of her bed. He put a hoof on her shoulder and jostled her around until she started to stir. She slowly opened one of her eyes, peering up at Jason.

"We need to get you to school, Scoots." She groaned and rolled over, shielding her head with a pillow. He chuckled and levitated her out of the bed as she flailed her limbs and tried to grab onto something. She took a moment to figure out what was going on before finally succumbing to her fate and crossing her arms in the air.

"Can't I just say that I'm sick?"

"You could if you weren't running around town in perfect health yesterday." He set her down after he got to the bottom of the stairs, making his way beside her to the kitchen. He levitated a few apples off the counter, floating one over to Scoots. "Sorry we don't really have variety Scoots, I'm going to go buy some more stuff after I drop you off."

"Why do you have to walk me there?"

"I'm going to walk my child to the first day of school under my care." He paused and scratched his head. "I didn't think I would say that for at least a few more years."

"Just today then?"

"Well, if you don't want me to other days. It's not like I'm going to embarrass you, I'm not that old. Didn't you also tell me yesterday about how cool your friends thought me and Dash were?"

"Yeah, but I was comparing you to Rarity and Applejack. They aren't really that cool in the first place."

"Glad you made me look good."

"It's a pleasure."

"You're becoming too much like me." He looked at the clock, which was unsurprisingly made out of cloud. "When does class start?"

"At nine." Jason did a double take at the clock.

"Scoots that's in five minutes, hurry up and eat! Actually just grab that apple and hop on." She grudgingly obliged, taking a moment to make herself comfortable before giving him the all clear.

"Why are you so worried about this?"

"I'm trying to make a good name for myself here, I might as well deliver you on time. After that I don't care as much." He trotted over to the door of Dash's house before making his way across the minefield of a front yard and taking off. He dove for the town, flattening out just above the rooftops. He banked hard towards the side of town, quickly approaching the schoolhouse as scoots whooped and hollered on his back. He circled around the back of the schoolhouse as he tried to scrub off speed before descending the rest of the way and quickly flapping his wings backwards to attempt a safe landing.

Scoots jumped off his back, her mane a little more windswept than usual, and trotted over to the schoolhouse door, sending a wave back. Hopefully he had made it in time, although at this point he was close enough. He turned to leave, going airborne and making his way back to town. What did he need to do? He needed to buy food, and for that, he realized, he would need money, which he had forgotten in his rush to leave. He mentally berated himself as he banked towards home, arriving after a few minutes of lazy flying. He touched down and walked into the kitchen, where a tired dash was fumbling with some sort of cloud kitchen appliance.

"What's that?" She jumped, not realizing that he had gotten back.

"This thing is supposed to make toast, but it keeps not heating up."

"How does it heat up anyway?"

"I don't know, you're the only one who questions anything around here anyway."

"Alright then, let me try something." He floated the bread over, and held it over a forearm as he ignited it. Apparently he had held the bread to close, and it had completely turned into ash. "Heh, false start." He grabbed another piece and raised it a foot or so higher, repeating the process. He examined the results, smiling as he saw that it was only slightly burnt, and floated the toast over.

"There you go."

"Yeah, now I can brag to all the other mares that my stallion can make toast by lighting his arm on fire."

"That actually does sound pretty cool."

"Or suicidal."

"Yeah, or that. But hey, I'm one of a kind." He walked over and nuzzled her cheek. "I'm your suicidal stallion." He paused. "You know, Scoots is gone, and we have the house to ourselves..."

"And I have to go try and figure out what happened to my job." She trailed a hoof down his neck. "Plus, we have all the time in the world." She kissed him before scarfing down the toast and getting ready to go. "So I'm going to stop by the weather office. It may take a while for me to figure all this stuff out. Scoots got to school okay I take it?"

"Yeah, she informed me like five minutes ahead of time that she needed to go. It sounded like she had a lot of fun riding over there. Speaking of school, do you know how she was doing prior to all this?"

"I dunno, it's pretty hard to get bad grades at her age last time I checked."

"Yeah..." He paused. "It's weird having to take care of someone all of a sudden. Thank god she's not a baby or anything, those are a lot of hassle, so I've heard. Scoots is at least pretty independent, which I'm sure will get annoying when she ends up being a teenager."

"Yeah, you're probably right." She took a sip of whatever she was drinking. "So what are you doing today?"

"I'm probably just going to buy some food, maybe fix up the house a little, that kind of thing. I'll probably grab some cupcakes since you guys like them so much." He scratched his chin. "How do showers work in a cloud house?"

"Rainclouds."

"Yeah, but don't they run out of water really fast or something?"

"Stop asking questions. Go find Twilight if you want to know so bad."

"But then she might ask about my past."

"Why do you care so much?"

"Well, two reasons. I just went through all this to get semi accepted as a changeling, I don't also want them to know that I'm either insane or an alien, depending on how they take it. Also I don't want to have to deal with publicity more than I have to, and there's probably going to be some sort of mention of us in the paper about all the attack stuff. That's where I want it to end. Ponies already stare at me all the time, I don't want to give them more reasons."

"You don't like publicity?"

"Well for a business it's fine, but I don't want people to really take more notice of me than normal, and I really don't want ponies following me or you around for news. If that happens here."

"It definitely does in Canterlot."

"Yeah that figures. Anyways, I guess I don't really want you to be late to a job that you've missed for three weeks, so we better leave. What time does school let out, by the way?"

"Two thirty I think."

"Alright, that's enough time for me to do all the things I was supposed to do. Good luck Dash."

"Same to you." She took off towards the middle of town, while Jason took off towards the market square. He hoped the ponies wouldn't end up being overly critical of him. At least he still had the letter. He glided into the middle of the square, landing next to a few staring ponies. He probably shouldn't have kept the wings and the horn. At least then he would be able to tell more easily if they were just staring at him because he was a changeling, or if some of them thought he was an Alicorn. He walked by a group of ponies that were whispering and pointing at him as he navigated over to a stall that appeared to sell hay. He hadn't eaten hay yet, and frankly it disgusted him. That and flowers. He shuddered, waiting for the pony behind the stall to turn around.

The orange maned red earth pony finally did, her face immediately racing through a set of emotions from confusion to fear to anger. Jason rolled his eyes and put the letter on the table, twisting it around so that she could read it. She briefly shot him a glare before reading the letter and shifting backwards through the same laundry list of emotions, which would have been hilarious if he hadn't seen it so many times already.

"So can I buy some hay?" She grabbed a small bale and pushed it over the table.

"Sorry for the trouble, just take it."

"No, how much is it?"

"Don't worry about it."

"I don't want your free handouts. Here's eight bits."

"But...!"

"Just keep it." He levitated the bale off of the table, walking across the small market to the Apple Family stall, which was staffed by Big Mac, looking imposing as usual. Mac looked towards him, managing to keep a neutral face unlike most of the other ponies.

"Mah sister told me about ya, and I agree with her, don't think you're not bein' watched."

"Can I just buy some apples?"

"Ah ain't gonna stop ya. Two for a bit." Jason doled out six bits, raking the apples off the table and into his saddlebag with his magic. Man, magic was useful. He went to the adjacent stall and bought a few bunches of flowers, surprisingly without hostilities. He sighed and turned around, tightening his magical grip on the hay bale as he took off to deliver the recently added supplies. Oh, the advantages of both wings and magic. The house was empty, not that he wasn't expecting it to be, but in its state it seemed to take on a slightly eerie appearance in the absence of Dash or Scoots, especially with all the holes in the walls. He stowed the foods in various cabinets, tossing the hay bale into the pantry, where it promptly fell through the floor. Jason managed to catch it before it disappeared from view, and brought it over to the cabinets, cursing under his breath as he tried to slow his heartbeat. These cabinets were made out of wood, why didn't they fall? He managed to shove the bale in, and partially shut the door.

He chuckled at the absurdity of it all before retreating to the door and taking off again. He glided by the clock tower, noting that it was nearly twelve. He landed on one of the side streets, looking into shop windows as he tried to ignore the stares from the ponies as he walked past them. One of the stallions bumped into his shoulder as he walked by, making him stumble a bit to the side from the unexpected contact. He sighed and looked around, finding himself in front of Rarity's Boutique. There was something he needed to do...

Aha! He suddenly remembered the importance of Rarity's business, he needed to see about getting Scoots that costume for Nightmare Night, which was apparently in a few days. He walked over to the front door, which was rather unimposing for the size of the building, and knocked. He suddenly remembered why he hated knocking after his hooves made almost no noise. He shouldered the door a few times, hoping that it didn't sound too much like someone was trying to break it down.

Luckily, he heard a sing song voice holler, "Come i-i-in." He opened the door, noticing Rarity hovering over a sewing machine. She looked over and saw him, a hint of fear passing over her face. That annoyed him, they knew the truth, and they were still afraid of him. "What can I do for you darling?"

"Well you can start by telling my why you're afraid of me." She froze, then looked away.

"Whoever told you that?"

"You. Your expression kinda gave it away. Now why?" She didn't respond. Jason sighed. "Well if you ever do decide to tell me I'm sure you can find me." He paused. "Now, the reason I came here in the first place was because I would like to place an order, for a Nightmare Night costume for Scoots." She took a second to regain her resolve.

"I still have her sizes from the wedding, so we don't have to remeasure her. Now, what would you like it to be?"

"Well, this was her idea, not mine, but she wanted to go as a zombie. That's basically a tattered, bloody costume because zombies are re-animated dead that try to eat the flesh of the living. It isn't supposed to look pretty, so maybe that's a nice change of pace?" She looked at the notepad she had taken notes on with a look of contempt.

"I'll try my best. Nopony's given me such a, say, unusual order before. Come back the day before Nightmare Night and pick it up."

"Alright, how much do I owe you?"

"Not a thing Darling, I'm happy to do this for little Scootaloo."

"So then like twenty bits?"

"No, of course not." Jason shoved a hoof into his saddlebag and pulled out a hoofful of bits, setting them on the ground, then feigning a shocked expression.

"Oh no, would you look at that, twenty bits just appeared on the ground over here, how strange! Well I'm just going to leave you with your magically appearing bits. Last thing, if you could, make it a really hardy costume, because Scoots and her friends tend to destroy things." He went out the door and shut it behind him, leaving Rarity to question the entire experience. Maybe she didn't have much of a reason to be afraid of him, unless this was just another act. It's not like they could ever know for sure. She sighed and went back to her sewing machine.

Jason had run out of things to do, which was kinda funny since he had only been here a day. He walked by a few more storefronts, looking at the wares ponies had to offer. He walked by another store, not seeing anything particularly interesting. Wait. He backed up and looked inside. Ha, he thought he saw that. He entered the store, walking over to the toy section. It was a miracle he had noticed this, considering the narrow window of vision he had into the store. The scooter gleamed in the artificial lighting of the store, shimmering slightly as he touched a hoof to it. As far as he could remember, Scoots had broken her last scooter and had seemed pretty depressed about it.

He carefully picked it up off the shelf and brought it over to the counter to pay, giving the cashier a look when she took a step back. "How much?"

"U-uh, forty five bits."

"Alright." He doled out the bits, realizing that the bag from his impromptu concert was starting to run dry. Oh well, it had taken him twenty minutes to make that money, no big deal. It wasn't like he was buying anything useless.

"Only forty five?" He had a feeling she was just giving him a better price, which he didn't want. Not because she was scared he would kill her or something, anyway.

"Yeah." She accepted his bits with a little more courage, and saw him roll his eyes as he went to leave. Then he looked into another isle and froze in confusion. He walked over and poked a small plastic bag that looked completely out of place from the rest of the products. It had nutritional information that looked shockingly like the candy from back home. He flipped the bag over and took a step back. He read over the candy name several times, engraining the name 'Jolly Ranchers' into his mind as he tried to figure out how those had gotten here.

He grabbed the bag off the shelf, there was only one left, or possibly only one ever, and walked over to the counter. "Is this for sale?"

"Yeah, my boss brought those in a while ago, but nopony's bought them. You can just take them, they're probably bad."

"How long have they been here?"

"A few weeks. I wouldn't eat those if I were you." Oh the wonders of food preservatives.

"Alright, thanks for the free stuff." She nodded as he exited onto the street, Scoots' new scooter precariously balanced over his back. Several new questions were swirling around in his head as he tried to figure out how something as random as a bag of candy had been brought here along with him. The dates matched up, both were a few weeks ago. Unless this was some sort of normal occurrence with items coming over, and he had just been the first human brought here. Or maybe not the first after all. This brought up more questions though. Were these things brought here purposefully, or were they just bleeding over into another dimension for some reason? He had unofficially decided that he had ended up on another planet; it seemed more plausible, and simpler for that matter than another dimension, but now he didn't know what to think. Then again, either way he had ended up teleported here, the same thing could have happened with the rest of it. He shook his head and took off to drop off the scooter at Dash's house. He could go ask Twilight, that could work. He would just say he was in a hurry and leave after he got any information and avoid giving her any info about his life.

He landed in Dash's front yard and walked inside, quickly attempting to find a place to hide the scooter. He eventually decided on Dash's closet and balanced it over the bar that the dresses hung on. He immediately pulled out the bag, looking it over again. It suddenly struck him as hilarious that he had attached this much importance to a cheap bag of candy. He started laughing as he descended the stairs, but quickly stopped as he realized that there could be fingerprints or something on it. How would he explain that? He dragged the bag across his chest hoping to smear any traces out of recognition, and then took off towards the library. He threw a glance at the clock tower, which read one o' clock.

He landed a few seconds later, a little faster than he would've liked. He tripped while trying to slow down and slid into the door, which was opened a few seconds later, presumably by Twilight.

"Well that's one way to knock."

"I was trying to be original."

"Come to take me up on that research session?"

"Partially." She looked confused, unsurprisingly. "Can I come in?"

"Sure." She swung the door open wider and stepped aside, closing it behind him. "So what do you mean partially?" He pulled out the bag, showing it to her.

"Want one?" he jostled the bag a little.

"Is this some kind of flirting I don't know about?"

"No, I'm already taken." She tried to ask, but he put a hoof over her mouth. "Now, the reason I'm showing these to you isn't because they look particularly unappetizing compared to the other candies in those shops, and I assure you they're quite delicious, but because these are from my country." She went from being disinterested to almost comically focused in a few seconds flat. "So I came here to ask how that works, and how exactly they got here since you have no knowledge of where exactly I used to live, and couldn't have gotten this through normal means."

"That is strange. I've never heard of even what happened to you, let alone these, things." She pulled a book out of the shelf with her magic and flicked through it. "Were you attempting a teleportation spell just before you ended up here?"

"No, I didn't do any magic anywhere near me leaving."

"None?"

"Nope. That's why I can't figure out what it was that did this."

"Yeah, the longest distance teleportation spell only covers a few miles maximum before it starts to get dangerous to attempt."

"Like you get really tired or something?"

"Some of you may not make it." Jason cringed. He didn't have to have a vivid imagination to see that happen in his mind's eye.

"Ew. Can I grab one of those candies?"

"Sure? I mean, this package says they're over six months old. I don't know how much you really want that."

"Yeah, there's also a time difference of six months between here and my home, but that could mean that you're in the southern hemisphere and think north is actually south. And they'd still be fine, they have preservatives in them." He opened the bag with his magic and popped one of the candies in his mouth, much to the disgust of Twilight. "They're not six months old, don't worry. You can kinda tell." He shifted into Dash's form, relishing the sudden influx of flavor. "Take one." He said in Dash's voice as he held one out to her." She reluctantly took the candy, slowly unwrapping it.

"Why do you shift into Dash?"

"She was the only pony that wouldn't freak out. Plus I don't really want to suddenly try out some taste buds I'm not at least partially used to." Twilight nodded and hesitated before putting the colorful treat in her mouth, a smile quickly dawning on her face.

"These are pretty good, how do you make them?"

"Oh, I don't, some factory somewhere turns out thousands of these a day, then ships them all over the known world." It was getting harder and harder to change what he was trying to say to make sense with the theory. One day, probably soon, he was going to mess up big time and let some information slip.

"Thousands a day?"

"Yeah. Take notes on this. The 'assembly line' is made up of ponies doing simple tasks before the product gets passed down the line to another pony doing a simple task. The process repeats until the product is finished." Twilight's clock struck the half hour.

"I have to go do some more stuff before I pick up Scoots. Find me if you figure anything out." He grabbed two more candies for Dash and Scoots before turning to leave.

"Jason."

"Yeah?"

"You still look like Dash." He looked down at a sky blue foreleg.

"Yep." He shifted back, opening the door and giving Twilight a final wave before leaving. Speaking of Dash, he wondered how she was doing.

"What do you mean, three hour waiting list?!?!"

"Ma'am, those are the rules, I just follow them."

"But there's nopony in here!" She gestured to the sea of empty seats. "Why do I have to wait three hours if I'm the first in line?!?!"

"The co-captain of the weather team has a lot of work to do, and she's busy right now!"

"You mean Cloud Kicker? She's the laziest pony I know, besides myself."

"I'm sorry, but you'll just have to wait until she calls for you." Dash groaned and sat in one of the open seats. If Jason were here, he would've compared this place to the DMV.

Dash turned inward to her thoughts, still angry at the staff member. Cloud Kicker really had it coming for her now... If she could only get past the lady, she could go talk to Cloud and get this over with, probably get her job back. She could honestly say that nopony of her caliber had ever been on the Ponyville weather team, and judging by the state of her house, things hadn't gone so well in her absence.

A plan started to formulate in her head. If she could do that thing that Jason had done before with the stones to distract the griffins, she would get a few valuable seconds, which was all she needed. Griffins were easy though, if one blocked your way, you could just kill it, and the problem was solved. She couldn't exactly go over to this pony and kill her though, no matter how much she hated her. Now she just needed something to throw.

She tried unscrewing a bolt on the chair, but considering that she was using hooves, that didn't work too well. She found a loose bolt on the floor and tossed it at the nurse when she wasn't looking. It landed in her cup of tea, and she looked over at it before becoming disinterested. Annoyingly enough for Dash, the bolt was supposed to go behind the counter, to distract the mare that way.

It turned out she didn't need to create another distraction. The mare took a sip of her tea and immediately started coughing, doubled over on the other side of the counter. After about fifteen seconds of coughing, Dash was starting to get worried that she'd killed her, at least until she heard a low metallic 'tink' on the ground. She took that as her chance, carefully making her way past the side of the desk and down the hallway to the door at the end of the room labeled 'Weather Team Captain'. She pushed open the door to see Cloud Kicker reclining in a chair with her back hooves on the desk, asleep.

She could wake her up, but that would be too easy. She hoped Cloud was a heavy sleeper, and she grabbed a marker off the desk. After she had drawn on a monocle and a mustache, she sat back in her seat and made sure that there were no mirrors around the room before sitting in one of the other seats in the room. She tossed the marker, bouncing it off of the other mare's head, making her stir.

"Cloud!" She yelled, causing the weather mare to yell out in fear as she was jolted from her dream.

"Oh, hey Rainbow Dash," her eyes narrowed, "I thought you were busy being a traitor to Equestria?"

"I got a pardon from the princess. I'd like my job back, because judging from the storm damage on my house you haven't been doing a very good job."

"What're you talking about?"

"We were scheduled for three light rains in the time I was gone. It looks like there were at least three heavy downpours. And since I was never formally dismissed, that means that you're only here as a temporary replacement and I'm still head weather pony." She smiled smugly, leaning back and attempting not to chuckle at Cloud's face. "Get your stuff together, you're back to your old job tomorrow. I may be lazy, but at least I get the job done right." Cloud sat there in shock for a few seconds before Dash got up and left the room, leaving the pony to her own devices. She walked back past the mare behind the counter.

"I explicitly warned you not to go back there ma'am, and now you've forced me to--"

"That's boss to you, now." She chuckled at the mare's confused expression and turned to leave, happy that she had managed to get her job back. She walked out the door with a slight bounce in her step, turning and walking down the street. She wondered what Jason had done with his day, he didn't exactly have anything planned. A wave of nervousness washed over her as she remembered how some of the civilians had looked at him, the hatred in their eyes. She knew he didn't like it. It's not like he complained, it was just the way he acted when he noticed the ponies walk by. It's not like he asked to be a changeling. She turned a corner and immediately collided with another pony, sending them both sprawling across the street.

Dash pulled herself out of the wreckage, going over to the pony to help him up. He was a white earth pony with a white and black mane, who was wearing a black vest and small black glasses for reasons she couldn't determine.

"Sorry about that, I was in a hurry." He said.

"No problem, I wasn't exactly watching where I was going." She pulled him to his feet, and he immediately trotted across the street to pick up his saddlebag, which had somehow managed to fly that far away. He looked at his watch worriedly as Dash picked up a few papers that had fallen out to give him.

"Sorry again ma'am." He said as he shoved the papers into his saddlebag and took off, heading into the distance.

She stared after him for a moment, attempting to figure out why he could possibly be in such a hurry in the middle of the day. She didn't recognize him either, maybe he was new in town. Then again, she wasn't really a people person. She shrugged her shoulders and continued to walk towards town.

"Well hey there Sugarcube!"

"Hey Applejack, what are you doing out and about? Isn't it the middle of applebucking season right now?"

"Yeah, but ah got ahead of schedule while ya were gone. Ah kinda took some of mah anger out on the trees." She rubbed the back of her head nervously.

"Gotcha."

"So where's the changeling?"

"Jason's running random errands. Getting food, dropping Scoots off at school, that kind of thing."

"Are ya sure?" She raised an eyebrow.

"Yes I'm sure. I trust him completely. He saved my life more than a few times."

"Alrighty then, if ya'll are totally sure..." Dash ignored her attempts to get her to doubt Jason. He wasn't even a changeling, he wouldn't be prone to trickery. In fact, he wasn't even very good at impersonating other ponies, as much as he would hate to hear that from her.

"So how's the farm doing?" Dash tried to change the subject.

"Pretty well ah suppose, it ain't no record setting year or nothin', but it's not bad, that's for darn sure." She paused. "So back to that changeling..."

"Stop worrying about it. He was near Celestia and Luna numerous times, if he was supposed to assassinate them he would've done it. Why would he fight through all that and almost die just to save a country he was supposed to destroy?"

"Well, consarnit Ah still don't trust him."

"So be it. He's not going anywhere, so you might as well get used to him. I gotta go fix my house." She took off, quickly flying over a roof and out of sight behind a building before climbing in altitude. She could use a nap after that whole weather team thing, especially with all the work she was inevitably going to have to do starting tomorrow. She landed and promised herself that she'd wake up in a few hours to work on the house and see about adding the empty room. Just as soon...as she got... some rest.

Jason arrived at the house a few minutes later after the whole conversation with Twilight. "Dash?" No response. She must still be out getting her job back. He hoped that everything had gone alright, and walked over to the nearest wall, intent on actually starting to fix up the house. He quickly flew outside and snagged a few clouds, bringing them back into the living room. He pulled off a chunk and shoved it into a hole in the wall, where it stuck like some weird kind of glue.

In short time he had patched and evened out two of the holes in the wall of the living room and had moved onto the kitchen before realizing that Scoots was probably nearly out of school by now. The clock on the wall confirmed him, and he quickly floated the remaining cloud towards the ceiling, making sure it didn't adhere to any of the walls. He grabbed a few bits, just in case, and shoved them into his saddlebag. He quickly took off and flew towards the schoolhouse, touching down just outside the school grounds as the bell rang. He watched as the students slowly filtered out.

Eventually Scootaloo walked out and ran towards Jason when she caught sight of him. She ran up and hooked her hooves around his neck.

"I thought you said you didn't want me to embarrass you Scoots."

"Yeah, but I was in class and it was the same as it used to be and then I had these thoughts that maybe all that stuff was just a vivid dream and you never adopted me but apparently it happened and I'm so glad it did."

"Oh, Scoots. You worry too much."

"Can we go get some cupcakes?"

"Uhh, sure." He had some trouble coping with the sudden change of topic. They started walking back towards town.

"Jason?"

"Yeah, Scoots?"

"Can you slow down?" He looked over at her. She was trotting alongside him as he walked, looking a little tired.

"Just get on!" He said, smiling as she hopped off the ground and fluttered her wings to navigate onto his back. She put her fore hooves on his head and raised herself up to get a better view.

"I wish I was this tall."

"You will be eventually Scoots."

"You think so?"

"It's easily possible."

"Wow, that would be awesome! I could just look down at ponies and be like: 'Hello there, comparative midget!'." Jason laughed as he walked up the steps to Sugarcube corner, pushing the door open with his magic. The place was unsurprisingly empty in the after-lunch hours. Jason walked up to the counter and waited for Pinkie to whip out of the kitchen to ask him what he wanted. And whip out, she did, stopping on a dime.

"What can I get ya?" She asked. Jason reached up and nudged Scoots with a hoof.

"Can I get one of those chocolate ones? Can I?"

"Go ahead."

"Ooh, that's one of my favorites! Hey Jason have you given any thought to that party?" Pinkie brought a cupcake out from under the display and handed it to Scoots with speeds that should have been impossible with the amount of agility she used. Or it was luck.

"Yeah, I just don't know when we're going to run out of work to do, Dash has to try to get her job back, we still have to fix up the house... Maybe the day after tomorrow? I wouldn't plan on it though. Oh, and I don't really want a big party, the civilians around here don't really like me."

"Okie doki loki, I'll get stuff ready, it's no trouble if I have to take it down. That's at seven in two days." Jason tossed her a few bits and walked over to a booth, letting Scoots jump off before he went to sit down. She scarfed down the treat without even a hint of slowing down. Jason looked at the clock, which read twenty five seconds later then when she had started to eat.

"New record Scoots?"

"Nah, I was ten seconds too slow."

"You're supposed to enjoy the food, not just see how fast you can eat it."

"I know, but it's just so good!" She picked a stray crumb off the table and flicked it into her mouth.

"Ready to go then Scoots?" She nodded and jumped onto his back as he got up to leave. Once he got outside he jumped into the air and took off, making sure that Scoots hadn't lost her grip on him. Once he made sure she hadn't he returned to a moderately fast speed as he ascended to Dash's house.

"Jason, why does everypony stare at you?"

"Because they don't like me Scoots, they think I'm dangerous."

"But didn't you save Canterlot with Dash?"

"Yeah, but these ponies don't know that, they just know that I caused a bunch of trouble around here."

"Well why don't they know about Canterlot?"

"Because the news hasn't come out yet I guess." He landed in Dash's front yard and walked through the door. "She's got to have come home by now. Dash!?!?" No response. "I'm going to go see if she's upstairs. You can get some food or something, I got some hay and some more apples and random flowers. Hopefully I didn't screw something up. I'll be right back." He walked upstairs, turning into Dash's room. She was unsurprisingly passed out on the bed. He briefly pondered whether to wake her up or not, and finally decided that he would, she must've been asleep while he had been fixing the house. He walked over and shook her shoulder around a little, watching her open her eyes.

"Come on, Dash, wake up. Scoots is home."

"How long was I out?"

"A few hours I think."

"Alright then." She rolled out of the bed and onto her hooves.

"Who are you and what have you done with the real Dash."

"Huh?"

"The real Dash would never get out of bed without a fight." He narrowed his eyes in what he hoped was a menacing expression.

"But I am the real Dash!" She choked back a laugh.

"Likely story. But how am I supposed to know for--" She kissed him. "Yeah, we better test that again, just to be sure." He leaned over and kissed her back, throwing a quick glance at the doorway to check for Scoots, who by now was fairly proficient in ruining moments. They broke apart and headed downstairs fairly quickly so to assuage any worry, or curiosity as it may have been. As soon as they got back downstairs Scoots came running up to Dash and Jason excitedly.

"Guys, guess what? Mrs. Cherilee told me to bring in a relative for some sort of family appreciation thing, and now that I have you guys, I can actually have somepony show up. Dash, can you come tomorrow?"

Dash facehoofed. "Scoots, I would, but I'm stuck trying to clear up all the weather problems that popped up while I was gone. I'm really sorry, but you have Cloud Kicker to thank for that. I mean, most days I'd be done in time no problem, but I think I have my first full day of work ever going on tomorrow." She groaned into her hooves. "I hate work." Scoots looked crestfallen. "You could always have Jason show up Scoots, he's almost as cool as me." Jason shot her a look.

"Yeah...Yeah!" Scoots exclaimed.

"It's probably good because I'm doing absolutely nothing important tomorrow." Said Jason. "I just hope there's something in the paper about us, because it would be strange to bring in someone they thought was a criminal. Although it would be pretty funny to see their reactions." He paused. "So if you have weather duty, that means you got your job back?"

"Yeah. It was a hassle getting in there, but I managed to get it back and draw on Cloud Kicker's face while she was asleep."

"Sounds like a good day."

"Yeah, but then I ran into Applejack, well first I ran into this other pony, literally, and I've never seen him before. Anyway, Applejack doesn't trust you at all. She kept asking me questions, and didn't really let it go until I flew away. And the thing is, she knows what you did in Canterlot. Twilight of all ponies accepted you, and Applejack won't."

"Isn't she ridiculously stubborn?"

"Yeah, but this seems kinda ridiculous."

"From her point of view it isn't that bad, but yeah, I wouldn't still be fighting it if I were her."

"Yeah, I told her that you weren't going anywhere so she had better get used to it."

"She probably needs some sort of first hand account. She can't deny that. Although how we're going to manage to find something dangerous to fight here in Ponyville is beyond me." He paused, digging around in his saddlebag. "You guys want some candy?" He pulled out the Jolly Ranchers, handing on to each of them.

"What is it?" They both asked simultaneously.

"Here's the thing, I was in a store today, and I saw these. Now the reason that's strange is because of the fact that these are only made in my world."

"Huh?"

"I know, weird, right? I gave Twilight the bag so that she could maybe figure something out, or at least take notes about my society, but it's kinda worrying, because if this came through, anything could have come through."

"That's worrying to say the least, I mean what if one of your boom sticks comes over."

"A gun?"

"Yeah."

"Well you need fingers to activate that, and I'm pretty sure that unicorns wouldn't be able to figure it out that easily. It's just a hunch, this could have been a big coincidence or something."

"I hope you're right."

"Dis it delershous!" Scoots said.

"Don't worry Dash, you like them, I tried one." Jason said. She popped it into her mouth, smiling broadly. "Scoots, are you crusading today?"

"Yeah, I told Applebloom and Sweetie Belle that I would meet them in the market square." Scoots said.

"You want me to take her down there Dash?"

"I can just fly myself..."

"Yeah, I guess you did get up here yesterday. Concentrate Scoots, seriously. Don't let yourself get distracted." She started to run towards the door, splaying her wings out. "Meet me in the town square before dinner if you're too tired to get up here!"

"Okay sure thing see ya later bye!" She ran out the door, taking flight off the end of Dash's front yard.

"You want to get this house fixed?" Dash asked.

"Sure, I did part of it, and I still have a cloud in the kitchen for us to work with." Jason replied.

"Alright, let's get cracking." They quickly got to work, fixing all the holes, dents and bumps, returning the house to it's former glory. Several clouds, and hours later, they had finished most of the upstairs of the house, the hardest hit by the storms. They re-enforced the roof, because it had tended to leak, even with the melting frost providing the only water. Pretty soon afternoon came and went, and yet they worked on.

"Dash, where are we going to put that map room?"

"I was thinking over by the bottom of the stairs, there's nothing behind that, so it would be an easy place to build more stuff."

"I'm really looking forward to that, I have to say. The Canterlot map was cool by itself, but man, if they can make a whole known world map look that cool that would be awesome. And as an added bonus Scoots would love it." He paused. "That reminds me, I bought her a new scooter. It's hanging in your closet until I can go get it enchanted or whatever and stop it from falling through the cloud."

"Oh yeah, I was just thinking about that earlier today. I couldn't figure out how that got there."

"Wanna get some dinner? I gotta go pick up Scoots from wherever she got off to."

"Yeah, alright. I'll get some food together or something."

"Okay then." Jason took off through the door of Dash's house, which was now the only other entrance in the house besides the windows, now that they had patched up the house. He saw that Scoots was in the square already, and landed next to her.

"Too tired Scoots?"

"We spent the afternoon being Cutie Mark Crusaders Roof Patchers, and fixed up the clubhouse. I was flying around most of the time, and now my wings are really sore."

"I'm glad you didn't push yourself." Sweetie Belle and Applebloom came scampering around a corner with a few cupcakes, giving one to Scoots. Applebloom turned to look him over. He hoped she wouldn't act like her sister.

"Well hi there Alternis!"

"It's Jason. Alternis was just the name of the disguise."

"Alright then Jason, how're ya findin' Ponyville?"

"It's pretty nice I guess. I've definitely had a busy day, that's for sure. Any closer to getting your cutie marks?"

"Nah, we ain't got any skill in roofing. Scoots here was pretty good, but I doubt that's her cutie mark, 'specially since she can fly now. Makes it mighty easier."

"Ready to go then Scoots?" She nodded.

"I'll see you guys tomorrow!" The other two Crusaders waved to her as she situated herself on Jason and they took off into the quickly darkening sky. He landed in the now flat and fixed up front yard and walked inside. Scoots jumped off and ran into the kitchen, followed by Jason. Dash looked up from a cutting board.

"I can't really cook, so I made sandwiches." Dash said.

"The flowers I got were okay then?" Jason asked.

"Yeah."

"Alright, cuz I have no idea what's good when it comes to flowers and stuff." He yawned. "Why is it that I'm so tired all the time? I thought that once we got back we'd be able to relax or something." Dash nodded and finished her sandwich.

"I'm going to bed. I'm probably going to have to get up early tomorrow to deal with all this sh-stuff." She said.

"I'm right behind you. Can you handle getting to bed Scoots?" She nodded and mumbled something through a mouthful of sandwich. Jason turned and went upstairs, walking into the bedroom and immediately sprawling himself out. Dash had pulled the scooter out of the closet and was looking at it, careful to make sure she didn't loose her grip.

"Where did you find this?"

"I saw it when I was walking by a store."

"Nice find, this is way better than Scoots' old scooter."

"I hope she likes it." He sighed and rolled under the covers, throwing a hoof around Dash when she rolled in to join him. "Maybe we'll actually get some time to ourselves before we die of old age."

"You and me both." She kissed him and snuggled under his chin. "Love you Jason."

"Love you too Dash." Dash sighed happily and quickly fell asleep. Jason's thoughts turned from the peacefully sleeping mare in his arms to the parent appreciation thing he had somehow gotten sucked into tomorrow. It wasn't like he didn't want to do it, it was just that he was worried he would just meet the same response as with the rest of Ponyville. He would've been fine with doing it, say, a week from now, but it just had to come up immediately after they got back. For once, he hoped, things would go his way. He scoffed. Like that was going to happen.

Jason woke up to an empty bed, much to his disappointment. Apparently Dash had already left for her job today. She hadn't been kidding about bright and early. Jason rolled out of bed and looked at the clock as he exited the room, glad that it was only eight thirty today. That was much better than the fifteen minutes he had before Scoot's school yesterday. He walked into her room, proceeding with the same wake up maneuver he had the day prior She woke up more easily than last time, much to his relief.

"Scoots, be downstairs in five minutes." She nodded tiredly and let her head fall back onto the pillow. Jason walked down the stairs, realizing how much he missed Dash. One of the good things about fighting was that they were together all the time. Now they were either apart or stuck doing work when they actually were together. He sighed, grabbing an apple before he realized he didn't really want to eat. He set the apple back down as Scoots walked in to the room.

"Why're you looking all sad, Jason?"

"I dunno, I just miss being able to do stuff with Dash."

"Oh, well, sorry about that." She walked over to the counter and took the apple, taking a large bite of it.

"Scoots, when do I show up for this thing?"

"Ten. That works, right?"

"Yeah, I'm just going to see if I can't find stuff to do between dropping you off and going there." He noticed her worried expression. "Don't worry Scoots, I won't be late."

"You better not be! Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon made enough fun of me last time when nopony showed up."

"Wow, really? I mean I knew they were kinda evil, but that?"

"Yeah, if you could beat Diamond up again I'd love that." She said. Jason chuckled.

"Well, as much as I would like to do that, I can't just go in there and start beating the crap out of her. I just got out of legal trouble, I don't want to get back into it."

"Are you going to bring me to school?"

"Do you want me to?"

"I guess, it was a lot of fun going that fast yesterday."

"Well I have to go to town anyway, so sure. You ready?"

"Hold on." She took a last bite of her apple and tossed it into a cloud trash can, were it promptly fell through the floor.

"Well that's one way..."

"Yeah, it's kinda hard to remember all this stuff."

"Don't worry about it, we're over a roof anyway." He paused. "I hope."

"We'll, I'm ready now." She walked over and hopped onto his back, making a gleeful noise when he walked over to the side of the front yard and jumped off, heading straight for the ground. He did a few twists as he continued to fall before completing the last twist a little faster and bottoming out. He glided over one of the streets, banking at an intersection and making a turn that should have normally been impossible in is world. Scoots sounded like she was having a hay-day on his back, shouting and hollering as the wind rushed through her mane. Jason banked straight upwards, pulling his wings into his sides and immediately feeling the zero gravity that was seemingly created as he slowed down and peaked in the air, propelled downwards by gravity. He slightly put out his wings, flipping the two of them over backwards until his nose was facing towards the ground. He spread his wings out the rest of the way and leveled out as he flew the rest of the way to her school.

He landed in the school yard, letting her off. She dizzily stumbled sideways before succeeding at making headway forwards.

"That was awesome! You fly so much differently from Dash, and it was so much fun!" How did he fly strangely? Compared to how Dash flied it was weird, but he didn't even attempt anything particularly challenging. Was she just referring to the part where he pulled his wings in? Ah well.

"Have a good day Scoots, I'll be back in an hour."

"Don't be late!"

"I won't!" Scoots waved and entered the Schoolhouse. He turned and took to the air. He needed to enchant that scooter. He flew over to Dash's house, and quickly grabbed the scooter before checking the clock tower as he glided past it to Twilight's library, landing correctly in front of it this time. He shouldered the door a couple times, waiting for Twilight with the scooter hanging over his back. The door opened to Twilight, who looked like she had stayed up all night, which she easily could have.

"Are you here about the candy? Because I'll tell you, I haven't found anything, and I've looked everywhere. Trust me."

"No... That wasn't exactly pressing, you know. I'm just here to get this scooter enchanted or whatever so it doesn't fall through Dash's floor."

"For Scoots?" She yawned.

"Nah, I just love riding tiny scooters around town." Twilight stared at him. "That was sarcasm, Twilight."

"What?"

"Just how tired are you?"

"I'll be fine. Just set down the scooter." He followed her directions, left it on the floor and took a few steps back in case something went wrong. There was a pretty good chance something would, in his mind. The scooter glowed purple and lifted slightly off the ground, before losing the aura and dropping back down. "Done."

"Sure? What'd you do?"

"Cloud walking spell. Spells last longer on inanimate objects. Just come back in six months or so and I'll renew the spell."

"Well, that was easier than I expected." He looked at her suspiciously. "Thanks. Don't work yourself too hard, one bag of candy is just a coincidence. Feel free to start overworking yourself if stuff like this starts popping up everywhere."

"It just makes me so excited though! All this new stuff. The advancements we could make would be mind-boggling."

"Most of the stuff is so advanced you probably couldn't even make progress in reverse-engeneering it. Dash told me you've got a calculator that does addition in a lab somewhere?"

"Yeah, it's much smaller than the last one!"

"Well we have affordable computers that basically have the computing power of a billion of those, in a box the size of one of your thinner books." She stared at him, slightly shocked. "Like I said, probably no progress. Anyway, I have to go present in front of a class for parent appreciation day, so hopefully..." He looked around. "Do you have a copy of the paper?"

"Yeah, what do you take me for?" He stared as a copy floated over and landed on the ground in front of him. He flipped it over to the front and looked up at a beaming Twilight. He looked back down to an article with the headline 'Victory in Canterlot! Griffins in Full Retreat.' It showed a picture of the ruined city. Another one below read 'Traitors Turned Heroes, Strange Changeling and Element of Harmony Orchestrate Successful Griffin Resistance.' Well that was a mouthful. He looked at the corresponding picture, which had been taken of him and Dash on the ledge, giving some speech, although he didn't seem to remember any sort of camera flash.

He had never really looked at himself or Dash all that closely during or immediately after battle, but they looked like a mess. Their hooves were all covered in blood, he had a few cracks on his face and side, and Dash's exposed fur was mostly matted with blood. Maybe that's why the ponies had been so willing to follow their plans. The fear factor.

"Can I keep this?"

"Of course, I've already read the whole thing."

"Cool, thanks. I guess I'll see you later than."

"Come to me if you find any more of those things from your world."

"Will do." Jason picked up Scoots' scooter and slung it over his back, realizing as he did so that he really didn't really use magic that much. He shook his head and opened the door, walking out and closing it behind him. He looked at the clock tower. Twenty five minutes left before he had to show up. He sighed, trying to figure out what he could possibly do with that time. A rustling bush caught his eye, a bush that was moving quite unnaturally in the absence of wind or nearby ponies. He deadpanned and walked over to the bush, watching as it rustled again. He sighed and parted some of the branches, honestly not sure what he was expecting.

"Applejack?"

"Oh, hey there pardner, ah was just..."

"Watching me?"

"No, ah wouldn't say that..."

"I don't know why you see me as such a threat! I laid my life on the line for this country, and all you care about is that under this disguise I happen to be the same species of creature that invaded Canterlot!"

"But what if it's all an elaborate trick, huh, what then? Twi was the only pony to suspect that Cadence was a changeling, maybe Ah'm right about you plotting against us."

"Can't you at least act like you trust me? The rest of your friends do." He paused. "Didn't you talk to Dash or something? What did she have to say about it?"

"She said she trusted ya with her life."

"And you think she doesn't have a reason to trust me after we were stuck out in the Everfree, then an active war zone, and I never showed a hint of betrayal? It would've been easy to take out one of the Princesses if I had wanted. That would've been the ultimate objective if I was a double agent, right?"

"Yeah, Ah suppose so, but ya know I still can't trust ya."

"Ugh, whatever. I gotta go present at Scoots' school."

"What about?"

"Some family appreciation thing. Dash couldn't make it since she has to fix the weather or something. It was bad while she was gone I take it?"

"It wasn't terrible, but most of the rain wasn't scheduled. Good for the farm though."

"Yeah. Well I'm going to make sure I'm not late. Stop watching me. It's creepy." He took off, flying towards the school house before remembering that he needed to drop off the Scooter. He banked towards Dash's house and landed in the front yard. He carefully took the scooter off his back, completely expecting it to fall through as he lowered it to the cloud. He let go of the scooter, and it continued to rest on top of the cloud. He smiled and picked it back up, running upstairs with it and resting it against the wall of Dash's closet. He looked at the clock. Still ten minutes, no big rush. He trotted downstairs to the kitchen and contemplated the things he could say to the kids.

He could tell them all the swear words he knew, then attach them to different meanings so that they would come up in conversation all the time... Nah, only Dash and him would understand that, and he wasn't sure if Dash would find a bunch of swearing foals all that funny. Actually, she probably would, but she'd end up annoyed at him for orchestrating the stupid prank. Or maybe not. He took a sip of water. Diamond was there though, that would probably open a pandora's box of problems. Even if he hadn't had that skirmish with her a month ago, she was still prone to acting like a bitch, especially since he was the parent of one of the fillies she hated. He looked at the clock again, jumping a little when he realized that four minutes had gone by. He galloped out of the room, across Dash's front yard, and dove off the side, quickly gaining speed as he neared the ground.

There was something about this type of flying that he loved. The non-complicated way, much like the flight patterns of jets. He liked the simplicity and the speed, the graceful corners he banked around. The school house quickly came into view, and he quickly scrubbed off the extra speed he had gained and landed in front of the school. Hopefully this would go well. That was wishful thinking at the best. He walked over to the open schoolhouse door and waved to Cherilee, who was looking over at him.

"I'm here for the appreciation thing. This is the time, right?" She peered over at the clock.

"I do believe it is, mister..." She gestured, evidently wanting his name.

"Jason." She turned to the class. "Class, it's time for this week's parent appreciation. Mister Jason is here to tell you about his job." There was a shifting of chairs as the class shifted their attention to the front of the room. Scootaloo was beaming at him happily.

"Just Jason, no mister involved." Cherilee nodded.

"Before you start, Jason, where were you the last times that Scoots was sent to bring a parent? Not to pry, but this is one of my students after all.

"Yeah, well the last times you asked, I wasn't her parent. Rainbow Dash and I adopted Scoots about a week ago."

"I see, sorry about that, I didn--"

"Who would want to adopt a blank flank loser like her?" Jason knew who it was before he even turned his head to look. There was Diamond Tiara, looking smug in the back of the room.

"I would, she's the coolest kid I've ever met. She didn't deserve to be living on the streets." Scoots was looking back and forth worriedly. He had been there what, like thirty seconds and Diamond was already trying to annoy him.

"Yeah, of course a freak would adopt a freak." Silver Spoon giggled. Jason tried to hide his anger, attempting to not give her what he wanted while he formulated a witty response. He opened his mouth. Before he could say anything back though, Cherilee had already spoken up.

"Diamond Tiara, Jason is a guest, and you will treat him and Scootaloo with some respect." Diamond crossed her hooves and pouted. Cherilee gestured to him to continue.

"Alright then. I was born in a land far from here, named America. I had a job there called accounting, where I kept track of numbers all day, and got paid pretty well for it. It was totally mind numbingly boring though. Long story short, I ended up here, in Equestria, and that's where the real story begins. How many of you know about that changeling that got chased out of town a few weeks ago?" Most of the class raised their hands. "Yeah, that was me." He chuckled nervously, but stopped when he noticed the smug glare of Diamond, and frowned.

"Anyway, the second time I got caught I didn't have a chance to run, and I got captured. When I woke up, I was in Canterlot, and the Princess and five of the elements of harmony were in front of me. Dash broke me out with a bomb I made that was a lot like the apple that exploded in here a few weeks ago, only bigger, brighter and louder. So we ran. We fled into the Everfree and set up shop. That's when Scoots showed up, because she had followed us out there. As I'm sure you all know, the griffins attacked Canterlot a few days later, and pretty much destroyed the city in a single day. Dash and I fought through the city, and ended up making it to this base they have under Canterlot that's specifically made for mass evacuation." He inhaled deeply.

"So we staged a counter attack in the middle of the night, got the rest of the forces together and rose up. That worked brilliantly, and ended up with most of the city under control. Then it was just a task of getting into the castle and freeing it from griffin control. I started a team, Team Green Bean," there were some giggles, "and yes that was the real name, and to cut a long story short, we battled inside the castle from a secret entrance and got the castle gates open for the rest of the army. After the griffins were fully repelled, Celestia pardoned all crimes I supposedly committed and gave me a job positioning the Equestrian troops, although technically both Dash and I are still on Team Green Bean. I guess that's about it." There were a few hushed whispers before the class broke out in applause, calming down a few seconds later. "Questions?"

"So you were the mysterious changeling?" A kid asked. He only vaguely recognized most of these ponies. Pipsqueak, maybe?

"Yeah, that was me."

"See, I told you he was a freak." Tiara said.

"Well if it weren't for this freak," he gestured to himself, "none of you would be here right now, and there'd probably be griffins all over the place." He was just glad she hadn't mentioned him beating her up yet. That would be a tough one to explain.

"What's it like being a changeling?" Some other kid asked.

"Strange. I mean, most changelings don't have free will because they're part of the hive, but it's mostly the same as you. I just eat love instead of food, and obviously I have wings and a horn. The whole changing between ponies is weird though, I can't get used to it. To answer your question, it's a lot less fun then it looks."

"Can you transform into me?" Applebloom asked. Yeah, here were the questions that he expected to have coming from kids.

"I could, do you want me to?" She nodded excitedly. "Fine, hold on." He looked her over before the green flames passed over his body and he opened his eyes, which were now much closer to the ground. "There." He said in Applebloom's voice. The class stared at him before he transformed back. "So is that about it?" Cherilee nodded.

"Any more questions for Jason before he leaves?" The class was silent. "Thanks for your service. Saving Equestria, I mean."

"I couldn't have done it without Dash and all the people that volunteered. They're the ones you should be thanking." He waved to the kids as he left the room. Diamond Tiara looked like she was plotting something. As long as it didn't involve Scoots he didn't care what it was. He was just glad that the whole thing had gone fairly well. Things didn't tend to go well. He started trotting down the road, not having much to do until he had to pick up Scoots from school in, what? He looked at the clock tower. Ten thirty. So, four hours to burn. Great.

"Hey!" A gravely voice emanated out of an alley. Jason stared into the darkness warily, just able to make out a few silhouettes. He continued to stare, not wanting to initiate a conversation with whoever these ponies were. The fact that they didn't want to be seen was suspicious enough.

Another voice spoke up. "I would get outta town if I were you. The boss doesn't take kindly to changelings on his turf. Make haste son." One of the ponies retreated down the alley, followed by the rest of the small group. Jason sighed and walked on. He didn't really think there was any form of organized crime around here. He did wonder why exactly they wanted him gone, and whether or not he should take them seriously. If he didn't, would that put Dash in danger? Or were these ponies just bluffing? He liked to think it was the latter option.

He walked through a small park and sat down on a bench. He pulled out the newspaper again, looking through the pages he had previously ignored. There was a picture of Canterlot, now a few days after the last time he'd seen it. The city looked to be in much better shape, with wooden frames popping up everywhere in the panoramic shot. The article below it was about ponies that were still missing, assumed to be buried in rubble or captured. Jason started reading the list, random names, that he luckily didn't know, Boulder Dash, Swift Flurry, Cherry Sunshine. He checked the section again for Sky or Star, but didn't find them, to his relief.

He shifted his attention to an honored service section of soldiers or volunteers that had received recognition for their actions. He read over the soldiers' names, chuckling slightly when he read over Fancy Pants's name, then Sky's a few names later. The newspaper wasn't really that clear on why they had received the recognition, but he hoped the honor hadn't come too easily. There was no honor in an easy medal, at that point it's basically just a participation trophy. Considering what Shining had said about some of the soldiers though, he didn't seem like the kind of guy to just give out awards willy-nilly, and there definitely weren't that many names on the list.

He flipped the page to a picture of a stallion that he felt he recognized, but couldn't quite place the name of. The caption said, "Blazing 'Potato' Skies, Gone But Not Forgotten" A picture of the blue unicorn smiled in the picture as thoughts of guilt and sadness rushed through Jason's head. The article went on to talk about him opening the gate with a broken leg while on a mission for Team Green Bean, which they had abbreviated as the TGB. There were a few quotes from loved ones, and a few more from Celestia. What shocked him was that they had put one of the things he had said in there, the initial statement Jason had made about Potato and his valiance.

A tear hit the page. He hated thinking about the life that Potato could have had, would have had, if Jason hadn't come up with that mission. The part that made it harder was the idea that he really had no choice, he had to order that attack. He was still lost in his thoughts when a voice broke the silence.

"Hey, you sit like me!" Jason's brain processes ground to a halt as he tried to analyze the meaning of that statement and chance the topic. He looked up to see a mint green unicorn, one he immediately recognized as Lyra.

"What?"

"Upright. Bon-Bon said that it was weird, and nopony else sat like that. But guess what, she was wrong!" She paused. "Hey, where'd you get that horn, Alternis?"

"Yeah, it's Jason. You don't keep up on news that much?"

"Well there was an attack on Canterlot, and apparently a changeling was involved."

"Yeah, that was me in your restaurant a few weeks ago, and me at the attack." She sat down next to him, and then pointed at the photo, which still had a tear on it.

"Someone you knew?"

"Yeah. He died in Canterlot."

"I'm sorry."

"Yeah, me too." He paused, looking over at her. "Why did you sit here? I mean, I'm not mad, it's just that most of Ponyville is afraid of me, and I just told you I was a changeling, and then you sat down over here like nothing happened."

"Well, I was in Canterlot during the attack, and a changeling actually helped me out, kept me hidden until they were all blown away by the love wave. Anyway, I guess I just figured if there's one exception, there's bound to be more."

"This changeling helped you?"

"Is that a problem?"

"Well, no, but I'm just trying to figure out how."

"You mean why?"

"No, changelings in the hive don't have much free will. But this one did. Weird."

"Actually he sounded like he kept yelling at himself, like he was arguing with someone." So that explains that. Changelings could apparently break through the hive mind themselves, at least partially, he assumed. It didn't sound like too common of a scenario though. He was sure that Twilight would love to hear about this.

"So what're you doing out here in the park?"

"I just got a little stressed and came out here to relax. Business isn't going that well."

"I wish I could help..." He said. Lyra sighed, then perked up a few seconds later, smiling over at him.

"I have an idea." She paused a second. "You played that one time at the other restaurant, and I heard that brought in tons of business. You could do a show at the Gilded Griffin, that would be really helpful."

"I still have to get a band together, so if you know someone that can play bass guitar, that'd be great. I'd like to give you the best performance possible, and most of the songs I haven't played yet have an important bass line."

"So if I find you a bassist you'll do it?"

"I'd have to ask Dash, her being unofficial drummer and all, but sure." She made a gleeful noise, getting up from the bench and dancing around.

"Bon-Bon'll be so happy! She hasn't been acting like her regular self in weeks!"

"Glad I could help. Remember, bass guitar."

"Yeah, I know. Thanks again!" She galloped out of the park, evidently keen on telling Bon Bon the good news. Jason looked back down at the paper briefly before getting off the bench and making his way into town. He walked around between different shops for a while in an attempt to burn time, a goal that hadn't evidently worked very well when he noticed that the clock tower only read twelve. He groaned and trotted down the street, bored without having anyone to talk to. At least the ponies weren't as hostile as yesterday. A few of them even nodded to him or wished him a nice day. It was a nice change from the norm, although a fair number of ponies continued to stare at him angrily. He was so lost in his thoughts he didn't even hear the loud wingbeats approaching beside him.

Something hit him in the side, bowling him over, across the ground a few feet. He looked up to see Dash standing above him and smirking.

"I get an hour off for lunch, figured I'd go find you."

"Yeah, you wanna go get something to eat then?"

"Are you asking me out on a date?"

"Sure."

"But all this is so sudden! I don't know what to say!" She feigned swooning, before breaking into a fit of giggles.

"So where do you want to go? It honestly doesn't matter to me." Dash looked around hurriedly.

"No, no, no." She ruled out several restaurants. "How about that one?"

"The Gilded Griffin?"

"Sure. Is there something wrong?"

"No, I think it's funny because I was just talking to Lyra."

"Let's just hurry up, I only have an hour, and there's still tons to do today."

"Alright," He held the door open for her. "Let's eat."

A Philosopher's Quest (read the author's note)

Dash and Jason sat down at a small table inside, and were almost immediately greeted by Lyra.

"Hey Jason! Hey Dash!" She distributed out a few menus. "I didn't expect to see you two here."

"Well as it turns out Dash wanted to go here for her lunch break." Jason responded.

"Well I'll leave you guys to it then." She winked at Jason.

"Why the winking?" Dash was looking at him suspiciously.

"I was talking to her in the park and I told her if she could find us a bass player I would play a show here. She's really happy because this place doesn't get a lot of business." Jason gestured to the multitude of empty tables. There were only two other groups of ponies inside. "So is that okay with you? You are the unofficial drummer after all."

"I'm fine with it, as long as I get a few days to practice stuff."

"Yeah, and we still have to wait for Lyra's bassist and get whoever that is trained. You have time."

"Good. So how did the presentation go?"

"Pretty well, I mean Diamond Tiara was a bitch, but that was to be expected. The kids didn't look too freaked out, although besides what's left of these bandages on my chest I don't really look that scary."

"You do have a lot of scars."

"How many scars?"

"Pretty much all those cracks in your armor are scars now."

"So a lot of scars then?"

"Yeah, sorry. I couldn't care less though."

"Well that's nice to know." He paused. "Scoots was glad I showed up."

"Yeah, I bet. I wonder what it's like for her, suddenly getting thrown into all this. It's gotta be better than all those weeks alone."

"Oh yeah, that reminds me. While I was walking back to town, some pony in an alley basically told me to get out of Ponyville, because his boss didn't want me here."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah, but say he's not bluffing, say that he's got ponies actually backing him up. What should we do? Let's assume that they don't know about my relationship with you or Scoots, which would meant that you two are safe."

"And if it turns out they do?"

"We'll just have to be careful. We fought in a war, it couldn't be that tough. Scoots, however, is where the trouble starts. I can pick her up from school and drop her off, but I don't want to intrude on her time with friends and so forth. We're going to have to wait until something happens, probably file a report to the local police. We can easily keep Scoots away from that part of town if it comes down to that."

"Why does stuff like this keep happening to us?"

"Mostly the fact that we were traitors and I'm a changeling." Lyra walked back over.

"Do you know what you want?" She looked at Dash.

"Yeah, I'll take a hayburger and some fries." She jotted down the order and looked over at Jason.

"And you?"

"I'll just take the same thing. Don't freak out if you see two of Dash over here." She stared at him quizzically. "I can't taste food unless I'm mimicking a real pony."

"So food has absolutely no taste to you?"

"Well it tastes terrible if it's inedible, and it tastes great if it is edible, but that's the extent of it." She laughed.

"If I see two of you, Dash, I'll look the other way, so to speak. Your orders should be done in a few."

"Thanks Lyra." Jason said as he leaned back against the booth.

"So did anything else awesome happen while I was doing other stuff?"

"Not today, but yesterday I placed an order at Rarity's for Scoot's Nightmare Night costume. She's afraid of me, as it turns out. I would have thought that that honor would only be reserved for Fluttershy, but I guess I was wrong. I got the order placed though, so I'm to pick that up two days from now, on Nightmare Night. Pinkie insisted that she throw a party for, I dunno, a welcome back to Ponyville party or something. I told her to keep it small, which probably means that there's going to be a fair number of ponies there."

"That sounds like Pinkie."

"Do you guys have alcohol?"

"Um, yeah. We have hard cider from Applejack, and Pinkie sometimes spikes the punch. You're not an alcoholic, right Jason?"

"If I was I'd have gotten some already. But yeah, I enjoyed a beer every so often."

"Beer?"

"Oh no. Don't tell me. You seriously don't have beer in Equestria?"

"No, should we?"

"Yeah, it's only the best low alcohol content drink on the market, as long as it isn't light. Oh well, it's not like I have my own tastebuds anymore."

"Yeah, that's gotta suck."

"It's not that big of a deal, as long as I can still taste some food it's fine." He phased. "That reminds me, don't ask me how, but Lyra said that she was in Canterlot during the attack, and that a changeling actually helped her."

"What?"

"Yeah, that's what I said. She told me that he was constantly keeping up an argument with himself. I'm assuming he wasn't totally free of the hive mind. Lyra said he got blown away with the rest of them though, which is too bad. I would've liked to meet the guy, see what was different about him from the other identical changelings."

"Yeah."

"You're talkative today, Dash."

"Yeah, well I don't really have anything to talk about. I've just been moving clouds and creating charts and graphs all day. That doesn't exactly lend itself to conversation." She said.

"So what are the charts about?" Jason rested his head on a hoof.

"We're only supposed to create a maximum amount of rainfall all year, and normally we stick to an average, so that we have wiggle room if there are crop problems or floods from the Everfree. All the charts and figures that we were supposed to follow have gotten blown out of proportion to some degree, and now we're stuck re-doing them and at the same time keeping the weather particularly clear."

"I like how before all this you would have added, 'not like I'm an egghead or anything'." He said. Dash giggled.

"I don't really need to impress them anymore. That's pretty much finished after the attack stuff. You should see them at work, it's hilarious! I mean, they're always nodding their heads and saluting, they never did that before!"

"Enjoying the power?"

"Am I ever! No one even groans when I tell them to do things, they just do it! Stuff gets done around here now."

"Glad to hear that. How many days until you finish all that stuff?"

"It was scheduled to be about a week, but it looks like we could finish everything in two, maybe two and a half days. I'm kinda getting a newfound respect for the weather team, they're pretty hardworking in a pinch." Jason made a thoughtful hum while Lyra walked over to the table with two floating dishes.

"Here you go guys!" She passed out the burgers and looked at Jason expectantly.

"What?"

"Oh, nothing, I just kinda wanted to see you transform."

"Ah." He shifted into Dash's form. Judging from her squeal of joy she had enjoyed it.

"Thanks, have a nice meal." She walked back into the kitchen.

"That mare is so strange." Jason said.

"Yeah, in more ways than one."

"What do you mean?" He took a bite of the burger, flinching slightly at the texture of the hay. Somehow it tasted slightly like a hamburger, although he couldn't begin to figure out why.

"Oh, just that she tends to act kinda strangely, and she has some kind of obsession with the ancient humans or something. Maybe just humans in general."

"How did I see that coming?" Dash looked at him quizzically. "Wouldn't it be funny if she were to find out? I think she'd explode from excitement."

"You gonna finish that?" Dash asked. Jason peered over at Dash, who had apparently already finished her burger and fries.

"Yeah..." He took another bite. "You still want to be on the Wonderbolts, Dash?"

The question caught her off guard, and she remained silent for a few moments, looking to the side. "I don't know what I want anymore. A month ago, sure, that's what I wanted, and it'd still be cool. But it's a full time job, and that'd mean traveling away from you and Scoots."

"Well jeez Dash, I didn't mean to stomp all over your dreams."

"Dreams change. I wouldn't give up what I have now for a job with the Wonderbolts, I'm glad all this happened."

"You sure?"

"Completely." She paused. "Done?" Jason rebelliously shoved the rest of the burger into his mouth, attempting to smirk at Dash. She giggled. After he finally swallowed the lump of food, Jason transformed back into his regular form, and pulled out a hooffull of bits to put on the table. They both got up and made their way to the door, waving to Lyra as they did. Dash looked up at the clock tower, which read twelve forty five.

"I have fifteen minutes left before I gotta go back to work. Whadda ya want to do?"

"I don't know, I already looked through most of the stores." His eyes trailed over an ice cream stand, which was a strange sight in October. It wasn't exactly cold though.

"Ice cream?" Dash looked over at him. Apparently she had been thinking the same thing.

"Sure, I guess." They trotted over to the stallion that was handing out the ice cream and waited in line behind a few foals. "What kinds of ice cream do you have here?"

"Strawberry, vanilla..."

"Alright, so it's basically the same." The foals left and they moved up in line.

"I'll take a strawberry cone." Dash said.

"No toppings?" The stallion asked.

"Nope." She looked over at Jason. "Make that two, actually." The stallion scooped out some ice cream and made some cones, handing themboth to Dash, who suddenly remembered that she couldn't really hold both of them. Jason's light green aura enveloped them, and they started to float with him as he turned to leave.

"Where are we going to eat these? I mean, we might as well not stay in a busy square like this and freak everyone out."

"Yeah, I know what you mean." She started trotting out of the square and into the park, making her way over a hill as Jason followed close behind. She sat down on the grass under a tree, waiting for Jason to sit beside her. He sat down and floated over her ice cream, watching as the aura dissapeared around it. He transformed into Dash, glad that there were only a few ponies to stare at them, and started eating the ice cream. It was pretty much how he remembered strawberry ice cream; apparently some things just don't change. They sat under the tree for a few minutes, just staring out over the other ponies in the park as they walked around and talked. Dash was the first one to break the silence.

"So what about us?"

"What do you mean?"

"Should we tell them?"

"Like I said before, it's totally up to you, they're your friends. Do you want to tell them?"

"I don't know, I mean, eventually, I just don't know what'll happen. Applejack doesn't really like you, Rarity is apparently afraid of you..."

"Well think of it this way, after you tell them, you won't have to worry about them finding out."

"Yeah, you could say that."

"Dash, they can't possibly care that much about it. They're your friends after all." He finished his cone and changed back. They were both silent for a while.

"Well, I have to get back to work, so I'll see you at dinner?"

"Sure." He said, walking over and nizzling at her chin. She pushed his head up with a hoof and kissed him deeply.

"Yeah, we probably shouldn't be doing this in the park." She chuckled

"Live a little Dash." He said, kissing her again.

"I'll keep that in mind." She hugged him briefly and then took off, heading towards the other side of town. Jason sighed and turned around, slowly making his way back into the town proper, heading in the opposite direction Dash had. He walked into the market area and quickly bought some bread, butter and cheese, planning on actually making a hot meal for dinner. He took off to drop off the food, taking mental note of the time between getting home and picking up Scoots.

Jason landed in Dash's front yard and walked inside, emptying his saddlebag into the cabinet as he usually did, and placed the butter inside a different cabinet, which he assued was the icebox. How that worked was beyond him. As he was closing the door to the old fasioned refrigerator, he heard a 'pomf' noise, which he could assume was coming from the front door. He opened said door to a couple of burly stallions.

"Can I help you?"

"Yeah, we're supposed to install some sort'a map around here somewhere, we at da right place?"

` "Oh, the map? Yeah, I'll show you where to put it." Jason took off and flew around the side of the house, landing on the flat piece of cloud Dash and him had laid out specifically for the map. The stallion made a few hand motions before a few others flew over, carrying, well, the map. It was surprisingly intricate and large, as they set it down on the cloud. The space they had expected to house the map in was several feet too small on all sides, although they hadn't exactly made the imaginary room foundation that large.

The stallions set it down and flew away, leaving only the original one that Jason had fist talked to. "So, da Princess told me ta tell you dat dis here map is magical, more than the whole sitting on a cloud part. By the way, dat spell won't ever wear off, Celestia did it herself. Anyway, see dat button over der?" he pointed to a button on one side of the map.

"Yeah..."

"Well dat dere button is fer submittin' yer positions er sumptin' like dat. There's another one at the castle, and the positions show up dere. Press the button next to it to cancel. Dat's about it. Drawers on the sides hold the peices."

Jason was in awe of the map in front of him. It was just as detailed as the map of canterlot, yet so much bigger. "Thanks, tell Celestia I love it, will ya?" The stallion nodded and took off after his buddies. Jason watched him slowly dissapear as he made his way over to the map. He found Canterlot, and carefully traced the road to Ponyville with a hoof, still in awe of the craftsmanship that was shown in the model.

After several minutes of observing the map and looking over the side of the cloud to judge it's accuracy in it's representation of Ponyville, which seemed spot on, he moved to the drawers, and pulled one open. There was a note inside, and he picked it up.

Dear Jason, Rainbow Dash, and Scootaloo,

I am glad to hear that you seem to be fitting into Ponyville alright. Since you are reading this message, that means that the map has been dropped off. Hopefully it is up to your standards. Shining armor is working on representing the current troop positions on a sister map that we have here in Canterlot. Those should be patched through to you around seven, and should appear as ghost peices, for you to fill in on your own map. I would like to have any strategic plans forwarded over within a couple days of Nightmare Night, so that we can begin to mobilize across the border.

If you would like to send messages for any reason, the pad of paper to the side acts in the same way as the map, anything you write will appear here.

Your boss,
Princess Celestia

"This map just got so much cooler. I wonder what Scoots'll think of-- Oh shit!"

He ran inside and checked the clock; school let out about now. Without thinking any further about it, he ran out the door and dove into the air, diving as he usually did. He evened out close to ground level, dodging around buildings and trees as he flapped his wings to gain more speed. He hadn't ever acheived these kinds of speeds before, and he was loving every moment of this flight as he continued to accelerate. He decelerated quickly as the school house approached, and ended up etching a few grooves into the ground as he stopped. He trotted over to the school house, not seeing Scoots anywhere outside.

His feeling of nervousness grew as he turned around the corner and entered the building, seeing Scoots and the rest of the crusaders, and Diamond and her little crony. They were all facing away from him. Cherilee looked up and frowned.

"Hello Jason, are you here for Scootaloo?" She asked.

"Yeah, what happened?"

"These girls had a little skirmish on the playground today."

"Just a little skir- Oh god!" The kids had turned around, and were mostly covered in dirt and bruises. Scoots had a particularly black bruise on her cheek. Sweetie Belle looked terrible, and was wimpering into a hoof, while the rather unscathed Diamond Tiara just stared at him with hatred. The other two of them weren't particularly hurt.

"Yeah, now I'm here to give them their punishments."

"So do you know who started the fight, or what it was even about?" Jason asked.

"From what I heard, Diamond was making fun of their lack of cutie marks, and apparently graduaed to making fun of Scootaloo's previous lack of parents. All I know after that is that Scootaloo said something and Diamond ended up being the first one to throw a punch. At about that point things got out of control. So basically I'm giving them all detention tomorrow, along with a parent teacher conference on the increasing frequency of these fights."

"Why?" Jason asked. "I mean, if Diamond threw the first punch, then the others were just acting in self defence. There's no rule break there."

"I understand what you're saying, Jason, but I can't condone any and all violence in my school. I'm sure you know how it is."

"You can't give them the same punishment though, you can't treat them the equally if they don't share equal parts of the blame. If you give Scoots and her little friends detention, you've got to give Diamond a worse punishment. I'm not just saying this as the parent of one of the kids, it's only fair."

"I see what you're saying, Jason, and I'll take the night to think on it. In the meantime, all of you have detention tomorrow until further notice. Give this slip to one of your parents about coming in." She handed out the papers. The foals sighed and slowly made for the door. Scoots bumped into Jason's leg to get his attention, sadly smiling up at him before fluttering onto his back. Jason twisted his neck around and floated the paper out of her hoof. At least he could inquire about Scoots' grades when he came in on...the day after Nightmare Night. And that was a weekend too... He looked back at the beat up Scoots on his back and sighed.

"I've got something big at home that'll cheer you up Scoots." She suddenly perked back up. He figured he'd show her the map, then wait for Dash to get home before breaking out the new scooter. He couldn't exactly hide the map.

"What is it?"

"You'll see, it's a surprise. It's no fun if I just tell you." He felt Scoots sigh on his back.

"Can you at least fly fast?"

"That, I can do. Any requests?"

"No, just do that stuff you normally do. I liked that flip from before."

"Alrighty then Scoots, here goes nothing."

Scoots walked in the front door, stumbling sideways before regaining her footing. Jason walked in a few seconds later, looking slightly less dizzy than Scoots.

"That was awesome! What were you even doing in that part where we were spinning everywhere?"

"Trying to get a buterfly off my face."

"Well it was still cool." She looked around excitedly.

"Scoots, stand still a sec, I'm going to get rid of that bruise on your face." Jason focused some energy through his horn and watched as Scoots' bruise went through the normal color cycle before turning back to it's native orange. She briefly felt her face before looking back at him.

"So where's the surprise? Where is it?"

Jason walked over to the wall that Dash and him had agreed to make into a door,and after a few tries pried the wall apart to show the new map. "I've still got to build a room around it, but there it is."

"Oh, wow. This is what they made for you?"

"Yep. Pretty cool huh?"

"Yeah, I'll say! It's so much bigger than the Canterlot map!" She moved to a new spot around the map and continued to look around.

"Be careful Scoots, it's not indestructible."

"Can I play with it?"

"Sure, but here's the deal, DO NOT press this button. It'll send the troop positions to Celestia, and we don't want that to happen, alright?"

"Yeah sure thing Jason!"

"Okay, Dash should be home around dinnertime. I'm going to try to build a room around this." Scoots nodded, apparently too engrossed in placing the first few peices to respond to him vocally. Jason smiled and took of to grab a few clouds to build with.

It only took him a couple of hours, but after long last he had finally finished the surrounding room. The fact of the matter was, clouds were only easy to build with in theory. In practice, they would always start warping and sticking to each other if you didn't make sure they were solidified in place. Scoots had, not once, gotten bored with the map, and had outfitted almost half the thing with the troops that were currently engaged in a battle in Manehattan and a few other cities north of Equestria.

"I'm home!" Jason heard from the other room. He made sure the last part of the roof wasn't going to fall apart before fluttering downward and walking into the kitchen, where Dash was waiting.

"Did you have a good day?"

"We got a lot done, but it was still totally boring. What are we having for dinner?"

"I'm going to attempt to cook grilled cheese sandwiches."

"Oh, alright. Those are just cheese and bread?"

"Yeah, and butter I guess."

"That's definitely better than apples again."

"Agreed. You want to see this new map?"

"They got it here?"

"Yup, and Shining is going to send over current troop positions in..." He looked at the clock. "Five minutes. We better get over there."

"What happened to Scoots?"

"She's already in there. I gotta talk to you about her at school later today."

"What happened?"

"Nothing too big. I'll tell you later." Dash sighed and followed him into the map room, gasping slightly at the craftsmanship that had clearly gone into it's production.

"Now that's a map."

"Yeah." Jason was looking over Scoots' troops, moving any that could be close to possible places where troops would show up in a few minutes. Luckily for the both of them, Scoot's had chosen to battle in northern Equestria, mostly away from the griffin border. As he moved the last pieces out of the way, several of the ghost auras began to appear across the map, and Jason immediately started floating peices into the positions, color coded based on whether they were griffins or ponies. As he stuck the last peice down he trotted over to the pad of paper and wrote: 'Got it'. The letters dissapeared, fading into the paper, and were replaced by new ones a few seconds later. 'Be done by Sunday.'

That was two days after Nightmare Night, so that couldn't be that hard of a deadline to meet. He looked at Dash, who was still staring at the paper.

"Pretty cool, huh?"

"Yeah, they really spared no expense."

"I'm going to go make that dinner, I'll call you in." Jason said/ Dash nodded, leaning over to kiss him. "I missed you."

"Me too." She turned back to the map as Jason went to leave the room.

As it turned out, Jason wasn't half bad at cooking grilled cheese, although the bread was slightly burnt. He really didn't know how a cloud stove worked, but he shrugged it off, as he did with most of the stuff he didn't understand. he called in Scoots and Dash, and brought the food to the table.

"Don't have high expectations." Said Jason as he transformed into Dash. "I'm not very good a cooking."

"I'm sure it'll be fine." Said Dash as she took a bite. "Yeah, this is great!"

"Are you just saying that?"

"No, this it the best grilled cheese sandwich I've ever had!"

"And the only grilled cheese sandwich you've ever had."

"Drat." She giggled. "It is good though."

"So, about what I wanted to talk about earlier."

"Yeah, something happened to Scoots at school?" She sent an accuaing glance towards Scoots, and she sank back into her seat.

"Diamond Tiara started some sort of fight after insults were thrown both ways. Scoots here must have come up with a real zinger to get Tiara to jump on her like that."

"So what's the punishment?"

"Detention, and I have to go in there and talk with Cherilee, not too much." Jason finished the food and changed back into himself, getting up to throw the dish into the sink. Dash followed suit.

"So really Scoots isn't to blame here?"

"No, but Cherilee said some sort of bullshit 'I can't condone any violence' or something like that."

"That's good to hear, well, you know what I mean." She yawned. "You going to bed soon?"

"I take it you are?"

"Yeah." She yawned again. "That was a long day."

"Okay, well then I think I will decide to sleep in the same bed as my beautiful mare-friend."

"Was it that hard of a decision?" Dash tried to create a suspicious look.

"Is this a trick question?" She laughed and they headed upstairs. "Hold on." Jason turned back downstairs. "Scoots, don't move my pieces and be in bed by nine thirty!" He heard a muffled 'okay', and headed into Dash's bedroom. She was already curled up on the bed, evidently more tired then he had thought. Jason pulled himself in next to her, and rested his head on her shoulder. "Night Dash."

"Night Jason."

Jason woke up to the sound of running water, as he rolled over into the area Dash should have occupied, still trying to figure out how water could have possibly be running in a cloud house. He rolled off the bed tiredly, following the sounds into the bathroom.

"Dash?" He asked. "How the hell does a shower work in a cloud?" Dash had evidently not heard him coming. She yelped and jumped into the cloud wall.

"What are you doing?!?!"

"Well, let's recap. No one actually wears clothes here, you didn't actually close the door, and I heard running water and got worried since the house is made of vaporized water."

"Oh, yeah." She rubbed the back of her head, then twisted a dial and the water turned off.

"Aww..."

She smirked. "Wanted to shower with me?"

"I'd like to do anything with you, we don't really get any time together. I mean, it just annoys me, you know? We should be one of those couples that are all inseparable and stuff, but all this shit keeps popping up." He paused. "By the way, how did you turn off the shower like that without pipes?"

"Stop questioning everything."

"Answer me this, how do you get the water hot?" He crossed his arms smugly.

"You turn the dial a few more times." She said. His smile fell.

"You took a few cold showers, huh?"

"It was definitely bracing." He chuckled. "It's a good thing you were gone, there was a lot of un-manly screaming for the first few seconds."

"Yeah, so the shower gets hot, for future reference." She pulled a towel off the wall, throwing it over her back.

"Tomorrow, see how fast you can get your work done, and we can maybe actually do something fun." He looked around over-suspiciously.

"Oh, I see what you're saying." She gave him a sultry look. "I'll get my work done, promise."

"I'll look forward to that." He chuckled. "I gotta go wake up Scoots and take her to school, probably figure out her punishment, all that stuff. You leaving for work soon?"

"Yeah, I'm going to leave in a few minutes here, I just have to get some food and obviously dry off."

"I didn't really buy any breakfast food, mostly because I don't know what you guys really consider breakfast food, but hopefully there's something you can eat in there."

"You work too hard." She leaned over and nuzzled his chin, getting it wet.

"I work too hard?"

"Well, yeah, you do it of your own free will, I'm forced to do this stuff with the weather."

"And you do a great job from what I've heard."

"Oh, stop it you." She batted a hoof at him. "We on for lunch today?"

"Sure, but you have to figure out where to go."

"Well seeing as anything I like, you like by default, I'm not going to have too much trouble."

"You're really liking this whole changeling thing huh?"

"Well it comes with a lot of advantages, if you know what I mean..." She wiggled her eyebrows.

"When was the last time I told you I loved you Dash?"

"Too long ago." She wrapped him in a hug. "I miss seeing you as a changeling. That's what I fell in love with after all." Jason pushed her arms off him and backed up a little, dropping his disguise for the first time in days.

"That better?"

"Yeah. I love you too, Jason." She ran a hoof along his chest before she hugged him again, slipping a little on the smooth chitin. "Yeah, so sorry to ruin this, but I have to get going."

"Yeah--Hey! We never showed Scoots that scooter last night, you want to bust it out right now?"

"Sure," She gave him a look. "How do you want to do this?"

"I don't know, I haven't ever really needed to give big gifts to people before."

"We'll just keep it simple then, bring her downstairs and just call for me. I gotta dry off, because somepony's been delaying me," she shot him an accusatory gaze, "Then just call for me."

"Aren't you going to be late to work?"

"Meh, they can wait a few minutes, we're still way ahead of schedule. I am their captain after all."

"Good to hear." He nuzzled her neck, then leaned back slightly to kiss her. He turned and walked into Scoots' room to wake her up. Scoots got up a few minutes later and came downstairs, sleepily trudging into the kitchen.

"What's for breakfast?" She asked, yawning afterwards.

"You want toast?" He asked.

"Man I love toast! I didn't really get to eat toast all that much before..."

"Jeez Scoots, it's just toast." He threw a piece of bread in the air, cooking it as it hung in the air. He handed it to Scoots, who had a look of awe on her face. "Liked that huh? It took a few loaves of practice."

"How do you light your arm on fire without hurting yourself?" She asked through a mouthful of toast.

"I don't know why it generates heat, but I'm just transforming the arm into itself, and I guess the absence of a use for the power transforms into heat energy, so yeah. I don't know why it doesn't burn me though."

"So why are you a changeling today? Are you going into town like that?"

"No, Dash just wanted to see me like this."

"Oh, okay." She looked confused.

"Speaking of Dash, we've got something to show you Scoots. You hear that Dash?!?!" He heard a muffled reply as Dash walked down the stairs with the scooter. Scoots was either speechless or in the process of having a stroke as she locked her eyes on the gift. After a few moments, where their thoughts had started to shift to the second of those two options, Scoots finally broke out of her trance and ran over to Dash, tackling her to the ground.

"Thank you thank you thank you!" She quickly jumped off of Dash and ran over to the scooter, quickly pulling it upright and examining it closely.

"Scoots, you should probably be thanking Jason, this was his idea."

"Thanks Jason!" She immediately went back to her examination. Jason looked at the clock and jumped a little, slightly annoyed that he had managed to get down to the wire on something again.

"Scoots, not to burst your bubble or anything, but we gotta go to school. You wanna ride that? I mean I can drop you off in town and let you ride there, but I still have to talk to Cherilee." Scoots nodded as the scooter floated over onto Jason, now in his pony form, and she jumped on right after. He was going to kinda miss flying her to school every day. "Good luck Dash."

"Yeah, good luck trying to find stuff to do today Jason, I know you tend to get bored."

"I got the map to fall back on. Pinkie's party is at seven tonight, don't forget."

"We can still talk about stuff over lunch, so no rush. Meet me in the market square." She leaned over and kissed him. "Don't forget." Scoots didn't protest the kiss, and Jason had to check that she was still on his back.

"Isn't this usually the part where you say 'ew' or something Scoots?"

"If it means you two are happy, not so much." She replied.

"Aww..." They both said.

"Not like I'm going all mushy or anything." She crossed her arms in a defensive manner, causing Dash and Jason to chuckle.

"Alright, let's just get going at some point today." Dash said.

"Sure, see you at lunch." He walked out the front door behind her, taking off in the opposite direction, planning to land with Scoots in the town square. After a minute or so of spiraling downward, he landed in the square and let Scoots off, handing her the scooter immediately afterward.

"Hey Jason, wanna race?"

"If you think you can keep up."

"Oh, it's on." Man she sounded like Dash right now. Of course, she always said how much Scoots sounded like him, so apparently she was taking after both of them, although he really didn't see it. He came back to his thoughts to see that Scoots had already taken off down the road. He took a deep breath and sprang off the ground, flapping his wings rapidly to speed up and follow the dust cloud on the horizon. After a full minute he managed to pass over Scoots on the ground, who was looking fairly determined as she buzzed along towards the school house.

The real question, though, was whether he should try to win or not. Winning against a kid wasn't exactly something he wanted to be remembered for doing, but then again he really didn't want to lose. He wasn't as competitive as Dash, but that didn't mean he liked to lose. He smirked, having thought of a plan, and pulled back to a slower speed. He waited until Scoots was closer to the schoolhouse before breaking into an all out sprint, attempting to tie with her. He was at least a few seconds behind, and arrived to a heavily breathing, but clearly celebrating Scoots.

"I beat you, I beat you. Ha."

"Good job Scoots." Ugh, losing. "Let's get you to class." She nodded, and they both trotted over to the door. Jason walked in behind Scoots, and immediately walked over to Cherilee's desk, waiting her to look up from the paper she was grading. She stamped a large 'D' onto a paper with the name 'Snails' and turned to look up at him.

"Oh, hi Jason, what are you here for?"

"I was just wondering what your final punishment was for Scoots so that I knew when to pick her up from school."

"Yes, I thought on what you said about it. Scoots will keep her detention along with the rest of them, besides Tiara, of course. So just pick her up a half hour later today."

"Alright, see you then. Is there still the parent teacher meeting? I wanted to see how she was doing in school."

"Why didn't you just ask? She's doing fine! sometimes she's a little distracted, but her grades are much higher than average."

"That's good to know then. Thanks."

"No problem." He nodded to her and took his leave, not exactly eager to remain under the stare of Diamond that he was sure that he was receiving. Scoots quickly waved to get his attention though, stopping him before he reached the door.

"Jason, don't worry about picking me up, I'm gonna crusade until the," She started to whisper, clever girl. "Party." Jason nodded and chuckled, tipping an imaginary hat to the trio of fillies. He left the schoolhouse and quickly walked into town, trying to figure out what he could possibly do with his day, considering all the shops he had already gone through. He sighed, and one of his ears flicked at a sudden sound. He had never really been able to get used to the new ears, with their consistent pivoting and uncontrolled reactions to noise. They had definitely not proven themselves to be a hindrance though, not in the long run.

Jason stopped and turned, looking around the general area for something that could've caused any noise. It was the crunch caused from hooves on gravel, which let him know that it hadn't come from the smooth street cobblestones or any of the nearby bushes. He turned to continue walking, but immediately heard another crunch, followed by some quiet muttering. A few ponies walked by, giving him strange looks. He sighed and continued to walk, feeling a strange sense of deja vu, probably because of that wolf he had been forced to fight when he first came here.

Furious clopping of hooves came from behind him, and he started to turn, only to be hit by a hooded, burly stallion. He flopped onto the ground, bouncing a few feet away and onto his stomach. He rose to his hooves and turned, managing to get a hoof in front of the stallion's right hook and deflected it to the side. The hooded figure slid a knife out of it's sleeve and ran at Jason again, aiming for his chest. He knocked the knife to the side, only to be punched across the face with the stallion's other hoof.

His head cracked to the side, but he recovered in enough time to duck under the next punch and grab the stallion's arm as it passed over his head. He got hit again in the face as he simultaneously flipped the stallion over backwards onto the ground. Jason quickly pressed a hoof to his throat and kicked the knife further away. He looked around at the small crowd of ponies that had gathered through the course of the fight, many of them looking at him with a mixture of fear and awe. He looked back to the stallion, who tried to lunge forward before Jason landed another punch across his face.

"Is there some sort of police department around here?" He asked to the crowd. There was a shuffling as a large pony with a police vest and hat pushed out the front of the crowd.

"Yes." He was breathing heavily. "Just got here." He walked over and pulled out a couple pairs of hoof-cuffs, tightening them around the criminal's legs. The cop slid a hoof under the still hooded stallion, and threw him over his back. "You're going to need to answer some questions, Boss." He started walking. "Name's Dusk."

"Boss?"

"That's what you're called, right? The changeling in Canterlot?"

"Yeah, but they seriously call me Boss?"

"I've heard that a few times, yeah. Mostly from ponies that were in Canterlot at the time though."

"Ah, okay that makes sense I guess."

"Say, where's the other one, they call her Boss too."

"Dash?"

"Yeah, sure." The pony pushed open a glass door in front of him and walked inside, holding it open for Jason. He leaned over the welcome desk and whispered a few words to a secretary before gesturing for Jason to follow him and moving into a new room. He threw down the stallion in a cell and locked the door before pulling Jason into an interrogation room and closing the door behind him. Jason took a seat on one side of the table, sighing as he rested his head on a hoof. At least he had found something to do with his day.

"So, obviously you beat up a stallion in town a few blocks away, what were the circumstances surrounding that event?" He pulled out a pencil and notepad, waiting for Jason to start talking.

"Well this stallion just jumps out of an alleyway and kinda tackles me, then he pulled out a knife and tried to stab me. So basically I was acting in self defense."

"Did you have any relations to the pony in question?"

"Not specifically, but a few ponies in the same alleyway told me yesterday to get out of town. I'm sure you know I'm not really that well liked around here."

"Yeah. Listen, I'm sure you have a life to get back to, and I think I have everything I need from you. I got a motive, a culprit and a possible lead."

"That's it?"

"So long as you stay in town so that we can question you if need be, yes. Of course I'll also be adding to your account with several of the villagers'. Don't worry, I'll make sure that they aren't biased. Thanks for your work in Canterlot, Boss."

"You don't need to thank me." He paused. "Thanks for the fair trial and all though, I appreciate it."

"No problem." He tipped his hat as Jason got up and left the room. He went back through the lobby, walking towards the front door until the secretary stopped him. He went back to the desk, where she gave him a small pile of paperwork, informing him that he should bring it back completed within a few weeks. He knew there was a catch somewhere here. He sighed and put the papers into his saddlebag, realizing that the knife fight had left a cut in one of the bags, making it virtually useless until he could get it fixed. Looks like he had more stuff to do today. Hooray.

He left the police station and turned down the street, getting a few more mixed looks from the villagers as they cleared out in front of him to create their normal wide path. Something bumped him in the side, and he looked over to see Lyra. He sure was seeing her a lot lately.

"How's it going, Jason?"

"Not so good, some stallion just tried to kill me."

She looked over with a smile playing on her lips, seemingly expecting him to laugh and say that he'd been joking. After a few moments her expression turned to shock and she averted her gaze to the ground. "Sorry, I thought you were joking."

"Yeah, I wish I'd been joking."

"So where's the culprit now?"

"Ponyville jail. The cop figured I was innocent, because it was pretty clear that I was, and let me go so long as I stay in town."

"Oh..." She was silent for a few moments. "So, I think I have a bass guitar player for you guys, you'd never guess who it is!" The ability for ponies around here to change topics always seemed to leave his mind reeling.

"I really have no idea."

"That's what I thought! I'll bring her by at the party tonight."

"How many ponies are coming to this party exactly?"

"Well let's see, I am, then there's Bon Bon, Twilight and her friends, Scootaloo and her friends for some reason, and then my bassist." She smiled over at him.

"How did Pinkie manage to invite everyone I know? I didn't even know you until yesterday, and I haven't talked to her since-- whatever. I don't care that much."

"So how do you know the foals?"

"Oh, you don't know? Well obviously not. Anyways, I adopted Scoots a few weeks ago, and I guess Pinkie invited her friends. Although I was enrolled in Ponyville school for part of a day, when I was disguised as a foal, so I know them for that too." They had started to walk through the park.

"That's nice of you to adopt Scootaloo, although I didn't know she was an orphan."

"Yeah, I didn't either until a couple of weeks ago."

"So you were disguised as a foal, huh?" She asked.

"Yeah, they're really short. And I mean really short." He said.

"Okay, not exactly the answer I was looking for, but hey, you're from out of Equestria, right?"

"Yeah..."

"So I was just wondering, are there humans there?"

"They used to exist there."

"Wow, do you think they still exist?"

"I'm pretty sure, maybe." This conversation was steadily getting weirder.

"Ha, wait until I tell Bon Bon! She said that I was never going to find anything new." Jason suddenly became distracted as he noticed a glint in some mud to the side of the path.

"Hold on a sec." He pulled at the corner of the object with his magic, liberating it from the mud. It was a thin square of some sort, hopefully not something from his world, although he had a sinking feeling it was.

"Why're you going through trash on the ground?"

"Shh.." He wiped off one side with a hoof and gasped. Lyra looked unimpressed. "No surprise that you don't know what this is, it's music from where I came from." He further wiped off the front of the case, getting slightly annoyed as the emblem of Pink Floyd's 'Dark Side of the Moon' stared back at him. Fuck.

"What is it?"

"Well, a band from where I come from put together an album of songs onto this little disk thing." He opened the case to show her.

"They fit a bunch of songs onto that tiny thing? No way, you're pulling one of my legs."

"No, there's seriously, god I don't know the number, at least fifteen songs on here. We were a lot more advanced than you are here."

"So how did it get here?"

"I have no idea, I'm going to go give this to Twilight and see if she can find out. Now listen, you can't tell anyone about this stuff, just grab any super futuristic stuff you see and bring it to her or me. I really don't want ponies setting off weapons if they come over."

"Sure thing, but how exactly can you 'set off' a weapon?"

"Explosives, like 'bang' explosion. Probably deadly."

"Yeah, I'll be on the lookout then. Anyways, I gotta go get ready for the lunch crowd, Bon Bon's probably mad about me being late again. See ya later!"

"See ya!" He said back, but she had already galloped off. Jason sighed and continued at his walking pace, turning back into town. He passed by Rarity's, before having second thoughts and deciding to see if she could mend the saddlebag for him in a few minutes. He went up to the door, knocking the side of his hoof against the door, an action that made exponentially more noise than with the bottom of his hoof.

The door was opened to Sweetie Belle, who looked up at him for a moment before recognizing him. "Rarity, it's Jason!"

"Well let him in dear, it's freezing outside." He rolled his eyes. It was maybe sixty eight. His earth house was like fifty six, and he didn't even have fur then. Rarity walked into the room, doing a good job at hiding her flinch. "What can I do for you darling? I'm not quite finished with Scoots' Nightmare Night costume, so you'll have to come back for that."

"I was just wondering if you could possibly take a minute to sew up this cut in my saddlebag. I can't really carry anything on this side and it's kind of annoying.

"But of course, just hand it over." She didn't wait for a response, and simply floated it off his back and over to her sewing machine, where she immediately started to mend the cut. "What happened here, Darling? This is the least ragged tear I've ever seen."

"Some stallion tried to stab me, and apparently cut the saddlebag." Rarity looked over at him, slightly stunned.

"What happened to him? He isn't dead, is he?" Jason was slightly taken aback.

"What am I, a murderer? He's in Ponyville jail." Rarity opened her mouth to respond before closing it again. She turned off the sewing machine and handed him the saddlebag, bidding him goodbye as he pushed open the door to leave. God damn, did everyone in this town expect him to go rogue or something? This was just ridiculous. He didn't need recognition for his efforts, he just wanted them to realize he wasn't dangerous.

He slowly walked over to the library, realizing a little too late that Dash would be in the market square for lunch soon. He broke into a gallop, quickly making his way through the streets to Twilight's library, a task that became much easier when the ponies cleared out in front of you. He arrived at the door, suddenly realizing that he needed to take out the album booklet, it probably had pictures of the band inside. He pulled it out and stuffed it into his saddlebag as he knocked on the door, watching the clock tower strike another minute closer to noon. Spike opened the door, then quickly backed away and closed it.

Twilight opened the door a few seconds later, smiling over at Jason. She gestured for him to come in, and she sat down with some tea.

"Okay so listen, I've gotta go meet up with Dash so I'm going to try to go through all of this really quickly. I found this, it's a compact disk from my world. Don't bother trying to reverse engineer it. At this point it's still a coincidence, so don't worry about that either. I just wanted to drop it off here. How's the whole steel thing going?"

"Fine," She sipped her tea, obviously not mindful of his lack of time. "I sent blueprints to Celestia, she should be getting back to me in a little while on whether or not there are any problems with my design."

"Alright, I'll see you later then, bye." She waved as he trotted over to the door, carefully closing it behind him. He sprinted over towards the market square as the clock struck twelve, and arrived a few seconds later. Dash was already there, smirking at him.

"When I explain my day so far, you're going to be wondering how I even got here at all."

"Okay, let's get to the park first." She picked up a picnic basket in her teeth, and took off into the air. Jason made sure the pocket in the saddlebag with all of the papers inside was completely and totally closed before he took off after her, quickly catching up to the lazy pace she had set. Lazy for her anyway.

Because of the 'lazy' pace, they arrived in the park only a few minutes later and set up on top of a small, rolling hill. Dash quickly laid out a small blanket and handed him a sandwich and an apple. He thanked her and looked out over the park for the second time in as many days. Even with the lack of detail this world had, it could still be incredibly pretty.

"So what's this epic story you've got for me?"

"Well, I'll just start after I dropped off Scoots. She's doing well in school apparently. Anyway, I was walking past that same alley as yesterday, which was kinda stupid in hindsight, and then this stallion with a hood on jumps me with a knife. I fought him off, and then got pulled into the police office for interrogation, to get my story straight. Anyway, I'm not really sure if the cop was in Canterlot or if he just knew people there, but he seemed to like me and let me off the hook. Not like I committed a crime in the first place. Apparently the ponies there call me and you 'Boss'. How cool is that?"

"Pretty damn awesome."

"Yeah, then I bumped into Lyra again, and we chatted, and I found another thing from my world, which is worrying, to say the least. Then I went to Rarity's to get the saddlebag sewn up, because it got slashed in the fight, then I delivered the thing to Twilight, which was a music disk, like a record, and then I ran over to the market square." He took a deep breath. "So how was work with you?"

"That's it? You're not going to say anything about the stallion that jumped you?"

"Oh, yeah, well the police know about it, and the gang ponies didn't go after you or Scoots so I'm pretty sure they're only going after me, so at least there's a silver lining."

"A what? Don't answer that. Just be careful, okay? I already had to wait through one of your near death experiences, I don't want to have to wait through another."

"No worries Dash." He pulled her over, resting her shoulder against his as they sat. He wrapped a wing around her, bringing her closer to him as they stared out over the park in silence. Dash finally broke the silence.

"I love you, Jason."

"I love you too, Dash." He paused. "What're you thinking about?"

"I'm just so worried. Danger just follows us everywhere. I just want to have a day where we can relax and not need to worry about ponies that want to kill us, or you in this case."

"Yeah, me too. It gets old after a while." They sat there for a few more minutes, quietly eating their food. "I realized I never transformed. Just saying." Dash laughed.

"You do a good job diffusing serious situations, Jason."

"And later, I'll do a great job ruining romantic moments in the exact same way."

"Don't ruin this one." She leaned over and kissed him, throwing a hoof around his back and drawing him closer as Jason copied the motion. They continued to sit there and kiss until Dash suddenly drew herself out of the moment enough to realize that she was missing work. She pulled back and looked at the clock tower, swearing under her breath when she realized that she had to go.

"Hey Dash, my wings aren't like this for the reason I think are they?" She looked over at him and giggled.

"Yeah, that's exactly why."

"Dammit Dash, why do you have to be so pretty all the time?"

"It just comes naturally." Jason managed to get his wings down to his sides after a few moments of struggling, soon enough to wish her good luck before she took off to get back to her job. Speaking of jobs, Jason realized that he really needed to get back to his. The inner procrastinator inside of him had evidently acted, although he didn't really have a choice with most of the stuff that had happened in town. He sighed and took off towards Dash's cloud house, intent on spending the rest of the day planning. The sooner he could forward the plans to Celestia, the better.

He landed in the front yard and walked inside, immediately heading for the map room. Luckily, all the pieces were right where he had left them, untouched by Scoots. If he were to forward these plans, however, she would have to move her pieces. He didn't really want to forward them a battle plan with random pieces on half of the map. Jason smiled and got to work, immediately starting to move the Equestrian army pieces.

Jason yawned. He'd been at this for at least several hours, possibly more. The natural timepiece that hunger created was gone, considering the fact that he didn't need to eat, leaving him in a perpetual state of not being able to know the time. He finally tore himself away from the work to go look at the time. Five thirty, not too bad. He definitely wasn't setting any records for work in one sitting, that was for sure. He yawned again, and decided that he might as well take a shower. Sure, any dirt and grime fell off when he shifted away from his pony form, but he just kinda felt like taking a shower. Especially now that the water was warm.

He trudged upstairs and walked into Dash's bathroom, turning the dial in the shower several times before the water began to turn warm, and then stepped into the inviting sensation. He missed showers. Well, the warm ones, he hated cold showers with a passion. Showers were supposed to wake you up, though, but this silly little rain shower was just making him more sleepy. The water was just so nice as it...ran...over his....fur.... and mrmnrmnwmne.

Another long day, Dash thought as she glided back from weather. Ninety percent done though, just a few more charts and minute weather adjustments to make and she was home free. She landed, feeling slightly more energetic as she walked inside. "Scoots? Jason?" She heard water upstairs, evidently Jason had decided to use the warm water he had discovered this morning. She chuckled and made her way upstairs and into her bathroom, looking for Jason. What she didn't expect to find was him passed out on the bottom of her shower. She prodded his shoulder with a hoof, attempting to rouse him.

After a few more attempts, he opened an eye and lazily looked up at her. "Dash, has anyone over told you that the bottom of your shower is really comfortable?"

"No."

"Well it is."

"So, why exactly are you sleeping on the floor of my shower?"

"Because I was tired."

"Are you going to answer any of my questions with descriptive answers?"

"Maybe." She sighed and he chuckled. "I worked on the map for five and a half hours, then I decided to take a shower, and it made me sleepy, and everything in this house is comfortable..."

"Why are you such a goof?"

"I'm not just any goof, I'm a professional."

"Let's just get to that party."

"That should definitely be interesting."

Jason finally pulled himself out of the shower, and simply shifted into his changeling form, allowing the water trapped in his fur to be liberated and fall into the cloud floor, absorbing quickly and turning the cloud a slightly darker color. He chuckled a little and left the bathroom before freezing in place and backpedaling, taking a look inside of one of Dash's bathroom drawers. He pulled out a paperclip, examining it closely in front of one of his eyes. "Shit. Dash!" She trotted into the room, following his gaze to the paper clip.

"Don't tell me..."

"Yep. A paper clip. Useful for attaching documents, with multiple pages. A fifteen dollar value..."

"Jason."

"Mmm?"

"What are you doing?"

"Oh, television commercial. The box with the moving pictures? They'd try to sell stuff to you. Maybe a television, and a generator, and some DVD's, and a DVD player, and some gasoline will show up here and I can show you some time."

"That sounds a little far fetched."

Jason deadpanned. "I'm in a world where almost everything I do defies every single theory of physics from my home world. Far fetched means nothing."

"You and your stupid probability..." She sighed, walking back out of the room.

"Hey, we don't actually need to wear anything for one of these parties, do we?"

"It's a Pinkie party." She said, acting like that explained everything.

"So no clothes. Not like I have any. Maybe your gillie suit would work?"

"Yeah, great, creep out the ponies even further than they already are."

"Hey. Twilight doesn't think I'm weird. Just because the rest of your friends are either afraid or suspicious of me, except for Pinkie, doesn't mean anything. Maybe eventually they'll see past the changeling alien I am." He snickered before breaking out in laughter.

"It's not really that funny..."

He wiped his eyes. "Yeah, I just never thought I'd say something like that. Oh, man." He paused. "You want some food? I want some food."

"How do you want food this much? You don't even need to eat."

"But it's fooooood Dash."

"So?"

"Foooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo--"

"Alright I get it! We'll get some food." She punched him in the shoulder, chuckling. "You can't ever just make anything simple, can you?"

"Would you really enjoy talking to me if I did?"

"Uh, let me answer that question with a question. Would anypony else?"

Jason grabbed an apple and comedically stroked his chin, deep in thought. "Now isn't that the question." He paused, taking a bite of the apple. "Hey, since we may have a new band member after tonight, do you want to show me your cloud drums or something? At the very least I could get them tuned or something. I'm going to act like I know things about drums."

She giggled. "Yeah, sure. I practiced a little while you were gone, I'm not too bad at these as it turns out." She led him upstairs into another room.

"You know, it's amazing how I haven't even seen all the rooms around here. I guess I'm just not a curious person."

"You just forgot."

"Yeah, you're probably right. If we're lucky this new member'll be a pegasus and we can just practice in here." He gestured to the airy room. "I should move the guitar stuff in here. I just realized that those must've been enchanted and that that was really lucky."

"Most products are enchanted. That's part of the warranty. It also says, if you forget to renew the spell it's not their fault."

"Yeah, usually the warnings on products at my home just have pointless warnings because morons hurt or killed themselves with things like cups and string." Dash walked over and sat down on the small chair, and grabbed a pair of drumsticks.

"What do you want me to play?"

"I dunno, a fast beat, something complicated." She nodded and proceeded to tune what Jason assumed was the snare, resting a hoof on the base drum pedal. Jason took another bite of the apple, slightly nervous about how she would preform. He really hoped that she wasn't terrible.

"Here goes nothing." She said, taking a deep breath before she started drumming, slightly surprising Jason at her skill. After all her talk of being rusty, he didn't expect her to immediately pick up a new beat with no mistakes. After a few minutes she hit an accidental rimshot and slowly stopped drumming, then turned to Jason nervously.

"Are you actually wondering if that was good?" He laughed, then stopped, realizing she had probably taken that in the wrong way. "It was amazing Dash, I don't know why you worried about it."

"Really? Other ponies always said what I played was really weird!"

"Yeah, well I play some pretty strange stuff too, that's probably why I actually recognize the talent. If it wasn't official before, it is now. Welcome to the band, Dash."

"Awesome!"

"It's only me and you right now, don't get too excited."

"I really can't wait to meet that bass player."

"Hopefully Lyra actually got a bass guitar player."

"Ha, yeah. We seriously need to get going though." She pointed to a clock on the wall. "We're almost late already." She put the drumsticks back into a cup that held several other pairs.

"I'm sure Pinkie won't mind."

"Yes she will, she might go insane like the last time I was late and think that for some reason I wasn't her friend anymore."

"So do we need anything, or..."

"No, I don't think we have to bring anything, really. What were parties like from your world?"

"Well, that depends on if you want to know about college parties or other parties. Those are the real parties. Lots of alcohol, lots of girls, and I don't really remember anything else."

"You've gotta know more than that. There were girls apparently?" She was trying to look uninterested.

"Yeah, and tons of alcohol. I hardly remembered it the day after, and that was years ago." Dash let out an exaggerated sigh. "I wasn't with any girls when I got put over here anyway, you don't have any competition."

"So what makes a party a college party then?"

"Oh, ha! College is like advanced school, like really advanced, compared to what you have here. I had, um, at least eighteen years of school total."

"Eighteen?!?!"

"Yeah, you learn a lot in that time. Not like teaching is any faster where I come from, though."

"So what can you even do with all that schooling?"

"Well, I became an accountant for a big company. It was probably worth somewhere around the total wealth of Equestria, maybe more. But then again, we do have billions more people."

"Jason, as much as I'd love to discuss your old life, we really have to go."

"Oh, fine. College parties are between a bunch of young kids who just ended up with more freedom then they know what to do with. Thus, college party." He got up and walked after her, taking another bite of the apple as he turned the corner and walked down the small hallway before descending the stairs.

"So, Jason, what happened to Scoots?"

"She's crusading, she'll meet us there." Dash shot him a glare.

"It's okay, that means she's with her friends. I told her yesterday that I think her cutie mark could be better found doing something in town, so they'll be safe with all the other ponies around."

"God, you make me worry too much."

"You probably shouldn't have fallen for me then."

"Oh, but I'm so glad I did." She leaned over and kissed him, more roughly as time passed. Jason finally interrupted the kiss with a hoof, then pointed to the clock. Dash giggled and pointed at Jason's wings. He groaned before chuckling at her for the same reason. They broke out into pointless laughter, rolling about on the ground as best they could. A few minutes later they managed to compose themselves.

"I am so getting my work done early tomorrow."

"And I'll be waiting impatiently." Dash laughed, and finally exited the house with Jason, quickly gliding down to Sugarcube Corner through the darkness that now shaded Ponyville.

They landed in front of the building, which was darkened for some reason or another. "That's probably not good." Dash said, looking around nervously.

"She probably made it into a surprise party, which only Pinkie would do after specifically telling me the time, date, and location of the party." He said, smirking at Dash. She chuckled.

"So do you want to act surprised?"

"No, we should try to surprise them, and I have a few ways of doing that. I can go in as someone dangerous, and they'd freak out, or we could act like we died when they surprise us. The only problem is that I really don't know how to act, and I don't know who's dangerous around here."

"You always get through like half of a plan, and then just run out of ideas."

"Well sorry for having limits! It's not like I can get big enough to become Nightmare Moon or Chrysalis, although that second one would just be stupid."

"Let's just act surprised." She said, rolling her eyes.

"Fine, we'll do it your way." He walked over to the entrance, pushing open the door and holding it for Dash. They both walked in to the darkened room, looking around as nothing seemed to happen. Jason smirked, he could see some of the ponies in the dark, one was attempting to hide behind what looked to be a lamp. The ponies that he could see made a simultaneous movement as the lights went on. Jason shielded his eyes, growling from the painful influx of light. He blinked a few times and slowly moved his hoof away from the front of his face. Pinkie was bounding around in front of him.

"Did we scare you? Did we? I hope we did, it was a surprise party after all!"

"Yeah, sure, you scared me."

"Yay, I was worried that I wouldn't be able to, but it looks like I could!" She started to bounce away. "Enjoy the party!" Jason looked around, focusing on a banner that said 'Welcome back!, and/or welcome to Ponyville!' This wasn't exactly the first time he'd been here, but whatever. He brought his gaze back down, sweeping it over the ponies that were present. Looks like what Lyra had said about the party guests was right, and speaking of Lyra...

"Dash, let's go see if we can find that bass player." Some music started up. To say that he didn't really like it would be an understatement. Jason locked his eyes on Lyra, picking her out of the small crowd, and immediately started to make his way over. She saw him and stopped her conversation with another mare mid word to meet him.

"Hi Jason!"

"Hey, how's it going?"

"Great! I got that bassist you wanted, I'm sure you two'll love her!" She turned around and led them back to where she'd been. There was a gray mare that Jason couldn't quite recognize. A look at Dash showed that she was in the same state of partial confusion.

"Are you going to introduce us, Lyra?" Dash asked.

"Oh, yeah. Dash, Jason, this is Octavia Philharmonica. Octavia, this is Rainbow Dash, and this is Jason." Jason got over his moment of recognition long enough to walk over and shake her hoof.

"It's a pleasure." He said. As far as he could remember, she was upper class. Might as well make a good impression. He also seemed to remember that she played the orchestral bass, not the bass guitar. He had only told Lyra about that specification, oh, five or six times now. He stepped away from the hoof shake, clearing his throat. "I'm sorry to ask this, but don't you play the form of bass consistently used in orchestras, rather than the guitar version?"

"No, I play both instruments. A friend of mine convinced me to try out the more 'rock and roll', as she called it, type of music. As it turns out I quite fancy the instrument. It's a nice distraction from the run of the mill, classical instruments of our age." Jason chuckled, causing her to raise an eyebrow. "What's so funny?"

"I just didn't take you to be a bass guitar player, that's all. I guess I didn't take Dash here for a drummer either."

"Yeah, so Jason, how do you want to figure out if she's band material?" Dash asked.

"We'll just do the same thing as with you. I'll giver her some sort of bass line, and see how well she does." He turned to Octavia. "You alright with that?"

"But of course, I wouldn't want to be in a band that didn't have standards."

"Good to know, I guess. We still have yet to come up with a band name, though. God knows we're a different enough set of ponies. Seriously, the fastest flyer in Equestria, an orchestra member and a changeling. If we can't find a name, we're probably doomed."

"Wait a moment, you're the changeling?"

"Yeah." He figured this was the part where she'd be like 'Oh wait, as it turns out I have other important stuff to do, sorry'.

"Well I commend you and your friend here for your bravery. I can't believe I didn't recognize you two sooner. My friends tell me that I'm terribly bad at recognizing faces, but not recognizing your's," She gestured to Dash. "Really proves their point. Those were some excellent speeches, by the way."

"Wait, you were there?" Jason asked.

"Yes, I fought in your little war, luckily I ended up with a nearly empty zone. I probably wouldn't have done that well in a pinch. Now I've moved here because of the destruction of my house."

"I'm sorry to hear that." He turned to Dash. "When and where do you think we should meet?"

"I don't know, it's not like we can practice at my house, seeing as it's made out of cloud and all."

"We could just use another cloud walking spell."

"Or we could practice at my house." They both turned, looking a little surprised.

"You sure?"

"Yeah, it shouldn't be that big of a deal. It's the red one over kinda by the library."

"How does tomorrow afternoon sound?" Dash asked.

"As good as anything else." She smiled. "I'm glad you're giving me a chance."

"No problem." Dash replied.

"Dash," Jason started, "You wanna go try that cider?"

"A little too excited, are we?"

"I heard it was good, okay?" He started to walk over to the snack table and grabbed an empty mug, as did Dash. He filled it up and took a few swigs before he realized that he needed to shift into Dash's form. A few ponies gasped , and he groaned before turning around. Applejack and Fluttershy were behind him, naturally. They were probably the ones that had gasped. He thought he'd made it pretty clear why he shifted into Dash's form. He took another swig of the cider, quickly downing the rest of the mug. It just tasted like apple juice, maybe there was a mistake? Applejack looked a little angry, maybe he'd get his answer.

"I heard ya beat up a pony in town today."

"Oh, yeah I did that." She raised an eyebrow.

"And may I ask why?"

"Yeah, he gave me the stink eye, I had to teach him a lesson." He chuckled as she narrowed her eyes at him and Fluttershy backed a little further away. "He actually tried to kill me though, jumped me with a knife." It always felt strange talking to ponies in Dash's form, mostly because of the voice change. It always threw him for a loop when Dash's voice came out of a different place than her mouth.

"He tried to kill ya?"

"Yeah, ponies don't really like me that much. The pony's in jail, if you want to see him." She nodded and sighed.

"Sorry 'bout jumpin' the gun on ya again." She rubbed the back of her head with a hoof.

"Yeah..." He took a long swig of the cider, then turned and refilled the mug. "Maybe you should look at these things from an optimistic point of view for a change."

"We'll see." She turned and walked away as Jason faced Dash.

"Some party. Where're the Crusaders anyway?"

"They're over there by the food."

"The punch isn't spiked, is it?"

"Nah, Pinkie seems pretty dense at times, but she wouldn't risk getting foals drunk." She said. Jason took another swig of cider.

"Does this taste like apple juice to you?"

"Well, it is made out of apples."

"I mean straight apple juice, no alcohol."

She took a sip. "Nah, taste's pretty alcoholic." She said, starting to walk over to the crusaders. Jason looked down at the mug in his hoof inquisitively.

"If you say so." He took another swig, looking back up to the faces of Twilight and Rarity. "Yeah, Twilight I found another thing." He hoofed over the paperclip. She looked between him and Dash before apparently figuring out which one of the Dashs was him.

"What is it?"

"It holds papers together."

"Ah. I still haven't found anything out about where these are coming from."

"So are you otherwise enjoying the party?"

"Yeah, it's alright, you?"

"Yeah, I wish I knew more ponies."

"This is the portion of town that wasn't afraid or suspicious of you?"

"No, that's even smaller. That's just you, Dash, Lyra, and the Crusaders, and I guess a few others that aren't here. Applejack thinks I'm going to kill everybody, Fluttershy's completely afraid of me, and Rarity," he shot a glance her way. "also seems to be afraid of me." Twilight opened her mouth and then shut it again.

"Darling, what is it that bugs you so much about ponies fearing you?"

"I don't know, It just annoys me that they still see me as a threat after all I've gone through for the ponies around here. I don't want recognition, just for them to kind of see me as just another pony. Clearly that won't happen with the attempt on my life and the fact that most ponies still hate me after the paper came out. If I wanted to rule by fear I would've done it by now."

"For your sake then, I'll try to improve."

"Cool, thanks. Hey, is that Nightmare Night costume almost finished?"

"Why, yes! I finished it only a few hours ago. If I may, I would recommend that Scootaloo come in to get it just before the festivities, because I will need to touch up some of it with makeup."

"Like the wounds?"

"Yes, I've never done anything like this, and it was just so original, I had to go all out."

"Maybe everyone'll want to go as a zombie next year."

"Oh, please. It's not anything to get worked up over."

"Alright. I'll talk to you later then." Jason shook his head as he walked over towards Scoots and her friends, he might as well see what kind of ridiculous plan they had attempted today. He took another mouthful of cider. Scoots noticed him and turned away from her friends.

"Hi Jason!"

"Hey Scoots. What kind of crusading were you doing today?"

"Oh, Applebloom convinced Applejack to let us run the apple stall for a few hours!"

"And how did that go wrong?"

"Why do you have so little faith in the success of our plans?"

"How did you do?"

"Not very well. But you must have some ideas, right Jason?"

"Well I think I know what your cutie marks are, but I'm not going to help you find them."

"But why?" Applebloom whined, making puppy dog eyes at him.

"Would you really want to tell someone later that the big important story behind your cutie mark is that some pony told you what it was?"

"No..." She replied.

"But, I'll give you a hint." They all perked up. "It's something you've already done. It's not the same thing for all of you, but you all enjoy the different activities."

"Well that doesn't narrow it down at all!" Sweetie belle complained.

"Oh, doesn't it? Have any of you ponies gone shark wrangling?" They shook their heads. "Well that's off the list. How much did any of you like Manticore capturing?"

"We didn't." They chorused. He figured that would be another of the ones they hadn't done.

"Another thing off the list. Hopefully you can see where I'm going with this. Your special talent isn't going to be something you hate, and you're already going to have a tendency towards doing whatever that talent is. The cutie mark is just a representation of a talent you already have. It's pretty pointless, really."

"How can you say that?!?!" Scootaloo yelled.

"Do you think a mark on your flank just suddenly makes you a great actor or painter? It really doesn't. By the time you get the cutie mark, you already know what it's for. I don't have one, and I know what I'm good at, even if I were to change it. I'm still me." He ran through several cutie marks on his flank, just random pictures he thought of off the top of his head before returning to the normal absence of one. The fillies seemed satisfied with his explanation, seeing as they had grappled onto his fore legs in a hug, he assumed.

"That was a nice speech." Jason jumped, turning to the new voice behind him. He tried to shake one of the fillies off, but she remained stuck. He turned far enough to see the face of a new mare, who he recognized after a few seconds as Bon Bon.

"Thanks! I would shake your hoof, but mine are kinda occupied." She giggled, parts of her mane shaking slightly.

"I can see that. Lyra told me that you wanted to play at the Gilded Griffin, and I just wanted to express my gratitude, I mean, it's just so nice of you to do this, especially since you don't even really know me or Lyra, and with business the way it's been..." She wiped a hoof across her eyes. "Thanks." She moved forward and wrapped him in a hug. He managed to free a hoof and patted Bon Bon on the back as she tried to collect herself.

"I'm happy to do this show, I'm just glad you provided us with a venue. Maybe we could organize some sort of contract if this stuff takes off. I'm not accepting pay for the first concert. Seeing as there aren't economic depressions around here, I don't really need to worry about saving my money like crazy." She looked up, peering at him through teary eyes.

"Why are you doing this?" She asked. He took a moment to think about that. He didn't really feel like he was doing this for money. He definitely wasn't trying to woo either of them with his supposed generosity. He didn't really see it as a big deal, he'd help out a friend, and as an added benefit he'd get publicity. That was it, a friend!

"Because Lyra's my friend, and that makes you my friend by extension. It's really not as big of a deal as you're making it out to be though."

"It's a big deal to me." She squeezed her arms around him before letting go and dropping back down to the floor with a smile. "Do you know when you're going to be able to preform?"

"Well, I could do it as early as tomorrow night, although I'm not sure if we can have that many songs ready, or even one at all."

"Just so long as you have a couple, it shouldn't matter too much. It's also fine if you have to wait a few days."

"We don't actually have microphones, do you have something that we could use?"

"Um, yeah! We actually had a band preform a while back, I think we have some microphones from that. Lyra'll have to practice her magic to power the things and sound equipment, but that should all be fine.

"Cool. I'll come by if we're able to do it." He looked around for Dash, seeing that she had ended up in a booth with Pinkie. Scoots was slouched against Dash, looking happy. He honestly didn't know when the crusaders had left his hooves. Most of the other ponies were hovering around the food or dancing. Dancing looked so stupid when you were a small horse, it was just shifting legs around. The cool part about extreme dancing with humans was that they could hold each other up, do twirls, interesting stuff. PEOPLE COULD DIE. This just looked easy and monotonous. He was so focused on the ponies' dancing, in fact, that he ran into the table that Pinkie and Dash were sitting at, jostling the plates of half eaten food.

He looked over sheepishly, realizing that at the slow speed he was walking, that must've looked spectacularly stupid. Dash and Scoots were staring at him, while some of Pinkie's legs flailed around above table level as she lay on her back, laughing. The rest of them broke out into a fit of giggles, which eventually subsided. Dash wiped her eyes and slid a mug of cider over as Jason placed his own on the table. He looked up and smirked.

"Are you trying to get me drunk?" Dash looked around innocently. "Well it's not going to work." He downed the rest of his first mug, immediately chasing it down with the second. He didn't even feel buzzed.

"How are you doing this? The only other pony I've seen drink more mugs of this stuff than it looks like you're going to is Applejack."

"I think I hear a challenge coming on. Where is that Applejack anyway?"

"Ooh! A challenge! I like challenges! I'll go get things ready!" Jason sighed. What had he gotten himself into this time?

"Ooh, Jason, you have to take on Applejack." Scoots said, chuckling. "She's never lost a drinking contest before. Even I know that, and I'm just supposed to be an innocent foal." Jason raised an eyebrow.

"She's also never gone up against a changeling that used to be a human that drank amounts of alcohol that would apparently kill several ponies around here. So if I have even a fraction of that resistance to alcohol, I've already won." He assumed a triumphant position.

"Or, you'll end up looking cocky when Applejack drinks you under the table." Dash said, smirking.

"Well we'll ju--"

"Pinkie tells me there's somepony that wants ta challenge me to a drinkin' contest. Ah'm gonna take a wild guess and say that it's you." She pointed a hoof at Jason. "We'll have to see how much of a heavyweight you actually are. No changin' though, ah don't know what that does to the alcohol in yer body."

"Yeah, alright. You wanna make bets on what happens if whoever wins?"

"Ah was hopin you'd ask!"

"What'll you have me do if I lose? Nothing against the law, hopefully."

"Nah, Ah'm just gonna have ya have the next crusader sleepover that's scheduled at my house at your house instead."

"Fine, if I win, you gotta start trusting me. No more of this, hiding in bushes stuff."

"That's it? That there is a terrible bettin' term."

"Well that's all I really have to bet."

"You're goin' down, pardner, you ain't got a chance."

"I think we should move up the competition here!"

"I think yer right!" they had been steadily moving closer to each other during the argument, and were now only inches away, trying to stare each other into submission. Dash rolled her eyes and got up from the table. She pushed the two of them apart and held them there.

"Solve this with the stupid alcohol! You better not end up with some giant hangover tomorrow, Jason."

"No promises." He chuckled. "I'll drink lots of water before I pass out." Applejack had already pulled a table towards the center of the floor, gesturing to him to make his way over. Pinkie bounced out of nowhere with a bunch of mugs balanced on her back. She slid them onto the table, looking back towards the ponies that were making their way over. Lyra and Bon Bon walked over and stood behind Jason, while Rarity ended up behind Applejack.

"Are we taking bets now?" Jason asked.

"I'll put three bits on Jason!" Lyra said, placing the bits on the table. Bon Bon shot her a glare.

"Are you ready to lose those bits, darling? I've got three on Applejack." Rarity rebutted.

"Okay, you're going to match each other drink for drink, until somepony passes out!" Pinkie said, a little too happily. "Readysetgo!"

They were at least fifteen mugs into there little competition, and Jason was starting to feel the heat. The cider may have had low alcohol content, but he had ingested so much that he was starting to slur his words.

"rre you gunna give up yet there Applejack?"

"Not unless *hic* you do......first!" Maybe she was more drunk than he was. He couldn't tell. His eyes lazily shifted to Dash, whose face was slightly red from the cider she had drank. She definitely was a hot pony. He'd really like to just go over there and f--

"Pardner, ya'll better catch up, ah'm a mug ahead a ya." Jason reached over and grabbed a mug, downing it as she watched in annoyance.

"Ha." He couldn't remember what else he had wanted to say. They both reached over and grabbed another set of mugs, chugging them in unison. By now most of the other ponies had made their way over, and there was a fairly big pool of bets that had been placed. Those coins were shinier than he remembered...

He grabbed yet another mug and downed the contents, watching Applejack as she started to do the same, before putting down the mug midway through. She swayed around for a few moments, before raising a hoof to point at him. "Ya know, ah don't real--" THUNK. Her head hit the table as half of the ponies let out a cheer. Jason turned to Dash, giving her a smile that was probably ridiculously sexy. He grabbed the glasses of water that she had laid out for him and downed all of them. He couldn't remember why he was supposed to, though. He got up from the table after deciding that he wanted some cake and started to walk across the floor. Then he got really short all of a sudden as the floor got closer.

He ended up passed out on the floor.

Jason awoke with a pounding pain in his head as he slowly rose out of his slumber.

"Ohh, my head." He groggily put a hoof to his forehead, slowly opening his eyes. He quickly closed them again, repositioning so that he wasn't facing the light. He re-opened his eyes, glancing around. For a while, he wasn't sure how to react. He was in Dash's house, but how was that possible? She must've somehow pulled him up here with her, even though she had downed at least a few ciders. He looked out the window, squinting his eyes. It was at least nine, possibly later. He rolled out of bed, noticing a note on the bedside table as he started to leave. He walked back over and picked it up, looking it over.

Jason,

I took Scoots to school for you, and am probably working by the time you wake up. I should be in town for lunch, and be done with work at that point. Because I know you'll ask, yes, I brought you to the house. You owe me one. In any case, you better sort that hangover out before we meet up. Feel free to do whatever in the mean time, just try not to get stabbed. In case you forgot, you won the drinking contest last night.

Jason put down the note, sighing as he walked back downstairs. This definitely wasn't the worst hangover he'd ever had, evidently the water Dash had brought him had worked like it was supposed to. He trotted into the kitchen, hissing at the sudden increase in brightness. He downed a couple more glasses of water. He didn't know why people always complained so much about hangovers. He'd just get hydrated again and they'd go away in a few hours. When it really got bad was when he woke up nauseous, and couldn't keep the water down. That day was a living hell. Luckily this wasn't one of these days.

He sighed, moving back into the living room. He levitated the guitar and amp into the air, grimacing slightly at the increased pressure on his head. He brought them upstairs, setting them next to Dash's drum kit. If they were going to practice later, they'd have to bring this all back down, but at least it was all in one place now. That was something, maybe. He could swear he still felt at least a fair amount of alcohol in his system. Apparently pony livers weren't any faster at alcohol processing than human ones. At least it wasn't anything seriously judgement impeding, he felt like he was thinking clearly.

Jason shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts. At least he was starting to feel the effects of the water, much more quickly than he'd expected. He trudged back down the stairs and grabbed a pair of sunglasses off the table, figuring that Dash wouldn't mind too much. He put them on and slowly edged his eyes further open, enjoying the effects the tint had on the pain in his head. Jason drank another glass of water before deciding to go into town. Maybe he'd find something to do.

He put the water glass back on the counter and checked his form, making sure that he hadn't somehow ended up turning back into a changeling when he had passed out. He hadn't, luckily. Jason walked out the door as he slung his saddlebag over his back and took off, wobbling slightly before he managed to stabilize himself. Figuring that diving straight down wasn't the best of options, he carefully glided down, landing in the town square. Some pony was yelling and holding up a clipboard, pointing to it as he yelled at the passing ponies.

Jason walked over to the pony, watching as he turned and started yelling. "You look like you would make a good soldier, pony!!!! Care to sign up for enlistments?!?!" There was no way his eardrums hadn't been damaged by any of that.

"I'm already part of the army."

"What part of the army would take a sorry excuse for a recruit like you?!?!" One of Jason's ears started to ring. He would've laughed, considering the pony had just contradicted himself in consecutive sentences, but was too preoccupied with the salvation of his ear drums.

"Team Green Bean." The pony opened his mouth before losing his smug expression and looking him over. A few moments later, he face-hoofed and sighed.

"Boss?"

"That's what they call me apparently."

"Sorry about that, you don't really look like you used to..."

"Yeah, no problem. Do you have lists of ponies that are currently in the army? I want to know if "

"We have fairly recent conscription charts from some of the nearby cities. I don't know exactly how recent they actually are, but I know we got one updated from Canterlot today." He led Jason back into the small tent they had put up, and picked up a couple clipboards. He turned around and handed them back to Jason.

"Thanks. You should probably stop yelling so much. See if you can find a position as a drill sergeant or something, you've definitely got my recommendation." He looked down at the lists. The ones from Ponyville and Cloudsdale were pretty thin, just a couple pieces of paper to both of them. The Canterlot list was several times longer, and contained at least three hundred names. That was an astronomical number of civilian recruits around here, especially for a city that was nearly destroyed a week ago.

He flipped through the list, looking for any names that he recognized. He thought he saw Dash's name, but it turned out to be some pony named Light Dasher, followed by some random pony Star Grazer, then Blueblood of all ponies. Blueblood? Wasn't he that guy that Rarity briefly pined after? Yeah, that sounded about right. He had thought that Blueblood was fairly cowardly, but maybe he was wrong. He did a double take, but the name continued to stare back at him. Typo? Nah, that seemed unlikely.

He didn't find Sky or Star, that was no big surprise, they had foals to take care of. He'd have to visit them next time he was in Canterlot. Hopefully that wasn't anytime soon, Dash was just about done finishing all of her work, and he wanted to have some time to relax and kick back, for once.

He looked up. Apparently the pony had gone back to his attempts to find more recruits. He kinda doubted that he would really succeed at getting that many ponies to join. He walked back out of the tent, walking across the square and into the blacksmith shop, where he hadn't been since before he left town the first time. He wasn't exactly sure why he hadn't spent time here earlier, it was definitely interesting to look at all the weapons.

In the time he'd been gone, the pony had put several more weapons on the wall, including a few swords and spears. Jason continued to peruse the wares, eventually coming across a pair of long knives in the corner of the room. He turned around, immediately meeting the stare of the blacksmith, who had apparently come out of the smithing room.

"Are these for sale?"

"Yeah, why do ya need em?"

"In case I get called back to the war."

"Ah, you're that guy, huh?"

"Yeah."

"Well, hey, no hard feelings. I'll cut you a deal on this, I'll make you two pairs, new knives, and I'll special make them for you and your mare friend." Jason stared at him in shock.

"How did you...?"

"I've been around a long time, boy. You want those knives or not?"

"Sure, how much?"

"Listen, I know you're going to be reaching my market with these things, so I'll cut you a deal. You tell them that you got these from ol' Ferris in Ponyville, and I'll give you all four knives for thirty five bits."

"Yeah, sure! Thanks!"

"No problem." Jason paused.

"You sure you're only doing this for the business?" The stallion was silent for a few moments.

"My daughter lives in Canterlot, she sent me a letter a couple days ago telling me about how you saved her in the forest and then warned her about the impending attack, so I'm grateful. It's too bad she sent the foals to her husband's parents, but I guess sending them here wouldn't put them very far out of danger.

"Wait, Star is your daughter?"

"Yes, I thought you'd know who I was talking about."

"Yup, I didn't see her in the army roster so you can rest assured that she isn't going to be in any trouble."

"That's good to hear. Come by in a few days and pick these babies up. I just need your mare-friend to come in here and get her hoof measured so I can fit the handle around it."

"Oh, no problem, hold on." He shifted into Dash, watching as the blacksmith proceeded to not be surprised in any way. That was new. He put his hoof onto the counter and watched the pony put a strip of measuring tape around it.

"If you will, I need the diameter of the holes in your hooves also. That's how you hold the knives, right?" Jason nodded and dropped the disguise, waiting for the stallion to finish his measurements. After a few moments the blacksmith stepped back and scribbled on a piece of paper. "That's all I need, so like I said, come back in a couple days."

"Alright, thanks again."

"I should be the one thanking you."

"There's really no need..."

"This is my way of thanking you, then we're even."

"Fine." Jason chuckled and shifted back into his normal pony form, taking a moment to enjoy the fact that he had been able to stick with the same disguise he had created for Alternis all those weeks ago. It really was a nice disguise. He turned to walk out the door, pushing it open with his magic instead of a hoof, for a change. He looked at the clock tower, which read ten fifteen. Ugh, so much time to waste, and his head still hurt. It wasn't anything terrible, but annoying nonetheless. He sighed.

"Oh, hey Jason!" He looked up, locking his eyes on Twilight as she walked by. He had frankly been expecting Lyra, considering that she had seemed to form a pattern with talking to him when he had nothing to do. Oh well, Twilight still fit that bill.

"Hey Twilight."

"I like the glasses, a little hungover are we?"

"A little, all that water I drank last night got rid of the worst of it though."

"Yeah, congratulations on beating Applejack. I haven't seen her yet today, but I'm sure she's pretty miffed you won."

"She'll probably find another reason not to trust me after that."

"She isn't too keen on you, I take it?"

"Where have you been?" He chuckled. "She's been trying to find me doing something incriminating this whole time." He looked around. "So what're you doing out here?"

"I was picking up a few things at the market, just some apples and greens. Speaking of food, what did you eat before you came here?"

"Oh, uh..." He probably shouldn't mention the meat. "Pretty much the same stuff you guys do, less focus on the flowers. A little more shellfish."

"Oh, that's weird, flowers are the best part!"

"Yeah, I don't really think so. How goes the steel stuff?"

"Pretty good as far as I know, I got a letter from Celestia saying that the test run was successful, but any other number of problems could've come up between then and now. I'm going to assume that everything's going alright though."

"How about research on the stuff from my world?"

"Well I couldn't really figure out anything about their origins, but I did find some other stuff, if you want to see."

"Well I have nothing else to do, so sure." She nodded and they trotted out of the town square, heading for the tree library. Jason looked around, trying to find Octavia's house. If they were practicing there later today, he might as well know where he was going.

"Is that Octavia's house over there, Twilight?"

"Yeah, I think so. She's that mare that wanted to join your band, right?"

"Yup. We're practicing over there, but I don't really know how much we can possibly get done in the first day. I said I'd maybe do a show tonight and all, so..." He turned back to see that Twilight had already walked inside, and was looking back, waiting for Jason to follow her in. He took a final glance at Octavia's house before walking in and closing the door behind himself. "So what'd you find out?"

"Well I did some forensics on the stuff you brought me, and I found all these oval shapes with little squiggles all over them. Do you know what they are?" Jason trotted over, realizing that she had found fingerprints on the album case and candy bag.

"The companies put those on there for differentiation." He liked making shit up when there was no way he could be proven wrong. "Like a serial number. You can rub them off and stuff, so they're also there to detect tampering."

"Oh, I guess that makes sense. It seems overly complicated though."

"Well this is the society that created the computer."

"Oh yeah, that thing. Maybe one of those'll show up?"

"I guess it could, although it needs electricity to run. Before you ask, electricity is, to simplify it, the movement of energy along conductive wires. You're familiar with the atom, right?"

"Yeah, electrons, neutrons, protons. What does this have to do with it?"

"Electricity is moved along by the movement of electrons down the wire. I have no idea how it works beyond that."

"Is it kind of like the speakers and stuff that's powered by magic?"

"Probably, but I'm not really sure. I don't really know that much about magic." He paused. "So what exactly goes on during Nightmare Night?"

"Well last year it was kinda weird, because Luna had just come back, but basically the kids go around and get candy in costumes. And Rainbow Dash pranks ponies."

"Cool, so it's the same as back home. Well, without the Dash part."

"You had Nightmare Night too?"

"No, we had a similar holiday called Halloween."

"Weird. Besides the big technology difference, our worlds have a lot of similarities."

"Yeah, it's strange. So do you have anything else to show me?"

"No that was all I've found. I'll probably look into these prints and see if there's anything else I can find."

"Okay, cool. I guess I'll see you later then."

"See ya." Jason waved and walked back out the door, trying to figure out another thing he could find to do. The clock read ten forty five, so he still had time. Not that he wanted it. Usually things for him to do just popped up, but it didn't look like today was going to be one of those days. If only he could--

Some pony had bumped into him, and judging by the yelp they let out, they were as surprised as he was. He turned his head and extended a hoof to help them up, realizing a little belatedly that his hoof was extended to Octavia, who must've been equally lost in her thoughts. She gladly accepted his help, and got back to her hooves.

"A little lost in your thoughts?"

"More than a little."

"Yeah, I was too." He paused. "Hey, I should probably give you some music to practice before we come over, you have a while?"

"Yeah, I can't seem to find much to do around this dreary town."

"Same here, most of the time stuff just pops up and I do that."

"Funny how I was thinking about that just before I bumped into you." She said. "I'm so terribly sorry for that, by the way."

"No big deal, it was as much my fault as it was yours. In any case, if you could grab some paper we could go into town and I could write stuff over some tea or something." He felt his masculinity had taken a hit for that.

"Or we could just go to my house, it's only a few feet away."

"Okay, I mean I don't want to intrude."

"Oh, it's no big deal, I wouldn't have been doing anything if you hadn't shown up. What do you find to do, anyway?" They started walking back towards her house.

"Well yesterday I woke up, took Scootaloo to school, she's my daughter now if you didn't know. Then I had to fight off some pony that wanted to stab me, that reminds me, I need to see if they got any information out of that guy. I had to briefly testify in the police station, then I figured out that my saddlebag was slashed by the criminal's knife, so I went to get that fixed. While I was walking, Lyra showed up and we walked for a while. Then I saw something in the mud that looked like something from where I come from, which should be impossible since no one here or there knows about each other." He took a deep breath as they entered Octavia's house. "So I went and got my saddlebag fixed, then I delivered the thing to Twilight, then I had lunch with Dash, and finally I worked on my job assignment for five hours. There was some more stuff in there but it doesn't really matter that much."

"That was one day?"

"Most of it, yeah. Today's not quite as bad, but I've already done a fair amount. It would be nice if I wasn't still slightly hungover."

"Oh, the drinking contest, huh?"

"Yeah, nice house you got here, by the way. It's kinda strange how it's not made out of cloud. I'm kinda used to that now."

"I got this baby for a bargain, too! Three bedroom two and a half bath, it's really nice. You want to see the room I set up for practice?"

"Sure, I guess." She led him through a few more rooms and into a larger one with a peaked ceiling. Jason looked around in awe. How ponies could build houses this well, he'd never know.

"Pretty nice, huh?"

"I'll say." He walked across the room. "This is your bass?" He pointed to the bass guitar leaning against the wall.

"Yeah, it's pretty new. The old one broke." Jason shot her a questioning gaze. "It wasn't me, my friend broke it. She bought me a new one though. I'd never tell her, but I like this new one better."

"So I guess I need to give you some music. What kind of stuff do you like, besides classical?"

"I don't really know, I mean I really don't like the computerized stuff, but I have heard some of the 'rock and roll' that bands are starting to come up with." She trotted over to an old fashioned record player and threw a disk on, starting the music. Jason listened through the song, slightly surprised at the lack of drums. The song faded out eventually, and the record player filled the air with a slight scratching noise.

"So what do you think?" She asked.

"It was alright. That there is what you call, 'light rock'. Rock and roll is generally louder and more complicated. And it always has drums. We're probably going to be sticking to the heavier side of rock, which is apparently something new to everyone around here. Do you have music paper? I can write out a few songs."

"Oh, sure." She trotted out of the room, returning a few moments later with some papers and a pencil in her mouth. Jason floated over her bass, and started strumming the strings, stopping to tune one. Octavia looked at him quizzically.

"It's probably tuned to your types of music, so I had to retune the lowest string. I hope that's okay."

"Oh, yeah, of course." Jason nodded and went back to his writing, trying to pull a song out of his head as he hummed along to the bass strums. Every couple strums he'd wright down a note or two. Octavia left the room, entering the kitchen to brew some tea. She returned a few minutes later with a fresh brew and a few cups, and placed one in front of Jason.

"This'll help your hangover." She said. He nodded to her before taking a sip, erasing a note and replacing it with another one simultaneously. After a few more scribbles he sighed and set the bass down.

"There's two songs, those should be fairly simple to learn." She picked up the pages, looking them over.

"What are these? I've never seen a bass line like this before."

"Yeah, the titles are at the top of the pages. Think you can learn that? We have a tentative show scheduled tonight at The Gilded Griffin, and we only need a couple songs."

"You could probably leave me a third one."

"Sure?"

"Yeah, these don't look too bad."

"Okay, hold on." He grabbed the bass, tapping his chin in thought for a few moments before starting to scribble at another piece of paper. After a while longer, he handed her the next few sheets of paper. "If you can get at least one of those down pretty well by the time we come by you're in the band, as far as I'm concerned."

"What's the tempo?" He shrugged, then proceeded to rap his hoof on the floor a few times.

"It's pretty much that for all the songs. If you can play them at a faster speed you should be fine if we slow it down."

"I'll look at these, then. Sometime in the afternoon you said?"

"Yeah, sorry I can't be more specific. It'd be after two thirty at the earliest."

"I'll be completely ready by then, just you watch."

"Ah, a little confident there, are we?"

"A little."

"Well I'll see you later, hopefully I didn't screw anything up there."

"Don't worry about it. See ya." Jason waved and closed the door behind him, attempting to get a quick look at the clock tower. He moved around a tree and jumped a little, it was nearly twelve, and he needed to meet Dash! He started sprinting towards town, and quickly arrived in the square. He sat down on a bench to catch his breath as he waited. Fifteen minutes later, Dash finally landed and walked over. Looks like he didn't need to hurry.

"Sorry I'm late, I just had to make sure I was finished with everything."

"No problem, where are we going for lunch?"

"That's the other reason I was late. I already ate." She cracked a grin.

"So what you're saying is, there's nothing stopping us from going back to your house right now?" He quickly matched her grin.

"Only if you want to." She giggled.

"Let's just stop beating around the bush. Come on." He took off into the sky towards Dash's hose, watching as she pulled up beside him a few moments later. They quickly ascended to her house and made their way inside with a guise of calmness. Jason turned to Dash as she tackled him to the floor. She leaned into his face and kissed him, stroking her other hoof down his chest. Jason broke off the kiss, laughing.

"We haven't been here for five seconds, Dash, and you're already on top of me." She blushed as he shut the door with his magic. "Plus, there's a cloud bed up there with our names on it."

"Fine, change."

"What?"

"Changeling form, let's go. I don't want to have sex with one of your disguises, I want to have sex with you."

"Oh, how romantic." He pushed her off, dropped the disguise and threw a hoof around her neck, bringing her in for another kiss.

"After all this, you better not disappoint me."

"Oh, believe me, I won't."

Optional clopfic.

Jason drifted back into consciousness, feeling a warm pressure on top of himself. He opened his eyes, seeing dash slumped over his chest on the bed, still asleep. He watched her as she breathed, and her ear twitched. He couldn't really get up without disturbing her, considering the fact that most of her weight was resting on him, that was more than impossible. He figured he'd give her a few minutes. She stopped him from needing to actually wake her up when she cracked open her eye, peering at him. She cracked a smile, raising a hoof to stroke across his face.

"I love you." She said, leaning down to kiss him.

"I love you too." Jason replied. There was a moment of silence.

"That was nice." She sighed contentedly.

"That's all you say? The ringing in my ears says you had more fun than that." He replied, smirking. She blushed.

"Fine, it was great. Let me just point out to you that my only comparisons were a couple of one night stands." She poked him in the chest.

"Everything's got to be a competition with you, huh?"

"Admit it. You like it when I'm competitive."

"Yeah..." They both went silent for a moment. "I'll tell you what though, I've never gotten that much love from you before. This is the first time I've ever felt totally full before. It's nice."

"I'm just glad I could help." She swept a hoof down his arm, lingering at one of the holes in his hoof. "The number of things I could do with you being a changeling." Dash said, smiling mischievously.

"Who's it going to be, Dash?"

"No I'm just saying!"

"Are you secretly into mares, Dash?"

"Ugh, Jason! Why do you always have to tease me?"

"You make it so easy to."

"Maybe I should start doing the same to you."

"You can try, but then what'll I do in this relationship?"

"You can be my trophy colt-friend." She chuckled.

"You learn too fast."

"I learn from the best."

"I'm not sure if I should take that as a compliment."

"You probably sho--"

"Jason, you were supposed to pick me up from school!" Scoots yelled from downstairs.

"Oh, shit." The room became a flurry of motion as Dash jumped off of the bed, immediately wrapping up the discarded blankets in her hooves and throwing them into the air. Jason spread them out with his magic and threw them onto the bed, making it generally look clean-ish. Dash had already ran out of the room in a rush, and the sounds of the shower filtered into the room. Jason deadpanned, annoyed that she had left him alone in all this. "Be right down." He shifted a few times. Hopefully that burned some stuff off.

He casually trotted downstairs. "I'm really sorry Scoots."

"Ugh, whatever. We gotta go back down and get my scooter." Jason looked over at a clock. It was ten minutes after school ended.

"You couldn't have found something to do, Scoots?"

"Yeah, but you didn't say if I could."

"Ugh, fine lets go. Can you find something to do if I leave you down there?"

"Yeah, probably. We made a list of cutie mark things, we can start doing those. There were a lot of them." She paused. "You know, I could just glide back down if you want."

"Fine, go ahead Scoots, but don't dive for town or anything like that."

"Yeah, I wasn't going to risk it."

"Okay then, see you later. Try not to cause trouble."

"We always try not to." She said, making her way to the door. Jason chuckled.

"Bye, Scoots."

"Bye Jason." She walked out the door and took off, wobbling as she started to descend. He felt a brief pang of worry before remembering that she had made it up here on her own, it would be easier for her to get down. He worried too much.

He shook his head and started back upstairs, walking into the bathroom. "Thanks for the backup there, Dash." He sighed. She turned and shrugged, shutting off the water.

"She would've asked too many questions. I'm clean?" She said, looking herself over.

"Yeah, looks like it. Anyway, I got rid of her. By that I mean I got her to go back to town to crusade, I didn't permanently get rid of her, just in case you took it that way."

Dash smirked, shaking her head. "It's a little annoying that we have to juggle sex around all this. If we didn't have anything I would've been all over you days ago."

"I wouldn't say it that way, but same here. At least we finally got something in." He paused. "Ha. It's a pun."

She snickered. "That was so stupid. But yeah, I just wish we didn't have to plan it all out, and all that shit." They were silent for a few moments.

"Did you try sleeping on the floor in the shower yet?"

"No, it must've skipped my mind." She smirked. "You're the only one who would do that anyway."

"Hey, you should try that, seeing as there isn't a water bill. It's nice." He caressed her wet mane, flipping part of it over to the other side of her body. She giggled and leaned over to kiss him.

"Are you going to prank Ponyville this year again?" He asked.

"Well, the whole raincloud thing is pretty hilarious."

"So, yes?"

"Yeah. I can keep an eye on Scoots that way too."

"Wow, multi tasking." He put on an exaggerated face of awe.

"So besides Nightmare Night, what do we have to do today?"

"Well, I have to pick up Scoots' costume from Rarity, which means actually bringing Scoots there, we were supposed to practice with Octavia later, then maybe play a show at The Gilded Griffin if we're ready."

"Is it sad that I look at that schedule and think, 'that's nothing'?"

"Yeah, probably. But hey, at least most of that isn't work anymore, right?"

"Oh man, yeah. I'm so sick of weather team stuff right now."

"Yeah, I understand why. I wrote out the drum line for three songs we're going to play though, you wanna go practice them or something?"

"Sure, what're they called?"

"I put the names on the sheets, hold on." He trotted downstairs with Dash and pulled them out of his saddlebag, which was currently slumped against the wall. He reached into one of the flaps and pulled out a few pages, slightly more rumpled than when he had put them in. He handed them to Dash and she looked them over.

"Yeah, I can work with this."

"Okay, I have to fill out paperwork from the police station, so you have time."

"Awesome!" She galloped up the stairs with the music in her mouth, quickly disappearing into the hallway. Jason chuckled and made his way over to the kitchen counter. He grabbed a pencil out of a cup and laid the papers down on the counter, pulling a chair up at the same time. Drum beats started to drift down into the kitchen. Jason picked up the pencil in his magic, he had never really learned how to write with his hoof, and got to work.

The first set of papers went fast, names, jobs, etc. He realized that no one actually knew he had a last name. He'd have to at least tell Dash, although it was kinda strange that no one had even asked. He got away with 'Blaze' though. Scoots didn't have a last name as far as he knew. Actually, most ponies didn't have a last name. Weird.

Address:

Did they have an address? They could just move the house around, so it couldn't be related to position. He'd have to ask Dash. He turned the page and groaned as the questions got harder.

Do you have large amounts of sex in your life?

What the hell? Large amounts of--Oh.

Do you have large amounts of stress in your life?

Ha. Whoops. He checked the 'yes' box. Maybe there wasn't a ridiculous amount, but there wasn't an 'other' option.

Have you ever committed a felony or misdemeanor?

They had those here? He figured it was just 'crime' and that was it. What did his stuff count as anyway? Did a pardon make it like it never happened, or what? Did what he did count as a felony or a misdemeanor if he wasn't considered a citizen? He shrugged and checked the 'yes' box. Better safe than sorry, although that didn't really seem to apply, considering he was incriminating himself.

Have you ever taken part in the sale or creation of drugs?

Okay, so they had drugs here. He supposed that wasn't all that surprising, magic and all. It's not like some drugs were even that hard to process. He checked 'no' and moved on.

Please explain any infringements on Equestrian law.

Oh, great. This was going to be a long answer.

It had been at least an hour, maybe more. For seven pieces of paper, that was unbelievable. Jason groaned and got up from the chair, hearing a few cracks in his back as he stretched. He trotted upstairs after putting the papers back into his saddlebag, and walked into the room Dash was in. She saw him and ceased her drumming, putting a hoof on a cymbal to mute it.

"Hey, Jason I think I got these down."

"Yeah, it sounded like you did. You wanna go bring this stuff down to Octavia's and get some actual band practice in?"

"Might as well. If it turns out we work well together, then maybe we can fit in this show."

"I'd like to do this, it'd probably be good for Bon Bon. I dunno if you saw, but she kinda broke down at the party over this. She doesn't look like she's doing too well, and hopefully we'd be able to allay her worries for a while. Lyra says she just hasn't been acting the same."

"Well I'd definitely like to help, especially if it's that easy to."

"So then let's get going."

"Alright!" Dash grabbed the cup with the drumsticks, staring at the drum kit. "How are we--" The drums were enveloped in a dark green aura, and floated upwards. The aura flickered and turned into a lighter green. Dash turned to see that Jason had turned into pony form, and was currently manipulating his guitar and amp into the air. He started floating the items out the window one at a time, re-grouping them outside. She looked over at him again; he seemed to be having a fair amount of trouble manipulating all those objects individually.

"Having trouble Jason?" She asked, immediately regretting the decision. The instruments dipped for a moment before returning to their previous positions.

"Yeah, just let me concentrate, it's really tough to control all this stuff separately. Takes a lot of brainpower. Now shh." After a few more seconds, he got the rest of the drums and cords outside, and finished putting them together in a group. He sighed.

"Now we can talk." He said.

"Funny how now I have nothing to say."

"Of course you don't. Let's just get down there. Slowly." She nodded.

"That'll be a weird interlude from normal stuff." They started gliding downward, all the instruments in tow. "You know, I haven't done any flight practice recently."

"Sorry Dash."

"Well it's not your fault, I'm just saying that it doesn't mean that much to me anymore, since I'm not trying to get into the Wonderbolts, but I miss all the flying time anyways."

"Thus, why I said sorry. All this stuff you're doing because of this stuff with me has got to be a time suck."

"Yeah, but--"

"No, I'm not saying if I wasn't around, things would be better, but I could've tried harder to get on Celestia's good side. It probably would've been impossible to actually change that much, but I still could've tried. That could've got us on better terms or something."

"Stop beating yourself up about this, I can just fly around tomorrow." She landed on the ground, kicking up a small cloud of dust as she came to a halt. Jason landed beside her, turning to re-organize the equipment before turning back around and following Dash. She got to Octavia's door and knocked, saving Jason the trouble of shouldering the door. A few moments later the door opened to the familiar grey mare, who greeted them and gestured for the pair to come inside. They both walked in, and Jason checked the route to the practice room before returning to the front of the house.

"So where're all of your instruments?"

"I'm going to bring them in. Just try to stay out of the way." She nodded and stepped to the side, bringing Dash with her into the practice room. A few seconds later, the first of the drums started to drift around the corner, followed by Jason's amp, guitar, and overdrive unit. The objects set themselves down as Jason walked in. He sighed heavily.

"That's tough. It's not really magically draining, exactly, just mentally draining."

"Do you want some tea?" Octavia asked. "I just brewed some."

"Does it have caffeine?"

"Yeah."

"Then yes." She nodded and left the room, returning a few moments later with three steaming cups balanced on a plate on her back. Jason grabbed one of the cups and thanked her.

"I still don't understand how you ponies can balance things on your backs like that."

"It's not that hard, really."

"Did you get those songs ready?"

"Yeah, completely. Forwards and backwards. Some of that stuff was really weird though."

"I know, I put in some background guitar line parts where you didn't have a specific bass line. We have a small band; I had to make some changes."

"Oh, well no big deal. At least I know that those parts weren't mistakes."

"Let's get to it then." He said. Dash chuckled behind him.

"I'm way ahead of you, Jason." She had already gotten her drums sorted into the right positions.

"Fine, let's just close this window then. Get your amp all hooked up, Octavia."

"Yeah, I am." They plugged in the cords, receiving some feedback from the amps as Jason started to power them.

"Okay, which song?" Dash held up a piece of sheet music.

"Let's do this one first!"

"The one with the drum solo, right?"

"Yeah, did you really expect me to choose one of the other ones?"

"Well, no. You gonna count off then?" She nodded.

"One Two Three Four!"

"Octavia?" Jason asked, ears still ringing from their practice.

"Yeah?"

"You're in the band." He said. She pumped a hoof into the air, letting out a whoop.

"Dash, you wanna go tell Lyra we can preform?"

"Definitely! I want to see the look on her face. Well, more Bon Bon's face if she's there." Jason looked over at a clock. It was almost five. Probably close to dark by now.

"We need to find Scoots and get her into her costume after though."

"Oh, yeah. I'd really like to see her handiwork."

"Octavia, you want to come?"

"Yes, I'd like to catch up some more with Lyra. It's been quite a while since I've been in Ponyville."

"Well let's get going then, we're down to the wire with this stuff again." He walked out the door, just in front of Dash, and turned to start walking down the street. The other two trotted past him, and he sped up to match their speed.

"I'm usually the one rushing, why're you two speeding up?"

"Same reason as you. If we're going to preform, we may as well give Lyra as much warning as we can so she can get stuff ready." Dash replied.

"Sounds like as good a reason as any." They quickly made their way into the town square, and skirted around the square, entering into the Gilded Griffin. Lyra caught sight of them from the bar and came trotting over.

"Can you do the show?"

"Yeah, if you can be ready."

"I knew it! I knew you'd be able to! I already got all the stuff ready, I just have to put up some posters around the square and finish setting up the stage. Hold on a sec." She turned away. "BON BON!!!" A few seconds later the startled mare came running out of the kitchen, looking around frantically before she saw Lyra.

"What? What happened?"

"They're going to play a show for us tonight!"

"Really?" She turned to the small group. "Thank you thank you thank you!" She hugged them each in turn before backing up and doing a little victory dance. She composed herself a little while later, and turned back to Jason and Dash. Octavia was already across the room with Lyra.

"How does seven sound? How many songs do you have?"

"Three, and that's fine." He responded.

"We'll have microphones ready for you. Thanks again for doing this."

"No problem." He turned to Dash. "Wanna go look for Scoots then?"

"Sure. We'll be back on time." Dash replied.

"Okay, see you then." Bon Bon said. They nodded to her and walked out, making their way through the crowds in the square. They extracted themselves on the other side as they continued to look for Scoots and her friends.

"Jason, they're over here." He followed her gaze to the small group of ponies, watching as a fourth pony walked up. Diamond Tiara, although she was without Silver Spoon, for some reason. He started walking over, attempting to keep calm. Dash seemed to be doing a better job than him in that respect as she trotted alongside him. The conversation started to come into focus.

"Where's your costume, blank flank?" She asked.

"I still have to get it, so back off!" Scootaloo shot back.

"I think you're just too poor to get one."

"And that's the best you could put together with all your money?" She pointed to Diamond's 'Little Bo Peep' type costume. Jason smirked, watching as Diamond tried to come up with a response.

"Scoots, you wanna go get that costume? Rarity said she was done with it."

"Yeah, sure!" She threw a final glare at Diamond before moving to follow him and Dash. The other crusaders moved to follow, immediately telling Scoots about how awesome she was against Diamond. Their conversation continued until they arrived at the boutique, and Jason moved to knock on the door. As usual, his hoof made no noise. He should really be catching on by now. Dash leaned over and knocked before he could graduate to shouldering, and the door opened a few seconds later, to Rarity in a costume of a spider, which was slightly ironic from a number of angles.

"Here for the costume, Darling?" Rarity asked.

"Yeah, I'm really looking forward to your handiwork." She smiled and gestured for the five of them to follow her inside as she trotted over to a large wardrobe, pulling out a few hangers. She swung the hangers around in her magic before extracting the clothes and draping them over her arm.

"Scootaloo, would you be a dear and try these on?" Scoots nodded excitedly and grabbed the tattered clothes off her hoof, throwing them on. Jason let out a small gasp, followed by a grin. Ignoring the bright fur that poked out in places and Scoots' normal, jolly face, she already looked like a zombie.

"How did you get the blood splotches to look like that?"

"I just took the ways that I used to accidentally destroy fabric and applied them to this. I even got a few ideas from Sweetie here. It was great fun."

"Glad to hear it."

"Now we just need the makeup, dear."

"Ew, Jason, you never said anything about makeup!" Scoots whined.

"Don't worry, it's just to make the wounds look semi-realistic. It's not like eyeliner or anything."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, Scoots." Rarity came back into the room with several small boxes of makeup, and immediately started applying them to the areas around the tatters in Scoots' costume. Jason and Dash watched in awe as their daughter transformed into something closely resembling a zombie. Well, horse zombie. The only thing he could think to add would be contacts for the eyes, but he kinda doubted they had those. It seemed like it would be hard to make contacts for eyes as big as they had anyway. He looked at Scoots again, starting to think that Rarity had replaced her with some other pony while he hadn't been looking.

"Scoots?"

"Yeah?"

"No, nothing, I just wasn't totally sure it was you."

"Oh, it looks that good?" She asked.

"Yeah." He said. Rarity suddenly backed up.

"There, finished darling. I must say you do look like a little beastie there." Scoots got up and started walking around and looking herself over.

"She needs to work on her acting though." Jason said. "Scoots, drag a hoof along, imagine you haven't slept for a few days." She stopped moving for a moment before slowly starting to limp back over towards Jason and Dash, letting out a groan when she was about halfway over.

"That's pretty good, right Jason?" Dash asked.

"Yeah, she makes a damn good zombie." Scoots giggled. "Okay then you three, go have fun!" They all turned and sprinted for the door, racing past Rarity as she opened the door in front of them. "Thanks Rarity." He said. "That was a pretty nice costume."

"Oh, it was nothing dear." Dash caught his attention and tapped her wrist.

"Jason, we gotta go!"

"Oh, yeah. Sorry to cut this short, Rarity, but we really have to get going. We gotta go play a show."

"Where?"

"At the Gilded Griffin, in the town square."

"I'll be sure to show up, this is a music show I take it?"

"Yeah." He trotted in place. She just wasn't letting him go.

"Oh, what type of music?"

"I guess you'll just have to see. Bye!" They both sprinted out the door, immediately taking to the skies and gliding over a tall building across the street. They banked towards Octavia's house, landing in front of it a couple minutes later. Dash knocked on the door, and they waited patiently until a familiar voice from behind them spoke up.

"Getting the instruments, huh?" Octavia had walked up behind them, and was jingling a key ring in one hoof.

"Yeah, we don't really have that much time until we have to go onstage. Clock tower says.....fifteen minutes."

"I guess we better kick this into high gear then." He nodded and followed Dash inside, pondering for a moment how ponies actually got that expression. He shook his head, attempting to regain his concentration as he started floating the instruments out of the house. Without too much delay they got them down the street and past the small groups of ponies that gawked at the group of floating instruments in the air. In a world with magic, they shouldn't have cared that much.

Eventually they got the instruments to The Gilded Griffin, where Lyra quickly offered to help him move some of the equipment. He quickly let her, and they quickly set up their amps and instruments on Lyra's makeshift stage as some more ponies wandered inside. Bon Bon trotted up to the stage with a look of joy on her face.

"I haven't seen The Gilded Griffin with this many people since over a month ago! Thanks so much you guys."

"Bon Bon, it's not a big deal in any way, alright? How long till we start?" She looked over at a clock, which read seven.

"Five minutes?"

"Sounds fine. Just give us some notice."

"That's what Lyra here is for." She threw a hoof around her co-worker's shoulder and pulled her over.

"Yeah, I've gotta wire up the amps to the other speakers, then you'll hear some feedback and we can start. Oh, I'll dim the lamps a bit." That'll be the signal. He nodded as she walked away, then turned and walked over to Dash and Octavia.

"She's going to dim the lights, then we're on. Looks like we attracted a pretty big audience, by the way."

"Yeah, I'm a little nervous." Dash said.

"You, the Rainbow Dash, nervous? If you play half as good as you usually do you still probably won't make a noticeable mistake. We have nothing to worry about."

"Why are you always so confident?"

"I just act like I am. It seems to be working magic for me."

"Can't argue with that logic." There was the noise of feedback as the other speakers started spewing out a light static noise. Lyra trotted by a couple seconds later, frantically plugging in wires. Jason powered the amps, waiting for the lights to dim as he picked up his guitar and slung it over his shoulder. He walked up to the microphone as the lights dimmed and tapped it with a hoof. It made a very small amount of noise, probably a good thing in this case, and then went silent again.

"So, hey there Ponyville!" The crowd let out a cheer. "I'm just going to skip any speeches and jump in. This first song's called 'Let There be Rock'." He slid his hoof along the neck of the guitar, waiting for Dash to count off the song. He heard some sharp clanking of sticks, and the song began.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqcO8aWrfA8

The final note rang out, immediately transitioning into a moment of silence in the crowd. After what seemed like a minute or so, they finally started cheering, and he let out a sigh. He could see Bon Bon do the same in the back of the room. He wiped his brow, slightly missing the fact that he didn't sweat. Only slightly. He shook his head and waited for the crowd to calm down a little before introducing the next song.

"This one's called 'Spoonman.' Don't ask me why." He sighed, trying to contain his nervousness as Dash counted the song off, slightly more slowly.

(first fifteen seconds aren't part of the song.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T0_zzCLLRvE

The crowd reacted in the same way, damn them. Just when he couldn't take the waiting anymore, they'd start cheering. It's not that he didn't want them to like it, but considering how long it took for them to figure out the song was over, or whatever they were waiting for, was really annoying.

"Here's the last one we got ready," Some of the ponies groaned. "We'll probably be doing more than one show here, you can just pay a return visit. Anyway, this one's called 'Welcome to the Jungle'." Yet another count off.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1tj2zJ2Wvg

Damn that was a nice song. The ponies burst into applause, much faster this time. "Okay folks, that's all we got. Have a nice Nightmare night!" Jason yelled over the noise of the crowd. The three watched as some of the crowd left, while most of the others stayed to grab a bite or stand in line. Line for what? No way. He turned to Octavia and Dash with a smirk.

"Looks like we have some fans." He gestured to the small group of ponies offstage. they shared a chuckle and walked over. Lyra came up to them before they could get to the fans, trying to get some words out.

"Lyra, slow down." Octavia said, trying to get her to speak in a way they could understand.

"Thanks again for this guys, Bon Bon told me to thank you again, because with all the ponies that want food now we're kinda busy. You can just leave your stuff here overnight if you want. I gotta go take some orders see ya later bye!"

"Oh, Lyra." Octavia sighed. They walked off the stage, immediately getting surrounded by some rather mellow fans. Jason shrugged. He wouldn't have minded getting attacked by fans. Just maybe not all the time. He was presented with a piece of paper and a pen, and he quickly put two and two together as he quickly whipped off a signature. Another set of autograph tools was thrust at him, and he repeated the process.

Several minutes later, the fans had dispersed, and they were able to finally make it out of the restaurant and into the crisp outside air. Octavia said something about meeting an old friend and split off, leaving the two of them alone. They trotted through town, observing the festivities, eventually arriving in a quieter street.

"Hey, Jason. I'm gonna go get on my costume, you may as well stay here, it'll just take me a minute if I hurry."

"Okay, fine. I'll be timing you." He poked her chest playfully. "Hurry back." She smiled and took off into the sky, quickly disappearing into the night sky. Jason saw a bench and moved over towards it, quickly sitting down. He looked up towards the stars, which were increasingly hard to see with the flickering streetlamp nearby. Mind you, they all flickered, fire and all, but this one seemed particularly flickery. He shrugged, staring back into the darkness.

His reverie was broken when something slid onto his horn, and stuck there. He put a hoof up to his forehead to investigate, but was immediately hit with a hoof to the side of the face. Jason slid off the bench and onto his stomach, and turned to see several stallions, a glint near one of them telling him that they had knives, at least. So they were probably akin to the ones from the other day. He tried to put up a shield and give himself some time to recover, but instead felt excruciating pain in his forehead. He touched the metal ring around his horn, realizing that it must've had some sort of dampening effect on unicorns, and that it was stuck, probably magically. He dropped his disguise and got back to his feet, trying to stare the stallions into submission.

One came running at him, and he deflected his hoof to the side, knocking the knife away. Another one came at him with a swing, which he blocked, sliding backwards on the loose dirt a few feet. Yet another stallion came at him from the side, and Jason turned to meet him. He managed to swing a hoof into the stallion's face before the stallion made contact, sending Jason flopping to the ground. A unicorn emerged from the darkness, sending a spell whizzing past Jason's ear as he rolled sideways. He ducked under another magical bolt before taking to the air, attempting to get the high ground. Something caught him by the leg and swung him into the ground, knocking the air out of his lungs.

He staggered to his feet, punching a stallion in the gut. The stallion dropped his knife, which Jason picked up and planted into a pegasus' shoulder. He punched the unicorn's horn as he was charging up a spell, knocking him to the ground. Another punch came at him from the side and he moved to block, before something heavy hit him in the back of the head. The ground came up to meet him, and he watched through his fading vision as a stallion with something resembling a baseball bat walked up, laughing.

"You've been quite the trouble, changeling. I think we should change that."

"Hey, Jason, I'm back!" A slight echo rebounded off of a building wall down the street. "Jason?" She looked behind her, checking to make sure that he wasn't sneaking up on her. If he was, she wouldn't necessarily hear him anyway. He was quiet when he wasn't being all clumsy. She smirked. "Well I'm just going to go back to town then, if you aren't going to show up, and--" her eyes froze, caught on the ground. She started for several minutes at the discolored ground, attempting to derive more information from the flickering firelight. A knot started to gather in her gut.

Eventually her curiosity got the best of her and she carefully trotted over. She raked a hoof through the goo, lifting it towards her face. After realizing that she still couldn't see it, she sighed and quickly hobbled over to the lamp on three legs. The dark grey on her hoof turned scarlet red as she approached the light, and her nervousness grew. "Maybe it's just ketchup or something..." she muttered, taking a lick of her hoof without another thought.

It wasn't ketchup. Ew. That meant that Jason was in trouble, and could already be a bloody mess. She galloped back over to the blood, finding a few scuff marks in the cobblestones, with a few scratches leading away. She trotted after the scratches as fast as she could find them, watching as they suddenly disappeared. She double checked the area for anything else, but the trail seemed to die as soon as it started.

"FUCK!!!" She turned around and bucked at the nearby bench, sending splinters flying in every direction. She threw a punch into a brick wall, cracking one of the bricks. She pulled her arm back and repeated the process, chipping off the corner. She continued the process several times yelling the whole time. "Shit, Shit, Shit!" She finally stopped, looking at her hoof, which now had almost as much blood on it as the other one.

She felt tears well up in her eyes. Things had just began to get easier, and now here they were, Jason was off somewhere, either dead or in really bad shape, and nopony could do anything about it, especially her. A tear hit the ground, making a faint sploosh noise. Sure, she could hold her own in battle, she could watch his back, but she couldn't always be in the right place at the right time. She wiped the still flowing tears from her face as best she could, and took off towards town.

Who should she get though? She couldn't get Applejack, Rarity wouldn't want to, and Fluttershy was out of the question. Pinkie would probably think they were playing a game, so that left Twilight. Why she hadn't thought of Twilight first was beyond her. She put on another burst of speed, feeling her tears freeze in the wind. She changed her aim to an open window in the trunk of the library and blasted through, startling Twilight and the foals she was handing out candy to. Twilight took a moment to compose herself before clearing her throat to speak. She could see that Dash wasn't particularly able to get anything out, although she wasn't sure why.

"Dash, I see you're wearing that costume from last year again, what'd you call it? Nice touch with the fake blood." She said. Dash looked at her hooves.

"Listen, Twilight, this isn't fake blood. Jason's gone, there was blood where he used to be and signs of a scuffle, and I'm just so..." Gotta keep it together, Dash. "Worried." Twilight's eyes widened, and the bowl of candy dropped to the floor as her magical grip lost it's focus.

"You mean like that stallion that tried to kill him the other day?"

"Probably. We gotta go see what we can do, Twilight, before it's too late." Dash turned and galloped out the front door. Twilight caught up a few strides later as a saddlebag that she had somehow packed up with stuff attached itself to her back.

"Did you...see anything Dash?" She asked.

"No, I was gone for maybe five minutes to get my costume, and by the time I got back he was gone."

"Any sounds of a skirmish?"

"None that I heard, but there were obvious scuff marks and the blood." She took a hard right onto the street, clamoring for purchase among the slippery cobblestones as she tried to slow down. Twilight pulled up behind her, lighting up her horn and covering the walls and ground in a bright purple light. She immediately caught sight of the blood and trotted over, briefly enveloping it in her aura.

"Well, this isn't changeling blood, so either he was disguised and is tricking the spell, or it's not him." She levitated a few drops into a vial and put it away. "We can test to see though. What's this?" She floated a small black shard off the ground, twirling it around in front of her face.

"Can I see, Twilight?" She nodded and floated the shard over. Upon closer inspection, Dash knew that it was part of Jason's armor, which meant that that wasn't his blood, because he must've been undisguised. Her heart did a little leap. But then again, it wasn't easy to chip his armor off, this couldn't be a good sign.

"Do you know what it is, Dash?" Dash was jolted out of her thoughts by Twilight's words.

"Yeah, it's part of Jason's armor. Means he must've been undisguised himself after I left, so that's probably not his blood, and he got hit really hard somewhere." Twilight nodded and moved onto the scratches and slight hoof prints in the dust, coming to the same conclusion that Dash had. The blood trail stopped, along with the hoof prints. She fanned out from the scene, quickly making her way past the bench and stopping for a moment. "Dash, does this look familiar?" She floated a knife out of the high grass and over towards her.

"Not to me, but the last stallion had a knife, maybe one of these guys did too." She grabbed the knife out of the air, turning it around in her hoof and feeling it's weight. "This isn't a very good knife. Either the stallion that had this is unimportant or this operation isn't very large scale."

"Probably good to know. Let's get back to the library. You can crash with Scoots there until tomorrow, if you want." A few more tears welled up in her eyes, realizing the emptiness in the house Jason left behind, the feeling of his hooves around her at night that she may never be graced with again. Twilight saw the grief on her friend's face. "We'll find him, Dash, don't worry."

"But what if we don't, Twilight? What if we're already too late?"

"Dash, if they only wanted to kill him his body'd still be here. You're not going to be able to do anything if you don't get some sleep. "

"I don't need sleep, I just need a lead."

"Don't make me drag you back there. We'll get everything going in the early morning."

"Twilight..."

"No, we can't do anything here!" She yelled back. Dash hung her head. She promised herself that she wouldn't let herself get into the same situation as when Jason had been injured, but here she was again, probably worse off now. She hated feeling useless.

"Fine, we'll go back." A tear slipped out of her eye, not unnoticed by Twilight as they turned to leave. She couldn't seem to stem the flow from her eyes, no matter how hard she tried.

"I'll just meet you there Twilight." She nodded as Dash took off into the star studded sky, quickly coasting over a low roof. "You idiot, Dash." She chided herself. "You knew that there were ponies after him, and you didn't take it seriously enough. What's wrong with you?" She couldn't answer her own question. How could she let this happen, from right under her nose? She flew through the same window as before, and landed in the middle of the library. She could've got back faster, she could've done so much more than she did.

She realized that she needed to tell Scoots where she'd be staying tonight. There was a knock at the door, and she got up to open it, wiping her face clear of tears. Twilight was on the other side of the door with Scoots, neither of them looked particularly happy.

"Scoots, come back here tonight, we're staying the night." Dash said, her voice wavering

"Is there a problem with the house?" Scoots asked.

"No Scoots, I'll tell you tomorrow. Just come back here when Nightmare Night is over."

"Okay. Don't be sad Dash." Scoots turned and trotted back to her friends, and they talked for a moment before moving off. Dash let her attention drift to Twilight, who was studying her features intently.

"Dash, go get some sleep. I'll get anything done that I can." She saw Dash's unconvinced expression. "Dash," She laid a hoof on her shoulder. "We'll find him."

Dash sighed and walked upstairs, into the guest room. She sighed and sat down on the edge of her bed, head in her hooves. At least last time Jason had any risk of death she was able to stay by his side. Now, though, she had somehow become even more useless. She couldn't give him love to help him stay alive, he was on his own. She pulled a blanket over herself, staring out into the darkness.

Why was she never fast enough, never strong enough to make a difference? She bumped her hooves together, her anger steadily rising. This one was all on her, Jason had evidently fought the stallions, and apparently lost, although he had managed to stab one when he didn't actually have any weapons to start out with. He had to be alive, he just had to be. If he had gone through all this, he could make it through some more, right? She hoped so, but he hadn't been captured by criminals that seemed hell bent on wiping him out before. Her exhaustion was starting to catch up with her as she began to drift off, the word 'failure' spinning around in her head as she finally found sleep.

Dash awoke to the quiet muttering of voices from downstairs. As her ears tuned into the voices, she could differentiate at least a few, although she wasn't sure exactly who was talking. She looked around, trying to figure out why she was in Twilight's room, until the events from last night finally came back to her. She swung her legs around to the side of the bed and rested her head in her front hooves, trying to keep herself from breaking down again.

After a few minutes of trying to control her breathing, she finally gave it up as a lost cause, and moved to leave. The clock read seven forty. Scoots had apparently gotten back, and was still huddled under a small pile of blankets. At least she didn't have to worry about her; she probably couldn't handle losing both of them. Scoots' hoof twitched, and she mumbled something in her sleep. Dash trotted over and ran a hoof through her mane, watching as she subconsciously pushed her head into Dash's hoof. She broke a smile, slightly surprising herself. She wiped away her residual tears and went downstairs, finding Applejack, Twilight, Fluttershy and Rarity.

"What'd you find, Twilight?"

"Oh, Dash, you're awake!" She quickly turned around. "I didn't find much." She sighed. Dash hung her head, the previous joy quickly forgotten.

"What did you find?" She gathered up a few papers from the desk.

"Well, the blood wasn't Jason's, and I went back to the scene, but I couldn't find anything new. I got the serial number off this knife, and apparently it came from this company that went out of business a few years ago. The company was based in Manehattan, but I doubt that's where they went with Jason."

"And why's that?"

"Manehattan is currently under lockdown from a string of murders that occurred. They're not letting anypony in or out until they get the thing solved. With the new drafting for the military, that's actually a plausible thing to do. They've got a lot more ponies to distribute. I went by the police station late last night and had them file a report, that should be all over the nearby cities by midday. Speaking of the police station, I'm going to go by there right now and see if they got anything new out of the criminal Jason captured the other day."

"Can I tag along, Twilight?"

"Well," She seemed briefly lost in thought. "I'll go by and see if we even can interrogate the pony, then I'll come back and get you if it's a go ahead. You can stay here for a while, right Dash?"

"Yeah, I guess." There was that useless feeling again...

"Okay, I'll be back in a bit. Oh, that reminds me, I sent a letter to Celestia, she says she's dispatching somepony to help. She didn't say who though." She trotted out the front door, breaking into a faster pace once she got outside. Dash turned back to her friends, trying to smile but grimacing instead. She heard the tail end of one of Applejack's comments.

"Probably just left."

"What was that, AJ?"

"Ah said, he probably just took his leave, just made it look like he got taken away."

"And why would he do that?" she crossed her hooves over her chest.

"If ah had any idea, ah would've acted on it by now. We can't trust him, Dash."

"After all this, that's all you can say?"

"Bu--"

"No! He saved you ponies from the griffins, he almost died for you!"

"But D-

"Shut up! He came back here, and you couldn't even act like you trusted him, you couldn't even give him the benefit of the doubt! He won the drinking contest just so you would be forced to trust him! And now--" She started to get choked up, and her tears started to flow again. "And now he's gone, and we don't even know where he is. And all you can think about is that he betrayed us by leaving. Betrayed us? Half the town doesn't even want to go near him! He did all this stuff, and the only one of you that remotely cares is Twilight, the one with the most reason out of all of us to distrust changelings! Even Celestia trusts him." She went silent, having run out of things to say.

"Dash, he was just yer war buddy, why do ya care so much anyway?"

"Because I love him!" Well that slipped out. She would have face hoofed if it wouldn't have distracted from her argument. The other four gasped. "And this is why I didn't want to tell you, I'm just the mare-friend of a piece of shit in your minds."

"You could have just told us, Darling." Rarity said.

"No I couldn't! If I had you would've said I was under a spell. I know you're all thinking it now, but it was my decision, and I made the first advances. Changeling spells like that don't even exist anyway. He didn't want to tell anypony, not just for my sake, but because he was trying to keep me and Scoots safe, keep us unattached so that those stallions would only focus on him." She took a breath. "That's another thing! It was his idea to adopt Scoots, he was the one that finally gave her a home. And after all that, you still can't see through the fact that he's a changeling. Your sisters can, for fucks sake!" She could see that that last one had struck home, but she honestly couldn't care what happened next. She turned and calmly walked over to the door, slamming it shut behind her.

Dash took off into the air, immediately climbing in altitude until the ponies looked like specks, happily going around their business. If the news was out, she imagined that quite a few of them were happy about the abduction of Jason, which pissed her off even more. She landed on a small cloud, steadily growing angrier as she looked down at the townsfolk. Those little, ungrateful specks. Her interest was immediately shifted to a small purple form moving down the street towards the library, so she took off and flew downwards, hoping to intercept Twilight before she got to the library.

She landed hard, cracking a cobblestone in her anger as she came down in font of Twilight. She took a moment to calm herself before speaking. "What's the situation, Twilight?" Her voice still had a tone of hostility to it, much to her annoyance. She didn't really have a bone to pick with her.

"We can go over there, if you're up to it. The police pony says that he still has full rights to intervene, though." The last part of her sentence was lost on Dash, who had already started galloping away towards the police station. Twilight sighed and started after her. She still didn't see why Dash cared this much. Even she hadn't gone this insane when she was investigating the disappearance of Dash, so why was she acting like this? She knew that Dash had seen something in Jason, but that was just in his tendency for good, right? She couldn't say she really trusted the guy, but she definitely didn't act outwardly like she was against him. He hadn't really done anything before now, though.

As far as she could tell, this was just another trick. She didn't want to jump the gun and assume like she did last time with Cadence; she may have been right, but she wanted to make sure she was totally correct before she made a move. He was resourceful, and that's what made him so dangerous. That begged the question though, why the sudden capture? Was it staged? That was doubtful, there was a lot of blood. But if he had committed a crime, then that would mean there was an innocent stallion involved, but given the number of different hoof prints, he was probably the victim.

She felt sorry for the guy, he just got out of all this war stuff, and even with all his heroics he still couldn't fit in here. Celestia trusted him enough to position the troops, maybe she should try to have more faith.

Twilight finally caught up to Dash, who was already waiting outside the police station, only slightly winded. She was further confused when Dash proceeded to simply push the door open and enter, without even an attempt at a competitive statement. Jason must mean a lot to her, which was a strange thought. A police pony saw them, eyes bulging a little when he saw Dash, and quietly ushered them into a room, one side covered in mirror, with a table in the middle. They both took a chair, watching as the police pony entered through another door with the criminal. The orange suited pony sat down, and the police pony left.

"So you gunna try ta get information outta me? Hah. I aint tellin' you squat." He tilted back in his chair and put on a smug expression. Dash leaned over to Twilight.

"Put an illusion spell on the room. Make that police guy think we're playing nice. I don't care how you do it. I'm going to get the information out of this guy." She whispered.

"No!" Twilight whispered back. "I'm not going to let you beat him up!"

"We're talking about ponies' lives here. You can't think that these ponies are going to stop at Jason?"

"How would we explain injuries?"

"Make it look like he tilts back in his chair too far, and then hits his face on stuff."

"This better work, I'm not taking the blame." She crossed her arms, while a quick burst of light came from her horn. "This spell is really tough to maintain, so don't distract me. You've also only got a few minutes, so you better hurry."

Dash pushed herself up from the table, walking over to the side of the pony. "So where's your little criminal base?"

"I don't know wat you're talkin' 'bout." Dash threw a hoof into his face.

"Wrong answer, you want to try again?" The stallion worriedly looked across the table at Twilight, who had a disitant look in her eyes. He jingled the hoof cuffs around his front hooves nervously.

"U-uh, nope." Another punch, this time to the other side of his face. She noticed he'd dropped the accent.

"You sure? I could do this all day."

"Y-yeah, I'm s-sure." His head cracked to the side as Dash swung again.

"All. Day. Long. Think about it." The stallion squirmed in his seat as Dash paced back and forth behind him. She rather liked playing the role of the bad cop. She swiped at him, planting another blow, this time glancing into his nose. "Think faster."

"You're insane!" She threw another punch.

"I'm not doing this for fun. You tell me, and I'll throw in something nice, more food, a couple blankets, shorter sentence..."

"F-fine. I cave, just stop with this." Dash sat back down, tapping Twilight on the shoulder, hopefully giving her the sign to make the stallion look like he injured himself. She waited a few more moments in silence, assuming that Twilight had run footage of them picking the pony up. She twirled her hoof, motioning for the stallion to continue. He contemplated how to start talking before he actually began.

"I was pulled into this whole thing years ago, because I got a loan that turned sour. He said he'd take my daughter if I didn't go with him, so I did." He sighed.

"Who is he?" Twilight asked.

"Nopony really knows. He was scheduled to come into town yesterday, and I was just the test fire, so to speak. Anyway, I've been stuck with him ever since, and was told to kill that changeling, because he was going to get in the way."

"Get in the way of what, exactly?"

"I don't know, I just had my orders."

"Where did you come from, I mean just before you attacked Jason?"

"There's this building over there, but as far as I could tell, it's filled with traps and stuff, there's really no way to get in."

"Where's the entrance?"

"It's inside the alley, and there's a metal door. It has a spell that sets you on fire, I'm not sure how that works, so don't even try to touch it." He shuddered. "I've seen it firsthand. It's not pretty."

"Weird." Twilight said.

"What?" Dash asked.

"Oh, just that that's the building that's been under construction for twenty years. Nopony ever really asked why it wasn't ever getting any closer to completion, with it being towards the outside of town and all. Nopony really knows what it's for, either."

"Yeah, that is weird." She turned to the stallion. "That's all you know?"

"Sorry, but yeah. Don't act like you got information from me, he might send someone to 'finish the job'." He looked around nervously.

"Yeah. As far as I know, you didn't talk. A tip from a ponyvillian got us the info." Dash knocked on the mirror, and a few minutes later the cop walked in.

"Jeez, I've never seen somepony hurt their face like that from rocking back in a chair. It was almost hard to watch. Good job getting him to talk though. I'm assuming this is about the Boss, eh Boss?" Dash scrunched her face up in confusion.

"Uhh...Yeah, this's about him."

"Oh, figures. Buncha ingrates in this town huh? Name's Heavyweight, by the way."

"Yeah, I was just thinking that. I mean, you'd think they'd at least give him some respect, but no! It's all 'He's a changeling he must be evil.' I'm sick of it, and I'm sure he is too. Or maybe was..." Her eyes started to tear up again. Goddammit brain! You have a lead now, pull yourself together!

"I can get a few of the police on this, make it out to be a gang against the general public. It's worth it to save him. From the report your friend filed, I heard there were a lot of ponies, eh?"

"From what we could tell."

"Yeah, you're going to need more than a few ponies to take him out. Hold on, I'm going to get a few cops together, a couple of forensics guys, a little of everything." He left the room with the convict.

"Dash, what do you mean ungrateful?" Twilight asked.

"What do I mean?!?! The ponies move to the other side of the fucking street when he goes by! I can count the number of ponies that like him without using a two digit number. He did all this for what, eight ponies to accept him?"

"Why the sudden attachment to him, Dash?" Dash facehoofed.

"I love him." She wasn't even trying to hide it anymore, with her prior screw up she was going to find out pretty soon. Twilight gasped. "Funny how you all react the same way. Now I know I made the right decision to leave Ponyville with him, I'm the only one who would've ever listened to his story without complete bias."

"Why would you believe him? He could just lie to you!"

"But he didn't! Dammit Twilight, he's not like the rest. Everything he's ever done goes to show that, but you can't even figure that out?! If you ignored the fact that he was a changeling, you'd see that he's just like the rest of us! You acted like you trusted him, and his story made sense; the stuff from his country, the knowledge... Get out of your little bubble Twilight, the real world isn't all black and white." Twilight let her mouth hang open as Heavy walked back in, as if on cue. He gestured to Dash, who walked past Twilight and out the door. Eventually he spoke up.

"So far we've sent some ponies to the general crime scene, just for reconnaissance type stuff, so this'll be the first real investigation. I would've had ponies there sooner, but my higher ups wouldn't let me take any ponies off of their other jobs. What annoys me about that is the fact that forensics was checking the crime scene for leads on a shoplifter and the rest of the police were out patrolling for him. What a stupid bias. A pony that could be dead, and they keep the police on shoplifting."

"I'm just glad there's somepony in this town that thinks the same things I do."

"Yeah, most of the ponies that were in Canterlot do also." He gestured for the waiting ponies to follow him as they exited the building. They quickly trotted down the street, the lack of conversation giving Dash what she wanted least, time to think. She realized that she had, in only a few hours, made all of her friends angry with her. And Jason was still missing. They stopped in front of the alleyway a few seconds later, exchanging looks before moving inside. The morning sun couldn't reach the bottom of the alley with the tall brick buildings on either side, creating an artificial dusk. The forensics team was already huddled around the dried blood and hoof marks, doing, well, they were doing something. Dash looked back into the alleyway, drifting back into her thoughts.

The afternoon rays graced Dash's face as she exited the alley. She didn't know how long she'd been around this building looking for clues of any sort, but by now it seemed a lost cause. The forensics team had extended the trail by a couple feet after an hour of work before deciding that the ponies had been teleported. Things didn't look like they were going anywhere fast. Maybe they'd never actually find Jason. In the beginning, she thought the only trouble would be getting him alive, but seeing as there was no entrance to this building besides the metal door and the whole thing apparently had spells all over it, things looked grim. The worst part was that she didn't know what was happening in there, he could be being tortured or beat up, and there was nothing she could do. She continued to stare into the alley, still lost in her thoughts.

"Rainbow Dash, it has been quite a long time!" Dash jumped and looked over towards the source of the voice, taking a second to recognize the pony before bowing down. Luna laughed.

"There is no need, Dash." Her face quickly took on an air of anger. "My sister tells me that Jason was captured by a gang of ponies, or something of the sort?"

"Yeah, last night he was just, gone. I was away for maybe five minutes. It hasn't been fun."

"I see. I know what you're going through."

"Whoever it is, they're in that building, but it's protected by all manner of spells, so you aren't able to break in." Luna nodded and walked over, enveloping a corner in her dark blue aura.

"You're right. I could break through those spells I suppose, but it would take time. Another of those spells sends a warning that the spell's being attacked."

"By magical means only?"

"Yes, but from what I can see these walls are at least a foot and a half thick anyway." she saw the look on Dash's face. "What're you planning?"

"I'm going to make a bomb to go through one of the walls. It's a good thing that this building's not in Ponyville proper, then I couldn't really do anything." She smiled for the first time in hours, a plan finally coming into place. "I'm going to go prepare this, we can still get him out!" Heavy came out of the alleyway, shaking his head.

"We're going to have to do this tomorrow. Nopony's going to stay, and we need them if we're going to fight whatever's in there. As soon as their shift is over, they're outta here."

"No... We can still do it, we can just go in there, you me and Luna."

"And you look like you were hit by a train today. You need sleep, Dash."

"He's still in there, he could be being hurt right now, how do we know he'll even be alive tomorrow?"

"If we aren't ready, we'll be dead too. Be logical, Dash."

"Ugh! Fuck this shit!" There was a thunk on the wall. "AAAAAAHHHHH!!!!" She pulled at her mane." I'm at the end of my rope here. I can't handle all these delays!" She could almost feel her sanity slipping away. How could she sleep, full well knowing the possible consequences? She hung her head. She'd have to get the explosives together first anyway, she might as well get on that.

She took off towards the blacksmith shop, eyes burning as tears tried to follow all the ones she'd shed already. These weren't tears of grief, however, they were tears of frustration. Nothing was going her way, right when she needed it most. It just wasn't fair. They should be on favorable terms here, but as usual, things went wrong and they were the only safety net. And now half of that net was gone.

She landed in front of the blacksmith, quickly pushing open the door. She stopped in front of the counter, trying to slightly repress her rising anger. Eventually the pony came out from the back room, keeping a neutral expression when he saw her.

"I need some of the stuff Jason's been getting here, you know the changeling. He gets the saltpeter, charcoal and sulphur mix?"

"Yeah, I heard what happened." he threw a few sacks onto the counter. "I figured you'd need this. Stay here for a second." Dash looked through the bags, checking that there were the correct amounts of material in each one. Satisfied, she composed herself to wait as a grinding stone made some noise in the other room. The pony returned a few minutes later with a small box.

"Your colt-friend had these made for you. They were probably supposed to be a surprise, but it sounds like you need them now." She raked her brain for any time she had even hinted at being Jason's mare-friend.

"How did you..?

"I'm old. I read ponies pretty well." He chuckled, stroking a hoof through his short beard. "Now, the 'gift'." He slid the box across to her, watching intently as she undid the latch and carefully opened the lid. She took a small step back in awe. She didn't know how much of the process was Jason's ideas or just the Blacksmith's skill, but the blades definitely looked amazing. Black blades protruded from a simple hilt, one that was curved to fit around the front of her hoof. She picked it up, inspecting it closer. The blade had several outlandish characters on it, and was backed by a shiny metal edge. She swiped the blade through the air, creating a whistling sound as it went.

She turned back to the blacksmith, hinting at a smile. "How much do I owe you?"

"Nothing. You need it more than I need the money." Dash sighed and took out a hoofful of bits, setting them on the counter.

"At least take something. I'm glad some ponies don't hate him."

"Fine, now go save that guy."

"No problem." She tipped an imaginary hat to the blacksmith before carefully putting the box on her back and taking her leave, immediately flying up to her house with the bags in her mouth. She missed Jason carrying things for her. She also missed the times where she didn't think about Jason every two seconds; she was just making herself feel worse. She landed in the front yard and hauled the bags over to the table where they had made their first set of explosives. Jason had overbought on the flint and canisters, so at least that wouldn't be a problem. As she started grinding up the mixture, she started to think about her plan. Finding the giant thing she needed to put this bomb in was going to be a problem. Oh wait, that would work.

She grabbed the metal trash can she had bought a few days ago, to keep food from falling through the floor, and quickly filled it with gunpowder. She sealed it with a bandage that she had soaked in glue, tethering the lid to the rest of the can. That should hold, if she gave it time to dry, anyway. That meant more waiting. Great. Oh well, at least she had something that should work, hopefully. She only had one chance at this, so it better work.

She face-hoofed, realizing that she needed a fuse of some sort. She grabbed some twine that was still laying around, and tied a rather long fuse, sticking it into the trash can and resealing the lid. Twine should act as a pretty long fuse, that would give them time to clear out. But when they did get inside, they'd need weapons to fight with, but more importantly, they'd need an advantage. She pulled out a few more canisters and got to work on more flash bangs. They were almost out after that whole time away, but it had never crossed her mind to make more. She hadn't really thought that Ponyville would be dangerous.

She could feel herself growing more sleepy as the monotonous process of making the bombs went on, and pretty soon she decided that a nap wouldn't hurt. If she had this much time before zero hour, she might as well get through it as quickly as possible. She didn't really feel like going up the stairs; after a day like this, the stress had really tired her out. She flopped down on the couch, the grumble in her stomach telling her that she still hadn't had anything to eat today. She groaned and rolled off the couch, trotting in the kitchen.

She grabbed a few apples out of the cabinet, immediately munching on the first one. She looked around, eventually focusing on a picture of her on the wall, slightly blurry as she streaked through the air. She realized that the only pictures around here were of her or her friends. If she got Jason back, she was going to get pictures of him and Scoots. She couldn't imagine not being able to see his face again. It pained her to think about it, but one day she'd forget, one day she wouldn't be able to recall what he looked like.

Sure, she could just look at a picture of a changeling in a book, but they didn't really look the same. Besides the small differences he already had, there were the scars criss crossing his face, the subtle chip on one of his fangs. And she'd forget all of that, one day. One day, she'd forget his smile, she'd forget his laugh. She looked down at her apple and threw it into the trash can, having lost her appetite. It sailed through the floor as she realized that she had taken away the metal trash can for bomb production. She sighed, turning to walk back into the living room.

Dash kept the tears out of her eyes until she laid down and gave up, letting them flow. She would've loved to have a picture to look at around now. Hopefully in a few hours after this nap she'd feel better. That sounded like a pipe dream though, considering how she felt right now. She shivered, unused to the normal heat that she received from Jason when they'd been huddled together under the blankets. She hadn't ever needed to sleep alone since they'd started 'dating' and it was something she'd become accustomed to. She pulled a picture off of the coffee table, briefly looking over herself as a filly. She looked a lot like Scoots, albeit with larger wings. At least she still had her. She wouldn't if it weren't for Jason. She smiled, realizing that there was still something he'd done, something tangible, that he'd left behind. Somepony, that is, somepony that she loved as much as he did. She managed to get to sleep in the brief reprieve from the storm of pessimistic thoughts and accusations of blame that were racing around in her head that was created by her sudden realization.

Dash was in a dark room, dressed in a lab-coat of sorts. She looked around, checking the dusk for any signs of life. She turned her attention back to a small cart covered in various medical equipment. Dash grabbed a scalpel off of a tray, running it over her hoof and observing it. What a nice blade. She giggled, and walked over to a sheet that was hung over a something that was strung between a few wooden posts. She grabbed the sheet with a hoof and pulled it off.

Jason stared back at her, grief in his eyes. "Stop Dash, I know you're still in there." he said. She smiled, throwing her head back in laughter.

"I am Dash. There's nothing new." She shoved the blade through one of the cracks in his armor. "Well, maybe a little." She left the scalpel stuck in him and went to grab another tool from the table. She perused her choices for a while, eventually selecting a tweezers. She chuckled and walked back to Jason. "Open those eyes now." Jason struggled against the chains. "Tisk tisk." She grabbed some metal clips, quickly pulling his eyelids out of the way.

"Dash, you don't have to do this."

"I know I don't have to, but it's so much fun! Now let's see just how compound those eyes really are..."

"Dash are you okay?!?! You were screaming and yelling about something, I was getting scared." Scoots yelled, pushing a hoof into Dash's cheek.

Dash awoke with a start, still reeling from her dream. Damn, that was vivid. Still somewhat in dreamland, she tried to get off the couch in a panic but ended up collapsed on the floor. Apparently there were already streams of tears on her face, made worse by the easily recalled memories from the dream. She felt numb.

"Dash, say something!" Scoots yelled. She was the one torturing him, why? What did it mean? The pressure of the cloud on her face seemed to increase and she rolled over, turning her field of vision to include Scoots, who looked like she was having a breakdown on the couch. She finally pulled herself the rest of the way out of the dream, shaking off the residual mental images.

"Scoots, it's okay." She got up off of the floor, then walked over and hugged her. If scoots was back here, that must mean that it was already morning. She glanced up at the clock, noting that it was, at least, still early. They hugged for a few minutes as Scoots tried to pull herself together and Dash continued to feed the rivulets that trickled down her cheeks. Just trying to handle losing Jason was one thing, but that? That was like the nightmare from hell, she could almost feel the cold metal of the scalpel on her hoof as she tortured Jason. She wasn't in control of the dream, but that didn't mean that she didn't feel responsible. She just prayed that whatever they had done to Jason hadn't been worse than that.

"Dash, why were you acting like that?" She finally asked.

"I--- I had a nightmare about Jason. I was in the middle of torturing him." She sighed as a few residual images flashed through her head.

"You wouldn't really do that, would you Dash?"

"No, of course not Scoots. I guess I should just start from the beginning here and explain the nightmare. Jason's been gone these last couple nights, because he was taken by some stallions. I want to get him back, because he's my special somepony, as I'm sure you know by now."

"Is that why you were yelling yesterday morning?"

"Well, partially. I was yelling at my friends because they never trusted Jason, and were ungrateful for not doing so. I kinda freaked out a little more than I should have, but I think I got my point across. I spent the rest of yesterday getting a plan together with two of the few ponies on my side, and I'm going to go save Jason today."

"Is he going to be okay Dash?" She could see that Scoot's eyes had become foggy again. She threw an arm around Scoots and pulled her into her chest.

"I hope so Scoots." She felt part of her chest dampen as she continued to pat her on the back. They sat there for a few minutes, the only noise being Scoots' quiet whimpering and the growing wetness on her chest. Eventually Scoots pulled her head away and looked up at Dash.

"I know you have to save him, but don't leave me alone, okay?"

"Yeah, Scoots, I won't." She really needed to cheer this kid up. "You wanna help me get ready then? I can show you a pair of knives Jason had made for me."

"Yeah, okay." She said. Dash smiled, at the very worst, she still had Scoots. They both trotted across the room over to the pile of armor and weapons that was still leftover from the day they had gotten back. She sighed in reminiscence as she grabbed part of a foreleg chunk. She looked through one of the holes, peering at Scoots, who let out a quiet giggle. She tied on the forelegs, then got up to grab the box. She carried it over to scoots, laying it in front of her.

"Care to open it, Scoots?" She nodded, letting a small amount of excitement play over her face. She briefly struggled with the latch before getting it open and lifting the lid. She mouthed the word 'wow' before carefully pulling out one of the knives, balancing it between the two of her hooves.

"What do these things mean, Dash?"

"I dunno Scoots, I think they're just designs. Maybe I could ask Twilight. Hopefully she isn't annoyed at me, not that I really care how she feels, but because I won't get information out of her if she's mad."

"Are you still friends with them Dash?"

"I'm not sure Scoots. They didn't really trust Jason, and they thought that I was wrong about trusting him. I'll have to see how they act around me next time I see them. Help me get the rest of this on." Scoots walked over and pulled a few strings tight, locking Dash's chest plate in place and completing the armor set. She moved her legs around, running through every conceivable movement before deciding that the armor was on correctly.

"Are you going to have to kill the ponies that took Jason?"

"I don't know, Scoots." She threw the belt of explosives on. "If they surrender I won't have to. Do you not want me to kill them?"

"No, I couldn't care less if those jerks died." Dash looked over at the clock and jumped.

"Listen, Scoots, I gotta go. You wanna see the explosion?" She finished tying the second knife onto her foreleg. They fit like a dream.

"Yeah!"

"Okay, I'll stick you on a cloud pretty far away. At any hint of trouble you gotta run though, Squirt."

"But I haven't had anything to eat!" Dash ran into the kitchen, returning with a couple apples. She threw one over to Scoots.

"We gotta eat it on the wing." Dash walked over to the trash can, rapidly taking a few bites of the apple when she realized that she couldn't hold both that and the bomb. She awkwardly dragged it over to the door, rolling it along the front yard.

"Ready to go, Scoots?"

"Yeah, how are you going to carry that?"

"Simple." She pushed it over the side before diving after it. She flapped back up a few moments later, holding it with her legs. "I don't need my legs if I'm flying." She smirked. "Now let's go get Jason back."

Dash quickly glided towards her destination, noticing a glint behind a bush nearby. She landed on the ground, hearing Scoots land behind her, and set down the trash can. She pushed the leaves of the bush behind, scrunching up her face in confusion when she saw the source of the glint. It was a long thing, and it had several things sticking out of it. One of the things held a lens. There were several other slightly curved blocks of metal scattered around. She shook her head and sighed, she couldn't figure out what it was, but it definitely wasn't equestrian. She covered the thing in leaves, she'd come back for it later.

"It's something from Jason's country Scoots. We'll have to come back later to get it."

"Do you know what it does?"

"I honestly have no idea. Maybe a shovel? Let's just get going." She grabbed the trash can again, quickly lifting off of the ground.

She landed near the brick building, carefully depositing the bomb before turning to the others present. She was slightly disappointed when the only ponies there were Luna and Heavy, both wearing light armor. Heavy was weilding a spear.

"Where's everypony else?"

"Called in sick today, bastards." Heavy replied.

"Ah, yes, but there should be a couple guards coming. I sent for them lat night, in case something like this were to happen." Dash let out a sigh of relief. "Why did you bring a trash can?"

"Aha! That's how we're going to get through the wall. All we need now is something heavy and mostly immobile to kind of direct the explosion into the wall." Luna rolled a dumpster on the other side of the bomb from the wall.

"Like that?"

"No, we need more stuff." She started shoving more of the trash cans and boxes behind the dumpster to keep it in place. After the seventeenth trash can she figured she'd added enough.

"Okay, so listen," Dash started, "That thing's going to go off, and it should blow through that wall. Then I'm going to chuck a few of these things inside," she gestured to the fash-bangs on her belt. "And most of them should be stunned. That's when we'll go in, and hopefully sweep the floor with these pieces of shit. A word of warning, get really far away from that explosion, if the shockwave doesn't kill you, the shrapnel will."

"Princess, when are those guards supposed to get here?" Heavy asked. The princess pointed a hoof in response. Two ponies were trotting down the street in full royal armor, one of them an earth pony, the other a unicorn. They stopped in front of Luna and saluted, looking around at the rest of the rag tag team.

"At ease, soldiers." They dropped their solutes.

"What's the plan, Princess?" One of them asked.

"To simplify for you, we art going to blow a hole in that wall, then go inside after Dash gives us the signal and take out the hostiles inside. Is that correct, Dash?"

"Yeah. Have either of you seen combat?"

"Yes, Boss. We were assigned to sector G8 in Canterlot along with the rest of our squad."

"Where is the rest of your squad?"

"They're still M.I.A. ma'am."

"I'm sorry to hear that. Stop with the formalities by the way. This should be basically the same as it was out there, but with ponies instead of griffins." She turned to Luna. "Luna, can you deal with at least a few of them when we blow our way in?" The Princess laughed.

"I'm sure I can deal with at least a few, if that's all you're going to allot for me. It's been quite a while since I've been able to outright fight something. My sister says that violence by the princesses is no longer looked up to like it was." She smirked. "But this is off the record. Are we taking them dead or alive?"

"It doesn't matter. Their boss is in there though, watch out for him. The captured pony said that he was pretty freaked out by the guy, he might have a large amount of power." Dash turned to Scoots, who had been watching intently the whole time. "Get to that cloud over there if you want to watch, Scoots. If something goes wrong, I want you to fly into town as fast as you can, okay?"

"Yeah, Dash." She jumped forward, throwing her arms around Dash in a hug. "Be careful." She could hear a few 'aww's from behind her.

"I will be Scoots. Now get over there so we can get started." She nodded and took off, quickly ascending to the cloud. She had gotten much better at flying in the last two weeks, Dash noticed. She turned back to the group, putting a hoof up to her mouth to tighten the string around one of the knives.

"You guys ready to blow some shit up?" There was a resounding cheer from the team. "Luna, will you do the honors of lighting the fuse? As soon as you do, get back to a safe distance."

"Ah, yes. I would love to." She tapped her hooves together happily before trying to regain her composure and walking over. Her horn glowed and she gestured for them to get away as she took off into the air. Dash pulled out a couple of flash-bangs and got ready to prime them as she hovered back at least fifty extra feet. The five of them waited in silence as the fuse continued to burn. It was a long wait.

Her nervousness grew as the time period continued to drag on. The worst part of this plan was not knowing what was inside. Everything was based on them successfully surprising the gang members. They definitely had an advantage, but that never seemed to help them in the past. They'd just always squeaked by on the slimmest of margins, why would this plan be any different?

BANG!!!

The dumpster fell over backwards as trash and dirt flew everywhere. A small mushroom shaped fireball floated past the top of the building as debris started to rain down, creating a light pattering noise. Dash took off towards the opening that was making itself known through the rapidly clearing smoke cloud. She pulled the pins in midair, throwing them through the rather sizable hole as she neared.

Bang!!! Bang!!!

The two slightly muffled bangs sounded as the other ponies rushed up to the entrance. Luna got inside first, immediately picking up several ponies in her magic. They briefly struggled before going limp, and she tossed them into the wall. Dash looked over at Luna, who was smirking.

"What, I can't have some fun of my own?" She said, continuing to smirk. Dash shrugged and looked around for an exit. An open door led out of the room into a long hallway, and the five of them crept through while making sure they weren't running into a trap. As Dash went around the corner into another room, a stallion jumped out of the shadows, diving at her with a knife. She knocked the knife to the side and put her other hoof in front of her chest, impaling the stallion using his own momentum. They ended up face to face, and Dash watched as a trickle of blood flowed out the side of his mouth before she threw him into a corner.

"Clear!" She loudly whispered back to a pony at the door, who turned out to be Heavy. She snuck back out the door, moving to the next room in the long hallway with him by her side. They entered and split up, Heavy immediately taking out a pony that was too slow to get out of his chair while Dash sparred with the other, more ready stallion. He swung at her with a knife, jumping back to avoid her counterattack. He repeated the process a second time, eyes going wide when he jumped backwards into a wall. Dash smirked before quickly running a blade across his exposed throat and throwing him to the ground.

She looked over to see Heavy finally kick the stallion off of his spear, and they both ran back out, nearly colliding with the other three ponies. The only room left was at the end of the hall. They snuck along the walls, careful to not burst into a situation they weren't ready to handle. Dash grabbed another flash-bang, making it obvious that she was going to use it before tossing it into the other room and covering her ears. From what she could see before she closed her eyes, the others did the same.

They all rushed into the room as a stallion was thrown aside by Luna, crashing into the wall and going limp. Dash punched another across the face, stabbing him with the blade from her other hoof as he fell. She heard several other bodies slump to the ground. That left two ponies in the room. A pony and a changeling, that is.

Dash felt tears start to pool in her eyes when she saw what Jason looked like, he was cracked all over, covered in blood. One of his eyes was looking over at the group of them. He smirked, wincing a bit when some of the cracks on his face moved around. She managed to tear her gaze away from him and focus on the stallion that was standing on the raised platform that held Jason. He was laughing maniacally, something you really didn't want to see from somepony you'd thought you had beaten. There was an almost unnatural darkness around him, obscuring his face and most of his grey coat. The baseball bat like weapon was floating in the air next to him.

"You think you have me beaten? Not now, not ever! I have resources, I have more power than any of you. I have what I came for, so I'll just be taking my leave. Expect another visit from me, because mark my words, I'll be back. And next time I'll bring an army!" There was a burst of light and the pony disappeared. A tendril of smoke rose off of the platform where he was standing.

Dash flew over to Jason, struggling with the manacles that bound him. Luna's magic extended to the chains, and Dash watched as the chains unlocked and opened. She managed to grab Jason before he hit the ground, and carefully laid him out in a way that looked somewhat comfortable, propping him up with a hoof. Her tears started to flow again as she looked him over more closely. He looked terrible. Worse than terrible, actually. Besides the cracks that spiderwebbed over his body, she could see that he was missing part of an ear, and that a sizable chunk of armor on his side was missing entirely. One of his fangs was chipped more than it had been, and was now missing at least an inch and a half of it's length. The tissue around his closed eye was so swollen he couldn't even open it. And worst of all, they had somehow managed to completely saw off part of the very bottom of his hoof. She had chipped off part of one of hers before, and it was one of the most painful weeks of her life.

He focused his eye on her, seemingly unable to form words. Finally, he got some out as he smiled up at her. "Dash," He chuckled lightly. "I knew you'd come for me." He coughed and contorted in pain as he re-closed his eye and his head lolled sideways.

"Jason!" she gently slapped his cheek, which had apparently not received any mercy whatsoever. There was no reaction. She shook his body around, still not managing to get him to re-open his eye.

"JASON!!!"

Beep....Beep.....Beep.....Beep.....

Dash opened her eyes warily, looking around the small hospital room. She had spent the night and most of the morning here, curled up by his side. The doctors didn't want her to stay here, but it wasn't like there was anything else she could do. Her eyes quickly focused on Jason, who was still asleep in the bed. It had been over twenty four hours since he had been moved here, and she had yet to even see him move of his own accord. She sighed, as if getting him out of there and in here wasn't hard enough.

"JASON!" She yelled, hearing the echo a fraction of a second later. She shook him around some more before putting an ear to his chest checking for a heartbeat. He was still alive, at least. She grabbed his arm and pulled him onto her back, trotting as quickly as she could back to the Princess.

"Princess, can you teleport us out of here? We need to get Jason some help." Dash said, her voice sounding much more calm than she felt. Luna nodded.

"Yes, just stay close and don't try to move." She said as the light of her horn intensified. Dash complied, saying stock still after raising her wings to keep Jason cradled on her back. A burst of light later, she found herself outside the building on the side facing town, briefly annoyed that the whole clear area requirement had kept them from teleporting anywhere closer. She took off at a gallop, the deja vu of the situation not escaping her. Her cold rage grew as she encountered more ponies. Some of them let slight smiles grace their lips, she assumed when they saw Jason's condition. One pony had the audacity to chuckle, and she threw a quick swipe across his jaw. Funny how public opinion can be so fickle.

She cornered and ran over to the hospital, shoving the door open with a shoulder. The door smacked into the adjoining wall, startling one of the secretaries enough to cause her to fling her tea cup through the air. It crashed into the ground and broke, covering a fairly large spot on the floor with the mostly clear liquid. Dash streaked across the space between the two of them, coming face to face with the secretary.

"I need a room, now."

"I can't just--"

"NOW!" The pony jumped again, immediately pointing down the hallway.

"First room on the right, I'll send somepony in." She got up from her desk as Dash turned into the hallway, moving into the hospital room. She set him down on the bed, adjusting his head on the pillow. She looked him over again. Honestly, the fact that he had made it this long was surprising, considering the blood stains that were already extending from his hoof and the rest of his cuts. Dash wiped a bit of grime off his forehead with a wingtip, watching as it came up crimson. She was past the point of fear, she was terrified. No response seemed to come to mind when she saw him like this, besides the burning hatred she harbored for that pony. The pony that had caused all this.

Then, as she sat back in a chair, her emotions made themselves known. She put her hooves to her face and wept, wept like she never had before, whether it was due to pride or otherwise. What would it matter now, especially if Jason couldn't pull through? She wouldn't be surprised if he didn't, honestly, and that scared her even more.

She didn't know how long she was out of it, but she looked up at some point to see a couple of doctors hovering over Jason, hooking him up to a heartbeat machine and poking him with needles while another was in the process of wrapping an arm in bandages. She threw her head back downward, not wishing to watch anymore of the process. She realized her hypothesis about the heartbeat machine was correct after a series of rhythmic beeps pierced through to her shaken mind. It was almost calming, coming at the same rate minute after minute. The Doctors left, apparently not to return. An orange and purple head extended around the doorway before Scoots galloped in, immediately jumping onto the chair next to Dash and looking up at her.

"Dash, is Jason going to be okay?" She took another look over her shoulder. "He doesn't look too good."

"I'm not sure Scoots." She choked back a sob. "I-- I just don't know." Scoots hung her head, immediately going silent. She flopped down in the chair, curling up into a ball and whimpering to herself. Dash laid a hoof on the filly, stroking it through her mane. A knock emanated from the doorway, and Dash looked over.

"Rainbow Dash." Luna began, "I know how little you want to hear about what happened, but I feel it is necessary to give you some information." She sighed. "That stallion we met in there, I threw up a last minute barrier around him to try to stop the teleportation spell, but--"

"It didn't work." Dash finished for her, looking away.

"See, that's the thing. It did." She said, shifting uneasily on her hooves. Dash looked back over at her, confused.

"What are you saying?" She asked. The princess walked over and took a seat.

"That it wasn't a teleportation spell he used. With that spell, you almost 'feel' where all the ponies are inside of the aura. But there was nopony there." She sighed again. "I think we're dealing with something far more powerful than a crime boss here. I think I know the spell he used, it was never common, but back in the day it wasn't unheard of. It allows a pony to displace their conscience into an area outside of their body, creating a decoy of sorts although there are far more capabilities. The setbacks are that the castor's body is totally defenseless, and that any magic cast by the castor through the decoy is many times more taxing than it would normally be."

"That type of magic even exists?"

"Yes, it's called 'soul magic'. We tried to stamp out the last of it over a thousand years ago, it was just too dangerous to keep around. Mostly for the ponies casting the spells, they would tend to go insane, or just die in the middle of a spell. I was the one that created it years ago, with my dabbling into ponies' dreams at night. That's part of my power, not soul magic. Another pony wanted to see if he could go into dreams like I could, and after a few weeks I got a spell up and working."

"Did it work?"

Luna sighed, sweeping a hoof down her face in stress. "Yes, it worked, the pony saw the dream, and didn't go insane like so many did after him. He differentiated the initial spells I had created into several tomes and a veritable armada of different applications. His power was a cause for strife between me and mine sister, she thought that the stallion was trouble, considering his knowledge of spells for which we had no counter. Needless to say, eventually he proved himself to be a threat, killing at least a few ponies for an 'experiment', and I was sent to kill him. I don't even know what he did, but he killed the guards I had with me long before I could even get a hit in on him. I won the fight, and personally brought his head back as proof." Dash looked over, disgusted. Luna shrugged. "That's what we did back then. The 'soul magic', as he called it never reared it's head again, at least until now. A thousand years seems like a long enough time to get another pony with the same skill, unless..."

"What?"

"Well, maybe I didn't finish the job."

"You cut off his head!"

"I know, but the sudden emergence of one pony that has such a skill-- I guess there isn't any proof, all things considered, but I never knew his full capabilities. I'm just accounting for all the possibilities here."

"So what did you do with all of the records?"

"We hid them, kept them away from the common eye. Apparently not all of them though. Or maybe somepony just figured it all out again."

"It can't manipulate other ponies' consciences can it?"

"No, it's solely ways to re-represent your own. It can interact in ways, but all are indirect. My situation with dreams is an outlier, the stallion was never able to influence dreams on his own. Although I am fairly experienced in it, I have never come anywhere near the stallion's skill level. The irony, I suppose, is that he could barely preform a levitation spell back then."

"So is he out of our league to fight then?"

"No, I just have to use a new repertoire of tricks. The thing about the magic is that there is very little power needed for the movement of the 'soul' so to speak, the only important part is control. A thousand years with the nightmare in my head tends to leave you with at least a fair amount, after you get over the initial insanity." She sighed, evidently pained to remember such an event, or string of them, as it may have been. "The only hard part is finding him, if he's at all smart. Anything we do could be playing into the flat of his hoof. I beat him once though, I can beat him again." Dash opened her mouth to speak before Lyra came galloping in, clearly out of breath.

"I heard something happened to Jason." She looked over at the bed and winced.

"Yeah, you just found out?" Dash asked.

"Well, I got a bunch of different stories, most of them weren't too good. I heard one about him being captured, and apparently that was the right one."

"Yeah. He might not make it." A couple tears wetted her eyes.

"What else did you hear?" Luna asked, perking her ears.

"Well," Lyra started, brushing part of her mane out of her face, "A couple customers told me he'd jumped town, and had gone back to the hive to turn in. Yeah, we have customers now, by the way. Let's see, a few others said he'd been forced to leave after Celestia figured out that he was actually evil or something. They were pretty varied. The only story I got that was the same more than once was from a couple of your friends, Applejack and Twilight, I think. It's strange, because I thought Applejack was all suspicious, but she was the one who told me the captured story first." Dash was beyond surprised. Applejack had done that? She had expected them to be stubborn to the end, hell, maybe she still was. At least they seemed to be moving in the right direction.

"She was the suspicious one. As it turns out they were all suspicious. Except for Pinkie, and maybe Fluttershy." She heard a particularly raspy breath from Jason and looked over expectantly, only to be disappointed a few seconds later when his breathing returned to normal. Maybe she shouldn't get her hopes up...

Luna got up, making her way to the door. "I hate to do this to you, Dash, but I must get back to Canterlot to preside over my duties. With the mobilization tomorrow I have a lot to do. I'll get right to resharpening my soul magic, it looks like we're going to need it. I'm will take this pony down." She walked over to the bed, enveloping Jason in her aura briefly. "That should help the pain when he wakes up, hopefully." With that she left Scoots, Lyra and Dash to their own devices. Dash watched a drop of blood pool at the end of Jason's sheared off hoof before it fell to the ground, adding to the small pool of blood already there. She got up and grabbed a rag from the counter, wrapping it around his hoof in place of the soaked bandages. A tear came to her eye as she watched the rag itself start to taint red. She stared at it for a second longer before turning and smashing a hoof into the wall, cracking a tile.

"Fuck!" She moved down a tile, breaking that one also. She drew her arm back again, flinching when something stopped it from moving forward. She turned to see that Lyra had put a hoof around her arm, keeping her from striking the wall.

"Dash, you aren't helping Jason by breaking his hospital room!" Dash's arm went limp, her anger quickly converting itself into frustration as a few tears started streaming down her cheeks.

"It's just not fair! We went through all of the stuff in Canterlot and here we are again, one of us is almost dead! Jason hasn't even gone so far as to complain about it! What kind of a welcome is this for him?! It should have been better, we should have been able to relax here! Do you know what some ponies did when I went by with Jason like this? They laughed, they smiled, they were glad he looked like he was out of the picture." She quieted down, most of her anger spent. "I couldn't care less about their thoughts towards me, but how could they still think of him as a traitor, even now?"

Lyra was quiet, the wetness in her eyes evidence that she agreed. "I don't know, Dash." They both lapsed into silence, lost in their own thoughts. Lyra finally spoke up, laying a hoof on Dash's shoulder. "I know how you feel, at least partially. My mother got really sick before she died, I just hated knowing that I couldn't do anything to help her." She turned her head away, looking instead at the floor.

"Yeah, I should be happy that there's something I can actually do." She sighed. "I can't stay in here. I gotta go take a walk. Will you watch him while I'm gone? It'll only be a few minutes."

"Of course. I'll try to, love him or something?"

"Yeah, just think about how he's a good friend or whatever. Good emotions towards him, I think. He never really talked about anything in that much depth." Lyra nodded, moving her chair over to Jason's bedside. "Scoots, you okay?" The filly looked up and nodded, gazing over at Jason with misty eyes. "I--I'm sorry Dash."

"Sorry for what?"

"Being so useless through all of this."

"Scoots, you're anything but useless, you should know that by now." Dash ran a hoof through her mane. "I would've been an emotional wreck right now if I didn't have you around. Even if worse comes to worse, we still have each other." She drew the kid into a hug, holding her tightly. Scoots really shouldn't have to go through all this, especially not at her age. After a few moments Dash let go and sighed, moving to leave. "I'll be back in a few, just as soon as I get some fresh air."

She walked out the door and through the hallway, moving past the secretary and out the front doors. She sighed, realizing just how little medical care Jason had received. That wasn't entirely surprising, they couldn't assume that changelings would react the same to most treatments.

It also wasn't surprising that she had come out here with no further plan of action. On a whim she turned and walked down the street, trying to clear her mind. She wnated to be near Jason as much as she could, but at the same time she couldn't bear to see him like that, with the injuries from the torturing she could have kept from happening staring her in the face. She was probably just being selfish, actually.

The thought hit her like a load of bricks as she continued to walk down the street. What if she wasn't there when he woke up? Maybe he wouldn't care, but she knew she would. She turned resolutely, taking a big gulp of air. She started to trot back, stopping for a moment to look at a familiar bush. She shook her head and started to trot again. Familiar bush? What?

Ooooh. She turned and parted the leaves, coming in contact with the cool metal of the device. She hurriedly picked it and it's little brethren up, and stuck them through some holes on her belt. She galloped back, feeling slightly renewed, and slowed to a trot when she entered the hospital. She calmly trotted back into Jason's hospital room, finding it in much the same way as she left it.

"Do you feel better Dash?" Lyra asked, turning away from the bed.

"Better, still not good in any sense of the word. I feel like I could sleep for three days straight."

"Yeah, I know what you mean." She sighed, turning her gaze back to Jason. "I looked him over a little more while you were gone, cuz I had a little medical training from my mom way back when, and it looks like the bleeding's starting to stop, and as far as I can tell from this stuff he's at least kind of stable."

"What do you mean, kind of?"

"He's a changeling, I have no idea for sure." She hinted at a smile. "At least things are looking better."

"Lyra, this may sound cold, but I actually want to know, why do you care about Jason? Why do you trust him?"

"Well, back in Canterlot."

"I know about that, but that still sounds like a longshot, I mean--"

"Dash, I--I just don't want to talk about it." That threw her for a loop, what could Lyra possibly care about telling her? She sighed, she could've just taken the trust towards Jason as a given, but of course she had to pry. Oh well, there were more important things to worry about. She touched a hoof to Jason's foreleg, flinching as a plate of it moved. She sat down on the bed, rolling over onto her side a couple seconds later.

She looked at Jason's face, realizing she had really just avoided it, she wasn't sure why, if it was some sort of avoidance of guilt or what. His brow was covered by a bandage as well as his cheek, the one she had carelessly slapped earlier to try to keep him conscious, and the swelling around his eye seemed to have shrunk. His face held a guise of ironic serenity, even through all of that.

This armor was getting hot. It was already hot, but this was starting to get ridiculous. She quickly stripped it off, stacking it in the corner of the room. She laid the knives on top and leaned the---thing against the wall before walking back to the bed and resuming her previous position near the foot of the bed.

What a morning. And it was only ten something. She could feel her eyelids drooping, watching as Lyra seemed to share her fatigue, although she couldn't be sure why. Just a little nap, then she'd hopefully feel better. Although, she'd said that the last time before she'd had that dream. Ugh, that dream. Her thoughts started to become more dispersed before they stopped entirely and she slipped into a light slumber.

And that was just the beginning, Dash mused, trying to find something to occupy herself with besides endlessly looking over Jason's injuries. At least he looked a lot better than yesterday, but that wasn't exactly saying much. She carefully ran a hoof over part of his un-bandaged chest, finding the cracks much less ragged. When the doctors came in today, though, they said something about a coma, that he may heal but never actually come back. That depressed her more than the idea of simply losing him.

There he was, possibly in an endless nap, he'd be totally uninjured in a few days, and yet she might never get him back. Not his personality or soul, anyway, just his body. She'd made it perfectly clear to him that whatever form he was in, she'd always love him, changeling or otherwise. That was starting to lose it's charm with the idea that his changeling shell could figuratively become a husk of what he used to be.

She sighed, trying to think optimistically. It wasn't easy; apparently she could be quite the pessimist at times. The doctors had thought that he wouldn't make it through the night, and they were obviously wrong about that. But they were doctors, how often could she be right?

Oh well, what was she supposed to do anyway? There was nopony here, they'd all visited yesterday, besides Lyra. She'd brought by a few flowers this morning, although she still wondered why exactly the mare trusted Jason so easily. Funny how she was musing about the uneventfulness of this morning when she had all the time in the world to recall yesterday afternoon.

Dash awoke from a hoof that was tapping pretty impatiently on her shoulder. In a brief moment of over-optimism she opened her eyes and turned them to Jason, only to be disappointed by the same facial expression he'd had since last time. As it turned out, Lyra had been the one tapping her, and was now pointing a hoof towards the door. Dash looked over, ears pining back when she noticed who was at the door. She resisted the urge to yawn, instead continuing her death stare.

Twilight and Applejack were at the door, the former shifting uncomfortably on her hooves, looking anywhere but into Dash's eyes. Applejack was more subtly nervous, her avoidance less obvious.

Dash finally broke the silence. "Well, you got what you wanted, are you here to celebrate? Finish the job maybe?" She propped herself up into a better fighting position. Twilight took a step back, what little resolve she had crumbling. Applejack did the opposite, slightly surprising Dash as she approached the bedside.

"Listen, Sugarcube,"

"Why should I? You never listened to him, and since he can feel your emotions I know he knew you didn't trust him. You didn't even listen to me, and I'm supposedly your friend..." She trailed off, realizing the pointlessness of arguing. If they felt any guilt then good, but chances are they saw nothing wrong with their point of view.

"You're right." Twilight said from the door. Dash looked over at her, expecting some sort of turnaround, or at least a but. "We couldn't listen, we should've seen that he wasn't just a changeling, but--but we couldn't--I couldn't, and I'm sorry. You guys trusted me tons of times, I should have been able to at least reciprocate the action."

"Sugarcube, I know it's too late for apologies, and I don't expect you to accept mine, but ah'm sorry fer causin' this ta happen. Ah could've trusted ya, hay, we all could've, but Ah didn't and now Jason's over there," She sighed, her breath sounding slightly ragged, "Looking like that. And it's at least partially mah fault." Dash opened her mouth to speak before Applejack cut her off. "Ah'm not finished. Ah should've seen him as a pony, I should've been optimistic. If he did all you say he did, well, I should be thanking him."

Then she surprised Dash further by coming over and hugging her. She wasn't sure whether to be annoyed that they had only figured this out when he was on death's door. She took a few deep breaths to calm herself and get her thoughts straight, although she wasn't sure why, exactly, she was getting so worked up. Things were really starting to get to her, she wasn't thinking right. Finally, she turned to her friends, keeping a neutral expression.

"You know it wasn't your fault that this happened, not really. You shouldn't be apologizing to me anyway, Jason's the one you wronged." Applejack seemed slightly put off, which was unsurprising. Considering how stubborn she was, Dash doubted that she really wanted to admit that she'd been wrong to him. Although she'd have to grill Jason afterwords on whether he thought they were being serious. Twilight was much less of an issue, she wasn't stubborn, she just needed information to back up claims. That wasn't too much to ask, and there was definitely enough information to go around, she felt.

"Dash," Twilight started, drawing her out of her thoughts. "Do you really love Jason, or were you just saying that to further your argument? I know I shouldn't really be the one asking questions, but..." Dash sighed, she knew it'd come up eventually. There was another reason she'd left the library after she'd slipped up and said that, she didn't want to know what they'd think. As much as she wanted to think she wouldn't care what they said, she knew she still would, somewhere deep down.

"Yeah, I do." Applejack bit her lip. "And I don't want any grief about it. Maybe if either of you ever got to know him you'd understand." She swiveled her head back towards Jason, feeling a wave of grief and fear wash over her as her thoughts wandered again, this time more than they usually did. She thought about Scoots, she thought about having a foal of her own, if that could even work. If Jason would even be alive for that. Appearance wise, she wasn't sure if it would take after Jason. It was just another pipe dream anyway, like some peace and quiet in Ponyville turned out to be. She was jolted out of her thoughts by a hoof swinging in front of her face.

"I couldn't care less, Dash." Twilight said, shaking her head. "You'll always be my friend."

"Yeah, but I know what you would think about it, the conversations you'd have behind my back. You'd probably trust Jason even less, and just assume that he manipulated me." Twilight seemed to be at a loss for words. "That's the problem with you ponies, you let your fear for changelings as a whole affect how you act towards an individual."

Lyra spoke up for the first time during the argument, slightly startling everypony else in the room besides Scoots, who had been silently watching the whole time. "Another changeling saved me during the raid on Canterlot. It definitely wasn't Jason, but it was still on my side. I mean, he was constantly having arguments with itself before it finally pulled itself together long enough to tell a group of passing changelings that the house I was in was clear of ponies." She paused. "I'd probably be dead if it weren't for that changeling." They all became silent, the only noise Jason's ragged breathing, quickly joined by Twilight's.

"I--I'm so sorry Dash." A few tears fell from her face, plopping onto the floor. "I know I don't deserve my apology to be accepted, but I can't be any more sincere." Dash got off of the bed, throwing her hooves around Twilight.

"I accept your apology. You weren't all that out of line to doubt him, I just wish you'd come around sooner. It's not my apology you should be worrying about. I'll always be your friend." She patted Twilight on the back for a few minutes, waiting for her to calm down. After a few minutes she did, and extracted herself from the hug, smiling back at Dash. Dash tried to force a smile that probably came off as more of a grimace.

"I hope he gets better Dash. I wish I could do something more."

"You've done enough. I have one less thing to worry about now. Thanks you two." They smiled weakly and moved to leave before Twilight noticed the thing in the corner.

"What's that Dash?"

"I think it's something from Jason's home country, I was going to ask him about it if-- when he wakes up." Twilight nodded and they bid their final goodbyes before Dash turned back to the bed, climbing back towards her previous position. She pushed her back up against Jason, shivering when she found out how cold he was. She jumped up from the bed again, grabbing a blanket from the corner and tossing it over him. She sighed and resumed her place on the bed, leaning against Jason's side through the blanket. She sighed, wishing she was able to put an arm around him without causing him pain. Maybe he couldn't feel it, but she didn't want to take the chance that he could. As usual, more waiting, more time for her thoughts to wander. No surprise there.

"Hey Dash?" She looked up to see that Lyra had evidently gotten bored of waiting as well.

"What?"

"You know about where Jason comes from, right?"

"Yeah?" What did Jason tell her, exactly?

"Well, I found this thing," She reached into her saddlebag and pulled out a rectangular prism, parially covered in glossy pictures. "And it has humans on it. But it's not a book, so I figured it must be from Jason's country, but he said that humans probably didn't still exist, so how did they make this?" Oh, Great.

"Well, you see--"

"I want the truth Dash, I know you've been keeping something from the rest of us." She narrowed her eyes.

"Yeah, but--"

"Dash." Dash sighed. She might as well tell her, but how long could it be until more ponies found stuff out? All it had taken was for Lyra to find this box and connect a few dots.

"Can I see the thing?" Lyra nodded and passed it over. Dash turned it over in her hoof, reading a few words of a larger font, 'The Hurt Locker'. She couldn't figure out what that meant, it was probably just another reference she wouldn't understand. There were several men, at least she assumed they were men, holding things that kinda looked like the other thing in the corner. All of them were wearing camouflage, and some dirt was flying into the air as a guy in a giant suit ran away. Jason had made her that camouflaged gillie suit to stay hidden in war, maybe these were for the same reason. She looked at the humans, trying to figure out why one of them looked horribly burned compared to the other pale ones. She'd never actually seen a human before, just a couple drawings from Jason and history books. She hoofed the thing back to Lyra.

"I have no idea what that is, it's just a box with pictures on it, I mean-"

Click

"Hey, there's stuff inside, like a miniature shiny record thing!" Lyra exclaimed.

"Oh, Jason mentioned those, they're called DVPs, I think."

"Okay, fine, but let's hear Jason's story here Dash. The truth." She closed the case up and set it aside.

"Fine. He said he used to be a human, like one of those there, and then he was in a self propelled vehicle crash, and when he should've died he ended up here. That's what he said anyway." She sighed. "Listen, though, I don't want that many ponies to know. Besides the fact that they wouldn't believe me, they'd probably just use that as another reason to alienate him." She really didn't know that much about his history besides vague descriptions. She'd have to ask about that.

"Jason's a human?!?!"

"That's what you took from that? Yeah, keep it down though." She moved a hoof in a shushing motion.

"Wow, then that means that humans still exist! This is so cool! Where did he actually come from?"

"Well he didn't really recognize any of the stars here, and his world it totally explored. I think he came from a different planet called earth, I mean this is earth too, but--whatever. The general idea is pretty far fetched though, and I still have no idea why he ended up as a changeling."

"Yeah, I don't know either. You mind if I ask him some questions when he wakes up?"

"So long as you keep this a secret."

"Don't worry, I hear what you're saying. You should tell them before they find out, they might take measures to make sure you're safe or something. You may not have seen it, but with Jason they thought they had your best interest in mind. That's worth something at least."

"You're right..." Maybe she should've tried harder to see things from her friends' side. Another pang of remorse rushed through her.

"Well I guess I'll leave you to it."

"You're leaving?"

"I'm really sorry Dash, but the dinner rush is coming, Bon Bon'll kill me if I'm not there. She said something about visiting later, so you shouldn't be alone."

Dash groaned, her depressing thoughts beginning to sneak up on her again in the absence of a distraction. "I understand, see you later." Lyra waved and left the room.

"Dash?"

"You're still here Scoots?"

"Yeah, I just kinda slept through most of the day apparently. You mind if I go find Sweetie Belle and Applebloom? They're probably pretty worried if they've heard anything. I'll come visit if I find them."

"You don't have to Squirt." She forced a smile. "You don't need to worry, just go have fun."

The orange filly opened her mouth to debate Dash's statement before re-closing her mouth. Finally she broke the silence. "I love you Dash." Dash's smile suddenly became sincere.

"I love you too Scoots, now go, stop worrying. It's not good for you."

"Bye Dash."

"Bye." Strangely, she didn't feel alone in the room after the last of her company left. She lazed off into a wakeful slumber where time had no meaning. She was disturbed a few hours, maybe only minutes later by a couple of Doctors that had come in to do their thing. They took off the old bandages, cleaning the wounds before replacing them with new ones. Dash felt a wave of actual, founded hope rush over her when his chitin came into view. The cracks were no longer bleeding, and seemed to be forming the beginnings of healing.

What happened in there? She'd been too preoccupied with guilt and the other ponies before to ask, but considering how beat up he was, well, she was surprised he even could get that beat up. The pony had said he had gotten what he wanted, he'd said that he'd be back. What is it he wanted though? Knowledge? No, they couldn't really do that much, all his stuff was too advanced. But what would they want then? Wait, what if they didn't know he knew anything, what if he was just a changeling to them? That would explain a lot.

"Jason," she started, running a hoof across his face now that the doctors had left. "Why did they do this to you?" A doctor tapped her on the shoulder, tapping on a clipboard.

"We ran a few quick tests, and in terms of the ones that came back with plausible results, compiled with the records of the injuries he came in here with, I have some bad news." Dash swiveled her head over slowly, waiting for him to continue. "With the injuries to his head and the swelling we could detect, he may not make it through the night. After that he could well be stuck in a coma." Dash felt several emotions plow into her. Another wave of grief, but above that anger, anger at herself for thinking it'd be over that easily, angry at the doctor for waiting this long to tell her.

After at least a minute, she managed to squeak out, "What're the chances he makes it?"

The doctor sighed. "I don't know in the slightest. I wish I did. If a pony had sustained the same injuries and made it to this point I'd say fifty-fifty or so, but like I said I'm just telling you what I know." He laid a hoof on her shoulder. "I'm sorry." She felt tears of frustration come to her eyes, and she latched onto the doctor on impulse, feeling him struggle for a few seconds before patting her on the back awkwardly. She finally became aware of herself and let go, moving back to the bed and hearing the door close behind her.

She threw an arm around Jason on the bed and let her tears run silently down the side of her face into the bed. Time started to stretch on into oblivion again until she was finally brought back out by the noise of the door opening again and the sound of a gasp. Dash peered up from the bed, noticing that Bon Bon had come by like Lyra said she would.

"Lyra said he looked bad, but this?"

"Yeah." She didn't really have much else to say. They stayed there in silence for a while until Bon Bon trotted over to a side table, putting a few roses in a vase.

"I never really thanked him for all he did. I wish we could've seen this coming." She stood for a few more minutes in silence, head hung, before walking back to the door. "I don't know how you bear to stay around him all this time Dash, I could never bear the stress." She opened the door and left, returning to the dinner rush, she assumed. She returned to her dozing, at some point managing to get to sleep.

Dash swept the rag over the thing in the corner again, inspecting the metal to make sure it was spotless. She had to say, this was definitely more interesting then remembering what had happened yesterday. She dipped the rag in a cup of water and went back to scrubbing, working in little circles. She took the rag away, admiring her own distorted reflection. She got off the bed to get some water, watching as the thing fell off and hit her hoof with the blunt end. She hissed in pain, sticking the hoof into her mouth as her eyes watered. Oh, man that hurt.

"Ow..." Somepony said. Exactly! At least somepony understands how much getting hit in the side of the hoof---

She looked over towards the bed, looking straight into Jason's open eye. A wight of worry immediately vanished off her shoulders. He tried to smile, frowning when he heard a cracking noise.

"Welcome back to the world of the living Jason." She said, trotting over and giving him a hug as a tear leaked out of the corner of her eye.

"Dash, that hurts."

"Oh, sorry." She let him out of her grasp. Before he could speak she leaned forward and caught him in a kiss, making sure to place her weight on the bed beside him, not wishing to crush him twice in a minute. She finally broke off the kiss, leaning back slightly before rolling over onto the bed next to him. She gingerly wrapped her hoof around his, gently squeezing.

"I missed you." She said, looking into his eyes.

"I missed you too." He pulled her into another gentle hug. "How long exactly was I here?" He gestured to the bed and the room.

"New record." She chuckled nervously. "A little over a full day. It wasn't fun."

"Yeah, I'll bet. If you were stuck like this and I couldn't do much I-- I guess I don't know what I'd do. I love you Dash." She only nodded, a stray tear leaking out of her eye. "Hey, don't cry..."

"I'm just so relieved that you're back."

He nodded, looking up at the ceiling from his back while keeping his arms wrapped around her. "What happened while I was out?"

"Not that much, compared to how much usually happens to us." She took a ragged breath, trying to calm herself. "Applejack and Twilight came in and apologized."

"What?"

"Yeah, weird huh?"

"I didn't think that was going to ever happen, I mean I'm not surprised they didn't trust me, though, considering I'm a member of a species that is completely based in trickery and manipulation and was involved in the Canterlot attack. From their point of view it almost makes sense. More sense than the whole thing with Zecora, at least."

"How can you look at it that calmly?"

"I dunno, I'm tired. Where's Scoots?"

"She went back to the house last night, and she's probably in school right now. I had Fluttershy check when she came by this morning." She paused. "Hey, about all that stuff after you were captured..." Jason shuddered, looking a little grossed out after a few things crunched.

"If it's alright, can I wait until there's more ponies around before I tell it? " Dash nodded, sighing slightly. A green blur came into the room, stopping in front of Dash. Lyra, apparently.

"Is he better?" She asked Dash.

"Yeah." Jason said, startling her into a tray that held several medical tools. They flew across the bed and a scalpel landed on the covers right in front of Jason. He jumped and struggled to push himself backwards, away from the knife until he tried to throw it away with his magic. He was met with the same pain in his head, and finally just swatted the thing away with a hoof. Dash was looking over worriedly, while Lyra smiled sheepishly.

"What did they do to you in there?"

He put a hoof to his chest, trying to get his heartbeat down. "Like I said, I'll tell you when we get some ponies together, it's really not a fond set of memories. We seriously need to get this thing off my horn." He touched it with a hoof, trying to pry it off. "I guess that'll be a job for Twilight."

"Doesn't that hurt?" Lyra asked, pointing to his body.

"Not that much, it looks like it should though. I mean my head and hoof both hurt a lot, but other than that I'm fine. What drugs do they have me on?"

"None, as far as I know." Dash said, "Luna did something."

"Luna was here?"

"Yeah, she was here to help break you out, but I guess you knew that already."

"What happened with the...guy?"

"Well here's where it gets weird. Luna said he was using a different form of magic, where you re-represent your conscience. It's called 'soul magic,' and this guy knew how it worked, which means that his body was probably miles and miles away. I really don't know if we can do anything against this guy, he seems like he's totally out of our league."

"Just when I thought it couldn't get any weirder here, this guy pops up. I'm sure we'll pull through, we always seem to do that one way or another."

"Yeah, but those were physical fights, this is something we don't even have a hope of matching hoof for hoof."

"Aren't you the little pessimist, Dash."

"Hey Jason!" Lyra broke in, evidently trying to diffuse the tension. "After you tell everypony what happened, you think you could tell me more about humans?" She smirked, a knowing look on her face. Jason looked over to Dash, who sighed.

"You told her?" He asked, raising an eyebrow. Funny how he couldn't do that as a human.

"I didn't really just tell her, she kinda knew something was up. She's one of the few ponies that actually trusted you, I didn't want to alienate her."

"Don't worry," Lyra said, "I won't tell."

Jason ran a hoof down his face and sighed. "Fine, I'll do it. How did you figure it out? More stuff came over?" She nodded and levitated the box out of her saddlebag, floating it over. He noticed the cover and smiled. "Man, I loved this movie."

"Movie?"

"Yeah, like a moving picture." Lyra seemed to understand, as far as he could tell.

"So what're these things on the box?"

"The humans?"

"No, like the things they're holding. Why's there an explosion?"

"Well, these guys are soldiers from my country and are holding guns, which are used to kill people. They're in a war in the Middle East against a bunch of terrorists, to simplify all this. Those terrorists all hate Americans and most of the rest of the western world, and some of them'll blow themselves up to take out American soldiers. This guy's running away from an explosive device that one of the terrorists made and stuck in the ground with the express purpose of trying to kill more americans. This guy's job is to defuse the bombs and make sure they don't go off, while the rest of his team helps him out. That's the movie in the nutshell."

"How did they make a movie when it's that dangerous?" Dash asked.

"These are actors, but it's based on a true story."

"Ah. I also found this." She picked the thing up off the ground, laying it on the bed. Jason jumped and turned it sideways immediately.

"That's a gun, Dash."

"Oh, cool!"

"It's not cool, what if a bunch of these come through and ponies figure out how to use them? Especially those ponies that captured me?" Both Lyra and Dash lapsed into silence, still apparently waiting for Jason to do something with the gun. He looked over and sighed. "Since you're so interested, this is a military grade assault rifle, called the AUG. The fact that it's this big probably goes to show that humans are way taller than we are now." He pushed a button and pulled out a curved piece of metal, looking at one end of it. He pulled out a shiny elongated thing, showing it to the two of them. "This is a bullet cartridge, the bullet and the gunpowder that propels it is all included. These go into the magazine, which feeds them into the gun to be fired." He slid the bullet back into the magazine and shoved it back into the gun.

"So where does it shoot from?" Lyra asked. "This hole here?" She put her hoof over the barrel's end. At least she wasn't looking down it or anything.

"Yeah. I can show you what it does later, but Dash seemed pretty impatient to hear what I had to say, and..."

"Oh, you wanna come to tell everypony at the Gilded Griffin?"

"Not everypony, just the ponies I know. I guess those who care. I just don't really want to say it over and over again. But only if you want me there, I don't want to intrude or anything."

"I'll go get stuff ready! Just come over when you're ready!" She darted out of the room. That mare definitely wasn't far from Pinkie energy levels. Actually that was probably an idiotic statement, no one was even close to Pinkie levels.

"Dash, why does my hoof hurt so much?" He shifted around, trying to get it to face him before he let out a grunt of pain and relented.

"They sheared it off, don't you remember?"

"I remember that it hurt like a bitch, but that I couldn't really look down. They had me..." He trailed off. "I'll get into it later. I'm so glad you came for me Dash, I don't know how much longer I could take that. I didn't-- I was having trouble staying sane through that, and it just wouldn't end." Dash felt a pang of remorse, she could've-- should've gotten there sooner. She threw her arms around him, pulling him into a hug.

"I'm sorry Jason, I should've been there sooner. I didn't want you to go through all of that, nopony deserves that."

"Dash are you crying?" He pulled her out of his shoulder, trying to get her to look him in the eye, although she kept shifting her gaze. "Dash, do you know why I didn't lose my sanity?" She shook her head, choking back a sob. "Because I knew you'd get there, and I knew I'd get back to you."

"You couldn't know that, from what the doctors said you're alive and not comatose because of luck."

"But I was right. You did come for me, and you got me out of there, and you made sure I ended up alive. That's what you've always done for me. I honestly don't deserve to have a mare like you." He ignored her protests and pulled her back into the hug.

"But, how can you--"

"You're too hard on yourself, Dash. No one else could do what you do." They stayed there for a few more moments as Dash tried to slow her breathing. Jason waited until he was sure she was feeling better before breaking the silence. "You wanna go over to The Gilded Griffin? I'm getting pretty sick of laying here already."

"Yeah, hold on a sec." She got up and left the room, leaving a slightly confused Jason to his own devices. He picked up the gun again, turning it over in his hooves. An automatic weapon. And it'd only taken a car crash, several angry mobs, a battle and torture to bypass the laws for legal ownership. Soooooo worth it.

He set the gun down and moved to get off the bed, struggling to get parts of the covers unstuck from the places where blood had soaked through the bandages. He rolled off and immediately collapsed onto his stomach on the the floor, struggling to get a hoof under himself. He got his fore hoof flat on the ground and pushed, straining with all the strength he could muster. He moved back a couple inches before his hoof slipped and he smacked his face into the ground, forcing him to stop trying and take a couple deep of breaths. How could he possibly be this weak?

Dash walked back in and gasped, immediately rushing over to Jason's side. He was glad she couldn't see any blushing through his chitin. He knew he shouldn't, but he felt embarrassed, annoyed even, that he couldn't even get up off the ground. Dash threw her hooves around him and awkwardly picked him up, leaning over and falling onto the bed where they bounced a couple times before coming to a rest.

"You okay?" She asked. He nodded, still embarrassed. She poked him in the nose lightly and giggled. "That was the reason I wanted you to wait. You're pretty heavy by the way." She got up and walked back over to the door, pulled a wheelchair through and positioning it next to the bed. "I talked to the doctors and they need to run a few quick tests, but as long as I don't do anything crazy with you we're good to go. At least for a while. They were pretty surprised that you even woke up, let alone that you'd be in any condition to do anything." She sat down on the bed next to him.

"I never said I wasn't tired, but some things are just more important. Like the plans, right? Today's Sunday?"

"Yeah, but you don't need to do that, not like this..."

"Yes I do, they're depending on me to get them the plans."

"Why don't you just have me do it? You could just tell me where to put the pieces."

"Fine Dash, you win. I'll start drawing after I get this stupid thing off my horn." He tapped it ruefully. "I guess it's good that I never really used magic that much. Except I still can't write by hoof. Or do you use your mouth?"

"Either, it depends on the writer. Some ponies just find it easier to do it one way or the other."

"I see. We just wrote with our hands. I kinda miss those sometimes." She nodded and held a hoof in front of her face, probably trying to imagine what it'd look like with fingers. A doctor walked in, the one that had tole her the bad news last night, Dash realized. He walked over to Jason, looking back and forth between his clipboard as he jotted down some notes. He held a pencil in front of Jason's face.

"Follow this with your eyes." He moved it back and forth a few times before writing some more phrases. He picked up a matchbook from the counter and struck one, holding it up to one of Jason's eyes. He blew it out and continued his note-taking. A few seconds later he looked back up.

"Well as far as I can tell you only have a minor concussion. Blood loss was large, but you should be recovering now. If you feel woozy or dizzy, come back here. Obviously don't attempt anything physical, chances are you'll be pretty weak for a while. Most of the rest of this is about food, but I gather you don't actually eat, so that's pretty pointless. Don't drink large amounts of water in one sitting, more food stuff, I think that's about it. You haven't been cleared from the hospital yet, you'll have to come back before five to stay the night here, then you're free to go, assuming nothing pops up." Jason groaned; he didn't want to be stuck here longer. Dash seemed to agree with him though, maybe she was right. It's not like he could fly up to their house anyway.

"Don't worry doc, I'll probably bring him back in one piece." Jason smirked at the Doctor's worried expression. If he hadn't known Dash, he'd probably be wearing the same face. The doctor tapped his pencil on the edge of the clipboard a couple times before nervously leaving the small room. Dash rolled off the bed, throwing a hoof out to Jason.

"Unsurprisingly, this is the first time I've had to do this, so don't expect me to do well."

"Don't worry, I've got you." She moved her hooves under his shoulders and pulled him the rest of the way off the bed, dropping him rather more quickly than she would have liked into the chair. Jason hit his bad hoof on the ground and hissed in pain as Dash finished pulling him into the chair. "Sorry about that." she said, laying a hoof on his shoulder reassuringly as She started to move the chair towards the door.

"Wait." She stopped moving, looking puzzled. "I'm shifting into some other form than this."

"Yeah, probably a good call." He took a deep breath and shifted into a stallion the same size with a white and light blue mane. Dash leaned to the side to see that he had stayed wing free, oddly enough. Something almost seemed to be missing against his new, navy blue coat.

"Kept the horn?"

"Yeah, I couldn't get rid of it with that thing still there."

"Ah, ready to go then?" He nodded and she started pushing again. They quickly crossed town to the Gilded Griffin, drawing only a few looks from the townsponies. Either they'd suddenly gotten much more friendly, or they didn't actually know it was him. Unsurprisingly, it was probably the latter. She stopped next to the door of the rustic diner, stepping in front of Jason to try to get the wheelchair through at the same time. Wanting to be more useful, Jason tried to stick out a hoof to keep the door propped open, and realized that it was the bad hoof immediately after running the bottom of it into the side of the door. A long string of swear words muffled by the fore hoof Jason was biting later, Dash pushed him up to the table where Lyra, Bon Bon, Twilight, Rarity and Applejack were already sitting.

Rarity looked shocked. She was the only one who hadn't seen Jason in the hospital, so that would make sense. She briefly whispered something to Applejack before getting something in response that seemed to shut her up. Or so she thought.

"Darling, doesn't that hurt?"

"Not as much as it looks like it would. The hoof, however, does." She leaned over the table to try to figure out what he was talking about he fore seeming to wish she didn't. She turned a rather bright color of green. "I'm assuming you want to know what exactly happened behind those walls?" They nodded. "Well, I'm going to give you the full story, but I really don't want to give it again, which is why I pulled you guys together. Feel free to leave in the middle if it gets too gruesome, but I'm not leaving anything out."

"Wait." Twilight said. She threw a glance across the table at Applejack, who sighed. "Listen, Jason. You are Jason, right?"

"Yeah, just trying not to attract attention."

She hummed thoughtfully before opening her mouth to speak again. "I know I didn't really trust you since you've been back, and I'm sorry. I just-- I couldn't take your trust from Celestia and Dash seriously enough, and I really should've. Mostly, though, I should've overlooked the fact that you're a changeling and given you the benefit of the doubt." She hung her head, looking defeated. "And I'm sorry for all that." Jason furrowed his brow.

"Ah guess I need to apologize to ya also there, Sugarcube. I've been mighty annoying, and you didin't really deserve a buncha' crazy ponies to be suspicious of you when you came back." Jason threw a questioning glance at Dash before returning his gaze to the two other mares.

"I accept your apology. I mean, it's not like it's that big of a deal..."

"It is though!" Twilight said, shaking her head like a madpony. "You deserved our trust and we never gave it to you! And we should have, just like Lyra or Bon Bon here." She gestured to the other ponies. "And I'm just so sorry."

"I said it didn't matter Twilight..."

"How can not be mad when you look like that?"

"Because it was my fault I got captured. It wasn't the fault of any of you, unless you gave them some sort of tip...?"

"No, of course not!"

"Well okay then, it's not your fault. Thanks for apologizing though, it means a lot." He shot a smile across the table at her, and she seemed to calm down. "Now, I guess I'll get to that story. It's not spectacularly great, and definitely not uplifting, but here goes nothing."

A ringing blow bounced of his face, cracking his head to the side. Jason opened his eyes to a burly stallion stepping backwards, nodding to another pony with some fog or something swirling over his face before continuing to back away. He wasn't particularly big from what Jason could see of his grey coat, but he held himself with an air of superiority. The boss, he figured. The pony let out a low laugh before walking through a table in front of himself. Jason's eyes went wide as he tried to figure out what kind of illusion the pony'd been using. He tried to move his arms, but they were tied by metal cuffs, as were his legs.

"Why don't I start by explaining why you're here, changeling. I need some information, and if you give it to me you're free to go. Oh wait, silly me, I need some other things also. My memory's really starting to go." He tapped Jason's cheek before pushing his head to one side, than the other.

"I'll start with an easy one," He said. "Where's your hive?"

"I don't have one."

"Come now, I just want to know where all your brothers and sisters are, that's all I ask. I'm not very patient, I would start speaking now."

"I don't have one."

"Oh, so we're going to be challenging here, hmm?" He gestured to the stallion behind him, who walked over. "Why don't you inform our guest about what we do to those who don't cooperate?"

"Sure thing boss." He put his hooves together with a cracking sound before leaning back and sinking a blow into Jason's upper chest. He felt the crack rather than heard it, and tried to shy away from the blow before he was hit again, lower down. The boss held up a hoof and the stallion stepped back.

"Now, where is your hive?"

"I already told you, I don't have one! If I did, I wouldn't hesitate to tell you." He cringed when another punch connected, feeling a few more cracks appear. "Fine," This would never work. "There's a hive in griffin territory to the east, that's all I know." The stallion smiled.

"I know you aren't part of the hive, changeling."

"Then why--"

"I wanted to check that that was the general location. You know, for posterity." He paused. "Now, for the interesting questions."

"Who are you?" Jason asked before he could continue.

"There you go again, breaking the rules." A hoof contacted his cheek. "I'm the only one that gets to ask questions around here." He took a moment to chuckle. "Now, just go ahead and tell me what position you hold in relationship to the princesses."

"I'm their janitor." Another hoof to the cheek. "Sorry, I'm actually part of her secret bobsled team." His head cracked to the side as a hoof hit his other cheek.

"I have all day, changeling. Nopony's going to want you back, not with how the townsponies act around you. Well, that blue one may be a problem, but no matter."

"She's going to break me out," He spit some blood through the pony, hearing it hit the ground under him. "And whatever the fuck you are, I'm personally going to kill you!" The burly stallion stepped forward and threw a hoof slightly lower, hitting the bottom of one of his fangs. Part of the tooth broke off and Jason hissed in pain, trying to get a hoof over to feel at the missing bone.

"Tisk tisk. If the ponies do come for you like you say, how do you know it won't be too late?" The stallion threw another hoof, hitting Jason in the side of the head and knocking him out.

"Jason?" Dash asked. He stopped mid sentence and turned to her.

"Yeah?"

"How did you know I'd come?"

"Because you would, I mean, that was a given. The only question was when you'd get there." He paused to grunt in pain. "Oh, Luna's spell is starting to wear off. Someone grab that trash can over there." Twilight floated it over, and Jason immediately took it in his hooves and threw up into it. Dash leaned over slightly and wrapped an arm over his shoulder, feeling slightly helpless yet again. Jason retched a few more times before setting down the can and leaning back in the chair.

"Ew..." He looked back across the table, noticing the startled expressions the other ponies.

"We can finish this later if you want..." Bon Bon said, looking slightly worried.

"No it's fine, it's just going to get worse. Now is better."

"Jason, there's blood in here!" Dash exclaimed, looking up from the trashcan.

"Yeah, I know."

"Well doesn't that worry you?"

"It would if I wasn't expecting it to happen, I guess." He turned to the table. "Can you get this thing off my horn Twilight?"

"Sure, just a second." A purple aura appeared around his horn, and the ring slipped off a couple seconds later, floating across the table and landing on the flat of her hoof. "There we go. You know, you can't really blame yourself for losing a fight when you didn't even have magic."

"I still could've done better." He ground a hoof against the side of the table. "Just let me finish, then you guys can ask me all the questions you want." They nodded, and he opened his mouth to continue.

"What were you trying to do, kill him?"

"No, I was just--"

Thump

Jason opened his eyes to find that he was still hanging from the manacles, and that the thump was apparently from the stallion that had punched him before he had passed out, now being replaced away by another stallion. He watched as the first stallion was picked up by the boss's magic and hurled into the wall, making another loud thump.

"Sorry about that interruption, it seems I had a slight breach of command." He chuckled. "Now, what was that job you had again?"

"I was a chair tester." The air in his lungs escaped as a blow hit his chest. He felt something give. Great, so how he had a broken rib. He took a few deep breaths, trying to ignore the pain as the rib pivoted around the break. A tear slid out of his eye and hit the ground, splashing much more loudly than he would've liked.

"Oh, liked that huh?" Jason figured he probably smirked, although the black fog around his face didn't exactly make that an easy thing to find out.

"Yeah, it was great fun." He huffed, trying not to breathe too deeply. After a while he couldn't be sure just how long he was in the room, punch after punch. He probably passed out a few more times, he couldn't be sure. Time just slurred into one long, never ending blur of motion and conversation that he was having trouble recalling. He knew he'd give eventually, there was a line for everyone. This pony was just toying with him, as far as he could see. Minutes, maybe hours later he got his answer.

"Listen, we've been here a while, and as much as I like watching you get beat up, I really don't have forever. I have to hand it to you though, you've been pretty resilient. So far you've only told me about your job, nothing specific about those ponies up there. How's that job going by the way?"

"Go fuck yourself."

"Oh, how I wish I understood all the ins and outs of whatever language that is. Maybe you'll have to teach a class." He chuckled. "But seriously now, let's get this process rolling." At another gesture, a stallion pushed up a cart with several metal tools resting on top. A pair of scissors floated off the table, floating over Jason's head and out of view. A moment later their presence became known as the tip of his ear got cut in one fell swoop. The corresponding flesh that fell past his face moments later told him that it wasn't just cut, it had been removed.

"Feeling more like talking?" Jason let out a grunt, too preoccupied to speak. "No? I'll just have to try harder. Oh well, I can accomplish a few things while I'm here." The scissors set themselves back down as a few syringes and a scalpel floated up off the table. "I've never been able to research a changeling before, I think I'll start with a couple of blood samples." The needles hit him through the cracks in his chitin and he stiffened as the stallion started to draw the blood. "Oh calm down now, this should be an honor."

"F-fuck you."

"Oh, you and your silly words." The filled syringes landed on the table, while the scalpel continued to float closer. "Now to get that information..." He accelerated the scalpel, sinking it into Jason's forehead and drawing it slowly across. Jason screamed into the darkness, arching his back in pain. He pulled out the scalpel and seemed to stand expectantly, as if waiting for him to cave.

"No? Fine, I have other tricks." A saw jumped off the table, quickly floating out of view below him. Then a grinding sensation started up at the bottom of his hoof, quickly blossoming into an inferno of pain as the saw got through the first half of his hoof. He thought, for a moment, about just giving him the information. Anything had to be better than this. He yelled out at least a few words as tears ran down his face, although he wasn't sure if they were even words in the first place. He felt the sensation stop, quickly followed by a quiet clunk on the ground. The boss took the hoof bottom in his aura and threw it into the darkness, just as a huge boom sounded through the building. The boss picked up the syringes in his magic, hearing a few more bangs echo through the building.

Some other sounds grew, briefly dropping off a moment before a bang and burst of light drew the room away from Jason's perception. His vision returned soon enough for him to see Dash, Luna, and a few other ponies, and twisted his head slightly to see the boss disappear. He dropped from the shackles a few moments later, and his head was propped up to look Dash in the face. "I knew you'd come for me." He said. Then there was this giant urge to cough, and he gave in, remembering the stabbing pain from the broken rib in his chest as he lost consciousness.

The ponies looked across the table at him, all wearing an expression he couldn't quite place. There was definitely some pity involved, he could feel that that much. Fear, maybe? He looked over at Dash, who seemed much less surprised. She wouldn't meet his gaze, evidently annoyed at herself for not getting there sooner. He threw a hoof around her, pulling her into a hug. She still felt guilty, he could tell, and that made him fell bad. He was the cause of that guilt, and he really didn't want her to feel guilt over something she had saved him from anyway.

"Dash, I don't want you to feel guilty over this, okay?" He shook her shoulders lightly. "You aren't to blame, and you're just making me feel bad about the fact that you feel like this." She stopped avoiding his gaze before finally looking into his eyes. Then she threw her arms around him and pulled him into a kiss, surprising him more than a little. She pulled back a few seconds later before turning back to her friends, who were now slack jawed for a different reason. Dash's cheeks turned bright red, and she hid her face in her hooves out of embarrassment. Jason could feel the same heat moving up in his face as well, albeit less than Dash. He could hear Lyra snickering across the table.

Twilight composed herself enough to break the silence first. "So you never caught his face?"

"No, he never let the cloud thing go away."

"And what information did you give him?"

"I know I gave away my job, what I did in the attack, and the code names of Team Green Bean, but other than that it's pretty foggy. Sorry..."

"Oh, it's no problem, well it is, but I didn't expect you to remember all of it."

"Yeah. God knows I tried."

"Who?"

"Huh? Never mind. Anyway, that's the story."

"Jason, stay hidden until you heal at least. It doesn't sound like those ponies need you anymore, but they also said you were in the way of their plans, so..."

"Don't worry, I'll stay on the down-low." He turned to Lyra." I think I still need to talk with you, right Lyra?" She seemed to brush off her proceeding emotions quickly, and immediately started ushering the others out excitedly. Bon Bon walked over to the door, turning the 'closed' sign to 'open,' and then walking into the kitchen, evidently to prepare for the ponies that were bound to come in for a late lunch. Lyra sat back down in a chair, looking across the table eagerly at Jason, while Dash sat next to him nervously.

"So, what do you want to know?"

She seemed to briefly loose her energy as she tried to think of a question, or maybe just figure out which one to ask first. She perked back up, having come up with something to ask.

"How big are humans? The books didn't really have very good descriptions."

"Six or so feet tall for males, maybe five and a third for females, I think. Arm-span's about the same as the height."

"Wow, you're giant!"

"Probably just because we walk on our 'hind' legs." He yawned. "Which isn't too hard by the way. Figured you'd ask that next."

"Yeah. So what different sub-species of humans are there?"

"You mean like pegasi or unicorns for ponies?" She nodded. "Well basically people just have different builds or skin colors. We're like a bunch of earth ponies without any specific skill at growing things."

"Well how do you survive?"

"Technology, we can't do things with magic, so we invent machines that do stuff for us. One guy can harvest ten or so acres of wheat in a day with one such machine." Her jaw dropped.

"But, that's almost a quarter of Applejack's farm, and that takes her and her family weeks to harvest!"

"Well that's technology. We have something called the internet which has more information uploaded to it in a single day than you have in all the libraries in Equestria combined." That statement caught Dash's attention, and she looked over with a doubtful expression. Jason chuckled. "But the craziest part is that most of the world can access it, and can send information to someone across the world in seconds." He chuckled again when Dash's doubtful expression intensified. He wished he had a wine glass to hold and say true story.

"You can't be serious." Dash said.

"I'm completely serious. If anyone from my world heard you say magic existed, they'd call you crazy."

"Am I going to understand anything about modern human advances?"

"Probably not, we aren't those cavemen that used to be here anymore." He remembered something that he had wanted to say for a while. "Hey Dash, remember those rockets I told you about?" He immediately piqued her interest, and she looked over at him excitedly. "Still that speed demon from all that time ago, huh?"

"Would you really want it any other way?"

"No, not really. But listen, we sent a couple men to the moon using rockets," Lyra gasped. "And those went over sixteen thousand miles per hour." Dash got a far off look in her eyes for a moment, evidently trying to imagine that kind of speed.

"Sixteen thousand..." She muttered under her breath. "Wow..."

"That's in space though Dash, there's no air friction out there."

"I know, but still, sixteen thousand miles per hour."

"Lyra, I'd love to talk more, but I'm really tired, and I still don't feel that good." She nodded, looking slightly crestfallen. "But listen, I'll be happy to come in another time if you really want questions answered, just, not right now."

"Yeah, I understand, but just so long as you come back soon."

"Like I said, I will." He yawned again. "But right now I have a somewhat lumpy hospital bed calling my name."

"Okay, thanks!" He simply nodded, feeling more and more tired by the second. Dash rolled him over to the hospital, accidentally running over a small rock on the way and jostling him awake. Not that he was totally asleep yet anyway...

Dash pushed him into the room and quickly helped him into bed, before he remembered something. "Dash, Get me some paper. I need to get the rest of those plans down." She nodded and walked over to the small counter in the room, grabbing a few pencils and papers. Jason got to work immediately, madly scribbling before he would eventually lose the battle to stay awake. He put the pencil down a few minutes later, looking through the pages to see if he'd made any mistakes.

"Okay, so these have labels corresponding to land features, and should match parts of land just outside Equestria's border. This one up here is really important because of how close this city is to the Equestrian border. It'll only take a few days to get there, so we need to make sure that's planned out. It didn't look that important, but hey, you never know right?"

"Yeah, I'll get these sent off." She turned to leave.

"Wait." She turned back around. "Could you stay here, at least until I'm asleep?"

"Scared?"

"No, I just want to spend time with you." He twiddled his hooves around nervously.

"Why are you so nervous? It's not like I'd say no." She trotted over and rolled into bed next to him. "Don't expect me to be here when you wake up though, I still have to get those plans together." He chuckled and pulled her into a hug.

"I love you Dash."

"Love you too Jason." She ran a hoof through his mane, careful to not brush any of the cuts that crisscrossed his face or shoulder. She watched him fall asleep in a matter of only a couple of minutes before leaning in to kiss his forehead just below the horn but above the cut, and carefully getting up to leave. Jason shifted around a little after she left, grasping for the mare that was no longer present. Dash smiled and left the hospital, taking off for her house.

She'd hate to jinx herself, but at least things were finally getting better.

Dash landed in her front yard, pulling the papers out of her saddlebag to look them over. A gust of wind blew one out of her hoof, and she immediately reached out to grab it. The paper flew out of her reach, and she shoved the other papers back inside one of the pockets before taking off after the escapee. She dove and twisted after the page, finally allowing herself to have fun while flying. With all the stress since they'd gotten back, she hadn't really been able to just fly and relax.

The paper took a sudden dive and she kept after it, swooping down and catching it in her hoof. She reached back and stuck it into the saddlebag with its brethren before making sure the pouch was closed and taking a quick barrel roll. She threw a quick turn around a passing cloud, diving above and below two more immediately afterwards. She ran through a few more tricks before starting back towards the house.

An idea struck her as she remember watching Jason fly Scoots to school one of the days she was working weather. He had done that weird thing with his wings, where he'd just pulled them in and flipped by sticking out his wingtips to change direction. Simple really, but it wasn't a thing she would have though to do, considering that the stemming tricks weren't particularly technical or fast. She decided to try something, and sped up before tucking her wings in, sticking out the wingtips to start twisting.

She was right when she had thought that it wasn't all that tough to do, but the novelty definitely increased it's fun value. When she pulled out of the twist she quickly flattened out and looked at her surroundings. She had made it back to the house, and quickly landed before entering and trotting into the kitchen. She grabbed an apple and took a few bites, trying to sate the hunger she had just recently realized she had. She threw the core onto the countertop, making sure that it wouldn't roll off before attacking another apple. It was a good thing she had put in that marble countertop a while ago, considering all the food that had gone through when it was just cloud.

"Anypony home?" Scoots yelled from the other room. Dash opened her mouth to yell back to her, but instead let out a long, loud burp. She immediately broke down in laughter, rolling around on the floor and enjoying the sudden lack of stress. Scoots walked in and wiped an eye, evidently she had enjoyed the answer to her question as well. Dash got up and wiped her eyes, letting out a few residual laughs.

"Is Jason okay?" Scoots asked, giggling a few more times before she finally calmed down.

"Yeah, Scoots, he woke up a couple hours ago. He's getting better, although he still doesn't feel too good."

"Can we visit him later?"

"Sure, Scoots. He wanted me to put these other parts of the plan on the map before I do anything else, because they were supposed to be due today. I said that it could probably wait, but you know Jason..."

"Ooh, can I help?"

"Sure, Scoots." She paused. "Just let me eat about five more apples first. No, better make it six." Scoots giggled and trotted over to grab an apple for herself. Dash inhaled a couple more apples before finally trotting out of the room and over to the map. She laid out the papers on top of a blank section before she started carefully moving the pieces, occasionally hovering over the table to allow herself to reach some of the ones that were more centered. She hadn't really gotten a very good look at the map prior to now, and she couldn't believe just how detailed it turned out to be.

She was surprised just how much Jason had to do when she finally got to the last page of his directions. It had been at least a couple hours, and even with Scoots helping her where she could, it was still a tedious and long process. Finally she sighed and hovered off the table, landing and looking over her work. She made a few minor adjustments, moving pieces to nearby high ground, and eventually decided that it was up to code. She walked over to the pad of paper, quickly picking up the nearby pencil and scrawling 'Here're the plans' before pressing the button.

Another message popped up a few seconds later, 'Why the delay?'

Dash sighed and wrote back 'It's a long story.' The pony at the other end seemed to accept that answer, and didn't write back. She stood there a few more seconds, trying to make sure she didn't miss another incoming message before turning away from the map and back to Scoots.

"So you wanted to go visit Jason?"

"Yeah! I mean, if he's up to it..."

"It's been at least a couple hours, I'm sure he's rested by now."

"That was a cool explosion yesterday Dash."

"Oh, you think so?"

"Well, I guess I've only really seen the apple and that thing yesterday, but still! Can we blow something else up, can we?"

"We'll see Scoots." Dash mussed up the filly's mane affectionately. "Now let's get going." Scoots nodded and broke into a mad dash for the door, tripping over a slightly uneven part of the floor and face planting.

"I'm okay." She said a few seconds later. "That would've hurt a lot more if this wasn't cloud."

"Trust me Scoots, the number of times I've fell down the stairs and stuff around here, I know that better than anypony. Now come on." She helped the kid up and walked through the door, grabbing a few things in the process. She made sure Scoots hadn't lagged behind before she took off, making her way towards the hospital. Scoots pulled up beside her, startling Dash with how quickly she had caught up. "You're getting better at flying." She said, smiling at the little orange filly.

"Oh really? I've been practicing a little, nothing serious, but I didn't feel like I was really improving that much."

"How could you not notice that? You're flying at what used to be your top speed, you've got your rhythm down, and you aren't wobbling. Nice improvement Squirt!" Scoots smiled ear to ear.

"Thanks Dash! Maybe one day I'll be as good as you!"

"I'm sure you will, Scoots." She landed on the street, waiting for Scoots to do the same before starting to walk over to the hospital.

"Hey Dash, Sugarcube Corner is right over there, can I go get a few cupcakes?" Man this kid got distracted easily.

"Sure, just grab one for me and Jason." She stopped to grab a few bits out of her saddlebag, turning to hand them to Scoots, who immediately stuck them under her wing and went running off. Dash shook her head, trying to remember if she had ever had that much energy. Unable to recall a specific memory, she resumed her walk, pushing open the hospital doors and walking inside. She wasn't sure to be annoyed that Jason was forced to stay here overnight. She knew he didn't like being cooped up here, and that it was probably better to get him out and about. But that hoof...

She walked into his room, quietly closing the door behind herself and trotting over to the bed. She shrugged and crawled in next to him, throwing a hoof over his form. He was worryingly cold to the touch, but then again there weren't that many blankets here, and she supposed he probably hadn't complained, considering how out of it he looked. She pulled him into his chest, rocking him forward and backward in an attempt to wake him up.

She started to get worried after he continued to sleep despite her continual attempts. She increased the intensity of her shaking, trying to tell herself that everything had to be fine. A few tears welled up in her eyes before Jason finally stirred. She stopped shaking him around, throwing her arms around him and pushing her muzzle into his shoulder, letting out the tears of fear. Jason patted her on the back confusedly, evidently trying to figure out what the hell was going on.

"Dash, what happened?"

"You took a while to wake up, and you were cold, and I just got scared." He put his own hooves around her, squeezing lightly.

"You worry too much Dash. Seriously, you're stressing yourself out too much over nothing." He leaned over and kissed her on the forehead.

"Well excuse me for worrying about my colt friend, who just got tortured and is all cut up in the hospital."

"Oh shush." He smirked. "When I get out of here, and I'm not so tired all the time, I guess I'll have to help you loosen up a little."

"You better not be teasing me about that." She said.

"You know, it's usually the guy that says that, or something to that extent."

"Well it's been a long time." She rebutted. Jason chucked. "By the way, Scoots is coming, so I might as well not make it look like we're in bed together already." She giggled and got up, sitting down closer to the foot of the bed. She reached out and grabbed a blanket from the counter, spreading it out and covering him. "Like I said, you were cold."

"Yeah, thanks."

"How's your hoof?" She asked.

"I dunno." He shifted his weight, shoving it out from under the covers. "Can you see that?" Dash peered over, looking at the hoof intently. It didn't look that bad anymore, it was all scabbed over at least, although there was still a slight bulge in the middle and around the sides, where she assumed the bones had been cut. Considering how it had looked yesterday, or even this morning, it was definitely healing. She didn't really know how long it'd be until he could walk on that, maybe only another day at this rate, maybe a week.

"It doesn't look that bad, it's definitely healing. Does it still hurt?"

"Not as much, unless it touches anything. Then it hurts like hell." She looked the rest of him over, at least what she could see of him through the disguise he had created this morning. From what she could tell, the cracks, cuts as they appeared now, were healing pretty nicely. The cut on his forehead was worrying though, it didn't seem much better than it was on day one.

"Dash!" A voice yelled from out in the hallway.

"And that would be Scoots." She said to Jason. "In here Scoots!" The filly walked by the door, looking in and smiling towards the two of them. She set her three cupcakes down in a surprisingly controlled manner before she dove for the bed, fluttering over the covers and knocking Jason over in a hug.

"I missed you Jason, I thought you were gone." He could feel her smile into the fur of his neck, as he raised his hooves to hold her to his chest. His rib hurt, but he could worry about that later. A click sounded from across the room.

"They can't kill me that easily Scoots." He looked up, trying to figure out what had made the click noise, and found Dash, flopping a picture around in her hoof. "Why the pictures, Dash?"

"When you were first taken, I realized that eventually if you never turned up I would forget what you look like, and I didn't want that to happen."

"Aww... aren't you the sweet one." He said. He let Scoots out of the hug, and she laid down next to him in the bed. "So did you get your cutie mark while I was gone?" He asked her.

"I wish." She turned her flank, showing him it's blank appearance. "How did Tiara get her's so soon?"

"Well what's her talent?"

"I don't know."

"Sounds like a great talent if she's so keen on telling everyone. Think of it this way Scoots, how fun is it to win a game when there's no challenge?"

"Well, it's kinda boring."

"So, how fun would it be if you got your cutie mark on the first thing you tried?"

"But I'd have my mark!"

"Yeah, but you have fun with your friends, right?" She nodded. "Then what's the big deal? Like I said before, it really doesn't mean that much." Scoots opened her mouth to speak before Jason blocked it with a hoof. "No more buts, Scoots." She crossed her arms, looking annoyed. Silence descended over the room.

"Does anyone else want to get out of this stupid room?"

"What would you even want to do Jason?" Dash asked from the foot of the bed.

"Well, I know tons of stuff I'd like to do to you..." Dash blushed. Jason looked over at Scoots, and it looked as if that had gone right over her head. He chuckled.

"Anything we can do right now?"

"Well, in all seriousness, I could test that gun, talk to Lyra again, go ov-- Ohh, I need the trashcan." He floated the trashcan over to the side of the bed and threw up into it much the same as last time. "Why...does this...keep happening?" He managed to ask between retches. He finally pulled his head back upright, looking slightly more tired than he had before. There was a light clang as the can touched down on the floor. Dash sighed and got up, evidently intent on checking the damage. She walked over to the can and sighed, tapping the side with her hoof.

"This isn't as bad as the last one, but that doesn't say much. There's also a lot less, but you probably knew that." A knock on the door caused all three of them to jump as they swiveled their heads towards the invader. Twilight nervously looked into the room, as if waiting for one of them to say 'come in.' Jason gestured with a hoof and she entered, sitting down in a chair with the same degree of nervousness.

"So I guess you guys are probably wondering why I'm here. A couple reasons actually." She levitated a piece of parchment out of her saddlebag, floating it over to Jason. "Celestia sent me this a little while ago. She knew what happened since Luna got back, although she didn't yet know that you'd awoken."

Dear Twilight Sparkle,

As I'm sure you're aware about the unfortunate events leading to Jason's capture and the inevitable consequences this has, both for his friends and for Equestria as a whole. He was the planner for original Equestrian troop movements, and without him a replacement must be found. If she has not done so already, tell Rainbow Dash that she must finish the plans. She was the closest to Jason, and should be able to emulate his battle strategy the closest. From what Luna has told me, Jason's chances do not seem to be particularly good, considering what the doctors had told her. I have caught wind of the way ponies treat him in Ponyville, and hope that you are not a part of this, my faithful student. Dislike is not punishable by law, but I hope you can at least make some effort to trust him.

I'm watching you,
Princess Celestia

Jason passed the letter to Dash. "Does she always put something creepy on the end there?" He asked Twilight.

"Only recently, why? What've you been getting?"

"Well, there was an 'I know where you live,' and an 'I know what you're thinking' in there somewhere. I think it's a joke, but if it's not, that'd be really weird." Dash snorted in laughter, evidently she had reached the end of the letter.

"I just generally get the ones with mentor somewhere in the name."

"So was there a follow up letter?"

"Yeah, I told her you'd woke up and that the plans should get sent, although in hindsight I really didn't have any evidence that they would be. You did send them, right?" Jason looked over to Dash, realizing that he should have probably asked about that already.

"Yeah, of course. They were probably a little late, but I still got them over there."

"She sent me this a couple of hours later, after the plans had arrived. Maybe they just got them because she didn't actually mention them in any detail. Anyway, here." She floated over the other letter.

Dear Twilight Sparkle,

I have important news to get to Jason when he's up to reading this. From what Luna told me he doesn't look good, and it shouldn't be particularly time intensive. If he gets this before the end of today, that should be fine. Shining Armor has approved the plans for use, and we will be mobilizing as close to schedule as possible. With the huge influx of volunteers from the bigger cities and the beginnings of steel production, the Equestrian army is stronger than it's ever been.

On another subject, Luna has informed me about the stallion and his proficiency in soul magic, and has made plans to start investigating the issue herself. I will try to keep you updated on anything she discovers.

I have eyes in the back of my head,
Princess Celestia

Jason handed the letter over to Dash as he had with the last one, turning back to Twilight. She was looking around worriedly. "This is what I wanted to talk to you about, soul magic."

"Oh yeah, that stuff."

"I'm pretty surprised it popped up at all, it's been so many years since anypony even attempted to use it."'

"The last guy went crazy?"

"Yeah, took him all of five seconds. I don't know why he even attempted it. Must've been pretty crazy already. I never really tried it for myself, the risks kinda outweighed the benefits and all." Jason nodded, trying to stifle a yawn. "Tired?" She asked.

"Yeah, it's really starting to annoy me, I can't do anything. I couldn't get up off the floor yesterday without Dash's help." He looked away, too embarrassed to continue.

"I'm sorry to hear that, but I do have some good news, at least." She reached into her saddlebag and pulled out a bag, tossing it onto the bed. Dash opened the bag and gasped.

"There's like a million bits in here!"

"Celestia sent those to cover the medical bill, anything else is just your pay."

Dash passed the bag to Jason. "Wow, what was she smoking when she sent this?"

"What?" They both asked.

"What was she thinking?" He rephrased.

"She felt bad about the stuff that was happening, she said something about the fact that she was annoyed she couldn't help more."

"Well this is, generous of her..." He yawned again. "I'm not sure if I'm tired because I just don't have a chance to wake up or what." He shook his head, trying to perk up. It didn't work, but his nose started to run. He held a hoof under his nose, looking around for a tissue. He threw his hoof out to point, replacing it by holding the other one under his nose.

"Can you bring that over here Dash?" He asked. She cringed and brought over the box. Jason grabbed one, only now realizing that he had a bloody nose and his hoof was covered in blood. He sighed and started wiping off his hoof before using it to hold a tissue over his muzzle. Dash grabbed his other hoof and wiped it off, sighing herself before tossing the bloody tissue into the trash, where a slight splash noise reminded her what else was in there. It was kinda strange that the vomit didn't really have a smell to it. Funny how she just thought that.

Twilight got up, making her way towards the door. "I have to go, sorry guys. I really don't feel comfortable intruding into your family, either."

"It's fine, Twilight, you don't have to go."

"Like I said, I have to go do some stuff, so, see you tomorrow?"

"Sure." Twilight moved to exit, stopping suddenly when she saw the gun again.

"Did you know what that is, Jason?" She asked, turning back to him.

He took the tissue away from his nose for a moment before answering. "Yeah, it's a gun. How about tomorrow morning, get Lyra, Bon Bon, and the rest of your friends, along with things for target practice, and I'll test it out."

"Oh, wow! I can't wait! I'll come by Tomorrow and get you."

"Oh, do it before school so Scoots can watch." He shifted his attention to his daughter. "See if your friends want to watch also, Scoots." She looked up and nodded before laying her head back down.

"Sure thing, bye!" Twilight happily bounded out of the room, disappearing down the hall. Jason looked at the clock, which read six. He laid back, sighing as his head sank into the pillow. He took a deep breath, cringing as as his rib pain suddenly flared up. He heard Dash slide into bed next to him, and turned to throw an arm around her, immediately planting a kiss on her cheek. She giggled and blushed, pulling herself in closer. Scoots mumbled something and twitched; evidently she had been as tired as the rest of them.

Dash wrapped her arms around Jason's back, frowning slightly when she couldn't find his wings. It was just something she'd grown used to, the soft bushy wings on his back. It wasn't bad that he didn't have wings, but it was definitely something she missed, it was something that just seemed to be part of his identity.

"Miss the wings?" She jumped at the sound of his voice, before guiltily looking him in the eyes and nodding. "No big deal Dash, I really don't care what you want me to look like. You still know it's me anyway, so it doesn't matter." He reached behind himself and moved her hooves before a flash of green flames from behind his back and on his side indicated the change. She tentatively returned her hooves to their position around his back, sighing contentedly when she found the soft feathers of his wings.

"You really like those wings, huh?"

"I'm not sure I would if you didn't let me get so used to them." She giggled, raking her hooves through the feathers playfully. "Goodnight Jason."

"I love you Dash." He replied. She leaned forward and nuzzled his cheek affectionately in response before laying her head into his shoulder and closing her eyes. Jason did the same, laying his head above hers on the bed, and quickly falling asleep.

"Guys wake up! Wake up!" Jason opened his eyes just in time to see Scoots, who was bounding on the bed, come down towards his hoof in an almost comedic manner. She seemed to see what was going to happen and opened her mouth in a gasp, before her fore hoof finally made contact.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!" He grabbed his hoof through the blanket, trying to ease the pain. Dash woke up next to him with a start, trying to figure out why Jason was rolling all over the bed yelling. She put out a hoof to stop him, making sure that his face was looking in her general direction.

"Jason, what the hell happened?!?!"

"Scoots landed on my hoof, apparently it hasn't healed." He groaned before he let go of the hoof and turned to Scoots.

"I'm sorry, Jason."

"Yeah, it's fine Scoots, just make damn sure not to land on this hoof again." She nodded sadly, and he patted her on the shoulder, trying to get her to perk up. She seemed to lighten up at least slightly, and he smiled.

"Twilight hasn't come here yet?"

"No she did, she wanted me to get you guys up. Last time she woke someone her mane got singed, so..."

"So she put you in her place?"

"No I'm just kidding, she had to get the rest of the ponies together, we're meeting over by Sweet Apple Acres."

"Right now?"

"Well she came by a few minutes ago, so I guess so."

"Okay, well I could definitely use some time out of this place." He tested his hoof on the ground, wincing slightly. "Dash, could you just put the wheelchair over here, I really don't want to walk on this."

"No, of course I won't. Jeez Jason, what do you take me for?" She smirked and pushed the chair over to the bedside, getting ready to help him over.

"No, Just hold it, I want to do it myself."

"You don't have to be all prideful about this."

"Yeah, but I want to see if I'm getting stronger." He pushed himself over to the side of the bed with his arms and operational hoof, and successfully transferred onto the wheelchair. "Ha. I am."

She rolled her eyes. "You don't need to worry about proving yourself to me, Jason."

"It's not like that, when I woke up my biggest fear was that I'd be paralyzed or something, and I honestly couldn't handle that. Then after that passed, I was worried I'd never get back to my full potential. I know it sounds stupid, but I'm really trying to reassure myself that things are getting better."

"Yeah, I understand. It makes a lot more sense when it's your body that's injured and not your wings specifically. It doesn't work as well that way."

Jason snorted. "I'll bet." He paused. "Hold on a sec. He leaned forward and shifted his green wings away, checking with a hoof that they were indeed gone. After confirming they were, he leaned back and let out a sigh.

"More comfortable?"

"Yeah, but being an alicorn is a dead giveaway that I'm, well, me. I kinda like these colors, I don't want to come up with something else."

"Just make sure you don't forget the original one we made up, I like that one."

"Yeah, you were practically drooling over that."

"I wasn't!"

"Whatever you say, Dash." She wheeled him over to the door, pulling Scoots away from her adventure in discovery around all the medical supplies. Jason picked up the gun and magazines in his magical grasp, setting them across his lap. Five magazines, six including the one in the gun. That was thirty times six, assuming all six were full, for a total of one hundred and eighty. Not too shabby, but there were no more bullets available, unless some more came over, and that seemed pretty unlikely given how random the stuff was that came through.

He had stuck a fair amount of possibly incriminating junk back at the house, including a few action figures, some magazines, a crappy children's movie. He couldn't have been the only one to be finding this stuff, though, and keeping his origins a secret seemed increasingly far fetched.

His thoughts took a sudden shift. Mobilization was today, hopefully that was going well. There weren't that many ponies in the Equestrian military though, it couldn't possibly get that hectic. But they hadn't really done something like this before, he supposed. As long as it was going well in Canterlot, he was satisfied. There was a griffin town pretty close to Canterlot, they would probably be the first soldiers to see heavy combat.

Dash stopped the wheelchair unexpectedly and he lurched forward. The reason for stopping became clear as he looked up from the surprisingly clean gun to see a fairly large group of ponies, Twilight and her friends, the rest of the CMC and Lyra and Bon Bon. He was slightly surprised they had all showed up. Twilight had a bulging bag hanging in the air, evidently she had taken target practice fairly seriously. All the ponies were looking at him expectantly, waiting for him to do something.

"Okay, so you've all come here to see this gun in action. Can you start setting those things up on the fence, Twilight? Make sure there's nothing behind them." She nodded and happily trotted over to the fence, quickly setting out several items, one of which Jason was completely lost on. Whatever, he'd ask later.

"So this is called an assault rifle, relatively recently invented." He pulled out one of the magazines, extracting one of the bullets. "This is a casing of a bullet, the gunpowder and projectile are inside. When you press this trigger, the gun hits a primer in the back of the bullet and the gunpowder explodes, sending the bullet out the barrel." He gestured to the parts. "Then a new bullet is pushed in as the shell casing from the old one flies out here."

"So how many years ahead of us is this?" Twilight asked, having apparently set up all the targets.

"Oh, I dunno, I guess it depends on when you invent gunpowder. If you follow the same pace as we did, that's at least a few hundred years. But you have steel, and you've seen this, maybe a little less. It's hard to say. I guess after a certain point the only thing that gets better about these is the size of the bullet and how tough it is to break."

"Well let's see it in action!" Dash yelled from behind him, surprising Jason with her energy.

"Fine, wheel me over near that tree." Dash pushed him over quickly, evidently as excited as the others seemed to be, except for Fluttershy, naturally. "Help me down from here, I'm going to lay on my stomach." She stared at him for a moment before she helped him onto the ground and passed him the gun. He smiled up at her and took it, trying to shoulder it as best he could. Twilight had set up eight targets, most of which were random things she had found. A ratty book, slightly surprisingly, some full jars, and other assorted things. There was some sort of yellow cube stuck on one of the fence posts at the end.

"What's that yellow thing?"

"It's this gel stuff that does a pretty good job of mimicking weapon damage to ponies."

"Ah. You guys are going to want to step back and cover your ears. This is loud." They moved backwards and Jason pulled his ears back in an attempt to shield them from the noise. He turned off the safety and changed the gun to semi automatic, before making sure he knew where the trigger was. He lined up the red dot sight with the first target, the book, and fired.

BANG!!

There was a small explosion of paper as the book flew off the fence. The ponies behind him gasped, and he sighted on the next target, moving through the jars in rapid succession.

BANG!! BANG!! BANG!!

The jars exploded, sending bits of glass and their contents flying. He moved on down the line, shooting and receiving corresponding oohs and aahs until he finally got down to the gel thing. The bullet hit the gel and went through, impacting an apple tree behind it. Jason ejected the magazine, turning the gun's safety on. The other ponies had already trotted over to the target area to look at the damage. Applejack and Twilight were focused on the apple tree and gel stuff respectively. Pretty soon they came back, most of them grinning. Fluttershy seemed to have enjoyed herself, and had evidently not run off.

"That was awesome!" Dash yelled as she came trotting up. "You were just like bang bang bang and those things were exploding!" The rest of the ponies came up and offered similar comments, although Applejack was a little pissed for damaging her apple tree. They quickly went their separate ways however, Rarity and Applejack volunteered to take the foals to school, Lyra and Bon Bon had to get back to the Gilded griffin, and the others had left to do tasks that they hadn't gone into any detail about.

"You guys going back to town?" Lyra asked Dash and Jason.

"Yeah."

"Well, since we're going the same way, and we have some time..."

"Fine, ask me some stuff." Her face lit up and she quickly grabbed a piece of paper out of her saddlebag, holding it in front of her face.

"I came prepared." She smirked. "So what kind of diet do humans have?" Bon Bon looked over confusedly. Jason facehoofed.

"Lyra, you didn't tell her?"

"No, Dash told me not to."

"Yeah, but now she's here, and..." He sighed, looking at the other mare. "Bon Bon, I used to be a human from a place that's most likely on a different planet. If you don't know much about humans Lyra can fill you in."

"Um...wow. This is a lot to take in." She looked over at him again, apparently trying to see through the changeling he appeared as. "Okay Lyra, go on."

"So yeah, same question."

"Well, we were omnivores, so we ate meat, but not ponies if that makes you feel better. I guess I should also point out that besides humans there isn't any other intelligent life. So yeah, we ate pigs, cows, turkey, chicken. And it was delicious." He paused. "But I don't really get to eat any of that here, and it's not like I'm really going to try to get meat."

Lyra seemed to shake the shock of that question off fairly quickly. "So, what d--"

"Hold on a sec." Jason went silent for a few seconds, before opening his mouth. "We used to have teeth like this, at least as far as I remember." Bon Bon gasped at the canines before he re-closed his mouth.

"So what are physical skills of humans? Speed? Agility?"

"Well, we aren't that fast, we can't jump that high, but we are pretty agile, we can change direction pretty quickly, climb trees and rocks... They have this sport called parkour, and that's basically people jumping off of buildings and not hurting themselves because of how humans are built. We can just roll when we hit the ground, stuff like that."

"And mental?"

"Well, we're a pretty smart race, I mean there's a fair number of idiots, but I guess those are everywhere anyway. It's tough to compare to ponies here because I don't really know that many of you. But lets just say equal for the time being." Dash pulled up at the hospital, and Lyra quickly bid her goodbyes. As Jason watched them walk away, Bon Bon immediatel barraged Lyra with about a million questions that she had politely withheld.

Jason turned to Dash with a smirk. "You know, I'm feeling pretty energetic today, and my wings aren't hurt, and Scoots is gone, and the house is riiiiiiiight over there, and--"

"Okay Jason, I'm dropping off the wheelchair first. We might as well not have ponies finding an empty wheelchair. They probably aren't going to assume that a miracle occurred."

"Oh, but it would be funny to see their reactions."

"Whatever, Jason." She pushed him inside and into the hospital room before leaning the gun up against the wall and helping him off of the wheelchair. She draped one of his forelegs over her neck, making sure he kept the bad hoof above the ground. He tapped it a few times experimentally before setting it down.

"It's not that bad, at least not unbearable."

"Just form some wings on there and get me into bed already."

"I'll just stop talking then." Dash giggled and led him out of the room after he took away the horn and replaced it with a pair of wings. They walked out of the hospital and carefully took off.

"You sure you're up to this Jason?"

"Yeah, it's just been a while. I'm referring to flying in this sentence, by the way" He rose steadily upward, and they eventually reached the house. Flying wasn't too tough normally, unless he was really trying to go fast, and he was pleased that he wasn't heavily winded when he reached the level Dash's house was at. They landed and hobbled inside, moving towards the stairs. Jason brought his head over and kissed her on the cheek, quickly moving over to her lips. They stopped in the middle of the living room and kissed, before Dash finally pushed him away with a hoof.

"You. Me. Bedroom. Now." She smirked. "Maybe we can find out just what you meant by your statement of how many things you wanted to do to me."

Jason jiggled the fishing rod slightly, trying to snag one of the fish that were swimming around the bottom of the pond. One of the fish finally went for a bite, and he quickly pulled it out of the pong, throwing it into the fishing net, where it started flopping around. He chuckled and threw the hook back into the pond. He heard some wing flaps and hoofsteps soon after, before Dash walked up next to him, sitting down on the rock adjacent. She threw a wing around his back as they stared silently over the little pond.

"So this is the pond that was right next to where you came in?"

"Yeah, this is where it all began. And I'm so glad it did." He leaned over and nuzzled her cheek, causing her to giggle.

"I'm just glad these last few days haven't been hectic like the rest. And that Scoots has school every day." She brushed a hoof across his chest, easing it up to his face before pulling him over for a kiss. The line tugged, and Jason quickly turned to pull out the hook. He snagged another fish, and pulled it out of the water, transferring it to the bag. He laid his rod down and stretched, for all this time he only had two fish. And he got both of them within five minutes.

"Apparently you're good luck Dash."

"Oh am I?"

"Yeah, most of the time I was just sitting here waiting until right before you showed up." He said, shortening the line and making sure the hook was no longer free. She giggled, striking an important pose.

"So you're bored of vegetables, I take it?"

"Yeah, and this was the closest I could get to beef. It isn't even close. Anyway, I'll fry these up later and you can try some if you want. I'm not really a good cook, so we could just end up with black, crumbly soot. And that's not even the worst case scenario."

Dash stifled a laugh. "Then what is the worst case scenario?"

"I burn your house down and ashes set the rest of Ponyville ablaze. And everyone dies."

"Good to know you're so positive." She got up herself and stretched. "So are we going into town for lunch?"

"Sure, we have to put these in your house first, it would probably be weird for me to be walking around with dead fish." He slid the fish into Dash's saddlebag. "And I gotta hide this." He trotted over to a hollow log and set the fishing pole inside. It was just too telling; he'd already waled around with it in a different disguise, and he was probably one of only a few ponies to own one. Especially since it wasn't of Equestrian origin.

"Fine, it's on the way." She started to take off, before Jason stopped her.

"Dash, we aren't in any rush, lets just walk part of the way back. I need to toughen up this hoof anyway." He showed her the bottom, where a general hoof shape was starting to re-emerge from the otherwise flat surface.

"How's that going for you?"

"Well, it doesn't hurt unless I walk longer distances, but it definitely isn't going to end up as tough as it used to be. And it's a half inch shorter than the rest of my hooves."

"Yeah, I still feel guilty I didn't get there sooner, from what you said a couple of minutes could have made all the difference." The sunlight dimmed as they passed under the first trees, following the path back to Ponyville. A branch cracked up in the tree, quickly followed by a heavy thump just off the path. Jason tentatively walked over, spreading the leaves of a crushed bush to reveal a dumbbell.

"No big deal Dash, it's just a dumbell."

"That's one hell of a dumbbell." She tried to twist it to read the weight before giving up and moving around the side. "Fifty pounds?! You could lift that?"

"Well, I could a couple times, but that weight's mostly for guys that are looking for huge muscles. I didn't really want to body-build, so I just worked out enough to get muscles that stood out a little, nothing particularly large. I'll show you what I'm talking about later, I think a bodybuilding book came through."

"Yeah, you've really been filling up that room with stuff from your world." She looked a little annoyed.

"We can burn some of the magazines if you want, but all the metal and plastic is pretty much indestructible. And some of that stuff'll become a lot more useful once we get a generator. But given the random span of the things that come through and the tire I found yesterday, that could be a while."

"Jason, what's that?" She pointed her hoof up into a tree.

"Oh, well, I don't... Oh, that rectangle thing?"

"Yeah..." she took off the ground to grab it, bringing it back down a moment later. She turned it over in her hooves, trying to figure out it's purpose, and why Jason was getting really excited. "What's so good about this? All it has is a few holes in the side and-- Wow, it opens up!"

"Dash, that's a computer!" He carefully took it from her hands, looking it over more closely before stowing it away in his saddlebag. "This is great! I've been waiting so long for something this good to come through! It's like a window into my world, I can actually show you things now. And," He took it out of the saddlebag again. "It almost looks like it's mine from back home!" He figured he'd been the only one to only use half of a computer case. "It's dead though, so I can't really find out."

"How do you make it alive?" She asked.

Jason chuckled. "The batteries are dead. It has no power. I just have to charge them up and it should turn on."

"And you can do what exactly with this?"

"Well, I cant use the internet because I'm not on earth, so that rules out a lot of things, but I did have a lot of stuff already loaded onto the computer, a few games, pictures, movies, music. It holds a lot of information."

"So how long until you get it up? I really want to try out these games of yours!"

"I don't know, I can ask Twilight about how to power it, but then again she wouldn't really know anything, so I guess I have to figure it out by myself. I kinda know how this works." He resumed his walk towards town.

"Jason, can't we just fly over there?"

"Fine..." She let out a sigh of relief, taking off through a small break in the trees. Jason jumped into the air to follow her after making sure he had the computer secured inside the saddlebag. This took priceless to a whole new meaning. Dash flew through a couple clouds in front of him, making him wonder why they could't just fly through the house. Funny how it'd been over a month and he still didn't know how most of the stuff worked around here. Maybe it was just better to suspend his disbelief.

He heard Dash giggle as she streaked past, flying a tight corkscrew around him before jetting ahead. Jason chuckled, knowing she was trying to challenge him, and accelerated after her. With all the flying he'd been doing the past couple days to try to get his strength back, he actually stood a chance of catching her. Winning was out of the question, but he wasn't trying to win, just improve.

He flew above her, keeping above the overcast clouds she had spent the morning putting up with the rest of the weather team. He kept his view on her from above, before finally catching up enough to dive. He tucked in his wings and fell out of the sky, straight through a hole in the clouds. He came up right behind her, continually gaining on her. She turned and laughed, before streaking ahead.

Jason cursed under his breath and doubled his efforts, trying to catch up to the rainbow maned pegasus. He threw a glance at the house, which was way to close for him to catch up, let alone pass her. She turned upside down, evidently thinking the same thing, but Jason watched as the fish just fell out of her saddlebag, dropping out of the sky. She seemed to notice the change in weight, and made one of her breakneck turns downward at about the same time Jason dropped to grab the fish.

A competitive glare flashed between the two of them as they dove, and the race destination changed to the moving target of the fish. They bumped into each other as they dropped, taking a moment to regain their balance before accelerating further. They got to the bag at the same time, and both grabbed it with a hoof. They started to spin as they continued to fall, and the ground grew closer. They both chanced a look downward before they simultaneously let go of the bag and leveled out slightly above the ground.

Jason quickly scrubbed off his speed and turned around, searching for the landing place of the fish. Dash swooped down by a bush, parting a couple of the branches before moving onto a window box behind it. Jason landed next to her and she turned, giving him a sheepish smile.

"Uhh, sorry about that Jason." she pulled the bag of fish out of the window box, taking a bit of the flowers with it. "You took so long to catch these, and..."

"It's not a big deal, Dash. That's the most fun I've had since...Yeah, that was probably one of the most fun things I've ever done."

"Well I'm glad you think that, because..." She pulled the bag out from behind her back, showing it to him in closer detail.

"Eww." One of the fish, at least what was still in the bag, almost looked like someone had detonated a bomb inside of it. The other one didn't look too bad though. He opened the bag, pulling it out. "This isn't too bad, there's only a stick through this one, and part of the tail came off. I can work with this." A pony walked by and stared at them.

"We should probably get going before we attract a crowd." Dash said, as Jason emptied the extra dead fish out of the bag and replaced it with the regular dead one. She took off, twisting her head to check that Jason was following behind. They leveled out at the house and landed, walking inside. Jason walked over to the kitchen, tossing the fish into the icebox after extracting the stick.

"So that's what you're cooking for dinner?"

"If you want to try it, I mean you don't have to, but it might be the best thing you've ever tasted. I need to get some spices and butter, probably some other stuff, but I'm still not sure the extent of the foods you have around here. We could pretty much go to the store and buy anything, coming from anywhere in the world. Such is the awesomeness of modern transportation. You can buy an apple in the middle of winter, for a price between one and two bits, transported from thousands of miles away."

"You're saying it's still affordable?"

"Yeah, it's about the price of an apple here, or so, I mean there's still the issue of currency conversion, and the fact that you only have the bit as a base unit. We have dollars, and those are divided into one hundred cents, and that allows companies to beat the competition by small amounts, and keep competition alive. Around here you can't really beat the price of one bit without buy one get one free or something like that."

"You still care about the economy here?"

"Well, it shouldn't work, but it does. I guess the government doesn't really intervene, but you don't even have a federal reserve or patents, there should still be some sort of crisis eventually."

"Jason, just suspend your disbelief about this stuff, you're probably the only economist around here anyway."

"That's kinda ironic seeing as I don't really know that much about economics." He paused. "My dad knew a lot before he died, though, he traded stocks and shares over the internet, utilizing various hedging strategies, or something like that. I had investments, but I was never able to do anything like that. I'll tell you though, if you make the right investments with enough capitol, you can become a millionaire in a day." Dash's jaw dropped. "I guess you'd have to be close already, you cant take fifty grand and do that or anything. You could probably take five hundred grand and do that." He shook his head. "God dammit, why am I telling you all this? We have to go eat lunch."

"Yeah, I understood the part about bits and then you lost me."

"Twilight wouldn't have understood any of the stuff after that either, so I definitely don't think any less of you for not knowing. Nice cloud work out there by the way."

"Yeah, we set a new record with setting out the overcast sky today, and we were down a member. I tell you, I hope this prestige from Canterlot never wears off, everypony's scared of letting me down or anything."

Jason chuckled. "You rule by fear?"

"Yeah, I guess you could say that." She giggled. "I wouldn't do it if it wasn't so fun!"

"My mare-friend the dictator."

"You'd probably act just like me in my situation."

"Just because you're right..."

"Jason, we can argue over lunch. Come on, I'm hungry."

"Have I ever told you that the whole not eating food thing is just weird? I can't really explain why, but I suppose the fact that I needed food for the first twenty years of my life has something to do with it."

"Oh really?" She smirked.

"Yeah" He leaned over and kissed her. "You're so pretty when you're being sarcastic, Dash." She giggled.

"It's nice that we get to spend so much time together now. And the sex is a nice bonus." She reached over and caressed his wing, making him shiver slightly.

"Like you don't make it kinky enough."

"What, you don't like it?"

"I didn't say that..." He facehoofed. "God dammit, let's just go get lunch." She playfully punched him in the shoulder, and they got up, moving towards the front door. Jason pulled out the computer, planning to leave it, before deciding to bring it and see if he could get it to work. They walked outside and took off, gliding down to the street in a much less competitive manner than before.

Jason pointed to a pony that was in the process of watering his plants and chuckled. Dash turned to see him get to the window box that the fish had landed in and jump. He stood in front of the box, either trying to figure out where all the gore came from, or why his plants were completely squished by it. He pulled out a fish tail and gagged, tossing it towards a trash can.

As they continued their trek towards the town square, as Dash made her way to, well, he didn't really know where she was going exactly. She walked across the square and into the Griffin. He wasn't sure what she liked about going here, exactly. The staff was a nice bonus, being two of the ten to fifteen friendly ponies in town.

Lyra came up to them, bouncing happily in place. Not like Pinkie bouncing; she wasn't leaving the ground. "Where do you want to sit, guys?"

"Booth sound okay?" She asked Jason. He nodded. "We'll take a booth." Lyra nodded and led them over to the side of the room, showing them to their table and doling out the menus.

"I can't thank you enough for the performance here, I mean it brought in so much business, and we have money, and it's great! I just wish Bon Bon would consider hiring because I have to get a lot of caffeine to keep up with all the orders." That explains a lot...

"It was no problem Lyra." Jason said.

"If you say so. See you later!" She turned and trotted away, and Jason turned his attention to Dash. "What're you getting?"

"I dunno, maybe a hay dog? Yeah, that sounds good. And you?"

"It doesn't matter, I'm not going to be able to transform in here anyway."

"Oh yeah, with the fact that we're trying to keep your presence here a secret."

"Yup, I mean after what happened before, I was really just painting a target on myself, although I suppose I really didn't have any idea that, well, that was going to happen." He sighed, sticking a hoof to his forehead. "This thing still hasn't healed?"

"No, it looks a little better, but the cut's still there."

"Ugh, that's what I thought. Why this won't heal like the rest of me, I have no idea."

"I just hate that you have to stay under cover this whole time, I'd rather you were just able to exist here normally."

"So you can flaunt me around?" She face hoofed. "Don't say it didn't cross your mind." Lyra came over to take their order.

"What can I get for you?"

"I'll take a hay dog and a mug of cider." Dash said.

"I guess I'll take the same." Lyra took the menus and left, allowing them to get back to their conversation

"Where was I? Oh yeah, what I mean is, I wish I had the possibility of doing something like that without drawing bad press. Nothing's ever perfect with us, there's always something." She put her head in her hooves.

"Do you really care what they think? I mean, all of your friends know, and seem to be fine with it, so what else matters?"

"Well, I know it shouldn't matter, but it just does to me. I don't want to feel like a coward because I'm not standing up for you. I-- You just don't deserve the rap you're getting. And I wish I could do something about it without endangering all of us. I feel like I'm living under constant threat, and I don't like it."

"That's really my fault Dash, you don't have to stand by me, you could've just left. I can't be worth all this."

"Jason." She reached a hoof across the table and under his chin, raising his head to force him to look her in the eye. "I wouldn't stay if I didn't know that it was worth it. You may think that you've just made my life harder, but you haven't, you've made it better. Before you came around, I was alone. I mean, I had my friends, but I didn't have any pony to actually, you know, love. And then we went through all this, and we pulled Scoots onboard, and even with the emotional roller-coaster I've had to go though, I wouldn't take it back for the world." Jason smiled weakly, before pulling her head across the table to kiss her.

"I love you Dash." He said, running a hoof down her cheek.

"Love you too, Jason." He looked around, checking to see if any ponies had been watching. Satisfied that they weren't, he turned back.

"Are you embarrassed to be seen with me, Jason?" There wasn't even a hint of a smirk on her face. He sighed.

"No, but considering all the changes in disguise, you've been kissing a lot of ponies lately. It probably wouldn't be good to instill rumors that you have a whole bunch of stallions." He said, and she chuckled.

"Yeah, that would be a tough one to explain. 'Well, you see, it was actually the same guy every time and he was a changeling.' Actually that would probably make things worse. And it wasn't tough to explain either."

"God dammit, I hate all this secrecy. I know we need it, but seriously. We should move to Canterlot, they like us there."

"We could easily vacation, it's not like we have a lot of stuff going on. Canterlot's only an hour away."

"Yeah, sure. This weekend, maybe?"

"I'll have to brief the weather team on what to do, but that sounds fine." Lyra trotted over and delivered their entrées, sliding them carefully onto the table. How service was so fast here, he would never know. He took a bite of the hot dog ripoff, wishing for a moment that he could taste it.

"So how's Scoots doing with flying?" He asked.

"She's improving by leaps and bounds. I already miss the little wobbly filly from a month ago."

"Well that's probably why you took like a million pictures these past couple of days."

"Hey, those were good pictures."

"Yeah, the one where I was halfway through blinking with a stupid smile on my face was great."

"It was funny, I had to frame it."

"One of these days, I'm going to get a terrible picture of you, mark my words."

"And that's why I always keep the camera on me." Jason sighed, and they went silent for a few moments, the only noise the slight crunching of their food. Jason pulled out the laptop, opening the lid and staring at the blackened screen. Dash looked at him curiously, and he turned the laptop so that they could both see it.

"Trying to get that to work?"

"Well, I would if I knew what to do, You guys don't have electricity, so it's kinda tough to figure out how to start."

Dash took another bite of her food. "Why don't you just power it like the amp?"

"I could try, but what if it blows up? Then we're back to square one, and for all we know, another computer might never come through."

"Well doing nothing isn't getting us anywhere." Jason stared at the screen, thinking hard about what he should do. He shrugged and started to power the computer, the aura on his forehead blinking to life, and put his hooves in front of his face in case the thing decided to explode. Nothing happened after a few moments, so he put more energy into the system. Still, nothing happened.

"Is it on?" Dash asked. Jason face hoofed. Hard.

"No, let me try that." He pushed a power button in the corner, and much to his surprise, the computer played a few startup sounds, and an apple popped up on the screen. "Yes!" He pumped a hoof into the air, startling the ponies in the booth next to them, who looked over the barrier, trying to figure out what was causing the ruckus. Their eyes went wide when they saw the little lit up box, which quickly went black again as Jason lost concentration.

Jason moved to the other side of the booth, quickly turning the computer away from them, and towards him and Dash before powering the device again. A password screen popped up and she jumped, while Jason simply typed in the simple words, which became much less simple when he had to type them with hooves. After a few more seconds of loading his background popped up, followed by all the icons.

"Oh, what's that do? What's this do?" She started pointing to random icons and things on the screen.

"Well what do you want me to do?"

"Uh... Play a game?"

"Let's just finish the food first, then I can show you. And maybe blow Twilight's mind in the process."

"Heh, I'd like to see that." She gobbled down the last of her food, throwing a few bits onto the table. "Come on, this is the most interesting thing that's ever come through, and you're just sitting there."

"I like watching you freak out like this." She groaned and grabbed his hoof, giving him barely enough time to stow the computer away and make sure that it was asleep. She pulled him out the door and took off, pulling him into the air. He freed his hoof and caught up, chuckling over her excitement.

"It's not that mind blowing, Dash."

"It is to me, you've toted this thing up the whole time you've been here, if it's even half as good as you say, it's still the coolest thing ever." She landed in front of the library, creating a blur with her hoof when she started knocking. Twilight opened the door and smiled, gesturing for them to come inside. She shot Dash a second glance.

"Dash, I don't really know how to ask this, but you're all jumpy and excited, you aren't in heat, are you?"

Dash blushed. "Does it really-- No. I'm just excited because of what we found earlier. If I were I'd have Jason up against a wall by now." Now it was Jason's turn to blush. "Anyway, we found a computer out there, and he has this hobby of trying to blow your mind with things that even you can't understand, so here we are." She turned to see that Jason already had the computer up on a table, and was leaning over it and occasionally clicking. Twilight trotted over and looked over his shoulder, letting out a quiet gasp.

"This is a computer?"

"Yeah, here, watch this." He opened up Minecraft and started a new world, turning the computer to show them. "Want to try, Dash?"

"Oh, so much." He motioned for her to sit down next to him and set the computer on the table in front of her. "These keys move, this one jumps, and these are for removing and placing blocks." She nodded excitedly. "And the idea of this game is to build a house and survive against the enemies that come out at night. If you press this," he pressed a key on the keyboard, "The inventory comes up, and you can check crafting recipes through this mod I have installed over here. I'll let you two try to figure the rest of it out. It's not as much fun if it's not a challenge."

Jason got up and crossed the room, browsing the books in the library. The system had changed since the last time he needed a book, which was only partially surprising. He eventually slid out a book on illusion spells, flipping to random pages. He got to a chapter about screwing with the perceptions of ponies. Interesting, but it looked pretty tough, there were equations and stuff all over the place, he had no idea where to even start. He put the book back, finding a beginner's guide right next to it.

"These things EXPLODE?!?! They looked so friendly!" Dash yelled from across the room, whacking the table with a hoof. Jason chuckled and went back to his book, skimming the pages. Darkness spell, that could be useful. Apparently it changed the range of sight to a small radius, ending in darkness. Maybe that's one of the things that had been used on him? It definitely wasn't soul magic, so at least he wouldn't go insane trying to learn the spell.

He read a passage in the book before laying it down on the table and trying to work through the simple looking formulas in his head. Teleportation was way easier than this, that was just a bunch of energy and a good memory of a location, not much to it. Dash had said that Twilight put up a ruse for the police pony before he'd been saved, and he suddenly gained a new respect for her. He tested the spell on another book, seeing the general features that the spell's aura was supposed to have from his point of view. So he'd probably got it right. Well, maybe.

He flipped through the rest of the small book, not finding anything that could be particularly useful, mostly a bunch of tricks for foals to do. Was he really on the level of foals here? He sighed and slid the book back in, and turned to look through some of the other books. Boring, pointless, ah. More illusion stuff. He pulled out another book, flipping through the pages. This one apparently allowed for fake copies of other ponies to be created and controlled, although he couldn't preform the spell on himself. Dash it is then. The spell said that upon failure, possible harm befalls only the caster. So no big deal.

He visualized another Dash prancing across the room, but managed to only get three disembodied hooves. He tried to make the spell disappear, but the hooves continued to move, taking off the ground and floating a couple inches above the table that Dash and Twilight were still at. They both jumped, and Twilight let out a little yelp, before they both turned to stare at him. He smiled sheepishly.

"Just trying out spells, nothing to worry about."

"Stick to the easy ones, Jason. Even if you do have some sort of skill creating illusions, they're still some of the harder spells out there for overall complexity. Can't you just learn something simple like some of those silly little fireworks Trixie did?" Twilight asked.

"I'm trying to find useful things here, in case we get attacked or something. Might as well be prepared. If we get attacked and I give them a fireworks show, I don't think they'd run away."

"Fine just don't attempt any more unless they're rated two stars or under." He looked back at the book, and sure enough, each spell had a number of stars next to it. He'd thought they were purely decorative, but apparently he was wrong. He looked at the clock, sighing a little when he saw the time. It was two already, Scoots would be out of school soon and they still had to get stuff for dinner.

"Dash, we need to go get stuff for dinner."

"Why don't you just get them yourself and come back when you're done?" She was clearly absorbed in the game. Apparently it wasn't just humans that liked video games then.

"Because I don't know how most of the things around her taste to you, and since it's your taste buds, I need you to come along. And I'm getting tired from powering that thing." He gestured to the computer.

"But what about the game?" She whined.

"Simple. You press this key and then that button that says save right there."

"And all that's still there?"

"Yup." He closed the computer and slid it into the saddlebag, catching a brief glimpse of the pile of notes Twilight had already taken. "First glimpse of technology up to par with you?"

"Yeah, you could say that. It does more, I take it?"

"Of course, but most of it involves a computer network called the internet that we had back home. Basically that links all the computers together."

"Wow."

"So I'll see you later, maybe I can show you some more soon." She smiled and nodded, sitting back down and flipping through her notes. Jason turned and left with Dash, quickly trotting over to the marketplace, just down the street. Dash pointed out several spices, most of which he was familiar with, and a few that he had never seen before. The shopping was rather lackluster, and they quickly left to drop off the supplies at the house. They landed and went inside, making sure that all the food was put away and accounted for.

"Dash, you wanna see a movie?"

"Oh yeah, you have those now. Sure!" He chuckled at her excitement and walked into the other room, placing the computer on the wooden table in the other room. After several minutes of convincing, Jason had finally gotten her to cave on replacing the previous cloud table. He opened the computer and clicked a few icons, bringing up another window.

"So this is called 'Saving Private Ryan', but it's pretty gory. It's set in World War II, do you know what I'm talking about?"

"Yeah, the big war that happened like seventy years ago in your world?"

"Mhm, this is set during D-Day, that big invasion of France and the time right afterwards, I think. So here goes." He started the movie with a quick rap on the spacebar.

"Oh shit, where did that guy's legs go?! Why's that other guy on fire?!"

"Maybe we should stop watching this for a while."

"Oh, Celestia!" She cringed, partially covering her eyes.

"I'll take that as a yes." He paused the movie, closing up the computer. After a long silence where Jason asked himself several times if he'd broken Dash, she finally spoke up.

"That was war?"

"Well..."

"Will we ever have to go through something like that?" She asked, pulling herself into his side.

"No, unless someone comes up with hundreds of years of technology in a couple decades." He paused. "Dash are you okay?"

"I'm-- I-- I'm scared, what if something like that does appear, those men died in horrible ways, what if that happens to me, or you? I don't want to lose you Jason, I know you've survived two near death experiences, but you can't be lucky forever, at some point you're not going to make it out of a fight." He threw an arm around her and pulled her closer.

"There was a saying, where I came from, that there was a bullet to kill every man, and someone, somewhere had it. The idea is to make sure you die of old age before it finds you. I'm not going anywhere, Dash, no matter how much I can annoy you sometimes." She smiled up at him, and kissed his cheek.

"You better not." She gave him a sultry look. "Especially with all the things I have yet to do with you in bed."

"How do you bridge those two subjects like that?"

"Practice." They continued to cuddle for a few more minutes, relishing the time they got to spend together, now that they were out of the thick of it. The door opened and Scoots trotted in, having apparently finished school. Jason looked at the clock. Okay, she finished school a while ago, never mind. She looked around before focusing on them and trotting over.

"Hey, Applejack's holding a Cutie Mark Crusader sleepover tonight, can I go? Please please please?" Jason raked a hoof thorough his imaginary beard.

"I'm not entirely sure, let me ask this mare over here. Mare, what do you think?" Dash stifled a laugh.

"I agree with your unagreement, good sir."

"Funny you should say that, because I just came to a decision." Scoots looked over at him expectantly. "I have decided to let you decide."

"Oh, good decision, stallion, but your sitting on the fence previously leads me to consider reversing your decision."

"Guys come on! Applejack even invited you to dinner!"

"Oh, she did, did she?" Jason asked. Scoots nodded. "It seems we have more to discuss, mare."

"Indeed we do, does your indecision still hold?"

"I can't decide." Scoots let out a yell of frustration and trotted into the kitchen. Dash and Jason burst into laughter as she left, before finally breaking down to actual decision making.

"So, we're letting her go?" He asked.

"I don't see why not, that means she's gone all night, if you know what I mean. But do you want to go to dinner?"

"Sure, I mean I'd be surprised if Scoots didn't mishear her, but it could be fun. If she's inviting me she obviously doesn't see me as an enemy anymore. It's not like we have anything to do, I guess there's fish for dinner, but we can have that tomorrow morning. After that I wouldn't risk eating it."

"Okay. Scoots!" She came trotting back into the room. "You can stay over, but you're sure Applejack invited us to dinner?"

"Yeah, she made it pretty obvious. You might as well go, she makes great food Jason!"

"Okay, around five or something?" She nodded, turning to leave. An audible flap of her wings from outside let Jason know that she'd taken off.

"You want to go see if Octavia's around?"

"Want to practice some stuff?"

"Or something, I mean I haven't played any music since Nightmare Night. The closest I've come is moving our stuff back over there."

"Yeah, okay, I'm fine with that." She got up and walked over to the door, hardly waiting for him to catch up before taking off. They dove downward, arriving at the iconic red house rather quickly. Dash knocked on the door, and they waited there for a few moments before Octavia opened the door and smiled.

"I haven't seen you two for quite a while, come on in." She escorted them inside, and they quickly moved to chairs in the practice room. "Come here because of another gig?"

"No, I just wanted to see if you had time to play some music, just for fun."

"Well I didn't really have anything going on, so sure. Are we just playing the songs from last time?"

"Well we can, I guess I'll leave you with a few new ones to work on."

She plugged in her bass. "Cool, when can we start?"

Dash landed in front of the gate to Sweet Apple Acres first, turning with a smirk to Jason.

"Ha. I win."

"You always win." He drew his face in close, trying to look menacing. "But one of these days, I'm going to win. And you're going to be embarrassed." She giggled and moved her face slightly to peck him on the cheek.

"Come on, we've got a dinner to get to." Jason snorted, following her up to the porch of the apple household, where she quickly knocked and cut off any clever response he would have had.

Applejack opened the door a couple moments later, and smiled when she saw the two of them. The whole 'Applejack smiling' thing caught him a little off guard, and he missed her telling him to come inside. Dash pulled him in, sighing under her breath, as Applejack led them over to a table that was already set up. Granny Smith was looking at them from another chair at the table. Or maybe she was sleeping with her eyes open, she wasn't really moving. The CMC and Big Macintosh briefly looked up before returning to their idle banter.

"So thanks for having us for dinner, Applejack."

"Oh, it's no problem. Ah decided to take your advice and get to know him a little more, Dash. I hope that's okay with ya."

"I don't know why you're asking me." She said.

"It's fine." Jason ensured.

"You were a little late though, ah though ah told Scoots to tell you to get here before five."

"Sorry, she told us five, actually." He shot a look over to Scoots, who shrugged.

"It's no big deal, food's still warm." She had them sit down, and quickly filled their plates with things that were obviously made out of apples, but were in an unbelievably wide assortment of sizes and shapes. Jason stared at the food before sending a glance over at Applejack, gesturing to the food. She nodded and he replicated Dash, apparently scaring the shit out of Big Mac, considering the fact that he fell backwards out of his chair.

The CMC laughed, and he got back into his chair, slightly more red faced than usual. "Ah thought you said he doesn't do that, sis."

"Well, not in public he doesn't, but there ain't much point in comin' to dinner without tastebuds." Big Mac shook his head, apparently annoyed at the sudden complexity in his life that had forced him to utter more words than he usually did in a week.

They ate in silence for a few minutes, the only noise coming from Sweetie Belle and Applebloom, who were apparently scheming something up, while Scoots had a rather one sided conversation with Big Mac.

"So Jason," He looked up and Applejack shifted her view from Dash to him. "How long have you been around here?"

"At least a while before you guys chased me out of town. No hard feelings, by the way."

"Yeah, but Twi said you came from another country?"

"Mhm." He swallowed a bite of food. This was delicious. "America. And now I'm here, I have no idea why."

"But ya like it around here?"

"Yeah. I mean it could be better, but you know. I'm not complaining."

"So why the new disguises all the time?"

"Well, this one's actually the same one I had when I woke up, but I don't really want the townsponies to know about me, considering how that ended last time."

"Ah'm mighty sorry about that."

"Seriously, it's not a big deal." He finished the last of the food on his plate.

"Can Ah get ya some more?"

"No, I mean I think I can eat as much as I want, so everybody else should just go before me."

"Ya sure?"

"Yeah, it was great though, best stuff I've had around here so far."

"Well thanks, it means a lot." Granny smith woke up from her place at the table with a start, looking around feverishly.

"Ha, there's two of ya sunny." She said, proceeding to fall back asleep immediately afterwards. The room went silent as they tried to figure out what exactly had just happened. The crusaders all got up in a group and ran out of the room, giggling amongst themselves.

"Ah gotta go make sure they don't set the house on fire. Ah don't want to sound rude, but when you're done could you leave? Ah can't really take care of these three and two guests, and granny."

"That's fine," Dash said. "I'm pretty much done anyway. Thanks for the food."

"If you want to talk over lunch or something later, Applejack, just say the word."

"Ah'll probably take ya up on that offer, Ah asked what, three questions?"

"Yeah. Well I'll see you around."

"It was nice talkin' to ya!" She turned around and left the room, as they did the same. As Jason turned to close the front door, Applejack yelled from the other room "Girls, how did ya get hoof prints on the ceiling?!?!" They laughed briefly before turning and taking off.

"I'm really glad I won that drinking contest, I'll tell you that."

"Yeah, you should really be thanking Applejack."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, if it weren't for her we wouldn't have an entire night alone."

"Oh! Oh..."

"And guess what? We have time for a round three now."

"I'm starting to like the number three." They landed and walked inside. "And we don't need to use the bed." Dash shot him a sultry look.

"Just stop talking and rut me."

(optional clop- no story development, maybe marginal character development. Here )

Dash woke up, frowning slightly when she realized that Jason wasn't in the bed next to her. She was sore, not painfully sore, but more than just a little stiff. She got up, trying to figure out what smell exactly was coming from the kitchen, and walked down the stairs. She trotted into the kitchen, ducking under a pan that floated off of the stove and onto a pad on the counter. Jason looked over at Dash and smiled, reaching his arm out to pull her into a kiss.

"Is this the fish?" She asked after they broke apart.

"Yup, I didn't burn it, so that's a plus." Dash walked over to the pot, blowing a gust of air over the fish with a wing to try to cool it, before stabbing a piece with a fork and putting it into her mouth.

"This is weird. It's not bad, but it's definitely different." Jason reached over and tried a bite after shifting into her form. It tasted great, he didn't know that he could have possibly forgotten the taste. He was jostled out of his reverie by some knocking. He groaned.

"Just because we put a panel next to the door for knocking doesn't mean I wanted ponies to actually come up here and use it." Dash followed him over to the door, evidently curious about who would want to come up here this early in the morning. Jason opened the door, letting his jaw drop when Princess Celestia herself stood outside with a couple of her guards. He rubbed his eyes and looked again, but they were still there.

"Jason, Rainbow Dash. You agreed to be on call for the war, and we're calling you back. We need you two. We need Team Green Bean."

"Fuck..."

_______

A Philosopher's Quest

So here's the sequel, The Winds of Change: Fog of War

If you liked the story, just drop a like or a favorite before you go. Because it's only one click...

By the way, most of the time I imagine Jason kinda waking up a lot like this guy. Or any of the characters where I say 'awoke with a start.'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FH3XrNj9Su0

Well, kinda.