Chapter Four

About a month after the hydra incident, Randis was released from the hospital and allowed to go back to work. This was great news for him had no clue what had been going on while he was bed ridden. He had seen many things from hopping hay-bales, to cotton-candy clouds that rain chocolate, to upside down buildings, and many other weird things that had happened in the last few days. He had witnessed TWO rainbow explosions in the last month, and wanted to know what was going on. Surprisingly, after what had appeared to be the pony equivalent of World War Three, he saw that nothing had been damaged, or at least if it had it was fixed already. He had to find out. As he walked up to the library door, and was promptly smashed against the wall by the opening door. As Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and Rarity left and Twilight bid them good-bye, He made a mumbling sound.

"mmhhhnnfff" Randis complained.

"Huh?" Twilight looked behind the door and pulled me from the wall with her magic, "What were you doing back there?"

"Saying hello to our wonderful library," Randis replied, sarcastically, "Actually, I was just discharged a few minutes ago, and was coming to see what had happened. From what I could hear it sounded like you were at war!"

"Oh...," Twilight faltered, "Well, lets go inside, I can explain there."

"Okay," He replied, with a bit more sympathy, whatever had happened, had been rough. She was usually so eager to explain anything.

As they closed the door and headed for the sitting room, Spike looked up from the stacks of books he had been sorting and waved in greeting. In the sitting room, Twilight took a seat on the couch, and Randis took a chair opposite from her. She began.

"Well, what did you want explained first?" She inquired.

"Hmm, if you want, just start from after I was admitted for the bite, please." Randis replied.

"Okay, Shortly after you were admitted..." She continued. She explained the events from the flyers competition, to the being frozen in stone, to the diamond dog incident, to model Fluttershy, to the buffalo herd in the scrubland, to the princesses visit, to the realization that Rainbow Dash had caused them all to find their cutie marks, to Spikes jealousy of her new pet Owlicious, to Pinkies slight breakdown, to the Gala, then she paused.

"Whats wrong?" Randis asked.

"No, nothing, Shortly after the Gala, Discord, an ancient..." She looked a little sad as she explained the events of Discord over the last few days. It was most likely because she saw how fragile friendship could be, but at the end she was a little more hopeful, as she reminded herself that if you fight for it, friendship will survive.

When she had finished, we sat in silence. Her to reflect on what had happened, he to absorb all that he had missed. How could that much stuff happen in a single month. Things happened fast sometimes, sure, but all of that, and to think that there were other beings out there like Celestia and Luna, other deities. Hopefully no others wanted to stir up trouble.

With tales told, and night falling, they went back into the routine that had been off for a month. Spike got early shut-eye, and Twilight went back to studying, while Randis finished the nights chores. He was done at about ten o'clock and was asleep before Twilight gave in to fatigue. Randis was stuck thinking, however, about the strange things that had started happening in Equestria. Before he had gotten out much, he knew that nothing as odd as these recent events had occurred. It was all harmonic. No chaotic deities, no phase shifting hydras. The world was entering a new time, as many could tell.

Early the next morning, Randis had completed breakfast, and retrieved the mail. He had had a quick conversation with the mail mare about muffins, such as favorite type, and different recipes. He enjoyed the mornings as much as ever. Even when Twilight was cranky for staying up too late, she hid the fact well in front of company but friends and normals in her early mornings new better. This morning had a happy feel to it, for many reasons. One was that it would be the first full day he would spend out of a hospital in a month, something anyone would relish, and another was that he had particularly started to enjoy acting as the standing librarian during the day. Enough ponies came to the library to make life interesting. Especially after they had gotten used to their bipedal book watcher. Many had avoided the library while he was standing in temporarily for Twilight, or Spike, for about a week after the announcement in the town hall. As time when on, however, and they saw Randis more often the ponies, naturally, began to accept his difference. They were always a more trusting group, and never very violent, so once he proved that he was a good guy, more showed up at the library during his working time. Today was no different.

It was about ten in the morning, early, but not enough for anyone to still be asleep (other than a cyan weather pegasus), and Randis was working in the library. When the towns most mischievous group of little fillies came in. They had decided that they could get their cutie marks by becoming philosophers. Why any such idea dawned in their heads was a wonder, but it was always worth a shot right? So he tried to guide them in the right direction as best as possible.

"Well, philosophers you say? Thats quite a jump from your normal attempts," he commented, "But I will show you a few of the books on the subject. He walked over to the non-fiction section and grabbed a thick, dusty book with a faded title. "Philosophy," he read, "The Study of the Fundamental Nature of Knowledge, Reality, and Existence. Are you three sure this is what you want?

"Well," Applebloom started, "We hadn't heard of this philosfy, until Sweetie Bell here, said somethin' 'bout it.

"Yeah," Scootaloo continued, "What is it even actually about, it sounds really boring!"

"Hey," Sweetie Bell countered, "from what I knew a philosopher was someone who was super wise, and knew bunches of stuff. I didn't think we would have to do tons of studying. We're here already though, so what should we do?"

"Well," Randis began, "You could look at these books here, Mythology, A guide to myths and legends. You could all become Mythologists! Think about all of your favorite legends, like the old Canterlot Fury Fighter who single hoofedly stopped a legion of Discordian forces in the Chaos War! You could study things like that."

"Naw," Applebloom rejected, "We have other things to try first."

"We might come back later," Scootaloo continued.

"But thanks anyway!" Sweetie Bell finished before dashing out the door with the other three.

"Darn. I almost got them to read the Mythology books. Oh well, not for everypony I guess," Randis said to himself. "I will have to try something more appealing next time. Maybe something like..." He stopped as another visitor arrived.

"Hello?" an old earthpony mare inquired, "Is anypony in?"

"Well, no," Randis answered as he stepped from the non-fiction section, "But I can help."

"Oh, uh, good. I was wondering if you happened to carry any books on brewing?" She asked.

"Well, what kind of brewing. Potions, alcohol, cider..." Randis began.

"OH, alcohol of corse, it is my profession! Can't you tell?" She flicked her mane to the side, and stood taller. Randis noticed her cutie mark for the first time, a shot glass. This was new.

"Ok, are you new in town?" He asked as he began to look for the rather small selection of alcoholic brewing manuals, "And, if you don't mind me asking, why do you need to look up how to do your profession, if it is brewing, that is."

"Well, I know perfectly well how to, but I don't mind seeing if anypony has found a new trick in the last century that is recorded somewhere, as for being new, yes. I moved here recently from Fillydelphia. I wanted a change in the scenery and recently found out that there was no local market for my type of beverage here. What a shame! You were a shock though, what, exactly, are you? If you will have to pardon my rudeness," She informed.

"Well, I am a human, fairly rare specimen, the only, I think. I have found your books, we don't carry many of them here, as this town has a low population of drinkers," Randis answered.

"Oh good! I will have to check any that I have yet to read, out. Do you need any information?" She asked.

"Well, I will need your name, and mailing address. That is all of the required information to check out books," Randis replied.

"My name is Lenna. My address is..." and she went on to explain the rest and chat a bit more. This had been eventful so far. As Lenna departed, Randis recorded her in the library's log, so as to keep her information from being lost to human memory deficiency.

As the day went on Randis got many other visitors to the library, and serviced them all to the fullest. He was efficient even though the library had been rearranged a little since the last time he had worked. As five in the afternoon came and went, the ponies looking for books, had all gone. This gave Randis some needed time to think. He had to wonder at a few things. He considered everpony he met a friend. While he knew that many of them would only consider him an acquaintance, he hoped one day he would be able to relate with the rest of the wonderful town he now lived in. He also put some thought to why things were getting a bit chaotic lately. There had been a few rumors of rogues, and ponies denouncing the Royal Princesses. He would have to ask Twilight when she returned from a pick-nick with her friends. He had seen her earlier and she had seemed almost ready to have a nervous breakdown over something. She had gone on about being 'tardy'. Randis had considered going to help, but she had left the library fairly quickly when she had thought of some sort of resolution to her problem.

As Randis moved to go outside, Celestia herself, burst through the door. She looked very cross. She barely acknowledged Randis is she stormed in. A few minutes later, Twilight came through the door, head bowed in shame. Their conversation ensued.

"Twilight, I am very disappointed with you. Why would you cast a spell like that on your doll, and then proceed to get all of Ponyville caught up in your problem?" Celestia demanded.

"Well... I'm so sorry princess, I was just..." Twilight was cut off by the rest of the mane six entering the library.

"It wasn't her fault princess!" Applejack interjected.

"She shouldn't be punished because we were to insensitive to help her," Fluttershy added.

Celestia, seeing this the perfect opportunity, said, "Okay, I wont punish her on one condition."

"What!" the five newcomers exclaimed.

"You will all have more duties to perform as the Elements of Harmony. You may have heard rumors of rouges and those going actively against my sister and I. Taking care of these will be part of your duties. Along with more formal appearances, or are my conditions too harsh?" Celestia finished.

"No," They said, "We accept, princess."

With that they thought they had saved their friend. Celestia was actually going to let Twilight off the hook, as she herself had done much worse on accident before, but the opportunity for the elements to be an active force had presented itself, and like a smart ruler, she took it.

Randis viewed the scene, and was shocked at how they didn't seem to see what Celestia had said, they were going to be, more or less, soldiers. He had to help, things WERE changing, and not for the better.

Author Stuffs

Thank you all for reading and thank some of you (or maybe all of you) for reviewing. I may be making this a bit confusing, as I look back and see half of the chapter full of irrelevance, but I tried more dialogue, and using third person. What do you think? I kind of like the third person, and giving Randis a social life. Its up to you people though, because you don't sell what people don't buy.