//------------------------------//
// Replaceable 
// Story: The Desert Pony 
// by thesilentpony 
//------------------------------//

	“I miss anything?” I asked and even Haggle looked scared now.
“I’m just going to ignore it this time.” Every pony was uneased by me for some reason, I just had no clue any more.
“You have a bit of blood on your mouth.” Cord said and I wiped it.
“Oh, must have missed it.” I licked it. I didn’t care much for my own blood, but it was better than simple water.
“Did you eat the lung?” Haggle asked.
“No I don’t like my old lungs or used body parts, they always taste like ash.” I shivered a little bit. “Actually let me take that back, they taste more like something else, ash can actually taste really good.” I sat down. 
“Are you a monster?” I looked at a little filly and a distraught mother grabbed the filly away.
“Sorry about that.” She said, she and a stallion left the cart making me look at Cord.
“Why would she ask that?” I asked really confused.
“Well, you’re, just not normal,” Cord said. “Ponies tend to forget that every pony is different.” I shrugged. “Anyway, um how are we paying for all the food? I know that you want to hire her but I don’t think we have that much on us.”
“May I have one of those stones?” Haggle asked looking at me.
“Sure.” I gave him a larger one and he smiled.
“Thank you, I will be back shortly.” He got up and walked out of this part of the trains back. I looked at Cord and he started to eat. I picked up a drink and took a sip setting it down shaking my head a little bit.
“Ah.” I looked at Cord and he had a sorry expression.
“What is that?”
“Apple wine.” 
“What’s that?”
“It’s, um, it’s a drink which will get you drunk.”
“What’s drunk?”
“Dizzy, warm, empty headed, blurry vision, and if you have too much you’ll pass out and have a headache in the morning.” I eyed him for a few seconds. Why would anyone want to do something like that? “It helps with bad memories and will make you feel good if you feel bad about something. It’ll make you forget for a while. A buzz can feel good.”
“Why would you ever need to forget something?”
“Um, well ponies will sometimes need to forget something bad they did, sometimes you can’t change something or fix it.”
“I don’t understand, why would you ever want to change anything you do?”
“It’s hard to explain, but you’ve never done anything you regret have you?”
“Why would I regret anything I’ve done, I’ve never been wrong and I'll never be wrong no matter what I do.” He chuckled. 
“Have you ever done something in the moment which you knew you shouldn’t do, or should have saved later?” I thought for a moment and shook my head no. “You don’t feel bad about eating ponies or killing the griffins?”
“They were food, why would I feel bad about eating food? You ate that cake, did you feel bad for the whatever was put into it so you could live? You honestly confuse me, you say something is bad yet you contradict yourself all the time. Why do you consider something bad even though you do it?”
“Well there’s a difference, between something that can talk and something that can’t, you shouldn’t kill something that talks.”
“I know plants that can talk, or you telling me that I shouldn’t eat them? Or what about the creatures you killed to save one of your ponies on the trip? It could talk, and you didn’t plan on eating it, you planned on it going to waste.”
“Well I was protecting my friend.”
“But you still planed on letting the food go to waste, would it not have been more helpful to feed the meat to them? That way he did not starve.”
“I,” he sighed. “I’m not going to get through to you.”
“It’s wrong because Princess Celestia says so.” We both looked at a stallion as he walked over to us in a white bow tie. “I’m sorry, but I couldn’t help but over hear this conversation and how disturbing it was.”
“Disturbing?” I asked.
“Wrong, incorrect, morally bad.” I tilted my head confused.
“How was what we said wrong or any of that?”
“Well, may I sit?” Cord nodded and the stallion sat down. “Well Princess Celestia raises the sun, that means she gives everything warmth and light, each and every day. That means you need to do what she says.”
“Or she won’t raise the sun?”
“Yes.”
“But if she did that wouldn’t that kill every pony, not just me?” He paused and looked at Cord, Cord shrugged.
“She would turn you to stone.”
“I have several things that would stop a pony from doing that to me, that would be silly if they tried, I would just rip out her throat.”
“She can’t die.” I paused.
“So, wait you’re saying that if I were to eat her, she would regenerate fast enough for me to never run out of food?” He stared at me.
“Stop!” Cord said now slightly panicked. “Do not give her ideas like that, okay, just drop it please.” The stallion nodded and I looked at Cord.
“Who is this Princess Celestia?”
“A god, she wouldn’t be able to be touched by you unless she wanted you to be able to touch her.” I now wanted to try this Princess Celestia, if she could really give me an unlimited amount of food, finding and capturing her to eat would be wonderful! “I see that look, and stop right there, don’t even start.”
“But if she can’t die, and I would never run out of food, then.”
“NO!” He shouted standing up clearly panicked. “Stop, okay, just stop, think of it like this, if I ate the last birdie and you would never have that taste again, no matter what you did, it was the last birdie ever.” I stood up.
“That’s not funny! Birdies taste too good to do that!”
“That’s what it’s like to me when you say you want to eat Princess Celestia. It’s a very bad feeling.” I looked down and sat down.
“Oh, I’m sorry then, I did not know she meant that to you.”
“She of course isn’t food, but she’s a special pony that every pony cares deeply for, and just hearing you say that is painful.”
“I’m sorry.”
“That is also regret.”
“What? Oh I don’t feel sorry for saying it, I still want to taste her flesh, now more than ever, but I won’t because you care so much for her. I wouldn’t want to take your meal from you like that.”
“Yeah, good enough.” He said smiling. Haggle came back a while later with a rather large bag setting it down.
“Whoa.” Cord said.
“And that’s after paying the bill.” Max came with a cart setting a large stack of fish on the table. I smiled, and he sat down feeding me the fish. I licked him and he looked at me worried.
“I like you birdie.”
“Thanks, so you like my cooking?”
“Very much, I’ve never had a cooked meal before so this is wonderful.”
“What really?!”
“Yeah, why?”
“I will have to cook you a lot then.”
“You learn fast, I thought you might try to escape a few times before you learned that no matter where you go I can find you.” He chuckled nervously scared.
“You really.” I went up to his face. “Don’t have to say that.” He was sweating again, I imagined after me chasing him he would be afraid of me. I knew what it felt like to be on the wrong side of a hunt, but I played with my food sometimes, and I had with him too much. I laid down on his lap looking up at him.
“You do realize I had let you go before.” He looked at me a bit confused. “When I caught you, I knew you weren’t dead, you played dead really bad. I could hear you breathing, your heart was beating so hard you body moved to it.” I chuckled.
“You-you let me go?”
“Yeah, even let you fly into the sky so I could chase you. I just didn’t realize that you were so fast, I would have probably let one of your other friends escape if I knew. I ended up losing you, I was so pissed.” 
“I always wondered if it was luck that you didn’t break my neck, or if you did it on purpose. I still have nightmares.” I chuckled.
“That’s great.” He stared at me smiling.
“You enjoy my fear.”
“Yes, you smell great when you’re scared, everything does. When you’re scared it’s like adding a chewy heart on top.” I licked my lips and he tried his best not to look at me. Hours passed on the train, it would have only taken me about half an hour instead of a full day to get to Ponyville, if it was really next to Everfree Forest.
We got off the train and it hissed at me again making me snort, but Cord grabbed me this time stopping me from attacking. Max came with us almost too easily, made me want to chase him around for a while, but he stayed quiet and mindful. A good pet if there ever was one, he would be my first and probably my last. Feeding a pet was going to be hard work.
“What’s wrong?” Max asked and I looked at him.
“Nothing, just never had a pet before, kind of weird.”
“I can take care of myself.”
“Yeah, yeah.” I said rolling my eyes. As if a birdies could take care of themselves, I was going to have to constantly filly him. We followed Haggle and Cord to a building going inside and a rather old earth pony stallion, with a brown coat, black mane was behind a desk looking at papers.
“Filthy Rich, we’re back.” He looked up with a slightly confused look on his face.
“You’re back early, I thought you had at least another month before you needed to come back.”
“Nope we got everything and more.”
“More?” Haggle went around and showed maps.
“What in the world?”
“This information is very reliable, in fact if it were not for her, we would have all died and you would have wasted your money.” He looked at me. “That is Roma, a local to the area, not part of a tribe, but she’s lived there most of her life, this is all her information.” He looked at the maps and then at me.
“Is all this information correct?”
“Well I also have this.” He showed the creature patterns on another map. “The information is correct and accurate.”
“If that is true, this will create me more money than I have ever dreamed. What was her fee?”
“Fish.”
“What?”
“She eats meat and living creatures. She’s, um, not normal, but very strong, she threw the train like it was a toy.” His eyes went wide. “Anyway, using her as a guide I think we could retrieve this all and it would be wise.”
“I have worked with strange ones before, but that’s honestly a first. How many fish do I have to get?”
“As many as I can eat.” I said smiling and he looked at Max.
“Who is he?”
“Her, um, pet.”
“I escaped her from killing me and, well I couldn’t do it again.” I pinned him to the ground licking my lips.
“Oh you know that’s right.” He shivered. 
“Yes master.” I frowned.
“My name’s not master, it’s Roma, who’s master?” I looked around a bit pissed at whoever it was that was trying to take my pet!
“Master is a name to some pony that owns another,” Cord said. “Or in this case you owning Max, your title to him would be master.”
“That makes no sense whatsoever, why would I tell him to call me by anything other than my name, that would only confuse him. Whoever came up with that is an idiot, and they will not steal my pet by making him call them their owner.”
“She’s a bit odd, and doesn’t understand most common sense.” Cord said looking at Filthy Rich.
“I can see that, but why use her instead of a unicorn? A unicorn could use magic or any number of things.”
“She took down a squad of griffin.” Bridie said and they looked at him as he got up. “Not even your best unicorn could do that, and we were armed. In fact we were moving to kill a monster that had been killing ponies flying around, but I found out it was her and reported it to command.”
“Whoa.” Haggle said.
“That’s, wait does she have a bounty on her head?” Filthy Rich asked.
“Yes,” Max said. “Last I heard it was about, oh there it is.” He walked over to the wall and pulled off a wanted poster walking over to them setting it down. It had a drawing of me, it was rather good.
“Cool.” They looked at me and Cord picked it up reading.
“Wanted, the desert pony, upon the return of the desert pony’s head the reward of fifty thousand bits!” He said shocked and they stared at him. “Sub group bounties are partnered with at least fifteen other bounty sets. Upon proof of the desert pony, and her crimes to the sub groups, the reward will be up to but not limited to an additional fifty thousand bits per proof of each crime committed.”
“That’s, that’s over seven hundred and fifty thousand, eight hundred thousand if you include this post.” Haggle said.
“She is wanted for the murder of at least three hundred and ninety six ponies, one hundred and eighty five griffin, twenty three royal pony guards, thirty eight royal griffin guard, and the murder of thousands of pets. She is to be considered extremely dangerous, and under no condition should a party less than a hundred attempt capture or kill.” They looked at me and I stopped licking Max’s side.
“This is serious,” Filthy Rich said. “I can’t hire such a dangerous mare, the implications alone would bankrupt me! That has a royal decree from both Princess Celestia and the ruler of the griffins!” 
“That is the highest bounty I have ever heard of,” Haggle said. “That could feed a family for several generations and then some.”
“How many fish is that?” I asked.
“There wouldn’t be enough fish in the ocean to sell to you.” 
“Then let’s do that.” They looked at me a little confused.
“You would have to die.” Max said looking at me and I looked around.
“What?”
“A bounty means to hunt and kill something, you’re what they want dead, you would have to die to get the bounty.”
“Oh.” I looked down.
“I feel a little at odds,” Cord said. “Now that I know her, I kind of feel bad for her, but at the same time she should be stopped.”
“I stopped eating ponies.” My words didn’t make them feel less nervous.
“Anyway, I can’t hire her,” Filthy Rich said. “I mean I'll pay her for this information, but other than that I can’t do anything else.”
“No fish?” I asked and they looked at me.
“Yeah no fish.” I sighed.
“I guess that’s fine, I got a nice cleaning, your hot water was wonderful, I'll have to figure out something.”
“I have an idea,” Max said and I eyed him. “I mean if we can manage to sell that heart for that money.”
“My heart? Well I guess I have a spare one or two.” I reached for my chest and he grabbed my hoof.
“I didn’t mean your heart, I meant that gem heart. You showed it on the train.” I gasped realizing what he meant. “Yeah keep that other heart.” I pulled it out and gave it to him. He smiled looking at it.
“But only because you asked nicely, and you have plan to get fish right?”
“Yes, lots and lots of fish.” I smiled.
“Wait sir, we could do a short list hire,” Haggle said. “Have her work under the radar, so long as we do night drops and pay for anything she gives us, then we could make a lot without doing much of anything, of course we would leave salted fish, is that useable?” 
“I can cook salted fish, they last for weeks.”
“That’s fine,” Filthy Rich said. “But other than those here, we tell no one of this, where will there be a safe drop point?” Haggle pointed at the point on the map I had taken them to on the road.
“This spot is perfect, I saw a small grove from the road, we’ll leave a large crate where we can leave the fish, and we’ll pay fairly in fish, and other salted meats when we can get them.” I licked my lips.
“I’m craving fish now though.” 
“We don’t have any.”
“The river will.” Cord said. I smiled going outside and running over to the river, I couldn’t wait for salted fish. I had tasted dead fish heavily covered in salt, and that was really, really good, but I didn’t know what they meant by salted fish exactly.
I walked over to the river and looked down at the fish. I started to rub my hooves together just a tiny bit apart really fast causing them to heat up a little, and build up a massive charge. I could build up huge amounts of electricity so long as I didn’t actually touch my hooves together while building the charge. 
“As I was saying Twilight.” I stuck my hooves in water and a ton of fish jumped out of it leaving me only a second as I caught over twenty fish putting them in a wooden crate I had found on the road. I smiled and walked onto the road.
“You there.” I turned to a purple and white pony. Both of them wore some kind of wear gold armor. I dropped my fish letting my jaw drop seeing a horn on their head and wings at their sides. “Why do you have so many fish?” The white one asked.
“I’ve never had birdie unicorn before.” I said and they gave a confused look as Cord ran in front of me.
“NO!” He shouted. “That’s Princess Celestia and Princess Twilight Sparkle.”
“You didn’t tell me she was something I’ve never eaten before! I want to eat her, that’s not fair!” Princess Celestia and Twilight Sparkle gave a confused but serious look. “You can’t tell me she won’t be delicious!”
“Remember what I said, not funny.” I growled.
“Fine, I won’t eat them, but I want twice the fish!” I picked up a still wiggling fish tossing it into the air and swallowing it whole making me smile.
“We’ll deal with it.” I picked up my fish.
“PET!” I shouted with the crate in my mouth and Max came out. I threw it at him. “I want cooked fish.”
“Where, how did you get so many? You were only gone for thirty second!” He looked at Princess Celestia and Princess Twilight Sparkle as they came over every pony around bowed to them.
“What is this?” Princess Celestia asked and I looked at her. “Why is this pony demanding cooked fish and eating them?!” My mouth watered seeing them. 
“It’s hard to, Roma!” Cord shouted at me and every pony backed away seeing me having Princess Celestia on her back with me on her chest, my teeth at her throat. 
“DON’T!” Princess Celestia shouted at Princess Twilight Sparkle and she paused realizing that her magic wasn’t working. “Roma is it?” Princess Celestia asked, I let go of her throat.
“Yes.” She nodded swallowing a little nervous.
“Well Roma, why are you attacking me?”
“I’ve never eaten pony with both wings and horn before, I want to try you, I have never seen a pony like you before. I want to know how you taste.”
“I see, but will you please release every pony around us from your metal string?” Dozens of strings came from every pony and several of them fell to the ground breathing hard including Princess Twilight Sparkle.
“You can see my string?”
“Yes, clearly, if you wanted to, every pony within eye sight would be dead the second you made your move. The string is very sharp.” Blood ran down her face from a cut.
“Oh.” I pulled my hoof and she let out a breath breathing hard.
“Roma please don’t.” Cord pled.
“But she looks so delicious.”
“Roma,” Princess Celestia said and I looked at her. “I want to give you this.” She held up a ball of meat. “This will taste just like my meat, you’re not the first which has come for my flesh, so I made this in case.” I took it from her and sat down looking at it. 
“You sure?”
“Yes.” I licked her and then bit into the ball. The taste was weird, both of them tasted like my old body parts making me spit out the rotten meat.
“Ugh, you taste nasty!” I set the ball on her chest and it disappeared. “I like the fish better than you, pet cook me my fish!”
“Yes Roma.” He picked it up and I turned to Princess Celestia.
“You are lucky you taste nasty, or I would’ve eaten you, though I can’t say I’m happy about that though, I thought you would be delicious.” I sighed hopping off of her. A few ponies helped her up breathing hard.
I went over to Max and he started to cook them and I sat down. I started to hum and Princess Celestia came over to me.