Penblade

Yay!

"Please...none of that, Master Gale...I've had enough groveling to last me a lifetime. As for talking, this will suit just fine, I need no special treatment. I have come here as an equal, and so I will speak to you as an equal. Does that suit you?" "Thank God, yes!" Gallows said a bit too loudly, his voice carrying further than he would have liked through the mist. He winced as he sat up and the exclamation echoed faintly back at him, "Um, I mean to say, yes my lord, that's perfectly fine with me." The prince's stare was certainly that of a stallion used to command, but Gallows met him blink for blink, or lack thereof as it were. "I have something I need of you...and only you can help me in this." Well now... Gallows had not known what to expect from this exchange, and those had been the last words he would have imagined coming from noble lips. The idea of it made him smirk involuntarily, "Is that so my lord? I hardly see how I could help the most powerful stallion in the empire, unless you were planning on dying sometime soon."

Gallows' lips curled down in a frown at the mention of his past, but his attention was quickly diverted as the figure pulled back his hood to reveal his regal status. He raised both eyebrows and immediately wondered what the prince was up to in a cemetery at night. "Not Mrs. Twine then," he muttered, then smiled broadly and stepped to the side, away from his shovel and dropped onto all fours again. He bowed low and touched his forehead to the ground, "My humblest greetings, oh great lord. I am honored by your presence. I have never met a pony anywhere near your station before who was not in a pine box, so forgive me if I insult you unknowingly." The short speech was delivered carefully. Gallows had seen first hand what upset nobility were capable of, normally in the form of small crates of dismembered remains. He glanced at the open grave and back at the prince, "Forgive the mess. I was just making sure Silver Pan here was comfortable for his stay. Would you like to talk in my cabin? Unless you were just passing by, in which case I apologize for making the assumption." All this scraping and groveling was starting to grate on Gallows' nerves.

Gallows whistled tunelessly to himself as he pressed his shovel down into the damp, marshy ground and heaved it out over the side of the grave. The air was chill and silent tonight, of course it was always like that in the graveyard. Gallows didn't even notice it anymore, much like how he didn't notice or react to the myriad of worms and insects writhing in the bottom of the hole and in the pile of soil he was steadily building. Cemeteries were a prime source of food for the nasty little pests. When the grave was just about perfect he through his shovel over the pile so it landed spade-first in the ground and dragged himself out. Beside the grave, on the opposite side as the dirt pile, was a plain, nondescript coffin with the name Silver Pan carved on it. After scraping the majority of the dirt out of his coat with a hoof Gallows patted the foot of the coffin like one would pat a friend's back and began to lower it into the hole. "So, Silver Pan is it? Nice to meet you. I certainly hope you enjoy your stay here, and I think you'll be pleased with your accomodations. I've set you up with a nice little plot between a baker who got murdered and a decapitated captain who disappointed his commanding officer one too many times. Make sure to say hello and make good friends with them, you won't be moving much after tonight." With those albeit strange parting words Gallows finished positioning the coffin in the bottom of the grave and picked up his shovel once more. Filling the grave was much faster than emptying it, seeing as Gallows had gravity on his side now. Not for the first time in his career, the undertaker pony had the slightest urge to stop shoveling and pry open the coffin before it was completely buried. He'd seen on the occassion what sort of expensive trinkets the wealthier class liked to be buried with, and it was hardly like they needed them anymore, but alas, Gallows' conscience, however small it was, won out yet again and he continued to dig. After a few minutes the stallion decided to take a break as sweat started to seep into his coat despite the chill. He stood beside the grave with his shovel driven spade-first into the ground again. His hooves were crossed on the handle and his chin rested on those as he whistled aimlessly. He stopped whistling and lifted an eyebrow with a fair amount of surprise as a dim outline coalesced out of the shadows and mist, walking between the rows of graves. He stared for a moment as the figure approached, then looked down at the half-finished grave. "Friend of yours?" Silver Pan made no reply, so Gallows looked back at the hooded figure and whistled sharply to grab its attention. "Mrs. Twine, is that you? I told you I was sorry for burying you over a sinkhole. This is a bit extreme just to get petty revenge, don't you think?"

All right. Here's my first attempt at a character, so please, tear it apart and tell me what I screwed up royally on. I won't get better any other way. Name(s): - Birth Name: Sea Spray - Destined Name: Gallows Gale Sex: Male Age: Stallion Species: Earth Pony *Nationality: Coltaran **Organization: None ***Social Class: Commoner Eye Color: Grayish blue Coat Color: Dark navy blue Mane/tail: Gray and grayish blue Physique: Stocky and muscular, but not as big as Big Mac Cutie Mark/Destiny Mark: A noose hanging from an oddly shaped cloud can be seen on his chest. He got it a few days after his father’s death, while he was digging his grave. It represents how he views death a lot like rain or wind, just another unstoppable force of nature. It also represents his talent for being unphased by disturbing things like death, letting him do jobs others shy away from. Origin/Residence: Gallows was born in a small town in the middle of nowhere along with his brother and sister. His family moved to Coltan’s Rest when his father entered the military. He now lives alone on the outskirts of the city, in a small cabin in the cemetery. Occupation: Cemetery tender/gravedigger Personality: Harsh and realistic, though occasionally wistful. Gallows spends his days and nights tending to the graveyard a few miles outside Coltan’s Rest. He became desensitized to death a long time ago working there, but as such his social skills have been somewhat warped. He makes idle chit-chat with the graves and tends to creep out those that visit to pay their respects to the dead. Despite his complacency he sometimes dreams of leaving it all in the dust and staring over somewhere else. Family: He has a brother in the EVA, posted at the Pit of Nightmares, and a sister who works as a seamstress in Coltan’s Rest. His parents are both dead and he has no children. He barely even has any friends. Background Story: Born in a bland mining town with a population of not even three thousand, Sea Spray was quickly taught the value of hard work. He went to school with his siblings for several years but eventually dropped out to help his father in the mines. He was just entering his teenage years and starting to get settled in his mining job when his father received a scroll, telling him he had been chosen to be reenlisted into the military after ten years of retirement and posted at the pit of Nightmares to help oversee the mining project there. With no other option but to obey orders, Sea Spray’s family packed their things and moved to Coltan’s Rest. Sea Spray hated the militaristic rigidity of the city, whereas the rest of his family seemed to just slip into place like pieces of a puzzle. Things were much less simple now for Sea Spray. He was constantly told to watch what he said and did around his father’s superiors, and at least half of the other people in the city. He would frequently shut himself away in his room or wander the outskirts of the city so he wouldn’t have to deal with this new and aggravating way of life. As the years passed and he grew into a capable young stallion, still lacking a Destiny Mark, Sea Spray grew more and more distant, spending his time hiding in the slums or doing odd jobs for the less formal ponies near the edge of town. His brother entered the military as a soldier under his father, his sister became an apprentice seamstress, and his mother stayed at home most of the time due to her growing age. Things seemed to slip into a disquiet sort of rhythm for the most part until the day Sea Spray heard his father had been accused of treason; allegedly trying to cease the mining of the white crystal at the bottom of the pit, and was to be executed that day, along with his mother for trying to fight the guards when they came for his father. It all occurred so suddenly that the day is a blur in Sea Spray’s mind except for two details that haunt him. One is that there had been two sets of executions that day; a pair of thieves and his parents; and one of the executioners had hired him to sharpen his axe before he knew who was being executed that day. If he knew which party he’d helped kill he might have gained some solace as the years passed, but the doubt and constant question at the back of his mind let it fester. And the second detail that left a pit of anger and a sense of betrayal in his heart was who had been the one to accuse his father. The miserable worm had been a stallion named Copper Helm; his brother. In the aftermath of the execution Sea Spray blindly followed his parent’s corpses to the cemetery, feeling so much shock and anger and grief that his mind would hardly function. His family had been the only thing he thought he’d understood in this city, and now that family had been reduced to only his sister in his eyes, and even she had grown distant, feeling he was a lost cause. Abandoned, alone, and numb, Sea Spray refused to leave his parents’ side and resorted to the only thing that gave him any comfort, remembered from his young days in the mine. He started to dig, and he never stopped. Every shovelful of earth he tossed out of the forming pair of graves was dampened by his tears as he finally let his feelings show among the misty, silent tombstones. By the end, as he pressed down the last pile of earth over his father’s grave, Sea Spray was dead, and Gallows Gale had taken his place. At some point during his grieving Gallows had lost his faith in the living, seeing peace and solidity only among the dead, the bitter realization leaving it's mark on his chest. He stayed by the graves for three days straight as his mind tried to reconcile itself with what had happened. In the end, a hollow acceptance washed over him as he looked around him. Not a single creature here had come here by choice and his parents were no different. His brother’s actions had been monstrous, but he was a military stallion now, so it was hardly surprising to Gallows, now that he considered it. Loyalty to the Empress and her laws was the only thing they lived for. Not so with the ponies and griffins and wolves around him now though. They could care less about laws and rulers, much like himself. At the end of the three days Gallows had come to a decision. Everyone dies in the end, so there was no point in lamenting it. From that day on Gallows Gale gradually took over maintenance of the graveyard and became almost completely separated from the world of the living.

I am the Box Ghost Brony!

Thanks MLPTales (or whatever the abriviation might be) I had actually never heard that saying when I came up with the name a few years back. I was just musing and thought those two words would fit well together. Oh, and thanks for adding me to your Friends thing.

Welcome TashiBear. Hope you enjoy yourself here.

I once split an arrow with a second one, and I was just ten at the time too! I'm pretty sure it was just dumb luck though since it hasn't happened since. But still! It was cool!

Thanks Brony1337 . I just need to figure out what sort of character I want to make first.

*Brohoof's everyone* This place is great already . I've got a few questions though, since I'm a noob and all. One, is there somewhere I can find a list of all the site rules and such so I don't accidentally call down upon myself the wrath of Mod? And two, what do the apples under everyone's names mean, and why do some folks not have them?

Wow, five replies already? And great, galloping moon mares! One of them is Starswirl the Bearded! *passes out* (<--manly way of saying 'faints') I'm feeling the love already.

About Myself: Brace yourselves. Wait for it. Here comes the dramatic plot twist! ... ... ... I'm a brony. (Dun-dun-duuuunnn!) Other than that I also enjoy writing, reading, cooking, archery, listening to music of all varieties, and computer games. How I found Canterlot.com: surfing the interwebs How I became a fan of MLP:FiM: My favourite main cast pony/s: Fluttershy Hello everypony, or "everybody" in case there are any dragons or griffins reading this. (Griffins or Gryphons? Which is it?) I am Penblade the bard, not to be confused with Quillknife the traveling-stroryteller-and-entertainer; the jerk, always stealing my spotlight. *Ahem* anyway, it's a very nice pleasure to meet you all *Gentlemanly bro-hoofs all around*. This is my first time being part of a pony forum so I'm both excited and nervous to see how it goes. Can't wait to chat and roleplay with you all.