Journey to Equestria! Colab Story
Feb 14, 2013 12:55:25 GMT -7
Post by Tieren on Feb 14, 2013 12:55:25 GMT -7
So! For those who have seen the icons I posted in my Art thread, you know that I have worked on a story with a friend of mine. I've decided to post it here as well. There are going to be moments that Adult scenes will be present, but those will be removed from this story. If you want to full scene sent to you, PM me when that particular chapter is posted with the Chapter name in the subject and I'll send you the scene that fills the blank.
We are taking suggestions for things to happen in the story. So if you have any thoughts about it, or things you want to see, let us know. Same for comments on the story. You liked it, you didn't like it. It was hard to follow, you followed it fine. Offer us some help as it's the first Collaborative story that either of us have ever done.
So! Without further ado, Here's Chapter 1 "Welcome to Equestria" The beginning is started off by Me (AKA Jason, or Sunshine Sapphire). After that, it alternates between my friend and me. The change of font will show you the difference.
‘This isn’t happening... it couldn’t truly be happening, could it?’ were the thoughts that went through my mind as I woke up that morning. I figured it would be just like every other morning when I stayed over with my friend. We’d wake up, he’d try to go back to bed, I’d yell at him until he finally rolled out of bed, and then we would play games. Sounds simple enough, right?
What if you went to bed one night in a familiar place, only to wake up someplace completely different? That was what I went through that morning. I woke up, having had trouble sleeping as usual, and found myself looking around at... grass, trees, and some lake off in the distance. Birds flew overhead and the bed I had been laying in was completely gone. Not to mention the house, the town, and all the people who were there too. It was just... a wide open field. And none of it made any sense.
“Hey. Hey! Wake up!” I finally said to my friend. It was then that I turned toward him and noticed something even more strange than before. I let out a slight scream as I backed away from him, not knowing I wasn’t quite the same either.
His body was covered in white fur. From head to toe.. or... hoof? I wasn’t sure exactly, but they looked like hooves. And he even had wings; large feathery wings growing out of his back. His hair was longer, and he had a tail, both colored a dark red color. His eyes shot open as he heard me scream, his protective nature kicking in instantly. I watched his hoof shoot out for something I knew he would find wasn’t there anymore.
I watched as he noticed his own hoof as I looked down to see that I had been transformed similarly. Yet all I could see was the yellow color of my fur, my hooves themselves being colored brown. I looked around to my backside and noticed a tail, colored the same as my hooves. I also noticed a strange mark as well. It was a wire whisk with what looked like batter flying off of it. I tilted my head slightly before I turned back to my friend. He had a mark as well, his being a shield with a red cross in the middle.
“Ni-Nikolai? What... What happened?” I asked, looking around. I could see the confusion in his face too. We had known each other for quite some time. Six years to be exact. But we had never had anything like this happen before. I punched one hoof with another, feeling if I was dreaming. Sure enough, it hurt. And a lot more than I thought it would.
“Hell if I know!” he said. I knew he was trying to come up with an explanation for it. He hated not being able to explain one thing over another, but neither of us had an answer to this. And a large part of me felt that we never would. It was just too strange to be able to come up with a logical reasoning behind this. It’s not everyday you wake up as a horse with everyone you once knew, and everything you saw the night before just gone.
The two of us finally stood up all the way, albeit a little shakily. It wasn’t like we were used to walking on four hooves after all, and Nikolai had even more trouble. Those wings seemed to have a mind of their own. I watched him struggle to keep them down before he stopped and just stared at me, more particularly my forehead.
“Everything okay?” I asked him with great confusion on my face. But he didn’t respond right away. It was clear he was looking at something, but I had no idea what. Finally, he decided to speak.
“What in the Hell is that?!” he asked, raising a hoof to point at my head. I blinked slightly as I reached my own hoof up and gently felt around my forehead. It was then that I found whatever it was, and the annoying feeling I got when it was touched.
“Oww.... that doesn’t feel good. And it doesn’t help me know what it is any easier either.” I said, shaking my head slightly. It was giving me a light queasy feeling and I wondered why. I just looked over to Nikolai and watched as he laughed at me, calling me a Prissy little Unicorn. He really was a jerk sometimes. If I had been able to control my hooves, I would have punched him.
“So... it’s not a dream. It’s real. And... we’re horses. Nothing to panic about, right?” I said sarcastically as I looked around once more, as though expecting the answers to start falling out of the sky.
My eyes shot open. I heard Jason was screaming. I reached up for my gun that I kept beside my bed but... something was just not right. I reached out, but it didn’t feel like it was me at all. I looked down at my hand to see that it wasn’t really a hand at all. I scrambled around on the... grass. What!? I had gone to sleep last night in my bed. What was I doing in grass?
I flopped around in the grass for a moment, trying to come to grips with what in the Hell was going on. Jason asked me that himself, and I had no real answer for him. But I did notice that he wasn’t the same as well. As odd as my whole body felt, his certainly looked it. He was... well, not a person anymore, to put things bluntly. He was a horse. Now, I usually call him names because I’m a jerk. But he was truly and honestly a horse. An odd colored one at that though. He had a bright yellow coat that was actually difficult to look at for long, it was that bright. He had a dark brown mane, and the color of his hooves matched.
I looked around us to try and understand what exactly had happened. I had not a clue. We were in some kind of field, with the sun just over the horizon. There were yellow flowers growing out of the healthy green grass. And there was a small lake off in the distance not too far away. I glanced down at myself as best I could and noticed that my own coat of short fur was white. Upon my back I could see a pair of... wings? Kinda cool I guess. They wouldn’t cooperate with me though, and it was beginning to aggravate me a little.
I looked back over at Jason and noticed something on his head. He caught me staring at his head, and he started looking a little worried. “What in the Hell is that?” I asked him, pointing with a hoof. Man that was going to be awkward and hard to get used to. If we, indeed, had to get used to it. I was pretty sure I was just hallucinating. Wouldn’t be the first time that’s ever happened before.
Jason reached up and touched the thing on his head. He flinched as he did. Apparently it was pretty sensitive. It was then that I really noticed what it, and he, was. I started laughing, rolling around on the grass a little bit. “Hahaha! You’re a unicorn!” I said. “A prissy little unicorn! Man, I couldn’t have planned a joke better than this myself.” Like I said before... I’m kind of a jerk. At least to my friend anyway.
After I had had my chuckle, I righted myself as best I could. I attempted to stand up, with hilarious results. Four hooves were definitely not two feet. I eventually got them underneath me with the assistance of those crazy wings on my back. I flapped them madly to try and keep my balance, and it worked better than I had anticipated. But once I was on my hooves, I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to walk. That was going to be a whole different kind of trick.
I glanced around us again, trying to figure out where we might be. And I hadn’t the foggiest clue. I lived in the desert, nowhere near big open fields. And it wasn’t a hundred and ten degrees, so we were definitely not back home. “We’re not in Kansas anymore,” I muttered under my breath as I looked up at the infinitely blue sky above us.
“Not a dream. Yeah, sure...” I mumbled in response to Jason’s remark. If this wasn’t a dream, it was one Hell of a hallucination. I had had a few in my day, though details I will not go into. I ran my hoof through the tall grass around me. It felt... strange. There wasn’t really a whole lot of sensation in the hoof, which made sense really. There weren’t nerve endings in a horse’s hooves. That was going to make walking even more difficult that it already was.
But at least I was upright. Everything still felt weird, but I’d get over it. Or I wouldn’t. Didn’t make a difference to me. But there was one feeling I was familiar with. My stomach grumbled a little bit, and I shrugged, as best as a horse could shrug. I bent my head down and took a mouthful of grass. Jason gave me the strangest look. “When in Rome,” I commented with a goofy grin.
“Oooo! Rome?! Where’s that!?” a high pitched voice asked from behind me. The shock of hearing someone else knocked me back down to the ground as I jumped from surprise. Once the world stopped spinning around a little bit, I noticed another horse, a bright pink one.
I rolled my eyes slightly as I looked at Nikolai. I knew of his past, the two of us being best friends for a rather long time. But there were still times I wondered about him. Even more so as I heard his stomach growl. He then bent down and took a large mouthful of grass. My eyes went a little wide when I saw it. But as he commented, mouth full at that, I just shook my head.
That is... until I heard the words from the pink pony who had just heard what Nikolai had said. I let out a slight yelp, jumping back a bit. But she seemed harmless. In fact, she seemed a little too happy to be here as she started jumping in place and giggling.
“That was great! I mean, I didn’t really MEAN to scare you, but I did anyway! And you were all like ‘AHHH!’ and then you fell down on the ground,” she said, laughing. It didn’t seem like she was making fun of us, but at the same time, it sounded like it. Finally she stopped bouncing long enough to talk some more.
“So you two must be new around these parts. I mean, I would know. I know everypony in Ponyville, and I’ve never seen you. So that must mean you’re new. And if you’re new, it means you haven’t been welcomed yet. And if you haven’t been welcomed yet, then that means I’m slacking off in my duties! And that just isn’t good, soooooo....” she said before taking a huge breath. I was honestly a little scared of what she would do.
“WELLLLLLCOOOOOMEEEEE!” she yelled out, the sound of it alone seeming to move the trees away. It echoed across the field as my hooves covered my ears before I flopped down in the grass. I knew I would have to figure out these hooves sooner or later. She just giggled as I finally stood back up.
“I’m Pinkie Pie! What are your names? And birthdays. And favorite colors. OOH! And favorite animal, favorite type of cupcake, favorite place, favorite--” she just kind of kept going after that to a point where I forgot for a moment that she had even asked my name in the first place.
When I tried to answer, all that came out was a little “Buhhhh.... huh?” My mind trying to catch up to what she actually just asked me. But then it registered what her name was. She said it was Pinkie Pie. It sounded like a strange name. I wasn’t really sure how to answer, feeling that the names Jason and Nikolai would just sound weird to her. But before I could, I noticed a purple colored pony, also a unicorn, and a winged pony colored light blue coming up behind her.
What? Who? Where? When? Why? I was beyond confused. I don’t think I got a single word that this... pony had said. Was that what we were? Ponies? What was the difference? I honestly wasn’t too sure. But this... Pinkie Pie, as she called herself, didn’t seem to have an off button. I looked. I swear I did. But there wasn’t a single button to be found.
Just as I was getting ready to poke her nose to make sure she was real, and I wasn’t on some kind of bad acid trip, I noticed a couple more ponies approaching us. ‘Oh what now?’ I thought to myself as Pinkie Pie continued to ramble on and on and on.
The two ponies, a light blue pegasus, like myself, and a lavender unicorn, came up to the three of us. “Did you give these two a heart attack, Pinkie?” the unicorn asked. “They look scared stiff.” That was an understatement to be honest. When Pinkie Pie first startled me, I was pretty sure my heart jumped into my brain. There’s a name for that medical condition. Its called death.
“Yeah, Pinkie. You have a way of scaring off newcomers before they even make it to Ponyville,” the pegasus spoke up, nudging Pinkie Pie with a hoof.
Alright, so my brain was having a little bit of difficulty adjusting to what was going on at the moment, and I’m pretty sure I started to drool as my brain melted out of my ears and nose. There were talking ponies... like, seriously. Talking ponies. Was this some kind of acid trip? I mean, I had a couple of beers the night before, but nothing that would cause this. Did Jason spike my drinks or something?
“Uh... you alright there?” the lavender unicorn asked me. She took a step toward me, tilting her head a little to the side as she tried to get some kind of response from me. But nope. Brain melted. Gone. Poof. Goop. But for another reason entirely.
Now, I usually have pretty bad eyesight. And my hearing isn’t exactly up to par either. Too much time staring at the sun when I was a kid. And too many times out at the shooting range without proper hearing protection. But one sense that I’ve always been proud of is my sense of smell. I could smell just about anything, and correctly identify it.
When the unicorn stepped closer to me, I smelled something particularly good. She smelled like pomegranate and pears. There are certain memories in my mind associated with that scent. Pretty much all of them good. And she smelled exactly like that. Though I’m pretty sure I scared her off when I sniffed the air as she got closer. I just couldn’t help myself!
I remained silent for a moment as I watched the other two arrive. It was when I saw Nikolai’s reaction toward the other unicorn that I couldn’t help but chuckle a little bit. I nudged him lightly before giving him this look of ‘Snap out of it’. Finally, I turned toward the other three. It was strange to look at them. One had wings like Nikolai; one had a horn on their head, which I assumed was what I had; and the other had nothing in particular other than that pony shape.
I finally decided to speak to them, however. They seemed friendly enough. Or rather, they seemed more curious about what we’re doing here. “Don’t mind him, he’s a bit of a dolt sometimes,” I said with a light chuckle. They laughed lightly as well before smiling.
“Well at least you two are okay. My name’s Twilight Sparkle. It’s nice to meet you,” the unicorn said with an endearing smile upon her face. It was interesting to see how happy and friendly these ponies were.
“And I’m Rainbow Dash. Fastest flyer in all of Equestria!” said the pegasus with the rainbow colored mane, colors I might add that annoyed me to no end due to my colorblind nature. She took off slightly in a rainbow blur and showed us just how fast she was. But then I realized that she called this place Equestria. And the pink one had mentioned Ponyville. Just where were these place?
The three looked at me, as I had actually spoken back to them, and I assumed waited for an introduction as well. But hearing their strange names, I wasn’t entirely sure that our names would fly well with them. Twilight Sparkle. Rainbow Dash. Pinkie Pie. They were curious names alright, and I had no idea why they sounded so weird. But before I could respond, we heard a splash and a slight squeak come from the lake.
Rainbow Dash took off rapidly toward the lake as we all ran behind them. Another winged pony was there, colored yellow with a pink Mane. “Fluttershy! Are you alright?” Rainbow Dash exclaimed. There was another strange name.
“Oh... umm... yes. You see, this newborn turtle is finally learning how to swim and I... Oh!” she said, squeaking slightly at the end. Her voice was very soft as she covered her mouth with her hooves. Twilight shook her head slightly as I looked at the small turtle in the lake. It was then that I got a good look at myself.
My fur was a rather bright yellow, and there was the horn sticking out of my head. I wasn’t sure of its purpose here, despite knowing what a unicorn was, but as I looked at myself, I noticed my hair was the same color as it had been before. It looked kind of similar as well, aside from the falling out thing. One thing that wasn’t the same was my eyes. They were now a deep blue. And as I looked at them, I thought of one thing. A gem I had always loved.
“So you two never told us your names,” Twilight said as Fluttershy continued tending toward her animals, and fearing for the small turtle who seemed to try to comfort her as she watched him. I took a minute to think about their names versus their appearances. And in that, I managed to come up with a name that would sound rather similar to theirs.
“I’m... Sunshine Sapphire,” I said with a smile. The bright yellow of my fur reminded me of the sunshine, even if I wasn’t a huge fan of it. And Sapphire had always been my favorite gemstone. My deep blue eyes reminded me of that, so I figured it would be perfect. The others nodded their heads with a smile before turning to Nikolai. I just hoped that he would be able to come up with a name as well.
I glared at Jason when he told them I was a ‘dolt’. I didn’t appreciate being called a dolt. At least not in front of others. We often called each other names for fun, but it was when it was just us two, and not actually referring to each other as such to others. But I remained silent as he spoke with... Twilight Sparkle. Now that was going to be hard to say without sighing heavily, or laughing. There’s a certain book series and movies associated with that name, ‘Twilight’. They aren’t particularly good, or at least not in my opinion.
The other pony that came up with Twilight Sparkle called herself Rainbow Dash. She said she was the fasted flyer in Equestria, which I guessed was where we were. She then took off in a streak of rainbow colors, flying around the sky. I glanced back at the wings on my body and gave them a couple of test flaps. That was really about all I could manage. I wasn’t used to those muscles back there at all, and didn’t really know how to control them other than keeping the things flat against my back. Though I had to admit, it was neat being able to turn my head all the way around to see my back like this. This was one realistic hallucination.
Before we could say too much though, there was a squeak and a splash that came from the lake, and everyone headed off that way. Jason and I followed to discover yet another pony here. They must dominate the ironically named Equestria. Made sense. This was turning out to be some sorta strange dream or whatever. I thought about maybe turning it into a story when I got the time to get back into writing.
The shy pegasus by the lakeside was attempting to get a young turtle to swim. The others called her Fluttershy. An appropriate name if there ever was one. All of them seemed appropriate to their characters. A little unimaginative, but at the same time, completely creative. Or at least creative compared to names from our home.
I stepped over to Fluttershy as the others were leaving her alone for now. I crouched down to the little turtle by the lakeside and helped the little guy into the shallows of the cool water. “You just have to trust that nature knows what its doing. He’ll swim. He was born to.” I looked up and smiled at Fluttershy. She gave me a look like I was nuts, and I wasn’t sure why. Was it her job to teach all the creatures in the world to do the things they were already supposed to know? I didn’t know, and thought maybe I overstepped my boundaries.
I just smiled sheepishly toward Fluttershy who didn’t really seem upset or anything. Maybe she was just more curious than anything. But at least the little turtle was swimming around in the shallows just fine, so he was safe for now. I stepped back a few paces to stand beside Jason again. I heard him call himself Sunshine Sapphire. What in the Hell was he doing? It didn’t matter what we called ourselves. This was going away in the morning anyway.
Twilight Sparkle turned to me next, expecting me to introduce myself as well. I didn’t know what to say really, but I figured I’d go along with this for the time being. “Name’s Sterling. Sterling Aura,” I introduced myself. It was honestly the only thing I could think of at the moment. Would have been able to come up with a better name had I been given a little bit of time. But it seemed to satisfy her curiosity for now. And now I was stuck with it until the end of this little ride.
With the two of us having chosen our new names in this strange land, I was beginning to wonder exactly what we were going to do here. I also wondered about our homes, our families. Surely they’d miss us and wonder where we were, right? For now, I knew we were stuck here.... wherever here actually was. I glanced over at Nikolai, now named Sterling, and wondered what he thought about all of this. He probably thought it was still some dream.
“So where are you two from?” Rainbow Dash asked us curiously. “I mean... we’ve never seen you, and if Pinkie Pie had never met you, then you must be new around here,” she added on. Damn these ponies. They had so many questions for us, and we didn’t exactly have the answers.
“Oh, you know... the desert. We uh.... we’ve been traveling,” I said, hoping that the answer would be good enough. They all started thinking, and that led me to believe that I had no idea what I was getting myself into. This was not going to be fun to talk about later. Once we found out where we were, we would definitely have to do some research on this ‘Equestria’.
“The desert, huh?” Twilight repeated, thinking some more. “Like... Dodge Junction or Appleloosa?” she asked. Apparently these were towns in the area that were from a desert.
“Yeah! Appleloosa. That’s the one,” I said, hoping that she didn’t have much experience down there. Sure enough, I was wrong.
“Ooh! Like with Chief Thunderhooves! And Little Strongheart! And Sheriff Silverstar! And Braeburn! And...” Pinkie Pie said, presumably naming off every single pony that lived in this strange town of ‘Appleloosa’ that I now said we were from. This was getting more and more complicated by the second.
“Yes Pinkie. We get it,” Twilight said, shoving her pink friend away with a hoof before walking past her. “Well if you’re traveling, why not come take a look at Ponyville? It’s got several other friends of ours there, and everypony is very friendly,” she added on. Wait... did she... did she just say... every... PONY?!? Okay, that’s it. I’m with Ster-- Nikolai. We’re dreaming. We are definitely dreaming. Or hallucinating. Nikolai must have spiked the drinks last night, forgot which he spiked after drinking, and accidentally drank from some of my spiked water. That had to be it. There was no other explanation.
At this point, I wasn’t even sure what to think, say, or do. We seemed to be stuck between a rock and a hard place at this point. But the other four just started to head back into town, Fluttershy deciding to follow now as her animal friends were finished doing what they were doing. I looked over to Nikolai though. Were we supposed to just play along with this even longer? I wasn’t sure, but knowing him, he was about to tell me to just shut my big mouth.
The four others were quite a bit away from us at this point as I finally turned toward him. “What are we going to do? We don’t know anything about this place, and there’s no way we’re having the same dream. But we can’t just... sit here and do nothing,” I finally asked, sincerely afraid as far as what was actually going to happen as we kept going on.
I simply sighed and smacked a hoof to my face. That hurt more than I had been expecting. It also informed me that I was no longer wearing glasses for whatever reason. But I could still see, so this definitely was some kind of dream. I couldn’t afford laser surgery, but I had always thought getting rid of the glasses would be nice. Yup, it was a dream.
But as I was standing there, Jason, or Sunshine Sapphire, was digging us a great big hole to go ahead and bury ourselves in. Why did he have to talk sometimes? Jason. What are you doing? Jason. Stop.
The other ponies were heading back into this Ponyville place, and I figured it couldn’t hurt to follow. Maybe they had food or something. I was starting to get a little hungry. But before we left, I turned to Sunshine Sapphire. I was going to have to make fun of him for that silly name. “Just... leave most of the talking to me. You know I’m a better storyteller than you are.”
We followed the ponies into a small-ish town. It was quaint, if a little behind the times. Or at least behind as far as where I came from was. But it was nice. It was clean, and all the ponies walking around seemed to be in good spirits. That was certainly a change from the world I was used to. Hell, if this was real, I might consider staying if it ended up being a decent place.
There were little stalls lining the dirt streets selling all manner of vegetables and fruits and other foods. No meat though, and that made me sad a little bit. If I was a horse now, I wouldn’t be able to eat meat. I was going to miss that.
There were other shops, small buildings selling a strange assortment of things. There was one that only sold sofas and quills. What kind of store only sells two things, and two totally different things at that? My messed up brain must have made this place. It was the only thing that made sense.
We walked behind the ponies who had met us out in the fields just outside of town. What they had been doing there I hadn’t the foggiest. But I think we were probably lucky to have met them so soon. At least now we sorta knew someone here, instead of walking around blindly and lost.
But all in all, it seemed a decent place. But I had no idea where we would stay, if we were, in fact, stuck here. I was fairly certain this was some kind of dream, but one could never be too sure. Folks go missing without explanation all the time. We neared the center of the small town, and there was a message board setup for others to post memos for the townsfolk. I stopped by it quickly to scan a couple of them. There really wasn’t a whole lot of bad news to read. Again, I think I might like it here. Back home that was all anyone ever heard on the news was bad.
I noticed the others were getting away from me, and I trotted quickly to catch up to them. But I still wasn’t used to these bloody limbs. I ended up tripping and faceplanting right into the dirt.
The town we were in was interesting. Various shops and stalls, each selling their own individual things. One thing I noticed was the marks that everyone had. It seemed to fit with whatever it was they were doing. At one point, I looked behind myself and noticed the mark that I had seen before. A wire whisk with batter flying off. It now seemed to make sense. Apparently these marks were actually related to what we did.
I noticed Nikolai falling behind. He had stopped to read some of the news here as I was just trying to figure out what had happened. He ended up tripping into the dirt. But before I could run over to help him out, an orange pony with a cowboy hat on had already been beside him to help.
“Careful there, partner. Better watch where yer goin’,” she said with a smile as she helped him. The others noticed he had fallen behind and started walking back over to them.
“Oh hey, Applejack. I see you’ve met our newcomers to Ponyville,” Twilight said to the one who was now named Applejack. Sure enough, I noticed the mark was three apples. It was making more and more sense, but at the same time, less and less.
“I can’t say so far as to MET them. More like just helped this one out of the dirt,” she said with a light chuckle. She had a bag around her back, presumably how they carried things around. In it was, of course, apples. “I brought the apples that you need over at Sugarcube Corner, Pinkie. Best apples I could find,” she said with a smile as she transferred the bag to Pinkie’s back.
“Oh boy! The Cakes are going to love these bright and shiny apples,” she said with a grin. Pinkie Pie also had a strange way of walking. That is to say... she didn’t walk. She hopped everywhere she went. I wasn’t sure how she had so much energy, but the others didn’t seem to care.
“Well then... now that ya’ll know my name, how about you get to telling me yours?” She said, looking over to Sterling and noticing me as well.
“Mine is Sunshine Sapphire, and his is Sterling Aura,” I said. At least I could say things that we had already told them.
“It’s a pleasure to meet ya, Sugarcube. I reckon yer showin’ them around town, Twi?” she asked. The unicorn nodded in response, and Applejack seemed ready to help show us around even more. But as we turned around, I saw something I didn’t think I would see.
A dragon... granted, he was small, but still a dragon. It was interesting to see, more so because all we had seen was ponies, but why was there a dragon here? And he was riding on a white unicorn, with a rather curled and carefully groomed purple mane and tail. She seemed to walk with elegance, and from the three diamonds on her flank, I had a feeling she acted that way too.
“Why do I miss out on all the fun?” she asked, her voice sounding far fancier than the others. I figured I was right. “I go to see my little Spikey-Wikey and see that everypony else is missing,” she added on, walking closer to us. The dragon, I assumed being this ‘Spikey-Wikey’ hopped off of her back before looking over to Twilight.
“Twilight, Rarity brought me here because you received a letter from Princess Celestia,” he told her, holding out a scroll. Princess? A scroll? A talking dragon? Just what was going on in this strange dream we were in? I looked over to Nikolai and gave a light shrug. It seemed he wasn’t following this anymore than I had been.
“Oh, thank you Spike,” Twilight said. It was then that I saw just what the horn of a unicorn could do as it glowed, the paper glowing the same color and lifting into the air before unrolling itself. It appeared that unicorns could produce magic. After everything else I had heard, I was honestly not surprised.
“Hmm... it appears that Princess Celestia has requested we go to Canterlot in a couple of days. Her and Princess Luna detected some strange magic surge across Equestria, and told us to be on the lookout for strange ponies,” she relayed to her friends. Uh oh.... that had to be us. So did that mean that... this was all real? We didn’t stand out too much, did we? Then again, they all seemed to know the ponies of Ponyville, and we were the only two who didn’t quite fit in. I had a feeling we would be meeting up with these two princesses sooner rather than later.
“Well then... I must get a dress ready if I am to meet up with the Princess yet again. Oh my, so much to do,” the white unicorn said, I assumed being Rarity. But Twilight had mentioned ‘we’ go to Canterlot, and for ‘us’ to look out for strange ponies. Perhaps that meant that the seven of them were rather close? It seemed so, but I wasn’t entirely sure.
“Rarity, you’ve already met the Princess numerous times. You know she doesn’t care if you’re in a dress or not,” Applejack said with a laugh.
“Just because you have no issue ‘roughing it’ in front of Princess Celestia doesn’t mean that I don’t. I would rather present myself rather nicely in front of Royalty,” she retorted, flipping her mane back a little.
“Yeah. Maybe then, Prince Blueblood will look over at you again,” Rainbow Dash added in, laughing afterward. Rarity seemed none too happy with that comment.
“That good for nothing Prince... he’s only in love with himself. I dare say I’ll never be attempting to garner his attention again,” she responded, finally walking away, all the while Rainbow Dash laughing more while flying.
“Well what about you two? What are you up to here?” Applejack finally asked us. I turned to Nikolai now. He told me to leave the talking to him, and that was just what I was going to do.
I shoved Sapphire out of the way a little when Applejack asked us what we were doing. I told him to leave the talking to me, and I was going to glue his mouth shut if I had to to keep him quiet. Did they even have glue here? It was made from horse hooves afterall.
“We’re just traveling, looking for a new place to live,” I lied. It sounded good enough. “Had to get away from home and find a place all our own,” I added on. It seemed believable enough.
The others nodded, accepting the answer. Apparently, Ponyville was a fairly desirable place to live. “Well that’s good. I hope you like it here,” Twilight said with a smile.
I returned the smile, “Oh, I think I will,” I responded quickly without even thinking, looking right at Twilight. I took a small step toward her, and then realized just how that probably looked. I would have smacked myself in the face if everybody wasn’t looking at me. I’m sure they were. I was acting like an idiot in front of a pretty girl. Wait a second... ‘pretty girl’? What was I thinking!? Was there something wrong with me? Well, there’s a lot wrong with me, but still. She’s a horse... pony. She’s a pony! I can’t be attracted to a pony. Besides, why would I be attracted in the first place? I didn’t know her... or any of them.
I did smack myself when she looked away though. “I’m such an idiot,” I muttered under my breath. I knew I would get endless flak from Sapphire about this when we were alone.
I regained my composure though as quickly as I could. “So... about that tour?” I asked Twilight. She was apparently the one leading this pack of ponies. Some of the others looked like they had other things to be doing anyway. Pinkie had to get those apples to ‘Sugarcube Corner’, whatever that was. Probably a sweet shop or something. Rainbow Dash looked like she was ready to fly off at any moment for no other reason than just to fly. And Applejack, from the southern sound of her voice, probably had farm work to do. I didn’t want to distract them all from their obligations.
Twilight nodded her head and smiled again. I thought I saw a hint of a blush, but I was probably wrong. It would be hard to tell with the soft lavender color of her fur anyway. “Right, yes. Let me show you around town. If you’re thinking of maybe moving here, you should know where everything is.”
Yep. He was in love. I could see it on Nikolai’s face. He was deeply, madly, in love. With a pony nonetheless. I knew I wouldn’t be able to refrain from making fun of him now. The opportunity was just too great. I listened as he said that we were planning on moving here and wondered if that was going to end up happening.
The others seemed okay with that reasoning, so it seemed we were out of the hot water for now. But I knew it was only a matter of time before we’d have to come up with something else to tell them. Rainbow Dash eventually left, saying something about having to clear the skies of clouds. And sure enough, as she zipped away, she started bursting through clouds and getting rid of them.
Rarity had already left, I assumed to work on that dress she mentioned. Pinkie Pie said her goodbyes and hopped off to what I guessed was Sugarcube Corner. Fluttershy even left, muttering about having to take care of her animals. But Applejack said that she would stay for now. That she had taken care of her work back on the farm.
“What farm is that?” I asked her, out of curiosity.
“Why... Sweet Apple Acres. No other apple farm can compete with what we do. The rest of my family take care of it, that is, Granny Smith, Big Macintosh, and Applebloom. We all take care of the farm,” she told us rather enthusiastically. It seemed like she enjoyed her work, which was a good thing. I nodded in understanding as we started off through Ponyville.
Twilight pointed out quite a few things, including the areas where the others had gone off to. Sugarcube Corner was a bakery, one I enjoyed as we walked by. I was a baker at heart, and was proud of it. Carousel Boutique was where Rarity had gone off to. She ran her own clothing parlour. Next was the town hall, where we met the mayor, Mayor Mare. She seemed nice enough, if not a little scatterbrained.
Cloudsdale was pointed out toward us. Apparently there was a city in the clouds that controlled the weather here in this area. Things were getting harder and harder to understand. We passed by the post office, where a gray colored pegasus came barrelling out and running right into Sterling. “Oops! My bad!” she said as she took off to the skies. One thing about her was her messed up eyes. They looked a little derpy. But oh well. She still had a smile on her face as she attempted to deliver mail.
Finally, we arrived at a large tree. Spike opened the door and we walked in. This was apparently where Twilight and Spike lived. We learned that Spike was Twilight’s assistant, along with her pet owl who’s name I won’t even try to spell.
“Here we are, the library. This is where I do all of my studies for the Princess. I’m her personal student, after all. Spike and I also live here in the upper levels. And... that’s pretty much it. Outside of town we have the Everfree Forest, Fluttershy’s cottage, Saddle Lake, the Whitetail Woods, and Sweet Apple Acres. Other then that, you’ve seen pretty much all of Ponyville,” Twilight said, happy with how the tour went.
“Any questions ya’ll might have about our town? I’ve lived here most of my life, aside from when I went to Manehattan to live with my Aunt and Uncle Orange when I was just a filly,” Applejack said. Manehattan? Seriously? I was seriously concerned now. Just what other things did they have that was similar to our home?
Twilight Sparkle and Applejack showed us the rest of the town. It was a nice town. Small, but nice. And I had always been a small town boy at heart, so I was comfortable here. As we walked and talked, our two guides would often stop to greet another pony out enjoying the nice day. It seemed that it was one of those kinds of towns where everybody knew everybody.
We passed by the Sugarcube Corner that was mentioned before. It was actually a bakery. I could smell it long before we even got close to it though. I nudged Sapphire playfully and pointed at it with a hoof. That boy loved to cook, and especially bake. I’d force him to visit Sugarcube Corner today if I had to. Though I was sure it wouldn’t come to that.
As we were walking by the post office, a grey pegasus mare came bursting through the door and barreling right into me. We tumbled to the ground, and she quickly apologized before flapping her wings and fluttering off into the sky. A strange place to be sure, but it was... normal. Everybody was just walking around, doing things that they normally would. I was beginning to wonder if this really was all in my head or not. Normally there’d be some sort of crisis or depression or something. I was not this happy and upbeat... or normal. At least not in my head.
The last place on our stop was a large tree near the center of Ponyville. Twilight led us inside and told us this was the library, and also her and Spike’s home. I saw the little, purple dragon moving about the shelves of books, putting some back on the shelves in their proper places. I had always liked libraries. “I used to spend a lot of time in libraries in high school,” I mentioned. This seemed to get me on good terms with Twilight, though that hadn’t really been my intention. It was more or less just an observation really. But given that she lived there, it was my guess that reading was one of her favorite things to do.
Applejack asked us if we had any questions, and then she mentioned a place called Manehattan. I just burst into laughter when I heard that. Now I knew I really wasn’t trapped inside my own head or something. No way I could come up with a pun as good as that. The two mares gave me some strange looks before I could gather myself again. I wiped a laughter tear from my eye and cleared my throat. “N-no, thank you. I don’t really have any questions right now,” I said, trying to not think about it. I didn’t know why it had tickled me as much as it had, but it did.
I stepped away from the others though to examine some of the titles of the books on the shelves. ‘100 Simple Spells and Incantations’, ‘Dangerous Plants of the Everfree Forest’, ‘How To Train Your Dragon’. Some strange titles. but given the world we were in, they made sense. Unicorns had magic. There were dragons, apparently. And pegasi could fly. It really made sense if one thought about it for a second. It was like I had stepped into some sort of fantasy kid’s world or something. Could make life simpler. That would certainly be nice for a change.
I turned to Twilight as she was talking to Sapphire about some sort of spell she had been practicing. I could tell Sapphire had no idea what she was talking about, but he was smiling and nodding his head as she talked, trying to not seem rude, or blow his cover. “Hey, Twilight?” I interjected, trying to save Sapphire from embarrassment if he couldn’t add something to the conversation.
Twilight turned to me with a smile, “Yes?”
“Well, I do have a question. You see, Sapphire and I might be in town for a little while, but we don’t have a place to stay. You wouldn’t happen to know a place where we could hold up for a little while?” I asked her. I don’t know why I was hoping she’d say we could stay at the library with her. It was wishful thinking, and I was pretty friggin’ sure it wasn’t going to happen too.
As Applejack mentioned Manehattan, Nikolai, or Sterling as I supposed I should start getting used to saying, burst out laughing. He seemed to be accepting this strange world, but I couldn’t hold in my own laughter as he started. We both got some strange looks before clearing our throats. We really seemed like we were brothers at times.
The two of us started to look around at the books that were on the shelves. They seemed relevant to this new world we were in and I wondered what other strange things that they had here. Magic, dragons, ponies, flying ponies. It was starting to seem like a strange fantasy land. Even Fluttershy seemed to be able to talk to the creatures we saw earlier. But seeing the owl, I wondered if this world had similar animals to ours.
Twilight started talking to me about a spell that the supposed Princess was having her learn. A lot of it didn’t make sense, and I felt awkward hearing about it. I knew I would have to learn some basic magic at least in order to truly pass off as a unicorn. But before I could even come up with some sort of story about not really using my magic lately, Sterling interjected.
He asked if Twilight knew of a place that we would be able to stay for the time being. It was a good question, one that she seemed stumped on for now. She thought for a bit about the town and the ponies that were here.
“I don’t know, Sterling. Strangely enough, Ponyville doesn’t get many visitors. It’s a good place, but it’s one of those... if you’re new, everypony knows it kind of towns. So we don’t really have many inns or hotels or anything here. I suppose I could ask my friends if they can offer something,” she said, turning to Applejack,
“Well ya’ll can stay in mah barn if you need some place to stay. It’s not much, but it’ll give ya something until you can figure out what yer doin,” she said, offering us something at least. I nodded at the words, figuring we had to take what we can get.
“Don’t you have family coming into town soon? I know I’ve heard Applebloom and the other crusaders cheering about Babs Seed coming back,” Twilight mentioned.
“Aww, pony feathers! Yer Right, Twi. Some of the other Apples wanted to get in on the Zap Apple Harvest, and we told them they could come. Babs is the only one sleepin’ in the house since she’ll be with Applebloom. But the others would be out in the barn. If you two don’t mind sharing with some of my family members, you could stay with us,” she said. That complicated things a bit. Considering the name of the town I said we were from, I had a feeling that some of the ponies from that town would be coming here. At this point, I turned to Sterling. He told me to leave the talking to him. That’s what I was going to do.
Sapphire was leaving it entirely up to me. I know I said before to leave the sweet talking to me. But I couldn’t do everything on my own. I had to think of something. Sharing a barn with a bunch of strangers didn’t seem particularly inviting. I had used hostels before, and even those creeped me out. And they weren’t a barn.
“Well... we wouldn’t want to intrude on your family. I know family is important. That, and I also wouldn’t want to get in the way of your... Zap Apple Harvest.” Yeah, that sounded like a good ‘excuse’. I turned back to Twilight to see if she would offer any options herself.
She tapped a hoof to her chin as she thought for a minute. “Hmm... well the Cakes have their hooves full with the babies... and Pinkie. Honestly, I don’t know how they can put up with her all the time and the kids. They have some serious patience.”
I chuckled a little bit, remembering the way Pinkie was. Add some kids to that and I was sure it was a regular party over at Sugarcube Corner. “Well... if there’s a nice, quiet place for us to stay, that would be nice. We’re pretty quiet ourselves,” I added, hinting to the lavender mare about a possible place we could stay.
She kept tapping her hoof to her chin in thought. “Rarity might be able to take you guys in for a little bit. Though she has her little sister over quite often, and the Boutique isn’t really made for guests.” She continued to think about other places. “And only Sterling could stay with Rainbow Dash. And I’m not even sure what her place looks like to be honest. I’m a little afraid to see how she lives.” Twilight gave a little, involuntary shudder as the thought crossed her mind. Apparently Rainbow Dash wasn’t as organized or clean as her. “And I know Fluttershy always has all her animals at her cottage. And its pretty small to begin with. That really leaves only one other place...”
“But can you and Spike really keep the two of them here?” Applejack asked. “It’s not the biggest place in all of Ponyville,” she added on. It seemed like this was becoming more and more difficult to come up with. But Twilight just shook her head.
“No, it should be fine. I had you and Rarity over that one night during the planned storm, remember? Besides, they could probably sleep in the side room. We’d just need to get an extra bed. Two, if we’re lucky, but I don’t even know if two would fit there. That is, if you two don’t mind,” she said, looking over at us. I knew I didn’t mind, but I felt Sterling sometimes did. “If we can get two, and can get them to fit, that’d be perfect. If not, I’m sure we could live with one. I’ll just push him onto the floor if I need to,” I said with a smile. Twilight and Applejack laughed, apparently seeing the friendship we already had. I took a tentative step away from Sterling, expecting to be punched in the shoulder.
“Alright, then it’s settled. The two of you can stay here in the library for a little while. At least until you can get yourself situated and figured out. If you tell me how many bits you have now, I can probably help you figure out how much you’ll need for a place of your own. Well... I’m guessing you don’t have any, actually... considering you don’t have anything with you,” she pointed out. Welp, we’re screwed. What kind of travelers are we if we don’t have any bags or... wait... what are bits?!?! I assumed they were what was considered money in this land, but I thought that was a strange name.
“Well! I guess we’ll just have to help them find some work so they can start gettin’ paid. What do ya’ll like to do?” Applejack asked us.
“Well... I like baking, and Sterling’s rather good in the medical field,” I told her. Hey! At least I wasn’t making up a lie this time.
“Great! Then perhaps we’ll let you two rest and get used to the town. Tomorrow we can see about getting you work at the hospital, and you could probably help out at Sugarcube Corner. Like Twilight said, the Cakes are rather busy with two foals and Pinkie Pie, so they could probably use the help,” Applejack said with a smile. I nodded back to her. Things seemed to be working out for now. But I knew if I didn’t get a chance to speak with Sterling soon, we wouldn’t have anything figured out.
“Alright, thank you both! Do you mind if Sterling and I walk around town? We should probably get to know the town a little bit better, and maybe we can see about procuring some beds to use for sleep,” I asked.
Twilight shook her head. “Not at all. I’ll see if some of my friends have an extra bed to spare for a little while. They might have something locked away in an attic or something,” she said with a smile. Applejack said her goodbyes, saying she had to get to work back at the farm. As for me, I stepped out with Sterling. We had quite a bit to discuss.
We are taking suggestions for things to happen in the story. So if you have any thoughts about it, or things you want to see, let us know. Same for comments on the story. You liked it, you didn't like it. It was hard to follow, you followed it fine. Offer us some help as it's the first Collaborative story that either of us have ever done.
So! Without further ado, Here's Chapter 1 "Welcome to Equestria" The beginning is started off by Me (AKA Jason, or Sunshine Sapphire). After that, it alternates between my friend and me. The change of font will show you the difference.
‘This isn’t happening... it couldn’t truly be happening, could it?’ were the thoughts that went through my mind as I woke up that morning. I figured it would be just like every other morning when I stayed over with my friend. We’d wake up, he’d try to go back to bed, I’d yell at him until he finally rolled out of bed, and then we would play games. Sounds simple enough, right?
What if you went to bed one night in a familiar place, only to wake up someplace completely different? That was what I went through that morning. I woke up, having had trouble sleeping as usual, and found myself looking around at... grass, trees, and some lake off in the distance. Birds flew overhead and the bed I had been laying in was completely gone. Not to mention the house, the town, and all the people who were there too. It was just... a wide open field. And none of it made any sense.
“Hey. Hey! Wake up!” I finally said to my friend. It was then that I turned toward him and noticed something even more strange than before. I let out a slight scream as I backed away from him, not knowing I wasn’t quite the same either.
His body was covered in white fur. From head to toe.. or... hoof? I wasn’t sure exactly, but they looked like hooves. And he even had wings; large feathery wings growing out of his back. His hair was longer, and he had a tail, both colored a dark red color. His eyes shot open as he heard me scream, his protective nature kicking in instantly. I watched his hoof shoot out for something I knew he would find wasn’t there anymore.
I watched as he noticed his own hoof as I looked down to see that I had been transformed similarly. Yet all I could see was the yellow color of my fur, my hooves themselves being colored brown. I looked around to my backside and noticed a tail, colored the same as my hooves. I also noticed a strange mark as well. It was a wire whisk with what looked like batter flying off of it. I tilted my head slightly before I turned back to my friend. He had a mark as well, his being a shield with a red cross in the middle.
“Ni-Nikolai? What... What happened?” I asked, looking around. I could see the confusion in his face too. We had known each other for quite some time. Six years to be exact. But we had never had anything like this happen before. I punched one hoof with another, feeling if I was dreaming. Sure enough, it hurt. And a lot more than I thought it would.
“Hell if I know!” he said. I knew he was trying to come up with an explanation for it. He hated not being able to explain one thing over another, but neither of us had an answer to this. And a large part of me felt that we never would. It was just too strange to be able to come up with a logical reasoning behind this. It’s not everyday you wake up as a horse with everyone you once knew, and everything you saw the night before just gone.
The two of us finally stood up all the way, albeit a little shakily. It wasn’t like we were used to walking on four hooves after all, and Nikolai had even more trouble. Those wings seemed to have a mind of their own. I watched him struggle to keep them down before he stopped and just stared at me, more particularly my forehead.
“Everything okay?” I asked him with great confusion on my face. But he didn’t respond right away. It was clear he was looking at something, but I had no idea what. Finally, he decided to speak.
“What in the Hell is that?!” he asked, raising a hoof to point at my head. I blinked slightly as I reached my own hoof up and gently felt around my forehead. It was then that I found whatever it was, and the annoying feeling I got when it was touched.
“Oww.... that doesn’t feel good. And it doesn’t help me know what it is any easier either.” I said, shaking my head slightly. It was giving me a light queasy feeling and I wondered why. I just looked over to Nikolai and watched as he laughed at me, calling me a Prissy little Unicorn. He really was a jerk sometimes. If I had been able to control my hooves, I would have punched him.
“So... it’s not a dream. It’s real. And... we’re horses. Nothing to panic about, right?” I said sarcastically as I looked around once more, as though expecting the answers to start falling out of the sky.
My eyes shot open. I heard Jason was screaming. I reached up for my gun that I kept beside my bed but... something was just not right. I reached out, but it didn’t feel like it was me at all. I looked down at my hand to see that it wasn’t really a hand at all. I scrambled around on the... grass. What!? I had gone to sleep last night in my bed. What was I doing in grass?
I flopped around in the grass for a moment, trying to come to grips with what in the Hell was going on. Jason asked me that himself, and I had no real answer for him. But I did notice that he wasn’t the same as well. As odd as my whole body felt, his certainly looked it. He was... well, not a person anymore, to put things bluntly. He was a horse. Now, I usually call him names because I’m a jerk. But he was truly and honestly a horse. An odd colored one at that though. He had a bright yellow coat that was actually difficult to look at for long, it was that bright. He had a dark brown mane, and the color of his hooves matched.
I looked around us to try and understand what exactly had happened. I had not a clue. We were in some kind of field, with the sun just over the horizon. There were yellow flowers growing out of the healthy green grass. And there was a small lake off in the distance not too far away. I glanced down at myself as best I could and noticed that my own coat of short fur was white. Upon my back I could see a pair of... wings? Kinda cool I guess. They wouldn’t cooperate with me though, and it was beginning to aggravate me a little.
I looked back over at Jason and noticed something on his head. He caught me staring at his head, and he started looking a little worried. “What in the Hell is that?” I asked him, pointing with a hoof. Man that was going to be awkward and hard to get used to. If we, indeed, had to get used to it. I was pretty sure I was just hallucinating. Wouldn’t be the first time that’s ever happened before.
Jason reached up and touched the thing on his head. He flinched as he did. Apparently it was pretty sensitive. It was then that I really noticed what it, and he, was. I started laughing, rolling around on the grass a little bit. “Hahaha! You’re a unicorn!” I said. “A prissy little unicorn! Man, I couldn’t have planned a joke better than this myself.” Like I said before... I’m kind of a jerk. At least to my friend anyway.
After I had had my chuckle, I righted myself as best I could. I attempted to stand up, with hilarious results. Four hooves were definitely not two feet. I eventually got them underneath me with the assistance of those crazy wings on my back. I flapped them madly to try and keep my balance, and it worked better than I had anticipated. But once I was on my hooves, I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to walk. That was going to be a whole different kind of trick.
I glanced around us again, trying to figure out where we might be. And I hadn’t the foggiest clue. I lived in the desert, nowhere near big open fields. And it wasn’t a hundred and ten degrees, so we were definitely not back home. “We’re not in Kansas anymore,” I muttered under my breath as I looked up at the infinitely blue sky above us.
“Not a dream. Yeah, sure...” I mumbled in response to Jason’s remark. If this wasn’t a dream, it was one Hell of a hallucination. I had had a few in my day, though details I will not go into. I ran my hoof through the tall grass around me. It felt... strange. There wasn’t really a whole lot of sensation in the hoof, which made sense really. There weren’t nerve endings in a horse’s hooves. That was going to make walking even more difficult that it already was.
But at least I was upright. Everything still felt weird, but I’d get over it. Or I wouldn’t. Didn’t make a difference to me. But there was one feeling I was familiar with. My stomach grumbled a little bit, and I shrugged, as best as a horse could shrug. I bent my head down and took a mouthful of grass. Jason gave me the strangest look. “When in Rome,” I commented with a goofy grin.
“Oooo! Rome?! Where’s that!?” a high pitched voice asked from behind me. The shock of hearing someone else knocked me back down to the ground as I jumped from surprise. Once the world stopped spinning around a little bit, I noticed another horse, a bright pink one.
I rolled my eyes slightly as I looked at Nikolai. I knew of his past, the two of us being best friends for a rather long time. But there were still times I wondered about him. Even more so as I heard his stomach growl. He then bent down and took a large mouthful of grass. My eyes went a little wide when I saw it. But as he commented, mouth full at that, I just shook my head.
That is... until I heard the words from the pink pony who had just heard what Nikolai had said. I let out a slight yelp, jumping back a bit. But she seemed harmless. In fact, she seemed a little too happy to be here as she started jumping in place and giggling.
“That was great! I mean, I didn’t really MEAN to scare you, but I did anyway! And you were all like ‘AHHH!’ and then you fell down on the ground,” she said, laughing. It didn’t seem like she was making fun of us, but at the same time, it sounded like it. Finally she stopped bouncing long enough to talk some more.
“So you two must be new around these parts. I mean, I would know. I know everypony in Ponyville, and I’ve never seen you. So that must mean you’re new. And if you’re new, it means you haven’t been welcomed yet. And if you haven’t been welcomed yet, then that means I’m slacking off in my duties! And that just isn’t good, soooooo....” she said before taking a huge breath. I was honestly a little scared of what she would do.
“WELLLLLLCOOOOOMEEEEE!” she yelled out, the sound of it alone seeming to move the trees away. It echoed across the field as my hooves covered my ears before I flopped down in the grass. I knew I would have to figure out these hooves sooner or later. She just giggled as I finally stood back up.
“I’m Pinkie Pie! What are your names? And birthdays. And favorite colors. OOH! And favorite animal, favorite type of cupcake, favorite place, favorite--” she just kind of kept going after that to a point where I forgot for a moment that she had even asked my name in the first place.
When I tried to answer, all that came out was a little “Buhhhh.... huh?” My mind trying to catch up to what she actually just asked me. But then it registered what her name was. She said it was Pinkie Pie. It sounded like a strange name. I wasn’t really sure how to answer, feeling that the names Jason and Nikolai would just sound weird to her. But before I could, I noticed a purple colored pony, also a unicorn, and a winged pony colored light blue coming up behind her.
What? Who? Where? When? Why? I was beyond confused. I don’t think I got a single word that this... pony had said. Was that what we were? Ponies? What was the difference? I honestly wasn’t too sure. But this... Pinkie Pie, as she called herself, didn’t seem to have an off button. I looked. I swear I did. But there wasn’t a single button to be found.
Just as I was getting ready to poke her nose to make sure she was real, and I wasn’t on some kind of bad acid trip, I noticed a couple more ponies approaching us. ‘Oh what now?’ I thought to myself as Pinkie Pie continued to ramble on and on and on.
The two ponies, a light blue pegasus, like myself, and a lavender unicorn, came up to the three of us. “Did you give these two a heart attack, Pinkie?” the unicorn asked. “They look scared stiff.” That was an understatement to be honest. When Pinkie Pie first startled me, I was pretty sure my heart jumped into my brain. There’s a name for that medical condition. Its called death.
“Yeah, Pinkie. You have a way of scaring off newcomers before they even make it to Ponyville,” the pegasus spoke up, nudging Pinkie Pie with a hoof.
Alright, so my brain was having a little bit of difficulty adjusting to what was going on at the moment, and I’m pretty sure I started to drool as my brain melted out of my ears and nose. There were talking ponies... like, seriously. Talking ponies. Was this some kind of acid trip? I mean, I had a couple of beers the night before, but nothing that would cause this. Did Jason spike my drinks or something?
“Uh... you alright there?” the lavender unicorn asked me. She took a step toward me, tilting her head a little to the side as she tried to get some kind of response from me. But nope. Brain melted. Gone. Poof. Goop. But for another reason entirely.
Now, I usually have pretty bad eyesight. And my hearing isn’t exactly up to par either. Too much time staring at the sun when I was a kid. And too many times out at the shooting range without proper hearing protection. But one sense that I’ve always been proud of is my sense of smell. I could smell just about anything, and correctly identify it.
When the unicorn stepped closer to me, I smelled something particularly good. She smelled like pomegranate and pears. There are certain memories in my mind associated with that scent. Pretty much all of them good. And she smelled exactly like that. Though I’m pretty sure I scared her off when I sniffed the air as she got closer. I just couldn’t help myself!
I remained silent for a moment as I watched the other two arrive. It was when I saw Nikolai’s reaction toward the other unicorn that I couldn’t help but chuckle a little bit. I nudged him lightly before giving him this look of ‘Snap out of it’. Finally, I turned toward the other three. It was strange to look at them. One had wings like Nikolai; one had a horn on their head, which I assumed was what I had; and the other had nothing in particular other than that pony shape.
I finally decided to speak to them, however. They seemed friendly enough. Or rather, they seemed more curious about what we’re doing here. “Don’t mind him, he’s a bit of a dolt sometimes,” I said with a light chuckle. They laughed lightly as well before smiling.
“Well at least you two are okay. My name’s Twilight Sparkle. It’s nice to meet you,” the unicorn said with an endearing smile upon her face. It was interesting to see how happy and friendly these ponies were.
“And I’m Rainbow Dash. Fastest flyer in all of Equestria!” said the pegasus with the rainbow colored mane, colors I might add that annoyed me to no end due to my colorblind nature. She took off slightly in a rainbow blur and showed us just how fast she was. But then I realized that she called this place Equestria. And the pink one had mentioned Ponyville. Just where were these place?
The three looked at me, as I had actually spoken back to them, and I assumed waited for an introduction as well. But hearing their strange names, I wasn’t entirely sure that our names would fly well with them. Twilight Sparkle. Rainbow Dash. Pinkie Pie. They were curious names alright, and I had no idea why they sounded so weird. But before I could respond, we heard a splash and a slight squeak come from the lake.
Rainbow Dash took off rapidly toward the lake as we all ran behind them. Another winged pony was there, colored yellow with a pink Mane. “Fluttershy! Are you alright?” Rainbow Dash exclaimed. There was another strange name.
“Oh... umm... yes. You see, this newborn turtle is finally learning how to swim and I... Oh!” she said, squeaking slightly at the end. Her voice was very soft as she covered her mouth with her hooves. Twilight shook her head slightly as I looked at the small turtle in the lake. It was then that I got a good look at myself.
My fur was a rather bright yellow, and there was the horn sticking out of my head. I wasn’t sure of its purpose here, despite knowing what a unicorn was, but as I looked at myself, I noticed my hair was the same color as it had been before. It looked kind of similar as well, aside from the falling out thing. One thing that wasn’t the same was my eyes. They were now a deep blue. And as I looked at them, I thought of one thing. A gem I had always loved.
“So you two never told us your names,” Twilight said as Fluttershy continued tending toward her animals, and fearing for the small turtle who seemed to try to comfort her as she watched him. I took a minute to think about their names versus their appearances. And in that, I managed to come up with a name that would sound rather similar to theirs.
“I’m... Sunshine Sapphire,” I said with a smile. The bright yellow of my fur reminded me of the sunshine, even if I wasn’t a huge fan of it. And Sapphire had always been my favorite gemstone. My deep blue eyes reminded me of that, so I figured it would be perfect. The others nodded their heads with a smile before turning to Nikolai. I just hoped that he would be able to come up with a name as well.
I glared at Jason when he told them I was a ‘dolt’. I didn’t appreciate being called a dolt. At least not in front of others. We often called each other names for fun, but it was when it was just us two, and not actually referring to each other as such to others. But I remained silent as he spoke with... Twilight Sparkle. Now that was going to be hard to say without sighing heavily, or laughing. There’s a certain book series and movies associated with that name, ‘Twilight’. They aren’t particularly good, or at least not in my opinion.
The other pony that came up with Twilight Sparkle called herself Rainbow Dash. She said she was the fasted flyer in Equestria, which I guessed was where we were. She then took off in a streak of rainbow colors, flying around the sky. I glanced back at the wings on my body and gave them a couple of test flaps. That was really about all I could manage. I wasn’t used to those muscles back there at all, and didn’t really know how to control them other than keeping the things flat against my back. Though I had to admit, it was neat being able to turn my head all the way around to see my back like this. This was one realistic hallucination.
Before we could say too much though, there was a squeak and a splash that came from the lake, and everyone headed off that way. Jason and I followed to discover yet another pony here. They must dominate the ironically named Equestria. Made sense. This was turning out to be some sorta strange dream or whatever. I thought about maybe turning it into a story when I got the time to get back into writing.
The shy pegasus by the lakeside was attempting to get a young turtle to swim. The others called her Fluttershy. An appropriate name if there ever was one. All of them seemed appropriate to their characters. A little unimaginative, but at the same time, completely creative. Or at least creative compared to names from our home.
I stepped over to Fluttershy as the others were leaving her alone for now. I crouched down to the little turtle by the lakeside and helped the little guy into the shallows of the cool water. “You just have to trust that nature knows what its doing. He’ll swim. He was born to.” I looked up and smiled at Fluttershy. She gave me a look like I was nuts, and I wasn’t sure why. Was it her job to teach all the creatures in the world to do the things they were already supposed to know? I didn’t know, and thought maybe I overstepped my boundaries.
I just smiled sheepishly toward Fluttershy who didn’t really seem upset or anything. Maybe she was just more curious than anything. But at least the little turtle was swimming around in the shallows just fine, so he was safe for now. I stepped back a few paces to stand beside Jason again. I heard him call himself Sunshine Sapphire. What in the Hell was he doing? It didn’t matter what we called ourselves. This was going away in the morning anyway.
Twilight Sparkle turned to me next, expecting me to introduce myself as well. I didn’t know what to say really, but I figured I’d go along with this for the time being. “Name’s Sterling. Sterling Aura,” I introduced myself. It was honestly the only thing I could think of at the moment. Would have been able to come up with a better name had I been given a little bit of time. But it seemed to satisfy her curiosity for now. And now I was stuck with it until the end of this little ride.
With the two of us having chosen our new names in this strange land, I was beginning to wonder exactly what we were going to do here. I also wondered about our homes, our families. Surely they’d miss us and wonder where we were, right? For now, I knew we were stuck here.... wherever here actually was. I glanced over at Nikolai, now named Sterling, and wondered what he thought about all of this. He probably thought it was still some dream.
“So where are you two from?” Rainbow Dash asked us curiously. “I mean... we’ve never seen you, and if Pinkie Pie had never met you, then you must be new around here,” she added on. Damn these ponies. They had so many questions for us, and we didn’t exactly have the answers.
“Oh, you know... the desert. We uh.... we’ve been traveling,” I said, hoping that the answer would be good enough. They all started thinking, and that led me to believe that I had no idea what I was getting myself into. This was not going to be fun to talk about later. Once we found out where we were, we would definitely have to do some research on this ‘Equestria’.
“The desert, huh?” Twilight repeated, thinking some more. “Like... Dodge Junction or Appleloosa?” she asked. Apparently these were towns in the area that were from a desert.
“Yeah! Appleloosa. That’s the one,” I said, hoping that she didn’t have much experience down there. Sure enough, I was wrong.
“Ooh! Like with Chief Thunderhooves! And Little Strongheart! And Sheriff Silverstar! And Braeburn! And...” Pinkie Pie said, presumably naming off every single pony that lived in this strange town of ‘Appleloosa’ that I now said we were from. This was getting more and more complicated by the second.
“Yes Pinkie. We get it,” Twilight said, shoving her pink friend away with a hoof before walking past her. “Well if you’re traveling, why not come take a look at Ponyville? It’s got several other friends of ours there, and everypony is very friendly,” she added on. Wait... did she... did she just say... every... PONY?!? Okay, that’s it. I’m with Ster-- Nikolai. We’re dreaming. We are definitely dreaming. Or hallucinating. Nikolai must have spiked the drinks last night, forgot which he spiked after drinking, and accidentally drank from some of my spiked water. That had to be it. There was no other explanation.
At this point, I wasn’t even sure what to think, say, or do. We seemed to be stuck between a rock and a hard place at this point. But the other four just started to head back into town, Fluttershy deciding to follow now as her animal friends were finished doing what they were doing. I looked over to Nikolai though. Were we supposed to just play along with this even longer? I wasn’t sure, but knowing him, he was about to tell me to just shut my big mouth.
The four others were quite a bit away from us at this point as I finally turned toward him. “What are we going to do? We don’t know anything about this place, and there’s no way we’re having the same dream. But we can’t just... sit here and do nothing,” I finally asked, sincerely afraid as far as what was actually going to happen as we kept going on.
I simply sighed and smacked a hoof to my face. That hurt more than I had been expecting. It also informed me that I was no longer wearing glasses for whatever reason. But I could still see, so this definitely was some kind of dream. I couldn’t afford laser surgery, but I had always thought getting rid of the glasses would be nice. Yup, it was a dream.
But as I was standing there, Jason, or Sunshine Sapphire, was digging us a great big hole to go ahead and bury ourselves in. Why did he have to talk sometimes? Jason. What are you doing? Jason. Stop.
The other ponies were heading back into this Ponyville place, and I figured it couldn’t hurt to follow. Maybe they had food or something. I was starting to get a little hungry. But before we left, I turned to Sunshine Sapphire. I was going to have to make fun of him for that silly name. “Just... leave most of the talking to me. You know I’m a better storyteller than you are.”
We followed the ponies into a small-ish town. It was quaint, if a little behind the times. Or at least behind as far as where I came from was. But it was nice. It was clean, and all the ponies walking around seemed to be in good spirits. That was certainly a change from the world I was used to. Hell, if this was real, I might consider staying if it ended up being a decent place.
There were little stalls lining the dirt streets selling all manner of vegetables and fruits and other foods. No meat though, and that made me sad a little bit. If I was a horse now, I wouldn’t be able to eat meat. I was going to miss that.
There were other shops, small buildings selling a strange assortment of things. There was one that only sold sofas and quills. What kind of store only sells two things, and two totally different things at that? My messed up brain must have made this place. It was the only thing that made sense.
We walked behind the ponies who had met us out in the fields just outside of town. What they had been doing there I hadn’t the foggiest. But I think we were probably lucky to have met them so soon. At least now we sorta knew someone here, instead of walking around blindly and lost.
But all in all, it seemed a decent place. But I had no idea where we would stay, if we were, in fact, stuck here. I was fairly certain this was some kind of dream, but one could never be too sure. Folks go missing without explanation all the time. We neared the center of the small town, and there was a message board setup for others to post memos for the townsfolk. I stopped by it quickly to scan a couple of them. There really wasn’t a whole lot of bad news to read. Again, I think I might like it here. Back home that was all anyone ever heard on the news was bad.
I noticed the others were getting away from me, and I trotted quickly to catch up to them. But I still wasn’t used to these bloody limbs. I ended up tripping and faceplanting right into the dirt.
The town we were in was interesting. Various shops and stalls, each selling their own individual things. One thing I noticed was the marks that everyone had. It seemed to fit with whatever it was they were doing. At one point, I looked behind myself and noticed the mark that I had seen before. A wire whisk with batter flying off. It now seemed to make sense. Apparently these marks were actually related to what we did.
I noticed Nikolai falling behind. He had stopped to read some of the news here as I was just trying to figure out what had happened. He ended up tripping into the dirt. But before I could run over to help him out, an orange pony with a cowboy hat on had already been beside him to help.
“Careful there, partner. Better watch where yer goin’,” she said with a smile as she helped him. The others noticed he had fallen behind and started walking back over to them.
“Oh hey, Applejack. I see you’ve met our newcomers to Ponyville,” Twilight said to the one who was now named Applejack. Sure enough, I noticed the mark was three apples. It was making more and more sense, but at the same time, less and less.
“I can’t say so far as to MET them. More like just helped this one out of the dirt,” she said with a light chuckle. She had a bag around her back, presumably how they carried things around. In it was, of course, apples. “I brought the apples that you need over at Sugarcube Corner, Pinkie. Best apples I could find,” she said with a smile as she transferred the bag to Pinkie’s back.
“Oh boy! The Cakes are going to love these bright and shiny apples,” she said with a grin. Pinkie Pie also had a strange way of walking. That is to say... she didn’t walk. She hopped everywhere she went. I wasn’t sure how she had so much energy, but the others didn’t seem to care.
“Well then... now that ya’ll know my name, how about you get to telling me yours?” She said, looking over to Sterling and noticing me as well.
“Mine is Sunshine Sapphire, and his is Sterling Aura,” I said. At least I could say things that we had already told them.
“It’s a pleasure to meet ya, Sugarcube. I reckon yer showin’ them around town, Twi?” she asked. The unicorn nodded in response, and Applejack seemed ready to help show us around even more. But as we turned around, I saw something I didn’t think I would see.
A dragon... granted, he was small, but still a dragon. It was interesting to see, more so because all we had seen was ponies, but why was there a dragon here? And he was riding on a white unicorn, with a rather curled and carefully groomed purple mane and tail. She seemed to walk with elegance, and from the three diamonds on her flank, I had a feeling she acted that way too.
“Why do I miss out on all the fun?” she asked, her voice sounding far fancier than the others. I figured I was right. “I go to see my little Spikey-Wikey and see that everypony else is missing,” she added on, walking closer to us. The dragon, I assumed being this ‘Spikey-Wikey’ hopped off of her back before looking over to Twilight.
“Twilight, Rarity brought me here because you received a letter from Princess Celestia,” he told her, holding out a scroll. Princess? A scroll? A talking dragon? Just what was going on in this strange dream we were in? I looked over to Nikolai and gave a light shrug. It seemed he wasn’t following this anymore than I had been.
“Oh, thank you Spike,” Twilight said. It was then that I saw just what the horn of a unicorn could do as it glowed, the paper glowing the same color and lifting into the air before unrolling itself. It appeared that unicorns could produce magic. After everything else I had heard, I was honestly not surprised.
“Hmm... it appears that Princess Celestia has requested we go to Canterlot in a couple of days. Her and Princess Luna detected some strange magic surge across Equestria, and told us to be on the lookout for strange ponies,” she relayed to her friends. Uh oh.... that had to be us. So did that mean that... this was all real? We didn’t stand out too much, did we? Then again, they all seemed to know the ponies of Ponyville, and we were the only two who didn’t quite fit in. I had a feeling we would be meeting up with these two princesses sooner rather than later.
“Well then... I must get a dress ready if I am to meet up with the Princess yet again. Oh my, so much to do,” the white unicorn said, I assumed being Rarity. But Twilight had mentioned ‘we’ go to Canterlot, and for ‘us’ to look out for strange ponies. Perhaps that meant that the seven of them were rather close? It seemed so, but I wasn’t entirely sure.
“Rarity, you’ve already met the Princess numerous times. You know she doesn’t care if you’re in a dress or not,” Applejack said with a laugh.
“Just because you have no issue ‘roughing it’ in front of Princess Celestia doesn’t mean that I don’t. I would rather present myself rather nicely in front of Royalty,” she retorted, flipping her mane back a little.
“Yeah. Maybe then, Prince Blueblood will look over at you again,” Rainbow Dash added in, laughing afterward. Rarity seemed none too happy with that comment.
“That good for nothing Prince... he’s only in love with himself. I dare say I’ll never be attempting to garner his attention again,” she responded, finally walking away, all the while Rainbow Dash laughing more while flying.
“Well what about you two? What are you up to here?” Applejack finally asked us. I turned to Nikolai now. He told me to leave the talking to him, and that was just what I was going to do.
I shoved Sapphire out of the way a little when Applejack asked us what we were doing. I told him to leave the talking to me, and I was going to glue his mouth shut if I had to to keep him quiet. Did they even have glue here? It was made from horse hooves afterall.
“We’re just traveling, looking for a new place to live,” I lied. It sounded good enough. “Had to get away from home and find a place all our own,” I added on. It seemed believable enough.
The others nodded, accepting the answer. Apparently, Ponyville was a fairly desirable place to live. “Well that’s good. I hope you like it here,” Twilight said with a smile.
I returned the smile, “Oh, I think I will,” I responded quickly without even thinking, looking right at Twilight. I took a small step toward her, and then realized just how that probably looked. I would have smacked myself in the face if everybody wasn’t looking at me. I’m sure they were. I was acting like an idiot in front of a pretty girl. Wait a second... ‘pretty girl’? What was I thinking!? Was there something wrong with me? Well, there’s a lot wrong with me, but still. She’s a horse... pony. She’s a pony! I can’t be attracted to a pony. Besides, why would I be attracted in the first place? I didn’t know her... or any of them.
I did smack myself when she looked away though. “I’m such an idiot,” I muttered under my breath. I knew I would get endless flak from Sapphire about this when we were alone.
I regained my composure though as quickly as I could. “So... about that tour?” I asked Twilight. She was apparently the one leading this pack of ponies. Some of the others looked like they had other things to be doing anyway. Pinkie had to get those apples to ‘Sugarcube Corner’, whatever that was. Probably a sweet shop or something. Rainbow Dash looked like she was ready to fly off at any moment for no other reason than just to fly. And Applejack, from the southern sound of her voice, probably had farm work to do. I didn’t want to distract them all from their obligations.
Twilight nodded her head and smiled again. I thought I saw a hint of a blush, but I was probably wrong. It would be hard to tell with the soft lavender color of her fur anyway. “Right, yes. Let me show you around town. If you’re thinking of maybe moving here, you should know where everything is.”
Yep. He was in love. I could see it on Nikolai’s face. He was deeply, madly, in love. With a pony nonetheless. I knew I wouldn’t be able to refrain from making fun of him now. The opportunity was just too great. I listened as he said that we were planning on moving here and wondered if that was going to end up happening.
The others seemed okay with that reasoning, so it seemed we were out of the hot water for now. But I knew it was only a matter of time before we’d have to come up with something else to tell them. Rainbow Dash eventually left, saying something about having to clear the skies of clouds. And sure enough, as she zipped away, she started bursting through clouds and getting rid of them.
Rarity had already left, I assumed to work on that dress she mentioned. Pinkie Pie said her goodbyes and hopped off to what I guessed was Sugarcube Corner. Fluttershy even left, muttering about having to take care of her animals. But Applejack said that she would stay for now. That she had taken care of her work back on the farm.
“What farm is that?” I asked her, out of curiosity.
“Why... Sweet Apple Acres. No other apple farm can compete with what we do. The rest of my family take care of it, that is, Granny Smith, Big Macintosh, and Applebloom. We all take care of the farm,” she told us rather enthusiastically. It seemed like she enjoyed her work, which was a good thing. I nodded in understanding as we started off through Ponyville.
Twilight pointed out quite a few things, including the areas where the others had gone off to. Sugarcube Corner was a bakery, one I enjoyed as we walked by. I was a baker at heart, and was proud of it. Carousel Boutique was where Rarity had gone off to. She ran her own clothing parlour. Next was the town hall, where we met the mayor, Mayor Mare. She seemed nice enough, if not a little scatterbrained.
Cloudsdale was pointed out toward us. Apparently there was a city in the clouds that controlled the weather here in this area. Things were getting harder and harder to understand. We passed by the post office, where a gray colored pegasus came barrelling out and running right into Sterling. “Oops! My bad!” she said as she took off to the skies. One thing about her was her messed up eyes. They looked a little derpy. But oh well. She still had a smile on her face as she attempted to deliver mail.
Finally, we arrived at a large tree. Spike opened the door and we walked in. This was apparently where Twilight and Spike lived. We learned that Spike was Twilight’s assistant, along with her pet owl who’s name I won’t even try to spell.
“Here we are, the library. This is where I do all of my studies for the Princess. I’m her personal student, after all. Spike and I also live here in the upper levels. And... that’s pretty much it. Outside of town we have the Everfree Forest, Fluttershy’s cottage, Saddle Lake, the Whitetail Woods, and Sweet Apple Acres. Other then that, you’ve seen pretty much all of Ponyville,” Twilight said, happy with how the tour went.
“Any questions ya’ll might have about our town? I’ve lived here most of my life, aside from when I went to Manehattan to live with my Aunt and Uncle Orange when I was just a filly,” Applejack said. Manehattan? Seriously? I was seriously concerned now. Just what other things did they have that was similar to our home?
Twilight Sparkle and Applejack showed us the rest of the town. It was a nice town. Small, but nice. And I had always been a small town boy at heart, so I was comfortable here. As we walked and talked, our two guides would often stop to greet another pony out enjoying the nice day. It seemed that it was one of those kinds of towns where everybody knew everybody.
We passed by the Sugarcube Corner that was mentioned before. It was actually a bakery. I could smell it long before we even got close to it though. I nudged Sapphire playfully and pointed at it with a hoof. That boy loved to cook, and especially bake. I’d force him to visit Sugarcube Corner today if I had to. Though I was sure it wouldn’t come to that.
As we were walking by the post office, a grey pegasus mare came bursting through the door and barreling right into me. We tumbled to the ground, and she quickly apologized before flapping her wings and fluttering off into the sky. A strange place to be sure, but it was... normal. Everybody was just walking around, doing things that they normally would. I was beginning to wonder if this really was all in my head or not. Normally there’d be some sort of crisis or depression or something. I was not this happy and upbeat... or normal. At least not in my head.
The last place on our stop was a large tree near the center of Ponyville. Twilight led us inside and told us this was the library, and also her and Spike’s home. I saw the little, purple dragon moving about the shelves of books, putting some back on the shelves in their proper places. I had always liked libraries. “I used to spend a lot of time in libraries in high school,” I mentioned. This seemed to get me on good terms with Twilight, though that hadn’t really been my intention. It was more or less just an observation really. But given that she lived there, it was my guess that reading was one of her favorite things to do.
Applejack asked us if we had any questions, and then she mentioned a place called Manehattan. I just burst into laughter when I heard that. Now I knew I really wasn’t trapped inside my own head or something. No way I could come up with a pun as good as that. The two mares gave me some strange looks before I could gather myself again. I wiped a laughter tear from my eye and cleared my throat. “N-no, thank you. I don’t really have any questions right now,” I said, trying to not think about it. I didn’t know why it had tickled me as much as it had, but it did.
I stepped away from the others though to examine some of the titles of the books on the shelves. ‘100 Simple Spells and Incantations’, ‘Dangerous Plants of the Everfree Forest’, ‘How To Train Your Dragon’. Some strange titles. but given the world we were in, they made sense. Unicorns had magic. There were dragons, apparently. And pegasi could fly. It really made sense if one thought about it for a second. It was like I had stepped into some sort of fantasy kid’s world or something. Could make life simpler. That would certainly be nice for a change.
I turned to Twilight as she was talking to Sapphire about some sort of spell she had been practicing. I could tell Sapphire had no idea what she was talking about, but he was smiling and nodding his head as she talked, trying to not seem rude, or blow his cover. “Hey, Twilight?” I interjected, trying to save Sapphire from embarrassment if he couldn’t add something to the conversation.
Twilight turned to me with a smile, “Yes?”
“Well, I do have a question. You see, Sapphire and I might be in town for a little while, but we don’t have a place to stay. You wouldn’t happen to know a place where we could hold up for a little while?” I asked her. I don’t know why I was hoping she’d say we could stay at the library with her. It was wishful thinking, and I was pretty friggin’ sure it wasn’t going to happen too.
As Applejack mentioned Manehattan, Nikolai, or Sterling as I supposed I should start getting used to saying, burst out laughing. He seemed to be accepting this strange world, but I couldn’t hold in my own laughter as he started. We both got some strange looks before clearing our throats. We really seemed like we were brothers at times.
The two of us started to look around at the books that were on the shelves. They seemed relevant to this new world we were in and I wondered what other strange things that they had here. Magic, dragons, ponies, flying ponies. It was starting to seem like a strange fantasy land. Even Fluttershy seemed to be able to talk to the creatures we saw earlier. But seeing the owl, I wondered if this world had similar animals to ours.
Twilight started talking to me about a spell that the supposed Princess was having her learn. A lot of it didn’t make sense, and I felt awkward hearing about it. I knew I would have to learn some basic magic at least in order to truly pass off as a unicorn. But before I could even come up with some sort of story about not really using my magic lately, Sterling interjected.
He asked if Twilight knew of a place that we would be able to stay for the time being. It was a good question, one that she seemed stumped on for now. She thought for a bit about the town and the ponies that were here.
“I don’t know, Sterling. Strangely enough, Ponyville doesn’t get many visitors. It’s a good place, but it’s one of those... if you’re new, everypony knows it kind of towns. So we don’t really have many inns or hotels or anything here. I suppose I could ask my friends if they can offer something,” she said, turning to Applejack,
“Well ya’ll can stay in mah barn if you need some place to stay. It’s not much, but it’ll give ya something until you can figure out what yer doin,” she said, offering us something at least. I nodded at the words, figuring we had to take what we can get.
“Don’t you have family coming into town soon? I know I’ve heard Applebloom and the other crusaders cheering about Babs Seed coming back,” Twilight mentioned.
“Aww, pony feathers! Yer Right, Twi. Some of the other Apples wanted to get in on the Zap Apple Harvest, and we told them they could come. Babs is the only one sleepin’ in the house since she’ll be with Applebloom. But the others would be out in the barn. If you two don’t mind sharing with some of my family members, you could stay with us,” she said. That complicated things a bit. Considering the name of the town I said we were from, I had a feeling that some of the ponies from that town would be coming here. At this point, I turned to Sterling. He told me to leave the talking to him. That’s what I was going to do.
Sapphire was leaving it entirely up to me. I know I said before to leave the sweet talking to me. But I couldn’t do everything on my own. I had to think of something. Sharing a barn with a bunch of strangers didn’t seem particularly inviting. I had used hostels before, and even those creeped me out. And they weren’t a barn.
“Well... we wouldn’t want to intrude on your family. I know family is important. That, and I also wouldn’t want to get in the way of your... Zap Apple Harvest.” Yeah, that sounded like a good ‘excuse’. I turned back to Twilight to see if she would offer any options herself.
She tapped a hoof to her chin as she thought for a minute. “Hmm... well the Cakes have their hooves full with the babies... and Pinkie. Honestly, I don’t know how they can put up with her all the time and the kids. They have some serious patience.”
I chuckled a little bit, remembering the way Pinkie was. Add some kids to that and I was sure it was a regular party over at Sugarcube Corner. “Well... if there’s a nice, quiet place for us to stay, that would be nice. We’re pretty quiet ourselves,” I added, hinting to the lavender mare about a possible place we could stay.
She kept tapping her hoof to her chin in thought. “Rarity might be able to take you guys in for a little bit. Though she has her little sister over quite often, and the Boutique isn’t really made for guests.” She continued to think about other places. “And only Sterling could stay with Rainbow Dash. And I’m not even sure what her place looks like to be honest. I’m a little afraid to see how she lives.” Twilight gave a little, involuntary shudder as the thought crossed her mind. Apparently Rainbow Dash wasn’t as organized or clean as her. “And I know Fluttershy always has all her animals at her cottage. And its pretty small to begin with. That really leaves only one other place...”
“But can you and Spike really keep the two of them here?” Applejack asked. “It’s not the biggest place in all of Ponyville,” she added on. It seemed like this was becoming more and more difficult to come up with. But Twilight just shook her head.
“No, it should be fine. I had you and Rarity over that one night during the planned storm, remember? Besides, they could probably sleep in the side room. We’d just need to get an extra bed. Two, if we’re lucky, but I don’t even know if two would fit there. That is, if you two don’t mind,” she said, looking over at us. I knew I didn’t mind, but I felt Sterling sometimes did. “If we can get two, and can get them to fit, that’d be perfect. If not, I’m sure we could live with one. I’ll just push him onto the floor if I need to,” I said with a smile. Twilight and Applejack laughed, apparently seeing the friendship we already had. I took a tentative step away from Sterling, expecting to be punched in the shoulder.
“Alright, then it’s settled. The two of you can stay here in the library for a little while. At least until you can get yourself situated and figured out. If you tell me how many bits you have now, I can probably help you figure out how much you’ll need for a place of your own. Well... I’m guessing you don’t have any, actually... considering you don’t have anything with you,” she pointed out. Welp, we’re screwed. What kind of travelers are we if we don’t have any bags or... wait... what are bits?!?! I assumed they were what was considered money in this land, but I thought that was a strange name.
“Well! I guess we’ll just have to help them find some work so they can start gettin’ paid. What do ya’ll like to do?” Applejack asked us.
“Well... I like baking, and Sterling’s rather good in the medical field,” I told her. Hey! At least I wasn’t making up a lie this time.
“Great! Then perhaps we’ll let you two rest and get used to the town. Tomorrow we can see about getting you work at the hospital, and you could probably help out at Sugarcube Corner. Like Twilight said, the Cakes are rather busy with two foals and Pinkie Pie, so they could probably use the help,” Applejack said with a smile. I nodded back to her. Things seemed to be working out for now. But I knew if I didn’t get a chance to speak with Sterling soon, we wouldn’t have anything figured out.
“Alright, thank you both! Do you mind if Sterling and I walk around town? We should probably get to know the town a little bit better, and maybe we can see about procuring some beds to use for sleep,” I asked.
Twilight shook her head. “Not at all. I’ll see if some of my friends have an extra bed to spare for a little while. They might have something locked away in an attic or something,” she said with a smile. Applejack said her goodbyes, saying she had to get to work back at the farm. As for me, I stepped out with Sterling. We had quite a bit to discuss.