On a rather normal day, as far as this applied to the town of Ponyville, a brown coated mare was making her weekly rounds, restocking her shelves with all the necessities. Her name was Furball, and her story starts with her tripping on a small rock in the road.
Furball yelped, her bag flying into the air as she began to plummet. She flinched in preparation for the impact, when her face would meet the dirt road and probably send her skidding into some other ponies like a bowling ball. There wasn’t any reason for her to expect this beyond the universe having a special, comedic brand of attention reserved for Ponyville. But gravity never enacted her swift judgement for ungrounded, non pegasus ponies.
She waited patiently for a few seconds, trying to ignore the sensation of falling that made her stomach turn and muscles tense. And then, thoroughly annoyed, Furball opened her eyes to accost whoever had so rudely interrupted her fall; there was an order to these things that mere ponies were not to mess with, after all. Except there was nopony nearby. In fact, there was a small parting in the hoof traffic round her as ponies ignored her plight completely.
Frowning, she spotted her bags and their contents scattered on the grass beyond the road. The flour bag had even split, turning the grass into pale white strands. She sighed. “So, no tripping, just some ruined groceries. Fair enough, I guess. Ha-ha.” Ponyville had claimed larger victims than bread and butter; she had just gotten lucky today.
Furball started towards her bag, then stopped. Well, not stopped, exactly. Stopping would imply that she ever managed to move. What she did do was stop waving her legs uselessly in the air. Confused, she looked down to see that she was floating a few inches off the ground, hooves unable to meet the earth even at full extension. She wiggled a hoof experimentally, and decided that magic must be the problem.
“Discord.” The chaos god was always playing pranks like this; ultimately harmless, but irritating or embarrassing for the prankee. Furball could not understand why setting him loose on Equestria, reformed or not, was a good idea. At least the road wasn’t made of soap. This time.
And on cue, a complete mess of a creature with a serpentine body came floating down the road, booping random ponies on their noses as he passed. Furball pointed at him and shouted “Discord!” Startled, the creature spun upside down to look, and with a snap of his clawed hand appeared next to her.
“Chewball!” he said, seemingly pleased to see her. “What can I do for you today? Oh please tell me you want to replace Sugarcube Corner with a scale model pastry.”
“I want you to fix this!” Furball ordered, flailing her legs for emphasis. “And my name’s Furball.”
Discord bent over, making a painful looking arch with his back. He reached below her, waving his hand in the space between her and the dirt. Satisfied, he stood straight and gave her rear a great shove, accomplishing nothing. He shrugged his shoulders and draped himself across Furball’s back, grinning.
“Well, it’s not my work. I would’ve had you fall up, or even sideways, by now. Maybe into a rubber ball pit.” Discord smirked expectantly at her. Furball just stared. “You know, because of your name? Rubberball landing in a rubber ball pit? It’d be like a family reunion!” He sighed, disappointed another pony didn’t understand his genius and acquiring a paint spattered beret with the thought.
“It’s my day off, anyways. No tricks, no pranks, no magic, and no ‘helping’. Fluttershy’s orders. She even set her watchbunny on me.” At this, a white rabbit finally managed to pull himself out from between the draconequus and the pony. He dusted himself off and kicked Discord’s side, pointing somewhere. “Isn’t the little furred rodent adorable? I must be off though; things to do, ponies to see, boredom to be had.”
“Wait!” Furball cried as he began to... well, calling it a skip would be insulting to skippers everywhere. “At least put me on the ground?”
Discord looked like he seriously considered it for a moment. Then he laughed, “Sounds too much like helping. Don’t want to upset Flutters now, do we, Angel?” The bunny on his head slapped it’s face, regretting everything that had lead up to this day. “Besides, it’s funny! Farewell Blueball!”
“My name is Furball!” she shouted, swinging impotently at the fading figure. The motion had the effect of sending her spinning wildly in the air. Without any way of catching herself, this could have gone on for quite a while if a passing stranger hadn’t stopped her. More accurately, an innocent bystander who got walloped by a hundred pounds of frantically flailing filly.
Furball spun to a stop at somewhat of an angle and saw a dazed unicorn stallion a few feet away. “Oops,” she said quietly, and then to the stallion “Sorry! I can’t really control myself right now.”
The stallion picked himself up, dusting off his orange coat. “Don’t worry, I get that a lot from the ladies,” he said, wearing some variety of the dashing grin. Furball stared at him flatly until, uncomfortable, he asked “What kind of name is Furball?”
“My parents looked in a magic mirror and discovered I would one day become a ball of fluff. What do you think?” she snarked, waving towards her lump of fur cutie mark. “And before you go about flirting and insulting in the same breath, maybe you should tell ponies your name.”
“I am Mango Sunset,” he said, proudly displaying his flank, and consequently, his own mango tree cutie mark. “Sole grower of mangoes in all of Ponyville!”
“Don’t mangoes grow south, where it’s warmer?”
“No one said it was an easy job. But hey, no competition!”
“And Mango Sunset? Really? You couldn’t get more orange if you tried.”
Mango huffed, turning away. “Well, if all you’re going to do is mock me, then I’ll take my leave. You can run into some other pony, and you won’t even have to lie when you make fun of their looks. Unlike me.”
Noticing that the market street was becoming very empty, Furball relented. “Fine. Whatever you say. Can you just help me down?”
Mango walked back to her and eyed her critically. Or appraisingly, but she would rather not think about that. “I don’t understand the question.” He stated.
“Help me down. From up here.” Furball strained her legs, trying to reach the earth and doing little more than making dust swirl. “I’m stuck.”
Inspecting her floating hooves, Mango asked the obvious question. “Did you ask Discord?”
“Yeah. Tried that already, turns out it wasn’t him. And he didn’t want to help me.”
Mango rubbed his chin, puzzling out the situation. Before him was an earth pony who had apparently learned to fly. Or levitate herself. These being the only two reasonable conclusions, he came up with an ingenious plan to fix the situation. He jumped onto her back.
“What are you doing?!” Furball yelled, flailing once more.
“I’m weighing you down! Stop squirming, you’re going to throw me off!”
“That’s the idea, you maniac!”
A quiet squeak made them both freeze. A small filly had happened across them, and was now watching with a blank expression. Furball stared back with a mix of horror and panic. Mango smiled nervously. They both drifted upside down slowly, making Mango squeeze himself closer to the mare in an attempt to stay on. The filly turned around and walked away silently, vanishing round a corner. Mango quickly fell off with an ‘oof’.
“Well! Her mother is going to have a heart attack soon enough,” Mango said with a shaky laugh.
“That is all your fault.” Furball said, jabbing a hoof at him. “Why did you jump on me?!”
“I was trying to weigh you down, and you would’ve heard that if you had listened. The only reason you’d be hovering like that, besides Discord, is because you suddenly learned to fly or do magic. The best solution was to add more weight, so you wouldn’t be able to keep yourself afloat either way.” Mango, quite pleased with his wisdom, smiled at the mare.
“What.”
“Now, if you’re willing to work with me, you’ll be down in-”
“No. For one thing, that is the worst idea, ever. A strange stallion jumping on a helpless mare’s back? Can’t imagine how that might look bad.” Mango flushed and looked indignant, but Furball wasn’t done. “Secondly is that there is a serious flaw in your idea. I am an earth pony. Earth. Pony. No horn, no wings, which means no flying and no magic! You should know that, Mr. horny!” Now it was her turn to flush, and she hastily backpedaled. “I didn’t- you’re a unicorn, you have a horn- Whatever. You’re an idiot, and your plan is stupid. So take your massive flank away, and find somepony who can actually help!”
Mango sat in the dirt, ears low, for a long moment. Then he stood up and trotted away, leaving Furball upside down and alone in the growing darkness. She blinked, surprised, then tried to flail herself so she was looking towards him.
“I- I’m sorry! I didn’t mean... all of that... Please come back?”
Groaning, Furball kicked at the ground, or tried to. Today had been going so well before the universe went and picked her to be todays punch line. She had woken up to sunshine, had a nice bowl of oats, and then got to her shopping. Everything was fine and sane and...
And, frankly, quite boring, now that she thought about it. Furball had done the same thing, everyday, since she moved to Ponyville. Sure, sometimes a particular pink pony and her pesky parties threw themselves into her routine like a kitten made of balloons and noise that no decent creature could ever say no to when she made that face, but those were just glitches in an otherwise perfect system.
She had come to Ponyville because she heard all the stories about how exciting it could be. Princesses appearing on a regular basis, random monster attacks from the Everfree, not to mention the messes the Element bearers regularly brought about. Adventure! Action! And she had settled almost immediately into her same old practices. Just last month a timber wolf had wandered into town and sent everypony into a frothing panic before it was herded away. She had been reading the newspaper, in her house, at the time.
“How sad is it that suddenly floating in place is the most exciting thing to happen to me all year?” Furball said sadly, waving a hoof at the sky.
“Depends on your perspective,” a new voice said from behind her. “Personally, I get a little tense after too much excitement.”
Furball maneuvered herself to see who was speaking, and gasped when she saw the newly crowned Princess Twilight Sparkle smiling upside-down at her. The smile turned concerned, and she pushed Furball so she was right side up. Furball tried to bow, but the courtesy was lessened somewhat by her slight drifting. Twilight giggled and waved a hoof.
“Please, no bowing. I’m still getting used to the princess thing. But I heard that I may be able to help you, and as a crown princess of Equestria, new or not, it is my duty to aid my subjects whenever and however I may.” The purple alicorn grinned, “All the books say so.”
Now Furball noticed the other pony, this one not so new. Mango Sunset was standing off a ways, looking somewhere over her shoulder. She gave a timid smile and wave; he nodded in return. Twilight looked between the two of them and coughed awkwardly.
“Right, well. Can you describe what happened?” Furball told all she knew, from her awakening to that moment. Mango snorted at her description of her morning activities.
“That does sound boring.”
“Shut up, sir orange.”
“Ahem,” Twilight said, stopping the ensuing argument. She then lit her horn, inspecting Furball with her purple-red magic. When she was finished, she frowned inquisitively at the space between the mare and the ground. “It’s not a spell of any sort that I know of, and I am an expert in spells. Nor did you suddenly develop flight.” Mango rubbed his forelegs together, blushing. “I need to touch up on my physics, but I’ll figure this out soon! Just wait here.” The princess galloped back to her library home, happily talking about reacquainting with ‘Newthooven’. Furball wondered for a second if Twilight knew the bad joke she had just made. Probably not. And now she was alone, once again, with the stallion she had, quite recently, thoroughly insulted.
Furball coughed, now somewhat sideways. Mango stared at the stars, whistling quietly. Finally, simultaneously, they both said “I’m sorry!”
“You first,” Furball said, at the same time Mango asked “What are you sorry for?”
They both stared at each other. The air grew tense as they strained themselves, daring the other to speak first. A battle of wills as old as awkward silences had begun; otherwise known by the title of 'jinx'.
“Pickle barrel!” Mango shouted.
A second too late, Furball gave her own. “Picka flower!”
“What?”
“I forgot what Pinkie Pie keeps saying. Don’t laugh at me!” Furball said crossly as Mango began guffawing into his hooves. But her own cheeks were turning at the edges, and soon she too was a laughing mess, spinning in place like a wheel on an axis.
Once the fit had passed, Mango silenced, and stilled, Furball with a hoof so he could talk first. “I’m sorry I jumped on you, like that. It was a stupid idea, and it was rude, and I really am just an idiot sometimes. You had every right to freak out at me. And besides, you learning how to fly? You weigh way too much to be a pegasus.”
“You’re a real charmer, you know that?” Furball said, half seriously taking a swing at the orange stallion’s cheeky smile. “And I shouldn’t have ‘freaked out’ at you like that. You were only trying to help, even if your idea was... yeah.” She spun her hoof in a circle next to her head. Mango looked at her expectantly. “What?”
“Eh, nevermind; I’ll take what I can get.”
“Come on, what is it?”
“Aren’t you cold?”
“Wha-” Furball stopped to consider this. She had been so focussed on the whole floating and subsequent making a mule of herself (no offense) that she had completely forgotten the time. The sun had well and truly set, and now Luna dominated the sky. As beautiful as this was, and despite it being a warm summer, the night was still unpleasantly chilled. Furball began to shake, her meagre brown coat doing nothing to block the cold. “I wasn’t until you pointed it out, dumby,” she accused through chattering teeth.
Mango smiled apologetically. “Sorry about that, too. Not the dumby thing though, because I-” he reached into his saddlebags and pulled out a quilted cloth, “brought a blanky!”
Furball snickered. “Blanket. I brought a blanket,” Mango corrected, like a foal trying to cover spilled milk after his mother had seen it. “Do you want it or not?”
“No, I want to sit here and catch a cold.” Mango just blinked at her, and she rolled her eyes. “Yes, I would like your ‘blanky’.”
Mango draped the blanket over her back, and then wrapped her in it so it would stay on while she spun about. Then he pulled out his own and wriggled into place next to her.
“You don’t have to stay here,” Furball told him, not really meaning it.
“Someone’s got to stick around, just in case you start floating away.”
“Oh.” She had not thought about that possibility. Spontaneous, uncontrolled levitation was one thing; drifting away like a loose balloon was worse. Furball shot a worried look at the sky and squirmed into her cloth cocoon. “Another thing I didn’t fret about until you pointed it out.”
“Don’t worry,” Mango said, turning over and pulling on a cord tying their blankets together. “If that happens, I’ll just anchor you down.”
“Now who’s too heavy to be a pegasus?” Furball quipped, feeling slightly safer.
Mango jabbed her side, “Mine’s all muscle mass, missy.”
“Did somepony pay you for that alliteration?”
“I can’t you hear, I’m asleep.” Mango followed this with exaggerated snoring noises. Furball could practically see the z’s drifting from his mouth. She chuckled and drifted off, imagining that this was what pegasi felt, sleeping on clouds.
They were awoken early the next day by an excited Twilight, who carried a half dozen books in her magic. The sun had just begun to rise, and the streets abandoned except for them. “I figured it out!” she said excitedly, practically prancing in place. “Because of the high amount of magic residue in Ponyville - sorry about that - you got caught on a magically magnetized zone! The residue built up on this spot specifically,” she pointed at Furball’s midsection, “and locked you in place by connecting with your own inner magic. I’m guessing it’s because you’re an earth pony, and your magic is actually inside of you, that this happened. I bet a pegasus or a unicorn would just trip here and never notice. Maybe I can get Rainbow to-”
“In Equestrian?” Furball interjected, rubbing sleep out of her eyes. The blanket she was wearing slid off as she rolled, and Mango gathered it up. “Can you fix it or not?”
“Well, yes, it’s a very simple spell actually. I just need to remove enough of the residue so that the magic feeding the anchor performs a sort of osmosis and-” seeing only blank stares, Twilight cleared her throat and reiterated. “Just a quick spell and gravity will be in full effect once more.”
Furball nodded and righted herself, tensing for the fall. Twilight positioned herself and lit her horn, this time spreading her magic through the air and ground. The floating mare closed her eyes and braced as the spell finished with a strange rushing noise. Only, once again, nothing changed except a renewed sensation of falling. Furball looked down and saw that she was still off the ground, but approaching it very slowly.
“I should have phrased that better. A quick spell and gravity will start to affecting you, albeit rather slowly. Because of the- You don’t really care,” Twilight dead panned the last bit.
Mango and Furball shared a quick, terrified look. They had just made a princess deadpan! They bowed quickly, or as close as they could manage to the act. “Sorry, your highness. Thank you for helping.”
“I- Your welcome, anything I can do to help my little ponies. And don’t worry about it, not even my friends are very interested in science.” Twilight said her goodbyes and left.
Shortly afterwards, Furball met the ground with a quiet pomf and staggered, unused to holding her own weight. Mango caught her and set her down softly.
“You okay, Furball?” he asked, already bringing the blanket back in case she needed it.
She waved the offering off, “I’m fine. Just got to get my uh... earth legs back.” She chuckled, and Mango grinned. “Don’t you have mangoes to worry about?”
Mango snapped his head up, looking towards his house. “Aw shoot! I knew I forgot something. Are you sure you’re fine? I’d hate to leave an injured lady on her own.”
Furball motioned him away. “Perfectly okay. See? My legs are waking up even as we speak. And if nothing else, I could always fly home.” Mango laughed and ran off, and Furball felt a pang of loss as he left. “Hey!” she yelled suddenly, much to her surprise. Mango turned and looked back. “We should meet up again sometime, when I’m not breaking the laws of physics!”
Furball waited, tense and hopeful. She had done nothing but make fun of the stallion, even while he was trying to help her. It seemed like they were getting along towards the end, but he could have been only accommodating her. He could decline, make some polite excuse, and she would understand. Didn’t mean she’d like it, in fact some part of her would be downright saddened, but she’d understand.
Mango nodded, and then shouted back “Sounds fun! I’ll come by your place later, we can set something up!” And then he was off.
Smiling to herself, Furball made her way to her hooves and trotted away, a little unsteady but getting better. Her groceries from yesterday were ruined by now, and some animal had made off with just about everything but the flour anyways. But those could be replaced, and she didn’t mind much. Her schedule was ruined as well, but she cared even less about that. Ponyville had finally given her it’s introductory kick in the rear.
‘Maybe now,’ she thought as she walked home, ‘life can get a bit more exciting.’
Then she stopped and stared after Mango. “Wait, how does he know where I live?”
Author's Note
The title was by suggestion of someone else. And yes, it is a bad pun.