Chapters People, Princes And Ponies
Intro
My name is Scribble. My kind are called a few things; Watchers, Recorders, Authors. In your language, we prefer Scribe. The common names of individuals, such as my own, when translated in your language, have alliteration with that word, which we find pleasing. What we are are the perfect reporters, historians and makers of documentaries. We are capable of observing events throughout the omniverse without ever interfering unless we wish to. Then we usually tell our tale to a place however we see fit of another place insurmountably far away. Such is the case now.
~
Scene 0
This is Equestria. I know my target audience, so I know you know what Equestria is. Equestria has a history and this is the one I know, because I observed it. Before Equestria was made, before the Alicorn Sisters ruled all of pony kind, the equine people were ruled by the Three Kings; Tellus, Aequor and Caelum, three brothers plus their sister, Princess Flamma.
Tellus ruled the Earth Ponies and the Kingdom On The Earth, Aequor ruled the Unicorns and the Kingdom By The Sea and Caelum ruled the Pegasi and the Kingdom In The Sky. Flamma had no kingdom but her power to grow wings or a horn of fire at a whim and put them out just as easily made her welcome in every kingdom.
The three brothers were not a functional family, constantly bickering with one another. Flamma tried to keep the peace but between that and attempting to protect pony kind from outside threats as her brothers turned on one another, she failed. War was rare but not unheard of and without the unity of three tribes, pony kind suffered.
Called forth by the chaos came the demons Discord and Strife. Discord was the strongest but least malicious. He made merriment upon the Kingdoms In The Sky and By The Sea. Aequor and Caelum united themselves and their people to fight him off but he was too strong. Discord made fools of them all.
Out of these dark times stepped forth the Alicorn Sisters. With the Elements Of Harmony, they defeated Discord, and sealed him away forever. Filled with such gratitude toward the sisters, the two brothers rewarded them with nobility, making them part of the royal family and naming them Princesses. That is to say, enamored and with reciprocated feelings, they married them.
The two brothers were weary, weary of the fighting, weary of the ruling. King Aequor passed power to his wife, Princess Luna, and King Caelum to his, Princess Stella. The Kings retired then and so the Princesses took the reigns and united the two Kingdoms, beginning Equestria. The last piece lay to the south, of the Kingdom On The Earth.
King Tellus, Princess Flamma and the Earth Ponies faced Strife alone. Weaker than her brother, she was far more vile and cruel, her games were loathsome and deadly. She too fell like her brother but not without a price. Princess Flamma burned her away with her last breath, a conflagration so great that their ashes were inseparable, and so Tellus buried them both.
Having loved his sister the most, bearing witness to her final moments, her lost hit Tellus the hardest. His brothers were known as the serious kings while he was called the Merry May-King. In retirement, the other two took to jovial pursuit while he fell into a deep depression. Unable to rule his kingdom, he succeeded it to the sisters and thus Equestria was completed.
And that was how Equestria was made. As for the brothers, they remained in Equestria for some time, still technically the Kings. More informally, they became known as the Princes, the Prince of Earth, of Sea and of Sky to Tellus, Aequor and Caelum respectively. In their retirement, they took up the pursuit of travel and became seen less and less frequently as the years passed.
When Luna was sealed away on the moon and Stella took the name of Celestia, Aequor was struck with depression, Caelum felt the call of the open sky and Tellus decided he had no ties except the very ground he walked on. So the Three Princes disappeared for generations at a time. A pony of Canterlot could be born and grow old without ever laying eyes upon the Princes.
For these past generations, they have not been seen at all.
~
Scene 1
Now, I told you that story, not so much so I could tell you this one but, to provide some context for this scene and for the future as well. This scene opens up on Twilight plus guest, the two of them discussing the history of Equestria. This is particularly after Twilight read a passage covering essentially the above.
"Ya know, what really gets me is how peaceful that was," Said the guest, tracing her fingers over the words of the book. She'd stared at the pages with quiet fascination, as if expecting this further portions of Equestrian history to reveal themselves. She would have loved to have been given context to what she saw as somewhat bizarre.
"Peaceful?" The librarian pony questioned with a bit of confusion and a touch of worry. She leaned to the side to get a different angle on the book, she herself attempting in vain to see what her guest saw. She couldn't understand this bizarre point of view, "Ivian, this portion of Equestrian history is filled with chaos! I mean, with Discord and Strife wreaking havoc and everything. It's- it's not until the Royal Sisters arrive that everything calms down."
"Yes, I know, and that surprises me," Ivian explain, "The, well, the interaction? The transfer of power between the Sisters and the Brothers. The brothers, who by all accounts are similar beings to the Queens, just give up their power. When Oberron united Sapistan and, uh, wrested, took, the rulership of humans from the Queens, it was a bloody conflict. It was, well, Oberron who brought chaos, for a short while."
Ivian was a winged woman. Not a mare, but a woman, a human woman, except for the fact she had wings. She was a harpy, here the human equivalent of a pegasus. If she were to stand and so were Twilight, she would be twice the height of the pony. She was plump, pear shaped, possessing pale yellow hair that hung low between pale silvery wings.
Twilight's face scrunched up and paled. She showed worry, fear, revulsion. The thought of a ruler purposefully bringing suffering to their people, or a would-be ruler warring for power. It reminded her too much of the King Sombra, "Why would Oberron do that?"
"Oh?" Ivian breathed deeply, turning away from Twilight to stare off into space. She was collecting her thoughts, feeling distinctly uneasy. In her home, explaining this history to young humans was easy, but this adult pony seemed to be more innocent than even a child to her. "The Queens were tyrants. Queen Mab was the worst, being actively... malevolent. Titania tried to be good, so the stories say. She would rule with compassion at times, but at others with.... fury. And they hated each other, were constantly at war with each other. Not a one of their wars equalled the Unification War but added all up they would drown it... drown it in bodies. If they were allowed to continue, it would only be worse."
Ivian looked to the side at Twilight and felt her stomach flop. The little pony was hardly quivering or crying, but she was obviously unsettled. Ivian didn't quite know what to say. Well, she did but she wanted to say something better. The only platitude she had was, "It was worth it though. The long term, uh, short term loss was- well... Once the Queens were overthrown and Sapistan unified, was unified, peace has reigned- we have been at peace ever since."
"I guess," Twilight pretended to agree, unable to gainsay someone on their own history. She was downcast, looking so sad, pangs of sympathy that the humans had to suffer a horrific history.
Ivian looked away, sniffing, thinking. She felt so very awkward now. She rattled her mind to try to think of something to change the subject. Something did come to her, something not to abrupt a change, "So, yes, tell me, what were the Three Kings like?"
Twilight immediately perked, her mind allowed to ponder on something less violence prone than humanity. "Well, historical accounts-"
Ivian leaned in to listen intently, glad her new friend in this land was no longer in distress over her history lecture. Briefly then, she pondered on her family, and how they might be handling Ponyville and its people.
~
Scene 2
Which is a perfect seque into just that. There are a couple possible relatives that could be explored at that time, so let's go with her son. He was over at the school then, being young enough to still attend. The whole class of foals stared in rapt attention at him, being a strange and fascinating creature.
"Class, I'd like you to meet Freydolf!" Ms. Cheerilee stood with him, introducing the boy, although he hardly seemed a colt's age to the eyes of foal who had little knowledge on humans. Thing was, he was tall, standing head to head with Cheerilee. "He comes all the way from Sapistan and he'll be joining you in class from now on!"
Outcries, questioning, murmuring. It amounted to a couple things. What is he? A few foals knew precisely what a human was and a few had absolutely no idea. Most had a vague notion without exact details. Really, how old was he? He was huge! Isn't he an adult stallion? Man. Whatever. A few more observant and intelligent foals noted that of course he was tall, he stood on his hind legs. That's why minotaurs are so big, right?
This is ignoring that most of a minotaur's mass and indeed height is in their oddly proportioned torsos. Minotaurs are that big simply because they are. For humans though, they would be on the right track.
"-on his hind legs, see?" Applebloom explained to her friends, the pair called Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle, "That's why minotaurs are so big, ya know?" Thereby demonstrating to us that she was not wholly informed on minotaur physiology but quite immediately observant on what was in front of her. This was the same intelligence that made her capable of building a fully functional catapult, but not consider why you shouldn't build a catapult, let alone fire yourself from it while indoors.
Cutie Mark Crusaders: Siege Catapult Operators was an abysmal failure, by the way.
Freydolf bristled and twitched under the attention. His feathers rustled. He would have frowned but he was already frowning. Scowling would also be an accurate description. This was a boy quite self-absorbed in his own seriousness and dignity. That image was being battered as he was gawked at like a caged animal, making his normaly pale skin become red with embarasement.
He was quite pale, a contrast to his tanned mother. Besides his skin, he was very yellow, not a pale silvery yellow but a lemony yellow. That is, his eyes, his hair, his wings. All of those things were yellow. It was a running theme with him, that color.
It was one colt who finally raised his hoof in question. Cheerilee both identified him and permitted him to ask his question with a "Snips."
"Hey, how come you stand on your back legs?"
Freydolf would have scowled in confusion but as noted he was already scowling in general. As such, his scowl merely became a confused one. "Back legs?" Also, in case you were wondering, all that scowling DID make him look like a prat. His mother thought it was adorable but then she did fall in love with his father's sneer.
Here, Cheerilee jumped in, just eager to teach. Expanding young minds with knowledge was how she got her sick kicks. "You see, Snips, like minotaurs, humans are what are called 'bipeds', meaning they stand on two legs instead of four. We ponies, along with griffons, are 'quadrupeds'. Minotaurs and humans call their backs legs just 'legs', and front legs are 'arms', which are then soley used for what we normally use our front legs in part for."
The awful disgusting thrill of education rushed through Cheerilee's body. She could not, would not, stop exposing these young innocent minds to the full force of enlightenment. She bent her head low to indicate the end of his arms, "Now see how Freydolf has a great deal more joints on his arms then ponies, especially here at the end. This is called a 'hand' and these things are called 'fingers'. Their use is greater manual dexterity, for what we need to use our mouths and tongue for."
Freydolf absolutely had to drop the scowl right then. Before, it was becoming deeper and redder as Cheerilee really began to put him on display with her impromptu anatomy lesson. He was thoroughly embarassed but unwilling to speak up about it, therefore his opinion didn't matter. However, when Cheerilee explained what they had to use instead of fingers, his face slackened into a gape of pure confusion. They used their mouths and their tongues as fingers?
"What?" He said, way too quietly to be heard.
"Miss Cheerilee!" Called Peppermint Twist, waving her hand eagerly. Well, it was more like "Mith Cheerilee!" But I refuse to transcribe her lisp, you're just going to have to imagine it. "Where is Sapistan?"
Cheerilee looked at her with stark confusion, matching Freydolf's own over the whole 'tongue-finger' revelation, becuase she didn't know what "Thapithtan" even was. She quickly caught on and brightened up though. Filled with that horrifying giddy sensation of teaching, Cheerilee nabbed a globe to display in on her desk. She spun that thing hard and then struck it unneringly right on Freydolf's homeland, stopping the globe dead.
"Sapistan exists on the other side of the World! In fact, it lays on the exact opposite side of Equestria! It means that the straightest and shortest route for Freydolf's family would have been to dig straight down and emerge right out of the ground! Of course, they didn't do that."
Everyone imagined it though. Except for Sweetie Bell, who raised her hoof with a much more important question in mind, "What kind of name is 'Freydolf'?"
Feeling insulted, Freydolf glared at the filly and she returned it with blank confusion. Freydolf was the master of glaring and feeling insulted and Sweetie Bell was his equal in the area of blank confusion. Both expressions clashed in epic battle but neither could win out.
"Humans names are like that, Sweetie Bell," Cheerilee said, "Humans create meaningless words for names."
"Freydolf means me," The boy corrected. He said with a little anger in his tone, but Cheerilee brushed it off because she is a bucking professional.
"Exactly! Previously meaningless, by human understanding the new word has the meaning of that human's unique identity. 'Freydolf' means 'Freydolf'."
The foals mulled this over while the child mulled on something else. He observed what he knew about pony names and came to something equivalent, "Sun Feather." He then looked up and repeated that loudly.
"Excuse me?" Cheerilee asked him.
"My title, every human has one. They sound like pony names, I think. Mine is 'Sun Feather'."
"Oh, can we call you that?" Sweetie Belle asked.
"You may not," Freydolf barely didn't snarl. He immediately regretted telling them his title because he actually hated it. It's full expression was "With Beautiful Feathers That Shine As The Sun." It was not only the title of a child, it was the title of a girl-child, and Freydolf was a man's man, or so he would like to think.
"Who talks like that?" That mocking drawl was Silver Spoon, getting a "Yeah!" of agreement from Diamond Tiara. This earned an even sharper glare from Freydolf than what he levelled at Sweetie Bell but Silver Spoon was a grand master of mocking apathy with Diamond Tiara to back her up. Freydolf turned away in defeat.
His indignation came out of one fact: His father talked like that. Of course, his uncles and aunt made fun of him for it, but his mother found it adorable.
As Cheerilee defused the situation by telling Freydolf to sit down, assigning him next to Sweetie Bell, Freydolf's mind drifted over two things. First, those chairs were surprisingly comfortable. You would think ponies had completely different seating arrangement, but apparently not. Second, he wondered about his family too, once again allowing me to seque over to one of them.
~
Scene 3
Three humans explored the town. Well, 'explored' is the wrong word. They got up to the main part of it and one of them raised his arms up to stop the rest dead in their tracks.
"Hold on!" Is what he said, crouching low with his arms up high at an angle, barring his companion's direct passage through. He had an absolutely serious expression, he eye balled every last living creature there in the town square, milling about, minding their own business and occasionally staring right the Tart' at those three strange creatures, especially the wierd one staring at them.
There is a pause as this man just carefully observed his particular discovery. I could condense it and skip over to its end, or even describe it in excruciating detail, but I'd actually like to take this moment to describe who and what these people are. They are, of course, Freydolf's uncles and aunt, although only two of them are by blood. Not that a one of them was married.
Freydolf's uncle by blood was Vinten, the stopping and staring one, his father's brother. Taller than the rest, straight black hair, yellow eyes, pale skin, skinny and pointy. He was the model of an elf, except he had the audacity to be a dwarf, the human's equivalent to the earth pony. His stare was a leering one, more creepy than it had any right to be.
Araji was the proper model of a dwarf sans the beard; short, stocky and generally square shaped. He had one of those flat expressions, set between apathy and disapproval, you can't read his poker face. His hair, a dark, dark purple, naturally grew in porcupine-like quills, giving the impression that he might toss his head aside and impale someone.
Saufier was the woman, the proper model of she-dwarf, as short and well muscled as Araji. She was the opposite of Vinten, having then the audacity to be an elf. Her pointed ears marked her as the human equivalent of a unicorn. She was Ivian's sister, as dark skinned as her but with hair that matched the skin, growing like a spherical bush.
Saufier just grinned, more amused by Vinten's actions or actually anticipant of the results. She was well acquainted with the wierdness stemming from the dwarf and took glee from the chaos that resulted. She bent low, close to his ear and whispered, "So... what?"
"Don't you guys see it?" Vinten asked, looking at them with inspiration gleaming like a far away nova in his eyes.
"I suppose we don't," Araji's tone was flat, his glare straight ahead and going on forever.
"Okay, fine, if y'all're gonna be so slow, I'll lay it out to you," He huffed, annoyed that only he could share in his genius, "So, I'm vaguely familiar with pony physiology. Enough to know about their sexual dimorphism-" Vinten glanced at Araji when he violent cleared his throat, "-outwardly visible differences between boys and girls."
"And what do you see?" Saufier asked, actually turning to look at the milling ponies.
"Girls," Araji growled, his eyes following something only he could see, "Girls everywhere."
"You saw it too? Yeah, Saufi, there ain't nothin' but girls here." He said, and the admittance of this fact finally causing a note of sheer amazement to enter his smarmy tone. He uncrouched, more because his legs were getting tired, and the three now stood to the side just... talking.
"Nothing wrong with girls," Saufier decided to defend her sex because her sex included her number one favorite person.
Saufier is her own number one favorite person.
"Nothing wrong with boys either," Vinten's sex also included his number one favorite person, "It's just strange is all. Why the misproportion?" Araji cleared his throat. "Why the... um... why the Tart don't you just learn what I'm saying, Araji?"
"So yeah, you see alot of girly ponies," Saufier surmised, "Hey, I'm just sayin', what with none of them having boobs and all, what if you're seeing some really pretty boys? Ehh, colts?"
"I thought so to-"
"Hey," Araji interupted. He lifted one hand and pointed with the force of the final judgement, "That one has boobs."
Vinten and Saufier did follow his point, looking to gaze on a blue-maned and tan-furred mare, -bouncing- on by. Once pointed out to them, they briefly became glued to the sight, forgetting just everything. It was only until she disappeared from sight, and Araji's hand dropped, did Saufier and Vinten regain any coherency in thought.
"Well, okay, that was a thing," Saufier said.
"A pair of 'em," Vinten added. He rapidly blinked to drive the images off. He even did the thing where he'd raise his hands up to his temple and squeeze his eyes shut, focusing his will. "Alright, thaaat aside, I did consider the possibility of a village full of pretty boys. However, conveniently, you might notice that ponies don't wear clothes."
"And now I'm never going to stop noticing that."
"So yeah, I thought they might be boys too, so I checked the plumbing."
"Well, I NEVER!" This was a third party, not one of the humans. It was, in fact, a pony, the only one in town who would say 'I never' with total seriousness. Classy-lady Rarity stomped on over to the trio, glaring up at beings twice her height with the full force of indignation at her back, " Did I hear you right, you hairless barbarian? You've been looking under our tails!"
Rarity's accusation elicited several gasps from surrounding ponies, who turned to stare at Vinten with shock and horror. One pink and green mare even raised her hoof at him, standing on her hind legs to briefly declare, "Shock and horror!"
Then she fainted.
Vinten's eyes dodged between the fainted mare, the other ponies, his friends and finally at Rarity. His eyes were wide in surprise and anxiety, or shock and horror. "That's a thing?"
"Apparently, that's a thing," Araji answered unhelpfully, in a bland tone.
~
Scene 4
The novelty of the human's presence in the classroom wore off to a degree, except for one particularly humorous moment where Freydolf tried to write with his mouth. The only foals still paying close attention to him were the ones hoping to get their cutie marks in human studies. Once Cheerilee released those poor innocent younglings from her foul grip of education, Freydolf found himself dealing with the Cutie Mark Crusaders (Human Experts) on his way home.
"What is Sapistan like?" "Can you fly?" "What kinda critters do you got over there?" "Does it have a lot of humans?" "How fast can you fly?" "And what kinda crops do y'all grow?" "Are there any ponies?" "I bet you can't fly as fast as Rainbow Dash!" "Cause I know a thing or two 'bout critters and crops."
There are stories told among the humans of warriors in the throes of the berserkergang. Of a fury so great that it granted them a moment of sublime enlightenment into the secrets of ultimate violence. Freydolf would exagerate, saying that he thought these fillies were going to send him into one of these legendary furies.
The truth was, as annoying as the fillies were becoming, Freydolf suffered from the same lack of social grace as most berserker warriors. So, even another child could've dealt with the onslaught of questions, even revelled in being the center of attention, Freydolf's shyness and patience were not at all equipped to deal with this properly.
"AAA- Enough! Shut up!" He rounded on the fillies, towering over them, "Fates, you three are annoying!" The three backed away from the boy, shock, worry and fear written on their faces, "The- the three most annoying things I've ever met! Always, always talking! Always asking questions! Just- just shut up! And leave me alone!"
Now, what Freydolf expected was them to round on back with insults and counters themselves. Then they'd have a back and forth argument until one of them got fed up and went away, and then Freydolf would have no friends again. Or they'd skip right to the last part and go.
What he didn't expect, was that they'd apologize.
"Well, gee, I guess we were bein' a might nosey," Applebloom said, scuffing the dirt with her hooves.
"We're sorry!" Sweetie Belle intoned, looking down cast. She'd glance between her friends, "Right girls?"
Scootaloo nodded and raised a hoof up of surrender herself, "Yeah, man, you're right, I guess we should cool off."
At that moment, something inside of Freydolf died. It was the proverbial wind behind his metaphorical sails. His self-righteous indignation washed out of him, leaving him feeling empty, an emptiness ripe for being flooded with guilt. Made to feel like a right fool, Freydolf covered his eyes in embarasement and sighed audibly.
"Okay, okay... I'm sorry too. I... shouldn't have called you annoying. I just... just... ahhhh... I dunno."
"Well shucks, that's okay! We all make mistakes," Applebloom wisdomed beyond her years, reaching up to pat Freydolf on the hip.
"I made five this morning!" Sweetie Belle cheerfully chipped in.
Scootaloo cast a worried and confused glance at her. Quickly glossing over the inanity that is Sweetie Belle, Scootaloo offered her raised hoof as a stretched, "So, hey, friends?"
Freydolf actually paused, staring at the hoof like it were a mysterious and possibly damning letter, but just as possibly blessing. Knocking aside caution for the fillies' anxiously grinning faces, he took Scootaloo's hoof in hand and shook it, "Friends."
And something bloomed inside of Freydolf, something magical.
(It's the magic of friendship.)
Now on a lot more amicable terms, the four youngsters walked toward town together. That's where they'd start to hear the yelling.
People, Princes And Ponies
Scene 5
The time of the Three Kings was considered a largely backwards time for pony-kind, especially in regards to sexual equality. The Three Kingdom were largely patriarchal, the Kingdom On The Earth so in totality, the Earth King being even more of a misogynist then his brothers. In Ivian's opinion, present Equestria had a strong matriarchal leaning.
'But not nearly as bad as the patriarchy of Sapistan Proper,' Ivian wrote in her notes. 'Reexamining my notes on current political structure in the Equestrian capital, Canterlot, I see that there are a nigh equal number of male and female nobles in positions of power. However, counting the-' She crossed out the last three words, 'The numbers do favor noticeably-' Crossed out the last two, '-noticeably favor females of er-' Two words crossed out, '-over males. This is the exact opposite-" Three words crossed, '-in stark contrast to Sapistan, where women in the cities are treated as dirt-' Cross, '-slaves-' Cross, '-second class citizens. Only on the fringes could I-' Two crossed, '-do women have a chance to gain respect-' Cross, '-status-' Cross, '-rights-' Cross, '-anything.' Underline twice.
'As I write this, my family and I live within one of the fringe communities of Equestria. I would like to visit one of the Equestrian cities, like Manehattan. (Aside: The name sounds similar to Sapistan's own Manhandling City. I wonder if the names have the same linquistic roots.) Here on the fringe, the matriarchal leaning of the ponies is even more apparent. Most of the important or high-end jobs are filled by mares, while many stallions, the few there are, are relegated to menial labor. It makes me wonder if there is just something about the female sex and countrysides.'
Ivian stared at that last sentence for a long moment. She didn't cross it out but she did add, 'No, that's just silly.'
Ivian looked over at Twilight, seeing the unicorn still excitedly scribbling her own notes. She'd take the time to admire the casual grace unicorns manipulated physical objects with magic. Not being an elf, Ivian couldn't full wrap her mind around it but she was familiar enough with them to know she had never seen such a feat before.
She leaned over to look over Twilight's shoulder and also came to a second personal admiration, the absolute beauty of Twilight's hand- hoof- hornwriting. Not having any other unicorns to compare to, Ivian settled with stacking it up against her own handwriting. The comparison was more startling in its contrast. While Twilight had gorgeous penmanship, Ivian was self-aware enough to know there were several unkind things to be said about hers.
I have a few too; she had the Antichrist of Penmanship. Like, Ivian's writing was dreadfully inconsistent chicken scratch. Lowercase 'n's and 'r's and 'h's were indistinguishable, 'a's and 'v's became 'u's if she wasn't paying attention, 'g's and 'y's and 'p' just bucked up everything the next line down. Or, she would, if the language she was writing in were the least bit like English and the Latin Alphabet. Atrocities equivalent in her alphabet were made with alarming frequency.
That's just me though. Ivian did not nearly ponder her aborted attempts at penmanship as long as she should have. Instead... well, there is what she going to do instead of penmanship self-evaluation and then what she ended up doing instead of doing instead of that. She was going to engage Twilight in further stimulating conversation on cross-cultural analysis. What she ended up doing was more than walking, not quite running, definitely not jogging, outside with Twilight as they heard voices each of them recognized in a very heated discussion.
~
Scene.... 6? 5.5?
6
So Rarity laid into Vinten. She was particularly good at that, one of two of Harmony Bearers who actually had a talent in tearing people apart when she had the inclination. Rarity was Generous with her words, you see and not the least bit shy about it. The other necessary virtue was Honesty, because the truth hurts. Fortunately, Applejack was prone to excuse a lot of things.
Unfortunately for this skinny dwarf, Rarity was not. “Barbaric pervert! How dare you violate our loins with your peeping eyes? You, you avert your eyes right this second and you never, ever, go- go- go- argh!” She dramatically indicated she was at a lost for words with a huff and wide sweep of her leg, “I think I’ve said everything that needs to be said. Do YOU have anything to say for yourself before the guards cart you away?”
Saufier had the temerity to look embarrassed for the three of them, because Araji was being uncooperatively stoic and Vinten was demonstrating what a unrepentant jerk he was. But also a very observant jerk, a master of finding where exactly to stick his thumb in a being’s eye.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t catch all that. I was too busy wondering why you were wearing a grape fruit roll on your head.”
Rarity did flinch and blink, taken aback by that statement, “Wha-what?”
“Then I realized,” He grinned wide, his smile twisting his eyes into a vicious leer, “That’s your mane!”
So the rest of the pony’s watching, while apparently quite shocked by the accusations against Vinten, were not quite confrontational enough to do what Rarity was doing. They would have much rather tucked their tails, avoided his gaze and general avoided him. Rarity had the power of saying what they were all thinking, yes, but they were also a little bit embarrassed themselves. Rarity would recognize this as making a scene, but she was allowed to make a scene. She was a diva, divas make scenes.
Then Vinten just went ahead and insulted her mane. The equine audience gasped and now they knew: It was on. Saufier covered her face in shame and Araji stared at something a hundred yards away. Rarity’s face twisted into a look of sudden rage which immediately became one of contempt.
“Well, I should have known a pervert barbarian like you wouldn’t know good fashion when he wears his mane like his head is trying to take off like a bird from his body.”
Vinten face widened up into a bigger leer, a wider snakier smile, “Well that’s big from the filly with the twister tail, helicopter butt!”
“Helicopter Butt!? Pecker Face!”
“Marshmallow!”
“You-! You... you’re enjoying this, aren’t you?” Rarity asked, narrowing her eyes as that realization dawned on her. The skinny dwarf kept grinning like a cheshire cat, and his yellow eyes only completed the image.
“Why, yes I am! It’s actually quite fun to get you, and you in particular, to act immature, because,” He slid down to his knees to look her in the eyes. His gaze softened, “Otherwise, you seem like a really classy lady. Classier than I ever could be, so I guess wanted to bring you down to my level.”
The absolute bloody turn-around of this situation apparently did to Rarity what one Freydolf experienced earlier, completely killed the wind behind her sails, in the proverbial metaphor. “I- well, absolutely.” With a side order of scrambling her composure.
“And I’m sorry,” Vinten said, slipping his hand forward and grabbing one of her front hooves. He pulled it forward and up, bending forward to kiss her hoof. “Forgiven?” He’d ask, looking up at her with pleading eyes.
Embarrassed and confused, Rarity white fur showed through with pink. She nodded her head, “Y-yes. Of course, darling.”
Saufier had been travelling with Vinten a long time. This wasn’t the first time she’d seen the dwarf make a total ass of himself and then turn it right the hell around when he turned up the charm. Everytime she did see it, it still shocked. All she could was stare with a dumbfounded grin, “What, the, Tart’.”
Araji keep staring off at something only he seemed to notice. Of course, everyone else noticed it too as a high-pitched voice trying to sound deep yelled out as his little body marched its way through the crowd of ponies. One very pale and yellow human followed by three chaos causing fillies, burst into the middle with a, “How DARE you!?”
Vinten looked up with a gleeful smile, “Well hey there, Freydolf!” He stood up to, waving at his nephew, “How are you doin’?”
The young harpy responded by marching up to the dwarf and kicking him in the shin, “How dare you embarrass me- us in front of the locals AGAIN!?”
“Ow! Ow ow ow!!” Vinten grabbed his kicked shin, and jumped on one leg.
“Yes, feel my anger and my embarrassment and my anger!”
“You said ‘anger’ twice, little dude,” Saufier told him.
“That because I’m very angry!”
“Ow ow ow ow!!”
“Shouldn’t we-” Rarity raised her hoof, having a hard time regaining her composure.
“Nope,” Araji was the answer that cut her off.
“Hmph, very well.” She stamped her hoof in final resolution to the world, declaring her composure against the absurdity and lack of good taste in the universe, “Good sir,” She addressed Vinten, heedless of his pain, “Despite first impressions, you have proven yourself to be a good sort. Once you have sorted out your issues with you...” She looked to Araji, “Family?”
“Family.”
“Yes. Once sorted, I expect to see you at my boutique so we can continue to sort this out like adults.”
“Ow ow ow!!”
“Very well,” She nodded her head and turned back to make her way... just away from here.
She exited stage right just in time for Twilight and Ivian to enter stage left, coming upon the situation that everyone was still staring at it.
“D-did we miss something?” Twilight asked.
~
Scene 7
There were some explanation, some apologies, some Freydolf getting even more of a faceful of humble pie, some meeting Spike. Spike liked to be included in things, so he got saddled with a pair of duties most people and ponies didn’t want to, dealing with “Freydork Hot Air” (“Tee hee!” - Vinten giggled, with all the maturity of a little boy) and Cutie Mark Crusaders.
Vinten recovered from the pain in his shin rather quickly, and went off toward his rendezvous. Around the same time, the quietly looming Araji disappeared too. To tell truth, he was actually doing his voyeuristic stalker ninja thing and following his friend through shadows that shouldn’t exist in the late afternoon sun over Ponyville. Somehow, he managed.
He watched him be what he always was, an incorrigible flirt. Not that the man flirted with any of the mares on the way down, no. He prepared for flirting, using his rather limited allowance to buy up flowers from various sellers. Araji noted with curiosity that there in fact seemed to be quite a few flower vendors. By the time Vinten visited them all, he had a very big bouquet in hand.
Araji had to adjust his approach to stealth. Although he was also trying to go unnoticed by Vinten, he didn’t want the ponies blowing his cover either. Therein lie the problem, they were ponies. He was a human, altogether something strange and foreign to them. That problem was easily solved by staying out of sight but doing that with more predatory humans, with a different host of instincts and sensory input, was drastically changed with the more prey-like ponies.
Araji enjoyed the practice and Vinten was meandering, not at all in any hurry. Eventually, Araji got it down, even with the flyers; pegasi here. That’s how he ended up in a tree overlooking a strange round building with a tent-like roof. It’s whole circumference was ringed by a porch covered in a continuous line of unending pony mannequins. Ponnequins?
That’s when it occurred to Arashi what the building reminded him of, a carousel.
Except instead of such mighty beasts as drakes, timber wolves and dire bunnies, it was a circle of horses. Bizarre. What was even more bizarre was, once he translated the Equestrian script, it apparently read ‘Carousel Boutique’. Did ponies think a carousel full of ponies was a proper carousel? That’d be like if human children piggy-backed on human statues atop a carousel.
Well, actually, Araji thought that sounded like a lot of fun.
Also of note was the cat. There was this white cat in the tree with him. Araji looked at the cat, the cat looked at him. They came to a silent accord of mutual tolerance. From there, then Araji watched Vinten ‘get to work’. It was absolutely bizarre, more bizarre than pony on pony carousel action.
Rarity opened her door and the fashionista seemed absolutely delighted to see the being she got into a public insult match not much more than half an hour earlier. And they were flirting! Araji knew this was going to happen but now that he was witnessing it, it was even more bizarre.
“Bizarre” was a word he liked. It was a useful label Araji could apply to anything he didn’t understand.
Apparently, human women were not enough, or more likely there were not enough human women in the land of ponies. Vinten hadn’t been here for a day and already was try to nab himself a pony mare. Rarity, why did she seem receptive? Shouldn’t Vinten be some kind of hideous hairless monkey to her? Or was Vinten’s observation true, and this town was so lacking in pony stallions that Rarity would take anything?
Or maybe that had nothing to do with it. Perhaps all living thinking things, when thinking with their loins rather than their sapient minds, would all be more than willing to go at it with one another. Araji admitted to himself, when it came to matters of sexuality, he lacked as much insight or interest as a child.
He snapped out of his musing over his own inabilities to watch Rarity invite Vinten inside. Araji thought he heard something about tea but he secretly suspected they’d begin to rut as soon as they were out of sight. Compared to himself, in truth, most people were. He needed to continue watching them, no matter what came of it. He slid from his tree branch perch, with cordial nod to his feline neighbor, and moved himself to the Boutique’s rooftop. Eventually sliding into an upside down view of inside, Araji looked and listened through an open window while remaining unseen.
~
Scene 8
Araji thought it was a bit weird when Rarity tore a petal off a flower and ate it, but Vinten had been expecting that exactly. This human had apparently brushed upon some pony etiquette. In Araji’s opinion, it was all of the etiquette that would grant him access to their genitals, rather than the etiquette that restricted it.
Rarity made that particular sound between a humm and a giggle, “Oh, I absolutely love roses!”
“Oh yeah? You actually seem the type,” Vinten noted, adopting an expression of calm bemusement. Rarity cast the same look at him even as she turned tail to him, walking over to her kitchen to fetch a vase. These were half-lidded expression with faintly curved smiles almost pulled into pouts.
“Do make yourself comfortable, dear,” Rarity offered to him as she disappeared through the archway. Vinten didn’t notice this but Araji did as he spied on them, pony domiciles had a minimum amount of doors, mostly archways. Of course, he had only Rarity’s home and shame to make this assumption, but he suspected this observation would hold.
Vinten noticed that pony furniture was a mite small. He tried to make himself comfortable on a particular fancy couch, or at least he thought it was a couch, and was failing. While Rarity wasn’t here to see him, he didn’t hide his awkward discomfort. Eventually though, he shook it off and decided to just roll with it.
He immediately switched over to acting cool when she came back, a tray of tea floating over her head, wrapped snuggly in a lavender field. “Well then!” She hopped into a nearby perpendicular seat, it and the couch situated around a short standing coffee table on which she put the tray. “Now that we’re situated, let’s talk, Mr. Vinten.”
The motions were covered, tea poured, cup received, tiny sugar cookies acknowledged. Vinten gestured lightly with the cup, “What did you want want to talk about, Miss Rarity?” He thought he knew what was coming, but Rarity was generous with disappointment.
“What do you do for a living, Mr. Vinten?”
Vinten didn’t flinch in surprise though. He didn’t flinch in surprise when Rarity suddenly started eating the flowers he brought. As much as Araji assumed it was preparedness, it was unflappability instead, a trait of the dwarf that bowed only to his conscious. Instead, he rolled with it.
“Well, I work with my friends Araji and Saufier. The three of us-”
~
Saufier grinned at Twilight, reclining in her tiny seat with much more acuity then Vinten, “We’re murder hobos.”
Ivian rested her face in her hands, massaging her eyes and her temples as a headache of exasperation began to come on. She regretted letting the elf field this question.
Twilight quivered and paled, lower lids lifting up her eyes, “W-what?”
~
Freydolf regarded Spike for a moment, with pursed lips and a thoughtful expression. The curious dragon was his sister’s brother, and just as filled with the need to find out more about these newcomers. Freydolf easily explained what his mom and dad did, giving the later quite a bit of flourish, but paused when it came to his aunts and uncles.
“They’re…” He said after a moment, “Professional Vagabonds.”
~
“-adventurers.” Vinten’s grin widened as he simply showed off and he wasn’t disappointed. Rarity’s subtle intake of breath, slightly widening eyes, told him that even here that title was lost on her.
“Rrrreally? Dashing heroes, damsels in distress, daring do’s, dastardly villains, the whole dynamic?”
“That’s a lot of D’s.”
“Ooooh, I’ve read books about your kind, Mr. Vinten, but I’ve never met one in person. Is it all like I’ve read?”
Vinten knew how adventuring was normally presented in literature and he could make a very fair guess what kind of books Rarity read. Particularly the kind that use ‘ravage’ in a positive context. Now Vinten couldn’t completely lie to her but he also couldn’t NOT play the part, so he compromised.
Putting on a show of coyly faux humility, he preened visibly, “Well, I’m afraid the adventuring life isn’t always as glamorous as they say.” He guessed that Rarity’s books in particular would skip the part of being knee deep in sewer refuse while being harassed by cackling kobolds. He couldn’t imagine that pony adventurers had it any easier. Less murder prone, maybe, but no less unpleasant.
“Not always, but sometimes?”
“It has its moments.”
Rarity leaned forward, “You simply must tell me more, darling.”
Vinten leaned forward right back, “Of course, my dear.”
Rarity then turned around, leaning back and drawing a serious expression on her face. In this, Vinten seamlessly mirrored her, flowing with the mood. “But first, we have something else to address, and that’s my behavior earlier.”
“Again, I’d like to apoli your behavior?” Their is a lack of ‘-’ terminating ‘apologize’ there because that implies a pause. Vinten cut the word off and kept going without missing a beat.
“You are not entirely blameless, but I had time to think back on it. I was insensitive toward your cultural… ignorance,” She said carefully while watching him. He recognized her lack of any more appropriate words and nodded his assent. “Then I went off on you and you responded in kind.”
“I escalated it,” He reminded her, “And honestly, I should have applied common sense in the first place and not gone… peeking.”
Rarity nodded assent right back, “Then may we be in accord, Mr. Vinten. Let’s act like adults and put our mistakes behind us, okay?”
Vinten gave her the first really genuine smile she’d so far seen from him, “How refreshingly sensible. Yes, Miss Rarity, I’d like that very much.”
Rarity used Maturity
It was Super Effective!
~
Scene 9
“Oh, you’re adventurers!” Twilight said with relief, “We don’t have many of those in Equestria, so I- I didn’t know. ‘Murder Hobos’. What an… odd euphemism.”
Saufier hid her smile behind her hands as she looked at Twilight. She couldn’t for very long and grinned openly at Ivian, “Ivi, she’s adorable!”
Twilight flashed through frowning to nervously smiling, her ears joining the roll of expressions, perking when she frowned and then lowering when she smiled. “Erm… thank you?” Ivian, for her part, rubbed the bridge of her nose.
“Um,” Twilight still flashed nervously between the two humans. “Well, I’m afraid I don’t have much information on pony adventurers, nothing factual at least, but I suppose I could read up on it to help make comparisons.”
Ivian raised her hand, particularly the one previously rubbing her face, “I can help with that. I know plenty about adventurers, and we can study the subject together.”
“Ooooh, excellent!” Twilight clopped her front hooves together once before cheerfully turning toward Saufier, “But perhaps you can tell me about some technical details about adventurer organization. For example, is it true you normally organize yourself according to the four roles?”
Saufier nodded and held up her hand, ticking off her fingers with her other hand, “The Warrior, The Rogue, The Black Mage and The White Mage.”
Twilight nodded her head, “Yes, those! May I ask, which are you in your party? I mean, is ‘party’ the right word?”
“Party’s the right word,” Saufier assured her, “But I’m not any of those things because in an adventuring party there ain’t four roles, there’s eight.” She held up both her hands and started ticking these off, “The Rock, The Striker, The Sneak, The Trapster, The Blaster, The Expert, The Medic aaaand The Face.” She rolled her eyes a couple times to remember, wiggling her fingers, “I think I listed these in the same order, as like, those usual roles most everyone talks about, like which goes with which. Like, the Warrior is the Rock and the Striker,” She spun her hand about, “Theee Black Mage is the Blaster and the Expert, and so on.”
Twilight listened with rapt attention, filled with that same demented sensation as Cheerilee, except as she took it from the receiving end, learning. She took her vampiric lust for knowledge and was determined to suck Saufier dry. Suck. Her. Dry. She had a quill out and was writing and everything. “So, what were your Roles?” She asked, hiding the pure menace in her intentions, the wanton uncontrolled greed to just know things.
Twilight also got to witness something else, elf magic. She had expected, when she would see it, that their ears would glow, since that was the only pointy indicator separating them from the rest of humankind. Instead, Saufier lifted her hand up to demonstrate, and her whole eyes glowed the same color as her blue irises and her hand sparked with blue electricity, “I was the Blaster and the Healer.”
Feeling like she inserted a suitable amount of dramatic flare, Saufier leaned back against her chair and turned to the harpy, “Ivi, do you have that family photo on you?” Ivi gave her a brief glance before pointing to her bag, situated against the wall from couch they all sat next to each other on.
Saufier reached out with both hands, eyes aglow, and lifted the bag over and into her hands. Holding it then in her hands, she fished another smaller bag and produced a picture. Setting that on the table and replacing the bag, Saufier showed Twilight a picture of Freydolf, his parents and his his aunt and uncles. Saufier pointed to the uncles, “Araji is our Striker and our Sneak. He’s not much of a sword guy, but he can swing the meanest hook and bust down doors with the best of them and he doesn’t sneak so often he just kinda looms. Vinten is our Rock and our Face.” She gave Twilight an incredulous look, “I know he acts like a jerk and looks like a twig, but rolling with the punches is basically his thing.”
Twilight prodded the one unknown number in the picture, the one Ivi had her arm wrapped around. A male, an elf, with pale skin and voluminous black hair that radiated from his head and then trailed down his back and half-lidded purple eyes. In contrast to the other smiling adults in the picture, he had a stern serious expression which Freydolf was apparently doing his best to imitate. “Is that Freydolf’s dad?”
“Mugen,” Ivian sighed wistfully, “Yes.”
“He was our Trapster and our Expert,” Saufier explained, “Always liked puzzles.”
“I haven’t seen him at all,” Twilight observed, “Where is-” Her eyes widen and she covers her mouth with her hooves, “‘Was’!? Oh no! Did he-?”
“Die? Nooo, ha!” Saufier laughed, “He quit!”
“Settled down before Freydolf was born,” Ivian explained.
“Took me by surprise,” Saufier admitted, “He’s a really mousy guy, ya know? Wouldn't expect him to come out of the blue with a girlfriend and says he’s gonna marry her, and then that girlfriend is my sister!”
“I didn't expect he was a full-time adventurer either when I first met him, either,” Ivian regaled Twilight.
“But yeah, you’ve never seen him at all cause he isn't a people person. Or a pony person,” Saufier told her, “He does all kind of arcane study now in his lab in the basement, all by himself. He prefers it that way.”
“Oh, really?” Twilight perked, “Well, I wouldn’t mind speaking with him then, when he has any free time, of course. I wouldn’t want to bother him. Not like Pinkie Pie, might.”
Ivian perked her brow and smiled encouragingly, “Who is Pinkie Pie?”
People, Princes And Ponies
Scene 10
Pinkie Pie was Pinkie Pie and Pinkie Pie was in a basement. Not her basement, or technically the Cake’s basement, but in a basement that technically counted as trespassing, breaking and entering if it weren’t for Ponyville’s very relaxed views on public property and personal space.
Mostly though, it was just Pinkie Pie’s relaxed view.
Mugen was the counterpart to Araji, an elf’s elf. He resembled his brother, with thin triangular features, everything about his face was pointy, from his eyes to his chin and especially his ear, but not his hair. His hair was filled with large soft curves, voluminously erupting from his head and cascading down his back..
He regarded the pink pony severely. She regarded the pale human eagerly. Here in the dark depths of the earth, two ancient powerful forces met; the silliness of Pinkie Pie and seriousness of Mugen Water-Count.
The silence stretched on for a moment, both of them waiting for the other to make the first move.
“Ffffffine,” Mugan finally said with exasperation, “Who are you?”
“I’m Pinkie Pie and it’s so nice to meet you because I’ve never seen you before so you must be new because I know everyone in Ponyville and I’m friends with everybody but also I’ve never seen anything like you before but I think heard about you before in a book somewhere that I read in Twilight’s library and have you met Twilight because she’s like super smart and you’re down in here in this dusty old lab so you gotta be super smart too because that’s what super smart people do so I should probably throw you a Welcome To Ponyville party in her library since she’s always pretty cool about that even though you’re supposed to be super quiet in a library so-”
“Fascinating,” Mugan breathed, not taking his eyes off the rapidly talking pink pony while grabbing a nearby notepad on his workbench with his magic and a quill with his hands, taking both in hand. He rapidly scribbled down notes while he watched her, “She seems to actually be sneaking breaths in between each word so she doesn’t have to pause for a bigger breath and break her tempo. The absolute breathing discipline that would require is staggering to consider.”
“-and that’s how I got my cutie mark! What’s your name?”
The elf actually looked disappointed that this anomalous demonstration was coming to an end, but he put his quill and pad down anyway, “I am Mugen Who Would Count The Drops Of Rain In The Ocean, or Mugen Water-Count or just Mugen.”
“Ooooh, how do you pronounce that?”
“What? ‘Mugen’?”
“Yes!”
“Like ‘Mugen’. Like I just said it,” Mugen said, not understanding the question.
“Well, is it ‘mu’ as in a cow’s moo, or ‘mu’ as in a cat’s mew? And is the ‘g’ pronounced with a ‘guh’ sound or a ‘jah’ sound? How much stress is placed on the last vowel?”
Mugen was simply confused while I was feeling distinctly uneasy. He was simply confused, thinking about her question and trying to understand why she needed vocalization spelled out to her. He suspected that it was possible she had some kind of mental handicap, some form of audio dyslexia? But he couldn’t fathom HOW that would work.
“Mmmm, more stress is placed on the first vowel, I suppose. And it’s pronounced as if a cat’s mew. The ‘g’ is with a ‘guh’ sound. An interesting dissection of my name, Pinkie Pie,” He started repeating his name with different pronunciations, “MOO-gen. Mew-GEN. Mew-JEN.”
“Pinkie Pie! Pinkie Pie! Pinkie Pie!” Pinkie just started singing her name. She didn’t so much as miss the point of the exercise as abandon it in favor of her own agenda. Mohan too had an agenda, getting sucked right in to it as he grabbed a chalkboard and started hurried scribbling on it. He muttered about names and resonance as he mixed letter and number with obscure arcane symbol to create complex equations.
Pinkie Pie, still quietly singing her name to herself, grabbed her own chalk and started playing tic-tac-toe by herself. Mugen seamlessly incorporated the crossed hatch, X’s and O’s into his mathemagical formula. Pinkie Pie got into a draw with herself, and Mohan made that central to proving his theory, “-a name spoken in full and proper pronunciations will resonate with a sentient creature’s essence, allowing near flawless integration of third-party enchantments. Yes. Yes! It all checks out! It all make SENSE! YES!”
Mugen threw back his head and cackled maniacally. Pinkie Pie, always enjoying a good laugh, joined right in.
~
Scene 11
Araji decided he had others things he needed to do. By his estimates, of the three Murder Hobos, he was certainly the least hobo-ish. He was the responsible one, although maintaining enough self-awareness to realize that wasn’t saying quite a lot. He knew one thing though, that the market for trouble stabbers was somewhat small and low in demand in these parts. Things were more idyllic here in Equestria. It was certainly looked down upon if you broke into some creature’s house and did everything upward towards violently dismembering them and nicking their stuff.
There were dragons in these parts, but Princess Celestia was apparently more on top of that than the King ever was. Diamond Dogs sounded familiar but Araji learned that incidents with them were rare. Changelings were once the single greatest threat to Equestria, but they’d been gone for ages. Ponies with a bad combination of treasure, vanity and madness willing to build large booby-trapped tombs filled with all of their stuff and purposefully designed be just as filled with violently territorial monsters were apparently in shorter supply than among humans..
What it all came down to was that Araji needed a job and fortunately he found himself gainfully employed in no time at all.
The bark crunched under his knuckled with a satisfying crack. He twisted his fist just so in the split moment it made contact with the tree, forcing the kinetic energy to run and echo up the tree with an instinctive ease to which elven magic could not compare. It went like a curveball crossed with an uppercut, the energy pushed down before flinging back up. It split neatly in half against the unyielding rock of his flesh, flying up either side of the tree.
There was a resounding number of as two large buckets place to either side of thee were finished filling with delicious juicy apples. He swiped both of them up and turned back to the barn standing in the center where he would deposit the apples.
“Ehm, excuse me, eh, mister? But what are you doing?”
Araji stopped, slowly inclining his head down to regard the orange mare that came up to his waist. He grunted a one word answer, “Working.”
“Ah didn’t know we hired any workers on the farm.”
Araji realized he had forgotten one very important detail; he didn’t tell his prospective employers he was working for them now.
And he was supposed to be the responsible one.
~
“Lookit, it’s real cute ‘n’ all ya wanted to help out ‘n’ all, but, uh, we really don’t need help with the harvest season right now,” Applejack told him.
Araji sat on a pile of lumber in the barn, each of his buckets at his feet. He was surprised how kindly these farmers were treating him, considering he was trespassing. Humans would have beaten him silly, especially the big one standing with her. Big Mac came up to his sternum almost; so much for earth ponies being short like dwarves. Araji showed none of that shock on his face but his face rarely changed from its constantly constipated frown.
“You already have a lot of workers for the harvest?” Araji asked.
“We don’t really need workers for the harvest,” Applejack corrected.
“You… harvest this whole plantation by yourselves?” Incredulity entered Araji voice. He tilted forward and looked out toward the expansive acres of apple trees.
“Well, yes,” Applejack, frowning at the implied insult. Big Mac glanced at her and she at him, a silent exchange crossing between them. Applejack softened, “We might get a little help. But that ain’t the only problem here. For example,” She pointed at the bucket of apples, “Those’re red apples.”
Araji looked down, “Those are green.”
“Exactly.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, it just ain’t harvesting season right now. I guess people forget that cause we can sell ‘em year round like there fresh.”
“So… you really don’t need any help?” Araji asked, a clear tone of finality ringing there.
“Now hold on there, partner,” Applejack lifted up a hoof to stop him right there, “There’s still the matter of damages. It ain’t much, to be honest, but I tell you what, ya can pay it off and Ah can see how much I like your work ethic.”
Araji didn’t smile, he merely frowned less. He stood up, planted a fist into his palm, and bowed. “Yes, I understand. Thank you.”
~
Scene 12
And now for something completely different.
“So, we are in accord?” Said the earth pony.
The unicorn spoke, “Accord? Accord for what? I just got here.”
“Is it for an accordion?” Asked the pegasus, “Are we having a party?”
“The time is now, brothers,” The earth pony insisted. He nodded to the unicorn, “Your wife has returned and now our cousins’ children are moving in. If there ever was a time, this is that time. Right now.”
“Oh, dear, your wife’s been back for a while,” The pegasus said.
“Now is the time,” The earth pony reiterated.
“Like, have you sent her a single letter?” The pegasus asked.
“Ooooh, man, you’re right!” The unicorn moaned, “She’s gonna kill me!”
“Now-ish,” The earth pony admitted.
“It’s just, I’ve been so busy with… everything, ya know?” The unicorn’s grimace masquerading as a grin marked him.
“With what?” The pegasus admonished, “My dear brother, we’ve been on extended vacation for… how long?”
“Forever,” The earth pony supplied, “Ish.”
“I know… I know,” The unicorn leaned in to the table, resting his face in his hooves, “Sun and stars, I’m horrible.”
“You’re not horrible,” The pegasus assured him, “We’ve all been away.”
“Until now,” The earth pony insisted, “Ish.”
“She’s been locked up for who knows how long and as soon as she gets out, I should have been right there with her instead of screwing off in the flank end of the world.”
The three didn’t look like brothers but then again ponies had a wee bit of a problem with familial appearances. You have a better chance guessing two ponies are related to each other if they have the same accent. Not that these three had the same accent; the unicorn seemed to occasionally slip into a Mareibu accent, the pegasus affected a Canterlot accent and earthy pony talked like he was an actor in a play set in ye olde tymes.
They and their conversation attracted no attention, because they were completely normal looking. Then again, ponies had a wide margin of error for normalcy, so it was an easy mold to fit into.
“Well, do you love her?”
The all-blue unicorn flinched and turned, regarding the mare waitress carrying a plate of food to their side of the table, balancing it all on her back. He regarded her and her question and her lack of any of his food.
“Yes! Ever… ever since I first laid eyes on her. She was…. is…” His eyes got a panicked looked as he struggled to grasp words to describe his feelings.
“She must still love you too, I bet. Just go back to her and she’ll understand,” She told him with a smile, grabbing their plates and setting them down. The brown and green earth pony dug into big bowl of really thick vines. The blue and white pegasus ate an arrangement of particularly sweet flowers, enjoying every dainty bite. They both pretended not to listen while the unicorn gaped at the waitress but also didn’t eat too loud, lest they miss a single word.
She put her carrying plate back on her back, “My special somepony, he sometimes loses track of time too but he makes every moment he does remember special, because he loves me. I wish he were on time more but I don’t ever regret that time we do have.” She looked over the rest of the table, “Will that be all?”
“Yes, dear, thank you very much,” The pegasus said, turning his head toward her fully. She couldn’t see his eyes through the white curls falling over his face like a thick fog. Then he shook that mane, letting her see one brilliant yellow eye. He winked at her, or blinked, she couldn’t tell, “For everything.”
The unicorn realized a couple of things. One, he arrived late so he never got to put in his order. The waitress didn’t have any food to offer him, just sage advice. Two, she was right. Totes right, in fact. He turned away from her to gaze wonderingly into the air, slumping against the back, “Huh…”
The waitress, she nodded, and trotted away to deal with other customers.
The unicorn’s stomach growled. Three, he was hungry.
~
Even the unicorn had his fill eventually, picking off his brothers' plates, therefore guaranteeing his survival if this were a Trottingtino movie.
By the way, yes, that's a thing.
Leaving a hefty tip for Waitress The Wise, really brightening up her day as she picked it up. The unicorn and the earth pony took off, but the pegasus stayed behind to show her even more of his gratitude.
"Thank you very much for your help," He said, all culture and dignity. He was poised just so, his head tilted back, one front hoof lifted, sky blue wings spread just so to give him a regal cloak. The waitress really felt the weight of his words, as well as the blood rapidly running to her cheeks, "You really put my brother at ease, and for that I-"
"Hey, oi, bro, you wanna get some cake?" The unicorn called outside.
The pegasus's entire demeanor changed, his wings unfurling with child-like excitement, yellow eyes popping out as his mane lifted when he jerked his head with a huge smile. His hooves spread far apart and his tail wagged rapidly, "Ooo, yes!" He turned his head and pecked the waitress on the cheek before she knew what was happening, rapidly taking off before she could react.
The mare blushed harder for a brief second, her heart thumping, her face twisted in incredulity and shock. She gathered her wits in a moment when she caught a peek of something light blue on the ground. It was a long primary feather from a pegasus wings, exactly matching that pegasus’s coloration. Not a pegasus herself, she knew keeping shed primaries was supposed to be important to them.
“Hey, wait!” She called out but he was already gone. She frowned and looked back down at the feather, flinching in surprise. The feather wasn’t blue anymore, but as white as the purest cloud, and twice as long as any pegasus feather had any right to be. “Huh?”
~
The pegasus caught up with his brothers in a few minutes, taking the ground route after the other two took off. His eyes glanced imploringly about but all he found was the dark night and the deep shadow of the trees. The three brothers were going on into the Everfree and not a pastry factory. “Where’s the cake?”
“Your wife will have some,” The unicorn said, teasing.
The pegasus rolled his eyes in thought, “Yeah, Celestia always got a cake supply.”
The unicorn quirked incredulous, “She still calls herself that?”
“It’s what everyone’s called her for a thousand years,” The pegasus shrugged.
“Better than Nightmare Moon, at least,” The unicorn added sardonically.
“So, we are in accord?” The earth pony repeated.
“Yeah yeah,” The unicorn rolled his eyes at the earth pony’s language.
“Are there going to be accordions?” The pegasus asked.
The earth pony ignored him, turning to go into the Everfree. As he did, he began to change. Before, he was a pony from the Big Macintosh school of design, large and burly, with hooves distinct from the rest of his body. He was brown coated with a long green mane and tail that hung loosely on him, and green-gray eyes. His cutie mark was a mountain stamped on his flank.
His body creaked and rumbled like shifting stones and falling boulders. His hooves began to turn red as if heating up until they glow like fire. Red vein-like cracks worked their way up his leg, turning the rest of each of his legs black. Reaching his bottom torso, his fur turned as gray as the mountain on his flank. A spike of that gray color grew above his front legs all the way up his neck and touching his cheeks. The red-orange cracks from his back legs grow further through the gray, pushing that strata to join with the mountain mark. It was letting the ‘lava’ seemingly erupt from the top, fusing his cutie mark with the rest of his coat.
He blinked his eyes and his iris became the color of pure jade, the once-white sclera glowing like molten magma. He huffed fire from his nose and the end of his snout became black as soot. Small black stripes ran down his like zebra stripes. With the shake of his head, his green mane snapped into a neat mohawk with a bushy top, like a row of trees. A snap of his tail made it stiffen and sharpen like blades of grass. And he grew, he grew until he was twice the size of one large red farm pony.
His brothers had similar dramatic changes, growing in size as well but not quite as large. The unicorn bubbled and rippled while his blue fur took on several shades, nearly white at the tip of his wave-like hair and slowly darkening to a near black at his hooves. His sclera was blue as well and his horn became a tightly spiraling pillar of ice. His ocean wave cutie mark swirled around itself, grabbing all the different shades of blue and twisting into a whirlpool on his flank that was visibly there but impossible to tell apart from his coat.
The unicorn took a deep breath and puffed out his cheeks. His hair sprang to life, really swirling around his head like a cloud attached to his skull. His body remained blue but his wings spread to their true size and cloud white color. His cutie mark, a lightning bolt erupting from the bottom of a cloud, moved over toward his tail. The cloud grow in three dimensions and the white curls became white cloud, covering his bottom with clouds, while the lightning bolt split and grew across his flank further, drawing a jagged path all over the back half of his body.
Three elementals in the shape of ponies, of earth, sea and sky, walked in the place of the mortal Equestrians they just masqueraded as. Casually, the three brothers chatted amicably of what was to come, of lovers they would become reacquainted with. Fearlessly, they cut a path directly through the dangerous wild forest, making a beeline straight for Canterlot.
~
Scene 13
That interlude done and over with, let head back over to Ponyville where actually important things are happening. Take, for example, the Cutie Mark Crusader Clubhouse. Here, the fate of the future of all sentient life forms was decided by three mighty mares.
“We could get our cutie marks in bein’ adventurers!” Applebloom said, the three fillies standing in a circle around each other, head close to each other in discussion.
Scootaloo relished the chance to do something her sort-of crush, sort-of mentor, sort-of big sister figure, sort-of she wasn’t actually emotionally mature enough to quite understand herself would definitely approve of, “It’d be just like Daring-Do!”
The two boys sitting to the side weren’t exactly excluded from the conversation but they weren’t exactly invited in either. This was Equestrian sexism at its worst but that’s something we will explore some other time.
“Alright, then we’re in an accordion!” Sweetie Belle declared.
Applebloom and Scootaloo turned to her in confusion, speaking in stereo, sounding like some awful fusion creature of science. “Huh?” Scootabloom asked.
“It’s a real fancy way way of saying we all agree,” Sweetie Belle explained, “I read it in one of those books Rarity doesn’t want me to read.” She frowned and looked frustrated for a moment, “I still haven’t figured out was ‘ravage’ means yet but I think ya need a colt and his-”
“Well, how about that adventure!?” Spike interrupted before this conversation went farther than it ever, ever needed to. He was a baby dragon, yes, but ‘baby’ for a dragon extended to around fifteen years old. Living with a librarian and literature lover, the little lad picked up a few things.
The girls wordlessly agreed and turned to the nearest closest thing to an expert they had on adventurers. “Freydolf, what do adventurers do?” Applebloom asked.
Freydolf blinked, first a little shocked at being directly addressed. Personally, he wasn’t used to Equestrian female-biased sexism. His application to this conversation was Sapistanii male-biased sexism, wherein a group of females chattering closely together probably wasn’t worth his attention. This is, to be specific, little boy Sapistanii sexism.
Actually, it isn’t that different from small child sexism the world over.
“Adventurers? Mmm, why?”
“We wanna go adventuring! Ya know, for our cutie marks. Weren’t you listening?” Sweetie Belle asked.
Freydolf would look sheepish with embarrassment, but his ego wouldn’t allow it. The little harpy’s wings fidgeted as his pale face burned red with shame and indignity. He almost snapped at them but bit it back. These girls were actually nice to him, they put up with him, they were kind to him and valued his opinion. Yes, they were just girls but damn it someone valued his opinion!
Freydolf looked at the floor and mouthed, ‘For once.’
“Well, are there any… old ruins nearby? Adventurers would go to those to look for treasure.”
“Treasure!?” Sweetiebelle said excitedly, showing who’s sister she was.
“Ooo! Ooo! I know a place! Rainbow Dash has been there!” Scootaloo offered excitedly, “We can try the old alicorn palace!”
“Scootaloo, Applejack and Rarity and all those girls been there too,” Applebloom interrupted.
“Yeah, but they’re not Rainbow Dash.”
“No, no, Ah suppose they’re not.”
“Yeah, exactly!”
“Not that Ah see how it matters.”
Freydolf was sitting down, knees against his chest, leaning back with his wings propping him up on the ground. This made him about equal height to the fillies. So he raised his hand and asks, “So, who’s Rainbow Dash?”
“What!?” Scootaloo screeched and tackled Freydolf. Just straight full bodied tackled the poor guy. She was going to explain to him who Rainbow Dash was. She was going to explain it to him a lot.
~
Scene 14
Saufier hadn’t ever thought to use her magic in this fashion. Her entire body sparked with small arcs of electricity but her ears and her tongue outright glowed with electric power. She felt it charging through her mind, and she wondered how long she could keep it up before she suffered a catastrophic error in judgement.
It was necessary. It was the only way she could keep up with this bloody conversation. She wasn’t a stranger to magical theory, no. She had a fair grasp of the basics and knew quite a bit of stuff that potentially applied to her area of interest. She also hung out with a super smart guy for a long while and some stuff rubbed off. However, holding a five way conversation on topics this advance at this pace simply wasn’t possible.
It started when Mugen found them. Saufier didn’t know how, maybe the pink one lead him here but then she couldn’t figure how she knew they were all there. That pink one, though, was part of the problem apparently. She wasn’t a pony elf, but apparently she just helped Mugen hammer out some mathemagical equation or something and it got him super excited.
So he goes in, trying to explain what he just figured out to his wife. Saufier got to see why they got along, her sister was genuinely interested. She also knew some stuff and he was interested too. They were asking questions, swapping facts and to no one’s surprise the purple pony elf chipped in, rapidly drawing herself into the conversation. Twilight was eager to learn about True Names.
The pink dwarf pony seemed to carry herself through the conversation by sheer determination and the ability to break complicated explanations down into layman terms and silly analogies. This left Saufier dreadfully alone between four rapid firing voices and she just couldn’t handle it. Rather than something sensible, like leave, Saufier decided this was good a time as any as to experiment with pumping her brain with electric steroids.
“-so by thaumaturgical convention of identity-” Mugen went.
“-males are not encouraged to enter into politics but interestingly-” Ivian told.
“-it’s fascinating the parallels I found between pony society and your society in-” Twilight explained.
“-then you just pour the cream over the chocolate chips and set it to bake until it’s all-” Pinkie went into. Cooking can be a rather complex and engrossing subject as magic and comparative civilitatemology.
“That sounds delicious!” Saufier put in. It’s how you make fudge, by the way. Fudge is delicious.
“-with the proper and unique labels of the individual-” Mugen continued.
“-correct, with proper applications that could-” Twilight added.
“-so Equestrian sexism is rather limited by-” Ivian kept going.
“-I called down the thunder! And that-” Saufier regaled.
“Oooo! That sounds super duper spiffy, Saufier! And then what happened?” Pinkie Pie encouraged her to continue.
Twilight didn’t rightfully know what conversation Pinkie Pie and Saufier were having. They seemed to switch between tales of Pinkie Pie’s sweet confectioneries and Saufier’s stories of horrible violence. At least the two seemed to be getting along, although Pinkie Pie could get along with anyone. Twilight supposed she wasn’t much better, holding a conversation about arcane sciences as applied to names at the same as one about opposing gender societal conventions across different cultures.
Having not just one but two scholars to actually speak with was a uncountable good fortune. She envied them actually being a married couple. Twilight loved her friends dearly but they weren’t exactly the right people to have discussions about academia about. Well, not exactly true, each of her friends had very narrow regions of interest they could go on about. Pinkie Pie and baking, for example, which Saufier seemed remarkably adept at keeping up with, even if she apparently needed to supercharge her mouth to do so. And what an interesting application of lightning ma- was that smoke coming out of her ears?
Everybody yelped and jumped as a loud crack and flash emitted from Saufier’s head area. Her hair, already an afro before, was now doubled in sized. Black plumes of smoke trailed from her ears and her wide gaping mouth. He stared blankly into space for a moment before face planting into the hard wooden table.
Pinkie Pie leaned over, frowning.
“Was it something I said?”
