The Amusing Misadventures of British Teensby British BronyChaptersChapter 1: An Eventful Walk HomeChapter 2: AwakeningChapter 3: Walking, flying, fightingInterlude, Notices and other fun stuff!Chapter 4: IntroductionsChapter 1: An Eventful Walk HomeChapter 1: An Eventful Walk Home It was your average November day, cold, windy; the sun was out, the winter air giving its light a sharp appearance. The cloud cover, enough of it to look gloomy, yet not enough to block out the sun’s icy rays. Overall, a bloody miserable day. It is upon this bloody miserable day where our story begins, in your standard school courtyard. The benches unoccupied, cold and unforgiving. Cars parked outside the foyer, engines still, silent. The entire scene could be considered serene, quiet, peacef- BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP! -ul. The school bell, loud, high-pitched and ear splitting tore through the silence of the courtyard as it signalled the end of yet another gruelling school day, that the students were free of their teacher’s cruel tyranny of algebraic equations and language analysis. Students were starting to pour out of the various exits situated around the courtyard, some waited in the courtyard giving their friends a chance to catch a lift or to talk with someone on the way home. Others were by themselves listening to their MP3s or in groups of two or three, chatting animatedly about their plans for the weekend as they walked out the school gates. Let us turn our attention to the exit closest to the foyer, ‘twas a simple doorway, blue and a handle on the left-hand door. This door had faced many challenges in its lifetime; wind, rain, snow and hail, over enthusiastic students and the idiots who used it as an improvised weapon in fights. It is through this doorway of trials and triumphs where our first character will walk through in... Three... Two... One... ... Well, it seems that he’s a lit-Ah! Here he is. Allow me to introduce Matty as he is called by everyone who knows him. He’s a rather tall chap; short ginger hair gelled ever so slightly to give it a spiky appearance, ice blue eyes and a clean shaven face. Matty squinted against the sudden burst of sunlight assaulting his sight, as he made his way into the courtyard. A brief look around confirmed that he was the first of his friends to reach the courtyard. So he walked over to the usual spot that he waited in, turned his MP3 on and plugged his headphones in. He was half way through Opeth’s “Drapery Falls” when our next two characters decided to show up. One of them was Lee; a rather small guy, blonde-brown hair roughly four inches long and light blue eyes. Also, with a clean shaven face. Next to him was Tom, taller than Lee yet smaller than Matty. He has medium length brown hair and brown eyes. Yet again, he was clean shaven. Matty, however was a little too absorbed in his song and failed to notice Tom and Lee approach him. Tom, noticing that Matty hadn’t seen them, felt a smile tug at his face and decided to take full advantage of the situation. Tom nudged Lee and made tip toeing motions at Matty, catching on Lee felt a similar grin spread across his face. And thus, they began to sneak. They managed to get all the way around Matty without him noticing and were now standing directly behind him. Tom raised his hand, first three fingers erect, and started to count down. The first finger fell, Matty was still painfully oblivious to what was about to happen. The second finger was retracted, Lee and Tom tensed, ready for the act. The final finger was brought down. Both Lee and Tom leapt forwards, clamped down their hands on Matty’s shoulders, one to each side, and shouted at the top of their adolescent lungs. “BANG!” The reaction was just as desired. Matty jumped almost a mile off the ground. When he returned to the lithosphere he turned around to look at Tom and Lee, who could hardly breathe for laughter, and shouted at them... “Jesus Christ! You bastards don’t do that!” A smile on his face despite what they had just done. “Haha! Oh God, your face was hilarious” Tom replied, trying (and failing) to get his laughter under control. “Oh piss off” Was Matty’s only reply as he punched Tom across the arm. But before Tom had a chance to retaliate another voice cut across their conversation. “Hey, what’s going on?” This voice belonged to none other than our fourth character, Joel. He was roughly the same size as Lee, with short black hair, glasses and green eyes. The beginnings of a moustache upon his lips. He was often called Harry Potter by other because he was a lookalike to the wizard that we all know and love, a rather poor lookalike mind you but a lookalike nonetheless. “Nothing, nothing happened” Matty said, failing rather epically at concealing the truth. “We scared him and he absolutely shit himself.” Lee choked out through his chuckles. “I did not shit myself!” Matty exclaimed, his voice laced with exasperation. But, alas, it was too late for Matty as Joel was now laughing alongside Lee and Tom. After a few more seconds of joy at Matty’s humiliation they managed to get their laughter under control. After a few moments of awkward silence Joel decided to break it by asking a question, a very important question, a question of such thought, such philosophy that it may never be answered... “Why the fuck are we still standing here?” They all turned and looked at each other, all seemingly in deep thought at such an intelligent and philosophical question. It was, however, Tom that answered this bombshell of dilemma. “I thought we were waiting for Connor.” “Oh yeah, so we were.” Replied Matty. And so they waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. And wa-You know what? No, fuck it, they’re done waiting. “Fuck it, I’m done waiting!” Joel exclaimed. He turned around, ready to take the long walk home, his stride full of- OH SWEET DEAR LORD! Standing directly in front of Joel, his face inches from Joel’s face, was Connor. He had short blonde-brown hair, light blue eyes and more facial hair than someone his age should have and his face was twisted into a bemused smile. Naturally, having someone that everyone else considered crazy no more than an inch in front of you face is going to, most likely, scare you shitless, and so it did. “ARRGGGHHH!” Joel, for want of a better word, screamed like a little girl and backpedalled so fast that he tripped and fell over. Matty, Tom and Lee promptly burst into uproarious laughter. “Hello Joel” Connor said his voice both unamused and yet full of mirth at the same time, “Did you have a nice trip?” “For fuck’s sakes Connor!” A very irate Joel exclaimed, “Will you stop fucking sneaking up on me?!” “Awww, but Joel, where would be the fun in that?” Connor asked, still wearing the same bemused expression. “I swear, you’re going to give me a bloody heart attack one of these days.” Joel muttered as he stood back up and brushed himself off. Connor just laughed at this and moved to stand next to Matty. “So” Connor started after everyone else had finished laughing themselves silly, “Shall we be off?” “Yep” Was Tom’s simple reply. And so, they were off. They talked as they walked and walked as they talked. Many topics were brought up; Games, politics, random stories from their lives, their jobs. The list goes on and on. But eventually they came across a topic that Lee, Joel and Matty had hoped they wouldn’t, My Little Pony. “I can’t wait for Season four, how about you Connor?” Connor just rolled his eyes and said “You clearly can wait, else what have you been doing for a year?” “Oh shut up” Tom rebuked, “You know what I mean.” Connor just sighed “Yes Tom, I know what you mean and yes, I’m excited” he replied, putting emphasis on the ‘excited’. It was now Tom’s turn to roll his eyes as they started to converse about what they wanted to see in Season four. As the others suffered in silence, a bit further down the road a bus was trundling along at a steady pace. The bus driver, an elderly man with grey hair, was humming a happy tune to himself as he approached a decline, he went to apply the brakes to keep the bus from picking up too much speed and found them to be unresponsive. “Oh, dear.” He muttered under his breath. He searched frantically for a place to pull over but found only terrace housing on either side of the bus. Regardless he tried frantically to turn onto the pavement but found that the bus was unresponsive to his attempts to steer it. He summed up his entirely gloomy and doomful situation in one word. “Bollocks.” Matty, Tom, Joel, Lee and Connor were now engrossed in an argument about whether bronies were, in fact, creepy and weird. With Tom and Connor arguing for the ‘Not’ side, things were looking bleak for the brony collective. As the bus began to pick up speed Lee started to get a feeling of unease in his gut, but he simply brushed it off as something he had at lunch. As the bus picked up even more speed, it began to veer to towards our group of oblivious friends. Lee’s feeling of unease increased even more and he felt that this time he should listen to it. “Um guys? I think something’s wrong.” You don’t say. Connor turned and arched an eyebrow at Lee’s comment “Such as?” he inquired. “I don’t know.” Lee replied a little bit exasperated, “I just feel like something’s off.” Connor just scoffed, “Pfft, come on Lee we’re in an empty street what could possib-“ And that’s when they all noticed the bus flying towards them, the driver frantically gesturing for them to move. Yet they could not, they were like deer in the headlights, frozen with either shock or fear. Despite it all, despite their impending demise Lee turned and gave Connor a deadpan look and said “Told you s-“ CRASH! *** Meanwhile, in Equestria “NNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” Nightmare Moon’s scream of defeat pierced the serene night as a ribbon of pure magical rainbow friendship energy thingy tore the evil and corrupt visage of Nightmare Moon from existence. Banishing with it the threat of night-time eternal. As the light reached its brightest point and the screams of Nightmare Moon started to decline six mares, the elements of Harmony, the closest friends could be, Equestria’s first and last line of defence, were knocked unconscious by the sheer amount of energy from the blast that they had created in order to defeat Nightmare Moon. An undisclosed amount of time passed, let’s say twenty minutes, before they started to show the first signs of consciousness, the first one to properly awaken was a cyan Pegasus with rainbow mane, let’s call her Rainbow Dash, you know for shits and giggles. The next to awaken were the pink and orange earth ponies, let’s call them Pinkie Pie and Applejack. Applejack spoke up “Is everypony okay?” in a very southern accent. She got various nods and murmurs of afferma- Hang on, you know what? Fuck this; I’m not retelling this scene. If you want to know what happens then go to YouTube, lazy sods. Anyway, everyone’s alright, Luna’s back, Celestia and her are sisters (shock horror), everyone celebrates, whoop-de-fucking-do break out the booze, etc. But, unbeknownst to the celebrating ponies, things had not finished happening. The sheer massive amounts of magic that had been cast in the throne room of the old royal palace had not yet dissipated, in fact one could say that it was clumping together, being drawn to one point. Now then, what could happen to this giant influx of magic in the throne room? Well, if you’ve read the damn description you ought to fucking know where this is going, but for those of you, who can’t put two and two together, allow me to elaborate... It’s a fucking portal. Now, this portal is, at least partially, made up of Element of Harmony magic. As well as beating the baddies like their parents did, the EoH (you damn well know what that’s short for) magic is also all about redemption and second chances (or so I say it is) which means, naturally, that the magical influx is going to be directed towards those that deserve it most. Who do we know that has been unfairly ripped from their lives? That deserves a second chance? That’s right! Our British friends are coming to lil’ old Equestria. So, with the targets lock firmly in its magical crosshairs, the giant influx imploded inwards and created a portal to Equestria, dragging our favourite teens into a new world. ... What? Did you perhaps expect a detailed account as to how the portal was made, with gripping and entrancing imagery? The fuck do I look like to you? J.K. Rowling? Honestly, some people. Next time in The Amusing Misadventures of British Teens: Humans get transformed and sent to Equestria Bickering ensues and insults are cast about The narrator continues to be a dick Chapter 2: AwakeningChapter 2: Awakening The Equestria sun was hanging at high noon, spreading its warmth across the land of friendship and harmony. The sky, a beautiful shade of azure, was dotted with the occasional fluffy white cloud. Giving the sky an idyllic, natural look. Birds and other creatures of flight were taking advantage of the wonderful weather, flying around, hunting or playing games with one another. But all this was wasted upon our British friends...ungrateful gits. There they lay, unconscious, in centre of the old royal throne ro... The fuck happened here? You see, our friends were in the throne room, but not as the loveable humans we know them as, instead lying sprawled across the floor were several creatures, all of an Equestrian nature. One of the creatures was staring to awaken and boy was he a big one! He was a Minotaur, tall, muscular, brown fur, darker shaggy fur on his legs, hooves and a black mane. Basically, Iron Will that had gone down the shitter. “Ohh fuck! My head!” He grumbled as he raised his hand to rub his aching cranium. It was then that he noticed his hand, “What the fuck?” was the only thing he said as he studied the furry brown appendage, panic gripped him as he inspected the rest of his body. He then noticed his location, the centre of crumbling ruin, “It just gets better and better, doesn’t it” he moaned. He tried to stand but found that he was a bit top heavy; he looked up and noticed he had horns “Of fucking course” he muttered. After few failed attempts at standing up, he finally used a nearby wall to help steady him as he dragged himself over to a nearby window. What he saw didn’t help his mood; all around him was a giant forest, a thick impenetrable canopy of trees and plant life, out in the distance he could see the rooftops of a far off town and a glittering castle hanging off of a mountain in the distant horizon. Upon seeing this he simply smacked his head against the wall and said “Oh fuck me.” Why, I didn't know you swung that way. He was shaken out of his sexual desires by the sound of something moving about. As he looked around he realised that he wasn’t alone. There were in fact several other bodies strewn across the floor, but before he had time to inspect the others, his attention was drawn back to the moving figure. The creature that was making all the commotion was none other than a Griffon; he had a charcoal grey coat, white feathers with the tips coloured red and eyes of the same colour. “Ohhh, bollocks” the griffon moaned, that voice sounded familiar to the Minotaur but he couldn’t recall where... “Ah shit! My head!” the griffon exclaimed, his eyes clamped tight and a claw grasping his head in pain. Suddenly the Minotaur remembered where he’d heard that voice before. “Joel?” He questioned, his voice filled with relief at finding one of his friends, and shocked amusement at his current form. Upon hearing his name, Joel tensed up slightly and opened his eyes to look upon the Minotaur. Several emotions flickered across his eyes; shock, fear, amazement, puzzlement, but in the end he decided to adopt a more cautious look. “The fuck are you?” Joel asked, oh so delicately. “How the hell do you know me?” Once again displaying his finesse. Before the Minotaur could answer this, Joel had just noticed what his han- I mean claw looked like. “The fuck?” He turned and inspected the rest of his body, his charcoal grey coat, wings, and his white, red tipped feathers. He crossed his eyes and looked at his beak. “Well,” he said after a few seconds of silent wonder “that’s new.” Never would have guessed. “Ahem,” Joel snapped his attention to the Minotaur, who was standing there with a rather unamused look on his face. “Are done ogling yourself?” “Pfft, you’re just jealous of my incredibly sexy and beautiful body” Joel retorted, momentarily forgetting his caution towards the Minotaur. As he said this, he tried to stand up as a biped would, and promptly fell flat on his face. The Minotaur snickered “Yeah, I’m real jealous.” “Oh piss of!” a very annoyed Joel exclaimed, as he slowly pushed himself up to a sitting position. “I still don’t know who the fuck you are.” The Minotaur just rolled his eyes, raised his hands up, put a big smile on his face and said, “It’s me, Lee!” Heh, me, Lee. RHYMES! Joel’s face was inexpressive as he studied Lee. Starting first with his face and looking all over him before looking back at his face, which was still holding the same goofy expression. Joel continued to stare at his face for a few more seconds, as Lee began to feel a little uncomfortable with his excess staring. Then, Joel burst out with laughter. “HAHAHAHAHA! You look fucking ridiculous!” You seriously just said that? “Oh yeah? At least I don’t have a face that not even a mother could love!” “I don’t know why you’re so angry Lee; your face is a massive improvement since before” “At least I can fucking stand up properly!” “Yeah? Well, your face!” “What the fuck?! That doesn’t even make sense!” “Your face doesn’t make sense!” “Stop going on about my fucking face!” “How can I not? It’s fucking ridiculous!” But before Lee could come back with an insult, two very annoyed voices cut across them. “Oh my god, will you two SHUT! UP!?” Now, Joel and Lee had both seen small snippets and images from the show, so they both had a rough understanding as to what ponies looked like. But the two creature before them giving them death glares were a little unlike anything they had ever seen from their limited knowledge of MLP. The one standing to the left was what appeared to be an insect like pony, big, blue eyes with no pupils. Chitin covered him instead of fur and he had two fangs jutting out of his upper lip. Upon his back were what appeared to be insect like wings, with one or two holes in the wing membrane. He also had a small Mohawk of a mane growing out the back of his neck, with a small mottled tail accompanying it on his hindquarters. This, my friends, is what we call a changeling. DUN DUN DUUUN! Standing next to the changeling is what appeared to be a standard unicorn; with a charcoal grey coat, pitch black mane and tail. But what strikes this unicorn as odd are his other features; his eyes were a fierce orange and instead of round pupils, he had slits instead. He also had no cutie mark adorning his flank. Lastly, he also had a pair of fangs jutting out of his upper lip. “Honestly,” the creepy pony thing continued on, irritation clear in his voice “Not only did we die, get magically transported to wherever the hell we are, transformed into stuff from MLP and wake up with a headache that made us feel like we were on the business end of a morning star, but we also have to listen to you two arguing over your looks!” Always looking on the bright side are we? Bastard. “Wait a minute.” The changeling said, the reality of the situation crashing down upon him, he turned to look at the creepy unicorn guy, “We died” “Yep” “We got magically transported to here” “Correct” “And got transformed into stuff from MLP” “Just about covers it.” The changeling blinked once and replied “Ah...................WE’RE ALL DOOMED!” The changeling screeched at the top of its voice. Then, despite only having recently woke up and not having a chance to get used to its new body, the changeling started to run around in circles. Wondering just how the hell that works? Join the fucking club, biscuits are in the corner. “DOOOOOMED!” Lee and Joel just looked at the creepy pony guy, with rather bored expressions and said “Tom?” The creepy pony guy just nodded a smile upo- “DOOMED!” ...A smi- “DOOMED!” A- “DOOOOOOOOOOOOOMED!” ... Asmileuponhisface ... Seriously? Now you sto- “DOOOOOOOMED!” Oh for fucks sakes. “Oh for fucks sakes” Lee muttered under his breath. He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted “Oi! Tom! Calm the fuck down!” This seemed to work, as Tom was snapped out of his apocalyptic mindset and stopped running around and screaming. He wal-dammit, trotted up to the others, panting slightly from his recent excursions. Serves you right, daft sod. “Sorry...about...that...” Tom forced out, trying to get his breathing under control. When he finally reached his friends he promptly collapsed upon the floor, clearly still exhausted. Bro, do you even lift? A small silence elapsed; Lee and Joel were carefully studying the creepy pony’s body, whilst Tom caught his breath. “So,” Joel started, breaking the silence, “If that’s Tom then you are...?” he said leaving the sentence hanging, directing his inquiry towards the creepy pony that had remain still and silent ever since Tom’s little outburst. The pony took a moment, clearly considering the question. Whilst he was doing this, Tom had finished gathering his breath and had dragged himself over to Lee’s side. Damn Tom, I bet there are dead bodies with more stamina than you. After a couple more moments of deliberation, the pony spoke. “Now, I could tell you,” as he was speaking the pony raised his one of his forelegs, getting ready to move closer to the others, “But, that would be – umphf!” And as he tried to walk he decided to do a perfect re-enactment of Joel’s earlier acquaintance of face to floor. The pony stayed on the floor for a full five seconds before very slowly opening his eyes. He lowered his gaze down to the floor. As he glared at the floor, his eyes were filled with anger, rage, and cold fury. He slowly stood up, his death glare never leaving the ground. Then before anyone else could do or say anything, he started to jump up and down, smashing the stone beneath his hooves with as much force as he could muster. “FUCK YOU GRAVITY!” The pony bellowed angrily at the floor. “I SWEAR WHEN I GET MY-“ Whilst he was ranting and screaming obscenities at the harsh bitch that was gravity, Lee and Joel simply turned to look at Tom and said, “That’s Connor, isn’t it?” “-AND THEN I’M GOING TO BEAT YOU SO HARD THAT WHAT YOUR PARENTS DID WILL FEEL LIKE A FUCKING MASSAGE!” “Yep” Was Tom’s simple reply, they all turned to look at Connor who was continuing to pound away at the floor whilst shouting various threats towards it. “Why is he shouting at the floor?” Lee questioned, observing Connor’s actions in an equal measure of amusement and concern. “I think that gravity somehow wronged him.” Tom answered watching on with a rather neutral expression. Joel winced ever so slightly upon hearing this “I feel sorry for gravity now.” He said as Connor’s exclamations took on a more gory turn. “I’M GOING TO STRAP YOU DOWN, GET AN ICE CREAM SCOOP AND TAKE YOUR EY-“ “Do you think we should stop him?” Joel asked, torn between amusement and disgust. “I suppose it would be for the best” Tom sighed. “-THEN I’M GOING TO GET YOUR DICK AND A CHEESE GRATER AND I’M GOING T-“ “Connor.” They all called in unison. “I’LL GATHER UP THE SHAVINGS AND STUFF ‘EM DOWN YOUR THR-“ “Connor!” They tried again, this time louder. But it didn’t work as Connor couldn’t hear them over his insanity driven rage. “-AND THEN I’LL GET A POTATO PEELER AND RAM IT UP YOUR-“ “CONNOR!” This time it worked, Connor stopped shouting and froze in mid-bounce. I’m sorry, Physics isn’t available to take this call at the moment, please try again later. Connor turned his head to look at the others and asked, with an inquisitive look upon his face, “Yes?” They just stared at Connor and his blatant disregard for the laws of physics, their minds momentarily disabled. However it was Joel who was the first to snap out of his shocked state. He rubbed his eyes, to make sure that he wasn’t actually hallucinating. “How the fuck are you doing that?” He asked, once again showing off his fineness. “Doing what?” Then Connor looked down and saw that he was in the air about two feet above the ground. Then, as if a spell was broken, the moment Connor noticed his disregard for gravity, the mistress of mass herself enacted upon Connor the punishment of disobeying her law. Namely, by slamming him, face first, into the ground. “Ow” Was Connor’s only utterance, as his face and the ground had another friendly reunion. Lee, Joel and Tom were barely even containing their laug- no scratch that, they weren’t even bothering to contain it, they openly laughed at Connor’s misfortune. Connor just grumbled as he pushed himself up to a sitting position. Connor just kept an unamused expression upon his face whilst he waited for the others to finish laughing, or to inhale something, choke and die. Whichever came first. Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on who you ask, no one choked and died. The laughter simply died down after awhile. “Are you quite finished?” A rather annoyed Connor asked. Whilst there was the occasional giggle or laugh, it had for the most part finished. Connor put on his best serious face and decided to get things going .“So, first things first,” he started, looking at Lee and Joel, “Do you two know what you are?” They took a moment to ponder the question, Lee was the first one to speak up first. “I think so, I’m a Minotaur, right?” Connor nodded and replied “Yep, that’s right. How ‘bout you Joel? D’you know what you are?” Joel seemed to take longer answering than Lee, you could practically see him thinking. It’s rather funny actually, reminds me of someone who’s bad at Tetris. “I’m not sure, I want to say Hippogriff but I don’t think that’s right...” Harry Potter reference, typical. Bitch, you’re not Harry Potter, get over yourself. “Close,” Connor corrected. “A Hippogriff is half horse – half eagle. You’re a Griffon, half lion – half eagle.” He explained. Joel blinked as the realisation hit him, “Ah, that’s it, Griffon, knew it was something like that.” Clearly you didn’t, or you would have fucking said it. Moron. Now though, it was Joel’s and Lee’s turn to ask the questions. “So if we’re a Minotaur and a Griffon, then what fuck are you two?” Lee oh so nicely asked. Tom and Connor turned to look at each other for a second before looking back at Lee and Joel. “Well,” Tom started “I’m am changeling. They have a pony like appearance with insectoid features. They also feed on love.” Lee and Joel raised their eyebrows at the last part (Do griffons even have eyebrows? Eh, they do now) but didn’t make any comments. “But for Connor,” Tom continued, “We’re unsure of his species.” “What do you mean unsure of his species?” Joel asked. The fuck do you think he means? He doesn’t know what fucking species he is! Connor was the one to answer this time “Well, just look at my body, I have the body like that of a normal pony and I have a horn, that would make me a unicorn” he said indicating the body parts as he said them “But, I also have fangs and slits for pupils. Those are either found on Nightmare Moon, Queen Chrysalis or Bat Ponies.” Again indicating to his eyes and mouth as he continued to explain. “Seeing as I’m neither a changeling queen or an evil, twisted alicorn that would only leave bat ponies.” Connor had adopted a more monotonous voice that one would expect from a teacher, “But-“ Ohhh, there’s a ‘but’! The plot thickens! “-Bat ponies don’t have horns like I do, they have bat like wings, hence the name bat pony.” Connor took a pause, seemingly gaining his breath and gathering his thoughts. “So you see my predicament,” Connor continued, after a couple seconds of silence, “ I have no idea what species I am and there is no mention of anything like me in the show at all.” “What the fuck do you want us to do about it?” Lee asked, looking rather bored after Connor’s impromptu lecture. “I don’t know!” Connor said, annoyance creeping into his voice “Just sit down and think, it can’t be that hard!” What can’t be that hard? Trying to figure out your species, or asking them to think. Both are equally hard for them. And so they did just that. They all sat down and thought long and hard about just what Connor could be. Well, Connor and Tom did, Joel and Lee knew fuck all about the show so they just pretended to look like they were thinking. Whilst Joel and Lee just sat there looking pretty (and failing massively at it), Connor and Tom were deep in thought, pulling up every episode they had ever watched, fan art, fan fiction, conversations with other bronies, etc. It was a couple of minutes before someone came up with an answer. It was Connor who came upon a conclusion first, “No, surely not...” he muttered under his breath, “That was only in a fanfic...”. Nobody else had heard Connor’s comments and so remained in thought. But Connor was now staring at Lee intently, seemingly debating something in his head. It was another ten seconds before Lee noticed that Connor was staring at him so hard that metal probably would have snapped under his gaze.”Um Connor? Why are you staring at me?” Lee’s sudden interruption of the silence seemed to snap Tom and Joel out of their thoughts. However, it had no effect on Connor who just continued to stare at Lee. After a few more seconds he seemed to have made up his mind, “Only one way to find out.” (Fight!) He said to himself. The other were confused at this statement, Joel raised his eyebrow and asked “Connor what the fuck are you-“ But before he could finish his question, Connor launched himself at Lee and pinned him to a nearby wall. How he pinned a fucking Minotaur to a wall is beyond me, just bloody roll with it. Before Lee could shout or swear or do anything to retaliate, Connor bit down on Lee’s neck, sinking his fangs into Lee’s skin. Lee didn’t even feel Connor’s fangs enter his neck, the moment Connor’s fangs entered his body Lee felt himself go numb, his arms wouldn’t respond, his legs felt weak and he found he couldn’t move his head more than a few centimetres or say anything beyond incoherent mumbles. Tom and Joel just watched on in silent horror, frozen in place by pure shock. For Connor, however, he was having the time of his life. The blood he was drinking from Lee tasted magnificent to him. He did, unfortunately, realise that he had to stop soon or he would drain his friend to the point where he’d be too weak to survive. So, rather reluctantly, he removed his jaw from Lee’s neck. Well, that escalated quickly. When Connor released Lee’s neck, you could clearly see where his fangs had been. There were two holes which Connor noticed had sealed themselves up after he had removed his fangs. Other than the fact that the area around the puncture marks was red raw, Connor couldn’t notice any other lasting side effects. “Well,” he said as he turned to look at his other horror struck friends, “would you looky at that, I’m a Vampony.” [insert advert here to serve as a dramatic pause between shocking revelation and friend’s reaction] Lee could sense feeling to returning to his limbs, he shakily pushed himself off of the wall and gave the back of Connor’s head a glare full of pure, unbridled rage. “WHY THE FUCK DID YOU DO THAT?!” Lee bellowed as loud as he could. Which was pretty damn loud, if I do say so myself. Connor stiffened when he heard Lee’s ferocious shouts. He slowly turned around only to find Lee’s angry face gazing down at him with murderous intent. “Oh, dear” Friends and family, we are gathered here today to mourn the loss of our good friend Connor. Before Lee could do anything to stop him, Connor took off in the opposite direction, running as fast as he could. Lee gave chase, the floor thundering as his considerable mass hit the ground. Tom and Joel, no longer in their shocked looked at each other, then to Lee chasing Connor around the ruin, then back to each other. “Ten quid says Lee throws Connor out the window.” Joel said a smirk on his face. “Fifteen quid,” Tom countered “that Lee beats him to death.” “Deal” Joel agreed, holding out his claw to Tom. Tom, in turn, offered his hoof and they shook, closing the bet. Lovely lot aren’t they? Betting on each other’s demise. “CONNOR! GET OVER HERE!” “Why should I?!” “BECAUSE I’M GOING TO BREAK YOUR FUCKING LEGS!” “Not really a good reason to get me to stop!” Lee continued to chase Connor around the ruins of the castle, whilst Tom and Joel commentated on it as if they at a sporting event. “Hello world! It is a beautiful morning in Equestria and boy do we have a show for you today!” “That’s right Tom, we have two new competitors here today. We have Lee the Minotaur and Connor the Vampony.” “Well Joel, this is certainly shaping up to be a very interesting event as it appears that Lee is out for blood.” As Joel and Tom continued to natter on like the retarded idiots they are, Connor was starting to get tired of running whereas Lee looked like he could keep at it for hours. Connor saw only two options ahead of him; stop, catch his breath and then get beaten to death or keep running, eventually collapse from exhaustion and then get beaten to death. Decisions, decisions. “Wait a minute,” Connor said, as he realised something “I’m a fucking unicorn, I’ll just use magic.” A proud smile across his face for thinking of such a brilliant answer. The smile then slid off his face just as quickly as it had arrived as he realised something that made his plan about as useful as a bottle of Drench in a rainstorm. “How the fuck do I use magic?” Connor risked a glance back at Lee, he really wished he hadn’t. Lee was closer than he was a minute ago and he was gaining, fast. “Bollocks!” Connor shouted. “Alright Connor, think! Think! How the fuck does magic always work in fanfictions?” He said, speaking out loud in his panic. He did his best to recall as much as he could about how people had theorised magic worked. “Alright, just visualise the target and concentrate, better fucking work.” So he did just that, he visualised Lee stuck, trapped in a magical grip. As he did so he felt a small tingle in his horn and a tug on his brain. Keeping the image firmly locked in mind; Connor experimented with the tingle and found that he could direct it up and down his horn, a bit like a slidey whistle. However, Connor could still hear Lee’s thunderous hoofsteps behind him meaning that his little experimentation hadn’t worked. He pushed the magic (I mean what the fuck else could a tingly feeling a unicorn’s horn be?) all the way up to the top of his horn, but he didn’t stop it there; he kept pushing the magic until he felt it leave his horn. When Connor felt the magic leave him, he saw his horn light up a fierce orange, similar to his eyes. Lee had finally caught up to Connor and he raised his hand, a fist forming in it, ready to smash it down on Connor’s back. Just as he was about to bring down his fist, he found that he had stopped moving. He tried to move his arms, legs, anything but, alas, he was trapped in place. Lee looked down, to see if he could spot what was holding him back and discovered that his entire body had been encased in an orange glow. “HA! BITCHES! I HAVE MAGIC NOW! WHAT CHA GOIN’ DO ‘BOUT IT?!” Burn you at the stake. “Goddammit Connor! Let me go!” Lee shouted, once again his anger building up inside of him. “That depends, are you still going to kill me?” Lee looked like he was having a difficult mental debate, try and kill Connor or have the freedom to walk. On the one hand, if he managed to kill Connor, he would be celebrated eons from now as the one who saved them from a psychotic tyrant. On the other hand, he was rather fond of moving. In the end Lee just sighed heavily, “Fine, I won’t kill you. But if you try that shit again, I’ll punch you so hard I’ll send you to another reality.” “Well okay then.” And with that, he cut off his magic and Lee was rather unceremoniously dumped on the floor. Lee just grumbled under his breath as he got up and brushed himself off. Connor and Lee went back over to Tom and Joel, who were in the middle of a rather strange conversation. They walked in just as Tom had started to speak, “All right, my son: I could've had it away with this cracking Julie, my old China” To which Joel replied, “Are you telling pork-pies and a bag of trout? Because if you are feeling quigly, why not just have a J. Arthur?” “What, billy no mates?” “Too right, youth.” “Don't you remember the crimbo din-din we had with the grotty Scots bint?” “Oh, the one that was all sixes and sevens!” “Yeah, yeah, she was the trouble and strife of the Morris dancer what lived up the apples and pears!” “She was the barrister what become a bobby in a lorry and...” At this point they had descended into talking complete gibberish, their words coming out as an unintelligible slur. They continued on like this for a second or so before they both exclaimed “-tea kettle!” “And then, and then-” Tom started, giggling as he said it “She shat on a turtle!” The exclaimed together. I...I don...I don’t even know what to say to that. Connor and Lee were just standing there, mouths agape as their brains tried to process what they had just heard. It took a grand total of no time at all for Tom to notice them, he waved at them in a jovial manner and said, “Oh hello! Are you two done killing each other yet?” They shock their vigorously and looked at each other, silently agreeing to just forget what they had heard. They walked...trotted?...Goddammit! They went over to Tom and Joel and took a seat on the floor of the ruins. “Eh, we won’t be killing each other any time soon.” Was Connor’s reply to Tom. They all sat in silence for a few seconds, seemingly at a loss for something to say. It was, however, Lee that broke the silence first, “Is it me, or do any of you feel like we’ve forgotten something important?” They all turned to look at Lee as he said this, and then all adopted looks of thoughtfulness as they wondered if they had indeed forgotten anything. Joel was the first to realise what was missing, he brought his claw up to his face in the first of would be many facepalms...faceclaws? Fuck you Equestrian terminology! “I can’t believe it-“Joel muttered under his breath, he looked at his friends addressing them head on this time, “We forgot about Matty.” It seriously took you until now to figure that out? Idiots. Looks of realisation spread across the faces of Tom and Lee, whereas Connor just gave Joel a deadpan look and said, “I thought that we had forgotten something important.” The others all turned and gave Connor and unamused look, “I was kidding! I was kidding.” Connor sighed, his own unamused expression upon his face. Tom just rolled his eyes, well he felt himself roll his eyes but being a changeling and all makes those sorts of expressions rather invalid. “Come on, look around the room, he’s got to be here somewhere.” Tom said as he stood up and made his way over to a pile of rubble in the centre of the room. The others just murmured a quite acknowledgement to what Tom said as they spread themselves out across the room. Connor was the one to find Matty, he was sprawled out over near the doorway, it appeared he had hit his head on the doorframe somehow. “Guys!” Connor called out across the room, “I think I’ve found him!” The others quickly stopped looking around and huddled over to where Connor was. Matty’s form was...interesting to say the least. In front of Connor and the others was a pitch black Pegasus with a blood red mane and, like Connor, also lacking a mark (I refuse to say cutie mark). No, what was really strange about Matty’s appearance were his wings. They were completely skeletal. No skin, no muscle, no feathers, nothing. The only thing that was there were the bare white bones. They all stood there for a while, simply looking at Matty’s body or more specifically, his wings. “I swear,” Connor started, talking to no one in particular, “If he can fly with those wings, then I’ll walk up to Princess Celestia, wearing a frilly pink dress and declare my love to her in the form of on the spot poetry.” ...It is now my life’s goal to make Matty fly. “Why is he still unconscious?” Joel asked, “We all woke up at pretty much the same time.” I don’t know Joel; maybe he’s unconscious because he HIT HIS HEAD ON THE FUCKING DOOR! It was Lee who replied this time “I’m pretty sure he banged his head on the door.” He said. “Well what are we going to do? None of us know how to give medical attention.” Joel asked. “Actually...” Connor started, but was cut across by Tom who gave him a flat stare and said, “No Connor, amputation is not going to work here and the day I let you near a scalpel is the day I go to Narnia and have tea with a talking lion.” “Awww...” Was Connor’s disappointed response. “Does anyone have any ideas that aren’t lethal to Matty and everyone in a kilometre radius?” They all stood there, trying to come up with an idea about what they could do. After a minute Lee remembered what he had seen outside the window earlier on. “I think I saw a town off in the distance a while ago, before any of you were awake.” Tom and Connor simultaneously slapped their hooves on their faces, shocked at their own idiocy. “How could I have forgotten that Ponyville was on the edge of the Everfree?” Tom asked, wondering how he could have forgotten such a crucial piece of information. “Come on, if I remember correctly there’s a hospital in Ponyville. Matty can get help there.” Connor said, already heading towards the exit of the ruins. “Lee, you carry him.” “Why me?” “Because you’re the strongest out of all of us now, and I’d rather not test mine or Tom’s magic durability whilst carrying Matty through a monster infested forest” “Goddammit, fine.” Logic : 1 – Lee : 0 Once Matty was ‘securely’ slug over Lee’s shoulders, the group of friends headed out into the forest, the destination; Ponyville. I feel sorry for Ponyville already. Next time in; The Amusing Misadventures of British Teens: Forests and walking Tempers are sent skyrocketing Joel joins them shortly after Violence! Chapter 3: Walking, flying, fightingChapter 3: Walking, flying, fighting They trudged through the dense, green, canopy of the forest; flora and wildlife were abundant in each and every direction. The sunlight was sparse and the air was very hot, humid and full of pests. The ground beneath them was damp, spongy and littered with hazards like; roots, holes, loose soil, poisonous plants, poisonous predators. You know the usual. At first they had marched into the forest, full of gusto and energy. Their minds had been filled with wonder at their surroundings, their eyes greedily absorbing the foreign sights. That had been 3 hours ago. Now, they were all bored, bored of walking, bored of forest, bored of everything. Connor and Tom were discussing their magic and how to use it, Joel was trying to figure out how to use the muscles in his wings and Lee was testing his Minotaur strength by shattering trees to pieces with his fists. Matty was still deep in his unconscious slumber, blissfully unaware of his current situation. Lazy prick. “Right then Tom, do you have the image locked in your mind?” Connor asked, trying to teach Tom the telekinetic wonders of levitation as they made headway through the maze of trees and bushes. Connor was carrying a stick upon his back, which was the target of Tom’s spell. “Yeah, I think so.” Was Tom’s reply, as he gazed intently at the stick, as if the force of his stare would make the stick float. “Good, now you need to will the stick to move, imagine it being picked up by magic, visualise it.” Connor continued to explain, waving the stick around in his own magic before placing upon his back. Tom did so and he, as did Connor, began to feel a small tingling at the base of his horn. “You should, if changeling magic is the same as mine, feel a small tingling in your horn. You should also be able to move this feeling up and down it.” Connor lectured, clearly enjoying explaining this to Tom. “How d’you do that?” Tom asked, slight at a loss as to how to do it. “Erm, just imagine the feeling being moved around it. Imagine the tingling at some other point.” So Tom did just that, he imagined the tingle in the middle of his horn, he imagined what it would feel like for it to be there. Sure enough, the moment he did the feeling appeared at the middle of his horn, filling the path from the centre of his horn to the base with a similar tingly feeling. “Got it!” Tom said, proud of himself for succeeding. “Wonderful, now push it up until it’s at the very tip of your horn.” Tom did so and gave Connor a quick nod to show that he had done so, “Now, force it out of your horn, imagine it being pushed out, remember to keep the image in your mind whilst doing this.” “Yeah, yeah. I got it.” Tom said, dismissing Connor’s words as he concentrated. He pushed at the magic he could feel collecting at the tip of his horn. He felt the energy leave his horn, he could see his horn become engulfed in a toxic green aura and at the same time the stick resting upon Connor’s back also lit up green. “HA! Yes, I did it!” Tom exclaimed, ecstatic with his accomplishment. He made the stick float around them, occasionally making it twirl and rotate before eventually snapping it in half and chucking it deep into the foliage around them. Meanwhile, at the back of our group of miscreants, Joel was getting more and more frustrated. He had been trying for a large amount of time now to try and get his wings to work. He knew they were there, he could feel it when the wind blew upon them, or when a plant brushed against them. But he could not for the life of him figure out where they were or how to use his wing muscles. After seeing Tom accomplish magic, Joel’s frustration finally caused him to snap. “OH FOR FUCKS SAKE! HOW THE BLOODY HELL DO I USE THESE THINGS!” Joel shouted, glaring at his wings in contempt. At his sudden outburst, the others stopped and turned to look at Joel, matching expressions of curiosity upon their faces. “How the bloody hell do you use what, Joel?” Connor asked. “My fucking wings! I can’t bloody use them!” “You’ve only just got the bloody things idiot, how do you expect to use something you’ve never used before?” Connor said, rolling his eyes at his friend’s idiocy. “Fuck you Connor! Don’t bring logic into this!” Idiots! All my characters are idiots! I’m fucking surrounded by them! Instead of responding to Joel, Connor turned to Tom, a malicious grin spread across his face. “Tom, do you think we should give a Joel a...boost with our magic, so to speak.” It was Tom’s turn to grin viciously. They both turned to Joel, who backed up nervously as they approached him, their horns alight with magic. “So Joel, you wanted help flying?” Tom asked, his voice filled with mirth. “You know what? I think I’m over flying now, it’s overrated anyways.” Joel replied, backing up nervously. “Oh no Joel,” Connor continued, steadily approaching as Joel tried to put more distance between them, “We simply cannot allow you to never enjoy the ‘experiences’ of flight.” Joel was seriously considering turning tail and getting out of there as fast as his body would allow him. But before he could act upon these thoughts, he found himself surrounded by two magical auras. One was a fierce orange, the other a toxic green. Where they met, they melded to form a sort of brownish colour. He looked back up to Connor and Tom only to find that they were grinning at him, their face full of cruel amusement and their horns lit up with their respective colours. Well Joel, it was nice knowing you. See you in hell. “You should be excited Joel.” Connor said, “You’re going to be the first griffon to leave the ionosphere.” Tom just chuckled darkly, “Launching the Griffon MK.I in T minus five,” “Erm, guys? I really don’t think tha-“Joel started, fear creeping its way onto his face. “Four” Both Connor and Tom said, their horns glowing more brightly as they added more power to their spell. “Guys?” “Three” “Could you put me down?” “Two” Joel was really starting to panic now, futilely trying to tear his way out of their magical grasp. “Will you fucking let me go?!” “One” As they said this, they used magic to slowly make Joel’s wings open. Joel stopped trying to struggle as he turned his head in wonder at the feeling of flexing his new found muscles. “Huh.” Was Joel’s only utterance at new and marvellous experience. Simpleton. “Fire!” Connor and Tom shouted. At this Joel’s eyes shrunk to pinpricks, fear once again taking hold. “Ohnonononononono-” But his was cut off as Tom and Connor finally released their spell. In a glorious moment of momentum, screaming and adrenaline, Joel shot up into the sky at the speed of a Harrier Jet on steroids. “Come on now, break the sound barrier, break the sound barrier.” Connor said, as he watched Joel rocket further and further into the sky. “Erm, Connor?” Lee asked, also watching Joel’s trajectory to the ionosphere. “Yes?” “What are we going to do if Joel still doesn’t know how to use his wings?” “Well Lee, that’s a very good question. My guess is, that we are going to stand here and bicker and argue about how badly we’ve just cocked up, then try and think of a way to help him, realise that we don’t have enough time and just sit here and enjoy the show or do something incredibly stupid and injure ourselves in the process. Either way, Joel’s screwed.” Do you think I should intervene? ... Nah. Tom walk-dammit, trotted over to Connor and Lee, and joined them in staring at the increasingly small speck that was Joel. “I wonder how he’s handling it.” Meanwhile, from Joel’s perspective: “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” *** Connor, Tom and Lee waited for another minute before they could; thankfully, see Joel starting to descend again. Not so thankfully, they also noticed that Joel still hadn’t used his wings. “Well, the daft sod still hasn’t figured it out.” Connor sighed, shaking his, feigning disappointment. Tom and Lee just rolled their eyes, well Tom tried but you can never really tell with a changeling, as though Joel’s impending demise were an annoying chore to have to deal with. “I suppose we should catch him or something?” Tom inquired his voice a rather dull tone. “Ugh, fine” Connor replied. Lee just took a couple of steps back and leaned against a nearby tree, watching on with a blank expression. Connor and Tom looked up at Joel’s rapidly approaching figure and lit their horns up, ready to catch him. “Now remember Tom,” Connor started, glancing over at his friend, “Slowly stop his descent, we don’t want to break every bone in his body.” “Yeah, yeah, I know. Momentum and all that.” Tom said, dismissively. Connor and Tom focused their magic on Joel. Joel was about a hundred metres off of the ground when Connor and Tom’s magic formed around Joel, slowing his descent. At fifty metres, his speed had gone from a jet plane to an F1 car. At twenty five, he was going at the speed of your average roadster. At ten metres he was as fast as jumped up golf cart. In the last five metres Joel’s out of control descent had been whittled down to that of a piece of falling paper. Throughout this entire process, however. Joel had been screaming, loudly, like a little girl. Pfft, you bloody pansy. The moment that Joel touched the floor, however, he stopped his screaming. He cracked one eye open and, with a massive wave of relief, noticed that he was lying gently upon the ground, not a smouldering crater in it. Joel just slumped further into the ground, “Oh solid ground, let us never part again.” Joel didn’t have time to enjoy the sweet embrace of solids, as a whistle a couple of metres ahead of him snapped his attention to the group of impatient creatures whom were all looking at Joel expectantly. “Come on Joel!” Tom called out to him, “We don’t have time to wait whilst you muck about!” Joel just muttered several choice obscenities as he rose to his...feet? EQUESTRIAN! MOTHER FUCKING! TERMINOLOGY! I BLOODY HATE IT! They continued to trudge through the forest. Everyone was deep in the own thought. Tom was thinking about how much fun it was going to be once he got to Ponyville. Connor was already making plans on how he was going to manipulate each and every one of the mane six to further his own, non-existent ends. Joel was currently opening and closing his wings, as he had managed to remember how to use the muscles that controlled them. I suppose it must help not having the prospect of imminent death dangling right in front of you. Lee, on the other hand, was wondering why they hadn’t ventured across some other form of life aside from plants. “Guys?” Lee said, deciding to voice his curiosity. “Do any of you wonder why we haven’t run into anything yet?” Upon hearing what Lee had said, Connor and Tom froze in their tracks. They slowly turned their heads towards Lee, “You really had to say it didn’t you?” Connor said, clearly annoyed. “What d’you mean?” It was Tom this time that chose to answer, “This is a fucking cartoon world, cartoon logic applies here. What do you think is going to happen to us if you say we haven’t run into anything yet?” Lee just groaned and face palmed, “Don’t tell me we’re going to run into something.” The moment he said this, a deep, feline growling could be heard, emanating from a bush nearby. Everyone stopped and turned to look at the bush in question. Two glowing, cat-like eyes could be seen coming from it. No sooner had they noticed this, than did a fully grown manticore pounce out of the bush, aiming to take down Connor in one lethal pounce. Thankfully, years of growing up in English schools, being at the risk of attack at all times from friends or otherwise, had helped prepare Connor for this. He held his ground until the last moment possible and then, when the jaws of the manticore were almost right on top of him, he side-stepped out of the way. The manticore then, instead of getting a mouthful of juicy pony, got a mouthful of dirt as his teeth failed to clamp down upon its target. “Tom!” Connor called over to his friend, “Use your magic and help me take his legs out!” Instead of replying, Tom just lit his horn up with its green aura and grabbed two of the manticore’s legs, yanking them out from beneath it. Connor, in turn, did the same thing. Soon the manticore was on the floor, trying desperately to force its way out. “Lee!” Connor called over to his other friend, “Put Matty down and climb onto its back!” “Why?” Lee asked, genuinely confused. “Because holding this thing down is difficult and I want you to tear its fucking tail off!” Connor shouted back, the strain of holding the manticore down evident on his face. Lee just unceremoniously dropped Matty off his shoulder onto the floor and walked up to the manticore. Upon seeing this, the manticore struggled even harder in its bonds. “Hurry up Lee!” Tom shouted, his voice strained. Wasting no more time, Lee simply got as close to manticore as he could without being eaten and jumped with all his might. He landed right on the manticore’s back and he was fairly sure he heard something crack in the beast’s back. Which was proven to be true as the manticore let forth an immense cry of pain. Lee steadily approached the manticore’s thrashing tail, which was desperately trying to reach around its body to attack either Tom or Connor. After a couple of seconds of trying to grasp it, Lee finally secured the tail in his hands. “Now fucking rip it off!” Connor shouted over at Lee, “I can feel my grip slipping!” Lee got the tail in a firmer grip, it’s struggling useless against his immense Minotaur strength, and started to pull as hard as he could. The manticore responded by roaring even more loudly and increasing its thrashing movements. Lee just pulled even harder. A few moments later a horrible tearing sound could be heard and a deep red blood started to spurt out of the base of the tail, where the rip had appeared. With a final great heave and another roar of pain from the manticore, Lee completely tore the tail from the body. Without any further prompting from Connor or Tom, Lee jumped off the back of manticore and went over to its head. There he jabbed the tail, stinger first, into its eye. At this, the beast opened its mouth to, once again, roar in pain. But Lee didn’t let it, because before the manticore could even utter a single sound, Lee had rammed the stinger into the back of the manticore’s throat, before finally discarding the stinger and chucking it off deep into the surrounding forest. The manticore’s throat started to swell in size and before long, it started making chocking noises. Sensing that it was safe to do so, Connor and Tom, gratefully, released their grip on the manticore’s limbs. Realising that its limbs were free, the manticore proceeded to claw at its throat and roll around on the ground, futilely trying to get air into its lungs. It continued to thrash around the immediate area for about two minutes, in which time Lee had placed Matty back on his shoulder and Connor and Tom and recovered from the small conflict, when it finally came to a stop and the last shuddering breath escaped its mouth. After a few moments Joel poked his head from around a tree, which he had been hiding behind throughout the battle, and asked “Is it dead?” “Probably.” Connor replied, “But I’m not taking any chances.” Connor looked around him trying to find something, when his gazed landed upon a rather large rock. Picking this up in his magic he raised it over the manticore’s head and brought it down with as much force as he could muster. A resounding crack echoed into the surrounding forest, blood started to pour from a large wound to its head and bone could be seen poking through the thin layer of skin around the skull. Again and again Connor drove the rock into its skull until it had completely caved in and the brain was nothing more than a small puddle of grey matter. “Well,” Tom said, after a moments silence, “I think it’s dead now.” You know what Tom? I never would have guessed. “Come on,” Connor said, leaving the rock to rest in the manticore’s decimated skull, “Let’s get going.” * * * After what seemed like hours more trekking, our dynamic group of morons finally made it to the edge of the forest. Once they got to very edge, all they could see for miles around were even spaced apple trees. “Sweet Apple Acres?” Tom wondered aloud. Staring in awe at the sheer amount of trees there. “Must be.” Connor said, his gaze had adopted a more cold, calculating look. He turned and look at the Sun, which was about half way to being completely set. “I think we should rest here for tonight.” He said, looking back at his friends, “We can talk to Applejack tomorrow.” “Who the hell’s Applejack?” Joel asked. “The pony that helps run this place.” Tom said, not taking his gaze from the orchards of apples. “Oh,” Joel replied, “Then yeah, resting here for a while seems okay.” He continued. It was at that time, however, that Joel’s stomach made a very loud rumbling sound. “Although, having something to eat sounds equally good.” He added. It was then that the other realised how hungry they all were, as they has not eaten since before they had woken up in the castle. “Right then,” Connor said, taking charge for some reason, “Tom, you go and get some apples from the orchards whilst we set up a fire or something.” “Wait.” Tom said, finally tearing his gaze from the apple trees, “Why do I have to go?” “Because,” Connor rebuked, “Changelings are supposed to be all sneaky and shit, so get out there and get us some food.” And before Tom could protest, Connor used his magic to pick him and throw him bodily into a nearby orchard. Tom pushed himself back onto his hooves, after landing as gracefully as a dead elephant, and shouted back to Connor, “Oi! You bloody prick! You can’t keep abusin’ your magic like that!” To which Connor shouted back “You just fucking watch me abuse it!” But before Tom could reply, Connor had retreated into the trees, presumable to set up a fire. Tom just sighed heavily and trotted up to the nearest tree. After a moment regarding it, Tom just shrugged and used his magic to start pulling apples down from the branches. Tom continued like this for a couple of minutes, but, unbeknownst to him, a small filly named Applebloom who had a yellow coat and a red mane and bow was watching him, her eyes full of fear and apprehension. “There’s a monster stealin’ our apples! Ah gotta get help!” Applebloom thought to herself, not daring to speak for fear of alerting the monster to her presence. She slowly started to back up, trying to sneak away from the monster. But just as she thought she was a safe distance away, she trod on a twig, which made a large, dry, snapping sound. Both Tom and Applebloom froze upon hearing this. Tom slowly turned his head, bringing his big, blue, orb-like eyes to look upon the filly, who was now shaking with fear. A moment of silence elapsed between the two, before Tom finally spoke but one word. “Bollocks.” And then Applebloom screamed. [End of part 1] Interlude, Notices and other fun stuff!NOTE: This isn't actually a chapter, just in case you thought it was. This is just a way for me to get a couple of ideas and important notices across. Heyho everyone! Welcome one and all to British Brony's first ever INTERLUDE CHAPTER! Now you may be sitting their thinking,"Whoa, whoa British, slow down. What's an interlude chapter?" Well, if you are indeed asking this then I suggest that you just stop reading this story, I'm about to start using big boy words. Now then, I shall probably do these little interlude chapters when my ideas for this story start spilling over into my other pony related thought patterns. I mean, do you have any idea what it's like to be me when I'm storying? Let me give you a hint, imagine, if you will, one big fucking universe, wherein I'm trying to create a cross-over of about 20 individual T.V. programmes, books or other fanfics with conflicting plots, storylines, characters and personalities. Then, try spending an unhealthy amount of time trying to get all to work together. That is the hell of just ONE part of my mind. Quite honestly, I'm suprised that I haven't yet gone insane....oh, wait. Moving swiftly on, I believe that I ought to give a proper reason as to why chapter 3 was released over 2 weeks too late. One of the reasons is actually related to the paragraph above. Have you ever tried to write about one thing whilst having ideas for about six others floating around your head? It makes it fucking difficult to concentrate. Another reason, I procrastinate. A lot. Seriously, I have procrastinated my own free time by staying behind at school and doing coursework. That is the level of procrastination I'm at. I suppose that the biggest fault is that I was the fucking genius that thought writing a story with weekly updates during his GCSE year would be a good idea. Anyway, I will try to stick to my weekly update schedule. But I can't promise that I'll keep to it successfully. Right, enough of all these whiney ass excuses. Time to get on to the other stuff. I already wrote something about this in the comment section but from the utter lack of response, from anyone, I shall write it here so that you have to acknowledge it and so that future readers can also keep 'in the know'. I am handing some aspects of the story over to you lot! The readers! Seeing as this would be a pretty shitty story if I didn't include some sort of character/relationship development. So I am letting you lot how you want relationships between other characters to go. Do you want Lee and Cadance to become Poker buddies? Do you want Joel and Applejack to exchange scathing and bitter insults and remarks? Or do you want Connor and Discord to hold a trolling competition? Also, after giving much thought, I will try and get some romantic relationships going. But ONLY if enough of you readers demand it. I have absolutely no idea how good I am at writing romance, and quite frankly, I don't really want to find out. But then again, I'm not in control of this any more, you have complete and utter control over how certain relationships go. Word of warning though, if I do get enough requests to romance then NO homosexual relationships. Connor, Matty, Tom, Lee and Joel would quite literally beat the absolute shit out of me. Also, Connor has already had words with me about who he wants to get romanced with, should I ever start to write romance. Lastly, as we get near the end of season three I will have to take control of the relationships again. I have already planned out a different story branch for each of our loveable teens, and certain story lines require certain relationships. But other than that. COMPLETE CONTROL! Oh sweet dear lord. What fresh hell have I introduced upon myself? Oh yes, one last thing. This story is on hold until the beginning of my Christmas holidays, exams and coursework mean that I'm having trouble keeping on top of everything. After that I should be regularly updating again until about May-June time when my actual GCSE's begin. But once they're out of the way, whoo boy! I'm going to have all the spare time I need to finish this damn story. Anyway, I'm pretty sure that I was going to include something else here, but I've forgotten. So, for the love of whatever you hold dear, if you have an idea or a question FUCKING POST IT! I quite literally wait with bated breath for someone to comment on something they like about the story or want to change. Until next time then, Tatty bye! Chapter 4: IntroductionsChapter 4: Introductions Applejack had been having a usual day at the farm. She woke up at the usual time of 6:30. She went to her mirror and did her hair and donned her hat, as usual. She had her usual breakfast with her family, like she usually did. She went out into the usual apple orchard and she got down to doing her usual work. She took her usual short break at noon, had her usual lunch and then got around to her usual afternoon schedule. She worked all through the afternoon doing her usual rounds about the orchards. You know, the usual. As she bucked the last tree for the day and was rewarded with the sound of apples thudding into the baskets grouped around the tree, she looked at the rest of the trees in the orchard and was pleased to see that there were baskets full of apples underneath all of them. Giving a satisfied nod at her...hoofiwork? She decided to call it a day and started to load up a nearby cart with the apples that were littered about the place. As she had finished loading up the last of the apple baskets, she stopped to take a look at the sky, hued red and gold as the sun inched further and further down the horizon. As she stood there, illuminated in the fiery ashes of a dying day, she basked in the serenity of it all. Revelling in the peacefulness of the moment. Of the deep feeling of satisfaction that came with a day’s hard work. Applejack to her hat off of her head and held it against her chest, truly taking in the beauty of the scene before her. Never before had she ever felt so at peace, so at – “AAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” Applejack’s moment of tranquillity was shattered by the shrill scream of her little sister. Applejack just sighed heavily and placed her hat back on her head, “Ah’m comin’, ah’m comin’” she said, in a rather bored tone as she got up and headed off in the direction of the scream. “Ah swear,” Applejack muttered under her breath, “If this is ‘nother snake or somethin’ then ah’m goin’ ta have some serious words with ‘er.” * * * Tom was panicking slightly now. He had a screaming filly that wouldn’t shut up whom had probably alerted the entire farm to his presence. With little else left to do he tried to calm the little filly. “Nonononononono, don’t scream , I’m not going to hurt you.” He said putting on what he hoped was a gentle, reassuring smile. But all Applebloom saw was his fangs and a creature that wanted to eat her, which in turn made her scream even louder. Tom winced at this and started to plead with her. “Please be quite!” Still she screamed. “Pretty please?” She still didn’t stop. “I’ll get you some sweets. Ice cream? Cupcakes?” She kept screaming, as if she hadn’t even heard him. “I’ll be your friend.” At this she appeared to scream even louder. “Oh come on! What d’you want from me?” “Ah want ya to step away from mah sister!” Another, older voice called out. Applebloom stopped screaming and both she and Tom turned to see Applejack running towards them, twirling her rope that always seems to spontaneously appear whenever she needs it. “Of course, it had to be her.” Tom sighed as Applebloom quickly ran away from Tom towards her sister. “Look, this isn’t what it looks like!” Tom tried to argue, but Applejack wasn’t listening instead she (somehow) formed her rope into a lasso and without a seconds hesitation she threw it at Tom. Tom only just managed to jump out of the way of the rope, but Applejack had used the time Tom spent dodging the rope to close the gap between them. Tom had less than a second to look surprised before Applejack tackled him to the ground. Tom’s new chitinous armour helped to absorb most of the impact, for which he was grateful. But despite this he was still left a little winded. Whilst Tom was still trying to recover his breath Applejack magically procured a new length of rope like she always seems to do and tied his legs together, despite his struggles and protests. “You can’t just go and tackle and tie up random people willy nilly! That’s assault! Assault I say! I want a lawyer! I know my rights!” Tom said, struggling with his bonds. But Applejack wasn’t paying him any attention. Instead she went over to Applebloom checking to see if she was alright. “Applebloom! Are ya alrigh’? Did tha’ creature hurt ya?” Applejack asked, worry in her voice. Applebloom shook her head, “Nah, it didn’t get close enough fer that.” “Oh thank Celestia fer that.” Applejack said as she pulled her sister into a hug. They held the embrace for a couple of seconds but they finally broke it off and turned to look at the still struggling Tom, whom was now muttering darkly under his breath. “What d’ya reckon it is Applejack?” Applebloom asked, her pervious fear overridden by her curiosity. Applejack just shook her head as she looked at Tom harder. “Ah don’t rightly know. But ah reckon it migh’ be dangerous what with those fangs n’all, so stay away from it Applebloom.” “It? It?! I’ll have you know that I take offence at being called an ‘it’” Tom said, clearly annoyed. But Applejack continued on as if he hadn’t said anything. “I think ah’ll go an’ get the girls. Maybe Twiligh’ or Fluttershy know what it is an’ how ta deal with it.” “Again with the ’it’, I have feelings you know!” But again Tom’s outburst went unnoticed as another pony approached them. This pony was a large stallion that had an apple red coat and a straw coloured mane. He looked between Applejack, Applebloom and Tom a few times before he finally stopped on Applejack, his eyebrow raised in a silent question. “Big Mac, ah’m glad I caugh’ ya. D’ya mind look over this here creature while ah go get the girls?” “Creature! Why I – you know what, I give up. Please continue to talk as if I’m not even here and can’t hear everything you’re saying.” Big Mac just raised his eyebrow further at Tom’s outburst and turned to look at Applejack. “Ah reckon ah can keep an eye on it.” Tom just fumed silently, knowing that any comment he made would be ignored. “Thank you Big Mac. Applebloom, go back to tha house an’ help Granny Smith with dinner.” Applebloom looked a little unhappy at being dismissed but she didn’t argue back and started to make her way back to the house. “Ah’ll be back in a while Big Mac. You sure ya’ll be fine?” “Eeyup” Was Big Mac’s trademark reply. Applejack just nodded and headed off at a brisk trot. Tom had stopped trying to escape the rope and was now looking up at the sky with a bored expression. He and Big Mac spent a couple of minutes in silence, before Tom decided to break it in the only way he knew. “I know a song that will get on your nerves, get on your nerves, get on your nerves!” Meanwhile, at the edge of the Everfree Forest Connor, Lee and Joel had seen the entire thing unfold and were now watching Big Mac clutch his ears to his head whilst Tom appeared to be singing something. The continued to watch this for a few more seconds before Joel spoke up. “D’you think we ought to go and help?” “Nah.” Connor replied, “I think we should wait for a bit. I think Applejack went to go and get the other Elements. Might as well wait and address them all at once.” “Sure, whatever.” Was Joel’s reply. They all took a seat on the edge of the forest and waited for Applejack and the others to get back. Twenty minutes later “So Applejack, let’s go over this again. You found a ‘creepy, fanged insect monster pony’ stealing apples from your trees and your sister was screaming at it?” Twilight asked as she and the other girls made their way across the orchards to where Big Mac and were. Twilight had brought as many books on obscure creatures as she could. Pinkie Pie had just bounced around and said something about a party. Fluttershy had said little other than agreeing to go, but she had an expression of curiosity on her face. Rarity and Rainbow Dash were...eh fuck it, I can’t be bothered to describe them. Just imagine them arguing or something. “Tha’s what ah said Twi, then ah went and tussled it up. Last ah saw of it, Big Mac was lookin’ after it.” Applejack told Twilight. Twilight immediately levitated one of her books and quickly flipped through it. “Are you sure Applejack?” Twilight asked, sceptical “There’s nothing in my books about an insect like pony.” “Are ya callin’ me a lair?” Applejack asked, her voice taking a more hard quality. “Oh no, no, no. Nothing of the sort. I’m just saying it’s rather hard to believe.” Twilight said hastily. “Well ya better believe it. Tied the thing up with mah own hooves.” “Oh, I hope you didn’t hurt it.” Fluttershy said, concern in her voice. “Ah’m sure it’s fine. It was sti-“ But Applejack was interrupted by Pinkie Pie before she could finish. “Hey,” Pinkie Pie said as she all but shoved Applejack out of the way. “Can anypony else hear singing?” They all stopped talking for a moment and true to Pinkie’s word they could hear the faint sounds of someone singing. “Come on girls,” Twilight said, taking charge, “Let’s go and see what this is all about.” Without wasting any more time they sped up their leisurely trot and soon enough they were close enough to hear Tom's dreadful caterwauling. “What is that been sung?” Rarity asked, scrunching her muzzle at the sound. “I know a song that’ll get on your nerves, get on your nerves, get on your nerves!” Raising their eyebrows at each other they finally reached the area where Big Mac and Tom were. What they saw there was Big Mac lying on the ground with his hooves pressing his ears into his skull and a jolly Tom singing the same few lines over and over again. However, when Tom finally noticed the six other ponies in front of him he stopped his singing and addressed them. “Oh, hello there. You there, purple and unicorny. I would like to make an official complaint as to how I have been treated upon my arrival to Ponyville. I have screamed at, lassoed at, tackled and insulted. Quite frankly I find this behaviour to be rather appalling. I mean, being called and ‘it’ and a ‘creature’ is rather a hurtful thing to say to someone. And I’m a male, for future reference.” As soon as Tom had stopped singing and started talking, Big Mac had gotten up and all but galloped away from the annoying changeling. Twilight blinked a couple of times as she processed what had just been said. “Erm...I’m sorry, what?” She asked, a little unsure as how to respond. “Additionally,” Tom said, continuing on, “I’m fairly sure that being tackled to the ground and tied up is classified as assault and as such I would like to talk to a government official.” Twilight blinked again, a bit taken aback by what Tom said. “He...erm , he actually has a point Applejack. What you did was technically assault." “What!?” Applejack exclaimed, outraged. “The only reason I tackled ‘im in tha first place was because he was attackin’ mah sister!” “Attacking you sister?” Tom scoffed, “I did no such thing, she simply looked at me and started screaming, I never even touched her. If you don’t believe me then ask her yourself, or check her body for that matter. If I had attacked her there would have been signs of it.” Applejack sat down as she took a second to comprehend what had been said, “You-you aren’t going to turn me in. Y’know, for the tacklin’ and whatnot? Are ya?” Tom appeared to consider it for a moment before he replied, “That depends.” He said giving her an even stare, “How much longer are you going to keep me tied up like this?” But just as Applejack moved to untie Tom another voice cut across to them. “Oh but Tom, where would be the fun in that?” Everyone turned to see three more newcomers approaching them. There was a pony who had a pair of feline eyes and fangs. There was a Griffon with a charcoal grey coat and red eyes. Lastly there was a brown Minotaur with what appeared to be an unconscious pony over his shoulder. The pony, whom appeared to have been the one whom had spoken, walked towards the group of mares as the other two stayed a bit behind. “Greetings ladies.” The pony said, offering them a small bow, “Allow me to introduce myself. I am Connor. I see you have already met my friend, Tom. The Griffon behind me is called Joel,” “Sup” Joel said casually, offering a nod of his head. “The big Minotaur is called Lee.” “Hey” Lee said, raising his hand in greeting. “And the unconscious pony on his shoulder is called Matty.” Matty said and did fuck all to greet them, owing to the fact he was still unconscious. “And whom,” Connor said, a small smile on his face causing his fangs to be shown, “Do I have the pleasure of making the acquaintance of?” For a couple of awkward moments none of the Elements said anything. Instead simply staring at Connor a mixture of shock and apprehension. But eventually, Twilight blinked a couple of times and hesitantly approached Connor. “Hello there,” She started a bit of apprehension in her voice, “My name’s Twilight Sparkle” Connor’s smile only widened at this, causing his fangs to become more prominent. “Good evening Miss Sparkle, it’s wonderful to make your acquaintance.” Connor said, offering Twilight his hoof. Twilight looks at his hoof, uncertainty written all over her face. Connor just chuckled, “Come now Miss Sparkle, I don’t bite.” “Like hell you don’t” Lee muttered under his breath. Joel just rolled his at Connor’s more ‘posh’ than usual approach to the situation, “Bloody hell Connor, you’re laying it on a bit thick, aren’t ya?” Connor let his hoof drop before he turned around to address Joel. “Well excuse me for wanting to make a good impression. What, pray tell, are you doing to help this situation?” “What situation?” “The situation in which we don’t come off as complete idiots or freaks.” “I think we failed at the when we were born.” “Way to inspire confidence moron.” “Who are you callin’ a moron? I’m not the one who decided that Tom, the most unsubtle person out of all of us, ought to go and sneak around in an orchard.” “I didn’t see you coming up with any better ideas.” “That’s because there are no better ideas. This whole situation is fucking stupid.” “So? It’s not like I’ve ever given you any reason to doubt my plans,” “You threw me into the fucking atmosphere!” “Because you were bitiching about not knowing how to fly!” “That doesn’t mean you should throw me and hope I figure it out before I hit the ground!” “Hey! I still caught you! I saved your fucking life!” “You were the one that put my bloody life in danger!” All whilst Connor and Joel had been arguing, Twilight had slipped back over to the girls and was now watching the argument begin in earnest. “Does this usually happen?” She asked a still tied up Tom. “Pretty often. Believe it or not, but this is a more tame argument. Just you wait until the personal insults start to fly.” Twilight gave Tom a rather shocked look, “How can you guys even call each other friends?” “Maybe I’ll tell you,” Tom said, annoyance creeping into his voice, “If you get me out of these fucking ropes.” Twilight winced at Tom’s vulgarity but used her magic to untie him nonetheless. “You don’t have to be so rude about it.” “You try being tied up for about thirty minutes on uncomfortable ground and let’s see how you’re feeling.” Tom said as he sat up, rubbing his forelegs where the rope had been. "Sooo, what exactly are ya?" Rainbow asked, scanning Tom curiously, "Never seen or heard about anything like ya." "I think Connor's plan was to explain all of this as a group" Tom said, turning his attention back to the argument between Connor and Joel, "Although I think that plan's fucked itself sideways and got thrown out a window." "My word! Is there really any need to be so vulgar?" Rarity asked, to which Tom replied in a heavily accented 'posh' voice, "Oh my! I am so sorry my dear! Would you find it more pleasing if I were to cease my obnoxious and obviously displeasing linguistical patterns?", wearing a mocking smile as he spoke. Rarity just huffed as Pinkie and Rainbow laughed at Tom's display. "Erm, guys?", Twilight's voice cut across causing them to look and see that Twilight, Fluttershy and Applejack had been watching Joel's and Connor's argument which had now heated to the point where they were shouting in each others faces. "Should we intervene?" Twilight asked worriedly. They all quickly turned their attention back to the argument as the shouts started to get even louder. "I'D SAY THAT I'D SHOVE YOUR COCK DOWN YOUR THROAT BUT YOU COULDN'T CHOKE A FLY WITH THAT ONE INCH-WARRIOR!" Connor bellowed at Joel. “AT LEAST MY HAIR DOESN’T LOOK LIKE IT WAS DRAGGED THROUGH A FUCKING CHIPPY DURING THE FUCKING LUNCH RUSH!” “OH LOOK AT JOEL, SLIDING ON IN THERE WITH A BIT OF ASIAN PERSUASION!” “COME ON THEN, LET’S GO RIGHT NOW YA FUCKING CUNT!” Joel and Connor tensed up getting ready to lunge at each other. Connor used his magic to tear off a nearby tree branch whilst Joel flared his wings, preparing to launch himself. They glared daggers at one another for several seconds before a small smirk broke across Connor’s face. Despite wanting to remain mad at Connor, Joel also couldn’t help but smirk slightly too. Soon they were both chuckling at each other before bursting into outright laughter, both of them leaning against each other, gasping for air. Twilight and the other girls just stood there dumbfounded as they watched two creatures that were about ready to atomise each other laughing with one another as though nothing had happened. Whilst Joel and Connor rendered their sides shredded, Tom just “rolled” his eyes and made his way over to them and Lee, who was watching the other two with an amused look. After a few seconds the laughing died down and Connor and Joel just had smiles plastered on their faces, along with Tom and Lee. If one were to look at the group as they were now, one could say that they were enjoying a blissful moment, happy in each others company. Then Connor grabbed Joel’s head in his magic and slammed his face into the ground. “You fucking bastard.” Joel muttered with a facefull of dirt whilst the other laughed at him as he picked himself up. “Right then, with that out of the way I suppose I should tell you where we’re here.” Connor said, in a cheerful tone, smiling at the slightly confused mares before him. “Hang on a second,” Twilight interrupted him, a hoof raised to stop any retort, “How can any of you call yourselves friends? All you do is pick on and laugh at each other.” The guys all shared a look with one another before returning their attention to the mare, “Your point?” asked Lee, eyebrow raised. “My point is that friends don’t do that! Friends are supposed to help each other out and compassionate and caring towards one another.” Twilight said, sharing a warm look with her friends. The guys once again looked at each other...before erupting in laughter. Even Matty, who was still unconscious, snickered in his sleep a little. The girls glared at them, annoyed that they took what was now their most valued belief so jokingly. “What, pray tell, do you find so funny?” Rarity huffed, clearly unamused. “”It’s just-hehe- it’s just that,” Joel stuttered slightly, still racked with the occasional giggle, “It’s just that you managed say that with a straight fucking face, that sounds like something you’d hear on a shitey show for seven year old girls.” “Why I never!” Rarity exclaimed, glaring at the guys who were once again chuckling to themselves. “While I would love to debate the ins and outs of friendship with you, that’s not the reason we came here.” Connor stated, as he gestured with his hoof to the slumbering Matty, “We were trekking through that forest over there and we were attacked by a Manticore.” The girls gasped at this, there previous annoyance replaced by begrudging respect, wondering how a dysfunction group of freaks could deal with a monster that bested most of them only a day before. “Matty was thrown in the fight and he struck his head. We had noticed the roofs of a village a bit earlier on and decided to look there for medical help.” Before any of them could do anything there was a small blur of yellow as Fluttershy zipped up to Matty, inspecting the now scabbed over gash on his head which was mostly obscured by his mane. “Oh my, this looks really bad.” Fluttershy gasped as she mithered over Matty. She looked up to Lee who had recovered from the shock of having a bundle of drop-dead adorableness launch itself at him at breakneck speeds. “Follow me, we need to get him to my cottage so I can take care of him.” Lee looked up at the others for some sort of confirmation, but the most he got was a few shrugs. He just sighed, “Lead the way.”, gesturing loosely with his hand and lumbering after Fluttershy as she took of hurriedly. The others stood there awkwardly for a moment or two, none really meeting each others gaze. “Well then,” Connor coughed, breaking the silence, “We’ve done what we came here to do,” he gestured to Tom and Joel to follow him, “Shall we?”. They turned around and started to head back to the forest. ‘Come on, come on,’ Connor thought to himself, ‘Take the bait, take it.’ “Hey!” Rainbow’s voice called out, the guys stopped and Connor quickly had to hide a big grin as he turned to face them, “Victory!” he cheered in his head. “Where do you think you’re going?” Rainbow asked, eyeing them with curiosity. “Well, since we’ve gotten Matty some medical attention, we were going to go back to our small campsite back in the forest.” Connor explained, trying his ha...hoof at manipulating to get what he wanted. “You can’t go in there!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed, “There’s lots and lots of dangerous animals and if you go in there you might get attacked by one and then if you get attacked by one you might not be able to attend my ‘Welcome-to-Ponyville’ party and then there’ll be nopony to enjoy the cake and if there isn’t any cake then everypony will be sad and if everypony's sad then that means I’m not doing my job properly and if I’m not doing my job properly then there’s nopony to make everypony smile and if nopony smiles then Ponyville won't be a fun place to live in and nopony wants to live in a place with no fun because then everypony would be all grumpy and boring and there’d be no fun and no parties and no cake!” Pinkie spoke in a way that could only be described as words being fired out of a mingun, before she took a deep breath and threw herself to the ground, “WHY IS THERE NO CAKE!?”, she wailed with despair. It took the others a couple of seconds to get over the mental whiplash of following what Pinkie had said before Joel spoke up again, building upon Connor’s earlier points, “Well, what should we do? We don’t have any money for a room and I’m not about to go around begging for some.” The moment Joel had finished speaking Pinkie had shot right back onto her hooves and started chucking words out again, “Well that’s easy silly. Matty can stay with Fluttershy seeing as she’s looking after him. Lee can stay with Applejack since she’s got the barn and that’s about the only place that’ll hold him. Connor can stay with Twilight because I think Connor’s the kind of stallion that likes to read and study, Joel can go with Rarity because I’m Pinkie Pie and I’m going to keep Tom!” As soon as she had finished that last part she teleported over to Tom and enveloped him in a tight hug before zipping off into the distance with him, already spouting party plans and personal questions. Once again it took a moment for the other to catch up with what Pinkie had said, but once they had Joel and Rarity started eyeing each other warily, neither one happy about the situation presented to them. “I suppose I can accommodate you, so long as you keep the cursing down to a bare minimum.” Rarity said at last, giving Joel a nasty look. “I can try, but if I hurt myself I might end up swearing.” He admitted, returning Rarity’s stare. She just huffed and turned around before trotting off, “It’s a start, I suppose, follow me.” Joel said his goodbyes to Connor before going off after Rarity, muttering about his luck under his breath. Twilight and Connor just sat there for a moment, neither sure how to proceed. “So...Twilight was it?” Connor pretended to be ignorant of their names so as not to arouse suspicion. Connor’s voice jolted Twilight out of the small zone-out she’d been in and turned her attention to him, “You don’t mind taking me in, do you? It would be a big help.” “I suppose I can house you, we do have some spare room in the library. You’d have to sleep in a sleeping bag for a couple of days though, until we can get a proper bed for you.” She replied, she too a bit wary of her new guest. “Take all the time you need Twilight, I’d hate to be too much of a burden. Shall we head off? I do believe it’ll be dark soon.” Twilight turned to look at the sun and saw that there was only a very small amount still above the horizon. She nodded her agreement, “Yeah, let’s go. I’d best introduce you to Spike, my assistant. Then perhaps get you something to eat, you look like you haven’t eaten anything for a while.” And in accordance to very clichéd and terribly overused circumstance, Connor’s stomach let out a growl. “Heh, I can testify to that.” He laughed, as they too set off across the orchard towards Ponyville. “Ah suppose tha’ I’d better ‘ead off to ‘Shy’s house an’ tell tha’ Lee fella’ he’s kippin’ over ‘ere for a while.” Applejack said as she started to make her way to Fluttershy’s house. Soon, everything in orchard was how it should be, except for one thing. “Erm, guys?!” Rainbow called out, nothing but the sound of nature replying, “What about me!?” Again, nothing. Rainbow scowled, annoyed that she’d been forgotten so easily, and took flight before heading back to her cloudhouse, muttering angrily to herself as she went.
Chapter 1: An Eventful Walk HomeChapter 1: An Eventful Walk Home It was your average November day, cold, windy; the sun was out, the winter air giving its light a sharp appearance. The cloud cover, enough of it to look gloomy, yet not enough to block out the sun’s icy rays. Overall, a bloody miserable day. It is upon this bloody miserable day where our story begins, in your standard school courtyard. The benches unoccupied, cold and unforgiving. Cars parked outside the foyer, engines still, silent. The entire scene could be considered serene, quiet, peacef- BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP! -ul. The school bell, loud, high-pitched and ear splitting tore through the silence of the courtyard as it signalled the end of yet another gruelling school day, that the students were free of their teacher’s cruel tyranny of algebraic equations and language analysis. Students were starting to pour out of the various exits situated around the courtyard, some waited in the courtyard giving their friends a chance to catch a lift or to talk with someone on the way home. Others were by themselves listening to their MP3s or in groups of two or three, chatting animatedly about their plans for the weekend as they walked out the school gates. Let us turn our attention to the exit closest to the foyer, ‘twas a simple doorway, blue and a handle on the left-hand door. This door had faced many challenges in its lifetime; wind, rain, snow and hail, over enthusiastic students and the idiots who used it as an improvised weapon in fights. It is through this doorway of trials and triumphs where our first character will walk through in... Three... Two... One... ... Well, it seems that he’s a lit-Ah! Here he is. Allow me to introduce Matty as he is called by everyone who knows him. He’s a rather tall chap; short ginger hair gelled ever so slightly to give it a spiky appearance, ice blue eyes and a clean shaven face. Matty squinted against the sudden burst of sunlight assaulting his sight, as he made his way into the courtyard. A brief look around confirmed that he was the first of his friends to reach the courtyard. So he walked over to the usual spot that he waited in, turned his MP3 on and plugged his headphones in. He was half way through Opeth’s “Drapery Falls” when our next two characters decided to show up. One of them was Lee; a rather small guy, blonde-brown hair roughly four inches long and light blue eyes. Also, with a clean shaven face. Next to him was Tom, taller than Lee yet smaller than Matty. He has medium length brown hair and brown eyes. Yet again, he was clean shaven. Matty, however was a little too absorbed in his song and failed to notice Tom and Lee approach him. Tom, noticing that Matty hadn’t seen them, felt a smile tug at his face and decided to take full advantage of the situation. Tom nudged Lee and made tip toeing motions at Matty, catching on Lee felt a similar grin spread across his face. And thus, they began to sneak. They managed to get all the way around Matty without him noticing and were now standing directly behind him. Tom raised his hand, first three fingers erect, and started to count down. The first finger fell, Matty was still painfully oblivious to what was about to happen. The second finger was retracted, Lee and Tom tensed, ready for the act. The final finger was brought down. Both Lee and Tom leapt forwards, clamped down their hands on Matty’s shoulders, one to each side, and shouted at the top of their adolescent lungs. “BANG!” The reaction was just as desired. Matty jumped almost a mile off the ground. When he returned to the lithosphere he turned around to look at Tom and Lee, who could hardly breathe for laughter, and shouted at them... “Jesus Christ! You bastards don’t do that!” A smile on his face despite what they had just done. “Haha! Oh God, your face was hilarious” Tom replied, trying (and failing) to get his laughter under control. “Oh piss off” Was Matty’s only reply as he punched Tom across the arm. But before Tom had a chance to retaliate another voice cut across their conversation. “Hey, what’s going on?” This voice belonged to none other than our fourth character, Joel. He was roughly the same size as Lee, with short black hair, glasses and green eyes. The beginnings of a moustache upon his lips. He was often called Harry Potter by other because he was a lookalike to the wizard that we all know and love, a rather poor lookalike mind you but a lookalike nonetheless. “Nothing, nothing happened” Matty said, failing rather epically at concealing the truth. “We scared him and he absolutely shit himself.” Lee choked out through his chuckles. “I did not shit myself!” Matty exclaimed, his voice laced with exasperation. But, alas, it was too late for Matty as Joel was now laughing alongside Lee and Tom. After a few more seconds of joy at Matty’s humiliation they managed to get their laughter under control. After a few moments of awkward silence Joel decided to break it by asking a question, a very important question, a question of such thought, such philosophy that it may never be answered... “Why the fuck are we still standing here?” They all turned and looked at each other, all seemingly in deep thought at such an intelligent and philosophical question. It was, however, Tom that answered this bombshell of dilemma. “I thought we were waiting for Connor.” “Oh yeah, so we were.” Replied Matty. And so they waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. And waited. And wa-You know what? No, fuck it, they’re done waiting. “Fuck it, I’m done waiting!” Joel exclaimed. He turned around, ready to take the long walk home, his stride full of- OH SWEET DEAR LORD! Standing directly in front of Joel, his face inches from Joel’s face, was Connor. He had short blonde-brown hair, light blue eyes and more facial hair than someone his age should have and his face was twisted into a bemused smile. Naturally, having someone that everyone else considered crazy no more than an inch in front of you face is going to, most likely, scare you shitless, and so it did. “ARRGGGHHH!” Joel, for want of a better word, screamed like a little girl and backpedalled so fast that he tripped and fell over. Matty, Tom and Lee promptly burst into uproarious laughter. “Hello Joel” Connor said his voice both unamused and yet full of mirth at the same time, “Did you have a nice trip?” “For fuck’s sakes Connor!” A very irate Joel exclaimed, “Will you stop fucking sneaking up on me?!” “Awww, but Joel, where would be the fun in that?” Connor asked, still wearing the same bemused expression. “I swear, you’re going to give me a bloody heart attack one of these days.” Joel muttered as he stood back up and brushed himself off. Connor just laughed at this and moved to stand next to Matty. “So” Connor started after everyone else had finished laughing themselves silly, “Shall we be off?” “Yep” Was Tom’s simple reply. And so, they were off. They talked as they walked and walked as they talked. Many topics were brought up; Games, politics, random stories from their lives, their jobs. The list goes on and on. But eventually they came across a topic that Lee, Joel and Matty had hoped they wouldn’t, My Little Pony. “I can’t wait for Season four, how about you Connor?” Connor just rolled his eyes and said “You clearly can wait, else what have you been doing for a year?” “Oh shut up” Tom rebuked, “You know what I mean.” Connor just sighed “Yes Tom, I know what you mean and yes, I’m excited” he replied, putting emphasis on the ‘excited’. It was now Tom’s turn to roll his eyes as they started to converse about what they wanted to see in Season four. As the others suffered in silence, a bit further down the road a bus was trundling along at a steady pace. The bus driver, an elderly man with grey hair, was humming a happy tune to himself as he approached a decline, he went to apply the brakes to keep the bus from picking up too much speed and found them to be unresponsive. “Oh, dear.” He muttered under his breath. He searched frantically for a place to pull over but found only terrace housing on either side of the bus. Regardless he tried frantically to turn onto the pavement but found that the bus was unresponsive to his attempts to steer it. He summed up his entirely gloomy and doomful situation in one word. “Bollocks.” Matty, Tom, Joel, Lee and Connor were now engrossed in an argument about whether bronies were, in fact, creepy and weird. With Tom and Connor arguing for the ‘Not’ side, things were looking bleak for the brony collective. As the bus began to pick up speed Lee started to get a feeling of unease in his gut, but he simply brushed it off as something he had at lunch. As the bus picked up even more speed, it began to veer to towards our group of oblivious friends. Lee’s feeling of unease increased even more and he felt that this time he should listen to it. “Um guys? I think something’s wrong.” You don’t say. Connor turned and arched an eyebrow at Lee’s comment “Such as?” he inquired. “I don’t know.” Lee replied a little bit exasperated, “I just feel like something’s off.” Connor just scoffed, “Pfft, come on Lee we’re in an empty street what could possib-“ And that’s when they all noticed the bus flying towards them, the driver frantically gesturing for them to move. Yet they could not, they were like deer in the headlights, frozen with either shock or fear. Despite it all, despite their impending demise Lee turned and gave Connor a deadpan look and said “Told you s-“ CRASH! *** Meanwhile, in Equestria “NNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” Nightmare Moon’s scream of defeat pierced the serene night as a ribbon of pure magical rainbow friendship energy thingy tore the evil and corrupt visage of Nightmare Moon from existence. Banishing with it the threat of night-time eternal. As the light reached its brightest point and the screams of Nightmare Moon started to decline six mares, the elements of Harmony, the closest friends could be, Equestria’s first and last line of defence, were knocked unconscious by the sheer amount of energy from the blast that they had created in order to defeat Nightmare Moon. An undisclosed amount of time passed, let’s say twenty minutes, before they started to show the first signs of consciousness, the first one to properly awaken was a cyan Pegasus with rainbow mane, let’s call her Rainbow Dash, you know for shits and giggles. The next to awaken were the pink and orange earth ponies, let’s call them Pinkie Pie and Applejack. Applejack spoke up “Is everypony okay?” in a very southern accent. She got various nods and murmurs of afferma- Hang on, you know what? Fuck this; I’m not retelling this scene. If you want to know what happens then go to YouTube, lazy sods. Anyway, everyone’s alright, Luna’s back, Celestia and her are sisters (shock horror), everyone celebrates, whoop-de-fucking-do break out the booze, etc. But, unbeknownst to the celebrating ponies, things had not finished happening. The sheer massive amounts of magic that had been cast in the throne room of the old royal palace had not yet dissipated, in fact one could say that it was clumping together, being drawn to one point. Now then, what could happen to this giant influx of magic in the throne room? Well, if you’ve read the damn description you ought to fucking know where this is going, but for those of you, who can’t put two and two together, allow me to elaborate... It’s a fucking portal. Now, this portal is, at least partially, made up of Element of Harmony magic. As well as beating the baddies like their parents did, the EoH (you damn well know what that’s short for) magic is also all about redemption and second chances (or so I say it is) which means, naturally, that the magical influx is going to be directed towards those that deserve it most. Who do we know that has been unfairly ripped from their lives? That deserves a second chance? That’s right! Our British friends are coming to lil’ old Equestria. So, with the targets lock firmly in its magical crosshairs, the giant influx imploded inwards and created a portal to Equestria, dragging our favourite teens into a new world. ... What? Did you perhaps expect a detailed account as to how the portal was made, with gripping and entrancing imagery? The fuck do I look like to you? J.K. Rowling? Honestly, some people. Next time in The Amusing Misadventures of British Teens: Humans get transformed and sent to Equestria Bickering ensues and insults are cast about The narrator continues to be a dick
Chapter 2: AwakeningChapter 2: Awakening The Equestria sun was hanging at high noon, spreading its warmth across the land of friendship and harmony. The sky, a beautiful shade of azure, was dotted with the occasional fluffy white cloud. Giving the sky an idyllic, natural look. Birds and other creatures of flight were taking advantage of the wonderful weather, flying around, hunting or playing games with one another. But all this was wasted upon our British friends...ungrateful gits. There they lay, unconscious, in centre of the old royal throne ro... The fuck happened here? You see, our friends were in the throne room, but not as the loveable humans we know them as, instead lying sprawled across the floor were several creatures, all of an Equestrian nature. One of the creatures was staring to awaken and boy was he a big one! He was a Minotaur, tall, muscular, brown fur, darker shaggy fur on his legs, hooves and a black mane. Basically, Iron Will that had gone down the shitter. “Ohh fuck! My head!” He grumbled as he raised his hand to rub his aching cranium. It was then that he noticed his hand, “What the fuck?” was the only thing he said as he studied the furry brown appendage, panic gripped him as he inspected the rest of his body. He then noticed his location, the centre of crumbling ruin, “It just gets better and better, doesn’t it” he moaned. He tried to stand but found that he was a bit top heavy; he looked up and noticed he had horns “Of fucking course” he muttered. After few failed attempts at standing up, he finally used a nearby wall to help steady him as he dragged himself over to a nearby window. What he saw didn’t help his mood; all around him was a giant forest, a thick impenetrable canopy of trees and plant life, out in the distance he could see the rooftops of a far off town and a glittering castle hanging off of a mountain in the distant horizon. Upon seeing this he simply smacked his head against the wall and said “Oh fuck me.” Why, I didn't know you swung that way. He was shaken out of his sexual desires by the sound of something moving about. As he looked around he realised that he wasn’t alone. There were in fact several other bodies strewn across the floor, but before he had time to inspect the others, his attention was drawn back to the moving figure. The creature that was making all the commotion was none other than a Griffon; he had a charcoal grey coat, white feathers with the tips coloured red and eyes of the same colour. “Ohhh, bollocks” the griffon moaned, that voice sounded familiar to the Minotaur but he couldn’t recall where... “Ah shit! My head!” the griffon exclaimed, his eyes clamped tight and a claw grasping his head in pain. Suddenly the Minotaur remembered where he’d heard that voice before. “Joel?” He questioned, his voice filled with relief at finding one of his friends, and shocked amusement at his current form. Upon hearing his name, Joel tensed up slightly and opened his eyes to look upon the Minotaur. Several emotions flickered across his eyes; shock, fear, amazement, puzzlement, but in the end he decided to adopt a more cautious look. “The fuck are you?” Joel asked, oh so delicately. “How the hell do you know me?” Once again displaying his finesse. Before the Minotaur could answer this, Joel had just noticed what his han- I mean claw looked like. “The fuck?” He turned and inspected the rest of his body, his charcoal grey coat, wings, and his white, red tipped feathers. He crossed his eyes and looked at his beak. “Well,” he said after a few seconds of silent wonder “that’s new.” Never would have guessed. “Ahem,” Joel snapped his attention to the Minotaur, who was standing there with a rather unamused look on his face. “Are done ogling yourself?” “Pfft, you’re just jealous of my incredibly sexy and beautiful body” Joel retorted, momentarily forgetting his caution towards the Minotaur. As he said this, he tried to stand up as a biped would, and promptly fell flat on his face. The Minotaur snickered “Yeah, I’m real jealous.” “Oh piss of!” a very annoyed Joel exclaimed, as he slowly pushed himself up to a sitting position. “I still don’t know who the fuck you are.” The Minotaur just rolled his eyes, raised his hands up, put a big smile on his face and said, “It’s me, Lee!” Heh, me, Lee. RHYMES! Joel’s face was inexpressive as he studied Lee. Starting first with his face and looking all over him before looking back at his face, which was still holding the same goofy expression. Joel continued to stare at his face for a few more seconds, as Lee began to feel a little uncomfortable with his excess staring. Then, Joel burst out with laughter. “HAHAHAHAHA! You look fucking ridiculous!” You seriously just said that? “Oh yeah? At least I don’t have a face that not even a mother could love!” “I don’t know why you’re so angry Lee; your face is a massive improvement since before” “At least I can fucking stand up properly!” “Yeah? Well, your face!” “What the fuck?! That doesn’t even make sense!” “Your face doesn’t make sense!” “Stop going on about my fucking face!” “How can I not? It’s fucking ridiculous!” But before Lee could come back with an insult, two very annoyed voices cut across them. “Oh my god, will you two SHUT! UP!?” Now, Joel and Lee had both seen small snippets and images from the show, so they both had a rough understanding as to what ponies looked like. But the two creature before them giving them death glares were a little unlike anything they had ever seen from their limited knowledge of MLP. The one standing to the left was what appeared to be an insect like pony, big, blue eyes with no pupils. Chitin covered him instead of fur and he had two fangs jutting out of his upper lip. Upon his back were what appeared to be insect like wings, with one or two holes in the wing membrane. He also had a small Mohawk of a mane growing out the back of his neck, with a small mottled tail accompanying it on his hindquarters. This, my friends, is what we call a changeling. DUN DUN DUUUN! Standing next to the changeling is what appeared to be a standard unicorn; with a charcoal grey coat, pitch black mane and tail. But what strikes this unicorn as odd are his other features; his eyes were a fierce orange and instead of round pupils, he had slits instead. He also had no cutie mark adorning his flank. Lastly, he also had a pair of fangs jutting out of his upper lip. “Honestly,” the creepy pony thing continued on, irritation clear in his voice “Not only did we die, get magically transported to wherever the hell we are, transformed into stuff from MLP and wake up with a headache that made us feel like we were on the business end of a morning star, but we also have to listen to you two arguing over your looks!” Always looking on the bright side are we? Bastard. “Wait a minute.” The changeling said, the reality of the situation crashing down upon him, he turned to look at the creepy unicorn guy, “We died” “Yep” “We got magically transported to here” “Correct” “And got transformed into stuff from MLP” “Just about covers it.” The changeling blinked once and replied “Ah...................WE’RE ALL DOOMED!” The changeling screeched at the top of its voice. Then, despite only having recently woke up and not having a chance to get used to its new body, the changeling started to run around in circles. Wondering just how the hell that works? Join the fucking club, biscuits are in the corner. “DOOOOOMED!” Lee and Joel just looked at the creepy pony guy, with rather bored expressions and said “Tom?” The creepy pony guy just nodded a smile upo- “DOOMED!” ...A smi- “DOOMED!” A- “DOOOOOOOOOOOOOMED!” ... Asmileuponhisface ... Seriously? Now you sto- “DOOOOOOOMED!” Oh for fucks sakes. “Oh for fucks sakes” Lee muttered under his breath. He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted “Oi! Tom! Calm the fuck down!” This seemed to work, as Tom was snapped out of his apocalyptic mindset and stopped running around and screaming. He wal-dammit, trotted up to the others, panting slightly from his recent excursions. Serves you right, daft sod. “Sorry...about...that...” Tom forced out, trying to get his breathing under control. When he finally reached his friends he promptly collapsed upon the floor, clearly still exhausted. Bro, do you even lift? A small silence elapsed; Lee and Joel were carefully studying the creepy pony’s body, whilst Tom caught his breath. “So,” Joel started, breaking the silence, “If that’s Tom then you are...?” he said leaving the sentence hanging, directing his inquiry towards the creepy pony that had remain still and silent ever since Tom’s little outburst. The pony took a moment, clearly considering the question. Whilst he was doing this, Tom had finished gathering his breath and had dragged himself over to Lee’s side. Damn Tom, I bet there are dead bodies with more stamina than you. After a couple more moments of deliberation, the pony spoke. “Now, I could tell you,” as he was speaking the pony raised his one of his forelegs, getting ready to move closer to the others, “But, that would be – umphf!” And as he tried to walk he decided to do a perfect re-enactment of Joel’s earlier acquaintance of face to floor. The pony stayed on the floor for a full five seconds before very slowly opening his eyes. He lowered his gaze down to the floor. As he glared at the floor, his eyes were filled with anger, rage, and cold fury. He slowly stood up, his death glare never leaving the ground. Then before anyone else could do or say anything, he started to jump up and down, smashing the stone beneath his hooves with as much force as he could muster. “FUCK YOU GRAVITY!” The pony bellowed angrily at the floor. “I SWEAR WHEN I GET MY-“ Whilst he was ranting and screaming obscenities at the harsh bitch that was gravity, Lee and Joel simply turned to look at Tom and said, “That’s Connor, isn’t it?” “-AND THEN I’M GOING TO BEAT YOU SO HARD THAT WHAT YOUR PARENTS DID WILL FEEL LIKE A FUCKING MASSAGE!” “Yep” Was Tom’s simple reply, they all turned to look at Connor who was continuing to pound away at the floor whilst shouting various threats towards it. “Why is he shouting at the floor?” Lee questioned, observing Connor’s actions in an equal measure of amusement and concern. “I think that gravity somehow wronged him.” Tom answered watching on with a rather neutral expression. Joel winced ever so slightly upon hearing this “I feel sorry for gravity now.” He said as Connor’s exclamations took on a more gory turn. “I’M GOING TO STRAP YOU DOWN, GET AN ICE CREAM SCOOP AND TAKE YOUR EY-“ “Do you think we should stop him?” Joel asked, torn between amusement and disgust. “I suppose it would be for the best” Tom sighed. “-THEN I’M GOING TO GET YOUR DICK AND A CHEESE GRATER AND I’M GOING T-“ “Connor.” They all called in unison. “I’LL GATHER UP THE SHAVINGS AND STUFF ‘EM DOWN YOUR THR-“ “Connor!” They tried again, this time louder. But it didn’t work as Connor couldn’t hear them over his insanity driven rage. “-AND THEN I’LL GET A POTATO PEELER AND RAM IT UP YOUR-“ “CONNOR!” This time it worked, Connor stopped shouting and froze in mid-bounce. I’m sorry, Physics isn’t available to take this call at the moment, please try again later. Connor turned his head to look at the others and asked, with an inquisitive look upon his face, “Yes?” They just stared at Connor and his blatant disregard for the laws of physics, their minds momentarily disabled. However it was Joel who was the first to snap out of his shocked state. He rubbed his eyes, to make sure that he wasn’t actually hallucinating. “How the fuck are you doing that?” He asked, once again showing off his fineness. “Doing what?” Then Connor looked down and saw that he was in the air about two feet above the ground. Then, as if a spell was broken, the moment Connor noticed his disregard for gravity, the mistress of mass herself enacted upon Connor the punishment of disobeying her law. Namely, by slamming him, face first, into the ground. “Ow” Was Connor’s only utterance, as his face and the ground had another friendly reunion. Lee, Joel and Tom were barely even containing their laug- no scratch that, they weren’t even bothering to contain it, they openly laughed at Connor’s misfortune. Connor just grumbled as he pushed himself up to a sitting position. Connor just kept an unamused expression upon his face whilst he waited for the others to finish laughing, or to inhale something, choke and die. Whichever came first. Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on who you ask, no one choked and died. The laughter simply died down after awhile. “Are you quite finished?” A rather annoyed Connor asked. Whilst there was the occasional giggle or laugh, it had for the most part finished. Connor put on his best serious face and decided to get things going .“So, first things first,” he started, looking at Lee and Joel, “Do you two know what you are?” They took a moment to ponder the question, Lee was the first one to speak up first. “I think so, I’m a Minotaur, right?” Connor nodded and replied “Yep, that’s right. How ‘bout you Joel? D’you know what you are?” Joel seemed to take longer answering than Lee, you could practically see him thinking. It’s rather funny actually, reminds me of someone who’s bad at Tetris. “I’m not sure, I want to say Hippogriff but I don’t think that’s right...” Harry Potter reference, typical. Bitch, you’re not Harry Potter, get over yourself. “Close,” Connor corrected. “A Hippogriff is half horse – half eagle. You’re a Griffon, half lion – half eagle.” He explained. Joel blinked as the realisation hit him, “Ah, that’s it, Griffon, knew it was something like that.” Clearly you didn’t, or you would have fucking said it. Moron. Now though, it was Joel’s and Lee’s turn to ask the questions. “So if we’re a Minotaur and a Griffon, then what fuck are you two?” Lee oh so nicely asked. Tom and Connor turned to look at each other for a second before looking back at Lee and Joel. “Well,” Tom started “I’m am changeling. They have a pony like appearance with insectoid features. They also feed on love.” Lee and Joel raised their eyebrows at the last part (Do griffons even have eyebrows? Eh, they do now) but didn’t make any comments. “But for Connor,” Tom continued, “We’re unsure of his species.” “What do you mean unsure of his species?” Joel asked. The fuck do you think he means? He doesn’t know what fucking species he is! Connor was the one to answer this time “Well, just look at my body, I have the body like that of a normal pony and I have a horn, that would make me a unicorn” he said indicating the body parts as he said them “But, I also have fangs and slits for pupils. Those are either found on Nightmare Moon, Queen Chrysalis or Bat Ponies.” Again indicating to his eyes and mouth as he continued to explain. “Seeing as I’m neither a changeling queen or an evil, twisted alicorn that would only leave bat ponies.” Connor had adopted a more monotonous voice that one would expect from a teacher, “But-“ Ohhh, there’s a ‘but’! The plot thickens! “-Bat ponies don’t have horns like I do, they have bat like wings, hence the name bat pony.” Connor took a pause, seemingly gaining his breath and gathering his thoughts. “So you see my predicament,” Connor continued, after a couple seconds of silence, “ I have no idea what species I am and there is no mention of anything like me in the show at all.” “What the fuck do you want us to do about it?” Lee asked, looking rather bored after Connor’s impromptu lecture. “I don’t know!” Connor said, annoyance creeping into his voice “Just sit down and think, it can’t be that hard!” What can’t be that hard? Trying to figure out your species, or asking them to think. Both are equally hard for them. And so they did just that. They all sat down and thought long and hard about just what Connor could be. Well, Connor and Tom did, Joel and Lee knew fuck all about the show so they just pretended to look like they were thinking. Whilst Joel and Lee just sat there looking pretty (and failing massively at it), Connor and Tom were deep in thought, pulling up every episode they had ever watched, fan art, fan fiction, conversations with other bronies, etc. It was a couple of minutes before someone came up with an answer. It was Connor who came upon a conclusion first, “No, surely not...” he muttered under his breath, “That was only in a fanfic...”. Nobody else had heard Connor’s comments and so remained in thought. But Connor was now staring at Lee intently, seemingly debating something in his head. It was another ten seconds before Lee noticed that Connor was staring at him so hard that metal probably would have snapped under his gaze.”Um Connor? Why are you staring at me?” Lee’s sudden interruption of the silence seemed to snap Tom and Joel out of their thoughts. However, it had no effect on Connor who just continued to stare at Lee. After a few more seconds he seemed to have made up his mind, “Only one way to find out.” (Fight!) He said to himself. The other were confused at this statement, Joel raised his eyebrow and asked “Connor what the fuck are you-“ But before he could finish his question, Connor launched himself at Lee and pinned him to a nearby wall. How he pinned a fucking Minotaur to a wall is beyond me, just bloody roll with it. Before Lee could shout or swear or do anything to retaliate, Connor bit down on Lee’s neck, sinking his fangs into Lee’s skin. Lee didn’t even feel Connor’s fangs enter his neck, the moment Connor’s fangs entered his body Lee felt himself go numb, his arms wouldn’t respond, his legs felt weak and he found he couldn’t move his head more than a few centimetres or say anything beyond incoherent mumbles. Tom and Joel just watched on in silent horror, frozen in place by pure shock. For Connor, however, he was having the time of his life. The blood he was drinking from Lee tasted magnificent to him. He did, unfortunately, realise that he had to stop soon or he would drain his friend to the point where he’d be too weak to survive. So, rather reluctantly, he removed his jaw from Lee’s neck. Well, that escalated quickly. When Connor released Lee’s neck, you could clearly see where his fangs had been. There were two holes which Connor noticed had sealed themselves up after he had removed his fangs. Other than the fact that the area around the puncture marks was red raw, Connor couldn’t notice any other lasting side effects. “Well,” he said as he turned to look at his other horror struck friends, “would you looky at that, I’m a Vampony.” [insert advert here to serve as a dramatic pause between shocking revelation and friend’s reaction] Lee could sense feeling to returning to his limbs, he shakily pushed himself off of the wall and gave the back of Connor’s head a glare full of pure, unbridled rage. “WHY THE FUCK DID YOU DO THAT?!” Lee bellowed as loud as he could. Which was pretty damn loud, if I do say so myself. Connor stiffened when he heard Lee’s ferocious shouts. He slowly turned around only to find Lee’s angry face gazing down at him with murderous intent. “Oh, dear” Friends and family, we are gathered here today to mourn the loss of our good friend Connor. Before Lee could do anything to stop him, Connor took off in the opposite direction, running as fast as he could. Lee gave chase, the floor thundering as his considerable mass hit the ground. Tom and Joel, no longer in their shocked looked at each other, then to Lee chasing Connor around the ruin, then back to each other. “Ten quid says Lee throws Connor out the window.” Joel said a smirk on his face. “Fifteen quid,” Tom countered “that Lee beats him to death.” “Deal” Joel agreed, holding out his claw to Tom. Tom, in turn, offered his hoof and they shook, closing the bet. Lovely lot aren’t they? Betting on each other’s demise. “CONNOR! GET OVER HERE!” “Why should I?!” “BECAUSE I’M GOING TO BREAK YOUR FUCKING LEGS!” “Not really a good reason to get me to stop!” Lee continued to chase Connor around the ruins of the castle, whilst Tom and Joel commentated on it as if they at a sporting event. “Hello world! It is a beautiful morning in Equestria and boy do we have a show for you today!” “That’s right Tom, we have two new competitors here today. We have Lee the Minotaur and Connor the Vampony.” “Well Joel, this is certainly shaping up to be a very interesting event as it appears that Lee is out for blood.” As Joel and Tom continued to natter on like the retarded idiots they are, Connor was starting to get tired of running whereas Lee looked like he could keep at it for hours. Connor saw only two options ahead of him; stop, catch his breath and then get beaten to death or keep running, eventually collapse from exhaustion and then get beaten to death. Decisions, decisions. “Wait a minute,” Connor said, as he realised something “I’m a fucking unicorn, I’ll just use magic.” A proud smile across his face for thinking of such a brilliant answer. The smile then slid off his face just as quickly as it had arrived as he realised something that made his plan about as useful as a bottle of Drench in a rainstorm. “How the fuck do I use magic?” Connor risked a glance back at Lee, he really wished he hadn’t. Lee was closer than he was a minute ago and he was gaining, fast. “Bollocks!” Connor shouted. “Alright Connor, think! Think! How the fuck does magic always work in fanfictions?” He said, speaking out loud in his panic. He did his best to recall as much as he could about how people had theorised magic worked. “Alright, just visualise the target and concentrate, better fucking work.” So he did just that, he visualised Lee stuck, trapped in a magical grip. As he did so he felt a small tingle in his horn and a tug on his brain. Keeping the image firmly locked in mind; Connor experimented with the tingle and found that he could direct it up and down his horn, a bit like a slidey whistle. However, Connor could still hear Lee’s thunderous hoofsteps behind him meaning that his little experimentation hadn’t worked. He pushed the magic (I mean what the fuck else could a tingly feeling a unicorn’s horn be?) all the way up to the top of his horn, but he didn’t stop it there; he kept pushing the magic until he felt it leave his horn. When Connor felt the magic leave him, he saw his horn light up a fierce orange, similar to his eyes. Lee had finally caught up to Connor and he raised his hand, a fist forming in it, ready to smash it down on Connor’s back. Just as he was about to bring down his fist, he found that he had stopped moving. He tried to move his arms, legs, anything but, alas, he was trapped in place. Lee looked down, to see if he could spot what was holding him back and discovered that his entire body had been encased in an orange glow. “HA! BITCHES! I HAVE MAGIC NOW! WHAT CHA GOIN’ DO ‘BOUT IT?!” Burn you at the stake. “Goddammit Connor! Let me go!” Lee shouted, once again his anger building up inside of him. “That depends, are you still going to kill me?” Lee looked like he was having a difficult mental debate, try and kill Connor or have the freedom to walk. On the one hand, if he managed to kill Connor, he would be celebrated eons from now as the one who saved them from a psychotic tyrant. On the other hand, he was rather fond of moving. In the end Lee just sighed heavily, “Fine, I won’t kill you. But if you try that shit again, I’ll punch you so hard I’ll send you to another reality.” “Well okay then.” And with that, he cut off his magic and Lee was rather unceremoniously dumped on the floor. Lee just grumbled under his breath as he got up and brushed himself off. Connor and Lee went back over to Tom and Joel, who were in the middle of a rather strange conversation. They walked in just as Tom had started to speak, “All right, my son: I could've had it away with this cracking Julie, my old China” To which Joel replied, “Are you telling pork-pies and a bag of trout? Because if you are feeling quigly, why not just have a J. Arthur?” “What, billy no mates?” “Too right, youth.” “Don't you remember the crimbo din-din we had with the grotty Scots bint?” “Oh, the one that was all sixes and sevens!” “Yeah, yeah, she was the trouble and strife of the Morris dancer what lived up the apples and pears!” “She was the barrister what become a bobby in a lorry and...” At this point they had descended into talking complete gibberish, their words coming out as an unintelligible slur. They continued on like this for a second or so before they both exclaimed “-tea kettle!” “And then, and then-” Tom started, giggling as he said it “She shat on a turtle!” The exclaimed together. I...I don...I don’t even know what to say to that. Connor and Lee were just standing there, mouths agape as their brains tried to process what they had just heard. It took a grand total of no time at all for Tom to notice them, he waved at them in a jovial manner and said, “Oh hello! Are you two done killing each other yet?” They shock their vigorously and looked at each other, silently agreeing to just forget what they had heard. They walked...trotted?...Goddammit! They went over to Tom and Joel and took a seat on the floor of the ruins. “Eh, we won’t be killing each other any time soon.” Was Connor’s reply to Tom. They all sat in silence for a few seconds, seemingly at a loss for something to say. It was, however, Lee that broke the silence first, “Is it me, or do any of you feel like we’ve forgotten something important?” They all turned to look at Lee as he said this, and then all adopted looks of thoughtfulness as they wondered if they had indeed forgotten anything. Joel was the first to realise what was missing, he brought his claw up to his face in the first of would be many facepalms...faceclaws? Fuck you Equestrian terminology! “I can’t believe it-“Joel muttered under his breath, he looked at his friends addressing them head on this time, “We forgot about Matty.” It seriously took you until now to figure that out? Idiots. Looks of realisation spread across the faces of Tom and Lee, whereas Connor just gave Joel a deadpan look and said, “I thought that we had forgotten something important.” The others all turned and gave Connor and unamused look, “I was kidding! I was kidding.” Connor sighed, his own unamused expression upon his face. Tom just rolled his eyes, well he felt himself roll his eyes but being a changeling and all makes those sorts of expressions rather invalid. “Come on, look around the room, he’s got to be here somewhere.” Tom said as he stood up and made his way over to a pile of rubble in the centre of the room. The others just murmured a quite acknowledgement to what Tom said as they spread themselves out across the room. Connor was the one to find Matty, he was sprawled out over near the doorway, it appeared he had hit his head on the doorframe somehow. “Guys!” Connor called out across the room, “I think I’ve found him!” The others quickly stopped looking around and huddled over to where Connor was. Matty’s form was...interesting to say the least. In front of Connor and the others was a pitch black Pegasus with a blood red mane and, like Connor, also lacking a mark (I refuse to say cutie mark). No, what was really strange about Matty’s appearance were his wings. They were completely skeletal. No skin, no muscle, no feathers, nothing. The only thing that was there were the bare white bones. They all stood there for a while, simply looking at Matty’s body or more specifically, his wings. “I swear,” Connor started, talking to no one in particular, “If he can fly with those wings, then I’ll walk up to Princess Celestia, wearing a frilly pink dress and declare my love to her in the form of on the spot poetry.” ...It is now my life’s goal to make Matty fly. “Why is he still unconscious?” Joel asked, “We all woke up at pretty much the same time.” I don’t know Joel; maybe he’s unconscious because he HIT HIS HEAD ON THE FUCKING DOOR! It was Lee who replied this time “I’m pretty sure he banged his head on the door.” He said. “Well what are we going to do? None of us know how to give medical attention.” Joel asked. “Actually...” Connor started, but was cut across by Tom who gave him a flat stare and said, “No Connor, amputation is not going to work here and the day I let you near a scalpel is the day I go to Narnia and have tea with a talking lion.” “Awww...” Was Connor’s disappointed response. “Does anyone have any ideas that aren’t lethal to Matty and everyone in a kilometre radius?” They all stood there, trying to come up with an idea about what they could do. After a minute Lee remembered what he had seen outside the window earlier on. “I think I saw a town off in the distance a while ago, before any of you were awake.” Tom and Connor simultaneously slapped their hooves on their faces, shocked at their own idiocy. “How could I have forgotten that Ponyville was on the edge of the Everfree?” Tom asked, wondering how he could have forgotten such a crucial piece of information. “Come on, if I remember correctly there’s a hospital in Ponyville. Matty can get help there.” Connor said, already heading towards the exit of the ruins. “Lee, you carry him.” “Why me?” “Because you’re the strongest out of all of us now, and I’d rather not test mine or Tom’s magic durability whilst carrying Matty through a monster infested forest” “Goddammit, fine.” Logic : 1 – Lee : 0 Once Matty was ‘securely’ slug over Lee’s shoulders, the group of friends headed out into the forest, the destination; Ponyville. I feel sorry for Ponyville already. Next time in; The Amusing Misadventures of British Teens: Forests and walking Tempers are sent skyrocketing Joel joins them shortly after Violence!
Chapter 3: Walking, flying, fightingChapter 3: Walking, flying, fighting They trudged through the dense, green, canopy of the forest; flora and wildlife were abundant in each and every direction. The sunlight was sparse and the air was very hot, humid and full of pests. The ground beneath them was damp, spongy and littered with hazards like; roots, holes, loose soil, poisonous plants, poisonous predators. You know the usual. At first they had marched into the forest, full of gusto and energy. Their minds had been filled with wonder at their surroundings, their eyes greedily absorbing the foreign sights. That had been 3 hours ago. Now, they were all bored, bored of walking, bored of forest, bored of everything. Connor and Tom were discussing their magic and how to use it, Joel was trying to figure out how to use the muscles in his wings and Lee was testing his Minotaur strength by shattering trees to pieces with his fists. Matty was still deep in his unconscious slumber, blissfully unaware of his current situation. Lazy prick. “Right then Tom, do you have the image locked in your mind?” Connor asked, trying to teach Tom the telekinetic wonders of levitation as they made headway through the maze of trees and bushes. Connor was carrying a stick upon his back, which was the target of Tom’s spell. “Yeah, I think so.” Was Tom’s reply, as he gazed intently at the stick, as if the force of his stare would make the stick float. “Good, now you need to will the stick to move, imagine it being picked up by magic, visualise it.” Connor continued to explain, waving the stick around in his own magic before placing upon his back. Tom did so and he, as did Connor, began to feel a small tingling at the base of his horn. “You should, if changeling magic is the same as mine, feel a small tingling in your horn. You should also be able to move this feeling up and down it.” Connor lectured, clearly enjoying explaining this to Tom. “How d’you do that?” Tom asked, slight at a loss as to how to do it. “Erm, just imagine the feeling being moved around it. Imagine the tingling at some other point.” So Tom did just that, he imagined the tingle in the middle of his horn, he imagined what it would feel like for it to be there. Sure enough, the moment he did the feeling appeared at the middle of his horn, filling the path from the centre of his horn to the base with a similar tingly feeling. “Got it!” Tom said, proud of himself for succeeding. “Wonderful, now push it up until it’s at the very tip of your horn.” Tom did so and gave Connor a quick nod to show that he had done so, “Now, force it out of your horn, imagine it being pushed out, remember to keep the image in your mind whilst doing this.” “Yeah, yeah. I got it.” Tom said, dismissing Connor’s words as he concentrated. He pushed at the magic he could feel collecting at the tip of his horn. He felt the energy leave his horn, he could see his horn become engulfed in a toxic green aura and at the same time the stick resting upon Connor’s back also lit up green. “HA! Yes, I did it!” Tom exclaimed, ecstatic with his accomplishment. He made the stick float around them, occasionally making it twirl and rotate before eventually snapping it in half and chucking it deep into the foliage around them. Meanwhile, at the back of our group of miscreants, Joel was getting more and more frustrated. He had been trying for a large amount of time now to try and get his wings to work. He knew they were there, he could feel it when the wind blew upon them, or when a plant brushed against them. But he could not for the life of him figure out where they were or how to use his wing muscles. After seeing Tom accomplish magic, Joel’s frustration finally caused him to snap. “OH FOR FUCKS SAKE! HOW THE BLOODY HELL DO I USE THESE THINGS!” Joel shouted, glaring at his wings in contempt. At his sudden outburst, the others stopped and turned to look at Joel, matching expressions of curiosity upon their faces. “How the bloody hell do you use what, Joel?” Connor asked. “My fucking wings! I can’t bloody use them!” “You’ve only just got the bloody things idiot, how do you expect to use something you’ve never used before?” Connor said, rolling his eyes at his friend’s idiocy. “Fuck you Connor! Don’t bring logic into this!” Idiots! All my characters are idiots! I’m fucking surrounded by them! Instead of responding to Joel, Connor turned to Tom, a malicious grin spread across his face. “Tom, do you think we should give a Joel a...boost with our magic, so to speak.” It was Tom’s turn to grin viciously. They both turned to Joel, who backed up nervously as they approached him, their horns alight with magic. “So Joel, you wanted help flying?” Tom asked, his voice filled with mirth. “You know what? I think I’m over flying now, it’s overrated anyways.” Joel replied, backing up nervously. “Oh no Joel,” Connor continued, steadily approaching as Joel tried to put more distance between them, “We simply cannot allow you to never enjoy the ‘experiences’ of flight.” Joel was seriously considering turning tail and getting out of there as fast as his body would allow him. But before he could act upon these thoughts, he found himself surrounded by two magical auras. One was a fierce orange, the other a toxic green. Where they met, they melded to form a sort of brownish colour. He looked back up to Connor and Tom only to find that they were grinning at him, their face full of cruel amusement and their horns lit up with their respective colours. Well Joel, it was nice knowing you. See you in hell. “You should be excited Joel.” Connor said, “You’re going to be the first griffon to leave the ionosphere.” Tom just chuckled darkly, “Launching the Griffon MK.I in T minus five,” “Erm, guys? I really don’t think tha-“Joel started, fear creeping its way onto his face. “Four” Both Connor and Tom said, their horns glowing more brightly as they added more power to their spell. “Guys?” “Three” “Could you put me down?” “Two” Joel was really starting to panic now, futilely trying to tear his way out of their magical grasp. “Will you fucking let me go?!” “One” As they said this, they used magic to slowly make Joel’s wings open. Joel stopped trying to struggle as he turned his head in wonder at the feeling of flexing his new found muscles. “Huh.” Was Joel’s only utterance at new and marvellous experience. Simpleton. “Fire!” Connor and Tom shouted. At this Joel’s eyes shrunk to pinpricks, fear once again taking hold. “Ohnonononononono-” But his was cut off as Tom and Connor finally released their spell. In a glorious moment of momentum, screaming and adrenaline, Joel shot up into the sky at the speed of a Harrier Jet on steroids. “Come on now, break the sound barrier, break the sound barrier.” Connor said, as he watched Joel rocket further and further into the sky. “Erm, Connor?” Lee asked, also watching Joel’s trajectory to the ionosphere. “Yes?” “What are we going to do if Joel still doesn’t know how to use his wings?” “Well Lee, that’s a very good question. My guess is, that we are going to stand here and bicker and argue about how badly we’ve just cocked up, then try and think of a way to help him, realise that we don’t have enough time and just sit here and enjoy the show or do something incredibly stupid and injure ourselves in the process. Either way, Joel’s screwed.” Do you think I should intervene? ... Nah. Tom walk-dammit, trotted over to Connor and Lee, and joined them in staring at the increasingly small speck that was Joel. “I wonder how he’s handling it.” Meanwhile, from Joel’s perspective: “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” *** Connor, Tom and Lee waited for another minute before they could; thankfully, see Joel starting to descend again. Not so thankfully, they also noticed that Joel still hadn’t used his wings. “Well, the daft sod still hasn’t figured it out.” Connor sighed, shaking his, feigning disappointment. Tom and Lee just rolled their eyes, well Tom tried but you can never really tell with a changeling, as though Joel’s impending demise were an annoying chore to have to deal with. “I suppose we should catch him or something?” Tom inquired his voice a rather dull tone. “Ugh, fine” Connor replied. Lee just took a couple of steps back and leaned against a nearby tree, watching on with a blank expression. Connor and Tom looked up at Joel’s rapidly approaching figure and lit their horns up, ready to catch him. “Now remember Tom,” Connor started, glancing over at his friend, “Slowly stop his descent, we don’t want to break every bone in his body.” “Yeah, yeah, I know. Momentum and all that.” Tom said, dismissively. Connor and Tom focused their magic on Joel. Joel was about a hundred metres off of the ground when Connor and Tom’s magic formed around Joel, slowing his descent. At fifty metres, his speed had gone from a jet plane to an F1 car. At twenty five, he was going at the speed of your average roadster. At ten metres he was as fast as jumped up golf cart. In the last five metres Joel’s out of control descent had been whittled down to that of a piece of falling paper. Throughout this entire process, however. Joel had been screaming, loudly, like a little girl. Pfft, you bloody pansy. The moment that Joel touched the floor, however, he stopped his screaming. He cracked one eye open and, with a massive wave of relief, noticed that he was lying gently upon the ground, not a smouldering crater in it. Joel just slumped further into the ground, “Oh solid ground, let us never part again.” Joel didn’t have time to enjoy the sweet embrace of solids, as a whistle a couple of metres ahead of him snapped his attention to the group of impatient creatures whom were all looking at Joel expectantly. “Come on Joel!” Tom called out to him, “We don’t have time to wait whilst you muck about!” Joel just muttered several choice obscenities as he rose to his...feet? EQUESTRIAN! MOTHER FUCKING! TERMINOLOGY! I BLOODY HATE IT! They continued to trudge through the forest. Everyone was deep in the own thought. Tom was thinking about how much fun it was going to be once he got to Ponyville. Connor was already making plans on how he was going to manipulate each and every one of the mane six to further his own, non-existent ends. Joel was currently opening and closing his wings, as he had managed to remember how to use the muscles that controlled them. I suppose it must help not having the prospect of imminent death dangling right in front of you. Lee, on the other hand, was wondering why they hadn’t ventured across some other form of life aside from plants. “Guys?” Lee said, deciding to voice his curiosity. “Do any of you wonder why we haven’t run into anything yet?” Upon hearing what Lee had said, Connor and Tom froze in their tracks. They slowly turned their heads towards Lee, “You really had to say it didn’t you?” Connor said, clearly annoyed. “What d’you mean?” It was Tom this time that chose to answer, “This is a fucking cartoon world, cartoon logic applies here. What do you think is going to happen to us if you say we haven’t run into anything yet?” Lee just groaned and face palmed, “Don’t tell me we’re going to run into something.” The moment he said this, a deep, feline growling could be heard, emanating from a bush nearby. Everyone stopped and turned to look at the bush in question. Two glowing, cat-like eyes could be seen coming from it. No sooner had they noticed this, than did a fully grown manticore pounce out of the bush, aiming to take down Connor in one lethal pounce. Thankfully, years of growing up in English schools, being at the risk of attack at all times from friends or otherwise, had helped prepare Connor for this. He held his ground until the last moment possible and then, when the jaws of the manticore were almost right on top of him, he side-stepped out of the way. The manticore then, instead of getting a mouthful of juicy pony, got a mouthful of dirt as his teeth failed to clamp down upon its target. “Tom!” Connor called over to his friend, “Use your magic and help me take his legs out!” Instead of replying, Tom just lit his horn up with its green aura and grabbed two of the manticore’s legs, yanking them out from beneath it. Connor, in turn, did the same thing. Soon the manticore was on the floor, trying desperately to force its way out. “Lee!” Connor called over to his other friend, “Put Matty down and climb onto its back!” “Why?” Lee asked, genuinely confused. “Because holding this thing down is difficult and I want you to tear its fucking tail off!” Connor shouted back, the strain of holding the manticore down evident on his face. Lee just unceremoniously dropped Matty off his shoulder onto the floor and walked up to the manticore. Upon seeing this, the manticore struggled even harder in its bonds. “Hurry up Lee!” Tom shouted, his voice strained. Wasting no more time, Lee simply got as close to manticore as he could without being eaten and jumped with all his might. He landed right on the manticore’s back and he was fairly sure he heard something crack in the beast’s back. Which was proven to be true as the manticore let forth an immense cry of pain. Lee steadily approached the manticore’s thrashing tail, which was desperately trying to reach around its body to attack either Tom or Connor. After a couple of seconds of trying to grasp it, Lee finally secured the tail in his hands. “Now fucking rip it off!” Connor shouted over at Lee, “I can feel my grip slipping!” Lee got the tail in a firmer grip, it’s struggling useless against his immense Minotaur strength, and started to pull as hard as he could. The manticore responded by roaring even more loudly and increasing its thrashing movements. Lee just pulled even harder. A few moments later a horrible tearing sound could be heard and a deep red blood started to spurt out of the base of the tail, where the rip had appeared. With a final great heave and another roar of pain from the manticore, Lee completely tore the tail from the body. Without any further prompting from Connor or Tom, Lee jumped off the back of manticore and went over to its head. There he jabbed the tail, stinger first, into its eye. At this, the beast opened its mouth to, once again, roar in pain. But Lee didn’t let it, because before the manticore could even utter a single sound, Lee had rammed the stinger into the back of the manticore’s throat, before finally discarding the stinger and chucking it off deep into the surrounding forest. The manticore’s throat started to swell in size and before long, it started making chocking noises. Sensing that it was safe to do so, Connor and Tom, gratefully, released their grip on the manticore’s limbs. Realising that its limbs were free, the manticore proceeded to claw at its throat and roll around on the ground, futilely trying to get air into its lungs. It continued to thrash around the immediate area for about two minutes, in which time Lee had placed Matty back on his shoulder and Connor and Tom and recovered from the small conflict, when it finally came to a stop and the last shuddering breath escaped its mouth. After a few moments Joel poked his head from around a tree, which he had been hiding behind throughout the battle, and asked “Is it dead?” “Probably.” Connor replied, “But I’m not taking any chances.” Connor looked around him trying to find something, when his gazed landed upon a rather large rock. Picking this up in his magic he raised it over the manticore’s head and brought it down with as much force as he could muster. A resounding crack echoed into the surrounding forest, blood started to pour from a large wound to its head and bone could be seen poking through the thin layer of skin around the skull. Again and again Connor drove the rock into its skull until it had completely caved in and the brain was nothing more than a small puddle of grey matter. “Well,” Tom said, after a moments silence, “I think it’s dead now.” You know what Tom? I never would have guessed. “Come on,” Connor said, leaving the rock to rest in the manticore’s decimated skull, “Let’s get going.” * * * After what seemed like hours more trekking, our dynamic group of morons finally made it to the edge of the forest. Once they got to very edge, all they could see for miles around were even spaced apple trees. “Sweet Apple Acres?” Tom wondered aloud. Staring in awe at the sheer amount of trees there. “Must be.” Connor said, his gaze had adopted a more cold, calculating look. He turned and look at the Sun, which was about half way to being completely set. “I think we should rest here for tonight.” He said, looking back at his friends, “We can talk to Applejack tomorrow.” “Who the hell’s Applejack?” Joel asked. “The pony that helps run this place.” Tom said, not taking his gaze from the orchards of apples. “Oh,” Joel replied, “Then yeah, resting here for a while seems okay.” He continued. It was at that time, however, that Joel’s stomach made a very loud rumbling sound. “Although, having something to eat sounds equally good.” He added. It was then that the other realised how hungry they all were, as they has not eaten since before they had woken up in the castle. “Right then,” Connor said, taking charge for some reason, “Tom, you go and get some apples from the orchards whilst we set up a fire or something.” “Wait.” Tom said, finally tearing his gaze from the apple trees, “Why do I have to go?” “Because,” Connor rebuked, “Changelings are supposed to be all sneaky and shit, so get out there and get us some food.” And before Tom could protest, Connor used his magic to pick him and throw him bodily into a nearby orchard. Tom pushed himself back onto his hooves, after landing as gracefully as a dead elephant, and shouted back to Connor, “Oi! You bloody prick! You can’t keep abusin’ your magic like that!” To which Connor shouted back “You just fucking watch me abuse it!” But before Tom could reply, Connor had retreated into the trees, presumable to set up a fire. Tom just sighed heavily and trotted up to the nearest tree. After a moment regarding it, Tom just shrugged and used his magic to start pulling apples down from the branches. Tom continued like this for a couple of minutes, but, unbeknownst to him, a small filly named Applebloom who had a yellow coat and a red mane and bow was watching him, her eyes full of fear and apprehension. “There’s a monster stealin’ our apples! Ah gotta get help!” Applebloom thought to herself, not daring to speak for fear of alerting the monster to her presence. She slowly started to back up, trying to sneak away from the monster. But just as she thought she was a safe distance away, she trod on a twig, which made a large, dry, snapping sound. Both Tom and Applebloom froze upon hearing this. Tom slowly turned his head, bringing his big, blue, orb-like eyes to look upon the filly, who was now shaking with fear. A moment of silence elapsed between the two, before Tom finally spoke but one word. “Bollocks.” And then Applebloom screamed. [End of part 1]
Interlude, Notices and other fun stuff!NOTE: This isn't actually a chapter, just in case you thought it was. This is just a way for me to get a couple of ideas and important notices across. Heyho everyone! Welcome one and all to British Brony's first ever INTERLUDE CHAPTER! Now you may be sitting their thinking,"Whoa, whoa British, slow down. What's an interlude chapter?" Well, if you are indeed asking this then I suggest that you just stop reading this story, I'm about to start using big boy words. Now then, I shall probably do these little interlude chapters when my ideas for this story start spilling over into my other pony related thought patterns. I mean, do you have any idea what it's like to be me when I'm storying? Let me give you a hint, imagine, if you will, one big fucking universe, wherein I'm trying to create a cross-over of about 20 individual T.V. programmes, books or other fanfics with conflicting plots, storylines, characters and personalities. Then, try spending an unhealthy amount of time trying to get all to work together. That is the hell of just ONE part of my mind. Quite honestly, I'm suprised that I haven't yet gone insane....oh, wait. Moving swiftly on, I believe that I ought to give a proper reason as to why chapter 3 was released over 2 weeks too late. One of the reasons is actually related to the paragraph above. Have you ever tried to write about one thing whilst having ideas for about six others floating around your head? It makes it fucking difficult to concentrate. Another reason, I procrastinate. A lot. Seriously, I have procrastinated my own free time by staying behind at school and doing coursework. That is the level of procrastination I'm at. I suppose that the biggest fault is that I was the fucking genius that thought writing a story with weekly updates during his GCSE year would be a good idea. Anyway, I will try to stick to my weekly update schedule. But I can't promise that I'll keep to it successfully. Right, enough of all these whiney ass excuses. Time to get on to the other stuff. I already wrote something about this in the comment section but from the utter lack of response, from anyone, I shall write it here so that you have to acknowledge it and so that future readers can also keep 'in the know'. I am handing some aspects of the story over to you lot! The readers! Seeing as this would be a pretty shitty story if I didn't include some sort of character/relationship development. So I am letting you lot how you want relationships between other characters to go. Do you want Lee and Cadance to become Poker buddies? Do you want Joel and Applejack to exchange scathing and bitter insults and remarks? Or do you want Connor and Discord to hold a trolling competition? Also, after giving much thought, I will try and get some romantic relationships going. But ONLY if enough of you readers demand it. I have absolutely no idea how good I am at writing romance, and quite frankly, I don't really want to find out. But then again, I'm not in control of this any more, you have complete and utter control over how certain relationships go. Word of warning though, if I do get enough requests to romance then NO homosexual relationships. Connor, Matty, Tom, Lee and Joel would quite literally beat the absolute shit out of me. Also, Connor has already had words with me about who he wants to get romanced with, should I ever start to write romance. Lastly, as we get near the end of season three I will have to take control of the relationships again. I have already planned out a different story branch for each of our loveable teens, and certain story lines require certain relationships. But other than that. COMPLETE CONTROL! Oh sweet dear lord. What fresh hell have I introduced upon myself? Oh yes, one last thing. This story is on hold until the beginning of my Christmas holidays, exams and coursework mean that I'm having trouble keeping on top of everything. After that I should be regularly updating again until about May-June time when my actual GCSE's begin. But once they're out of the way, whoo boy! I'm going to have all the spare time I need to finish this damn story. Anyway, I'm pretty sure that I was going to include something else here, but I've forgotten. So, for the love of whatever you hold dear, if you have an idea or a question FUCKING POST IT! I quite literally wait with bated breath for someone to comment on something they like about the story or want to change. Until next time then, Tatty bye!
Chapter 4: IntroductionsChapter 4: Introductions Applejack had been having a usual day at the farm. She woke up at the usual time of 6:30. She went to her mirror and did her hair and donned her hat, as usual. She had her usual breakfast with her family, like she usually did. She went out into the usual apple orchard and she got down to doing her usual work. She took her usual short break at noon, had her usual lunch and then got around to her usual afternoon schedule. She worked all through the afternoon doing her usual rounds about the orchards. You know, the usual. As she bucked the last tree for the day and was rewarded with the sound of apples thudding into the baskets grouped around the tree, she looked at the rest of the trees in the orchard and was pleased to see that there were baskets full of apples underneath all of them. Giving a satisfied nod at her...hoofiwork? She decided to call it a day and started to load up a nearby cart with the apples that were littered about the place. As she had finished loading up the last of the apple baskets, she stopped to take a look at the sky, hued red and gold as the sun inched further and further down the horizon. As she stood there, illuminated in the fiery ashes of a dying day, she basked in the serenity of it all. Revelling in the peacefulness of the moment. Of the deep feeling of satisfaction that came with a day’s hard work. Applejack to her hat off of her head and held it against her chest, truly taking in the beauty of the scene before her. Never before had she ever felt so at peace, so at – “AAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” Applejack’s moment of tranquillity was shattered by the shrill scream of her little sister. Applejack just sighed heavily and placed her hat back on her head, “Ah’m comin’, ah’m comin’” she said, in a rather bored tone as she got up and headed off in the direction of the scream. “Ah swear,” Applejack muttered under her breath, “If this is ‘nother snake or somethin’ then ah’m goin’ ta have some serious words with ‘er.” * * * Tom was panicking slightly now. He had a screaming filly that wouldn’t shut up whom had probably alerted the entire farm to his presence. With little else left to do he tried to calm the little filly. “Nonononononono, don’t scream , I’m not going to hurt you.” He said putting on what he hoped was a gentle, reassuring smile. But all Applebloom saw was his fangs and a creature that wanted to eat her, which in turn made her scream even louder. Tom winced at this and started to plead with her. “Please be quite!” Still she screamed. “Pretty please?” She still didn’t stop. “I’ll get you some sweets. Ice cream? Cupcakes?” She kept screaming, as if she hadn’t even heard him. “I’ll be your friend.” At this she appeared to scream even louder. “Oh come on! What d’you want from me?” “Ah want ya to step away from mah sister!” Another, older voice called out. Applebloom stopped screaming and both she and Tom turned to see Applejack running towards them, twirling her rope that always seems to spontaneously appear whenever she needs it. “Of course, it had to be her.” Tom sighed as Applebloom quickly ran away from Tom towards her sister. “Look, this isn’t what it looks like!” Tom tried to argue, but Applejack wasn’t listening instead she (somehow) formed her rope into a lasso and without a seconds hesitation she threw it at Tom. Tom only just managed to jump out of the way of the rope, but Applejack had used the time Tom spent dodging the rope to close the gap between them. Tom had less than a second to look surprised before Applejack tackled him to the ground. Tom’s new chitinous armour helped to absorb most of the impact, for which he was grateful. But despite this he was still left a little winded. Whilst Tom was still trying to recover his breath Applejack magically procured a new length of rope like she always seems to do and tied his legs together, despite his struggles and protests. “You can’t just go and tackle and tie up random people willy nilly! That’s assault! Assault I say! I want a lawyer! I know my rights!” Tom said, struggling with his bonds. But Applejack wasn’t paying him any attention. Instead she went over to Applebloom checking to see if she was alright. “Applebloom! Are ya alrigh’? Did tha’ creature hurt ya?” Applejack asked, worry in her voice. Applebloom shook her head, “Nah, it didn’t get close enough fer that.” “Oh thank Celestia fer that.” Applejack said as she pulled her sister into a hug. They held the embrace for a couple of seconds but they finally broke it off and turned to look at the still struggling Tom, whom was now muttering darkly under his breath. “What d’ya reckon it is Applejack?” Applebloom asked, her pervious fear overridden by her curiosity. Applejack just shook her head as she looked at Tom harder. “Ah don’t rightly know. But ah reckon it migh’ be dangerous what with those fangs n’all, so stay away from it Applebloom.” “It? It?! I’ll have you know that I take offence at being called an ‘it’” Tom said, clearly annoyed. But Applejack continued on as if he hadn’t said anything. “I think ah’ll go an’ get the girls. Maybe Twiligh’ or Fluttershy know what it is an’ how ta deal with it.” “Again with the ’it’, I have feelings you know!” But again Tom’s outburst went unnoticed as another pony approached them. This pony was a large stallion that had an apple red coat and a straw coloured mane. He looked between Applejack, Applebloom and Tom a few times before he finally stopped on Applejack, his eyebrow raised in a silent question. “Big Mac, ah’m glad I caugh’ ya. D’ya mind look over this here creature while ah go get the girls?” “Creature! Why I – you know what, I give up. Please continue to talk as if I’m not even here and can’t hear everything you’re saying.” Big Mac just raised his eyebrow further at Tom’s outburst and turned to look at Applejack. “Ah reckon ah can keep an eye on it.” Tom just fumed silently, knowing that any comment he made would be ignored. “Thank you Big Mac. Applebloom, go back to tha house an’ help Granny Smith with dinner.” Applebloom looked a little unhappy at being dismissed but she didn’t argue back and started to make her way back to the house. “Ah’ll be back in a while Big Mac. You sure ya’ll be fine?” “Eeyup” Was Big Mac’s trademark reply. Applejack just nodded and headed off at a brisk trot. Tom had stopped trying to escape the rope and was now looking up at the sky with a bored expression. He and Big Mac spent a couple of minutes in silence, before Tom decided to break it in the only way he knew. “I know a song that will get on your nerves, get on your nerves, get on your nerves!” Meanwhile, at the edge of the Everfree Forest Connor, Lee and Joel had seen the entire thing unfold and were now watching Big Mac clutch his ears to his head whilst Tom appeared to be singing something. The continued to watch this for a few more seconds before Joel spoke up. “D’you think we ought to go and help?” “Nah.” Connor replied, “I think we should wait for a bit. I think Applejack went to go and get the other Elements. Might as well wait and address them all at once.” “Sure, whatever.” Was Joel’s reply. They all took a seat on the edge of the forest and waited for Applejack and the others to get back. Twenty minutes later “So Applejack, let’s go over this again. You found a ‘creepy, fanged insect monster pony’ stealing apples from your trees and your sister was screaming at it?” Twilight asked as she and the other girls made their way across the orchards to where Big Mac and were. Twilight had brought as many books on obscure creatures as she could. Pinkie Pie had just bounced around and said something about a party. Fluttershy had said little other than agreeing to go, but she had an expression of curiosity on her face. Rarity and Rainbow Dash were...eh fuck it, I can’t be bothered to describe them. Just imagine them arguing or something. “Tha’s what ah said Twi, then ah went and tussled it up. Last ah saw of it, Big Mac was lookin’ after it.” Applejack told Twilight. Twilight immediately levitated one of her books and quickly flipped through it. “Are you sure Applejack?” Twilight asked, sceptical “There’s nothing in my books about an insect like pony.” “Are ya callin’ me a lair?” Applejack asked, her voice taking a more hard quality. “Oh no, no, no. Nothing of the sort. I’m just saying it’s rather hard to believe.” Twilight said hastily. “Well ya better believe it. Tied the thing up with mah own hooves.” “Oh, I hope you didn’t hurt it.” Fluttershy said, concern in her voice. “Ah’m sure it’s fine. It was sti-“ But Applejack was interrupted by Pinkie Pie before she could finish. “Hey,” Pinkie Pie said as she all but shoved Applejack out of the way. “Can anypony else hear singing?” They all stopped talking for a moment and true to Pinkie’s word they could hear the faint sounds of someone singing. “Come on girls,” Twilight said, taking charge, “Let’s go and see what this is all about.” Without wasting any more time they sped up their leisurely trot and soon enough they were close enough to hear Tom's dreadful caterwauling. “What is that been sung?” Rarity asked, scrunching her muzzle at the sound. “I know a song that’ll get on your nerves, get on your nerves, get on your nerves!” Raising their eyebrows at each other they finally reached the area where Big Mac and Tom were. What they saw there was Big Mac lying on the ground with his hooves pressing his ears into his skull and a jolly Tom singing the same few lines over and over again. However, when Tom finally noticed the six other ponies in front of him he stopped his singing and addressed them. “Oh, hello there. You there, purple and unicorny. I would like to make an official complaint as to how I have been treated upon my arrival to Ponyville. I have screamed at, lassoed at, tackled and insulted. Quite frankly I find this behaviour to be rather appalling. I mean, being called and ‘it’ and a ‘creature’ is rather a hurtful thing to say to someone. And I’m a male, for future reference.” As soon as Tom had stopped singing and started talking, Big Mac had gotten up and all but galloped away from the annoying changeling. Twilight blinked a couple of times as she processed what had just been said. “Erm...I’m sorry, what?” She asked, a little unsure as how to respond. “Additionally,” Tom said, continuing on, “I’m fairly sure that being tackled to the ground and tied up is classified as assault and as such I would like to talk to a government official.” Twilight blinked again, a bit taken aback by what Tom said. “He...erm , he actually has a point Applejack. What you did was technically assault." “What!?” Applejack exclaimed, outraged. “The only reason I tackled ‘im in tha first place was because he was attackin’ mah sister!” “Attacking you sister?” Tom scoffed, “I did no such thing, she simply looked at me and started screaming, I never even touched her. If you don’t believe me then ask her yourself, or check her body for that matter. If I had attacked her there would have been signs of it.” Applejack sat down as she took a second to comprehend what had been said, “You-you aren’t going to turn me in. Y’know, for the tacklin’ and whatnot? Are ya?” Tom appeared to consider it for a moment before he replied, “That depends.” He said giving her an even stare, “How much longer are you going to keep me tied up like this?” But just as Applejack moved to untie Tom another voice cut across to them. “Oh but Tom, where would be the fun in that?” Everyone turned to see three more newcomers approaching them. There was a pony who had a pair of feline eyes and fangs. There was a Griffon with a charcoal grey coat and red eyes. Lastly there was a brown Minotaur with what appeared to be an unconscious pony over his shoulder. The pony, whom appeared to have been the one whom had spoken, walked towards the group of mares as the other two stayed a bit behind. “Greetings ladies.” The pony said, offering them a small bow, “Allow me to introduce myself. I am Connor. I see you have already met my friend, Tom. The Griffon behind me is called Joel,” “Sup” Joel said casually, offering a nod of his head. “The big Minotaur is called Lee.” “Hey” Lee said, raising his hand in greeting. “And the unconscious pony on his shoulder is called Matty.” Matty said and did fuck all to greet them, owing to the fact he was still unconscious. “And whom,” Connor said, a small smile on his face causing his fangs to be shown, “Do I have the pleasure of making the acquaintance of?” For a couple of awkward moments none of the Elements said anything. Instead simply staring at Connor a mixture of shock and apprehension. But eventually, Twilight blinked a couple of times and hesitantly approached Connor. “Hello there,” She started a bit of apprehension in her voice, “My name’s Twilight Sparkle” Connor’s smile only widened at this, causing his fangs to become more prominent. “Good evening Miss Sparkle, it’s wonderful to make your acquaintance.” Connor said, offering Twilight his hoof. Twilight looks at his hoof, uncertainty written all over her face. Connor just chuckled, “Come now Miss Sparkle, I don’t bite.” “Like hell you don’t” Lee muttered under his breath. Joel just rolled his at Connor’s more ‘posh’ than usual approach to the situation, “Bloody hell Connor, you’re laying it on a bit thick, aren’t ya?” Connor let his hoof drop before he turned around to address Joel. “Well excuse me for wanting to make a good impression. What, pray tell, are you doing to help this situation?” “What situation?” “The situation in which we don’t come off as complete idiots or freaks.” “I think we failed at the when we were born.” “Way to inspire confidence moron.” “Who are you callin’ a moron? I’m not the one who decided that Tom, the most unsubtle person out of all of us, ought to go and sneak around in an orchard.” “I didn’t see you coming up with any better ideas.” “That’s because there are no better ideas. This whole situation is fucking stupid.” “So? It’s not like I’ve ever given you any reason to doubt my plans,” “You threw me into the fucking atmosphere!” “Because you were bitiching about not knowing how to fly!” “That doesn’t mean you should throw me and hope I figure it out before I hit the ground!” “Hey! I still caught you! I saved your fucking life!” “You were the one that put my bloody life in danger!” All whilst Connor and Joel had been arguing, Twilight had slipped back over to the girls and was now watching the argument begin in earnest. “Does this usually happen?” She asked a still tied up Tom. “Pretty often. Believe it or not, but this is a more tame argument. Just you wait until the personal insults start to fly.” Twilight gave Tom a rather shocked look, “How can you guys even call each other friends?” “Maybe I’ll tell you,” Tom said, annoyance creeping into his voice, “If you get me out of these fucking ropes.” Twilight winced at Tom’s vulgarity but used her magic to untie him nonetheless. “You don’t have to be so rude about it.” “You try being tied up for about thirty minutes on uncomfortable ground and let’s see how you’re feeling.” Tom said as he sat up, rubbing his forelegs where the rope had been. "Sooo, what exactly are ya?" Rainbow asked, scanning Tom curiously, "Never seen or heard about anything like ya." "I think Connor's plan was to explain all of this as a group" Tom said, turning his attention back to the argument between Connor and Joel, "Although I think that plan's fucked itself sideways and got thrown out a window." "My word! Is there really any need to be so vulgar?" Rarity asked, to which Tom replied in a heavily accented 'posh' voice, "Oh my! I am so sorry my dear! Would you find it more pleasing if I were to cease my obnoxious and obviously displeasing linguistical patterns?", wearing a mocking smile as he spoke. Rarity just huffed as Pinkie and Rainbow laughed at Tom's display. "Erm, guys?", Twilight's voice cut across causing them to look and see that Twilight, Fluttershy and Applejack had been watching Joel's and Connor's argument which had now heated to the point where they were shouting in each others faces. "Should we intervene?" Twilight asked worriedly. They all quickly turned their attention back to the argument as the shouts started to get even louder. "I'D SAY THAT I'D SHOVE YOUR COCK DOWN YOUR THROAT BUT YOU COULDN'T CHOKE A FLY WITH THAT ONE INCH-WARRIOR!" Connor bellowed at Joel. “AT LEAST MY HAIR DOESN’T LOOK LIKE IT WAS DRAGGED THROUGH A FUCKING CHIPPY DURING THE FUCKING LUNCH RUSH!” “OH LOOK AT JOEL, SLIDING ON IN THERE WITH A BIT OF ASIAN PERSUASION!” “COME ON THEN, LET’S GO RIGHT NOW YA FUCKING CUNT!” Joel and Connor tensed up getting ready to lunge at each other. Connor used his magic to tear off a nearby tree branch whilst Joel flared his wings, preparing to launch himself. They glared daggers at one another for several seconds before a small smirk broke across Connor’s face. Despite wanting to remain mad at Connor, Joel also couldn’t help but smirk slightly too. Soon they were both chuckling at each other before bursting into outright laughter, both of them leaning against each other, gasping for air. Twilight and the other girls just stood there dumbfounded as they watched two creatures that were about ready to atomise each other laughing with one another as though nothing had happened. Whilst Joel and Connor rendered their sides shredded, Tom just “rolled” his eyes and made his way over to them and Lee, who was watching the other two with an amused look. After a few seconds the laughing died down and Connor and Joel just had smiles plastered on their faces, along with Tom and Lee. If one were to look at the group as they were now, one could say that they were enjoying a blissful moment, happy in each others company. Then Connor grabbed Joel’s head in his magic and slammed his face into the ground. “You fucking bastard.” Joel muttered with a facefull of dirt whilst the other laughed at him as he picked himself up. “Right then, with that out of the way I suppose I should tell you where we’re here.” Connor said, in a cheerful tone, smiling at the slightly confused mares before him. “Hang on a second,” Twilight interrupted him, a hoof raised to stop any retort, “How can any of you call yourselves friends? All you do is pick on and laugh at each other.” The guys all shared a look with one another before returning their attention to the mare, “Your point?” asked Lee, eyebrow raised. “My point is that friends don’t do that! Friends are supposed to help each other out and compassionate and caring towards one another.” Twilight said, sharing a warm look with her friends. The guys once again looked at each other...before erupting in laughter. Even Matty, who was still unconscious, snickered in his sleep a little. The girls glared at them, annoyed that they took what was now their most valued belief so jokingly. “What, pray tell, do you find so funny?” Rarity huffed, clearly unamused. “”It’s just-hehe- it’s just that,” Joel stuttered slightly, still racked with the occasional giggle, “It’s just that you managed say that with a straight fucking face, that sounds like something you’d hear on a shitey show for seven year old girls.” “Why I never!” Rarity exclaimed, glaring at the guys who were once again chuckling to themselves. “While I would love to debate the ins and outs of friendship with you, that’s not the reason we came here.” Connor stated, as he gestured with his hoof to the slumbering Matty, “We were trekking through that forest over there and we were attacked by a Manticore.” The girls gasped at this, there previous annoyance replaced by begrudging respect, wondering how a dysfunction group of freaks could deal with a monster that bested most of them only a day before. “Matty was thrown in the fight and he struck his head. We had noticed the roofs of a village a bit earlier on and decided to look there for medical help.” Before any of them could do anything there was a small blur of yellow as Fluttershy zipped up to Matty, inspecting the now scabbed over gash on his head which was mostly obscured by his mane. “Oh my, this looks really bad.” Fluttershy gasped as she mithered over Matty. She looked up to Lee who had recovered from the shock of having a bundle of drop-dead adorableness launch itself at him at breakneck speeds. “Follow me, we need to get him to my cottage so I can take care of him.” Lee looked up at the others for some sort of confirmation, but the most he got was a few shrugs. He just sighed, “Lead the way.”, gesturing loosely with his hand and lumbering after Fluttershy as she took of hurriedly. The others stood there awkwardly for a moment or two, none really meeting each others gaze. “Well then,” Connor coughed, breaking the silence, “We’ve done what we came here to do,” he gestured to Tom and Joel to follow him, “Shall we?”. They turned around and started to head back to the forest. ‘Come on, come on,’ Connor thought to himself, ‘Take the bait, take it.’ “Hey!” Rainbow’s voice called out, the guys stopped and Connor quickly had to hide a big grin as he turned to face them, “Victory!” he cheered in his head. “Where do you think you’re going?” Rainbow asked, eyeing them with curiosity. “Well, since we’ve gotten Matty some medical attention, we were going to go back to our small campsite back in the forest.” Connor explained, trying his ha...hoof at manipulating to get what he wanted. “You can’t go in there!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed, “There’s lots and lots of dangerous animals and if you go in there you might get attacked by one and then if you get attacked by one you might not be able to attend my ‘Welcome-to-Ponyville’ party and then there’ll be nopony to enjoy the cake and if there isn’t any cake then everypony will be sad and if everypony's sad then that means I’m not doing my job properly and if I’m not doing my job properly then there’s nopony to make everypony smile and if nopony smiles then Ponyville won't be a fun place to live in and nopony wants to live in a place with no fun because then everypony would be all grumpy and boring and there’d be no fun and no parties and no cake!” Pinkie spoke in a way that could only be described as words being fired out of a mingun, before she took a deep breath and threw herself to the ground, “WHY IS THERE NO CAKE!?”, she wailed with despair. It took the others a couple of seconds to get over the mental whiplash of following what Pinkie had said before Joel spoke up again, building upon Connor’s earlier points, “Well, what should we do? We don’t have any money for a room and I’m not about to go around begging for some.” The moment Joel had finished speaking Pinkie had shot right back onto her hooves and started chucking words out again, “Well that’s easy silly. Matty can stay with Fluttershy seeing as she’s looking after him. Lee can stay with Applejack since she’s got the barn and that’s about the only place that’ll hold him. Connor can stay with Twilight because I think Connor’s the kind of stallion that likes to read and study, Joel can go with Rarity because I’m Pinkie Pie and I’m going to keep Tom!” As soon as she had finished that last part she teleported over to Tom and enveloped him in a tight hug before zipping off into the distance with him, already spouting party plans and personal questions. Once again it took a moment for the other to catch up with what Pinkie had said, but once they had Joel and Rarity started eyeing each other warily, neither one happy about the situation presented to them. “I suppose I can accommodate you, so long as you keep the cursing down to a bare minimum.” Rarity said at last, giving Joel a nasty look. “I can try, but if I hurt myself I might end up swearing.” He admitted, returning Rarity’s stare. She just huffed and turned around before trotting off, “It’s a start, I suppose, follow me.” Joel said his goodbyes to Connor before going off after Rarity, muttering about his luck under his breath. Twilight and Connor just sat there for a moment, neither sure how to proceed. “So...Twilight was it?” Connor pretended to be ignorant of their names so as not to arouse suspicion. Connor’s voice jolted Twilight out of the small zone-out she’d been in and turned her attention to him, “You don’t mind taking me in, do you? It would be a big help.” “I suppose I can house you, we do have some spare room in the library. You’d have to sleep in a sleeping bag for a couple of days though, until we can get a proper bed for you.” She replied, she too a bit wary of her new guest. “Take all the time you need Twilight, I’d hate to be too much of a burden. Shall we head off? I do believe it’ll be dark soon.” Twilight turned to look at the sun and saw that there was only a very small amount still above the horizon. She nodded her agreement, “Yeah, let’s go. I’d best introduce you to Spike, my assistant. Then perhaps get you something to eat, you look like you haven’t eaten anything for a while.” And in accordance to very clichéd and terribly overused circumstance, Connor’s stomach let out a growl. “Heh, I can testify to that.” He laughed, as they too set off across the orchard towards Ponyville. “Ah suppose tha’ I’d better ‘ead off to ‘Shy’s house an’ tell tha’ Lee fella’ he’s kippin’ over ‘ere for a while.” Applejack said as she started to make her way to Fluttershy’s house. Soon, everything in orchard was how it should be, except for one thing. “Erm, guys?!” Rainbow called out, nothing but the sound of nature replying, “What about me!?” Again, nothing. Rainbow scowled, annoyed that she’d been forgotten so easily, and took flight before heading back to her cloudhouse, muttering angrily to herself as she went.
