Chapters COMING TO GRIPS
Chapter One: A Storied Beginning
Aaron sighed, looking up from his work. Writing these stories wasn't easy, but they were the closest thing he had to being in Equestria himself. If only he could have that chance, to even meet somepony, he could be truly happy. Getting up to get something to eat, he noticed a tiny shimmer in the air, but easily dismissed it as nothing more than a mere trick of the light.
It was nearly six, so it was dinner that Aaron sat down to eat. After a delicious meal of pasta and salad, he returned to his study to continue his writing. It was only then that he saw what stood there watching him. A creature he knew well, of purple hue and powerful magic: Twilight Sparkle herself. She seemed confused, however, looking around without recognizing what she saw.
"What is this place?" She sounded accusatory, almost as though blaming him for her presence.
"This is my house. I live here," Aaron replied. "But what are you doing here? How did you get here, and why have you come? I mean sure, it is an honor to be visited by none other than the princess' protege and the bearer of the Element of Magic, but you must have some reason for coming here?"
Twilight was immediately suspicous of this strange creature. She had never heard of such disproportional, stick-like beings, so how did this one know of her? "How do you know me?" she demanded, aggressively. "And yet you claim to know nothing of my arrival here? I think you have some explaining to do!"
Her horn glowed, the door swung shut, and a chair came up from behind him, forcing Aaron to sit unceremoneously as Twilight's angry eyes bored into his skull.
"First I at least need to know what you're talking about," Aaron protested meekly. "What exactly happened that brought you here? What do you know of this? Because if you know anything about what is going on here, you know more than I do about all this.
"All I know," he continued, "is that we have stories here (best not try to explain television just yet) about what happens in a fictional land we call Equestria, and that your arrival seems to mean that those stories are somehow true. I don't understand this any more than you do, and probably less!"
"So you say you have nothing to do with my appearance here? Nothing to do with my spell going wrong and sending me here?"
"Yes. That is what I am telling you. I don't know how you got here, it's an honor to meet you, and I don't know how you can get back
Dropping his pen to his desk, Tyro stops writing. He shakes his head as his thoughts break apart. What was he doing?
Then suddenly, there she is: Twilight Sparkle herself. In an eerie parallel to his own story, she demands to know where she is and has has happened. Tyro isn't quite sure, but he has a suspicion...
"Let me guess. You were casting a spell that went terribly wrong and now you're here and you don't know why?"
Twilight was speechless for a moment. "Err, yes, that about sums it up. But how did you know?"
"Call it a lucky guess. Now, before you go all crazy on me, let me explain what is going on here. On this world, there are no ponies—at least not like the ones you know, anyway. Most things work like they do in your Everfree Forest; they work without outside help. The sun and moon move by themselves. In short, this world is nothing like the one that you know.
"So I can't help you get home. I can give you food and a place to stay, but that's about all I can do for you. If you want to get home, you're going to have to fix whatever spell brought you here in the first place, if you can."
Twilight remained quiet for some time after this revelation, trying to accept what this "human" was telling her. She might never see her friends again if she couldn't get that spell to work, and she'd have to do it on her own. Sure, she'd done harder tasks before at Princess Celestia' school, but never with so much on the line.
Seeing Twilight become lost in thought, Tyro quietly left the room, threw together a healthy salad, and returning to her, placing it gently where she will be sure to see it. Only then did he return to the kitchen to prepare his own meal.
Chapter 2: Welcome to Reality
Tyro woke up. He'd had the most incredible dream, in which he'd met Twilight Sparkle in his own home. Tyro chuckled to himself. What a crazy thought. As he started making himself some eggs for breakfast, he heard something that made him blink. He wasn't entirely awake yet, so it was understandable that he hadn't realized the truth. When Twilight walked into the room, commenting, "oh, I see you're awake," he very rapidly realized the truth, retaining exactly enough presence of mind to crack a few more eggs into the pan than he normally would.
"Umm, how did you sleep? I trust that the spare bed was comfortable enough?" Tyro nervously tried to fill the empty air with talk, not really sure how to address a unicorn who up until moments before he had been sure had been no more than a dream.
Twilight stopped to confirm her approval and respond to Tyro's attempts at conversation, but quickly moved on to her own concern. "I've been going over the spell that brought me here, but I can't seem to figure out—"
Tyro cut her off. "I would love to hear all about it, but I'm sure you must be hungry, and that will have to come first. No visitor in my house goes hungry while I have anything to say about it!" With that, he served up a plate of breakfast for Twilight's enjoyment, and another (somewhat smaller) plate for himself. It ocurred to him that ponies should technically live on a strictly vegetarian diet, but in the show he had seen ponies eating just about any food they wanted to. Tyro figured the egggs should be an acceptable meal, especially after he added some vegetables to the eggs, along with a single, delicious, red, Washington apple.
Twilight seemed delighted with his offer of breakfast, quickly thanking him for the food. "I don't mean to be a burden or—"
Tyro cut her off, mid-sentence. "Don't you worry about it. Meeting you is worth far more to my than a few bits to buy some food." Tyro silently congratulated himself on thinking to use the Equestrian currency instead of his own. "I need to clean up in the kitchen, so we'll have to talk later." As much as Tyro wanted to stay and keep talking to Twilight, he was still in relative shock that she was there at all. Furthermore, his mind was blank when he tried to think of things to speak with her about. Using the dirty kitchen as a way to get more time just seemed natural, and it was a valid excuse.
As Tyro washed the dirty dishes (save Twilight's own, of course, since she was still eating), he thought about what had happened to him. Was he crazy? Was all of this in his mind, or was Twilight really there? The half-written story on his desk was so similar, it was like it was coming true before his very eyes.
Tyro caught himself. This was not a productive line of thought at all. What he needed to focus on was dealing with the fact that Twilight Sparkle was sitting all of ten feet away in another room. Tyro sighed.
There was one story he had read, called "My Little Dashie," that resonated with his own situation. Sooner or later, Twilight needed to go home, and that would be the end. And this pony was no young amnesiac, either. That end
would have to be soon, whether Tyro wanted that or not. Twilight did not belong in this world, and he had no right to keep her here anyway. She needed to return to Equestria, and he needed to do whatever he could to help her get home. The thought saddened him, but he knew it was the truth.
Returning to Twilight, he sat across from her at the table. "Twilight. As much as I love having you here, you need to go back to Equestria. This world isn't where you belong, and I have no right to keep you away from your friends, who I'm sure are very worried about you.
Twilight looked at Tyro for a long moment. "You're taking this very well, my human friend. I had not been looking forward to telling you I need to go home, but I see you already understand. From what you've told me, my friends and I are quite popular here, and meeting me must have been an exciting time for you. But like you said, I do need to go home."
Tyro nodded at this, in sad agreement. "You need a way to get back to Equestria, though, or none of all that really makes any difference. As far as I can tell, you're stuck here until we can figure out what happened."
When he included himself in that statement, Twilight started a little, blinking. "What do you mean, we ?"
"I mean I'm going to help you in any way I can. I can't have you here, but I can at least know that I was able to help you in some way or another. If I recall, there were a lot of things that Spike was able to help you with, even though he has no actual magical capacity of his own. I can do those things for you, so that you can work without interruption. I'll do whatever it takes to get you back home safely."
As Tyro went on, Twilight's eyes got bigger and bigger, until at his conclusion she burst out, "But why would you do all that for me? You don't even know me!"
"You've forgotten something, Twilight. You may not know me, but I know you very well. You're the kind of pony who would help someone who needs it, friend or not. I admire that, and that's why I will do whatever it takes to help you."
The look on Twilight's face changed slowly, from incredulity to surprise, and finally to understanding. "You are helping me now, because you know I would do the same for you. I can respect that. You humans are noble creatures."
Tyro looked awkward for a moment before making his reply. "No, Twilight." She looked shocked. "We are not noble creatures. We make war on each other, destroy the land, and pollute the seas. We once had honor, and we once had friendship like you do, but those times ended long ago. The Elements of Harmony are all but lost to us. We are terrible, terrible creatures."
Twilight began to protest, but Tyro went on. "It is through great fortune that I was the one to find you. Other humans would not be so friendy as I have been. They would lock you in a cage like an animal, and collect bits from those who want to see you. They would use you for their own ends, and they would certainly never let you go home. I am one of the best of my kind."
Twilight was clearly concerned over this new development. She seemed speechless, so Tyro tried to explain. "You see, there is no Princess Celestia in this world to guide us. There is nothing to keep us honest, kind, loyal, or generous, so we drifted away from those ideals, and our world became a cold, hard place. Unfortunately, we had no Wendigos to freeze our land and make us think about each other. All we have are the stories of Equestria, and few listen to them."
Horrified understanding of Tyro's words swept over Twilight's face. "But what about you?" She seemed a little uncertain, but went on nonetheless, slowly gaining confidence. "You didn't act like all that. You were honest, when you told me about other humans. You were kind, when you offered me a place to stay. You were generous, when you gave me food. And you were loyal, when you didn't betray me to the humans you just told me about. You have the Elements in your heart. So not all humans can be bad."
Tyro was able to respond to that fairly easily. "There are some small number of us who listen to the stories, and we do our best to keep the Elements in mind, in all we do. But we are few, and those with empty hearts are many." Tyro's voice was filled with sadness at this last statement, as he silently wept for all humanity.
Twilight wasn't quite sure how to respond to this, so she quietly excused herself and walked out of the room, back to the spare bedroom where she had slept. Thinking back on what Tyro had told her, she wondered at her luck, to end up somewhere relatively safe in an apparently hostile world.
However, these thoughts did not trouble her for long. No, not when there was a mystery to be solved. She needed to find out what went wrong with her spell. Collecting herself, she left the room to ask Tyro what he knew of what had happened.
When she explained that she was going to work on figuring out what happened, Tyro quickly offered her some thin material for writing on, and a strange-looking tool, presumably to use like a quill. At her confused look, he explained that the device was like a quill that didn't need ink. Twilight resolved to puzzle out the workings of this device—once she found a way to get home.
At her prompt, Tyro began to speak, Twilight carefully taking notes. "Well, all I can really tell you is what I saw. There was this weird thing in the air, and it got bigger until it was a little bigger than you are. The middle part sort of twisted around, like something was pushing reality out of shape. It felt really strange, like being squeezed except it didn't hurt. The center part—I don't know how else to say it—ripped open like a hole in reality, and you came through, and it snapped closed behind you."
Twilight thought for a moment, then started asking questions.
Chapter 3: Going Home
As the discussion went on, Twilight collected more and more sheets of notes on the table. Eventually, she stopped asking, and started thinking about what she knew about the event.
Tyro watched her write and write, occasionally going from simple text into arcane-looking diagrams. She seemed to be recreating the spell she used to get here, which made sense. However, he knew she no longer needed his help, so he left to go make a salad and some beans for lunch.
When he returned with their meals, the table was covered in papers and Twilight looked proud of herself. "I think I've figured it out! The spell is actually designed to make thiks kind of travel possible, but it needs two anchors to work properly, and I only used one! So instead of my destination, it just sent me to a random location, which was right here."
"Uh... what?" Tyro had no idea what she was talking about, apart from there being some thing wrong with the spell. "I have no idea what you're talking about."
Twilight gave him a patient look, then explained, "This spell is designed to allow teleportation between places, even if those places are in sdifferent worlds. The problem is that it needs to have something from each end to anchor the spell. Otherwise, it won't know where to sent the user."
"So it didn't work because you didn't give it the right directions? It should be easy to fix, then, right? You just have to do the spell again to get back!"
"That's the problem. I would need a living focus from Equestria—I can provide that on my own—but I also would need a living focus from this world. The spell transports the one who casts it, but I don't know what would happen to the other focus." I can cast the spell to take me home. I've figured out how it works, but that isn't the problem. The problem is the second focus. I refuse to put somepony else in danger just to get me home."
A long silence passed between the two of them. It was Tyro who finally broke it. "I'm not a pony."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean you said you wouldn't risk putting somepony in danger to get you home. But I'm no pony, and I'm willing to take the chance."
Twilight laughed. "Don't be ridiculous! This spell could kill you, or worse! I won't accept what you're offering. No."
"Twilight. I don't really care what happens to me after this. I've had the chance to meet you, and that's all that matters to me. I'm not waiting for you to ask me. I'm doing this whether you ask me or not."
Twilight looked at him again, bemused. This was something she hadn't expected. But if Tyro was so set on doing this, she might as well let him. It didn't look like she was going to be able to talk him out of it.
She gave him a short checklist of things she would need, and watched as he left the room, already reading it.
"Chalk in several colors, pure water... okay, these make sense... Cookies for Twilight?" Tyro shakes his head, smiling, as he goes to get the supplies—and a bag of cookies.
Returning with the supplies, he sees Twilight looking around at the room, frowning. "I need a bigger area than this to make this work. Tyro brought her out into his empty garage—his car got repossessed last month—and with Twilight's approval, they got to work. Or rather, Twilight got to work and Tyro got to sit on a step watching things flying around his garage. Finally, the activity ceased, and Twilight surveyed her work.
Tyro was startled by Twilight's voice at his side. "Here, have a cookie," she said, relaxed. A cookie floated in front of him, surrounded by a faint purple glow. Chuckling, Tyro took the proferred cookie with a word of thanks.
"Okay. So, we have a number of lines on the floor, but what now?" Tyro suspected he knew what the answer was, but he asked anyway.
Twilight turned to face Tyro, and sighed. "I'm sorry that our friendship has to end today, Tyro, but you know I won't be able to come back. I will never forget what you have done for me in the two days I have known you."
Two days? It felt like a lifetime ago that reality had split around him and brought the unicorn into his life. "I won't forget you either, Twilight Sparkle. You changed my life and brought me happiness."
Twilight led him to the center of a small circle. "I need you to stand here, and try to keep your mind clear." Leaving him, she walked to another circle within the complex diagram. Facing her new friend, Twilight said, at last, "thank you, Tyro. Thank you for everything."
Twilight's horn began to glow, brighter and brighter, magical energy lighting up the lines of chalk, one at a time. When the energy finally reached him, Twilight spoke in some unknown language. Reality twisting around him, he felt a tremendous surge of pain, and everything went black.
Chapter 4: Consequences
Tyro slowly regained consciousness. His whole body was in pain, his eyes wouldn't focus, and his head was pounding.
"Ughh," he groaned. Then he tried to move, and found that he couldn't, not without making everything hurt even more. So he lay there on the ground, waiting for the pain to stop. It didn't.
Eventually he realized that the pain wasn't going to just go away and started focusing more on his situation. He was lying on his back on the ground, unable to move. He could see the sky above him, so he didn't seem to be in his garage anymore. Or maybe the garage didn't exist anymore. That would explain the pain, too.
No, it couldn't be the garage, or the ground would be hard and unyielding. This felt more like dirt. Clearly, Tyro had been moved somewhere by the spell, but where could be anypony's guess.
Tyro's eyes were finally beginning to focus again when an orange head came into view. "Twilight," he moaned, "that isn't funny."
"What, now? I'm not Twilight, I'm Applejack. I see ya must be new 'round these parts, not knowin' everypony... who are you, anyway?"
Tyro said hoarsely. "Applejack? My name's... Tyro. W-where am I?"
"This here's Sweet Apple Acres, Tyro, home of the best apples around. Ya really are lost, aren't ya? Ya mentioned Twilight before, maybe I should take ya ta go see her. Let's go, Tyro!"
Tyro tried to stand up, but it didn't seem to work so well. "Huh. Looks like he's out cold again. Well, I'll just take him to see Twilight myself." With that, she slung him over her back and trotted down the road to the library, to go see Twilight Sparkle.
Twilight was not particularly impressed with this dark red pony Applejack found out in the fields. There didn't seem to be anything wrong with him, at least physically. "You said this pony said he knew me? I've never see him before in my life!"
From Tyro's chair there came a muffled exclamation. "Sweet Celestia, I'm a pony now, am I? When will the madness end?"
That got Twilight's attention. "Now listen, what are you talking about?"
"You don't know me, but I know you." That phrase sounded familiar to Twilight, but she couldn't place it. It was understandable. She had been through a lot since that time.
"Twilight, when he was awake before, he said his name was Tayo, or somethin' like that." Applejack sounded uncertain, but Twilight was horrified. "Tyro, what have I done to you," she cried out. "If I had only known..."
Applejack sounded irritated. "Will somepony tell me what in Celestia's name is goin' on here?"
Twilight sighed sadly. "Applejack, this is Tyro."
"Well ah figured that out already!"
"Tyro... I owe him a great deal, I'm afraid, because I've done a terrible, terrible thing. When I went missing a few days ago, I told you the spell didn't work right, remember?"
"Yeah, but ah don't see what that has to do with Tyro here—"
"I'm getting to that. The spell didn't just send me somewhere else in Equestria. It sent me to a completely different world. Tyro was willing to trust himself in the grip of an unknown spell, just to get me home. I knew it might do something to him, but not this!"
"So, are you tellin' me that this here pony is from a different world?"
Gathering his strength, Tyro spoke. "Yes, Applejack. I am from a world... a world where the Wendigos never came and forced everypony to work together. And I didn't used to be a pony, either. I guess I'm one now, though..."
Applejack blinked.
Tyro went on. "It's not so bad as you're probably thinking, Applejack. That world was dying. I'm happy to be here. That place held nothing for me. In fact, I would rather be here anyway. Twilight, I'm not blaming you for what happened. I'm thanking you. I think I need to rest now, though." With that, he closed his eyes and was soon asleep.
Chapter 5: The Truth Revealed
Tony put down his pen, thinking to himself. Who do I think I am, anyway? I'm not fooling anyone with all this except myself. No matter how much I want to be, I know I will never be Tyro. I will never have a fictional character come out of a portal needing my help to get home, and I will certainly never get to go to Equestria. So who do I think I'm kidding with all of this? Just because it happens in a story doesn't mean it can be real. Not even if the story itself says it can be. When all is said and done, it's just a story, and nothing more. A fantasy, a wish.
This is reality, though. There is no magic in the real world, and there are no talking ponies, either. By writing a story about my own desire fulfilled, did I really think that could make it happen in the real world?
I will never have the chance that Tyro had, because Tyro was never real. Neither is Twilight Sparkle, and at some level I'm going to have to accept that. This is the real world, and things like that don't happen here.
Silently, Tony rose from the bench at the park. It was his favoite place to write, because it was filled with happiness and cheer by to children who played there. But now, it only seemed to be taunting him, reminding him that he could never have the happiness he wanted more than anything. He walked quickly down the path to leave the too-cheerful atmosphere, never once looking back.
And so he never saw the slight shimmer in the air near the bench.
AUTHOR'S NOTE
Many of my readers here have expressed an interest in the continuation of Tyro's story. I have alway been one to heed such requests, especially when I'd already been considering something along those lines.
However, this is a story about Tony, not one about Tyro. Tony's story is over, and he will not be heard from again. If you wish to continue the story of Tyro's life in Equestria, I have begun a new story that picks up where Tony left off. This new story, called Tyro's Tail , is a work in progress. I really haven't decided where to go with it yet, but hopefully it will appeal to your interests.
Thanks for reading!