Chapters The Other Draconiquus - Story 1: Imaginary Friend
It begins one night, when Twilight was seven years old, and her parents and brother had to be somewhere important, but they hired a foal sitter to watch her. This was before Princess Cadence was Twilight’s favorite foal sitter, so there was always someone new every time.
This one in particular was late in showing up, as it had already been 15 minutes since her parents and sibling had left and still no sign of her anywhere.
Twilight was passing the time waiting by reading a book on the mythology and legends of the Draconiquui (what awful things it said about how they treated ponies), when suddenly she felt a strong cold breeze coming from inside the living room, which was blowing on the pages of the book, making her loose her focus on it. She looked in the direction of the breeze, knowing that she didn’t leave a window open anywhere, when she saw a rather bizarre sight.
A large blue box was in the corner of the room, but in some kind of state between being there and not being there at all, and yet in the process of materializing. There was an odd vwoomp vwoomp noise as it came into being.
When it was fully solid, Twilight went up to it to get a better look at it. It was had two handles on one side, as though they were doors that opened up. On one of these doors, had a sign, which read PULL TO OPEN. At the top of each side of the box read the words POLICE PUBLIC CALL BOX.
Twilight was about to attempt to open the door, when it opened from the inside. In the wrong direction. And out came, a draconiquus.
“Hello, Twilight Sparkle!” he exclaimed. “I’m your foal sitter for tonight! You can call me, ‘L’. ” He paused. “Where are your parents? I was hoping to see them off before they left. What time is it? Did they leave already?”
This particular draconiquus had the head of a blue pony, with strangely normal pony eyes, although one is pink and the other is yellow, a green curly mess of a mane, no beard, no fangs sticking out of his mouth (unusual for a draconiquus, judging from what her book said), one ear of a rabbit, the other matched his pony head, and no horns. His left arm was the left foreleg of a leopard, his right arm was the right foreleg of an iguana, tail of a fox, and both wings appeared to be those of a dragon, both red fingered and purple membrane. Over his torso he wore a coat made up of mismatched fabrics, an undershirt, which equally didn't match, a bow tie, which also didn't match, over his legs he wore pants which also didn't match with everything else. On each hoof he wore very peculiarly shaped shoes.
Twilight was too surprised and afraid to move or respond.
"Hey, are you okay?" he asked her.
"You... you’re... you’re a..." she sputtered.
L reached down and zipped her mouth shut. Literally. "Let me stop you right there. Before you get under the impression that I want anything bad to happen to you, and that you should be afraid of me, I'm going to tell you this right now. I am NOT your enemy, Twilight. I don't want to do anything bad to you, Twilight, nor anypony else for that matter. I'm not like those others that you have read about in that book."
He snapped his fingers and the book appeared in his leopard paw, and he read aloud the title: "Draconiquui: the Myth and Their Horrible Treatment of Ponies. I must say that the Draconiquui have changed their ways since the last time they had any contact with ponykind. We no longer wish to throw your world into chaos, or enslave you. Instead, today I have come here, to your home, in an attempt to make peace between us. If ponies can see for themselves that we're not complete monsters anymore, and can actually be very responsible and logical beings, they'd be more willing to negotiate with us to bring about peace between our kinds. Do you understand? I know you can't speak right now with your mouth zipped up and all but just nod if you mean yes."
Twilight nodded frantically. L bent down and unzipped her lips. She took a deep breath, and exhaled.
"Just give me a chance, Twilight. If I fail, if tonight doesn't go as well as I had hoped, or the negotiations are unsuccessful, at the very least let's be able to say we gave it a good effort."
"Sure, but would you mind telling me as to how your kind survived their supposed extinction so many years ago?"
"Extinction? Hardly. But before we get into that, have you eaten already? Are you hungry?"
"Not really. We had dinner already before my parents and Shining Armor left."
"Well then, let me rephrase that question." He snapped his fingers and had teleported into the dining room, a bunch of tea pots and tea cups placed out sporadically on the table. He was now wearing a sick green coat, a dark green undershirt, a blue bow tie, dull green pants, brown worn out shoes, and a green top hat with a large tag with the size, 10/6, still attached. "Would you care for a cup of tea?" he asked as he poured the tea into one of his ear, which the sweet brown refreshment came out the other, and landed poured into a tea cup being held in his opposite hand.
"Um, sure. I suppose I could go for that." She walked over to the table and sat on one of the cushions, and poured herself a cup with her bare hooves.
"Um, you're a unicorn, right? Why don't you use your magic to levitate the teapot?"
"I'm still a little filly, silly. I haven't much mastery over my magic just yet."
"Oh, that makes sense, I suppose. And speaking of making sense, how about something that doesn't? A riddle. Why is a raven like a writing desk?"
Twilight was delighted by the prospect of having something to use her brain power to figure out, that she wasted no time in getting to it. After several minutes, she said, "I give up. Why is a raven like a writing desk?"
To this, L responded: "Because there is a B in 'both' and an N in 'neither'."
Twilight blinked three times before responding. "I think I might have misheard you on that one."
"No, you heard me correct. I told you before that riddle doesn't make sense. It's actually a riddle that has a question but no official answer. People have been coming up with many of their own answers to it. If you want one that actually makes sense, but is a bit meta of an author whose work hasn't been officially published in Equestria yet: 'Because Poe wrote on both.' "
"People?"
"Another species, who refer to themselves as people."
"Oh. And how can a riddle with no answer be so popular?"
"That is EXACTLY the reason why it's so popular! Plus it was written in a popular children's book called Alice in Wonderland. And... Oh, how silly of me! Alice in Wonderland was never published in Equestria. Every reference I make to it is completely lost on you, isn't it?"
"Pretty much."
L considered a thought for a moment. "Wait right here," he then said to her. "I'll be back in five minutes or less." He then waked into his blue box, pushing the door open instead of pulling it like the sign says to.
Twilight waited for a few minutes, and then L came back out of his box holding a small volume, titled: "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" by Lewis Carol. On the cover there was a strange creature, standing on two legs, wearing a blue and white dress, with a blonde mane, and digits on its front hooves. It was looking at a large grinning cat curled up on a tree branch.
"How would you like for me to read you a story, Twilight? Now, before you say anything about preferring to read it yourself, I must inform you that you have never truly experienced a story until you have heard it read aloud by a Draconiquus. You'll be glad that I was reading it aloud. I guarantee it."
"Alright."
L opened the book to the first page and began to read aloud:
"Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, 'and what is the use of a book,' thought Alice, 'without pictures or conversations?'..."
The Other Draconiquus - Story 1: Imaginary Friend
Draconiquus storytelling is the most remarkable, beautiful, immersive, and unexplainable experience you one can ever have in being told a story. It is in fact one of the top 100 abilities specific only to one particular species that are the most pleasurable to others around them.
What's so great about it? I'm glad you asked.
Draconiquus storytelling is unique in that the listener isn't stuck having to imagine everything going on in the story in their minds, for the sound of a draconiquus telling a story gives the listener a very unique sort of hallucination, in which allows one to believe they're actually seeing the events of the story play out in front of them. They see the story unfold as an observer following the main character(s) in everywhere they go, watching everything they do, as long as it is actually written about in the actual text. Even with seeing, hearing, and smelling all of the action that goes on in the story, they can still hear the voice of the Draconiquus as the narrator in the background, so not a single word in the narrative goes unheard.
This allows for the listener to become more emotionally involved in the story as a whole, as well. One who might be able to read a story with a sad ending by themselves and not shed a single tear, will be bawling their eyes out when the same story is read aloud to them by a draconiquus. Any feeling of happiness, anger, envy, hatred, awe, fear, bliss, etc., that the main character(s) feel, the listener feels just as much of said emotion as they do. They become more fond of the characters themselves. It is simply a beautiful emotional ride, that no other form of storytelling could ever manage to come anywhere close to.
If you ever become friends with a draconiquus, ask him/her to read you a story. Choose one of your own favorites, or let him/her read you one of his/hers. Believe me you will not regret it. You won't even care about how many hours you had spent in that hallucination, how many appointments you missed because of it. It will have been completely worth it!
Sadly, however, audio recordings of these readings seem to negate the hallucinogenic effects of hearing it in person, and so once the draconiquus finishes the story, the experience is lost forever except in memory.
This is how Twilight Sparkle experienced for the first time Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. She felt herself falling down the rabbit hole right next to Alice. She shrank and grew in size every time that Alice did. She smelled the fresh scents coming from all the plants that Alice went by. She was at a loss for words on how to describe the experience later on.
"That was... that was... amazing..." was all she could get out, after the story was over, and the hallucination wore off. "I've never heard of any kind of magic like that before! I'd love to be taught how to do that!"
"Sorry, Twilight. It's a kind of magic that only draconiquui have. Not chaos magic, necessarily, as it can be explained scientifically. The audio waves of a draconiquus voice have a very peculiar hallucinogenic compound inside them, in which, when they are reciting any kind of narrative, be it a short story, a novel, a poem, or a song, those who are around at the time to listen begin to believe that they're actually a third party witnessing the narrative take place before them. Well, I say third party rather loosely, because if the story is told in either first person or second person the listener takes on the role of the main character."
"What's second person?"
"It's when the story's main character has no name, because he/she is supposed to be the reader him/herself, the narrator will speak in second person by referring to the main character as 'you'."
"I've never read a book like that."
"I doubt you would have. Anyway, you are the first Equestrian pony in history to have heard this story. It just so happens that, at this point in time, the race who wrote this book have yet to make official extraterrestrial contact, but when they do, they begin to publish translated copies of their own works to many other planets of the world. It just so happens, that, three hundred years later, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carol became the second highest selling children's book of all time."
Twilight's jaw dropped in awe.
"Don't believe me, take a look for yourself." He opened the book to its copyright page, and pointed to where it said the following:
Original Publication: Earth year 1869 A.D. (393 years before first Equestria edition).
First Equestria Publication, Year 1242 C.R.
"But, this hasn't even been published yet! How could you even own this book?"
"Normal ponies do things in chronological order. I'm neither normal, nor pony."
"But that's impossible!"
L snapped his fingers, and an orange with a slice missing, and frog legs appeared on the table. "Oh look, an orange frog. Your argument is invalid."
The frog went ribbit.
"You change that frog back to normal at once!"
"I wasn't the one who made him like this in the first place."
A fruit fly flew close to what it thought was an ordinary orange, in hopes of a nice meal, completely oblivious to the fact that it was flying towards its bane.
"Oh, then who did?"
The frog shot out its tongue and reeled the fruit fly inside of him.
"Spoilers."
The frog began to hop across the table knocking over and smashing up the tea pots that L set out on it.
"Spoilers?"
"Okay, I'll make this easy for you to understand. I'm a time traveler, which is how I got that book that hasn't been published yet, and that is how I do things outside of chronological order. And when I answer a question with just the word 'Spoilers', that means that the answer is an event that happens in your future, and you have to find out for yourself in your own time. Telling you could cause the sort of chaos that even the draconiquui who lived back thousands of years ago strictly forbid." He proceeded to pick up the orange frog as it hopped his way. "But, I can tell you that sometime after this frog was turned into this, he (well, technically he's now an it, but I call it 'him' just so as to not be rude) has become my pet."
Twilight considered this for a moment. "Well, I guess they at least had some sense of order after all. So, you're a time traveler? What's time travel like? Does it hurt? Do I ever make a significant contribution to my species? No wait, that's a spoiler. What-"
L placed one long iguana digit on Twilight's mouth, which is universally known to mean "be quiet". Twilight wasn't even sure how it was physically possible for him to be doing this while still sitting in his seat.
"Yes, I'm a time traveler. Time travel is complicated. Chaotic, and very complicated. No, time travel itself doesn't hurt, but what you do in the past or future certainly can. And although I can tell you nearly nothing about it, I can, however, say that your own contribution to ponykind will be remembered forever. Let that be a very encouraging thought to remember in the future."
These last two sentences made Twilight happy. That was the most wonderful thing anypony had ever said to her at that point in time. Tears of joy began to form in her eyes.
And then a loud thump was heard upstairs, ruining the beautiful moment.
The Other Draconiquus - Story 1: Imaginary Friend
Twilight Sparkle jumped in surprise, and let out a yelp of fright. “Warn me next time you do something like that!” she yelled at him.
“I didn’t do that,” responded L.
“Then what was it?”
“Dunno. Shall we investigate?”
“No. Mother told me that whenever you hear a strange noise outside, or even in the house, don’t go out and investigate it alone.”
“But you won’t be alone, Twilight. I’ll be right there with you, I’ll even go first if you wish.”
“Really?”
“Really. Now, come on.”
He led her to the stairs, up to the library tower. It is strange to know that, just like in her days in Ponyville, when she was a filly in Canterlot, she lived in the town library as well. Seems like it’s true what they say: “the more things change, the more they stay the same.”
When they got inside, they saw the devastation that had just occurred. There was a huge hole blown into a wall with a bookcase, spreading wood, books, pages and other debris all over the room, and a strange pod, which is apparently what had blast through the wall, had crashed landed onto the floor, making it bend downward. It was hot.
“What in Equestria did you do to this place!??!” exclaimed Twilight.
“I didn’t!” responded L, on the defensive.
“Did you at least know this was going to happen?”
“No.”
“Great! You have a time machine, know so much about my future, and yet you didn’t even know that my library was going to be destroyed on this night!”
“I’m sorry. But I didn’t.” He took a closer look, being careful not to get too close to it. “It looks like there’s something inside it. Twilight, fetch me a bucket of water. Make it about eight buckets. I’m gonna cool this sucker off and get it open.”
Twilight did as she was told, but she could only find one bucket, so she filled it, brought it up, had L splash the pod with it, and brought it back down, and repeated seven more times. It let out quite a lot of steam, but finally, it was cool enough to touch.
L pulled out a strange short silver rod with a blue tip from his inner coat pocket. He held it out to the door of the pod, and pressed a button. A high-pitched humming noise came from the rod, as he held it to a panel on the side. The door opened up with a soft hiss as pressure was released.
“What is that thing?” asked Twilight, referring to the rod that L was just about to re-pocket.
“A Sonic Screwdriver,” he stated, more focused on what was inside the pod at the time. “And this looks like it is an egg. A dragon egg to be precise.” He pulled a large light purple egg with darker purple polka-dots out of the pod. He took a moment to thoroughly investigate it. “I wonder,” he said to himself.
He then noticed something else inside the cockpit. He gently set the egg down on the ground, and pulled the other object out of it. It was an envelope made of parchment paper with a single letter “L”, written with a feather pen. He opened the envelope and read the single piece of parchment paper inside of it. Twilight never found out what was written in that letter, but whatever it was, it was making L on the verge of tears. When he was done reading it, he held the parchment paper to his chest, and a single tear fell from his left eye.
“What does it say?” asked Twilight, curiously.
L turned to her and simply said, “Spoilers.”
"That again?"
"It's not good for one to know too much about their own destiny, Twilight. But, I will say this, I think you should keep that egg. Your whole future depends on it."
"How am I supposed to keep a dragon egg? What do I do when it hatches? How can I possibly take care of a giant, fire-breathing dragon?"
"He will start out as a baby, and it will take him hundreds of years for him to get to the size that you're thinking of. Also, they're only mean and dangerous because they're normally brought up not to know any better. You can bring him up to be less dragon-like and more pony-like. Your own mother did the same."
"What happened to her dragon?"
"It died in an accident. A terrible, stupid, chaotic accident. Which I had no part in." He added for good measure. "It will be different with him."
"You keep saying 'him', as though you know it's going to be a boy."
"I do." He stopped himself before he ended up giving an even bigger spoiler. "Don't ask me any more about it. Now let me get this library fixed up. He snapped his fingers, and the entire crash event happened in reverse. Every book, page, every splinter of wood and other debris went back to their proper place, while the pod flew back to wherever it came from. The only sign of it ever having been there was the egg still lying on the ground near Twilight's hooves.
Twilight was now going around, investigating the room, disbelieving that everything could have gone back exactly the way it was.
"I'll go find something for you to carry that egg downstairs with. I know you don't know levitation just yet, and it would be impossible for you to walk on two legs while holding onto something as delicate as an egg with the others. I'll be right back." He paused before going downstairs. "I'm certainly glad that this isn't a Grim Dark fic, otherwise those would have been terrible last words," he said to reader. The Narrator reminded him that he was not allowed under any circumstances to break the fourth wall like that. "Shut up, Narrator! I'll say whatever the hay I want!"
"Who are you talking to?" asked Twilight.
"Nopony important. See you in a few minutes." He went downstairs.
He came back up a few minutes later with a wicker basket, with a handle and a few cloths and a pillow inside, so as to form a sort of carrying nest. He set the basket next to the egg, picked up the egg, and placed it inside, resting the tip of the egg on the pillow, and wrapping a cloth on top of the base. "There you go, little guy," he said. "All nice and snug."
"He's an egg. He can't hear you."
"And how would you know? Have you ever been an egg?"
"Of course not!"
"I rest my case."
He picked up the basket, and led Twilight down the stairs, back to her living room. "You know, there were these scientists in some other planet who were doing these brainwave scans on an egg once. As the egg rolled of the table and fell to the ground, they managed to decipher a very clear thought out of its mind. The thought was: 'Oh, no. Not again.'... No, wait, that was bowl of petunias. Never mind."
"You're off your rocker!"
"And loving every minute of it!" He paused in front of the door. "Although the actual seconds are a bit dull." He opened the door and brought himself, the egg, and Twilight inside. "Now, um, I forgot to ask. What time are you supposed to be in bed tonight?"
"8:30."
L looked at the clock. It read 8:25. "Looks like we're going to be cutting it a bit close. It's time that you started getting ready for bed. Go on, brush your teeth, and whatever else you have to do, and get in it. But first, show me where your room is, so I can set this down on a desk or something."
They did all of this.
L went into Twilight's room, and tucked her in. He kissed her on the forehead. "Good night, Twilight Sparkle," he said, softly. She closed her eyes, as he walked to the light switch and switched it off. "And goodbye, my love," he added, under his breath, not realizing that Twilight had heard him, and would fall asleep pondering over these last four words.
This was only the first time Twilight had ever seen L. But it was the last time L would ever see her.
The Other Draconiquus - Story 1: Imaginary Friend
This is the story of a mare named Twilight Sparkle.
Or rather, this is the story of somepony else, as Twilight Sparkle knew them, and the strange course of events that occurred in her life because she knew them.
When Twilight was a little filly, she had no interest in making any friends besides her own brother, Shining Armor. She was more interested in immersing herself in books, and putting an unhealthy effort into building up her magical abilities. It was because of this “eggheaded” behavior that she became Princess Celestia’s favorite protégée, and later alicorn princess.
One day, she was sent to Ponyville by the princess, ordered to make some friends. She was very reluctant to do so, but, after discovering that she and five other ponies represented the elements of harmony, and defeating a powerful foe, she accepted them as her friends.
One other day, they had to save the order of Equestria from the tyranny of a chaotic god, named Discord. Discord was a draconiquus, a creature with a body made up of an assortment of animals.
Twilight Sparkle never mentioned it to her friends, but once, when she was a little filly, she had what she thought was a dream, about having met a different draconiquus. Her parents and brother all believed that this was simply an imaginary friend she had come up with after reading too much mythology.
They could not have been more mistaken.
For this draconiquus is the non-pony, of which this story is about.
This is the story of a draconiquus known as L, as Twilight Sparkle knew him.
Not much is known about L, except that this single draconiquus’s enigmatic initial has appeared in many conspiracy theories about the events in Equestria’s history, and claiming that he is Princess Celestia’s greatest secret ally. This is probably why so much of Equestria’s history is virtually unknown to the general public.
Many of these conspiracies have him show up whenever the planet is in danger of extraterrestrial encounters/invasions, and leads Equestria to the path that would allow it to see another day.
Because Twilight Sparkle has no interest in conspiracies, she, like many other ponies, has been spending her life utterly blind to the truth that would have been so blatantly obvious otherwise, despite having met L in person.