So Far...

CHAPTER ONE

Me and one of my friends were intensely debating one of the new episodes of My Little Pony. His argument was that the chain of events that happened to Twilight (in her going back in time) is a paradoxical impossibility. I argued that Steven Hawking’s theories would explain for any paradoxes that could occur.

“You see, Arthur” he said, “Twilight put herself in a paradox where the original outcome could no longer exist by going back in time to tell herself where the scrolls are, she could not have continued without the future Twilight explaining to her where the scrolls were, who needed another future Twilight to explain that to her in the past”

“Actually” I conjectured, “Steven Hawking’s multiverse theory clearly calls for infinite possibilities to each possible outcome, therefore when Original Twilight, by any means at any point, traveled back in time, she didn’t warn herself, but rather a Twilight from a parallel universe, because clearly she wasn’t warned by any other Twilight, because she is the original. In which case, the Twilight in the parallel universe was able to go back in time to another parallel universe and warn herself, creating an endless chain.”

“Maybe” he sniffed. “Maybe… But you failed to account for the string theory proposed by…”

“Fuck the string theory!” I barked. “The string theory is a bunch of bologna!”

With that phrase, space and time began weaving around me, and with a sudden burst of sparks I disappeared.

*

Several hours had passed and I woke up in the middle of a field, surrounded by 3 creatures with disproportionately large heads which had disproportionately large eyes.

“Well howdy there stranger!” the yellow face with red hair replied.

I passed out again.

*

As I woke up, I heard some familiar voices

“Now what am Ah gonna do with this here creature?”

“Ah don’t know sis, we jus’ found him in a field while tryin’ to get our cutie marks and we couldn’t jus’ leave him there!”

“I think he’s waking up!” a purple unicorn said.

I stood up and everypony in the library stared at me.

“Hello. My name is Twilight Sparkle. Do you under-stand?” She asked in a slow, choppy voice.

“Um, yeah, I think. I’m not dead am I?”

“Well no, but you seem to have appeared in the middle of a field and we’ve never seen anything like you before…” she paused and thought about my situation for a moment. “You didn’t blaspheme the string theory, did you?”

As usual, we got into a heated argument about physics and time/space and other crap most people are too smart to know.

*

Rainbow Dash rocketed towards me, I estimated going well over 500 kph. As she approached, I heard an audible whistle, and as she passed me, this pitch did not drop a bit. I facepalmed.

“Well then, Arthur, I guess we came to a consensus here.” Twilight gloated.

“Yep” I conceded. “The Doppler Effect has never failed me before.” My credibility shattered, I agreed to accept that the Sun moved through the sky with magic but moreover I have traveled into some parallel universe where ponies ruled- not just any ponies, but the awesomest ponies ever. I guess it wasn’t as bad as it could be. After all, I felt so close to the whole scenario I could just write a story about it. But that was for later. Wait, wut?

Twilight snapped me out of my pensive state.

“You ok there?” she asked.

I didn’t really care that everything I knew- be it quantum physics or calculus- was now down the toilet. What was I going to use all that stuff for anyway? I didn’t want to be a microchemist or a mathematician anyway. I counted my fingers. Two plus two still equaled four. I was at peace.

Rainbow, who was now behind me, giggled at the sight of my fingers.

“I still can’t get used to those silly things!” she exclaimed. “Oh well. Pegasi have wings, unicorns have horns, and hummans have those thingies.”

“… humans.”

“Hummans; humans. Same thing.”

I half-giggled at the thought of the mistransliteration. I guess some words people use just don’t exist in whatever language ponies speak. Like human. Then again, there are some words ponies use that humans don’t have in their dictionaries, like clopping.

“Alright, pick up your shattered ego and let’s go back to the library so I can teach you some REAL information.”

“Well ok” I agreed, seeing as though I really didn’t have anything better to do. Earlier today I woke up here in the middle of a field. At first I thought I was sleeping. But I never woke up. Then I thought I might just be high. Then I saw the red ribbon on my shirt promising I wouldn’t do drugs, which by now has flown off. I just decided to take what’s coming as it came. I really couldn’t think too far into the future, because my logic was well and thoroughly flawed. Well, it is now anyways.

I walked up to the library, and opened the door.

“Oh hi, Pinkie” I said as I walked in.

I turned around, and everypony was staring at me, including Pinkie with her jaw dropped.

“How exactly do you know my name?” Pinkie asked

“And how did you know, of all the buildings in Ponyville, that this one happened to be the library?” Twilight added

“Are you a spy?” Interjected Rainbow.

I thought a bit on how to answer those questions simultaneously without seeming creepy.

“Are you some sort of omniscient alien?” asked Twilight.

“One at a time please. From a show, from a show, no, and alien yes, omniscient no” I replied as best I could.

Twilight looked at me extra funny, deciding whether she was hasty in making me her friend. She sat me down on her couch and interrogated me some more.

“What show? What are you talking about?”

“There’s a show back in my universe/world/planet thing called My Little Pony and…”

“Little? I’m 18…”

There was a pause.

“So you know everything about us?”

“Pretty much”

“You know Applejack works at Sweetapple Acres?”

“Yep”

“And that I am a book worm?”

“Definitely.”

Twilights eyes dilated

“And you know that I masturbate to book catalogs!?!”

“Wait, WHAT? You WHAT?”

Her face grew pink and buried her muzzle in her hooves.

“Never mind…”

I dropped the subject.

“Well to be honest, we have a show on humans too, but I always assumed they were just drawn and animated…”

She flipped on the TV and scrolled through the guide until she came across South Park that was to be on at 9. I facepalmed again, something I seem to do much more often since my arrival. My stomach then rumbled. I haven’t eaten since breakfast.

“Are you hungry?” she asked.

“Actually, I am” I replied

“Well seeing as you are my special guest, I’ll try to see what I can do”

She went into the kitchen… Wait, a kitchen? Ok, not EVERYTHING is depicted on the show.

“You want mayo on your sandwich?” She asked.

“I am your special guest, aren’t I?” I replied.

She smiled and a few moments later brought me a completed sandwich. I examined it hastily and bit into it. Almost immediately I spit out the chunk I bit off.

“What the heck is in this?”

“Let’s see… bread, mayo, some dandelions and daisies…”

I facepalmed again.

“Ok then, tell me what humans normally eat”

I started spitting out foods that popped into my head

“Pizza, burgers, fish sticks, chicken nuggets, ham, oranges…”

“I have never heard of those plants before” She stated.

“Oh, they’re not plant products, most of those are meat products” I said in a partially silly and partially condescending voice, as if I expected any common knowledge to be recognized.

“Did you say MEAT? Like from animals? Like bunnies and cows and… ponies?!?”

I started seeing how this might be viewed as disturbing.

“Well yes but we don’t eat ponies, and bunnies rarely; mostly cows and pigs and chicken.”

Twilight turned a sickly shade of green.

“Don’t you care about their feelings? Do they know you want to eat them?”

“Why, do yours?”

“Well yes, we communicate, verbally or not, with most of our animals…”

Things started to make somewhat more sense. I think.

“Alright, well on Earth, by the way greetings from Earth, that’s where I am from, we don’t communicate with animals and they don’t understand us.”

Twilight seemed to be more at ease with this, however I never did get any meat in my stay as of yet. I eventually ate my sandwich, although the mayo was extra. I decided I had nothing better to do than go out and find a job, maybe earn a few bits and not be such a mooch. Twilight didn’t in particular say I was a burden, but I figured the day would come, preceded by a lot of discomfort for both of us. I went into town and tried to find any help wanted signs. Instead, as I walked through town, everyone- or rather everypony, was staring at me. No doubt I was something to stare at. I had pretty much no hair, relatively speaking, and I stood on my back appendages, causing myself to tower over everypony else. I eventually found a job as a roofer. It wasn’t all that bad, I could be working in the hospital. On my 2nd  day I decided to pay a visit to the hospital, just to see what this “great free healthcare” Twilight was talking about was. Blood doesn’t normally scare me, but there was something about the hospital that reminded me of the first (and only) time I ever watched cupcakes. After about the 30 second mark when the axe came down, I couldn’t bear to look any further. I closed the YouTube page and ran to the bathroom  where I nearly threw up. I guess it wasn’t that I couldn’t bear to see somepony mutilated, maybe it was just that I couldn’t bear to see Rainbow Dash mutilated. She was my favorite after all, but I didn’t tell anypony, not yet anyway.

My job wasn’t half bad, after all swinging with your hands can drive nails in lickety split, whereas it takes about 10 seconds per nail if you happened to be trying to do the same with the hammer in your mouth. Ouch, by the way. 10 bits an hour was pretty good pay for a roofer, though to be honest from watching the show I always thought that the regime was socialist.

When I came back to the library, Twilight jumped, still not used to a big hairless bear waltzing around the place. I’d always have to duck a bit to enter through most doors, as they were intended for those who walked on all fours. Stretched out on the floor, I was about the same length as Twilight, though. She would always be asking me about life on Earth, taking detailed notes. I told her about how the Earth was created some 20 trillion or so years ago and about the dinosaurs who died out and about George Washington.

“Now who is this George Boshington again?”

“He was America’s first president”

“How many presidents are there?”

“45 I think”

“Can you list them all?”

I thought for a bit and then remembered that one song I heard on Nickelodeon on the presidents.

“Washington, Adams, Jefferson…”

“Adams Jefferson?”

“No, John Adams and then the 3rd is Thomas Jefferson. How about you make the list then we number them, if I try to number them through my list I’ll screw something up more likely than not”

“Alright, go on”

“Uhhh… Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Adams, Jackson, Van Buren, William Henry Harrison… He died in a month and couldn’t get much done…”

I thought for a second, unable to use my iphone because there was no internet in Ponyville.

“I remember somewhere in there there was also Millard Fillmore, then after him Pierce, Buchanan, then Abraham Lincoln.”

“So we are up to 13?”

“Well no, Lincoln was our 16th, I’ll remember the ones I missed later.”

I kept on stating them, my tone getting more rhythmic as I continued down the song until I reached Obama.

“So that’s 44, who is the 45th?”

“I don’t know, might not be a 45th if Obama got reelected. I missed the elections with my time here.”

With that my interrogation for the day ended. I climbed upstairs, trying not to bang my head against the hard wooden low ceiling, and climbed into Twilight’s spare bed. It wasn’t too small as I had predicted, but the pillow was stuffed with feathers and not synthetic fiber, which poked out and to some degree nettled me. I could see Twilight a few feet away, automatically picking up a book catalog. She saw me looking at her, dropped the catalog, and pulled her pillow over her head.