My Beautiful Dark Twisted Reality

Too Close

“That’s a wonderful idea. Everypony gather around me and I will return us to Ponyville,” Celestia said. We all complied, some quicker than others. I had no idea how standing close to the princess would get us out of the castle.

“Brace yourselves, this may be disorienting,” she advised. With that, a blinding flash preceded the feeling of getting, pushed, pulled, and twisted in every direction at once. Disorienting didn’t even begin to describe the experience.

I felt myself stop moving before I could see anything. Rubbing my eyes to get the dark spots out of my eyes took me a few seconds. When my vision fully returned, I saw that I was back in the town hall, but on the stage instead of the far end of the room.

I was giving the idea that magic was a thing here more credibility, since it did a much better job explaining what just happened the past few hours than anything else I could come up with.

The assembled ponies had all silenced themselves at our sudden entrance, then cheered upon seeing their princess alive and well. Their cheering gave way to silence again as they looked to the stage, awaiting something.

“Sorry for the delay, my little ponies, but it is with great pleasure that I now announce the beginning of the Summer Sun Celebration,” Celestia said. The cheering returned, louder than before.

“What’re you waiting for? Let’s party!” Pinkie said.

And party they did.

Music almost immediately started blaring from speakers by a pony on a turntable, food was set up around the edges of the room, and balloons and streamers fell from the ceiling.

I immediately went for the food since I hadn’t had anything to eat all day. I found a plate and began stacking it with brownies, cookies, cake, and other foods that were clearly part of a healthy breakfast. I moved on to filling a cup with punch, ponies moving out of my way and giving nervous glances to either me or their friends nearby. Once I got my drink, I took my spoils to a corner of the room and sat down, wasting no time going to work.

I wonder if I can make this into a chain, I mused while I bit into a cookie. The necklace wasn’t bad, it was actually pretty nice. But I’d rather wear a chain than a necklace if I was going to be wearing it consistently.

Also, Elements of Harmony isn’t a good enough name for them. Something like Pimpin’ Jewelry of Kickass is more appropriate.

My thoughts continued on this path for some time. Pinkie came over to see if I was enjoying the party. I answered in the positive; I wasn’t really into socializing with people, and doing so with ponies was lower on my list of interests.

As I was finishing my food and about to get seconds, I saw that I had company. “How long have you been there?” I asked the mint green unicorn. Her unblinking stare and smile were creeping me out.

“Only a couple minutes,” she said. “What’s that?”

“This?” I said, pointing to the necklace.

“Yeah.”

“I’m told it’s called an Element of Harmony, but I don’t really kn-“

“Not that. The thing on the end of your foreleg,” she clarified.

“You mean my hand?” I asked as I wiggled my fingers. She nodded without saying anything. “It’s not much. I use it to grab stuff, mostly.”

“Hands...” she said dreamily. Wherever my hand, her eyes followed. This gave me an idea. I moved my hand around her head, making her eyes dart around to watch it like I would with a cat. This entertained me for a little bit, before I remembered that I had more food to devour.

“Can I...can I touch it?” she asked right before I left.

“I guess.” I have no idea why I was letting this stranger touch my hand, but I’ve made worse decisions.

The unicorn squeaked with excitement before grabbing my hand with her front hooves. Then, she started rubbing it across her face.

“It’s so nice,” she told me. “I can’t imagine how great life must be with hands. I wish I had my own.”

“I’m rather fond of it myself,” I said while mentally recoiling from the image of a pony with hands in place of hooves.

“Can I have my hand back?” Seriously. The staring and smiling was creepy, but this was reaching levels that were exponentially higher on that scale.

Unfortunately, my words fell on deaf ears, with my hand still being rubbed against a pony’s face against my will. Finally, I jerked my hand away from the unicorn and started walking to the food table.

“No! Come back!” she cried.

I ignored her and went on my merry way. I resolved to avoid her for the rest of the party if I could help it.

Back at the food table, I found Pinkie eating cake. Not the conventional way, however. No, she was eating them whole, even though one of them was definitely bigger than her head.

I guess more food is out of the question, I thought with a sigh. Oh well, I can try to socialize.

“Hey Pinkie, what’s up?” I greeted her.

“Oh, just enjoying these super-duper scrumpdiddlyumptious cakes right here,” she said. “Did you make any new friends in the corner? Did you make friends with the corner?”

“I met this green unicorn who was strangely interested in my hands, but other than that no,” I said.

“You must’ve met Lyra! She can be kinda weird sometimes, but she’s really nice,” she said, walking away from the table.

“The only adjective I’d use to describe her right now is creepy,” I said as I followed her. “She started out by staring at me for a few minutes, then rubbed my hand on her face.”

“Don’t worry, you’ll like her when you get to know her better.”

“I hope you’re right.”

Pinkie led me to a group with the other ponies I could name and the princesses. They were listening to Celestia tell them something.

“...shall remain in Ponyville to give me weekly reports on your findings of the magic of friendship,” I caught her saying.

“Thank you so much, Princess. I won’t let you down,” Twilight said.

“You never do, my faithful student. Now if you’ll excuse us, my sister and I need to return to Canterlot. Before we leave, however, could each of you take off your Elements? They’ll be safe until they’re needed again,” Celestia said.

I took mine off, while all the others had theirs levitated off before floating towards the princess. I held mine out, which levitated off to join its companions.

“Thank you. Now, Luna, our chariot awaits.” She chuckled a little as she said the last part.

After she left, Applejack spoke up. “Well Twilight, Ah think it’s great that you’re stayin’ in Ponyville for the long haul. You’re gonna love it here.”

“It really is a fabulous small town,” Rarity added.

“I’m sure it is, and it’s great that I have such great friends here, too,” Twilight said. Then she turned to me, “But what about you?”

“What about me?” I was puzzled.

“Rainbow Dash told me that you just showed up one day, so you must be new to this town, too,” she said. “But you don’t seem to have a place to live.”

“You’re new here, too!? I have to get a welcome to Ponyville party ready for you, too!” Pinkie yelled.

“I’d prefer if you didn’t,” I told her. “Anyways, I slept at Fluttershy’s last night, but I’m homeless as of right now.”

“That simply will not do!” Rarity said. “Any friend of mine is welcome to stay the night should they need it.”

“We got plenty a space over at Sweet Apple Acres,” Applejack said. “You could stay with us until you get your hooves under ya.”

“Ooh! It could be like a sleep over every night,” Pinkie said. “Well, as long as the Cakes say it’s okay.”

“There’s a spare room in the library,” Twilight said. “This could be a great learning opportunity for both of us.” Something about the way she said learning experience was strange to me, but I ignored it since I was being offered a place to sleep.

“You can stay with me if you want to,” Fluttrershy said. “Unless you don’t want to, that is.”

“Don’t look at me,” Rainbow Dash said. “My house is made out of clouds. There’s no way you could get up there.” I’d just have to take her word for that. Surprisingly, it wouldn’t be the weirdest thing I’ve seen.

“Thanks, guys. You don’t have to do this for me,” I said.

“Nonsense!” Rarity declared. “We would be completely remiss if we were to deny help to a friend in need.”

Everyone else voiced their agreement with Rarity. Before I could thank them again, a new voice joined our group’s.

“There it is! That’s the one I’ve been talking about, the one with the hands,” the voice said, sighing out the last word.

“I don’t see what’s so great about them. They just look like stubby claws without any of the pointiness,” a different voice said.

Turning, I saw the same unicorn that had tried to keep my hand from earlier. Lyra, that’s what Pinkie said her name was. She was joined by an off-white pony with blue and pink hair in weird curls. I assumed this was the one who was skeptical about my greatness.

“You can’t touch my hand again, if that’s what you’re thinking,” I told her, trying to solve the problem before it begins.

“Why not?” she whined.

“Because I said so!” Wow, I’m beginning to sound like a parent talking to their child.

“Just drop it, Lyra,” her friend said. “It’s really not worth it.”

“It is worth it! Once you experience hands, there’s no way you can go back,” Lyra said. I agreed with her opinion, but I’m not gonna tell her if it can get me away from her.

“Now, put your hands where I can feel ‘em,” she demanded.

“No,” I said.

“I didn’t want it to come to this, but you leave me no choice,” she said. Then her horn started glowing, and my hand started, too. Then, my hand was being pulled towards her, completely against my control. I pulled back, not wanting to let my hands fall into her...hooves, I guess.

“Give. Me. My. Hand. Back.” I grunted while we were locked in a stalemate.

“Not. Until. I. Have. It.” she said.

This continued for a minute or so, neither of us moving an inch. Finally, Lyra’s friend batted her on the horn, which released the force on my hand. With nothing to fight against, I stumbled backwards a few steps, ultimately falling over.

“Leave the poor thing alone, it clearly doesn’t want you to touch its hands, so you should respect its personal space,” she said.

Lyra didn’t appear to be hearing any of her friend’s (expert) advice. She was walking closer to me, with a crazy look in her eyes.

I got up and started backing away, not willing to break my line of sight with her. She just started walking faster, which made me back away faster.

Suddenly, she broke into a run, moving faster than I could backwards.

Are you ready for some football? I thought. I waited until she was only five feet from me, then juked to the side and started running in the opposite direction. I weaved through the crowd, making a beeline for the nearest exit. Towards the end, I actually hurdled over one of the ponies, earning a shocked gasp from my “victim.”

I burst outside the door without stopping, eyes darting around to find somewhere to run. The road I was on was rather wide, which didn’t offer much in the way of hiding places.

“Your hands will be mine!” I heard from behind me, signaling Lyra’s emergence from town hall.

“Never!” I yelled. Glancing back, I saw she was gaining on me. Taking a hard cut, I turned right down the first road I could. I figured changing directions frequently would give me an advantage against a quadruped, basing it off absolutely nothing but a hunch.

As I ran, every song I could think of that had the word ‘run’ in it popped into my head.

Run, run, run, run...

Too slow.

Let me see if you can run it, run it

This isn’t a party.

A little sprintin’ motherfucker that they won’t catch

That’s more like what I’m looking for.

With my song choice solidified, I continued trying to get away from the deranged unicorn. There weren’t a lot of ponies in the streets, but the ones I did see stopped what they were doing to watch the strange spectacle unfolding. It definitely wasn’t every day that you saw a human on the run from a unicorn who just wants to touch his hands.

I took a turn at almost every opportunity available, at one point doing a lap around the same block three times because it was convenient. The whole time, Lyra kept up her pursuit and chatter, which I sometimes responded to.

“Let me have it!”

“No!”

“But I want it!”

“That’s too bad!”

“I must feel it on my face again!”

I didn’t want to say anything to that, so instead I focused on getting away from the obsessed unicorn.

Finally, after what felt like a couple of miles, I lost my pursuer. I gradually slowed to a stop as I caught my breath. I had no idea where I was, but that was okay with me as long as I didn’t see Lyra.

Once my breathing was back to normal, I took the opportunity to inspect my surroundings. The buildings all looked similar, light brown wood with a darker brown trim and thatch roofs. Some of them had signs that labeled them as stores, such as the oddly specific Quills & Sofas, while others weren’t. I assumed the ones that were unmarked were houses.

There were also ponies around, and they were much more diverse than the houses. Color coordination didn’t seem to be a concern, as there were some color combinations I’d never suggest, like a light purple body and teal hair.

They weren’t doing anything spectacular; most were standing around talking, walking and talking, or sitting and talking. One was watering flowers, using its mouth to carry the watering can.

None of them seemed to be particularly interested in getting near me, giving me a noticeable berth. Whenever I looked towards any of them, eyes were averted and conversations became much more interesting.

I wasn’t bothered by this, because I wasn’t planning on talking to anyone. I wasn’t planning on doing anything, actually. I was still lost, so wandering aimlessly was all I could do until I found something I recognized.

Rounding a corner, I bumped into something I recognized. It was green, with aquamarine hair and yellow eyes. And it happened to be very happy to see me, if its smile was anything to go by.

“I found you,” Lyra said, singing the second word. Then she got right in front of me, obviously making a move for my hands. I held them up as high as I could, out of her reach.

Running probably wasn’t an option this time. Even if it was, I didn’t really want an encore of my earlier performance. So I admitted defeat.

“All right, here’s the deal,” I said. “You can have one hand for fifteen seconds as long as you promise to leave me alone afterwards. Otherwise, you’re gonna learn another thing that hands can do. Understand?”

She nodded, her smile (somehow) growing larger as I lowered my right hand for her. She inspected each finger individually, bending each of them in order. She couldn’t figure out how to straighten them, though. Just as she was pulling my fist towards her face, time ran out.

“B-but I wasn’t finished,” she whined as I took possession of my hand again.

“That’s too bad, but we had a deal, and you agreed to it,” I reminded her.

“Can I please have 15 more seconds?”

“No.”

“Pleeeeee-”

“Get out of here before I make you.”

That incredibly empty threat worked, and she walked away, but not before giving me one last pleading look. I gave her an expressionless stare in response, which finally did it.

Sighing, I walked over to a nearby bench and sat down.

Are all the ponies here as crazy as she is?