Yeltsin, Pinkie, and the Long Road to Petersburg

Location: M10 Highway, southeast of Tver, Tverskaya Oblast, Russian Federation

Date: July 12th, 1996

Time: 10:51 PM

“But Mr. Boris, I really gotta go!” Pinkie Pie winced as she squirmed in the front seat of the Lada with her hind legs locked together. Twilight and Fluttershy sighed and slouched into their seats.

“I told you to go before we left!” Boris Yeltsin growled as he tightened his grip on the steering wheel.

“I didn’t have to go before we left, but I gotta go now!” Pinkie moaned.

“Yob moyu zhizn’...” the president sighed as he slapped his forehead.

Boris Yeltsin and his Equestrian friends were about an hour and a half into their journey. Their run-down Lada had crossed from the greater Moscow area into the less-densely populated Tverskaya Oblast. They still had a long way to go, but it seemed that, for the moment, the trip had to be briefly postponed. For Pinkie Pie, nature was calling.

“Alright, when I see a clear spot, I’ll pull over,” Yeltsin mumbled as he squinted at the roadside for a place to stop the car. “Bad enough we ‘borrowed’ Gleb’s car. We don’t need to soil the front seats.”

At the right of the road was a forested area that separated the M10 highway from the mighty River Volga that ran alongside it. For the most part, the trees hugged the road, but Yeltsin eventually came to a stretch of the highway with a clear, grassy fringe between the road and the woods, barely distinguishable in the darkness of night. Yeltsin slowed the Lada to a crawl, steered off the highway, and came to a stop.

“Okay,” he said as he turned the key, surveying the road ahead and behind in the rear-view mirror. There was a lone car approaching from the rear. “When this guy passes us and is out of view, you hop out, make for the edge of the woods, do your business and come back here. And if anybody comes, duck down or hide somewhere.”

“Maybe you should wear one of Boris’s blankets out there,” Twilight added from the back.

“That’s a good idea,” Yeltsin agreed, motioning with his hand back toward the unicorn. “The last thing we need is for someone to come out of nowhere and see you before you can hide. Sling that blanket over your back when you go out. And try not to get it wet or anything, okay?”

The single car that had approached from behind had now passed the stopped Lada on the side of the road and pressed on northward toward the city of Tver. Pinkie, meanwhile, had thrown the blanket over her body.

“So how do I open the door?” Pinkie asked.

“Just pull the handle. The little silver thing by the…” Yeltsin began, but his sentence trailed off. “Oh, right. You can’t.” The Russian president leaned over and gave the door handle a tug and a quick push. “Alright, now be as quick as you can.”

Pinkie pie hopped out of the car and made for the treeline, while Boris Yeltsin sat there and shook his head.

“I feel bad for you three. No fingers, no thumbs,” he said as he turned to the back seats, visibly flexing the fingers of his good hand. “Must be a rough way to live. I don’t know how I’d manage to-”

Yeltsin suddenly stopped and shifted uncomfortably in the driver’s seat.

“Are you okay, Mr. Boris?” Fluttershy asked, leaning forward and putting her hooves on the back of Yeltsin’s seat.

“No…” the president sighed. “Your friend isn’t the only one that needs a bathroom break… Now that she’s been talking about it, I’ve gotta go, too.” Boris Yeltsin fumbled for the handle in the dark car and pushed open his door. “I’m gonna take a leak. You two wait in here, and stay low if you see headlights.”

Yeltsin climbed out of the tiny Lada and shut the door as the mild air of the summer night relieved him from the stuffiness and strange smell of Gleb’s car. He scanned the roadway, thankful that there still were no drivers in sight, and moved quickly but cautiously to the treeline, trying his best to see the ground under the black sky of the dark night.

“Hey! Pinkie!” Yeltsin called out. “Move over, you’ve got company!”

“I’m over here, Mr. Boris!” was the reply heard from the forest’s edge at Yeltsin’s right.

“Just finish up and head back to the car. I gotta go, too,” Yeltsin said as he neared the treeline.

The president’s eyes were still adjusting to the darkness as he picked as spot between two trees, undid his belt and zipper and relieved himself.

“Ugh. I thought I was going to burst,” the president whispered.

Just as the Yeltsin was finishing up, he heard Pinkie approach him from the side.

“Hey, give me some space!” Boris Yeltsin exclaimed. “Can’t a guy get a little privacy when he’s taking a leak?”

“What?” Pinkie called. “I can’t hear you!”

Boris Yeltsin stopped fumbling with his belt buckle. Something didn’t make sense. Pinkie Pie had just walked up to him, but it was very apparent that her voice emanated from where the car had been parked.

A grunt at Yeltsin’s right made his eyes grow wide. He heard the rustling of grass as the thing next to him came a couple of steps nearer. Slowly, Yeltsin turned to face whatever he had mistaken for Pinkie Pie. His wide, adjusted pupils could discern a large, husky silhouette just a few feet from his body. He heard it sniff several times, and then it rose up onto its hind legs. Vaguely, he could see from the faint glimmer of two large eyes that the beast was taller than him. As it stood there, watching the Russian president, Boris Yeltsin realised that he had been approached by a massive bear.

“By God…” the frightened man breathed as his blood ran cold and his heart pounded in his chest. The beast grunted again. “Listen, bear… can you just… go back into the woods? Please?”

A dull growl was the bear’s only reply.

“Hey, come on…” Yeltsin whimpered as his frail frame trembled. “I’ve got a lot to live for! I just won the election for my second term!”

The bear pointed its muzzle to the air and roared menacingly.

“I uh… I guess you must have voted for Zyuganov.”

With that, Yeltsin let go of his unbuckled belt, turned on his heels and raced back towards the Lada. The massive brown bear returned to all fours and lumbered after him.

“Bear! Help! BEAR!” Yeltsin screamed, pumping his arms and running as fast as his flaccid girth would allow.

Pinkie, waiting by the Lada, could barely see the two figures running toward the car, but heard Yeltsin’s girlish screams and the bear’s throaty growls. She turned and pounded on the rear door of the Lada.

“Twilight! Fluttershy!” she yelled frantically. “A bear’s trying to eat Mr. Boris!”

“A bear!?” the two ponies in the Lada shouted in unison.

“Fluttershy! You have to get out there and give him the stare!” Twilight cried.

“But Twilight, I-”

Before Fluttershy knew what had happened, Twilight covered the door handle with her aura, threw open the car door, and shoved Fluttershy out onto the grass. She then waved her horn and conjured up a small orb that floated above her head, bathing a decent radius around the Lada in light. Fortunately for the group, there were still no cars to be seen on the street.

What Twilight’s lighting orb did reveal, however, was a terrified head-of-state, jerkily charging toward the Lada, with a savage beast on his heels. But as Yeltsin ran, his failure to buckle his belt caused his pants to slowly drop with every step he took. When they came down to his knees, revealing a rather embarrassing pair of underwear that was speckled with images of the lovable cartoon character Cheburashka, Yeltsin misstepped and tripped, tumbling down onto the grass. The bear, snarling and huffing as he went, was ready to make the kill on his grounded prey.

“Oh God, not like this!” a disheveled, sweaty Boris Yeltsin wailed as he struggled to scramble away. The president rolled over and put up one of his feet in a pathetic, last-ditch effort for self-defense. But just as he was ready to give the bear a kick, Fluttershy flew over and hovered above the trembling man on the ground.

“What do you think you’re doing?” the pegasus angrily asked the bear, who turned his attention to the flying pony and roared back a throaty reply. “Hey! Don’t talk to me like that, mister!” Fluttershy demanded as her brow wrinkled in frustration. Her lower lids twitched as her eyes bored deep into those of the massive brown bear.

Boris Yeltsin was in shock as his attacker became still as a statue, one paw frozen in the air. The bear seemed suddenly confused, as if it simply forgot that it was about to tear apart the president of the Russian Federation and was unsure of its next move. At one point, it even glanced down at Yeltsin and almost appeared apologetic. All the while, Fluttershy was staring the shamefaced animal down.

“Mr. Boris didn’t do anything to you. He was out here minding his own business, and you scared him half to death and started chasing after him!” Fluttershy scolded. “Was that a very nice thing to do?”

The brown bear put his raised paw down, looked at the middle-aged man on the ground before him, and took a seat on the grass. It lowered its head and let a out a sound that was halfway between a growl and a whimper. Pinkie had now approached the group, and was standing on the other side of the flickering light from Twilight’s orb.

“Now tell Mr. Boris that you’re sorry,” Fluttershy ordered. The bear looked at Yeltsin and then dropped its head back down. “Tell Mr. Boris that you’re sorry.” To the president's amazement, the beast picked its head back up, stared right at him, and moaned apologetically. “There, was that so hard?” Fluttershy asked as she hovered toward the animal.

“Are you out of your mind?” Yeltsin hissed, still paralyzed from fear. “Get away from him!”

“Yeah, I knew it,” Fluttershy cooed as she rubbed the bear’s back. “You’re just a big softie that had a bad day, that’s all.” Boris Yeltsin’s mind was ready to implode as he watched Fluttershy pet a monster four or five times her size like  it were some sort of adorable household pet.

“Alright, Fluttershy, he’s learned his lesson,” Twilight said as she turned back toward the highway. “Come on, we need to get back on the road!” Fluttershy nodded as she continued to rub the bear’s back.

“My friends and I need to go now, so you head back home, okay?” she told the massive animal. “And next time you think about eating somebody like Mr. Boris, remember that they have feelings, too.” The bear grunted in what apparently was agreement, returned to all fours, and slowly lumbered back toward the trees. Pinkie and Fluttershy trotted over to the president and helped him get to his feet.

“How… how the hell did she…” Yeltsin stammered. “You… you talked to a bear. And he just… stopped and listened!”

“Fluttershy’s got a way with animals,” Twilight Sparkle explained as Yeltsin finally managed to stand. “This is nothing - you should see her with the dragons.”

“You’ve got dragons back home, too?” the president heaved as he bent over and rested his hands on his knees. “Oh, blyat’...”

Suddenly, pinkie started to giggle. She was staring at Yeltsin’s childish-looking, Cheburashka-covered underwear, still in plain sight as his pants rested in a crumpled heap around his feet. Fluttershy turned back to the president and did her best to stifle the laugh that was trying to escape from her throat, but she too started giggling just as loudly. And shortly after Twilight joined in, the three ponies dropped to the ground in stitches of laughter.

“Hey, cut it out!” Yeltsin yelled after he realised that he was still pantless. Bending down to pick up the pants of his suit, he added, “And turn off that light!” Twilight let the golden orb of light fizzle out, but remained on the grass with her two friends, laughing to the point where it began to hurt.

“Yeah, yeah, real funny,” the president barked as he fastened his belt. “Clam up and get back to the car, we’ve still got a long way to go. Thank God nobody came by to see any of this.”

The three ponies did what they could to regain their composure and followed the president back to the parked Lada, where two of the doors remained wide-open. Twilight, still struggling with the remnants of her laughter, closed the doors behind Pinkie and Fluttershy while Yeltsin climbed back into the driver’s seat.

“Looks like this suit’ll have to go in for heavy cleaning,” Boris Yeltsin mumbled as he shut his door. He reached for the key, but stopped and looked back at Fluttershy. “Hey,” he said to the pegasus, “I still don’t know how you did it, but you saved my life back there. Thank you. I thought I was dead meat.”

“No problem, Mr. Boris.” Fluttershy responded. “That bear was a lot nicer than he looked anyway.” The president scoffed.

“A lot nicer than he looked. Sure. Okay.”

After a few unsuccessful turnovers, the old Lada finally roared back to life. The Russian president brought it back onto the M10 highway and resumed the trip northwest toward Tver.

“Oh, and one more thing,” Yeltsin added nonchalantly as he readjusted the rear-view mirror. “If you tell a single soul about my whole pantless episode, you’ll all find out what the inside of a Russian prison looks like.”