October 12,
Dear Journal,
My name is Chad Matthew Parker Tylerson, and since I'm the kind of guy who likes to get right to the point, let me start by saying that I suffer from the dreaded three A's: acne, astigmatism, and awesome super powers. Just kidding, the last A stands for Asperger's.
It's tough to be friendly when eye contact makes your heart pound against the inside of your ribs like an alien chestburster, and I have learned to avoid social interaction at just about any cost. It's gotten to the point where I feel like the lady at the drive-through window is invading my personal space. Suffice to say, I don't know many people, and even fewer know me.
In the past, I used to drag myself to places where I might meet a girl. There are plenty at conventions and Renaissance Faires, especially if you're willing to talk to the one who probably shouldn't be cosplaying in that chainmail bikini. But eventually it all comes down to the fact that any conversation I have with a girl is like Russian Roulette, and I can't stop pulling the trigger.
Anyway, I've got to go. There's this stupid show for little girls that these guys online have been talking about, and I guess I'll break down and watch one episode or something.
October 23,
Dear Journal,
Or maybe every episode, both seasons. I especially liked Green Isn't Your Color.
So a few things have changed since I last wrote in you, journal. First of all, I am now a brony.
What is a brony, you ask? A brony is a perfectly normal, not-creepy-in-any-way, would-totally-let-them-watch-my-kids-AND-my-dog kind of guy who loves an awesome television show called My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. Bronies will try to tell you that a "Brony" is merely someone who watches the show, but that's not true. That's just a fan. In order to be a "Brony" you must love the show. You must love it like your first born child. You must love it so much that it begins to worry the people around you, and yourself, too. And as with most thing, once you realize it's happening to you, it's too late.
"Why would a grown man want to watch a show for little girls??" you ask. Or rather, "Why would a grown man want to fall in love with and devote nine-hundred hours a week to praising a show for little girls?"
And I answer: How the hell should I know? I don't watch shows for little girls, and the only praise I've given them recently is that the G3 theme song was really catchy. HEY HASBRO, WHERE MAH TOOLA-ROOLA, HUH? The point is, FiM is family entertainment, of which there are many well-admired examples, such as Toy Story, Shrek, and... uh... Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2. Can we just go with it? Okay, we're going with Baby Geniuses 2.
MLP:FiM literally changed my life. It taught me what true friendship could be. Now every Saturday, I poke the hell out of my Youtube app and proceed gaily to break all kinds of copyright laws by diving into a colorful world where happy endings abound, friends really care for each other, and every single female is outrageously hot. For a pony. Especially Fluttershy. For a pony.
Fluttershy, oh Fluttershy, you are so very perfect. So kind, so caring. Self-esteem so low you'd probably sleep with anything. Also, you're probably a Stephanie Meyer fan, but I'm willing to set that aside for the sake of hot ponyness.
I remember the first time I ever saw the show. As I sat there letting the candy-colored warmth envelop me (and strangely fantasizing about chicks in legwarmers) I was overcome with a joy that rivaled what Pinkie Pie must have felt when she saw her first Sonic Rainboom. My whole life was changing. I no longer had to actually have friends in order to feel like I had friends. And that is some pretty freakin' powerful magic, I'd say!
I was so happy that I went to all the Brony image websites and made a 3-page meme thanking everyone in the fan community by name for offering even a temporary reprieve from a life, which, I don't remember if I've said, was a horrible, endless, daily descent into the blackest depths of all Hades.
I made sure the meme had references to "yay" and "20% cooler" because I wanted everyone to know how clever and original I was. I included a joke that My Little Pony would sweep the globe and bring all of mankind together in peace, which was funny because we all know that mankind is actually doomed.
My meme hit the front page, along with ten others just like it. It was like a wall of big, sloppy, wet kisses, and I will take whatever I can get.
So, life was slightly improved! The problem was that pony times only existed on the internets. In reality, everything pretty much sucked as much as always, except that now I had a not-inconsequential amount of pedoguilt about being attracted to Apple Bloom.
I needed more pony. I craved more pony. So I did what every brony does in this situation. I surrounded myself with plastic pony replicas. Then I lived in terror that anyone I knew would find my plastic pony replicas. Also, this made me go broke.
It was the best I could do, though. I mean, come on. Only the truly desperate turn to fanfic.
October 26,
Dear Journal,
The ponies are REAL.
Sorry if I'm writing a little fast and misspelling a bunch of stuff, but I am still not sure if there really is a pony portal in my basement, or if it was just a side effect of all the medicines Mom and Dad put me on. That happened once when my psychiatrist didn't communicate well enough with my doctor and I thought the girl on the bus was a hamburger.
Hold on a second....I have to breath into this paper bag. Full of spray-paint. Just kidding, never do that.
The Ponies are real. Did I really just write that? My hands are shaking. All my dreams are about to come true and I think I might be crapping a rainbow even as I write this. I hope it's a rainbow.
It's probably not a rainbow.
Doesn't matter. There's a freakin' portal to Equestria in my basement. It's behind the hot water heater. I'm feeling a little dizzy now. Gotta lie down for real...
October 26 (continued),
Dear Journal,
So, my bearded dragon Revolver Ocelot got out of his cage yesterday. It's not like we have a cat or a dog to eat him, since my asthma is sensitive to basically all pet dander in the world, not to mention mold, ragweed, cleaning liquids, night blooming jasmine, peanuts, and latex. However, my pet tarantula Kakashi Sensei escaped in much the same way a few years ago, and I worried that he might be lurking in the shadows somewhere, fangs quivering at the idea of slaying a dragon. A bearded dragon, AMIRITE??
Anyway, I have been spending more and more time in my parents' basement lately (I moved my computer down there since Mom still likes to walk into my room without knocking), and I guess I've been dropping a lot of Cheetos and stuff like that around my office chair. The bearded dragon has really been known to book it when he smells a tasty crumb, even if that crumb is down a flight of stairs or up a Jehovah's Witness's pantleg. I mean, I guess that's why he did it.
A glow was coming from behind the hot water heater, so I walked over and took a look. It was a portal. To Equestria.
By some quintillion-to-one chance, there just happened to be a Pony Portal in the basement of a dude who just happened to be a huge Brony who just happened to be willing to leave behind a middle-class existence in the richest nation on Earth to jump into a one-way Pony Portal! To think if this portal had appeared in the basement of someone who had only seen G1 a few times and didn't even like it. One shudders at the thought. Anyway, this was great, great news for me. Especially since I suppose I could have just as easily ended up with a portal to a dimension of pure itchiness, or pure Cthulhu, or something.
It was time. It was the moment of truth. I would miss my parents, but you know what? Screw 'em, they made me do boring chores and sign up for classes I didn't want to take in the summers. I would miss my friends, but screw 'em. They were all imaginary and had stopped talking to me anyway. I would miss eating meat, but screw it. Maybe I could cut a deal with some Diamond Dogs, or maybe Zecora had some. Zebras eat meat, right?
Behind me, a cold, gray world. Before me, a world with hot, colorful ponies. Seriously, discounting senior citizens, there's really nothing less than a "six" in the bunch.
The choice was no choice at all.
So I jumped in, and my nuts exploded. The rest of me too, but my nuts just a microsecond before everything else. He is a cruel God.
Date Unknown, (Equestria!)
Dear Journal,
I slowly became aware of my surroundings after what might have been hours later. The warm sunlight fell upon my face, and I blinked myself awake in its bright, white glow. It was very bright and sunny, and the warm, white, bright sun was bright and warm and intensely white on my face. It was so warm and bright that I thought to myself, I never knew that Celestia's sunlight could be so warm and so bright as this is both warm and bright as mother f'ing hell.
"It's regaining consciousness," said a voice from overhead. "Oh, this poor, hurt little animal! I found it here in the field and was afraid to move it! Look, its mane is so dirty and greasy, it must be too sick to clean itself."
My vision finally swam into focus and I beheld, for the first time in real, actual life, the object of my months-long infatuation. It was my waifu, Fluttershy. No, really, journal, you have to believe me. It was really her. I've spent enough time on EqAD to know what the heck Fluttershy looks like, and I don't mean the Environmental Quality Assurance Division, although they do good work, too.
Those sad, teal eyes, that luscious buttery coat, those soft, downy wings. She was so beautiful it gave me a lump in my throat, and absolutely nowhere else on my body, I swear.
The other pony was Twilight Sparkle, the brainy side of hotness. I managed a confident half-grin. Every single moment of my life had led up to this point. My purpose was being fulfilled and it gave me confidence I'd never had before. Here it was, the pickup line of the century.
"Hey," I said. "Hey. How YOU doin'?"
They stared at me.
Then Twilight nodded back casually and said, "S'aright, s'aright. You?"
"Not bad," I said. "Can't complain."
"You're a human," she said.
"You know what humans are," I said.
"It's my job to know these things," announced Twilight. "Besides, you're not the first of your species to come falling into our world. The last one kept saying something about 2012."
"Right," I said. "I think I read that one." I looked down at the stained band-shirt I'd been wearing for three days. "Darn," I said. "I was hoping that the portal would turn me into a pony like you guys."
"Are you male or female?" asked Twilight.
"What??" I said. "Jeez! Male of course! Can't you see my awesome beard?"
"No," she said.
"It's there," I assured here.
"Four hairs, and you've named each one," came a voice from behind me. I turned around and my gaze fell upon the sleek, foxy Rainbow Dash. Actually, I'm not really into her, but what the hell, you know?
"Dash," I said.
"Uh-oh," she said.
"He knows our names," agreed Twilight. "Don't you?"
"Twilight Sparkle, Fluttershy, and Dashie, yeah. Where's Pinkie Pie? Where's Rarity? Where's Applejack? Where's... where's... Apple Bloom?" I slapped myself in the face. Brain bleached, sir. Ready for next thought.
"You're a Brony," said Dash. She turned to the others. "He's a Brony."
"No, I'm just a fan!" I shouted out of knee-jerk reflex. Then I said, "I mean, uh, yeah I am."
"What's a Brony??" asked Fluttershy.
"It's a religion," said Dash grimly.
"Oh, go on, Rainbow Dash," said Twilight waving a hoof at her. "Bronies are fine. In fact, they can be pretty cool."
"It's not a religion," I said. "It's a fandom. We have these characters that inspire us to act in ways that we wouldn't normally act, and we come together once a week to praise these characters and watch parables about how they solve their problems, and it gives us comfort in times of great hardship and oh my god it's a religion."
"It's not a religion," said Twilight. "You don't actually believe in these characters do you?"
"You know," I said, "at one time I thought I knew the answer to that question, but here you are standing in front of me and it's seriously messing with my head. So I guess the answer is: chicken sandwich."
"Zealots," said Dash.
"Big word!" said Twilight. "Nice one, Rainbow Dash."
"Thanks, did I tell you I'm writing a fanfic?" said Dash excitedly.
"Yo, girls, this is about me," I said, waving my hand. "Human over here." Then I paused. "Although now I'm kind of dying to know what your fanfic is ab--"
"Okay," interrupted Dash. "So there's this pony, right? Let's call her Rainbeam Slash. She gets to go along with Daring Do on a totally radical quest for this artifact, and then she is totally amazing and saves Daring Do from all these traps and monsters, and Daring Do is like, 'oh Rainbeam Slash, you're so strong and hot.' And then they get married."
"You'll have to let me see it," said Twilight. "After you've proof-read it at least once and fixed any outrageous, obvious errors, like misspelled words in the title. And make sure you have more than one paragraph in your two-hundred pages. And for Celestia's sake, don't fill the darn thing up with pictures you didn't even draw." She turned to me. "You'll have to excuse her aggression towards your sect. Most Bronies who come through here try to sleep with all of us right away."
"That totally effing surprises me," I said. "Personally, I have no self confidence, so I just make platonic friends with every girl I secretly want to bang."
"You seem pretty confident to me," said Twilight.
"Well, it's different around ponies," I said. "You guys are all so much nicer and sweeter and kinder than humans. Except to Zebras. You are kind of dicks to them."
"I don't understand any of this!!" shouted Fluttershy.
That's when it happened. All the insanity that I had experienced today had turned my existential preconceptions onto their goddamn head. I was getting reckless, like you do in a dream.
I turned to her. "Fluttershy, I have been wanting to say this to you for a long time. You are, by far, the hottest pony in Ponyville. You've got the best eyes, and the best coat, and the best mane, and the best personality. Your cutie mark is awesome. You have stolen my heart away, Fluttershy. You are a ten. I'd give you an eleven if the scale went that high." Then my courage ran out and I finished with a squeak.
The damage was done, though. Fluttershy blushed fiercely and looked to the others for support. Dash started laughing and a second later, Twilight couldn't hold back her giggles either.
"Oh, man," said Dash, wiping away a tear. "Bronies! Where the heck do they get this stuff?"
"Movies," I said. "And not good movies."
"Pickup lines only work for attractive people," said Dash.
My heart sank. I was ugly in this world too. Even with ponies, I had run out of clicks.
Then Twilight saved my life.
"I can make you into a pony, if you want," she said. "You're not the first Brony through Ponyville, and I've perfected the spell by now."
"Yes!" I said. "Oh my God, yes. And please, make me gorgeous. If there's one thing that the media has taught me, it's that if I'm not beautiful, I might as well be dead."
"Funny, all you humans say that," said Twilight. "But in the end, that's not up to me. What I need for you to do is imagine what you want to look like, what race you want to be and so forth, got it?"
"Got it," I said. "Juice me up, baby!"
A bright flash of purple light first blinded me, then encased me in a glowing cocoon. And then it was like I had testicle, torsion of for the second time that day (don't Google that, by the way). How cruel that even after a lifetime of living in fantasy worlds, I had no prior warning that all this dematerialization would hurt like such a bastard.
Again, I awoke on the ground. Something was different this time, though. For one thing, I was butt-ass naked. I rose up slowly onto my hooves.
"Hooves... Holy crap!" I said. "I am a pony! I turned into a pony!! This is like all those terrible, I mean awesome stories!"
"Good, it worked," said Twilight. "Not like last time."
"What happened last time?" I asked.
"Who said what now?" said Twilight, looking around.
I checked myself out. Instead of being a teenager with the body of a forty-year old alcoholic, I was now a badass pony with racing stripes and anime hair. My cutie-mark was Chuck Norris punching Satan in the face. Satan was crying.
I flapped my freakin' awesome wings. My balls itched so I scratched them with telekinesis. Oh, did I mention I was an alicorn? A racing-striped, badass alicorn with glowing flame eyes, but only when I wanted them to be glowing flame eyes. And also, I was handsomer and bigger than the usual pony stallion, and totally ripped.
"He looks... different from the others," said Dash.
"Why is his coat striped?" said Fluttershy. "Um, I kind of like it."
"Me too," said Twilight. "And I can't help but notice you're an alicorn, and frankly that freaks me out a little."
"I would have thought all the Bronies would want to be racing-striped badass alicorns," I said.
"Maybe so, but they rarely have the will to imagine it into being," said Twilight. "Their negative self-image is so set in stone that nothing can change their minds about themselves. They know what they want, but they don't believe. So, they end up looking like Snips or Snails or Featherweight or something."
"Not you, though," said Dash. "Dayum."
"I never had much of an identity," I said. "And I've been imagining myself as a pony now for a pretty long time. I never thought my unhealthy delusion would actually pay off."
"You know what?" said Fluttershy. "I don't think we even know your name yet."
I smiled at her, my perfect teeth glinting in Celestia's warm, bright sunlight. "How about Demonhunter Planetcrusher?" I said. "That's my name now. And I already know yours, baby."
And then we all had sex.
THE END
