Better A Pony You Know

As a "young" man in his mid-late 20's roamed the halls of the convention he was at with his backpack loaded with swag, having picked up a custom item that he had ordered a few months before for his OC Tokusatsu Warrior cosplay, a portal opened up before him and pulled him through to Yahweh-knows-where before he could react.

~~~~~~

In the basement of the Ponyville Library, Twilight Sparkle was finishing the last touches on a portal generation mechanism from blueprints that Celestia gave her, which had been found in a old book from the Canterlot Royal Archives by somepony called Leoneighdo DaPonyo, placing a freshly-cut Fire Ruby that Rarity recently acquired for her into the heart of the machine in-lieu of some mineral called "dylithium" that the blueprints had called for, before charging the contraption with her magic.

Whilst the magical energies flowed into the device, a wave of energy surged forth from it and phases through the basement walls to fly out into the Everfree Forest as Twilight lost her concentration due to Pinkie Pie popping up out of nowhere in the basement.

“Heya Twilight! Whatcha doooing?”

“PINKIE?! Where did you come from?!” Twilight yelled in surprise to the pink pony's sudden appearance along with the surge of magic.

"From my mummy and daddy of course, silly Twilight!" replied Pinkie, not fully catching the subtle undertone of Twilight's words being more along the lines of "Don't scare me like that you idiot!" over anything else.

Twilight sighed and looked over the machine checking to make sure it wasn't broken as Pinkie bounced around the room, before stopping her bouncing for a second as her Pinkie Sense kicked in and gave her the combo for "something big happen at Everfree Forest" causing Twilight to glance over from the machine.

"Pinkie? What's wrong? What does your Pinkie Sense pick up?" Twilight asked curiously as she watched the combo flow.

"Dunno Twi. But something tells me I should prepare a "Welcome to Ponyville" party for when we've returned from the Everfree Forest! But first I need to get my cookies out before they burn!" Pinkie blurted out in a single breath before zipping out of the basement, leaving a pink-coloured dust cloud in her wake back to Sugarcube Corner.

Twilight sighed as Pinkie Pie vanished as suddenly as she had appeared, powering down and grounding any left-over energies in the machine she was working on before testing that nothing in it was broken either structurally or with its mana channels because of the surge of energy before.

~~~~~~

The wave of energy that escaped Twilight's machine and flew out to the Everfree Forest had stopped and "landed" - for lack of a better term - in the main foyer of the old Castle of the Two Sisters before opening up into a portal and unceremoniously dumping the form of the cosplaying Human male.

"Goddamned jvjrzbjrpun, tvaolymbjrpun, honourless sonouvaipajo portal!" Cursed the poor guy aching all over in pain from the rough exit of the portal plus the contents of his backpack trying to crush him into the floor combined with the cosplay prop belt on his slightly-oversized waist digging into his gut.

"Where the slag in the Nine Worlds am I, and why does this place look so damn familiar?!" He cursed a bit more gracefully, having managed to roll and manoeuvre into an upright sitting position in order to take a look around the ruins, commenting as he saw a semi-familiar pedestal "Ain't that the pedestal of the Elements of Harmony, back when Twilight and her crew cleansed Luna of Nightmare Moon?"

"But that's impossible, it's probably just a good replica or otherwise coincidence; there's no way for inter-dimensional travel between reality and a cartoon show, right?" He commented as he shook his head to clear it of dust and shake out a crazy notion that tried to implement itself inside. "If it was possible, then why would I be sent to Ponies, and not to some place with humans/humanoids like The Doctor or Power Rangers, unless some cosmic being decided to weave me into a MLP fanfic?"

Mulling over his train of thought, the Human sighed and took a deep breath of air, noticing how clean and crisp it seems to taste even compared to the rural farmland air of his old home back on Earth, and especially to the smoggy air of ratrace cities like his birthcity of Canberra. "Well, if there's one thing I should be glad for - I'm likely not gonna lose my lungs to some dipswitch's secondhand smoke, at least if this place IS Equestria anyway." He commented and chuckled sardonically as he stood up and headed over to the aforementioned pedestal.

As the Human reached the pedestal and placed his hands on it to make sure he wasn't hallucinating it, a spark of magical energy jumped between it and the belt on his waist causing it to shudder and lightly hum with an energy of it's own, unnoticed by the wearer as his hands glided over the remnants of the pedestal and he looked around visually picking out some old half-broken statues of ponies dotted around the chamber.

"Welp, seems I'm not hallucinating, this probably IS the Castle of the Two Sisters and I'm in a world of magical talking equines." Was the conclusion the man came to as he walked around the place and headed down a spiral staircase to the lower levels, a fairly strong believer in the adage of "Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth." at least in the words of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle for what he was seeing.

~~~~~~

Twilight had just returned upstairs after the machine downstairs came all-clear with no found faults or damage that would have caused the energy surge, leading her to come to the conclusion the surge was caused by Pinkie's surprise appearance, when Spike belched up a letter from Celestia."Hunh, what's this? A letter from the Princess so early in the week?" She questioned as she opened it up and started to read the contents.

"Ohmigosh, Celestia's giving me an assignment to... Search the castle ruins in the Everfree Forest for signs of recent damage?" Questioned Twilight as she re-read the letter thrice and scanned the room as if looking for an answer from the Ether on why she was given this assignment. "Could this be what Pinkie Pie was referring to before? About going into the Everfree Forest for some reason?"

"Dunno, Twi," Spike shrugged his shoulders at Twilight's question before continuing "but I guess you should probably gather the girls, unless the letter states you're on your own. I think Applejack's busy tending the South Fields this week, Rarity is working on some designs for Sapphire Shores, and I think Rainbow has Weather Duties on the other side of town. I can stay here and take care of the Library whilst you're on assignment, don't forget." He listed off half of their little group on one hand, looking at Twilight to finish the list and see who might be able to help her in the assignment.

Twilight mulled over Spike's words as she remembered the rest of her friends plans for the day "Well, apart from the brief interruption she gave me downstairs, I'm not sure what Pinkie has planned for today outside of her usual baking sprees and party planning, though I believe that Fluttershy is helping over at the schoolhouse today." she sighed before perking up a touch "At the very least I should be able to visit Zecora and get some more of the herbal tea she sources. That stuff is magical after a long day sorting the Library!"

~~~~~~

A screeching of brakes and throbbing hum sounds out through the Fourth Wall as the Author decides to take a break here and publish what has been written so far, due to RL causing issues writing more, so sadly we must pick up from where we have left off in the next chapter.

"Sorry about that chaps, but it seems our good Devil here is experiencing a painful case of Writer's Block right now. We'll be sure to move this along when it's ready, mean time what's been written is so he doesn't drop this project unlike all his OTHER past projects!"