Pony Swagger

“Everything in life is luck.”-Donald Trump

As I put my drawing equipment aside, I saved the image that I was drawing in some random file that I cared little about and began to turn off my behemoth desktop computer. I wasn’t much for procrastination, but it was a badass day outside, as I had noticed when a squirrel got run over by a taxi just outside my window,  and I just couldn’t resist taking a scenic walk over to the deli to see how Jeff’s been. As I pushed my chair away from my table and stood up, stretching as I looked down at myself. I was still dressed in my Rarity-themed boxers, my bed not yet made. I still hadn’t eaten breakfast, so I figured I might as well pick up something to munch on. As my computer screen turned to black, I grabbed a pair of jeans that I had thrown on the floor the night before, along with a plain black t-shirt, which I covered with a hooded jacket, as the early autumn winds made the outside air feel pretty chill.

I grabbed my man-bag, since I planned on looting some abandoned buildings in the area after I had ate. I put the book I had just started reading, “The Last Unicorn”, into the bag, as well as some drawing utensils and a sketch pad. I yawned as I put both my cell phone and my keys to my house in my pocket, and I then went out the door. Closing the door, going down the stairs, and heading outside were all routine for me, I had done those actions so many times before. As I was greeted by the cool autumn air, I quickly put my hood on and, with my hands in my pockets, I began to swagger across the street. I was now nearing the deli, and I soon found myself walking up to the door and opening it, feeling that familiar jingle of a bell as I walked in, letting the door slowly close by itself. My friend waved to me as he saw me walking over to the counter.

“How’s everything been going?” I asked Jeff as I looked around the rather new deli. The floors had just been cleaned and the shelves were re-stocked and re-positioned, at least, compared to the last time I had been here.

“Nothing much here, my bro’s caught a bit of a cold, but my dad and I can keep the business running. You gonna buy something? Oh yeah, I did some research last night, I proved that Soarin is best pony,” Jeff replied in his usual tone of voice.

“Man, you KNOW Rarity is best pony, and when are ya gonna quit hassling me to buy something everytime I come here? But whatever, broski, I’ll just take a breakfast bagel, extra cream cheese, and a bottle of Snapple, kay?” I told him.

“Whatever, man, just grab that Snapple and let me scan it,” he said, going to make my breakfast bagel. I casually walked over to where the bottled drinks were kept, and grabbed a bottle of that delicious mango flavored drink. As my hand reached to take it out of the freezer, I heard the jingle of the bell near the door as two people came in, each wearing ski masks. The first one dashed straight for the liquor aisle, while the other walked up to Jeff, who was still preparing my bagel.

“The money,” commanded the man, taking out a gun and aiming it sideways at Jeff, who was just turning around, his hands now in the air. The man motioned for Jeff to take out all the money from the register, to which Jeff was quick to comply, his life on the line. I couldn’t just stand there and do nothing, I had to act.

“Put away the gun,” I calmly told the robber. He did not look at me, keeping his eyes on Jeff, but, he was still able to reply.

“Yeah?! And what you gonna do, boy?!” He asked, giving a small chuckle. Since he wasn’t looking, I had managed to sneak around him, Snapple bottle in hand. I had the element of surprise.

“Ya know what? Imma love and tolerate the SHIT outta you!” I yelled, forcing the butt of my Snapple bottle upon his weak and feeble cranium. The bottle exploded and the cold, sugary drink soaked the robber as he fell to the ground with a thud. By now, the other robber had already taken out his gun and was aiming it at me. As soon as I turned and looked at him, he let off a few bullets, but as I braced my body and waited for the impact, I was surprised to find that nothing had hit me. As I opened my eyelids, I found my vision to have blurred, but time seemed to have stopped.

Of course, it wasn’t me who did it, so it must have been that someone, something, or, perhaps, somepony had stopped time for me. Unfortunately, before I could run rampant around the city performing hilarious hijinks, I felt my body being moved, teleported, in fact. It felt like getting sucked into a black hole or something, not that I had experienced spaghettification myself. I soon found myself in an abandoned building, a ruin of sorts, the forest surrounding it had begun to creep up with its vines, slowly piercing the windows and sneaking themselves into the room itself. A few meters away, facing me, were two hooded . . . horses?

“Silence, do not speak!” commanded the one with violet legs in a rather booming voice, but I was already speechless, I heard that voice before. They both took their hoods off as my assumptions on who they were were proven correct.

“Greetings, stranger, I am Princess—” began the white alicorn, but I had already finished her sentence for her.

“Celestia, and that is Princess Luna, your sister,” I said as she was about to say the exact same thing as I. The two princesses looked at me, their faces filled with shock and surprise.

“How do you . . . know our names?” asked Princess Luna, in a much calmer of a voice than before.

“Uh . . .  it’s a long story,” I replied with a small grin plastered upon my face.

“You’re probably wondering why you’re here right now, aren’t you?” Princess Celestia asked. I nodded. “Well, you see, we hope to learn from ‘your species’, and we wanted to bring ‘your kind’ along here to Equestria to examine you and see how we both can mutually benefit from our experiences together. We want you to ‘fit in’ with the life in one of our towns. So, we send to Ponyville, you send us letters, win-win situation,” she explained. As soon as she mentioned Ponyville, I felt my jeans becoming uncomfortably tight right around my pelvic region, and I saw Celestia eying it creepily.

“Right, sooo, uhh, when do I become a pony?” I asked nervously. Celestia gave a small nod to nod to Luna, who took a step forward. Luna’s horn let out a pulsing, radiant light, and soon I found myself encased in a faint purple glow, but after a small “poof” I found that my vision was obscured by my clothing. As I tried to get my clothing off of my body, I found that, instead of fingers and hands, that I had . . . hooves? I was a . . . pony, a unicorn, in fact, as I found out once I kicked off the clothing that had encased me. I looked down at myself: my coat was deep lust red, my mane was long, and it was a deep, rich brown, as though it had just been washed with shampoo and conditioner. As I looked at my flank, I had seen what I had expected to see . . . no cutie mark. The two princesses waited impatiently for me to finish gazing at my figure and actually pay attention to them. Luna cleared her throat loudly to get me to stop gazing at my sweet hunk of a body, and I soon stood in attention to the two. “Where’s my cutie mark?” I asked stupidly.

“It is not within our power to bestow cutie marks, you understand that you must earn one yourself,” Luna replied

“Won’t it look strange when I’m sauntering around Ponyville as a grown stallion that’s still a blank-flank?” I asked the two. Neither Celestia nor Luna responded to my question, they just looked off into the distance, ignoring my inquiry.

“Well, anyway, I need to tell you some more information before I let you go,” Celestia began. I nodded for her to continue, and so she did, “Of course, since you’re going to Ponyville, you’re probably going to meet my good student, Twilight Sparkle. You know of her, right?” I nodded, and she kept talking, “You’re gonna have to keep everyone thinking you’re from a place called ‘Stalliongrad’. If anyone asks you where that is, tell them it’s on the outskirts of our lands, and that they don’t teach magic there. But going back about Twilight Sparkle, she will make sure that you and I . . . keep in touch. Oh, and I almost forgot, you’re new name is, uh . . . North Star, deal with it,” she finished.

“Now, when do I get to leave for Ponyville?” I asked the two princesses. They looked at each other and then back at me. They seemed so. . . serious. I can’t be that big of a risk, can I? Unless something happened with the last human here.

“Come with me,” Luna said in an almost commanding tone. I followed her as she led me down the steps, Celestia following behind me, her eyes creepily locked on my flank, even when I continually looked back to see what she was doing. I swear I saw her licking her lips. Outside the ruins of the tower, we came across a carriage, two large, hefty pegasi stallions at its head, waiting for us to board. As we did, they glanced at each other, as though they had felt something was wrong with my presence. My stomach sank a bit as the carriage began to move, the pegasi at the carriage head flapped their wings as they ran and slowly, but surely, the carriage began to fly up into the air, up out of what I presumed to be Everfree Forest. It was bright, sunny, and cloudless day, and it seemed that noon had already passed, as the hung to the western horizon. It was quite while before one of us actually spoke.

“I apologize for my inquiry, North Star, but how exactly do you know so much about us?” Luna asked me.

“Yes, I am also intrigued about how you know about us,” Princess Celestia added.

“Do enlighten the both of us while we travel,” Luna said in addition. At first I didn’t know what to respond with, but I soon came up with a rather half-assed response.

“I guessed,” I stated bluntly to the two princesses. They both looked at me, annoyed.

“I know you’re lying. Now, please, tell us the truth,” Celestia said in a calm tone. Now I was in a real pickle. I couldn’t tell them that it was all a cartoon, they would be disgraced and would not believe me. But neither could I say that my race has also know about theirs, I wasn’t about to tell THAT big a lie. Luckily, we just so happened to descend into the town of Ponyville, and it gave me a chance to change the subject.

“Oh, look, we’re here!” I said nervously, a trickle of sweat running down my forehead. The two princesses each glared down at me. Unfortunately, none of us noticed we were losing altitude more rapidly than we should have until it was too late. Both of the pegasi at the carriage seemed to have, somehow, fallen asleep after a mysterious blue glow overtook them. I had been the first one to notice, but I said nothing, merely pointing forward with my hoof to get the princess’s attention, my face now flushed with fear, I was speechless. As the two princesses looked forward, their pupils dilated as we all held onto each other comically, screaming, bracing for the impact, Celestia awkwardly groping my flank. “Wait, didn’t the princesses have wings?” I thought to myself as we were about to crash down into the ground, I had also noticed that each of them formed a protective outline around themselves, but, probably in their haste, they didn’t form one around me.