The Storm

John slowly drifted back to consciousness, and when he awoke, he found himself inexplicably back at the controls of his Typhoon. “Am I dreaming?” he thought. “This is just too strange, too strange. For all I know, I should be dead, crumpled up in my burning fighter somewhere on Gold Beach in occupied France, with symptoms of Carbon Monoxide poisoning.”  He felt alive, but something was still amiss. John turned around and saw that everything was normal. He looked down and saw only forest, which had small misty white clouds hovering above the treetops lazily. His eyes widened in amazement when he thought he saw the ruins of what looked like a medieval castle. “That’s really weird, I was fighting just a few miles inland from the coast… not above forest, with a castle in it,” said John, taking a quick look at his fuel gauge. It indicated he had a full tank of fuel. John was confused but pleased with his discovery; so he just shook his head and curved off to the right. There, he saw a town, which looked very similar to 14th century houses, with thatch roofs, timber framed walls, and overhanging second floors. However, the clocktower was a bit inconsistent with his assumed time period.  “Ok, what’s next? Technicolor ponies with horns and wings?” said John, laughing aloud. Suddenly, he saw something ahead of him.

As he came closer, he saw, much to his amazement, that it was a pony-sized blue pegasus, with a rainbow mane and tail. Also, on its flank, there was… what looked like a tattoo of a red, yellow, and blue lightning bolt coming out of a white cloud. But, what surprised John most of all was the fact it was... sitting on a cloud?! Its purple eyes suddenly widened and John pulled a hard right. He could only sit, mouth agape, as the pegasus,hovering in midair, looking just as amazed as he was, vanished into the distance as he flew further away.

“WHAT THE...!?!?” thought John, who was starting to question his sanity. “I CAN’T BELIEVE IT! I SWEAR IT’S LIKE SOME BLOKE MADE ME SAY THAT! IT’S JUST TOO IRONIC, AND WHY THE H*** DOES THIS PLACE LOOK LIKE A WARNER BROS. CARTOON?!?! PONIES SHOULDN'T EVEN BE ABLE TO SIT ON CLOUDS!” However, he just shook his head and looked for a safe place to land.  As he did so, he turned on his radio and said, “This is Wing Commander John Robert Baldwin, No. 198 Squadron RAF, come in, please!”  The only thing that responded was overwhelmingly loud static. “Damn!” said John. “The radio is useless, and I doubt there are any other humans here, let alone RAF planes or pilots. I guess I should be grateful my plane is still in one piece.”

He decided to land in a nearby empty field next to what appeared to be an apple orchard, filled with many large apple groves, which had apples of all shapes, sizes, and colors.  He also spied a series of small sheds, and a large red barn, and even a farmhouse, which reminded him of the stereotypical American Midwest (so John assumed he was somewhere in America, but last time he checked, America wasn't inhabited by Technicolor ponies). He also noticed a treehouse in a large apple tree, about a mile or so from the farm.

As the landing gear of his Hawker Typhoon lowered, John noticed a few ponies without wings moving around at the farm. He saw an orange one with a blonde ponytail mane, ponytail, and it was also wearing a cowboy hat; there was also a red one with blonde mane and tail. He also noticed that they had tattoos on their flanks as well, the orange pony having three red apples and the red pony having green apple that had been cut in half.

They looked up at the plane, but even though John couldn't see their faces clearly, he figured they were looking up in surprise. A few momentary thumps signified that his landing gear had made contact with the ground and he slowed the plane to a halt. He then heard a dog bark, and saw what looked like a white and brown Border collie running up to the plane, wearing a red collar with a gold name tag.

“WINONA! YA GET BACK HERE THIS INSTANT, YA HEAR?!” yelled a feminine accented voice.

“My cover has been blown!” thought John. He quickly grabbed his survival supplies and his Enfield No.2 revolver from the plane and closed the canopy, before leaping off the plane and running away towards the cover of a nearby cluster of thick bushes.  He only hoped that the dog couldn't smell him out, or that

John saw the orange pony he had seen earlier run up to the dog, Winona, and say, “WINONA! IF AH EVER…” the horse suddenly noticed the Hawker Typhoon. Its jaw dropped (and so did John’s upon realizing he had heard the orange pony speak) as it stared in amazement at the aircraft. “What in tarnation…?” it muttered in silent awe. It walked around the craft, tapping it cautiously and reading off the markings on it. “JB, what does that stand for?” John heard it mutter. “P…O…521? And what is that? A target?” the orange pony said, tapping on the RAF roundel painted on the Typhoon’s fuselage. it continued inspecting the Hawker Typhoon, and while doing so, John was able to get a better look at the orange horse. It had freckles on its face, and had bright green eyes. John started backing away, but the dog, Winona, turned in his direction, sniffed, and growled. “What’s gotcha all riled up, Winnie?” asked the orange pony.

John acted quickly and threw a stone over by some other bushes. It broke a few twigs, which prompted the dog to run in that direction, braking furiously.

“WINONA!” the pony shouted in exasperation as it ran after the dog.

John ran as far as he could in the opposite direction and eventually came to the treehouse had had seen.  Inside, he could hear children’s voices.

One sounded high-pitched and girly, “So, what haven't we tried today to get our cutie marks?”

“Cutie marks?” thought John aloud. He immediately clapped a hand over his mouth and silently pressed up against the trunk of the tree.

“Did you hear something?” the girly-voiced one asked.

“No, you're still a scaredy-pony after we tried to get our cutie marks in ghost hunting,” said another girl voice, but it sounded a bit more tomboyish.

“Ya know, ah think you’re just hearin’ things,” said another voice, with an accent resembling the orange pony’s accent.

“Whatever, Applebloom, I'm sure I heard somepony say something out there,” said the girly-voice again.

“That’s what you said last time, Sweetie Belle,” remarked the more tomboyish voice.

“And the time before that,” said Applebloom.

“And the time before that,” said the tomboyish voice.

“Alright, Scootaloo! I get it already,” said Sweetie Belle. “Anyways, what did we try? Oh yeah, we tried being cooks, farmer, bakers, confectioners, grocers, salesmares,  bankers, pro-bowlers, ghost hunters, astrologists, physicists, mathematicians, chemists, alchemists, wagon repair mares, realtors, receptionists, musicians, clothing designers, artists, fishermares, pro-water skiers, pro-tennis players, pro-golfers, pro soccer players, pro-hoofball players, hobos…”

The list went on and on, where everything from ‘Patton Clerk’ to ‘Used Carriage Salesmare’ was listed. John only stood in amazement; all the jobs listed either existed on earth, or were close parodies of them.  Suddenly, he heard footsteps, and the sound of a door opening. They were outside! John was taken by surprise and before he could move, three small ponies without tattoos on their flanks came down from the treehouse.

One was a cream yellow, with a bright red mane and tail, wearing a big magenta bow in its mane. The next one was white with a small horn growing out of its head, and its mane and tail were purple curls of hair with pink ends. The last one was a pegasus, and it was kind of a light chestnut color, with a magenta mane and tail. the three young ponies clambered down out of the tree house and onto the ground before John could react, and soon all three were staring at him with wide eyes.

John opened his mouth to speak, but the three young ponies let out high-pitched ear-piercing shrieks of terror. “Nononononono, it’s okay, I'm not going to….” said John, but the young ponies ignored him and only screamed louder, which made John go temporarily deaf.

“IT BUCKING TALKED!” Scootaloo yelled.

“LET’S GET OUT OF HERE!” said Sweetie Belle.

The three ponies ran away, still screaming.

John let out a frustrated grunt, now knowing that the ponies would be permanently alerted to his presence and walked on. After a while, he came to the outskirts of the town he had seen in the air. Unsure how the inhabitants would react to him, he skirted along the edge of town, where he saw many ponies walking about and talking. They came in all sizes and colors; and some had horns while others had wings, and some didn't have any horns or wings at all. Suddenly, John bumped into something and fell onto his back with quiet thump.  When he has back on his feet again, he saw a zebra, wearing large gold earrings, several gold bracelets on its left foreleg, and a few gold neck-rings on its neck. He also noticed a pictograph-esque like sun on its flank. It looked more curious than alarmed.  John drew his Enfield No.2 and began to say, “If you even…”

“Talk, I will not, but if you speak, you will get caught,” said the zebra with a feminine African accent. For some reason, everything she said rhymed. “If you follow me, then no one will see.”

Unsure what to do do, John decided to try and befriend the black and white equine and followed it into some thick bushes.  John uneasily holstered his Enfield No.2 and asked quietly, “What’s your name?”

“Zecora, that’s who I am, and you sound like you’re from Trottingham,” said Zecora in the same quiet voice.

“Oh, no, I come from a place called Bath, in Somerset England,” said John. He didn’t know why he was giving away such intel, or why his volume went from super soft to normal, but he had to trust someone or… somepony in this case. She seemed trustworthy anyways. Besides, it wasn't exactly anything they could use to their advantage, except maybe against him.

“You come from a place named for a device of washing? Now that will get someone talking,” said Zecora.

Then, an idea came to John’s mind. “Can you disguise me? I don't think your kind has ever seen a human before, and causing  trouble isn't high on my list of priorities right now, and God knows what the h*** these things, sorry… ponies could do to me if they got pissed at me.”

“I can give you a disguise, but be warned, it will demise,” said Zecora.

“Is this gonna become a regular thing with her?” thought John as he followed Zecora into the woods.