Engines of a revolution

I sat back on my sofa with a sigh; I'd just finished moving my belongings into my new house, a cottage located out in the North Lincolnshire countryside that I'd managed to pick up for a bargain. Now I was relaxing with a well-earned cider as I looked at the bare living room populated only by the sofa, myself, and a wall of cardboard boxes. Tomorrow I’d start unpacking, but first came sleep. I was stirred from my musings by the padding of paws and looked over to see my pet dog, Sam. He was a wolf-husky cross and the biggest softy you could ever meet…if a little protective at times. He plodded over and jumped up on the sofa before laying down and resting his head on my lap.

“Well” I thought aloud “At least I've got you to keep my company tomorrow” Sam offered no response over than his ears twitching to the sound of my voice as he began to nod off. That brought me onto my next train of thought, sleep, I didn't have a bed set up, that was currently still in pieces in its box upstairs. I grimaced, looked like I would be sleeping on the sofa tonight, something I was not looking forward to. With a resigned sigh, I downed my cider, got up and began looking for a box which had some form of bedding in it.

Once I'd found a small duvet and a pillow I accepted my fate for the night and walked back into the living room to see Sam had stolen my spot.

“Sam” I said sternly “down” he let out a grumble before jumping off the sofa. With that taken care of I placed the pillow and one end and lay down to sleep. As I was drifting off I noticed a flash through the curtains, but dismissed it as a car driving past as I slipped into slumber

*POV 3rd Person*

Twilight Sparkle was awoken by rapid knocking echoing through the castle. She rubbed the sleep from her eyes and sat up in bed, still half-asleep. She was shaken into coherence by another volley of knocking and made her way to the front doors as fast as she could whilst still half asleep.

'It’s not like I could even wake spike up at this time in the morning' she thought, glancing at a clock as she walked through the hallways of the castle, 6:30 'who wakes up a pony at this time in the morning!?' she got to the front doors and opened them to find Derpy standing there, with her mailbags full of letters and a troubled expression on her face.

“Derpy?” she asked, rubbing the tiredness out of her eyes and letting out a yawn “what’s wrong?”

“So I was on my early morning mail run as I normally do” she began “when I noticed something that’s not normally there, or rather shouldn’t be there”

“What do you mean?” Twilight queried.

“A house has appeared on the edge of the Everfree forest, a really strange looking one, at that” she said “I know I have a sight problem, but I know when there’s something there that wasn't there yesterday” Twilight frowned.

“I'll check it out” she said “Thank you, Derpy, you can go back to your mail run.” Derpy smiled, nodded, and was just about to take off when she remembered something.

“Oh, I almost forgot!” she exclaimed, digging into one of her mailbags before producing a letter and handing it to the purple Alicorn princess “Special delivery” she then took off and flew towards her next destination.

Twilight placed the letter on a lamp table near to the door and quickly wrote a note to spike before teleporting it to Spikes room. She then Teleported her Saddle bags to her before nodding to herself determinedly and stepping outside. With barely a thought, she closed the doors behind her and set off for the Everfree forest. As she walked through Ponyville, it was largely empty, although the occasional pony waved to her; she even waved a greeting to Rainbow Dash, who was busy on early weather patrol, if Twilight remembered correctly, the weather was scheduled for clear skies. Eventually she reached the edge of the Everfree, where she had to shake her head to make sure what she was seeing was real.

It was a house for sure; that much was certain, but it was unlike any she had seen before. It was large, at least twice as wide as any house in Ponyville, and boxy. Instead of thatched roof, it had what looked like stone plates. The front was painted white, and on the corners and side, bare stones, like those on a stone wall, showed through. After standing there for a good five minutes taking in the details of the house she plucked up the courage to start making her way to what she assumed was the front door. After hesitating for a moment she knocked on the door and paused for a moment before calling out.

“Hello, is there anypony there?”

*POV 1st person*

I was shaken from my sleep by a knocking at the front door and put on my glasses before looking at my phone.

“6:45?” I asked aloud “What person knocks at a cottage in the middle of the countryside at 6:45 in the morning?” Sam didn't answer, he just grumbled went back to sleep. I hastily got dressed and just as I was about to go to the front door I heard a female voice.

“Hielen, est dan jemenay zere?” it called out. I paused, I wasn't exactly a multilingual, but I'd never heard a language like that in my life, I cautiously opened the door and peered out. I froze, standing there was a purple miniature horse with wings and a horn. It also had a disturbingly human face, and that face had a shocked expression on it.

“The fuck!?” I exclaimed before promptly blacking out.