CH.1-A Day of Normality

Rainbow Dash was having a good day. Scratch that: an awesome day.

She had been allowed off her Wonderbolts duty of mopping all the floors for the day, nothing was trying to take over Equestria or ruin friendships, and to top it all off; there was no wind or bad weather to screw up her chance to practice some epic tricks and stunts to try in the next airshow.

The way she saw it, the only thing that might halt her progress were fans wanting autographs. Not that she minded; she'd welcome an ego stroking anytime. She was in the middle of a Triple Aileron Roll when she heard a voice shouting louder than the fans in her head were.

"Rainbow." No answer. "Rainbow!" She was purposefully ignoring her now. "RAINBOW DAAASH!" Dash, caught off-guard from the loudness of the unknown entity's voice, hurriedly landed gracefully; a feeling of annoyance festering in the back of her mind.

She glanced towards the voice and tucked her wings to her sides, noticing that the voice belonged to her friend, Twilight Sparkle. Unfortunately, it seems Princess Luna had taught her how to use the 'Royal Canterlot Voice©'. She shook her head, ridding herself of any further anger.

"Uh - hey, Twi'. 'Sup?" she said with a smirk, seeming to keep calm and collected. "Damn it, I was about to perform the coolest stunt!" Twilight's features slipped from the irritated face she'd made into a smile faster than Pinkie could inhale cake.

"Hi, Rainbow Dash! I just came to ask for your help with some...stuff.” Rainbow tilted her head and squinted her eyes in confusion. "Why would she come to me for help with egghead stuff?"

“Um, yeah, no thanks. Why don't you go ask one of the others? They'd be more than happy to help you with your egghead stuff, math and books just aren’t my style." Twilight raised an eyebrow.

"Actually, you’re the only one I can ask besides Applejack,” she said.
Rainbow groaned as Twilight began to rant in rhythm with her waving hoof. “Pinkie's working at Sugarcube Corner, Rarity is filling in a big order and Fluttershy is on a date with Discord.” She frowned. “Actually, I haven’t even asked Applejack yet! For all I know, she's most likely flirting with”-

Suddenly, Pinkie Pie spontaneously materialized in front of Twilight causing both her and Rainbow to yelp.

“FOREVER!" Pinkie screeched.

She then faded from existence and reappeared at Sugarcube Corner.

Twilight swallowed nervously. “Um - Apples! She's flirting with apples, heh-heh...” Twilight said, eyes shifting left and right above an oversized smile.

Rainbow smirked, raising an eyebrow. "Oh, AJ, when I find out who it is; you better be ready extreme humiliation!" She shook her head. Right now, she needed to find a reason to say she couldn't help Twilight.

“Well, uh I can't help 'cause I've got... Wonderbolt duties!” she began, starting to ramble. “Yeah, I mean there's just so much stuff that needs to be done there, so, yeah, uh - see ya!” She promptly catapulted herself into the air, only to be slammed back to the ground by a magical-purple-aura-bubble-thing.

“Alright then, you leave me no choice." Twilight said slyly, ignoring Rainbow’s pained groans. She then looked directly at Rainbow with huge eyes and a wobbly lip.
"Will you pleeaase help me?"

The scene was too much for Rainbow and it showed as her eye was twitching uncontrollably.
"*Sigh* Okay... I'll help..."

Twilight then grew a smug look and with it, Rainbow knew that she had lost all chances to get away. She stuck her tongue out as Twilight winked, then teleported to her castle, leaving behind a defeated Rainbow.

"Buck."

~MEANWHILE ON EARTH~

... wait what?

...
...
Knock-knock-knock.

"Nngh..."

This is John, the man who is currently sleeping to avoid answering the door. John is your average person, he's got a backstory, a character, and a way-of-life, however he has this one tiny detail about him that separates him from any other person: He's half cat. He's got the ears, tail and a few other things, but otherwise he's human. A better term for what he is could be simply: Neko, the Japanese word for 'cat' but known to anyone who watches anime as a person who's half-cat half-human. (What? Were you expecting him to be dark and edgy or mysterious and 'misunderstood', or maybe one-sided and extremely overpowered? No way, those just aren't quality character traits for OCs anymore.)

Knock-knock-knock.

"Mmmaauugh... five more minutes; dad hasn't even made the catnip yet..." he mumbled, rolling over on his bed whilst swishing his tail at the thought of said item.

KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK. DING-DONG!

John bolted upright; the sound of his doorbell ringing really wasn't something he wanted to hear right now. He groaned and rubbed his eyes which were bloodshot from deprivation. Furry ears arched backwards as his alarm clock decided to join in on the torturous fun, beeping cheerily while the numbers ‘9:00’ flashed across its screen.

"Auugh... I'm up, I'm up! Don't need to rub it in," John slurred groggily. Reluctantly, he dragged himself out of bed.

He slowly dressed himself in his usual white hoodie and blue jeans, then did all the other things normal people did when they woke up, taking his time as he did so. He stumbled his way to the door and peeped through the keyhole as the knocking increased to an infuriating pace, only halting to give way to the occasional screech of the doorbell. He froze when he saw an unknown person at his doorstep.

Immediately, he tucked in his tail and slipped his hood over his head, making sure to cover his ears... before cautiously opening the door.

"Ah, finally! I was beginning to think you weren't home. Now... where's your rent?"

John swallowed nervously. The man was obese, sporting a top hat and monocle accompanied by a brown suit and tie. A matching goatee and a devious smile coated his features. John just offered him a confused grin while trying his best not to nod back off to sleep.

"SIR!"

John jumped back slightly as the man's voice jolted him from his thoughts.

"W-wha~?"

The man hissed in irritation. "You know why I'm here, correct?"

John tilted his head dazedly, not realizing what was going on.

The man in front of him was his landlord. He was here to collect a long-overdue payment...and he didn't seem to have any patience. Not knowing who the man was, John tried to shoo him away:

"Sorry, this ain't McDonald's; try down the block," he said tiredly.

The landlord went aghast at the comment, and instantly lost any sign of false cheeriness.

“Look. I'm not in the mood for disgusting low-lifes like you. So give me the 50 grand you owe me and I won't have to mortgage your house. AGAIN."

John, finally snapping out of his tired state, managed to finally understand the problem that had unfolded before him and twitched his tail under his shirt instinctively as a way of showing frustration. "Oh crap not this, not now..."

For sneaking out of paying bills, he owed $50,000 to this rich snob. Unsurprisingly, all he had was about $40, and let's just say that he was not looking forward to being stuck on the street again. At that moment his pupils turned extremely microscopic.

He bit his lip as the man tapped his wristwatch impatiently.
"Uhh... c-could you maybe give me a little more time?" he stuttered. He was clearly afraid and the landlord knew it.

Said landlord was clearly not amused... though that would be an understatement. "A deal?” he spat. “Where do you think you live, Las Vegas? You cannot gamble your way out of this again!"

John stepped back, cowering in fear as the landlord leaned forward intimidatingly. 'God he's big...' "Give me the money. Now."

John looked around for anything that could save him from this situation. Th-there's no way I'm getting out of this one, am I? One of his ears twitched in fear and he instantly brightened as an idea formed, before making him shift uncomfortably from the thought of it.
Is there really no other way? He looked back at the landlord who had been staring at him the whole time gave an irritated growl.

He sighed."Guess I have no other choice..."
He proceeded to drop to his knees and stare up at his landlord with the most pitiable expression he could muster -- which was perfected being what he was.

"Pwease, sir? At weast a few more days? Pwetty pwease?" The scene was too much for the businessman and John grinned inwardly. He had become putty in his paws...er...hands.

"I-uh... F-fine," he grunted. "I'll give you two more weeks but that's it. Once your time is up, you’d better have the cash...or you'll get taken out with the trash!" John nodded vigorously as the landlord stormed away... probably to go and be with other rich snobs to do other rich snobby things.

As soon as he had disappeared from his line of sight, John closed the door and sighed, letting his tail run free and taking his ears out from under their hood. Since he was now too awake to go back to sleep, he strode to the kitchen to grab a bite. He opened the fridge, trying to decide what he should eat; box of stale ramen, instant mac and cheese, cans of soup… basically items that would make a homeless shelter seem like a five star restaurant.

He settled for a rotten fish sitting behind it all, silently wishing that he wasn't a freak so he could fix his shoddy lifestyle. But he knew that would never happen, and it was with no small distress that he threw himself into the hard cushions of his beaten-up, fur-ridden couch.

He closed his eyes and sighed melodramatically, rubbing his temples.

"Well, might as well see what's on today," he yawned, flipping on the HBO™ channel to find a commercial blaring across the screen. He was poor, but luckily the only four friends he had who knew about his...predicament had won him an epic 78' TV in a lottery, along with a lifetime subscription to HBO™.

He sat up straight and frowned as a commercial ended and a show he'd never seen before started playing.

“Huh. This is new...I’ll have to tell Elijah about this," he thought, chuckling. "He'll probably go into a rant about where this 'universe' is and all that other egghead stuff."

Then, he allowed his brain to switch off as he began to watch some reruns of (what else but) MLP.

~A PROLONGED AMOUNT OF TIME LATER~

“Huh. Not bad.”

That was all John could say after finishing his little MLP marathon... though in truth, he was mentally pinning Equestria at the top of his ‘places to survive’ list(It's a very short list).

Suddenly there was a knock at the door and John jumped off the couch. He padded silently to the keyhole and grinned, happy to see his friends and not an obese Scrooge McDuck. He didn't bother to put hide anything and quickly opened the door.

"Hey wassup, John?" The guy behind the voice was tall, most definitely the tallest of the five there. He sported a green shirt with ‘PEWDIEPIE’ scrawled across the front and red sports shorts...which was odd because it was winter. He was African-American with a scruffy Mexican mustache accompanied by red buzz-cut hair.
Name: Daniel

"Yeah, we just thought we'd come to check in on you, dude.” This guy was about the size of John, but slightly shorter. A red under-shirt peeked out from beneath his black biker jacket which fell over even darker jeans. Earmuffs hugged his ears without preventing a streak of deep blond hair from falling over one side of his face. There was also a guitar strapped to his back.
Name: Liem

“Well -- actually -- I require some more data for my work. Would you care if I ran some experiments? I assure they won't injure you like last month." The speaker was the shortest there and dressed in a brown overcoat and black sweatpants. A scarf adorned his neck, swinging over a white t-shirt. His brown hair was sticking out all over the place, even going so far as to fall over his glasses.
Name: Elijah

“Thanks guys, I'm doing same as usual,” John said gratefully. “And sure, Eli, you can run your tests.” He peered at the girl standing next to Liem. “ So how’re you doing?” She smiled.

“Oh! Hi John.” The girl was small, almost as small as Elijah. Long, blue hair flowed over her back and small wisps of it floated across her freckly face. Her hands were hidden in the sleeves of her blue sweater and one foot was tucked behind the leg of her sweatpants. She was wearing earmuffs like Liem, who had suddenly become the subject of her dreamy-eyed stare. Everyone happened to notice this and John took action first.
“Uh...you okay?”

She blinked as she realized that everyone was staring at her. A blush spread across her features before she stumbled over her next words, trying desperately to save herself from further embarrassment. “Oh! Y-yeah, I’m fine.” She tilted her head curiously. “By the way, John...are you running through our names like we’re in a spy movie?”
Name: Cherry.

“Whaaa...” Cherry’s blush deepened and she shook her head.

“Oh...um...n-never mind,” she squeaked. She rubbed the back of her head nervously and bit her lip in concern. “We just stopped by to see how you were doing... Oh! And to give you some cat-nip, you look like you need it.”

John grinned almost maniacally.
"Sweet! I ran out just yesterday; can't thank you enough,." He greedily grabbed the bag, tore it open and began scoffing its contents. "Oh, come on in guys it's getting pretty cold out there." He spoke, muffled.

"Hmm... I think she's right, you look worse than usual. What’s got you in a mess?" Daniel asked, plonking himself on the couch next to John, who swallowed nervously.

“Uhh...yeah, about that. I-I've been avoiding telling you guys 'cos I wanted to do this on my own. But...apparently I owe my landlord a shit-load of money and I only have two weeks to come up with the it.”
“How much?” Liem asked, pulling out his guitar and sitting down next to Daniel. John chuckled nervously as Liem began playing.
“...Fifty grand.”

The measuring tape wrapped around his ear crashed to the ground as Elijah fell backwards in shock, Daniel grew wide eyed with his mouth agape, Cherry gasped covering her mouth and Liem’s melody degraded into an audible twang. The sound was extremely off key and John’s ears flattened themselves over his head, enticing a “Fascinating!” from Elijah despite his shock. Cherry glared at him: not a good time.

There was nothing but awkward silence for the next few minutes.

“S-sweetie?” Cherry finally stammered out, “Even if we all pitched in all of our money, I don't think it would be enough to pay it off. I’m so, so sorry...but I don’t think we can help you.” Her face crumpled; clearly, she didn’t like the idea of her friend living in an alley... again.

John rubbed the bridge of his nose in distress as Liem scrambled frantically for a way to fix the problem in any way possible, and Eli just nodded his head in shame and continued his research.

Daniel was the one who finally spoke; "Hey, man, if worst comes to worst, I can prob'ly hook you up with my garage. I think I got a spare bed in there, y'know?” Daniel grinned. Cherry smiled weakly in return and John murmured his thanks whilst Liem breathed a sigh of relief.

Liem proceeded to put an arm around Cherry giving a cheeky smile causing her to blush, causing John and Daniel to laugh at the display.

“Anyway! You mentioned something I'd be interested in?" Elijah interjected bluntly, comically rising from the floor between Cherry and Liem, ruining the moment.

Cherry glared at him as John sat up excitedly.
"Oh, yeah! I think I found something for... whatever weird experiment your doing,” he said, causing Eli to glare at him and say;
"It's not weird! It's inter-dimensional travel!"

John ignored him and leaned forward, grabbing the remote and switching on the TV. Immediately, a newly recorded episode of MLP materialized on the screen and Daniel gasped. ”Bro, You watch MLP?” he asked excitedly. “And here I thought I was the only one!” Everyone stared at him confusedly with the exception of John, who laughed heartily and nodded.

After watching the recorded episode, ‘Pinkie Pride,’ everyone who had been confused instantly showed signs of enjoying the show -- except for Liem who slept through the entire thing. Elijah was acting like a giddy school-girl, blabbering on about how extraordinarily amazing it was. As John had suspected he would, he had fallen in love with the series in less than ten minutes into the episode and an in-depth conversation about it's ‘universe’ happened after it ended.

John could only raise an eyebrow when Elijah started defying physics, pulling charts and graphs out of thin air. He simply shrugged and returned to his ‘food’; he was more far more interested in the catnip than Elijah's miracle-working.

All the while, Daniel had been listening to their conversation; wanting to know where the universe of his favorite show was.
Cherry had fallen asleep on Liem's shoulder and him on her head. The scene could only be described as ‘cute’.

A few hours later, John found that he had scoffed the last of his catnip and he stood up, stretching luxuriously. A massive grin spread across his face.
“Who's up for a few drinks?”

“Great. Looks like instead of helping her with egghead work, I’m going to be her test subject.”

A series of similar, fuming thoughts fired across Rainbow’s mind as Twilight babbled on about how she needed to work on perfecting her teleportation spell. As it turns out, Applejack had not been flirting with apples and stood nervously in a corner with Spike as Twilight droned on about graphing the equation of x plus y times z equals blah-blah-blah: MATH.

Luckily, Rainbow managed to sleep through most of her rant, waking up just in time to see Twilight gazing at her expectantly. She sighed.

“Alright, let's get this over with,” she grumbled.

“That’s what I want to hear!” Twilight exclaimed. “If I can perfect this spell, who knows how far we’ll be able to travel in less than 3.15 seconds!”
She turned away from Rainbow. “Now! AJ, Spike, you might want to step back."

Spike obeyed and eagerly backed up against the wall while Applejack...uh...

"Yo, Applejack, y'alright?" Spike asked, tilting his head in confusion. The Earth pony was staring dreamily in his direction; she hadn’t heard a thing. Rainbow grinned evilly before shaking her head and dashing up to her, waving her forehooves rapidly in front of her eyes.

Suddenly, she snapped out of it.

“Oh...er...right. Back Spike. I mean Spike back.” She groaned. “Step back! Y-yeah, that’s it.” She blushed lightly before scooting towards the back wall, pointedly ignoring Spike’s quizzical stare. Rainbow could see the relief in her eyes as she silently thanked Celestia that a certain dragon hadn’t noticed her behavior.
Rainbow snickered quietly to herself. "Oh, do I have some teasing to do!"

She got into position as Twilight prepared her spell, getting ready to teleport her... somewhere in Equestria. She had no idea what went on in that mare's mind. Probably books.

Sparks flew into view as Twilight, looking extremely constipated, gathered a ball of purple magic at the tip of her horn. Then, before Rainbow could react, she sent the ball soaring straight towards her.
"WHAT THE"-
Rainbow yelped and closed her eyes as the magic surrounded her and smoke billowed from her form, concealing her.

Spike and Twilight looked on in terrified awe and Applejack snapped completely out of her Daydream-Which-Shall-Not-Be-Mentioned-To-The-Public to stare at the scene.

“Rainbow?” Twilight whispered.

“Well, I'm pretty sure it didn't work,” came the satirical reply. Everypony sighed in relief as the smoke dissipated.

“Oh, thank Celestia you’re okay!” Twilight exclaimed, rushing forward and throwing her forelegs around Rainbow’s neck. Rainbow opened her mouth to say something sarcastic, but was interrupted as Twilight suddenly drew away from her.

“H-hang on! This is impossible! All my spells work to some extent 100% of the time!" she yelled, luckily not in her 'royal Canterlot voice.' Applejack shrugged.

"Well Twi', guess this is a first. Sorry for the waste a' time, Rai...” was all Applejack managed to get out before Twilight angrily shot about ten more spells towards Rainbow, each having as little effect as the first. Rainbow glared at her as the smoke cleared once again before Twilight finally sighed in defeat...and began showing signs that she probably hadn't slept in days. Spike was the first to notice and rushed to help the purple alicorn to her hooves. He turned to Applejack and Rainbow.

"You girls should probably go,” he said tiredly, biting his lip as Twilight fainted in his arms. “Twi's probably gonna have a mental breakdown when she wakes up, and I'm pretty sure you don't want deal with that."

Rainbow nodded in agreement, and started flying out the door. Applejack followed suit, before stopping and turning to Spike. Rainbow glanced behind her to see that she was slightly flustered.

“Uh... sugahcube?” A.J stammered. “A-are 'ya gonna be free tommorah? Er - it’s just that...” Her ears pricked up in the way they always did when she got a bad idea. “Pinkie’s really missed 'ya and wants to throw ‘ya a...as ah reckon she's callin' it...a 'thank Celestia 'ya got a day off party'!” she babbled. She bit her lip and looked around wildly hoping he believed her. Rainbow smirked; Applejack had it bad if she was lying.
Spike, completely oblivious, chuckled.

“Heh-heh! Oh, that Pinkie. Always trying to cheer us up. Yeah, I’ll definitely be at Sugarcube Corner around noon. Unless its a 'surprise' party,” he said, winking. His face shifted from mock confusion to glee. "Ooh, will Rarity be there?" he asked hopefully.

This sole sentence visibly tore Applejack apart, even though she and everypony in Ponyville already knew about Spike's supposed 'secret crush'. Rainbow’s smirk slid from her face. She had been watching the whole scene like it was nothing more than a film, wishing that she had some popcorn to accompany her entertainment. Until now, that was...she didn't want her friend hurt any more than she already was.

"Yeah she'll be there,” Applejack said dejectedly. She glared at him. “And so will the rest of us, so big deal if she's there if 'ya ask me!"

“We’d better get going,” Rainbow said sharply, grabbing Applejack by the tail and flying her forcefully out of the castle before Spike could notice the sadness in a certain Earth pony’s eyes.

After a few minutes of gloom, Applejack finally shook herself from her state and told Rainbow that she'd be fine...meaning that Rainbow no longer felt obligated to stay with her. Applejack had outright refused to confess to her crush on Spike though.
"This doesn't mean I'm not gonna tease her about this."

As she soared towards her practice spot, she realized that Twilight’s escapades and Applejack’s miniature therapy session had taken up almost the entire day. So she sighed and changed direction, heading towards her home in the clouds.

As Rainbow let out a yawn and closed the door behind her, a floating, shelled creature flew up to her and lightly bumped her back. “Oh, Hiya Tank!” she said delightedly, turning to face him. “Did you miss me? Aw, 'cos I missed you!"

Said creature was actually her pet tortoise, Tank. She reserved a sweet side for him that she shared with nopony else. Otherwise, she'd lose her awesomeness status. At least, that’s what she thought would happen.

“Turtle noise!” Tank replied happily, bobbing his head up and down slowly.

"Aw, seems like you had a busy day! Let me get that propeller off ‘ya so we can both...” she yawned “...go to beddy-bye." She removed Tank's propeller and gently placed him in his cage. It didn’t take long for him to fall into a deep sleep.

Rainbow gazed at him with a tired smile. This was the only time she could allow herself to be soft: with her pet and with her pet only. So she had figured that since her 'soft time' was so short, she could turn the mushiness up to full throttle whenever she was alone with Tank.

After a few drowsy minutes, she floated up the stairs and (too tired to care about the mess of twisted sheets) flopped onto the end of her bed and curled into a ball, drifting into her usual dream of kicking changeling flank...

It was only an hour later when a purple aura began to surround her. A very spell-like purple aura. It grew ten times bigger before halting in its progress with a slight hum, barely fazing Rainbow; the master of heavy sleeping. Then, as suddenly as it had appeared, the aura closed in on her and disappeared...

Along with Rainbow Dash.

John woke from an abnormal, but peaceful night's sleep.

His friends had decided to play a drinking game. It was nearing Christmas, so it was decided that every time a character wore the Santa hat which was placed on the corner of the TV, everyone took a shot. Let's just say that it happened a lot.

John, completely hungover, had passed out on the couch with his tail swaying in...delight? Everyone was too plastered to tell. His friends, nice as they were, had tucked him into bed where he'd just woken up to the warmth of his blanket, the soft light of morning sun...and the comforting feeling of a pet sleeping at his feet.

"Waitaminute."

John didn't have a pet; he thought it would be inhumane being what he was. So what on earth...

He leaned forward, trying to see just what it was that was occupying the space at his feet, but could only make out a blob of cyan. In case it was an animal, he slipped silently from his covers, careful not to make any noise, and tip-toed to the foot of his bed to get a good look at what...it was.

What he saw shocked him, but not as much as one might think; he'd seen weirder stuff.

Before him was a horse... no, a mare. Her fur was the color of the sky, her mane a blazing rainbow. She could be no bigger than a human child. His eyes widened...he couldn’t stop staring.
"Is she an alien? Nah, she's probably something created by necromancy or something."

He zeroed in on her sleeping face, looking for any signs of necromantic runes on her muzzle. Unfortunately, this meant that Rainbow woke very suddenly to a very frightening hooded figure staring intently at her face. Under any other circumstance, she'd immediately start blaming Twilight for using magic on her.
But instead, she simply screamed, reared and bucked John into a nearby closet. Then, scared...no, annoyed, she backed up against the far end of the bed where it met the corner wall. And so, it was out of ‘annoyance’ that she spoke at the same time as John:

"What the hell!?"
"What the Tartarus!?”

Author's Note

Hope you like it! Criticism and comments are always welcomed!
~quick note, yes I know your sort-of just thrown in on John's side of things but I'm honestly not good at story beginnings... never gotten an 'A' on any essay because of that...