Equis Art Online

As Twilight woke up, instinct drove her to look out the window. She sighed. Nothing out of the ordinary. Guards and townsponies were repairing the damage done from the battle. As she walked out of her bedroom, she could hear talking coming from the guest bedroom. As she poked her head in, she rolled her eyes. Kirito and Asuna were sitting together on the bed, with Asuna's head on Kirito's shoulder. Leafa, Sinon, Klein, Lisbeth, and Silica were chatting, while Aries watched while he read a book. Twilight looked in a little more, and she saw Spike sleeping on the bed, completely conked out from last night.

"Morning." She said, and everyone looked her way, and they smiled.

"Morning." Asuna said, wiping her eyes. "How are you doing?"

"Fine. What happened to Spike?"

"Oh, he passed out after we told him what we were. Rather hilarious." Aries said, shutting his book and walking over.

"That's good to hear." Twilight said.

"You know what? I'm actually pretty hungry." Klein said, and his stomach growled, giving Kirito an apprehensive look.

"What's wrong?" Twilight asked.

"You don't know how much Klein can eat in one sitting." Asuna said, chuckling a bit. "We found that out the hard way."

"Hey! I thought that party was forgotten about!" Klein said indignantly. "I thought you guys forgave me for that!"

"Not on your life, sport." Lisbeth said, "Anyways, should we get a bite?"

"Yeah. Twi? Any recommendations?" Aries asked.

"Sugarcube Corner is around the block. It's my friend Pinkie's bakery. Believe me, she knows how to bake."

"Sounds good to me." Kirito said. "We should put our weapons in our inventory. Just so we don't frighten anyone."

Everyone nodded. As they made a strange motion with their hands, the strange white tablets appeared. They tapped them a few times, and their weapons disappeared into blue energy. Twilight was dumbstruck.

"What was that?" Twilight said. "Another In-game skill?"

"Nope. We just put our gear in out inventories. Just item storage." Silica said, and Pina crowed and flew up onto her head.

"You never actually told me what that is." Twilight said, and Silica laughed.

"This dear here is Pina, my Familiar. I met her in SAO. I'm a Beast Tamer, and my race, the Cait-Sith, are naturals in that aspect. He's a little cutie!" SIlica said, and Pina gave her a little lick on the cheek, which made her laugh.

"That's adorable!" Twilight said, and Pina crowed in response.

"I know that this is fun and all, but we should get moving. Twi, what's this Pinkie pony like?" Kirito asked as they walked down the stairs.

"She's a party planner to the 999th degree. She has a cannon that shoots out confetti and balloons everywhere. I still don't know how it works. Thing is, she's always rambling, doing something, eating, baking, or all of those at once. She'll probably throw you a party when we get there. She's that kind of pony." Twilight said, walking out the door, with the group following. After a brief walk (with a few stops to respond to grateful ponies thanking them for getting rid of the dragon) they arrived. As they walked up, Klein suddenly stopped.

"What's wrong?"

"It just seems that house was made by a insane gingerbread man. Or something like that." He said, with his eyes bulging. Even as the group walked forward, Klein stayed still. Even after a few attempts to snap him into reality, they failed.

"He's shocked still!" Silica said, doubling over in laughter.

"Yeah. I can see why." Aries said, and he promptly slapped Klein across the face, snapping him about of his stupor.

"OW!" he yelled, and Aries cracked up, and so did most of the group. After dodging a few punches, they walked in. Ponies whispered and murmured as they sat down. As they took seats by the window, Kirito turned to Asuna.

"So, get any feeling this is similar to Agil's bar back IRL?" he said, and Asuna smiled.

"Yeah, I'm getting that vibe." Asuna replied, and they hugged again. Lisbeth shrugged and as Klein sat down, still mumbling about getting payback for the slap, Pinkie arrived to take orders. Seeing the group of fairies, she gasped rather loudly, causing a few ponies to cover their ears. After some unintelligible ranting, she ran off. Then she came back, this time with a steel gray cannon that intimidated a lot of the group, save Twilight

"Brace yourselves." Twilight said, and the group took her advice. As Pinkie fired, a boatload of confetti, streamers, and a Vanilla creme cake flew straight into Klein's face. As the cake and decorations slid off, Pinkie (Now carrying a platter) caught them as it fell, and somehow now holding a washcloth, wiped Klein's face rather vigorously, despite is muffled protests. As she finished, his face was red, although clean.

"That...was unexpected." Sinon said flatly, echoing the thoughts of every group member.

"Imagine her at the party we threw for you for escaping SAO." Asuna said fondly.

"Yeah. Even without Pinkie there, it was enough for me. Even the drinks." Kirito said, sighing. "Not sure how Agil would react to having a hyperactive pink pony racing around his bar."

"Yeah, I don't think he'd be rather fond of that." she said, and as they conversed, the group was suddenly bombarded by a barrage of balloons. As they sat dumbfounded, they eventually looked up, to see Pinkie dumping a crate-load of balloons on them.

"Wait, she was on the ground literally ten seconds ago. How'd she get up there?" Aries said, exceptionally confused.

"It's what we refer as Pinkie being Pinkie." Twilight said sheepishly. "She's always like that. Hyperactive and hyper-fond of new ponies, or in your case, fairies/humans."

"Yeah. I can see where that came from." Asuna said, while Kirito laughed. At that moment, Pinkie came back, this time on roller skates, carrying a load of pastries and cold/warm drinks. As she handed Twilight the bill, the others dug in. Suddenly, a scroll popped up right in front of Twilight's face. As she opened it, she smiled, then raised her eyebrows, then frowned.

"What's up?" Klein asked.

"Celestia wants to bring you all to Canterlot for a conference or something like that. Apparently a few nobles have heard about your "heroic" deeds, and they want to reward you, thanks to Celestia. Plus, I think I'm due for a trip to the capital. Just be warned. A few nobles there aren't exactly "welcoming" to unfamiliar things, such as extraterrestrials." Twilight said. "And, you can explain a few things on the ride there."

"Okay. How are we getting there?" Aries said.

"Steam train." Twilight said, and Aries hardly suppressed a giggle.

"What's up with that?"

"We stopped using the steam engine in the 1800's. It's currently 2025. We have bullet trains that can reach a few hundred miles per hour faster than a steam engine's top speed." Aries said.

Twilight was genuinely shocked. "For 200 years you haven't used them? The steam engine was one of our biggest innovations!"

"Just like the gasoline engine was for us. Or the tech we need for magnetic levitation. Very long story about both." Aries said noting Twilight's shocked and curious look. "We should get moving."

"Agreed. If I ever go to your IRL world, I  should probably read up."

"Yeah." Aries said. After Twilight paid for their orders, they walked outside. As Twilight ran up to them, the train arrived. Suddenly, Twilight gasped.

"Be right back!" she suddenly said, and there was a bright flash. After around thirty seconds, she was back, this time with a bunch of ponies. They were assorted as the loot in a New Aincrad dungeon. One of them, a Rainbow colored one, saw them and got into a charging position. Then, it a blitz, she charged Kirito. Kirito sidestepped and elbowed the pony to the ground. Before anything else could happen, Twilight's magic aura covered the pony and dragged her over to Twilight side.

"Friend of yours, Twilight?" Kirito said angrily.

"BUCK YOU, ALIEN!" the pony roared.

"In case you didn't see it, WE got rid of the dragon that was attacking the town. Notice that, little miss attack-everything-in-sight?" Klein said jokingly.

"So what? You got rid of a dragon? nnniiiccceee." she said sarcastically. "You are nothing more than...mrph!" Twilight's purple hoof had been shoved into the pony's mouth.

"Sorry about Rainbow." Twilight said. "She's egotistical and a bit hostile to things she's unfamiliar with." A loud "MRPH!" from Rainbow only reinforced that.

"Ah second that." a tan pony said, and she extended her hoof in greeting. "Applejack. Sorry about Dashie, friend."

"No probs. I'm Kirito."

As introductions went around, Rainbow tried, many times, to break free of Twilight's aura to get at each group member. She failed every time. As the conductor yelled "All Aboard!", they boarded the train and found seats for themselves. Twilight released Rainbow and quickly regretted it as she instead of going for Kirito, she charged straight at Asuna. Kirito launched himself at her, and as they grappled, Lisbeth sighed.

"He'll do anything for Asuna. You should have known that."

"Hmph!" was Rainbow's reply. After three minutes of wrestling, Kirito had Rainbow pinned to the floor. After some rather rude remarks from Rainbow, she agreed to stop. Kirito released her, and she flew as far away from them as possible and began to pout.

"So, ready to explain?" Twilight asked.

"Hope you're ready for a very long story." Kirito said , with a small laugh.

"Let's get started."

As the train began to move, the conversation began.