Is Love A Mirage?

by HauntingSpiritRisingMoon

Rating: teen
Tags: Slice of Life, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Romance, Original Character, Comedy, Rarity
Length: 2085

A stallion named Mirage is sent to a village in the desert to help make a weather machine there. He then meets Cactus Fruit.

Cactus Fruit is an Earth pony stallion living in a desert village named Mojavneigh Village. He is popular for being as tough as a wall and his astounding ability to control plants. However, plants need water, so he sends an ad into Manehatten, asking for an inventor to help with their water supply.

Mirage is a Unicorn inventor who uses (What else?) mirages to clearly envision his inventions. He responds to an ad he finds in a paper and travels to a mysterious and low-populated village in the Mojavneigh Desert. There he meets his employer, Cactus Fruit.

Cactus Fruit is unaware of his sexuality, as he has little to no friends.

Mirage is in the closet, afraid of judgement from his friends and family.

Cactus finds Mirage adorable.

Mirage finds Cactus hot.

Will either admit their feelings?

Will the new machine work?

Will Rarity resist the urge to forcibly ship them?

Wait..... What?

(Character tags will be added if neccesary.)

Published 2015-11-09 23:40:02 UTC
Last updated 2015-11-23 00:40:27 UTC

Written in ink.

Cactus Fruit sighed as he closed the blinds, trying to muffle the shouts from outside. The leaf green stallion put a hoof to his head, trying to calm his pounding headache. 'Don't those ponies understand? You need water to grow plants!' He swept back his brown mane as an idea popped into his head. 'Of course! Why didn't I think of that earlier?'

The stallion walked to the back door of his little hut and picked up his cloak, flinging it over his body. He carefully looked around, made sure that no pony saw him, and walked to the post office.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------1 week later---------------------------------------------------------------------

Mirage walked along the street, his good friend Rarity walking with him, as they went to pick up the morning paper. He did this every morning, looking for ads.

"So how much did it pay for?" Rarity questioned, as Mirage had just told her about her recent creation for one of his employer's, a shop keep.

"100 bits. It was an elaborate grandfather clock that showed what each phase of the moon meant. 5 feet tall. Cheapskate." Mirage explained dejectedly.

Rarity put a comforting hoof on his shoulder. "That is a sizable amount, why the long face?"

"It won't be enough to pay my rent, now that the renovations are finished." During the last few weeks, Crane and his build team had been renovating the apartment building, giving it a whole new feel.

They finally reached the newspaper store, and the two started checking papers.

"How about this one? It's a gentleman by the name of Caramel, looking for an inventor to help him make a..... Music box? 50 bits?" Rarity suggested.

"No, I recently ran out of sound boxes, and it'll be another week until my supplier restocks." Mirage turned down. It went this way for a while, Rarity giving suggestions while Mirage gave a reason to turn it down, like "Not enough bits" or "Don't have the right materials." Finally, Rarity found a rather extreme request.

"Mirage! A fellow in Mojavneigh Village is searching for an inventor to make a weather machine, 1000 bits."

Mirage blinked in surprise and took it in his silvery magic. "Wow. This is a great deal." 'A stallion, eh? Good thing Rarity doesn't know, or she would try to get him to marry me as soon as I met him.' The fashonista had no clue that her friend was gay, so she just thought this a great opportunity.

"I'm gonna go, Rarity. You want to come? It will be lonely if I'm the only pony I know there."

"Absolutely! I love learning new cultures so I can introduce them into my designs." The unicorn responded to her orange coated friend. He had always been an odd looking pony. His coat was a bright orange, his mane sky blue, and a white streak in his mane. Even stranger was his Cutie Mark, a fuzzy image of an oasis.

"Well then," The inventor said, walking out the door with magazine in his silver magic. "let's get packing."

Author's Note

Well, this my first chapter in this series, and I'm excited. Let me know if my pacing is too fast, and five points to Gryffondor if you can guess what the title parodies.

Hellos and Goodbyes.

Fluttershy's faint voice floated out of the tub she rested in. "I bet he'll do amazing. He's probably a very nice stallion."

Rarity glanced at her friend warily. "Probably?"

Twilight spoke from the chair where she got her mane done. "You haven't really told us about him before. You talk about the amazing sights and shopping malls, but almost never the ponies."

"Really? Mirage is such a good friend of mine! We we're friends in high school but he had to move to Phillydalphia for a while. Such a shame you never met him." Rarity explained.

Pinkie popped up next to Rarity, seemingly form no where. "He's probably pretty cool with his whole mirage-making power-stuff! We should have a going away party, and then a party when you get back! Send us pictures! Better yet, send postcards!"

Rarity chuckled. "Of course Pinkie. Now, it has been wonderful, but I'll have to go now if I want to catch the train."

Her friends, at least the ones who would actually go to the spa, waved and said cheerfully, "Good bye!"

"Bye!" And with that, Rarity exited the spa and walked towards the train.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------Hours later------------------------------------------------

Mirage tapped his hoof impatiently on the wood floor of the train station. 'She's late. Why isn't she here yet?' He suddenly heard a train whistle and turned. The train was almost there, and the Unicorn was upset. He decided that if she was late, it was all her fault.

Suddenly a pitter-patter of manicured hooves was heard rushing across the station, shouting "Wait!" The mare panted as she sat next to the inventor. She had a large amount of suitcases floating in her magic before she set them down.

"Where's your little dragon friend?" The stallion questioned. Rarity had told him about Spike and how he would do everything for her. He thought he took him for granted but she felt hurt whenever he brought it up.

"Twilight had him stay. She said Spike wanted Twilight to test something with him." Rarity panted. "I wonder what?"

"From what you said about him, probably a spell to turn him into an adult without consequences." They shared a quick laugh as the train pulled into the station. "Onward to Mojavniegh Village!"

----------------------------------------------------------------------One incredibly boring train ride later...-----------------------------------

Mirage walked off the train, him nodding his head absentmindedly as Rarity talked his head off about her fashion designs.

"And the headdress was red silk and-"

"Rarity." The inventor said, spotting a pony on a nearby bench. "I think that's him." Mirage had to admit, the stallion was quite handsome. He had a deep green coat and a chocolate colored mane and tail. He had leaf green eyes and, surprisingly, a rose as his Cutie Mark. He was tall, similar to a stallion Rarity had mentioned called Big Mac.

When he spoke, it reminded Mirage of a baritone saxophone. "Howdy. I take it your the inventor?"

It was a struggle for the unicorn to pick his jaw off the floor. "Y-yes. You wanted a weather machine...? Why, besides the obvious reasons?"

The stallion looked like he wasn't sure if he should tell him, but the pony relented. "Well, I happen to be very good with plants, better than most ponies, and I've been harassed for not growing enough." He shook his head sadly. "But I can't. There's plenty of sun, but plants need shade and water too.

I'm pretty sure a weather machine could fix both those problems." In the stallion's mind, though no pony could tell, he wad arguing with himself.

'He's adorable!'

'I'm straight!'

'He's adorable!'

'I'm not gay!'

'He's adorable!'

The unicorn looked up to the sun and squinted. "Do you know a place we can stay?"

The stallion blinked and cleared his thoughts. "Y-yeah, you can stay at my place." He suddenly noticed the white mare, who had a strange grin on her face. "Who's this? Your marefriend?" For some reason it pained him to say that.

Mirage quickly shook his head. "No! She is my friend, and she loves getting new designs, so be wary. She is probably imagining a suit for you right now. And my I ask my employer's name?"

"Cactus Fruit. But just call me Cactus."

"Well then, hello Cactus."

"Hello....."

"Mirage."

"Hello Mirage."

Meanwhile, through all of this, hiding behind Rarity's strange smile, was one thought.

'SHIIIIIIP!!!'

Author's Note

Chapter two! These chapters will probably be ranging in amount of words.

Discussions

"Remind me, why are we hiding here?" Mirage asked in a hiss. The trio were currently hiding behind a pony's house, as a crowd of ponies walked by.

"These ponies want me to grow crops. I can't do that without water, but they don't realize that. If they see me, they yell at me, and I get surrounded, and then they get physical." He stared in to the crowd, not taking his eyes off of it for one moment.

"Oh." Came the stunned reply.

Rarity was being, surprisingly, calm. She wasn't moaning about how dirty it was. Instead she was thinking over some instances she had when she had hung out with Mirage. Now, she was no love goddess, but she could tell when two ponies fit perfectly for each other.

Most times ended in disaster, but there were some gems. Like when she made a fake ad for a pony named Caramel, telling him to work at Sweet Apple Acres, and that ended in a happy romance with Big Mac and Caramel.

She had a feeling this was one of those times. So she replayed scenes in her head when she had talked about stallions. The time when they had past an ad for cologne for stallions with an admittedly hot stallion holding the product. Mirage had looked at it when Rarity had pointed out. And when she stopped to remember the memory, she didn't focus on her freak out over this hot stallion, and on Mirage's face, which was noticeably red.

And though he could have just been embarrassed over her hysterics, he did happen to be staring at the ad at the time. During her thoughts, the crowd had cleared, and she nearly missed Mirage and Cactus walk in to a house across the street. She ran after them, luckily making it there before Cactus shut the door. "Why didn't you wait for me!?"

Cactus Fruit shrugged. "We tried telling ya, but Ah knew we had to get here before they came back."

Mirage frowned. "I even shook you and you still didn't react."

Rarity blushed. "Oh my. Well, Mirage, can I quickly talk to you?"

Mirage had a puzzled expression on his face, but he nodded. "Sure."

Cactus walked in to his kitchen. "I'll be makin' dinner."

Rarity led Mirage to an adjacent room and sat on a chair. She decided to get straight to the point. "Mirage, are you gay?"

Mirage froze up, and his eyes widened. His mouth opened and closed like a fish. "H-How...?"

"Ah, so you are. As for how I found out," She winked. "That's my little secret."

Mirage seemed to collapse. Hooves raised to his head, covering his face, as his body drooped to the floor. "What do you want from me?"

Rarity smiled. "To see my friend happy." And with that, she left the room, a stallion left in her wake.

"Okay, can you ask me why you want me out here?" Cactus glared at the mare sitting in front of him on the back porch.

"I have a simple question for you." She responded elegantly.

"And what is that?" He asked grumpily.

A smile tugged at her lips. She was using all the works on this pony. Half-lidded eyes. Suggestive posture. Yet, nothing phased him. "All righty then. Are you gay?"

The green pony stared at her. "Are you dumb? Ponies don't asked ponies that out of the blue!"

Rarity sighed. "I will ask you something different. Have you took notice of my posture?"

Cactus did a quick scan. "Uh, yeah. What about it?"

Rarity smirked again. "Now think of me as a stallion."

Cactus blinked. "You really are going for this? Alrighty then." He closed his eyes, and Rarity took notice as heat raised to his cheeks, and he grew a mischievous grin. Cactus seemed unaware for a bit, before his eyes snapped open, seeing Rarity's victorious expression. "That does not mean anything!"

Rarity sighed. "Suit yourself then...." As she walked by, she 'accidentally' dropped a magazine from her saddle bags. She made a quick turn to see Cactus' expression, and was awarded with a massively blushing face, jaw dropped, and eyes wide. Smirking, she went inside the cottage.

Author's Note

Before you all bother me, if he picks up the magazine is i the next chapter.

Cancelled

Just to get it out there, I'm cancelling this story. I don't like how I set up the setting and story for my pairings.

Buuuuuuut, that doesn't mean I'm abandoning them. I am going to start a new story, where these two are in college. Things are going to change, but I hope you accept my decision. So tune in to..........

SCHOOL OF LOVE!!!!