“Buck you! ...Shtupid *hic* hooman!” The obviously intoxicated pony slurred out of his mouth as he wobbled drunkenly outside of the club.

“Tch, whatever, fuckface, get lost!” Donovan threw over his shoulder, shutting the club door behind him as the heavy bass welcomed him back inside. “Ugh…” he groaned, holding his head as he made his way back to the staff lounge, taking his palm off his forehead and looking at what was now a handful of blood. “Shit…”

Just as he sat down on the couch that was definitely not meant for someone who sits the way a human does, he heard the song fade out and the crowd cheer before Vinyl’s voice blared through on the speakers lining the walls of the dance floor. “Thank you, you ponies all rock! Now up on stage for a quick 8-song set is my good friend, DJ Hightop!” The crowd cheered as the second DJ made his way onto the stage, Vinyl heading back into the staff room with happy sigh of relief, donning a few dozen glowsticks which illuminated her slightly sweaty fur. “Phew, what a night!” She said, her voice coming from around the corner to where Donnovan was sitting, trying desperately to not let his blood spill on the carpet.

“Hey, Vinyl.” He called out, the pony soon coming around the corner to greet her friend.

“Hey man, what’s u- Jeez, what the buck happened to you?” She asks in shock, mouth agape.

“It must’ve slipped my mind that you little shits kick. Really. Fuckin’. Hard.” He said, looking up to the DJ with a defeated expression.

“Shit, man, here.” The unicorn said, using her magic to swing open the fridge against the wall opposite of the two, floating out a bag of frozen peas, and a towel from a cupboard up above it, also making sure to toss two hay pockets into the microwave simultaneously.

“Thanks.” Donovan replied slowly as she set the cold pack on his forehead and dabbed the blood away with the towel.

“Don’t thank me; thank the drunk bastard who gave you that shiner, heh.” The tomboyish mare chuckled out before trotting over to the couch and sitting beside the human.

“Gah, it was my own damn fault;” He said with a sigh as he shifted a little, leaning back in a more relaxed stance once most of the blood had stopped flowing out of the gash in his head. “I tried to grab his hoof, shoulda just tugged him out by his mane. It’s a lot harder to wrangle something with four legs. Definitely won’t happen again… God, this hurts more than a tequila hangover…”

“Well, the good news is I’m off for the night, and that means you are too. Kinda cool how our shifts wrap up around the same time, eh? You can thank yours truly for that.” She said, eyebrows raising as the microwave beeped. “Ooh! Hay pockets~” She sang out in the commercial tune, swinging the door open and scarfing down the first microwave haysleeve in two bites.

“Great, so I can be spotted with a celebrity walking out of the club and get harassed by more alcoholic talking horses? You are truly in my good graces.” The dark-haired bouncer said with a chuckle.

“Wanh’ wun?” Vinyl asked through a mouthful of chewed up processed food, offering the second to her battered coworker.

“No thanks, I’ll take a few stoges if you have ‘em though.” He said, hope in his eyes as he massaged the bump he could already feel forming.

“Oh, yeah!” The white pony almost yells out before stuffing the second greasy snack down her gullet, reaching for her back in the corner, handing a pack of cigarettes to Donovan. “All yours. Consider it danger pay for that bucking to the face.”

“Thanks. Been lookin’ for smokes around here, but cant seem to find any… where’d you pick these up?” He asks as he holds a cigarette to his lips, the DJ simultaneously lighting the tip. He takes a long drag, suck it deep into his lungs and leaning back as he blew out a thick cloud of smoke; it had been a few days since his last smoke and he had started to suffer from withdrawals. “Ah, God I missed you, cancer.” he jokes as he looks at the lit tip of the cig, blowing off the dead ash.

“Yeah, it’s hard to find smokes in Ponyville.” Vinyl responded before letting out an obnoxious burp, digging through the fridge once more for a soda before looking at Donovan and nodding her head towards the back exit. With a soft sigh, the human stood, dumped the bag of peas on the counter, and followed behind her. “I usually get them in Canterlot when I have gigs out there, and some of my other DJ buddies bring me some when they visit the club here in town. I can get you, like, a pack a week or somethin, if that works for ya.”

“That’d be cool, man.” The new bouncer replied with a smirk. “How many - what do ya call it, Bits? Yeah, how many Bits would you want for a pack?”

“I’m not trippin’ too hard man, we’ll work that out later. For now, though, you should get home and keep icin’ that thing. I’ll see you next weekend, yeah?” Vinyl said before trotting away.

“Uh, yeah…” Donovan trailed off before heading back to the Acres, getting undressed and into bed as quietly as possible; though Big Mac had already rose from bed, preparing himself for the day’s farmwork. The stallion knocked softly on his door before poking his head in.

“AJ says it’s your day off… whenever you wake up, there’ll be a plate’a food downstairs for ya.” The stoic farmhand said to Donovan in his low voice.

“Great, thanks Mac.” He replied in a sleepy voice, expecting that to be the end of the conversation as he laid down and started to drift off to sleep, managing to hear one more thing from the horse before sleep took him.

“...There’s icepacks in the freezer for yer face, too…”

Donnovan awoke sometime in the early afternoon. He scratched his head as he stretched and yawned before standing and dressing himself, walking down to the Apple Family kitchen and eating his meal, entertaining the Cutie Mark Crusaders while he did so. He then decided to take a stroll out on the town; He’d been paid for his first days at the farm and club, and needed to get some things for himself. His first order of business was to pay Rarity back for the clothes she’d tailored for him. When he arrived, she realized that he’d need something along the lines of a saddlebag for humans, which he noted as a backpack, which she quickly tailored for him as well. After several minutes of her denying payment, he settled to stuff a small bag of bits in her mailbox on his way out.

Next, he stopped by the Ponyville Library to check out some books, which Twilight was happy to loan him. Knowledge is power after all! ‘Better than a lamborghini, right?’ He mused to himself with a soft, sarcastic smile. He’d picked up a few books that would certainly help him understand life around these horses a little better, including a geographical map and index of Equestria and the surrounding areas, an encyclopedia of the dangers and wildlife in the everfree forest, and a book detailing Equestrian civil law. Her only condition was that he allowed her to study him some more. Donovan agreed, as long as he didn’t have to be restrained or stripped; he offered to answer any and all questions she had instead, which was a deal she quickly accepted. They agreed to go out and have the conversation over dinner later the same night. He thanked her for the books and tucked them into his bag before giving Spike a fist bump and heading out onto the streets of Ponyville. He stopped by the market, buying enough food for himself that he wouldn’t have to worry about paying for an expensive meal at the club for a good long while.

With nothing to do really until dinner with Twilight later in the day, Donovan took a walk into the Everfree Forest, looking for a nice tree to read under. About three miles into the woods, he finds a large oak along a trail. Smiling, he sighs calmly as he sits down, pulling out one of the books he’d obtained and pulling a cigarette from the pack Vinyl Scratch had given him, striking a match and lighting the end, puffing it nonchalantly as he read up on Equestrian law. About five pages into learning about how sentient ponies handle a situation in which mommy smacks daddy with a two by four but daddy is also a heavy alcoholic, resulting in a gridlock of parental custody during the soon-to-come divorce, he realized that a strange sound was coming from deeper in the forest. He slid his matchbook nto the page he was reading, setting the book back into his bag and slinging it over his shoulder as he followed the sound. It wasn’t a threatening sound, more like a low hum or chant of some kind. He couldn’t make out the words, but there was a rhythm to it. It sounded like an incantation to a spell. He turned along the trunk of a large tree, a bright green glow laying across the foliage of the forest. Looking to the origin of the glow, he saw what looked to be a stereotypical witchdoctor’s hut. Curious, he stepped up the wooden porch, the words becoming clear as he looked into a window, watching a zebra with several gold rings around its neck and legs chant some sort of blessing, or spell as it poured ingredients into a cauldron, seemingly in a native tongue.

“Holy shit...”

“Ha! Demons stay away, or a violent price you shall pay!” The zebra calls out as in a low but feminine voice as she whirls around, eyes wide open, holding a spear of some sort in her foreleg.

Donovan called out in pain, her reaction had spooked him enough to cause him to jolt into a fully standing position, causing him to hit hi head and a beam that was sticking out from the top of one of the exterior walls. The human fell to the ground, gripping his head in pain. “Ah, shit…. Fuck!”

The zebra ran out to her porch, pointing the spear at Donovan, but soon her eyes widened and she stepped back, bowing her head in apology. “I am sorry, sir anomaly; for it was not a human I expected to see.”

“Uh, yeah no it’s fine, I guess, as long as you don’t stab me…” Donovan said as he stood up, holding his head and wincing in pain. “Fuck… wait, did you say anomaly? The rainbow pony queen said that, too. Why do you ponies - er, and zebras… love using that word? Have you really never seen a human before?”

“Come inside my hut, the story I will tell. And give you a remedy for your headache as well.” She replied, chuckling behind a hoof at the last part of her statement.

“Why are you rhyming like that?” Donovan asked, a bit annoyed at the cadence the zebra spoke with.

“I’m a magical rhyming shaman, is all that I should say, but what if I told you I’m just written that way?” She responds with a smirk.

“Uhh… what?”

The zebra chuckles lowly and shakes her head. “Nevermind that, human anomaly. Also, by the name Zecora is what you may call me.”

Donovan shook his head in confusion, squinting at the strange zebra. “Uh, yeah. Hi. Donovan.” He says, starting to walk with Zecora before pointing at her and gasping in shock. “Wait, you know what I am! You know what a human is!’

Zecora led the human inside, standing next to her cauldron as she began to pour two glasses of what seemed to be an herbal tea of some sort, nodding in response. “Indeed I do, have a drink with me; take a seat and I will tell you how your legend came to be.”

Donovan scoffed but took the tea and sat on a pillow that was next to the cauldron, still able to see over it as Zecora began to pour some strange looking ingredients into the cauldron, rhyming as she did so. “Timberwolf paw and soapstone dust, smoky quartz rock is also a must. Mix with centaur blood and eye of hippogriff… and the concoction shall show the ancient human myth…” A flash filled the room as she added the last ingredient, quiet screams emanating from the pot, slowly growing louder until it became too much to bear, Donovan covering his ears.

“What the fuck?!” He screamed, obviously more than a little freaked out by the orchestra of damning yells coming from this crazy Zebra’s witchcraft pot. Suddenly the screaming stopped, and the once sickly, neon green stew that had formed from Zecora’s alchemy turned to a thick, gooey black substance, dripping from the sides of the pot. Donovan simply stared at the strange event unfolding before him with an open mouth, now transfixed by the freaky but admittedly cool transformation.

Zecora turned to Donovan with an unreadable expression. “Look for yourself, and surely you shall see, just why you are brought here and what you’re meant to be.”

Slowly, and against every instinct in his body, Donovan stood and walked closer to the cauldron, the strange black liquid bubbling at the top. He leaned over the pot, looking for something, but was met with an unfortunate surprise when what looked to be tentacles shot out of the black plasma and clun to the back of his head, pulling his face into the void. “AHH-ffgh!” Zecora stood there patiently, not the slightest bit surprised at what had happened. Donovan’s hands punched and knocked at the sides of the cauldron for a moment before going limp.

Donovan came to moments later seeming to be in a black void, with no sense of space or dimension. He sat up holding his head, but before he had any time to question what had happened, a disembodied voice seemed to speak to him from everywhere at once.

A legend told long ago, forgotten by most. The anomaly will come, descend upon this world, and with it they will bring salvation and strife, from that of their own kind.

Donovan stared upwards, squinting in confusion as he tried to decipher what that meant. He felt something clawing at his thoughts; he’d heard this voice somewhere before, but he couldn’t place it. He whispered to himself in what could only be described as a tone of complete and utter disorientation. “What the… fucking fuck?”

Another voice spoke, much quieter and more timid, this one seemed to be female.

‘Is this him? Is this the anomaly…? He doesn’t look like much, will he be able to-’

Donovan whirled around as he heard another voice, authoritative like the first one he heard, but with a much more casual demeanor. Voice #1 was taking himself too seriously, it seemed.

‘Why do you always have to complain? Every time Dad picks someone, you always have to whine!’

‘Hm, okay, Voice #3, a bit of a bitch.’ Donovan thought to himself, so captivated by the raw power he could feel just through the voices of these seemingly godly beings that he didn’t dare to stop listening for one second. He could tell that he was way out of his own league, no way he was getting out of whatever the fuck this black void world was until these Powers That Be decided he could leave. Suddenly, two beings began to appear in front of him, slowly become less transparent until he could see them clearly, though an ethereal glow surrounded them still. Donovan managed to match the voices up soon enough. The seemingly more timid one was an reindeer with a form similar to Celestia’s, but taller and more slender, with deep green eyes and impressively long antlers. The bitch was easy to identify just by her chronic RBF. A majestic antelope, with an impressive physique for a female, a frame that could rival Big Mac’s, and a husky voice that just emanated raw strength and prowess; her sharp, piercing eyes only added to the ensemble. He watched as the two began to argue.

‘Well, I just feel bad for him, Panzera! He doesn’t even know what’s going on! Poor thing…’

‘Oh, come on, Lonnie! You really have to care about every mortal that comes around?’

‘Oh, have a heart, sis!’

‘Okay, I feel like I’m watching a demigod sitcom.’ Donovan deadpanned before being shook by a strong shout by the booming voice that he first heard when he awoke. Judging by the two arguing sisters’ reactions, it had enough power in it to shut them up too.

ENOUGH! Lonnirva, Panzera, quit this incessant bickering and tell the anomaly what he came here to hear.

‘Ugh, fine.’

‘Yes, Father.’

The two turned to him in unison. Panzera spoke first, in a very casual and cold tone.

‘Sup? In case you didn’t catch that exchange, I’m Panzera, this world’s goddess of power. And my nice little sister over there is Lonnirva, the goddess of protection. Anyways, enough about us, since dad obviously thinks you’re more important. You have a prophecy to fulfill here.’

Lonnirva continued from there, with a much happier and gentler demeanor. ‘That’s right! You were brought here out of necessity. A strong evil awaits you and your friends, and in due time you’ll face it.’

Donovan squinted his eyes in question as he attempted to get some more information. “Oh great, now I’m in the middle of a fucking storybook. Ok, I’ll bite.” He then held his hands up in a sort of mockery of stereotypical polytheistic priests in TV shows and movies. “O, great almighty goddesses, bless me with wisdom! What is this evil thing and how do I fuck it up?”

Panzera gave a chuckle and turned to her sister, pointing a hoof at Donovan. ‘Hey, you know what? I like this one, he’s got a sense of humor!’ She then turned back to address Donovan’s questions. ‘Well, we can’t tell you any of that yet. You’ll hear from us again before this whole thing goes down, but until then…’ She then stood up on her hind legs, holding a slowly materializing yellow ball above her head before hurling it at the human. Donovan’s eyes went blank, his pupils turning white as he was sent to his own mind’s eye. Though he couldn’t exactly see anything, visions ran through his head. It seemed as though he could feel everything all at once, as if he was contemplating all good and bad in the universe for the last million years all condensed into one moment. Pain, strength, sorrow, loss, fortune, love, hate, anguish, joy… it proved to be too much for the mortal human, and was enough to rouse him from this black void, throwing his conscience back into his physical body.

He gasped loudly for air as his head came back up from the cauldron, and he collapsed onto the floor of Zecora’s hut, panting heavily. “Ah, you’re back! Now relax, try to cope. You’ve learned something in this vision quest, I hope?” Zecora asked, waiting patiently for Donovan to answer her, seemingly expecting this type of response.

Donovan looked up with an almost fearful expression and began to retreat backwards towards the door, scooping up his backpack as he spoke in a shaky voice, sweat rolling down his face. “What the fuck did you do to me? I saw everything, felt everything… stay away from me!” He managed before turning and heading at a swift pace back towards Ponyville.

Zecora called out to him, not the least bit upset by his actions, staring out of the window of her hut as she watched him disappear into the heavy foliage of the Everfree Forest. “It’s okay, take some time to recover from this event. In time you will understand what your experience meant!”

Author's Note

Ah, it feels good to get the old writin' muscles working again! Hope y'all enjoyed this (very late) chapter. If you haven't read my most recent blog posts and are wondering why I haven't updated any stories on here in forever, I suggest reading them just so you're all caught up. Hopefully I can get on at least a semi-normal update schedule again, but for now...

Deuces, guys!