“Oh crap, what do we do about this?”
Caleb Newson’s mind was in a complete rage at his friend, John Tychus, after he clumsily dropped his gift for their friend Elizabeth Oxton. John was entrusted with carrying their presents, while Caleb was carrying the cake for tomorrow’s mini celebration. The gift was a heavily detailed clay sculpture of Fluttershy, which took Caleb weeks to perfect every little detail, from the cutie mark to the hairstyle. To make matters worse, she would be getting them gifts too, since all three of them were, surprisingly, born on the same day at approximately the same time. Some might call it a coincidence, others say God, but either way, they were in trouble. The three of them were close friends, so something like this could go either good or bad. At the time though, they were expecting the worst. Caleb’s and John’s minds were scrambling to find a solution before disaster strikes.
“Well we can’t just leave it here! We need to clean this up and see if we can fix it.” John said, with a look of worry in his eyes.
“I don’t know if I can fix it in time, let alone fix it at all before she gets back. You shouldn’t have tried to carry everything in your hands! You should have used a fucking mini wagon or cart or SOMETHING! But no, you just had to drop it. I knew I should have been the one holding the gifts! Next time, you carry the cake, WITHOUT ANYTHING ELSE IN YOUR HANDS!!!” Caleb screamed.
“I know I screwed up, but yelling won’t fix anything. Let’s just try to get as many of the pieces as we can and take it home, we can call Liz saying we forgot to feed our dogs or something to get out of meeting her. It’s not the best plan, but it’s the only one we have” John said.
“Fine, but this argument isn’t over. We need to talk about your clumsiness after our birthday passes, but for now, just get the pieces and let’s get out of here.”
The two of them spent the next 4 minutes trying to find and collect the tiny pieces of the shattered sculpture. When they finally got all of them, they headed to Caleb’s house to talk and plan the birthday tomorrow.
“Looking at the pieces that we have, I should be able to fix it, but it will take a lot of time. I may have to pull an all-nighter if I want a present to give her “Caleb said.
“That’s good news to hear, although I’m sorry I dropped it in the first place. I’ll try to be more careful when carrying things, especially when it’s yours” John said, an apologetic tone in his voice.
“It’s ok, we just need to figure out who is best at what. I should have brought along a cart or something to put the gifts in” Caleb said.
“Agreed. Once we get into the swing of things, things could go a lot better th-”
Just then the phone rings, showing Liz’s caller ID on the miniature screen. John runs over to grab it and answers.
“Hey Liz, what’s up?
“Nothing much, did you guys pick up the cake from Baskin Robins?” Liz asks.
“Yeah we got it around 4:30-ish. We put it in the freezer in our garage to keep it cool for tomorrow” John answers.
“Ok, I can’t wait! See ya later!” Said Liz.
“See ya.” John hangs up
“Was that Liz?” Caleb Asked
“Yeah, she was only asking if we got the cake, nothing really special.”
“Ah ok. Well, this is going to take a lot longer than a couple of hours. I’m going to be late to bed trying to fix this thing. If I seem sluggish tomorrow, that’s probably why” Caleb said.
“Gotcha. Well, I’m going to head off, it’s getting late and I need my sleep for tomorrow. Hope you get it done soon!”
“Alright then, g’night” Caleb said.
As John walked out the door, he couldn’t help but notice his dark brown hair had turned a tad lighter. Maybe he got some hair dye, or it just got lighter 'cuz of age Caleb thought to himself. Yeah, probably just age. Caleb dismisses it with a shrug.
While he fixes the sculpture, he remembers the first time all three of them met together. It was two years ago, at Bronycon 2014. They were at the vendor stalls looking at some items when they started talking about the show. It eventually got to a point where they became good friends. Caleb smiled at the memory. I can’t wait to go to this year’s Bronycon with them. It would be nice if they were up to it, Caleb thought.
Caleb finished the sculpture around 11:45 and took one final look over it before he went to bed. He made sure that he covered up the cracks and that everything is sealed. Once he is satisfied, he goes to his bed, falling into sleep within a matter of minutes.
“Give it up Tyranius! Your rampage ends NOW, if you do not stop, we shall be forced to end you!” Celestia screamed at the monster before them.
“Oh please Celestia, spare me your empty promises. Your kind is too accustomed to 'peace' and 'friendship'. You and I both know you wouldn't follow up on a threat like that” The monster bellowed.
“ENOUGH!!! Everypony surround him and keep him contained in your magic, we must stop his path of destruction before Canterlot joins the list of destroyed cities! We must protect the refugees from those cities as well!” Celestia said to the other princesses beside her.
“Got it” Twilight said as the princesses and mane six all flew up into the air, ready to strike against the monster in front of them.
But the monster was ready for this, as he threw a punch that barely missed Twilight, but came around and hit Cadence, sending her to the ground.
“CADENCE!!!” Twilight screamed as her former foalsitter/sister-in-law was sent plummeting to the ground with a loud THUD. To her relief though, she got back up and joined back in quickly, but not with the same speed she had before.
At this time, Celestia and Luna were all firing magic blasts from their horn in an attempt to cripple or even make any sort of effect on the monster called Tyranius. Tyranius lashes out by swinging his arm around, knocking princess Luna and Twilight to the ground, dazed. Distracted by the blow made to her fellow princesses, Celestia slightly lowers her guard, allowing Tyranius to knock her to the ground as well. Princess Cadence flies down to protect the others while they recover. They all are still conscious, but are too hurt to fight much longer. The rest of the mane six stand ready beside Cadence to defend the other princesses
“Give it up princess Celestia, I have the power right here, right now to kill all four of you. I Will give you a choice: either die a slow, painful death, or watch as your precious capitol and all of the ponies inside are destroyed” Tyranius said, with a sense of triumph in his voice.
“We must use the spell, otherwise Equestria is doomed” Luna whispered.
“But if it backfires, who knows what will happen to Equestria!” Twilight whispered back, a look of worry in her eyes.
“But what will happen if we don’t try?” said Celestia.
“…Let’s do it then” said Luna and Twilight, almost in unison
Tyranius had grown impatient. “WELL? IF I DO NOT RECEIVE AN ANSWER, I GUESS IT WILL BE THE END OF YOU!!! Say goodbye to everything you ever loved and cherished!” Tyranius screamed at the ponies before him.
“NOW!!!” Celestia commanded as the four alicorns brought their horn together to summon the spell that would send this creature away. The magic started sputtering, and proceeded to explode in a big sphere of raw, uncontrolled magic due to the fact that the alicorns were too weak to keep it stable long enough for it to work.
Noticing that the alicorns had lost control of their magic, Tyranius took the chance that was presented to him. “Gah, Die!” Tyranius said as his fist started to come down on top of the princesses, but was blown back by the shockwave emitted by the out of control magic. The sphere started growing, sending powerful shockwaves outward until it exploded in a brilliant flash of light. And just like that, everything disappeared withing the blinding ball of magic.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHhhhhhhh… Oh, it was just a nightmare” Caleb said as his body bolted out of bed the moment he woke up. That was a very strange nightmare though, he thought, as he had not had a nightmare that intense, let alone with the cast of MLP. The part of it that bugged him though, was the fact that it felt much more real than any other nightmare he has ever experienced. He gets out of bed and opens his laptop, hoping that playing some Overwatch will help ease his mind. As he puts on his headset and hears the opening menu theme of the game, he ponders about the dream. Well my memory of this is definitely not gonna be forgotten for a while. As that thought rolled through his mind, he wasn’t aware of how true that statement really was.
Author's Note
It's time to let go of all of the ideas that people have put into my already-cramped head. I hope you guys like it, as it is my first fic i have spent actual time on. Let me know what you guys think in the comments, and i might continue this fic for longer than i had originally planned.
Thanks to Hoolle/Epiccookie/Aurora for the edits and nitpicks!
Edit: I changed some of the final paragraph to show some more thought by Caleb about the dream. I also changed their age from 25 to 21 because i just started reading Five Score/Four (great fic btw) and i realized that it would be too similar to mine.
Chapter 2: The Winds of Change
Author's Note
WARNING!!! Contains spoilers for MLP:FIM Season 6 Episode 10
Disclaimers aside, plz tell me how badly my writing skills are in the comments.
Chapter 2: The Winds of Change
Caleb slept the rest of the night without any more freaky nightmares, to his relief. As he got out of bed and got dressed, he couldn’t stop thinking about that dream last night. It all felt so real, almost like it actually happened, Caleb thought as he walked out of his door. There were so many questions he had, but he tried to move on to focus on getting ready. “Oh well, I’ll worry about that later, I gotta get the cake out to take it to Liz’ house for the party” Caleb said to himself. He quickly glanced at the clock and panicked, “OH SHIT! I gotta get everything ready and fast” Caleb said. He was supposed to be ready to go at that time, but he had overslept by an hour and was in a rush to get the cake into its container.
Once he got everything into the car he pulled out his phone and texted Liz: I’m gonna be about 15 minutes late, so just hold off until then ok? Two minutes later he got a response, so he pulled over and read it: Did you oversleep again? I should have known you would do that, you do it every time! Caleb doesn’t respond and starts driving again. He got there around 11:45 and opened the door without knocking or ringing the bell, as they would know who would be walking in. Liz stood up to greet him.
“Hey sleepyhead, late as usual I see?” Liz said, half joking.
“Oh shut up frazzle. You have problems too you know” Caleb said in response.
The three of them all have nicknames for each other representing their past mistakes upon coming to meetings. Caleb is called sleepyhead because he is always the last one to the meeting due to sleep. Liz is called frazzle because most of the time, she comes with her hair looking like she just put her hands on an electric ball. John is called hot potato, due to the fact that he always drops things. It was just a little aspect of their friendship that always brought a smile to their faces.
“Yeah yeah, we know my hair care sucks. Let’s just get on with this party ok? I recorded the new episode of MLP from this morning so we can watch it” Liz said, grabbing the remote off the table.
“Oh yeah, I forgot there was an episode today. It’s kinda cool that there is a new episode on our birthday this year. We actually have something to do for once other than play Magic the Gathering.” Caleb shot a look at John, mildly annoyed at him.
“Hey, don’t dis MTG ok? It’s a fun card game and helps pass the time” John said, obviously a little miffed at Caleb’s comment.
“I just saying, we start every party with MTG, so it kinda got boring after a while. I’m just glad we can start with something else this year.” Caleb shot back.
“Well, if ya put it that way, then I guess we could do something different. But we will be playing MTG later, no matter what” John said
“Fine, but don’t bug us constantly about it” Liz said
Liz brings up the new episode and starts it with everyone watching on the couch. About halfway through the episode Liz gets a text from her mother Lena saying that she ordered pizza for their party. She says thanks and continues the episode. Lena usually lives in London, but she is visiting her daughter for her birthday like she normally does. Her mother was definitely strange though, her quirky personality contrasting with the fact that she has to carry this machine with her to keep her condition stable. Nobody in their family knew what exactly the condition was, but they all know that it is a very bad condition.
The pizza arrived as the episode was about to end. They got the pizza, then proceeded to immediately take 3 slices each as they finish the episode. Unknowingly, all three of them had felt the same kind of light prick on their thighs. Without saying anything to the others, they just passed it off as pins and needles. The end credits roll and they start their weekly routine of criticizing the episode.
“That was definitely one of the more girly episodes in the series. I mean, Rainbow Dash enjoying the spa? That is not the Dash that we know” Caleb said, obviously a little confused at the story of that day’s episode.
“Yeah, it could have been better. I didn’t like how they presented Applejack’s problem, because it really didn’t make sense to me at first.” Liz said, with a slightly miffed look on her face.
“It just presented itself as an episode aimed at girls, it really wasn’t good” said John.
“Overall, I would give it a 6/10. Be right back guys, I gotta go use it” Caleb said as he walked over to the bathroom.
“Sure thing, just don’t take forever ok? If you take too long I’ll start eating your part of the pizza” John said as Caleb walked into the bathroom.
As Caleb is about to finish up, he notices something on his hip. He turns and pulls down his pants down a little so he can see what it was. “WAIT, WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!” He screams as the object revealed itself
Liz and John both heard him scream and bolted to the bathroom to see if he was alright. They knew he would never scream like that unless he got really hurt or someone pulled a prank on him and he took it wrong.
“Hey Caleb, what’s going on in there? Are you hurt?” Liz asks, a worrisome look on her face.
“PISS OF GUYS! I know you guys tease me for having Rainbow Dash as my favorite, but what you did crossed the line!” Caleb screamed.
“What are you talking about dude? We didn’t pull any pranks on you, so what are you talking about?” John asks in a confused manner.
Caleb was not letting up. “Oh come on guys, admit it! I wouldn’t do this on myself because I don’t even like tattoos.”
“What do you mean about tattoos? We never gave you any tattoos and probably never will!” Liz says to Caleb, obviously confused.
Caleb realizes then that his friends had nothing to do with it and had no clue to what he was talking about. “Do you guys promise not to freak out if I tell you?” Caleb asks.
“We’re your friends Caleb, we promise not to freak out or tell anybody else about it if you don’t want us to” John said.
“Ok fine, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.” The bathroom door opens and Caleb comes out. He slightly pulls down his pants to show his thighs. What John and Liz saw before them left them in complete and utter shock: Caleb had Rainbow Dash’s cutie mark emblazoned onto his hips.
Liz was at a complete loss for words. “Bu…Wha…HOW???” she sputtered, her mind still reeling from seeing the mark.
Caleb was scared and confused, as he didn’t remember putting on a tattoo of Rainbow Dash’s cutie mark on his ass. “Are you sure neither of you guys did this or knows who did?”
After a brief moment of silence, John spoke up. “Don’t look at us, we didn’t do anything!”
“Well shit, we don’t know what did this and we don’t know why. This is TOTALLY going to end fine” Caleb said, a sense of sarcastic fear in his voice.
“Do you remember any possible feelings you could have had when the cutie mark showed up?” asked John.
“I do remember having a light prick in my side after we got pizza, but I just thought I was getting pins and needles from the couch” Caleb said.
“A light prick in your rear huh? Come to think of it, I actually do remember feeling a prick myself, but I als-wait a fucking minute” John says as he pulls down his pants, revealing its own surprise similar to Caleb’s.
“I HAVE APPLEJACK’S MARK? Why?!?!?!?!” John said, the panic in his voice crystal clear.
The discovery of John’s cutie mark appearance made Liz look down at her hips. She looked down to see that Fluttershy’s cutie mark was spread on her hips, although she appears to be taking the appearance much better than Caleb and John did, most likely because she was a big fan of the show compared to Caleb and John.
“Ok settle down guys, or we won’t be able to solve this before anything else happens. W e somehow get cutie marks from the mane six, and don’t know how” Liz said, surprisingly calm when speaking.
“Yeah, and we don’t know If anything else will happen to us in the future” Caleb said, worrying about his job and if she can continue,
“Relax, you can still work and live a regular life, just with a permanent tattoo. Nothing really much has changed except our new tramp-stamps” Liz said.
“Yeah, let’s just continue this party and hope nothing else happens” Caleb said, still shaken from the discovery.
Just then, John has an idea. "Heeeeyy guyyyyys!" He said, pulling a bottle of vodka from his bag.
"Woah, where did you get that bottle? Liz asks, taken aback by the sudden alcohol appearance. "And also, how? You came right here this morning, and you couldn't have gotten it before today!"
"Lets just say I know a guy" John says, an evil grin on his face.
"Well, ok then. We aren't playing drunk Magic, though. After what happened earlier with the cutie marks. I don't want to be seeing shit after that fiasco." Caleb said, an authoritative tone in his voice.
"Awwww" John groans, as he really thought it was a good idea. "Fine, but you guys are taking a shot tomorrow, no ifs, ands, or buts, you hear?"
Caleb and Liz both nod in agreement and start getting their card decks out for the game.
The party continues to the Magic the Gathering game(s) that are held every year. John gets knocked out of the final match by John’s Spirit of Innistrad, and the game ends with Liz winning.
“Wow guys, you have really gotten good at this game. That was a close match” Liz said.
“Thanks Liz, I did have fun playing that round, especially when my soul of innistrad just DESTROYED you.” Caleb said, as he puffed his chest out in triumph. It was just then that he noticed Liz’s and John’s hair were much longer than they were before the game. “Um, guys? Your hair seems to have grown since we started” Caleb pointed out.
“Wait really? Gimme a mirror” John said, as he went to look in the mirror in the bathroom. “WAIT, MY EYES ARE GREEN????????????????????” Caleb hadn’t even noticed the change in eye color in them either.
“This day just keeps getting weirder and weirder, first the cutie mark, then the hair growth, now the eye color. Something is definitely wrong, seeing as Caleb’s new eye color is not physically possible” Liz said, pulling out the nerd inside of her to analyze the situation.
“You know I don’t understand you when you go all nerd on us. Besides, we need some rest for tomorrow if we want to try to figure this out.” They glanced at the clock and all agreed that they needed some rest.
“Do you mind if we stay over tonight Liz? I was thinking we all stick together just in case something happens.” Caleb asked
“Ok, don’t care if you stay here. You are always welcome to stay no matter what” Liz said to Caleb and John.
“Ok, I will start setting on the couch” said John
Caleb was already ready for sleep on the couch, as he fell asleep within that very minute.
