Paper Pen: Plagerismby Paper_PenChaptersChapter OneChapter TwoChapter ThreeChapter OneI woke from my nest of strewn blankets on a worn out mattress and, like every morning, tried to find something poetic or inspiring in it. Writers block is hell when you know thats your purpose in life, every time I look in the mirror I see the ink I fail to spread, granted, I have a black mane on a pale coat, but still, forced poetry. I was about to have my signature hash brown and hard cider breakfast when a knock at my door interrupted me. "What do you want?" I asked a stern light blue guard mare. "You have been summoned by Princess Celestia for an urgent issue regarding friendship" "Really? The princess and not some bureaucratic pony? How is this all set up-" "Listen, buddy, just spare the rant and go, It's a royal decree, ya' think I wanna be knocking on some random stallions door during my only day off? I'd rather be in bed too" "Fine, what time I gotta be there?" "Do you not get what 'urgent' means? Get your flank there ASAP" "Sure, I'll get there after breakfast" "Your oats can wait, why are you not at all concerned about being given some awesome friendship quest from the god queen the rules the whole kingdom?" "Say, hypothetically, this is a set up, I'd like to eat before I got jumped" "Buddy, I can assure you that the palace hasn't been taken over" "Just let me eat!" "Come on!" The guard mare then escorted me to the castle without a word. During this long walk I noticed a few odd things about her, for one, all guards I'd ever seen had an honorary white or black coat given to them while hers was blue. I decided to ignore this and instead focus on the pastry magically suspended in front of my face. The odd blue mare stood to my side smiling as Celestia entered the hall. "Hello, my child" She said, but her tone was all wrong, it was that of a royal trying to sound nice, maybe she had a cold or something. "How are you, your highness?" I asked in the most formal voice I could manage, she seemed to like this. "I'm doing well, Paper" "Actually I go by Pen" "Well, Pen, I have a very important mission for you" "Anything for the crown" "Magnificent! It seems you haven't been making many friends since you've moved here" "With all do respect, your majesty, I'm not a very social stal-" "I don't want to hear it, it's more of a quest anyways" "As much as I would love to drop everything and go on a quest, I have a very important contract to draft for the Apple family" "You're a lawyer?" She looked at my mark, an inkwell as monochrome as the rest of my body. "No, but I have a typewriter and a flank that leaves me with the option of an ink kiosk or writing to make money" Thinking about it, and ink kiosk wouldn't be too bad an idea, I could call it "Inkiosk", not much of a client base though. "Just do me this for me, Paper, go to the Crystal Empire and tell Shining Armor that I need to see flurry heart" "You sure you can't find some other messenger pony? I really need to get this contract done, then Granny Smith wants to draft a will, so I'd like to get that over with-" "I am your princess, your petty scripts can wait!" She yelled. It was then I realized why everything looked wrong, this was not Celestia, she was a kind ruler, and whatever was talking to me carried the voice of a weapon, not an aid. "With all do respect, your majesty, just who the hell are you?" Mystic paint of a goddess washed away, revealing a public enemy. Chrysalis had taken Canterlot. I ran from the throne room into the street, by now the rainbow of fake guards turned to changelings, still not sure how they messed up the colors. I ran to my home and packed my essentials. With my saddle backs packed, I headed for the nearest small town, Ponyville. Chapter TwoThis small town brought back memories, mostly bad ones, but the odd good one kept my mind at bay, it was an odd town, the capital of kindness resting just north of the Everfree Forest, but even that I had some nostalgia for, not good nostalgia, but nostalgia nonetheless. "Howdy!" Greeted a light yellow mare, she looked to be around my age. "Hi! Is there anyone I could talk to around here about renting a place out?" "Wait, are you from Canterlot?" Her eyes widened. "No, I just decided to move to buck nowhere for zero reason" I gave a half sighing expression. "I'll take that as a yes" She scoffed and walked away. I made a mental note to be less sarcastic around here, small towners are a bit more sensitive than city ponies, and held longer grudges. The capital may be under siege, but that wasn't really my problem, I had a job to do, so I made my way to Sweet Apple Acres. Farms never made much sense to me, who would willingly live where you could see nothing but trees and dirt for miles? I myself wasn't on any ground to judge others ways of life, but it seems to be willful isolation. I knocked on the ranch house's door. "Howdy!" Greeted an ageing orange mare, she looked familiar. "Hi!" I shaked her hoof, "I'm Paper Pen, you talked to me about drafting a land acquisition contract?", a lot of ponies can't afford lawyers and would rather just abide by formal sounding documents. "Oh, you're the writer! Why don't you come on in and sit down, I'll be just a minute", Her accent was responsible but not bitter, kind even. Two other mares were in the room, one so ancient I couldn't even tell what her mane used to look like, and the other I had met at the train station. Her look made me feel she disliked me greatly, yet I had no idea as to why. "I can't believe what's going on around here anymore!" Scoffed the ancient mare, reading a newspaper. "Pardon?" I asked "Haven't you heard? Canterlots taken by the changelings!" "I'm pretty familiar with that, just got out of there as a matter of fact" The mare gawked, it looked like she was expecting me to say something. "Well then why ain't you out there trying to save the princess, it's your home after all!" She was disgusted with me. "I write things, I make words sound good, I don't go on big crazy adventures, that's not what I'm made for" Writers are made for two things, writing, and drinking. A lot of drinking. "It may not be what you normally do, but it's what you should do" "Regardless, I can't do anything like that right now, I still gotta find a place to stay, and the same gals that usually fix everything will, you know, fix everything" "Have you seen Applejack recently?" "I don't really keep up with celebrities, she's the orange one, right?" "She's the one in the next room is what she is" I peeked into the kitchen, the aged apple was a bit ripe. "Even if someone else has to step up, their sure not gonna be an accountant" "Fine then, I don't think I want a coward getting this land for me!" Her barely understandable drawl was crystal clear, I was going to lose this contract and all the money that came along with it. "Please, miss, don't do this, I just lost my house! I need this contract!" "And I need a drafter I can trust!" I knew what I need to do. "If I at least attempt this 'quest' could I get the contract back?" "I think that would work" she smiled as she said this. I must be in an asylum. I said some quick goodbyes, and like that, I was off to Apploosa. Chapter ThreeTree's anger me, they really do, every leaf is like a personal insult, and to add injury to insult, I was going from a small town in a forest to a desert, where they farmed apple tree's for some reason. It disturbed me how much of this nation's economy is based around apples. Appleloosa's train station was a lot less busy than Ponyville's, yet I could already tell I was out of my element, not a single building here exceeded two floors and everything short of the church was made of wood, some would describe this as rustic, I'd describe it a cruel and unusual. As I walked through the town center I noticed how empty the streets were, everypony was either home or at the tavern this night. I walked into the tavern and heads turned, it was clear to everypony I was an outsider. It could have been the close nit community that gave me away, or the fact that I was to only one there with clothes from this century. "Hello, everybody!" I said enthusiastically, making the situation worse. "What are you doing here?" asked a caramel coloured mare. "I, uh, I was hoping I could find a blacksmith or something" "You came all the way out here for farming equipment?" "I was thinking more a machete or something" "You know you can just eat weeds, right?" "It's not exactly for weeds…" "Botany?" "No" "Murder?" "Not really, but I'm kind of on a quest tha-" The mare tackled me. "Quest? Can I come? Please, please, please?!" Her eyes were cartoonishly wide at this point" "Sure, fine, just get off of me!" I struggled out from under her hooves. "Yay! Where are we going? What are we doing? When? How? I'm so excited!" Her squeal was deafening as the awkward silence that briefly left. I found a table and sat with my new companion "Where are we going?" She asked excitedly. "You know what's been going on in canterlot with Chrysalis?" She nodded. "Just gotta fix that" "You say that like its farmwork!" "Well, all we gotta do is find Celestia" "All right then, where is she?" "Probably a hive, I know there's one in the Dragonlands, so I was gonna check there" "The first spot you check is the dangerous, giant fire breathing lizard infested, mountains?" "To be fair, I thought this up on the train here, but yeah" She sighed and I thought about trying to defend my plan, but in all honesty, it was probably gonna get us killed, but it was all I had. "Well, farmfilly-" "I got a name you know!" "So do I, most ponies do" "Well, if we're gonna be adventuring, maybe we should know each other" "Pen, Paper Pen" "I'm Caramel Candy, heir to the Candy fortune!" "So what are you doing in a place for fruit?" "Wanted to try and find adventure, thought there might be something interesting here, turns out farmers ain't that interesting, but still, this town has some sort of charm over me" "It's nothing but apples and sand for miles, I'll rot before I live here" "So, citycolt, what's your deal?" "Pardon?" "Never heard of you before, a writer in canterlot, you must be a big shot" "Mostly I do accounting and draft contracts" "Well thats… boring" I cleared my throat and showed her my map. "Next stop is Horseshoe bay, E.S.S Harmony is the only liner that goes to the Dragonlands" "I assume you only got a ticket for yourself" "Yeah, one ticket is, like, three hundred bits, I was just gonna sneak on" She sighed, but agreed to the plan.
Chapter OneI woke from my nest of strewn blankets on a worn out mattress and, like every morning, tried to find something poetic or inspiring in it. Writers block is hell when you know thats your purpose in life, every time I look in the mirror I see the ink I fail to spread, granted, I have a black mane on a pale coat, but still, forced poetry. I was about to have my signature hash brown and hard cider breakfast when a knock at my door interrupted me. "What do you want?" I asked a stern light blue guard mare. "You have been summoned by Princess Celestia for an urgent issue regarding friendship" "Really? The princess and not some bureaucratic pony? How is this all set up-" "Listen, buddy, just spare the rant and go, It's a royal decree, ya' think I wanna be knocking on some random stallions door during my only day off? I'd rather be in bed too" "Fine, what time I gotta be there?" "Do you not get what 'urgent' means? Get your flank there ASAP" "Sure, I'll get there after breakfast" "Your oats can wait, why are you not at all concerned about being given some awesome friendship quest from the god queen the rules the whole kingdom?" "Say, hypothetically, this is a set up, I'd like to eat before I got jumped" "Buddy, I can assure you that the palace hasn't been taken over" "Just let me eat!" "Come on!" The guard mare then escorted me to the castle without a word. During this long walk I noticed a few odd things about her, for one, all guards I'd ever seen had an honorary white or black coat given to them while hers was blue. I decided to ignore this and instead focus on the pastry magically suspended in front of my face. The odd blue mare stood to my side smiling as Celestia entered the hall. "Hello, my child" She said, but her tone was all wrong, it was that of a royal trying to sound nice, maybe she had a cold or something. "How are you, your highness?" I asked in the most formal voice I could manage, she seemed to like this. "I'm doing well, Paper" "Actually I go by Pen" "Well, Pen, I have a very important mission for you" "Anything for the crown" "Magnificent! It seems you haven't been making many friends since you've moved here" "With all do respect, your majesty, I'm not a very social stal-" "I don't want to hear it, it's more of a quest anyways" "As much as I would love to drop everything and go on a quest, I have a very important contract to draft for the Apple family" "You're a lawyer?" She looked at my mark, an inkwell as monochrome as the rest of my body. "No, but I have a typewriter and a flank that leaves me with the option of an ink kiosk or writing to make money" Thinking about it, and ink kiosk wouldn't be too bad an idea, I could call it "Inkiosk", not much of a client base though. "Just do me this for me, Paper, go to the Crystal Empire and tell Shining Armor that I need to see flurry heart" "You sure you can't find some other messenger pony? I really need to get this contract done, then Granny Smith wants to draft a will, so I'd like to get that over with-" "I am your princess, your petty scripts can wait!" She yelled. It was then I realized why everything looked wrong, this was not Celestia, she was a kind ruler, and whatever was talking to me carried the voice of a weapon, not an aid. "With all do respect, your majesty, just who the hell are you?" Mystic paint of a goddess washed away, revealing a public enemy. Chrysalis had taken Canterlot. I ran from the throne room into the street, by now the rainbow of fake guards turned to changelings, still not sure how they messed up the colors. I ran to my home and packed my essentials. With my saddle backs packed, I headed for the nearest small town, Ponyville.
Chapter TwoThis small town brought back memories, mostly bad ones, but the odd good one kept my mind at bay, it was an odd town, the capital of kindness resting just north of the Everfree Forest, but even that I had some nostalgia for, not good nostalgia, but nostalgia nonetheless. "Howdy!" Greeted a light yellow mare, she looked to be around my age. "Hi! Is there anyone I could talk to around here about renting a place out?" "Wait, are you from Canterlot?" Her eyes widened. "No, I just decided to move to buck nowhere for zero reason" I gave a half sighing expression. "I'll take that as a yes" She scoffed and walked away. I made a mental note to be less sarcastic around here, small towners are a bit more sensitive than city ponies, and held longer grudges. The capital may be under siege, but that wasn't really my problem, I had a job to do, so I made my way to Sweet Apple Acres. Farms never made much sense to me, who would willingly live where you could see nothing but trees and dirt for miles? I myself wasn't on any ground to judge others ways of life, but it seems to be willful isolation. I knocked on the ranch house's door. "Howdy!" Greeted an ageing orange mare, she looked familiar. "Hi!" I shaked her hoof, "I'm Paper Pen, you talked to me about drafting a land acquisition contract?", a lot of ponies can't afford lawyers and would rather just abide by formal sounding documents. "Oh, you're the writer! Why don't you come on in and sit down, I'll be just a minute", Her accent was responsible but not bitter, kind even. Two other mares were in the room, one so ancient I couldn't even tell what her mane used to look like, and the other I had met at the train station. Her look made me feel she disliked me greatly, yet I had no idea as to why. "I can't believe what's going on around here anymore!" Scoffed the ancient mare, reading a newspaper. "Pardon?" I asked "Haven't you heard? Canterlots taken by the changelings!" "I'm pretty familiar with that, just got out of there as a matter of fact" The mare gawked, it looked like she was expecting me to say something. "Well then why ain't you out there trying to save the princess, it's your home after all!" She was disgusted with me. "I write things, I make words sound good, I don't go on big crazy adventures, that's not what I'm made for" Writers are made for two things, writing, and drinking. A lot of drinking. "It may not be what you normally do, but it's what you should do" "Regardless, I can't do anything like that right now, I still gotta find a place to stay, and the same gals that usually fix everything will, you know, fix everything" "Have you seen Applejack recently?" "I don't really keep up with celebrities, she's the orange one, right?" "She's the one in the next room is what she is" I peeked into the kitchen, the aged apple was a bit ripe. "Even if someone else has to step up, their sure not gonna be an accountant" "Fine then, I don't think I want a coward getting this land for me!" Her barely understandable drawl was crystal clear, I was going to lose this contract and all the money that came along with it. "Please, miss, don't do this, I just lost my house! I need this contract!" "And I need a drafter I can trust!" I knew what I need to do. "If I at least attempt this 'quest' could I get the contract back?" "I think that would work" she smiled as she said this. I must be in an asylum. I said some quick goodbyes, and like that, I was off to Apploosa.
Chapter ThreeTree's anger me, they really do, every leaf is like a personal insult, and to add injury to insult, I was going from a small town in a forest to a desert, where they farmed apple tree's for some reason. It disturbed me how much of this nation's economy is based around apples. Appleloosa's train station was a lot less busy than Ponyville's, yet I could already tell I was out of my element, not a single building here exceeded two floors and everything short of the church was made of wood, some would describe this as rustic, I'd describe it a cruel and unusual. As I walked through the town center I noticed how empty the streets were, everypony was either home or at the tavern this night. I walked into the tavern and heads turned, it was clear to everypony I was an outsider. It could have been the close nit community that gave me away, or the fact that I was to only one there with clothes from this century. "Hello, everybody!" I said enthusiastically, making the situation worse. "What are you doing here?" asked a caramel coloured mare. "I, uh, I was hoping I could find a blacksmith or something" "You came all the way out here for farming equipment?" "I was thinking more a machete or something" "You know you can just eat weeds, right?" "It's not exactly for weeds…" "Botany?" "No" "Murder?" "Not really, but I'm kind of on a quest tha-" The mare tackled me. "Quest? Can I come? Please, please, please?!" Her eyes were cartoonishly wide at this point" "Sure, fine, just get off of me!" I struggled out from under her hooves. "Yay! Where are we going? What are we doing? When? How? I'm so excited!" Her squeal was deafening as the awkward silence that briefly left. I found a table and sat with my new companion "Where are we going?" She asked excitedly. "You know what's been going on in canterlot with Chrysalis?" She nodded. "Just gotta fix that" "You say that like its farmwork!" "Well, all we gotta do is find Celestia" "All right then, where is she?" "Probably a hive, I know there's one in the Dragonlands, so I was gonna check there" "The first spot you check is the dangerous, giant fire breathing lizard infested, mountains?" "To be fair, I thought this up on the train here, but yeah" She sighed and I thought about trying to defend my plan, but in all honesty, it was probably gonna get us killed, but it was all I had. "Well, farmfilly-" "I got a name you know!" "So do I, most ponies do" "Well, if we're gonna be adventuring, maybe we should know each other" "Pen, Paper Pen" "I'm Caramel Candy, heir to the Candy fortune!" "So what are you doing in a place for fruit?" "Wanted to try and find adventure, thought there might be something interesting here, turns out farmers ain't that interesting, but still, this town has some sort of charm over me" "It's nothing but apples and sand for miles, I'll rot before I live here" "So, citycolt, what's your deal?" "Pardon?" "Never heard of you before, a writer in canterlot, you must be a big shot" "Mostly I do accounting and draft contracts" "Well thats… boring" I cleared my throat and showed her my map. "Next stop is Horseshoe bay, E.S.S Harmony is the only liner that goes to the Dragonlands" "I assume you only got a ticket for yourself" "Yeah, one ticket is, like, three hundred bits, I was just gonna sneak on" She sighed, but agreed to the plan.
