Where are we going, and why are we in a handbasket?
Author's Note
As flattering as it was for Sporktacles to urge me to publish this after originally posting it as a comment, until and unless said author endorses it as 'canon,' consider this an omake. I wrote this in the space of about an hour and a half, being inspired by the hilarity of the original stories and some parts of the comments section, so technically this is flash-fiction, posted without editor.
Anyway, enjoy!
Where are we going, and why are we in a handbasket?
Principal Celestia steepled her fingers momentarily on the inhale, then pinched the bridge of her nose on the exhale. This was one of those situations that left her completely unable to figure out exactly what to do with her hands. That her trans-universal counterpart wasn't fidgeting like her was belied by the pulsing vein in her forehead and clenching jaw, tells that the human and mortal Celestia knew she had as well...after all, her sister did love to tease her about it.
The pair of Lunas were sitting off in the corner, giggling furiously. Her sister, the one who wasn't normally an equine, was as easy to distinguish from their visitors as she was from her own doppelganger, the visiting princesses were resplendent in long, flowing dresses whose style was more in line with fantasy artwork than any historical period. Meanwhile the school administrators wore business casual and looked downright plebeian in comparison. Whether they were visiting alicorn or vice-principal, the suddenly thick-as-thieves pair were doing nothing to help their older sisters.
Between the older women sat or stood thirteen young women, only six of whom were born as humans. Confusing matters was the nearly identical nature of twelve of them.
Discerning the two Twilight Sparkle's was easy enough. The one who was wearing what for all the world might as well have been a Crystal Prep uniform without the badging seemed to be trying to hide behind her glasses. The princess was practically tomato red and holding Sunset Shimmer's hand like it was keeping her from being sucked into a black hole formed from pure embarrassment.
Deciding to use the obvious three as a foundation for discerning the remainder, she decided to focus on the differences and tie them in with the three she knew the identities of for sure.
The two Rarity's were easiest to spot among the rest; while it wouldn't have surprised Celestia to find the dragon-turned-dog Spike (as opposed to the magically-intelligent-dog Spike, who thank the All Mother was with human-world's Shining Armor for the duration of this meeting) in the lap of either version of Rarity, the fact that the currently seated version of the purple haired, white skinned girl was the very picture of calm, cool, and collected, wearing clothing that was a near perfect homage to the Princess' gowns while being magnificently modern and utilitarian gave away the older, more experienced woman easily. (Celestia made a mental note to ask the successful business-pony and fashionista about commissions afterward) Meanwhile the other Rarity was standing behind and just to the side, mincing and dithering in an outfit that was an amalgam of several outfits that the school administrator remembered seeing on the girl throughout the year before. Large though her wardrobe may be, whether she was one of the best employees at the boutique she worked at or not, human Rarity just didn't have the resources or poise an older, more experienced woman with a chain of highly successful high-end boutiques under her highly fashionable belt.
Next up were the Pinkie Pies. As much as it made her shudder to imagine two versions of the girl, the older, more experienced Pinkie from Equestria was doting on her younger self like a favorite aunt. Where they were getting the candy they were trading Celestia didn't know, and didn't care enough to find out. Celestia also opted to ignore the fact that the younger Pinkie was sitting in her older counterpart's lap like a kid visiting Santa at the mall.
Right between them and the Twilights was the Equestrian Fluttershy. Like the princesses, her clothing was the most distinct from her high-school counterpart, though she was wearing what appeared to be a well worn park ranger's outfit. Celestia had been informed, along with other human authorities, by Princess Twilight that the ponies normally didn't wear clothes, so why the portal chose to make the ranger's outfit pre-worn and mended was anyone's guess. Unlike most of the other pony visitors, she had opted to remain separated from her human counterpart, a fact for which Celestia was glad. The two had gotten into it like cats in a bag when they first arrived back from Equestria, the older Fluttershy making it known to everyone within earshot that the younger version of herself could take her snarky, negative, bullying attitude and do anatomically impossible things with it. The younger Fluttershy had replied, quite loudly, that she couldn't imagine having anything in common with such a loudmouth braggart who got what she wanted thanks to her likely highly questionable morals and nepotism, and that she could take both versions of her brother and get...sexually acquainted with them. Nobody from either world had thought that Fluttershy could get that loud.
And speaking of the younger Fluttershy, she was sitting proudly...on the floor...wearing a collar...attached to a leash...being held by a blushing-so-hard-she-could-power-Vanhoover-for-a-week Rainbow Dash. This was the pony Dash, made evident by the crisp Air Force blues dress uniform (complete with a few medals over one breast and name tag over the other) granted by the portal.
The teenager Dash was sitting so close to one of the Applejacks that she might as well have been in the other girl's lap. While Applejack looked at least a little abashed about being in trouble, both girls were clearly not going to let anyone think they were ashamed of their relationship. That said relationship was going to prove challenging, what with the species difference and the portal and all, didn't seem to matter to them.
And yes, it was the Equestrian Applejack that Rainbow was cuddling. While at first glance, one might not be able to tell the difference between the cowgirl and the cowpony, the head of the Equestrian Sweet Apple Acres had a bit more muscle definition, was a bit leaner, and had just a bit more world-weariness in her eyes.
Finally, the younger Applejack was standing against the wall behind the Equestrian Fluttershy, apparently trying to disappear into her hat.
"One week." she said into the near silence in her office.
The oddness of the sentence fragment that came out of her mouth was enough to grab even her millennia-older counterpart, who turned briefly to face her with a raised eyebrow. The princess apparently trusted the principal, though, as she returned her stern gaze to the rest of the group without a word.
"In one week the school year would have been over, the six of you who are my responsibility...not counting Sunset Shimmer, who is only still attending this school in spite of being at least a decade too old at the explicit request of Princess Celestia..." while she hadn't meant to drop a bomb without warning, Sunset apparently wasn't privy to this information. She nearly jumped out of her chair and looked to the pastel-rainbow haired princess for confirmation, who merely nodded, "...would have been high school graduates, officially adults in every sense of the word, and Not My Problem. Some bureaucrat in the State Department would be dealing with you, and with problems like this...steaming pile you've dropped on my desk, I'd say good riddance!"
Celestia opted to ignore her sister and identical cohort, as they were at least keeping quiet as they watched her build up a head of steam. If she heard any giggling from them right now, though, she'd throw them out by their ears, centuries-old princess or not.
"But instead you come to me and promise that you're going to turn this into an extra-curricular activity, one that you get me to sign off on, declaring that you're going to help your 'good friend' Prime Minister Sunset Shimmer get comfortable in her new role and write up a report on the Parliamentary process of Equestria. You even get her..." the principal stabbed a finger at the bespectacled Twilight, "To sell me on the notion that this will be, and I'm quoting here, 'the first actual study of an alien government by humans,' and that by giving it my full backing and blessing it will secure greater prestige for the school, boost funding, and cure zombie cancer or whatever you could pull out of your..." she paused only because she really, really didn't want to use profanity in front of her students, nearly graduated or not, "...HATS!" she snapped out.
She dropped back into her seat, picking up a packet of paper, which was student-Twilight's report on the...incident. At least the girl didn't let her scholarly standards slip over this debacle. "Let's start with the first...gem in this mess. The 'DSP' is the new Majority Party in Equestria's Parliament. The new Head of the DSP being our very own Sunset Shimmer." She glared directly at Sunset as she spoke, "Were any of you going to tell me that DSP stood for 'Drunken Sex Party' before graduation? Or was I going to have to read about it when I was being handed a pink slip by the school district for sending a bunch of teenagers off to a foreign land without passports, visas, or even formal diplomatic ties, giving my blessing to participate in a DRUNKEN SEX PARTY!" The last three words were pretty much spoken at a roar, which in the confines of the small office sounded even louder than the Fluttershys combined.
Even if she hadn't already identified them by that point, Celestia would have known which ones where her students by how badly they cringed. Applejack slid down the wall to sit on her backside, while Pinkie practically curled into a ball on her counterpart's lap. Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash's veneer of confidence broke, Rarity whimpered, and Twilight Sparkle almost reacted like she'd been stabbed with a rusty baseball bat.
Even their older doppelgangers flinched a bit.
She flipped open the first couple pages of the packet"And next up in this wonderful, wonderful," her voice dripped in saccharine sarcasm, "Mess; we have the use of, if I read this right, the pony version of marijuana."
The Twilight in school uniform spoke up, “Actually, it’s South Haysian Kanab, a plant that has many features in common with garden variety catnip here. While it likely has no effect on human anatomy, it’s effect...on...um…” she trailed off under the glare of the educator.
“And as if that were not enough,” Celestia continued, “You were not only high you were drunk!” With this she glared at the older Applejack.
Said cowpony-turned-human jutted out her chin, “Hay, ‘taint like we didn’t warn ‘em. We told ‘em we had cider, and durned if it weren’t some of the best cider my family has ever made!”
“Yes,” responded Celestia, “But did you tell them it was alcoholic?”
Applejack snorted, “Didn’t think we needed to. Why, I reckon even the Cake twins know if cider’s got a head that means it’s al...cohol...ic?” To her dismay, as well as the dismay of the other Equestrians excepting those who weren’t immortal princesses (and including one particular immortal princess who hadn’t studied humans as much as she thought she had), she noticed that their younger counterparts were looking at her in confusion. “Y’all didn’t know that did ya?”
“You see, Applejack,” snipped Celestia, “In this world most ‘cider’ is simply spiced apple juice. I doubt any of these girls have ever seen an alcoholic cider in their lives.”
As the older Applejack took her turn pretending to disappear into her hat, a nearly identical voice spoke up from behind Fluttershy, “I have. But, er, I guess that ain't important right now…”
I’m not going to single her out for drinking it anyway, I’m not going to single her out for drinking it anyway, that’s a DICK MOVE to single her out for drinking it anyway… she repeated to herself in a mantra.
“And then we get to the pièce de résistance,” she flipped further into the packet and read right from the page, “‘Using the phenomenon known as ‘magic,’ Equine Sapiens are able to manipulate even their own bodies so they can emulate down to the cellular level the primary sex characteristics of the opposite gender for any period of time specified by the ‘caster’ of said magic, limited only to the abilities and mana reserve of the caster.’ End-quote,” she slapped the packet closed, “So you turned into opposite sex versions of yourselves.”
The seated Rarity opted to speak up at this point, “Not quite ‘opposite sex versions,’ though I’d imagine that, strictly speaking, that would be the case. It was more like we were mares with only the one specific item of male anatomy for a time.”
“She means we were chicks with dicks.” the younger Rainbow Dash interjected sotto-voce. The Pinkies and other Rainbow giggled, the Twilights blushed, the Fluttershys facepalmed, the Applejacks tried to bury themselves even deeper under their hats, and the Raritys rolled their eyes. The synchronized movements would have been creepy if it weren’t so annoying.
“Yes, so drunk, stoned, and sporting brand new organs with their accompanying hormones flooding your system, you…” Celestia’s rant was somewhat stalled suddenly, desperately trying to find some way to address their activities euphemistically but failing.
“Partied hard?” offered the Equestrian Pinkie.
Celestia sighed, “Yes, you ‘partied hard.’ So, show of hands, who all ‘partied hard?’” this last question was offered to the room. Nearly every hand went up, save only Spike, the two Celestias and the vice-principal. Said vice-principal was in open-mouthed shock for only a moment before whispering into her counterpart’s ear. Princess Luna smiled smugly and swept her her hand as if to say, ‘All of these.’ An unspoken conversation played out between them in a flash, leaving the vice-principal blushing and giggling.
Luna waved at Celestia, as though the principal hadn’t noticed their antics, and mouthed, ‘You are soooo fucked!’ without vocalizing it. The two Lunas then descended into a fit of giggles.
Celestia pinched the bridge of her nose, “So, I’m guessing Princess Twilight or Sunset Shimmer was able to cast a spell or something to determine if anyone got pregnant.”
Princess Twilight spoke up, smiling for the first time since they arrived through the portal, “Oh yes! Bountiful Harvest’s Quick Fertilization Detector spell! It’s based on some of pony-kind’s oldest known spells, predating...even...um…” As quickly as she leapt to speak, she also trailed off, pinned under the glare of the principal.
“And if you’re not pregnant, lower your hand.” Five hands remained up, three of which were… Fuck, three students! Celestia only barely kept her head from slamming into the desk. Fluttershy, Rarity, and oh-goddess-not Twilight! Cinch will NEVER let this go if she hears about it!
It was about that time she noticed that Princess Celestia, Princess Twilight, and Sunset Shimmer where staring at the back of the room agast. As soon as the other Equestrians saw it and turned to look at what their compatriots were looking at, they nearly all stood in shock.
All except the Equestrian Pinkie Pie, whose grin was threatening to split her face. After only long enough for the smile to get a bit creepy, the party pony practically shouted, “ROYAL BABY SHOWER!!!
That the farm-pony Applejack was pregnant was significantly overshadowed by the sight of Princess Luna looking smugly at her sister, holding up one hand and cupping her still flat belly with the other.
