Chapters Starlight Glimmer was sitting with Sunburst when it happened. She thought nothing could stand in the way of their friendship. But apparently, she was wrong. Sunburst was gone. It was a nightmare. Now she was a loner. And without her friend to stand up for her, she was bullied even more. Usually, her and Sunburst would both be teased by being blank flanks. They were two little misfits and they wouldn't have it any other way. Sometimes, the bullies took it to far and Sunburst would step in. Now, Starlight was forced to watch teary-eyed as her friend simply trotted out the door. She was ignited by rage, but she was more overcome by sadness.
There wasn't any way to get him back now, to turn things the way they used to be. "Sunburst, why did you leave me?" Starlight would ask. "I thought we were inseparable..." She had no pony now, she was all alone. She thought she had lost her heart, all she could feel was numbness. Every day was monotonous. Her daily routine was set ever since Sunburst had left to that School For Gifted Unicorns. A few days after he had left, however, Starlight had been working very hard to increase her magical abilities, so that she could prove she was just as good as Sunburst. Then she would earn her cutiemark, get sent to the School For Gifted Unicorns with her friend, so that they would always be together. But Sunburst had set the bar far too high and Starlight couldn't meet the school's standards.
Sunburst was being carried off to who knows where while what seemed like the entire town was following him. Starlight was about to run after them to see his voyage when a sound got her attention. There was something between her house and her neighbors'. It was about the size of herself, but it had no muzzle. Well, it seemed smaller than the usual pony's. It looked like an Earth pony, but with some stick-like things sticking out of its hooves. She noticed that the thing had different ears and no tail. It was nestled next to a dragon about the same height, but with wings. It was a rare type of dragon, that could barely be found in these parts of Equestria. She then saw that the thing was staring at her too, examining her. She took a step forward, which seemed to alert the dragon of her presence. She backed away, afraid it would lash out and attack, but instead, it nudged the creature with its tail.
Starlight stayed still and silent. The thing got up on its hind legs and strode towards her, it seemed comfortable doing so. Is this even a pony? Starlight asked herself, the town was deserted, no pony else seemed to have seen this thing.
"Hi." The thing said.
Starlight was frozen. It can talk?! She mentally screamed, but responded shakily. "Hi... I-I'm Starlight." She introduced herself, hiding her amazement.
The thing thought for a moment, trying to remember something. "I'm Leo. And this is Axel." It pointed to the dragon which was still curled in the alley.
"Nice to meet you, Leo. And you too Axel." Starlight was seeming to relax as she found that the thing called Leo wasn't hostile, and its dragon wasn't as well. Starlight smiled, Leo smiled back. This was the beginning of a new friendship.
*** 5 Years Later ***
"Come on, you slow poke! We need to find this Ponyville library!" Starlight called out over her shoulder to Leo running behind her.
"Why couldn't we go to the one in our town?!" He panted, having a hard time catching up to the enthusiastic unicorn, Axel flying overhead with ease. Some ponies stared and gasped at the sight of him, but quickly recovered from the shock. In Starlight's village, it had become normal to see Leo and Starlight walking around.
"We've been studying that one for years ! I've been told that there's better information in this library than in our own!" She replied, sprinting forward.
"Information about what?" Leo gasped for air as Starlight finally slowed her pace, they were almost at the library.
"Information on your species! Of course you've noticed all your differences from the rest of Equestria!" Starlight explained. "You are a human, I believe."
"I guess so." Leo shrugged. "I never paid much attention to it, I mean, Equestria is my home, right?"
"Well, yes. Of course it is. But I need to make sure you are being taken care of right, humans function differently than ponies." Starlight was like a sister to Leo, and very protective. If anyone wanted to get close to him, they'd have to go through Starlight.
They stopped in front of the Golden Oaks library, which was also Twilight's home. Starlight threw the door open and entered, Leo followed close behind. Starlight wasted no time and browsed the shelves. Leo aided her in her search while Axel sat on a pedestal in the middle of the room. "Umm... Starlight, you're looking in the fiction section." He said, which was correct. "Oh, and I found a book. It's called The Anatomy of Humans, by Lyra Heartstrings. " He added.
"So I guess we're done here." Starlight turned to leave when Twilight descended the stairs. Her eyes widened in shock, she had never seen a human before. She pushed past Starlight, almost knocking her to the ground. "Hey!" She yelped, barely regaining her balance.
"A human? I've been reading up on these but I have never had the honor of seeing one so up close... So it is true! They stand on only two things that are called feet! And they have hands!" Twilight studied Leo closely, taking a look at his ears and face.
Starlight intervened. "Sorry to get in the way of your research, but you need to back off!" She didn't even know Twilight, which gave her yet another reason to keep Twilight away from Leo. She stepped in front of him, holding out a hoof to block the lilac overexcited mare from Leo. "We'll be leaving now!" She cast a spell on Twilight levitated her to the other side of the room before taking off, Axel flying after them.
"Who was she?" Leo asked when Starlight had ensured that the temporary freezing spell had worked.
"The librarian. She's a bit of a bookworm, or so I've been told. But we better leave before the spell wears off." With that, Starlight sped ahead.
"Wait up!" Leo shouted, still holding the book and running after her.
There were more gasps as he darted past, following Starlight as they were about to begin the tiring trip back to their own village.
Starlight was reading The Anatomy of Humans in her bedroom while Leo watched television with Axel in the living room. It was late at night. Not one pony was hustling and bustling about. Starlight yawned, she had been reading for an hour and had gotten to chapter three, which was describing a human's diet. She read that humans weren't so different from ponies, but she'd already found that out years ago. There was a knock on the door, Starlight's ears perked up when she heard Leo's footsteps. Her eyes widened. She ignited her horn and teleported herself in front of the door, finding that Leo was a few feet away from it. "Leo, you know the rules, you cannot and I mean cannot answer the door. Celestia knows who might be behind it!" Starlight reminded and turned to open the door.
Twilight Sparkle was standing outside, with a purple and green dragon on her back. "You see?!" Starlight pointed to Twilight. "This mare is exactly why you can't open the door! She might kidnap you and run tests on you! And I might never be able to save you!" Leo nodded. Axel was now at his feet, narrowing his eyes at Twilight and Spike.
"Hi! I'm Twilight Sparkle! Don't mean to brag but I'm Celestia's student and I thought that I should research a bit more on humans! I can send this information to the Princess!" Twilight said, a bit intimidated by both Axel and Starlight's facial expressions.
Starlight stepped forward. "I'm Starlight. Now, listen here. You may be the student of Princess Celestia, but that doesn't mean I automatically let you lay a hoof on Leo. And how the hay did you find where we lived?!" She raised her voice.
Twilight stood there for a moment. "I sort of... Weakened your spell so that when you exited the library, you'd think that I'd still be stuck when I was actually following you here. I went back home got this list of questions and a notepad and quill." She admitted, opening her saddlebag to show all the items she had mentioned.
"You're a smart unicorn..." Starlight said grudgingly.
"Why thank you! I went to the School for Gifted Unicorns as a filly!" Twilight chirped.
Starlight froze. She was getting flash backs. When Sunburst earned his cutiemark, when their friendship was shattered. She was remembering it all so vividly.
"Was it something I said..?" Twilight asked, concerned.
Leo shook his head, Starlight hadn't really told him much about Sunburst, only that he was an old friend. "No, I don't think so. She'll be fine. She's the calmest pony I know." He picked Starlight up. "You can come in if you'd like, though."
Twilight was slightly confused, the calmest pony he knew? Then she had to be the only pony he knew. Just earlier, Starlight was blowing a fuse just because Twilight came for an unexpected visit.
"So, what research did you want to do?" Leo asked after he put Starlight in her bedroom.
Twilight emptied out her saddle bag on the table. "Spike, why don't you go play with that... Rare dragon! " She rushed to Axel, who seemed less than amused. "Wow! I didn't know that Starlight owned all this information that all of Equestria didn't know about!"
"Now," Twilight cleared her throat as she sat on the couch next to Leo. "Where did you come from?" She asked, levitating the quill over her notepad.
There was a long pause. "I don't really know... I was just... Here. The only thing I knew was that my name was Leo and that was Axel." He motioned to the dark dragon, who was eyeing Spike. "I met Starlight and then I started living with her and then here we are now."
Twilight nodded. She jotted down some notes. "So Starlight is your only friend?" Leo nodded. "Well, you need to branch out more! Come on, you're going to meet my friends!" She declared.
"W-Wait... Right now..?" Leo stuttered, he'd never gone anywhere without Starlight and felt it would be wrong to do so.
"Yes!" Twilight got up, packing her things back into her saddle bags. "You need more friends! I should know because I could've never defeated Nightmare Moon without my friends!"
"Nightmare Moon? But Twilight, Starlight didn't say I could go with you." Leo replied, nervously glancing over at Starlight's bedroom door.
"Don't worry, we'll be back before she even knows you'll be gone!" Twilight assured.
Minutes later, Twilight had managed to drag Leo with her on her journey back to Ponyville. They didn't notice Axel slipping out with them. Spike had, however. But he said nothing, after all, the dragon was slightly bigger than himself and could easily beat him in battle. Twilight had magically cast a spell to teleport herself and her friends to one area, her laboratory.
"What in tarnation? One second Ah'm on the apple farm bucking some apples and the next, Ah'm in some fancy house!" Applejack said.
"I know right! I was busy practicing my flying for the Wonderbolts and then I'm teleported here!" Rainbow Dash agreed, looking at Twilight accusingly.
Twilight had teleported one other pony in the lab other than herself, Leo and her friends.
"What am I doing here?!" The mint green mare asked. Lyra's gaze fell upon Leo. "How did a human get here?! Did he use the portal!? But he seems used to seeing ponies, he must've been here since a young age... Though the portal is at Canterlot High school, so he might have been younger..." Lyra analyzed him, not as shocked as the others.
"A human? " Fluttershy squeaked in surprise.
"No pony told me humans were this... Shockingly good looking..." Rarity said, earning a look of disappointment from Spike.
"What are these things?" Pinkie Pie asked, poking Leo's fingers with her hoof.
"They're fingers, humans have five on each hand, as well as five toes on their feet. Fingers help the human grip things, kind of like unicorns, but more manual." Lyra explained.
"How'd ya find him, Twi?" Applejack asked curiously.
"Starlight's house, she even had a rare dragon!" Twilight replied.
Meanwhile, a furious Starlight had recovered. She realized that Leo was gone. "Twilight..." She muttered under her breath. Axel motioned for Starlight to follow him, which she did. She ended up at the Golden Oaks library. Axel pointed to a wall. "Hmmm.... Must be a secret hatch." The unicorn's horn lit up. The wall moved, slowly but surely. Starlight ran into the lab. "Don't you touch my Leo!" She screamed.
Twilight froze. She was just tying Leo to her Sampler, as she called it. She quickly stepped in front of it, making an attempt to hide it by turning it around. "Oh, hi, Starlight! What's up?" She asked, nervously smiling.
"The jig!" Starlight glared at Twilight.
"Excuse me?" Twilight was genuinely confused now.
"The jig is up! Now let Leo go!" Starlight demanded.
"Who?"
"Leo!"
"Leo?"
"Yes, Leo!" Starlight shouted. Twilight was trying to throw Starlight off her trail by acting as innocent as possible, but Starlight could see through her. "The human! I can see him! You're not as tall as you think, you know!" Starlight pointed a hoof at Leo, who was quietly watching the scene unfold.
"Human??" Twilight asked.
"Ugh! You went to the human world. You even came to my house to study him! Then you brought him here! Axel told me!" Starlight reminded Twilight as the dark dragon rested on top of the Sampler.
"Well, can you wait a bit? Like an hour or two? I need to run some tests on Leo. Sure I have been a human, but I didn't have the chance to study them as well as I'd like to." Twilight pulled a lever on the wall next to the Sampler. "In the human world, they have limited magic. They only have a bit, which leaks out from here." She explained.
Starlight was still furious. "What are you doing?!" She screamed.
"This will just give me a sample. You see why I call this the Sampler, huh?" Twilight made sure the wires and tanks were secure as the machine started to hum. Axel took off, landing in Starlight's hair.
"What do you mean sample ?!" Starlight stomped her hoof on the ground.
"I mean it will put some energy into his body, then take the little that he has as my sample." Twilight proceeded to jump start the machine with her magic.
"What energy?!" Starlight watched as zaps of electricity encased Leo. It didn't seem to hurt him much, though. "Stop!" Starlight ordered, using her own magic to shut down the Sampler, her horn absorbing the energy.
Axel immediately flew off of Starlight's head. Her horn was giving off a few flickers of energy. She had switched off the Sampler before it had been able to take Leo's energy. She was afraid that something absolutely terrible would happen if it had.
Starlight took a deep breath, trying to ignore jolts of electricity her horn was sending her. She blasted the latches on the Sampler, some sparks of the electricity visible in her magic. "Come on, Leo." She ordered.
"Amazing, absorbing energy with your horn, which grants you the power of controlling such!" Twilight jotted down the notes.
"We're leaving." Starlight led Leo out of the room, Axel following close behind.
"But I wasn't done studying you yet!"
"Too bad. We're going home."
"Fine." Twilight tore off a piece of paper and levitated it into Leo's hand. Starlight was obviously unaware of this. Twilight waved as she closed the door behind them with her magic.
"Wow." Said Pinkie, who was silently standing with the rest of her friends, watching everything from the other side of the room.
"Okay. We're going to the Crystal Empire, girls!" Twilight announced.
"What? But we need tickets and junk!" Rainbow Dash reminded her.
"Bam!" Twilight opened a drawer, revealing seven tickets.
"How'd you get those, Twi?" Applejack asked.
"Early planning!" Twilight replied proudly.
"But why are we going to the Crystal Empire?" Rarity stepped forward.
"You'll see." Twilight stashed the tickets away. "Be at the train station at midnight."
"But the train station is closed by then." Fluttershy said.
"Or so you think. The last train departs at midnight, that's when the station officially closes." Twilight shooed her friends out of her lab. "See you there!" She opened the door and pushed her friends out. "Remember, midnight! And exactly midnight!" She shut the door with her magic.
"She seems awfully excited." Applejack observed.
"No kidding." Rainbow Dash agreed.
"She probably wants to spend more time with us." Fluttershy thought aloud.
"Or maybe she's hiding something!" Pinkie suggested.
"Don't be silly, Pinkie! We're her friends, she would never hide something from us! She probably wants more quality time with us, like Fluttershy said." Rarity trotted to the door. "I need to go work on some dresses. See you all at... Midnight." Rarity groaned. With all the work she had piling up, the last thing she needed was her rest to be cancelled. But she would go anyways, a vacation in the Crystal Empire was just what the doctor ordered. She opened the door, exiting the building.
"I have some animals to tend to." Fluttershy was a bit worried. Who would take care of her dear little critters while she was gone? She didn't even know how long they planned to be gone. She hurried out the door behind Rarity.
"I got some chores to do on the apple farm." Applejack raced through the door.
"Aerial stunts to practice, see ya. Dash, out!" Rainbow Dash took off with no further explanation.
Pinkie bounced out. She just had to bake a few cupcakes for the Cakes to sell while she was gone.
Lyra looked around briefly. She ignited her horn, then disappeared.
Twilight was getting jumpy. She had planned the whole thing since the previous day, when she had met Leo. "My plan is full-proof!" She said as she went over her notes, which she had written the plan on. "Starlight won't notice a thing, or at least until she realizes he's gone." She felt slightly guilty. "It's for science. I'll probably leave her a note anyways." She reassured herself.
Twilight opened the door and closed it behind her as she walked out. She trotted upstairs, hearing Spike's snoring halfway up. Spike had gone to nap as soon as he got into the library. It was only sunset, but Twilight was ready to call it a day as well. She needed to get some sleep before midnight, so she figured she might as well go to bed early. She set her alarm clock to 11:45 PM. She wanted to arrive early since she was very punctual and didn't want to be even a nano-second late.
"Goodnight, Spike." Twilight whispered to nopony in particular. "Goodnight, Ponyville..." She yawned, falling asleep the second her head hit the pillow.
Starlight flung the front door open. "Why did you let her do that?!" She shouted.
"Do what?" Leo asked.
"Tie you to that Sampler of hers!"
Leo shrugged. "Guess I don't know."
"You could have died! I was worried sick about you!"
"Sorry."
"Just... Don't do that again. You're like a brother to me and I don't want to lose you."
"Though you act like a mom..."
"What was that?!" Starlight snapped.
"Nothing! I'm going to my room." Leo ran into his room, shutting the door behind him.
Leo switched on the light, looking at the paper in his hands. Meet me at the train station at midnight - Twilight Sparkle .
Rarity trotted over to the platform at the train station. "Why do I have to carry my own bags?" She whined. "Where's Spike when you need him..?" She groaned. She hated having to do everything for herself. She levitated her many suitcases behind her.
Applejack walked over behind her. "Howdy, Rarity! I didn't expect ya to be so early."
"Well, I wanted to be able to get some time to design a new fashion line before we left." Rarity put her bags down and opened one, grabbing a quill, some paper and a clipboard. "And I was worried I wouldn't make it because I had to carry everything myself!"
"Well you do have a hefty load there. You seem to have brought yer whole house with ya." Applejack looked at the huge pile of suitcases which were a few inches taller than her. She was only carrying a single saddlebag.
"Well, I only packed for a short trip. A vacation would be a different story." Rarity replied.
"Well, with you I guess it would be." Applejack shrugged.
"The Dash has arrived!" Rainbow Dash announced as she zoomed towards the train station. She landed right beside Rarity. "And it looks like the egghead's late!"
"First of all, I'm not an egghead." Twilight corrected, scaring her friends as she slipped out from behind the train station. "Second of all, I'm always punctual, I arrived an hour before all of you!"
"And you were behind the station the whole time? Wow, you really are weird." Rainbow Dash commented.
Before Twilight could reply, Pinkie bounced over along with Fluttershy. "We're ready to go!!!" Pinkie chirped.
"Hold on, we have to wait for someone else." Twilight briefly checked her watch. "He has to be here in the next five minutes or he'll be late."
"Who?" Applejack asked.
"Leo," Twilight replied. "You know, the human."
"Oh, that one! I remember him!" Rarity said, looking up from her notebook. "He's quite the extraordinary creature!"
"You can say that again!" Pinkie stated. "I've never seen anything like him!"
"Yes, well, humans are quite rare unless you go through the portal. There you can find millions of them!" Twilight took a book out from her saddle bag. The book had a sun on the front cover. "It was an amazing experience, too bad I couldn't pinpoint the source of the leak from this world to theirs."
"Humans are so different, they stand up on their hind legs and have... Fingers ..." Fluttershy said quietly.
"Eh, they could stand to be about 20% cooler." Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. "I mean, they can't do anything ."
"What do you mean by that?" Applejack asked.
"Well, they don't have wings or horns..." Rainbow Dash shrugged
"You practically just defined an Earth pony." Applejack narrowed her eyes.
"Well, I mean..."
"Earth ponies are stronger than the rest of us ponies and have as much talent as the next pony." Twilight finished.
"Yeah! That!" Rainbow Dash exclaimed. "That's what I meant!"
The train approached, stopping at the station.
"Oh! Leo's here!" Twilight shoved her book back into her saddlebag. "Leo! You're just in time!" She yelled, waving at Leo, who waved back.
"So, where are we going?" Leo asked.
"The Crystal Empire!" Twilight said, pushing her friends in the train, which soon started down its railroad to the Crystal Empire.
"Why?"
"To go to the mirror that will take us human world!"
"What!? Why?!"
"Don't you want to see more people like you? It must be hard being a human in a world of ponies."
"Yeah, but I like it here!!!" Leo protested. "How will Starlight react to this?"
"Don't worry, I left a letter for her, she should find it in the mail." Twilight shrugged. "If she's reasonable, she'd understand my intentions of putting you in your original environment."
"Won't she follow us?" Leo asked.
"Nope! I didn't specify where exactly I was taking you." Twilight said proudly.
"Starlight's smarter than that, she'll probably use a tracking spell!. When she finds me, I'll be dead!"
"Don't worry, I got tons of magical experience." Twilight winked. "Either way, after we go in, the portal would close after a few days, just enough time for me to let you get settled in and leave."
"Wait, you're going to leave me there?!"
"Well I think it would be best for you. You'll go to school, graduate, go to university, it'll be amazing! By the time you're through, your brain will be full of knowledge!" Twilight sighed.
"That doesn't sound fun at all." Leo yawned.
"That's because you've been home schooled! Once you've actually been to school, you'll never want to stop going!"
"But I'll have to leave every one behind. I might never see Starlight again!"
"They have human counterparts, though. That's a plus." Twilight thought for a moment. "Though they don't have much magic."
"I'll hate it there." Leo concluded.
"No you won't! They have amazing stuff there! Like, umm... Computers!"
"Here we have talking dragons."
"They have books!"
"We have them here too."
"They have Nintendo!"
There was an awkward silence. "What's a Nintendo?" Leo asked.
"It's something the humans made, super hard." Twilight frowned, remembering the many times she had failed at the game, causing her friends to laugh repeatedly. "I wasn't used to opposable thumbs at the time but I bet no other human could do it either!"
"Then why'd they make it?" Leo questioned.
"I dunno, to make a quick buck of off the fools who tried to beat it, the ones who failed each time. I think that there's only one guy who beat it."
"Who?"
"Flash Sentry..." Twilight sighed dreamily.
"Isn't that the new guard they put on patrol in Canterlot?"
"How'd you know that?"
"Equestria Daily , the new newspaper that came out a few weeks ago. They feature tons of stuff, art, small stories about Equestria's favourite ships..."
"Ships? Ponies write about boats?" Twilight cut him off.
"No, it's when you pair up somepony because you'd think they'd be a good match. They even make ship names , a mashup of the two's names. The most famous shippers are Lyra and Bon Bon, who are considered cupids for their match making." Leo explained.
"How come I never knew about that?!" Twilight yelled.
"It's relatively new, almost all ponies know about it since it was in a few magazines so word of those are spreading quickly." Leo shrugged. "I read in this article that the first ever shipper was a mare named Derpy. She had a moment where her vision got a bit messed up so she saw two ponies kissing instead of talking to each other and she yelled out the ship name. She's been in like, thirty interviews since last Tuesday."
"Wow. I need to make something super quirky, and I'll be super famous?" Twilight asked.
"I guess."
"You know, it's surprising that your face isn't plastered all over the place. I thought ponies would be more... Shocked about you." Twilight thought aloud.
"Well, I like it that way. At least I can live a somewhat normal life."
"You realize you aren't living a normal life, right?" Twilight asked.
"Don't go talking about that agai-!"
Twilight cut Leo off. "You're surrounded by ponies when you're a human. Isn't that strange for you?"
"Nope!"
"But it can't feel normal to you. I mean, you know you aren't like any of us. You can't find creatures like you anywhere in Equestria. How are you comfortable with that?"
"I enjoy being unique." Leo replied.
"Ugh! You aren't getting the point!" Twilight groaned.
"Hey, is that the Crystal Empire?" Leo pointed to a giant crystal structure rising above the rest.
"It is! I can't wait to see Cadance!" Twilight squealed. "We're here!"
The train stopped as everyone filed out, then it was on its way back Ponyville.
"It's still dark." Pinkie Pie complained.
"You booked us a hotel, right Twilight?" Rarity asked. "I need my beauty sleep, you know."
"Well, I... Didn't have time to book one." Twilight admitted.
"See? You aren't always prepared!" Rainbow Dash laughed.
"Don't worry, no pony's perfect, I'm sure we can find one soon." Fluttershy reassured Twilight.
"Right, let's go!" Twilight shouted, speeding ahead of the rest, who followed her into the empire.