The one wherein the protagonist realizes he has no idea what he is doing.

I could see sunlight and buildings in the distance when I initial opened the portal to view the destination, well not like I could change that really. I had set the power feed increment and the governor to produce an area of effect (screw it I'm calling it a bubble) slightly larger than before so I didn’t clip anymore of the building. Foolishly I had expected to arrive within the same plane as the ground and upright and within sight of what I saw when I initially opened the portal. However, the lack of options for testing the hunk of junk that hurled me to this place as far as arrival is concerned put me at a disadvantage.  Evidently there was some sort of shift in location with the white flash of the full power bubble because the next thing I knew it was dark, very dark, only the lights of the device, the computer and the truck were lighting anything, I could see darkness out the roll up door and hear an echo of the exhaust of the truck into some kind of larger space.

I walked over and looked out the roll up door to see a large dark opening, with what little light that came from inside reflecting from the walls. I grabbed my phone and turned on the flashlight to see where the hell I was.

Shiny, huh. All I can see are reflective areas in the wall, probably crystal of some kind. Great I’m underground in a cavern, which narrows it down some I guess and I just realized I’ve displaced whatever sphere of material was here before I  jumped to this place, which might be very bad I thought if it decided to cave in on me.

I walked out of the door across where the first transition of "Earth" dirt led into the little bit of that other places dirt I had taken with me with the last jump, and after a short bit of that into the rock that made up the floor of the cavern. Looking back over the building I could see that evidently the cavern was actually a bit smaller then the initially sphere of displacement as a perfectly curving arch of the wall of the cavern loomed over a good chunk of the building where it had been carved out, the surface was extremely reflectively likely due to being cleaved smoothly by the bubble that surrounded the building. I’d have to be wary of that in the future it looked like, or figure out how to weaponize what in effect was an extremely sharp cutting field… hmmm some definitely interesting ideas there.

However, if I couldn’t find a way out I was going to be extremely screwed when the air ran out or I starved to death etc… I needed to find my way out of here and first off I needed a better light then what my phone could provide. I also needed to shut down the truck before I suffocated due to exhaust fumes too. I walked back inside, opened the driver’s side door, leaned in and turned off the truck. Damn, I definitely got a woof of unpleasant odors when I opened the door. I’m going to need to get rid of that head soon before it stinks up the place. I opened the glove box and got out the bright Cree led flashlight I knew would be in there.  I scooched out of the truck and turned on the flashlight, quickly walking back outside to take a better look around.

Shining the flashlight around told me the cavern, well aside from my new addition to it, wasn’t all that big, but where was an opening? Swinging the light down to the floor I saw what looked like a portion of a path which went towards the wall parallel to the building I had arrived in. I followed it with the flashlight until it stopped at the transition zone of my arrival, if it kept in a straight line that meant the exit was effectively behind the lab. But where did it start at? I followed it back the other way straight into what looked like an outcropping from the wall, which didn’t make any sense at all. I walked towards the rock outcropping and as I got closer I could see the path curved around and there was opening that was not readily apparent at first.

Hmm, let me think which way do I need to go and how am I going to track my progress, at least I probably don’t need to worry about air then, well I guess there could still be poison gases. Ok, this kind of sucks, where is the green grass and signs of civilization I saw before? More importantly I had not been eating very well lately and I wanted some food soon.

I walked back inside and decided to gather some supplies and prep for a walk, I also needed to pick a direction. The rifle was definitely coming in case I ran into anything down here I needed to worry about, but some water and a way to mark the walls as I walked would be nice.

About 15 minutes later I was ready to go. I had dug out my messenger bag from behind the seat of the truck and shoved what I thought would be necessary into, slinging it over the other shoulder from the rifle. I decided to head outside the building and pick a direction. Further digging behind the seat had found my crowbar which I hooked through the loop on my jeans just in case. As I exited I turned around and shut the roll up door and locked it. No sense in tempting fate anymore than necessary, especially as lately it felt like fate had a serious hard-on for screwing me over. Now which way to go?

I knelt down and shined the flashlight on the path in an area I hadn’t walked. Now that I looked at it closely I could see that it had been disturbed not too long ago and it seemed whoever had been down this way had moved towards the outcropping, so looks like I’m going that way.

I walked towards the outcropping and around it where the path followed, here I could see the walls should signs of mining where another chamber connecting this one had been broken into. I pointed the light forward and walked on, I’d make a mark on the wall and floor if I came to a junction.

After about 15 minutes of walking I started coming across more signs of mining, but more importantly I started smelling fresher air and feeling a light breeze occasionally, from what seemed to be airshafts cut into the rock every now and then.  I was getting closer to an exit if felt like.

I had left the connecting caverns some ways back and was heading down a tunnel hewn out of the rock, thankfully the support beams while old looked reasonably sturdy. Turning a shallow curve in the tunnel I came to a pair of shut and rusting iron doors before me which blocked any going any further. But more importantly a faint light seemed to be coming through the doors.

Walking up to the doors I put my cheek against the rust, closed one eye, and peered out the crack of the door. It seemed the tunnel continued for a little bit and then opened up to what looked like a natural overhang of rock up ahead, more importantly I could sunlight and my way out.

I backed off from the doors and looked them over to figure out how I was going to open them. I didn’t see a handle on this side at all. The doors looked like they had been put in place to keep people from going into the mine after it closed. I expected they were locked from the other side and I was going to have to force them open with the crowbar. Wait, the hinges were on this side. I walked to the right edge of the door and inspected the hinges top and bottom, simple enough looking design, I would just need to pop the pin and then the door should open. I would just need to be careful when I did it so the door didn’t fall on me. But it also meant it would be obvious someone had been down here. Hmm.

Looking at the hinges it seemed the right side also seemed in better shape and less rusty so these would be the easiest to lever out. I backed up and imagined how the door would fall when I popped the hinges, if I stood to the side I should be out of the way. Setting down my bag and rifle, I got the crowbar and placed it at the bottom hinge and started pulling against the pin. Slowly the pin seemed to shift upwards, but the rust was not making my life any easier for getting this to move. I kept pulling against the crowbar at which point I slipped and managed to wham my knuckles into the door and drop the crowbar.

FUCK! Fuck! Fuckity fuck. That fucking hurt, I cradled my hand blowing on it gently. I needed this cursed door open, time to get back to work.

Well 20 minutes and several minor injuries later I had popped the bottom pin completely out and had the top pin just barely holding on. All I would need to do was pop it up a bit more to clear and then get out of the way of the door, quickly.  I tapped the pin up a couple of more times and suddenly it came free, I jumped back to get out of the way and was rewarded with absolutely nothing happening. The door hinge had shifted a little and that was it. Why hadn’t it fallen in yet, was the other door holding it up that much? I put the crowbar at the edge of the door and pried while keeping my body as far away as possible. With a great lurch the door tilted some and began to fall. Leaping out of the way the door half slid half fell to the floor with a good sized crash. After eating a decent amount of dust it kicked up I could see freedom for the first time since entering this damn mine.

I scooted past the door and walked to where the light was. It appeared to be midday as I let my eyes adjust and looked out at what I could see and what a sight it was. A slow whistle escaped my lips as I looked out, I was up high, very high on a shelf of rock jutting out of the side of a mountain. I could see forest and some mountains in the distance. More importantly I could see railroad tracks crossing a grassland not too far off that appeared to head towards the base of the mountain I was standing on.

Looking around I could see a disused path that curved off from this ledge and looked like my way off this mountain and more importantly towards where I could get a good meal and maybe a real bed for the night. Sleeping on the bench seat in the pickup had gotten old really fast. Sniffing my shirt I also really needed a bath, and maybe to burn these clothes.

Looking at the sky it looked like I had at least a few more hours of daylight left. Enough time to see where that path lead and still let me get back while it was still light out. I started walking down the path which hugged the side of the mountain. It had obviously been cut with an intention of being able to get a cart down it. Bit of a drop off to the side though…hmmm I wasn’t going to get this chance again and my bladder was calling and it was a beautiful vista provided.

Well peeing off a cliff it turns out is only amusing for the first 10 seconds or so, how disappointing to learn.

After a bit longer of walking I came around a bend in the mountain and my jaw dropped. Hanging off the side of the cliff ahead and below me was a castle that looked like it gave civil engineers nightmares. I’m not even sure what kind of cantilever design was required to keep that thing hanging there. More than that though I recognized that castle and confirmed what I had suspected, that was freaking Canterlot,and I knew right where I was.

I handled this new information calmly… ok total lie, I’m sitting here hyperventilating and wondering if I’ve had a damn stroke. Suspecting something of this magnitude and confirming it were two very different things and to say I was handling it well was a bit of an overstatement. The implications about the nature of the universe and fiction lead to some very unpleasant musings on my part that I didn’t really want to think about right now.

The biggest thing crossing my mind was that in no way in hell did I want to get anywhere near Ponyville or the main (heh., mane) characters and get sucked into their particular brand of insanity. I was also hoping that what I knew about this world and its leaders had been censored or flanderized for a kids show. Otherwise, the thought of sapient beings with the level of maturity and poor decision making they showed having that kind of power and handling life ending apocalyptic events on a regular basis was a fucking scary ass thought. Like beyond the ability to have rational thought scary. Also, I'm really hoping to find a pub, because I needed a beer or eight to process all of this.

Deep breath, and I needed to make up a plan of action. But also do some information gathering so I knew exactly what I was dealing with. I needed a test of some sort, something that was definitely not TV Y so I knew how this world really worked.  I knew exactly what I needed to do…