Undesired Assimilation
Chapter Two - Nate McBoing-Boing
"So since we've established that this is in fact another dimension, the question would be either 'how did I get here?' or 'why am I a pegasus?'" Nate said to the empty hospital room.
It had been five days since the Princess had visited him. Ever since then, only the nurses and one doctor had entered the room. The promised visit from the princess had yet to come. Lacking any form of socialization, Nate grew bored quickly. In the absence of any other entertainment, Nate had started to sing whatever came to mind to occupy himself, but the nurse walked in shortly after with a petition to stop. Instead of arguing against 32 signatures, he ran through a number of things to do. After growing bored of those, he began his one-sided conversations.
"Let's go with 'how did I get here first?' shall we? Let's see, I didn't get involved with any malicious wizard did I? Not as far as I can remember. Aku? No, he's a cartoon... of course, I'm in one... let's mark that one 'maybe.' Any other possibilities? Oh! Can't forget magnets."
His less than sane antics were interrupted by the door opening. Nate perked up slightly. He welcomed any new source of entertainment at this point, regardless of the fact that the source probably thought him crazy. This entertainment took the form of a purple pegasus nurse with a roll of parchment in her mouth. This particular nurse had been the one who had given him the petition, and happily so.
"¡Hola, Señorita!" Nate welcomed her, hoofs stretched out in a gesture to the room. "Que es in tu ... ah... mouth?"
The Pegasus blinked, then shook her head as if she were trying to forget what just happened. She trotted forward and spat the parchment on the bed next to him. It was neatly curled into a roll and sealed with a wax seal.
"It's from Princess Celestia," she said to him, in a voice that said 'I'm only happy because it's in the job description.'
"¡Excellente!"
She responded by rolling her eyes and turning to leave. She only made it to the door before being interrupted.
"¡Un momento, un momento!" Nate called, sounding somewhat panicky.
The yellow maned nurse turned around slowly, an extremely forced smile plastered on her face.
"Can you please say something that isn't jibberish?"
Nate had never seen a more perfect blend of hate and cheerfulness in his life. The fact that it was directed at him made him rather nervous. He chuckled sheepishly.
"Could you, ahem, open this for me?" He usually didn't ask for favors like that, but he had a certain lack of fingers, and an excessive amount of clumsiness with his hooves. The nurse, not aware of his condition, stared at him in disbelief. She was motionless for a few seconds, then she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. When she reopened her eyes she adopted the same smile again.
"Of course! It would be my pleasure," the purple pegasus responded, her voice dripping with sarcasm. She took rigid steps toward the bed and picked up the scroll with her mouth. She dropped the scroll on a bit of bed sheet that covered Nate's wing and, without missing a beat, struck the seal with her hoof. Nate winced at the foreign pain, partly because it hurt, and partly because of the cold nature of the phony apologetic smile she shot him. Pinning down the edge of the paper that fell away from the middle when the seal broke, she deliberately pressed into his wing as she unfurled the scroll with her other hoof. Satisfied with her handiwork (mostly in taking out her frustration on the annoying, demanding patient rather than assisting him), she slid it next to Nate's head and trotted out the door without a word.
"I feel the love!" Nate called after her as the door closed. He felt equally satisfied with his own work. Make a fool of himself? Check. Annoy someone in the process? Check. Have the last (humorous) word? Check. Despite himself, Nate frowned. He was rather uncomfortable with how easily he was accepting everything. Sure he flipped out a bit when he first realized he went Pagemaster (ponymaster?), but after his chat with the Princess he came to terms with his situation pretty quickly. No more nausea, no more panic attacks, just acceptance. Sure, the oddly colored talking ponies still threw him off a bit, but having hooves and wings didn't bother him much anymore. Nate was well aware of the oddity of the order as well.
Shaking off his train of thought, Nate turned his attention towards the message to the left of his head. Unsurprisingly, it had partially curled back up, both loosely curled ends meeting in the center of the parchment, effectively nullifying most of the purpose the request. Rather than call for further assistance, Nate rolled over onto his side and propped himself up on his elbow (or front knee?) to have a better angle at reopening the letter. His side mildly protested, but it had healed up too much for it to bother him. Carefully, he put the corner of his right hoof between the two rolls, and pinned down the roll closest to him with the other hoof. He pushed his right hoof away from himself slowly and unfurled the top half of the letter.
“Let’s see,” Nate mumbled to himself, grinning with satisfaction as he read the first half of the parchment. “Introduction, blah blah blah, due to the consumption of my time as a result of royal duties I shall not be able to visi-… She so crossed out interrogate. Huh. I didn’t think it was too bad. Anyway, blah blah royal duties blah blah. Here we go, visit you anytime soon. Instead, I shall send you to reside under the watchful eye of- aaaannd time for part two.”
After a moment of fumbling, Nate opened up the rest of the letter. He spent a few seconds finding his place, then resumed his skimming. “…under the watchful eye of my faithful student Twilight Sparkle in her current residence of Ponyville. You know, that line would be a lot better if it said Liam Neeson and some mountain in Asia. It can’t be helped I guess. Back to boring, blah blah blah, arranged transportation, blah pony lifestyle, blah blah, make friends blah blah- oh hey, Applejack and Rainbow Dash’ll be there. Blah blah blah, best regards, Princess Celestia. Well that was the most interesting and to the point thing I've ever read. No wait, I forgot about Don Quixote."
Nate chuckled at his own bad joke. A small smile crept onto his face as his chuckle started to escalate. Before it became too loud and deranged, however, he flopped onto his back and groaned.
"I need to get out of here. I am going crazy. When did it say that 'transportation' was taking me? Thursday was it...? No, it's Friday. (Shut up, brain! That song is evil!) so that gives me... wait, what day is it?"
Nate was silent for a second, waiting for an answer, before he remembered that he was talking to himself. After a painful face-hoof, he glanced around for some calendar or something. Seeing no such thing, he changed his approach.
"Hey! What day of the week is it?!"
"Wednesday!" a female voice answered from somewhere out in the hallway. Her voice was muffled by the door, but didn't sound familiar regardless. Nate just assumed it was another patient.
"Thanks!" Nate yelled back.
"No problem!"
Two days. 'Transportation' came in two days. Nate wasn't sure what kind of transportation it would be, or what much else in the letter was talking about. All he knew was that in a couple days he would go outside the tiny room. He really couldn't focus on anything else. Sure he knew Twilight Sprinkle was probably going to send everything she found out about him to the Princess, but he was fine with that as long as he could escape this prison.
'Even if it is a comfy one,' Nate thought as he nestled into the bed.
"Hello? Hello? It's time to wake up. Rise and shine!"
A baby blue unicorn stood next to a bed occupied by a dark blue pegasus that was dead to the world. The unicorn looked at the figure laying on the bed. Nate lay curled up in a tight ball. His legs were pulled in and his head curved around to rest on his tail. Even his wings (which he had trouble using accurately when he was conscious) were folded on his back. The unicorn, seeing how peacefully he lay there, almost didn't want to wake him up. She wished she could let him sleep for just a bit longer, but she had a job. Right now it was to wake him up and get him ready to leave. She nudged him in another attempt to wake him up. Instead of the desired action, he groggily raised up a hoof and swatted in her general direction.
"No!" Nate moaned at her. "No shining. Too early. Need sleep."
"As witty as that comeback was, you still need to get up," the nurse responded. "You need to have breakfast and get on your hooves. You have a train to catch."
"Don't want to. Too heavy," Nate retorted, sounding no more awake than before. This time he smiled a bit at his comment. "S'that witty 'nuff for you?"
She smiled at him. She really was rather fond of him, even if everypony though he was crazy. So did she, but that didn't mean she didn't think he wasn't a bit funny. Sighing inwardly, she remembered he had to leave later, and she had to make sure of it. This was the reason she wasn't supposed to get attached to any patients. Unfortunately, having so little room for laughter in her life, she couldn't help herself. She didn't know what ran through his head, or even who he really was, but despite that she felt as if she had some sort of connection....
"Ow! Stupid hooves! I can't even rub my eyes right anymore!" Nate pressed his hoof to his forehead where he had just unintentionally struck himself. After shaking off his pain, he stretched out his hind legs and rolled onto his back. Blinking repeatedly to bring his eyes into focus, he turned his gaze toward the distracted unicorn.
"Hey, Moonlight," he said once he could distinguish her green and yellow striped mane clearly. Immediately after getting his sentence out he yawned widely, cutting off anything he was going to follow it with.
"Oh, good morning, Nate," Moonlight answered, a bit quicker than she should have. Wincing a bit at her response, she stepped to the side and levitated a small tray of food up from a nearby stool. She placed it gently on the bed next to him and cleared her throat.
"Here's your breakfast. You'll have to be quick, because we need to have you out of here by noon."
Nate gave a quick smile as thanks, then looked over at the tray. The meal itself wasn't special, consisting of an egg, a bowl of applesauce, and a glass of orange juice. He sat up, flexing his wings a bit awkwardly as he did so. As weird as they felt, Nate found they were becoming easier to use, like he just had to figure out how to control the muscles. He reached both his hooves over to the tray and, carefully as possible, he squeezed them together on either side of the bowl and lifted it. Sticking out his tongue in concentration, he slowly brought it in front of him. He grinned with satisfaction at a job well done, and then, after folding his wings in, fell back onto the bed. Lifting the bowl above his head, he closed his eyes, opened his mouth as wide as he could, and poured the applesauce directly down his throat.
A soft chortle from Moonlight distracted Nate from his meal. He opened his eyes and turned his head toward her, pausing mid-gulp. The applesauce, however, did not stop and continued to pour on the side of his head. Nate tensed at the feeling of the thick food oozing onto his cheek and brought down his hoof quickly to wipe it off. Still unused to the general bulkiness of the appendage, he smacked himself in the face rather than cleaning it. Immediately afterwards, the bowl landed on his hoof and tumbled into the tray, causing the tray to begin sliding off of the bed. In an attempt to stop it, Nate raised his hoof and slammed it down on the tray. It worked, but the force knocked over the glass of orange juice, which poured into the egg.
In the meantime, Moonlight's quiet chortle has escalated to a loud laughter. She still made an effort to be quiet, but she was obviously failing miserably. Nate didn't mind the fact that she was laughing at him, quite the contrary as a matter of fact. He felt slightly proud that he made somepony laugh that hard. After watching her for a few seconds he turned back toward his tray, only to have the smile melt right off of his face when he saw the orange juice and eggs. If there was one thing that did annoy him (besides Xbox Live payments), it was food touching other food. Drink in food was just that much worse.
"Ahem, sorry," the unicorn said as she attempted to halt her laughing. Her voice broke, and she was still madly grinning, but for the most part she had calmed down. "That was a bit unprofessional of me. I should have-"
"Naw, it's fine," Nate interrupted, slapping a goofy smile on his face. Glancing back at his food, he opened his mouth to say he wasn't hungry, but he cut himself short after something occurred to him. Frowning, he cocked his head to the side.
"Don't you work the night shift? I mean, not that I'd rather have Mrs. Purple Party Pooper here, but why are you here?"
"Oh, ah, I volunteered to help you get out of here and over to your new home. I'm not actually here to work." Not waiting for a response, she levitated the bowl and tray off of the bed and set them down on the table on the opposite side of the bed. "Anyway, the doctor said you might need a wheelchair, but if you felt fine you could walk. What do think?"
Nate went from suspicious to nervous almost as fast as it took for the Road Runner to make a fool out of Wile E. Truth be told he felt like he could run a race, so walking was fine. The problem was that he really wasn't sure if he could. He certainly couldn't on his first panicked attempt. But he would have to figure it out eventually. For a moment he thought over the pros and cons, then he decided to bite the bullet.
"Bring it on," Nate said in his best Kuzco imitation. Dramatically (or dorkily, depending on your perspective), he flung aside the blanket. After pausing for a moment to let Moonlight take a step back, he rolled off of the bed and onto his hooves. Momentum, on the other hoof, denied him of his dignity, or what was left of it. His momentum propelled him to the right until his applesauce covered face hit the ground with a dull spack, sending bits of the runny food in several directions. Slightly red in the face, he unsteadily pushed himself up onto his hooves.
'Okay, time to turn. I've got this. Just move this hoof to the right... that hoof to there... this one here... knight to E5... move that one... wait! Too far! Put that one back! You! Move there! Okay, walk forward. Just with both arms and legs. No problem. Left, right, left right, left, right, left, right. Ack! Closed door! Abort cycle!"
Nate, as deep in his concentration as he was, failed to notice the bemused Unicorn standing next to him. Moonlight knew she should be more worried, considering the fact that he had trouble walking nearly two weeks after a fall that miraculously lacked a concussion, but his facial expressions as he slowly and delicately made his way to door distracted her from everything else. His face would go from dead seriousness to mild panic the next, all from something as simple as turning too much. It wasn't until he brought his feet too close together and lost his balance that she finally stepped in. Rather than allow him to fall over onto the floor again, she fell in line next to him and caught his body with hers. They both remained motionless for a moment, Nate’s face reddening by the second.
"I think I'll take the wheelchair actually," Nate mumbled. He slowly folded his legs beneath himself and started crawling back over to the bed, his head hung in defeat. The nurse behind him tried not to giggle as she excused herself to fetch the promised wheelchair.
Coming to a halt next to the bed, the brown pegasus pushed himself into a sitting position. After a few seconds of wobbling, however, he decided that being upright really wasn't that comfortable anymore. Nothing was the same in this body. Sure, some things he could do similarly to his time as a human, but everything else was so weird. He could look straight up and not only be completely comfortable doing it, but also still be able to tilt it back further. Not to mention that he had wings and a tail of course. Granted, he looked like a cool Matchbox racecar he had as a kid, what with his blue coat and twin yellow pinstripes stretching from his mane to the tip of his tail. They made him feel a bit cooler than before, even though he still had the bowl cut, but still: he was a pegasus in My Little Pony. You can’t just waltz into something like that and feel right as rain. He doubted even Link felt in control of himself when he went bunny or wolf. He certainly didn’t seem to have similar trouble walking though…
Nate froze for a moment, his face abandoning the embarrassed expression he had still sported in favor of a look of utter seriousness. Here he was, alone, with nopony to watch him practice walking, and he sat here. He always did do better at things when nopony could see him do well. Besides, even though his personal philosophy was that he was only embarrassed when he let himself feel embarrassed, he would feel a lot better if he wasn’t watched.
“Cue Rocky music!” Nate said to nopony in particular, but rather to rally himself up. It appeared to work too, because he rose to his hooves while singing out the tune. Before he took the first step, though, he remembered his singing was not fondly looked upon here, so he switched it to his mental MP3 player. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and decided to let his body do the thinking. Snapping his eyes open, he pushed his body forward the same way he would walk: without thinking about it. Kind of like how he would effortlessly breathe or subconsciously button mash through boring dialogue. The result was a success, and he took several steps forward effortlessly at a normal speed. When he tried to turn before he hit the wall his luck came to an end. He twisted his front half to the right to pull himself in that direction, but lost his balance almost instantly and fell to the right. Luckily he didn’t hit the ground that hard, but that was probably because he slammed his head into the wall on the way down.
At that moment, the door swung open and Moonlight walked in, pushing a wheelchair in front of her. Nate would have grinned at the sight of her, what with her front hooves propped up on the chair and her back legs pushing it forward, but he wasn't exactly in a dignified position himself. He lay on his side with his chin pressed up against the wall, forcing his head to nearly touch his flank. He tried to scramble to his hooves, but fell toward the bed instead.
If Moonlight saw his blundering, she didn't show it. Instead, she calmly walked the wheelchair forward, head held high. Nate threw himself into a sitting position, his front legs rigid in front, back legs tucked underneath, and head erect. For a moment he looked from side to side passively, as if trying to pretend that his tumble never happened, but quickly dropped it and hung his head.
"Why does God hate me?" He said in a combination of embarrassment and frustration.
"Oh I'm sure it's not all that bad," Moonlight assured him with a comforting smile. "I can't imagine there's something you could've done or said to get on the Princess's bad side. She's very kind and forgiving."
Nate snapped to attention. Something in that sentence stood out to him and completely overshadowed his walking predicament.
"Princess? You mean Princess Celestia? The one I talked to?"
"Um... yeah."
All of the sudden Nate became very self conscious of that particular conversation. He knew that she was important and powerful, that much was obvious from "princess" and her sun thing. He never suspected that she was a goddess. His eyes darted back and forth as he tried to remember anything he said that might come back to haunt him.
"Hey! Snap out of it!"
Nate blinked a few times, turning his attention back to reality.
"Why didn't anybody tell me that she was a goddess before now!?"
Moonlight, taken aback by the question gave him a look of incredulity.
"Because everypony knows that. It's common knowledge. How do you not know?"
"Well I'm not exactly from around here, am I?!"
The door opened yet again and revealed the first nurse Nate saw: the pink unicorn with the purple mane. She had a scowl on her face as she walked into the room. The scowl vanished, however, when she saw the two occupants.
"Moonlight? What are you still doing here? You were supposed to leave half an hour ago. The train leaves in twenty minutes."
Moonlight took on a look of panic, tensing up.
"What?! It's that late already? How?!"
"Time flies when you're having fun. You really should be going though. I can't really do anything in here until you guys leave."
Moonlight wasted no time in getting Nate up. Using both magic and her head and hooves, she lifted his front legs up and moved him over into the chair. Once in position, she dropped him, raced over to the back and turned it around fast enough to make Speedy Gonzales blush. She then pushed past the other nurse and out the door equally fast.
The pink nurse raised an eyebrow at her coworker. She rolled her eyes as she heard yells of "slow down" and "watch it" indicating the progress of the pair.
"Just one of those days," she muttered to herself as she levitated the tray and started towards the door.
The noisy train station bustled with ponies. Few workers could be seen, excepting the conductor walking back and forth along the platform. The rest of the mass was bidding family and friends farewell or boarding the train alone. Some could be seen in tears, while others gave somewhat of a cheer. Further along the station, toward the front, the crowd tapered out, and only individual or coupled ponies filed into the more luxurious cars. This was the scene that Moonlight and Nate arrived to when they reached the station.
After making their way past the initial horde of bodies and into the nicer cars, they flopped into opposite cushioned benches in their small room. Both ponies panted, Moonlight from exhaustion, Nate from excitement as a result of the terrifying marathon he was just pushed through. Several times on the way there he thought he'd run into something or somepony. It was a miracle that they made it through the crowd without crashing, even though she had gone much slower than she had on the way there.
"It's... hoo... a good thi-thing that the train was delayed," Moonlight said through her panting.
"Yeah," Nate responded, his voice breaking halfway through. He cleared his throat. "But there is one thing. How did I not notice I was naked until now? I kind of feel like I should've been arrested by now or something."
Still breathing heavily she gave him another puzzled look as she wondered what kind of pony this pegasus was. First he was moved to Canterlot as per Princess Celestia's request, then he confessed he had no idea where he was or who anypony was, and now he was wealthy enough to think it odd that he wasn't wearing anything.
"Just... who are you? Where are you from?"
Nate wrinkled his nose.
"That was a bit out of the blue. You sure we can't just-"
The train's whistle blew, drowning out whatever Nate was going to say. For a couple seconds the high pitched trill sounded, piercing the eardrums of the companions, then the train lurched forward. The movement pressed Moonlight deeper into the cushion she rested on, but Nate, being opposite her, slid off of his own seat and into the wheelchair. They both hit the ground with a loud noise, though it was cut short by the blow of the whistle.
Moonlight ignored the urge to smile at the flailing pegasus in front of her. Instead, she levitated the chair back upright, causing Nate to fall off. He popped up grinning a few seconds later, but the grin melted off of his face when he saw the look of seriousness on hers.
"It's kind of complicated," Nate said as he climbed back onto the bench. "I actually have no idea how I got here, or really where here is, but I have a theory. I think that this is a different universe and that someone... somepony magicked me here."
"That doesn't make any sense," Moonlight replied after a few seconds of silence. "How would that even be possible? Even Princess Celestia can't teleport from one city to another, so forget about universes."
"Okay, probably closer to a hypothesis, but whatever. All I know is that one moment I'm champion couch potato of the family and next thing I know, I'm on Qubo."
"What? That doesn't make any sense!"
"That makes two of us," Nate retorted. He froze and made a face when he realized that made more sense in his head. "The thing is, I have no idea how or why I got here, or anything else about what's going on. I don't even know how politics work here. Seriously though, since when does a princess do the royal work? What about the King?"
"Equestria doesn't have a king, and don't think you can distract me from the question," Moonlight responded.
"I'll have to get back to you on that when I know the answer," Nate retorted, somewhat annoyed at her persistence. He glanced at the door, hoping the conductor would come through and interrupt to punch their tickets. Then something occurred to him.
"Wait a minute, you do have tickets or something for this, right? They're not gonna, like, throw us off of the train or something?"
"Of course," the unicorn answered, still eying him. "The princess rented out this section for you and any escorts. I put the ticket in the wheelchair."
She pulled the page-sized ticket out of a pocket built into the back of the chair via magic to show him. After suspending it in midair for a few seconds, she slipped it back in the pocket.
"More like a deed than a ticket," Nate murmured before replying in his normal voice. "Next question: would you mind calling me Professor Layton while we're on the train? I do feel like a gentleman right now."
His badly suppressed smile melted off when he saw her look of confusement.
"Forget it, you wouldn't get the reference here anyway. How long is the ride anyway?"
Moonlight shrugged. "How should I know? I've never been anywhere but Manehattan and Canterlot."
Nate opened his mouth to make another reference that would be wasted on pony ears, but was cut off by the conductor sliding the door open.
"Tickets?" the slender orange pony asked.
Moonlight nodded and raised the ticket. The conductor looked it over intently for a moment, then nodded in satisfaction.
"Seems to be in order. Hope you enjoy the ride."
"Thank you."
"Ah, excuse me?" Nate said, raising his hoof. "Um, ah, about how long will the train ride be, approximately?"
The conductor looked up in thought for a second, then nodded and answered, "about three and a half hours if all goes well."
"All right, thanks," Nate said, his voice almost breaking halfway through.
"My pleasure," the colt acknowledged. He nodded his head at Moonlight, then closed the door and continued down the car.
Nate cleared his throat awkwardly, then shifted in his seat. Across from him, Moonlight tried to mask her smile at his discomfort. Like before, she failed and ended up pursing her lips instead.
"You of all ponies," she said, abandoning her attempt at concealing her amusement.
"What?" Nate replied innocently, his face reddening ever so slightly. "What'd I do?"
"You're shy."
"What? Pfft, no I- yes, yes I am."
He hung his head, while she stifled a giggle. She found it hilarious that this pegasus who amused himself in the most obnoxious way possible in an apparently unfamiliar place was shy when it came to talking to strangers.
Nate popped back up with a faux relieved smile.
"I'm just glad you didn't think I was gay," he said in an attempt to distract from his mild shame. "But if I was, I'd have to say that the guy in the booth next to us has a higher rating. Just sayin'."
Moonlight rolled her eyes, her grin still intact. When she glanced out the window, though, her heart skipped a beat. Her face visibly lost all of the cheerfulness the second her eyes drifted to the left. Instead of the expected mountainous landscape, she saw a single eye. Unlike any eye she'd seen, this eye was almost the size of the window. It had a slit for a pupil, like a reptile, but was otherwise entirely red. The small bit of jet black skin she could see around the eyes consisted of what looked like hoof sized scales. The evil feel it gave off was the worst part. She was filled with dread and felt as if she had no hope or happiness left; only fear remained. A scream tried to escape her lips, but she couldn't make a sound. Then a voice snapped her out of her trance-like state.
"Hey, are you all right?"
Moonlight darted her eyes toward the speaker. She saw Nate looking at her, his eyebrows furrowed in concern. She looked back at the window, still panicked. The eye was gone, replaced by the view of the valley and the mountain ranges in the background.
"Moonlight!"
The Unicorn felt a hoof on her leg. She glanced at Nate and saw he had leaned forward and now had one hoof on her left hind leg and the other on the wheelchair for support. Letting out a breath she didn't know she had, Moonlight tried to relax.
"I'm fine," she said in a shaky voice. Nate was nowhere near naïve enough to believe that for a second.
"What's wrong?" he asked somewhat forcefully, yet at the same time gently.
Moonlight took a deep breath before answering in a much calmer voice, "I'm fine. I... I thought I saw a spider. They, ah... yeah."
"Oh. Well, if you say so," Nate replied, still skeptical. He didn't believe her statement, but he didn't want to pry into something she obviously didn't want to tell him. He reasoned that if he wanted privacy, he had to give some first.
A silence followed, but not an awkward one. Rather, this one was tense, suspenseful. It was the kind of silence that was followed by something bad. It was like the calm before the storm, broken by a single sentence uttered in the most serious tone Nate could muster:
"I have to go to the bathroom."
And to Think that I saw it in Ponyville
Undesired Assimilation
Chapter Three - And to Think that I Saw it in Ponyville
The sunlight poured over the small town of Ponyville, blasting it with the heat of the day. Only the occasional breeze did anything to cool down the uncomfortably warm environment. Despite the heat, most of the residents were out and about. Some ate lunch with their family, some hawked their wares at the local market, and others just relaxed. Everypony in the town seemed to be enjoying themselves, or at least was in a good mood. Everypony, that is, except for one.
"Everything's fine, it's all fine. He's not even here yet. I can do this. Princess Celestia can count on me," Twilight said to herself nervously. Her voice had a waver in it, making her nervousness more pronounced.
Beside her were a couple pegasus and an earth pony: Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie, respectively.
"Don't worry about it. You'll be fine," Rainbow Dash reassured her, lazily doing a backstroke in midair. Her shaggy rainbow colored mane waved under her light blue coat in the breeze. "Besides, how hard can watching a weirdo be?"
"I'm sure you'll do great," Fluttershy quietly spoke in agreement. In contrast to the other pegasus's carefree and almost apathetic tone, the yellow and pink pegasus's voice showed sincerity as she trotted alongside her friend.
"Of course she will! She's Twilight!" The bouncing pink pony interjected. With each bounce she rose up above everypony's head, including Rainbow Dash's. Along with the giant grin she wore, Pinkie's presence made it difficult for any onlookers to keep themselves from smiling.
"Thanks, you guys," Twilight said, giving a little smile. "I'm glad you guys came. I don't want my first impression to be a nervous wreck. I mean, that's the fourth worst thing that could go wrong. The third would be-"
"You're doing it again," interrupted the hovering athlete. She was right, of course. Twilight's voice had started to become more panicky towards the end of the statement and was only getting worse.
"You're right, you're right. Just stick to the checklist, and I'll be fine. Princess Celestia has nothing to worry about."
Pinkie giggled.
"Checklists are for checking, not for making friends, silly. That's what parties are for! Ooh! I should throw a welcome party for whatshisface! That way the rest of us can all meet him at the same time! I need a cake!"
Without another word, the pony bounced off quickly in another direction to organize one of her popular parties that she could throw so well.
"There goes Pinkie," Fluttershy murmered. "Well, no stopping her when she's like that," Rainbow Dash nonchalantly said with a wave of her hoof. After a second, she cocked her head and flipped up into a sitting position, not slowing down one bit. "Hey, speaking of bailing, where's Rarity and AJ? Didn't you tell them about the newbie?"
"I did, but Applejack needs to work the farm because of Big Macintosh's injury, and Rarity had some order she needed to finish," Twilight answered after a moment's hesitation. "I think that's what Pinkie said, anyway. She's a great messenger and all, but she's kind of hard to understand when she's on a sugar high."
"You don't have to tell me twice," Rainbow said with a slight smirk before relaxing her legs and letting them hang loosely. "Anyway, do you have anything else on the newbie? You were kind of vague when you mentioned him."
"Actually, I pretty much just summarized the letter," the unicorn stated. "I didn't leave out any detail Princess Celestia gave me. I don't think she knows much about him herself, which is all the more reason to be prepared for anything and do a good job. It's a big responsibility and-"
"The train's coming!" Pinkie yelled, having appeared next to them. "He's here!"
The other three jumped, Rainbow Dash almost falling out of the air. Pinkie didn't seem to notice, as she simply resumed her bouncing in from of them towards the nearby train station.
"Pinkie!" Rainbow scowled, somewhat annoyed at the fact that she lost her cool demeanor. "Don't sneak up on me like that!"
Pinkie turned around to face her accuser and started bouncing backwards. She gave her trademark smile at the scowl and giggled a bit.
"I didn't sneak up on you, silly! You guys were just too busy talking to notice me walking. I know because I had just put the finishing touches on my party and I was trying to remember if I had forgotten anything when I was coming back, but I saw the train coming so I ran as fast as I could back here and yelled "he's here!" and started leading the way, and I never once was being sneaky."
Her friends stopped, trying to process what she had just said. After a couple seconds, Twilight looked at her pink friend and raised an eyebrow.
"You ate some of your 'Super Sugar Treats', didn't you?"
"Well, duh!" Pinkie answered with an exhasperated expression. "It's impossible to make seven batches of cupcakes and not eat a few from each! That reminds me! I need punch! Be right back!"
The party pony sped off once again, leaving the others to ponder the connection between baking and punch. After a moment, they shook it off, deciding it was just Pinkie being Pinkie.
"Aaaanyway, she is right. There's the train," Twilight stated, gesturing down the track. Sure enough, about two miles down, a train was chugging along towards the station.
Rainbow Dash flew up several feet and squinted.
"Is it just me, or is that train a bit longer than usual?"
"Is it?" Twilight asked before looking intently at the oncoming locomotion. "Huh. I think you're right. I think there are some bigger cars towards the front too... I wonder why that is...."
"Oh, that's easy," Fluttershy piped up, earning the attention of the other two. "Rarity's business has been doing so well that a few of her wealthy clients arranged for high quality private cars to be added to the train to Ponyville. That's why she's been so busy. She told me so at our last spa date. I'm not sure I've ever seen her so excited."
"Wow," Twilight said, impressed. "I knew she had some good connections in Canterlot, but I didn't realize they were that good. That's really great!"
"Yeah, real great," Rainbow Dash said, turning her attention back towards the train that was becoming clearer and clearer as it got closer. "Hey, how much do ya it would cost to ride in those private cars?"
"Probably more than you can afford," Twilight replied, slightly peeved at her friend’s apathetic reaction.
The hovering Pegasus contemplated it for a second, then shrugged, deciding flying was better anyway.
"We'd better hurry," Twilight said, starting off in the direction of the station again. "I want to make a good first impression, and being late is one of the worst ways to do that."
As Twilight started walking towards the station, Fluttershy close behind, Rainbow Dash opened her mouth to make a remark, but shook her head and decided against it. She landed softly on the ground and briskly trotted forward to catch up.
"I wonder if any of Rarity's big customers are on the train," Fluttershy wondered aloud.
"Princess Celestia didn't say," Twilight answered. "She really didn't say much in the letter at all, come to think of it."
"Probably because she's busy," Rainbow Dash cut in. "I mean, there is the whole "protesting monarchy" stuff over in Canterlot."
"What?!" Twilight said in a suprised voice with a matching face.
"Yeah. One of the Wonderbolt's agents got in on it too, so they fired him. It was pretty big a few days ago. All over the papers. I'm surprised you didn't know."
"I've been in the library working on my gravity essay all week! I didn't know anything about this! This is huge!"
"Not really," Fluttershy said in a calming voice. "It's only a small movement. The papers tried to play it up, but you can tell the crowds are small in the pictures."
If Fluttershy said any more, she wasn't heard by other two because the train grew louder and louder as it neared until it drowned out the quiet pony. Rather than try to talk over the noise, the trio hurried up the steps to the platform.
With a loud screech, the train slowed down and crept into the station, stopping with a whooshing noise. Steam hovered underneath the relatively new overhang, the fickle wind refusing to swoop in and scatter it. The doors started opening and swirling the cloud of steam started to swirl and dissapate as ponies trickled out onto the station. The bit of silence that reigned after the train's noises died down quickly became overrun by the talk and laughter of unloading passengers. The city ponies made a surprising amount of noise for their number, which was about twenty-five on the platform at any given time. It seemed a never ending stream of ponies flowed from the train for a while, and while a few were recognizable, none fit the description from the letter.
Eventually the platform cleared, but there was still no sign of the anticipated pony.
"Well, I didn't see him," Rainbow Dash said, sounding slightly dissappointed as she turned to leave.
"Do you think we missed him?" Fluttershy wondered aloud, and then went to follow her friend.
"I hope not," Twilight replied, her face beginning to scrunch up in worry as she followed suit.
"See why I said to wait? If we'd left when the train stopped we would have passed these guys right up."
"You said 'no, this seat's too comfy,' then tried to fake snore."
The three turned around to see two more passengers trot out of the train. One fit the description in the letter, a dark blue pegasus almost as dark as Luna with two bright yellow stripes in his mane and no cutie mark, while the other unknown unicorn pushed along an empty wheelchair. For whatever reason, though, he refused to meet the other pony's eyes and instead stared intently at the ground in front of him.
"Details, details," the pegasus responded, still not raising his gaze.
Smiling widely, Twilight briskly trotted toward the pair.
"Hi," she greeted in the friendliest voice she could muster. "You must be Nate."
For a moment Nate froze, looking like a deer in a spotlight. After a second he glanced somewhat expectantly at his companion, who's only response was to raise an an eybrow. He replied back with a quick scowl before taking a deep breath and looking back to Twilight.
"Yeess," He replied slowly with a cracked voice. He cleared his throat and continued. "And you would be... er...." He darted his eyes back and forth, trying to remember her name.
"Twilight," the pony beside him supplied.
"Right, yeah. Twilight... Saga...?"
"Sparkle."
"That's what I meant."
"I think you won't have to worry about first impressions anymore, Twi," Rainbow Dash stage whispered next to her.
"Well sorry!" Nate said more quietly, his face reddening. He didn't appearing truly sorry, but niether was he upset or apathetic as he quickly looked her over. "Not everyone can have an easy name like 'Rainbow Dash.'"
"So you know my name, but not the name of the pony you're supposed to live with?" Rainbow grinned, obviously amused by his distress.
"Leave him alone," Twilight cut in. She wouldn't deny that it was kind of funny (in both senses of the word), but she wanted him to like them, not feel alienated.
"Fine, fine," She said, waving her hoof. "I was just messing with him."
Rainbow backed off a couple steps and resigned herself for the moment, leaving Twilight room to talk.
"Sorry about that. Some of us don't seem to have an off switch," Twilight said, glaring at Rainbow Dash. "Anyway, Yes, I am Twilight, and that is Rainbow Dash. This is Fluttershy."
Twilight tilted her head toward the direction of said friend, who responded with a much quieter "Hi."
"Hello," Nate responded before giving his trademark nervous half smile; pulling back the corners of his mouth rather than up.
"I should probably introduce myself," the baby blue unicorn with the wheelchair stated. "I'm Moonlight. I helped take care of Nate in the hospital. I'm just going to be here for a little while to help him settle in. It's nice to meet you."
"Pardon my asking," Fluttershy interjected, "but why do you have a wheelchair?"
"Oh this?" Moonlight said, putting her hoof on the chair. "Well, 'Mr socially and physically handicapped' over here had a bit of trouble gettting around this morning and asked for it. Now he's miraculously cured."
"It was Kris Kringle, remember?" Nate commented in the same voice as before. "Put one hoof in front of the other, and soon you'll... be...." He trailed off when he saw the odd looks from other three.
"You know... 'cause Santa does the miracle thing... and he... yeah." His face turned red as he dropped his head and bit his tongue.
“Shall we head over to the library?” Twilight asked, coming to Nate’s rescue once again and distracting from his embarrassment. “I was thinking that maybe we could sit down and get to know each other before showing you guys around.”
“That sounds great,” Moonlight answered for the both of them. “We’d love to…” She trailed off and stiffened, keeping her eyes locked on something behind Twilight and her friends. Everypony glanced back to see what cought her eye, but saw only the empty station.
"Uummm are you all right...?" Rainbow Dash asked, an eyebrow raised.
Nate shook his head and looked up at Moonlight. He nudged her with his hoof, breaking her trance.
"I'm not sure. She's been doing this all day."
"I'm fine," Moonlight assured, relaxing . She reverted her attention to Twilight, but her eyes kept darting back.
"Are you sure?" Fluttershy asked, sounding concerned.
"Of course. Let's, ah... let's go," she confirmed, putting her slightly wobbly hooves on the wheelchair. It took her several tries to place it on the chair, however, because she had once again locked eyes with something unseen.
"Here, let me get that," Nate offered, starting towards the chair.
"Huh? Oh, no, I've got this," she replied as-a-matter-of-factly. "Besides, you have trouble with walking without pushing things."
"Kris Kringle, remember?" He said in a nonchalant tone. "Besides, I'm more of a bipedal mover anyhow. Think of it as a walker."
"If you say so...." She looked at him as she backed away from the wheelchair and glanced one last time at the empty station.
Nate trotted forward, placed his two front hooves on the chair, and turned his head toward Twilight.
"Lead the way, Twilight Sparkle," he said with a nod.
Twilight started to slowly walk toward the end of the platform, but was too distracted by Moonlight's behavior to bother correcting the way Nate addressed her. Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy followed suit, the former by opening her wings and hovering a few feet in the air with them. All of them had their eyes locked on Moonlight, who walked to the left of Nate, excepting Nate himself who was staring at Rainbow Dash. The concern did not go unnoticed by the unicorn in question.
"I'm fine," Moonlight said, sounding a bit annoyed by the unwanted attention. "Stop looking at me like that."
"Suuure," Rainbow Dash retorted, rolling her eyes. "And Twilight here's a great athlete. No offense."
"None taken," replied an obviously offended Twilight.
Ignoring the statement, she continued.
"All I'm saying is that it's kind of obvious that- ... um, why are you staring at me?"
"... you're flying..." Nate chuckled, seemingly unaware that all the attention had suddenly diverted towards him.
Rainbow raised her eyebrow at him and gave a blank look.
"Yes, it's something we pegasus do," she answered sarcastically. "Amazing isn't it?"
Nate shook his head slightly and chuckled in response.
"How are you light enough for your wings to carry you?"
"Are you calling me fat?" Rainbow Dash accused, going from condescending to accusatory in the blink of an eye. She hovered a bit closer and narrowed her eyes at him.
"No, no," he replied, a grin forcing its way onto his face. "It's just... a pony couldn't just fly where I'm from. It doesn't... well, you just can't."
"And why is that?"
"Ponies aren't... aerodynamic or whatever it is. Physics must be different here."
A few feet over, Twilight's eyes widened and a smile appeared on her face. This was exactly the sort of thing she'd been waiting for, and there it was, right next to her! Twilight was sure Princess Celestia would love this kind of information.
"What's different about our physics?" She asked hastily so that Rainbow Dash wouldn't be able to cut her off with a smart comment.
"Huh?" Nate looked back down towards Twilight as if remembering she was there. He blinked a couple times and the grin faded away.
"What are physics like where you come from?" Twilight restated.
"Oh," Nate shrugged. "I don't know. I was behind in math. Only ever got to algebra. But if bees are a freak of nature for flying, I'm pretty sure a flying pony would freak everyone out."
Nate grunted the last few words as he had reached the stairs and began attempting to cart the wheelchair down the stairs without letting it escape him and tumble. As he pushed it into the sunlight and out of the shade, he scowled slightly.
"Wait a minute," Rainbow Dash said to him somewhat loudly. "You're telling me that you're a pegasus who is old enough to do that kind of boring math, and you've never flown once?"
"Well I never really had the ability to-"
"What is that supposed to mean? Anypony with wings can fly."
"Um, excuse me," Fluttershy tried to cut in from the back of the group. Unfortunately for her, she was too quiet to be payed any mind.
"You see, that's just it. Up until a little while ago, I didn't have wings."
"So you're telling me you grew wings overnight? Are you kidding me?!"
"Actually it was closer to noon."
Rainbow Dash turned to Twilight with an incredulous expression.
"Are you hearing this?"
"Actually, I don't think it's outside the realm of possibility," Twilight answered thoughtfully. "I mean, he did appear out of nowhere with clothes that didn't fit and covered his wings."
"Thank you, Twilight," Nate said to her in a voice that was less thankful and more like somepony who had just made a point. A second later he registered what she had said. "Wait, you guys took my clothes?"
"You guys, I really don't think we should talk about that where everypony is watching," Fluttershy interrupted, this time successfully.
The others looked around and sure enough, they stood in the middle of the road from the station where a number of ponies had stopped to listen in on the conversation. Unicorns, pegasi, and earth ponies of all colors near them had halted whatever they had been doing.
Twilight, Rainbow Dash, and Nate all froze for a moment (Nate's hooves slipping off of the wheelchair in the process). Everypony simply stared at each other awkwardly. Finally, Twilight spoke up.
"Let's just get to the Library."
The others nodded in agreement and continued walking down the street, Moonlight grabbing the wheelchair. The other ponies watched them for a short distance, then returned to whatever they had been doing before as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.
Nate, for once, didn't mind walking through town in the sun. In fact, he kind of enjoyed walking through this new place, seeing all he could from the road. The rustic look of the town rather intrigued him. It sort of reminded him of Skryim, but with no dragon and more pony. On second thought, there were less obvious dragons. If his memory served him correctly (which was questionable judging by his test performance) there actually were dragons in this.
"There's the library up ahead," Twilight announced.
Nate's eyes and mind ceased their wandering and locked onto the most eye catching structure in their path.
"The tree...?"
"Yup!" Twilight confirmed with a tinge of pride audible in her voice.
Nate took a closer look at the tree. It was still a ways away, but at a second, closer look, he saw windows and a door. His first though was Ellesméra, but he discarded that when he remembered that every building was a tree in Du Weldenvarden. Then he couldn't help but smirk at the irony of a tree library.
"It's actually rather brilliant," he admitted after several similar thoughts had passed through his head.
"And it's surprisingly homey," Twilight added.
Nate resisted a Keebler reference he knew would be lost on them and instead said, "So long as it has good books."
"Oh, believe me, there are plenty of those," she told him eagerly. "There's history, fantasy, adventure, horror-"
"Horror?" Nate cut her off with a chuckle. "You guys have horror here?" The question was met with a nod. Nate grinned a bit at the thought of My Little Pony Horror that wasn't from a psyco fanatic. "I'll have to see that."
"If you want, you can ask Spike to find you some," Twilight informed him, either oblivious or uncaring about his amused disbelief. "He's my assistant dragon. Right now he's helping my friend Rarity at her boutique though, so you'll have to meet them later."
Nate perked up a bit at the mention of Spike. He knew the name, but didn't realize that its owner was a fire-breathing lizard who worked at boutiques. That was definitely an interesting bit of trivia. But a dragon is still a dragon, regardless of occupation, he reasoned.
"Hey, do you guys hear... dubstep?" Nate interrupted himself. He was really hoping the answer would be a no.
"Yeah... I do," Moonlight said, crushing his hopes of escaping wubs for life. Nate suspected that there would be bad music, but he figured that it would carry over from old versions of My Little Pony, not from Skrillex.
"Didn't Pinkie Pie say she was going to throw a party?" Fluttershy offered.
"No..." Rainbow Dash replied, not with disagreement, but rather with a doubting suspicion. "Even Pinkie couldn't have done it that fast.... Besides, she always throws her parties later than this."
Twilight shook her head. "You're forgetting about her sugar level and her party cannon."
"Pinkie?" Nate inquired, confused and trying to picture a pony version of Pinky and the Brain. "Party cannon?"
"Pinkie Pie's a friend, and her party cannon pretty much exactly what it sounds like: a cannon that shoots parties," Twilight answered. "The question is how she got the music and guests in there so quickly. Not everypony has Pinkie's hyperactivity."
"Try nopony," Rainbow Dash corrected with a scoff. "And that's without sugar."
"Oh, goodie," Nate injected with a hint of sarcasm. "Somepony crazier than me." He was extremely self concious of the fact that he said "somepony" without a second thought, and felt a bit uncomfortable.
"Oh, no," Fluttershy disagreed with a shake of her head. "I wouldn't say Pinkie Pie is crazy. She's just a bit random and energetic."
Nate almost responded with a comparison with Beast Boy, but frowned when he remembered they wouldn't have any idea who he was. He made a mental note to seriously educate the ponies on basic pop culture sometime so he could make references.
The music grew louder and clearer as they neared the library, a sure sign that their suspicions were true. Their steps became slower and more deliberate with each 'wub' (with the exception of Rainbow Dash and her hovering). When the five finally reached the library door they hesitated, not sure what to expect behind it. After a second Twilight enveloped the door in her transparent purple unicorn magic and pushed it open. Immediately the music grew louder, making a few of them cringe after the relatively quiet walk.
Nate turned his head to recommend investing in a "quiet in the library" sign, but before he got a word out a pink blur shot over to the doorway. He snapped his head back ahead to see nothing but two light cerulean eyes in front of him.
"Hi!"
Making some unintelligable exclaimation, Nate stumbled backwards in surprise. Due to the fact that his walking remained at novice level, he immediately fell onto his blank flank. Looking up at the rest of the pony revealed the pinkest, most poofy-haired thing he'd seen in his life (in person anyway).
"...Pinkie?" he guessed uncomfortably as he sat, hardly moving, on the ground.
"That's me!" the brightly colored earth pony responded, the polar opposite of the pegasus in front of her. While he was nervous and uncomfortable, she seemed happy and excited. "How'dja guess? Are you psychic?"
"Aaah, no," Nate responded, suddenly aware he lacked dignity. He awkwardly clambered to his hooves, not bothering to dust himself off. He knew the light dirt would stand out against his darker coat, but he didn't want to try and figure out how to brush himself off with witnesses nearby.
"That's okay, even though that would be super duper cool," Pinkie Pie replied in a voice no less energetic and bright than before. "You know what else is super cool? A party! And guess what? I've got one almost finished right here! Just a few more ponies and it'll be perfect!"
With that she lept over their heads and started prancing around them in a circle. Everypony's heads turned to follow the pink abundance of energy as she circled them.
"Bye blue pony and Twilight and Rainbow Dash and other blue pony and Fluttershy!" She abruptly halted in front of Moonlight and put her face directly in front of the nurse's. Moonlight blinked and pulled her face back a bit, appearing slightly flustered at this sudden invasion of personal space. Pinkie said to her without altering her volume, "Don't worry, this party's also for you. Welcome to Ponyville!"
The party pony bounded off in a seemingly random direction at a relatively fast rate. The five ponies stared after her: three with either a smile or smirk, and the two new arrivals with a blank face.
"That was classic Pinkie right there," Rainbow Dash said, smirking at the pair's expressions.
"And I thought I knew some spontaneous peop- er, ponies," Nate mused.
Moonlight opened her mouth as is to say something, but hesitated and closed it after a few seconds with a shrug.
"Let's go on inside," Twilight suggested.
Moonlight responded by pressing forward with the wheelchair into the library. Rainbow Dash quickly followed by landing softly and trotting inside.
Nate, still staring after Pinkie, motioned for the others to go on inside with his hoof. He watched her bobbing up and down as she grew smaller and smaller. Almost every time she passed a pony, he or she would pause for a moment, look toward the tree-house, and then start walking towards it. Nate began contemplating how much authority she carried and how that would relate to her status in the town. He tilted his head from side to side as if weighing the options and then shrugged, dismissing the train of thought. She was probably just someone that was well liked enough for ponies to trust her just like that, he reasoned.
He carefully turned and stepped inside, taking in the scene before him. Nearly all of the furniture and decorations were simply carved into the tree. The bookshelves were large grooves, the staircase portruded from the wall, and the doors were rounded holes with doors attatched. In the center of the room there stood a wooden horse-head centerpiece with a ring shaped table around it all carved from the tree (although the head looked as if it came from different wood). No sign of a party in this room, however, unless the splotch of pink icing on the floor counted. In the next room, on the other hand, he saw fairly large speakers on either side of a turntable, which was manned by a white DJ pony with neon blue hair and purple glasses.
After taking a few steps towards the door, Nate halted on account of the sound of a crash and hushed whispers from upstairs (which he somehow heard over the music). Snapping his head toward the top visible stair, he saw a large red tome tumble down. It opened and closed and the pages flapped as it attempted to strike every step before conveniently coming to a thud on its cover. Looking at the book, he saw a small head with a large pink bow pop down, see him, and pull right back up out of the corner of his eye.
At that moment Nate decided that he didn't really need to be present during the entire party.
Slowly, he made his way up the stairs, well aware of the bass dropping in the next room causing the floor to vibrate. He tried to narrow his focus on the hushed voices above him, although he had a difficult time focusing on both that and not falling down the stairs himself. The lack of railing worried him, and as a result he gravitated towards the wall with every step. Once he reached the point where the ceiling turned into a wall he relaxed and walked up the stairs more naturally, his steps matching the beat of the music.
When he reached the top he saw three young ponies, a white unicorn with a purple and pink mane, an orange pegasus with a (somewhat unkempt) dark purple mane, and a very light, pale orange earth pony with a red mane and a big pink bow. A short wall of books, only a few inches tall, ran about four feet long on the other side of the fillies. The fillies in question had their backs tuned to him, and were too absorbed in their stacking to realize he had entered the room.
Nate let out an audible sigh of relief at the sight of them. He was much more comfortable around younger kids than people (or fillies ponies in this case) who were his age or older. Which was good considering he had to babysit his little siblings and their friends back in his non equine days. The trio of fillies, however, heard his sigh and whirled around, looking like deers in headlights. The white colored pony in the middle bumped into the wall as she did so, knocking down a stack of books. They winced at the sound of their work undoing itself as the books hit the floor.
"We didn't-"
"Twilight said-"
"We were studying!"
"What she said!"
They nodded their heads and smiled weakly after they finished talking over each other. Nate gave them a blank stare, fighting back a grin at the scene before him.
"You know," he said slowly, watching them visibly sweat out of nervousness, "that wall would be a lot sturdier if you overlapped the books more." This was met with a mixture of confusion and relief, albeit mostly relief.
"Wait, you ain't mad that we're messin' up th' library?" the red maned pony to his right asked. "Usually strangers get kinda upset at our crusadin'."
"Crusading?" Nate voiced his confusion, noting a distinct lack of christian army.
"Yeah!" The orange one piped up enthusiastically. "Crusading for our cutie marks!"
The white filly puffed out her chest and spoke with authority, "I'm Sweetie Belle, this is Apple Bloom, and she's Scootaloo, and we're the Cutie Mark Crusaders!"
"Yeah!" The three said in unison, clapping their hooves together above their heads.
"All right," Nate responded, nodding his head, "so how does stacking books get you your, ah, 'Cutie Mark'?" Truth be told, he had completely forgotten what a Cutie Mark was, and he hoped their answer would enlighten him.
"Well we were going to try and be Cutie Mark Crusader Scholars," Sweetie Belle began.
"But that was really boring, so instead we decided we should be Cutie Mark Crusader Architects instead," Scootaloo cut her off.
"And we were already in a library, so we decided to jus' use th' books!" Apple Bloom finished.
"And this is so important that you'd miss the party downstairs?" Nate asked, his eyebrow raised. He was a bit disappointed that he he still had no idea what a 'Cutie Mark' was, and wished he had paid a tad more attention when the Goddess-Princess explained it to him.
"Getting our Cutie Marks is the most important thing in the world!" Apple Bloom answered, her bow bobbing up and down as she explained with enthusiasm. "Didn't you want one when you were younger?"
"Well- I, uh," Nate spluttered. He had no idea how to answer that question- for obvious reasons. Before he could think of something to say, Scootaloo, who had craned her neck to see his backside, let out a gasp.
"He doesn't have a Cutie Mark!" She exclaimed, which was met with excited (and horrified) gasps. All three sped forward with speed to rival Pinkie Pie's, coming to a abrupt halt to his left. He turned his head to follow them, blinking in surprise.
"Oh... my... gosh," Sweetie Belle said in a hushed tone.
"Does that mean we're gonna have a blank flank until we're thirty?!" Apple Bloom yelled with a horrified espression. She dropped to the floor and covered her head with her hooves as if scared for her future.
"Hey, I'm not even halfway to thirty!" Nate protested indignantly, snapping to attention. He turned around carefully, placing each hoof with care. Because he had been caught red-handed already, he decided to ask them the question bluntly, "And what's a Cutie Mark anyway?" This was met with gasps almost as surprised and horrrified as the last few.
"How can you not know what a Cutie Mark is?" Scootaloo scolded, emphasizing each word with a shake of her hooves.
"It's only the most important thing in the world!" Apple Bloom restated, perhaps unitentionally.
"I'm new here," Nate firmly stated in a loud voice, effectively hushing the crusaders. He continued in a quieter voice, "Humor me."
"A Cutie Mark is a sign that appears on your flank when you discover your special talent," Sweetie Belle explained as if she were reading from the dictionary.
"Oh right, like whole thing with the Goddess-Princess and the sun," Nate said, remembering his encounter with Princess Celestia. "I remember that. Duh."
"So how come you don't have one?" Scootaloo questioned accusingly. She jumped onto his back and put her face a close as possible to his, looking him in the eye.
Rather than give her the fantastic story of his life, he simply responded with a raised eyebrow, accompanied by the retort, "Because I don't have a special talent."
"That's not true!" Apple Bloom countered. Nate and Scootaloo broke eye contact and looked to her. "Everypony has a special talent! Miss Cheerilee and mah big sister Applejack say so!"
"All right then, maybe I just haven't found it yet," Nate responded, trying to take back what had obviously upset her.
Sweetie Belle, who had her hoof pressed to her chin, suddenly snapped her head up, her face one holding an expression of dead seriousness. "Cutie Mark Crusader Conference!" she yelled. The other two rushed toward her and they quickly huddled together. An exchange of whispers ensued, and Nate politely opted to focus on the music downstairs rather than listen in on the conversation.
I can't sit idly, no, I can't move at all.
I curse the name, the one behind it all:
Discord, I'm howlin' at the moon,
And sleeping in the middle of a summer afternoon.
Discord whatever did we do-
"Hey, what's yer name?" Apple Bloom inquired, popping her head out of the huddle and above the other two.
"Nate," he responded with a nod. Apple Bloom pulled back into the huddle and resumed whispering. After a moment, the three separated and stood in a row.
Sweetie Belle cleared her throat. "We have come to a decision!" she declared with as much authority as she could muster. "If you want, you can be an Honorary Crusader."
"We can help each other find our special talent!" Apple Bloom said with a grin.
"You can't be a real Crusader because it'd be weird to have an old guy on our team," Scootaloo interjected. Apple Bloom stuck out her hoof and roughly nudged the pegasus, forcing a quiet "ow" to escape her lips.
"It couldn't hurt to find what I'm good at. I would be honored," Nate answered with a slightly (very) pathetic pun. He looked at them expectantly, but was only met with unamused expressions. "Yeeeaaah.... So anyway, I hear Pinkie Pie's throwing a party. Wanna take a break from crusading and do unproductive stuff? You can blame collateral damage on me." This joke brought a smile to their faces, and even a few chuckles.
"Okay," Apple Bloom responded. "We can always crusade some more later." The others nodded in agreement and the three crusaders trotted off down the stairs (surprisingly orderly), followed cautiously by the honorary member.
The fillies traveled down the stairs easily and rapidly, as it was second nature to them. Nate, on the other hand, opted to descend sideways. He didn't feel comfortable at all with his head below his tail, and thought it convenient to move uniquely. This went unnoticed by the crusaders, and they continued in the natural style.
By the time Nate reached the first floor in his unusual style, the three had already assimilated into the crowd in the other room. The song had ended as well, and was now replaced with a blend of techno and strings. He noted a significantly fancier-looking gray pony standing next to the DJ as well and guessed she had some influence on the alterations. Upon walking into the other room, he discovered that the number had increased by far since he first arrived, and still more stood in adjoining rooms. All told, about one-third of the area in the room was occupied by ponies, and tables took up another quarter. The tables, square, rectangle, and circle, all held an assortment of cakes, cupcakes, sandwiches (many with flowers poking out), and several bowls of punch in different colors.
"Well, this 'Pinkie Pie' sure can throw a party," Nate said, sure no one would hear him over the noise of overlapping conversations combined with the music. Though hardly the first time, Nate was mistaken.
"Yeah, she really has outdone herself this time."
Nate looked around for a few seconds before halting on a pale brown stallion just a few feet away. The smiling unicorn had a brown mane styled similar to a bowl haircut. Stealing a glance at his flank, he saw a pink doughnut Cutie Mark.
"Based on the assumption that you've never been to one of Pinkie's parties, I'd say you're the reason for the party," the unicorn yelled, making an effort to be heard over the commotion. "It'll make sense if you get to know Pinkie better, which you probably will. Everypony does. Anyway, I'm Ian. Well, Ian Heclops, but nopony calls me that. And you are...?"
"Nate," he answered. Something about Ian was familiar, but he couldn't put a hoof on what.
"Jake?" Ian shouted, taking a step forward. "Sorry, I didn't quite catch that over the everything."
"Nate," he repeated, raising his voice. "And yeah, I got here about an hour ago."
"Oh, Nate. I gotcha," Ian nodded in understanding. "Hey, you should come check out the comedy show me and a buddy do. It's on Friday evenings in the town square. We do little plays on what happens in the town every week, so you can learn stuff about the town there."
"I'll try to remember that," Nate responded with his half smile accompanied by a nod of his head. Ian grinned in return.
"Cool. See you around then," the unicorn said as gave a brief wave of his hoof. He then turned and jumped longways onto a nearby pegasus of the same color. They both collapsed onto the floor. The victim pegasus shoved him off and lifted himself up into the air with his wings, blowing rasberry at Ian all the while. He flew off, leaving Ian in a grinning pile, who picked himself up a second later.
Nate walked away from the unusual pair towards a door on the other side of the room murmuring to himself, "That wasn't too bad. Maybe this whole 'meeting new people-' er, ponies. 'Meeting new ponies.' Maybe that's not so bad. Maybe-" Nate bumped into a bright pink body that had seemingly materialized in front of him. For a moment he fought to keep balance, and then he spontaneously dropped his flank to the floor in a sitting position, anchoring himself. With a startled face he looked up at Pinkie Pie, who stood grinning in front of him.
"I'm back!" She yelled so enthusiastically it justified a small hop, which she gladly provided. As Nate stood up she started quickly talking and moving her head along with her words. "It's kind of funny because I told you to not leave, but when I came back you weren't there, but then when I saw you talking to Ian I realized that you were at Twilight's house, so you hadn't really left in the first place! Then I remembered I'd promised Vinyl I'd get her some punch, and since you were so busy I decided to go get some now, and so I did and then I saw you walking away and not being busy, so I decided to go say 'hi' again. Hi!"
Nate nodded his head in silence for a second, absorbing her rushed speech. After his brain processed everything he answered, "That's... ah.... Hi."
Pinkie giggled and tilted her head. "You know, I haven't thrown a welcome party like this since Twilight came to Ponyville, and she really didn't want to be friends with anypony, but now she's friends with lots of ponies, so even if you don't really want to make friends, don't worry, cause you will eventually! Well, actually she only wanted to make friends after Nightmare Moon came down and me and Twilight and Applejack and Rarity and Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy turned her a lot less scary, but that's not what I mean. What I'm trying to say is-"
Before she could tell him what her point was, she dropped to the floor as quickly as only a cartoon character can. For a brief moment Nate tensed and started to panic, thinking she dropped dead. As soon as he realized she was snoring, he relaxed and started to breathe again. After he calmed down, he nudged her cheek with his hoof in an attempt to wake her up. She flopped her head in the direction of the nudge drowsily, but remained asleep. He nudged her a bit harder, but without effect.
"How do you even crash this fast?" Nate muttered, not expecting to get an answer. "And how much sugar did you eat?" He looked from side to side, searching for someone who noticed. Unfortunately, everypony seemed to be absorbed in whatever they were doing, be it talking, dancing, or whatever the heck Ian was doing with his three cups of punch.
After a moment Nate discarded that idea and started to walk away. Only a few steps later, he hesitated and looked back over his shoulder. Nothing had changed; she still lay on the ground, unnoticed by anyone else in the room. He couldn't leave her in that exposed position, easily stepped on, and simply walk away with good conscience. For a few seconds Nate leaned back and forth, then he turned and went to move the pink pony, grumbling about his "stupid OCD conscience" and its attention to detail.
After quickly scanning the room for a place to put a sleeping pony and finding none, he scanned the room for an out of the way location. The only one he could find was under a table pressed up against the wall a few feet away. It was still better than the middle of the floor, he reasoned. Nate dropped closer to the ground, stretching his front legs out in front of himself and leaving his back legs bent and ready to push. Placing his front hooves on Pinkie Pie, he pushed with his hind legs, moving her bit by bit towards the table. As soon as he couldn't stretch his back legs anymore, he pulled them closer and started again. In doing this repeatedly, he slowly approached the temporary sanctuary.
When he finally got her to the wall, he attempted to stand up but instead slammed his head on the underside of the table. The table didn't budge, but Nate dropped his head to the ground and grabbed his head, hitting his head again with his hooves in the process.
"God-dang frizjh flubberty jeebeez!" he exclaimed in an intake of breath. "Who designed these hoof things?! Stupid natural selection!"
"I think there's something fishy about him," Rainbow Dash accused, her arms crossed and hovering above the punch bowl that Twilight was currently ladling punch from.
"Of course there is," Twilight replied, sounding as if she thought it was obvious as she poured the drink into a cup. "I mean, he appeared out of nowhere, had no idea where he was, apparently had a completely different anatomy, and he's eminating something. You can't see it, but I can sense it."
"Oh... well, I was talking about how he says he can't fly, but that's weird too."
"You you do know you could-" Twilight started, then cut herself off and shook her head. "Never mind, that's not important right now. What is important is that Nate is eminating strange energy in the middle of Pinkie's party. What do you think; could it be dangerous? I didn't really think this through..."
"Yeeaah, I don't really know what you're talking about," Rainbow Dash responded with a roll of her eyes, "but if you're talking about his uncoolness, don't worry, that doesn't catch. I mean, I've spent a bunch of time around you, and-"
"Wait, you can't feel it?" Twilight interrupted with a confused and concerned look.
"Obviously not," Rainbow answered, landing in front of Twilight. Fluttershy, who had been sitting with Owlowiscious in the corner, saw Twilight's expression and trotted over.
"Is something wrong?" Fluttershy inquired. Twilight turned to her friend and asked with a tone matching her face, "the energy Nate's radiating; can you feel it?"
"Oh, well, no. I mean, I can't, but Owlowiscious says he does."
Twilight quickly scanned the faces of the ponies in the room. As far as she could tell, nopony seemed to be bothered by anything. Quite the opposite, as everyone was happy and talking or horsing around. She tilted her head down and frowned, metaphorical gears grinding in her brain.
"This doesn't make sense," Twilight though out loud. "Why can Owlowiscious and I feel it, but you two can't?"
"Maybe it's because of Owlowiscious's instinct and your ability with magic," Fluttershy offered. She flinched and let out a squeak as a cup flew by her head. Rainbow Dash zipped forward, catching the cup before it touched the floor.
Twilight, on the other hand, was too deep in thought, trying to comprehend the nature of the energy signature. Questions and suggestions flooded through her head in a torrent of ideas. She envisioned herself in the castle library, surrounded by books and notes representing her facts and theories respectively. She read through the books repeatedly at an incredible pace, as only she can. With the aid of her magic, several quills furiously scribbled and scratched out theories. After what seemed like an eternity, she arranged her notes in a seemingly unorganized array. The words on the pages all together formed two large words: Inconclusive Data. Frustrated, Twilight opened her eyes, abandoning the sanctuary of her mind in favor of reality.
Rainbow Dash, hovering just above Twilight, threw a cup at someone in the crowd yelling, "Watch it, buddy!"
"My bad!"
Twilight slipped nearer to Fluttershy, who now stood upright, ready to protest Rainbow's less than peaceful response. Before a single defensive word slipped out, Twilight cut in, saying, "I'm gonna go keep an eye on Nate. I need you to see if the animals have any more intuition about his energy."
Fluttershy bit back her forgiving and condescending remark and nodded her head.
"Got it."
"Thanks, Fluttershy," Twilight responded as she trotted away in search of her "guest". She displayed a calm demeanor, but was mentally kicking herself for overlooking something like this. She had been so focused on the world Nate came from that she had neglected to pay much attention to Nate himself. With that in mind, she resolved to inconspicuously isolate him from everypony else until she was sure his "aura" was harmless. Now to find him.
Finding Nate had proved an easier task than she had thought. She needed only to walk into the next room and look at a party table Pinkie had laid out. Both Pinkie and Nate were curled up underneath- the former sleeping and the latter cursing in unintelligible gibberish.
After hearing a strange explanation (though knowing Pinkie, believable), she convinced him to leave fairly easily, telling him he should meet Rarity and Spike (where an emergency letter could be sent to Celestia if need be). It was so easy to pull him away from the party, she suspected he'd rather not be there anyway.... At any rate, Twilight had moved Pinkie to a more suitable sleeping location, and Nate and she walked toward her friend's boutique.
"Sooooo," Nate said to break the awkward silence that had prevailed over the trek. "Is my whole, ah, not-cutie brand thing noticeable? Or do people not usually look at other people- er, ponies' butts?"
Twilight made a note of both his tendency to use foreign words before correcting himself, and the words themselves as she replied, "You'll be fine. It depends on who it is, really. Most ponies will usually only pay attention to your cutie mark if they're trying to figure you out, but there are some ponies like Rarity's little sister who don't seem to think of anything else."
"Oh, okay," Nate nodded. As he realized the imminent awkward silence, he attempted to continue the conversation. "I asked because there was this little group of girls who made a point about it. The, ah, Crusaders for Cutie Marks or something."
"You've met the crusaders at the party? That's weird. I didn't see them anywhere..."
"Well, not exactly at the party. More just outside it, not making any sort of mess."
Twilight rolled her eyes and turned left, almost causing him to run into her.
"Okay, they made a bit of a mess, but they did make me an honorary member of their little cult."
His companion raised her eyebrow. The three little fillies had initiated a total stranger into their group of already dangerous stunts, albeit honorary, with no outside approval? She made a mental note to ask Cheerilee about a stranger danger lecture.
Nate glanced at Twilight's face and made a guess at what she was thinking.
"Okay, I see your point, but in defense, I find it easier to talk to younger kids than me, and I'm a lot less... uneasy," he reasoned. He had no idea if she was thinking accusingly of him or the crusaders, but either way, her face accused somepony.
Seeing Twilight change her face to a more surprised expression told Nate he had hit the nail on the head with his guess. He was proud of his accuracy, though perhaps he should have remembered some jedi proverb or something because not five seconds later, he walked right into the door Twilight had led him to. Crumbling into a pile of uncoordinated wings and legs, he forgot his inner victory.
"My apologies," a voice came from beyond the door. It sounded muffled, but some sort of upper class sounding accent applied to the voice, which continued, "The door handle has been a bit stuck for the past few days, and I just haven't had the time to get somepony to fix it. I'll be there in a moment."
Nate untangled his limbs and clambered to his hooves as rapidly as possible to avoid further embarrassment. No sooner than he had stood up, the door opened to reveal a white unicorn with the best kept hair (well, mane) that he had ever seen firsthand. As soon as she saw her visitors, her eyes locked onto the familiar face.
"Hello, Twilight! What brings you here? And who's your friend with the, ah," she gave him a once-over, "interesting color combination?"
Nate frowned. He had grown somewhat fond of his non-negotiable style (though the first thing that came to mind when he though of this was stockholm syndrome).
"Hi, Rarity," Twilight replied, either unknowledgable or indifferent of her somewhat insulting comment. "I just wanted to stop by and introduce you and Spike to Nate, the pony Celestia told me about."
"Well you were only a few minutes shy of perfect timing," Rarity smiled warmly. "Fancy Pants just left to go see the 'charming' town. All Spike and I have left is to get the outfits ready for him to take back to Canterlot. Won't you both come in?"
Surrounding the door with a light blue aura, she took a step back and opened it wide, gesturing towards the inside of the boutique. Twilight stepped right in, Nate following behind her with a nod at Rarity and and regret at not coming up with a name like Fancy Pants when he had the chance.
As Rarity closed the door behind him, Nate looked around at the room. A bit grandois (and pink) for his taste, but as a boutique it looked fairly high quality for this town. Small wonder she was taking distant orders. Even though there were ribbons, jewels, and materials strewn about on assorted chairs and tables, there was a sense of professional order in the place. Jewel encrusted pony suits were placed on several mannequins as if to show them off, a tea set was sitting on a table in the middle of the room, and there was some lizard assistant, scurrying around and cleaning up dropped items from the floor. Wait a second...
"Spike!" Rarity called to the "lizard assistant". "Could you come over here, please? Twilight wants to introduce us to her new friend."
Spike, holding a pile of excess suit parts in his stubby purple arms, hurried towards her, answering, "sure thing!" Rarity's smile faltered as he approached with the mound. She cleared her throat and levitated everything out of his hands and placed them behind a chaíse lounge.
"Spike, Rarity, this is our guest, Nate," Twilight spoke up. "Nate, this is Spike and Rarity. He'll be staying here for a while as Celestia instructed."
"Hi, Nate, welcome to Ponyville."
"Pleasure to meet you."
It took Nate a moment to realize he was supposed to say something in return.
"Oh, uh, nice to meet you too. It's *ahem* a nice place you've got here."
"Thank you, Darling," Rarity replied, her warm smile returning to her features. "I do try to keep it homely, considering it is my actual home."
"Speaking of homes," Twilight interjected as the thought stuck her, "What was your home like back in Texas?" She fully intended to discover everything she could about him that could prove useful to Celestia and herself as quickly as she could.
"Oh, ah..." Nate was a bit caught off guard by the question. "Erm, pretty good I suppose. Suburban, clean, I don't know. It's hard to compare with here. To be honest, the biggest difference that comes to mind is that everyone wears clothes. Probably because I'm in a clothing shop, but-"
"Hang on a moment," Rarity interrupted, her face wielding an expression of dead seriousness. "You mean to say that where you're from, everypony wears clothes?" He nodded, and all at one she exploded in excitement. "Oh, wouldn't that be just fabulous? Most ponies here only dress for a formal occasion, but everyone, all of the time? Oh, imagine all of the dresses I could sell! Oh! Wait a minute, you belong there, so you usually do wear clothes of some sort, and probably feel a bit uncomfortable without them. Aha! I shall make you a wonderful outfit to match your coloring and solve both your color problem and your comfort! It's perfect! Now, I'll just need-"
"Hold on a second, I don't have any money," Nate interrupted. He didn't want to interrupt (both because he wanted to be polite and he lacked social graces), but he really didn't want to be embarrassed when she asked for payment.
"Don't worry about that, we'll figure something out later," she dismissed his worry with a wave of her hoof, then added under her breath, "to be honest, I'm doing us both a favor."
"Fillies and gentlecolts, the element of generosity," Spike supplied with a grand sweeping gesture towards Rarity, not having heard the muttered statement.
The mare in question was about to disclaim her action as common courtesy, but something clicked in her mind first.
"I almost forgot! I need proper containers for Fancy Pants's order! He can't just carry it all the way to Canterlot, after all."
"I'm on it!" Spike hastily volunteered, obviously eager to please. Nate, wanting to help out the pony who just offered to make custom clothes for him without worrying about money, volunteered as well.
"I could probably help."
Twilight hesitated to comment. She wanted to keep an eye on Nate, but she also wanted to ask Rarity her opinion of Nate and his potentially dangerous energy radiation. Besides she trusted Spike to handle it if something happened, or if he couldn't, then let her know. After weighing her options, she said, "You two go on ahead. I want to talk to Rarity about something."
"You got it," Spike replied, already heading towards the door. "C'mon! I know just the place."
Nate hurried after the little purple dragon, pausing only to push the door closed behind him. Spike hardly bothered to let him catch up before he started talking.
"Rarity's pretty particular about what her clothes go into," Spike started, then hesitated, "and her clothes in general. And her food. And a lot of other things. But anyway, she only wants the best. Normally that would make it hard, but I know a pony who's got just what we need. She used to work for a mailing company, but they fired her because of some accidents. She still has some stuff from her job, so she's been helping me out whenever I need a a professional. Pretty sweet, huh?"
"Useful," Nate commented. He really wasn't sure what to expect from a dragon, but whatever it was, it wasn't Spike. Not that that was a bad thing. Quite the contrary, Spike seemed easy to like and trust.
"I'll say," Spike agreed. "She's a bit weird at first, but she's a good friend when you get to know her."
"I can handle weird," Nate grinned, "I deal with myself, don't I?"
Spike chuckled.
"In my opinion, you're pretty normal compared to some ponies. Have you met Pinkie Pie yet?"
"I've had the pleasure. But I bet she didn't come to Equestria by falling from the sky."
"I dunno. I'd believe it."
The two continued laughing and joking like old friends until they reached their destination, completely unaware of the nature of the conversation they had just walked away from.
Oh, the Places You'll Go!
Undesired Assimilation
Chapter One - Oh, the Places You’ll Go
How much is there? Is our planet the only source of life? If there is a sort of God, how narrow is our viewpoint of his creation?
All of these questions deserve an answer. The answer is thirteen thousand infinite universes. The proper term for these universes in english would be "dimensions."
These dimensions are parallel to each other, occupying the exact same space, yet separated just enough so as not to crush all the dimensions. These are governed each by a deity, or a group of deities, and they in turn must be directed by their superiors: the Council. Each of the thirteen members of the council preserve balance throughout the dimensions, interfering in a deity's work when they deem necessary. The Council exists outside of the dimensions, but are forced to obey the set of rules they determined when they first decided to create the dimensions. Because of these rules, they can not always deal with a problem when it first appears. The most common one being dimensional convergence.
When two dimensions begin to converge upon each other, one will pull something from the other. Most commonly, knowledge. Some people make this kowledge known, by spreading this new form of math or create some story on the events of the other dimension. On other, rarer occasions, an abduction occurs. Sometimes a plant or animal, but every so often an intelligent life form is ripped from one dimension and thrown into the colliding one. Often the victim can cope and adapt to the new environment, but sometimes they simply cannot exist in the new dimension where different laws of physics apply. After 26 billion years of abduction, the council unanimously instilled a sort of charity, a way of survival rather than non-existence. Upon entering another dimension, the authoritive deity must convert the life form into a species capable of the level of intellect pertaining to the abductee.
Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.
"So bored."
Nate raised his head a few inches above the fold-out table, and then dropped it again.
Thunk.
Apart from the old air conditioner, Nate was the only sound inside the pop-up camper. The camper wasn't very roomy, considering benches, tables, drawers, a mini fridge, and a counter took up most of the room, but it was the only active A/C unit available for half a mile.
Thunk.
Nate dropped his head on the table again. A healthy fourteen year old boy, he stood about five foot ten, but was as pale and skinny as they come. No doubt that was due to his lack of physical exercise. He would much rather play Minecraft or browse Memebase than play frisbee or join a team. In fact, he found himself missing video games and internet in this 100 degree dead zone of a campsite.
Thunk.
Sure, he could go outside with the rest of his family and stave off boredom with his seven siblings, but to interact with them, he had to leave the cool shelter and brave sunburn territory. No, suffering from boredom was much better than cringing from sunburn for a week after a few hours of risking dehydration and/or heatstroke. Texas was great and all, but the heat isn't exactly to die for. Dying from it isn't the plan either.
Thunk.
So here he was, dropping his head on the table repeatedly while his little brothers and sisters played outside in the campsite.
"Hey Nathan!" Nate's Dad called. "Can you bring out the hot dogs?"
Nate scowled. Not only did he now have to leave his sanctuary, but he now knew that one of his least favorite dishes was coming up for lunch. Slowly sitting himself up into an upright position, he tilted the table back onto two legs so he could squeeze past the minifridge on the cabinet next to him. After squeezing through, he dropped the chair leg onto his bare foot.
"Shiiieeah!" He growled ill-temperedly. He really was usually a nice happy person, even apologizing to people he trolled on occasion, but camping really wasn't his thing. At all. Combine that with his short temper, and the outcome is, well, not a happy camper. After lifting the table off of his foot, he grabbed the hot dogs out of the mini-fridge and slammed the door.
Stepping outside, the blonde squinted in the brighter light. After giving himself a second to let his eyes adjust he took a step forward, then fell into oblivion.
It was the strangest thing really. One moment he was stepping on a patch of grass surrounded by gravel, the next he was nowhere. Well, not nowhere but not exactly somewhere either. There was only darkness, but at the same time only whiteness. He couldn't tell if there was nothing or everything all at once. Then there was thirteen. Nate didn't know what, only that there was thirteen of them. He couldn't see, feel, or hear them, or anything for that matter, but he knew they were there. It was as if some sixth sense told him of those presences. Not of their intent or purpose, only of their existence.
As quickly as it all happened, it ended. Nate's eyes snapped open. The first thing that came to mind was that this was not the camper, or anywhere else familiar. It was a hospital. But it was... wrong. Nate couldn't tell why, but it was. He heard the beeping of a heart monitor and the tell-tale sound of nurses tending to patients or talking to each other.
Nate turned his head to look around at the room. A bedside table and a chair next to a wall met his eyes, but something else caught his attention. Turning his head felt wrong. It was almost like he had to use different neck muscles to do it. Turning it back toward the ceiling repeated the same queerness. Nate closed his eyes and reached his arm up to rub his face like he always did when something confused him, but froze when he realized something else very wrong: not only did his arm feel thicker and shorter, but he couldn't feel his fingers. Reopening his eyes, he saw that his arm was now something right out of a cartoon. His arm was that of a blue, furry, cartoon, elephant arm. Raising up his other arm showed the same thing.
"What the...!" Nate said, his tone a cross between confusion and fear. "What's going on?!"
Pushing himself upright with his revised appendages, he felt pain shoot up through his back. Grunting from the pain, he dropped back onto the bed, sending another arc of pain through him. Letting out another grunt, he lay down for a moment and panted. The small attempt seemed to wear him out. Sure, he never was one for any sort of stamina, but this was ridiculous!
After getting his breath, he decided to change tactics. Lifting up a leg, and discovering that this appendage felt very similar to his arms, he kicked the blanket off of himself, bit by bit. Letting panic fuel himself, he lifted up his head and looked at himself. He wasn't a hairy elephant. He was a cartoon pegasus. The blue and yellow tail between his legs and the plain blue wings flayed out on either side behind his bandaged torso said it all. Hypervenilating, Nate reached his right hand, or hoof as it were, down to the wing and tapped it. Frighteningly enough, he felt the tap. At this point he lost it. Screaming, he desperately tried to throw himself out of bed. He had to get out of there! Twisting himself so that his hind legs touched the floor, he pushed forward to stand up. Unable to balance as he formerly would, Nate fell flat onto his face, effectively shutting him up. As his face smacked painfully into the floor, the door swung open and slammed into the wall.
"He's up!" A woman exclaimed. "Hurry, get him back into the bed!"
Turning his head so that he could see the door, Nate saw another pegasus- no, just a pink horse with a purple mane wearing a nurse cap- standing in the doorway. She hurriedly took a few steps towards him and tried to nudge him up with her head. A blue horse and two equally strange colored unicorn trotted into the room, one of which had a stretcher in it's mouth. After the stretcher was laid on the floor next to him, they pushed him onto it and hoisted it up... without touching it. Instead, a green aura surrounded one side, and a blue aura encased the other. Nate couldn't take it anymore. He fainted.
Falling. Nate was falling with the sun shining directly in his eyes. The sky seemingly endless before him as he was dragged away from it by gravity. It seemed almost peaceful, borderline serene, but with a tinge of panic tainting it all. All that was forgotten when the pain struck. Excruciating pain, more that he could have imagined. It felt as though he was being stretched and squeezed like clay in the hands of a child. Unlike clay, however, he felt every pull, every hellish twist of pure pain. His nervous system was active while it was being split and stretched itself, sending all the painful information to his brain. Writhing and twisting in torment, he started rolling in the air, the ground coming closer and closer while the pain never altered. Then, just as it seemed he would hit the ground, Nate lurched forward in a cold sweat.
Nate remained motionless for a while, listening to the frantic beating of his heart in time with the beeping. He was still in the hospital. Which meant it wasn't all a dream. Just as the gravity of the situation hit him and he began trembling, the door swung open.
"Are you awake?" The pink horse said as she trotted into the room. She sounded like any other nurse would, and the heart monitor sounded like any other, but beyond that, there was nothing normal about anything. Trying to bring himself to believe that all this was happening, Nate opened his eyes. Upon seeing the nurse and his arm, or rather his front leg, he grew sick to his stomach.
"Oooohh," he groaned. "Why...?" Trailing off, he closed his mouth to try to prevent himself from relieving the contents of his stomach.
"You suffered a rather nasty fall," the nurse said, hoping to answer him. "Miraculously, only a few ribs were fractured, and nothing else was too heavily damaged. You should be up and around by the end of the week. You really should be more careful up there."
It took Nate a minute to realize what she meant by that. 'You should really be more careful.' It's not as if he flew up there and fell down... unless he was a pegasus...
"Are you hurt?" She asked in response to another groan. Her voice sounded concerned. "The herbs should have numbed the pain. Is there something else wrong? If there is we need to know about it."
Nate looked up at her with a pained expression. "I'm a pegasus," he moaned. Just admitting it out loud sent another wave a nausea through him. He felt rather pathetic, considering that he was sick for that, but he couldn't just stop being nauseous. It was similar to a crying child. A child can't stop crying at will, not even with bribery. But of they are distracted and forget they wept at all, then they refuse to shed a single tear. Right now, unfortunately, there was nothing to distract Nate.
"You're... wait, is that all?" She asked with a confused tone of voice and an expression to match it. Giving him an odd look, she slowly turned and trotted out.
Nate grimaced and looked out the open door as she left. Across the hallway was another ward where an orange unicorn with a red mane lay. Arm and neck in a cast, she turned to see him grimacing at her. She smiled uncomfortably back at his grimace until the door closed between them.
'Oooohhh, this is so wierd,' he thought to himself. 'Was it something I ate? I've heard of food induced illusions, but this... Am I dreaming? No, whenever someone says that, they definitely aren't dreaming. Besides if I was I could do whatever I wanted.'
"Bippity boppity boo!" He quietly said, sticlking a hoof in the air. Nothing happened. "By the power of grayskull I am Hema- erm, Hepegasus?" He dropped his hoof, somewhat dissappointed that it wasn't a dream.
'If it's not a dream... then where am I?'
As if in response, a knock sounded at the door, followed shortly after by the door swinging open to reveal the nurse. She slowly trotted over with a suspicious expression. She looked him over for a moment, and then spoke slowly, almost cautiously.
"I don't know who you are or what you did, but you seemed to have gathered some attention. Princess Celestia sent word that she is coming as soon as she knew you were awake."
Nate furrowed his brow (as best he could in his new body). The name sounded familiar. He'd heard it before. The question is: where? After a few seconds it hit him and a look of dread covered his face and he squeezed his eyes shut. Princess Celestia. How many times had his little sister said that? 'My favorite is Princess Celestia'
'... oh, God. I'm in My Little Pony. Of all the things it could have been. Naruto, Eureka, even the Marvel Universe, as deadly as it is to not have powers. I hardly know anything about this show.'
He had watched it before. Well, listened would be a better word. It played on the TV while six-year-old Tess watched an episode about Spike being a number one assistant. Nate had been playing Picross on the couch the while. And of course little Vinnie would try to play with him constantly. 'I'm Rainbow Dash and you're Applejack!'
'What do I know about this? There's a Princess names Celestia for one. Then somewhere there's a baby dragon named Spike and an owl named Owluwishus or whatever, an they're both an assistant to... I don't know. And then there's Rainbow Dash and Applejack, whoever they are. Other than that... Why couldn't this happen to a Brony?!'
A knock snapped him out of his train of thought. Opening his eyes hurriedly, he noticed that the nurse pony was no longer there. The door silently opened to reveal her current location. Nate had been so deep in though that he failed to notice her absence. She appeared a bit tense, sweat visibly forming on her brow.
"Your visitor is here." She said rigidly before stepping aside.
Nate nearly had a heart attack as the princess elegantly trotted forward into the room. When he heard the name Princess Celestia, he had pictured a pony/unicorn/pegasus wearing a tiara. What he did not picture was a pure white pony twice the height of the others with both a foot long horn and wings wearing pieces of golden armor and a long multicolored flowing translucent mane and tail with a huge sun tattoo on her flank. The Princess was forced to bow her head to fit though the doorway before rising back up as tall as possible without impaling the ceiling. As intimidating as Nate found it, she gave off this calming feel, as if it were difficult to be afraid in her presence. He soon found himself calming down and become somewhat at peace.
"My name is Princess Celestia. Who are you?" Princess Celestia asked. She said it kindly, a verbal personification of her calming aura. Her tone of voice suggested a mutual conversation between equals rather than the expected Spanish Inquisition. Focusing so much on ther personality and intent, it took a moment for Nate to realize that her words formed a question that expected an answer.
"Ah, Nate," he responded, voice steady.
She gave a half smile, as if she was slightly annoyed that Nate only answered a fragment of the question.
"I mean to say," She rephrased, "where did you come from?"
Nate hesitated, wondering how he could answer this. How do you tell someone 'I came from outside the television?' Finally he settled on saying, "Texas."
The Princess responded with a frown. This gave her as much help as the last answer, which is to say, none at all. She took a deep breath before trying again.
"How did you get here?"
"To be honest, I was hoping you could tell me that," Nate replied, disappointed that one of the highest forms of authority couldn't even give him any clue. "All I know is that I walked outside and woke up here like this." He used his hooves to gesture at his body. The nausea came back as he once again remembered his current form.
"According to witnesses," Celestia informed him, "you appeared quite a distance up in the air. From there you just fell down to the ground. Nopony was close enough to break your fall, so they picked you up and moved you to a hospital."
Something in her story spoke to him, ringing a bell. Nate thought for a second, and then it hit him harder than his My Little Pony revelation: his dream. It was a memory. Suddenly he found himself living the epxerience over again, falling in excruciating pain for what seemed like forever. His heart raced as he gasped for breath, panicking as he feared for his life. Then, he hit the ground, breaking him free from his horrifying memory. Looking up, he saw the concerned face of Princess Celestia and the purple maned nurse rushed into the room with a similar expression.
"What is it? What happened?!" the nurse said frantically as she rushed over, checking the equipment behind Nate's bed.
"I'm f- I'm fine," Nate tried to reassure her, but his voice was too shaky and his heart raced too quickly to comfort anyone. "Just... panicking."
As Nate calmed down and the beeping slowed to a regular tempo, the nurse calmed down. She turned toward the princess as if she was going to tell her off, but froze when she her eyes met the Princess. After a moment's hesitation, she walked off to the hallway as if she had though better of it.
"Where am I?" Nate asked after a minute, parly to break the awkard silence that had fallen, and partly to answer the question for himself.
"You were found in Fillydelphia, but I requested that you be moved to the finest hospital in Canterlot," the Princess answered. She paused for a moment to see if the name sparked some recognition. After seeing no notable show of it, she continued. "The capital of Equestria?"
"Hang on a minute," Nate said, a bit wary. "These are familiar. Philadelphia, Camelot, and Horse in Latin?" Nate bit his tongue and reminded himself that this was a little girl's cartoon. Correction, this was his new reality. He had to try not to take a jab at every ponified word. Especially now that he realized she said 'anypony.'
"Sorry, I mean that these places are not familiar, only... coincidentally similar."
Celestia gave him an odd look, decidedly confused at his interjection. She brushed it off, and then threw another question at him.
"Forgive me if I insult you, but is it a coincidence that you do not have a cutie mark?"
"I don't... wait, what?" Nate said with a bewildered tone and an expression to match. "I figured as much," the Princess responded. "A cutie mark is the mark that appears on one's flank when one realizes his or her special talent. It is the outward sign of their talent."
Nate glanced to what he assumed must be her own cutie mark: the sun tattoo as big as his head. 'Wait a minute... Celestia, a sun talent... does she control space?!'
"So what would your talent be?" He asked, knowing that he is the embodiment of the 'assume' saying.
"I raise the sun each morning."
"So, you're a Ra pony?" Nate said, trying to make light of the situation in an attempt to calm himself.
"I'm not sure I understand what you mean,” Princess Celestia replied slowly. "And if your goal is to be specific, I am an Alicorn."
"No, Ra is... never mind, I was... yeah," Nate trailed off somewhat embarrassed. "Ah, while I'm thinking about it, do you know of someone- er, somepony named Rainbow Dash?"
The Princess started to open her mouth to respond, but stopped and gave him a curious look. "How is it that you are ignorant of all this, yet you know her name?"
Nate's heart skipped a beat. He really didn’t think that one through. He also really didn't want to try to explain, for if something came across wrong, or seemed contradictory, he could be in trouble.
"I uh, heard the nurses mention something about her... and someo- pony named Applejack...?" He tried to remain calm and collected, but he never was a good liar. As a matter of fact, he was a bad one. Attempting to remember the signs of a liar, he tried as best he could to not do any of those things.
She gave him a wary look, then answered a bit cautiously, "Rainbow Dash and Applejack are two of the weilders of the Elements of Harmony, and have Equestria several great favors in doing so."
Before Nate could say something in response, a female unicorn nurse stepped in the doorway. She was a baby blue color with a light green and yellow mane. Around the Princess she also seemed more nervous than the pink and purple nurse. She was visibly shaking as she turned to address Celestia.
"Visi- visiting hours are ov- over," she stated, then mumbled the rest incoherently.
Celestia, recognizing that she was flustered, glanced at me and said, still a bit wary, "I will be seeing you again soon." She then exit the doorway past that semi-cowering nurse and walked down the hallway.
After a moment, the Unicorn stood up and composed herself. She turned towards Nate and said with a calm voice, "my name is Moonlight and if you need anything tonight, please let me know." Content with a mere nod in response, she trotted out, switching off the light and closing the door behind her as she left.
'All right subconscious, this is your last call!' Nate thought to himself in the now dark room, illiminated only by the light shining form underneath the door. 'Do something crazy or this isn't a dream!'
Of course, nothing happened
