SWIE (Somewhere In Equestria)
It was a hot day in Equestria. The birds were singing, the sun was shining, and the inhabitants of Ponyville were taking advantage of the gorgeous summer weather. Truly, the Ponyville Weather Team had done an amazing job. However, whilst the adults were the ones enjoying the summer day, the foals of Ponyville were stuck inside school. More specifically, Miss Cheerilee's classroom.
In this classroom, they were being taught the ever so annoyingly frustrating mathematical equations that they would need later on in life. Not that they knew this, as every school day they would whine and groan in horror and annoyance at the prospect of another morning of maths.
"Now now, students. Maths is one of the most important subjects in the curriculum, and like it or not it is what I'll be teaching you. Now, turn to page 44 and answer as many questions as you can." Following Miss Cheerilee's instructions, the classroom turned to the specified page, finding a multitude of mathematical equations now lying before them. Reluctantly, the students began their arduous task, with some foals not even bothering to hide their annoyance, sighing in frustration.
Having been a teacher for many years now, Cheerilee had perfected a way to get her little academics into a mood much more suited to education. "Gold stars will be given to those who can answer the most!" The atmosphere in the class changed almost instantaneously. Within moments, a dozen pencils were put to paper, and question after question was being answered. With a smile, Cheerilee began to patrol her classroom, helping those that required it.
On the other side of the classroom sat Scootaloo, who was not the brightest tool in the shed. She was struggling to answer even the most basic of questions, much to her annoyance. With a heavy sigh, she raised her hoof into the air, quickly attracting her dutiful teacher to her side.
"Are you stuck on a question, Scootaloo?" Miss Cheerilee inquired, peering over her students shoulder. Upon seeing the state of her students work, she internally cringed. She knew that Scootaloo wasn't the best at maths, but this was just abysmal. It was to be expected in her line of work, and she couldn't be annoyed at the poor filly. After all, it was her job to work with students such as Scootaloo, and by Celestia herself she would make Scootaloo an honour roll student even if it killed her.
"Yes Miss Cheerilee. I don't understand how to answer question 4.4." Scootaloo replied, sinking into her chair in embarrassment, trying to ignore the judgemental stares of her peers. Smiling softly at the filly, Cheerille began to explain the question in a way that Scootaloo could follow, and she quickly got the hang of it, and was using the same process that she had just been shown to answer the other questions.
With a proud smile on her muzzle, Cheerilee returned to helping the other students. By the end of the lesson, Cheerilee was beaming with pride. Her students, Scootaloo in particular, had surpassed her expectations and had answered most, if not all of the questions that had been set in the lesson. With a wide smile, she addressed her class.
"I'm so very proud of you all, class! Because of your hard work today, I'm going to give you all gold stars!" Such a declaration elicited a loud, joyful cheer from the class. "Alright, alright, simmer down class. Now, I'll dismiss you all individually, but you'll have to answer an equation before you can go." Holding back a chuckle at the disparaging groans of a select few students, Cheerilee began to pick out students at random.
"Snails, what is..."
"Silver Spoon, work out..."
"Pipsqueak, answer..." The questions were easy enough, and most of the students had left. Only Scootaloo remained. Her best friends, Sweetie Belle and Applebloom were patiently waiting for their friend outside, giving the pegasus' filly smiles of encouragement.
"Come on, Miss Cheerilee. Can't I just go now?"
"Now now, Scootaloo," Cheerilee tutted, shaking her hoof at the impatient filly. "I'll make this one easy for you. I have two X's, and one X equals two. I also have one B, which equals minus one. If I add them both together, what do I get?" The young pegasus' muzzle scrunched up in thought as her mind began to process and decipher the mathematical riddle that she had just been presented with.
"If X is two....And there are two X's....That makes four...And B is minus one....Add them together...two plus two is four, minus one....that's three!" Scootaloo exclaimed, a wide, joyful smile adorned on her muzzle. Cheering in celebration, both of her friends ran into the room, hugging Scootaloo, whilst Cheerilee let out a happy sigh, relieved that her student hadn't suddenly regressed into retardation in the space of an hour. Unfortunately, their celebration was promptly cut short.
With a loud boom, a portal suddenly materialised in the ceiling above them, and they barely had time to jump out of the way before a strange, not-hot creature dropped out of the portal, landing on its feet. Twisting it's head towards the terrified equines, its eyes transfixed on those of Scootaloo's, it pointed a dark finger in her direction.
"QUICK MAFFS!" It shouted, its deep, legendary voice echoing around the room, startling the already petrified ponies into the corner, quivering in fear. Their fear turned to confusion as they watched the creature stride out of the classroom and into the corridors of the school, the shocked screams of ponies echoing through the school. Looking to one another, the four ponies ran out of the classroom after the strange bipedal, who had just walked out of the school and into the streets of Ponyville itself.
Princess Twilight Sparkle had only been out and about in Ponyville for a few minutes, when she heard the screaming. Following the noise, she found herself looking upon the Ponyville school building. More importantly, she found herself looking upon the bipedal figure of the jacketed creature. Said creature was surrounded by a group of foals, who were looking up at the creature in wonder. Fearing for their safety, Twilight teleported closer to the group, her horn already charging up to blast the biped away from the foals. Before anypony could stop her, her horn let out a blast of magic, which impacted the creature directly in the chest, blasting it a few feet away and onto its back.
With the creature incapacitated for now, she turned to the foals, who were looking at her in shock.
"Are you all alright?" She asked, checking the foals over for any injuries. Seeing no outward injuries, she let out a sigh of relief, believing that she had just saved them from whatever cruel fate that the monster had had in store for them. "Did it do anything to you? Did it say anything at all?" She questioned further, looking to both the foals in front of her and to Cheerilee and the Crusaders, who had just came to a halt next to her. Shaking their heads, they looked over to where the creature had landed, still lying motionless on the ground.
Gulping nervously, Twilight cautiously began to approach the downed creature, ready to launch another spell if the creature decided to attack her. As she approached, a plethora of questions were running through her mind. What was this creature? Where did it come from? Why was it wearing such a fine jacket on such a hot summers day? She was so lost in thought that she had no time to react when the creature shot up onto its feet, both checking its jacket for any damage and dusting it off. This was an understandable course of action, as such a well made piece of clothing required constant maintenance to ensure it remained as beautiful as it was. Satisfied, the creature turned to its attacker, a certain lavender coloured pony.
"Y' man thought I froze!" It laughed, seemingly unharmed and unfazed by Twilight's spell. Swallowing her fear, Twilight managed to stutter out a simple question. A question that resulted in an answer. An answer that would be forever ingrained into the minds of Twilight and the surrounding ponies, and quite possibly Equestrian history itself. "Wh-who are you?"
"Yo, Big Shaq, the one an' only!" It replied. Before Twilight could question this turning away and walking further down the road, heading towards a certain bakery whilst leaving a dumbfounded Twilight behind, who quickly composed herself and galloped of after it, determined to find out more about this 'Big Shaq' creature, and what its intentions were. Hopefully they were good, and wouldn't result in Equestrias' total annihilation.
Celestia knows how many times she'd had to deal with somepony trying to accomplish that feat.
Entering Sugarcube Corner, the pair of Big Shaq and Princess Twilight Sparkle made their way to the counter, where Pinkie Pie was standing. She'd yet to notice the pair as her attention was currently focused on one of her many custom orders; a birthday cake for one of the stallions in Ponyville, who was days away from reaching the age of 44. Hearing the voice of her friend Twilight, Pinkie looked up from her order, only to find herself looking into the dark, enchanting eyes of Big Shaq, who tilted his head in confusion at the mare in front of him.
Ignoring her quizzical stare, and those of the store's patrons, Big Shaq made his way behind the counter and grabbed a box of ingredients, carrying it out from behind the counter and out of the store, leaving a flabbergasted Pinkie and Twilight behind. Giving Pinkie a look that just oozed 'I-have-no-actual-fucking-idea-fam', Twilight dashed out of the store and back outside.
"So uhh....Mr Shaq, is it? What...uhh...what are you doing?" Twilight asked Big Shaq, who was still carrying the box that he had taxed from Sugarcube Corner. Giving his companion a sideways glance, Shaq shrugged, turning the corner with Twilight in tow. So far, Twilight had learnt little from Big Shaq, apart from the fact that he was some sort of musician. Or a politician of sorts. She was unsure as to what his profession was.
"Movin' dat' cornflakes." Was Shaq's answer, turning yet another corner. With one question answered, a dozen more questions were made.
"Cornflakes?" Came a confused Twilight, tilting her head at her much taller, darker and handsome companion.
"Rice krispies." Realising that she would most likely get no better answer than the one that he had just given her, Twilight let out a resigned sigh, deciding that whatever it was that he was going to do with these 'rise krispies' would most likely not end up with Ponyville on fire. Hopefully. Taking another look at her bipedal companion, she couldn't help but feel concerned for his well-being. It was a hot day, after all, and that jacket of his was surely too hot for Shaq.
"Mr Shaq? I don't know how your body handles the heat, but surely you must be hot with that jacket of yo-" She was interrupted by a loud crash that came from behind her. Startled, the mare turned on the spot, but was quickly lifted off of the ground by Big Shaq, who needed only one hand to do so. Evidently, Shaq lifted.
"Man's not hot." He growled, holding Twilight at eye level, giving her an intense stare that would reduce a normal man to a quivering, sobbing mess. Twilight wasn't a man, though, and so instead frantically nodded her head in fear, tears not included. Content, Big Shaq carefully placed the mare back onto the ground, before picking his rise krispies and cornflakes up off of the dirty floor and back into his box, one piece of cereal at a time, muttering the words 'Man can never be hot' over and over again.
The process of picking and placing every little bit of cereal took over an hour to do, but Big Shaq is a patient man.
With no directions given to him whatsoever, Big Shaq and Twilight reached the library, much to the surprise of Twilight. She hadn't told him where she lived, and no passing pony had told him either, though that was because any pony that passed him either ran away in fear or found themselves sweating from his hotness. But, no matter how hard she or any other pony tried to tell him, he still insisted that 'Man can be never hot', whatever that meant.
Along the way, Twilight had tried to initiate small talk with Shaq. One of her questions involved how high he scored in his 'Equiish' test, to which he responded that he got an E. To Twilight, that came as no surprise, having spent most of her day with him by now. What terrified her the most, however, was what that E stood for. 'E for Excellent, fam' is what he said. If his way of speaking was of an 'Excellent' quality by his species, then she was downright terrified of what those that scored less sounded like.
Opening the door for her companion, the pair entered the library, the door closing behind them. Placing his box of cereals to the side, Big Shaq dusted his jacket off again. Waddling out from the kitchen to meet them came Spike, who was too busy reading from what appeared to be a scroll, most likely sent by Princess Celestia, to notice Twilight's dark, designer jacket flaunting friend.
"Uuh, Twilight? We have a...problem...here..." As he was speaking, he looked up from the scroll and found himself staring face to face with Big Shaq the all-mighty. Being a dragon, Spike could breath fire. Because of this, he was used to the prospect of being hot, and was naturally resistant to it. But, being near such an imposing figure like Big Shaq, the young dragon couldn't help but feel himself heating up, sweat beginning to form on his neck. Taking a deep breath, he handed the scroll to Twilight, who speedily read through it. A minute later, and she let out a sharp gasp, dropping the scroll to the floor as she turned to Shaq.
"Mr Shaq, I need you to-" Whatever it was that she was going to say died in her throat when, suddenly, she was struck from behind by an unknown assailant. Watching his furry friend collapse to the floor, Big Shaq's face became one of anger. Picking up his box of cereal once more, he threw it at speeds unmatched towards Twilight's assailant, who didn't even attempt to dodge. As soon as the box made contact with the strange creature, it lit up in a flash of light, before dropping to the floor.
What was once a box of rice krispies and cornflakes had been made into a pristine box of Coco Shaqs. Seeing as how his Shaq attack did no visible damage to the intruder, Shaq adjusted his jacket and charged towards it, aiming for the heart.
"Hold tight my girl Whitney!" Our hero cried, determined to save Twilight from her perilous position. Unfortunately, the assailant predicted such a bold move, and effortlessly sidestepped Shaq's attack. Before he could do anything, the intruder used its magic to force Shaq to his knees. Just as this happened, Twilight rose to her hooves, shaking away her disorientation. Bringing her attention to Big Shaq, her eyes widened in shock at who it was that had brought Shaq to his knees.
It was Discord!
Wanting to be a hero, Spike charged at Discord, letting out a fearsome battle cry as he did so. Unfortunately for him, the bravery of 2 ft 5 dragon was no match for the power of a quite literal God of Chaos. Before Twilight or Big Shaq could stop him, Discord snapped his fingers, and the charging dragon dropped to his knees, eyes widening in horror.
"Twilight? I don't feel so good..." Spike wheezed, reaching out towards Twilight, before disintegrating before their very eyes. Holding back her tears for her fallen friend, Twilight focused her angers on Discord.
"Discord! Why are you doing this!?" Twilight cried out, referencing both the scene before her and the scroll that she had just read moments before. The scroll was from her mentor, Princess Celestia, detailing Discord's sudden betrayal and return to his old, devious ways. What a scummy fucker. It also said that, somehow, he'd managed to capture five out of the six ~~Infinity Stones~~ Elements of Harmony, and that somehow, someway, Big Shaq was the manifestation of a long since forgotten seventh element.
The Element of Shaq. The one Element to rule them all.
What a twist!
But before Discord could begin his evil monologue, that would no doubt have been interrupted midway through by a fourth party, the fourth party decided to interrupt it before it could even begin. Out of nowhere, a bright light had manifested within the library, and all except Shaq were forced to shield themselves from it's hot, bright rays. After a moment, the light faded, and in its place stood none other than Dawnbreaker, the malevolent version of Celestia.
"Release my husband at once, you foul serpent!" Boomed Dawnbreaker, giving Shaq a loving stare, before her features hardened and she locked eyes with those of Discord, who was grinning an evil grin that had never been grinned before.
"But man ain't even married, fam."
"I'm pregnant with your child, Shaqqy-Whaqqy."
"Yo, man used a condom, babes. We was protected-ed, fam." During this heated exchange, the room began to fill with more and more groups and individuals, including and not limited to:
The rest of the Element Bearers, The Score, The Last Airbender, Megatron, Hermann Göring, Matthew Ward, some back-alley drug dealer called Lee, SCP-173, what remained of the authors sanity, Thanos, a pug, some faggot named Braden that detests those of the black variety, the cast of Coronation Street, M. Bison, half of the WWE roster, a black and red Alicorn that nobody likes to talk about, that guy who believes that dicks don't make it cuter, Mr Rogers, Gandalf the Grey and Gandalf the White, Monty Python and the Holy Grail's Black Knight, Mr Rogers, The A-Team, Solid Snake, CREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED, a nigga 'wit a rocket launcher, Theresa May and finally his Holiness the Pope to exorcise the everlasting shit out of this cancerous story.
Truly, the fabric of reality itself has been fucked to the point that if it had an arse, it would be look like the Japanese flag.
This clusterfuck to end all clusterfucks quickly devolved into a moshpit, and within seconds the library looked like a fucking warzone. Or Toxteth, Liverpool. In the ensuing chaos, some mad bastard decided that it would be a grand idea to remove the designer jacket from the shoulders of Big Shaq, the one and only. May God have mercy on that poor soul, for Shaq has none to give. With a loud, deafening roar, Shaq began his ascent into the sky, leaving the chaotic library behind. His ascent slowed, and he was left hovering over Ponyville. Posing like a certain crucified prophet, Shaq began to glow white, the very energy of the universe coursing through his not-hot veins.
With a final cry of "The ting goes skrrrahh, pap, pap, ka-ka-ka", Equestria imploded and everyone and everything became hot. Not even Celestia herself could stop the Shaqpocolypse, as she was promptly vaporised by the hotness. Meanwhile, Big Shaq ascended to the Heavens and was met by 44 virgins, whose jaws he promptly spun.
-fin-
Author's Note
