Homer in Equestria: The Less Than Epic Saga
By Barry the Brony

“Pinkie, it’s been a good run, but I think this is the end.” Homer groaned, his voice barely louder than a whisper.

“Homer no! You can’t give up now!” Pinkie Pie pleaded, looking close to tears.

“It’s too late kid, I’ve got nothing left...” Homer said, his voice slowly starting to trail off as his eyelids began to droop.

“No, you can do this Homer, I believe in you!”

Homer’s expression suddenly changed from the look of a man on his deathbed to a blank stare. “...Boy, I am not used to people telling me that with a straight face.” He gave a deep sign and seemed to find the strength to keep going. “Okay, pass me the plate.”

Pinkie’s face lit up in hope, pushing the last plate full of sugary treats across the table. Slowly, but steadily, Homer began to scarf them down, chewing with the same kind of effort you would expect from Heracles as he carried out his Twelve Labors.

Three bites left.

Two bites.

One bi-

Homer’s cheeks bulged and his eyes briefly went fish eyed, causing Pinkie Pie’s little heart to skip a beat. But with a determined groan, he swallowed and dropped the empty plate on the table with a clatter, collapsing in his chair with a loud exhale.

Pinkie let out a squeal of sheer joy and pulled a switch that Homer could have sworn hadn’t been in the wall a moment ago as all Hell broke loose in the kitchen of Sugarcube Corner.

Confetti rained from the ceiling, balloons took to the air of every color, and in the middle of it all was a little pink pony doing her best impression of a bouncy ball, ricocheting around the room cheering at the top of her lungs “YOU DID IT YOU DID IT YOU DID IT!”

“WOO-HOO!” Homer couldn’t help but find the strength to stand and let out a cheer with his fists in the air as Pinkie’s infectious enthusiasm got to him.

Pinkie Pie suddenly popped up in front of him with a microphone, dressed like a news reporter. “Homer Jay Simpson, you are the first person (besides me) to successfully complete my ultimate dessert challenge ‘Around Equestria in Eighty Plates!’ that’s eighty plates of tasty treats from every corner of the land all under one roof and now, in one tummy! What are you going to do next?!”

“I’M GOING TO-” Homer was about to say ‘Disneyland’ before his face suddenly took on that same side eyed stare as a loud rumble came from his stomach. “-THE BATHROOM!”

Homer couldn’t remember the last time he had run so fast, clearing the last few feet with a spectacular running leap right through the (thankfully already open) bathroom door .

While Homer, well, took care of business, Pinkie Pie began to tidy up the kitchen, humming a little tune under her breath. Confetti was swept up, balloons were carefully deflated to be used at a later date, and the stacks upon stacks of dirty dishes that had piled up as Homer had undertaken the culinary challenge began to dwindle.

By the time the bathroom door opened and Homer came back out, the kitchen was spotless. “Oh man, sorry about that Pinkie but when nature calls you can not let that sucker go to voicemail.”

“Hey, when you gotta go you gotta go. I’m just so happy I FINALLY got to have someone try that challenge. I’ve never seen anyone eat as much as you Homer!” Pinkie Pie said. "Well, except for me, and I hear Princess Celestia has a pretty big appetite too!"

“What can I say? If the good lord above put me on this Earth with a talent for eating ridiculously large amounts of food, who am I to spurn such a gift? There’s so many different flavors and textures to try out there!”

“No kidding!” Pinkie Pie giggled. “I love the farm where my family raised me, but we didn’t have a lot of sweets, so when I left home to strike out on my own I wanted to try EVERYTHING I could get my hooves on. I’d even make a few bits on the side making bets with ponies. Things like ‘I bet I can eat this much cake in one sitting’ or ‘I bet I can fit these many cupcakes in my mouth at once.’”

“Been there, done that, bought the t-shirt. In fact, every other week I go down to my favorite seafood place in Springfield, The Frying Dutchman, and they bring me all the shrimp I can eat. All I have to do is let people watch and it’s a free meal.”

Pinkie started to say something when the front doorbell jingled signaling a customer. As both Pony and Kwyjbo alike poked their heads out of the kitchen, they saw Twilight trotting in.

Even as Homer watched, Pinkie Pie ducked back around the corner and somehow managed to pop up directly behind the counter a moment later. “Hiya Twilight!” She chirped.

Twilight smiled, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes as she looked a little lost in thought. “Hey Pinkie, hey Homer. Listen, I have a bit of an odd request. I know it’s not the right season but do you have any gingerbread ponies?”

“You bet we do! I always keep a batch of holiday sweets around just in case someone has an out of season craving!” Pinkie said, ducking behind the counter and popping back up with a box filled with said gingerbread cookies all in tiny pony shapes. There were even cookies with tiny wings or horns to represent all three tribes.

“Oh these are perfect!” Twilight said looking genuinely happy now as she floated a few bits onto the counter. “Thanks Pinkie I know I can always count on you when it comes to snacks.”

Twilight then opened the box and lifted up a gingerbread pony with her magic. Twilight stared down at the smiling little cookie as her own expression soured and with a low growl she lunged and bit the head clean off!

“Mmm, these are good!” Twilight said with a content noise as she chewed, not noticing Homer and Pinkie Pie drawing back in alarm. But rather than eat the rest of the first cookie, she put it down and grabbed another one. Just as she had before she glowered at it before proceeding to bite the head off with one hard chomp after another.

“Oookay…” Homer said slowly, his eyes huge. “I don't always pick up on these things, but I think something might be bothering her.”

“Yeah, is everything alright Twilight?” Pinkie asked. By now Twilight was more than halfway through the box.

Twilight paused before she could bite off another head, looking from Homer to Pinkie and then down at the growing pile of headless cookie ponies. “...I take it this is concerning?”

Homer and Pinkie nodded in perfect sync.

“Sorry guys, I’m a little stressed at the moment. Or rather, Princess Celestia is stressed which in turn is making me stressed. Do you recall how when we first contacted her to let her know about Homer, Celestia was trying to raise money for a settlement of ponies who lost their crops to Parasprites?”

There was a long pause.

“Okay well, do you recall that I just told you that a second ago?” Twilight asked, arching an eyebrow.

Another simultaneous nod from man and pony.

“Eh, good enough. The thing is, every effort Celestia has made to temporarily increase taxes to cover the recovery has been gummed up by the nobility in Canterlot. They’re pulling every connection they have to slow trot the whole process and she’s running out of options.”

“Can’t she just say ‘do this or I’ll lock you up’?’ like, you know most rulers do?” Homer asked.

Twilight sighed. “Believe me, she’d love to but the problem is that would give them all the ammunition they’d ever need to paint her as a despot. Princess Celestia and Princess Luna have to toe the line between asserting their rule and forcing it, push too hard and they’ll lose the trust of the public.”

“So in other words, the pony who literally controls the sun is as deadlocked by politics as anybody else?”

“Pretty much yeah. And it drives her nuts to be so helpless to do more for her subjects. I’ve been writing back and forth with her about it and I can tell she’s really getting frustrated. And given that she’s been both a mentor and a sort of third parental figure most of my life, seeing her like that has me on edge too.”

“Of course, now that leaves me with a bunch of headless gingerbread ponies, and if I take these back to the castle I’m sure Spike would be just as concerned for my mental health as you two were.” Twilight said, looking down at the decapitated sweets with a grimace. “Uhm, Homer, would you be willing to polish these off if it’s not too much trouble?”

“Twilight I think we both know the answer to that question is yes.” Homer said as he took the box and, without any hesitation, began to stuff the cookies into his mouth. “Mmmm…incriminating evidence.”

As Pinkie Pie watched Homer eat, she glanced at Twilight, and then at the kitchen, and then back to Homer as the complex workings of her little pony mind suddenly lurched into action. The hamster in the wheel started running, the monkeys at the typewriters started typing, the drinking birds began to bob and all manner of things in her head went ‘click’ and ‘whirr’ and ‘glug-glug-glug’ before there was an audible ‘DING!’

Pinkie Pie’s eyes lit up as she gave a gasp. “THAT’S IT!” She squealed loud enough to startle Homer in the middle of gorging, causing him to start choking.

“What’s it Pinkie?” Twilight asked. Normally she might have noticed Homer clawing at the counter and beating his chest, but Pinkie Pie had a knack for drawing attention to herself.

“I know how to raise the money Princess Celestia needs!” Pinkie Pie said bouncing up and down so fast she was practically a blur while Homer collapsed in a spray of gingerbread crumbs.

“We just need to-oops, hang on one second.” Pinkie, finally noticing Homer was in distress, embraced him from behind and applied the pony version of the Heimlich Maneuver. Finally Homer spat out an enormous lump of partially chewed gingerbread in a manner not unlike a cat hocking up a hairball.

Homer coughed for a few seconds before he got a few good lungful's of air. “Thank you Pinkie, you were saying?” He wheezed.

“I think what we should do is host a big public event and use the money we raise from ponies paying to attend it to cover what Celestia wants to do.” Pinkie explained as she patted Homer’s back and handed him a glass of water. “That way she doesn’t have to raise taxes and the nobles won’t make a fuss about raising taxes because there won’t be any tax raises in the first place!”

Twilight seemed to mull it over. “You know, that could very well work, but exactly what kind of public event did you have in mind?”

“Only the biggest spectacle in the history of sugary snacks! Princess Celestia and Homer, head-to-head in a winner take all eating contest!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed, bouncing up and down in excitement.

Twilight blinked. “...You want one of the rulers of our nation to sit down across from Homer and, in full view of potentially hundreds if not thousands of ponies, stuff her face to see which of them can eat the most?”

“Absolutely!” Pinkie chirped.

Four years ago when she had just come to Ponyville, Twilight would have said it sounded insane. Now as an older and wiser pony...well it still sounded insane, but Twilight had long learned sometimes good things could come from the craziness of this town.

Twilight mulled this over before she sighed. “Oh what the Hell, at this point I’m pretty sure Celestia would be willing to watch paint dry if it meant she could help those ponies out.” There was a pause as Twilight and Pinkie shared a look before both ponies broke into a sudden bit of giggling.

“Uh, am I missing something?” Homer asked, looking a little confused.

“Just a little inside joke.” Twilight said waving a hoof him. "I suppose there's no harm in contacting Princess Celestia and running the idea by her."

It didn't take long to make the trek back to Twilight's castle to find Spike, and only slightly longer to convince him it was worth cutting his nap short for a quick letter with a bribe of a few jewels.

"Well it's definitely a crazy idea, but as the old cliche goes, it just might be crazy enough to work." Spike admitted as he sent the letter on it's way to Celestia with a burst of emerald flame. "Ponies around here are definitely curious about Homer, and I bet they'd be just as eager to see him even in a big place like Canterlot. Put him in the same spotlight as the princess and you guys might have a real shot of raising the money she needs."

"And, though I hesitate to admit it, even the nobility would probably pay to attend. Major sporting events can be a prime place for the upper class to make some serious wagers, so they would have no reason to complain, and every reason to support it themselves." Twilight said, slowly warming up to the idea herself.

"Oooh this is so exciting!" Pinkie Pie said seeming to be even more hard pressed to stay still than usual, zipping all over the place with eager little giggles. "Do you think Princess Celestia will agree?"

While they had been speaking, Homer had been looking out the window at the view of Ponyville when he saw something off in the distance, coming from the direction of Canterlot. He squinted a bit, holding up a hand to shield his eyes. "Hey guys, how big do the pigeons get around here?"

"I dunno, not that much bigger than any of the other birds we have around here," Twilight said, her curiosity spurring her to trot over and look out the window in the same direction as Homer. "Why what's...oh buck me that's not a pigeon EVERYBODY DOWN!"

Homer and Twilight ducked, Pinkie Pie and Spike following suit as a large white blur flew through the window, bounced and turned into a tumbling sprawl of wings and hooves as one of the highest authorities in Equestria went ass over tea kettle into a bookshelf with a crash.

Scattered pages filled the air like drifting snowflakes as Twilight approached a pile of books and papers out of which a familiar tail with billowing rainbow hues stuck out from under. "I take it you wanted to discuss our proposal your highness?" She asked with a deadpan tone.

"Very much so, yes." Came the muffled voice of Princess Celestia from underneath the pile.

Author's Note

To quote Mushu from Mulan (the original animated film thank you very much) I LIIIIIIIVE!

It has struck me that with the world as strange as it is these days, it is more important than ever to provide smiles and laughter whenever possible. So in spite of my atrociously poor ability to commit to regular updates here is proof positive that neither I, nor this story, is dead!

I debated having a few more one on one chapters between Homer and the girls (which will still happen, including one I have planned for him and Spike) but I figured it might not be a bad time to start the next 'arc' of the story where Homer starts to participate more actively in the happenings in Ponyville. I can only apologize for the fact it's been over a YEAR since my last update, as I am often a victim of starting to write, and then trying to convince myself I shouldn't go back and redo it until it's just write.

But as a friend of mine was kind enough to point out 'Don't let perfect get in the way of good enough.' Advice I gladly pass on to you, dear reader along with hopefully the pleasant surprise of an update!