Just like the previous times I had gone through portals to other worlds, the feeling reminded me of a long train ride, seeing worlds and beings swish by while only being able to give them the briefest glance, only much more and condensed to the blink of an eye.
I shot out of the Sam & Max-esque experience, gripping the mattress hard in my arms as I found myself running to keep from falling over.
I stepped in something that caught my foot, and I lost my balance, coming down with a dull thud as the mattress hit the ground with me on top of it.
Looking back at what I had stepped in, I saw my foot inside a backpack.
There were many other things to consider, like my body, the clothes on it, the red and yellow haired human currently looking at me with a surprised expression and wide stance, but I had enough presence of mind to notice the rippling in the stone statue I had come out of. I launched myself off of the mattress, and slid it across the ground in front of the figure stepping out of the portal.
“Whoa!” Armor shouted, not able to take two steps before landing face-first on top of the mattress.
I breathed out a sigh of relief, finally having the opportunity to inspect myself and my surroundings.
I was dressed in a skirt, boots, and a cotton jacket over my own, somewhat more femininely shaped t-shirt. It was all very colorful, and kinda glittery.
“What am I wearing?” I said to myself, noting that my right arm and leg were very clearly and obviously metallic.
“You kept your mane at least,” Armor said, dressed in cargo pants, thick shoes, and a denim jacket over a white t-shirt. He put his hands on his hair. “How is mine?”
“Same,” I said, and turned to the much better dressed human who was slightly relaxing her posture.
When I finally got a chance to get a proper look at her, I was actually stunned for a moment. She had hair both blonde and red like the setting sun. and a tough looking leather jacket over her purple skirt and dress. She looked amazing.
“Uh, hey, are you okay?” she asked, in a raspy voice.
“We’re, uh… we’re fine,” I said, and extracted my foot from the backpack. ‘... Un… canny.’ “Is this yours? Sorry.”
“It’s fine,” she said. “I happen to know that your shoes are squeaky clean when coming from Equestria, so I’m not worried about you dragging filth into it.”
“Oh,” I said, catching on. “You must be Sunset Shimmer then.”
“That’s me, and you two must be Gabe and Armor. Twilight told me about you.”
“Likewise,” I said, lifting myself up and dusting my skirt off, confirming that I was the same level of physical maturity here as I was in Equestria. “Good thing, too. I was trying to think of a way to say that what you saw was not supernatural in any way.”
“No, don’t worry, I know about it, and the people at this school are getting pretty used to it as well,” Sunset said, and extended her hand.
I had the presence of mind to grasp it gently, lest I crush it before I got familiar with my metallic hand’s strength. Sunset gasped slightly as she touched the cold surface, but rallied admirably, and shook my hand properly.
I gently let go of her, and walked to Armor, who had raised himself onto his knees, and helped him up.
“Nice to meet you,” Sunset said, and extended her hand again, helping the slightly confused former stallion to grasp her hand with his unfamiliar appendage.
“Uhm, nice to meet you too,” Armor said, looking uncomfortable at his feet and holding onto me for balance.
“I know, you’re standing on your pastern,” Sunset said, sympathetically. “You’ll get used to it, don’t worry.”
Armor took a few experimental steps in place, and slowly nodded, before turning to me. “Thanks. Nice thinking by the way,” he said, as I picked up the mattress and tossed it back into the portal.
“Yeah, call it intuition,” I said, and took in my surroundings. We were standing in front of a U-shaped (or perhaps horseshoe-shaped?) building, on a sunny day. It was clear that this was the school that Sunset was attending. We were alone out in front of the building however, being the weekend and all. “Anyway, Sunset Shimmer, meet Sir Studded Armor, officer of the Equestrian Royal Guard and stallion of action extraordinaire.”
Armor gestured at me, and almost lost his balance as he did so, but I was there to help. “And this is Craftmaster Gabrielle Eleanor Desrochers, duchess of Ponyville and the vanquisher of nightmares, as well as a skilled bard, skald, troubadour, an–” he was interrupted by me shaking my head at that last one “– Oh, right, not troubadour, uhm, minstrel.”
I nodded, much more pleased with that.
“And uh… I’m Sunset Shimmer,” Sunset said.
“Grand arcanist of Canterlot university, I believe,” I noted.
Sunset looked a bit taken aback at that, before smiling a bit melancholically. “I… guess so, yes,” she said, before smiling politely at us. “So, Twilight told me you were here to investigate all the magical stuff that’s been going on around here.”
“Yep, we are,” I said.
“Uuuh, well, you two are the magi,” Armor interjected. “I’m a boot knight.”
“Those are important,” I said, with conviction, before turning back to Sunset. “Anyway, if you’re friends with Twilight, you’re friends with us.”
Sunset Shimmer looked taken aback again, before smiling. “Oh, well, uh, likewise,” she said, before rallying. “So do you guys need any place to stay?”
“In a sense,” I said. “A safe house would be nice, but we won’t be taking up a lot of space.”
“What do you mean?”
I retrieved the bag from inside my jacket, and held it up to Sunset. “Peek inside here.”
Sunset did so, and gasped. “Is this…? Wow! I’ve heard stories, but I never thought I’d see one for myself. Do you have a whole laboratory in here?” she asked, her voice stopped being muffled as she removed her head.
“The whole thing,” I said. “So somewhere to keep this would be great.”
“Don’t worry, I’d be happy to have you in my apartment,” Sunset said.
“Great. Hmmm…” I said, looking down at my right arm and leg. “I should get something to cover this up. Might draw a lot of attention if I don’t.”
“Take this… jacket, I guess,” Armor said, and started trying to extract himself from it, but ended up mostly stumbling around while needing me to steady him.
“Thanks, but let me,” I said, and held him still as I lifted it off from him, before throwing it over myself. “Still doesn’t cover everything though.”
“We should get moving then,” Sunset said. “Don’t worry, I know how to get from here to my apartment–” she hesitated for a moment, then continued a bit reluctantly “– without being seen.”
“A little short of an introduction, but we appreciate it,” I said, and followed Sunset, although I kept supporting Armor as he still struggled to walk on two legs.
Sunset looked questioningly at Armor, but he just smiled placatingly at her, and she led the way as Armor and I followed.
We started moving through alleys and parking lots, crossing parks while staying mostly hidden behind hedges and bushes.
It was a normal, sunny day on the weekend, but I honestly couldn’t tell if there was just hardly anyone outside, of if Sunset was just this good at travelling discreetly.
“She’s pretty,” I said in a low voice to Armor.
He looked at me, and opened his mouth, before closing it again.
“Okay that wasn’t a trap,” I said. “You’re allowed to agree with me.”
Armor stayed silent for a while, looking up at the sky while thinking. “I guess the princess’ personal students often are. I think I see it, and she has a very lovely mane, but so do you. Is she pretty for a human?”
“Yes,” I said, not really knowing what else to say.
“It’s okay to look at other mares, Gabe,” he assured me in comforting tone, but with a smirk on his face.
“I…” was all I managed to say, before using the hand I was steadying him with it to spank him on the butt.
“Ow! Ah, oh, okay, not that hoof,” he said, still smiling, before continuing to look around. “Are these things the ‘automobiles’?”
Sunset had glanced back at us when the conversation had reached normal speaking volume. “Yeah,” she said. “Be very careful where you walk out on the street. It’s a bit like a big city in Equestria, only it’s against the law to just waltz out in front of the cars.”
“I suppose you don’t need to worry about the one without anypony behind the, uh… helm?”
“Steering wheel. No,” I said. “We’re going to have to teach you about traffic signals as well.”
“Oh that’s right,” Sunset said. “Twilight said you were a human too, before. Does this world look like your world?”
“Compared to Equestria, very,” I said, looking around at what little I could see of the city scape from where we were. “There are some differences though, other skin colors, some strange fashions, and names just like in Equestria. Oh, and magic of course.”
“Yeah, the reason you’re here,” Sunset said, wincing slightly but trying to hide it. “Ah, this is my place, right up ahead.”
We weren’t in the most fabulous neighborhood, one might say. It didn’t look like a dystopian inner city slum full of splatterpunks like an 80’s movie. However, let’s just say that if you took a look in the basements and at the backyards, it looked like you could find some bangin’ sets for one.
I kept a frown from my face as I looked at the shabby townhouse. I liked to think I wasn’t delicate, but I didn’t appreciate vermin in my bed or on my food. Still, we’d have our housebag with us, and I figured if it was as bad on the inside as the outside, perhaps Sunset would like to use it as well.
Armor had started walking on his own now, and we followed Sunset up the steps to her apartment. My fears were very much assuaged as she opened the door and revealing the interior.
It was a cheaply but cozily furnitured studio apartment, walled off from the rest of the house when it had been turned into apartments for rental no doubt. It didn’t have a lot of different rooms however, besides a bathroom it was just one large room with alcoves and open kitchen, making it similar to both my housebag and my Canterlot castle apartment in that respect.
“Welcome. Make yourselves at home,” Sunset said, inviting us in and kicking off her shoes, with us following her example, though I had to help Armor with his.
Unlike my other places, especially my castle room, it wasn’t luxuriously decorated, but Sunset had managed to make it feel remarkably cozy with cheap, second-hand, and I suspected, often pilfered stuff. Mismatched chairs sat around a table with old commercial catalogues under a table to keep it steady, an old couch had the holes in it covered up by blankets and pillows, and some christmas lights hung from an alcove, helping to illuminate the apartment in the evening sun.
“Thanks,” I said, taking in the apartment. “Nice place.”
“Yes indeed, thank you,” Armor said.
“Thanks, I know it’s not much, but its home,” Sunset said, as I removed Armor’s jacket.
“It’s plenty,” I assured her.
“So, do you want me to describe all that’s been happening, if that helps you solve anything?” Sunset asked, and walked over to the table to sit down, with us joining her.
“We would, but first things first,” I said, and poked my head into the bag, retrieving another, smaller bag, as well as a large package wrapped in cloth.
“First, a little something for your trouble,” I said, and handed Sunset the bag of gold.
Sunset gasped when she opened it. “I… I can’t accept this… I…”
“I was going to pay you myself, but Celestia insisted that she does it,” I said. “She said it was from the intelligence agency’s funds, but I think that was just to help you accept it.”
Sunset looked down at the coins again, then nodded with a melancholic smile on her face.
“And then something you’re probably not gonna say no to. Let’s try this on,” I said, as I handed Armor the package before diving back down into the bag again.
Armor took the package, and I realized I should have given more thorough instructions on the subtleties of human interactions, as he undressed his upper body in front of Sunset, who suddenly blushed at the sight of the large, toned muscles. I pretended not to notice as I came up with another cloth package.
Armor unwrapped the cloth I had given him, and Sunset’s attention was drawn from his chest to the contents: A pair of shining, metallic wings.
He turned the rings by the base of the wings, and reached over his head with them to place them on his back.
Immediately, they stuck to his skin, and Armor grinned as they came alive, and spread out fully, giving him a wingspan larger than he was tall.
He gave a few lazy, experimental flaps with them, but not enough to blow every loose object in Sunset’s apartment down to the floor.
“Works perfectly, as expected,” he said, and gave me a warm smile.
I waved the compliment away in an overdone gesture, and looked thoroughly pleased with myself, until I saw Sunset staring wide-eyed at Armor, mouth agape and blush even deeper.
“Gabe is the one who made her own legs,” Armor said, finally blushing a little himself. “That’s what she does.”
“Which brings us to the next thing I have for you,” I said, and used my prosthetic horn inside my arm to unwrap the small package, revealing a hair clip with a perfectly cut ruby in it.
Sunset’s eyes widened at the sight of the magic, stuttering while trying to find words. “Wha- ha-ho-oouw… that was unicorn magic,” she stated, not believing her own words.
“Sure was,” I said, and lifted the lens with the painted pupil on it from my prosthetic eye to get a better look on Sunset’s magical aura. “And with just a little bit of tweaking… there.”
I magically placed the hairpin in Sunset’s hair, and at first I was afraid I had done a terrible mistake when she gently placed her hand on it, and whispered “... I can feel it,” before she slumped forward.
“Whoa!” Armor said, and caught her head just before it slammed into the table. He gave me a worried look, while I just looked sheepish.
“I think… she liked it,” Armor said.
“Let’s uuuh… let’s put her on the couch and I’ll try and cook something up for her,” I said, and levitated her into Armor’s arms.
—
“We lost them!” the cloudy blue woman said, her shoulders sagging. She was dressed in the most ‘street’ clothes she could think of, which was a pair of sunglasses and a necklace of thick wooden beads over her suit and tie.
“You can only lose a target that’s worth following,” the reddish man, dressed in a jersey and jeans, countered.
“But that’s them,” the woman insisted, looking around as she walked next to the man down the street, openly peering down alleys and glancing through binoculars.
“How do you know? In fact, ‘them’ what?” the man said, lazily spying down sideroads while keeping his hands in his pockets. “How are they important?”
“That girl, Sunset Shimmer, she’s important,” the woman insisted. “If you had done any research on your own, you’d know that.”
“Well, humor me,” the man said, and considered the agitated woman’s expression. “Look, this is a mystery, right? See it as cataloguing all the known facts about the case.”
The woman got the most serious look on her face, only remembering to spy around her on occasion, as she conveyed her known facts about the situation to the man beside her.
“Alright, so, at Canterlot High, there’s this bully, this serious bully, scary intelligent and dedicated monster who manipulates and steals and shakes down her fellow students. Looks like some instances of violence too. Like, this is movie-level high school drama, high stakes stuff.”
“How do you know she’s intelligent?” the man asked.
“I saw her grades,” the woman said.
“A known bully, manipulator, and probably cheat, has high grades, and you assume she’s academically capable?”
“We can smell our own,” the woman said, with a pouty face.
“... Fair enough,” the man relented. “Go on, tv villain at a high school.”
“Yeah, physically strong, good with computers, the whole thing. Suddenly, a young woman appears out of nowhere at school, and some refers to her as ‘princess’. A few days later, the explosions happen. A prom, explosions, but no one is injured, reports of strange lights and noises, and suddenly the second young woman is gone, Sunset Shimmer’s internet activities drastically changes, her demeanor does as well, and the reported incidents from the school drops to near zero… until another strange incident involving three young women, very young-looking women considering the numbers on their flimsy birth certificates. Again, reports of strange sightings and lights.”
The man considered this for a moment, his eyebrows doing a little dance as he did. “That does sound like an interesting series of events, but how does that mean that they’re alien or supernatural?”
“Disturbances and strange sightings at the prom?”
The man’s eyebrows climbed again. “Do you even remember high school?”
“The ‘monsters in the sky’ at the concert after that?”
“My nephew is doing workplace experience week at a place where they have that sort of equipment for rental. Just need some smoke from a smoke machine to project it onto.”
“Alright, I’m gonna show you the papers on Sunset Shimmer. Someone is pulling strings to get her into the system, and I’m pretty sure it’s the principal at Canterlot High,” the woman insisted. “She came from somewhere and I don’t know where.”
“We know where she’s going though,” the man said, lazily pointing to where the red-haired woman had stepped out of an alley in the distance, followed by a young man and a girl with a very poofy hairdo leaning against each other.
The woman gasped, and dove behind a garbage can, while the man stood next to her, looking a little awkward at being near her.
The woman brought up her binoculars. “Hey! Look at the girl’s leg, and her hand,” she hissed.
Reluctantly, the man brought up his own binoculars and did so. A frown slowly formed on his face as he did.
“Weird huh?” the woman asked.
“... Yeah… could be a costume… or something,” he cautiously ventured.
“Do you really believe that?”
The man just stood in silence for a moment.
“Alright, let’s not lose them again. Are you armed?” the woman asked, clearly distracted, her gaze fixed on the trio.
“Wha- yes I’m armed!” the man hissed angrily at the woman.
“Badge?”
“Yes!”
“Radio?”
“Moulder,” the man said, testily.
“Great. I’ll follow them, you go get the car so we can set up surveillance wherever they’re going.”
The man opened his mouth to question his partner, but just nodded in resignation, and brought up his portable gaming device to quickly check the battery.
He sighed in relief when he saw the number, and turned around to walk back down the street.
“Right. Oh by the way, Scullion, blueberry muffins and coffee please.”
“Right. Be back soon.”
—
“Alright, look at these people,” I said, gesturing at the tv as I sat on a chair on the opposite side of the couch from where Armor was sitting. “Do not imitate the way they act and behave, act like yourself, just try and get a feel for what clothes go with which.”
“This is a dramatization, right?” Armor asked. “Like a play?”
“Yes, and a bad one. It’s cheap daytime tv, which is why it’s not a great case study on how you should dress in detail either, but notice how everyone has something on their legs at all times, and only the women wear skirts.”
“Only mares wear skirts in Equestria as well, Gabe,” Armor pointed out.
“Sure, but notice how they’re almost always wearing things on their upper bodies as well, and that the female always covers up their mammaries. Males can go topless if it’s an appropriate situation, same goes for females but their amount of appropriate situations are a lot more rare.”
“So males without anything on their upper half and females wearing those mammary holders are on the same level of appropriateness?” Armor asked.
“Uhm, kinda… I think,” I said, trying to remember my own knowledge on the subject. “I need to familiarize myself on this world’s specifics when it comes to this. Also, don’t touch them, at least not in public and certainly not uninvited.”
“Is that… inappropriate?”
“Very.”
“But what if I get into a fight?”
“Uuuuh…” I started. “Good question...”
I was saved from having to answer from Sunset moaning and stirring on the couch.
We looked away from the tv with the low volume, and focused on our host.
“Hey, are you okay?” Armor asked.
Sunset sat up, and her hand immediately shot to where her hair clip had been.
“I got it, I got it!” I said, and held it up in front of her.
Sunset’s hand almost lunged towards it before she stopped herself and looked me in the eye with a worried expression.
She gingerly took it, and held it to her chest as she let out a sigh.
“Thank you so much,” she said.
“Hey, don’t worry about it. I made you some tea by the way, and some vegetable soup,” I said, poking my head into the bag. “We also have some soft drinks if you want any, and I can make you a sandwich or–”
“Thanks,” Sunset said, cutting me off. “Thank you, I’d… I’d love some, but I just need to get my bearings.”
“Do you need a hug?” Armor asked. “You kinda look like you do.”
“Uhm… maybe,” Sunset said, blushing a little.
Armor rose up and sat down next to Sunset, and gestured for me to join them.
I sat down on her side opposite Sunset, and magically lifted Armor’s arm around Sunset, showing him how humans sat in this situation.
Sunset took a few calming breaths as she sagged, shoulder first, into Armor’s chest, and put her arm around me. After a while, she wiped a tear from her face.
“Hey, I hope we didn’t upset you,” I said.
“Huh?” she asked.
“I mean, just coming into your home and giving you your magic back. I guess it can be a little disorienting to have that happen in front of two strangers, so I hope we didn’t upset you.”
“This is a first,” Armor noted, with a wry smile, in a low voice.
“Shush.”
“It’s… no, it’s okay,” Sunset said, and sniffled a little. “Besides, like you said, a friend of Twilight’s is a friend of yours, and the same goes for me.”
“You don’t even care about my feelings!” someone on the tv yelled, intruding on the moment.
I smiled, and pointed my arm at the remote, floating up in front of Sunset, far enough away that she couldn’t reach it.
She smiled a little at the challenge, placed the hairpin above her ear, and concentrated.
After a little flickering, the remote was enveloped in a strong and steady red glow, and Sunset turned the tv off, before setting down the remote, which she wouldn’t need anymore.
We smiled encouragingly at her little triumph, and disengaged, to just sit normally next to her.
“So you made these?” Sunset asked, holding her pin in her hands, and gesturing at my metallic limbs.
“Yep.”
“And… if I remember correctly, you’re actually an adult.”
“Well, where I come from, we grow up much faster than ponies and humans on this world, so yeah. Less mature body than I had before.”
“But you’re a pony?” Sunset asked, turning to Armor. “I mean, originally.”
“Yep. I’ve tried figuring out if Gabe and I are of different generations, but it makes my head hurt.”
“Can I see?” Sunset asked, motioning to my arm.
“Sure,” I said, and realized something just as I was about to present the limb. “Hmm, hold on.”
Obviously, I had a hole in the palm of my metallic hand which opened up into my hollow forearm, just like how I didn’t have a frog as a pony, but I hadn’t checked out my foot yet.
I removed my sort of superfluous sock, and turned the knee around one hundred and eighty degrees to take a look at the sole.
I had a calcaneus, but in front of that was another hole leading into a hollow in my leg.
“Huh. Maybe I should punch a hole in my shoe so I don’t blow it up if I use my stun gun,” I said, before turning the leg back into place, and shutting my arm off and handing it to a wide-eyed Sunset.
“Also,” I said, turning to Armor. “We should see if we can hide your wings under your clothes. Maybe make holes for them in your shirt and cover them with your jacket.”
“My friend, Rarity, can help with that,” Sunset said, turning my limb around in front of her. “Don’t worry, she knows all about the magic.”
I was silent for a while, before nodding with a sheepish look on my face. “Of course she does,” I said, rose up, and tried reaching for my bag. Tried. “Oh, right.”
Sunset handed me my arm back, and after trying to finagle it into the arm of my shirt, I just pointed it with my other arm towards the bag and floated out a whiteboard from our apartment.
“Alright,” I said, walking up in front of it. “Let’s find out everything we can about everything magical that’s been happening here, and see if there’s anything bad behind it.”
Author's Note
Gabe and Armor arrives at the human world that Sunset has been staying in. Takes place at a for now unspecified point in time, though later than the first chapter of the other sequel story.
Thanks for RP422 and ROBCakeran53 for their help.
