“One episode left before the big one, girls!” Lyra triumphantly raised her glass and her tablemates, the three fellow members of the Extras Club, did the same.
“Nine whole seasons of making crowds more crowd-ish,” Screwball marveled, tossing a shot glass of seltzer into her muzzle and swallowing. “Croup-breaking work, yes sir. Enough to make stress squiggles appear in front of my exhausted little look-holes.”
Blossomforth rolled her eyes. “Says the pony who appeared on screen exactly one time,” she razzed.
Moments later, Blossom’s face was sprayed with seltzer and Screwball was clad in a pinstripe suit to accent her vaudevillian spit take.
“I’ll have you know,” Screwball huffed as she stroked her comically large false mustache, “That I actually appeared twice during the show’s lifespan. After prepping super hard both times. I ain’t no one trick pony.”
Blossomforth harrumphed, but didn’t bother wiping her face. Everyone present knew the seltzer would be gone in a few seconds, along with Screwball’s gaudy costume. Screwball often employed continuity errors to clean up her sight gags. Not a very creative technique, but if it was good enough for her father, it was good enough for her.
“Chill, girls,” suggested Vinyl Scratch. “Let’s not argue over who pulled the most or least weight throughout the s-s-s-show’s run. We all did our parts. ’Sides, Lyra s-s-still has one more background bit she’ll be d-d-doing in next week’s episode.”
“For real?” Blossomforth did a quick mental check. “You were also a one-scene character in the pilot, right Chief? And now you’re gonna be in the last episode before the finale?”
“That’s some bush league bookending for your career, Ly!” Screwball exclaimed. She pulled her shot glass apart seamlessly and held each half up with a flourish. “Beginning and end, perfectly mirrored. With everything in between a cool, refreshing center.” The two halves snapped together like magnets, inexplicably full of seltzer once more. Screwball tossed this serving back as well.
“So, is it a speaking part?” Blossomforth asked casually. She was always interested in speaking parts, never having netted one of her own.
Lyra ran a hoof through her mane apprehensively. “No, no lines this time. Just a classic, silent pose in the midground of a scene. Pretty much as routine as it gets.”
“Always s-s-so modest,” said Vinyl. “Go on, Ly, Tell ‘em what you told me. What makes this one s-s-special?”
Blossomforth and Screwball regarded Lyra with shared excitement. Neither of the two junior Extras had made an onscreen appearance in ages. Living vicariously through their club leader was how they got their kicks nowadays.
“I, ah, well…” For all her years of experience, Lyra still didn’t do well when put on the spot. “I’m gonna be down on one knee proposing to Bon Bon.” She smiled, but only Vinyl Scratch detected the bitterness hidden beneath. Blossomforth laughed and clapped Lyra on the back while Screwball sqee’d, grabbed her friend’s hoof and pumped it up and down.
“What a great bit to go out on!” Screwball gushed. “It’s like a… a whaddya call it.”
“The end of a character arc,” Blossomforth finished for her. “Closure for nine years of ship teasing. Must feel good, Chief.”
“It does,” Lyra admitted. “And I think it’ll make a lot of watchers go absolutely nuts. I just feel kind of guilty about it.”
Behind her sunglasses, Vinyl Scratch’s eyes darted between Screwball and Blossomforth. Vinyl herself had already tried and failed to give Lyra a pep talk before they’d all met at the bar, but maybe the other two could succeed where she hadn’t. Blossom and Screwball were each well-spoken in their own ways, after all. Vinyl meanwhile had to randomly fight to get her malfunctioning mouth to form certain sounds.
“You feel guilty?” Screwball inquired, cocking her head at an impossible angle. “Guilt is for characters who cook up and eat their comedic foil’s expensive imported oats that they were saving for a special occasion.”
The other three waited patiently for the inevitable punchline.
“And the showrunners made you get over doing that years back.”
“So what’s the real trouble, Chief?” Blossomforth asked directly.
Lyra was reticent. “Girls…” She said, then looked over her ragtag friends wistfully, taking in what she saw.
A lackadaisical Earth Pony with heliotropic eyes.
A bluntly-spoken Pegasus with a mane that looked like a computer printer’s highest intensity color test.
And a serene, sunglassed Unicorn whose voice and music both had a trademark stutter.
Like chalk, cheese, and chicken feathers, nothing about any of them had any obvious similarities. The only thing they shared was membership of the Extras Club, a loose sorority Lyra had founded half a lifetime ago to meet and mingle with ensemble ponies like herself.
Only she hadn’t been feeling much like an ensemble pony nowadays.
“Girls,” she repeated, “Am I still an Extra? I mean, in the technical sense?”
“Technical sense?” (Blossomforth again). “How can you not be? You’re tied with freaking Derpy for Most Popular Filler Character.”
“It’s just… I don’t think filler characters are supposed to have arcs or payoffs. I started worrying about this back when Bon Bon and I were given two rapport scenes in Episode 100, because afterwards, things picked up so quickly. I got mentioned by name in an episode I wasn’t in, then featured in a photo as one of Twilight’s ‘Canterlot friends.’ Now with them having me propose to Bon Bon next week, I don’t…” Lyra took a swig from her whiskey glass apprehensively. “Have I gone from Extra to full-on Minor Character?”
Screwball manifested a newspaper bearing Lyra’s face, then fanned herself with it dismissively. “Well what if you have? Octy and Doc Whooves jumped that shark a few episodes back, no problem. The viewers love them.”
“Except,” Blossomforth realized aloud, “neither of those two are the founding member of a social club dedicated to us Extras hanging out together.”
The newspaper went up in smoke and Screwball’s already fishy expression became even more bug-eyed than usual. “Oh wow. Is that what it is? You worried your metaphorical britches are too small?”
“The phrase is ‘getting too big for my britches,’ Screwy, and the answer is… it's complicated. I love doing bits with Bon Bon. I really do. She and I are tighter than bolts on a Sweetie Bot, but…” Lyra reached out and laid a forehoof on Blossom and Screwball’s respective shoulders. “I don’t want my bit next week to make me lose touch with where I came from.”
“Come off it, Chief,” Blossomforth assured her. “Onscreen life doesn’t have to affect offscreen life. It’s not like you’re gonna quit the club or anything, right?” A hint of nervousness crept across Blossomforth’s face. “Right?”
“Wha-? No! I’d never do that. Extras for life. It’s just...” Lyra inhaled sharply before speaking her mind. “It’s just that I don’t feel completely happy getting a conclusion while the rest of you never made it.”
A mixed silence presided over the table. Lyra was staring into her half-empty whiskey glass, reflecting on her career. Blossomforth was looking away, chewing on Lyra’s confession. Screwball remained unreadable as ever. And Vinyl Scratch was still acting as an observer, waiting to see who’d step up to the mic Lyra had just yielded. It ended up being Blossomforth, but only after she’d downed her entire gin and juice for courage.
“Does anyone remember back in Episode 75 when I almost had a speaking role?” she asked.
“Yeah,” Lyra said cautiously. “ It was supposed to be you on the air sprinters team with Thunderlane, but they swapped you with… Helia during production.”
“Mm-hm. My name even had Helia’s voice actress listed in the credits, that’s how last minute the change was. And the reason it was so last minute is…” she swallowed. “Because the ‘last minute’ is when I chickened out.”
The surprise at the table was palpable. Even the normally quiet Vinyl Scratch chuffed audibly. It was Lyra who recovered first, though.
“Chickened out? But I thought-“
“That a speaking role is a lifelong dream of mine? It is. Has been since before I even joined the Extras Club. But at the time, right before I was set to be in the episode where I would get my voice heard... I thought of all of you. Of all the good times we shared between seasons. Between episodes. Shoot, even between takes. And in a moment of weakness, I thought if I spoke onscreen it meant I’d be outta the club.”
“Gosh-diddly-damn,” Screwball breathed, uncharacteristically morose. “It didn’t have to be a Pick One, Ditch The Other deal, Bloss. Can’t turn your back on your friends if they’re standing all around you on all sides.”
“Heh, I know that. I’d have to be three feet thick to not know that. But for one crucial moment, that’s what I was: too thick to see the big picture. It would’ve felt amazing to be heard. To own the airwaves, even if it was only to speak a single line. But I backed out because of some asinine belief it would have to affect my offscreen life. Lyra, you know how you said us Extras aren’t supposed to have arcs? Sorry, but I gotta call manure on that. Episode 75 was the conclusion to my arc. Not my character’s arc, mine. It was when I made my biggest mistake and learned from it. Don’t do what I did and drop the buckball at the finish line. You go onscreen next week and strike the best proposal stance you can, without letting any lame thoughts about the rest of us keeping you from doing it. We joined this club because we’re Extras. But we stayed because we’re friends, Chief.”
Her monologue done, Blossomforth raised her glass to her lips, only to remember she’d drained it dry before she’d started speaking.
“Uh… hey Screwy? Wanna top me off over here?”
“Boundless cosmic chaotic power,” Screwball whined facetiously, “and you use me as a walking beer keg.”
“Ew, no. Not any beer, please. Just more gin and grapefruit juice. With some lime pulp too, unless that cocktail is too complicated for your cartoon conjuring to handle, of course.”
“Too complicated?! I swear, if I wasn’t a merciful demigod, you’d be so humiliated right now.”
“Yeah. You get your niceness from your nonexistent mother, I’m sure.” Blossomforth jingled the ice cubes in her glass. “Still high and dry over here, in case you’ve forgotte-“
“Oh, to Tartarus with it.”
Blossomforth’s lips sealed and her cheeks bloated as Screwball conjured the requested drink ingredients directly into the pegasus’s mouth. Suddenly wearing a professional-looking mixologist’s uniform, Screwball gripped Blossomforth’s head like a cocktail shaker and gave it a few jostles up and down before stepping back. Blossomforth swallowed the result and doubled over the table, panting to get her breath back.
“Et voila,” Screwball declared in an atrociously fake Europony accent. “Ze lady’s thirst izt no more.” She glanced at Lyra, looking for approval for the gag.
“You two really can brighten anypony’s mood,” Lyra smiled warmly. “Whether it’s with life lessons or simple clowning. Or one after the other. You make a good double act.”
“It’s just the booze coloring the convo, Ly,” Blossomforth said between gasps. “We are all... very drunk right now.”
“Not me!” Screwball screeched rapturously. “Unlike you featherweights, I have the liver of a horse.”
“S-sure, and the voice of the s-s-s-sweetest sounding s-siren,” Vinyl added, rubbing her sensitive ears.
“Eas-s-s-sy for y-y-you to s-s-say,” Screwball retorted. “Where do you get off wearing sunglasses indoors anyhow?”
“It’s so I can s-s-secretly nod off when your jokes go on for too long.”
Laughter was shared around the table. The pure, hearty kind of laughter between friends who were comfortable poking crass fun at each other’s successes and failures.
Kind words coexisted with sharp ones in the Extras Club, just like the bitter bite of alcohol shared space with the sweet syrup of fruit juice in the drinks they clinked together and tossed back in unison. The upcoming finale and the ensuing week afterwards would be one long victory lap for the Mane 6 and their ilk, but tonight wasn’t part of such loftiness.
This particular night belonged to the workhorses.
It was the ever-watchful Vinyl Scratch who first noticed an unknown pony trotting tentatively towards them all from across the room. One by one, the others clued in and followed her gaze until all four were quiet and expectant by the time the stranger halted next to their table. The newcomer was an average-looking Earth Pony, or at least average by Equestria’s standards. Vinyl Scratch noted she had her shoulders drawn up in an involuntary defensive posture, despite clearly trying to be brave.
“Wanna sit with us, sulky stranger mare?” Screwball asked. “Always extra room for an extra Extra in a club already full of ‘em!”
The newcomer nodded mutely and obliged, sidling up between Lyra and Blossomforth. She wasn’t looking anypony in the eye.
“You sound like Vinyl before she got comfortable opening her mouth around us,” Blossomforth slurred. “Which means you don’t sound like anything at all.”
“Okay, put a bridle on it,” Lyra scolded.
Blossomforth complied by downing the rest of her drink and laying her now very heavy head down on the table.
“Sorry,” Lyra said to the newcomer. “Bloss is five... well, now six mixed drinks in at this point. We’ve been spending the evening celebrating our successes on the show.”
“Mm-hm. I know.” the newcomer said. Her voice was breathy, yet small-sounding. Like a flute. “This is the Extras Club. And you’re Lyra Heartstrings, the leader who sits weird.”
Lyra smirked. It was true she was the only one present not perched on their stool like a normal pony. Instead, her back hooves were flat on the floor while her front ones lay folded over each other on the table. Biped posture was what it was called. A quirk she’d picked up from associating with humans online.
“Oooh, she knows you.” Screwball giggled. “It appears we have a fan in our midst. In our presence. And to the fan who is present, I shall presently present...a present.”
The newcomer let out a slight “eek” as a napkin in front of her rippled and became a piece of wrapping paper patterned with Screwball’s Cutie Mark. The paper then folded into a cube with a bow on top. The newcomer eyed the bundle nervously.
“Screwy…” Lyra warned.
“Open it, beloved fan.” Screwball urged. “I may pack draconequus heat, but the stuff I conjure with it is cool for the whole family. Honest it is.”
“That’s very kind of you, but I came over for advice, not gift-”
“Open it!” Screwball chirped. “OpenitOpenitOpenitOpenitOpenit....”
“Screwball!” Lyra shouted.
The Spawn of Chaos scrunched her muzzle shut and looked submissively at her club leader.
“Take a break.” Lyra commanded.
Without another word, Screwball hopped off her seat and headed towards the bathroom. While her trotting appeared clownish and carefree, she was privately frazzled and grateful for the reprieve.
“So that’s Discord’s manic daughter,” the newcomer breathed after the bathroom door opened and shut. “She’s a lot more excited to make new friends than her old man is.”
“More excited than he is, yes.” Vinyl Scratch agreed. “B-b-but sadly much more over-b-b-bearing about it.”
“Don’t worry; she’ll be fine” Lyra promised. “Give Screwy some alone time to recharge her social battery, and she comes back calmer and way less in-your-face. Just don’t comment on it when she does. I’m sure she’s plenty embarrassed already.”
The newcomer looked down at where Screwball’s gift had been and saw it had returned to its previous state as an unfolded napkin. The newcomer wistfully wondered what would have been inside.
“Since it seems you already know me and Screwball,” Lyra continued. “I’m guessing the others don’t need to introduce themselves.”
Blossomforth, with her face was still laying against the table, made a grunting noise. It was supposed to be a greeting, but her sixth drink had apparently deactivated her speaking ability.
“Blossomforth the contortionist,” the newcomer said.
Blossomforth didn’t have the energy to pick her head up, but she did wave politely as she could in what she hoped was the newcomer’s direction.
“And you, you’re DJ P0N-3.”
Vinyl Scratch’s eyebrows rose up from behind her glasses in surprise. “B-b-been a long time since s-someone used my s-s-stage name,” she admitted. Maybe Screwball’s quip earlier had actually been an observation, not a joke: maybe this new pony was a fan of all of them.
“So who’re you?” Lyra asked genially.
“Oh my. We’re asking the hardest question straight out of the gate, huh?” The newcomer rubbed the back of her neck. “I um… I don’t actually have a name.” The admission radiated self-consciousness, which was a terrible emotion that Vinyl Scratch knew all too well.
“Maybe not a c-c-canon one,” Vinyl ventured, “But you know, none of us had canon names either-“
Another grunt from Blossomforth.
“None of us except B-B-Blossomforth had canon names either,” Vinyl Scratch amended. “Til we each did something endearing in the b-b-background, and those who s-s-saw us gave us names. Are you s-s-saying that hasn’t happened for you yet?”
The newcomer chuckled to herself. “Well, the truth is, I’ve never actually been onscreen.”
“Hold up,” Lyra said. “You’re not an OC, are you?”
The newcomer shook her head. “Uh-uh, I’m as real as you are. I’ve just haven’t ever been seen.”
Now that was an interesting enough claim to motivate Blossomforth to try lifting her head up to take a second look at this supposedly pre-release pony. After all, she herself didn’t originate from the show either, having once been exclusive to the toyline.
Sluggishly, Blossom contorted her neck, rolled her head sideways, and took in what she saw: A mane identical to Octavia Medley’s, though it was shades of blue instead of grey. A coat that was pink and featureless except for a Cutie Mark depicting two intertwined horseshoes. And eyes whose colors and lash design were copypasted from Pinkie Pie, albeit with less pep in them. Blossomforth groggily concluded that the pony might benefit from being even more bland, since a total lack of uniqueness would be kind of a unique quality all on its own. As she was though, she was as middle-of-the bell curve as it got. Not even noticeably average in her averageness. Energy spent, Blossomforth let her head thump back down on the table. Vinyl patted Blossom’s back sympathetically while Lyra tried to think of something to say to the nameless mare.
“You haven’t ever been seen? I don’t know how to respond to that. You know there’s only one episode left before the finale, right?”
The nameless mare nodded. “And I’m slated to appear in it.”
“You d-d-d-don’t sound excited about that,” Vinyl observed, still rubbing Blossomforth’s back.
“The truth is,” the nameless mare said, drawing her shoulders up even further, “I’m afraid of what will definitely happen after I finally put my face out there.”
Lyra leaned forward, propping her chin on a forehoof. Fallout from cameos was a topic she was very well-qualified to speak on. “And what is it you’re afraid will ‘definitely happen’ ?”
“Yeesh!” came Screwball’s call as she returned to the table. “Sorry I took a day n’ a year to come back. The soap shooting doohickey at the sink was busted, and I had to wait for somepony else to show up to fix it.”
Lyra was about to scold Screwball for interrupting, but Vinyl Scratch silenced her with a gentle nudge. The nameless mare had actually turned to face Screwball with a soft expression on her face.
“Why didn’t you just use your… um chaos powers on the dispenser to make it work again?” she asked, genuinely curious.
“No magic without an audience” came Screwball’s admission. “My dad conjured me to be his jester, and it’s baked into my bones like gingerbread that I need a watcher before I can make wackiness happen. Like I said, hadda wait for somepony else to show up ‘fore I fixed the soap thingy.”
“Oh?” Blossomforth’s voice was muffled and still not very articulate, but her highly efficient pegasus metabolism was working the alcohol out of her system very quickly. “Spill, girl; what'd you do to the dispenser, and who was the innocent witness?”
“Um…” Screwball tapped her lower lip thoughtfully. “Turned it into an elephant head that shot bubbles out of its trunk. And… a donkey foal with a yellow bow in her tail.”
Blossomforth shakily sat up. “For real? An elephant soap head?” She struggled to her hooves and began staggering off in the direction of the mare’s room. “That's amazing. This I gotta see!”
“Surely that thing disappeared after you left,” the nameless mare said to Screwball after Blossomforth was out of earshot.
“Undoubtedly,” Lyra confirmed from across the table. “But Bloss could use a good puke, so just as well that she goes to the bathroom right now.”
Vinyl nodded in agreement.
“Hey, I just realized we never swapped intros,” Screwball said, conjuring a business card and presenting it to the nameless mare. “I’m Screwball, Discord’s defective debutante daughter, and Executive Treasurer of the Extras Club.”
The nameless mare examined the card she’d been given. “This is a fifty percent off coupon for an order of donuts at Pony Joe’s,” she concluded.
“And I’ve been treasuring it, as my self-appointed job demands.” Screwball declared. “You can keep that, by the by. It’s expired.”
“This is a very thoughtful gift, Screwball. I’ll treat it well.”
Screwball watched in stunned surprise as the stranger folded the silly scrap of paper and tucked it behind her ear. Nopony, not even the other Extras, had ever responded so tenderly to one of Screwball’s off-the-cuff bits like this. It made her feel...good.
“Um…,” Screwball was off her game now. “So… what’s your title, new friend?”
“I’m unnamed.”
“Nice to meetcha, Unnamed. Enjoying chatting it up with the others? They’re nice ponies. Honest they are.”
“Mm-hm,” replied the newly christened Unnamed. She looked directly at Vinyl Scratch, remembering what the unicorn had said about being given a name after doing something endearing. “They really know their stuff.”
“What we don’t know though,” Lyra reminded everyone, “is how come you decided to sit down with us. You said you were looking for advice?”
“Oh. Yes.” Unnamed deflated noticeably having been reminded of the emotional baggage she needed help offloading. So far the Extras Club had been even more accommodating than she’d dared to hope, so it was at least worth a shot to ask about their experiences.
“As I said, after putting it off until the absolute last standard episode, I’ve worked up the courage to appear as an Extra.”
“Do you have a speaking part?” Blossomforth called as she approached the table and sat down again. Her normally white face was flushed pink, but her mannerisms were much less floppy than they were when she’d left. She'd definitely expelled a stomachful of booze in the other room. It appeared Lyra was two for two when it came to predicting what her friends needed to reinvigorate themselves.
“No speaking,” Unnamed admitted. “Just a startled yelp when a demonic apple pops out of the bushes in front of me.”
The members of the Extras Club stared at Unnamed. All had confused expressions except for Screwball. Her knowing smirk said she recognized her dad’s work a mile away.
“It makes sense in context,” Unnamed added hastily. “I promise.”
Blossomforth snorted. “No weirder than the time I had to stand on a polished gold street and be blinded by the glare. They made me do six takes for that one."
“You have an impressive work ethic,” Unnamed said, eliciting a grin from the still tipsy pegasus. “As I said though, it’s not the actual scene that frightens me. It’s the act of going onscreen at all.”
“S-s-stage fright?” Vinyl guessed.
Unnamed shook her head, gently to avoid dislodging her impromptu coupon barrette. “No, posing for the camera is very appealing to me. The reason I’m afraid to do it is..." she shuddered like a hunted animal. "because I know what the viewers do to background characters. They… twist you. Make stories and drawings and share them amongst themselves and use them to make you into something you’re not.”
“Hold up,” Lyra said. “I’m not denying that the fanbase has some hypercreative weirdos in it, but you look ready to cry just thinking about this sorta stuff.” She reached across the table and laid a hoof on Unnamed’s tense shoulder.
“Unnamed, look at me.”
The latter’s eyes were downcast.
“Please.”
Slowly, the nameless mare’s tentative gaze met Lyra’s concerned, motherly one.
“What is it that you’ve seen?”
“In the past nine years, plenty. You know how Extras always have somepony to look at from our spots on the sidelines? Well I’ve been on the sidelines of the sidelines, looking at other Extras.” She swallowed guiltily. “Looking at all of you.”
Every hardwired instinct in Screwball’s brain demanded she fire off an irreverent one-liner to kill the tension. She fought back by putting her hoof in her mouth and biting down to avoid saying anything. The demands continued for a bit, but once Screwball’s bite drew blood, they gave up.
“Easy now,” Lyra said to everypony who needed to hear her, but to nopony in particular. “So you’ve been watching the four of us from afar. We’re okay with that. Right, girls?”
Three heads nodded.
“Not just you as ponies, but the things the fans have made based around you too.”
“I see.” Lyra said. “I think I understand exactly where you’re coming from, then. It’s hard to sort through those things, isn’t it? For us anyway. Separating canon depiction from fan depiction is easy for the Mane Six, since they get to strut their stuff and show their personalities every week. That’s what makes it easy to laugh off any portrayal of them that… what’d you call it? ‘twists you into something you’re not?’ But for us, it’s different. Who we really are isn’t front and center, so when an outsider looks at us, the real us is obscured by… help me out girls, what fan works out there obscure the real us?”
The other Extras were silent for a moment. Each had old wounds that they were quietly preparing to reopen for Unnamed’s benefit. Lyra had done the same back when she first appealed to each of them for membership, and hers were the deepest of all.
“The first...” Blossomforth cleared her throat. “The first and last thing most viewers know about me is I’m that I’m double-jointed.” She bent a foreleg back behind her head to demonstrate. “So naturally, I have a Rule 34 page a mile long, filled with the most degenerate contortionist poses you could imagine. And unlike most other ponies, my porn gallery is the first thing most people think of me when they hear my name. Blossomforth the boneless nympho, that's my legacy. It’s demeaning as all hell, but I got the Extras Club to go to where I can forget about all of that.”
Screwball went next.
“I may talk like a loon, but I’m not dumb like one. So many fanfics lick-and-stick me in a mental ward like I got something wrong with me that needs to be cured. Or other stories will ratchet me up to ten-times-the-power-of-evil so I cause waaaay more carnage than my dad ever did. But that’s not who I really am. I know I’m weird, but I’m not sick or dangerous. I’m just… me.” She sniffled and wiped her swirl patterned eyes. “Ya know, you four are the only ones other than my dad who have ever made me feel like it's okay to just be me.”
Unnamed was acutely aware of the paper she'd accepted from Screwball and folded behind her ear.
“A P-P-P-Puppet To Her Fame,” Vinyl Scratch said when her turn came. “one of the most d-d-despicable fics ever published, is b-b-based around abusing Octavia, my closest friend.” There was boiling anger interlaced between her words. “I’m featured in it as her emotional anchor. Her hope for escape from the d-d-demonic thing that pulls her life’s strings. And at the end…” the normally calm disc jockey was shaking with rage. “at the end my c-c-character abandons her. Abandons her. Octavia was the p-p-pony who taught me not to b-b-be ashamed of the way I talk. She enc-c-c-couraged me to join the Extras Club, which was the greatest decision I ever made in my life. And how does that fic have me treat her? Like t-trash to be thrown away! I would never! Never ever!”
Unnamed had never seen a pony so upset on another’s behalf before. Then again, she’d never known a pony whose life had benefited so much from another individual’s presence as much as Vinyl Scratch’s clearly had.
At last, it was Lyra’s turn to speak.
“I’ve been pretty responsive to my human fans since day one,” she began. “You know, every cast member - from the most obscure Extra to Twilight Sparkle herself - has a fanclub that reaches out to them. But as far as I know, I’m the only pony who decided to reach back. I engage with my fans on blogs and messageboards pretty much every day. I love humans as much as they love me, and I can tell you after nine years of performing for them that’s a heckuva lot. But when I open myself up to their love...” Lyra restlessly pushed her stool back and stood upright on her hinds, forelegs hanging at her sides. “...I also open myself up to their abuse. You think Blossomforth has a lot of messed up porn made of her? Well I’m the subject of ten times as much, most of it cuz people interpret my appreciation for humans as some sort of cross-species fetish. You think Screwball has a lot of depictions that play up her psychological issues? Well as horse who barely acts like one, I have an endless stack of works that cast me as a dysphoric psycho. And as for the abusive fics...”
The image of a black hoodie flashed in Lyra’s mind. She gave a full body shiver, placed one forehoof on the table to steady herself, and used her other to pull her glass of whiskey up to her lips. She drank deeply, savoring the burning warmth that filled her body.
“I’ve seen dark fics in my life. Monstrous fics. Traumatizing fics. But it’s all worth it.”
Unnamed blinked, unsure how to respond.
“It’s worth it because, like I said, I love humans. And I truly believe most of them love me back. For every hateful or sadistic fanwork I see, there are hundreds more made with care. I’ve stood with humans these nine years because for every one of them that tried to shove me down onto my flank, a dozen others were there to catch me before I hit the ground. I started the Extras Club because I wanted other background ponies to feel how I feel: proud of the impact they made on the lives of the people who watch us. When we go out onscreen, even if its just for half a second, we inspire so much creativity in so many good people that I believe that’s worth getting together and celebrating about.”
Lyra raised her glass a final time.
“Here’s to Anthropology, an animated musical teaser that some incredible person took the time to make for me.”
Screwball raised her shot glass of seltzer. “To Daddy Discord, one of the first animatics this fanbase ever produced, and the coolest thing I’ve ever been a part of.”
Blossomforth sloshed the half-melted ice around her glass. She was definitely done drinking for the night, but a toast was a toast, after all.
“To the Winningverse.” She said finally. “A collection of wonderful fics where I’m the deuteragonist. I still can’t believe someone picked a throwaway like me to co-star in something so huge.”
“And to way t-t-too many original songs to count,” Vinyl finished. “About all of us. I don’t need Lyra’s hooves-on-the-ground perspective to know humans are a very musical bunch. I can respect that even from afar."
At Screwball’s prompting, a cup of water popped into existence in front of Unnamed. Her courage bolstered by what she'd heard tonight, she lifted it up.
“Long live the legacy of the Extras,” their newest club member said, tapping her cup against the glasses of the others. “Thanks girls, for showing me it’s never too late to join the herd.”
The four old friends and the brand new one ended up talking and laughing late into the evening, recounting the past and speculating excitedly about the future. Bets were placed on the impact Lyra and Unnamed’s upcoming appearances would have in the show’s final episodes and beyond.
Unnamed still didn’t know what fortune was in her cards, but at least she wasn’t frightened of it anymore. Now that she gave it some thought, expecting a massive dose of attention from just one humble background appearance was rather silly. Sure there was a guarantee that at least a few viewers who would notice her, but what would realistically come of that? Best case scenario, one of them would work up the motivation to write a short, feelgood fic that featured her as a character.
Yeah.
She felt like she would be okay with that.
