At a small cafè on the corner of Canterlot’s many avenues and streets, five foals' parents stop to order some food. The foals don’t know each other, but they would all end up connected.
The first, a yellow Pegasus with deep brown mane, nervously looks around, he isn’t attempting to make eye contact with any other pony in the store.
Unfortunately for him, another Pegasus and his Unicorn brother, notice him from across the cafè. Both green, the Unicorn more so, they had a strong family resemblance. The only problem was that while the Pegasus’ mane was a reddish-orange color, the Unicorn’s was a light brown.
Eager to start a conversation in his naïveté, the Peagsus weakly flew over to the other pegasus. Not of any natural detriment, but of a young age.
“Hi!” the Pegasus said, the Unicorn walking behind him,”I’m Carrot Top! What’s your name?”
Not wanting to start a conversation, the yellow one weakly responded,”Sunlight,” while he shuffled his hooves.
From a nearby table, a white Earth Pony with a mane that shone like the sun, in his natural curiosity, decided to check the conversation. When he got there, the two Pegasi were having a very one sided conversation.
“Hey,” the Earth Pony stated,”I’m Shining Lights.”
“We didn’t invite you into the conversation,” Carrot Top replied, in the way only a child can.
“I thought I could join...” Shining Lights replied.
Thus, the two ponies argued. Sunlight, who watched this, couldn’t help but find it a little amusing. About that time, the Pegasus’ brother came up to him.
“Carrot Top always fights with those sorts of ponies,” he said. To Sunlight, it was automatically clear that he was older, perhaps by a large margin, than his brother. “I’m Forest Floor.”
“Sunlight,” Sunlight said, meekly.
Forest Floor walked up to Carrot Top and Shining Lights and attempted to break up the fight. He succeeded, and before they knew it, the four ponies were talking about innocent childhood things. Things such as what books they read.
In the distance, a purple Unicorn saw this, but she didn’t have to say much before the four ponies sat together at her table.
“Oh cool! Another new face!” Carrot Top said, in the excitable tone he said everything in.
“My name’s Lilac.” the purple Unicorn said, not even taking a breath.
No thanks to Carrot Top’s constant chatter, the five ponies became good friends in the span of the thirty minutes they were there. Proposed by Forest Floor, they agreed to meet up once a month. Presumably, the path to such a thing would involve a lot of begging.
However, the five ponies succeeded, and they became the best of friends. Nothing could tear them apart.
Five years had passed, and the five ponies still met up regularly, now much more mature. They became more comfortable around each other, and Sunlight wormed his way out of his shy shell. Forest was the designated planner for their meetings, Shining Lights soon became overwhelmed by his curiosity and asked plenty of questions about the other races, Lilac had been getting closer to all of them, and Carrot Top never changed.
“How do Unicorns use their magic again? I’m just curious. I mean, I don’t mean to intrude, but...” Shining Lights started. He punctuated this sentence with pushing his glasses, looks befitting of such a question, you further on his nose.
Forest chuckled at that one,”I’m happy to answer the question when you ask, Shining, we imagine and we do.”
As Forest talked to Shining, Carrot Top turned to his best friend.
“Sunny, I’ve decided that me and Lilac would make a great couple!” Carrot Top said. Lilac weakly said yay in reply. She was enthusiastic, she just didn’t portray it well.
Sunny, who had now taken to wearing eyeliner, said,”Sounds great, looks like I won’t be getting her though. She’s kind of cute, Carrot.”
“I don’t even know if you’re straight half the time! You wear eyeliner, insist on us calling you Sunny, and like that weird show.” Carrot Top replied.
“Honestly, neither do I.” Sunny said, with a hint of sadness.
Carrot Top looked at Sunny, dumbfounded.
“Now,” Forest said, interrupting the awkward silence,”We still making it next month?”
“I’m good,” Sunlight said.
“Yep,” Lilac said.
“I’m fine,” Carrot Top said.
“I really don’t have anything else to do,” Shining replied.
The friends then talked and laughed late into the night, all worries forgotten. In this little slice of heaven, among friends, everything was alright in the world.
Just a few years afterwards, Equestria descended into unsightly war. Everypony who could server was forced to. That included the five friends, with the exception of Lilac. She stayed home and wished Carrot Top a good and safe time.
As he cried, Carrot Top went out to war.
Sunny, with her teary eyes causing her eyeliner to run, knew that she had a low chance of getting out of this alive. She barely knew how to survive by herself, let alone with a thousand hostiles attacking her. The fact that despite her being trans, she was still considered male by birth, only made her feel worse.
As she cried, Sunny went out to war.
Forest Floor, designated planner and the oldest of the group, had no plan for this. All he knew was that his family was probably going to die.
As he cried, Forest went out to war.
Finally, Shining, ever inquisitive, was now in a place where he couldn’t ask questions. His inner creativity was stifled, and he didn’t know how to survive.
As he cried, Shining went out to war.
They fought their hearts out. They were trained and were snapped into the proper picture of ponies at war.
That month, no one turned up at the cafè.
The war was still going strong, but somehow Forest had arranged a meeting. The cafè, now on the war-torn streets of Canterlot, was miraculously still there. The five friends sat together. Nopony really wanted to talk.
“I can’t believe it.” Carrot Top began, his normally excited demeanor broken down.”War has got to be the worst thing to grade ponykind. I don’t know what we’re fighting for.”
The normally stoic Sunny, now cried, she didn’t bother with eyeliner because she knew it was pointless.”I know. It’s terrible, I’ve seen my friends die, I don’t know what the point is.”
Lilac sobbed into Carrot Top’s shoulder. His hair was dirty, everypony’s was. They’d been fighting out in trenches and fighting for land for a while now.
“You shouldn’t even be fighting at all, Sunny. There’s really no mercy,” Carrot Top said.
“I know,” Sunny said, putting her face onto the table in resignation.
Nopony said anything more. For a meeting, the only meeting was the meeting of their inevitable doom.
The war had since ended, and the friends gathered together in relative normalcy. Forest, the arranger, sat down and waited for everypony to enter. Shining came in first, his right forehoof absolutely shot. He stumbled over to the table, taking an uneven stance in the chair. His hair was all ratty, he could barely walk.
“Hey,” Forest said to Shining.
“Oh, hi,” Shining said back.
Next, Sunny came in, balanced on a crutch. Her hair was a ratty mess, which had arisen after years of fighting about ‘proper military stallion’ length. As if to prove a point, she dyed it with a well-applied streak of red down the side. Personally half to prove an identity, and half to honor her wife, with her beautiful red hair color.
Slowly limping on her crutch, Sunny also took an uneasy seat at the table.
“Hey,” Forest said.
“Hi,” Sunny replied.
They sat in silence for a few minutes. Then, Forest broke it.
“Hey, have you guys seen Lilac?” He asked, clearly wondering.
Sunny chuckled,”If only, she’s probably mourning at her husband’s grave again. You know how she is when it comes to Carrot Top.”
“He did die in service, right?” Shining asked.
“Yeah, mine. Bam, suddenly I had the dead body of my best friend next to me, that mine crippled my leg for life, as well. I’m a little surprised they didn’t just shoot me, though they ended up laying me off shortly after,” Sunlight replied.
“You seem relatively unshaken by this,” Forest pointed out.
“Well, it’s more the fact that I’m continually grieving on the inside, after all, I’m miffed at war. I didn’t want to fight, I didn’t have to, but they needed every single eligible pony no matter the identity.”
“What do you say about war?”
“I say, screw it.
“War, war never changes.”
The three friends sat in the café, wordless, as the sun set behind them. They didn’t have much time left, but at least they had each other. Through the torrents of war, the friends remained. It was all they could hold on to.
Author's Note
Inspired by a birthday party I recently went to. I recently got into a pretty nasty injury, so I was just thinking about bringing in my crutch and being like,”Hey guys,” while leaning on it, then this story came out of it. The 5 ponies are actually vaguely based on the people that attended the party: fun fact.
In a broader sense of the word...
Inspirations:
The Tab, Fallout: Equestria
In addition, it’s probably not my best story, but I did enjoy writing it.
