Tiny Problems on Arrival
Rough Waves couldn’t believe his luck! First, he managed to enter Canterlot High. Second, he did so with flying colors and a student showcasing a promising future. Third, he was well on his way to start a career as a professional Chef once he graduated. And finally, unlike the rest of his competitors and fellow first-years that got a rando and unimportant senior student to show them the ropes and how the school functioned, he got assigned to the Sunset Shimmer.
Not only was she one of the most beautiful girls in school and also one of the most popular, but her fame was legendary to those that knew where and what to look for. Sure, she wasn’t always the nicest person, but everything changed after that whole incident that transformed her into a she-devil. At first, he thought it was a cheap trailer of sorts, but after the Battle of the Bands and a plethora of other incidents that had little to no explanation, there was only one conclusion: Magic was at play in Canterlot High.
And for some mysterious reason, no one really minded it or even questioned it. Girls moving insanely fast? Others with super strength? Some with honest to goodness magical abilities!? Who would not dream of rolling in a school that had real-life magical girls around!? And, again, he was being escorted by Sunset Shimmer, one of the infamous Seven Canterlot Girls!
“And right over here we have the School Cafeteria. Everyone can either eat the lunch the school provides or bring their own. Or, be like me, and eat double!” Sunset joked,
Rough chuckled at her quip. It was a constant thing she did, he noticed, though he wasn’t sure if it was part of her personality or was just trying to get him to be comfortable. In any case, he was grateful for it. He wasn’t the most adept at being social and his skill was wanting to say the absolute least. While he wasn’t overweight, he was still on the heavy side of things, though some could be attributed to the kickboxing he practiced. Not many girls talked to him and he honestly hoped he could interest a girl or know how to talk to one without fearing instant rejection or as more than just a friend.
Eh, problems for later, he thought as they left the Cafeteria and quickly entered the Gym. “Whoa, it’s way bigger than I thought it would be.”
“I know, right? I swear that every time I see this place it gets bigger,” she replied, stepping aside to let another senior lead his charge to another area. “And here we have the Gym. Almost every important event is held here: sporting events, talent shows, competitions, evil girls wanting to dominate the world, the usual stuff.”
“Ah, yes, I see--wait, what?”
“Aaaaaand right over there we have the famous garden,” she pointed at the Gym’s outside entrance. “Home to the School’s statue and symbol of all students here. I’m sure you’re going to fit right in, Rough Waves. Your grades are excellent and you seem like a pleasant guy. Just, uhh, just don’t mind all the crazy stuff that goes around here too much and you’ll be absolutely fine.”
“I plan to, Sunset. Can I call you Sunset? Or is that too informal? Maybe Miss Shimmer?” He asked in a hurry, his red eyes finding her teal ones. Blushing a little, he scratched his white hair. His blush intensified upon hearing her giggle.
“Just call me Sunset. I never did like honorifics, to be honest. So!” She clapped her hands, startling him. “What do you think about the school so far, Rough?”
“That is way bigger than I thought, for one. I heard a lot of rumors and I saw the videos about all the crazy stuff happening here, and that always interested me! But Canterlot High is also one of the best there is, and graduating from this school will help me out a lot!” No need to mention the magical girls reason, nooope, he thought in addition to his little speech.
Sunset nodded in approval. “You will not regret enrolling with us, Rough, I can assure you that much! Now, let’s see… ah, yes, the east wing! Just follow me and-” Suddenly, her phone began to ring. “-Oh, excuse me for a moment?” She asked with a sheepish expression.
“Sure?” He replied a moment after Sunset, without waiting for his actual answer, moved a few meters away from him. He waited patiently as she seemed to have a private conversation with someone.
“Are you serious?” She asked bluntly and dejectedly. “Did you warn the others? I’m the last? Well, it’s not my fault some areas of the school have poor reception! Yeah, yeah, I’m coming!” Sunset groaned in exasperation as she turned back to face Rough.
Rough, who had seen and heard that last bit of the conversation, raised an eyebrow in confusion.
Sighing in defeat, Sunset’s shoulders dropped. “Remember the things I told you happen around here? You know, the wacky, magical things that just won’t stop coming and letting me live in peace!” She snarled at the Gym’s doors. “Well, turns out one of those things is happening right now. My friends and I also have the unofficial role to stop those things from spreading and endangering the school.”
“Ah,” he nodded in understanding. “So, this will cut our tour of the school?” He asked in his normal tone, though he’d be lying if he wasn’t feeling sad for ending their time together so short now that he had just gotten comfortable around her.
“Usually, yeah. But these kinds of things take about… ten to half an hour to deal with,” she pondered something for a moment. “Ha, got it! Listen, since we have to visit the east wing next, why don’t you wait for me outside Twilight’s Lab?”
“The door that says ‘Knock before entering. Yes, I’m talking to you, Rainbow Dash’, right?” He asked, smiling internally.
Sunset nodded vigorously. “Precisely that one. Listen, since I don’t know how long this will actually take, how about I give you my phone number? I’ll call you once I’m done so we can continue the tour?” She proposed, her cellphone out and at the ready.
“I’m okay with that!” He replied enthusiastically, his voice a bit louder than he intended. After a quick exchange of numbers, Rough had to cover his eyes in order to protect them from the sudden flash of light that emerged from Sunset. When his vision returned, his jaw nearly hit the ground upon seeing the magical girl form of Sunset right in front of him.
Sadly, he could only admire her for scant seconds before she turned to leave. “See you later!” She said before running off, leaving behind her a sparkly afterimage that followed her trail.
“...Well… that just happened,” he muttered to himself after picking his jaw from the floor. “Now… where was Twilight’s Lab again?” He moved out of the Gym and backtracked to the Cafeteria, from there, he remembered the steps Sunset had guided him through until he reached the door with the aforementioned sign. “And now, to wait.”
As the minutes went by, Rough could hear a faint noise coming from the other side of the door. “What in the blazes is that noise?” He asked himself, leaning against the door and pressing an ear on the surface of the blurred glass so he could hear the sound coming from inside the laboratory. Rough was… confused. He could hear some sort of wiring, venting, electricity, and some sort of beeping. Shrugging, he returned to wait for Sunset’s return.
The clock ticked on, but aside from the distant and faint sounds of blasts and shouting, he grew worried as he heard the beeping sound past the door increase in volume and rapidity. “Should I check? No… no, no, no. That’s just silly. I mean, what could possibly go wrong in an unsupervised laboratory with an ominous beeping coming from it?” Rough chuckled nervously as he began to pace back and forth in front of the Lab’s door.
He sent glances at the door every few seconds, the sound and beeping increasing in tandem along with his nervousness. Finally, he stood in front of it, resolute. “No. No matter what happens, I’m going to stay right here and wait for Sunset!” He declared.
A second later, light could be seen emerging from the corners of the door and even shine through the crystal.
In an instant, Rough’s hand moved to the handle of the door before he could rationalize it. Bursting the door open, he saw… whatever was the contraption of wires, machinery, and a ball made of glass containing some sort of thunderstorm swirling in its enclosure. He quickly deduced that the machine-thing was the source of the sound and the beeping.
He also saw a paper card sitting next to the machine with a simple warning written on it: ‘No Sunlight!’.
To his abject horror, he saw how partial sunlight from the bright corridor reflected itself upon the now wide-open door’s glass; right at the glass sphere.
“Oh…” He managed to mutter before the swirling storm inside the sphere expanded, the glass cracked, and the beeping turned into a high-pitched alarm for the next few seconds. Then, it exploded sending a single lightning strike directly at him.
It happened too fast, too suddenly. He didn’t get time to react and his reflexes were far too slow to do anything until it was done. He felt an incredible pain thrash his body in violent jerks and spasms, but it also felt tickly and even relaxing by the end of it. The entire process took no more than two seconds, if that, but when it was done, he opened his eyes and found himself staring at a much, much, MUCH larger room. He then looked at himself.
“Seriously!?” He shouted in anger. “I still haven’t even started classes here and I’m already dealing with this kind of stuff!?” He shouted again, knowing that due to his current size, it would be impossible for anyone to actually hear him unless he was standing directly inside their ears. “How big am I anyways?” He asked himself before he began examining and comparing himself with, from his perspective, the giant structures surrounding him in order to get some semblance of normality. “Now I regret never paying attention to math all that much,” he groaned as he ran comparisons and some calculations in his head. When he was done, he nearly fell to his knees. “It can’t be… If I’m right, and I hope I’m not, then I’m the size of an ant, maybe slightly bigger!”
Again, he shouted. “This has to be a joke! Curse you, the Universe! I wanted to have magical, strange adventures if possible, but not this kind of adventure! What am I going to do!? How am I going to climb!? How am I going to cook!? Screw that, what am I going to eat until I’m back to normal!?”
He was so into his rant that he didn’t notice the tremors until they were strong enough to affect his balance. Putting his on-hand problems aside (at least, for the moment), Rough looked up to see a sight that would otherwise be utter perfection: Sunset’s panties. Too bad for him the gigantic sole of a shoe was coming down on him.
By pure reflex and instinct alone, he leaped to the side, narrowingly avoiding being squashed by her thunderous stomp. The noise was akin to a heaven-splitting thunder or a firecracker going off right in front of him, but the gust of wind her powerful stomp created was enough to send him flying a few centimeters to the side. Rubbing his head and ass after getting up following his fall, he looked up to see Sunset look around, saying something he couldn’t understand very well. After a few repetitions, he deduced she was calling for him.
“Okay… so, what should I do to get her attention? Shouting won’t work. Flailing my arms won’t work either… climbing up her leg?” He blushed, looking away. “What to do? What to do?” He pondered for a few moments. Then, his eyes went wide and a hand dived into his pocket to pull out his cellphone. “Yeah, take that, magic! Wavelengths don’t care sizes!” He cheered as he quickly searched through his (limited) contacts and found Sunset’s number. Pressing on the dial, he brought the cellphone to his ear. After a few moments, the reception went blank and the call ended.
“...She said something about shitty reception, right?” Rough sighed before watching Sunset pull out her phone. She went through the same process he had gone through moments earlier and then groaned in frustration.
“Great. Just friggin great! I lost my charge, I’m late for lunch, and this reception is being as shitty as ever. If the Principal tried to spend more budget on better equipment and less on Saturday-Cakefests, we wouldn’t have this problem! At least I know he’s alright… hopefully,” she muttered, her less powerful volume meaning he could actually hear what she said, albeit a bit distorted. “Should probably head to the Cafeteria first,” she placed a hand on her belly as the monstrous howl of a ravenous beast came forth her stomach. “Lunch first, fix magical mishap after!”
“Should I be worried about her putting her priority on eating first over my safety. Or that ‘magical mishaps’ happen so often she can be that nonchalant?” He asked himself, smiling awkwardly at her from his position. Whatever the answer was, he didn’t have much time to act. Shaking the silly thoughts out of his head, he rushed towards her just as Sunset spun around.
Rough pressed on, running as fast as he could to reach the trailing hair behind her. She was only walking now, but to him, each step she took would take him minutes to emulate. Knowing he only had one shot at a possible rescue, he put all the strength he could muster into his legs. Then, he jumped as her hair passed close by; managing to grab onto it. He got slammed against the floor two times before he could manage to take a firm grip of her hair and hitch a ride on it.
The ride turned out to be relatively peaceful, albeit somewhat bumpy. Rough had to let go of his idea to climb up her hair, the movement, and the silkiness of the strands made just maintaining his grip on it a challenge. Arriving at the Cafeteria took no time whatsoever, he knew they’d arrived because of the smell and the double doors he saw closing after their passing.
“Over here, Sunset!” Rough was able to make out amidst the cacophony of sounds assaulting his ears. Sunset went to the direction of the voice as he felt her rushing over to that place.
Coming to a halt, Rough was whiplashed to the front, barely avoiding hitting her shoe face-first by shifting around and using his legs as springs to withstand the impact. “NNnnnnggghh!” He grunted loudly before pushing back. His legs burned from the exertion, not because of the pressure or damage he took, but because he was nervous. “Oh yeah,” he muttered. “I’d like to meet anyone who wouldn’t be nervous in my situation,” taking a deep breath, he looked up and began climbing Sunset’s hair to avoid another incident like that.
Outside his hearing range, a conversation was taking place.
“Sorry for being so late, girls,” Sunset apologized to the three girls sitting around their usual table.
“Eh, no worries. So, where’s the guy?” Rainbow asked while she prepared her sandwich.
“That’s the thing, I couldn’t find him and the reception is terrible at this hour,” as if to make emphasis on it, she brought her phone out, pressed the dial, and then showed them the screen. “See?”
“I hope that new student is alright,” said Rarity as she took another tiny bite out of her salad. “The cellular phone service can be quite dreadful at the worst times, I tell you.”
“Any clue on what happened to him?” Applejack asked as she pushed a tray with a large burger resting on it to Sunset’s seat. “Maybe he got tired of waiting and left?”
“Can’t be. When I came back for him, Twilight’s lab door was wide open. All I found was a broken machine,” she explained. “I think he heard or saw something that looked dangerous, opened the door, and then something happened to him.”
“How much do you want to bet he’s in Equestria right now? Seriously, we deal with magical problems, like, twice a week now. Can’t complain, though. Ponying Up is super fun!” Rainbow said with a wide smile. Her face then turned playful and looked at Sunset. “Maybe you should ‘Pony down’, pony girl.”
“Oh!” Sunset blushed and looked away. “Sorry. It’s hard to notice when it’s active or not,” she apologized before her body shimmered with light and then her extended hair, ears, and enhanced power vanished in an unnecessarily flashy way. “So, what did you-- wait, do you hear that?”
“I’M STARTING TO HATE MAGIC!” Rough yelled as he flew through the air. What happened, he had no idea. One moment he was about to reach the hair tie bracelet, the next he was blindsided by a flash of light followed by a powerful shove upward, and then he opened his eyes only to find himself flying across the table the four girls were sharing. He saw the girls look around in confusion, likely his screams were like the annoying buzz of a mosquito, but they didn’t see him falling down onto their table. At that speed and velocity… “I seriously hope ant rules apply to me. I want to have a girlfriend and go out on dates before I die, dammit!”
Luckily for him, before he made an impact with the table itself, Rainbow Dash moved her platter just enough for him to crashland on the soft surface of her sandwich’s bread. Sadly for him, he didn’t have time to take a breather as Rainbow Dash lifted her meal; the speed quite literally grounding him to the slice of bread. From his helpless position, he saw Rainbow Dash open her mouth widely. He could see her bell, throat, gums, saliva… everything.
A rush of fear made him stumble back, an age-old instinct to avoid going inside the maw in front of him. For a moment, Rough was rather impressed at how she could take over half the sandwich inside her mouth in one bite. But then he was sprung into the air again; the force of her bite and the violent jerk of her hands to aid her task was too much for him to handle.
As he once more flew through the air, a handful of breadcrumbs resting inside his clenched fists, he saw that this time there was no way he was going to avoid hitting the table without some sort of incredible luck or by the intervention of some benevolent deity.
Whatever the case was, pure luck or the act of some benign deity, or asshole God, he thought a moment later, he was saved by Sunset when she passed a lettuce leaf right across his path. He hit it dead center and clung to it for dear life. For a blissful moment, he thought Sunset had seen him and rescued him. Alas, it was not to be. Mere seconds after his ‘rescue’ he felt her push the leaf down. Curiously, he looked up only to find two pickles raining down on him.
“What sort of monster puts pickles on a burger!?” He shouted as he rolled to the side, evading the two offending slices of said vegetable. He then saw a few rings of purple onion fall, followed by a slice of tomato. The onions he was able to evade thanks to his kickboxing training, but the slice of tomato he couldn’t. However, thanks to its watery properties, he was able to easily tear it and pierce through it. “Now that’s an experience right there. Swimming through jello has got to be just like that!” He talked to himself more out of desperation and fear rather than a need to be funny. What else could he do to maintain a semblance of sanity?
He was about to emerge completely when he saw two large containers; one red, the other yellow, hovering over him. “...” All he could do was stare in disbelief at the two containers before Sunset squeezed them and a torrent or tomato sauce and mustard washed over him, pressing him down against the tomato. Next, he felt her place a bun on top of him and he was squeezed gently.
He felt the burger being lifted up and he knew what was coming next. He could hear her mouth open and utter a playful ‘Aaaaaahhhh!’ before taking a big, crunchy bite out of her burger. He knew he was inside her mouth; the tearing noises, the smell, the moistness of it all.
“‘What did you do today honey, was everything alright with your new school?’” He asked in a fake feminine accent. “Canterlot High was great, mom! I got to meet Sunset Shimmer, she gave me a tour, and, oh, accidentally ate me!” He barked. Fighting to free himself from his prison now that everything was literally falling apart around him, he split the tomato apart and jumped out of the way before being crushed by her grinders.
Despite his best efforts, he couldn’t find any suitable balance. All around him pieces of meat of varying sizes, alongside the fragments of the bun, cheese, onion, tomato, and lettuce; all of which were being mushed up, sliced into pieces, and mixed with the abundant and rich-flavored sauce and mustard, not to mention the despicable pickles. Her swirling tongue didn’t help him find any balance, in fact, it proved to be his main enemy as she constantly moved food with it from one side of the other. Because of this, he often found himself forced to evade and dodge her snapping teeth.
He tried pushing himself back against the inside of her cheeks, but that only caused her to try and bite him down, thinking he was a stray piece of meat or something stuck in her teeth. Truly, her mouth, from his point of view, was akin to a smelly, food-filled, saliva-drenched cavern. The worst part was that he could barely see a thing.
His eyes widened and slapped his forehead. Searching through his pocket he found his phone, mercifully intact and only slightly wet with her spit. He quickly turned the lights on in order to see better and found a most dismal sight. Almost all of the solid food was gone and only mush remained… which meant only one thing. He could hear the strain of her muscles as her throat adjusted, expanded, and finally, aided by her tongue, she swallowed her food.
“Damn! Damn! Damn! Damn!” He repeated a few times as he looked around trying to find a solution to his current issue. And he found it. Prepping himself for a leap, he aimed at his target, and, once he was close enough to it, he leaped. Using both legs and arms, he wrapped them around her uvula. He doubted his size and weight would make an impact even to such a sensitive part of the body, but, apparently, he was wrong.
Sunset suffered from a fit of coughs before she managed to stabilize herself. In the meantime, Rough fiddled with his phone and called her. This time, as luck would have it, the call connected. He felt the vibration of her cellphone through her body.
“Hello? Rough Waves, where are you?” He heard the voice of Sunset through the phone, even if her bellowing roars made that a difficult task. She continued. “What is that noise? Are you okay!? What happened?”
“It’s going to be mighty funny when I tell you, Sunset. But for now, could you open your mouth and stay still?” He replied.
“What did you say? I can’t hear you all that well! There’s a lot of echo. Are you in a cave!?”
“Told yah he’s in Equestria.”
“The heck is Equestria?” Rough asked, then shook his head. “No, Sunset, listen. I’m inside your mouth! The cavern is your mouth!” He shouted at the phone.
Then, tragedy struck. His phone slipped from his grip. Rough watched it fall into the dark abyss that was her gullet. Her voice roared, not knowing what she was saying but he could feel her desperation. Which was then represented in the form of the rest of the burger being shoved into her mouth. He watched as she munched quickly her food, desperate to finish it early. He looked down, and let out a heavy sigh.
If she swallows that… I will never find my cellphone and that’s my only ticket to get out of here alive, he thought to himself. “Well… who wants to live forever, right?” He said sarcastically before letting go of her uvula.
The travel down her throat was quite uneventful and he arrived at her epiglottis with haste, and it parted like a flower, he continued his way down her stomach. Rough landed on the rather soft fleshy walls of her stomach as it was covered in protective mucus. Without wasting time, he searched for his phone and found it just a few steps away from him. He grabbed it and saw the call had been ended. He was about to dial her up again when a slithering noise caught his attention. Without even thinking it, he rushed to the nearest wall just in time for big chunks of a half-munched burger fell where he had landed only to then slide into her pool of stomach acids.
He saw the pool swell as more food entered it. If he didn’t do something, he’d be swimming in stomach acid in a few seconds. As a would-be chef, he knew exactly how potent human stomach acid could be and he would be having none of that. Desperately, he searched through his phone only to discover the signal was weak where he stood. “God, when I told you I wanted to get to know a girl better, this isn’t exactly what I had in mind!” He shouted as he stood up and began walking around in search of a signal.
He walked around all the available areas he could stand upon in search of enough signal to be able to call Sunset once more. Truth be told, he was scared. His oxygen supply was limited, not to mention tainted by the gases and the smell released by the acids as it slowly ate away her burger. The writing was on the goal: he had to get out of there and soon, or he’d be just part of Sunset’s meal.
And while the two-tones haired girl was beautiful, he was not too thrilled about that particular outcome.
As he watched a small island of meat sunk into the depths of the acid, he realized he would soon have no place left to move, but he still needed to find a signal. Looking around he saw a rather large piece of lettuce. While it was a weak vegetable, its leaves were sturdy and if not properly mashed, it could take the stomach’s acids time to eat through it. “Perfect.”
Covering himself with as much mucus as he could get his hands on, Rough placed his phone in between his teeth and stepped into the acid. There was no time to be tentative, and thus he moved quickly until he was left floating in the acid. Doing a weak form of dog-paddling (not wanting to ruin his phone) he swam towards the floating piece of lettuce.
He had to dodge floating pieces of meat, bun, and even half a pickle; often having no other solution but to push them away with his bare hand. The trip to the lettuce boat took a bit longer than he expected, resulting in some patches of his clothes starting to dissolve. Thankfully for him, human natural skin-oil protection provided him with a second layer of determent, though he knew his time was running short. He spat the phone into the boat and then climbed into it using a piece of bun and onion as support. Once in the boat, he tore a small piece of the stalk and picked up his phone. Using the stalk as a paddle, he guided the lettuce boat around Sunset’s stomach, watching as the burger was slowly dissolved. The sound of something falling made him turn his head around to see more of the burger, or quite possibly a second one, splash into her now flooded stomach.
As he moved around, his eyes were focused on the phone. For moments that to him felt like an eternity and a half, he stared at the empty bars of his phone’s signal until a single one appeared. Having her dial at the ready, he pressed it and the call began. He waited for long, cold seconds despite the increasing heat of her stomach, and finally the call connected.
“Hello, Rough? Is that you?” She asked.
“Yeah, yeah, it’s me,” he replied tiredly. “Look, Sunset, this is going to be super awkward…”
“Wherever you are, don’t move. I’m finishing my lunch and I’ll send some help as soon as I finish, okay? I know that being a pony for the first time can be jarring, but you have to stay put, okay?”
“Pony? What? No! What do you think happened!? I’m still human!” He asked, confused.
“Oh… then… where are you? You still sound to be inside a cave. And what happened earlier? You cut off the call so abruptly.”
“My phone slipped and I had to go search for it,” he glanced around him to see more food sinking into the acid. His lettuce boat was still holding strong, but for how long? “Look, listen to me, Sunset. I opened Twilight’s lab door because I thought something was going to explode. Turns out I messed things up, got blasted, and now I’m about the size of an ant,” he took a deep breath. “And I’m inside your stomach.”
“...Come again?”
“I’m inside your stomach, Sunset. The echo you’re probably hearing? The cave I’m trapped in? That’s your stomach,” he said bluntly.
“...Alright, very funny. Where are you, Rough? I don’t like this kind of pranks,” she said in a serious, no-nonsense tone.
“I’m inside your stomach, dammit!” He yelled. “And while you’re very beautiful I really don’t want to be part of your world in this manner!”
A few seconds of silence followed until Sunset spoke up.
“Sweet Celestia you’re not joking. H-How!? How did you end up inside my stomach!?”
“Wait, he’s where!?” Rainbow bellowed.
“Where in the boots of the rusty snake he says he’s in!?” Applejack demanded.
“AAaawwauuaaaaaa…” Rarity gasped as she fainted.
Before he could answer, the telltale signs of a gaseous overproduction emerged. Her belly growled, her stomach clenched, and Rough knew exactly what was coming up. Biting his cellphone once more, he dove into the acid pool. He swam as fast as he could towards the entrance of her stomach. Reaching it just in time to meet her gaseous ejection.
AKA, she burped.
Outside, Sunset felt sick to her stomach, not enough to vomit, but she really couldn’t hold back a mighty toad-song that echoed through the entire Cafeteria. Mindful and ready she placed her hands before her mouth. Once her burp was done, there, covered in pieces of food, slime, mucus, stomach bile, and other nasties, laid one ant-sized human breathing heavily. She saw him raise an arm and brought it next to his head.
“Believe or not, this is not my worst school tour,” he ended with a chuckle.
The End.
Author's Note
Special thanks to anyone that read this!
