My smile slowly widened more and more as I sat there and soaked in the theme song playing through the speakers of my television, and I found myself slowly mouthing along with the words under my breath. “I used to wonder what friendship could be…”

I fought the urge to get up from the couch and sit closer, sitting where I was, gripping the arm of the sofa firmly to ground myself a bit as a plethora of unfamiliar old feelings slowly trickled through me. For one I could hardly believe the show was still on the air, considering how long ago I had first watched it. As the opening faded and the show shifted focus to a small, rural-looking town filled with ponies, I leaned in slightly, keen to see what sort of adventures these strange little creatures were having these days.

It seemed that the focus of the episode in question was going to be on a purple alicorn. I could not remember her name for the life of me, but goodness she certainly did strike a chord somewhere in the old dome. If I remembered correctly she was the main character out of the cast. Though the last I could remember about her, she was a unicorn, not an alicorn. I wondered where she got the wings from as I noted that she was being followed around by A rather chipper-looking little purple dragon holding a long piece of parchment that dragged along the ground as he spoke.

“So we have most of your errands done for the day. We still need to stop by the apothecary to pick up that catalyst you needed for the new spell you were wanting to try out, and we need to swing by Quills and Sofas to grab some ink and er...more parchment…” he said as he looked down at the list he was holding. “Anything I’m missing, Twilight?”

I looked over at the clock and saw that my mother wouldn’t be home for another few hours or so and shrugged, figuring fuck it, I could sit closer if I wanted to. I took my old perch on the floor closer to the television, though not quite so close as I used to sit.

The purple alicorn...Twilight... smiled down back at him as she trotted at a steady pace. “You tell me, Spike, you were the one I put in charge of the list,” she said, smirking as she used what seemed to be magic to make her horn light up and pull the parchment over towards her, looking it over with a small hum. “Hmmm, I think that would be about everything we have to take care of actually, good work,” she said kindly, passing it back over to him and ruffling his...frill? The scales at the top of his head with a small chuckle.

Twilight...Twilight….now that was a name I had not heard for a very long time...as I rolled it around in my head, I felt it slowly come out of my mouth before I even knew it was happening properly. “Twilight…”

As I said her name, her ears seemed to perk at something happening on screen, and she looked around as if confused. “Spike, did you say my name?” she asked as she looked back at him again as the little dragon rolled the scroll back up and gave her a small befuddled glance of his own.

“Uh, no? Why, did you hear something?” He said as he scratched his head, looking around a bit as if to try to find what might have caught her attention before shrugging. “You’ve been working pretty hard today, maybe you are just a bit on edge, ya know?” he said, brushing it off after a few moments and garnering a reluctant nod of agreement from Twilight at his statement.

“I suppose you might have a point, I have been more than a little hard on myself lately. Let’s get these errands wrapped up and see what the girls are up to.”She said before continuing her steady-paced trotting towards a small shop in the midst of the town.

Huh...well that was all kind of odd. I felt as if I had missed something important, but shrugged. I was sure that they would bring it up again later in some form. This was a kids show after all if I remembered correctly, they would probably not be overly subtle in a way that would make things fly over the heads of little kids.

I watched quietly as the screen faded to another scene of Twilight leaving what I assumed to be Quills and Sofas, hovering a few bags behind her as she presumably was heading home to put her things away.

“Huh…” I said softly again under my breath. This show was a bit slow plotwise it seemed, but it wasn’t unpleasantly so. Just more...slice of lifeish I suppose would be the best word for it. Like it wasn’t in a hurry to get anywhere, it was sort of charming, really.

However, it seemed that the peace was due to be interrupted. Another familiar face soon appeared on the screen. A very happy one at that!

An excitable-looking Pink pony with a fluffy, curly mane bounced into view with the biggest smile on her face as she hummed a cheerful tune.

“Oh, hey Pinkie Pie!” Twilight said happily, trotting over to the other pony, who seemed to be a friend of hers, the wings on Twilights back ruffling slightly in what seemed to be mild excitement of her own! “You seem especially happy today, what’s the occasion?”

Pinkie Pie smiled wider at her, ceasing her bounce midair and settling onto the ground slowly as she started to speak “Oh Twilight! Just the pony I wanted to see. Well, I got a Doozy earlier, and at first, I was really worried because you remember how the last doozy went right?” She said, waving her hoof and giving a little displeased shudder before returning to her very happy demeanor. “But then right after my teeth chattered and both of my ears twitched one after the other, which means my Pinkie Sense is trying to tell me that someone we haven’t seen for a really long time is gonna be in town today!”

Twilight frowned slightly at this. From what I could remember this was not an unusual exchange for the two, though I might have been mistaken about that. “Ah yes, your….Pinkie Sense.” She said the last two words with a sense of mild distaste, shaking her head. “Well, thank you for the heads up, Pinkie Pie, I will be sure to keep an eye out.”

I could not help but give a small chuckle at this as I listened to the two of them. I was starting to remember what I enjoyed about this show so much, I think. However as I chuckled, Pinkies ears twitched and she slowly looked towards the...screen, her eyes wide as she slowly broke out into an even wider smile, poking Twilight repeatedly and quickly on her shoulder “I don’t think you need to look too hard Twilight.”

My own eyes were surely quite wide at this point as twilight gave the pink pony a confused look and turned her head towards the screen as well, freezing in place and putting a hoof over her mouth, standing there for a few moments like a deer in the beams of a particularly bright set of headlights before turning back to Pinkie Pie and chuckling softly as if trying to play something off.

“Ahahah, I’m sure you’re right Pinkie, we’ll probably see whoever it is around town one way or another, you know how it is with your Pinke Sense.”

Pinkie gave her a confused look, glancing back over at the screen. What are you talking about, Twilight? He-”

Twilight placed a hoof over her friend’s mouth to muffle her, smiling nervously at her as she interrupted suddenly “HOW about weeee go see what the girls are up to, huh?” She said as she withdrew her hoof.”

Pinkie attempted to object. “But-”

“Pinkie. We need to prepare for our friend to come back. They’ve been gone for a while and they might find things are a lot different than they remember here in town, We want to make sure they feel welcome and comfortable, right?” She said slowly, as if trying to convey something aside from strictly the words she was using to her friend as she gave her a stern look. “Now go and get the girls together so we can make sure he has a proper welcome, and I will take care of a few things here, okay?”

Her eyes lit up with realization as the pink mare realized what her friend meant and she nodded quickly, beaming at her and giving a small semi-serious salute. “You can count on me! I’ll make sure our friend has the bestest, most super special welcome back to Ponyville party this town has ever seen!”

Twilight smiled in relief as her friend seemed to understand what she had been trying to drive at and nodded in acknowledgment. “Excellent. Meet me back at the castle once you have them all up to speed on the situation. I’ll be there making sure everything is ready.”

The two of them nodded to each other one final time before splitting, Twilight picking up Spike in her aura, who had been looking at the two of them in utter confusion up until this point, and placed him on her back before dashing towards her destination, the camera following her while Pinkie went off to who knows where to get more ponies.

I was starting to become increasingly confused myself, was this one of those sorts of first-person OVA sorts of situations where the episode broke the fourth wall to make the viewer feel included? It certainly would not be too strange for them to do something of the sort to make a little kid feel extra special. But I would have expected that sort of thing to be a blu-ray extra on a limited edition release or something, not playing on television as a regular episode.

It was definitely strange. The plot hook seemed to be there, they were throwing a party for a friend who had been gone for quite some time and was only just now coming back. But what bothered me was how uncanny everything was. The characters certainly seemed to be acting as they normally would, from my recollection of them, but everything felt just a tad off, and with the way they were talking I could not help but feel that the hubbub was about….me? Not just whoever was watching, but me in particular.

I shrugged off the uneasy feeling that was building in my gut and looked away from the screen. Only a few minutes into watching the tube again and I was already slipping into an uncomfortable mindset. Maybe a different show would be better to start off at least, I could always watch another episode later if I can catch it on this channel.

I instead turned my attention to a fairly formulaic seeming action flick, Plenty of gunplay but not a whole lot of plot from what I could see. I had sort of popped in about halfway through so things were really ramping up. I allowed myself to become immersed in the mindless violence for a bit, enjoying the spectacle until the commercial break.

A cheerful male announcer spoke clearly as a logo for a channel that seemed to be called ‘The Hub’ Came on screen.

“Tonight on The Hub! Watch everyone’s favorite ponies work together to prepare for a very special surprise guest!” The voiceover chimed out as it flashed to several different mares all seeming to do tasks pertaining to preparing for a party, coming together at the end with six of them posing for a photo, Pinkie Pie moving from her spot to place her hooves on either side of the screen and looking toward me, the viewer.

“Please catch our show right now! we worked really hard on it Just for you.” She said with a hopeful, almost slightly worried expression on her face before the sceen faded back to the regularly scheduled programming.

Okay, that was a bit too much television for me, I thought to myself as I turned the thing off, chills running down my back as I rubbed at the back of my neck.

That was about a week ago now, and I have been too creeped out to turn the television back on since. Every time I think about giving it another go, the thought of them comes to mind and I just… can’t bring myself to face them. I know they are just cartoon characters…

I think they are just cartoon characters. I wouldn’t go as far as saying I hope they are cartoon characters. I’d have to be a mental case to go so far as to think it was even remotely possible that they were….

But if I was so sure, why was I so apprehensive about going back? It wouldn’t hurt to give it one more shot right? I mean, I loved the show so much as a kid, and I had to admit I had been getting invested again until all of that had started happening.

Steeling myself, I decided I would give the show another chance, I grabbed the remote, taking a deep breath as I turned the television and flipped back to the same channel as before, mouthing the numbers slowly.

“Two...Two...Two….”

Author's Note

And here it is! Sorry for the long wait!