My name's Trace; not too long ago my best friend, Jude, became a brony. Ya know, those pony loving creeps? He and I were attached at the hip since birth. We shared everything from food, games, and clothes, to secrets, money and even sicknesses. Now in high school, we share the same passion for drawing. Ever since we were able to hold a pencil there was no stopping us, even at school, we left no desk un-doodled and no wall un-graffitied. His recent obsession with ponies, on the other hand, has become the only thing I can't share with him.
As we made our way back home from school down the crack-ridden sidewalk we were so familiar with Jude was, as usual, trying to convert me to the world of ponies. However, I consider myself to be the maturer thinker between the two of us, and as such I was not ready to give in to his immature thinking.
"Come on dude! You gotta stop being so uptight." Jude repeated himself for the umpteenth time.
"You're the one that should stop being so childish. I mean, ponies, are you seriously expecting me to get into that? It's for little girls not for boys in high school." I knew there was no convincing him of the utter silliness in being into colorful, girly ponies but I had to try.
"It's made for everyone it just uses characters that would seem girly until you actually got to know each one of them." He pushed the argument further.
I raised an eyebrow at his statement, "What do you mean get to know them? It's a cartoon. The characters' personalities are consistent and bland through every episode. If you see one you've seen them all."
"No they develop throughout the series," he as-a-matter-of-factually stated.
"Even if that were true, it couldn't be by much."
Jude let out an exasperated sigh, "Why can't you trust me on this? You've been like this since we were kids, always the stick in the mud and party pooper."
"Eh, what do you know?" I brushed off his childish insults as I turned my attention back to the road before us.
Almost like a killer in a horror movie, Jude had somehow gotten within breathing distance of my ear without catching my attention. "I know that's why you haven't gotten anywhere with Mel," he whispered.
I came to a complete stop in my pace. How could I have forgotten her? The very cause of all this. The one who introduced Jude to the show. The one who is just as childish if not more so than he is...the one I have a crush on. Melissa—Mel for short—was a close friend of Jude and I. We met back in elementary in the principle's office, Jude and I for erasing the chalkboard and drawing on it, her for...well nothing. She was being picked on by two boys in her class who'd taken the teacher's papers off of his desk and put them in Melissa's and when he came back she took the blame. Jude and I had a strong sense of justice at that age, mostly due to our constant imitation of the Power Rangers, once we heard her story, while sobbing no less, we knew we had to do something. We went to their class the next day and proceeded to draw the two boys on the chalkboard, making them as ugly as possible. The words "poop heads" with arrows pointing to each crudely drawn stick figure was the icing on the cake. Well, in summary, the boys were laughed at, we got in trouble again, and Melissa thanked us both with a kiss on the cheek.
I could feel a slight warmth come across my cheeks and the bridge of my nose as I searched desperately for a retort for Jude's rather accurate remark, but to no avail. "Screw you dude!" I snapped back at him as I started down the path at a much faster pace, turning my reddened face away from my friend to spare myself the embarrassment of another teasing.
"Hold on man, you know I was just kidding!" Jude laughed. He started lightly jogging after me and apologizing.
"Anyways, we need to get started on our art project." I quickly changed the subject to the only thing he was willing to take seriously.
"Yeah, I can't believe she only gave us four days to get this done but it shouldn't be a problem for us." Only when it came to drawing would Jude get completely serious. "It should be simple enough, just let me take care of the outline for it and then you can fill it in."
"Okay, sure but don't you think 'freely express harmony through any form of art using any inspiration' is a little vague for our final project?"
My youthful companion placed an arm around my shoulder, "I think we actually got lucky with this topic, so don't worry about it." he assured me.
I let out a soft sigh as I maneuvered myself out of his grasp When you say don't worry I can't help but do just that, I thought. Jude and I always helped each other on our art project and whenever we could work as pairs, one of us would make the image itself and the other would take care of the color. This time around Jude was doing the image but I knew his fixation on ponies would find it's way on to the canvas. But, because of our long history, I couldn't help but give him the benefit of the doubt an trust he would take this seriously and put the ponies aside.
"You a brony yet?"
A familiar female voice had interrupted my train of thought. It was without a doubt her. I hadn't even realized we had made it to the front of Jude's house, where Melissa had been waiting on the steps of his porch.
"Mel!" Jude shouted with excitement.
"Jude!" Melissa returned with equal enthusiasm.
They'd always greeted each other with the yelling of each others' names followed by a tight embrace. Ever since we were kids I felt like the third wheel whenever I was around these two. I never seemed to be able to get inside of Melissa's bubble of innocence the way Jude was. I admit, I was jealous.
"Howdy, Trace," she greeted me with a little less stir.
"Hey Melissa." My heart began to race a bit. "What are you doing here?"
"What? A girl can't hang out with her two best friends?" she sassed.
"Sure she can." I nervously grinned.
"So you a brony yet?" she repeated.
"No." I had finally given in to my angst and given up on trying to make further conversation.
She stretched her hand out to Jude, "I win! Pay up!"
I gave a confused look as I saw Jude shove his hands into his pocket, pull out a five dollar bill, and hand it to Melissa.
"Mel and I had a small bet that I would make you a brony by the time we made it home from school." Jude explained.
I can't believe he thought he would win that, I thought to myself. I sighed as made my way further down the sidewalk to my own home. "I'll catch you two later, I have some math homework to work to do."
"Aww that sucks," she groaned. "We'll have to catch up later then." She waved goodbye as I turned to walk.
"Sure thing." I returned the goodbye wave and started down the beaten path—still partially paying attention to their conversation.
"Well, Mel, since you're here you can help me draw the outline for our project." Jude made his way up his porch steps into his home.
"Sure sounds like fun," she agreed.
"After we finish, it'll be pony time!" he added.
"Hey Jude!" I shouted over at him from the steps of my porch. "Don't make it bad!"
He replied with a thumbs up and a smile as he entered his home.
"We got this!" Melissa excitedly yelled as she followed behind him into the house closing the door behind her.
I turned back to the entrance of my home and proceeded to open the door but my attempts were thwarted by some unknown force on the other side. Mustering up all the strength I could, I planted my feet and pressed my shoulder against the sturdy mass of wood and began to steadily push through. A foul stench crossed my nose as I gave one final shove revealing a fort of full trash bags, some of them tipped over spilling their contents at the entrance. A note was posted on the wall that read "Take care of the mess for me."
"Again with this?" I sighed as I shoved the bags aside. "You really need to get it together Dad." I sighed once more. I wish mom were here, the thoughts echoed in my head.
My Dad was rarely home. He was either at work or out drinking, but on the rare occasion he would come home, he was either passed out somewhere in the house, or would leave a huge mess of beers and food before heading out again. With me being the only one to help him whenever he found himself in trouble, I couldn't afford to be as happy-go-lucky as my friends. I had to be the adult for the both of us.
I hopped and skipped over the rest of the scattered mess until finally reaching my room, my sanctuary. Murals covered every inch of my wall, the ceiling being the only blank spot in the room. I lazily threw myself onto my bed and shut my eyes, a decision I regretted the moment I opened them to realize the sun was gone...I had fallen asleep. In no mood to even think about math homework, I decided to head over to Jude's place and check up on the progress on the outline for our project. I flung myself over the edge of my mattress and onto the floor. After dusting myself off I headed for the door. A quick trek down the sidewalk to the house next to mine completed my journey.
"Hey open up!" I yelled as I banged against the door several times.
The door flung open leaving me face to face with Mel, "Hello again," she happily greeted, "How'd the homework go?"
"It didn't," I replied. "How's the outline coming along?"
"Oh Yeah! We're almost done!" She grabbed my arm and dragged me inside, much to my embarrassment, "You will love it, if this doesn't do it, nothing will," she proclaimed.
"W-What?" I stammered.
She started down the hallway that led to Jude's living room, "Just come see!" She coaxed me to follow her with her hand.
I began to follow immediately, I wonder what she's talking about... my mind began to race through hundreds of possibilities before being cut off by Mel.
"Look, isn't it amazing?"
The tension built as my eyes followed her stretched index finger down to the object of attention. A large poster covered the surface of the living room floor. I was able to make out six pencil-drawn figures decorated the surface of the poster. Idols for the stupid and childish, worshiped by the failures of normal society, and now my final art project. Ponies.
"What is this?"
"You like it?" Jude came in from the other side of the room with a smile on his face. "This is about as harmonious as it gets," he informed me as he lifted the canvas from the ground and brought it to full view.
Six ponies, one in the middle with the other five orbiting around her crown-adorned head. I stood there trying to make sense of it all but nothing could justify what I was witnessing. I tried to contain myself but there was no helping it. I was pissed.
Jude began to speak again, "I hope you remember the colors for each of—"
I snatched the drawing from his hand, "What the hell is this?!" I burst out in anger. "Did you seriously draw these damn ponies for our final?! I can't believe this!"
Melissa took a step back.
"What is your problem?!" he replied with just as much volume in his voice. "Do you honestly hate ponies that much? Or is it just anything that's fun?"
Tcchht!
I tore the huge poster in two clean halves. "I'm getting sick of all this pony shit!" I threw the two halves to the floor before pushing Jude into the wall. "When are you going to grow up?!" Before I could ready myself for another push, Jude had already grabbed the collar of my shirt.
"You asshole! Do you know how hard I worked on that?!"
His fist slammed into the side of my jaw. I almost lost my balance but was able to return the favor. I rammed my knuckles into his nose, knocking him back quite a bit. He charged after me and tackled me to the ground where, for the next few minutes, we were a tumbling mess of fists and kicks. We felt every blow we received and dealt. At the end of it all the total damage was: a bruised jaw, black eye, and numerous bruises for me; a bloody nose and busted lip for Jude; and a broken heart for Melissa, who had been silently crying through the entire thing. Out of all of us, she was hurt the most.
Jude and I staggered to our feet, panting heavily from the exhausting fight.
"Just get out man," Jude ordered, still catching his breathe.
"On my way," I hissed. I stumbled a bit before making it back to the hallway where Melissa stood, tears in her eyes. She saw how hard a time I was having walking and extended her arm to me for support, but my pride wouldn't have it. I shoved her hand away, and limped my way out of the door and into the dimly lit streets of the night. What was usually a short walk had turned into a long shuffle home.
At the end of the long journey I'd reached the entrance of my home, crossed the river of mess at the door, and entered my room. I eased myself onto my bed, minding my injuries. As I settled into my mattress I began to replay the events that had just taken place. Every thought brought them closer. Every word and action I ran through in my mind made it harder to stop them from coming, but I knew there was no stopping them. Tears. I began to cry. Other than some trivial disagreements, Jude and I never had a serious verbal fight let alone an all out fist-fight before. I needed something or someone to blame for the pain I felt. I came to the only reasonable conclusion I could think of...ponies. If it weren't for those damned ponies this would've never happened. I began to feel my pain mix with hatred. Why? I thought to myself, Isn't it enough I lost my mother? Now I'm going to lose my best friend? To ponies? My thoughts echoed as I, against my own will, slipped into a deep sleep with a troubled mind and mixed emotions.
"You shouldn't sleep in the middle of the road; somepony could step on you."
A female voice had broken my slumber. I raised my head to see who was speaking to me, but my tired eyes were met with a blinding light surrounding a dark figure. "Mom...?" I asked, still half asleep.
"I'm not your mother," the voice responded.
As my eyes began to adjust, the dark figure had focused into a purple pony looking down at me. I jumped up and immediately panicked. I looked down to see my hands had been turned into grey, round extremities. "W-Who are you?! Where am I?! How did I get here?" I began to unleash a fury of questions in my fright looking for any possible explanation as to what was going on.
"Calm down!" the purple pony demanded, "My name is Twilight Sparkle and you're in Ponyville."
I took deep breathes as slowly I observed my surroundings of bright, colorful ponies trotting about, "...What?"
