Friendship With A Side Of Toast

Chapters

Dorkin' Around In The Wasteland
Llama and Guru Get 'Swapped
Si-Fron and Silver's Story Spectacular
The Godly Failure

Dorkin' Around In The Wasteland

Time, Ken, & Wes Dork Around In The Wasteland

Slightly based in the FoE universe

by TimeForSP, WeirdBeard/bronyken, and TheOnlyWes

“Freaking A, Time!” Ken screamed out. The hapless idiot rubbed his back from where he had fallen. He looked around confusedly, their surroundings completely changed from the kitchen in Time’s house where they had met. The sky was covered with dark gray clouds and hardly a ray of sunlight penetrated through. “We finally meet other each and the first thing you do is teleport us somehow!”

“Well it’s not my fault!” A red pegasus mare rebuked, picking herself up from her spot on the soft dirt. “I thought it was a cupcake!”

Ken arched his brow and scowled. “How could you confuse a banana for a cupcake?!” he asked. Ken finally locked eyes with his friend. “And now you’re a pony! Why does crap like this always happen?”

“Well then you shouldn’t have put my bananas in the wrong drawe- wait a second...” Time examined her new body: she now had hooves where her hands should be. Hooves? Hooves! “Holykoolaidpitcher! I’m an O.C. now! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” The mare threw her hooves to the air, not remembering that she should be standing on them, and promptly planted her face into the ground.

The unchanged human smacked a hand against face. He scratched at his short brown hair in frustration and replied, “I think that’s the least of our problems right now. Take a look at where we’re at.” Ken swept his arm and pointed to the desolate landscape.

The pegasus spat some dirt out of her mouth, brought her head up and took a survey of her surroundings. “Looks like we’re somewhere in New Jersey,” the mare stated.

“Har har, ya filthy animal. The price is wrong, we’re stuck in the Wasteland. Apparently we’ve pissed off every ancient god or whatever and now we’re just their puppets. Nice job, Time,” Ken insulted. He bit at the corners of his ‘stache and frowned. Figured something like this would happen.

“Well bananas from ancient indian burial grounds are way cheaper than regular ones.” Time crossed her arms.

Ken stared blankly at the mare and sighed. Just great.HIs brown eyes scanned the horizon once more before responding. “Look, we’ve both read Fallout Equestria. We gotta get someplace safe quick before a radroach bites my face off or something.”

“Let’s go to Hoofington! That place is great!”

“Don’t be stupid,” Ken retorted.

“I just want to hug Glory. Pleeeeeeeeeaaaaaaassseeee?” Time annoyingly pleaded, making puppy eyes cute enough to kill an elephant.

“No.”

“So that’s a yes. Let’s go!” The pony started trotting in a random direction.

The human threw his hands up into the air. “Good night nurse, at least grab a weapon!” he exclaimed. Ken examined the ground closely before finding a rusty nine-iron. Why in the name of all things holy was there a nine-iron in a land of ponies?!

“Don’t worry. I’m fine.” Time pulled a baton out of seemingly nowhere.

“Where the hell did you get that?” Ken asked.

“You don’t want to know.” Time gave the human a wink.

Ken’s jaw dropped. “That’s disgusting.”

The mare rolled her eyes and zipped up her fanny pack.

“...Are you seriously wearing a fanny pack?” the human asked.

“What? Did you think I was gonna shove my stuff up my ass?” the pegasus raised an eyebrow. She suddenly stopped in mid-step and slowly shook her back legs. There was something missing. Time stared down between her legs. It took several minutes for the discovery to kick in. “I’m not a man!”

Ken simply shook his head and began walking off. “Again. Wasteland. Death by horrible dismemberment or even worse. With our luck though, you’d become Chief of some raider tribe and still sodomize me for the fun of it.” He took a few more steps forward, but suddenly tripped over a half-buried barrel. “DANGIT!”

Time burst into laughter. “Good job, buddy! You might even be able to last an hour out here.”

“Shut your dirty mouth, you want to go to Hoofington!” Ken sarcastically replied, pushing himself up. He paused however and stared at a nearby patch of grass. “Don’t move.”

“What’s wron- SOLAR-FLARING ORGASMS OF CELESTIA!” The pegasus stared face to face with a giant mantis, standing frozen in place.

Ken readied his nine iron and slowly moved into position behind the mutant insect. “Don’t. Move,” he quietly whispered.

“What do you think I’m doing?” Time spat back.

The human grinned wickedly. “I’ve always wanted to do this.” At this statement, he brought the golf club down heavily to where the mantis stood. However, the oddity dodged away from the attack and latched onto Time’s face.

“FFPPHFHFFP” The pegasus stumbled back, ungracefully tripped over a rock and tumbled over to the ground; all the while flailing her arms impetuously.

“Hold still, I’ll get it!” Ken shouted. The man started to swing his nine-iron down at the giant mantis, forgetting that there was a mare’s face underneath it.

The dead mutated insect slid off Time’s face, revealing the collateral damage -- a very bruised face and a very angry Time -- caused by Ken’s attack on the mantis. “Remind me to kill you...” The mare shook herself, then raised herself to a standing position. The pegasus looked dazedly at Ken. “Hey... Why are there two of you?”

Ken rubbed the back of his neck and chuckled awkwardly. “Sorry ‘bout that. C’mon, let’s find you a healing potion or something. There’s gotta be something around here,” he stated.

“Let’s go check out that OMINOUS LEDGE over there!” Time pointed her hoof at a decline next to the duo.

The human glanced at the directed spot. A sickly mist rose slowly from below the ridge and Ken replied, “...Sure!”

The duo pranced merrily to the ledge like magical little fairies. What could possibly go wrong?

XXXXXXXXX

“Run run run RUN RUN RUN!” Ken screamed. He sprinted ahead of the pegasus, his own legs carrying him farther. Behind the pair, dozens of giant mantis skittered quickly toward them.

“Don’t leave without me!” The pegasus attempted to use her wings to propel herself forward, -- away from the onslaught -- but since she had no experience using the appendages she ended up doing a nose-dive, skidding on her face to a halt.

The human stopped in his tracks, noticing the mare’s mishap. He grunted and doubled back. Ken almost retreated away at the sight of the mutant insects, but scooped up his friend and resumed their escape. “You just had to throw a rock at them, didn’t you?”

“I thought it would be funny!” The mare cried. Suddenly, Time spotted something in the distance with her new, keen pegasus eyesight. “Go that way, Ken.” The mare pointed in the direction of the unidentified object.

“That’s the last thing I’m gonna do! In case you already forgot, you’re the one who got us in the mess with your stupid advice!” Ken yelled, struggling to carry the shifting mare. He glanced behind them and immediately wished he hadn’t. One particularly freaky-looking giant mantis was only a few feet away.

“Well it doesn’t look like you have any other choice,” Time argued, bouncing in the man’s arms.

Ken rolled his eyes, but changed his momentum to the pointed direction. “Fine! Don’t blame me if these things catch us and decide to wear our faces for Halloween!”

“Whatever! Just run!” the mare screamed as the mantises closed in.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!” the human yelled in fear as two of the insects latched onto his back. “I FREAKIN’ HATE YOU, TIME!”

“Don’t worry. I’ll grow on you, just give me a year or twenty-seven.” The red pony climbed up onto his shoulders and swatted at the bugs, swiftly sending them flying off Ken’s back with strong blows from her hooves.

Ken quickened his sprint even more, not wanting any more mutants to jump onto him. It would have been a rather comical sight. This gangly human and pegasus perched atop his shoulders fleeing from a giant sea of green, mutant mantis. “Just shut up or else I’m dropping you off with the these things!” he shouted angrily while Time swatted at more leaping bugs.

Hopefully whatever they were running towards would help solve their little predicament.

XXXXXXXXX

Meanwhile, an entire world away, a young man strolled through a bustling Renaissance fair. Though perhaps ‘strolled’ was too kind a word. Rather, he was sprinting as fast as he possibly could, the plates of his archaic armor clacking together audibly as pushed through a sea of similarly-clad knights and noble ladies. His white cape, emblazoned with a black cross, trailed behind him in a dramatic fashion, though nothing about his quest was ‘dramatic’ in the slightest.

“Excuse me!” He called as he pushed through the crowd. “Pardon me, fair maiden! Forgive me, good sir!” His feigned Old English was beyond atrocious, but he didn’t dare act out of character. Even when his stomach was growling in protest as it struggled to digest the myriad of greasy, horrendously unhealthy food he’d fed it mere hours earlier. Of course, the young man was smart enough to know when a fight was lost, and had promptly sought out the faire’s lavatories.

When the blessed sight of the wooden stalls came into sight, he let out a triumphant cry that startled everyone around him. His pace quickened to a truly impressive speed, even as he narrowly avoided tripping over a small child in his haste to reach the stalls. When he finally did manage to lock himself into one of the rancid-smelling, stifling-hot toilets, it took him the better part of ten minutes to undue the necessary armor pieces covering his body. It was with great relief that he finally sat down, resting his sword gently beside him.

Unbeknownst to the young man, a wind began picked up around the stall. Dust and debris was kicked up with reckless abandon, completely obscuring the lavatory for a long moment. Then, as quickly as the wind had disappeared, it vanished...along with the stall and its occupant. Of course, said occupant was completely oblivious to the otherworld occurrence that had just transpired. In fact, he didn’t even know something was amiss until he finished his business within the stall, donned his armor once more, and swung the door open in a dramatic fashion.

“Whoaly shit.” He muttered under his breath, fanning the air in front of him as he lifted the visor of his helmet. “This side of the park is closed....every...one...?” He trailed off as he finally took notice of the desolate, barren wasteland around him. His eyes widened as he looked around, his gauntleted hand falling on the hilt of his sword. It was only when an annoyed voice shouted at him, did he look down and see a donkey staring up at him.

“Hey!” The donkey called. “Watch where you’re going, pal. You coulda crushed me with that thing!”

The young man stared at the talking donkey for a long moment, before promptly falling backwards as he fainted.

XXXXXXX

“Run! Run faster, you wimp!” the pegasus screamed, the mantises still trailing behind them. “Faster, horsey!” Time kicked the man in the butt.

Ken grunted from the jab and glared at the red mare atop his shoulders. “Again, you’re not helping! Why don’t you fly us both up or something?” he questioned while Time pushed her forehooves harder down upon his matted, brown hair.

“My awesome presence and fluids are leaking into your body. That’s help enough!” the mare proudly stated. It was not helping the duo that the mutant insects kept their steady, fast pace.

Ken gritted his teeth and tried desperately to stay focused on the task at hand. They were finally nearing the location that Time had directed to previously; a rundown, shackled wagon cart. The human darted ahead while the swarm maintained their heated pursuit. At the lead of the wooden cart, a strange, ghoulish donkey was pulling the vehicle effortlessly.

Out of the blue, an outhouse fell from the sky, raining the duties of many fair maidens and knights upon the the mantis horde. The intense crash launched Ken and Time out of the way while the mutant bugs sat in disbelief.

“Ewww, this is so disgusting!” cried one of the mantis.

“Oh mah gosh, there’s poop all over me!”

“So gross! I need a manicure!”

“This is not fabulous, in any way! Gosh!”

After the bizarre outcries from the insect horde, they abruptly turned around and skittered back to their spawn hole. The mare and human glanced at each other, but Ken shrugged at just another oddity to add to their growing list of madness.

“All hail the mighty toilet gods!” the mare exclaimed and threw her hooves to the air.

Ken shook his head dismissively, but paused when he heard a peculiarly familiar voice echoing from behind the outhouse. Upon inspection, his jaw dropped when he realized that the one and only Cranky Doodle Donkey stood before them.

“Look, Ken! It’s Doctor Professor Mister McUnhappy-Pants Doodle Donkey, Esquire!” Time merrily pointed at the depressed donkey.

“Great.” The donkey grumbled. “First I get stopped by bandits and now...toilets are falling out of the sky. Toilets.” He peeked his head around the side of the outhouse, narrowing his eyes at Ken and the mare. “And just who are you calling McUnhappy Pants, eh? Eh, whatever. You, String Bean.” He pointed a hoof at Ken. “Get over here, would ya? Some weirdo stumbled out of the toilet here, and ya’ll look mighty similar.” As if to emphasize his point, there was an audible groan from the ground at the donkey’s hooves.

Ken raised an eyebrow, but neared toward where Cranky pointed. Sure enough, another human lay flat on his back. ‘Fantastic,’ he thought to himself when he noticed the homemade armour and medieval garb. Either this was the worst knight in history or this chum was from a Renaissance fair. “Yo! Wake up, Larpy!” he muttered, kicking the prone human.

Time trotted over to where Ken was kicking the fallen knight. “Can I help?” the pegasus questioned the bearded man. At his affirmation, the mare turned her flank to the downed man and delivered a strong buck from her hind legs. This sent the man flying, but he still didn’t awaken. “He’s either dead, or just a heavy sleeper.”

“Heh. Nice buck, kid.” Cranky Doodle grunted. The donkey adjusted one of the many, many, weapons he wore on his back and trotted over to where the armored human had landed. He quirked an eyebrow at his still form, before casually slapping his helmet.

“Whahey!” He exclaimed, awakening with a jolt. “What’s the big idea, you jack...ass...?” He trailed off, before suddenly screaming shrilly and jumping to his feet. “Demon donkey! Stay away from me, spawn of Sata-oof!” The young knight careened into Ken, bringing both humans down to the dusty, sun-baked ground.

Ken shoved the newcomer off him and groaned loudly. “Great! I’m stuck in the Wasteland with a freaking donkey, an insane man-turned-pegasus, and Garfunkel the Wonder Larper. What a good sign of things to come!” he yelled sarcastically.

The mare glomped the angry man, shouting, “This is gonna be so fun!”

While Ken tried to escape Time’s embrace, the armoured knight sat in confusion next to them. Waves of confusion swept over him before he whispered, “My name’s Wes.”

“NOBODY CARES!” Cranky and Ken angrily shouted in unison.

“I only care if it has to do with cupcakes and sexual puns.” Time smiled wildly, everypony/body looking at him, “What?”

Brace yourselves. Part 2 is coming.

Llama and Guru Get 'Swapped

Llama and Guru get ‘Swapped

Oh Penis, Where Art Thou?

Slightly based from the "On a cross and arrow" universe

by: MagicLlama and TheGameFilmGuruMan

“What just happened?” asked Jim, rubbing his forehead and bumping his hat with his hoof. Wait, his hoof? Bugger. This couldn’t end well.He let out an exasperated sigh, before hearing a low moan to his left. Turning to investigate, Jim found a teal pegasus mare with a red mane sprawled at the base of a tree. She looked familiar somehow, but why?

“Are you OK?” Jim asked, then realized what a dumb question that was. She obviously wasn’t ‘OK,’ judging by the bump on her head. Ouch. That must have hurt.

Suddenly, the mare in question let out a long, pained groan and slowly flopped over on her back, all four legs awkwardly sticking up into the air.

“OOOWWWWW!!! What the F?!” she moaned. She cracked her eyes open, wincing at the harsh light of the noonday sun. Blinking a few times, she rolled over onto her side and stared at the grass, completely oblivious to the pony awkwardly sitting next to her. “Outside. Headache. Sun hurts. Ouch again. My nose feels funny. Huh?” she mused.

“Do... I know you?” asked Jim. “You look kinda familiar.”

The teal mare’s ears shot upright, and she twisted around to see the speaker. When she finally saw him sitting there, her eyes bugged out of her head.

“AAAHHHH A TALKING PONY!” she screamed hysterically.

“Speak for yourself,” muttered Jim. “You’re one, too.”

The mare froze, then slowly looked down at herself. Her mouth dropped open and she took a deep breath in preparation for more hysterical screaming.

“Don’t start bloody screaming again, gosh dang it!” yelled Jim at the mare. “My ears can’t take any more.”

The pegasus sputtered as the shriek died halfway out. She looked down at her haunches, carefully and deliberately maneuvered her new body into a sitting position, then crossed her arms and darkly pouted.

“You look ridiculous like that, you realize,” said Jim, facehoofing. “How does this even happen? One moment I’m a normal human going to work, the next...”

“Wait. You’re a human, too?” she asked.

“I was. Then poof, I’m a pony. Do I know you? You look really familiar.”

“I... don’t see why I would. Since I’ve been a pony for all of... however long I was unconscious. I was just minding my own business, when BAM! I’m on the ground! With four legs and a tail!” She paused. “...A tail...”

“Let me guess, you’ve always wanted one,” said Jim dryly.

“It’s like a whole nother limb! I can do stuff with it! Like flick it around a bunch!” She flicked her tail against her side and giggled. “It tickles, too!”

“Well hooray for you, Miss Flicksalot. Let’s just ignore the fact that we’re stuck here in the land of magical talking ponies, and-”

“But-!”

“Gah! I can’t even rant vaguely sarcastically. Who are you anyway?”

“I am a complex being! One of many titles! Distant galaxies-”

“Shut up. Now try it again without the blasted title sequence.”

She wilted. “Uh... well... on the internet, they call me MagicLlama...”

Jim spluttered incoherently before shouting, “What?! That can’t be right. What the hay is going on?!?! But that means... There can’t be two... The odds that two people from the same silly forum about ponies end up as ponies, is...is... Gahhh!!”

The mare froze, ears twitching and eyes widening in shock. She leaned in closer, squinting critically at the stallion before her. Then her eyes widened in a flash of recognition.

“...Chaos?”

“NO! Guru, you dunce. And why the heck are you a mare? I thought you were a guy. I even talked to you on a video skype call!”

“Oh, don’t be silly! I’m not a mare, I’m a... I’m... a...” She froze, then unceremoniously shoved a hoof between her hind legs and groped around, eyes widening in horror.

“Just be glad you aren’t stuck with Time.”

But Llama was deaf to the world. Her eyes began to tear up, and she collapsed onto her side with a Littlepip-esque bleating noise. She sniffled a few times, then began bawling loudly, the way only girls can.

Jim looked awkwardly at the bawling mare. “Er...um...nevermind.” He couldn’t relate at all.

“You... you don’t understaaaand!!!” she choked out. “I wanted to have kids the EASY WAAAAAY!”

“Dude, this isn’t cool. No guy should have to suffer this... except maybe child molesters.”

Llama eventually cried himself (herself?) out. She sniffed and slowly sat up, wiping away tears, and blinked at Guru. “Wait... how come you’re still a guy?”

“How come we’re ponies? I dunno! I woke up, like, a minute before you.”

“Okay. Let’s... let’s try... to be logical, here,” the pegasus mare sniffed. “I’m a girl pony. You’re a guy pony. We know each other online. We... might be in Equestria. I can’t tell. We don’t know how we got here. Does that sum it up?”

“Pretty much, except that we look like our OC’s and for some reason I still have my hat.”

“Ooh, so I’m Thunderbreeze! ...Except a girl. I need to think up a Rule 63 name for myself...” she murmured.

“Thunderbreezette? Oh, and you’re missing your trollface cutie mark.”

She blinked, then spun about and stared at her ass flank. Then she shrugged, before dramatically throwing up her hooves and screaming to the heavens, “NOOOOOOO!!! My cutie mark that I never actually haaaaaadddd!!!”

“I’d smack you, but I don’t hit girls. Do you count as one, though?”

“If it’s debating about whether to hit me, then yes, I count as a gir- Ooh, shiny!” Llama leaped to her hooves and raced down the grassy slope, or tried to, at least. She still wasn’t used to having four legs, and thus, fell flat on her face. Guru wiped his brow and sighed as the disaster was averted. Llama let loose on whatever land this is? He thought, shuddering, before shakily getting to all four of his hooves and wobbling very slowly after the fallen pegasus.

“You idiot. You could have broken your neck,” said Jim before helping the pegasus back to her hooves. “Come on, there’s a road over there. It has to go somewhere, right?”

As Jim and Llama walked, they found that the motion became more and more natural to them. This is not to say that it stopped being challenging altogether, but the number of times they ended up sprawled in the dust decreased as the day continued. The sun was just starting to reach its apex and their stomachs starting to growl when they saw a green sign stuck in the side of the road that read ‘Ponyville- 2 miles.’

“Well, at least we know we’re in Equestria now,” muttered Jim to himself. “So, should we just go by our OCs’ names, now that we’re ponies?”

“Sure. Whatever. I’m huuunnnggrryyyyy...!” whined Llama Thunderbreeze.

“Yeah, so am I. We don’t have any money, though, so even if we get to Ponyville, we’ll be stuck.”

“Pssh, don’t worry about it!” the teal mare scoffed. “I’m a girl now! I’ll just use my feminine charms to seduce somepony into giving us some food.”

“You? -snerk- I suppose it’s worth a shot, but still!” Guru bent over in silent laughter. “Besides, Ponyville is, like, mostly mares.”

“Exactly! Just because I’m a girl doesn’t mean I have to stop liking them!” She paused, eyes widening. “Oh my god, I’m a lesbian! Yes! I’ve always wanted to be a lesbian!”

“Remind me to sock you once you return to normal. You’re assuming that Ponyville has more lesbian mares than stallions you could seduce. If anything, I should be doing the seducing, considering the population make up.”

“Dude, think of the fanon! According to bronies, every single pony is bisexual!”

“Not all the bronies, dude. Besides, it’s just fanon with little to no evidence at all from the show. In all likelihood, certain bronies are just idly fantasizing and your idea is sunk.”

“I can still dream!”

“Yeah, whatever. Hey, maybe we should get ourselves arrested, then we’d get food and a place to sleep for free!”

“Hey, remember, this is canon Equestria. You said it yourself. Since there’s no law enforcement in the show, that means there isn’t any here, by your logic!” She stuck her tongue out at him.

“Appleloosa has a sheriff, ha!”

“Yeah, well your mom’s a-! Hey, look, Ponyville!” Thunderbreeze exclaimed brightly.

Indeed, as they crested a hill, the quaint little town of Ponyville popped into view, spread out across the small, shallow valley below.

“I’ll forget what you were about to say, but only because you’re a female now,” said Guru. “Let’s see if we can’t find some food or something, ok?”

As they continued over the rise and down the hill past a sign that read ‘Welcome to Historic Ponyville, population 3252’ and into the town proper. For some reason, there were a lot more stallions roaming the streets than either ex-human remembered from the show. Still, it was Ponyville, and that in and of itself made the two ponies stand gawking at all the sites, smells, and sounds of what was to them once a cartoon caricature of a small town.

“You must be new here,” said a stallion’s voice from behind them.

“Yeah, we seem to be getting a lot of newcomers lately, don’t we Harpsy?” said another voice.

Thunderbreeze and Guru slowly turned around to face the two stallions behind them. They stared. The stallions stared back, quizzically. The teal mare glanced to her friend, then leaned over and muttered, “Dude. Is that...?”

Guru muttered back, surprise dawning on his features, “I looks like it, but... how?”

Thunderbreeze stepped back and did a full 360, taking another, closer inspection of their surroundings. Over there was a drunk stallion that oddly resembled Berry Punch. And there was a cream-colored stallion with a pinkish mane, selling roses from a roadside stand. And... ooh, there was a really ugly mare that kinda resembled Caramel.

The pegasus’ eyes widened, and she turned back to Guru.

“Dude? I think we’re kinda screwed.”

“At least some of your plan has more of a chance of working, though,” whispered Guru back.

“What? No! I’m not gonna seduce a guy!” she loudly retorted in horror.

“If you lovebirds are quite finished, would you like some help?” asked Harpsy.

“Buwhaaaa?!” Guru and Thunderbreeze exclaimed, backing away from each other in horror.

“Only couples whisper like that; we figured you were together,” shrugged the second stallion.

“But- he- we...!”

“We’re just- that’s not-!”

Harpsy and his pale friend snickered. “Oh, calm down!” the other chuckled. “We’re just messin’ with you. I’m Babar, and this is my... friend, Harpsy. And from those looks you had a minute ago, I’ll bet fifty bits that this is your first time in our little town!”

“Er, um, yeah... Hi. I’m Gurumane and this is... uh... Thunderbreeze.”

“Thunderbreeze... no offense, but that kinda sounds like a colt’s name.”

“Er... yeah... uh, you see, my dad, he always wanted a little colt of his own, to follow in his footsteps as a, umm... hoofball player? Yeah, a hoofball player! But when I came along, he was just so stubborn that he-”

“You can just call her Breezy,” Gurumane cut in, chuckling.

“Oh. Yeah. Breezy. That’s me!” she blushed, with an awkward little wave and a death glare at Gurumane.

“Aaaanyways...” Babar slowly continued, “is there anything you two are looking for? What are you folks doing in Ponyville?”

Gurumane and Breezy glanced at each other.

“We’re, uh, looking for magical advice,” said Gurumane.

“Looking for food,” said ‘Breezy’ over top of him, resulting in an intelligible jumble of jibberish. They glared at each other.

“You came all the way to Ponyville for... magical food?” snickered Harpsy.

Gurumane facehoofed. Whyyyyy?! He let out a small groan.

“Er, nevermind. Where’s the library?” he inquired, as his pegasus companion scuffed at the ground, muttering darkly about her metabolism.

“Oh, here to see Dusk? Well, see that intersection over there? Just turn left there and the library’s in two blocks. Can’t miss it. It’s... a giant tree,” Harpsy cheerily offered.

Breezy and Gurumane thanked the two stallions, and trotted off towards the intersection in question. Once out of earshot, Breezy leaned over and whispered in her earth pony friend’s ear.

“Hey. I wonder if fanon works here, cuz if so, those two are totally gay.”

“Naw,” said Gurumane with venomous sarcasm through gritted teeth, “I thought they were European.”

And then world ended violently, in a massive explosion of confetti and pink-ness.

Gurumane plopped down hard on his rump in shock, while Breezy simply fell over, feet sticking up in the air. As the confetti began to clear, the pink wraith carried within emerged from the swarm, bearing an overly-excited, possibly-sadistic grin.

“HI!!!”

Gurumane’s eye twitched. Breezy’s legs twitched. The shockingly roseate stallion stared at them expectantly, grinning madly all the while. Gurumane tilted his head to one side. The frighteningly cheerful stallion mirrored the motion. Gurumane’s mouth opened, and the Pink One leaned forward in anticipation, ears flicking as the entire square seemed to fall silent around them.

“...Hi?”

Then the stallion exploded into motion, sweeping both Gurumane and the semi-comatose Breezy into a giant hug as the town returned to its business as usual.

“Well hi again!! My name’s Bubble Berry!!! Everypony in this town is my friend cuz everytime there’s a new pony or in your case new ponies (that’s plural!) I find them and I say hi and then I throw a party and then they like me and I’m their friend, and it’s worked every time which you may have guessed when I said “EVERYPONY IN THIS TOWN IS MY FRIEND” just a few lines ago!” The pink party pony paused to partake in a particularly prodigious gasp of air prior to proceeding. “So, yeah. Basically? Hi’s. Party. Friendship. Everyone.”

Breezy shook her head rapidly, snapping out of whatever had stricken her. “Did someon- er, somepony mention food?”

“Not quite, but there will be loads of food at the PARTY later!” Berry beamed.

“I’m not sure if we-!” Gurumane started, before Breezy slapped a hoof over his mouth.

“Aaaand when exactly is said party?” she inquired slowly.

“Uhmm... Ooh! How about at 7 this evening?”

Breezy’s face drooped. The pink stallion seemed momentarily confuzzled by this, until he heard the tell-tale sound of a certain mare’s stomach rumbling.

“Although... if you want a little sample right now...” he added slyly, turning to the odd confetti-shooting machine behind him. He pressed a couple buttons and turned a knob, muttering about “mixing up batter and confetti,” “what happened last time,” and “reversing the polarity of the chameleon circuit.” Then he spryly hopped out of the way, and grinned at them.

“Introducing, the new... well, newly fixed... feature of Bubble Berry’s Amazing Welcome Wagon(TM)!”

“Uh oh,” said Breezy and Gurumane in unison just before a cake shot outwards and covered both of them with chunks of sugary goodness.

After a moment of stunned silence, Breezy slowly bent down and shamelessly licked a big chunk of cake off of her foreleg. Gurumane gave her a look and shook his head in exasperation. Why?!

Seeing his look, his pegasus companion gestured her head and him and tried to talk around another large mouthful.

“C’mon, try shome! Itsh delicioush!” Gurumane winced as he was showered with partially-masticated globs of cake.

“Llama...” he muttered, but snuck a lick of cake off of his face. His eyes widened. “This... This is GREAT, Pinkie... I mean, Berry.” He caught himself, but the damage was already done.

“You know Pinkie?!” yelled Berry Bubble in joy, suddenly inches from Gurumane’s face. “This is amazing! Is she with you? Is she? Is she? Is she?!”

Gurumane attempted to back away, but couldn’t break away from the soul-piercing stare Berry had him fixed with.

“I... er... well...” Guru stuttered, not sure what exactly to say to the pony inches from his face.

“She’s not with you, is she?” Berry asked, seeming to deflate a little.

“Er, no.”

“Darn... Oh well!” Berry said, immediately brightening, “At least I have you and your marefriend here to party-”

“She’s not my marefriend!”

“Sure, you just keep telling yourself that. See you tonight!” With that, the pink menace bounced away, leaving Gurumane sputtering.

After a moment of silence, Breezy slowly began “...Well, look on the bright side! This greatly reduces the chances of gross stallions hitting on me!”

“I don’t hit girls,” Gurumane muttered to himself. “I don’t hit girls. I don’t hit girls. I don’t hit...”

Si-Fron and Silver's Story Spectacular

The moon had just risen, the night darkened to the point where the stars were just enough to see by. The chorus of the night was in full swing, loud enough to catch and hold the ear, but quiet enough to dream by. To Rylie, it was the muffled chorus of crickets that sang outside his window; for Jack it was the rain, a summer night’s shower falling steadily in a pleasant, soothing rhythm. The relative normalcy of the night belied the heavy hand fate was about to deal to the two of them, one that would lead to a whole new world of possibility.

For Jack, it had been an absolute stroke of luck that he even managed to watch the show. His family, while being kind and loving, tended to overdo the teasing in his opinion. As a result, he had made sure that his hobby of watching My Little Pony and writing fanfiction for it was hidden from them, lest he would be forever tormented by his family. Heaven forbid it if they tried to do something like make him a T-shirt of the show.

So when his family had left the house for the night on a rare outing, he rejoiced at the idea of watching the show on his TV for once, instead of having to cower in a corner somewhere with his laptop as he listened to it with his easily broken headphones. As he sat down on the ratty couch his family owned, he took out the TV remote and hurriedly began flipped through the channels, hoping he’d be able to watch some before something ridiculous happened, like having his TV fried by a lightning strike from the storm. His luck was terrible and since he only had the Hub network for this month, due to complicated reasons, he would bet that this may have been his only chance to watch it.

Rylie, on the other hand, had a family that didn’t really care about his enjoyment of the cartoon. However, he was always a bit uncomfortable watching any sort of cartoon when his parents were around. It was a silly feeling with no real basis, but still, he never watched any cartoon unless they were out of the house. That night he was alone for the first time in a while, so he fired up the new plasma screen, intent on watching ponies in High Definition.

Some might call it coincidence. Some might call it luck or figure out the exact possibility percent … some might even call it the hand of God. Regardless of what caused the occurrence, something happened that evening that was unexplainable: the two bronies hands were in synch on their respective remotes.

Click.

Click click …

And then, as they reached their desired target and clicked, still perfectly in synch, a bright flash filled their vision, a white noise almost deafening them! And then … blackness, their worlds disappeared …

It was a nice day, birds chirping, the sun shining, the clouds a smattering of huge, fluffy pillows, the wind through your hair … All in all it was a nice day, but the sudden feeling of vertigo and a rush of wind from beneath would cause anyone to glance down, an action that turned the nice day into an absolute disaster.

Nice days are never nice days when you’re falling towards the roof of a building.

In one of the most impendingly painful ways possible, Jack and Rylie had appeared in the sky without so much as a popping noise or a flash of light on this end. Before they could even register it, the change in position and gravity swiftly seized them and dragged them downwards. They tumbled through the air, their limbs whipping about wildly in a fruitless effort to find something to halt their unexpected and, quite frankly, rather terrifying descent. When then they landed, they did so ungracefully by smashing right through the roof, splintering it all over the room underneath and the room’s occupants.

As the dust settled and the fits of coughing subsided, the room became eerily quiet. To the occupants in the room, most of the roof had suddenly and inexplicably caved in, the timber and shingles suddenly relocating to the center of what appeared to be a lounge area. One such occupant sat stock still on one of the couches around the room, another crouched, hiding behind said couch, but most were standing in shock.

As for the unfortunate pair of travelers, they lay underneath the broken wood, hidden from sight … sadly conscious. With a cough, Rylie shook himself ever so slightly. That small shake, however, sent a jolt of electric fire up his arm and into his heart; the last time he had felt something like this he had been too young to remember. The resulting cry of pain and fright drove a few of the room’s occupants back a step, then rushing forward to help.

Jack groaned and hissed through his teeth, tensing as his body screamed at him for its suffering. For a moment, all he could think about was the pain that wracked his body as he squeezed his eyes shut as forcefully as he could. Then, slowly, it subsided a small bit at a time. As the agony faded from his mind, his thoughts came into focus.

What happened? He thought, quickly trying to piece together what had happened.

As it became easier to think, Jack ransacked his head, searching for memories that could explain the state he was in. Eventually, he remembered what he had been doing during the few minutes prior to the fall. He furrowed his brow in confusion, even as his eyes remained shut from the pain. He had turned on the TV, flipped through the channels, then fell through a roof. He tried again to remember anything else, but his mind had nothing to offer, not even a period where he might have passed out.

As he tried to puzzle it out, the sound of hushed and worried voices came to his ears and if he bothered he would have heard the sounds of the footsteps of the figures approaching him. Recoiling from instinctual fear, he was tempted to try to lay there as still as possible in hopes of going away. However, when he remembered that he had crashed through some sort of roof, he grudgingly opened his eyes so he could face the consequences of whatever had happened.

He almost immediately wished he had tried to feign unconsciousness some more.

Staring straight into the face of his savior, he saw a unicorn.

The ponies in the room had instantly come to help when they heard Rylie’s cry. Lifting planks and beams aside with hoof, wing and horn they reached Jack first, pulling him out roughly despite the high-pitched whine of protest, body mottled with fresh bruises. A hoof stuck out from the pile of debris below him, leg turned at an odd angle, the cry from before having turned into soft whimpering.

“Ditzy! Call Nurse Redheart, now!” The commanding tone coming from the alabaster unicorn left no wonder as to who was in charge. With the swift reply of yessir, Candfloss sir, a grey blur swept out of the building. Taking extreme care, he lifted pieces of the roofing away until Rylie was completely uncovered.

Rylie had been holding his eyes shut, sucking in breath through clenched teeth and expelling it again with a quiet, shuddering whimper, trying the best he could to simply ignore the pain. However, as he felt the pressure on top of him disappearing, he cracked an eye to see what was happening. At that moment, the reality of his situation came crashing down upon him like a sucker-punch to the gut, pushing all the air out of him and then holding him in shocked silence.

There was a unicorn. Right there. Looking down at him … and he was unnervingly familiar. If it wasn’t for the pain of his broken arm, he would have been sure this was a dream. Even now he wasn’t completely convinced. However, something else niggled at the edges of his mind, but he failed to make any further neural connections, his mind so numb as it was. And then he looked at his broken arm, only to see a hairy leg and hoof.

The aforementioned Candyfloss was not entirely surprised when the adolescent colt fainted, but he was caught off guard when he noticed Jack was still hanging in there.

“Gah! I just wanted to watch a cartoon,” Jack moaned, reacting harshly as the other ponies continued to drag him out of the pile. “Not be in one. Ow! Ok, that was a lie, but I swear, I wanted to get here a lot less painfully!”

“Mental note, have Nurse Redheart check the other for a concussion,” Candyfloss muttered under his breath, half concerned, half coming to the realization that these two ponies were somehow responsible for caving his roof in, though neither were pegasi. Probably that one’s fault, he mused with a quick, sidelong glance at Jack. The earth pony’s current state of writhing over some minor bruising was not helping his case.

After carefully levitating Rylie’s limp body out of the wreckage and resting him on one of the unoccupied couches, Candyfloss turned back to the two pegasus ponies trying to calm Jack. “Cloudcover,” he called, catching the attention of the one closest to him; “is the pony alright?” The green beret covered the pegasus pony’s eyes for a moment as he glanced down at the squirming, intelligible earth pony.

“Well, he’s not making much sense,” he began, Trottingham accent clear; “but it’s still Equestrian and complete sentences …” He trailed off, looking over Jack with a critical eye.

“Uhh, did I say cartoon?” Jack said, finally realizing his folly. “I mean I … the concussion is messing with my head?” Cloudcover looked at him, a singular eyebrow raised. “Umm, so, any idea how I ended up crashing through your roof for some reason, or are you just as clueless as I am?” With a self-satisfactory hmmph the pegasus turned back to his boss.

“I’d say he’s fine. He’s an earth pony, sturdy stuff.”

“You might say he’s fine,” the other pegasus pony said, a smirk clear across his red snout. “However, I’m tempted to find him a psychiatrist.”

“Mister Autumn Breeze!” A new voice spoke up from behind the red pegasus as a grey hoof bopped him on the head. “That’s not a nice thing to say about anypony!”

“Hehe, sorry Miss Doo,” Autumn replied with a humorous chuckle, rubbing at his head with a hoof as he turned to let the smiling mare past, eyes following her as we walked up to Candyfloss.

“Nurse Red Heart is on her way, I flew ahead to see if I could help with anything.”

“Umm, are you sure you want Nurse Redheart to treat me?” Jack paused for half a beat as he filed away the fact that there was someone else with him before hurriedly continuing. “I mean, I am not exactly a pony you know.”

“Oh really?” An electrified yellow Stallion said, appearing out of nowhere and zipping up to him with alarming speed. “Because you look, talk, and smell like pony! Wait …” The yellow pony sniffed Jack in a seemingly exaggerated manner. “Yep, you smell like a pony. Wait … Does that mean you are a changeling?”

“Wait what are you …” Jack stopped halfway through his sentence. He closed his eyes and slowly brought what he thought was his arm right in front of his face, wincing from the bruising. His eyes slowly opened as he forced himself to stare at the undeniable truth. With a groan, he brought his snow white hoof in for a facehoof. “Never mind,” Jack said with a deep sigh. “I am a little fuzzy from that concussion. Do I have any wings or a horn?”

“Nope!” The pony probably known as Watt chirped. “You are a regular okie dokie poky Earth Pony!”

Fate hates me, Jack thought as Nurse Redheart entered the room and immediately began checking over Rylie. It doesn’t hate me enough to kill me. It is even considerate enough to fulfill my wish of going to another world. But it seems to want to make me as miserable as possible while doing so. Ok, fate, if I ever find your house, I am going to skip the lemons and just go straight to punching you in the face.

“Oh, I punched fate in the face once!” Watt bounced up in front of Jack before helping one of Nurse Redheart’s assistants load him onto a stretcher. “He didn’t seem to like it very much, but then again I got to meet Glow, even though she was a bit cranky.”

Jack blinked and turned to question Watt when a look of realization came across his face. Slowly, he took a deep breath and placed his hoof gently to his face.

“Candyfloss, Autumn Breeze, Doo, Glow,” He murmured under his breath. “Your name wouldn’t happen to be Watt, would it?”

“Yepperooni!” Watt, then scratched his head. “Why, is it important?”

“No, but things make a lot more sense now,” Jack sighed wearily.

“Oh good,” Watt chirped. After a few moments of silence, Watt coughed. “So, is Pinkie Pie you’re favorite pony?”

“No, but only because I can’t choose between them..”

“Oh really?”

Deciding to throw all pretenses of ignorance out the window, Jack and Watt continued to discuss things that neither party should honestly know about. Ignoring this instinctively, Candyfloss walked calmly over to Nurse Redheart, trying to maintain some sense of composure. As she finished up a standard medical scanning spell on Rylie, her expression set in practiced neutrality and concentration, Candyfloss coughed to get her attention.

“Nurse,” Candyfloss glanced sidelong at Redheart as he faced Rylie. “How is he doing?”

“Well, it looks like he should be fine,” She said, examining the unconscious patient. “However, his right foreleg is broken. I‘ll need to reset it and take him to the hospital to check for any internal injuries as we check the other one out for concussive damage. I probably shouldn’t be saying this, but I hope that that one has a concussion.”

“What makes you say that?” Candyfloss asked, raising an eyebrow as he tried to conceal his curiosity and concern.

“He is holding a conversation with the only pony who can understand Pinkie Pie chatter without getting confused.”

“...Oh.” A few moments later, Candyfloss’ expression became that of barely contained horror as the implications set in. “That’s alarming.”

“Indeed,” The nurse gave the leg another examination. “Well, nothing shows that there will be any serious repercussions from it, so I’ll reset the colt’s leg now.”

At this most inopportune moment, the aforementioned pony woke up, brain back in working order.

“Ugh …” he groaned, stirring as he returned to consciousness. Opening his eyes and taking in the multiple equine faces brought back all that he had learned just a few moments beforehand, his breath catching in his throat and eyelids flying wide open. Slowly, he turned his head and looked around the room before getting disoriented by the new placement of his eyes on his head. Sadly, in his mental haste for rest, he had forgotten one aspect from before: his arm was broken.

Moving said arm brought intense pain back to the forefront of his thoughts. A high-pitched keening-turned-whine suddenly punctuated the room, telling all in hearing distance his exact condition. Rolling around didn’t seem to help, but he did so anyway.

To Nurse Redheart’s credit, the only reason she wasn’t the one to restrain Rylie was that Candyfloss’ magic was faster and more effective. After thanking him for the help and requesting that he keep the earth pony still, she stepped around the stretcher to Rylie’s opposite side, the side with the broken foreleg.

“Now, this is going to hurt, but only for a moment and it’s necessary,” she said to no one in particular, as her patient was obviously not listening and on the verge of hyperventilation. A moment later, after a swift movement punctuated with a blood-curdling cry that left Candyfloss’ white coat seem paler, the situation was resolved, Rylie’s brain deciding unconsciousness was still a better option.

“I hope I never break anything …” the pale unicorn managed, trailing off.

“It isn’t as bad as it seems if you are in good health,” She said simply. “... but it still hurts though. At any rate, I should take him and the loon over there to the hospital just to see if there was anything wrong that I missed, but I think they’ll be fine aside from being sore for the next few days.”

As the hectic atmosphere began to finally wind down, each pony began to notice how exhausted they were. They had a moment trying to get Jack to go with them. While he wasn’t particularly aggressive about it, he seemed rather reluctant and scared of leaving the room. Eventually, they managed to calm him down enough to get him to accompany them and the medical crew was on their way.

“Good day to you, Doctor Candyfloss,” Nurse Redheart said with a nod.

“Same to you, Nurse,” the unicorn replied wearily. After she exited, he was left in the quiet with his employees. Turning and taking in all the damage, he simply sighed, ears laid back against his head. “What a day,” he grumbled.

“What a day indeed …”

The Godly Failure

The Godly Failure

by pyrotigre

As I was forcefully stripped of sleep’s sweet embrace, my bleary eyes fell upon the source of my current state of wakefulness. It seemed Bonny had left the shutters open after watering her flowers. Bonny, my sweet sweet maker. I turned around, my eyes fell upon the love of my life. We were meant for each other. We had known it since that night in Manehatten. I smiled at the pleasant memory: that sunset which had marked the true beginning of us and got up, nearly tripping on a foam model of a person as I did.

It was a fine addition to my collection of human related items, every one of them kept in perfect condition under … hermetically … sealed … glass? ‘What the hay? Why is it out? It seems to be one of the more precious elements of the collection, so what is it doing off its shelf?’ As those thoughts came through my mind, I gave a cursory glance to see which item it was, only to discover none were missing ‘Well, that’s one mystery solved...’ Yet, it raised more questions than it solved... Where did it come from? Was it a gift? If so, from whom? Why would somepony give something like this to me? How had they managed it to get in front of my bed? The very thought of an unknown and possibly dangerous intruder laying eyes on my Bon-Bon left shaking and breathless. ‘If somepony can get in here to get me something, they would have the means of taking either of us out into the night, a weapon in our back, just to kill and bury us under one of AppleJack’s trees...” I was getting noticeably more distressed by the second. I could already feel my eyes watering up as fear took control of my mind. Soon, I was bawling in a useless ball of fur. Everypony did always think I got spooked too easily and got worked up over little things... It was one of many ways in which Bonny and I were totally different. She always was the level headed one, able to keep her head despite it all. Speaking of the lupus...

Once again, the sheets rustled as Bon Bon woke up to my crying one more time. Unlike many others, she was not only patient enough to put up with it, but she found it sweet. Masochist, perhaps? Slightly freaky love of pain aside, she turned around, and saw me. She got up, a gentle comforting smile adorning her lips as she made her way around the bed. What a wonderful mare... I couldn’t have hoped for a better partner to share my life with... Such an angel... She made her way to me, hugged me and petted my mane.

“What is wrong dear?” Her voice was like a soothing cold drink on a hot day, that is to say, much needed and quite welcome

“In...in...intruder...left...ssssomething...by...bed...Could...be...disastrous...” I shakily pointed one of my minty green forehooves at the figurine

“Shhhhhhhh.... It’s alright Lyra, everything is alright... If there was somepony here, they can’t have been that bad.. They left you a present, and if they wanted to harm us, they could have done it in our sleep.” Her cool logic reassured me, and when I say cool logic, I mean warm presence. With her around, nothing can go wrong (except that one time with the parasprite, but that was the exception that makes the rule...).

Having taken hold of my senses, though my mane was still in an unkempt state, much as like my mind. A mess, frayed around the edges but moving on (if barely), I made my way to my new little human lying on the floor. My earlier assessment of it had been an understatement. This piece was not just just fine, but absolutely marvelous! It was by far the most intricate design I had ever seen, matching the now counselor doctor Peterson's Anatomy down to perfect detail. the proportion differed slightly, and so did the facial features and expression. The pose was a bit odd as well, the frightened youthful visage trying to shield itself behind upraised hands, connected to a slightly chubby torso by arms covered by the black collared buttoned up shirt, his tie going past his neck, as if blown back by a heavy wind. Long khaki pants covered his legs and the glasses covering his blue eyes were cracked and askew, having completely come off one eye. If not for the rather macabre expression and dubious origins of the statuette, it would have become the central piece of my humble collection, detailed as it was...

I decided to put it under seal anyway, so I placed on the table to remind myself to do so before turning around to rejoin my voice changing marefriend (she never did find that recipe again... Oh well... It was fun while it lasted.). I would have walked the distance, but it seemed that she had made it for me and was examining figurine as well, so I simply caught her attention with a kiss. Her eyes widened and she returned it before breaking away, a small smile the only remnant of the display of affection, and that only lasted until she ruined our affectionate moment by bringing my attention back to the matter at hoof.

“Any idea who might have got you that?” Her question filled the room and my mind, resonating a bit in the latter. After a moment’s consideration, I share the results of my mental search with her.

“No... None of my usual suppliers have this level of craftponyship, and no one beside them or somepony working closely with counselor Peterson even knows about those details. Now that I think about it, you would need to have seen him, and maybe talked to him, to have any sort of a model to base it off of... It wasn’t somepony I know. My question is: why would a stranger get it to me?” I shuddered as the last sentence left my shaking lips. Sensing another panic fit coming, the cream colored piece of paradise hugged me again.

As I relaxed into the warm embrace, I once again saw the vision from my foalhood: a blindingly bright light, just barely contained by saving hands. These hands are my earliest memory, and from them, I made a creature, and I called that creature a human. It is funny really...I always knew in my heart that they existed, but that was not a popular belief, but, despite the best effort of the orphanage therapist, it persisted. I was finally proved right when the royal guard apprehended Dr. Petterson from the smoldering wreckage of some of his lab, a fact I was all too happy to shove down the throat of all the neigh-sayers I had the misfortune of meeting in the past. He became the most important thing in my life (after Bonny, of course). I gave up my carrier to follow him, study him, talk to him. In retrospect, I realize I should have just asked Twilight about it. After all, she was his mentor and colleague (and still is, as far as I know), so it would have made sense for me to get in contact... Why didn’t I do it? I have no idea. Anyway, I finally got back to my life when he move to canterlot to become a advanced physics teacher at Celestia’s School for gifted unicorns. I would have followed him, but I was banned from the place for ... unsavory reasons.

I paused on that last thought. It was not the best of leads, but it was the best I had. I tightened the hold of my return hug and broke away, a small cocky grin on my muzzle. A little too excited at what may turn out to be one more reason for them to despise me, I quickly shared my thoughts with my partner.

“Celestia’s school for gifted unicorns, materialisation department.”

“I beg your pardon?” The surprised look in her eyes was to die for.

“Celestia’s school for gifted unicorns, materialisation department. It is their job to study the controlled summon of objects. Last time I went by Canterlot, they were working on a way to materialise a mental image. Maybe I didn’t put off the lot of them and one sent me this. Either that or they decided to plant this to off me somehow, but I am fairly sure I didn’t get them that angry.” I smiled hopefully as I finished my theory.

“Someday, you will have to tell me what you did... That aside, the whole thing seems more than a bit far fetched, honey...”

“It’s our only lead! I was right about the humans, wasn’t I? I would think you would put a little more trust in my assumption by now.” I was a little disappointed with her. We had the same type of conversation about hand, pants, sitting oddly, and humans in general. I had hoped that she would trust me on these kinds of things by this point. On top of that, we had no other theories or even leads to work from...

“Fine. We’ll go, but only because I know you’d leave me behind if I didn’t come.” I whooped at the news. She might not believe me and might say it was just for protection, but I was glad to have at least a little moral support. We were suddenly tangled up once more in another show of affection. We might have our differences and fights, but we were meant for each other. Much as in other similar instances, this moment was ours. There was no shadowy pony giving me weird stuff. The public scorn haunting me was non existent and no one cared about the events that got me banned from several magical research facilities all over the country. I was hers and she was mine, and it was all that mattered.

After a long train ride to Canterlot the next morning, we exited the train station. We had been stopped along the way, and all the passengers had been checked several times over, displaying that the capital was on high alert. Once again, hindsight displays the missed omen warning of impending disaster. All the guards seemed on high alert and shortly after we had entered city limits, a message go to their head. Immediately, all tracked were closed and all entrances through the walls became heavily guarded. At the time, I believed that it was just another global mishap the elements of harmony of somepony else would fix, leaving most of the world unaffected.

Ignoring the deserted streets, we laboriously made our way towards the school. It was in one of the upper reaches of Canterlot, meaning we had to trot for a couple hours before arriving in the golden gates of the citadel, where we encountered a major hurdle. It seemed they were not letting anypony in or out of the citadel, which meant, unfortunately for us, that we would have to discreetly make our way in using earth pony means, as I doubted I could teleport myself, much less the two of us. It was going to be hard, but I had previous experiences in the city on my side, and most of them had ended quite badly. As such, I had learned of many ways into the citadel only few knew existed. Yet, this day, I would not use any of these, for if they were on so high an alert, they would have dug out the blueprints and guarded those as well... No. I would need to use one passage I was taught about. A passage no one will be happy to use. I would drag my beloved through the old sewer system. She would not be happy at all, but on the bright side, it looked like the local weather schedule was set for rain later, and that would give us a chance to wash off a bit. With or without the rain, it was possibly going to be the worst experience in my and Bonny's life.

After several hours in the least pleasant areas our shining capitol had to offer (most of which were silent, lest millennia old excrement get a second go in a digestive track) and a shower in one of the cheaper places of the district (which was still way too much), we finally arrived at our destination. Bon Bon was still glaring daggers at me for putting her through all that. I am fairly certain that if the roles were reversed, I would already have gone home by myself, and forcibly dragged her behind. I am quite the selfish pony, am I not? There we were, in the rain, about to enter with trepidation, when a white unicorn sporting a black mane and an artistic representation of an atom passed by us. She halted suddenly and looked at me, slightly puzzled.

“Aren’t you that unicorn? The one who nearly destroyed half of one of the experimental magic buildings?” Her questions left me glancing awkwardly at the muddy ground.

“YOU NEARLY BLEW UP A BUILDING? WHAT DID YOU DO? EXPLANATION. NOW.” I could understand her shock. It is not everyday that you find out the pony you have shared your life with for some time has a bit shadier past than you thought, after all. Don’t get me wrong. I never got into much trouble on purpose, but accidents do happen.

“I probably should not have barged in again... They were sick of my face anyway, and I am fairly sure that they would have banned me even if I didn’t break their concentration during a dangerous experiment... I bet they’ll throw me out the second they see me” I muttered shamefully. They both looked at me for a moment, and it was getting a little awkward for all parties involved. Then, the mystery unicorn guffawed heartilly at the situation.

“You know, I like you. I doubt you’ll be able to go near that department again, but you can stay at my dorm room for now. Here. Let me show you the way,” and with that, she trotted off in the rain. I followed her, but Bon Bon seemed to be having trouble moving (and closing her mouth). I came back and used my hoof to shut her mouth, and a combination of that and magic to get moving along.

A quick stroll in the now evening and we found ourself in a small spartan looking bedroom. it contained a wardrobe, a mirror, a one pony bed and a small table, which held our stuff. All of our items were still neatly packaged, well... all but one. Theory Point, as we had come to find out she was called, had wanted to know what brought us here, especially considering my history with the place, so I told her while the still shocked love of my life was walking stiffly beside us. After hearing about it, our new friend had decided that she want to have a look at the odd piece of art, so she was currently levitating it close to her face to examine it closely.

“That is fine work, a bit macabre, but definitely the best I have seen at this size, regardless of the subject. Look at these details! They even put tears of blood to complete the theme!” I looked at her suddenly in the eyes.

“Tears of blood? It didn’t have any when we left!” I took a closer look. The blood seemed fresh, and it had that real coppery smell... I lifted my hoof to try to wipe it away, and I touched the eye that had been stripped of the protecting shield of his glasses. With a click, it went backwards into its socket, releasing a maelstrom of light. It was utter and complete chaos. The head opened like a box, tendrils of light shooting out every which way. One struck the mare of my dreams, and she fell limply to the ground.

“BON BON!” I yelled, but she would not move. soon, the light seemed to have found a new target: me. One of the tendrils made contact with my horn, and that opened the pandora’s box. a blinding white pain flashed through my skull as all the rest of the cataclysm in the little room focused on me. It drained into my skull, leaving nothing but darkness and I crumpled to the floor too.

My head was pounding like it never had before, hazy memories coming to the surface. A dorm room, light...

“Eli? Are you OK? Where are you?” My voice sounded off, somehow oddly high pitched. It was natural, yet it wasn’t. What the heck had happened? More recent memories came in blinding rapidity. An orphanage, being tormented, rain, pain, solace, shared life, being proved right, and finally, another flash of light. A lifetime's worth of memories had just poured back into my brain. Who was I? Was anything I knew real? Human or pony? Neither and both, perhaps. My musing were interrupted by a soft voice. I think it might have been Theory, but by this point, I am certain of nothing. Well, I have one thing I am certain of, and that was that it was high time to have a talk with counselor Peterson. Suddenly, I realized that I had forgotten someone, or rather, somepony.

“BON BON! Are you alright?” I suddenly exclaimed. Whatever had been said to me before was lost in the spiral that was my mind. My eyes shot open and I rushed to stand, falling back down shortly after. I tried again, slower this time and got my hooves under me unsteadily. I fell once more as I reached the mare who had accepted me and had been there for me all these years. She was breathing, but her eyes seemed glassy. A quick light test later, I had established that something was deeply wrong. her pupils weren’t dilating or retracting. I sat there, pointedly ignoring Theory Point as I cried myself into unconsciousness.