Night Eyes And The Quest For Coffee
The First True Fanfic that I ever wrote
Night Eyes had always been somewhat strange compared to other ponies. For starters he had always preferred night (hence the name “Night Eyes”) where other ponies cared only for day. That is why he was overjoyed when Nightmare Moon had created an eternal night during the Summer Sun Celebration, only to have these feelings crushed when the sun rose once again when Princess Luna was redeemed. Perhaps the most obvious difference was that despite the fact that he was an Earth Pony he had zero connection to nature. In fact he spent the vast majority of his life behind the stonewalls of Canterlot. However it is the tale of how he unintentionally saved all of Equestria for the sake of a single cup of coffee that truly shows his oddity. And that is the story you are about to read.
It was a day that had begun like any other for Night Eyes, with him groggy and tired despite having slept well into the day. For you see he was a Writer and almost everything from his dark Brown untidy mane to his Quill and Scroll Cutie Mark showed it. He worked well into the night and slept until it was almost noon each day. Each morning he would journey to his local Café to seek out the one fuel that kept him going, caffeine. As he walked along the busy road his white mane shinned in the sun as he squinted his Deep Blue eyes. The sun’s just too bright! He thought to himself, longing for night.
At last he entered the café where he met the familiar owners who smiled to see him return as he had every day.
“The usual?” asked the clerk.
Night Eyes nodded and the clerk wrote the order down and sent it to the unseen kitchen. Night Eyes stood waiting by the counter, as his order rarely took very long as it consisted of a single cup of coffee and one doughnut. But something was wrong; the order didn’t appear as swiftly as usual. He continued to wait until the clerk told him the bad news.
“It seems were all out of coffee today would you like anything else instead?”
Night Eyes’ face twitched slightly upon hearing this news.
After a short pause he asked in disbelief “all out of coffee?”
The mare at the counter cheerfully responded “yes sir that’s correct were all out of coffee, would you like anything else?”
Night Eyes quietly muttered to himself “no, no, no …this can’t be true.” The mare almost asked him if he needed help but a loud cry had come from Night Eyes “THIS CANNOT BE!”
Oblivious to all else in the café, Night Eyes stormed through the door continuing to scream “THIS CANNOT BE!” The mare starred perplexed at the door for several seconds before simply shrugging and acting as though nothing had happened.
In a state of desperation, Night Eyes went to nearly every café in Canterlot in search of one that hadn’t yet sold its coffee. He failed. Curiously every café had said the same thing “I’m sorry sir, but all of our coffee was recently bought by somepony named Drocsid.” Now anypony in their right mind would wonder why a single pony would want so much coffee, but unfortunately Night Eyes wasn’t I his right mind. In his near comatose state, Night Eyes saw only one option left; he would have to requisition coffee from Guardsmen’s Surplus.
Now your probably asking yourself what exactly the Guardsmen’s Surplus is, or how Night Eyes would have access to it. Well to answer the first question first, the Guardsmen’s Surplus is essentially a large vault for the castle guards. Guards were given ration tickets roughly every week, and they could travel to the Guardsmen’s Surplus and exchange tickets for nearly anything imaginable. Growing up, Night Eyes had been friends with a Colt who would later join the Royal Guard. As a friend, Night Eyes was mailed a single ration ticket per month. Now keep in mind that with one ticket, coffee and knick-knacks were the only things Night Eyes could ever dream to requisition. On this day getting that cup of coffee to start the day was the only thing on Night Eyes mind and although the Surplus coffee was probably the worst tasting in all of Equestria (and perhaps all of reality as well) Night Eyes was out of options.
The Surplus was a small building that lay overtop of a large underground warehouse. There was a single clerk standing behind the front desk who was quietly reading a book. Night Eyes immediately recognized the cover.
This book was part of his moderately successful series of adventure novels about fictional pony explorer, Rock Hoof. Though the series was generally well received, the third novel was always disliked. It wasn’t that it was poorly written per se; rather it was extremely fast passed. This caused certain key plot elements to be muddled and led to the almost universal response “it made no sense.”
Night Eyes rang the bell on the counter and the clerk looked up.
Unexcitedly he asked “what can I get for you today?”
“I’d like to requisition some coffee please” Night Eyes said while handing forward his ticket.
The clerk flipped through a warehouse log to see if the item was in demand and after a short pause responded “I’m sorry sir all of our coffee was requisitioned earlier today.”
“For Celestia’s sake, who could have requisitioned all that coffee?” barked a very annoyed Night Eyes.
“Somepony named Drocsid.” the clerk responded
“Are you sure your out of every single blend?” Night Eyes frantically asked.
The clerk flipped through the log once more to double check. “Actually sir we do have one type of Coffee left” the clerk said.
“What is it?” asked Night Eyes.
“Decaf!” said the clerk, suddenly invigorated.
At this point Night Eyes felt utterly crushed. This Pony Drocsid had bought out all the coffee in Canterlot, and all that remained was decaf! Night Eyes now let out a cry greater than any heard before or since.
He screamed “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” So loudly that it caused the very earth to shake. Miles away in the mountain range near Canterlot; a young mare was hiking while on vacation from Ponyville. The titanic shout from Night Eyes caused several boulders to come crashing down in front of this mare only to reveal a large cache of gems. This mare would later make a fortune selling these rare jewels, and own one of the largest estates in all of Equestria.
After having run out of the surplus, Night Eyes went home to think things through. He came to a single conclusion, this “Drocsid” was up to something nefarious. Why else would he buy all the coffee in Canterlot? One mad thought burst into his mind, Celestia must be informed.
Now this was by far one of the most foolish ideas that anypony has ever had. Rush into the royal throne room unannounced and cry out to Princess Celestia herself that Canterlot was out of coffee. However if it weren’t for this terrible idea, all of Equestria would be in a state of chaos and suffering.
After a long gallop, Night Eyes finally reached the palace. At first he feared that the Royal guards would deny him passage, but when he reached the entrance he had found that the guards were nowhere to be found. Night Eyes concluded that they had all passed out due to lack of caffeine (he was wrong, the guards simply happened to be changing posts and those guards who would have seen and detained him were sent away to investigate the nearby avalanche caused by Night Eyes’ titanic “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”).
Night Eyes continued his gallop uninterrupted until he reached the throne room where he saw Princess Celestia talking to six mares. He recognized these six, as they had been the same ponies that defeated Nightmare Moon and Discord.
When Night Eyes had entered the room, everyone starred at him for a few seconds wondering how he had managed to get in.
“Who the hay are you?” asked the blue Pegasus whom he recognized as Rainbow Dash
“My name is Night Eyes, and I desperately need to speak with Princess Celestia.”
“Let me guess, this is about somepony named Drocsid isn’t it?” said Twilight Sparkle.
“Yes, he’s stolen all of the coffee in Canterlot!”
“Coffee?” Said Applejack “Y’all came all this way to tell us that Canterlot’s out of coffee?”
“You don’t understand I… I… I NEED IT!” responded a seemingly unstable Night Eyes.
“Okay…” Twilight Sparkle responded while trying to get further away from Night Eyes
“So it seems you to are having troubles with Discord.” Said Princess Celestia
“Discord, milady?” asked a confused and slightly terrified Night Eyes “I thought Discord was turned to stone by the Elements of Harmony.”
“He was, but recently he found a way to break free.” answered Celestia “He has used his reality warping powers to take the guise of a pony calling him self Drocsid (an anagram of his true name) in order to torment ponies across Equestria.”
“We were discussing a plan to stop him before you burst in.” Rainbow Dash picked up. “But we needed a pony who Discord had never met before to pull it off and seeing how he took all your “precious” coffee I think you’re just the pony we need.”
Night Eyes’ heart raced at those words. To travel with six heroes, help defeat Discord, and save Equestria. It would be like the novels he loved to read. One word buzzed around his mind
“Yes!” he responded having gained new vigor from this turn of events.
“Excellent!” Celestia resounded “I have a Carriage ready to take you all to the Everfree Forrest, where Discord has set up his “throne” leave as soon as you are ready, good luck everypony!”
And with those words everypony set of with a gallop. Night Eyes had no idea where he was going but simply followed the others until the reached the carriage.
This carriage looked like nothing out of the ordinary except for the fact it was pulled by Royal guards. Everypony got in and the journey had begun.
The trek to the Everfree Forrest was a strangely quiet one as everyone quietly prepared for what they hopped to be a simple task. It was only when the carriage had neared it’s destination that Twilight Sparkle broke the silence.
“Alright let’s review the plan.” She said. “Night Eyes your job is to talk to Discord and distract him while we sneak up behind him and use the elements.”
“Sounds good.” Night Eyes responded. “I can’t wait to give this coffee stealing jerk a piece of my mind!”
“That’s the spirit!” barked Rainbow Dash.
The cart stopped then and everypony knew that it was time to get out. The first thing Night Eyes noticed was a large column of light that was shooting down from the now night time sky into a ring of trees that had all been forced into place by Discord. The bark on these trees writhed and warped constantly as if alive.
“Remember just keep him talking and we’ll do the rest.” Twilight said.
“I’m on it.” Night Eyes responded adding, “good luck.”
As the Elements of Harmony moved to sneak up on Discord, Night Eyes stepped forward to at last seek vengeance for the theft of his precious coffee. Discord sat on a large throne that constantly writhed and shifted like the trees around him.
Discord spotted Night Eyes immediately and shouted, “Ah, hello Night Eyes so good to meet you at last!”
“You know me?” Night Eyes responded shocked.
“I’ve read your books.” Said Discord. “Personally I thought all except the third one were terribly boring.”
“You liked the third one?” asked Night Eyes.
“Why I loved it!” Discord Cheered “It made absolutely no sense what so ever!”
“Of course.” Night Eyes quietly muttered to himself.
“I’d love to chat but I’m afraid that you and I have some business that needs doing.” Discord said.
“Business?” asked Night Eyes. “I thought you preferred chaos.”
“No more stalling, I know that Celestia sent you here along with the Elements of Harmony to take me down!” as Discord said this the trees in the ring came crashing down and the others were exposed. “I’d like to make you an offer Night Eyes.”
“What offer could you possibly make with me?” Night Eyes responded.
“Well you see I drank all this coffee I got from Canterlot this morning and I know just the pony to give the last cup.” Discord held up a single cup of coffee as he spoke. “I’d gladly give it to you if you stole the elements from those six mares over there.
Discord moved to corrupt Night Eyes, but before he could Night Eyes had rushed over to the others at light speed. He took the five golden necklaces and one golden Tiara so quickly that no pony had any time to react before it was too late.
“Wow, I had no I didn’t even think you’d do that willingly!” he shouted overjoyed.
“Coffee, NOW!” commanded Night Eyes.
“It’s all yours.” Discord said, mug in hand.
Night Eyes reached his hoof forward, looking forward to finally enjoying this coffee at last. When his hoof got close to the mug Discord instantly crushed it in his fist, leaving Night Eyes to helplessly watch as the warm liquid spilled onto the ground.
As Discord laughed, rage filled Night Eyes. He had come so far in the hopes of getting this coffee only to see the last of it gone for good. Night Eyes dropped the Elements of Harmony slowly stepped back to gain distance from Discord. All but Discord knew what was about to happen and were overjoyed by it.
Night Eyes charged at Discord in blind fury moving faster than any Earth pony had before. Discord’s attempts at warping reality in order to stop this charge seemed useless while Night Eyes was in this berserker like state.
What happened next was beyond description. Night Eyes pummeled Discord with seemingly unnatural strength, and Discord was helpless to fight back. Discord saw only one way to stop this attack and that was to turn himself into stone just as the Elements of Harmony would have. Equestria had been saved.
Night Eyes had snapped out of his battle trance almost immediately after Discord was defeated and remembered nothing from that struggle.
“You did it, you defeated Discord!” shouted Twilight Sparkle.
As the other ponies cheered Night Eyes picked up a scent on the wind. The smell he recognized well, and knew it could only be one thing. Coffee. Discord had lied, for all the coffee hadn’t been drunk but simply made invisible. Several large crates full of coffee from across Canterlot were to the side of the now stone Discord and the top one was open. Night Eyes reached in, grabbed a cup, and quickly drank it.
And while there were celebrations and ceremonies that followed that night, none of it compared to drinking that one-cup of coffee at last in Night Eyes mind. And had it not been for the obsessive quest for coffee from one strange pony, Equestria wouldn’t have been saved.
Author's Note
This was the first proper Fanfic that I had ever written, looking back on it, I can say that it's not the worst thing of mine that I've ever read, and that is far more than I could have ever hoped for! I honestly don't remember all of the inspirations for this story, I do remember that I was I decided to make Discord the villain because I thought he was a cool character, and the main plot about not being able to get coffee was "strongly inspired" (dare I say, stolen) by a very old short webseries based on Warhammer 40k Dawn of War called A Day in the Life of a Commissar. If you've seen that series, I'm sure you'll recognize the scene I stole wholesale right away.
The main thing that struck me about this story was the strange, random kind of memey humor that's present. I seriously haven't written any comedy work in years (and I've never written a comedy Fanfic since I left this site), I'm not sure if it's actually funny or not, and even if it were, I'm not sure if I could ever write anything like this ever again. I've changed a lot since I wrote this story late in 2011, I honestly feel like a completely different person.
Regardless, looking at this story again was interesting for me if nothing else.
-Lost_One, 8/7/19