Oh the Humanity! A Si Fron and Stormcaller Tale

Chapters

Chapter 1: Pants
Chapter 2: Brushie
Chapter 3:Hue-Mans

Chapter 1: Pants

Chapter 1: Pants. No, I'm serious.

Darkness... The best starting point for practically anything story related. In the spiritual sense, it is the starting point for a journey into metaphorical Light. In a physical sense, it is an absence of light that one must search for. For the unconscious protagonist, it is often the first thing they notice mentally before they think to open their eyes.

Well, save for this figure. The first thing he noticed consciously was the noise. He always was woken up by some sort of noise and he hated it because, nine times out of nine, he would always be in the middle of some interesting dream. Even though he wasn't dreaming about bizarre worlds or crazy characters born form figments of his imagination, he still didn't appreciate the interruption.

As he responded to this unpleasantness by turning over, he began to notice a few other things. The first and foremost being that he was very uncomfortable. It was no surprise seeing how the bed he was laying in was very hard and felt like it had grass covering it. The distinct possibility that he might actually be on the ground occurred to him as he felt himself roll onto something distinctly weed-like. Being the stick in the mud that has never gone to a party to get himself plastered, he was startled and genuinely confused as to why he was lying on the ground.

He started to panic inwardly as the noise that forced the figure to wake up earlier rose in volume a bit. As he listened to it, he realized that it was a group of people murmuring. Hundreds of scenarios involving him being in some sort of humiliating position in public, most likely naked, bubbled to the surface of his mind. Dreading the possibilities, he reluctantly opened his eyes, knowing that he had to face the situation he was in at some point or another. Once the figure’s eyes opened, he was greeted to the sight of ponies surrounding him and chattering among themselves.

His mind stalled for a moment as all of the details of odd looking, multicolored talking ponies flooded it through his eyeballs. The scent of grass wafting to his nose, reminding him that there were other senses to pay attention to, jump-started the lump of grey matter right into overdrive. Within seconds, he scrambled onto his hind hooves in panic as his bewilderment seized the controls. He, however, had only just enough time to register the fact that he was trying to stand upright on hooves before gravity and the evolutionary traits of equines sent him plummeting back onto the ground with a hard thud.

As he lay on his back in a daze, his mind took the opportunity to distract him with the fact that he was still in his regular daytime clothes while it still could save his sanity. His white shirt, which now pinched where his new armpits were, was a bit tight on his hooved forelegs and the sleeves didn’t reach all the way down to the end. His black pants also were hugging his hind legs a bit tightly and severely hampering his attempts to wiggle them. A second later, he remembered that he was now vaguely equine in shape when he saw that the fur coat on his forelegs was just as white, if not brighter, than the shirt he wore.

Before the pony could investigate, scream, or continue to react in any other reasonable way, a decidedly pink pony popped up right in his face and introduced herself.

“HI!” Yelled the pink pony. “I’m Pinkie Pie!”

The white pony then passed out from the resulting mental breakdown. A few moments later, he was once again forced awake by outside influences. Once again, his mind jumped through the same hoops it did before. This time, however, he settled for just being startled instead going straight to full blown panic the moment he saw the pink pony shaking him with one of her forehooves. When this was all said and done, he leapt to all four hooves awkwardly and confronted the oddity.

As he looked at her, he noticed that the pony’s mane was styled rather like hair. Or rather, as many fashionable ponies would argue, not styled at all, seeing as how it was more like a giant, poofy set of knots and curls. On her flank was a set of balloons, one yellow and two blue, with her eyes matching the blue ones. Before he could fully comprehend this and its implications, the pink pony began to chatter rapidly with a light and bubbly voice.

“Hi there again! Are you ok, because the first time I was walking down the street to find a store because me and Rarity had run out of snacks again and I was kinda getting hungry so I went down the street to buy some when I heard a big commotion and thought ‘Wow! That’s a lot of ponies in the park, I wonder if they’re having a party,’ so I came over here and saw all of the other ponies crowded around you so I decided to come up to you and say hi but you were asleep so I waited and waited and waited and waited until you finally woke up and were like ‘AAAAH!’ and tried to stand up on your hind legs way too fast and, trust me, I would know since I practice that a lot so I can get stuff like flour and sugar and cookies out of those really high up cabinets without getting my hooves all over everything and so I can get it down a lot easier and-“

The mare paused for a moment, even not looking winded in the slightest. She put one of her forehooves to her chin in thought for a moment before she asked, in a very simple manner,

“What were we talking about again?”

Finally snapping out of his stupor, the white stallion shook his head. He then looked and blinked furiously at the pony for a moment more before his eyes widened in shock and recognition. He had seen this pony before, but not in like this. With her form covered with the complex shadows and textures that are harder to describe than they are to see, it had been hard to tell that this was the same Pinkie Pie from the cartoon My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. It was all he could do to stammer as his brain tried to process this impossible happening.

“P-p-p-p-p-p-p-p-p-p-p-p,” he stammered as if his mind had been caught in an endless loop.

“OOOoooOOOOO!” replied the familiar pink pony in an excited tone. “A guessing game! Ok! Ummmmmm, potatoes! How about pirates? No wait, popcorn! Oh wait, I know! It’s-“

“PINKIE PIE!”

It should be noted at this point that it was somepony else that shouted Pinkie Pie. While it may seem out of place, it should also be noted that the white pony is a tad paranoid. As he stammered, one of the thoughts in his head managed to drown out some of the others in the cacophony that was his brain. This dangerous jerk of a thought went around to every neurotic spot in the brain and claimed that this situation is so impossible that he must have fallen into a coma at some point and that this was all a hyper- realistic dream based on the aforementioned cartoon show. If it had more time, it would have eventually won over even the most optimistic of hopes and drove the poor person turned pony truly insane.

However, the sensation of having a dark blue coated, green and sky-blue maned Pegasus jump on you from the top of a building several stories high while he screams out the name of his favorite pony leads to a feeling of pain so unique that if you haven’t felt it before, then it would be impossible to replicate even in the most accurate coma induced dream. The fact hit home as the white pony experienced this distinctive pain and came to the realization as he passed out for the second time that day that everything that he is experiencing is very real, much to his misfortune. This resulted in the thought that had been trying to drive the pony into madness being promptly and metaphorically beaten up and tossed in a pile with the rest of the idiotic thoughts in the brain along with 'I hate everything because...' and 'Hey, wouldn't it be a good idea if...' thoughts.

The white pony awoke in a much fluffier spot this time, although it occurred to him almost immediately that something was wrong. He opened his eyes slowly and turned his head in a slow sweeping motion and his gaze was greeted with the sight of the pegasus stallion who had jumped on him and the pink pony known as Pinkie Pie chattering off to the side of his bed. As insane as that normally would be under ordinary circumstances, the splitting headache that was, thankfully enough, wearing off was proof enough that he wasn’t experiencing some coma-dream.

Feeling too timid and cautious to speak to them at that moment, he sat up as silently as he could and scanned the room in an effort to make sense of his surroundings. From what he could tell, the place seemed like an ordinary fancy hotel room. It was even complete with all the standard furnishings as his eyes passed over the standard bed, closet, coat rack, mini fridge, table, and couch. While he questioned how the ponies who used this room were able to manipulate the various objects with comfort and ease, he concluded that there was nothing wrong with the room itself.

He continued to sit there in bed for a minute before climbing out from underneath the covers. It was at this moment when the thought finally occurred to the unfortunate stallion when he noticed that he could now move more easily: He had somehow become naked. He may have been in a society that didn’t mind this at that moment, but the stallion was feeling very self conscious about it nonetheless. He had been raised in a society that frowned upon indecency, after all, due to their body structure not favoring the ideals of concerned parents. In seconds he was back underneath the covers and nervously peeking out from underneath them, his eyes dashing all across the room in a desperate bid to locate his now ill fitting shirt and pants. This did not go unnoticed by the pegasus nearby, who felt it was necessary to greet the unfortunate soul quivering on the hotel bed.

“Oh hi there! Sorry about falling on you from the top of a three story building, but I really wanted to fly since I just became a pony a few hours ago although I may have been a pony for longer than that since I wasn’t awake when I was turned into one which is funny because that always happens in fan fictions, the not being conscious while being transformed bit not the being transformed bit in general, and I have always wondered what it was like being turned into a pony although I suppose if it was painful I am really glad I wasn’t awake because then I would be all like AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH and in pain and all sorts of other not fun things and no amount of super awesome powers or ancient baddies to beat up would make up for it although I did meet Pinkie Pie but even then………”

He paused and put one of his hooves to his chin. After trying to puzzle it out, he turned to the pink mare to ask, “What was I talking about again?”

“You were talking about why you were jumping off a three story building before you started talking about what it would be like to get turned into a pony,” offered Pinkie Pie helpfully.

“Thanks!”

“No problem. Trust me, I know what that’s like.”

“Anyway, I had turned into a pony- but not just any pony a Pegasus pony as you can see- and before I was a human, which is sort of like an ape only without any hair, and humans don’t have wings so I never flew before and I really wanted to do it so I started running and flapping my wings like I’ve seen other pegasi do on TV but I wasn’t flying so I decided to see if jumping off of a really high building would somehow cause me to figure out how to fly super duper well before I turned into a pony pancake –which, by the way, wouldn’t have been very tasty at all unless you were some kind of evil meat eating pony in which case maybe I would taste just a little bit funny- but I still fell and I was about to go splat when I saw Pinkie Pie and I was really super duper excited and went ‘PINKIE PIE!’ because I am a really big fan of hers and I am often told that I act like her even though I really don’t know why they tell me that and then I fell on you! Sorry about that, by the way.”

The white pony said nothing for a moment, deciding to stare at Pinkie in concern. After seeing nothing but a blank expression on her face, he finally decided to speak to the blue Pegasus, giving him the best ‘What on Equestria were you thinking!?’ look as he did so.

“Why did you mention that you were a you-know-what?” he hissed nervously through clenched teeth.

The blue Pegasus cocked his head in curiosity. He stared at the white pony in thought before a grin broke out on his face. Then he began to giggle softly at first before it developed into full a full blown belly laugh. After a moment of this, the stallion stopped to catch his breath and started explaining his position once he had stopped panting so heavily.

“Because I didn’t know if you were a normal pony or not, silly! And if you were a normal pony, which is obvious now that you aren’t because you asked that question, then you would go around thinking that I was some sort of crazy normal pony who just realized that he has never flown before and not realize that I wasn’t originally a pony so I told you. And why is being a human a bad thing? I mean, I know that a bunch of us have been known to do lots of bad stuff, but that doesn’t mean that ALL humans are bad. In fact, I know a bunch of humans online who are all very nice and love My Little Pony and aren’t meany pants at all! Oh! Maybe we can talk to each other online if we somehow get internet here! My username is Stormcaller! In fact, I am also using it as my pony name! Hello!“

At this point the white pony remembered who the blue pegasus was. It was a pity that the earth pony wasn’t drinking a glass of water, because the spit take would have been perfect given the amount of shock that hit his brain once it made the connection. Fans of the spit-take cliche suddenly felt very depressed at the missed opportunity.

“STORMCALLER!?”

“Eeyup! That’s what I said!” Then a look of realization came upon StormCaller . “Wait a second... Are you one of the ponies I hang out with online!?”

The white pony nodded.

“Y-y-yes! It’s me, GodBlogger, although I would like to be called Si Fron here.”

Stormcaller then broke out into the largest smile that Si Fron had ever seen and tackled said pony in a hug.

“OHMYGOSHOHMYGOSHOHMYGOSH! I CAN’T BELIEVE IT! Well I mean I can but it just is so incredible that I felt like I had to say that!”

Si Fron, not used to such treatment, swiftly, but politely, broke away and got off the bed, once again wrapping himself in the bed sheets.

“I can’t believe it either! I mean, how did you get here?” asked the former human, the staggering amount of shock in his voice displaying itself very apparently. The Pegasus paused at this and looked towards the ceiling in thought. Eventually, he returned his gaze to his friend and shrugged with his wings.

“I dunno. When I came to, I was asleep underneath a newspaper. Apparently, everypony thought I was a hobo or something and didn’t bother seeing what I was doing and whatnot.” He then paused and turned to Pinkie. “Does Equestria have hobos?”

“Only if they want to be hobos,” Cheerfully replied the bubbly mare.

“Fair enough. So yeah, nopony gathered around me like they did with you. By the way, do you know how you got here? I mean here in Equestria, not here in the hotel room because you were clearly unconscious when me and Pinkie dragged you up here and you probably wouldn’t have known that unless you really weren’t unconscious in which case I have to say that was a really Meany McMeanerson thing to do because you were HEAVY and it would have been a whole lot easier if you walked up here yourself! No offense.”

“Umm, I was unconscious, but still, none taken, ” Replied Si Fron, who had realized by this point that he was just an earth pony since he didn’t feel anything weighing down on his back or anything resembling a horn on his forehead as he massaged it with his left fore hoof. “I don’t remember how I got to Equestria either.”

“Oh well, maybe this is like a fanfiction and we’ll figure that out later when the big bad reveals his sinister plot or something!” StormCaller then began giggling. “Heeheeheeheehee, plot.”

Si Fron rolled his eyes at this before remembering the reason for this somewhat pleasant revelation. He turned to face Pinkie Pie, mentally preparing himself to do damage control to whatever else StormCaller had told the naturally sentient equine as the aforementioned pegasus giggled at the mention of plot.

“Well, I guess he told you that he was a human already, huh?”

“Of course! He also told me about how all of you humans do all sorts of silly things like wear clothes all the time, walk around on two legs, and have elections every few years to see who gets to run the country instead of having somepony like Celestia take care of things. He was also about to tell me about something called MLP, but then you woke up and he got all distracted with apologizing to you and explaining that he was a human and you two realizing that you were best friends and that the word plot is funny!”

The white earth pony let out a breath that he didn’t know he had been holding in. If they learned that, in another universe at least, they all were just cartoon characters, things could get more serious and problematic than he could deal with at the moment. He was still reeling from the fact that he and some guy he knew from an online comments section had been turned into ponies and thrown into Equestria. He was pretty sure that he didn’t have the patience to deal with an existential crisis or two from Pinkie Pie or any of her other friends.

“That’s a relief.”

“Huh?" Pinkie Pie blinked and gave the black maned stallion a funny look. "What do you mean?”

“Um, I mean that I am relieved that you are taking this in stride and that you aren’t freaking out or thinking that we are crazy or something!” Si Fron quickly yelped, trying to cover up his mistake.

“Well of course! Why would anypony, or rather, anyhuman lie about what they were? Even so, it was a bit harder to convince Rarity, but after a little bit of explaining she believed us!”

“Wait a second,” Interrupted Si Fron. “Rarity is here too?”

“Why of course!” Chimed the very unicorn they had been talking about.

Rarity, with her stylish purple mane and dazzling white fur, trotted in with all of the grace anypony can muster. She had a pencil in her ear and her red glasses dangling from her neck by the gold chain they were attached to. Her eyes looked towards Stormcaller with a little bit of suspicion, but she held her peace and continue to speak in a pleasant manner.

“I’m so sorry about What had happened to you earlier. I hope that you are alright now."

"I am now, since the headache has subsided a bit," Si Fron nodded. "Although I am still a bit sore though..." As Stormcaller smiled ashamedly, Si Fron nervously rubbed the back of his head. "Umm, say.. I know this may be weird, but... uhh, do you know where my clothes are?"

"Oh, I took them. They were just so horribly designed and poorly adjusted that I had to take them off for your sake!”

Si Fron gaped for a moment before realization and indignation overtook him.

“You took my clothes!” He pointed at her out of the reflexive need to be dramatic.

“That is what I said,” Rarity said, raising an eyebrow at his reaction.

“B-but they were still on my body!” Si Fron half-stammered in indignation.

“You were uncomfortable,” She tried to reason back.

“But they were on my body!" He repeated. "And now I’m naked!”

“It’s ok sweetie," Rarity laid a hoof on his shoulder, trying to change tactics from reason to comfort. "We don’t mind it.”

“But I do! It’s embarrassing!" He said wildly. "And you undressed me! Isn’t that indecent?”

Rarity sighed in mild defeat.

“It isn’t going to change the fact that most other ponies aren’t going to be wearing clothes at all most of the time,” She said gently, subtly dodging the other point he brought up. “If they aren't going to care, then why should you be embarrassed about a silly little thing like not having any clothes yourself?”

Si Fron let the words sink in for a moment. His eyes darted from pony to pony briefly before he broke out into a full on blush. Swiftly, he dived underneath the frame of the bed. As he did so, he dragged the covers with him and pulled them over his eyes in an effort not to be an unintentional pervert. Rarity face hoofed at the white earth pony’s behavior while Pinkie Pie and Stormcaller began giggling.

“Wow,” The party pony said in between giggles. “That’s pretty silly.”

“I know!” Agreed StormCaller during his own bout of giggles. “I can’t believe he didn’t realize that we were nudists until just now!”

It had taken their combined efforts and the promise of Si Fron’s old outfit to get the sensitive Earth pony to finally come out of the bed, but after a good hour, they had succeeded. Although his face was permanently stained with a blush as he joined them in his ill fitting outfit, Si Fron did his best to remain calm and as fluster free as possible.

“So, are you sure you want to wear those ragged, oddly made things?” Inquired Rarity as she sat down at the table. “I am sure it can’t be pleasant or fashionable in the slightest.”

“I’m sure. To be honest, I feel much more comfortable this way,” He mentioned as he tried sitting down on the other side of the table, shifting from position to position in an attempt to get comfortable. He winced as the shirt cut into his shoulders and his pants squeezed part of his legs as he endeavored to do so. “At least emotionally.”

“Maybe you could ask Rarity to make you a new set! Suggested the pink mare as she took a position next to her 100% equine friend. "She is still trying to come up with a last minute design for the main showcase after all.”

“I couldn’t," Si Fron shook his head as StormCaller plopped down next to him. "It wouldn’t be right to ask something from either of you if I couldn’t pay for it.”

“Oh trust me, darling, it wouldn’t be much trouble at all! Well, maybe a little when it comes to those pants,” Rarity debated, both with herself and the white stallion. “But the challenge may be just what I need to be on the cutting edge! I mean, an item as bizarre as pants normally aren’t practical or fashionable for ponies, but if a few alterations were made in just the right spots and the design was adjusted ever so slightly…. Oh! Ideeaaa!”

Quickly, she rose up and headed towards the door. “This is simply a wonderful inspiration! I must head over to my design room and-“

“No, please don’t bother yourself with this!" Si Fron hastily interrupted her before the enthusiastic unicorn could make it to the doorway. "I would feel guilty for having you go through all that trouble without at least doing something to make it up for you!”

“I don’t mind at all darling!" She waved offhoofedly at the doorway. "It’s the least I could do for giving such a wonderful idea!”

“But it just doesn’t sit right with me unless I could pay you or something and all I have are literally the clothes on my back!”

Rarity gave up trying to convince him to accept her charity for free and she paused for a moment, putting a hoof to her chin in thought. After a moment, she stamped her hoof against the floor in a sweeping motion, making a sound akin to a snap, and sang out in epiphany. The stylish white unicorn then turned to fully face Si Fron, gesturing with her hoof as she spoke.

“Then why don’t you model my outfits at the showcase tonight? If I’m going to be making an outfit for you, I might as well display it. And since the showcase requires live modeling in order to show that ponies can actually wear it, put into place because of a rather embarrassing fiasco a few years back, I might as well pick you to model my line for stallions! When the show is over, you can keep the outfit as payment!”

The white stallion was still a bit hesitant about this, letting caution guide his judgment, but he still perked up at the idea of being able to get what he needed and not being a burden for others at the same time. “Really?”

“Cross my heart and hope to fly-" Rarity began, going through the now well practiced motions.

“Stick a cupcake in my eye!” StormCaller finished enthusiastically for no apparent reason. This action earned him an odd stare or three, but all he did was wing-shrug in reply. Then he jumped up and started bouncing in place as his face lit up. “Oh, Oh! Can I join too? I mean, if my friend is going to be in a pony fashion show, then why can’t I? Sure, it isn’t the most exciting or fun thing in the world, but I would get to do it with one of my friends and see hot models even though they aren’t or they weren’t my species or whatever and I would get to feel pretty and really, what human can say they participated in a pony fashion show? I mean, they could, but then they would be liars and lying is bad because when somepony finds out you’ve lied then you look all ridiculous and nopony trusts you anymore and losing a friend’s trust is the easiest way to lose a friend-“

“FOREVER!”

The four looked at each other for a moment after finishing the quote in unison. Then, they all laughed at their silly antics, although Rarity's was a bit forced since she hadn’t expected the two stallions to join in as well.

“Well,” Rarity replied after they had finished with their moment and she had shoved her discomfort to the side for the sake of convenience. “I don’t see why not. In fact, this could be the perfect opportunity to experiment with a few designs I have had in mind for a while, but could never find a Pegasus stallion to try them on! I could finally get those stylish vests finished and maybe even get a whole new lineup going! OOH! This is so exciting! Come on, I need to take your measurements!”

With Rarity in full on fashion mode, she began bouncing out of the room in a Pinkie Pie manner, followed the springy mare herself and her Pegasus fan, both bounding out of the room the same way. Si Fron, not wanting to be left out, gave a few experimental hops himself before the pain decided for him that it would be better to wait until he had better fitting clothes.

One enlightening moment later, Si Fron flopped onto the floor outside of Rarity's private design room. As he tried to make the room stop spinning, he addressed Pinkie.

“You know, now that I think about it, why would they even need rooms for last minute designs anyway? Shouldn’t they have already made their outfits by now?”

“Because it always seems more impressive if you are able to come up with and make something super duper fantastiwondeful off the top of your head, silly!" Pinkie Pie answered joyfully, getting rid of the dizziness with a quick shake of her head. "Also, the expo requires that at least one outfit is made here, according to Rarity. The ponies running the show thought it would make the whole thing last longer if the designers had to actually spend time making something at the expo and because they spend more time here they spend more money and they get even richer than before.”

StormCaller, stumbling around like he had one too many salt shots, simply commented with a simple “That makes sense,” before tripping over his own hooves and face-planting on the hotel’s plush carpet.

Si Fron got up once he could tell which way was up and shook his head, still wearing a face of confusion.

“At any rate, I didn’t expect things to go that quickly or that violently! Doesn’t she do things differently back in the Boutique?”

“Mmhmm! But she isn’t in such a hurry back in Ponyville when she has several days to make a dress so she can take it easy and not have to work so hard or fiercely. Besides, if you think getting your measurements taken was crazy, just wait until she has to make adjustments! THAT’S a doozy!”

Pinkie’s forehead scrunched up for a moment before she turned a suspicious gaze towards the white stallion, who was shuddering at the thought of continuing to be used as a living mannequin.

“Hey wait a second… if you’re from another world, then how do you know that Rarity lives at the Carousel Boutique?”

As Stormcaller stood up again, a large grin spread across his face.

“That’s easy!” he replied. “That’s because in our world-”

Si Fron, realizing what was coming from a mile away, quickly intercepted and covered Stormcaller’s mouth.

“Excuse me a moment Pinkie.”

He took Stormcaller out of Pinkie’s apparent hearing range.

“What do you think you’re doing!?” The earth pony hissed with worry.

“I was going to tell her about My Little Pony, duh!” Replied the blue pegasus like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“But that is a bad idea! Do you have any idea the confusion or the panic or the issues that would cause?”

“Well," Stomrcaller thought on it a moment, putting a hoof to his mouth. "Maybe for other ponies, but not for Pinkie Pie! She can handle it!”

Si Fron bit his lip in panic as every alarm bell in his head rang out and told him to think of a reason to not tell Pinkie Pie about MLP. Thankfully, his normally slow mind managed to choke up a good response in a reasonable amount of time for once.

“Maybe, but if she knew and got excited about it, then she would tell the others! What happens then?”

Stormcaller thought about it for another moment, tapping a hoof to his chin in thought. Coming upon a satisfactory reply, he pointed the hoof upwards and flicked it towards the earth pony like one would do with a finger when responding in a similar manner.

“What if we make her Pinkie Promise not to tell the others?”

Si Fron took a moment to weigh the possibilities. Seeing the sound logic in Stormcaller’s logic, he then sighed in defeat. Instead of fighting against the idea, he decided to compromise with the hyper Pegasus.

“…..Fine, but we won’t tell her right now. We’ll wait until it is appropriate, like if the fate of the world depended on it or if she made us Pinkie Pie promise her to tell the whole truth or something. Deal?”

The pegasus nodded satisfactorily. “Okie Dokie Loki!”

No sooner than when he finished his sentence Pinkie Pie bounced in front of the two humans in eager excitement, having completely forgotten about the odd behavior of her two new friends in order to focus on more important things like fun and how pegasi fly if they aren’t aerodynamic.

“Soooo, now that you two are done talking about whatever it was that you were talking about, what do you guys want to do first? We have about an hour while Rarity works on the clothes, so we have a while to do whatever you want to do while you stay here in Equestria and, more specifically, here in Manehatten!”

“Wah!” Si Fron yelped in surprise, not having gotten adjusted to real life exposure to the pink mare. Upon recovering, his brows scrunched up in confusion. “Wait, we aren’t in Ponyville?”

“Nope!” piped StormCaller. “I thought that was pretty obvious so I was all curious about where we were and I asked Pinkie Pie who then told me as we carried you up to the room that she and Rarity are just visiting for the expo! I guess that means we’re super duper lucky to have run into them. Or maybe we’re destined to do awesome stuff with them! Ooh, maybe things will be like a fanfiction and we’ll even get to use the Element of Harmony in a super duper ultra awesome showdown alongside some of our friends from the comments board! Dibs on Laughter!”

“Nuh-uh!” countered the real bearer of Laughter, not acknowledging that most ponies had never heard of her and her friend’s exploits. “I have Laughter!”

“But I really want to use Laughter! And besides, what if the big bad took out a giant laser cannon and-“

Si Fron tuned out the two hyperactive ponies’ conversation and paused a moment to take in the other things that were currently going on around him. As he watched the ponies go about their daily lives, it finally sank in that he was far beyond the world he was used to. It was familiar in shape, with its Earth-like structures and decorations, yet it had an atmosphere, a soul even, that was so unlike his old world. Dwelling on it, he felt freshness well up from his heart. Instinctively, he could tell that this experience could be the new start that he yearned for. It was brand new and invigorating! Right then and there, the first thing he wanted to do was-

His eyes widened. He didn’t know. All of the times he spent imagining such lofty scenarios never prepared him for this. He didn’t even consider it being possible, even though it was a desperate wish of his. Yet, now that he was here, he was at a loss for what to do. What did he want to do?

He carefully turned his gaze to every corner of the room, soaking in every detail that was available in search of an answer. It was all so real, it was now surreal. Just being here was incredible, he decided at last, and he decided the thing he wanted to do the most right now was soak in the moment.

“YO! Si Fron!" StormCaller waved a hoof in front of him, snapping the earth pony out of his poetic moment. "Did you hear that? You can have the Element of Kindness when we have to take on the big bad! Isn’t that awesome?”

“Woah!" The white pony shook his head, snapping out of his reverie. "Ummm, yes that’s cool.”

“Awesome! So, now that we have that settled, what we need to do is wander around the city aimlessly until something happens! Maybe we can hear a juicy rumor that foreshadows some awesome thing that’s going to happen, or we actually run into the big bad himself in disguise. If that happens, we can take him down right then and there and spend the rest of our time here on vacation! Or maybe-“

StormCaller’s rant ended when his stomach let out a loud growl. Pinkie Pie giggled as the blue Pegasus blushed.

“Or we could go grab a bite to eat,” The pink mare said with a hoof over her large grin.

“Yeah. Can’t save the world on an empty stomach!” agreed Stormcaller as he continued to blush madly.

So the group left the building and began sauntering down the street. Since a pizza was something that Si Fron and Stormcaller were familiar with, yet it could easily be topped with Equestrian toppings, it was decided that it would be an excellent idea for a lunch.

In the meantime, Pinkie Pie chattered on and on about all of the different things she knew about Manehatten, from the fact that it is one of the only three cities in Equestria to the tidbit about it being called the creative center of the country. Stormcaller, hearing that Equestria wasn’t the only country in the world, drilled her about all she knew about the surrounding countries. Si Fron only half-listened as he soaked in the sights around him.

The newly ponified human looked on in curious awe as he watched a unicorn pass out newspapers from her stand right into the mouth of an earth pony who, with a bit of skill and dexterity, balanced it on one hoof as he walked with practiced ease to his destination. Above him, pegasi flew from place to place either carrying saddlebags or seemingly defying gravity in more blatant ways as they carried carts filled with produce and materials behind them. He was even surprised when he saw a pegasus use their wings like a pair of arms and hands, skillfully wrapping around the fliers as they waved them about and passed one on to a passerby.

All of these amazing, yet common in this world, occurrences touched and amazed Si Fron a lot more than Stormcaller's conversation with Pinkie did. When he realized that she was talking about the diplomatic relations between ponies and griffons, it surprised him just how distracted he got from the different environment. he doubled his resolve to pay attention to Pinkie, but he gave up when he realized that he was too far behind in the conversation to understand what toupees and feather dusters had to do with properly entering the griffon's foreign embassy.

Once they had made it to the restaurant, Si Fron flinched harshly. He had just remembered that he still didn’t have any money and thus he couldn't pay for the pizza. Immediately, he shrank a little and he nervously and shamefully tapped Pinkie on the shoulder to get her attention.

“Umm, Pinkie?”

“Yes, Si?” She looked over her shoulder at him.

“I think I’ll stay out here," He shamefully turned his head away. "I just realized I don’t have any money for the pizza and-”

“So?” Piped up StormCaller. “I don’t have any money either. And besides, people do this all of the time!”

“Still, I wouldn’t feel good if I-” Started the earth pony before the blue and green maned stallion held up a hoof to stop him.

“Just chill out and stop being such a Serious McSeriouston! It’s Equestria! What’s the point of going to another world if you don’t enjoy yourself? Let’s get the pizza and not have to worry about silly little things like money and whatnot!”

The white stallion sighed in defeat and forced a small smile on his face. He was very ashamed at having Pinkie use her money to buy his pizza, especially since he had no way of paying her back, but knowing the that the two probably wouldn’t relent until he accepted the pizza for free he gave in anyway. He felt terrible, but he still managed to play along.

“All right, I won't worry about it.”

“WOOHOO! Now come on and let’s eat!” Yelled Pinkie as she grabbed Si Fron by the leg and dragged him in the building with abundant enthusiasm, followed shortly afterward by an equally rambunctious Stormcaller.

Two half cheese, half dandelion pizzas later, the trio were happily satisfied with the knowledge that the pizza was delicious and that, conveniently for their biology, Si Fron and Stormcaller's tastes had adjusted to the foods their new bodies normally ate. After explaining to Pinkie what a fanfiction was over the food while dodging the existential elephant in the room with various excuses, the trio began to walk back to the hotel with little to no fanfare.

Once the trio had made their way back to Rarity’s booth when they had reached the hotel, all three of them were sent into something that could be given no less than the title of Fashion Tornado. True to Pinkie’s prediction, it was even more rough and chaotic than when they got their measurements. After a few hours of fitting, refitting, and being measured again in the quickest and most violent fashion possible, the three unfortunate models had been generously given about thirty minutes to reorient themselves with the directions they formerly recognized as up, down, and sideways before they had to go to the dressing room for the modeling show.

“I lie down corrected,” Stormcaller commented with his voice wavering as unsteadily as a drunkard in the middle of an earthquake. “Being a fashion model is 20% more exciting than I thought it would be.”

“It always is,” Murmured Pinkie as she tried and failed to get back up on her hooves like a newborn foal.

“I now pity all of the anime characters who have ever gotten dizzy eyes on their show,” Said Si Fron as his eyes literally spun in opposing directions like interlocking gears. "Being this dizzy is painful."

They barely had time to recuperate when Rarity came back to lead them to the backstage waiting rooms. Once they were given their first outfits and placed into the waiting room, Si Fron suddenly began to get self conscious. He was going out in front of a large crowd to show off some clothes, probably judging his every move and action in the process. The thought of being judged, scrutinized, and examined by hundreds to thousands of very nitpicky designers began frighten the poor soul. Still, he knew that he had to do this and tried to calm himself down in time to do his job properly.

Once the show began, a pony wearing a pair of half moon glasses holding a clipboard came into the room and began to call out a few names. Afterwards, she left for a few moments and returned to call out more names. One by one, the fashion models left and eventually returned with new outfits and waited for their moment to bask in the limelight once more. Stormcaller, as this went on, chatted with the models and asked them about what it was like to be a model and why they were wearing such silly hats. Pinkie Pie did the same, only she also invited a few of the models who lived fairly close to Ponyville to attend one of her parties once the expo was over. Si Fron, however, was growing so nervous that he eventually started to paw the ground and fiddle with any small object that wasn’t claimed by anypony in an effort to distract his mind. Pinkie Pie, noticing Si Fron’s behavior, hopped on over in her frilly dress.

“Hey Si Fron! What’s wrong?”

“Oh Pinkie!" He jumped, dropping the pen he was holding on his hoof. "I, ummm…. I’m just…. A bit nervous, I guess…”

“You guess?”

He blushed. “I guess it’s a bit more than just a guess….”

“Oh, you silly filly! There’s no need to be so worked up that you don’t even know that you’re nervous or not! I mean, there may be hundreds of ponies eyeing you and examining every detail and-“

“Umm, Pinkie?” Si Fron cut her off politely.

“Yes?”

“Has anyone ever told you that, well, maybe it makes things worse to describe the stuff that, well, does make someone- err, somepony nervous?”

The hyperactive pink mare stared at him for a moment before a blush ran across her face.

“Oops! Sorry," She said as she rubbed the back of her head. "Well, anyway, don’t sweat it! The other ponies are just here to see the clothes! I’m sure you’ll do fine because, really, how could anypony mess up wearing clothes?”

In typical cliche fashion, one of the models ran from the stage through the room with her outfit inexplicably in shambles and tears coming down her face. While the door was open, the sound of booing followed her in and decided to settle down in the minds and fears of the impressionable models. Si Fron, getting the message full well, had to sit down in order to not pass out for the third time that day. StormCaller, having observed all of this, walked over to the comedy gold in pony form.

“Hey Pinkie?”

“Yeah StormCaller?”

“Has anypony every told you not to tempt fate?”

“Hmmmm,” She put her hoof to her chin in thought and then shook her head. “Nope!”

“Well, I haven’t either, but from what I’ve seen, it is generally considered a bad thing.”

“Oh,” She said with surprise. “Okie Dokie Loki! No more tempting fate. Got it!”

Stormcaller glanced over to Si Fron, who was now trying to cower behind a chair like Fluttershy would cower from a loud noise. “It might be a little late for that…”

Pinkie glanced over to Si Fron’s spot and grinned with embarrassment. “Oopsies.”

Knowing that the show must go on, the Pinkieish pegasus trotted over to where to Si Fron was shivering.

“Hey buddy!”

The white earth pony nearly jumped clean out of his outfit in fright before recognizing Stormcaller.

“Oh it’s just you!” Si Fron sighed in relief.

“Well, duh, who else would it be? Anyway, now that you have been scared, are you ready to go out there and look good for a bunch of complete and total strangers?”

The shy earth pony blinked before staring at the floor and saying “Uum,” in a simple manner, drawing it out as long as possible in hopes of buying enough time to figure out something to say. Not satisfied with this response, Stormcaller decided to step things up a bit as the assistant pony called out for Si Fron before closing it again.

“Come on, you’re up! You can do it! It’ll be fun!”

The effort, unfortunately, was in vain as Si Fron’s anxieties got the better of him.

“But what if I mess up? What if I don’t show it off just right, or what if I trip and knock something over, or if I pop a seam somehow , or-“

Unexpectedly, the hyperactive blue pegasus grabbed Si Fron, stood him up, and pulled out a pair of Kamina class shades in one go. In the same fluid motion, he gestured towards Pinkie Pie in an odd fashion that somehow translated to her as ‘Bring out the party cannon’, which she did. How he had known about it was anyone’s guess since season two had yet to premiere when the two humans had ended up in Equestria, but that was a moot point as he began his hammy speech.

“Just who the hay do you think you are?!”

“What the-“ murmured the white pony, flabbergasted at the sudden increase in drama that accompanied the bizarre actions.

Stormcaller raised a hoof to the ceiling. “If you’re going to dig, dig to the heavens! When you break through, it means you've won!”

“SINCE WHEN DID YOU WATCH TENGEN TOPPA GURREN LAGANN!?!?!?!”

“THE POINT IS,” he proclaimed loudly, completely ignoring the question. “Don’t believe in yourself or the me who believes in you, but the you who believes in yourself!”

The pony who had been calling out names stuck her head in again and called out Si Fron’s name rather impatiently this time.

“NOW,” Stormcaller bellowed, picking Si Fron up by his shirt. “SHOW THEM WHAT YOU’RE MADE OF!!!!!”

With a mighty heave, the white earth pony was shoved into the party cannon and promptly fired out of it, sailing through the door and towards the main stage at improbable speeds. As he flew through the air holding on to his outfit’s hat, he heard the fashion announcer doing what she did best.

“… and that was Photo Finish’s ‘Red Hot Action Fashion’ as part of her innovations line. Next up we have a design from an up and coming unicorn, Rarity, with her innovative design that has supposedly been modified to not only be practical for Earth ponies, but also stylish! And to top it off, it is an outfit with that rare fashion statement, pants! Let’s see how the live model demonstrates this new design on such an infamously difficult to handle article of fashion!”

On cue, Si Fron soared violently threw the curtain, somehow undoing the entire outfit as he flew through the drapes. During his brief moment of nudity, everything slowed. He could see where everything was going to land, he could see the flashing of cameras, and he could see all of the ponies in the audience gaping at him. His embarrassment shot through the roof and he knew that if he didn’t act fast, he would forever have ruined his reputation in Equestria and he would have to leave in shame and dishonor.

Adrenaline and instincts he didn’t even know he had kicked in as he tucked and curled upon landing. He leapt from his roll into the button up shirt, swiftly doing a few of the buttons as his mobster-styled white hat plopped onto his head. Snatching the rose and shoving it in the breast pocket, just one last thing remained: The pants. He made one last jump and he spun in mid–air. His legs smoothly glided into the leggings and the subtle string that was attached to the zipper floated into Si Fron’s mouth. With a fluid movement, he spun the string around the subtle knobs sticking out of the pants and pulled, zipping the black pants up with a good, strong tug as he nailed the landing. He held the final pose with the string in his mouth.

All of the ponies in the audience were breathless at the intense display of the practical ease that the clothes had been undone and put on with. For a few moments, nopony even dared to move until Pinkie Pie and Stormcaller, who had managed to catch up with him in time to see his improbable feats, started cheering loudly, prompting a roar in return from the crowd by those who had the good fortune of retaining their consciousness. The two hyperactive ponies ran up to him on stage in their fancy outfits and started congratulating him.

“WOW! THAT WAS SUPERDUPERAMIZINGSPECTACULAR!” yelled Pinkie as she bounced to the white pony in her frilly pink dress that was reminiscent of a certain royal member of the Mushroom Kingdom.

“How did you come up with that awesome action sequence!?" Stormcaller praised in his own fancy vest. "That was almost more brilliant than all of the Pinkie Pie episodes put together!”

“ Ummm…” Said Si Fron, starting to get a little dizzy from the adrenaline withdrawal. “Necessity?”

They all had a friendly laugh at this, not noticing the feedback from the microphone as the announcer passed out from the most exciting event in fashion history since Celestia and Luna both wore the same dress to the Grand Galloping Gala 1027 years ago.

Later that night, after the modeling session had ended, Rarity had graciously allowed the two stallions to stay the night in the hotel room so long as they stayed in the living room part of it. Too exhausted to argue or reject the notion, Si Fron flopped down on the floor next to the couch. After shifting his position a little to be a bit more comfortable, he soon fell asleep, emotionally exhausted from the recent series of events.

As he slept, though, instead of the usual comforting dreams of bizarre surealty he loved to embrace, he was rudely thrown into an odd scenario that felt all too real.

He tossed and turned in his sleep, plaugued by restless nightmares. The nightmares grew so fierce that he shot up, panting wildly. After a moment, he sighed and relaxed a bit.

"Heh, man, I didn't realize that robots could be so terrifying when they gang up on you like that."

He then frowned. There was something else to the dream, he thought. Something about... He couldn't remember. His dreams were so bizarre anyway, not even Discord could make sense or nonsense of them. He paused, though, and looked up at the sky. It was so surreal. He hadn't even been in Equestria for a full day and already he ran into the Elements and was doing wacky things. He laughed to himself as he laid back down.

As he tried to go back to sleep, his mind wandered and raced as his fanboyish excitement caught up to him. Here he was in Equstria. No, he was in an entirely different universe! He had a relatively clean slate and endless new possibilities for adventure and excitement that he couldn't have had in his old world.

He frowned as he came across that thought. That wasn't necessarily true, he admitted, but he didn't really have an opportunity to adventure or do interesting things. Not since he had to help out his family with his brother. He winced again as memories taunted him with dozens of reasons on why that was such a flimsy excuse.

He shook the mixed feelings and thoughts from his head and looked towards a window. Even now, he could see the pegasi flying in the sky at night, busily going from place to place and living their own lives. It somehow helped him remember the excitement and wonder that he could experience at any moment in this world, even though its edge had been tempered. Soon, his eyes drooped wearily and as he went back to sleep he mumbled to himself.

"I wonder what else Equestria has in store..."

Author's note:
Fun Fact #1, this thing was started ages ago, well before I knew of Fimfiction's existence.

Fun Fact #2, I have been working on it sporadically since then, meaning the writing style will change as early as the first real chapter.

Fun Fact #3, this chapter also has been edited. Several times. Hopefully for the better.

Chapter 2: Brushie

Chapter Two: Brushie - The Number One Enemy

The light drifted lazily in through the window of the hotel room as Celestia rose the sun to bring dawn to Equestria. Four ponies slept in the hotel room peacefully. Pinkie Pie slept upside down in a chair, snoring in an overly exaggerated and traditionally silly manner, while Rarity snored elegantly in the room’s only bed, Si Fron snored gently on the floor next to the couch, and Stormcaller, surprisingly, didn't snore at all as he slept on the couch. Eventually, Si Fron’s eyes began to flutter open as he yawned. He stretched out and simply lied there, relishing the moment as he remembered the previous day’s events and where he was this morning. It was his first dawn in Equestria. He gazed out of the window and stared at the sunrise. It was a true masterpiece worth savoring. He then began to contemplate how the sunrises in his world were, how the worlds were so similar in their beauty at times, and-

BAM!!!!

The poetic earth pony never saw it coming. Stormcaller, in the middle of a scandalously R rated dream, had rolled over in his sleep and fell on top of his friend.

“GAH!” Si Fron yelled out in fright.

“NOOO, NOT THE CURTIANS!” Shrieked Rarity as she bolted upwards and whipped her head around back and forth.

“WAH!” Si Fron, who stood up with fright and sent Stormcaller to the floor when he was startled by Rarity’s shriek.

“CELESTIA NO!” Bellowed Stormcaller as he hit the floor.

“WAAAAHHH!!” Rarity shrieked as she dove under the covers, having momentarily forgotten about letting Si Fron and Stormcaller stay the night in the hotel room.

“TWILIGHT, NO! NYX NEEDS YOU!” Pinkie Pie yelped, falling out of the chair as the cacophony woke her up in turn.

“AAHH!”

“GAAAH!”

“WAAHHH!!”

This chain of screaming went on for a few minutes until their lungs ran out of air. As they panted Stormcaller slowly rolled over and got to his hooves. Eventually, Rarity was the first to collect both her wits and her breath.

“What just happened?” Asked Rarity, still alarmed by the whole situation.

The white stallion blushed as he sheepishly stood up and pawed at the floor.

“Umm, sorry about that. I guess it was my fault. I got startled when Stormcaller fell on me and I sort of yelled and woke everybody up.”

“It’s everypony,” corrected StormCaller. “And it’s ok. If a stallion fell on me for no apparent reason when I was minding my own business, I would scream too. …..Well, maybe for entirely different reasons, but still!”

“Well,” said Rarity in between gasps of air, “I guess that’s one way to get up in the morning.”

They all sat there for a moment in terribly awkward silence. After an entirely appropriate amount of time, Pinkie Pie coughed a bit.

“Soooo...” She dragged out for effect. “Who’s up for pancakes?”

“Oh, I am!” Stormcaller perked up.

“A bit messy but I suppose that would be delightful,” Rarity chimed in, nodding in agreement.

“Sure,” Si Fron said, relaxing in time with the others. “Sounds good to me.”

After breaking the awkward ice over breakfast and undergoing the interesting and inherently embarrassing experience that is using the restroom as an equine, Si Fron and Stormcaller got dressed. Si Fron, feeling the need to be modest, had put on the black pants, button up shirt, and white fedora. As for StormCaller, while he had no qualms about running around as naked as all of the other ponies, he had rather liked the vest that Rarity had given him and decided to sport the forest green article of clothing simply to look spiffy. He also had a pair of goggles hanging around his neck for kicks.

“Well, now that we are all presentable, I believe all that is left for us to do is get my things from the design room and take them to the train station,” Rarity stated simply. Si Fron blinked in confusion and furrowed his brow.

“Wait, what do you mean?”

“Well, my roguishly handsome stallion,” Rarity said coyly, with a hint of teasing in her eyes. “Yesterday was the last day of the expo. You two came here just before it ended.”

“Really?” Si Fron said, completely missing the first statement.

“Indeed,” Rarity said, resisting the urge to roll her eyes at his obliviousness. “In fact, we are heading to the train station this morning to head back to Ponyville.”

“Can we come with you?” Stormcaller spouted out abruptly, his eyes as big as saucers.

Rarity blinked before smiling gracefully and with dignity.

“Of course, darling. All we need to do is buy a couple of tickets for you before we board the train,” She then turned to her friend. “Pinkie, what time does the train leave according to the tickets?”

Pinkie, who had put on her saddlebags while Rarity was talking, pulled out a pair of tickets.

“Well, according to these, it leaves at 9:30!” She said happily. “What time is it now?”

Rarity, despite being as white as ivory, paled to a whole new shade of white.

“Pinkie.”

“Yes Rarity?”

“It’s 9:00 right now.”

“Oh.”

It took a moment to sink in, but the moment it did, the room was a flurry of chaos as the ponies ran around in a panic. After a moment, the panicked running got organized enough to make its way out the door, into Rarity’s design room, and make a mad dash for the train station upon securing Rarity’s things into their saddlebags.

“OMYGOSHOMYGOSHOMYGOSH!” yelled Rarity as they ducked and weaved through the streets.

“‘Scuse me! Pardon me! Sorry about that!” apologized Pinkie as she bypassed the crowds by leaping from the tops of their heads.

“I wish I could fly... Uhh, I mean I’m late! I’m late for a very important date!” Blurted Stormcaller as he barreled through the miniature gaps in the crowds of ponies on the streets.

“BADDAYBADDAYBADDAYBADDAY!” Yelled Si Fron as he ran. “...why do I feel like ninjas should be chasing me?”

Soon enough, they made it to the main Manehatten train station. As they headed in, they heard the sound of one of the train attendants bellowing.

“LAST CALL FOR THE 9:30 TRAIN TO PONYVILLE! LAST CALL!”

With one last dramatic leap, Pinkie Pie and Rarity, holding their tickets in their mouths, soar onto the train as SI Fron and Stormcaller hurled the saddlebags they borrowed onto the train after the mares. With a sigh of relief, the four wiped the sweat off of their foreheads. Relieved that they had made it in time, Si Fron and Stormcaller made a move to get on the train...

Only to be blocked by the train attendant.

“Tickets please,” The attendant droned as he held out his hoof.

Si Fron and Stormcaller paused and began to search their pockets. Only after turning them all inside out did they realize that they were in such a rush that Rarity didn't have the time to buy them the tickets. They turned to each other looking for some form of reassurance or idea, but found none. Having no other option, they both turned back to the train attendant and looked at him sheepishly.

“HEY!” The two humans turned equine and the train attendant looked to find a sheep in a city slicker outfit staring at them. “That’s my stchick!”

Si Fron blinked. “Umm, sorry?”

The sheep simply huffed and stormed off angrily. The train’s whistle then echoed throughout the station. The attendant took a deep breath and bellowed with all of his might.

“ALL ABOARD!!!!”

Slowly, the train’s wheels began to turn as the train let loose some steam, beginning to move forward. Rarity began to beg and plead with the attendant to let them on the train, but he was as adamant in his decision. He pointed out that not only did they not have tickets, but the train was moving and that it would be dangerous to let them try to get on, even if he did have a change of heart. In the meantime, Pinkie began to panic.

“Oh my gosh! Stormcaller, Si Fron! The train’s leaving without you because that meany pants conductor won’t let you on!”

“Well, he is doing his job,” Si Fron replied timidly, coming to the attendant’s defense.

“Anyway, what are you going to do?” The pink mare continued as the train began to pick up speed, forcing the two stallions to have to move at a decent pace.

“I dunno!” Stormcaller said. He then assessed the situation before a figurative light bulb went off. “Wait a second! Pinkie, we’ll try to jump onto the train from the back! Meet us there so you can cheer us on!”

“Okie Dokie Loki!”

As the party pony headed to the back of the train and the duo slowed down to allow the train to pull ahead a little bit, Si Fron yelled at Stormcaller; partly out of anger and partly because the sound of the train was starting to get loud enough to warrant yelling.

“Are you insane!? Jumping onto a moving train is dangerous!!!”

“Of course I’m insane!” Yelled the pegasus, mostly out of excitement. “Besides, we’re pastel colored ponies in a cartoon world! At the worst we’ll end up in the hospital for a week and we’ll have to learn the importance of reading or something! Now come on! This’ll be fun!”

With that, they refocused their efforts and they began running at full speed again. However, they were a bit late as they realized that they should have tried to make their move sooner since the train was picking up in speed. Even Stormcaller realized that a dramatic train jump wouldn't be able to get them onto it at this rate. After another moment’s thought, the pegasus grinned again.

“Si Fron! Grab onto me and jump on the count of three!”

“What!?” Yelled the white earth pony in confusion and panic.

“One...”

“Stormcaller, we shouldn't!”

“Two...”

“Stormcaller what if we get hurt!?”

“Three!”

Possessed by some unknown instinct and a better known desire for excitement, Si Fron grabbed his friend’s vest with his teeth, gripped his hat with a hoof, and they both leaped for the caboose. Time seemed to slow as they sailed through the air. It was clear that unless something was done they would fall short of the carriage. Having anticipated this, the pegasus unfurled his wings and began to flap as hard as he could. With each wing beat, they got closer and closer to the train car until...

They were sent tumbling head first into the ground. However pegasi fly, apparently, Stormcaller was doing it wrong and the action of flapping his wings did absolutely nothing to aid them. As they tumbled over and over again down the slope next to the tracks, Pinkie gasped and Rarity, who had joined her upon losing the argument with the conductor, fainted.

“Si Fron!” Pinkie shouted out. “Stormcaller!”

“Don’t worry Pinkie!” Exclaimed Si Fron, whose first instinct had been to try to reassure the pony, despite the fact he was painfully tumbling down the sloped area. “We’ll be fine! We’ll meet you in Ponyville soon!”

The mare had replied, but she was already out of hearing range as the train speed down the slope and moved off towards the famed town of Ponyville. After coming to a stop at the bottom of the hill, Si Fron and Stormcaller panted from the adrenaline for a moment before the blue pegasus received a half-hearted smack upside the head.

“Never again,” Panted the earth pony, who wanted to be angry at his friend, but was too worn out to work up the energy. The only response he got was a groan in agreement.

After they had recovered from their disastrous attempt to be cool, they walked back to the street in front of the train station. Si Fron paced nervously back and forth as he fretted over their situation.

“This is bad. This is terrible. I can’t believe this is happening!” He paused to mess with his hat a bit before continuing his tirade. “We missed the train! We missed the train to Ponyville and we have no money to get tickets! What do we do? What can we do? How will we ever get there!? This is bad, bad, bad, ba-”

“Dude!” The nervous nelly of an earth pony turned to his companion. Stormcaller had placed a reassuring hoof on his friend’s shoulder. “We can just walk there.”

“Are you serious?” Si Fron said, caught off guard a bit. “Just walk there?”

“Well, yeah,” Stormcaller smiled broadly. “It wouldn’t be that bad. If we get hungry we can just eat some grass or pinecones or something. Plus, we can see all the cool places between here and Ponyville we don’t see in the show! It would be an awesome adventure!”

Si Fron decided to ruminate on this a moment. Stormcaller had a point. It wouldn’t be too much trouble to simply walk along the road from here to Ponyville. Because Equestria is much more peaceful on the whole, they wouldn’t have to worry about safety either. But most importantly, it gave Si Fron the chance to sate his long neglected wanderlust. For the longest time, he dreamed of travelling and seeing the sights and wonders of the world. Alas, cruel fate denied him such opportunities back home. But here.....

“Come on!” Stormcaller urged some more. “It’ll be fun.”

Si Fron grinned widely as he entertained the thought.

“That sounds pretty cool, actually,” He nodded as he warmed up to the idea. “Yeah, I guess we could go exploring a bit as we head to Ponyville.”

The blue pegasus grinned like Pinkie Pie when she is about to be brilliant.

“Then what are we waiting for? TO ADVENTURE!”

With that, the hyperactive pony dashed off. Si Fron, feeling the adrenaline surge through his body again, ran after him. After racing through the city for a few moments, they finally came upon a road leading out of the city into the distance. The path ahead of them was surrounded by grass covered rolling meadows with the sun shining down on them. Along the way, a few clouds had been tastefully left behind by the weather team to provide shade to the otherwise exposed path for the occasional traveler.

The two ponies continued galloping in this picturesque environment. Sometimes they were going flat out as they raced competitively, sometimes they just galloped at their own pace as they enjoyed the rush of the air around them and the feel of the path beneath their hooves. All the while, they grinned wildly, embracing the absolute bliss of freedom in the wide open world.

After racing for some time, the duo slowed down and began to walk at a more leisurely pace. As they took in the sights, sounds, and even pleasant smells, neither one of them said a word. The serenity lasted for a while, relaxing the two ex-humans to the point that if they ever found a tree, they would lean up against it and fall right asleep.

The peace wasn’t to last though. As they walked at a slow and steady gait, they heard a voice shouting up ahead on the other side of a small hill. Having nothing better to do as they traveled, they crossed the hill, becoming distressed as they were able to make out the vulgar and blasphemous language the figure was spouting out.

The clearly stressed and upset figure was a unicorn with a black coat. His mane and tail were blood red, but the mustache he sported was as orange as a carrot and extremely bushy. His cutie mark was that of a cartoonish drawing of a robot firing a laser at some unseen target.

“... itself! Thrice!” The pony sorely swore as the duo approached him. “If there is any form of governance over fate, I shall make sure it rues the day it decided to take a dump all over my life!”

“Hey, what’s got your tail in a knot?” Asked Stormcaller.

The figure whirled on him. While his eyes were hidden by a pair of black glasses, his posture screamed hostility and his voice dripped with rage.

“What’s got my tail in a knot?” He said curtly. “I shouldn’t even have a tail! Impudent whelp!”

“Dude, chill out,” Said Si Fron, narrowing his eyes in concern. Then it dawned on him. “Wait a second, you are- well, were, a human too?”

“If it took you that long to figure that out, then you must be the height of idiocy where you come from,” The unicorn replied sourly. “Or the height of intelligence, considering how moronic people are today.”

“Hey!” Piped up Stormcaller. “That was totally uncalled for! Have a Pepsi or something!”

“Why should I have that detestably caloric and sweet version when I can have Diet Pepsi?” He scathingly sneered, shocking the pegasi. “And furthermore, why should I calm down? A genius of my magnitude shouldn’t be reduced to such an insulting disgrace to the whole of existence! A useless pony form a worthless cartoon!”

Stormcaller’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “You like Diet Pepsi AND hate ponies?”

“Why shouldn’t I?” Said the stranger bitterly. “They are a mockery of the entire reason why I, Ivo, the greatest scientist on Earth, am in the wretched situation I am in!”

The pegasus blinked, then looked back and forth. “What ‘wretched situation’ would that be exactly?”

Ivo stood there for a moment flabbergasted, before letting out a fearsome, savage roar.

“CONFOUND YOU! EITHER YOU ARE ONE OF THE RETARDED INHABITANTS OF THIS WORLD, OR YOU ARE THAT DETESTABLE BREED OF SUB-HUMAN KNOWN AS A BRONY! EITHER WAY YOU SHOULD-”

“Shut the hell up, dumbass!” Si Fron, with little warning, got in Ivo’s face. His lips were curled back as he growled angrily. “And don’t you dare use that word in your insults, you flea-bitten rat.”

His friend stood by silently, thrown off guard by the wallflower-ish pony’s sudden change in demeanor. Ivo, too, paused in mid-rant at the unexpected hostility.

“Excuse me?” Sneered Ivo when he snapped back to reality. “What, exactly, did I say, you brain dead waste of oxygen?”

“The ponies here are not retarded and you ought to feel the pain of a thousand civilizations for ever using that word.”

Ivo pressed his forehead against Si Fron’s in clear, smugly arrogant defiance.

“Make me, retard.”

The white earth pony raised a forehoof to hit the offensive unicorn. However as the moment stretched on, it became apparent that he couldn't bring himself to follow through. His hoof hovered there, trembling with both fury and restraint.

“Just as I thought,” Chuckled Ivo. “A moronic and hot headed coward.”

Finally, Stormcaller grabbed Si Fron by the hoof and pulled him back.

“That’s right-” Ivo began.

He didn’t get a chance to finish,though, when the blue pegasus slapped the orange mustached pony with his wing. Swiftly thereafter he followed it up with a double buck from his hind hooves that lifted the unicorn into the air a bit. Stormcaller turned himself back around and stood between his friend and the bitter unicorn once Ivo had been sent sprawling onto the ground.

“That was for antagonizing my friend!” He snorted as the unicorn picked himself back up. “I don’t know why you’re like this, but you’ll never make any friends being a meanie pants like that!”

Ivo snorted derisively himself. His eyes, which could be seen for a moment while the black glasses hung lopsidedly on his face, flashed with raw, pained malice. He then huffed and assumed a more dignified and controlled stance as he readjusted his slightly cracked glasses.

“Why do you insist,” He said calmly. “That I should care about something as fake and short lived as friendship?”

“Fake? Short lived?” Stormcaller shook his head. “What are you talking about?”

The red maned unicorn let out a short, bitter laugh as he gazed maliciously at the duo. Stormcaller raised an eye in confusion at this, but Si Fron’s eyes widened.

“Do you know what friendship is truly like?” Chided Ivo, his voice growing rather dark and cold. “Here is what it is like: You find someone agreeable. Someone who doesn't piss you off and maybe even amuses you. You spend time together, using each other to accomplish your goals or to satisfy one’s needs for trivial entertainment. And the moment you move to live somewhere else, or the friendship becomes inconvenient? You end it and never think of it again.”

Si Fron flinched at his words while Ivo continued.

“It is only a hopeless romantic’s notion that friendship lasts forever,” Ivo continued, stepping forward with bold, carefully measured steps. “Like a discarded orange peel, a dead carcass, or even a stone under years of rain, it will one day wither away into dust, no matter how long it takes. Assuming of course, if the person who is supposedly your friend doesn’t simply destroy you after he is finished using you as a mere stepping stone. After all, friends just use friendship as a tool. What does it matter that you break a tool after you are finished using it after all? Or rather, to throw it away to save your own skin after the tool has outlived its usefulness.”

For a while, everything was silent and still. Stormcaller’s face was wide and agape with pure, numb shock at the unicorn’s accusations. Soon, that numbness gave way to indignant and uncharacteristic rage.

“That isn’t real friendship!” Stormcaller argued furiously. “That is just some fake friendship! Real friends don’t abandon each other or use their friendship like tools! They keep it alive and well! They spend time with others to help them through hard times and to make each other feel better! Your definition of friendship is that of a cynic’s!”

Ivo laughed bitterly at the counterargument, shaking his head slowly.

“Oh really? A cynic’s? And just what is so incorrect about a cynic’s view point, hmm? We live in a harsh and cruel reality, even if this pathetic world we stand in right now would like to make us believe that it is otherwise,” Idly, he turned his head to something just behind Stormcaller. He slowly grinned a dark and victorious grin at what he saw. “And if what you say is the truth, then riddle me this: why doesn't your ‘friend’ agree with you?”

“Huh? That isn’t true!” Stormcaller turned around to face his friend. “You agree with me, right? This guy is just full of hot air! ...right?”

Si Fron only gritted his teeth. He remembered so many instances from his childhood. While he never had to move, he had several friendships end due to an inconvenience or the moment the assignment they had been working together on was finished. Ivo’s words stung and rang more true than he would have liked. So instead of reporting falsely, he kept his peace as Stormcaller’s face grew increasingly concerned.

“Si Fron...” The pegasus slowly lowered his head to match his friend’s gaze. “You... you don’t agree with him... do you?”

The earth pony could only close his eyes as he looked away. Ivo laughed with bitter triumph at this.

“I rest my case,” Sneered the unicorn in response to the earth pony’s silence.

After walking away for a few steps, the pony paused. Ivo then turned around, smiling mockingly at Stormcaller..

“If you want to prove me wrong, pegasus...” He said condescendingly. “If you want to make my argument nothing more than that of a strawman’s... try convincing your so called friend first of your words... if you don’t come to find them as hollow as they really are first.”

With that, the black pony trotted off into the distance. The blue and green maned stallion turned back to Si Fron.

“Hey... are you alright?” The pegasus lifted his friend’s head up “You do realize that isn’t how friendship truly is, right?”

The earth pony turned his head away. He opened and closed his mouth a few times, but nothing came out at first. Eventually, he sighed, still not able to look his friend in the eyes as he spoke.

“I.... don’t, I guess,” Si Fron said painstakingly as he searched for the words himself. “But......if you’re right....”

“What?” Stormcaller laid a hoof on Si Fron’s shoulder.

“...then I have never had a true friend.....”

The silence was heavy for the longest time.

The duo walked down the road for the longest time with that same silence weighing heavily on them. Si Fron tried to think of something else, but Ivo’s words haunted him. He never thought of it before then, but they rang a little too close to home. Stormcaller, meanwhile, had been too stunned by the revelation with his friend to say anything. As they walked the long and winding road, the silence became too much for the normally hyperactive pegasus.

“Si Fron.”

The white stallion turned his head towards his friend. He was surprised by the serious look on the pegasus’ face, being reminded for the first time that he wasn’t just a knockoff of Pinkie Pie.

“Don’t let what Ivo said get to you,” Stormcaller reassured, looking at his friend with concern and his voice solid with genuine reassurance. “You will have friends come and go, sure, but you will find some true friends eventually.”

Si Fron smiled weakly.

“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” He looked away again, his expression still forlorn. “To be honest, it kind of was my fault.”

“What do you mean?”

“....Well, as I grew up, I had always had a few friends here and there. People who would help me out and share good times with me,” Si Fron recalled. “The problem was that they were all from class and that was the only time I ever talked to them or hung out with them. When it came to being with them outside of school, I never made any effort to get out of my comfort zone. I would always spend my afternoons by myself and let those... ‘weak friendships’ just sit idly for when class was going on. So whenever I changed from, say, middle school to high school or if I even changed classes, that would be that. I would never see them again except by chance. I never wrote or emailed to them or made any effort to stay in touch with them to even make the friendship more genuine... It was me who just let it die. Ivo’s words stung so bad because... it was me who would abandon the friendship, not them.”

Stormcaller said nothing, silently thinking as they trudged onwards down the path. For a moment, all that seemed to be there was the brown of the dirt path and the smell of the dirt their hooves shifted.

“You seriously never had any friends over, even when you were younger?” He asked quietly at last, grasping for some sort of straw. “You never went over to someone else’s place to play video games or sports or even eat cupcakes? At all? You truely never tried to get in touch with people outside of your classes and let yourself be all alone?”

“Well,” Si Fron paused and stopped walking. With a sigh, he continued to speak. “I guess I did have a few friends like that. But... they...”

After a few moments, Stormcaller nodded. He raised a hoof to stop his friend from continuing.

“I understand. If you don’t want to talk about it right now, that is okie doki loki.”

Si Fron sighed. But as he did so, he smiled in relief. It had felt comforting that Stormcaller respected his wishes.

“Maybe I’ll tell you more later,” Si Fron said as he thought of something to get his mind off of things. “Where are we, anyway?”

As they surveyed their surroundings, they realized the path that they were following had led them towards a forest that was in front of a large mountain. As they looked up, they saw that a magnificent city was jutting out of it.

“Wait a second,” Si Fron said, with the realization of their situation sinking in. “Is that-”

“Canterlot!?” Stormcaller exclaimed. Without missing a beat, he turned to Si fron and held out a hoof. “Let me see that map!”

Si Fron did a double take. Slowly, he looked with confusion at the hoof Stormcaller was holding out and back. Hesitantly, he spoke up.

“Ummm...” Si Fron was unsure of how to proceed. “I don’t have a map.”

“You don’t have THE map?” He said in faux surprise. “You lost it!?”

“But we never had one!” Si Fron defended. “We just ran out here and followed the first trail we saw!”

“Well that’s no excuse to go and lose the map!”

For a moment they looked at each other intensely. Then, slowly, the two started to laugh. It was weak at first, but as they heard each other’s laughter, it grew, slowly pushing out all of the harsh feelings that had been weighing them down.

“Thanks Storm,” Said Si Fron as the laughter died down. “I needed that.”

“Anytime,” Stormcaller smiled at his friend before putting a thoughtful hoof to his chin. “So, I guess this means we must have taken a wrong turn back at Albuquerque or something.”

“I knew we should have taken the left road,” The earth pony nodded. “But in all seriousness, I think we are seriously turned around and we need some directions.”

Stormcaller waved a hoof dismissively. “Directions, Schmirections! This is an adventure!”

“But I really don’t want to worry Pinkie Pie and Rarity!”

Stormcaller sighed. He then rolled his eyes and smirked at Si Fron.

“Fine, Mr. Serious McSeriouston. But can we at least go to Canterlot first? I want to see all of the cool stuff they have there! Like the Princesses!”

Si Fron conceded, silently sharing Stormcaller’s eagerness despite an overwhelming bout of the urge to be responsible.

“I suppose we have to. After all, there isn’t anyone else-”

“Anypony.” The pegasus reflexively corrected, much to Si Fron’s amusement.

“...anypony else on this road anyway that could give us directions.”

Not even a half a second later, the sound of a feminine voice was heard shrieking inside the forest. Before the duo could even charge in heroically, they spotted a light blue unicorn mare racing from the entrance.

“....how many times does Trixie have to say it, NO MEANS NO!!!” the unicorn shouted as she approached the two. From the forest, a purple pegasus stallion was galloping right behind her, with a brown mane and a look of pure ecstasy.

“But your mane looks so soft! Just let me brush it once!”

“TRIXIE SAID GET AWAY YOU CRAZY STALKER! Trixie may have led you on, but brushing Trixie’s mane is where Trixie draws the line!”

As she got close enough, the mare noticed the confused and somewhat worried duo looking at the scene. She stopped briefly in front of them.

“Oh thank goodness. Listen, Trixie doesn't care what you do or how you do it, please get rid of that idiot that is chasing Trixie! Ever since 2 days ago, Trixie has been stalked by that freak!” She pleaded desperately. “He seemed nice at first because he claimed to be Trixie’s biggest fan during Trixie’s...... hard times, but the moment Trixie said that he could bask in Trixie’s presence he hasn’t stopped bothering Trixie with weird and insane requests ever since like I-Trixie was some...well.. He wanted Trixie to eat pinecones and wear socks! Why would Trixie want to wear socks anyway, since Trixie would nev- ”

“TRIXIE!!!!” The pegasus had been getting closer during the Great and Powerful Trixie’s rant and he was almost upon them. With a shriek, the mare ducked behind Si Fron.

“AAH! DO SOMETHING!”

Thinking quickly, Si Fron pointed a hoof towards the fanatical pegasus. “Stop right there!”

Out of surprise, the purple pony skidded to a stop. Emboldened by the unexpected cooperation, Si Fron continued, deepening his voice to fake authority..

“What do you think you are doing?”

The purple pegasus blinked, caught off guard from the resistance.

“Umm, trying to brush the mane of the most beautiful mare in all of Equestria?”

“I think you misspoke there,” Interjected Stormcaller. “I don’t see Pinkie Pie anywhere. At any rate, let me see your license.”

“What?”

“You don’t have a license?” The blue Pegasus sighed and clicked his tongue.

“What license?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Said Si Fron, doing his best to not let a sly smile sneak across his face. “You need an official mane brushing license to brush her mane legally!”

“What in Equestria are you two-” Began Trixie in a harsh whisper before being cut off by Stormcaller being as loud as possible.

“YOU DON’T HAVE A MANE BRUSHING LICENSE!? Unacceptable!”

“But officers, I didn’t even know-” the stalker stopped in mid-sentence. “Wait a second!”

“Busted already?” Said Si Fron.

“Eeyup.” Replied Stormcaller, doing a decent impression of Big Mac. The pegasus in front of them snorted angrily and began pawing the ground in hostility.

“Any more brilliant plans of yours?” Snarked Trixie with her trademarked obnoxiousness.

“Just one,” Replied the pegasus calmy. “RUN!”

Before she could even blink, Stormcaller whirled around and plopped Trixie onto his back by the scruff of her neck as he and Si Fron ran in the opposite direction. The purple pegasus gave chase, infuriated by the two stallions taking ‘his’ Trixie away.

“EEEYYAAAAAA!!!!!” She screamed. “PUT ME DOWN!”

“And give you over to Mr. Stalker Guy?”

“I- I mean- “ She stammered for a few minutes before giving up on correcting her mistake. “Trixie didn’t want to be kidnapped by Trixie’s rescuers!”

“Well Excuuuuse us, Princess!” Snarked Si Fron as he looked over his shoulder. The crazed pony was gaining on them.“Dude, follow me!”

Complying, Stormcaller followed his earth pony friend off of the road and into the open field. They began to zig and zag to throw off their pursuer, but since it was just an open field, they didn’t do so well. In a stroke of brilliance, Stormcaller came up with something very rare: a good idea.

“Dude, My turn!”

Si Fron followed his friend as they ran straight ahead for a little bit more. When it looked like the purple pegasus stalker was about to catch up with them, they stopped and ran towards their pursuer, dodging around him at the last second. It took the pony a few seconds to realize what they had done and a few seconds more to turn around and gain back some momentum.

Using the time bought with the momentary confusion, the two heroes bolted towards the entrance of the forest. Once they had gone inside a little ways, they trio hid in a bush and waited for their pursuer to either get lost or give up. With luck, the pegasus ran right by them and continued running until they couldn’t him anymore.

“That was close.” Said Si Fron, panting from the exertion as they exited from the bush.

Stormcaller simply nodded as he plopped down onto the ground.

“Well!” Said Trixie as she got off of her blue rescuer. “Trixie supposes Trixie should thank you for losing that stalker. He was quite grating and he had the most annoying way of talking!”

“I’m glad we could help.” Si Fron said, holding out a hoof. Awkwardly, as if it took great effort on her part, she took the hoof and shook it.

“So, the Great and Powerful Trixie,” Said Stormcaller. “What are you going to do now?”

“Well, Trixie-” Her eyes narrowed suddenly. “How do you know that Trixie used to call Trixie the Great and Powerful Trixie?”

“Ummm.... we heard of your magic shows?” Offered Si Fron nervously.

Trixie glared at them for a moment more before sighing. With a look of defeat and resignation, she slumped down onto the ground and hung her head.

“Great. More ponies who want to make fun of Trixie,” The way she said those words had made it very clear just how utterly broken her spirit was. “Go ahead, laugh at the pathetic showmare who couldn’t even beat an Ursa Minor.”

The two stallions looked at each other for a moment, hoping to figure out what to say next.

“Okie Dokie Loki,” Replied Stormcaller with a playful grin on his face. “Although I wouldn’t know why you would want to be made fun of. That just sounds rather weird if you ask me.”

Trixie whipped her head up and stared at the odd pegasus. All she could do was blink for a few seconds, clearly thrown off by his oddly happy and friendly demeanor.

“Huh? W-what do you mean?”

“We didn’t want to make fun of you.” Si Fron said simply. “What’s not to get?”

“But surely you have heard about that one..... incident from Ponyville if you know about Trixie. Why wouldn’t you want to ridicule Trixie for failing so miserably there?”

“Because it is not nice and it wasn’t your fault that the Ursa stomped through the town?” Said Stormcaller, looking at her as if it was obvious.

“We aren’t those kind of ponies who would down-talk someo-pony for something they had no control over,” Agreed the white earth pony.

“But that is what everypony else has done to Trixie since the word spread about the Ursa...”

“Why should we do what everypony else does?” Si Fron sagely replied.

“You mean, you won’t hold it against Trixie?”

The two shook their heads. Trixie held a hoof to her chest as she looked down, a blush spreading across her face.

“Thank you...” She murmured.

“No problem!” Piped up the Pinkie Pie-ish Pegasus.

“So, what were you doing before you ran into that guy?” Inquired Si Fron.

“Trixie was actually...” She gulped and spoke as if she was swallowing something rather bitter. “Seeking employment in Canterlot when Trixie ran into that particularly putrid pest! Trixie was getting a little desperate, Trixie admits, and Trixie was going to the castle to apply for a job. While Trixie don’t normally want such charity from anypony, Trixie was trying to get the pity of the Princesses in an effort to get back on Trixie’s hooves. Much more quickly than Trixie would on Trixie’s own, I-Trixie means. Around that time is when Trixie’s trouble with that particular pony started.”

“Oh wow! What a coincidence! We were going to Canterlot too!” Stormcaller said, starting to bounce up and down in joy.

“Really?”

“We were actually heading to Ponyville to visit some friends when we sort of got turned around,” Si Fron nodded. “We were hoping to get some directions and look around for a bit before trying again while we are in Canterlot.”

“Trixie....sees.”

She looked at the two nervously as she silently debated with herself. She looked at the castle nervously, as if terrified of what is to come. Finally she looked at them, trying to appear bold and benevolent for the sake of appearances.

“Trixie supposes that she might as well use the company as Trixie goes to see the Princesses. Although...” Trixie peered up through the foliage again, looking at the sun’s position behind Canterlot. “Judging from the current time and distance time, we will probably end up seeing that new Princess Luna instead of Princess Celestia like Trixie originally intended.”

With that, the ex-showmare got up and began to walk off. She paused for a moment and turned back. Her eyes momentarily betrayed fear before the expression was replaced with annoyance.

“Well, are you going to come along with Trixie or what?”

The duo shrugged and caught up with the abrasive mare as they made their way back onto the trail and headed for the capital of Equestria.

Upon arriving in Canterlot, the three travelers were exhausted. The mountain trek had been long and rough. At this point, everypony in the group just wanted a nice soft bed to lie down in after a good long shower. Or maybe just a bed. They weren’t picky about it.

“Finally!” Trixie exclaimed. “Now Trixie can finally beseech the Princesses for that job. No more scavenging for food or getting scolded by others. Just a nice job so Trixie can live decently until Trixie finds a way to buy some supplies to start Trixie’s old act up again.”

Si Fron’s eye twitched at her repeated use of her own name. Bored, Trixie had decided to take it upon herself to talk the entire hike up to Canterlot. While Si Fron didn’t mind listening to her boasts about her days as a traveling entertainer, he did get annoyed by her using Trixie every time a pronoun would have been okay and even pleasant. He didn’t want to scold her and make her upset or more unpleasant, though, so he reluctantly kept his mouth shut.

As they entered the capital, the sun had already set and it was already an hour or 2 into the night. The city was relatively empty, with only a few ponies bustling about from place to place looking to either find a good party or make it to a late night business meeting. The street the group found themselves on was well lit with stylish lamps and the occasional neon sign. The three ponies soaked in the sights as they walked towards the castle. Si Fron whistled at it all.

“Wow....this is so....”

“Awesome?” suggested Stormcaller.

“Spectacular?” offered Trixie.

“...Picturesque.” Finished Si Fron.

Unbeknownst to the other two, he was beginning to go into the often unseen ‘poetic’ mode, where he babbled semi-intelligent nonsense. It would have been long and dreadfully boring if he had gotten started and it would have been a chore to stop him. Thankfully, Stormcaller had saved everyone from the cheese that is the earth pony waxing poetic by shouting really loudly.

“OH MY GOSH! WE’RE HERE! WE’RE ACTUALLY AT CANTERLOT CASTLE!”

After being thoroughly jarred by his friend’s loud declaration, Si Fron gazed upon the magnificence that was the Canterlot Castle. Large white towers soared up into the air, the guard rails on the bridges looked like they were made out of solid gold, and the banners and flags all flapped regally in the light breeze that brushed by. Not only that, but the details that were left out by the show’s cartioonish style also popped out at the two ex-humans. The stone that held up the towers was visibly weathered and old, but looked solid enough to stand for another few millennia with ease, while the gold on the rails shone and gleamed as if the group had just missed seeing a caretaker polish them, and the banners themselves had a sheen to their silky look as they flapped in the torchlight. The three of them took a moment to appreciate the beauty and prestige of the sight they beheld.

“........Well, that’s enough appreciating the super-duper awesome castle! Time to see the Princess!”

Eagerly, the pegasus stallion dashed off into the building with little other warning. Si Fron and Trixie yelped in surprise before pursuing their hyperactive companion. As they ran inside, the sights of the castle’s interior continued to awe them, with the walls adorned with realistically painted images of famous and royal ponies from all time periods, strings of well maintained groups of flowers, and more regal banners that were illuminated by nearby torches. Soon, they caught up to Stormcaller, who was dancing on the tips of his hooves in impatience. The reason for this, apparently, was the fact that the vicious enemy of all those who wish to enjoy things had appeared.

“UUGGGH!!!! WHY ARE THERE LINES IN EQUESTRIA!?” He griped impatiently to his friends as they caught up with him. “You would think that a place as awesome and perfect as Equestria wouldn’t even NEED lines, much less have them! Whyyy!?”

“Trixie finds it obvious that you two aren’t from around here if you expect to not have to wait in line to be heard from the one of the royal princesses,” She said with apathy as she polished and examined her hoof.

‘If Trixie doesn’t learn to use pronouns,’ Si Fron thought angrily, grinding his teeth. ‘Si Fron will have to pound her into the ground!!!’

As usual, though, he held his tongue and waited in line like everypony else. The line shortened over time at an agonizing but noticeable pace as the trio waited in anticipation. Soon, it was their turn to enter the illustrious throne room and as a group they made their way inside. The entrance they had gone through was actually a side door to the fabled room. As they looked about, they noticed that the line they were waiting in had extended to a large set of double doors on the opposite side of the room from where the throne was. On it was the regal Princess Luna, who was taller than all of the ponies in the room, but slightly smaller than her sister in height. Stormcaller pouted when he saw who was on the throne.

“Aw man. I really wanted to see Celestia! Oh well, I guess seeing Luna will do for the moment.”

Before Trixie or Si Fron could respond, they were deafened by the loud and booming power of the Royal Canterlot voice.

“THINE REQUEST FOR MORE STATUES OF THYSELF HATH BEEN DENIED, PRINCE BLUEBLOOD! THE STATUE ON THINE OWN PRIVATE ESTATE WILL SUFFICE FOR NOW! MAY THE NEXT PONY APPROACH THE DESIGNATED SPOT TO DECLARE THEIR REQUEST TO US?”

The three ponies winced in pain as the now deaf Prince Blueblood stormed past them, grumbling loudly about how the populace would only benefit from another statue depicting his blessed presence.

“Wow,” The white earth pony murmured, having not seen anything from season 2 besides the 2 part “Return of Harmony” opener since the other episodes hadn’t aired yet.

“Yeah, who would have thought that cute little Woona would have such a loud voice?”

“Trixie concurs with the insane pony. Trixie had no idea that the Princess of the Night had a voice that could awaken the dead.”

Si Fron nodded. He noted idly that the enormous double doors, which had stretched up towards the ceiling and were as thick as the average pony was long, had been forced open by the blast of the thunderous voice. Forced by the movement of the line, they eventually moved in front of the now open doors as a black Unicorn with blue and red hair approached a designated spot in front of the throne, styled so that his mane looked like flames. Squinting, Si Fron could make out that he had a flaming shield for a cutie mark. For some reason, this rang some bells in his mind, but he couldn’t sort out his thoughts fast enough as the Royal Canterlot voiced drowned them out once more, now buffeting him with fierce gales of force.

“SPEAK, CITIZEN OF OUR GREAT NATION! MAKE THY REQUEST KNOWN TO OUR EARS!” Spoke Luna at a slightly lesser volume at this point, much to everypony’s relief.

The unicorn stood there dumbfounded for a moment. He looked back and forth as if he couldn’t believe he was actually there before composing himself. Before Luna could loudly urge him to hasten his response, he finally spoke up.

“Umm, hey there, Luna. What’s up?”

The princess stared at him in confusion.

“WHAT DOEST THOU MEAN, WHAT IS UP? SURELY THOU CAN SEE THAT PLENTY OF THINGS ARE UP, INCLUDING THE ROYAL DECORATIONS, THE TORCHES, TH-”

She was swiftly interrupted by the unicorn’s laughter. After noticing her stare, he coughed and scratched the back of his head with his hoof.

“Sorry about that. Usually when peop- I mean ponies, reply to ‘What’s up?’, they usually tell them something that is going on in their life. It is a figure of speech, after all.”

“WELL, WE SUPPOSE THAT NOT MUCH HATH HAPPENED OTHER THAN THE USUAL ROYAL DUTIES IN OUR LIFE. WHAT ABOUT THOU? WHAT, AS YOU SAY, IS UP IN THINE LIFE?”

“Well, besides waking up in a completely different world in the body that I had described in a fanfiction,” He began. “I have been stared at by ponies, insulted the upper class, accidentally embarrassed a rather effeminate stallion, and confirmed that I can do awesome fire magic. Thankfully no one was injured, but I may have a bounty on my head if that stuffy stallion with the toupee goes through on his threats. Oh, yeah, that was rather fun.”

Luna blinked several times. “We...... do not know how quite to respond to that. WHAT IS IT THAT THOU IS REQUESTING? THAT WHATEVER BOUNTY ON THINE HEAD BE DISMISSED?”

“No, although that would be nice. Actually, I had come here for a very different reason....” He mumbled to himself for a few minutes. “I... had come here to see if....”

“JUST ASK. THOU HATH NOTHING TO FEAR FROM OUR JUDGEMENT.”

“...CanItrytobeyourfriendandtakeyouonadateifIimpressyou?” he said rapidly. He turned his head away from the Princess, blushing furiously. Luna said nothing for a time.

“Do you mean it?” She said at last in a regular voice, which may have been a whisper for all everyone knew. The unicorn nodded. Luna’s face lit up as she ran up and hugged the pony. Her response, unfortunately, was to speak at a volume that had easily outclassed the previous times she had spoke, much to everyone’s horror.

“OH THANK YOU BOLD PONY!!! EVEN BACK BEFORE MY UNFORTUNATE INCIDENT, I HAD NEVER HAD A SINGLE PONY EVEN REQUEST SUCH SMALL THINGS OF ME WHILE OUR SISTER HAD RECEIVED REQUESTS BY WOULD BE SUITORS BY THE DOZENS. WE HATH GIVEN UP HOPE THAT ANYPONY WOULD DO US SUCH A KIND FAVOR!!! AS A SIGN OF OUR GRATITUDE, WE SHALL GRANT THINE REQUEST POSTHASTE!!!”

As joyous as it was for Luna, everyone else in the room suffered as nearly everypony’s flimsy eardrums burst from the verbal blast. For Stormcaller, Trixie, and Si Fron, their eardrums were spared, but instead they had been lifted off of their hooves by the Royal Canterlot Voice and thrown physically out of the window in the hallway behind them. They weren't on the ground floor when they had left the building, but they thankfully landed into a bed of thornless flowers. While it softened the blow to survivable levels, they still all passed out from the physical trauma.

Chapter 3:Hue-Mans

Oh the Humanity! A Si Fron and Stormcaller Tale

Chapter 3: Hue-mans and their Tell A Vision these days!

“My Little Ponies... please tell me... what are you doing in my favorite patch of flowers?”

Si Fron involuntarily yawned and slowly opened his eyes as he was gently roused from his dreams by the melodious voice. He did did not expect to see Celestia staring at him, though, and quickly froze from the sight of such an important pony even being near him. In a calmly controlled panic, he slowly closed his eyes again, futilely hoping that if he remained still enough, she would go away thinking that he fell back asleep and-

“OMYGOSH!”

Si Fron’s already poor plans were dashed mid-thought as he was flung violently from the flower bed and at the feet of Celestia. The culprit was one lovesick Stormcaller, who had leapt from the pile of ponies to literally kiss the ground the princess was standing on. Trixie, who also was violently woken up by Stormcaller, began bowing and kissing the ground as well, although it was more out of a thinly veiled attempt to appear humble. She was overshadowed, though, by Stormcaller’s even more ill-conceived attempts to make conversation with the ruler of the mythical country.

“YOU’RE HOT!” Stormcaller blurted out as soon as his mind could process that he actually was in the presence of Celestia. She merely raised an eyebrow and her poker smile grew imperceptibly in response to his outburst.

“Umm, I mean, because you’re the Princess of the Sun. I mean, that you are physically hot! In a totally non-sexual way! I mean not that you aren’t that kind of hot too! I uhh-”

“Oh for the love of God, Stormcaller, Shut up!”

Si Fron, who felt embarrassed by merely watching the embarrassing situation, had out of desperation tackled the babbling blue pegasus and proceeded to try to keep his mouth clamped shut. Startled, Stormcaller began to try to throw off his attacker as he continued to make a fool of himself verbally by letting slip innuendoes about wanting to make out with her. Celestia giggled lightly, placing a hoof over her mouth as The Enraged and Terrified Trixie enter the fray, trying to keep both of them from making even bigger fools of themselves than they already had. Eventually, a gentle glow akin to the first rays of a golden dawn enveloped the three ponies and separated them.

“Well, it seems to me that everypony got off on the wrong hoof this morning. Judging from the glass and which window was broken, I’d say my sister got excited and launched you three into the garden with the Royal Canterlot Voice last night, correct?”

The three nodded hesitantly. Celestia sighed, although her slight smile never left her face.

“Well, I suppose you should be compensated for your troubles. Come with me and we can talk about what you came here for as we have breakfast.”

Mumbling some form of agreement, the three blushing ponies silently followed Celestia to the dining hall. None of them said anything they were so embarrassed. Even the sight of Luna skipping down the halls of the castle like a little schoolgirl couldn’t break their embarrassed silence, although it came very close. As they walked, Si Fron noticed that Trixie was walking closely next to Stormcaller, as if she found the presence of another pony more comforting.

Eventually, they all made it to the grand dining room in all of its glory. With its fantasy design and feel, the dining area fit hardly looked out of place with the rest of the majestic castle. Long, finely carved tables adorned with the whitest of tablecloths that ran their length, the silverware looked as if it was actually made of silver, and the fine china was decorated with masterfully detailed pictures and designs. Every seat even had its own personal butler or maid to attend the possible occupant.

Celestia merely nodded, acknowledging the hard working staff. Si Fron looked on, feeling more and more impressed as the reality of the situation overrode his fictionally spoiled mind. Trixie gaped, having never conceived of such a sight in her entire lifetime. Stormcaller, on the other hand...

“OH MYGOSH! THIS IS SO AWESOME!” yelled the pegasus as he rushed over from spot to spot in the room. “I can’t believe we are actually here in the castle, can you believe it, because I can’t and I am actually here!”

Si Fron nervously raised a hoof as he went to say something, but the word died on his tongue as Celestia placed a calming hoof on his shoulder. She silently debated with him for a moment or two using facial expressions, but Si Fron finally relaxed a little bit when she pointed out with a jerk of her head that the butlers were smiling and snickering too. So, trying not to feel embarrassed or unnecessarily concerned, Si Fron followed Celestia and sat at one of the seats close to the head of the table where she was. Across from him sat Stormcaller, who was babbling on about pancakes and muffins to a butler of saint-worthy patience, while Trixie sat between him and Celestia.

“So, since you are guests of the Royal Canterlot Castle,” Celestia gracefully said once everypony was seated. “I think it would be only natural that I ask you what you want to eat.”

“Really?” Trixie asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Really,” Celestia replied with a nod.

“Are you sure?” Si Fron said, still a little out of sorts at the good fortune he was experiencing.

“I am sure,” Celestia replied again.

“Annyyything...?” Stormcaller said suggestively, as a humorous tease.

Celestia smiled coyly and leaned her head in close, whispering seductively in his ear.

“Anything.”

Stormcaller, not expecting this, blushed violently and quickly spat out that he wanted pancakes. Trixie panicked a bit, not sure how to feel, as Si Fron did his best not to break out into full blown laughter out of respect for his friend. Celestia, having none of that, made a silly face at him and the earth pony fell out of his chair in gales of laughter. He was shortly joined by the princess and eventually everyone else as the laughter spread like a contagion throughout the room.

Once they had recovered, Trixie ordered a salad and Si Fron ordered a couple of Blueberry pancakes and a chocolate chip and peanut butter waffle. As they waited, Celestia began the small talk. It went awkwardly at first, but soon the food arrived and the guests had their first bites. The food soon prompted some shouts of glee and questions regarding the recipe and origin of the ingredients of the delicious delicacies.

“Now that we have our food,” Celestia politely redirected the conversation. “Do you mind if I ask what the three of you came here to ask of the court? Usually I’d have you wait for another hour or two when the court opens up to all ponies, but since we have a bit of time on our hooves, now would be just as good.”

Si Fron looked to Stormcaller, who was too busy enjoying his meal to speak. He then shrugged and looked at Trixie.

“Ladies first.”

Trixie looked at the earth pony for minute before brushing off the odd saying. She then looked to Princess Celestia for a moment, trying to figure out the best way to make her request. After a moment, she sighed dramatically.

“Oh dear Princess Celestia, who raises the life-giving sun every morning, Tr- I humbly beseech you for nothing more than a means to a livelihood. You see, Tr-I was a traveling magician, spreading amazing magics to all of the backwater villages when I happened on a small rustic village by the name of Ponyville. During my sta-”

Celestia raised a hoof at this point. Her expression grew stern.

“I believe I have heard about this incident from my apprentice,” Celestia began. “Who was personally involved in the matter.”

Trixie gulped as she realized what was about to come down. Shame and guilt surged forth, reinforcing the truth brought by the princess’ next words.

“When you went to Ponyville, you began a simple show based on the premise of showing off your magic. After only a few firework spells, however, you began boasting about yourself endlessly and insulting the crowd as you did so. You then proceeded to humiliate several of the ponies who heckled you for your insolence and acted arrogantly about your victories. You continued to act distastefully about all of this and even made up a story about defeating an impossibly difficult foe.

Celestia was saying all of this curtly as her gaze bore into the showmare. Trixie gulped as the ruler of the sun continued to recount the incident.

“A tale that two rather impressionable young colts decided that they wanted to see reenacted with a real Ursa. The resulting fiasco resulted in massive amounts of property damage and even an injury or two. While holding the last account against you would be unjust, your actions have shown a rather poor display of character that I am severely disappointed came from one of my subjects. I can only assume what you wish to ask of me, but let it be known that I am not particularly inclined to grant your request after having heard all of this from multiple sources, including one that I trust with my life. If you still want to make your request, then you may do so at this time.”

Trixie had flinched when Celestia had began her tirade, knowing that she was not in the princess’ favor. As the accusations had continued, the mare shrank down in her seat until it was no longer physically possible to do so. Once Celestia had brought out the whole ugly truth to bear, Trixie had been reduced to a sniveling wreck. Whimpering, Trixie was barely able to keep her words audible.

“...I just needed a job...”

Celestia’s stern expression shifted into one that could not easily be read.

“You request a job?”

“Yes, your highness...” said Trixie, quivering in fear and having at last completely dropped the annoying pronoun replacement. “I have fallen on hard times ever since the incident and I left Ponyville feeling terrified and humiliated. My only home was destroyed by the Ursa and so I had to spend the next few days without my bits and a home. If it wasn’t for the grass and the occasional pine cone that I had to scavenge, I would surely have starved.

“Despite all of this and the constant laughter and scorn I have had to deal with ever since the incident, I was still too proud at first to even conceive of asking anypony for help to seek employment. However,” she hung her head low in shame. “the guilt and the truth finally caught up to me and by the time they were through they had left me crushed. My reputation soon spread and it became harder and harder to find even a lowly cleaning job that would keep me afloat. If it wasn’t for the kindness of a few individuals like these two, I may never have had the courage to even drop my pride to ask even for directions to where a job might be, much less to come here knowing that something like this might happen...”

Si Fron blinked in surprise. In a rare gesture, he reached out and put a hoof on Trixie’s shoulder, causing the mare to look up at him with eyes that were holding back the tears of broken pride. Si Fron smiled softly, instinctively wanting to comfort the pony in front of him.

“If it means anything,”he said softly, in the same fashion one would comfort a dear friend. “I wouldn’t have held it against you. I sort of like flamboyant personalities, even if you could have been less mean about it.”

“Yeah! I still think you’re totally awesome, even if you are a hobo!” Stormcaller piped in encouragingly.

Trixie stared at the two of them for a moment before she looked down to wipe a tear away from her eye.

“Look at me,” Trixie said, forcing a smile. “Here I am with my wrongs and flaws laid out as I shamefully beg for something I don’t deserve and I am crying. Here, I haven’t learned much and I am still arrogant enough to try to ask for a favor instead of earning what I seek myself. Here I am being given kindness anyway as I continue to act so shamefully that it isn’t even funny.”

“The proud tend to do that sometimes,” Celestia said sagely, her gaze softening. “But at least you have the courage to admit that. I have seen many creatures pony and otherwise drop even lower than you and still not admit even to their own pride.”

Trixie looked up at the princess in shock.

“And instead of asking for bits or a free home like some of the more depraved ponies would, you also have asked for a job to earn your living properly, which shows that despite your demeanor there is still a bit of hope for you. Or that your pride is at least based on something positive. Considering that you now seem to know the how greatly the consequences of your actions can affect you, I may give you a job...”

Trixie, well and truly humbled, began to bow before Celestia interrupted her with a hoof.

“Under the condition that you must follow in my pupil’s footsteps in her studies.”

Trixie looked up at her and gulped, her mind trying to imagine what kind of difficult challenges she would have to endure. Si Fron and Stormcaller smiled, knowing exactly what was coming. Celestia, with her eternal poker smile, continued.

“And to do that, you...” the ruler paused for dramatic effect. “Have to go out and make some friends.”

Trixie blinked, her mind too blank to even be flabbergasted. After a long bout of silence to process this, Trixie finally responded.

“That’s it?”

Celestia smiled gently.

“You also will have to write to me what you have learned about friendship every so often, but that is nothing to pressure yourself over. I believe that your experience traveling will help you act as an emergency response guard, meaning that once you are finished with basic training you will be assigned to a unit and be able to travel wherever you want to in the kingdom. What you do in your time off in any village you happen to be in would also be up to you.” Celestia’s face grew stern fto emphasis the importance of her words. “Poor behaviour would prevent that freedom and, if repeated, would take away this one and only chance that I’m giving you. One another note, normally the job would get dull after a while and the rigors of the training might get discouraging without anyone by your side. It isn’t easy and not always exciting as the life of a showmare. But if you need this job as much as you say you do, I am sure you will find a way. Especially if you keep in mind my condition.”

The former showmare sat there with a very confused look on her face. Then, slowly, Trixie nodded. As the whole message sank in, a heartfelt smile blossomed on her face.

“I am very humbled, your highness. I... I thank you humbly from the bottom of my heart.”

Trixie then turned to Si Fron and Stormcaller, nodding at them. Her expression uncomfortably shifted a bit as she searched for her next words.

“And thank you too. I ... admit I may have had a bit of unnecessary anxiety when it came to coming here. You two have helped more than I may have realized and for that, I owe you any important favor you may wish to ask.”

Si Fron smiled sympathetically and waved his hoof.

“It’s nothing major. I know that feeling myself. I’m just glad I could help.”

The earth pony truly was. Being able to make a visible difference for the better helped boosted an otherwise low confidence and self-esteem. He was rather like Pinkie Pie in that aspect, if he ever bothered to think about it.

“Well, now that we have that matter out of the way,” Celestia said, smiling gently at the scene before her. “What are your requests?”

Si Fron took a moment to see if Stormcaller had anything to say. When it was apparent that Stormcaller had become distracted eating his breakfast, Si Fron sighed and turned to Celestia to speak.

“Umm, well, uh...I think...”

Si Fron stuttered and trailed off, feeling increasingly self-conscious about the situation. He knew what he wanted to ask and he knew generally how he wanted to say it, but whenever he opened his mouth to speak, the words got jammed in his throat and his mind wiped itself clean. Eventually, Trixie sighed in exasperation and disgust at the pony’s nerves.

“They were on their way to Ponyville and got lost,” she said swiftly, trying her best not to be curt about it. “In addition to accompanying me, they simply wanted to see you and maybe ask for directions. Of course, of all the times to be locked up with nerves, he chose now. Of course, no one can really blame him, but still!”

Si Fron blushed and shrunk back in his own seat. Celestia glanced at a butler who nodded and promptly brought out a piece of paper. He made a quick stroke on it and looked towards another butler, who rolled his eyes and hoofed over a few bits.

“If that is all you require, my little ponies,” Celestia said in a calm, practiced voice. “Then all you need to do is take the Friendship Express and you should arrive there in a day. If you can’t afford it for whatever reason, then you can take the road out of Canterlot and stay as close to the forest as you can as you take the path. The hoofpath will take about 5-6 hours, depending on your physical condition and if you decide to stop and see Cloverville.”

“Really?” Si Fron said with a bit of relief. “I thought it would take longer for some reason. I just hope we haven’t worried Pinkie Pie and Rarity with how late we already are.”

Celestia raised an eyebrow in bemusement.

“Are they expecting you?”

Stormcaller, who had just finished eating his breakfast, nodded vigorously.

“Uh huh! You see, we would have been there earlier but we didn’t have our tickets to get on the train when we got to the train station because when we woke up it was, like, going to leave super duper soon so we had to rush on over to the train station with all of the luggage and by the time we got there Rarity and Pinkie got on the train but when we tried to get on-”

“My word, I don't think the Great and Powerful Trixie has ever seen or heard of a pony who talks like that,” Trixie murmured as Stormcaller began Pinkie-Speaking.

“-so we tried to jump on it but since I couldn’t fly we fell on the ground and rolled down a hill and we had to walk there but we took a wrong turn at Albuquerque so we ended up heading towards here and running into a really mean unicorn who liked diet Pepsi which is stupid because Diet Pepsi doesn’t have sugar in it and what is the point of Pepsi if it doesn’t make you hyper? Anyway we then-”

“Reminds me of a certain friend of my favorite pupil,” Celestia mused wryly.

“-or is it a fancolt here... anyway, we came here to see you but it was nighttime so we went to see Luna instead and ended up getting knocked out of the castle by that super duper loud voice and-”

“Who is this student of yours anyway?” Trixie asked idly as she tried to spare her brain from trying to process the 100 mile an hour summary Stormcaller was giving.

“-‘Do you want breakfast?’ and we came here then Trixie had some character development and here we are with me talking one hundred miles an hour-”

“Twilight Sparkle,” Celestia said simply, causing Trixie to spit out a bit of her drink.

“...I now doesn’t feel quite as bitter about being upstaged in Ponyville,” she said quietly and evenly in her shock.

“-and that is why Kumquats are always better than Platypi!” Stormcaller finally concluded.

Si Fron, who was the only one paying attention to Stormcaller’s speech when he started going off topic, had doubled over laughing.

“Kumquats...” was all Si Fron could say in his hysterical guffaws.

“Well,” Celestia said carefully. “Sounds like you two have already had quite a time here in Equestria. Since my student knows the two ponies in question, I’ll send a letter to her so that they know about your detour and can relax knowing you’ll be in their town soon. As for getting to Ponyville, You actually were heading on the right path. Just exit the way you came and make a left. You’ll be within viewing distance in a few hours of walking.”

“Really?” Si Fron mused. “Huh, maybe we really should get a map...”

“Perhaps,” she smiled wryly. “On a different note, I’d like to-”

Before she said anything else, a white unicorn with a blue mane and silver armor stepped in. He looked a bit young and he had a grim expression on his face as he motioned for Celestia to come to him. She excused herself and headed over to the unicorn and conversed with him in hushed tones. After a moment, she turned to her guests.

“I do sincerely apologize, but I have a situation to deal with at the moment. Shining Armor here will deal with your induction momentarily, Trixie, once we have discussed something important,” she turned her head to Stormcaller and Si Fron. “And I trust you two will want to get moving as soon as possible. Feel free to take as much of the leftovers as you like, since you seem to be a bit short on funds at the moment. It was pleasant meeting all of you and I hope you have a good day.”

With that Princess Celestia and the stallion known as Shining Armor left to deal with the situation. Trixie turned to the two stallions, her expression betraying her perplexity.

“Do either of you have any idea have any clue what that was about?”

Si Fron shook his head as a feeling of tense excitement gripped his gut. Stormcaller wing-shrugged as he gathered up any and all of the leftovers in a checkered cloth that most of the waiters swore wasn’t there before.

“I dunno, but it probably means that cool, fate of Equestria sort of things are gonna happen soon.”

Trixie blinked and stared at the pegasus as they began to walk down the corridors towards the entrance..

“What makes you say that?”

“Call it a hunch,” Stormcaller said as he winked at Si Fron, who just rolled his eyes.

“Anyway,” Trixie shook her head as the trio came to a stop near the entrance of the castle. “This is where we part, I suppose. I really do want to thank you two for what you did for me. If we meet again and you need anything, I promise I will do everything in my power to help you two.”

“That is very kind of you,” Si Fron said before a grin appeared on his face. “I’d also like to thank you too.”

“Oh really?”

“For two things, actually. Thank you for the offer even though it was simply what anypony should have done.”

“And?” Trixie asked, raising an eyebrow in suspicion at the inclusion of ‘for two things, actually’.

“And,” Si Fron continued, doing his best not to break out snickering. “Thank you for finally using pronouns!”

Trixie blinked in surprise before blushing at the lampshading of her quirk. Storm took the moment to roll on the floor laughing as she recovered and stuck her tongue out.

“Oh shut up!” she said with a blush before trying to whack Si Fron over the head with a newspaper.

With a parting laugh, Trixie left to begin her life as a part of the emergency response guard as Si Fron and Stormcaller left through the entrance. They calmly walked on through the busy daytime streets of Canterlot, where they spent the time talking about some of the different ponies and buildings they passed. Soon enough they were back the trail down the mountain and even sooner after that they were down the right path towards Ponyville.

As they grew ever closer to their destination, the duo’s excitement grew little by little, only tempered by the cross country hike they were taking to get there. Stormcaller’s wings flapped up and down stiffly with tense excitement and Si Fron eventually stopped taking the time to readjust his hat every time it began to slide somewhat to the side of his head. The excitement grew to a boiling point when Stormcaller squeed loudly.

“LOOK! LOOK, SI FRON!” He grabbed his friend and pointed to a spot off in the distance. “LOOK OVER THERE!”

With a bit of squinting, the earth pony soon had a smile on his face big enough to rival his friend’s. His legs began to pump up and down more vigorously as they once again resumed their hike towards Ponyville. The hike, though, quickly turned into a jog which evolved into a flat out run as they sped down the trail and made a beeline towards their destination. 15 minutes later, the two were panting just as they crossed into the town good and proper.

“We’re here!” Stormcaller cheered, turning a few heads in their direction.

“I know right?”

Si Fron beamed as he looked around and soaked in all of the details from the rough textures of the old fashioned homes to the coarse and smooth furs of the ponies to even the earthy smells of the ground and the delicious aroma of baked goods. The sounds of the pleasant voices drifting through the air as ponies scurried from place to place in the afternoon sun also wasn’t too shabby either. He spent a moment more savouring the surroundings before turning back to Stormcaller.

“Wow, it is even more awesome than I imagined!”

“...I’ve seen better,” Stormcaller commented after a few moments. His friend looked at him with bewilderment before the Pegasus finally broke down laughing. “PSYCHE! But man, if this is how it feels to just be in Ponyville, just imagine how Pinkie’s party will be!”

“Oh yeah! Pinkie Pie is probably worried about us! Or at least wondering where we are.”

“Well, what are we waiting for?” The Pegasus dramatically pointed in a random direction. “On to the Sugarcube Corner!”

There was a brief pause. Stormcaller opened his mouth to speak when Si Fron waved a hoof to cut him off. Si Fron looked around the plaza for a second, looking for a sign or something. Alas, there was nothing to direct them towards the Sugarcube Corner. In fact, there didn’t seem to be any signs to guide newcomers anywhere at all.

“Well,” the earth pony shrugged with one of his legs. “At least we get to see more of the town! I’m sure it can’t be that hard to find any of the places that were in the show since they stand out, right?”

About an hour later Si Fron was mentally kicking himself for his words as they passed the same dead end road leading to a cliff for the third time. As interesting as it was to run into the first time, the duo were starting to get tired of wandering down different winding paths just to end up in front of the same dead end.

“Umm, maybe we should ask for directions,” Stormcaller finally said as he looked over the cliff face and kicked a small rock over its edge.

“Sure. Let’s get back to a somewhat crowded area so we have plenty of ponies to ask.”

A few turns later and they managed get themselves lost, ending up in a different part of Ponyville. Through sheer luck and path exhaustion though, the two had managed to make their way to the farmer’s market where the ponies went from stall to stall to buy and sell fruit, vegetables, and even pots and pans in one odd instance. Over towards the end of the stalls, Si Fron’s eyes caught what he considered to be the first major ‘landmark’ of the small town.

“Hey, Storm! Look over there!”

The pegasus turned his head and smiled as he saw a familiar Stetson wearing pony manning an apple stand. He grinned and bounced up and down on his hooves.

“It’s Applejack!” he giggled. “Come on, let’s go meet her!”

“Storm, hold on a second.”

Just before the pegasus could bowl over every pony between him and the simple farmpony, Si Fron grabbed him by the back of his vest. With a yelp, they both toppled over and attracted a few stares as they picked themselves back up.

“Ahem. Storm, we probably shouldn’t just go barging up to her like that!”

“Aww,” he whined with child-like disappointment. “But why not?”

“First, think about how you would feel if some strange pony ran up to you and started babbling on and on in your face with no apparent reason. Secondly, even if we were all calm about it, Applejack probably wouldn’t talk to us even then without getting into a bad mood.”

“Huh?” the pegasus tilted his head in confusion. “Why is that?”

“Because,” his companion pointed his hoof to a rather long line of ponies in front of the stall. “She has customers right now.”

“Oh, right...” his wings drooped as he sighed in defeat. “Then let’s go wait in line...”

For the next few agonizing minutes, they waited as the line would repeatedly stop and go, with ponies getting in line behind them and a few of the more rude ones cutting in front of them. They could have groaned or shouted in frustration, but they took the high road as they kept their peace. After what seemed like forever, they finally made it to the Element of Harmony herself.

“Oh boy, it’s really you!” Stormcaller gushed as he stood his front legs on the stall to get even closer to Applejack. “I mean, this is so amazing I-”

“-Ah can’t even believe that it is actually me and Ah think yore the best pony and whatnot, right?,” the mare rolled her eyes. “Look, ever since a day or two ago ah’ve seen a lot of new ponies who keep coming to mah stall to meet an talk to me an’ generally waste mah time and everyone else’s who are in line to actually buy an apple. No, Ah don’t mind talkin’ to ya as ya make yore purchase, but if ya don’t buy something then I suggest ya leave before my patience gets any thinner.”

“But-but-but-”

“Are ya buyin’ an apple?”

“...no...”

“Then Ah hope to see ya again when ya want to buy an apple. Next!”

As Stormcaller walked off to the side, Si Fron nervously walked up to the stand.

“Umm, I’m sorry, but I don’t have any bits. I-”

“Then why are ya here?”

“I was with him... But I-”

“Look, Ah don’t want to come across as rude or nothin’,” she sighed desperately. “But the past few days there have been so many ponies wastin’ mah time that it is getting hard to sell any apples. Between the lack of potential sales and the fact that all of mah customers are getting fed up with waiting in lines, it gets rather hard on the business. And all of that could be shortened if ponies would stop jabberin’ on an’ on about ridiculous things like my shipping costs to Rainbow’s house or somethin’. Nothin’ personal, honestly! I hope ya understan’.”

Si Fron just nodded weakly and stepped out of line to join his buddy.

“Well, that was a bust,” Stormcaller said morosely before shaking the depression from his mind. “What are we going to do now?”

“I guess we could do what we planned to do in the first place and ask some of the nearby ponies,” the earth pony wandered over to a nearby grey stallion and politely got his attention. “Excuse me sir, do you know where the Sugarcube Corner is?”

“Nope,” the pony said with a hint of sadness. “I’m sorry, but I am new here myself.”

“I see. Thanks anyway.”

“Huh,” Stormcaller mused as they looked for a new prospective source of information. “That was unlucky. Hey, you?”

“Me?” asked a lime green unicorn stallion off to the side.

“Yeah. Do you know where Sugarcube Corner is?”

“Umm, no, sorry. I haven’t been in town long enough to see it.”

“Okie Dokie Loki!”

“I think I agree about the bad luck,” Si Fron said with a frown.

This continued for a while, the two ponies asking around for directions. However time and time again, they always seemed to end up asking the wrong ponies or, at least twice, ended up asking a pony who had given out the directions do many times that they simply refused to repeat them again. After a while, they both sat down on a bench next to a grey coated, black maned unicorn mare who was busy reading the paper.

“Man, what is up with all of these new ponies?” Stormcaller said as he fanned himself with his wings. “There isn’t much time before sundown and we still haven’t gotten any directions!”

“I know!” he sighed as he looked just past the newspaper reading mare. “And is it just me, or are there a lot more stallions in ponyville than I thought there were?”

“Well, maybe the show just didn’t have time to show them,” the pegasus suggested as he stretched in his spot.

“Yeah...” Si Fron was about to just give up and admit defeat for the day when his eye caught the headline of the Equestrian Daily newspaper. After pausing a second to marvel at the fact that their national newspaper WAS called the Equestrian Daily, his eyes returned to the headline.

Strange Ponies, or Strange ‘Hue-mans’?

“What the-” Si Fron said before turning to the mare. “Excuse me miss, but may I see that article?”

“Huh?” She looked up from it. “Oh, sure. I was just looking at this because I wanted to see what was going on in Canterlot. I usually read the Foal Free Press.”

As she pulled out the aforementioned newspaper, the white earth pony took ahold of the paper. After fighting with it to get it into a proper and convenient reading position, the two stallions began to read the article.

“By Big Print

Now, I know what you are thinking: What is a ‘hue-man’, and what do they have to do with ponies? Well, while no one quite has that answer, we will tell you what we DO know.

As of earlier this week, strange reports have been coming in all over Equestria fro Appleoosa to Manehatten about the appearances of odd ponies. Most of them being stallions of all three pony demographics, the first thing that strikes ponies as odd is that they seemed to have teleported in from any nearby or discernable location from where they are initially sighted. While a few Unicorns with exceptional talent or specialization can easily use this technique, it is easy for any unicorn with elementary magic education to tell where at least from which direction the initial teleport location is in. However, a few curious unicorns have noted that these teleportations seemed to have no direction at all. Or at least, any that we can view in the conventional 3-dimensions we are used to.

While this isn’t alarming in and of itself, the personalities and reactions of these ponies give place this fact in a suspicious light. Without fail, every last one of the suspected ponies has reacted in some form or another with surprise, shock, or, in one case, idle verbal acknowledgement. From there, they all began to behave strangely. Some of the ponies tried standing on their hind legs alone the way a minotaur would. Others stuck to using all four legs, but seemed to be hesitant about walking from their spot. Either way, the ponies would then continue to walk as if they were unused to their own bodies and thought that they would trip or stumble. Some did, but most managed to walk fine regardless of their apparent anxieties.

The curious behaviour, however, would continue in its perplexity, as the ponies would begin to react to their fellow ponies as if they were newborn foals just witnessing their parents for the first time. Then some would rant and rave with adoration, others with hatred, and others with fear. When asked, most wouldn’t give a straight answer and for a few days, it was thought that none of them would.

Then some of them began called themselves hue-mans. More specifically, some of them called themselves ‘bronies’.

Those who were relaxed or loose lipped enough to talk about it began to babble what at first seemed like nonsense, claiming that they had been hue-mans at some point beforehoof. Some would go on to speak about how they were either loving fans of something called a TV (short for Tell-a-Vision) show (which has been described as like a movie, only using what can only be interpreted as something requiring more complex magics) while others would show disdain for the very same thing. Those who didn’t mention the show merely tried to describe their species and how the ‘horses’ of their world had differed from the three pony races.

At first, most ponies had passed it off as madness. Others thought that it was an elaborate prank. After all, even with conventional transformation spells, even the most talented of unicorns would need the strength of at least ten to perform the spell to make the transformation more permanent. Even then, the sheer amount, estimated in the high hundreds to even thousands, of these supposedly hue-mans turned ponies suggests that at least a unicorn population exceeding Canterlot’s would be needed to account for all of the transformations in such a short span of time.

However, when confronted with this information, more and more of the mysterious ponies began admitting the same thing, even when they had no clear contact with the other ‘brony’ ponies. The phenomena continued to grow in complexity when the ones who had mentioned the Tell-a-Vision show thing, specifically called My Little Pony, Friendship is Magic, began heading towards a small town called Ponyville. This small town, which, until the events surrounding Discord a few weeks ago, had been relatively unheard of, has attracted major attention with these new ponies. The vast majority of them are expected to arrive sometime the day before or the very day that this article is released.

Meanwhile, those who seemed to have shown nothing but hatred and disdain seemed to have stormed off or reluctantly sought help to return to their original forms and hopefully home. At least, in the best cases. Rumors of violence have been coming in from places like Appleoosa, Manehatten, and especially Baltimare. These reports have frightened ponies, seeing as how such violence is even less common than theft, which occurs less than once a year in the recent times. If the more hateful of the odd, supposedly transformed ponies are to blame, then investigation into the matter should be initiated as soon as possible.

One thing's for sure though: This event is unprecedented and expected to cause some big changes in Equestrian society.

In other, related news, historians and mythologists have also uncovered information to suggest that hue-mans once existed in Pre-Equestrian mythology. More of that on page 10.

Si Fron and Stormcaller stared at the newspaper for the longest time.

“Well,” Stormcaller finally said at last. “Looks like Pinkie Pie is going to be throwing a LOT of parties...”