In Which We Realize Something About Ourselves
"Oh, hello, Lyra!" Fluttershy said as the narrative skipped an introduction for various imaginary reasons. “I almost didn’t see you there on the park bench. It looks oh so comfy.”
Fluttershy flashed a delicate smile Lyra’s direction. She stopped whatever unimportant matter she was tending to and turned so that she could chat to the minty green mare before her. Lyra lazily returned Fluttershy’s smile as she lay reclined upon the park bench, her belly protruding outward though she was trying her damndest to suck it in. A passing flock of seagulls saw the greeting and they, too, dropped in to say hello. However, the seagulls, unfortunately, had dumbly forgotten to calculate the “‘rotundness of mare’ to ‘amount of food available to steal’” ratio, which was quite low, as both mares were rather skinny despite Lyra’s expanding belly. And so, instead, the flock of seagulls ran. They ran so far away.
“Good morning, Fluttershy,” Lyra sang in greeting. Fluttershy noted that Lyra should definitely keep her day job, and that she played the lyre for a reason. “What brings you here?”
“Oh, um, nothing really,” Fluttershy cheered. “I was only just walking these cute little ducklings down to the river. They’re very young, you know, and I just couldn’t let them go all alone.” she answered happily.
Lyra frowned. “What ducklings?”
“Oh, right... um,” Fluttershy looked to her left. Disoriented, she looked to her right. She looked under her legs and saw a few colts in the background that were most certainly, most definitely, not watching her bend over.
“Oh, dear,” Fluttershy muttered.
“I’m sure they’re fine, Fluttershy.”
Fluttershy was uncertain. She performed a quick pirouette in search of the missing ducklings. “Oh, but do you know that?”
“I’m sure that they’re fine,” Lyra repeated. She patted the vacant spot on the bench next to her. “Come. Have a seat with me. Do you have a while to talk?”
Fluttershy stopped spinning. “Oh, um, I’d love to, Lyra, but, um, the ducklings...”
“Like I said,” Lyra cooed to ease Fluttershy’s fretful mind, “I’m sure that they’re fine. They’ve probably already found their way to the river. It isn’t so hard to find, you know. Relax and have a seat!”
Fluttershy debated with herself for a short while. “Oh, you’re probably right...” she decided, “I’m sure that they’re fine.”
o----o
On a related note, somewhere in the center of Ponyville, three tiny ducklings waddled into the Ponyville bar...
o----o
Fluttershy joined Lyra on the park bench. She felt uncomfortable, as Lyra was sitting in a rather curious fashion, and it made Fluttershy feel out of place. To remedy this, as discretely as possible, which in turn wasn’t so discrete at all and was instead fascinatingly clumsy, Fluttershy righted herself on the park bench and slowly slithered down into a slumped position. Lyra eyed her with intrigue. Fluttershy fidgeted in place, and she furiously kicked her hooves in order to keep herself parked on the bench. It took a few moments of rigorous readjusting before Fluttershy had exacted the position and had replicated Lyra’s look to a degree where she wasn’t sliding off onto the sidewalk.
Fluttershy blushed. “Um... so how has your day been so far?”
Lyra had been eyeing Fluttershy the whole while. She noisily sipped at a hayshake. “Eh, you know, its been a day,” she said. “I’ve been here, there... that is assuming both ‘here’ and ‘there’ are right where I’m sitting.”
“Hm,” Fluttershy uttered. “So you’ve been sitting there all day?”
“Yes.”
“I see.”
“And I’ve also been sitting here all day.”
Fluttershy considered this. “Oh. I see.”
Lyra propped herself up with a hoof. “How’s your day been? I mean, other than, you know, the ducklings.”
“Oh, I do hope they’re okay,” Fluttershy stated remorsefully.
“They’ll be fine,” Lyra reassured her once more.
Fluttershy nodded her head in partial agreement. She hoped they were fine.
“Right. Well, um, my day...” Fluttershy thought back. “Oh, I guess I went to see Rainbow Dash this morning. We had breakfast together because Applejack had to work. Poor thing, she just works all the time. I almost never see her,” Fluttershy said. Lyra handed her an apple and she thankfully bit into its skin.
“Ohf, so you twooth had bweakfath togeffer alone?” Lyra asked, she herself chomping on a bite of her own apple. “Thath musta been awkwarth.”
Fluttershy gulped her bite down. “Awkward? Why’s that?”
“Ohf, soffy.” Lyra swallowed her bite. “What I meant was, how did Applejack feel about that? Was she okay with it?”
“Oh, yes, she was fine with it. After all, she had to work, so she said that we could go ahead without her.” Fluttershy watched a colt, who had most definitely not been staring at her flank, carelessly crash into a pole mid-stride. “It was very sweet of her to think of us.”
“Hm,” Lyra huffed. “That’s odd. She always seemed like the jealous type to me. Well, if you say so then. Be careful, though,” Lyra admonished her friend, “I’ve had my own share of experiences in situations like that.”
Fluttershy blinked twice in utter confusion. “Um, if you don’t mind me asking, what do you mean by ‘jealous type’?”
Lyra was sipping on her hayshake. She stopped slurping it up and faced Fluttershy with a slightly bewildered expression. “Really?”
“Oh, you don’t have to answer it if you don’t want to...”
“No, uh, let me put it this way.” Lyra started to implement the use of hoof gestures as she spoke, as if she had to fish words out of the air in order to throw them into her mouth. “I guess if I were Applejack, I wouldn’t be so, uh, happy, with my marefriend hangin’ around other mares.”
“Marefriend?” Fluttershy inquired. “Um, what do marefriends have to do with anything?”
Lyra looked disappointed. She couldn’t believe she was going to have to spell it out for somepony who was, on a personal level, much closer to the pairing they were conversing about. “Rainbow Dash and Applejack. They’re, uh.” Lyra performed a few twirling hoof motions. “They’re together, right?”
Fluttershy frowned. “Together? As in...” She bumped her two forehooves together.
Lyra found it surprising, almost disturbing, that an innocent pony such as Fluttershy even knew what that meant. For those that are unsure, succinctly put, it meant- “are they fucking?”.
Lyra raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, I guess.”
“Oh, goodness no, they aren’t a couple,” Fluttershy said.
Lyra felt as if she had been stepped on. “What?”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Fluttershy said sheepishly. “I must not have said it loud enough. They, um, aren’t a couple.”
Now, anypony who would have been looking at Lyra at that moment, which were certainly not the growing number of colts amassing in the park at that time, because they were fancying the flowers and definitely not the two attractive mares seated on the park bench, and they were definitely not waiting for the two mares to kiss like some sort of orgasmic fantasy that did not play out inside of their heads every day, would have seen that Lyra’s world looked as if it had been flipped upside down.
“They aren’t a couple? Huh? But they look so good together.” Lyra sighed.
“Exactly,” Fluttershy replied. “That’s just good marketing. It, um, appeals to their fan base... I think.”
Lyra was thoroughly lost. “What?”
Fluttershy appeared nonchalant, as if the conversation didn’t faze her any more than a casual conversation about how many colts Rarity had gotten in with the night previous. Wait, what?
“Applejack’s and Rainbow Dash’s fans. They just want to see them together,” Fluttershy said sweetly, her mane flowing steadily in the breeze, then stopping altogether because the breeze came to the sudden realization that it was sensationally cliché.
“Oh,” Lyra said. “So it’s one big hoax then? Isn’t that, like, kind of cheating?”
Fluttershy shook her head in disagreement. “Oh, Lyra. We’ve been cheating on each other since the day the first ship fic came out.”
Lyra was so lost.
“I am so lost,” Lyra stated.
Exactly.
Then, all was silent. A cliché tumbleweed rolled by because it was completely necessary to plot development, and in a place like Ponyville, they were most definitely found to be constantly roaming the premises.
Fluttershy rubbed at her temples as if she were recovering from a massive migraine. “Um, I think we should change the subject... oh, if you don’t mind, that is.”
Lyra merely blinked.
“Okay, I’ll take that as a maybe,” Fluttershy said.
Another awkward pause incurred thereafter. Crickets could be heard, mainly because a young filly had been trotting by and, inexplicably, she tripped over her own shoelaces and spilled a box of crickets upon the ground. Thus, a rather comical scene commenced, and numerous colts in the background were definitely not watching the commotion with malicious intent because she was, like, fucking eight. Fluttershy took it upon herself to speak up.
“You’re friends with Derpy, right?” Fluttershy asked in earnest, trying to pick the conversation back up from where it lay on the bed, slightly drunk, but not to the extent where you’d find it annoying.
“Huh?” Lyra asked, which is strange, because that’s exactly what the narrative was asking as well.
“Derpy? Are you good friends with her?”
Lyra snapped out of it. “Oh, uh, yeah, I am. Why do you ask?”
An abashed Fluttershy whimsically kicked her hind legs to and fro like a foal on a swing set. “Oh, I just wanted to know how she was doing is all. I haven’t seen her in so long.”
Lyra’s nose twitched. She took up the hayshake next to her and sipped at it. “Last time I checked,” she said in between sips, “she laid off the cider and was still going to her AA meetings. I think she’s fine.”
“Oh, that’s wonderful,” Fluttershy said. “I just wanted to know is all. I haven’t seen her ages.”
o----o
On a related note, three little ducklings sit at a bar, drunk out of their quacking minds because there isn’t a set age limit for cider in Equestria. The bartender has grown impatient with them. They’ve become rather loquacious drunks, and the dwindling population of the bar was suffering for it. It was bad for business. Thinking he was doing his bar a favor, the bartender calmly approached the three little drunk ducklings.
“Excuse me,” the bartender said to catch the ducklings’ attention, “I’m afraid you three are going to have to pay up and leave. I believe you’ve had enough.”
There was a moment of silence. The three ducklings stared at each other in astonishment, wondering just who this pony thought he was (he was essentially the law, but they were drunk, so they didn’t realize this). Eventually, they turned back round to face the bartender.
“Oh. All right then. I guess you can just put it on our bills!” they exclaimed in unison.
All three ducklings quacked up laughing. The bartender fainted. Why? Because ducks can’t very well quacking talk, now can they?
The bartender was out cold. Everypony else in the bar didn’t care, because they, like the ducklings, were hammered. Thusly, the bar rejoiced as the ducklings then bought a free round of drinks for everypony.
o----o
“I have a question for you as well,” Lyra said, finally finishing her hayshake with one last noisy slurp.
“Yes? What is it?”
Lyra pointed to the meadow. “Where do you think all of these ponies are coming from?” she asked, her hoof extending out to a delegate of ponies that could be seen congregating on the grasses. Every one of their coats were mixed with an odd array of colors, and most times their manes were styled to look like somepony Fluttershy and Lyra actually knew. You could say they looked... interesting... to say the least.
“Hm. I don’t know,” Fluttershy said unsurely. “They must be from out of town. Oh, I’m sure they’re nice if you get to know them...”
“But they’re poppin’ up left and right nowadays,” Lyra stated matter of factly. “It’s like they’re made at a factory or something.”
Fluttershy gave a wry smile. “Oh, I’m sure that’s not it...”
“I met a mare last week named Tea Kettle.”
“Maybe you’re on to something.”
They peered out into the meadow, and now those ponies were glaring right back across the way; it was a chilly stare that prodded at your spine with porcupine quills that hadn’t been disinfected. This sort of rudeness made Lyra feel out of place.
“They might be plotting world domination. Perhaps we should warn Celestia,” Lyra said, not taking her deadpan stare off of the ponies populating the meadow.
“Oh, Lyra, you might just be too shy,” Fluttershy told her friend. “I was shy once, um, you may not have known that. You just have to give everypony a chance.”
“Shy? Me?” Lyra asked skeptically.
“LyraShy!” Fluttershy giggled in response.
At that moment, both mares turned to each other and gazed deeply into each other’s eyes. It was a philosophical kind of deep, not the other kinds of deep. A rambunctious gathering of colts in the background were most definitely not whipping out their cameras to take pictures of the two mares sitting on the park bench, and were instead much more interested in photographing the various species of caterpillar that had been finding homes in Ponyville recently. Yes. They were completely uninterested in the goings-on of the two mares settled on the park bench.
Aw, who am I kidding. They wanted to bone the two mares sitting on the park bench. There was absolutely no doubt whatsoever.
“Fluttershy?” Lyra said, an unshakeable sensation suddenly overwhelming her.
“Yes?” Fluttershy asked.
Lyra felt hesitant to ask. She was shaking all over. She had to ask it, however. The narrative demanded it. “Would you... um, would you, um... you know... with me?”
Fluttershy bumped her two hooves together, a quizzical expression featured plainly on her face. Numerous colts in the background were jumping over each other in sheer elation, and their anxiousness to get “good seats” was so animalistic in nature that they resorted to strange grunts and barks to dissuade others from taking up spots to watch.
Lyra sighed. “Uh, yeah...”
“Oh, goodness, no,” Fluttershy responded. Every single colt in the background looked like a foal with a freshly deflated balloon.
Lyra didn’t look shocked at all. “Huh,” she murmured. “Interesting. I think in any other story, that would have worked.”
“Oh, um,” Fluttershy smiled faintly, “I just think ponies tend to forget who I am sometimes...”
“Yeah, you’re right. I’m sorry,” Lyra said. “Don’t believe everything that you read, you know?” Lyra watched as a grossly disappointed group of colts in the background dispersed, more than likely headed to Rarity’s shop, as Pinkie Pie was currently stationed there for a dress fitting. She frowned. “I for one can’t trust the papers anymore. They can’t get a single story straight. I mean, how many times have you read about Twilight Sparkle dying recently?”
“Twilight’s dead!?” Fluttershy yipped in utter disbelief.
“Oh, no, no,” Lyra clarified. “That’s just what the paper says, like, every single day.”
“No, no! This paper here that that gentlecolt just dropped!” Fluttershy picked up the day’s newspaper that a passing gentlecolt had thrown away, and she perused its contents vigorously. “Um, it reads ‘Twilight Sparkle has passed away from some unforeseen, incurable illness.’!”
Lyra rolled her eyes. She chuckled to herself, and she shook her head miserably. “That’s funny, ‘cuz she’s right over there.”
Lyra pointed to who else but Twilight Sparkle as she mosied on by them. She daintily skipped, her innards fully functional and healthy as ever though we couldn’t see them, and even cheerily waved to Fluttershy and Lyra when she caught sight of them. Fluttershy was confused. She picked the newspaper back up, and the next headline she saw read “Rarity and Princess Celestia: Wedding Bells?”. Disgusted, Fluttershy tossed the newspaper aside.
“Goodness,” Lyra continued, “I can’t even count the amount of times I’ve read about Twilight Sparkle dying on my own two han-.” She caught herself mid-thought. She appeared thoroughly confused. She frowned. “Hooves...?”
“Something wrong?”
“No... no. I just had the strangest sensation is all.”
Lyra rubbed at her head. Their entire conversation had been a head rubber, and I’m not talking about condoms.
Suddenly, and without warning, which is sort of redundant considering something that happens suddenly implies that the situation at hoof is not pre-conceived, a meteor came hurtling out of the sky because the storyline skipped several crucial points leading up to this, and some distance away, it crash landed in the meadow, annihilating a growing crowd of ugly ponies in the process. Thousands upon thousands of disgusting creatures poured out of the meteor’s midst and they immediately set upon destroying the small village of Ponyville for no bucking reason at all.
Twilight Sparkle came running back from where she had frolicked by earlier. She told Fluttershy to get a move on, because obviously Princess Celestia had gotten too fat or, somehow, too old to aid them in their current predicament.
“Oh, my,” Fluttershy said in an attempt to gather courage. “Well, I guess we’re off to go save Equestria from utter destruction once more, and then we’ll come back to everypony, and we’ll all immediately forget that anything happened at all...”
“What?”
“Oh, nothing...”
Fluttershy turned to leave.
“Fluttershy, wait,” Lyra said to stop her friend from leaving too soon.
“Yes?”
Lyra sighed. “How do you really feel about LyraShy? Be honest,” she asked.
“Oh, um,” Fluttershy stuttered. “I-I guess I’ve been paired with so many other ponies... being with somepony of my own choice for once would be lovely.” She smiled sweetly.
“Really? You aren’t being controlled by some other-worldly force that essentially determines for you how to walk, talk, and feel?”
“Debatable.”
“I think you should leave, Fluttershy.”
“Right. Um, it was very nice talking to you, Lyra! Oh, have a very pleasant afternoon...”
Fluttershy left Lyra on the bench, and a lingering number of colts in the background were most certainly, most definitely, not watching her hips sashay from side to side as she (clichely, if that were a word) sauntered off into the sunset.
Lyra sat. Lyra sat the same way everybody wanted her to sit. She had that stupid grin she always wore permanently plastered to her lips.
“I am a magical, pastel colored unicorn, and I enjoy every single second of it,” Lyra said in a sudden moment of realization.
And Lyra was happy.
And then the world of Equestria, very discretely, very gently, very gracefully, exploded.
Because buck you.
The End.
