We were bored.
Simply put, that is. In truth, we were both bored, hungry, and in need of sleep. Lounging in an endless vacuum of space tends to make one rather peckish for treats and the like.
Usually, when a King wants something, they simply snap their fingers and voila! There's a lowly little servant ready to take their order, usually a saucy maid or a nameless lad.
Curiously, we raised our hand and attempted to snap our fingers. It was a futile effort, considering that we were wearing gloves. We hid a grimace and lowered our hand to the side of our throne.
Sitting upon our slender knee was our son, our little Prince. He stared up at us with wide, vacant eyes, his mouth ajar in question as he swung his legs to and fro.
"Are you bored too, Prince?" we asked casually.
He placed a hand to his chin (well, where a human might expect a chin to be on our people) and seemed to think. After a little while, he turned to us and nodded slowly.
"Good. So it is not just us."
We sat in silence, our eyes trailing across the expanse of space. A comet here, a nebula there, all of the landscape seemed to be performing for our eyes alone.
A noble effort, but a fruitless one all the same. We could never be entertained by silly light shows.
We felt a slight tickling upon our knee, and we looked down to find our Prince stumbling to his feet, his arms flailing up and down to grab our attention.
"Hm? What is it?"
His antenna crackled with static in his excitement, and he bent over to mime a rolling motion with his hands.
"Oh! You want to roll up a katamari, then?"
He turned to us and nodded wildly.
We put a hand to our chin. "But what sort of katamari? Tasty? Flowery? Educational?" The possibilities were endless!
Before us lay a tapestry of stars, all with their own little worlds and knickknacks that were simply begging to be taken up. "What about Earth? That's always a nice chaotic place. Good variety." We rubbed our chiseled stubble as we mumbled to ourselves, our eyes trailing back to the Prince. "What do you think, Prince? You'll be the one to roll in it, of course."
The Prince narrowed his eyes and placed a hand to his mouth in a bored yawn.
Needless to say, we were shocked. "Why, Prince!" we cried. "Have some respect for our fans! You know well that most of our audience comes from there. At least give their planet the admiration they deserve for being so junky."
Startled by our outburst, our little Prince jumped up and bowed slightly, a few droplets of sweat streaming down his face.
We would have smiled had our facial muscles allowed for it. "That's much better. We would have sent one of your cousins had you kept up with such an outlandish opinion!" As baffled as we were, we could not help but raise out a massive hand to gently pat the Prince's head.
It's hard to be fatherly sometimes. After all, what are we to do that equals 'bonding' in space? We can't play baseball like normal dads and sons do. That would be silly. And impractical. Our Prince would never be able to match up with our superior prowess.
Our sweat could also stain the sky's polished finish too, and that would just be icky considering how sweaty it already is.
A loud 'boom' interrupted us from our thoughts, and we looked up to find a peculiar object racing towards us. It was a small sized thing, hardly fitting for a katamari, yet roundish in a sort of appealing way that we cannot quite describe, even now.
We'll simply spoil it right now and tell you that there was a cute little pony inside this thing, like an Easter egg filled with delicious candy.
And so, the little Easter egg thing came spiraling down to land square at our polished shoes. With a jump of fright, our Prince jumped up and scuttled up our arm to hide upon our shoulder.
For a few moments, the object sat there, as if it were sizing us up. It was opaque, yet pinkish on the outlines. Quite a jarring combination. we will admit that we were a little unnerved when the color began to drain from the object's surface, revealing it's contents.
Have you ever had a hamster? If you had or have one, then you know what a hamster ball looks like. You put your hamster in there and it rolls around and around. It's like a katamari, but it isn't. It's like a hamster cosplaying as one.
Except there wasn't a hamster in the ball. There was a little pony instead, colored baby blue with a mane and tail all the colors of the rainbow.
We rather like rainbows, so needless to say its vibrant colors made us jealous (don't tell anyone!).
The pony stumbled about in it's little ball for a second, its eyes fluttering as it unfurled its feathery wings. It spread its legs to gather up its balance, then looked up.
By now, the Prince had gained back what little courage he had to slide down our arm to get a closer look, yet our attention was focused on the pony, the little equine with wings. We think humans call such things 'pegasuses' but we like 'pony' just fine.
"You're a pony, yes?" we asked. "Albeit a very wonky looking one..."
"Wonky?!" the pony cried, it's nostrils flaring in a kind of adorable anger. "Why I oughta... You don't treat an ambassador like that!"
We raised a hand to scratch our chin. "An ambassador of the pony people? How curious..."
The pony winced, its hamster ball teetering as it tried to find a balance. "I dunno what people are, mister, but I do know that you look pretty fishy..." Its eyes narrowed. "Fruity, too."
"How can one be fishy and fruity?" We pondered, reaching out to grab the pony's ball as we did so. The little pony yelped in protest, but we were quite gentle as we held it in our palm. "To be fishy is to be a fish, but to be fruity is to smell fabulous. Are you implying that we are a fabulous fish?"
"I... what?" the pony stammered, eyes wide as it regarded our visage open-mouthed. "No, no... Look, maybe you can help me with something. Can you do that?" it asked.
"Oh!" It all made perfect sense now! We carefully cradled the hamster ball in our hands. "You should have mentioned earlier that you were a fan, pony. We can help you a lot faster if you just cut to the chase, you know?" We nodded knowingly.
"I'm just gonna stop asking questions then," the pony huffed and waved its little hoof in frustration. “seeing as how you make like, no sense...”
The Prince clambered down onto our hand with some difficulty, his arms waving about to get a sense of balance as he brought his hands against the pink hamster ball. The poor thing probably stupidly thought that the thing was a katamari for him to roll.
We ignored him for now, our eyes locked to the pony’s. “What brings you here, pony fan?”
The pony ignored our remark and twisted itself around to pull out a little scroll from underneath its wing. With a dramatic flourish, it unfurled it. Clearing its throat, it read "Ahem, 'To has come to my attention that there have been several disturbances with my sun, namely that I've witnessed various chunks of debris flying into it and throwing it out of balance. This would be grievous enough had I not noticed it being carried off by...'" The pony's eyes narrowed and drew closer to the page. "'...a tall, flamboyant man with cylindrical tumors on the sides of his head.'"
"Flamboyant? We do not know what this word means," we said, scratching our shaved goatee. "Does it imply that we are a buoyant flam? If so, then that message is grossly accusing. We don't aquatically rip off fans. We merely get them to waste money."
Sighing, the pony rolled up its little scroll and shot us an adorable little glare. "So you're pretty much admitting that it was you who did i-whoa!"
It fell backwards, its wings flailing as our Prince began to roll the pink ball around our feet. We had never seen our heir so delighted with a faux katamari. Perhaps it's because, like ourselves, he likes colorful ponies too.
The pony flapped its wings and painstakingly kept in pace with the ball's rolling. She looked looked up at us. "Can't you tell it to stop?"
"That 'it' is the Prince of all Cosmos, little pony, and you should be grateful. You've been promoted!" We rewarded it with a modest golf clap. "Do you like rolling?"
"I think I'm gonna throw up..."
"That's the spirit!" We cried. A new life seemed to surge within us, a new opportunity had risen its divine head and we knew, we knew just what needed to be done. As gently as we were able, we plucked up the pony's hamster ball between two fingers (along with our Prince, of course).
Beyond that vast nebula laid a new world untouched by any stray katamari, the pony kingdom. No doubt it was quite peaceful if a few accidental sun rollings were enough to get it in a tizzy. The possibilities for fun were just endless!
The Prince seemed to sense our own excitement, and his little body shivered with the events to come. The pony shivered as well, no doubt as equally as excited as we were. We were quite glad that she finally understood our intentions.
We pulled our hand back and threw. Hard. As the pink hamster ball flew away, the Prince waved his hand.
A new adventure awaited. Well... a new game, really. But all adventures are games in their own ways. It's just that this adventure is special since you have to go to a 'game store' to get it, and we're deeply sorry for that.
Oh!
Oh yes!
You bought the game! You thought it wise to play beyond the measly demo!
We are so proud of you, little player. We hope that you will have a gentle transition to becoming a full-fledged fan. You might even get to meet us in person. Wouldn't that be cool? We could go out and have ice cream with macadamia nuts in the sunset, then you could selfishly ask us to clean your room katamari-style. Then we'd cry.
But we digress, you're here to read about our little pony, aren't you? Yes, you are. Very well. We'll go into narrative mode for you now. We've been practicing since we last met you. We think that you'll be impressed.
We also seem worth it to note that, after a long investigation, we can safety deduce that the rainbow pony is a girl. We just wanted to make sure before we assumed, because assuming things can be quite rude.
Ahem.
As soon as we saw the pony's pink ball fade into space, we sat back in our throne and clapped our hands to summon a seventy-two inch plasma TV screen in front of our face. It was a little small, as we couldn't have all of our attention focused on our prince's exploits. Kings still have to do kingly things, unfortunately.
The pink ball flickered into view, and we could see our Prince clinging to its side, his eyes squinted shut. The pony was being tossed about, her wings and fur ruffling as her body smashed into her ship's curved sides. It made her look like she had been placed in a drier, fluffy and static-y.
Her mane was no longer that neat, pretty rainbow, but a tangle of messy colors that looked quite unseemly. Such a cacophony of hues would have looked beautiful on a katamari, but on a cute pony it just looked sad.
We decided to fix that. Reaching up, we placed a single finger to our screen.
"Pony, do you hear us?" we asked. We have a knack for tapping into the brains of simple creatures. How do you think that we're able to talk to the Prince so easily?
From the screen, the pony stiffened and looked around. "Wha... What the heck?!" she cried.
"We asked if you could hear us."
She planted her hooves to the sides of her head, grinding at her skull. "You're in my brain!"
"Naturally." We would have smiled it that were anatomically possible. "We were wondering if, during your journey back to your planet, we could play hairdresser on you?"
Even from the graininess of the screen we could see what looked like a frown on the pony's muzzle. "Go ahead and try. I dare you! You're like, light years away by now!" She turned to some random direction and shook her hoof like it was a fist.
She must have been quite shy, and that made us want to make her look extra special.
After a few seconds of mental sculpting (loading, as you peasants call it), the pony's mane erupted into a tidy pompadour. The stripes of colors were neatened out, smoothed to perfection and puffed up in a more traditional style, with the tumbling curls in the back.
The pony's eyes strained to look up at it, her mouth opening in a little 'o' of surprise as she gazed back into space. "What is this?" she asked loudly. "It's like something a pony from Prance would wear..."
"Do you like it?" we asked. "We used to have a pompadour once. It let us get all the ladies, but don't tell the Queen that." We shuddered at the thought.
"There are more of you?" the pony asked, her eyes bugging out.
We thought about that question very carefully, our hand stroking our perfect stubble. "There are three members of the immediate royal family, that being ourselves, our Queen, and our Prince. Would you also like to count the Prince's fifty-seven cousins?" we said.
The pony didn't say anything, rather she just stared ahead. "Okay... now what's that crunching noise?"
"The level is loading. It means that you're close." That was a stupid question, but we didn't tell her that.
"Oh... so I'm almost home? Great." She looked tired. Poor thing. We would be tired too if we were forced to look so cute all the time.
On the opposite side, the Prince had never looked more eager. It made us quite proud to be seeing him so motivated. Were we even bored twenty minutes ago? We can't even remember.
From the glow of the TV screen, we could see a little blue and green dot blink into view. That must have been it. That was the pony's world. It looked a lot like Earth, but we knew that it probably wasn't. Underneath that false exterior was a world of ponies. It made us tap our fingers to our arm rest in impatience.
The dot grew larger, enveloping the screen as the pony's ball broke through its atmosphere, charging down into unknown territory. The Prince held on tightly, his eyes squinting as a funnel of swishing air coned around the orb.
Underneath the roar of the wind we could hear the pony screaming quite loudly, and we wondered why she would bother wasting her voice like that. It seemed very counterproductive.
Eventually, after much falling the ball crashed into the ground, bobbing up and down as if were splashing through a sea of dirt. It rolled off a few yards and stopped, with the Prince sliding off the side to the ground below. What a slacker.
The little pony, perfect pompadour and all, slumped down to her chest, her hooves sprawled out so that she looked like a fluffy spider. Her eyes were closed, but we knew that she wasn't dead. That would be a silly assumption.
Where they had fallen, or at least what I could see was nothing more than a grassy green field, with not even a set of cows to sprinkle over the surface. Pretty boring. Not fit for a katamari at all.
But then the Prince jumped up and pointed. Our view panned to the left, and we saw something wonderful.
A farm.
An orchard, we should say! The perfect place to roll! The ideal place to breed a pure 'rustic' katamari!
The Prince looked towards our screen and nodded sagely. We rose a hand to our cheek to wipe away a tear. He understood. He had grown so much.
After a few more moments of proper cutscene drama we turned to the pony, still asleep, and urged our Prince to roll her hamster ball to the farm's edge. He did so ceremoniously, with slow, deliberate 'rolling' movements.
The pony woke up, but did not move. Her eyes widened at the sight of the approaching farmland. "Sweet Apple Acres?" she said.
"Is that the name of that place?" we asked. "Does it have cute ponies too?"
She ignored us. "Why are you taking me there?" She shakily stumbled to her hooves and walked along with the rolling ball. "At least let me get out of here..."
To right a wrong, we ignored her comment entirely. "We're taking you there because that's going to be the tutorial level!"
The pony snorted. "I'm sorry, what?"
We felt something crawl up our hand. It was probably one of the Prince's cousins, but for the moment we paid it no mind. "Because your leader thinks that we're a nuisance; we're going to prove her wrong by helping to better your society. Simply putting it, we're going to ask a fan if they need any help, then we're going to fulfill their request through rolling katamaris!" We spread our arms in a final flourish, and a blossom of rainbows exploded from our back.
A hideous squeaking erupted from our hand, and we looked down to find Cousin Ichigo staring up at us, her little red and black body bouncing up and down. The pony was saying something, but we weren't listening to her.
"Oh, Ichigo?" we asked. "What are you doing here? We thought you had wandered off again... did you want to play the role of the fan for the tutorial?"
Ichigo smiled and clapped her hands, then pointed to our screen and babbled something.
"Oh! You want us to try and find some strawberries for you? Brilliant! Your timing could not be better!"
We looked to the screen. The Prince was regarding us with a questioning stare. He had parked the makeshift katamari right in front of the farm's gate. It was a perfect starting point.
"Prince!" we called, and he flinched. "No time limit. You'll need to collect twenty strawberries for Ichigo and roll to a minimum of 4m." Such objectives could not be easier.
The pony followed the Prince's gaze and looked right at us. "Look, I dunno what you guys are talking about, but you can roll around Applejack's place all you want as long as you let me out, okay?" She raised a hoof to rub at her eyelids. "Ugh, the air is getting so stale in here."
We felt a pang of pity for the pony, but that might have merely been the dodgy tiramisu that the Queen baked for us. In our heart, we knew that the proper act of kindness would be to negotiate a proper deal. "So you're giving us permission to roll in this 'Applejack's' farm?" we asked.
"Yeah. Sure. Whatever gets me out of here!" the pony cried, clopping its hoof against rounded sides of her ship. How did she get inside in the first place?
No matter. The deal was sealed. The Prince scuttled over and undid the latch to the ball, and the pony weakly stumbled out onto solid ground.
"Thanks." she said.
"We had a deal, after all" we replied. "Now, Prince?"
The Prince grinned and placed himself behind the ball, so much bigger than himself.
The tutorial was about to begin. Now you, little fan, will have to wait for it to load. We're deeply sorry, but what did you expect for a budget title like this?
