The Unlikely Lanterns of Planet Equis

Chapters

Chapter one: An unusual evening
Chapter two: A whole planet of new friends
Chapter three: Pinkie “Poozer” Pie has problems
Bonus Content 1
Chapter four: Trouble, Training, and Time
Chapter five: Prodigal Daughter of Equis

Chapter one: An unusual evening

It was a night like any other in Equestria. The stars were shining, the moon was bright, and Twilight Sparkle was up late studying again. In fact the only unusual thing about that night could be completely disregarded on the grounds that the pony it involved was regularly doing unusual things, and therefore unusual behavior on her part was considered normal. However, the reasons behind her usual unusual behavior tonight were rather unusual.

For the first time in a very long time, Pinkie Pie had gotten in a fight with the Cakes.

Not a physical fight, mind you, but a very heated verbal one. She was so upset, she couldn’t even remember what had started the fight in the first place, but she certainly remembered how it had ended. She was fairly certain the neighbors could remember how it ended too, given the volume of the argument.

How could Mrs. Cake say something like that to her?

The fight had ended with Pinkie running from the building in tears, her mane and tail straightened out, heading for the edge of town at a speed that would have put Rainbow Dash to shame. She had headed straight for the very outskirts of the Ponyville area, a place so far outside of town, only Derpy would have been willing to go the distance to deliver the mail there, and only for the promise of at least three muffins.

The old abandoned rock farm…well, technically it wasn’t abandoned. Technically Pinkie owned the place. Technically she was supposed to be living there, and technically Derpy should have been getting three muffins a day to deliver Pinkie’s mail.
But alas, Pinkie’s talent wasn’t rock farming, and she hadn’t been old enough to live by herself when the place became hers. By chance, she had ended up living with the Cakes until she was old enough to live on her own, and continuing to live with them after that. The farm had been left alone, as the land it was on top of was only good for few things besides rock farming, which was a completely outdated practice.

It was a place of solitude, where Pinkie could be alone if she felt like it. Whenever something was upsetting her she would come out to the rock farm. The entire property was hers to do whatever she wanted with it. Sometimes she’d just walk around, looking at the rocks that were still in the fields, having not been moved in years, and other times, when she felt a need to keep busy, she’d grab a toolbox and some supplies and start fixing up the old house, if just to make sure it didn’t fall down. She always took at least one day off in a month to make sure that house was still in good shape.

There were other times where she’d simply walk up the hill behind the house, sit down by the five headstones at the top, and visit with her family.

Tonight felt like a night to keep busy.

It was around midnight, when the pink pony took a break from her work. The roof had needed fixing, so that was where she found herself lying on her back looking up at the stars. It was very early autumn, so it was just starting to get cold out, but the coolness felt nice after working so hard. She had almost forgotten why she was out there to begin with…almost.

The party pony sighed, and began to contemplate what to do about her situation, when she was distracted by an oddity in the night sky. One of the stars was green and it was getting bigger. About ten seconds after she noticed it, her tail started getting twitchy, and her brain put two and two together.

The Green light wasn’t getting brighter; it was getting closer…and judging from the way things looked, it was going to crash straight into the house Pinkie was lying on top of.

The pink pony was still for another ten seconds before she realized that sitting on the roof of a building that was about to be hit by an object falling from outer space was probably a bad idea.

It took another five seconds for her to realize that she should be moving out of the way by now, seeing as how the object was getting really, really close.

Pinkie rolled off of her back and quickly got to a standing position, before running for the ladder she used to get on the roof. Unfortunately, she forgot about her toolbox, and tripped over it on the way to the ladder. She fell hard, hitting her face on the roof, before rolling down the slope, and falling off the top of the house. She hit the ground two stories bellow in a belly flop, and discovered that as painful as that was when jumping into water, it was more painful when hitting dry land. Her house subsequently exploded behind her as the falling space object crashed through it.

After taking a few minutes to recover from her painful landing and to wait for debris from her house to stop falling, Pinkie got to her hooves and turned around to see just how bad the damage was.

It was bad.

The whole center section of the roof had been replaced by a giant hole, leaving roughly half the upstairs bedrooms exposed to the elements, and every window in the house had shattered from the force of the impact. After she’d been staring at it for a few seconds, the chimney collapsed, falling into a pile of bricks and dust. It was officially beyond her ability to repair.

Tears started welling up in the pink pony’s eyes, as she gazed upon her now ruined foal hood home. After years of putting tender loving care into it to make sure it would always be there, it had been wrecked in a matter of seconds by…

“What exactly was that thing?” She suddenly pondered out loud. Whatever it had been, she was going to have a talk with it about how mean it is to fall from the sky and crash through buildings that didn’t belong to it. Even Tom had more manners than that, and he was a rock!

She walked around to the back of the house, since the thing had shot straight through it, and spotted a crater by the hill where her family was. She quickly rushed over to it and was greeted by a sight that would change her life forever.

Inside the crater was a being the likes of which Pinkie had never seen before. It had arms and legs, like a monkey, but its head and tail looked more like a cats. Its body was covered in white fur with black stripes, which reminded Pinkie of Zecora. Over the creatures body was a green and black suit. On the middle of its chest was a solid white circle with a symbol inside of it: a circle with a horizontal line on the top and the bottom, all of which were green.

Now, Pinkie was no doctor, but she was pretty sure that the large gash on its left shoulder was a bad thing, as were the large number of claw marks over its body, all of which were slowly leaking a purple substance that the pink pony could only assume was the creature’s blood. It lay there, on its back, looking like a mess, and Pinkie completely forgot that she was supposed to be mad at it for wrecking the house. She hopped into the crater and quickly trotted over to the being.

“Hey…are you going to be okay?” She asked, even though she was sure she knew the answer. “Do you need a doctor? Because I think I can go get a doctor if you need one. It wouldn’t take me too long, I swear.”

The creature’s eyes opened. They were green, with cat like pupils. It glanced at her as best it could without moving its head.

“No thank you. I do not think there is much your doctors could do for me.” It spoke, its voice definitively masculine. It sounded proud and brave, but gentle too. Whatever this creature was, it had a kind heart…or equivalent thereof. It was some sort of alien after all. For all Pinkie knew, its brain was in its tail and its stomach was in its head.

Its voice also sounded weak, and in pain. Pinkie sat down next to the creature on its left, brushing a bit of her long mane out of her face as she gave it a warm and comforting smile, as opposed to her usual giant toothy grin.

“Well, okay then, if you’re sure you don’t need one. My name is Pinkamina Dian Pie.” The pony frowned for a moment, wondering why she had given the alien creature her full name. She quickly dismissed it, as it most certainly wasn’t the strangest thing happening right now, and was therefore not important. “Everyone just calls me Pinkie though. What’s your name?”

“I am Saban Ran’ger, Green Lantern of Sector 1847.” He replied, before coughing weakly.

Pinkie gasped slightly as she had a sudden realization. “Green Lantern! Of course! I knew I’d seen that symbol somewhere before! The Symbol on your chest is the same one that’s on Green Lantern’s uniform!” She gasped again. “Oh my gosh! You’re a Green Lantern from a whole other planet! This is so exciting! My first extraterrestrial encounter is with a super hero from another world!”

Saban chuckled a bit, before it turned into another coughing fit. He spoke again when the fit had passed, smiling slightly. “That’s just my luck; crash landing on my partner’s home world while she’s away.” He sighed heavily. When he continued speaking again, his voice sounded tired and defeated. “Perhaps she’ll find some comfort in the knowledge that my replacement will be from her home world. That I at least didn’t die alone on a completely unfamiliar world.”

Pinkie gave him a worried look. “Die? What do you mean ‘die’? You said you didn’t need a doctor.”

“I said, I didn’t think there was much your doctors could do for me. My injuries are fatal and I am an alien; they wouldn’t know the first thing about how to help me. I’m most definitely going to die…”

The pink pony found her eyes starting to water for the second time that night. “No. You can’t die; you haven’t even gotten your party yet.”

“My…party?” Pinkie nodded. “What party? When did I get a party?”

“I throw all my new friends parties. Yours is going to be a big one, since we’ll have so many reasons to celebrate. You’re new in town, you’re my new friend, you’re a super hero, you’re an alien visiting from another world, and, most importantly, your not dying. Because if you do die, then you can’t be there for any of it, and that would be really awkward since it’s going to be your party. So you have to stay alive to be there.” The Pink pony sniffed a little bit, as the tears started coming from her eyes. “Besides, I don’t even know what you that well yet. I’ve never met an alien before; I can’t throw a party for you unless I know what you like. I’ve got to know what color balloons to get, what shape the piñata should be, what kind of cake to bake, how many-”

“You…” the alien interrupted “…you consider me your friend?”

“Of course; why else would I throw you a party?”

“But…you barely know me…”

“Yeah, but I know enough. Your name is Saban Ran’ger. You’re an alien, and a Green Lantern. You know my Green Lantern, and called her your partner, which means you’re a hero like she is. And I know you’re my friend.”

Saban was quiet for a moment. He coughed again, and a small amount of his purple blood came out with it this time. He looked at the crying pink mare, a native of his partner’s home world. She was a being that wanted to fetch doctors for him, to throw a party for him, to be his friend. She had known him only a few short moments and already she was distraught at the thought of his death and begging him not to die.

“Never before have I met a creature that cared so deeply for its fellow living beings, no matter what they may be. I can honestly say there is no other being among the stars I would rather have with me in my final hours.”

“Don’t say things like that. You’re going to live. You have to live. The world you’re from needs it’s Green Lantern just as much as Equis needs ours.”

Saban turned his head to look at Pinkie. His eyes were filled with sadness as he spoke. “Pinkie…my planet was destroyed long ago. I am the only survivor.”

Hearing him say that broke Pinkie’s heart. She couldn’t even imagine what that would feel like; being the only surviving creature from her whole planet. The friend that lay before her, dying, had had his whole world taken from him. He was all alone; the last of a race that was about to be extinct.

“Pinkie, there is one thing I absolutely must do before I pass on.” Saban said with a tone of conviction in his weak voice. “This was no chance meeting. The ring has chosen you, Pinkamina Dian Pie of Equis, to join the Green Lantern Corps.”

Saban raised his right arm and brought it over to her. She noticed a green ring on his hand that had the same symbol that was on his chest on it. “Hold out your right hoof please.” He asked.

Pinkie complied, lifting and holding out her front right hoof. With his left hand, he removed the ring, before putting it back in his right hand. Without a word, he carefully took her out stretched hoof with his left hand, and moved to put the ring on it.

“I don’t think it’s going to-” She started to say, when the ring began to glow green. As it touched her hoof, the glowing ring stretched around it like a rubber band. When the glowing stopped, Pinkie had brand new green bracelet. In hindsight, she probably should have seen that coming.

“You are now the newest member of the Green Lantern Corps. Say the oath to the lantern, and the guardians will explain everything to you.” Saban told her. “This is the oath; listen carefully and commit it to your memory: In brightest day, in blackest night, no evil shall escape my sight. Let those who worship evil’s might, beware my power, Green Lantern’s light.”

As soon as he finished saying that, two things happened. First, Saban had another coughing fit, this time coughing up a significantly greater amount of blood. Second, the ring Pinkie now wore shone brightly, in a brilliant green flash. When the light (and Saban’s coughing) died down, Pinkie saw a new object floating in the air in front of her. It was a lantern, similar to the type that Pinkie had seen railroad workers use. It was green, the same shade as the ring, and a bright green light radiated from the holes in the front and back. All in all, it looked incredibly similar to a 3-D version of the symbol on the ring. She sat there staring at it for a few moments, before another coughing fit from Saban snapped her out of her trance.

“Well? Aren’t you going to say the oath?” he asked once finished.

She looked at him, then back at the lantern. Her pinkie sense tingled, informing her that if she did say the oath, she was going to experience something almost nopony else in the world had ever experienced before, something that would put all the rest of the strange stuff happening tonight to shame in terms of weirdness, something that was going to be, as Tick Tock (the pony who used to live in the blue box that now belonged to Time Turner) would say, fantastic.

But it would also take her far away, and leave her dying friend all alone.

“Do I…do I have to do it right now?” She asked, casting a worried glance at her alien friend. “I know you said it was important and stuff, but…but I don’t want to leave you here, all alone. Can’t it wait just a little while?”

Saban didn’t know how she knew the lantern would take her away, but he knew the answer to her question was: “It can wait, just for a little bit.”

Pinkie smiled a warm smile, glad she could stay by her friend even if she knew that he was going to die. The thought of him dying made a question pop up in her head. “Do you want me to bury you? When you die, I mean. It seems like that would be the appropriate thing to do, but I don’t know if aliens do that kind of thing, or if they prefer cremations, or if there’s something else they do…”

Her friend coughed a bit before responding. “Thank you for asking; not many would think to ask about such things. A proper grave would be nice, and if I’m not mistaken the traditions of yours are not too different from the traditions of mine.”

This put another question in Pinkie’s head. “Could you tell me what your world was like?”

“I…I would be happy to tell you, my friend.” He answered with a smile. “My home world was a planet called Eltar…”

He began talking, telling her everything he could of his home world. He told her about the plants and animals, about his people and culture, about his friends and family and the love of his life. And as he told her, even though his voice grew weaker and breathing became harder for him, even though Pinkie started crying again because she could tell his time was near, it was apparent to both of them that he was the happiest he had been in a long time. He was already at peace; ready to move on, and join the rest of his race.

Pinkie sat and listened, committing everything to memory. Even though she cried as he got weaker, she smiled knowing he wasn’t going to die sad and alone. She waited with him until his time came, and when he thanked her for doing so, she simply told him “It was the least I could do for a friend.”

Seconds later, he breathed his last breathe, and smiled.

Where there had once been five headstones upon the hill behind the old Pie family house, there were now six. The newest one, placed slightly separate from the rest, had been hoof made by the sole surviving member of the family. Pinkie’s talent might not have been working with rocks, but it was the family business and she had grown up learning how. The new headstone may not have been fancy, but it didn’t need to be. All it had to do was sit there and show it’s engraving to anyone that came by and read it.

“Here rests Saban Ran’ger, the last survivor of Eltar, a Green Lantern, and a dear friend.” Pinkie read aloud, wiping the last of her tears away. It was sad, really; not only was nopony ever going to believe her if she told them about it, but she also was going to have to earn the money to repair the damage he’d done when he crashed through the house, because she was pretty sure her insurance didn’t cover extraterrestrial crash landings.

She sighed, tired from the work of the day and staying up at such a late hour…or was it an early hour? She glanced up at the night sky and managed to estimate that it was way past Twilight’s bed time, which was saying something since Twilight stayed up later than most of the ponies in town.

The party pony turned and started to head towards the road to town, when she spotted the lantern from before. It was still floating there, right over the crater, exactly where it had appeared. She had completely forgotten about it after Saban had started telling her about his home. She glanced at the ring on her fetlock, pondering what to do.

“On the one hoof…” she said out loud to nopony in particular “…it’s really late and I’m really tired and I totally need to go get some sleep.” She paused for a moment, and then looked back at the most recent grave on the hill behind her. “On the other hoof, he said it was important, and it’s been way longer than ‘a little while’. I told him I’d do it, and I wouldn’t be much of a friend if I didn’t keep my word.”

With her mind made up, she trotted over to the lantern, staring at it silently for a moment, as she tried to remember the words she had been told.

“Um…In brightest day, in blackest night, no evil shall escape my sight. Let those who worship evil’s might, beware my power…Green Lanterns light!”

As soon as the pink mare finished, the light of the lantern brightened, shining at such intensity that Pinkie was forced to shield her eyes. When the light died down, the party pony found herself inside a transparent green bubble, and the lantern had disappeared.

“Uh…” Pinkie said nervously to herself, as she pushed against the bubble with her front hooves, only to find that it was much, much stronger than the soap made bubbles that she was used to. “Didn’t Saban say something about guardians and me getting an explanation? Because now would be a good time for somepony or alien to start explaining what’s going on.”

The bubble started rising off the ground, slowly at first, but getting faster with each passing second. Soon Pinkie was higher than the top of Canterlot Mountain, and showing no sign of slowing down. She looked above her, and saw the moon was getting larger as she continued her only some-what expected trip. She swallowed back the lump of fear in her throat.

“Well…I always did want to see what the moon was like.” She told the bubble. “Luna wouldn’t tell me much about it when I asked, except that it was dusty, empty, boring, and had no air.”

As she breached the upper atmosphere, she was happy to note that the bubble was apparently providing air for her, so she wouldn’t suffocate in the vacuum of space. She was also slightly relieved and concerned when instead of landing on the moon, the bubble and her simply passed the giant satellite, literally missing it by just a few yards.

“Well…I guess Luna was telling the truth.” She said as the moon began to get smaller and smaller as the bubble traveled further and further away from Equis. Pinkie looked back at her world, hoping to see what Luna had had the privilege of seeing during her less than privileged thousand years on the moon. Sadly her she was already so far away she could barely see it, what with the moon obscuring part of it and the sun shining in her eyes at the same time.

Speaking of the sun, Pinkie couldn’t believe Princess Celestia moved something that huge every single day. The giant fireball was enormous! How did she do it?

At that moment, the pink pony was privileged to be the second non-alicorn equine to receive an answer to that very question. She just barely spotted a midnight blue aura around the moon, and glanced over at the very edge of the sun (doing her very best to not look directly at it, lest she hurt her eyes) to see a familiar golden yellow aura surround it. The auras shone around their respective objects for a few seconds, before dissipating, leaving it looking like nothing had happened.

It was rather anti-climactic.

Seeing the spells that moved the sun and moon activate brought a new thought to Pinkie’s mind: Was it morning already? It hadn’t seemed that late when she’d said the oath thingy. Her mind turned to all her other friend who would be starting the day. Berry Punch would be walking out into the park for her morning Yoga and Tai Chi exercises, while Vinyl Scratch would just be getting back home in time to say hello to Octavia as the cellist left to catch the train into canterlot. Applejack and Big Macintosh would be finished with breakfast and starting to work, while Dashie hit the snooze button on her alarm clock for the first of many times. Everypony would be having a nice ordinary day…

…while she was stuck in a glowing green bubble heading (possibly) farther out into space than either of the princesses had ever gone in their lives…

…and there didn’t appear to be an in flight movie or snacks.

“This is going to be a long trip…” Pinkie told the bubble, before she curled up, getting as comfortable as she possibly could. “…I hope my friends will be okay without me until I get back.” She muttered as she finally drifted off to sleep.

Chapter two: A whole planet of new friends

“Because…do you know what I keep in here?” The Doctor asked as he stood by the doors of the TARDIS, a playful smile on his face.

“Muffins?” Ditzy “Derpy” Doo, a grey Pegasus with a blonde mane and golden eyes that were never pointed in the same direction, asked.

“The alleyway we came in from?” Sparkler, Ditzy’s teenage unicorn daughter, remarked sarcastically.

“In a matter of speaking, yes to both, because what I keep in here is…” He turned around and put a hoof on the doors. “…absolutely everything.”

He pushed, and both of the mares with him gasped at the sight. On the other side of the doors was outer space in all its glory. The beauty of stars and nebulas and the entirety of the cosmos right outside those doors, so close they could reach out and touch it if they wanted to.

Sparkler walked up to the threshold first. “No way. This…this can’t be real. It’s got to be an illusion or a trick or-”

“Oh, hey Sparkler, what are you doing all the way out here?” A familiar voice interrupted. The Doctor blinked in surprise and poked his head out the door. What he found was the strangest sight he’d seen yet in his entire life.

Slowly floating past the TARDIS was Pinkie Pie in a transparent green bubble. Her mane was straight, and she looked tired. It also looked like she had been crying recently, even though she had a very genuinely happy smile on her face as she looked at them.

“Pinkie Pie?”

“Hi there, Time Turner!” she said, waving at him in an enthusiastic manner. “Wow, you really do get around a lot. How did you get your whole house this far into outer space?”

The Doctor stared at the pink pony in the green bubble, completely bewildered. “It’s my TARDIS. It’s supposed to be able to travel in time and space.”

“Cool! I’d love to stay and chat some more, but my bubble won’t let me. See you guys around!” Pinkie called back to them as her bubble carried her away. The inhabitants of the TARDIS stood there, staring after her, completely confused as to what had just happened. Finally, Sparkler spoke up.

“Mom…we’re in outer freaking space.”

“I noticed that.” Ditzy replied.

“Your boyfriend lives in a blue box that travels in outer space.”

“I noticed that too, sweetie.”

There was another pause, before Sparkler spoke again. “Mom?”

“Yes Sparkler?”

“This is your coolest boyfriend yet.”

“How did she get this far out in space?” The Doctor asked himself, as he continued to stare after Pinkie Pie.

“I wonder where Dinky was…” Pinkie commented out loud to her bubble as it started to pick up speed again. She had lost track of how long it had been since she had left Equis. She had been woken up from her sleep when the bubble had taken her close to a particularly bright star, and had spent a lot of the trip trying to figure out a way to play Patty Cake with herself in an effort to alleviate her boredom. It hadn’t been going so well.

Bored out of her mind, and with nothing else to do but think, Pinkie had gone back over everything that had happened during the last month in her head, for absolutely no reason. She had then attempted to see how high she could count, only to quit after reaching three hundred seventy-four thousand nine hundred eighty six because it turns out that counting in an effort to relieve boredom was not only more boring that being bored in the first place, but was also incredibly depressing. After that she remembered she had a paddle ball hidden in her mane for boredom emergencies, but the string broke and the ball ended up hitting her in the face, so she put it away. After that she had seen Time Turner in his fancy blue box that could travel in time and space, along with Derpy and Sparkler.

And now that she was done reviewing the events of the last however-long-it-had-been she was bored again.

“Wow; who would have thought space was so boring?” Pinkie asked the bubble as she turned around to face the direction they were headed in, only to gasp in surprise. The bubble was approaching a rather large, green, planet, and was beginning to slow down again. Judging from the look of things, the bubble was actually going to land this time.

The planet itself had the same symbol on it as her ring, which was probably a sign that she was right about it being her destination. She let out a sigh of relief, glad that the trip was finally over. There was only so much of outer space she could take without having something else to keep her from getting bored.

The bubble quickly began to descend through the atmosphere, decelerating at a very gradual rate. As she got closer to the world, Pinkie could see that the part of the planet that made the symbol from her ring was a bunch of giant green buildings, bigger than even Canterlot Mountain. As she continued her observations, she realized that it wasn’t just the symbol; the every last bit of green she’d seen from outer space had been a building. The entire planet was a massive green Manehatten only with bigger, more alien looking buildings.

Well…okay; in fairness, green wasn’t the only color around, just the most common one. The buildings also had lots of white, and occasionally some black too, but overall it was very monochromatic.

The pink pony started to notice something else too.

Aliens. Lots of aliens. Aliens of all different shapes, sizes, and colors, and all of them wearing similar outfits to the one Saban had worn. They were everywhere. They were walking on bridges, moving around in buildings, standing on balconies, flying around (even the ones without wings!). There were so many aliens…

…So many new friends just waiting for her to meet them.

There was a burst of confetti as her mane and tail finally burst back to their usual poufy selves. So many new friends, so little time; how was she ever going to throw all of them parties? The sheer amount of cake that would be required was inconceivable. She only had one choice: she needed to build an orbital party cannon!

Before her thoughts could go any further down that set of tracks, the bubble around her popped, and Pinkie dropped a good five feet down on to a balcony, face planting the landing.

“Thanks for the ride Mr. bubble.” She called to the no longer existent bubble, before removing her face from the floor. She heard someone laughing, and glanced over to an archway nearby just in time to spot an alien approaching her. It was similar in shape to Saban, but far less feline in appearance. It was tall, roughly coming up to about Iron Will’s chest in height (or so Pinkie would have said if asked to provide a comparison) and much less bulky. It looked more like a hairless ape, with pinkish colored skin…except, it wasn’t completely hairless. It had a brown mane on top of its head. It didn’t have a tail, though; just the mane. It wore an outfit similar to the one Saban had worn, except it’s came with a mask.

As the alien approached, Pinkie’s ring shone once, and she found herself in a strange outfit. It was similar to the feel of a wonderbolts uniform (Pinkie’s friend Surprise had let the pink pony try her uniform on once) minus the cold spots where the holes for their wings should have been. It didn’t have a hood, but it did come with its own little green domino mask for her face. The suit itself was mostly black, with a lot of green around the torso area. On the center of her chest was a solid white circle, with the symbol from her ring inside it in green. The white circle and symbol were also adorning her flanks, right where her cutie marks were supposed to be.

“Wow…snazzy.” She commented upon finishing her examination of her new outfit.

“Hey there. You must be a new recruit.” The Creature approaching her said with a smile. He held out a hand to her. “I’m Hal Jordan of Earth, Green Lantern of sector 2814. What’s your name?”

She put her hoof in his hand and shook it, as a toothy smile appeared on her face. “Hi Hal Jordan of Earth, Green Lantern of sector 2814! Wow, your name is a mouthful to say. I’m Pinkamina Dian Pie, but my friends all call me Pinkie Pie, so you can call me that too! I’m from Equis and I’ve been having a really weird day. Have you ever noticed how green everything is here? Where is ‘here’ anyways? And why is nothing blue? Have you ever seen a blue box flying around in outer space? What are you anyways? What’s a ‘sector’? Are you a Green Lantern too? Do you prefer vanilla or chocolate frosting for a cake? Saban told me that the Guardians would explain stuff to me; do you know who they are? Did you get carried here in a bubble too? Was it just as boring for you as it was for me? When is lunch? How-?”

“Whoa, whoa, easy there! Please! Slow down with the questions!” Hal interrupted, holding up his hands slightly. “Yeah, you’re definitely a new recruit, and a little on the excited side too. Okay, Pinkie right?” She nodded in the affirmative. “Okay then, Pinkie, all I got out of that was ‘Equis’, ‘chocolate’, ‘Saban’, ‘Guardians’, and ‘lunch’. Why don’t we start with you answering some questions of mine, so I don’t waste time telling you stuff you already know, okay?”

She nodded again. “Yeah, that sounds good. What do you want to know?”

“Well, for starters, you mentioned Equis. Is that your home world?”

She nodded once more. “Yeah; I’m from Equis, more specifically Equestria, even more specifically Ponyville.”

Hal stifled a laugh upon hearing this. The other Green Lantern from Equis that he knew had mentioned places like “Ponyville” and “Canterlot” before, but it was still funny every time he heard it. “Okay. I take it you already know your planet has a Green Lantern?”

“Yep; the unicorn one, from canterlot. She helped during the changeling invasion.”

“Okay, good. Next question: you mentioned Saban Ran’ger. How do you know him?”

“He’s my friend.” Pinkie said, before her look of happiness turned into one of sorrow, and her mane and tail fell flat. “I mean…he was my friend…in the short time that I knew him.”

A look of understanding came over Hal’s face. “Oh…I see.”

Seeing that her new friend was just as sad over the news as she was, Pinkie couldn’t help but feel the need to try and provide some comfort. “I waited with him until his time came. He told me all about his home world and…and he was at peace when he went. I even gave him a proper burial.”

“Thanks. It’s good to know that.” Hal paused for a moment, before continuing. “Anyways, I should probably go ahead and say welcome to Oa, and to the Green Lantern Corps.”

Pinkie tilted her head in confusion, her mane quietly poufing back up again as she did so. “Oa? What’s an ‘Oa’?”

Hal laughed a bit as he turned around and started walking back to the archway, motioning for Pinkie to follow. She trotted quickly to catch up to him. “Oa is the name of this planet, and the central base of operations for the entire Green Lantern Corps. You see Green Lanterns like me, Saban, and the one you have back home, are all members of the Green Lantern Corps, which is kind of like a intergalactic police force. We fight bad guys all over the universe and lock them up to keep everyone safe. There are two active GLs per sector of the universe, and three thousand six hundred different sectors.”

“Wow…that’s a lot of Green Lanterns.”

“Yeah, and that’s not counting all the ones stationed here on Oa or the ones who aren’t on active duty.” Hal informed her as they walked along. “The whole thing is run a group called the ‘Guardians of the Universe’…” Hal abruptly halted in front of a door. “…who you’re about to meet.”

Pinkie, having been briefly distracted by the sight of another alien, didn’t see him stop, and promptly ran into the door.

“Ow…” she said as she rubbed her head with a hoof. “…that hurt.” She looked up at the large doors, and her pinkie sense told her that whatever was on the other side was not going to like her very much.

“So…uh…these guardians are like…the big bosses of the Corps right?” Hal nodded. “So it would be really bad if I made a terrible first impression, wouldn’t it?”

“Kind of, but not too much; I make most of them mad at me almost every time I walk into the room, and I’ve been a GL for years. Just relax, be yourself, and remember that if you actually do manage to make them mad enough to kick you out of the Corps based of a first impression, I’ll give you a lift home.”

The first and most surprising thing Pinkie found out about the guardians was that…
“You’re blue…”

As soon as the words came out of her mouth, Pinkie knew that befriending the guardians of the universe was going to be very, very difficult.

There were seven of them, sitting in chairs in a semi-circle. They were like small (shorter than Pinkie), blue versions of Hal, with (proportionately speaking) bigger heads. All their manes were white and were styled differently.

The second most surprising thing Pinkie learned about the guardians of the universe was that…

“…and you’re wearing red?”

As soon as those words came out, she knew she should probably stop talking, unless she wanted to make an even worse impression. Unfortunately, the words “stop talking” don’t have any understandable value to Pinkie’s brain.

“Well, I have to admit, this is the most surprising thing I’ve seen all day. I was expecting more green stuff, but this is definitely a refreshing change of pace. It’s like watching an old black and white movie, then going outside and seeing a rainbow. Oh my gosh, I have to tell Rainbow Dash about all this when I get back home. Although, I don’t think she’ll believe me unless-”

The sound of someone clearing their throat cut her off and alerted her to the fact that six of the seven pairs of eyes belonging to the guardians were giving her a less than friendly stare. She let out a nervous chuckle. “Sorry…it’s been a really rough day. I’ll be quiet so you guys can talk now.”

There was a moment of uncomfortable silence, as Pinkie could almost literally feel them judging her, and not in a good way. Things weren’t going well.

“Pinkamina Dian Pie of Equis, Green Lantern of Sector 1847. Welcome to-” one of the guardians began, before Pinkie gasped.

“Oh my gosh! How did you know name? Are you psychic? Is it written on the back of my uniform? Did Hal tell you? I didn’t see him tell you, but maybe he did it while I wasn’t looking and-”

Again she was cut off with the clearing of a throat. A number of the guardians were now openly glaring at her. It was starting to look like she was going to need to take Hal up on his offer to give her a lift back home. “Sorry.” She said, as her ears flattened back against her head.

“Welcome to Oa and to the Green Lantern Corps.” The Guardian she had interrupted continued. “As a Green Lantern, you will be expected to adhere to the laws of the guardians, and show us respect.”

“Sorry.” Pinkie whimpered out, shrinking under the hostile looks she was getting. Hal had clearly forgotten to warn her about their temper and frightening stares.

“Don’t worry too much about it; everyone makes mistakes…” One of the other guardians said. His voice carried a tone of kindness to it that was missing from all the others. He glanced around at his fellow Guardians. “…Some of which bigger than others.”

He turned his gaze back to Pinkie, and she instantly noticed a hint of a smile on his face. “I’m sure the next time you are brought before us, you will do much better. Until then, Pinkie Pie of Equis, you should leave and have Hal Jordan train you with the ring.”

Upon hearing the nice guardian call her “Pinkie” instead of “Pinkamina” the party pony knew for sure that she had at least one friend among the Guardians of the Universe. A small smile appeared on her face; there was hope for her as a Green Lantern yet.

“How did it go? Not too badly I hope.” Hal asked as the doors shut behind Pinkie.

“Well…at least one of them didn’t seem to hate me, and they told me to have you train me how to use my ring, so I don’t think I’ve been kicked out yet.” She replied.

“Really? They said I was supposed to train you?” Hal smirked. “Well then, I guess we’d better get started right away. For your first lesson…” Hal’s body became surrounded in a green aura. He rose a good five feet into the air, smiling at Pinkie’s shocked expression. “…I’m going to teach you how to fly.”

Pinkie stared at him in disbelief. Her? Fly like Dashie did? The thought alone boggled her mind. She was going to learn how to fly! She could picture it in her head; her and Rainbow Dash, soaring above the clouds together, zooming around, having a blast…

She was quickly brought out of her thoughts as her head hit the ceiling. Her focus having been broken, the unintentional aura that had appeared around her dissipated, and the pink pony found herself falling a rather long distance back to the floor.

Oh, pony feathers; this is going to hurt.

The neither the pain nor the impact with the floor ever came. Instead she landed on something soft. She looked down and saw she had landed on a giant, transparent, green pillow. There was a beam of green light connected to it that led back to the ring Hal was wearing.

“Little quick on the take off there, pink stuff. You might want to try not rocketing yourself into the ceiling.”

“That sounds like a good idea to me.” Pinkie replied, and then paused before asking. “How do I do that?”

“Just do what you did last time only think about doing it more slowly. In fact, why don’t you not even focus on flying just yet; try to hover in place first.”

Pinkie nodded, and then tried to do as he asked. Closing her eyes, she tried to picture herself hovering. Rainbow Dash appeared in the mental image next to her, but unfortunately the imaginary Pegasus was bored and wanted to try out some stunts. The next thing Pinkie knew, she’d smacked face first into a wall.

“Okay…thinking about Dashie is definitely not a good idea when I’m supposed to be taking this slow.” She muttered to herself. Fortunately Hal caught her with another cushion before she could hit the floor.

“You know, most people try to avoid crashing into things face first.”

“Don’t worry; I think I know what I’m doing wrong now.”

Once more Pinkie closed her eyes, and pictured herself hovering again. The mental Dashie came back, but this time Pinkie pushed it aside in favor of a different friend. The imaginary form of Fluttershy appeared hovering next to her pictured self, flapping just enough to stay air born.

“Well, looks like your getting the hang of it now.” Hal said.

Pinkie risked taking a peak and found herself floating in the air, once more surrounded by a green aura. Good old quiet, slow, careful Fluttershy. She thought to herself, smiling. The party pony did a little mid-air twirl, and let out a small squeal of delight. “Wow…this is so cool! I’m actually flying! By myself! I’ve always wanted to fly like a Pegasus!”

As soon as she finished talking, her ring started beeping and blinking. “Ring power levels at critical; power failure is imminent.” The ring said.

“Say what now?” Pinkie asked the ring as she held it up for a better look. The blinking and beeping died off and Pinkie’s aura, along with her suit, disappeared.

The party pony hung there in the air for about five seconds before her brain processed that she should be falling. True to Pinkie’s cartoonish defiance of the laws of physics, the second she realized this fact she fell.

“Oh horse feathers!” she shouted in surprise as she began her sudden decent. Thankfully, as he always had so far, Hal caught her with another cushion. Not so thankfully, he failed to catch something else that had appeared when Pinkie’s uniform had vanished.

The party pony’s lantern battery bounced off of her head as it made its trip to the floor below. The blow dazed her, and she found herself watching cartoon stars and planets circle her head.

“Ouch. You okay there?” Hal asked.

“There are stars and planets circling my head; I don’t think I can deal with astronomy right now.” Pinkie replied before shaking her head and coming back to her senses. “What just happened?”

“Your ring ran out of power. Your lantern battery popped out when the power failed.” He informed her, as he lowered her to the ground. The pillow disappeared, and Pinkie planted her four hooves firmly on the floor. Hal landed and picked up her lantern by the handle, carrying it over to her. “Which makes for a really good lesson number two: Always keep your ring charged. You never know when you’re going to need to make a long trip out to the middle of nowhere, and if the power cuts off in a dangerous situation, like in the middle of a flight through space or while you’re fighting a killer alien monster, you might end up like-”

“-Like Saban.” Pinkie finished for him, with a frown. Hal nodded somberly, then sighed, and held out the lantern for her.

“Anyways, it’s probably a good thing it ran out in here instead of on your way back to Equis. Recharging is really simple; all you have to do is put your ring into the lantern and say the oath. You do remember the oath, don’t you?”

Pinkie nodded, and then put her ring adorned hoof into the lantern. “In brightest day, in blackest night, no evil shall escape my sight. Let those who worship evil’s might, beware my power…Green Lantern’s light!”

Her ring shone brightly for a moment, and her uniform reappeared. She removed her hoof from the lantern. Her hoof was tingling and the ring itself felt charged with energy. The last time she had felt anything close to what she was feeling now was when she had last put on the Element of Laughter.

This ring…it’s so powerful. As strong as my element and ten times easier to use! To think, there are thousands of these things being used all across the universe…

“It’s incredible…” she whispered in awe, staring with renewed fascination at her ring.

“Yeah, the first time charging always feels like that. In any case you should probably put you lantern away now that you’re done recharging.”

Pinkie looked up from her ring, to her lantern, then to Hal. “Okay, but…where do I put it? It’s kind of big and I’m pretty sure this outfit doesn’t have any pockets.”

“Your ring is preprogrammed with a pocket space for holding onto your lantern. All you have to do is will it to be put away, and your ring will store it for later.” Hal informed her.

Pinkie closed her eyes and focused, willing the lantern to go back inside her ring. She felt the lantern return to its pocket space, waiting for the next time it needed to be used. She opened her eyes and once again looked at her ring in amazement.

“Anyways, we should probably go someplace else before we continue your training. I’m sure the guardians don’t appreciate us slamming into the walls out here.” the green aura reappeared around Hal, and he lifted off the ground. “Come on, know exactly where we can go, and I’ve got a friend there I’m sure you’d love to meet.”

Pinkie’s ear twitched and a gigantic toothy grin spread across her face. “Friend?” She took off quickly flying past Hal, and heading straight for the archway they had initially entered through. “Well, what are we waiting for? Let’s go!”

As Pinkie flew through the sky, following Hal to wherever he was leading her, she couldn’t help but ponder a very interesting question. “Hal?”

“Yeah Pinkie?”

“What are you?”

Hal glanced back at her, giving the pink pony a questioning look. “It took you this long to ask that?”

“Well, I up till now I was kind of busy. First I was landing on a strange new world, then you were telling me stuff about the Green Lanterns, then I was meeting the guardians, then you were teaching me how to fly and recharge my ring and stuff…this is really the first moment since I got here that I haven’t been busy thinking about other stuff.”

Hal chuckled before responding. “Yeah, the first day is always pretty busy for new lanterns. Anyways, to answer your question, I’m a human, a type of creature from a planet called earth. It’s located out in sector 2814. You should visit some time. Later on, of course, once you’ve got some experience with the whole lantern thing.”

“I think I will. Thanks for the invite.”

“No problem, just remember to let me know ahead of time before you come. Nothing quite panics the human race as easily as an unscheduled alien visitor.” Hal slowed down to a stop. “Speaking of going places, it looks like we’re here.” The human and pony both descended, coming in for a gentle landing on a balcony, directly in front of a pair of doors.

“Now, just as a heads up; my buddy is kind of a big scary looking guy. He can be pretty intimidating when he wants to, and he usually scares the new recruits pretty good, so be ready for that.” Pinkie nodded to show she understood, and her human friend opened the doors.

Inside was a large open space. There were other Green Lanterns flying around inside. Some were chasing after others and shooting blasts of green energy at them, while others were creating obstacles like walls, pillars, domes, and shields with their rings like how Hal had made the cushions when he was teaching her how to fly. Off to one side, a group of lanterns were sparing with various weapons made from the same green energy.

In the middle of it all, there was an alien roughly the size of Iron Will the Minotaur, in both height and width. His skin was a pinkish color and his eyes were red. His head looked a bit like a bulldog’s. His suit was different from all the other ones she’d seen so far. The suit itself was all black, but had green armor over it, with the Lantern symbol on the chest plate. He was shouting at the other Green Lanterns.

“I said over, not under! Do it again, you useless piece of space trash! And you! What is that pitiful excuse of a construct supposed to be anyways?! Give me five laps around Oa and then make a new one, you worthless rookie! You two over there! If you’ve got time to slack off, then you’ve got time to do a couple hundred pushups! Get to it! Or do you want to try and go a round with me instead?!”

This last comment was directed at Hal and Pinkie, the latter of whom was smiling.

“That sounds fun! Let’s do that!” Pinkie said as she bounced her way over to the large alien, stopping just a few feet in front of him, before tilting her head to one side and giving him a questioning look. “By the way; a round of what, exactly, am I going with you?”

Chapter three: Pinkie “Poozer” Pie has problems

Killowog (for that was what Hal had said his name was) took a swing at Pinkie, throwing his fist straight at her face. All of the other Lanterns in the training hall were sitting off to the side watching the amazing spectacle of the best trainer in the Green Lantern Corps…

…horribly failing to land a single hit on a four legged, poufy, giggling, pink pony.

Pinkie side stepped the experienced Green Lantern’s attack at last second possible. Killowog’s fist hit the floor where she had been a fraction of a second before, leaving a sizable dent in it.

“You missed.” She stated with a smile. The alien attempted to back hand her, only to end up swinging at empty air.

“You missed again.” She announced in a sing song tone of voice from directly behind him.

His ring lit up as turned whirled around, summoning a hammer made of emerald light. His efforts to harm her were not rewarded, however, as she ducked under the swing.

“You know you’re supposed to be hitting me, right?”

Killowog growled and took another swing at her, then another, followed by yet another. The ecstatic equine always seemed to know exactly where he was aiming and managed to get out of the way every time.

“Quit playing around, you poozer; you can’t win if you never try to hit me back!” He shouted at the pink pony.

“Hit you back? Doesn’t that imply that you’d actually managed to hit me first?”

Killowog’s eyes narrowed. His adversary was apparently better at avoiding hits than most rookie lanterns with basic military training, but it was obvious that she didn’t have that kind of training at all. She was just a civilian that was really quick and agile. Her increased efforts, however, would never make up for her lack of actual skill. All he had to do was take her a little more seriously…

…which was really hard to do when she was bouncing around, giggling like an idiot.

He rushed her, with his hammer raised high above his head. She dodged to her left, but saw what his plan really was just a second too late. As he brought the hammer down it split into two hammers, attached to each other by a tether of green light. One hammer went to each side, and as much as Pinkie’s friends talked about her defiance of the laws of physics it wasn’t something she could do on command. Her move to dodge left couldn’t be undone; she was stuck moving right in the way of Killowog’s attack.

Oh I am so going to feel this one tomorrow…

Crack!

“Augh!” The party pony cried out in pain, as Killowog’s strength slammed the hammer into her ribs, bashing her body against the floor.

Any possible confidence she might have had in her ability to be a Green Lantern was quickly shattered in the aftermath of that blow. Was that at least three broken ribs she felt? Why, yes; yes it was. The damaged ribs might explain why she was suddenly finding it hard to breath. It might also be a part of the reason she could taste blood in her mouth. Oh hey, there was Hal standing over her. He was saying something…she couldn’t quite make out what though, over the ringing in her ears. Her head had hit that floor harder than anything else it had collided against all day.

Huh…maybe this is what it feels like when Dashie crash lands. Pinkie thought to herself, right before passing out.

Pinkie let out a quiet moan, and slowly opened her eyes. The first thing she saw was Hal and Killowog looking down at her. She was still in the training room, although it appeared the area had been vacated with the exception of herself and her two alien friends.

“Ugh…did anyone get the number of the train that hit me?”

“That was no train, Pinkie; just Killowog…although, quite frankly, I’m not sure which one hits harder.” Hal replied.

“You feeling okay there, Poozer?” The large alien asked. “You took that hit pretty hard.”

Pinkie tried to move, and found that she felt a lot better than she did before she passed out. Of course, better didn’t mean without pain; her side was sore beyond all reason and she had a throbbing headache.

“I’m in pain, but it’s nowhere near as bad as before.” She told them. She then frowned and added. “I don’t really think I’m cut out for this kind of stuff though.”

“Nonsense! You were doing great for a rookie.” Killowog declared. “Stick with me, and I’ll have you fighting bad guys like a pro in no time!”

“Considering how badly you beat me and the fact that you did it in one hit, I’m not exactly sure I believe that.”

“Come on, Pinkie; if a rookie quit every time they had to receive medical care after one hit from Killowog, the Corps wouldn’t have nearly as many members as it does.” Hal told her.

“Not to mention you just went one on one with one of the best fighters in the Corps, and lasted more than three minutes without using light constructs or flying. All you need to do is train hard and toughen up a little, and you’ll be a great lantern.” Killowog added.

“I’m still not sure about that…but I guess I can keep trying.”

“That’s the spirit.” Hal said. “Anyways, I’m afraid I’m going to have to leave you in the capable hands of Killowog and whoever the guardians are going to choose to help him train you. I’m being reassigned to cover for you in your sector until Killowog and your other trainer say you’re ready for field duty.”

“Huh? You’re leaving? But-” Pinkie started to say, but her human friend cut her off.

“Relax. I’m sure we’ll get to hang out again some other time, and you’ll do just fine with the training as long as you try your hardest.”

“Well, it’s good to know all that, but I was more concerned with the part where I’m being left on an alien planet for an undetermined amount of time. I ran off from my home the night I left, and there’s a big crater by my other house, which was destroyed when a certain Green Lantern crashed right through it. Everypony is going to think something bad happened to me. I don’t want them all to worry or panic and think I’m dead. And what happens if a changeling replaces me while I’m gone?”

“Uh…” Hal scratched his head and glanced at Killowog for help. The larger alien shrugged in response. “Well, then…I’d better get over there and contact the other Green Lantern in your sector so we can figure out something to do about that. Good luck with the training.” And with that the human turned and left, shutting the door behind him as he exited. The remaining two Green Lanterns sat for a moment in awkward silence.

“So…what kind of stuff are we going to do first?”

“So I just think of something, and will my ring to create it?”

“Yep.”

Pinkie raised a questioning eyebrow at her newest alien friend. “That’s all there is to it? Just think of something and make it appear?”

“That’s all you’ve got to do.”

Pinkie looked back at her ring, frowning slightly. The fact that someone expected her to need training in how to do something as simple as making these “Hard Light Constructs” said that someone was clearly underestimating her intelligence.

“Okay then…here I go.”

She closed her eyes and imagined an object that she was familiar with. She then opened them again, and concentrated on her ring. A moment later, a tether of green light darted out of her ring and constructed the desired object…

Killowog laughed. “Wow, rookie, you’re just dying to get back to the fighting aren’t you? It’s not often a new recruit makes a cannon right off the bat.”

Pinkie was about to reply, when her large alien friend pointed his ring at the cannon. A green blast of energy shot out of the ring, hitting the cannon and causing it to shatter in a flash of green light.

“These constructs are the tools of your will. The more conviction you put into making them, the stronger they are. If you don’t have confidence that what you made will get the job done, it’ll weaken, and be more likely to fail. That’s the reason why a lot of Lanterns try to make constructs of things their familiar with; you have more confidence when working with things you know how to use.” Killowog aimed his ring at Pinkie. “Now that you know all that, let’s see if you can’t make something strong enough to block one of my shots.”

“Uh…are you sure that’s such a good idea? I mean, didn’t you just almost put me in a hospital with that thing?” Pinkie asked nervously taking a step back and pointing at Killowog’s ring.

“Well, you know what they say, Poozer: no pain, no gain.”

A blast of energy shot forward from the ring. Rather than block it, like she’d been told to do, Pinkie ducked under the attack. “Are you sure I can’t have a little more time to practice making constructs? I mean, do we really need to jump straight into this part of the training?”

Killowog fired another couple of shots at her, all of which she dodged. “You’re not going to get any better if you don’t try to work on what you can’t do well. Now stop moving and start trying to block, you pathetic pink sissy!”

“Calling me names isn’t making me want to be anymore compliant with your demands.” Pinkie replied as she nervously danced around another volley of shots.

It was plain to see that her confidence was very lacking at the moment. Killowog honestly couldn’t blame her for that; she didn’t really seem like the fighter type. Her behavior was playful, silly, and in no way serious. He doubted any shield she made right now to defend herself would protect her from a fly, let alone from one of his shots. Still, jumping straight in was the best way to train a rookie; experience was the best teacher. Letting her put this lesson off would only make things worse in the long run. She needed to learn to get over her failures; such easily shaken determination could easily get a lantern killed.

“Come on! You’re supposed to be acting like the next great champion of your world! If you’re the best the ring could find then it seems to me that your whole world is pretty pathetic!”

“Hey! A lot of the ponies and other creatures on Equis are my friends you jerk! Pick on me all you want, but leave them out of it!”

“Or what? You and your prissy little pony friends are going to run crying to mommy?” The first sign that Killowog had crossed a line was probably the twitching in Pinkie’s left eye. “I bet their just as big of sissies as you are.” The clenched teeth and small amount of steam coming out Pinkie’s ears probably should have made for an obvious warning number two. “Probably not that bright either, considering how stupid you are. If you can’t even grasp the concept of blocking an attack, your mother probably couldn’t-”

He never did get to finish that sentence.

There was a scream of inarticulate rage, followed by a pair of transparent green hooves slammed into Killowog’s gut with all the force of a charging minotaur. Before he could recover, she was already upon him, hitting him repeatedly with a glowing green baseball bat she held in one hoof. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted what appeared to be a construct of a pony charging straight at him. Another one dropped down from above, attacking him like an angry bird. He called up a hammer and managed to smash the flying construct as it took another pass at him, but he was subsequently tackled by the other pony construct, which proceeded to savagely try and trample him. One shot at point blank range later, the large alien got back to his feet just in time to have a bat hit him in the face.

Whack! Right in the head.

“DON’T!”

Whack! All air had been forcefully removed from his lungs.

“YOU!”

Whack! He was certainly going to feel that one in the morning.

“DARE!”

Whack! That one had to hurt.

“TALK ABOUT MY MOTHER LIKE THAT!”

Pinkie took another swing, but was cut off when a large green fist slammed into her from the side, knocking her straight into a wall. Her eyes traced the fist back to its source; a green lantern who appeared to be human, just like Hal. His mane was ginger, and done in a bowl cut style and he didn’t have a mask on. His outfit consisted of a black pair of pants and long sleeved shirt, a green sleeveless jacket (or maybe it was just a very jacket-looking vest) with the lantern symbol on it, white gloves, a belt, and a pair of green boots.

“Killowog, I can’t believe you just got your butt kicked by talking, pink, miniature horse. I bet you feel real proud of yourself right now.”

Killowog glanced in Pinkie’s general direction. “Heads up, Guy.”

The human glanced in the same direction Killowog was looking, just in time to get smacked in the face by a pegasus construct. Pinkie flew over to the door, glaring at the two senior lanterns the whole way.

“No parties for either of you! For the rest of your lives!” She shouted, before throwing the doors open and flying off.
The Human and Killowog remained where they were for a few moments, before the silence was broken by the larger of the two.

“Hey Gardner, I can’t believe you just got your butt kicked by a talking, pink, miniature horse. I bet you feel real proud of yourself right now.”

“Shut up, Killowog. She just got a lucky shot, that’s all; at least I didn’t get thoroughly trampled, like you did.” The human replied. “What the heck did you do to piss her off anyways? Ganthet made her out to sound like some kind of stupid, naive, sweet little kid or something…”

Killowog got to his feet and looked out to door. “I’m not completely sure, but I may have been trying to goad her into trying to use a construct to hit me and accidentally taken it a bit too far.”

“Well, congratulations big guy, it worked. She definitely hit you with one of her constructs…and now we have a rookie GL in a bad mood running loose on Oa…and I’m going to have to knock her out and drag her back here.” Guy Gardner said, as he glared out the door Pinkie had exited through.

Pinkie had no idea where she was now. All the buildings on Oa looked the same to her, which resulted in her getting lost very quickly. It was very hard for her to find a place to be alone with all the other Green Lanterns being out and about. After a few minutes of searching, she finally found a seemingly empty balcony in a relatively quiet area. She landed on it, sitting down with her fore-hooves resting on the railing, and her head on her fore-hooves. Her hair fell straight as she let out a depressed sigh.

“Gosh…I don’t think I’ve ever gotten that angry over stuff like that before.” she said to nopony but herself. “The last time I ever flew off the handle about that was years ago, and even then I didn’t do anything until they started picking on somepony else.”

“Would you care to talk about it?” asked a familiar voice. Pinkie turned to spot one of the guardians of the universe slowly floating over to her. She immediately recognized him as the one that had saved her from the wrath of his peers. She returned her head to its resting place on her hooves and let out another sigh.

“Not really. No offence, but I don’t think you’d really understand it, even if I did explain it to you…”

“Normally, I would be inclined to disagree with you, but at the moment I find that your statement actually helps prove a point. While most seek advice from those who do understand them, the opinion they receive tends to be somewhat biased. Perhaps by explaining your worries to someone who doesn’t understand you will discover the fresh perspective you need to put the problem to rest.”

The equine GL blinked, and thought it over for a moment. The guardian had a valid point. If you asked a bunch of people who had similar experiences for help, there was a good chance you were going to get a lot of similar answers, most of which Pinkie had heard before. Maybe a fresh perspective from someone who didn’t get it would be helpful.

“Well…” The party pony began.

“…And that’s why I’m out here instead of training.” Pinkie finished. The guardian next to her was suppressing a slight chuckle.

“No parties for you”…she certainly knows how to make a threat. He thought to himself.

“Yes, I can see why that would have you so upset, though I’m certain Killowog didn’t mean what he was saying. He is correct about your training, though. You will only get better if you put your best effort into the tasks he gives you.” The small alien put a comforting hand on her shoulder. “As for your other problem, I’m afraid you are correct for the most part; I’ve never experienced such a thing personally. What I knowledge I have gathered from such subjects is all second hand, and I honestly must say that I don’t truly understand it. But know that I’m very sorry for your loss.”

Pinkie gave him a sad smile, knowing that unlike many others who had spoken the same words to her before, this stranger on a far away world truly was sorry to hear about her misfortune. This of course brought a very important question to her mind.

“Why are you so different?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“You’re not like the other guardians. You’re nice, and friendly, and caring. You didn’t get angry when I was super disrespectful earlier, and you took the time to stop and see what was bothering me even though I know you must be busy with some super important work, what with guarding the universe and all. So why are you so different from the other guardians?”

The blue alien smiled. “Oh, I wouldn’t say I’m too different. All of us are concerned for the well being of the entire universe. I simply believe that if we detach ourselves from the problem emotionally, and only follow the logical course of action, then we will be almost no better than the evils we fight. Obviously we cannot always afford to show compassion all the time, less someone takes advantage of it…but showing it whenever possible is good enough.”

“But why waste your time on me? I know you just said all that stuff about showing compassion and all that, but why me specifically?” Pinkie asked.

“Let’s just say that I see something special in you, and that the corps could use someone like you.”

He turned and started to float back over to the door from whence he’d come, only to be stopped by cry.

“Wait! I, uh…I don’t mean to seem rude or anything, but…if you have a name, could you please tell me what it is?”

“I am Ganthet of the Guardians.”

“Jeez, how hard is it to find one pink horse on a world where everything is black, white, and green?” Guy grumbled to himself. He’d been searching for hours, and was turning up empty handed everywhere he looked.

“Hi Mr. Human!” Guy whirled around and found himself face to face with the very creature he was looking for.

“Before you say anything, I’m really sorry about earlier, I was just really-” She began to say, before being cut off by a fist of green energy hitting her in the face, knocking her away from him.

“Yeah, you’re going to be sorry, punk! Because there ain’t no way in hell Guy Gardner is letting some pink, poufy, pansy pony get away with hitting him in the face! I’m gonna knock you out and drag you back to the training hall so I can knock you out again for fun!”

Pinkie rubbed her jaw where he had hit it, not liking the feeling of pain one bit. “That doesn’t sound very fun to me…”

“Maybe not, but I’ll sure have a blast.” Guy threw another energy fist at her, but it was stopped by a brick wall construct, created by Pinkie. The wall cracked and threatened to break on her, but just barely managed to hold.

“Yeah, but I’ll get all beaten up and won’t be able to say I’m sorry.”

“I don’t see anything stopping you from apologizing.”

The fist Guy had used disappeared, as he began rapidly firing of energy blasts from his ring. Pinkie dismissed her own construct and began dodging the attacks with little effort.

“Well, it is kind of hard to apologize while you’re shooting at me, but I guess I can handle it since you don’t appear to want to stop.” Pinkie called up a kite shield to block another energy punch thrown by Guy, but her shield shattered, and the pink pony just barely managed to get away with the attack only grazing one of her legs. “Wow that was close. Anyways, where was I? Oh, right. I’m really sorry about earlier, I was just really upset, and I kind of blew up in Killowog’s face, and then you hit me, and it was just all sorts of foul moods and getting off on the wrong hoof. Seriously, I almost never do that kind of stuff back home. So if you wouldn’t mind forgiving me, I’d really like to start over and see if we couldn’t be friends.”

Guy paused in his attack for a second, and Pinkie cautiously lowered her defenses…

…she was subsequently hit in the face with a hammer construct and knocked out.

“Okay, now let’s start over. I’m Guy Gardner, and I just kicked your pink butt. It’s nice to meet you.”

Pinkie sat in pain, holding one of Oa’s equivalents of an ice pack against her head as she watched Killowog give a number of Green Lanterns quick demonstration of how to kick Guy Gardner’s butt. They were back at the training hall, and the large alien had been a bit upset that Guy had used excessive force when Pinkie had basically been surrendering to him. She sighed, bored out of her skull, when her ring started flashing.

“This is Hal Jordan of Earth, temporary Green Lantern of Sector 1847, contacting Pinkie Pie of Equis, Green Lantern in training. Can you hear me there pink stuff?”

The Pink pony looked at her ring with renewed fascination. “Wow, these things work as phones too? Super cool!”

Pinkie heard Hal laugh a bit before responding. “Yes, they can let us communicate…anyways, I have something kind of important that you need to know about. Is Killowog there with you?”

“Hang on a second, Hal.” Pinkie looked over at the alien in question, who was actively demonstrating the best way to attempt to break a humans arm. “Hey Killowog! I know you’re super busy at the moment, but Hal’s talking to me on my ring and he says he wants to talk to you too!”

Reluctantly, Killowog let go of Guy and went over to where the pink pony was, leaving the bruised human in charge of training. “Alright Jordan, I’m here now. What did you want to tell us?”

“I thought you should get a heads up about this, since it’s bound to become a complicated mess, but one of the lanterns in Sector 1846 was assisting the acting lantern of Sector 1847 with something and...well, to make a long story short, you’re about to get another Poozer from Equis…”

Author's Note

Okay, so first of all, sorry about the wait. I got a bad case of writers block just about every other paragraph with this one, and I'm certain that it's not my best work. even so i hope you guys enjoy it.

Bonus Content 1

The following is an unedited bit from the original draft of Unlikely Lanterns of Equis. In the original draft, Applejack and Rainbow Dash (who latter turned out to be a changeling with a personality disorder that made her think she was Rainbow Dash) were the green lantern heroes of the story. This scene is Pinkie Pie (an ex-green lantern at this point of the original draft) explaining how she managed to survive her apparent death and join the Sinestro Corps. Please remember that this scene was taken unedited from the original draft, and holds no sway over the current draft of Unlikely Lanterns of Equis.

Please enjoy.

I realized the aliens were somehow tracking me through my power ring. Every time I used it, they would instantly know where I was. So, in an effort to try and ditch them, I removed my ring, hoping I could find it again once I was no longer in danger of being incinerated by an exploding planet. I managed to find a ship, and I was going to go for help, but…well…the countdown was a little off.

The planet exploded before I could get into communications range, and I wasn’t terribly good at flying the ship, seeing as it wasn’t designed for ponies. I ended up crash landing on a very arid world. My ride was completely ruined, and my power ring had been left behind, so it was just me against an entirely unknown planet.

Eventually I became aware of a bit of a problem; edible plants were just too few and far between for me to survive long enough to be rescued, assuming there was even a rescue team looking for me. Water was going to be a problem too. As I desperately tried to figure out a way to solve my problems, another one presented itself: Predators. With nothing to use to defend myself, not even my party cannon, I was a mouse trapped inside a giant sand box with a whole mess of hawks and cats all trying to eat me.

It wasn’t until thirst and hunger drove me to incredible levels of desperation that I had the idea…the idea that saved me, and destroyed me, and changed me forever.

I had come across the body of a creature, as it lay dying in the sand. My mind was playing tricks on me by that point, and I wasn’t certain if the creature was really there at all until I touched it. It had clearly been attack by some other beast, and had lost the fight, though why it had been left behind without being devoured was beyond me.

Until then I had been telling myself that if I kept searching, I’d eventually find some kind of forest or location of abundant flora that had to be feeding the smaller creatures these things must have been feeding on. But as I stood there, with one hoof on the dying creature, it became apparent to me that if I didn’t eat soon I was going to be in the exact same position as it was. There was no way I could keep surviving on the small amounts of edible plants I kept finding, usually miles apart from each other. I’d gotten lucky a few times and managed to fine some drinkable water, but I never could get enough before a predator would show up. I had to do something…I had to eat something if I was ever going to make it.

And right in front of me was a very big serving of the local cuisine…and it tasted like survival.

At first I detested what I was doing. The thought made me gag, and I was sure I there was no way this would ever work out. I was going to get sick, or start vomiting until I dehydrated myself, or something like that…but it turns out desperation and the need for survival are very powerful motivations. I managed to keep from losing my new found lunch. Although I could tell the long term effects to my mental health was going to make one lucky therapist very rich, I knew I had to do it to survive.

I managed to get back to my ship a few days later (by local planetary time standards, of course) and started looking through the salvage again. Not in an attempt to find some sort of beacon or communications device to increase my odds of being found, as was my purpose the last time I had been there, but rather to find parts of the wreckage that I could use to make weapons; nothing fancy, just a simple ax or spear or anything that I could use to assist with my survival.

I quickly started learning the ropes, so to speak. I managed to secure a water source all for myself, and I grew desensitized to the horrors of what I was doing. Eat enough of anything, and you grow used to the taste.

Now, here’s the funny part; it turns out, I wasn’t quite as alone out there as I thought I was. In fact, the locals had actually been watching me from a distance since the day I landed. If I had bothered to head east (or the direction I believed to be east anyways) instead of west when I first started exploring, I would have found civilization wasn’t too far away. With luck I could have managed to overcome the language barrier, and found a place to stay until someone that could take me home showed up. But since I didn’t go east, I had instead been subject to starvation and thirst. I had been forced to adapt in order to survive, and I had managed to make myself the number one predator on a planet where all the sentient inhabitants were herbivores. In other words, they thought I was a demon straight out of Tartarus…one that needed to be destroyed.

As you can imagine, I didn’t take that so well.

I’m…not to particularly proud of what happened, but considering the circumstances and the fact that it got me rescued, I don’t need to be proud of it to say I don’t regret it. I had no clue what they were shouting at me, only that I didn’t like being hit with rocks and chased by a bunch of spear wielding, primitive aliens. They were being hostile, so I responded in kind. None of the ones that came after me ever made it back to their settlement.
And so their fear of me grew.

Eventually, I became confidant enough to go try and see why they had attacked me in the first place. I managed to find the settlement. All the natives had seen me coming, and in there terror hidden from me, barricading the entry ways to their homes in hopes of preventing me from harming them. I found out that they had managed to cultivate a bit of the land, and I cried. Had I only gone in the other direction…but there was no turning back the clock. What was done was done; there was no point in regretting it, so I didn’t. I still don’t regret my actions.

It was right then and right there, as I was crying and sitting in the middle of an alien town, understanding how Zecora must have felt when ponyville was still terrified of her (the largest difference between me and Zecora being that these creatures had good reason to fear me), that it found me: My yellow power ring.

I later returned, just for a brief visit, and discovered that they had made my image into their new god of death. There is actually a whole little story about what they thought I was doing there. It’s a rather interesting bit of their culture.

Chapter four: Trouble, Training, and Time

“You’re kidding me…you’re kidding me, right? Two new Green Lanterns from the same planet in one day? That’s ridiculous!”

Pinkie glanced at Killowog, a look of slight worry on her face. “What’s wrong with having two Lanterns from the same planet? Guy and Hal are both from earth, and Equis already had a green lantern when I got my ring…what’s wrong with having one more?”

“There’s nothing wrong with it. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with having a bunch of GL’s from the same world. The problem is that you’re a rookie and so is this new GL. That’s two rookies from the same world within a day of each other, in a sector that already has an active GL. Normally we send new recruits to their own planet to start off their career as a GL and have the other GL in that sector try to act as a kind of mentor…” Killowog started to explain.

“The problem is that according to regulations, the corps can only have two on duty GL’s assigned to a sector at a time, and there are three from your sector now, two of which are new recruits. No matter how we set it up, we’re either going to end up with two rookies trying to cover a sector by themselves or with one of you getting assigned to a completely different sector, which is going to make early field training a lot rougher than necessary.” Hal finished through Pinkie’s ring.

“So basically, it’s either allowing the blind to lead the blind or essentially banishing one of us from Equis for a while.” Pinkie surmised.

“That’s the basics of it, yeah, but to be honest we’re not entirely sure that those are the only options available. As far as I know, we’ve never recruited two GL’s from the same world within such a short span of time before. This is pretty much a new experience for everyone.” Hal paused for a moment before continuing. “Anyways, I can see Equis up ahead. I’ll be sure to call back if something you need to know comes up. See you later.”

With the communication terminated, Killowog had no choice but to go back to taking care of Guy Gardner, who had managed to get a rather large number of other GL’s to gang up on him at the same time. Pinkie merely remained seated, and reapplied her ice pack to her aching head.

“I wonder who the other new Green Lantern is…”
*
The guardians sat in their room, waiting patiently for the new green lantern to arrive. He had touched down moments ago, and was likely to be there at any second. The doors were flung open, as the newest Green Lantern entered. One of the guardians opened their mouth to speak, but was promptly cut off by the lantern in question, when he struck a pose. “Introducing, for the first time ever on your little planet, the one and only Iron Will!”

He was big, about the same size as Killowog. His body was covered in blue fur. He had yellow eyes with black irises, and a pair of bull horns on top of his head. The new lantern was bipedal, having arms with hands and legs with hooves. The lantern uniform he wore was, as usual, mostly black and green. It consisted of a black pants and a solid green long sleeved shirt. There was a white circle over his heart, with the green lantern symbol in it.

In an instant the large blue creature was standing mere feet away from one of the Guardians of the universe, pointing a finger directly at their face. “You small blue creatures are doormats now, but when Iron Will is through with you, you’re going to be lean, mean, assertive ma-!”

Within seconds Iron Will was curled up in a ball on the floor, clutching his stomach in pain. Ganthet did his best to suppress a chuckle.
Between Pinkie and this Iron Will character, things are going to be getting very…interesting.

“Iron Will of planet Equis, Green Lantern of Sector 1847, welcome to Oa and to the Green Lantern Corps. As a Green Lantern, you will be expected to adhere to the laws of the guardians, and show us respect.”

“I apologize…” The Minotaur managed to say in between groans of pain. “I didn’t realize you were already so assertive.”

“Yes, well, it’s certainly not the worst we’ve dealt with today. In any case, you arrival has caused a bit of a…scheduling problem. We will work it out. For now, go out into the hall and have a green lantern take you to see Killowog. He and Guy Gardner will be in charge of your training.”

Pinkie dodged another attack from Killowog, leaping and flipping out of the way of his barrage of energy blasts, before creating dome shaped shield around her, as he swung a hammer construct her way. The massive mallet hit her protective bubble hard, causing it to crack and threaten to shatter.

“Come on, Poozer, I know you can do better than that!” the large alien shouted. He raised the hammer again, and brought it down for a second strike.

Pinkie dismissed her construct and leapt out of the way of the attack. Killowog raised the hammer once more, when the party pony suddenly sent a Pegasus construct flying forth from her ring. It slammed into the hammer like a bullet, shattering both of them. Surprised by the sudden offensive tactic, the alien trainer barely had enough time to react when Pinkie summoned up a unicorn construct and began using it like a gatling gun. He managed to put up a square barrier between him and the pony construct/assault weapon before any of the shots hit him.

“Better, but still not good enough!”

The large alien sent his barrier forward, using it to slam Pinkie against the far wall, breaking her focus and causing her construct to vanish. The pony slid down the wall when her trainer dismissed his own construct.

“You’ve got a decent amount of will power, and you’re not half bad with your ring, but decent doesn’t get the job done and you’re severely lacking in the physical department. At this rate you’re going to be in training for years, which makes you a waist of everybody’s time.”

Pinkie glanced up at the large pink creature, clutching her now severely bruised chest with one foreleg. “Is this is supposed to be one of those drill sergeant speeches, where insulting me is supposed to provide me the motivation to do better next time around?”

“Yeah, something like that.”

“Okay, just checking…can we take Lunch break? I haven’t eaten in a while, and when I get hungry, I become super annoying to be around.”

The doors to the training room burst open, as Iron Will walked in…

…only to find it completely empty of all but one other life form.

“Who the heck are you supposed to be?”Guy Gardner asked, as he dismissed the punching bag construct he’d been practicing with.

“Iron Will is my name, training ponies is my game. I take pathetic little doormat’s like you and turn them into-”

WHAM!

“What the hay is this stuff?” the pink pony asked as she poked at the strange fruit on her tray. “I thought you said they’d have food I was familiar with.”

“They did…but I decided against getting it for you for two reasons. First of all, you need to get used to eating alien foods, since you might be spending a lot of time on strange worlds once your done here. Secondly, I know the other lantern of Equis, and even though I still wish she hadn’t, she’s wasted a lot of my time explaining the dietary needs of an Equestrian to me. Cupcakes and lollipops are not the kind of thing I want to give a recruit whose biggest problem is a lack of physical strength. From now until your training is done you’re on a diet, Poozer.”

Pinkie grumbled a bit in reply to that, but didn’t argue with him. He did have a good point, after all; living in a sweets shop did her no favors for staying in shape. She picked up one of the fruits and stared at it curiously. It was neon blue with orange vertical stripes, and vaguely resembled a cross between a pomegranate and a pineapple. Even though she knew Killowog wouldn’t actively try to poison her, the equine GL was still hesitant to take a bite, on the off chance he’d made a mistake and the fruit was actually something hazardous to her health.

She was also hesitant because it was pokey, and she had no idea how she was supposed to eat it without stabbing her tongue on one of the spikes. She directed a questioning glance towards Killowog, silently asking for instructions on how to avoid such a thing, only to gag upon noticing what was on his tray.

Are those…maggots?! Gross! I think I’m going to be sick!

Iron Will pulled himself out of the dent he made in the wall upon his collision with it, and gave an angry snort before lowering his head and charging straight at Guy. The senior green lantern used his ring to summon up a wall between them, which halted the Minotaur’s charge with a mighty “Crash!”

After she had managed to successfully keep the contents of her stomach inside her stomach, Pinkie set herself to the task of trying to unravel the mystery of how she was supposed to eat the spiky fruit she had been presented with.

Is there supposed to be some way to peel it, or am I supposed to cut it open, or say some magic words or something? How am I supposed to eat something that’s covered in spikes?

Using her ring, she levitated one of the curious fruits off of her tray and examined it closely, turning it this way and that. The pokey piece of plant life was a perplexing and puzzling problem that Pinkie’s powers of perception couldn’t provide an answer to.

So she simply stuffed the whole fruit in her mouth and swallowed.

“Mmm…tasty.”

Iron Will let out a ferocious battle cry as he tackled Gardner from behind, knocking him to the floor. The minotaur got up and grabbed the human by the head before slamming him face first into a nearby wall.

“How do you like Iron Will now?!” He slammed Guy into the wall again. “You think you can push Iron Will around?! Then you’re wrong, because nobody can push Iron Will around!”

“Eat! Eat! Eat! Eat!”

Lanterns from across the universe gathered around, some watching in horrified fascination, others in extreme amusement as they chanted.

Pinkie gladly obliged their wish, quickly scarfing down more of the strange fruits and vegetables placed before her. She was going so fast she didn’t even know what half the stuff she was devouring looked like. Still, it was probably better that she didn’t have a chance to judge most of it by its appearances.

She was just about to break a record for “most varieties of food consumed in one sitting” when an alarm went off. Pinkie swallowed what was in her mouth and turned to Killowog, as everyone quickly started rushing out of the room.

“What’s that alarm? Is there a fire? An Earthquake? A half off sale on used couches?”

“There’s a containment breech in the Prisoner holding cells. Come on, Poozer, we’ve got work.”

“I hope you realize this is your fault!” Guy shouted at Iron Will as he punched an escaping prisoner in the face.

Iron Will had his arm wrapped around the neck of a particularly large adversary and was attempting a choke hold. He glanced over at Guy. “On what crazy world is this Iron Will’s fault?!”

One of Guy’s first constructs slammed into a large Toad like Creature, sending it flying. “In the universe where you started the fight and you punched me through the training room wall and all the way into one of the prisoner containment blocks!”

“Iron Will seems to recall you hitting him first!” The Minotaur countered.

This was the scene Pinkie and Killowog had walked in on. An entire Cell Block, about a mile long and twenty stories high on both sides of the room, full of containment cells holding dangerous criminals, had been cracked wide open. All the prisoners were rioting, each one wanted for a ludicrous number of unbelievably heinous crimes, and the Lanterns were all doing everything in their power to get the situation under control again, while Guy Gardner and Iron Will played the blame game.

She had a lot of questions, but no time to ask them as she was already hard at work trying to avoid the attacks of several prisoners that had marked her as an easy target.

A Crystal Spider looking creature attempted to stab at her with its legs, which she dodged with a backflip, causing her to bump into some kind of reptilian gorilla creature, which took a swing at her. A shield from her ring stopped the blow, but not without visibly cracking under the force of the blow. The third, which looked like Hal’s race’s equivalent of a Pegasus, moved for the door while she was distracted, but she dismissed the shield and cartwheeled over in front of him to block his path, wrapping a chain construct around him to keep him from getting away.

Her focus was broken, however, when the crystal spider thing leapt at her, forcing her to defend herself with a Trampoline construct. The arachnid bounced off of it, and smacked straight into Guy Gardner, who didn’t take it very well.

There was no rest for Pinkie, however, as the lizard Gorilla and the bird-man were back, both rushing her at the same time. She quickly threw a Pegasus construct into the face of the bird man and took flight to avoid his scaly friend, who proceeded to start climbing the wall in an attempt to catch her.

The Pink pony fired a few generic blasts at it, hoping to knock it off as she continued to fly upwards, and it continued to chase her. The shots did very little to stop it, as it leapt at her, narrowly missing, but managing to grab ahold of the ceiling which she had failed to notice was immediately behind her now. Thinking fast, Pinkie made a construct on the ceiling that resembled a seesaw, and then kicked upwards, hitting the end that was near her, and letting the leaver smack the creature’s underside and knock it off the ceiling. It fell and landed directly on top of Guy, who had just finished dealing with the last bad guy she had sent his way.
She was about to relax a bit, when the bird-man slammed into her from the side, causing them both to collide against the wall. Pinkie hit it left-side first, and heard and felt her foreleg snap, almost distracting her too long for her to get out of the way of her assailant’s next attack, which she ducked under, twisting to face him as she did so.

The party pony bucked out with her back legs, kicking the bird-man in the stomach, but this inflicted more pain on her back legs than on her opponent. He took another swing with his fist, but she let herself drop into free fall for a few seconds, causing him to hit the wall and putting a bit of space between them, vertically at least. He came down at her with a dive attack, and she attempted to move out of the way, but his fist managed to make contact with her face, which was the last thing she remembered before everything went black.

Pinkie woke up for the umpteenth time in what she hoped was the same day, to find a strange creature looking down at her. It was Bipedal, about Hal’s size, with a matching amount of limbs. She couldn’t seem to make up her mind if it looked like a bug-man or bird-man though. Its skin looked like a slightly shiny carapace of some sort, and it had mandibles, but also a crest or horn like feature on its head, and talons on the tips of its fingers, not to mention the general body shame seemed somehow more avian than insect like. Speaking of fingers, it had two plus an opposable thumb on each hand. It wore its ring on the left hand. Its lantern outfit appeared to be a full suite of combat armor designed for its race, minus the helmet. There were green markings on its face, like some kind of war paint.

“Well, I see someone is finally up.” It said. Its voice was strange, but sounded distinctly male to her. “You took quite a beating. Not everyone can get pummeled by a Thanagarian and survive, especially when their as…soft…as someone like you. Frankly I’m amazed you survived, even more so that you’re up already.”

“A Thana-what-ian? Soft? I’m sorry, who are you?” Pinkie asked.

“I’m Serugis of planet Palaven, Green Lantern of sector 3400, former xenobiologist and medical doctor. I take care of a lot of seriously injured lanterns, anything basic first aid or a battle field medic can’t fix.” He said as he scanned over her body with his ring. “Thanagarian is the name of the race of the prisoner that took you out, the humanoid one with the wings. And while you are rather soft and furry I suppose a better word for what I was trying to say would be weak. You’re physically weak compared to most of the corps. I will admit that you did pretty well in spite of that. A good training routine and some proper nutrition, and you should be ring slinging like a champ in no time.”

He finished scanning her and looked over the data for a bit, while Pinkie started to get off the bed she was on, glancing around the circular room around her. It looked pretty similar to most rooms on Oa; mostly white and green, with maybe a bit of black mixed it here and there. There were screens and monitors along with fancy looking alien Cabinets, most likely holding medical stuff.

“Hmm…Your blood’s Ph level is point-zero-zero-seven higher than it should be. Then again, I may be wrong. I only have one other source of data on your particular species, so I can’t really make a definitive conclusion on that. I’ll have to look into that later, if I have the time and opportunity.” Serugis said, bringing her attention back to him. “Everything else seems to check out.”

“So I’m good to go?”

“Well, I would say take it easy for a few days, but your behind on your training with Killowog enough as it is. Still, if you develop any intense pains anywhere that you didn’t just get hit or start bleeding at any point, stop the training and come straight back here to see me. I can’t have you dying after all.”

“Okay. I should probably get back to Killowog for training then. Thanks for taking care of me.” Pinkie said to her newest friend, before putting a yo-yo on the bed and leaving.

Serugis stared at the door she’d left through for a moment, and then at the yo-yo, before he picked it up, examining it curiously.

“What the heck is this thing?”

“What do you mean he already left?” Pinkie inquired as she got started on the five hundred pushups that she had to do as a warm up. “How could Iron Will have already left? I’ve been here for days already; he can’t have gotten that far ahead of me in training, could he?”

“Well, you are scrawnier than him, and once he and Guy stopped trying to beat the snot out of each other, it was kind of easy to train him. He’s certainly not lacking in willpower or physical strength.” Killowog said as he fired a few shots at another lanterns construct to check its strength.

“Oh…well that’s good for him…” Pinkie replied halfheartedly. If Iron Will was done, that meant he was going to get stationed back on Equestria, and Pinkie was likely going to end up somewhere else. Who knew when she might see her friends again? But…on the other side of things, if she was stationed someplace else, she’d get to meet lots of new people and make lots of new friends.
She smiled and redoubled her efforts. The sooner her training was done, the sooner she could make new friends and go back to see her old ones again. She could see the training montage in her head already…

Risin’ up, back on the street,
Did my time took my chances,
Went the distance, now I’m back on my feet,
Just a mare and her will to survive.

Pinkie attempts to continue her pushups, as sweat drips off of her, but she collapses to the ground in failure.

So many times it happens too fast,
You change your passion for glory.
Don’t lose your grip on the dreams of the past,
You must fight just to keep them alive.

Pinkie attempts to mimic the moves of Serugis as he practices fighting, which resemble some sort of foreign fighting style, but ends up falling over.

It’s the eye of the tiger,
It’s the thrill of the fight,
Rising up to the challenge of our rival,
And the last known survivor stalks his prey in the night,
And she’s watching us all with the eye,
of the tiger.

Pinkie attempts to continue jogging laps, but is clearly winded and tired. Several Lanterns in the training room shake their heads, feeling she’s a lost cause.

Face to face, out in the heat,
Hanging tough, staying hungry.
They stack the odds till’ we take to the street,
For we kill with the skill to survive

Pinkie using a wall construct to block shots from a number of other lanterns, while simultaneously attempting to reach Killowog’s 500 pushup goal. However, she falls down in defeat again

It’s the eye of the tiger,
It’s the thrill of the fight,
Rising up to the challenge of our rival,
And the last known survivor stalks his prey in the night,
And she’s watching us all with the eye,
of the tiger.

Pinkie sits down to eat. There is an assortment of strange looking alien fruits on her tray. On the tray of the lantern next to her, there is a cupcake. She reaches for it, but is smacked on the head by a rolled up newspaper construct, courtesy of Guy Gardner, who is enjoying his job just a little too much.

Rising up straight to the top,
Have the guts, got the glory,
Went the distance, now I’m not gonna,
Stop just a mare and her will to survive.

Pinkie rests in her bed in the room she’s staying in while on Oa, looking at a picture of her and the rest of the mane six, clearly homesick.

It’s the eye of the tiger,
It’s the thrill of the fight,
Rising up to the challenge of our rival,
And the last known survivor stalks his prey in the night,
And she’s watching us all with the eye,
of the tiger.

Pinkie is running laps again, this time with alien attack dog constructs chasing her. She does manage a good time on all her laps though.

The Eye of the Tiger

Pinkie successfully completes 500 pushups with weights on her back

The Eye of the Tiger

Pinkie is mimicking the moves of Serugis again, and is managing to keep up with him, even pulling off the more complicated moves.

The Eye of the Tiger

Pinkie Reaches for a cupcake while in the line for food, but Guy smacks her with his construct again. Pinkie retaliates by dropping an anvil construct on his head, and stealing the cupcake off of his tray. Everyone in the room cheers.

The Eye of the Tiger

Pinkie collapsed to the training room floor, exhausted from her most intense training session yet. “Okay…so…same time tomorrow?”

Killowog shook his head, much to Pinkie’s surprise. “Nope. You’re done Poozer.”

Shock and outrage went across Pinkie’s face when she heard this. “What?! Are you kidding me?! You put me through tartarus and back again with training, and you’re going to kick me out of the corps now?!”

“What?! No! You finished your training. I told you this was going to be your last session three solar cycles ago. Iron Will got himself transferred by making the guardians mad. You’re going home.”

The party pony turned Green Lantern blinked, her brain processing the information. When it finally all clicked into place she leapt up into the air and took flight around the room. “WHOOHOO! I’m going home! Finally! It only took me-!”

“I’m sorry sugar plum, but it’s been a full year since she disappeared. It pains me to say it, but…I don’t think Pinkie Pie is ever coming back.”

Author's Note

Song is a slightly changed version of Eye of the Tiger by Survivor. The song and it's lyrics belongs to them, not me.

There. Now that that is out of the way...Oh my gosh, it's finally finished!

Its not my absolute best. I admit that. But after the crap I've gone through with This Chapter...Well, it's to be expected that it would either rock like crazy or totally suck, give that it's technically been in the making since December 2012. and given how hard it was to write...I'll be happy if people say this chapter was okay, let alone if they say it's actually good.

On the other end of things, I have a general idea of where to go with this from here, so we might be getting more soon...but don't keep your fingers crossed, because I am also busy looking for a job. But still, there's a chance.

Also, fun fact: When I started this chapter, I was in a writing class covering Philosophical essays. Originally, Pinkie was supposed to have a full two paragraph internal philosophical monologue about the spikey fruit Kilowog presents her for lunch before she eats it. Then I found out that I despise writing essays about Philosophical essays, and I dropped it in favor of this so wouldn't have to gouge my own eyes out by the time this chapter was finished. Part of me still wishes I'd done more with that, though. Maybe I'll re-write it in the future.

Chapter five: Prodigal Daughter of Equis

It was an average day in Equestria…or it would have been, if not for the light rain scheduled in ponyville. Normally rain in the weather schedule would be a normal thing, but this was no normal rain. It was part of a tradition that started after the first pegasi moved to ponyville.

Today was Pinkie Pie’s official funeral.

The service was being held outdoors in a cemetery, and there was a reception planned afterwards. Rarity had handled the arrangements, and would have paid for everything had not everyone involved given their services for free. Most of the town was present, and even all three princesses had taken the day off to be there.

“I still can’t believe she’s gone.” Twilight said, glancing over at the closed coffin. She, like most of the other ponies present at the cemetery, was dressed in black. Some wore dresses like Rarity, while others wore more casual clothes like Apple jack, who only wore a black hat and vest. Even the Princesses had exchanged their normal regalia for obsidian colored replicas.

The Apples were taking it hard. They were the closest things the Pie family had ever had to neighbors, and had been the ones that had found Pinkie the night her family had died. Besides the Cakes they were the closest thing she’d had to family, and in their hearts Pinkie had always been a part of theirs.

“None of us can, Darling. Rainbow Dash even refused to come because she’s still holding on to hope, and poor Fluttershy is practically drowning in denial.” Rarity replied to the lavender unicorn. Twilight nodded, as worry for her Pegasus friends welled up inside her. Rainbow Dash’s loyalty and persistence was admirable, and her stubborn refusal to admit that there was a chance Pinkie was dead was expected…but Fluttershy’s flat out denial that Pinkie was even gone was troubling to say the least. They had expected the yellow Pegasus to bust out crying when they’d told her their pink pony friend had gone missing, but instead she’d just smiled and commented how she’d probably show up tomorrow with a wild story, a smile on her face, and an apology for worrying everyone. It had seemed like optimism at first, but as time went on it Fluttershy’s response to the situation didn’t change, no matter how much worse things seemed to get with time. Always smiling, always assuring them Pinkie would be back at any moment. Twilight had even entertained the idea of holding an intervention or having a professional psychiatrist speak with her canary colored friend.

Twilight noticed Celestia had taken her place by the coffin to lead the service, and quickly moved to her seat. She took a brief moment to check the note cards she’d brought with her, so she’d be ready when it was her time to speak. They were all blank, of course. What does one say when one of their dearest friends is taken from them? There were no words to describe how she felt right now.

She glanced around as Celestia began speaking. Any other situation and Twilight would have been paying rapt attention to her mentor. Any other situation and she would have been so happy to see her.

Any other situation and Pinkie would have been sitting next to her.

She spotted the Cakes, both nearly inconsolable. Ditzy Doo and her daughters had shown up, and Time Turner as well, though he was standing in the back, almost as if waiting for something. Scootaloo was sitting with the Apples, and Twilight swore she saw Rainbow hiding not too far away, amongst some of the other graves. She’d probably say she only came to oversee the traditional funeral rain shower if asked.

Spike gently tapped Twilight, letting her know it was time for her to go up and speak a few words. She stood and made her way up to the podium, her mind blank and her heart feeling empty. What was she going to say? What could she say? Where were her words when she needed them?

Finally she reached her destination, standing in front of the gathered ponies sharing in her loss, standing next to an empty coffin, and she opened her mouth to speak when she spotted a cloaked pony running straight down the aisle, stopping in front of the coffin. Before Twilight could say a word, the pony opened up the coffin, jumped inside, and shut it on themselves.

Everyone gasped, some in shock, some in outrage. Twilight was flabbergasted. Who would be so disrespectful as to jump in another pony’s coffin at their funeral? It made her tremble with anger. In the blink of an eye she used her magic to rip the top of the coffin off and pull the pony out. “Just who do you think you are?!” She demanded of the figure.

The cloaked pony giggled and pulled off her hood. “I’m the deceased, silly. I’m supposed to be in the coffin.” Pinkie replied. “Sorry I was late though. I only found out I was dead a few hours ago.”

* Flashback *

“I can’t believe this! You forgot to tell them I was still alive?!” Pinkie exclaimed as she flew through the void of space towards her home. Hal Jordan had just finished explaining about how he’d never gotten around to telling her loved ones she was still alive, and she was less than happy at the moment.

“In my defense, that was a really busy day. There was a civil war that broke out two solar systems over and a giant killer space monster…”

“And that still doesn’t explain all the rest of the 378 standard solar cycles which were perfect opportunities for you to tell them I wasn’t dead!” The pink mare countered. “You realize that they probably had a funeral and everything, right? Do you have any idea how hard it is to have your citizen status changed back from deceased without going to court under suspicion of being involved in necromancy?! This is going to be my fifth time!”

“I was really busy and it kind of just…wait, what do you mean this is your fifth time?” Hal inquired.

“Just because I occasionally get drunk and break into the town hall’s records to prank everyone, doesn’t mean you’re off the hook!” Pinkie shouted, willing herself to move faster. “And besides, that prank got Caramel to finally propose to Flitter! It was totally worth it!”

“You…brake into the town hall and forge legal documents when you get drunk?”

“Not since they passed that law prohibiting me from drinking alcohol. Now when I get drunk, I spend the night running away from guard ponies…then I break into town hall and forge legal documents after that.”

Hal was silent for a moment before he replied. “What kind of drinks does your planet serve and where do I get some?”

“You’d already know the answer to both those questions, if you’d bothered to tell them I wasn’t dead!”

“How many times do I have to say sorry before you forgive me?”

“Everyone I know and love thinks I’m dead! You’re lucky you’re still invited to my birthday party! And you had better get me a really good present!”

* Back in the Present *

Pinkie sat there beaming with joy...until someone in the back decided to start a panic by shouting "Changeling!" In a matter of seconds, there was a dog pile of royal guard on the coffin. Pinkie found herself standing on the podium Twilight had been about to use for her speech.

"Nice try guys, but I'm a tag world champion!"

Two pegasi leapt at her, but Pinkie jumped nimbly out of the way, landing behind Twilight, giving her a quick hug before leaping away again as an earth pony guard landed less than a foot away from her. The pink pony pranced away from her pursuers as they pounced in her general direction.

"Guys, I know you're understandably excited to see me, but Family and best friends first when it comes to hugs!"

Right then, one fortunate guard finally manage to hit Pinkie from behind, tackling her to the ground…and causing a Baby Blue cannon to fall out of her mane and hit another less fortunate guard in the face. Several of the other guards quickly surrounded her, preparing to take her down, when Twilight appeared between them and her in a flash of purple light.

“Wait! Stop attacking!” The lavender unicorn said, before cautiously turning to her friend. “Pinkie...Is that really you?”

“Well, duh.” The party pony replied. “If I wasn’t me, then who would I be? Cheese Sandwich? That’d be ridiculous!”

Tears welled up in Twilight’s eyes, and the lavender unicorn suddenly moved forward and hugged her friend, taking the pink pony by surprise. Pinkie froze for a moment, then hugged her Purple pony pal back.

“It’s good to be home, Twilight.”

The guards quickly confirmed with a scanning spell that Pinkie was, in fact, the real Pinkie. Rainbow immediately made her presence known and started gloating about how she knew Pinkie was alive all along.

The Cakes practically trampled the Princesses on their way over to see the party planner. The two hugged her so hard, the guards had to pull them off of her when she started turning purple.

The Apple Family soon made their way over to her, through the crowd of ponies that had surrounded the Pink pony.

“Dang girl. Where have you been? You had all of us thinking you were dead!”

“Well, I guess you could say I was abducted by aliens.” Pinkie replied with a smile.

Applejack shook her head, then hugged her friend. "If any other pony said that, I'd think they were out of their mind. But you're strange enough that it's probably true. It's good to have you back."

Pinkie let go of the farmer and turned to face Rarity, who had just gotten past the crowd of ponies eager to welcome her home. She smiled and raised her legs to hug the fashionista...only to be smacked in the face with a purse.

“Don’t you ever do that to us ever again! Do you have any idea what you put us through?! Just suddenly disappearing like that, your rock farm house trashed in the middle of the night, leaving us to think you’d been kidnapped or worse.” The furious fashionista raised her purse to strike again, but a guard quickly confiscated the bag.

“It’s good to see you too, Rarity. I see you got a new purse...”

“You do not get to just come walking back into our lives with a joke and a smile, acting like absolutely nothing has happened since you left! Do you know I’m everyone’s back up party planner? ‘Hey Rarity, want to join a search party and help look for Pinkie?’ ‘Oh, no, I’m sorry Rainbow Dash, I have seventy three angry customers ready to bring out the torches and pitch forks to burn my house down if I don’t plan all of them the best parties ever within the next two months!’”

“Okay, so you're understandably upset, but it’s not like I had a chance to leave a note or something behind.”

“Why, if it weren’t for Minty’s help, I’m certain the town would have descended into absolute chaos.”

“I’m sure you're exaggerating just a little bit, and-wait, who is Minty?”

“Your replacement.” Applejack immediately replied.

“Applejack!”

“What? It’s true! Yall just don’t want to admit it cuz it’ll make you look bad.”

“Wait, I’ve been replaced?”

“She’s not your replacement, she’s...just...the pony who was conveniently hired by the Cakes to do everything you used to do before you vanished, likes to plan and throw parties for everyone, and has been helping all of us out when we run into the occasional friendship problem.” Twilight stated, plastering a very guilty looking and not at all genuine grin on her face.

“So what you're saying is that she’s not my replacement, she just happens to have taken over my role in every activity I would normally be a part of?”

“Um...well, that’s just because the two of you have so much in common. I’m sure you’ll both get along great, darling.” Rarity said. “But for now, You and Twilight should go let Fluttershy know your still alive, while I try to turn this funeral into a welcome home party, okay?”

A group of suspicious looking stallions gazed at a jewelry store from across the street, each of them dressed in a trench coat and wearing a ski mask. One of them scanned the street, looking for guards, then made his way across and looked in the window, noting a single sleeping security guard and a freshly hired employee inside, who was distracted with eating their lunch. He signaled to the others, and they joined him by the window.

“Just like she said, easy pickings. Almost the whole town is at that funeral, and the few guards that aren’t attending will never get here in time to stop us. Let’s do this thing.”

"So, um...I have a question." Pinkie announced as she trotted with Twilight along the path to Fluttershy's house.

"Is it about why Fluttershy wasn't at the funeral?"

"No...well, yeah, I want to know about that too, but I'm actually more curious about why ponyville has sky scrapers now. I mean, we were kind of popular before, but I didn't think we were popular enough to go full out Metropolitan."

Twilight sighed, glancing back at the colossal structures. "Yeah...a lot has happened in the last year. Most of the town itself remained the same, but a bunch of big wig companies started buying property around it and building stuff...next thing we knew, ponyville had a skyline." The purple Unicorn shook her head. "I'm still having trouble getting used to it."

"Well, it's not really much of a skyline." Pinkie remarked. "No offence to the owners, but there's only three or four buildings over ten stories high...granted those buildings are all at least eighty stories tall, because for some reason that's totally necessary, but still..."

Twilight giggled a bit at that. "Yeah, well...big corporations tend to be a bit excessive. Their business has done a lot for the town, though." Her smile slowly turned to a frown. "Of course, it's also caused some...problems. The crime rate has gone up significantly since you left. The town's guard had to expand their numbers, and then that entirely new agency was formed, and plopped it's base down on-"

The purple unicorn suddenly stopped talking, a worried and sad expression on her face. Pinkie could tell, where ever her friend had been taking the conversation, Twilight was certain Pinkie wasn't going to like it in the slightest. It would take careful tiptoeing around the topic and a very subtle and cautious approach to get Twilight to spill the beans, which would be difficult at the moment.

"Sounds like things have been rough, but I'm sure some good things had to have happened while I was gone too."

"Well, we did get our own local radio station."

"Really? That sounds awesome!"

"As long as neither of you make any stupid moves, no pony will get hurt." The leader of the masked robbers announced, as his accomplices started looting the store. Everything was going smoothly so far, as was expected. It was a pretty simple plan; get in, grab the money and jewels, get out before the big funeral was over. There wasn't much that could go wrong with-

The look out barged into the store, panic on his face. "Boss, its the guards! Their coming up the street!"

"What?! Already?! That's impossible! They couldn't have gotten here already, unless someone triggered the alarm before we even got inside!" The leader replied, baffled by this shocking turn of events that had shattered his perfect plan.

"Well...I did see you guys through the window," The mare working the counter stated,"And it doesn't take a genius to figure out what a bunch of suspicious looking stallions in ski masks and trench coats standing outside of a jewelry store are planning to do, so..."

The leader face hooved. His brilliantly simple plan ruined, all because he'd forgotten that his gang could be seen through windows. The other robber's started to panic, realizing that their seemingly fool proof plan was falling to pieces before their very eyes.

"Crap man, we're gonna get busted!"

"I can't go to prison, dude! I'm too handsome for jail!"

"What do we do? What do we do?!"

"We're not going to prison, now stop panicking! The guards won't touch us while we have hostages!"

Twilight knocked on the door to Fluttershy's cottage once again, frowning. Pinkie and Twilight had been standing outside of the cottage for a good fifteen minutes already, and there still hadn't been an answer. Worried, Twilight glanced over at Pinkie Pie. "I don't suppose you know where she keeps her spare key, do you?"

"Of course I do, silly. I know where every pony puts their spare key, just in case of a spare key emergency." The pink pony replied as she trotted over to the bridge in front of Fluttershy's house and reached under it with a hoof, grabbing the spare key.

"Really? Then where do I keep mine?" Twilight asked, as Pinkie trotted back.

"Which one? The one taped to the bottom of your balcony, the one Fluttershy hid in the bee hive, or the three Spike's misplaced since you guys first moved here? Because if it's the last one the answer is Rarity's fainting couch, your freezer, and his stomach when he accidentally put it in his sandwich."

Twilight blinked in surprise, then reminded herself that she was in fact talking to Pinkie, and that this particular outcome should have been expected. Pinkie simply smiled at Twilight's foolishness and unlocked the door to Fluttershy's cottage.

The door opened, and the two of them stepped inside. The hairs on the back of Twilights neck stood up as they crossed over the threshold. Her eyes scanned across the room, taking everything in. The interior of the cottage appeared to be the same as it always had been, with nothing missing or out of place, and yet she couldn't help but get the feeling something was missing.

The Couch is where it's supposed to be and so are the cabinets, the rug, the stove, the lamps, the tables, the bags of animal feed, and Angel's bed. So why does it all seem so...out of place?

"Hey, Twilight, I think I can hear voices upstairs."

Pinkie's voice snapped Twilight out of her thoughts. The lavender unicorn quickly trotted up the stairs, listening closely. She could hear two voices coming from Fluttershy's bedroom, but couldn't seem to make out what they were saying. Concerned for the safety of her friend, Twilight turned around and bucked the door open. To Pinkie's massive shock, the wooden obstruction went flying off it's hinges.

When did Twilight find the time to get that strong...and why?

With the door now out of the way, it was plain for them both to see the bedroom was empty, the voices coming from a radio sitting on the nightstand next to the bed. Twilight felt embarrassed and frustrated. The same day Pinkie Pie finally returned, it seemed Fluttershy had mysteriously vanished into thin air.

"...We have a report coming in that the local law enforcement of ponyville are currently in a standoff with a group of armed robbers with hostages. Local celebrity and DJ Vinyl Scratch is reporting to us live from the scene."

Twilight groaned. On top of the mystery of Fluttershy's disappearance, she now needed to come up with an excuse to step out and go stop an armed robbery. Twilight turned around to tell Pinkie whatever lie she was going to make up, only to find her friend had mysteriously vanished on her.

Vinyl Scratch peered over the public bench she was hiding behind, peeking over at the situation that was unfolding. "Not going to lie, it doesn't look good guys." She said to her microphone. "Some of the crooks in the store look like amateurs, but apparently their leader is a dude named Grand Larceny, and it's never a good sign when someone is named after a felony. So far the royal guards have only managed to secure a perimeter around the store to ensure they can't escape, but since all of their hostage negotiators are off duty and attending a funeral right now, they've had to call the ESD to borrow one of theirs. Given those guy's track record, the safe money is on someone getting shot today."

Not too far away from the DJ reporter, the guards had surrounded the jewelry store, using the SWAT teams carriages that had been strategically parked as cover. Several guards were in the air, keeping an eye on things from above and ensuring the suspects didn't escape via the roof.

Inside the store, the robbers in question were keeping low behind the jewelry counters. one of the earth ponies in the group had armed himself with the security guards hoof pistol, a small black bracelet like contraption that could shoot burst of magical energy that were stored in the power crystal inside. He turned to the leader of the group. "You do realize this thing only has six shots and no spare crystals, right? And there are like thirty guards out there...if they come in, we're screwed."

Grand Larceny, who was a rather mean looking unicorn stallion, turned to glare at him. "Shut up, you moron. They're not going to try anything as long as we have the hostages, so quit worrying. If the guards come in, we'll shoot them; if they try to hit us from out there, they'll get caught in the crossfire."

The hostages in question were tied up together and stuck on top of the counter, in plain sight of the guards, but also a position that would allow the crooks to shoot them without having to get out from their cover.

"But boss, what if one of them superheroes shows up?"

Larceny rolled his eyes. "Then we do the same thing we do if the guards try to get in. Honestly how hard is it to understand that as long as we have the hostages, they can't-"

The glass window at the front of the store shattered as something glowing and green came rocketing through it. Before the criminals could react, the hostages where surrounded by a green force field and pulled out of the building, just as a green and black clad pony landed in front of the store.

"Alright, bad guys, I've got to make this quick because I have a missing friend to go find and a party to attend."

Author's Note

I would like to thank VampDash for Pre-Reading/Editing/Helping out with the funeral scene. He's a great pal.

Also, thanks to L_Wolf for coming up with the Name for the new Govt. Agency (the ESD) that was very briefly mentioned in this chapter, but will almost certainly be addressed further in the next chapter.