And Suddenly, I'm Fluttershy

Christmas (Not So) Special

Bartholomew

I hate mornings. Especially Christmas mornings in an alternate universe after being chased to someone else's house to find rabbits copulating on the bed. Do you know what's worse? Lyra in the bed with you when you wake up.

"Aw hell naw!" I yelled, attempting to get out of the bed as quickly as possible. If you've been here for awhile, you know how well this worked last time.

So yeah, pile on the floor, tangled in the bedspread, only this time there was a horribly groggy and hungover Lyra.

It's times like these when I ask the question 'why me?' The universe never replies, but it's nice to know that somewhere, someone probably has it worse.

Probably.

Lyra was too busy hissing at the light and holding her head in her hooves (conveniently obscuring her view) to notice me leave the room.

"Angel, Henry, you got some 'splainin' to do," I said. "Why the hell is Lyra in my bed?"

"The magic of Hearthswarming?" Angel offered.

I kicked him across the room.

"Henry?" I asked.

"She sat outside for an hour, so I let her in," he replied curtly.

"Right then. So, who's up for a quality Christmas Breakfast?" I asked.

"What?" Henry wondered out loud.

"Family tradition. Screw Christmas dinner, there are lives to get back to, you're waking up early and meeting at one house to celebrate as a family in the best way possible:

"Pancakes."

"Good morning, merry sunshine!" I cheered to a beleaguered Lyra.

"Hangover."

"Eat something, it'll make you feel better."

"You really made breakfast?"

"Yes. Now eat quickly I have company coming over. Most likely."

"Who?"

"Pinkie and friends."

"Why, you hardly know them!"

"I hardly know you, and yet you found it fitting to sleep with me. I also distinctly remember you running after me after I... Not really dumped you, because we weren't really together."

That shut her up.

"Besides," I continued, "I didn't invite them."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm genre savvy enough to know when Pinkie is planning a surprise party. Until she manages to wake Rainbow up, feel free to eat what you can."

She sat down, taking four pancakes, pouring syrup over them, before taking a bite.

"What are these?" she asked after swallowing.

"Pancakes. Have you never had them before?" I asked.

"No, but they're similar to haycakes," she replied.

Haycakes. Figures.

"You seem relatively unperturbed, considering last night." I observed.

"Hangover. Free food."

"That feel, bro," I nodded sagely.

She greedily dug in (to the pancakes), before wandering upstairs with a cartoonishly distended belly. I absently wondered if Pinkie's clear insanity was simply fourth wall breaking.

But that would be preposterous, right?

Oh shut up.

At any rate, I did the one thing I've wanted to do since I bought those records; actually listen to them.

As it turns out, they were remarkably similar to ours, same key, same style, but not the same notes, although some passages bore striking resemblance.

Most importantly though, they had that spark of genius present in their human counterparts.

There was one downside, though. Listening to these records made me long for the music I knew, and for home.

I was interrupted from my internal monologue by the telltale sound of hooves knocking on doors.

Took long enough, the pancakes were starting to get cold.

I opened the door.

"Happy Hearth's Warming!" the Elements cheered in near-unison.

"Oh what a surprise," I said enthusiastically.

That was sarcasm by the way. Both the enthusiastically part and the words I said.

"It's not funny if you have to explain the joke!" Pinkie cheered.

"Wait, what?" I said, snapping back to reality.

"Silly billy, you don't have fingers!"

Silence reigned for several moments.

"Don't remind me," I said through my teeth.

"Okie dokie lokie!"

"Right, whose up for pancakes?"

Now it was my turn to be stared at.

"Right, those don't seem to exist here. Tell me, how are your breakfasts faring? It seems to me that they are in a dire state indeed."

They continued staring.

"It's a delicious breakfast food, try it," I said, turning and walking into the cottage.

They followed and sure enough, loved the pancakes.

It's kind of hard not to.

After breakfast, we quickly moved to the living room. The conversations taking place were mostly idle, until I mentioned that I knew the holiday as Christmas.

"What is Christmas?" asked Rarity.

"On my planet, Christmas initially celebrated the birth of Jesus, who is a historical and religious figure that I really don't want to explain right now. The holiday and some of its traditions are grounded in pagan winter celebrations, the Christians simply added in the new religious message to make converting the populace a bit easier."

She (and the others) seemed placated by that response.

"So what's Hearth's Warming, anyways?"

"It's the celebration of the unification of the three pony tribes," Twilight explained. "After decades of war, starvation, and harsh weather brought about by magic, the three tribes learned to get along. It's the first recorded appearance of the Magic of Friendship."

I resisted the urge to scoff. I knew all to well what the Power of Love could do here, having seen it utilized against Sombra first hand (and boy do I regret it). The Magic of Friendship was obviously a similar force.

The small talk continued for a while, until it came upon a rather touchy subject- last night's date.

"So, how did it go, darling?" Rarity asked me.

"I told her I wasn't interested. She flipped a bit last night, but she seems to be doing better.

"Then again, she is horribly hung over."

They simply stared at me.

"If I had a nickel for every time people do that after I make a remark, I'd have at least twelve bucks," I added thoughtfully.

"What's a nickel? And why do you have twelve stallions?" asked Applejack.

" I don't, it's obvious to everyone here that I have not twelve stallions, but twelve coconuts. That reminds me, do other races bang coconuts together to mock your hoofsteps?" I asked.

"Why would they do that?" Twilight asked.

"Never mind that, it's a lovely white Christmas outside, and I'd hate to miss it. Where I'm from, that's a twice, if you're lucky, thrice in a lifetime opportunity."

"Darling, there's something that need to be done first," Rarity said.

"What is that?" I asked.

"Hearth's Warming Gifts. Twilight, if you will do the honors."

Twilight's horn suddenly came to life, lavender arcs of energy swirling around it, culminating in a bright flash.

Various boxes and bags appeared in a pile near the center of the lounge.

"I'd hate to say it, but. I didn't get anyone anything," I said.

"Well, I would think not, although Fluttershy's gifts for us are there," Rarity said.

"Really now? That's interesting."

"I suppose I'll go first. For Pinkie, some new ice skates, you told me how you had lost one last year and had to get rentals, so I decided to work with Iron Ore to make some new ones," Rarity said, giving the box to Pinkie.

She gave the box for Fluttershy to me, saying, "Open it."

It was a scarf.

At any other time I would quip, but I was just too busy being astounded at the universe.

Twilight gave everyone a book, ranging from art history (Rarity) to an Almanac (AJ). I was given a book on gardening.

If only Fluttershy was an earth pony.

Pinkie Pie gave everyone their favorite baked good. Fluttershy got oatmeal raisin cookies, which happen to be best cookies.

No, I'm serious! You haven't lived until you've had oatmeal raisin cookies.

Applejack actually gave us stuff other than apples (except for Pinkie, who got the apple pie recipe). It was mostly hand-carved (if one can call it that) furniture, supposedly helped by Applebloom. Fluttershy got the magical gift of apple animal feed.

Rainbow Dash got everyone tickets to The Wonderbolts in two weeks.

Now, it was time to see what Fluttershy got everyone.

Rarity got a handbook on knitting. Rainbow Dash got a handmade Soarin' plushie.

Don't ask me where the g went. I still don't know.

She gave Twilight a book on animals, Applejack some beaver repellent, and lastly, she got Pinkie a set of mixing bowls.

"That was pleasant," I said, wrapping the scarf around my neck. "I'm going to frolic in the snow." I opened the door, letting in a wave of chilly air.

Pinkie was out before I could say "brr, that's cold".

Not that it was cold, I had a scarf.

It took all of five minutes before Rainbow started throwing snowballs at unsuspecting passers-by. Seeing this, I began to pack up snow into a wall. Soon it was tall enough to cover me while I crouched. Rarity quickly joined me behind the wall as Pinkie and AJ fought against Twilight and Rainbow.

"So, how's Christmas, er, Hearth's Warming been for you?" I asked her.

"Good enough. I do want to ask what you are going to do with Lyra, though."

"She'll get over it soon enough. Shame it's Christmas and all, but not much could be done about that. I hate leading people on. I usually only go on dates with random girls because people have the bright idea of me being a wingman on a double date.

"Besides, I'm not in the mood for all this gossip crap. I hope I'm not offending you by saying that you seem like the type to like it." A snowball slammed into my wall. "So I'll amend my first question, how's your family doing?"

"Sweetie is positively ecstatic about the presents she got from "Gwen."

"I want to know why an uncommon but rather normal human name has been encapsulated by quotation marks."

"Is it a normal name? Really? It's short for 'The Good Windigo'."

"Is this some sort of Santa Claus equivalent?"

"Who?"

"Mythical figure who brings good children presents on Chirstmas Eve. If you are bad he either gives you coal or ships you to Spain. Nobody can agree on which he does, but I choose Spain. It's much funnier."

"Well, minus the Spain part, whatever that is."

"Judging by the quotation marks he isn't real in this world either, correct?"

"Yes," she replied. At this point Twilight had begun levitating entire volleys of snowballs at once, whereas AJ and Pinkie had opted to take a more defensive strategy by building a roof to their fort. At this point I'm beginning to wonder if Equestria has any sort of natural laws.

"That's a shame, really. Even in this world of magic and nonsense, there's still no Santa Claus. My childhood dreams are ruined," I said, speaking the last sentence completely deadpan.

I was about to continue when I noticed a giant pack of snowballs above our position.

"Not my mane!"

"Oh crap."

And then there was white.

I popped my beleaguered head out of the pile of snow just in time to see Rarity go completely ham.

"It. Is! On!" she said.

They never saw it coming. Hundreds of snowballs rained down upon her foes in a glorious hail of cold. I opted to remake out fort, utilizing the Pinkie Pie strategy of completely disregarding physics in the process.

The battle raged for many an hour, as more and more people joined in. At twelve, a meeting was held between the now five armies, who unanimously agreed that lunch was in order.

An army of over fifty ponies marched on Sugarcube Corner. The slaughter was horrendous, many cakes losing their lives that day. The Cakes too, nearly lost their lives from the stress of feeding fifty hungry ponies simultaneously.

By the end of the meal, everyone was too stuffed to fight anymore, and we retired to our respective homes.

As I was walking back,  I noticed something, a pony fleeing around a corner.

The brief glimpse I had was of a yellow pony with a pink mane, and three butterflies as her cutie mark.

That stopped me dead in my tracks for about five seconds. And then, I gave chase.

"Hey, you there! Come back!" I shouted, rounding the corner. My doppelgänger rounded another corner, now running to avoid me.

I heard a strange noise, a grating, blaring sound echoing through the alleys.

My side was in stitches at this point, but I rounded the corner in time to see a blue object fading fast.

I slowed to a slow trot, gasping in both pain and oxygen starvation. Shaking my head, I turned back eager to get to my house and enjoy my Christmas.

Lyra was still at my house when I arrived, much to my great dismay. She sat at the table, facing away from me as I entered the kitchen and dining room combination.

She sat there, human style, a mug of coffee in her magic, taking sips sporadically,

"You know, I've got some apologizing to do," she said, taking another sip.

I trotted to a chair next to her and sat down.

"You clearly didn't want to go on that date, and I feel as if I forced you to," she continued.

"Nonsense. I went by my own will. I honestly shouldn't have accepted the offer, though. I expected that it would be a one time thing, but I saw some things that made it seem otherwise. Subtlety was never my strong suit, you see, so I figured I'd break it to you the only way I knew how,"

"I'm still sorry about-"

"No, I'm sorry that it didn't work out. I really shouldn't have lead you on like that, even if it was just one date."

The animals had the good sense to leave us there, sitting in silence. Eventually, Lyra got up.

I heard the door close behind her.

Thankfully, the rest of the evening came and went peacefully. I read, listened to some fuzzy music on the record player, and went to bed.

The strangest thing lay there, a neatly wrapped present.

I looked at the tag. It read:

Dear Bartholomew,

I hope you like this present, even if it was a bit late.

My sleigh had a few problems navigating last night, so I got to Ponyville a little late this year. Better late than never, as they say.

-The Good Windigo

I tore off the wrapping paper in a reasonable amount of time. It had been a long time since I had opened a present like this, so I was a little rusty.

Inside there lay something I'd never though I'd see here.

Inside was none other than a the three Lord of the Rings books, The Hobbit and The Silmarillion.

I took the books out. I noticed another note on the bottom of the box.

Thought you might like these. I had a bit of trouble getting them, but Santa Claus thought getting these to you was important.

He says Merry Christmas!