Chapters Home is Where Your Heart Is
"Incoming!" came a loud yell quickly followed by a loud crack as hoof met bark. Dozens of apples rained down as a young pony scrambled to catch them with the basket balanced on her back with only three apples actually hitting the ground.
"I almost got all of them that time!" the young pony squeaked with delight and gave a little hop. The other pony just smiled and picked up the three fallen apples and tossed them onto the basket.
"Thanks again for helping me with this Applebloom," the older pony said as she lifted the basket of apples off of her sister's back. "There's a big storm scheduled for tonight and I don't want any of the apples to get ruined."
"No problem Applejack," Applebloom sighed in relief after having such a heavy burdon taken off her back. "That's what sisters are for."
Smiling Applejack placed the basket on her back and started walking back towards the house. "No really Applebloom I appreciate all of your help..." And with that said she launched into a speech about how much she truly appreciated Applebloom's help with everything.
Applebloom stopped walking and looked at the basket on Applejack's back in a confused manner. "Uh Applejack..." Applebloom said uncertainly. "I think there's something wrong with the apples."
"Oh hush Applebloom. There's nothing wrong with the..." Applejack stood dumbfounded as she watched a dozen of the apples float out of her basket and silently float away. Without another word Applejack placed the basket on the ground and dashed after the rogue apples.
Applebloom simply shrugged and began dragging the rest of the apples back towards the house.
In only a few seconds Applejack had caught up with the awol apples and quickly tried to snatch them out of the air only to have them float higher into the air just out of her reach.
"What in tarnation is going on?" Applejack demanded as she jumped and caught one of the apples between her front hooves. Instead of the apple being pulled towards the ground, Applejack instead found herself being pulled higher into the air.
That's when she noticed the small black sparkles floating around the apple. "That's magic! Someone is stealing my apples with magic!" Applejack looked down for the first time and immediately wished she hadn't. She was now floating so high the apple trees looked like green toothpicks stuck into the dirt.
Applejack suddenly felt herself jerk to a halt. Looking straight ahead she found herself looking straight into the eyes of a rather surprised looking pony. The surprised expression on the pony's face quickly turned to one of annoyance.
Applejack quickly made her face as emotionless as possible in an attempt to hide her obvious fear despite hanging onto an apple for dear life while floating so high off the ground...'wait!' She quickly thought. 'How is this pony so high up?'
Applejack looked closely at the pony and quickly noticed that the pony had a horn in the center of his forehead which was currently glowing a soft black color. 'Well that would explain the magic but what about the floating?' She thought until she noticed the small feathered wings that were gently folded against his sides and the small black cloud under the pony's hooves. She noticed for the first time that it was indeed a male pony. His eyes were a blue so bright they almost matched the sky behind him and in contrast his light gray coat looked almost like a sad rain cloud. Slung over his back was a small satchel that she noticed was filled with apples. Her apples!
"Didn't you know that stealing is wrong?" She said in a low voice that was was in no way friendly.
This simply made the pony laugh. "Is it really wise to pick a fight with the only pony keeping you alive?" He said pointing to the apple.
Applejack felt her blood run cold and her face must have shown it as his laugh quickly died out and he sighed. "Don't worry. I'm not gonna let you get hurt." He said as his horn glowed a little brighter and a small white cloud appeared beneath Applejack and she was quickly enveloped in a black glow.
The next thing she knew she was sitting on the cloud which was slowly floating towards the ground. Looking up she saw the small black cloud shrinking as she got farther away from it.
Moments later she found herself sitting on the ground as the cloud she had been on mysteriously vanished. Looking up again she noticed that she could no longer see the small black cloud. Standing up she noticed that a dozen apples stood before her in a small pile. After a quick count she saw that these were all of the apples that he had taken. Shrugging Applejack gathered up all of the apples and carried them back to the house still watching the sky for any sign of the mysterious cloud.
Sighing deeply, the pony watched the clouds drift past him as his stomach growled sadly. "I should have at least kept one..." He mumbled to himself before falling asleep.
Home is Where Your Heart Is
Preparations for the scheduled storm were underway in Ponyville as everypony scrambled to prepare their homes for the impending rain. Pegasi of every color flew across the sky preparing the storm as ponies scrambled around on the ground preparing the town for the heavy rains that were soon to come.
A bright blue pony flew around the sky overseeing the preparations for the storm. Ponyville was in desperate need of rain this season as most of the scheduled showers had been cancelled as there had not been enough pegasi to help out. Dozens of the pegasi in town had gotten sick while even more had injuries from attempting to send water to Cloudsdale earlier in the season without having sufficient wingpower.
"Rainbowdash!" came a voice that Rainbowdash knew all too well. Looking over she saw Derpy Hooves clumsily fly towards her. Rolling her eyes, Rainbowdash flew over to the ditzy pony.
"What is it Derpy?" Rainbowdash demanded. "Shouldn't you be helping with the storm?"
The pale pony simply scratched the back of her head with her hoof and said, "I was but..some of the clouds got away." With that she pointed at a few small clouds that were floating away from them.
Looking at the clouds Rainbowdash noticed a cloud that seemed darker and larger than the others that Derpy had lost. Sighing she turned back to Derpy "Okay, you get all of the small ones and I'll get that big, dark one." Without waiting for a response she turned and flew towards the mass of clouds.
"But I didn't lose any big clouds..." Derpy said thinking out loud. "Oh well!" She laughed and flew towards the small clouds in a line that could be called anything but straight.
When Rainbowdash reached the cloud she immediately grabbed it and started dragging it towards the massive storm cloud. After a few seconds she heard a deep rumble and looked up at the clouds. "There shouldn't be any thunder yet..." She muttered to herself. After a few moments the sound came again and she relized it was coming from behind her. Quickly turning around she found the source of the noise to be a light gray pony sleeping on the cloud.
Surprise was the first thing that registered in Rainbowdash's mind which was very quickly followed by anger. The storm was scheduled to start any minute and this pony was sleeping! Rainbowdash, not so gently, shook the cloud causing the pony to quickly jerk into consciousness.
"What the hay...?" He muttered to no one in particular before turning around only to have his gaze returned by a pair of angry red eyes.
"Let's go you lazy pony! We have work to do!" She yelled at the pony. "You don't get to sleep while the rest of us work!"
"What are you talking about?" The pony yawned completely indifferent to the pony yelling at him.
"What am I talking about? The storm! Remember?" Rainbowdash stopped talking for a moment and looked at him carefully. "I don't recognize you...who are you exactly?"
"You're going to wake me up, yell at me then ask me who i am? Crazy country ponies..." He muttered. "Now.." He yawned looking at her again. "What do you want?"
"Nothing..I thought you were one of the pegasi who were supposed to be helping with the storm." She sighed looking back at the storm. "We're already behind schedule and it's just really stressful."
"Need some help?" He asked and silently prayed that she would say no.
"Yes!" She immediately answered. "We need all of the help we can get."
'Why did I have to offer...' He thought silently cursing himself. "Ok. In that case get all of your friends away from the clouds."
"Why?" She asked simply.
"Just do it." He answered with an edge of annoyance creeping into his voice.
After a moment she simply shrugged and set about collecting up all of the pegasi that were working on the storm. While she did that the pony opened up his satchel and pulled out a thick, leather-bound book with a sun and a moon printed on the cover. Using magic he quickly flipped through the pages stopping on a page with a spell for creating mass amounts of clouds. He quickly read over the spell and then slipped the book back into his bag when the strange rainbow-maned pegasi returned.
"There, that's everyone." She said simply.
"Good. Then let's get started." The pony closed his eyes as his forehead began to glow a soft black color.
Rainbowdash was confused for a moment until she noticed the horn sticking out of his head. She hadn't noticed it before as it was half hidden underneath his dark gray mane with the horn being only a few shades lighter.
The soft glow quickly turned to a deep black color that seemed to sap color from everything around it. Quickly the light vanished completely and the gray pony opened his eyes. "Done." He said simply and yawned.
Rainbowdash was confused. "But you didn't do any-" She was cut off by the heavy roar of thunder. Turning around she saw the clouds swelling and covering the sky in complete darkness. She stood dumbfounded as the rest of the pegasi cheered.
Turning back to the pony, Rainbowdash found him asleep again. She laughed for a moment before turning around and shouted to the other pegasi, "Good job everypony! Go home and stay out of the air for the rest of the day."
Still cheering the pegasi all dashed off towards their homes except for Derpy Hooves. "What happened?" She asked in a manner that told Rainbowdash that she had zoned out.
"Nothing Derpy. Just go home." Rainbowdash answered. With that Derpy turned and flew towards her home. Normally Rainbowdash would help Derpy get home as she would get lost on her way home even though Rainbowdash could see Derpy's house from here and, sure enough, Derpy was flying in the exact opposite direction. Sighing she turned back towards the sleeping pony on the cloud.
"Hey wake up!" She said shaking the cloud gently (or at least less violently than she had the first time). "You can't sleep here in a storm!" She yelled into his ear.
He didn't move at all and simply kept on snoring. Rainbowdash was about to yell some more when a bolt of lightning streaked across the sky immediately followed by the crash of thunder. "On second thought..." Rainbowdash muttered and began pushing the pony's cloud away. "Let's get out of here."
After a few moments of pushing the cloud the sky opened up and rain started coming down in sheets. Rainbowdash was instantly soaked and shortly after the rain started, the winds started to pick up.
Rainbowdash was the best flyer in Ponyville but trying to fly straight and push a cloud while being buffeted by rain and wind was a near impossible task but Rainbowdash refused to be beat by a little rain and some puffs of wind!
That is until a particularly powerful gust of wind flipped the cloud over and sent the pony hurtling towards the ground. Quickly looking down Rainbowdash only saw him for a moment before he vanished into the colorless rain, his light gray coat matching the color of the rain almost perfectly, much to her dismay. Quickly dropping into a nose dive she tried to spot him through the pouring rain but to no avail. She knew she wouldn't be able find him in this weather. Sighing she landed on the ground and quickly ran in the direction of her house, silently swearing that she would find him when the rain passed.
A young pony sat up quickly in her bed as a bolt of lightning streaked by her window. She screamed as her house shook with the quaking of the thunder. Shivering under her covers Fluttershy waited for more thunder to come but instead the only noise she heard was the sound of rain pounding on her tree home.
After a few moments she relaxed and she could feel her heartbeat slowing down. Closing her eyes slowly, Fluttershy felt her mind drifting back to sleep. Her eyes were only closed for a moment before a crash came from downstairs. All of her hair stood on end for a moment while she listened for more but no other sound came.
Swallowing her fear Fluttershy climbed out of bed and grabbed the candle holder off her table. Quickly she lit the candle in the holder and pick up the handle with her teeth. She walked out of her room and hesitantly descended the stairs.
Looking into the living room Fluttershy didn't see anything at first that seemed out of the ordinary. Taking a few steps forward she still didn't see anything until she stepped onto something wet. Looking down she saw that it was simply water and looking up Fluttershy saw a rather large hole in her ceiling and could see that something had crashed not only into her living room but had crashed straight through the second floor as well.
Looking around again Fluttershy saw a dark lump in the middle of her floor. Swallowing past the lump in her throat she started walking towards the lump and stopped short when the small light from her candle illuminated a dark liquid on the floor. Looking closer at it she quickly noticed that it was a deep crimson color. The sharp smell of iron hit her nose and Fluttershy went cold as she relized she was standing outside of a puddle of blood.
A low groan pulled her back to reality as the lump shifted slightly. Quickly Fluttershy rushed forward and illuminated the lump with her candle. Fluttershy found herself standing over a light gray pony. Even with the little amount of light that Fluttershy had she could see dozens of scratches scattered across the crumbled form of the pony and saw a mixture of blood and water slide off him. A single gray pegasus wing sat folded against his side while the other one she saw was bent at a horrible angle.
Looking out her window Fluttershy knew that she wouldn't be able to get him to a hospital so instead she grabbed one of his legs and began to carefully drag him into her kitchen where her first aid kit was located along with more candles. Hoisting him onto the table, she was surprised at how little he weighed.
She grabbed her first aid kit, lit the rest of the candles and looked down at the injuried pony for only a moment before she started about patching up the pony. As the storm raged outside Fluttershy only hoped that she could do enough to keep this pony from bleeding out.
Home is Where Your Heart Is
The first thing my mind became aware of as my brain began to stir was a dull ache that was spread throughout most of my body. The second thing my sluggish mind processed was that I could feel something soft wrapped around my body. The last thing my mind, or rather my body, noticed was the hollow feeling in my stomach.
I kept my eyes closed for only a few more moments before slowly opening my eyes. At first all I could see were blurs of bright color that made my eyes sting and my head ache. I closed my eyes until the pain in my head had subsided.
Trying again I very slowly opened my eyes and was relieved when solid objects came into view instead of colorful blobs. Looking around, I saw that I was in a small plain bedroom. Looking up I noticed a large hole in the ceiling which gave me an excellent view of the cloudless sky.
Looking away from the sky I tried to take a look at myself but saw that my entire body was covered in a large red blanket. Knowing that I probably shouldn't move, I tried to use my magic to lift away the blanket. This quickly proved to be a mistake as a lightning bolt of pain shot through my entire body causing me to cry out.
Almost immediately I heard a loud commotion come from outside the door but found myself quickly drifting away as the pain pushed all thoughts of staying awake away.
My eyes closed just as I heard the door to the room open.
The next time I woke up was much less uneventful. I opened my eyes and once again found everything to be a mass of colorful blobs as lines blurred into each other. Dozens of colors slid across my field of vision but the most noticible was a large spot of soft yellow and an equally large spot of pink. After a moment my head started throbbing again and I closed my eyes quickly drifting back into sleep.
I woke one more time in a daze as something sweet hit my tongue. Something very gooey and so sugary it borderlined on excess was pooled on the tip of my tongue. A small groan of pleasure escaped me as the strange liquid slid onto my tongue and down my throat. Noises began to quietly hit my ears but my brain was slow to process them.
Somewhere in the corner of my mind I knew that someone was talking but I couldn't bring myself to focus on the words. After a moment, more of the sugary liquid hit my tongue and I very quickly felt myself drifting out of consciousness again with the taste of sugar on my tongue.
I skipped through a bright green field underneath a crystal clear blue sky. Feeling uncharacteristically joyful I skipped straight through the field only stopping when I came to a strange yellow river.
Looking at it for a moment I noticed that it was much thicker than water should have been. Cautiously I stuck a hoof into it and found the liquid sticking to my hoof and I licked a small amount of the yellow goo off it. It tasted much sweeter than any honey that I had ever had.
Quickly I licked the rest off my hoof and stuck my entire face into the river quickly devouring as much of it as I could. I didn't move until I forced to breathe and pulled my head out of the yellow river. My stomach growled as I sat back and I looked at my stomach in confusion. How was my stomach still growling when I had just ate so much-
My eyes snapped open as my stomach started growling angrily. Unlike the previous times that I had come to, there was almost no pain and, while my body didn't feel quite right, I felt I had to strength to at least move around a bit.
Hesitantly I threw off the blanket and looked down at myself. I immediately regretted this decision when I saw all of the scrapes and bruises that covered my body. Certain areas of my body had been carefully bandaged and although the unbandaged parts of my body looked ghastly I noticed signs of healing as many of the bruises were faded and most of the small scrapes were simply scabs that hadn't fallen off. Overall, it looked much worse than it was as my light gray coat simply made every injury stand out.
Very slowly I climbed out of the bed and, despite a small wave of nausea hitting me, I found myself standing with very little trouble. I felt incredibly stiff and slowly I started to stretch out my legs. The soreness vanished after a few moments and I unfurled my wings to give them some freedom.
Or at least I tried to. My wings unfolded about half way before pain shot through my left wing. I bit my lip to keep from crying out and quickly refolded my wings. With tears swimming in my eyes, I looked back at my wings and saw my left one was very tightly bandaged. I silently cursed at my poor luck and wiped the tears out of my eyes.
Sighing I scanned the walls of the bedroom until I found what I was looking for. The door. I calmly walked over to the door and was about to reach for the door knob when a thought dawned on me. I had no idea where I was or who could be waiting behind that door.
Come to think of it, how did I even get here? What happened to me after I helped that pegasus? I know I fell asleep after making that storm but what happened then? Did that rainbow maned pegasus do this? Looking up I had no doubt that I had something to do with that hole in the ceiling, but did I fall through it or did I maybe smash that hole with my magic?
All of these questions buzzed around in my skull so quickly that I didn't even notice the door starting to open. Before I knew what was happening the door was wide open and I was looking directly into a pair of very startled looking cyan eyes.
For a moment nothing happened as we stood there unsure of what to do. After a few more awkward seconds I felt that I would explode if the silence wasn't broken. I opened my mouth to say something but found my voice trapped somewhere in my chest as I found myself frozen in place by the sight of those beautiful eyes.
"H-hello..." I heard the owner of those eyes say in a quiet voice. I quickly snapped out of my trance but still found my voice trapped. "I...I thought you were still asleep..." She said timidly with each word becoming softer and harder to hear. Still I said nothing and she kept talking each word getting quieter. "Y-you woke up a few times but..." At this point I couldn't even hope to hear her words so I simply let her continue speaking while I looked at her purposely avoiding her eyes to avoid becoming ensnared in them again.
She was a very light yellow color that could best be compared to the soft down of a baby chick and her mane was such a beautiful soft pink that I couldn't remember seeing such a color anywhere else. I noticed that with each whispered word that left her mouth she retreated farther behind the veil of pink hair that now obscurred her face.
Without even relizing what I was doing I reached a hoof out and gently brushed the hair out of her face. She abruptly stopped with her whispered words and quickly recoiled from me as if my touch would burn her. Silently I cursed myself and opened my mouth to apologize but the only thing that escaped my lips was a hoarse noise.
I hadn't noticed how dry my throat was and I quickly regretted opening my mouth. That is until I noticed her silently push something towards me. Looking down I saw a small bottle with an apple on it and a straw sticking out of it.
"I-I thought you might be thirsty..." She said in a very quiet, squeaky voice. I almost laughed at the way she said it but instead simply smiled not wanting to hurt her feelings.
I reached a hoof out and grabbed the bottle, being very careful not to touch her hoof, and pulled it towards me. I carefully lifted the bottle and took a hesitant sip. Very quickly that hesitant sip turned into a greedy slurp as I sucked all of the juice out of the bottle. I let out a heavy sigh that was half relief as my stomach began to calm down and half sorrow as I knew that there was nothing left in the bottle.
I looked at the bottle sadly for a moment until I heard a quiet giggle come from the pony in front of me. Looking up at her, she quickly turned the giggle into a cough. This simply made me smile.
"So..." I said hesitantly testing out my voice. "What is your name?" My voice still sounded very hoarse but it still sounded much better than it had a few moments ago.
After a few moments she answered quietly, "Fluttershy..." Only for some reason I heard Shutterfly.
"Ok then Shutterfly," I began. "Can you tell-"
She quickly cut me off with a quiet laugh. "No. My name is Fluttershy not Shutterfly." She giggled again but quickly stopped. "S-sorry..." She said once again acting shy but at least she wasn't hiding behind her mane anymore.
With a smile I started over. "So Fluttershy, can you tell me how I got here and why I'm like this." I said gesturing at myself.
"Well..." She began slowly. "About a week ago, during the scheduled storm, you kinda crashed through my roof." She pointed behind me at the hole in the ceiling then pointed at a similar hole in the floor.
"I fell through two floors..." My jaw literally hit the floor. Well that would explain the injuries, I thought.
She continued with her story slowly. "I found you on the floor and had to patch you up myself since it was too dangerous to take you to the hospital." With that she looked at the floor for a moment before looking back up at me. "I hope I did alright..."
I simply smiled at her shyness. A very well suiting name Fluttershy was for a pony like her. "Well obviously I'm still alive." I meant it to sound sweet but instead it sounded rude to my ears.
Despite what she thought of my response, she simply smiled. "Well the doctor definately did more than I did. After the rain stopped I ran to the hospital and practically dragged a doctor out here." She was obviously selling herself short but I decided it was best to not say so.
We stood there for a moment in a comfortable silence before she suddenly blurted out. "What is your name!?" She asked very quickly, almost stumbling over her words.
This question caught me off guard. It was not an unusual question to ask but the way she said it made me feel awkward for a moment. Acting casual I said in a cool voice, "My name is-"
I was quickly cut off by a loud knocking coming from somewhere behind Fluttershy. "Someone must be at the door..." She mumbled to no one in particular before looking back at me expectantly.
I tried again. "My name-" I was once again cut off by the knocking. I sighed in frustration as Fluttershy turned away and started walking towards the stairs.
"Sorry, but I just can't make them wait." She frowned slightly before descending the stairs. After a moment I followed her and heard a familiar voice come from down the stairs.
"Hey Fluttershy. Have you seen this pony anywhere?" I heard from down the stairs. In my mind I quickly brought up the image of the owner of the voice. A bright blue pegasus with a rainbow mane. She probably knows what happened to me, I thought before silently descending the stairs.
Home is Where Your Heart Is
Chapter 5: FOOD...and Dresses
Wanderlust walked down the path leading away from Fluttershy's cottage. He kept a normal pace only picking up speed when he knew she couldn't see him anymore. He trotted over to a shady spot under a tree a little ways away from the road and placed the saddlebag that he had gotten from Fluttershy on the ground.
There was only one thought on this particular pony's mind: FOOD! He threw open the saddlebag and almost cried tears of joy as he looked at all of the food that was in there. He couldn't believe he tried to not take any.
The half starved pony reached into the bag and grabbed one of the bowls of salad and a hoof-full of sandwiches. His stomach gave an enthusiastic growl as he tore into the food. It was delicious. After he had finished his salad and three sandwiches he reached back into the bag and grabbed an apple which he quickly reduced down to a core.
He ate in this manner until he felt that he would burst and only slowed down when he noticed that he had almost completely emptied the bag. All that remained in the bag was the jar of painkiller, two apples and a hay sandwich. Wanderlust was both shocked and impressed by his own appetite.
"Maybe my cutie mark should be a bunch of food." He chuckled to himself and in a moment of temporary insanity checked his cutie mark and was relieved to see that it remained as a compass. Wanderlust knew that his mark could never change but for some reason he worried that for whatever reason it might.
Wanderlust was so busy staring at his cutie mark that he didn't notice the white pony trotting over to him. The white pony stopped a few feet away from Wanderlust and carefully looked over the gray stallion who was oblivious to her presence. She took close note of his light gray coat, his dark gray mane and his bright blue eyes but wasn't quite so absorbed by his colors to not notice the obvious injuries and bandages covering parts of the pony.
After making doubly sure that his cutie mark wasn't going anywhere, Wanderlust turned away and found himself being examined by a white pony. Wanderlust was at first self-conscious of his injuries and his gaunt form but after a few more moments his uneasiness turned to a feeling of annoyance as the pony just stared at him.
"Umm..Hello?" Wanderlust spoke breaking the very awkward silence.
The pony snapped back into reality at the sound of his voice and replied with a simple, "Hello." It quickly lapsed back into silence as the pony once again stared at Wanderlust.
Desperate to avoid another creepy silence Wanderlust blurted out, "Why are you staring at me?!" The other pony blinked a few times and laughed lightly as she pushed her hair out of her face.
"I'm sorry but your colors are just lovely...It gives me an idea for a dress! Can you come model for me?" She asked with a look of hope spreading across her features.
Wanderlust looked at her as if she had not just one head, but a dozen! His first thought was, 'She is crazy.' He looked at her closely and although she looked sane, she was obviously crazy. Crazy with her perfectly styled indigo mane, her dull blue eyes and her diamond shaped cutie mark.
"You are aware that I have no clue who you are, you have no clue who I am and I can't model a dress for you!" Wanderlust replied incredulously.
"Well..." The white mare begin, "My name is Rarity, you could tell me who you are and of course you can model a dress for me!"
"I'm a stallion not a mare! Why would you want me to model a dress for you anyways?" He asked with a hint of apprehension as, for some reason, he doubted doubted that she would take no for an answer. "Oh and my name's Wanderlust" He added almost as an afterthought.
"Your colors are so perfect for this design I have!" Rarity exclaimed. "Please model for me!" Wanderlust was sure that soon she was going to start begging. He opened his mouth to say no but was cut off before he could utter a single word. "I can pay you!"
Wanderlust's response died in his throat at the mention of money. Almost distantly Wanderlust remembered the hollow feeling that would soon return to his gut and he remembered the holes in Fluttershy's house that he had made. As much as he didn't want to admit it, he needed money. He bowed his head down in defeat. "Fine."
The sound that followed was one of pure delight as the white mare hugged him so tightly he could hear his bones crunching. After her bear hug she grabbed his hoof and started dragging him towards her boutique. Wanderlust barely had time to grab the bag his friend (at least he hoped they were friends...) had given him before he began to be pulled away and before he had a chance to regret saying yes.
Fluttershy walked around her house filling her animal friends' bowls with food and water. As soon as that was done she rushed outside and tended to her chickens. After her chickens were content she flew around and talked with her bird friends. She took care of all of her animal friends with much more care than she normally did and spent as much time as she could moving around. Anything to keep herself busy and her mind occupied.
Only after she had finished every possible chore twice, did she finally sit down and take a rest. Her body ached from all of the running around and from the multitude of chores, some of which were important but most of which were not, especially when done two or three times.
Despite her now sore body, the yellow mare's mind remained remarkably lucid, much to her despair. A single image surfaced in her mind now that she was inactive.
In her mind she saw a young stallion lying under a red blanket covered in small pink butterflies. Light shined in through a hole in the ceiling and landed directly on his face. A small line of drool leaked from his mouth and, strangely enough, sparkled in the light. A dark gray mane fell across his forehead nearly hiding his small gray horn and obscuring the large lump located to the right of the horn. Peacefulness and vulnerability radiated from the sleeping pony.
Fluttershy felt her face burn at the 'sight' of her former patient and she cursed herself for thinking of this again. She tried to push the image from her mind but no matter how far away she pushed it, it always fought it's way back to the forefront of her mind. Eventually she stopped fighting and simply let the memory be. She sighed as her filled with the memories of her tending to the comatose pony. She wished that he was still there...
The pony jumped to her feet and shook her head violently. 'What are you thinking Fluttershy!' She asked herself. 'Get a grip! You have no clue who is that pony even is! You took care of him for a week but you have only known for maybe twenty minutes!' Fluttershy felt like screaming but she knew that it wouldn't make her feel any better. Fluttershy just frowned and put her head down thinking 'He probably wouldn't want to see me anyways...'
Fluttershy felt a prickling sensation from behind eyes and she knew was about to start crying. Fluttershy cursed herself for being so weak and blinked a few times until the prickling stopped. 'I have to get out of this house,' she thought as she walked towards her door. "Maybe visiting Rarity might cheer me up a bit..." She murmered as she left her house and started down her path.
Embarrassment was the main thing that Wanderlust felt as he stood draped in cloth. The white mare was staring intently at the dark gray and dull blue cloth on the stallion and was using her magic to shape the fabric to the way she wanted.
A closed sign sat on the front door and all of the shades in the building had been closed as part of the agreement between Wanderlust and Rarity. Wanderlust had agreed to model for Rarity's dress for one hundred bits and Rarity was unable to tell anypony about what was currently happening in her store.
In a trash can sat the discarded bandages from Wanderlust's more serious injuries. Although the cuts that the bandages revealed looked bad, they quickly vanished under a small layer of make up as did most of his bruises. After most of his injuries had been covered Wanderlust had had a wig placed on his head that was a shade very much like his own mane but that was significantly longer than his own and covered his horn and the bump that lay not even an inch to the right of his horn. Finally Rarity had applied a light red blush to his cheeks.
Looking in the mirror, Wanderlust was surprised to see a rather shocked looking gray mare staring back at him. He felt like he was going to be sick.
Now that his transformation was complete, Rarity grabbed his hoof and dragged him to the center of the room where she set about molding her new dress from pieces of fabric.
That had been an hour ago and still Rarity worked on the fabric that lay on the impromptu mare. Wanderlust felt like he was going to go insane and asked for almost the thousandth time, "Are you done yet?"
All he got was a grunt in response as still she continued working. That is until a knock came from the door at the front of the building. "Can't people read?" She asked exacerbated.
Wanderlust turned and watched the designer walk away. After a few moments he heard the door open as a small bell chimed. "I'm bus...oh hello Fluttershy." Was the next thing to hit his ears.
'Oh no...' He thought as he quickly looked around for a way out. He looked towards the window. 'FREEDOM!' He heard two seperate sets of hoofsteps coming towards his room and two voices drifting into the room.
"So darling, what can I do for you?"
"Oh, um..I just wanted to see how your business was doing?" It sounded more like a question than an answer.
"Oh. Well things are going good even though business has been rather slow lately. I was actually just designing a new dress if you would like to see it."
"...Yes that would be nice."
'Have to get out!' He thought as he prepared to dash to the window. He took a step towards the window and found that this was the worst possible thing he could do as his hoof landed directly on a pincushion. The sound that came next was something straight out of a horror story.
Both mares stopped dead in their tracks and looked at each other before they both rushed into the room where the scream had come from. The sight that greeted them was both hillarious and horrendous.
Standing the middle of the room was a young gray mare in a dark gray and blue dress who was hopping on three hooves with several pins stuck in the last hoof with blood leaking onto the floor. The way that the mare was hopping made Fluttershy think strangely of a circus clown.
"Ow ow ow ow..." The mare repeated over and over until her eyes settled on the two mares in the doorway and she froze.
Fluttershy smiled and walked over to the mare looking at the pins stuck in her hoof. Fluttershy smiled gently and helped the mare sit as she gently grabbed the injuried hoof with one of her own. "This might sting a bit." She said before biting down on one of the pins and pulling it out.
This elicited a small painful squeak from the injuried mare and more blood flowed from the small cut.
"Rarity can you please get a towel or something." It was more of a command than a request.
Rarity did as she was told and quickly grabbed a towel from her bathroom and gave it to Fluttershy. Fluttershy smiled in thanks and set about removing the rest of the pins. After the last pin had been removed, Fluttershy gently wrapped the bleeding hoof in the towel.
"All better," She said and smiled at the rather nervous looking pony.
"Uh..Thanks," She grumbled in a very deep voice while avoiding meeting Fluttershy's eyes with her own.
'She has some very beautiful eyes' Fluttershy thought as she looked at her bright blue eyes. Her eyes were drawn away from her eyes and she took in her simple dark gray mane. The combination seemed very familiar to Fluttershy. 'Kinda reminds me of Wanderlust,' she thought as the gray mare turned her head slightly and her mane shifted slightly before sliding to the side revealing a horn and shorter hair.
Fluttershy felt her eyes widen in shock as she no longer saw a mare but her former patient dressed as a mare. "Wanderlust?"
"Crap."
Home is Where Your Heart Is
Chapter 6: Meeting the Gang
"Crap." The exposed pony muttered as Fluttershy sat there with her mouth hanging open. Turning away from the shocked pony, Wanderlust glared at Rarity. "Why did you let her in?" He half asked, half growled.
"Fluttershy is my friend," She replied simply. "How could I just send her away?"
"Mmm..I don't know how about, 'Oh dear Fluttershy. I'm very sorry but I'm terribly busy right now. Goodbye.'" He answered in a terrible imitation of Rarity's voice.
The dressmaker narrowed her eyes. "Well excuse me if I'm not terribly rude like you."
Wanderlust just let out a noise of annoyance and looked back at the still silent Fluttershy. Still she said nothing and a look of annoyance appeared on Wanderlust's face. As the seconds stretched on Wanderlust felt his aggravation grow and it must have shown on his face as Fluttershy finally moved.
Her shoulders started to shake slowly and she put a hoof over her mouth as a small giggle bubbled in her chest. After another moment she was visibly shaking from the effort to keep from laughing.
Despite her best efforts a small burst of laughter escaped her which was soon followed by another and another until she finally exploded. She laughed so hard that her sides started to burn and tears leaked from her eyes.
A second set of laughter rang out in the room as Rarity felt small bursts of laughter being pulled from her by her friend's joyous laughter.
The only one not laughing was Wanderlust as he looked between the two laughing mares. As his gaze slid from Rarity back to Fluttershy he caught sight of something that made him snicker and almost laugh himself: a mirror! Or rather the pony staring back at him.
In the mirror he saw a gray pony wearing blush and with a horribly skew wig on top of his head. On his face sat a look of bewilderment and Wanderlust couldn't blame them for laughing...even if it did hurt a little.
After a moment he grabbed the wig off his head and threw it away from him as the laughing ponies started to calm down. Fluttershy muttered apologies between her quieting giggles and Rarity covered her mouth trying to suppress her own giggles. Wanderlust just smiled and rolled his eyes at the two mares.
After the ponies had reigned in their laughter Fluttershy asked shyly, "Wanderlust..why are you here and why are you dressed like a mare?"
Wanderlust opened his mouth to answer but was quickly cut off by another voice as Rarity answered instead. "He's modeling for me."
Fluttershy looked at Wanderlust in confusion for a moment. "But um...Wanderlust is a stallion." She said and felt some color flow into her cheeks.
"Yes I know but his colors made me think of a dress and I just had to make it!" Rarity exclaimed. "So naturally I asked if he model for me and he said yes!"
"R-Really?" Fluttershy asked Wanderlust.
"Yeah, really." He answered. "But Rarity was supposed to keep everypony out of the store while I was..." He shuddered slightly, "modeling..."
"Oh. I-I'm sorry..." Fluttershy put her head down and retreated into her mane a little. "I d-didn't mean t-to intrude..."
Wanderlust smiled at her apologetic nature. "Don't worry Fluttershy. I'm not mad or anything."
"R-Really?"
"Really! Besides it wasn't even your fault." He replied and sent an accusing glare at Rarity to which she smiled awkwardly. Rolling his eyes Wanderlust said, "Well we might as well finish with the dress." This elicited a squeak of joy out of Rarity and Wanderlust felt himself float back to the middle of the room as Rarity's magic grabbed him. "Just finish it quickly."
She nodded happily and stuck the gray wig back on Wanderlust's head and took the blood spotted towel from his hoof. She looked at his injured hoof for a moment and after seeing no more blood surface she tossed the towel in a trash can. Immediately afterwards fabric started gliding around the room as Rarity got back to work.
Fluttershy sat on the floor and simply watched her old friend as she worked her dress making magic and her new friend tried to not make a break for the door. They both succeeded in their tasks as soon Wanderlust stood in the center of the room in a beautifully made gray and blue dress. Fluttershy had to admit, he looked like a very pretty mare.
"Is it done?" Wanderlust asked Rarity as he looked at his reflection in the mirror.
"Yes. It is done." She replied with a smile as she looked over her masterpiece.
"Good. Now can I take it off?" He asked.
"But why would you want to?" Rarity asked with genuine surprise in her voice. "You look lovely in that dress! Don't you agree Fluttershy?"
Fluttershy was caught off guard by the question and her cheeks turned a slight pink. Whatever her response was was so quiet and shaky that nopony could ever hope to hear what it was. Rarity and Wanderlust both smiled at the timid pony's response or rather her lack of one.
Minutes later all three ponies walked out of Rarity's boutique. Rarity with a slight bounce in her step from the joy of a successful day of dress making, Wanderlust with a slight grimace as he imagined what would happen if anypony knew what he had done in the boutique, and Fluttershy was acting shy (believe it or not) and placed herself next to Rarity and away from Wanderlust.
"So Wanderlust," Rarity began. "What are you going to do now?"
Wanderlust pondered this for a moment. "I don't really know...I guess I'll see if there is any work in town that I could do." He replied with the idea of money and his debt to Fluttershy at the front of his mind.
"Why do you need so much money?" Rarity asked confused as she knew that in Wanderlust's borrowed saddle bag there now sat a bag of fifty bits.
"Oh you know food and uh..stuff." He answered but decided to not mention the supplies he would have to buy to fix the holes that he had made in Fluttershy's house, lest Fluttershy try to convince him that he didn't owe her anything.
"Maybe Applejack has some work that needs done..." Fluttershy suggested quietly.
Wanderlust looked around Rarity and focused his gaze on Fluttershy. "Applejack? Is he a friend of yours?" He asked Fluttershy.
"Y-yes!" She squeaked out quickly. "But Applejack isn't a..."
She was cut off as Wanderlust cut back in. "Well if he has work I would really like to talk to this Applejack. Do have any idea where he would be?"
Rarity was the one who answered. "I believe that Applejack is helping Pinkie Pie today with some baking. So they'll be at Sugar Cube Corner."
"Sugar Cube Corner? Is that a candy shop or something?" He asked.
"More or less. It's in the center of town." Rarity replied before Fluttershy could say anything.
"Great! I'll go see him!" Wanderlust answered before galloping off towards the sweet shop.
"B-But Applejack isn't a him!" Fluttershy called after Wanderlust but it was no louder than a squeak and Wanderlust didn't hear.
Rarity smiled mischievously and looked at Fluttershy. "This should be interesting... Let's watch!" The white mare laughed as she trotted after the stallion.
"Oh my..." Fluttershy muttered before chasing after both of them.
Wanderlust walked into the sweet shop and looked around for the stallion named Applejack but saw that the store was empty except for a single orange mare wearing a beaten looking cowboy hat who was currently placing pies on a counter. Looking around, Wanderlust was positive that there were no stallions in the store. No stallions meant there was no Applejack. At least that was what Wanderlust thought.
Wanderlust grunted in annoyance and looked towards the orange mare only to find his gaze returned by a pair of emerald green eyes. The mare and the stallion watched each other for a moment before a spark of recognition registered in both ponies. Wanderlust remembered a determined pony looking ready to attack him to save her apples despite being hundreds of feet in the air and Applejack remembered a shocked looking thief attempting to whisk away her family's apples right under her nose.
Applejack walked up to Wanderlust slowly and looked at him carefully. She registered his slightly gaunt form, his multitude of small scratches and faded scars (since Wanderlust had washed all of Rarity's makeup off) and the bump on his head that seemed to resemble a second horn. She stopped a foot in front of the stallion and glared at him silently as he looked incredibly uncomfortable.
"Can I help you?" Applejack asked the nervous pony.
"Uh yeah..." He answered hesitantly. "I'm trying to find somepony..."
"Why? So you can steal from them?" She answered in a voice cold enough to freeze water.
Wanderlust opened his mouth with a retort ready but knew he had no right to say anything so he simply looked down at the ground in shame. Just then two ponies burst through the door in front of the store and took in the scene before them seeing the look of shame on Wanderlust's face and the cold fury on Applejack's.
'Oh no...' Fluttershy thought. 'Did Applejack get that mad that Wanderlust thought that she was a stallion?!'
Rarity simply thought, 'This looks interesting.'
Applejack and Wanderlust didn't even seem to notice the two ponies watching them.
"So. Who exactly are you looking for?" Applejack asked with that same cold voice.
Wanderlust flinched from the tone as if it hurt him and responded in a small voice. "I'm trying to find a pony named Applejack..."
"Well you found her." She responded in a slightly less harsh tone. "So what do you want?"
Wanderlust was more surprised that he had tried to steal from the pony he was trying to get a job from than the fact that Applejack wasn't a stallion. He swallowed past the lump in his throat. "I...I wanted to know if there were any jobs that you needed done..."
This was a surprise to Applejack. A thief wanted to work for her. That was very surprising and rather ironic considering that he had tried to steal from her about a week ago. "Why? Why would you want to work for me?"
He looked up at her. "Because...I need money to..." At that moment Wanderlust noticed Rarity and Fluttershy standing a few feet away watching them. "I just need it." He said turning his head slightly to look at Fluttershy.
Applejack followed his gaze and saw her two friends standing in the doorway. Fluttershy looked noticeably uncomfortable but Rarity seemed perfectly content to just watch them. After a moment Rarity actually waved her hoof in a motion that suggested that they should keep going. Wanderlust smiled slightly at this but it quickly vanished as Applejack looked harshly at him.
Every pony sat there in an oppressive silence as Rarity waited for the "show" to resume, Wanderlust smartly kept quiet, Applejack pondered the appearance of her friends, and Fluttershy worked up the courage to approach her angry looking friend and her sad one.
Fluttershy eventually did work up the courage and walked towards Wanderlust and Applejack looking very nervous. When she stopped a foot away she had to resist the urge to hide herself in her mane. She leaned her heads towards Wanderlust and whispered in his ear, "Applejack isn't a stallion!"
Wanderlust just started laughing but it was almost a sad laugh. "Thank you for telling me that Fluttershy." He said and smiled a grateful smile at being able to laugh again.
Applejack watched the exchange in confusion. 'What the hay?' she thought as she watched her shy friend whisper something else into Wanderlust's ear that was too soft for Applejack to overhear. She watched as Wanderlust smiled at Fluttershy and shook his head silently. It was then that Applejack noticed something odd about the bag that Wanderlust had. It had a small pink butterfly on it and Applejack was sure that it belonged to Fluttershy. 'Who exactly is this thief and why is he friends with Fluttershy?' She wondered. She broke out of her thoughts as Rarity trotted over.
"So...What were you two talking about Applejack?" Rarity inquired. She knew that her farming friend had been angry but she couldn't imagine that Wanderlust's possibly confusing her name for a stallion's would make her so mad.
It was Wanderlust who answered in a shaky voice. "We were just talking about me possibly working for Applejack on her farm." He looked back at Applejack and silently pleaded with her to agree with him. He didn't want his new friends to know that he had tried to steal from this pony.
To his surprise she did. "Yeah. We were talking about him working for me." Applejack didn't know what had happened between her friend Fluttershy and the apple thief but she seemed to like him. 'He can't be too bad if Fluttershy likes him...' She thought before saying. "Be at the farm at sunrise tomorrow Mr...?"
His smile grew wide and he said simply, "Wanderlust."
"Well Mr. Wanderlust, as I was saying be at the farm tomorrow at sunrise. I'm sure you can find your way there." Her voice got a little cold towards the end.
Wanderlust felt his smile falter slightly as he knew that the only reason she gave him a job was because Rarity and Fluttershy were there. But at least he now had work. He was that much closer to repaying his debt to Fluttershy, not that he would ever tell her about that. His plan was simple: work in Ponyville for a month or two, fix the holes in Fluttershy's house, repay her for her care, and leave Ponyville before he got too attached to this town or anypony. That last part hurt his heart a little but he knew it was for the best. 'No attachments. No friends. Just explore.' He thought before returning his thoughts to the ponies around him.
"Sunrise it is." Wanderlust said with his smile returning. "Thank you for this. I won't disappoint you."
Applejack snorted and was about to say she hoped not when a voice that could only be described as loud and squeaky came from another room. "Applejack! Where did you go!?"
The voice gave Wanderlust a very distinct image of a pink pony with a crazy looking mane. Wanderlust had no idea where the image came from but the clarity with which the image popped to his mind was so shocking that he almost laughed.
"Sorry Pinkie! I'll be right there!" Applejack called back to the voice and was about to turn towards but she was beaten to it as a pony emerged from another room with a plate of cupcakes balanced on her back.
She looked almost exactly as Wanderlust had envisioned her. She was a light pink color with a darker pink mane and tail that both looked as if they had been stuck in a cotton candy machine. Wanderlust wandered if any filly had ever mistaken her tail for real cotton candy and tried to take a bite out it. Her cutie mark was a small image of three party balloons with two of them being blue and one being yellow.
Applejack walked over to the pink pony and took the plate off of mare's back and placed it on the counter. "Sorry Pinkie. I was busy..."
She was quickly cut off as the pink pony took a very quick and very deep breath as her eyes settled on Wanderlust. "You were busy meeting a new pony and you didn't tell me!" She said quickly and with so much excitement that it seemed as if someone had injected her with a heavy dose of sugar. In an instant the pink pony was inches away from Wanderlust and was talking so quickly that Wanderlust's head spun. "Hello! My name is Pinkie Pie. What's your name? Do you like cupcakes? Have you met Fluttershy and Rarity and Applejack?" She asked very quickly and then continued without giving him a chance to respond. "Well if you haven't you should! They are some of my bestest, BESTEST FRIENDS!" She ended in practically a shout. "Oh and there is Twilight Sparkle and Rainbow Dash too! They are my bestest friends too but they're not here right now!" She looked sad for a fraction of a second before her smile returned and she returned to her barrage of questions.
Wanderlust looked so uncomfortable that Rarity couldn't help but laugh. Applejack just watched them and smiled at her overly-excited friend. Fluttershy listened to her friend's rambling questions and she was unsure what to do but from the look on Wanderlust's face it should have been obvious that he needed help.
Wanderlust could feel his head pounding as the torrent of words kept flowing from the crazy ponies mouth. Eventually something snapped in his head and he yelled very loudly. "STOP! For the love of Celestia just stop!" To his surprise she did.
She didn't look particularly upset or anything at his outburst and her smile remained planted on her face. "Oh! I'm sorry was I was talking too much?" She inquired. "I tend to do that sometimes like this one time..." She quickly launched herself into another assault on his ears with her endless stream words.
Wanderlust was left simply wondering if this pony didn't need oxygen or something because not once did he see her stop for breath.
"Uh Pinkie?" Came Fluttershy's timid voice. "Can you calm down a little? I mean if it's not too much trouble..."
"Of course!" Pinkie Pie replied happily and then was silent.
After the noise of the past few moments, the silence that followed felt unnatural but no pony really complained as most likely everypony in the room most likely had a headache from all of the pink pony's talking.
"Sweet silence." Wanderlust muttered and almost immediately after his stomach growled breaking his 'sweet silence'.
This elicited a smile out of everypony in the room and even Applejack couldn't help but crack a smile.
Wanderlust just laughed lightly at his stomach and addressed Pinkie Pie. "So is this your store?" He asked.
"Nope!" She answered immediately. "This store belongs to Mr. and Mrs. Cake (author note: I like cake.)! I just work here. Making cookies and cakes and pies and cupcakes and..." She stopped talking as Wanderlust's eyes locked onto the plate of cupcakes that Pinkie had brought out earlier.
His eyes grew larger as he looked at the blue frosted cupcakes and he had to stop himself from drooling as his stomach growled like a rapid animal. "So um...how much for a cupcake?" Wanderlust asked while resisting the urge to rush at the cupcakes and eat them all.
Fluttershy giggled beside him as Pinkie Pie answered him with a laugh. "Just three bits."
"Done!" Wanderlust dived into his saddle bag and pulled the small bag of bits that he had gotten from Rarity out. He pulled out thirty bits and practically threw them at Pinkie as he quickly snatched ten cupcakes. Without a moment's hesitation he attacked his food and in an instant three cupcakes had vanished leaving nothing behind but three crumbled paper wrappers.
Everypony watching had different reactions to the cupcake carnage. Rarity was disgusted by the sheer abandon with which Wanderlust attacked his food. Fluttershy smiled at how enthusiastically he was eating and was vaguely reminded of how her Angel Bunny sometimes ate. Applejack didn't think much of Wanderlust or how he was eating. Pinkie Pie was just impressed that anypony, besides herself, could down sweets so quickly.
Wanderlust devoured one more cupcake before pausing to take a breath. He smiled contently as he looked at the six cupcakes sitting in front of him. He licked the icing from his lips and reveled in the sweet taste of all of the sugar. He sighed contently and looked around at the other ponies. He took note of Pinkie watching his remaining cupcakes with a covetous look on her face. "Want one?" He asked to which Pinkie instantly gasped sharply.
"YES!" She practically shrieked as she quickly grabbed a cupcake and ate it in an instant, paper and all.
Wanderlust laughed and he asked Pinkie how she could want a cupcake so much despite making them for a living. "Why wouldn't I want a cupcake?" She asked with shock creeping into her voice. "They're delicious."
"Fair enough." He laughed. "Anypony else want one?"
To his surprise they all did, even Applejack. Everypony munched on a cupcake while Wanderlust grabbed the last two and carefully put them in his borrowed saddle bag. He just hoped the frosting wouldn't smear around too much.
Wanderlust looked around at all of the ponies who had just finished their cupcakes except for Fluttershy who had only taken a single bite of hers and just looked at the rest of it. Wanderlust found this strange but decided not to comment on it. So he just yawned and decided it was time for a nap. "Well I have to get going. It was great to meet you Pinkie Pie. Applejack, I will see you tomorrow at sunrise."
Applejack nodded to show she heard and was able to resist the urge to glare at him again.
"Goodbye everypony." He smiled, turned and left the store.
Fluttershy watched him leave. Applejack and Pinkie Pie went back into the kitchen. Rarity and Fluttershy stayed for a little while and just talked about anything until Rarity abruptly turned the conversation to Wanderlust.
"So darling, you have to tell me." She started. "Is there anything between you and Wanderlust?"
Fluttershy blinked at this. "Yeah...We're friends I think." She answered timidly.
Rarity smiled at her naive friend. "No darling, I mean is there anything special between you too?" She asked.
Fluttershy felt her cheeks quickly warm and she shook her head quickly. "N-no no no..." she stuttered out. Rarity raised an eyebrow at her blushing friend. "I-I don't know. M-Maybe?" She confessed. "At least...At least I hope there's something."
Rarity smiled softly at her friend. "That's all I needed to hear. Now let's get you two paired up." Immediately her soft smile was replaced by a mischievous one.
Fluttershy opened her mouth to voice her objections but found her tongue frozen. Despite her shy nature, she had to admit that she liked this stallion. But something was bothering her: she had taken care of Wanderlust for a week but she had really only met him today! She felt weird about having a crush on a stallion that she had only known for, at most, a few hours.
"Rarity...I-I hardly know him at all." Fluttershy admitted.
This didn't phase Rarity at all. "So?" She responded. "Love at first sight right?" Her eyes sparkled as she thought back to some of the romance pony tales she used to read.
"B-but..." Fluttershy started.
"No buts." Rarity cut her off. "Now let's go. We have to get you ready."
Fluttershy blinked. "R-Ready for what?"
Rarity just smiled. "Your romantic dinner of course."
Fluttershy's eyes widened and her cheeks felt like they were on fire. 'Only one choice...' she thought. Fluttershy put a hoof to her head and did her best attempt at fainting.
Rarity looked at her with an annoyed look on her face. "Nice try." She said simply before grabbing Fluttershy with he magic before walking out of the sweet shop with Fluttershy magically being dragged behind her.
Fluttershy just frowned as Rarity dragged her to Celestia knows where.
Wanderlust wandered around Ponyville trying to find one building in particular. He didn't know why, but Wanderlust suddenly had a deep yearning to read something. So far he wasn't having a whole lot of luck with finding any place that looked like a library and surprisingly enough, there didn't seem to be anypony on the street he could ask. He wished that his wing wasn't broken so that he could just fly up and find the library that way. He sighed and kept on walking around trying to find the library.
In the clouds high above Ponyville flew a light blue pegasus with a rainbow colored mane. Rainbowdash flew around the clouds in a lazy manner bucking clouds with a yawn. "No rain today." She muttered as she casually bucked another cloud making it vanish in a puff of smoke. "So bored." She yelled at a cloud before kicking it into nothing.
Wanderlust looked up as he heard an aggravated yell. He watched several flashes of colors as clouds vanished overhead. In a few moments the sky was clear and the only thing in the sky was a mysterious floating rainbow. He blinked a few times and looked closer. He saw that the rainbow was attached to a light blue pegasus that blended in quite well with the surrounding sky. He recognized her as the pony Rainbowdash.
"Hey!" Wanderlust shouted. "Rainbowdash!"
Rainbowdash bucked another cloud and looked down as she heard her name called. She squinted at the ground and saw a gray pony looking back at her. 'Who is that?' she wondered before dropping into a steep nose dive.
Wanderlust backed up a few steps as he watched the pegasus drop out of the sky. "What the hay..." He muttered as she gained speed.
At the last second she pulled up and came to a stop just inches from the ground. She hovered above the ground for just a second before setting down softly. Rainbowdash looked at the pony in front of her and smiled. "Oh hey Wanderlust. You called?"
Wanderlust responded in a daze. "Uh yeah."
"Well what do you need?" She asked. When he didn't answer she raised an eyebrow and waved a hoof in front of his face. "Hello? Anypony home?"
He shook his head and snapped out of his daze. "Sorry. I was trying to find the library." He said.
"Another egghead huh?" She laughed lightly. "Yeah I can show you how to get there. Just give me ten seconds." With that said she dashed off leaving a rainbow streak behind her as she headed straight up. The rainbow streak flashed in and out of sight as every cloud in the sky exploded into nothingness as the rainbow hit them. Exactly ten seconds after Rainbowdash had flown away, she reappeared in front of Wanderlust with dust swirling around her. "Let's go." She said cheerily before turning and trotting off.
Wanderlust followed with his mouth hanging open. "Do you always do stuff like that?" He asked incredulously.
Rainbowdash looked back at him. "Stuff like what?"
"That flying!" He exclaimed. "That was just plain awesome!"
Rainbowdash straightened up and smiled proudly. "That's nothing. I do stunts that are way more awesome." She proclaimed loudly. "I'm training to be a Wonderbolt so I have to stay in top flying form."
"I imagine so." Wanderlust laughed as he admired the athletic pegasus walking beside him. His wings fluttered slightly and he wanted nothing more than to unfurl his wings and take to the sky like Rainbowdash had done. 'If only my wing wasn't busted...' He thought sadly.
"Well here we are." Rainbowdash said pulling Wanderlust from his thoughts.
Wanderlust looked straight ahead and saw a tree that had been seemed to have been converted into a building. "This is the library?" Wanderlust asked.
"Yup." Rainbowdash answered and walked up to the door. "My friend Twilight works here so she can probably help you find whatever you're looking for." She knocked on the door lightly.
They sat there for a few moments before the door opened revealing a small purple and green dragon. "Hey there Spike. Twilight home?" Rainbowdash asked the small dragon.
"Yeah." The dragon yawned. "I'll go get her." With that the young dragon turned away and ran inside.
Rainbowdash was about to walk inside when something caught her attention. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Pinkie Pie hiding in the shadows of a nearby building. She was gesturing to Rainbowdash telling her to come over to her. She blinked a few times in confusing but thought that it must be something important if Pinkie was hiding. Or at least trying to hide. 'Can't be very easy to hide when you're all pink' she thought. She was about to call over to her when she noticed Pinkie putting a hoof to her mouth. 'Quiet...got it'
"Well, I have to go now." Rainbowdash said quickly. "Have fun reading." As soon as she finished talking she dashed away from the library and left a rather confused Wanderlust behind.
"Okay then..." Wanderlust muttered as he walked inside the library and shut the door.
Rainbowdash flew in the exact opposite direction of Pinkie Pie and flew around the town so that Wanderlust wouldn't look in Pinkie's direction. She stopped right next to where Pinkie was hiding. "What is it Pinkie?" She asked.
Pinkie Pie turned to her with a gleam in her eye and said only one word. "Party."
Wanderlust looked around at all of the books sitting on the countless shelves built into the walls. He smiled as he walked over to one of the shelves and looked at some of the books. He looked at one in particular that caught his eye and read the title on the spine.
"Elements of Harmony, a Reference Guide..." He muttered. He was about to reach for the book when he heard a voice calling into the room.
"Rainbowdash? Are you in here?" Came the questioning voice.
Wanderlust turned around to see a lavender colored unicorn coming down a set of stairs in the back of the room. She had a soft lavender coat and a straight mane that was a darker shade of purple than her coat. Two small streaks of pink and a lighter shade of purple ran through both her mane and tail. Her cutie mark was a light purple sparkle surrounded by five smaller white sparkles. She had a pair of dark violet eyes that were currently locked onto Wanderlust.
"Uh hello." Came her voice. "Where is Rainbow?"
"Oh uh she had to go somewhere." He said awkwardly.
She raised her eyebrow at this but simply shrugged. "Well anyways, my name is Twilight Sparkle and welcome to the library."
He smiled at her. "My name is Wanderlust. It's nice to meet you Miss Sparkle."
"Just Twilight is fine." She said as she walked over to him. "So do you need help finding a book?"
"Actually I think I'm good. I was just looking at this one." He said gesturing to the book he was going to grab.
She looked at the shelf and smiled when she saw what book he was referring to. "I actually read that myself when I first came to Ponyville. It really helped me out."
Wanderlust was confused. "Helped you with what exactly?" He asked.
"It helped me find the Elements of Harmony." She said and watched as his eyes widened. "Have you not heard about what happened with Nightmare Moon?"
"Sure I've heard of it but I wasn't in Equestria at the time. I thought it was just a hoax or something." He admitted.
"Well I can show you that it was not a hoax. Follow me." She ordered him and walked over a display case sitting against a wall with Wanderlust following. "These are the Elements of Harmony."
Wanderlust looked at the objects sitting in the case. There sat five golden necklaces and a golden tiara, all adorned with special cut gems. Looking closely at the jewels he saw that they were cut in the shapes of a butterfly, a lightning bolt, a balloon, an apple, and one that was actually cut into the shape of a normal diamond. 'Where have I seen these shapes before?' He wondered as he looked at the tiara's jewel.
His eyes almost bulged out of his head as he realized where he had seen all of the shapes, one of which he had seen just moments ago. He looked at Twilight's cutie mark just to make sure. "Why do all of the jewels look like cutie marks?" He asked. "I mean this jewel is obviously your cutie mark." He said gesturing at the tiara. "And that one is Rainbowdash's. That's Applejack's. There is Fluttershy's, Rarity's and even that pony Pinkie Pie has a jewel shaped like her cutie mark."
"Well, in a way, me and my friends are the Elements of Harmony." She said. Wanderlust looked at her like he was waiting for her to say she was kidding. "Speaking of my friends, you seem to have met all of them seeing as you were able to recognize their cutie marks."
"Yeah I met them." He answered. "They're real nice." 'Cept Applejack, but I guess that's my fault.' He thought. "In fact your friend Fluttershy actually took care of me when I was hurt. She is really the kindest pony I have ever met." He felt his heart beat faster as he thought of the kind mare. It settled down a few moments later.
"Fluttershy really is very kind." She smiled at the memory of her friend. "So how did you get hurt?"
"Well um... I actually fell out of the sky and...well I crashed through the roof of Fluttershy's house." He answered with a frown.
"Well are you okay now?" She asked taking note of the faded bruises and small cuts on Wanderlust.
"Mostly. The only thing that is still hurt is my wing and my head." He answered.
"Yeah that looks like a rather nasty looking bump." She said pointing at a large lump on his forehead next to his horn. "Wait! You have a horn AND wings?"
"Uh...Yeah?" He answered although it sounded more like a question than an answer.
"That's weird...I thought all alicorns were royalty." She muttered.
Wanderlust drew himself up and tried to make himself look tall and regal. "And who is to say that I'm not royalty." He stated.
"Oh! Um, well..." Twilight stuttered.
Wanderlust laughed. "Relax, I'm not royalty. Just trying to poke a little fun." After he said that, he did in fact poke Twilight in the side. "As per all alicorns being royalty, I believe that most are but I guess I'm just the exception."
Twilight just shrugged and used her magic to grab the Elements of Harmony: A Reference Guide. She floated it in front of Wanderlust. "You wanted to read this right?"
"Oh right! Thanks." He tried to grab it with his magic but felt a sharp pain behind his eyes as he tried to focus his magic even to the small extent he would need to grab the book. He winced and the book fell to the floor with a dramatic thump. The pain soon dissipated and the room swam back into focus. The first thing he saw was a pair of violet eyes staring worriedly into his own.
"Are you okay?" Twilight asked.
"Yeah." He lied. "I think I'm just tired." He slid the saddlebag off his back and grabbed the book. He opened the bag and was about to slide the book in when he noticed the two cupcakes still sitting in there. Miraculously none of the icing had rubbed off but it would most likely not have stayed that way if he put a book on top of them. So he put the book down and pulled the two cupcakes out. "Want them?" He asked as he held them out to her.
"Uh sure." She grabbed them with her magic and floated them onto a nearby table. "Thank you."
"Consider them payment for letting me borrow this book." He smiled wearily. He slid the book into the bag and clipped it shut before sliding it back onto his back.
"Are you sure you're okay?" Twilight asked again.
"Yeah I'm fine." He smiled again and took a few steps before he felt his legs give out. He was sleeping before he hit the floor.
Twilight blinked a few times as she stared at the sleeping pony. "For some reason, I don't think you're okay." She said to the sleeping stallion before grabbing him with her magic and levitating him up the stairs and into her spare bed. "Sweet dreams you odd pony."
Home is Where Your Heart Is
Wanderlust's eyes snapped open but he found himself seeing nothing. Quickly he rose and looked around but still nothing showed. He didn't know if he was blind or if he was somewhere with no light but he knew that this wasn't where he should have been. He hesitantly took a step forward and when his hoof met solid ground he was relieved. He crept forward in a random direction since he had no way of knowing where anything was. He moved forward carefully until something caught his attention. In the landscape of darkness he saw a single green spot.
"Well I'm not blind so I guess that's a good thing." He muttered to himself before trotting towards the light. After several minutes of his careful trotting he noticed something: The light wasn't getting any closer. He turned his trot into a light gallop as he felt a strange paranoia set in. He hadn't felt any fear when he had woken in this place but now it felt as if something was watching him. He knew that it was most likely nothing but still his heart beat faster and his mind raced.
Minutes later, the light was just as small. Wanderlust felt his breath catch in his throat as he heard a soft clicking coming from behind him. In an instant he was in a dead gallop towards the light but the light only seemed to be getting smaller and smaller.
Again the clicking came but it was more rapid than it was before. Quickly the clicking was joined by another and another. In a moment the only thing that Wanderlust could hear was the horrible clicking noise that seemed to be coming from everywhere at once.
Wanderlust screamed in terror as he felt something brush against his side and he put everything he had into one last burst of speed. He closed his eyes tightly as he felt his heart and lungs struggle to keep up with his body. His terror pushed him to keep moving and when he opened his eyes, he found the green light now just feet from where he was. He felt tears of joy stream down his cheeks as he neared it.
He lunged towards the light and he could feel a strange warmth enter his body as his hooves came just within inches of the soft glow. But he never got the chance to touch it. Something collided with Wanderlust and knocked him several feet from the light. He winced as he crashed into the ground. He lay on the ground in a crumpled heap as the light floated just mere feet from where he now lay.
He tried to crawl towards the light but as soon as he moved something landed hard on his back. He cried out in pain as the weight was lifted off his back and swiftly smashed back down. Pain shot through his body but he forced himself to look up at his attacker. What he saw made him wish for death.
Standing above Wanderlust was another pony who was half illuminated by the soft green light. He made out a long pink mane and an equally long and pink tail. Looking into the pony's face he saw a pair of soft blue eyes. Wanderlust felt his heart constrict as he recognized the pony. "Fluttershy..." He grunted as she kicked him in the side again.
She smiled and he saw that her mouth was full of razor sharp teeth. Another figure soon emerged from the shadows behind her, quickly followed by another and another. Before long there stood five ponies behind Fluttershy.
Twilight, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, Applejack and Rainbowdash all smiled the same horrible grin as Fluttershy. Just like Fluttershy all their mouths were filled with the same razor teeth. All seemed to resemble broken glass.
He imagined those teeth ripping into his flesh and he shuttered. He watched helplessly as the ponies came to him and grabbed his back hooves. He didn't even have the strength to struggle as he was pulled away from the light.
In just moments the light vanished and all hope of escape vanished. He lay there helplessly before several sets of teeth ripped into his body. He didn't even scream as he was torn apart. The last thing he heard before he died was a soft voice. "Good night Wanderlust. Sweet dreams." Came Fluttershy's soft voice before his life completely left his body.
Wanderlust sat up in the bed that he was in and let out a horrible scream. He screamed until he thought his lungs would burst and then he screamed some more. He screamed for an entire minute before stopping. He just lay in the bed as cold sweat poured down his body and he shivered.
He looked out a nearby window and saw that it was still light out. A bird flew past the window and he breathed a sigh of relief. "It was just...a bad dream..." He murmured.
Home is Where Your Heart Is
Chapter 8: A Little Mind Magic
"It was just...a bad dream..." Wanderlust murmured. He looked around and for a moment he was unsure of where he was. He tried to remember where he was. He remembered being at the library but he couldn't quite remember leaving. Looking around he confirmed his location by the sheer number of books that lay scattered around the room.
Looking out the window he tried to figure if it was still the same day or whether he had passed out for a whole day. After being knocked out for an entire week, it didn't seem too far fetched that he could have been out for a good while. He crawled out of the bed and decided to try and find that pony who ran the library.
'What was her name again?' He wondered as he left the room behind and looked around. 'Twi-something...Twilight maybe? Yeah that sounds right.'
In a few moments he found himself back in the main room of the library. With a quick scan of the room he saw that lavender mare was at the door and was talking to somepony standing just outside of his view.
He tried to listen in to what they were saying but their words dissolved into a low murmur by the time it reached him. Wanderlust decided to sneak up on the two ponies so he could listen. Wanderlust knew that he was often too curious for his own good but he decided at that moment that he didn't care.
That is until he accidentally bumped into a small tower of books. The sound of falling books quickly filled the room and Wanderlust watched as Twilight turned around, instantly seeing the ease dropping pony. He gave a sheepish smile and retreated back a few steps.
Twilight glared at the pony for knocking over her books not even thinking for a moment about the fact that he had been trying to ease drop. After a moment she turned back to the pink pony standing outside and said something to her before shutting the door gently. She turned to Wanderlust who was trying his best to restack the books he had knocked over. Twilight just smiled and walked over to him and started helping him.
Outside of the library Pinkie Pie smiled to herself as she thought of the party that she was soon to throw. It wasn't everyday that she got to throw a party for a new pony and she was very excited. 'Let's see,' she thought. 'That's Twilight and Rainbowdash so far. Twilight said she would bring Wanderlust to Fluttershy's later so I have to have everything set up by then. I just have to find Rarity and Fluttershy and invite them to the surprise party!'
She started hopping down the street towards the Carousal Boutique. "This is gonna be so much fun!" She yelled to herself. "Too bad Applejack can't come though."
Fluttershy stood in the middle of Rarity's room as Rarity dug through her racks of dresses. The shy pony still wasn't sure why she was there and why she was supposed to be getting ready for a romantic dinner. 'A romantic dinner with...with Wanderlust!' She thought and as soon as the thought entered her head she felt her cheeks burn for at least the dozenth time in the past hour.
Her thoughts were interrupted as Rarity started murmuring. "You need something beautiful to wear darling and so far I can't find anything good enough for such an occasion!"
"W-well maybe w-we don't have to do this..." Fluttershy murmured.
Rarity gasped and turned around to look at Fluttershy. "Of course we have to do this!" She practically yelled. "Darling, you like this pony right?" Fluttershy hid behind her mane and squeaked out a small yes. "Then we have to do this." She turned back to the dozens of dresses that were hanging neatly on their racks.
"B-But Rarity," Fluttershy started. "What if...What if he doesn't like me back?" She felt her eyes sting and she knew that she was about to start crying.
"Shh..." Rarity went over to her friend and hugged her softly. "Darling trust me. He does."
"H-how c-can you be so s-sure...?" She stammered.
"I saw the way he looks at you." Rarity stepped back and looked at Fluttershy. "He couldn't keep his eyes off you!"
Fluttershy looked out from behind her mane. "R-really?"
"Of course darling." She smiled as Fluttershy came out from behind her veil of hair. "Now let's try and find you a dress!"
Fluttershy smiled. "Okay." They both started looking through the dresses with renewed vigor and several minutes later Rarity gasped sharply. Fluttershy looked over at Rarity and saw that Rarity was staring slack jawed at a simple blue dress. The next thing that Fluttershy knew, she was having the dress thrown at her.
"Put it on!" Rarity yelled happily. "You will look dazzling!"
Fluttershy blinked a few times and looked at the dress. It was a simple piece that looked to be simply one flowing piece of fabric. On the hem there were small sapphires that sparkled in the light. The color of the dress was very much like the color of her eyes.
Carefully she began to slip the dress on when a loud knocking came from the front door of the boutique. Rarity let out a sound of annoyance. "I'll get it." She said simply and trotted away.
Rarity opened the front door of her boutique and was surprised to see Pinkie Pie standing on her doorstep. "Oh! Hello Pinkie." She spoke cheerfully. "What brings you around here?"
"I wanted to invite you a to a party!" She giggled out. "It's a welcome party for-"
Rarity cut her off. "Oh a party... I'd love to go Pinkie but unfortunately I'm a little busy right now."
Pinkie frowned. "Oh...Well that's okay! It will still be a super fun party anyways!" Her smiled returned in full force. "I just have to find Fluttershy and invite her and then I can start setting everything up!"
"I'm sorry Pinkie Pie but I'm afraid Fluttershy is a little busy as well." Rarity said apologetically.
Pinkie's smile only faltered for a moment. "Well that's okay too! It will still be a super awesome fun time! If you finish with whatever it is you're doing you two should come over!" With that she turned and skipped down the street.
"W-Wait!" Rarity called out. "Where is the party?" Pinkie Pie was too far away to hear her so Rarity just shrugged and walked back inside. "Aw well. I would have liked to go to Pinkie's little soiree."
Rarity walked back into her room and saw Fluttershy standing there in the soft blue dress. Her breath caught in her chest as she took in the sight of her looked absolutely stunning. The color of the dress almost matched Fluttershy's eyes perfectly and the simple design was accented by the simple style of her mane and tail.
"Well, well, well." Rarity laughed. "I know a certain somepony who is going to be very happy to see you."
"So how long was I out?" Wanderlust asked as he slid a random book back onto a shelf.
"Oh not too long." Twilight answered as she levitated a few books off the floor and onto their respective shelves. "An hour maybe."
Wanderlust grabbed another book off the floor and looked at the cover. It didn't have a title but it did show a very strange picture of a pony on it. "What is this?" He asked Twilight indicating the picture.
Her eyes narrowed and when she answered her voice was a little cold. "That's a changeling. Monsters that steal love from ponies. They transform themselves into a pony so they ca use lies to get close to a pony and then suck them dry." She closed her eyes and a look of pain crossed her face. "Those things almost got my brother a while back." She opened her eyes and looked at the book with a look of hatred. "Anyways that book is about them."
Wanderlust looked at the picture again and he was surprised that he thought that it had been a pony. It had the general shape of a pony, wings and a horn but that was about where the similarities ended. The horn looked wickedly sharp and the wings looked like slightly torn bug wings. The hooves of the creature were filled with holes that made them look very brittle but he knew that they were most likely very strong. Instead of the soft coat of a pony, the changeling looked to be covered in some sort of bug shell. The mouth was the thing that caught his attention the most. Sticking out of the changeling's mouth was a set of terrible looking teeth with several of them ending in jagged points.
Wanderlust suddenly flashed back to his nightmare and the horrible teeth that he had seen in the mares' mouths. He found himself trembling slightly as his mind connected the two images. "Hey..." He addressed Twilight in a slightly shaky voice. "Would it be okay if I borrowed this book too?"
"Knock yourself out." She said simply. He nodded once and then slid the book into his bag next to the Elements of Harmony book. He noticed Twilight eyeing him suspiciously and Wanderlust forced himself to stop shaking.
"So..." He started trying to pull attention away from himself. "Who were you talking to?"
"What are you talking about?" Twilight asked truly confused.
"You were talking to somepony before I knocked over all of your books. Remember?"
"Oh yeah. I was talking to Pin-" She stopped herself. "Uh...I mean I was talking to Fluttershy! Yeah Fluttershy..."
Wanderlust raised an eyebrow. She had been about to say Pinkie Pie. 'Liar.' He thought before clearing his throat. "So, what did Fluttershy want?" He asked.
Twilight looked around the room in panic trying to think up a convincing lie. "Uh...She umm, wanted to borrow a book?" It sounded more like a question.
"What book did she borrow?" Wanderlust asked not wanting to call the pony on her lie just yet.
Twilight couldn't tell if Wanderlust knew that she was lying or if he was just truly curious about what book Fluttershy had taken. "Umm...The Elements of Harmony?" She said and she instantly wished she could pull the words back. That was the book that she had given Wanderlust!
Wanderlust just shook his head sadly and finally called Twilight out on her lie. "So why was Pinkie Pie here and why are you afraid to tell me? And don't lie to me this time."
Twilight sighed. "Damn." She mumbled.
"Come on." Wanderlust demanded. "Out with it."
"Fine!" She growled. "Pinkie Pie is throwing a surprise party for you. I'm supposed to bring you to the party later."
"Why would she be throwing me a party?" Wanderlust asked not quite believing her.
"She's throws a party for every new pony in town." Twilight answered. "She threw one for me when I first came to Ponyville."
"Well why couldn't you have just told me that she was throwing a party?" Wanderlust asked.
"Because it was supposed to be a surprise!" She answered exasperated. "Pinkie Pie loves parties but she loves surprise parties the most but now it's ruined."
"How so?"
"Because you know now."
"Why don't I just pretend that I don't know about it?"
"That's not the point! It's supposed to be a surprise." Twilight said sadly.
"Well where was she gonna throw the party anyways?" He asked curious.
"Fluttershy's cottage." She answered.
"Why there?"
"Because you were staying with Fluttershy. Weren't you?"
"Uh yeah but I was kind of comatose the whole time." He confessed. "I don't even know if I'm still allowed to stay there."
"Actually I talked to her earlier this." Twilight started. "She was telling me about somepony who crashed through her roof. I'm assuming that that was you, right?" He nodded. "She said that she was going to let that pony stay there till they were all better and judging by your head and your wing, you're anything but better."
"Well in that case," He said with a smile. "I guess I'll just have to forget about the party so it's still a surprise." Twilight looked at him in confusion as he walked over to the book shelves and began scanning over the titles.
"How will you forget about the party exactly?" Twilight asked truly curious.
"With this." He answered before grabbing a book from the shelf and placing it on the ground in front of him. "You are good with magic right?"
Twilight raised an eyebrow to this and looked at the book. "Mind Spells?" She was confused for a moment until she realized what he wanted her to do. "Wanderlust I can't do that!"
Wanderlust just started flipping through the pages. "Why not? You look like you know a thing or two about magic." He stopped on a page with a spell for erasing small amounts of memory.
"That's not the point! I can't just go through somepony's head and erase stuff!" Twilight tried to reason with him. "Come on we can just pretend that you don't know about the party! We don't have to do this."
Wanderlust laughed and pushed the book over to Twilight. "What happened to it's supposed to be a surprise? Besides, you can't honestly tell me that you have never wanted to try something like this." Twilight opened her mouth to argue some more but Wanderlust cut her off. "If you don't do it, then I will."
Twilight's eyes widened as she thought of this pony trying to use these spells on himself. He had passed out when he had tried to use a simple levitation spell and now he said he was going to try to do something as precise and dangerous as erasing a memory. For all she knew, he might end up wiping out every memory he had. She couldn't let that happen. "Fine, I'll do it." She muttered.
Wanderlust smiled and pointed at the open page. Twilight studied it for a few minutes before turning to Wanderlust. "Ready?" He asked.
"Yeah." She replied nervously. Twilight had used memories spells before, but those had been spells to restore lost memories not take them away. She had no idea what was going to happen.
Wanderlust just smiled some more. "This should be interesting. Let 'er rip!"
Twilight frowned at how excited he was to have somepony moving through his mind but she decided just to get it over with. She closed he eyes and let her magic flow.
Wanderlust watched as her horn began to glow a soft purple color. Moments later the glow began to drift towards his head. He swallowed past the lump in his throat but refused to let his smile falter. He was too curious about what was about to happen to let his fear show, even if this did turn out to be a horrible idea.
The aura of Twilight's magic flowed around Wanderlust's head. In an instant his smile vanished and all light from his eyes disappeared. His face was devoid of any emotion as Twilight's magic took hold.
Twilight kept her eyes screwed shut as she moved through the thousands of memories that made up Wanderlust's mind. His memories spread themselves behind her eyelids and Twilight found herself thinking, not for the first time, that this was a bad idea. His memories flew in and out of sight with such speed that Twilight only saw a blur of colors. Millions of sounds blended together into a horrible screeching noise.
Twilight wanted to shut out the images and sounds that assaulted her mind, but she quickly found that she had no control over her magic. The spell took any control that she had away from her and slowly but surely, the noises settled and the images stopped blurring. Images began to vanish as the spell pushed them aside and the typhoon of noise lessened in volume and intensity. In no time at all, all noise had vanished and only one image remained.
The memory showed Twilight moving books. Almost like someone pressed play on a remote, the memory started moving and she could hear Wanderlust talking. "So...Who were you talking to?"
'Bingo.' Twilight thought and almost immediately the memory vanished.
Twilight opened her eyes and saw that Wanderlust's face looked blank. He didn't blink and his mouth hung open slightly. "Wanderlust? Are you ok?" She asked. When she got no response she waved a hoof in front of his face.
He blinked a few times and closed his mouth. He looked around in bewilderment and backed up a few steps. "Where am I?" He asked. He looked at the pony in front of him. "Who are you!?"
Twilight felt sweat break out on her forehead. "I'm Twilight. Remember?" She said softly. He just blinked a few times and took another step back. "Oh no..."
"Twilight? I don't know anypony named Twilight." He blinked and looked around again. "Where am I?"
Twilight sat back on her haunches and put her face in her hooves. "What have I done..." She muttered.
She heard a laugh and looked up at Wanderlust. "Lighten up Twilight. I'm fine." He told her with a smirk.
"What? But I...you..." She stuttered.
"I was just messing with you." He laughed. "I remember everything. Well almost everything. I can't quite remember what that spell got rid of but I guess that's the point."
She stood up and glared at Wanderlust. "Don't do that." She scolded. "You made me think I completely wiped your mind!"
He laughed some more. "Yeah sorry 'bout that. It was too good of an opportunity to pass up." Twilight just rolled her eyes. "So...Who were you talking to earlier?"
Twilight looked at him and was unsure of whether he was just messing with her or if he truly didn't remember what she had, supposedly, made him forget. "I wasn't talking to anypony important." She answered him.
"Oh." He shrugged. "Ok then."
"Hey...you wanna head over to Fluttershy's later?"
Wanderlust raised an eyebrow. "Why?"
"No reason."
He shrugged. "Sure. Why not?"
Home is Where Your Heart Is
Chapter 9: A Romantic Party
Wanderlust yawned as he and Twilight walked out the front door of the library. The sky had started to darken, turning from it's light blue color to a soft orange as Celestia's sun fell and Luna's moon rose.
Twilight had tucked Spike in before they had left and Wanderlust had watched them almost with envy. He had nopony to take care of as Twilight did and nopony to take care of him as Spike did. It made his chest ache a little as he watched and realized that he was alone. Some of the ponies that he had met in Ponyville could be considered friends but he still wasn't very close to any of them. Except maybe Fluttershy...
His thoughts fragmented as he heard a soft scream and something heavy collided with him. He heard a shriek of surprise but he wasn't sure if it came from him or from some other pony. All he knew was that his head throbbed and something heavy was on his back. He opened his eyes and tried looking around but he saw only blue. "What the hay..?" He muttered as he tried to find something not blue.
He quickly found it in the form of three small pink butterflies sitting just inches from his face. His eyes widened as he recognized it as the cutie mark of Fluttershy and realized just what was in front of his face. His face felt like it was going to burn off as he quickly turned away and crawled out from underneath the mass of blue and yellow.
Free of the crushing weight that was Fluttershy, Wanderlust took a deep breath before turning around. He saw Twilight worriedly talking to a very dizzy looking Fluttershy wearing a beautiful blue dress that, if Wanderlust wasn't already as red as a tomato, would have made him blush.
"Fluttershy? Are you okay?" Twilight asked her dizzy friend.
"Y-yes..." She said as she shook the dizziness out of her head.
"What happened?" Twilight asked.
"I...I don't really know." She lied. She knew exactly what had happened. She had left Rarity and had started flying back to her cottage so she could get things ready for Wanderlust's dinner which Rarity had so graciously agreed to make. She got about half way there when she had looked down and saw Twilight and Wanderlust. Recognizing the pony that she was soon to be having dinner with if things went right. Her mind flew to all of the things that could happen if things went well. Without even realizing it, she had started drifting towards Wanderlust.
When she had been about twenty feet straight above him, she realized what she was doing and started panicking afraid that they would notice her. This made her heart practically beat out of her chest and she felt her wings lock up. She screamed as she dropped...
...and landed right on Wanderlust.
Twilight raised an eyebrow at Fluttershy's response but decided not to say anything. She merely looked back at Wanderlust. "Are you okay Wanderlust?" She asked.
His blush had almost completely vanished, much to his relief. "I think so. No broken bones at least." He replied looking at his busted wing. "Well no new ones anyway."
Fluttershy tensed up at his voice. 'He must hate me now...' She thought before slowly standing up and turning slowly to Wanderlust. "I-I'm so s-sorry..." She stuttered.
Wanderlust simply walked up to Fluttershy and looked at her.
Fluttershy looked at him for a moment before looking at the ground. 'Here it comes.' She thought before closing her eyes. She imagined him saying all sorts of horrible things to her and she felt herself already tearing up.
She didn't expect him to hug her.
"Be careful you crazy pony." He said with his throat tight with emotion. "And don't apologize for landing on me." He added before breaking the hug.
Fluttershy took a step back and looked at him in surprise. Surprise for the hug, for his concern, and for his telling her not to apologize. "B-but..." She started.
He put a hoof gently over he mouth cutting her off. "No buts. I don't mind being a cushion." He joked. He smiled as he felt Fluttershy's mouth form a smile under his hoof. "Besides, think how bad you could have gotten hurt if you didn't land on something soft." He said seriously.
Fluttershy moved his hoof away from her mouth. "Y-yeah but..." She started again.
"But nothing." He said. "I am your new official landing cushion. End of story."
Fluttershy just closed her mouth. She knew that there was no way she was going to win with him. "O-okay." She said in defeat.
"Victory!" Wanderlust exclaimed as he threw his front hooves into the air and Fluttershy and Twilight just laughed. Wanderlust just smiled. "So what's with the dress?" He asked completely shifting from his excited mood to a curious one.
"Oh um..." She starting looking back at her slightly dusty blue dress. "Oh my. Rarity is going to be so mad..."
"Rarity let you borrow one of her dresses?" Wanderlust asked. "I didn't expect her to the type of pony who would let anyone touch her dresses."
Twilight looked at Wanderlust. "Actually Rarity is a very generous pony." She told him.
"Wow. That's a surprise." He commented before turning to Fluttershy. "So why do you have the dress anyways? Going someplace fancy?"
"Oh um, no I was just going home..." She said quietly looking back and forth between Twilight and Wanderlust. "W-where are you two going?"
"We were actually going to your cottage." Wanderlust answered. "But if we were just going to be meeting you at your house, there really isn't a point in going to your cottage anymore."
Twilight and Fluttershy both panicked. Both of their plans involved bringing Wanderlust to Fluttershy's cottage.
"Oh, i-it's okay!" Fluttershy stammered out in panic. "We...We can still go to my cottage!"
"Yeah!" Twilight went right along with her. "Let's go there anyways! It should be fun!"
Wanderlust looked at the two mares with just a little bit of suspicion. "Why?" He asked simply.
"Uh..." They both responded at the same time.
Wanderlust narrowed his eyes. "Well, I guess I will just have to find out just what will be so much fun at the cottage." He said before taking off in a full gallop towards Fluttershy's cottage.
"Yes!" Twilight shouted while Fluttershy shouted "No!"
Twilight looked at Fluttershy in confusion. Twilight had done her job right. 'I got Wanderlust to go to the cottage without him knowing about the party. So why does Fluttershy look so upset...?' She thought to herself. 'She is in on this...right?'
Fluttershy panicked and started galloping after Wanderlust yelling at him to stop. Of course nopony heard her shouts as they were barely louder than whispers.
"Apparently not..." Twilight muttered to herself before galloping after them both.
Rarity pulled a small cart of food up to Fluttershy's door and knocked lightly, just in case anypony was already there. When she heard nothing she opened the door and was about to walk in when two sets of hooves, one pink, one blue, shot out of the darkness and grabbed her. She let out a loud squeak as she was pulled inside with the cart being pulled in with her.
She shook off the hooves after they had dragged her in and randomly swung her front hooves around trying to hit her kidnappers. "Stay back ruffians!" She yelled.
"SHHHH!" Came a very loud noise to her right and she swung her hoof in that direction but hitting only a plushy couch.
"Calm down Rarity." Came a voice from her left and she turned in that direction only to have a bright light shine into her eyes.
"Ow! My beautiful eyes." She gasped covering her eyes. "I'm blind."
"Drama queen." She heard and glared in the direction of the voice as the light illuminated a blue face with a mane of rainbow hair.
"Rainbowdash? Why are you here?" She asked, very surprised.
"Duh, for the party." She answered.
"What are you talking about?"
"The super, duper, awesome party for Wanderlust." Came a squeaky voice from behind her. She didn't even have to turn around to know that it was Pinkie Pie who had spoken.
"Oh...This could be bad." Rarity muttered before hearing a gasp come from behind her.
Pinkie Pie whispered really loudly. "There he is!" Rarity turned and saw the door slam shut, closed by some unseen pony and her cart of fancy food was whisked away, most likely to end up in the kitchen.
Somepony grabbed her hoof and dragged her away from the door while Pinkie Pie hissed. "Okay this is the real deal! When he opens that door you know what to do!"
Wanderlust stopped at the door and looked behind him. In the distance he could just make out Fluttershy and Twilight getting closer. He smiled and was happy about how fast he could run with his severe lack of extra weight. Normally that lack of weight was a bad thing, but at least it let him run fast. Turning back towards the door, he gripped the handle and opened the door.
He took two steps into the house before light blinded him and he heard a collective scream of the word "Surprise". Looking around he saw a dozen ponies looking towards him with smiles.
At first he was too shocked to do anything except stand there with his mouth hanging open. Soon after he felt a smile creep onto his face and a laugh bubbled in his chest. He tried to contain it but he felt himself shaking with excitement and one word escaped his lips. "PARTY!"
A wave of cheers erupted around the room and Pinkie Pie shot off her confetti cannon.
Twilight and Fluttershy stood a few feet away from the open door as Wanderlust ran inside and started partying along with all of the other ponies. They just stood there for a few moments before a white pony trotted out the door and stood before them. "Sorry Fluttershy." Rarity said sadly and hugged her now sad friend.
Twilight looked at both of them in confusion. "Rarity? What's going on?" She asked. "Shouldn't this be a good thing? Pinkie is throwing a party for Wanderlust being in Ponyville!"
Rarity looked at Twilight sadly. "We didn't know about the party. We planned something else for Wanderlust but now it's ruined."
"What did you have planned?" She asked and looked at Fluttershy in her dress. Her eyes widened as she realized why she was dressed like that. "Oh! Fluttershy we didn't know."
"N-no... It's o-ok..." She sniffed and stood up straight taking a deep breath. "For now let's just enjoy the party." She said without a single stutter or ounce of nervousness in her voice.
Rarity and Twilight both blinked in surprise and smiled. "Okay!" They both said in unison and walked into the cottage with Fluttershy following.
Twilight went off to talk with a couple of ponies while Rarity went off to a table covered in cupcakes and punch. Fluttershy hovered at the door for just a moment looking around until she spotted Wanderlust with a blindfold on and a tail sticking out of his mouth. She smiled as she watched him play Pin the Tail on the Pony until she watched him pin the tail on an actual pony.
"Owwie!" Yelled the pinned pony as Wanderlust slipped the blindfold off.
"Oh! I'm so sorry!" He exclaimed and took a step back looking at the gray pony he had pinned the tail to. She had a blond mane and a matching blond tail. Next to the fake black tail was a cutie mark that looked like a bunch of bubbles. "Are you okay?" He asked the pony.
She just smiled and looked at him. Nodding she said in a rather odd voice, "I'm okie-dokie!"
Her gaze unsettled Wanderlust as her yellow eyes looked in two opposite directions but he tried not to let it show. He heard a squeak come from next to him and looked over to see Fluttershy standing right next to him. She was looking at the tail stuck in the pony's flank.
"Oh Derpy! Are you okay?" She asked with concern creeping into her voice.
Derpy nodded and looked back at her new tail. "I look funny!" She laughed and started shaking her flank so that her new tail would wave.
This made Wanderlust laugh as Fluttershy took one of Derpy's hooves and took her into the kitchen. Wanderlust followed them since this was his fault. He watched as Fluttershy grabbed a small first aid kit and walked over to Derpy. "Need any help?" He asked.
She looked at Wanderlust and just shook her head with a smile. Shrugging Wanderlust just watched as Fluttershy removed the new tail and put a small bandage on the small bit of blood that started coming out where the pin had been.
"Aww...no new tail." Derpy said sadly and walked back out of the kitchen.
"What a ditsy pony." Wanderlust said thinking out loud.
"That's just how she is." Fluttershy said to him after putting away her small first aid kit.
Wanderlust looked at Fluttershy and couldn't help smiling. She was still wearing the blue dress and, despite her still being just as beautiful as before, this time Wanderlust was able to keep the blush off his face. "You know..." He started. "You look really good in blue."
Fluttershy felt her heart start beating faster and she blushed lightly. Despite this she was able to keep her voice steady when she responded. "Rarity actually picked this dress out for me."
"She has good taste." He said and cocked his head to the side. "I'm still wondering, just why you are wearing that dress."
Fluttershy swallowed and answered in a quiet voice. "I wore it for you."
Wanderlust raised an eyebrow. "Fluttershy I couldn't quite hear you."
She took a deep breath and repeated quietly. "I wore it for you."
"You wore it for me..." He repeated and looked down at the ground. Wanderlust felt his throat tighten with emotion and it hurt to swallow. "How nice..."
Fluttershy smiled lightly and took a hesitant step towards Wanderlust. This caused him to look up at her. Her eyes were filled with hope and a nervousness as she took another step towards him and another. She stopped about two feet from him and her cheeks grew warm.
"I-I like you Wander..." She started but was cut off when Wanderlust put a hoof over her mouth just as he had done before.
Wanderlust had a million thoughts bouncing around his head at the same time. His thoughts were not on Fluttershy though. His thoughts were on the memories of all of the places that he had left behind. All of the places he had explored and left and all of the towns that he had visited and never returned to. He knew that soon Ponyville would just be another similar memory. 'No attachments. No friends. Just explore.' Was his last thought before he looked at Fluttershy sadly. "How nice..." He repeated and turned away before walking back into the living room.
Fluttershy stood there with tears welling in her eyes. She didn't even try to wipe them away as they spilled from her eyes and slid down her cheeks.
Wanderlust walked out of the front door of the cottage and stood on the path leading away from the cottage. With a sigh he turned back to look at the ponies still partying inside. "No attachments. No friends. Just explore." He said to nopony and turned and walked away with the borrowed saddlebag feeling like it weighed a thousand pounds.
He found a decent sized tree in a nearby field and climbed into it's branches. He had to work at Sweet Apple Acres in the morning. He needed to sleep. He repeated the line over and over almost like a lullaby to himself. "No attachments. No friends. Just explore. No attachments. No friends. Just explore. No attachments. No friends. Just explore." He muttered this to himself until his eyes finally closed. 'I'm sorry Fluttershy.' Was his last thought before drifting off.
Home is Where Your Heart Is
Wanderlust jerked out of his sleep dripping sweat. "Another nightmare..." He murmured as he looked around his improvised tree bed searching for any sign of the monsters that had been chasing him. Seeing nothing, he sighed in relief.
The dream had almost been exactly the same as his previous nightmare. Darkness, a green light, Fluttershy and her friends attacking him, and those same horrible teeth. The only difference had been that the dream had ended before those teeth had been able to tear him apart.
A soft wind blew through the tree, chilling the sweat on his body and making him shiver. He wrapped his arms around himself and tried to rub some warmth into his body. After a few minutes of this he felt sufficiently warm and started climbing out of the tree. He grabbed the bag that was hanging on a nearby branch and slung it across his body before getting too far down.
Stepping out from under the shadows of the tree, Wanderlust looked up towards the sky and couldn't help but wonder at how many stars made up the sky. As a young filly, he had foolishly tried to count them all but never made it any farther than ten before he would end up counting a star twice. In frustration he would always start over only to start counting the same couple stars again. He remembered his parents watching over him on one of those calm nights and he could feel a tear slide down his cheek at the thought of it.
He continued to watch the sky for at least an hour until the stars began to fade one by one. A dull glow appeared to the east and Wanderlust knew that sunrise wasn't far off. That meant he had to get to Sweet Apple Acres for his job.
He ate the rest of the food that was in the bag. Afterwards he took a quick stock of the contents of the bag. In it sat the two books from Twilight and the jar of painkiller. He sighed before slinging the bag back over his back.
He said a final goodbye to the stars and Princess Luna's moon before turning and trotting in the direction that he assumed would lead him to Sweet Apple Acres.
Fluttershy stood on her front lawn staring at the sky as Wanderlust had been. She stared into the void that was space and the glitter-like sparkles that were the stars. She had long since stopped crying but, despite that, sleep eluded her.
Her friends had seen her crying but only Rarity could really have guessed the reason for her sadness. After a short time her tears had dried up and she had sent her friends on their way, the party having ended at least an hour earlier when everypony realized that the guest of honor was gone. She had gone to bed, her house still a mess and with the nice food that Rarity had made for the dinner growing cold.
After a few hours of lying in her bed, she had come outside to watch the stars that floated high above her and maybe forget about her problems for a few minutes. Fluttershy sat down on the ground and just watched the stars as night began to turn into morning.
Finally, she tore her gaze away from the sky and looked at the dirt path in front of her cottage. She was shocked to see a gray pony trotting past her home. She instantly recognized it as Wanderlust and her throat grew tight. She felt happy at seeing her crush again but that happiness quickly turned to sorrow as she remembered what had happened last night. Despite this her eyes remained glued to the pony as he hurried on, not even noticing the sad mare watching him. At least that's what she thought.
Wanderlust was acutely aware of the fact that he was trotting in front of Fluttershy's cottage but he resisted the urge to look at it.
He soon left the cottage behind, much to Fluttershy's disappointment, and soon found himself surrounded on all sides by apple trees. He saw a red barn and a small faded red house next to it. "That must be it." He thought as he increased his pace.
He reached the door at the same time that Celestia's sun came up and the roosters started to crow. He knocked on the door a few times and then took a step back as he waited for somepony to answer the door. After a few moments the door opened and Wanderlust found himself not looking at a pony but a large pink bow. Blinking a few times, he looked down to see a young yellow filly looking back with a curious expression on her face.
"Uh, hello little one," Wanderlust started. "Uh is Applejack home?"
She gave a quick nod. "Uh huh! She's out bucking apples in the field." The filly answered with a cheerful voice. "Come on, I'll show ya." With that she started hopping towards the field while looking back at him. "So who are ya anyways?" She asked.
"I'm Wanderlust." He answered. "What's your name?"
"I'm Applebloom! Applejack is my big sis." She answered proudly.
"You look like her." He said with a small laugh.
"Really?!" She asked with her eyes sparkling.
"Really." He smiled. He turned his head when he heard a loud crack followed by a loud of smaller thumps.
Standing about a dozen feet from them stood Applejack, hat in hoof with several baskets filled with apples sitting a few feet behind her. She shook some sweat off of her face and put her hat back on before looking at Wanderlust and Applebloom. "Howdy Wanderlust." She said as she walked up to her sister and her new worker. "Get bucking."
Wanderlust blinked a few times and looked at a nearby tree with several baskets sitting underneath it. Shrugging, he faced the tree and dug his hooves into the ground. He let out a grunt as he pushed off his back legs and galloped towards the tree. At the last second he turned sharply and kicked the tree with all his might. A loud crack sounded throughout the field and Wanderlust waited for the apples to fall.
He watched as a single red apple fell from the tree and landed in one of the baskets with an unsatisfying thud. He waited for more to fall but it soon became obvious that no other apples were going to fall. He looked back at the two ponies watching him.
Applejack covered her face with her hat and shook her head while Applebloom bit her lip in an attempt not to laugh.
Wanderlust felt his ears droop at how horrible that had been as he turned back to the basket and looked inside it but found it empty. He was unsure what to think of this until he heard a loud crunch coming from his right.
Looking over he saw a humongous red stallion with a short orange mane chewing loudly on the red apple. The red pony was one of the biggest stallions he had ever seen with not a single ounce of flab anywhere on his body, just pure muscle. He watched as the huge stallion swallowed the rest of the apple and looked at him with pair of bored looking green eyes.
Wanderlust's eyes were wide and for some unknown reason, he found himself absolutely terrified of the huge stallion and he wasn't at all relieved when Applejack came over and draped one of her arms across his broad shoulders. "This is Big Macintosh." She said with pride. "Big Mac, this is Wanderlust. He's gonna be working with us for a while."
Big Macintosh just nodded and turned to the tree that Wanderlust had kicked a few moments earlier. With hardly any wind-up he bucked the tree and sent dozens of apples falling from it's branches. Wanderlust just sat there with his mouth open as every apple fell into the baskets, without a single one touching the ground.
"Yeehaw!" Applejack yelled and patted Big Macintosh on the back. "Good job Big Mac." She said with a smile.
"Eeeyup." He responded with pride.
For a few hours after this, Applejack and Big Macintosh bucked the trees in the field while Wanderlust, seeing as he could barely buck a single apple out of a tree, carried the apple-filled baskets to the barn.
They stopped a little after noon for a lunch break. Applejack told Wanderlust he had about an hour to eat something and get back here.
Having already eaten all of the food that Fluttershy had given him, Wanderlust wasn't exactly in a big rush to spend all of his bits. Despite his grumbling stomach, he decided to just skip eating lunch. Instead he chose to sit under one of the countless apple trees and read one of the books that Twilight had given him. He pulled both of the books out of the saddlebag and looked at them.
"Changelings or Elements of Harmony..." He muttered in thought. After a few moments, he slid the book on changelings back into the bag and opened Elements of Harmony: A Reference Guide.
He sat in a thoughtful silence reading about the mystical objects known as the Elements of Harmony.
It wasn't a very long book and in only twenty minutes he had come to the last few pages.
With a yawn, Wanderlust turned the page and was surprised to see that the next two pages looked newer than the rest of the book. The words on these pages looked like they had been hoofwritten and a photograph was sitting on one of the pages.
Looking at the photograph, Wanderlust was surprised to see the six mares that he met in Ponyville. Applejack, Rarity, Twilight Sparkle, Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy were all huddled together in this picture with nothing but joy on their faces. They were all obviously friends from their smiles and friendly dispositions.
It made Wanderlust's heart constrict in sadness at never having such close friends as these ponies obviously had.
A noise came from behind Wanderlust making him jerk his head to the side and he was surprised to see Applejack. She stood a foot away from him and she wasn't looking at Wanderlust, but at the picture.
"Good times..." She said to herself before sitting down with her back against the tree. She didn't say anything else and just sat against the tree watching the peacefulness of the Apple fields.
Although she didn't say anything else, Wanderlust was all too aware of her presence and turning his attention back to the book seemed difficult. After a few minutes of attempted reading, he decided to just put the book away and finish the last few pages later. As he slipped the book back into the saddlebag, he heard Applejack ask him something.
"Why did ya come here?" Applejack asked out of the blue.
Wanderlust turned and looked at her but she was still gazing out at the fields. He answered hesitantly. "You said I could work here."
"No, ah meant why did ya come to Ponyville and why did ya disappeared for a week and why do ya look like somepony ran ya over with a cart." (Author Note: I apologize for the horrible Applejack accent.)
Wanderlust took a deep breath from answering. "I have no real reason for coming to Ponyville. To me it's just another town that I would pass through."
Applejack turned to look at Wanderlust but saw that he was now looking down at the ground.
He continued. "This town didn't look like anything special and still it doesn't seem like it's a place that's really worth visiting. As for why I look like I'm half-dead and why I disappeared," He paused for a moment. "I just got hurt." He said after a few moments not wanting to blame Rainbowdash for his current condition. He looked up from the ground at Applejack. "That answer your questions?"
"One more." She answered in her slow drawl. "Why did ya'll come to Sweet Apple back then."
"It's quite simple really." He answered slowly. "I was hungry."
"So ya decided to steal." She finished for him.
Wanderlust looked at her in anger. "What would you have done? I was half-starved and I didn't have any money. I didn't have a whole lot of options!"
Applejack stayed calm and spoke calmly. "Ya could've asked, not just taken."
This made Wanderlust bark out a bitter laugh. "I'm not a charity case." He said with bitterness in his voice.
"So ya would rather be a thief?" When he didn't answer she asked one more question. "Why did you want to work here?"
Although Wanderlust was still annoyed with Applejack's questions, he decided it wouldn't be of much use to lie. "I owe Fluttershy my life. She saved my life when I got hurt and disappeared for a week. She spent her time and energy trying to keep me alive and the only thing I have done is break her house and eat her food, so I can at least try to pay her back for what she's done."
Applejack didn't say anything to Wanderlust after he finished. After a few minutes of tense silence she stood up and left. Wanderlust looked after he when she left and looked down at the ground after she was gone from sight. He was surprised to see three red apples sitting on the ground next to him.
He smiled a sad smile as he thought, 'I guess I can be a charity case every once in a while.' He picked up one of the apples and took a bite out of it. He felt his smile grow as the sweet taste filled his mouth.
After he had finished the apples he walked back towards the small house and looked around trying to find any members of the Apple family. After finding nopony, he decided to just knock on the door.
Applejack opened the door. "Yes?"
"Are we still going to work?" Wanderlust asked.
Applejack shook her head. "We were gonna keep working but it's gonna rain." She said pointing a hoof towards a group of pegasi pulling clouds across the sky.
Wanderlust recognized the rainbow colored mane of Rainbowdash as she pulled a big mass of clouds behind her. He turned back to Applejack and was surprised to see her gone. The door was still open so he poked his head in. He didn't see her in the room and was still deciding about whether to go in the house or not when she came back with a small bag hanging from her mouth.
She placed the bag at Wanderlust's feet and Wanderlust looked at her in confusion. "Your pay for today." She said simply and pushed the bag forward with a hoof.
"Oh." Was all he said as he picked it up and opened the bag to look at the money. Sitting in the small bag was seven small coins and Wanderlust felt his spirits drop. 'All that work for seven bits.' He thought hopelessly. 'At this rate I will be here for an entire month just to fix the hole in Fluttershy's roof!' (Author's Note: I am assuming that a single bit is worth about one and a half U.S. dollars. So he just made about seventeen dollars.)
"O' course, that's for only half a day." Applejack said. "But, if ya worked a full day you would make twice that much."
When she said that, Wanderlust breathed a sigh of relief and smiled at the orange pony. "Thank you so much Applejack."
She brushed off his thank you. "Honest pay for honest work. No thanks needed."
With that Wanderlust took the small bag and put it into his saddle bag. He smiled one more time at Applejack and she said. "From now on, let's pretend that this is the first time ya'll have been to Sweet Apple Acres." She winked and shut the door.
Wanderlust felt his smile grow at how wonderful that pony was. Not only did she give him a job but she also was willing to forgive him for trying to steal from her. 'Today couldn't get much better.' He thought as he walked away from the farm. He heard the low rumble of thunder and looked up at the sky, which was now covered in dark clouds. "But it could get a whole lot worse." He muttered as he started trotting towards the town."
Home is Where Your Heart Is
Chapter 11: Who are you again?
A pair of solid ice blue eyes watched a gray pony as it galloped through the rain. The eyes followed his form as he pasted the alley it was hiding in. After a few moments, the pony had vanished from sight. The blue eyes blinked once and when they opened they were green.
In an instant a bright green light flashed in the alley and out walked a brown pony with a matching brown mane and a pair of light green eyes. With a quick look around the pony turned and galloped in the direction that the gray pony had gone in.
Quickly the pony found the gray pony entering a large building that looked strangely like it was made of food. The brown pony narrowed it's eyes and quickly entered the building. The pony looked around briefly and took quick note of all of the colorful food that was sitting in small piles around the room before finding his target sitting at a small table next to a window.
The gray pony was currently talking to a bright pink pony who was hopping in place while speaking. Seeing that his target wasn't alone, the brown pony turned and sat at a table near a corner of the room while being sure to keep an eye on the gray pony.
After a few minutes, he watched as the pink pony turned away from the gray one and started hopping away. The brown pony kept his gaze locked on the gray pony, who had pulled out a book to read, until everypony's attention was drawn to a loud gasp from the middle of the room.
The pink pony was staring directly at the brown pony and in a moment she was in front of him talking so quickly that it hurt his ears.
"Oh my gosh! A new pony in town! That's two new ponies in two weeks!" The pink pony squeaked with delight. "I was talking to my friend Wanderlust over there and when I was done talking to him I was going to go make some cupcakes but then I saw you! I bet you're wondering how I know you're new to town, right!? Well I know everypony in Ponyville and I didn't know you so you must be new! I'm so happy that there is a new pony in town! My name is Pinkie Pie, by the way."
The brown pony scooted backwards on his seat to try and get away from the pony who was practically screaming in his face. He tried to look past the pink pony to try and find the gray pony. Sure enough, he was still sitting at his table with his book.
"Oh! We need to throw you a party!" The pink pony screamed as she shoved her face into the brown pony's face. "Everypony needs a party and what's better than a welcome party!? Of course I just threw a welcome party last night but that's okay! We can throw you a party tonight! Oh, but my welcome parties are supposed to be a surprise!" The pony stopped talking for a moment and put a hoof to her mouth for a moment in thought. "I know!" She yelled making the brown pony cringe. "You never saw me. You didn't hear anything about a party. You will be surprised." She said a squeaky voice as she backed away into the shadows that did almost nothing to hide her bright pink coat.
The brown pony glared into the shadows after the completely visible pink pony. "Did it work?" She yelled and the brown pony just rolled his eyes as he turned his head back towards his target only to find him gone. He jumped off the chair and looked around the shop but found that the gray pony had disappeared. He made a very unponylike growl and stormed out of the store.
Looking up and down the street, he quickly realized that his target was lost. His eyes flashed bright green and he took off in a random direction to try and find the gray pony.
(Rewind!)
Wanderlust shook some of the water off of himself before he sat down at the table. He wasn't particularly hungry but he decided to wait out the rain in the sweet shop. He watched the rain for a few moments before Pinkie Pie walked up to him.
"Hi Wanderlust!" She said in her squeaky voice.
"Oh, hello Pinkie Pie." He said with a smile. "How are you today?" He asked conversationally.
"I feel super duper good!" She yelled. "I just made a fresh batch of extra-sugary cupcakes! Wanna eat one?"
"Maybe later." He laughed and noticed a brown pony walk into the store. The pony stared at him for a few seconds before turning and sitting at a small table in the corner. 'Probably waiting out the rain like me.' Wanderlust thought as he turned his attention back to Pinkie Pie. "Hey, I wanted to thank you for that party last night. It was fun."
Pinkie Pie smiled a big toothy grin. "I'll be sure to throw another real soon! Until then..." She said before pulling out a small piece of paper and handing it to Wanderlust.
Wanderlust opened it and saw that it was an invitation. "You are hereby invited to the next Pinkie Pie Mega Party!" Wanderlust read and then looked at Pinkie Pie. "Mega Party?" He asked.
Pinkie nodded. "Once a month I throw a Mega Party to celebrate!"
"Celebrate what?" He asked.
"Everything!" She squeaked and then hopped away.
Wanderlust smiled and slipped the invitation into his saddlebag before pulling out Elements of Harmony: A Reference Guide. 'Might as well finish it.' He thought as he flipped to the last few pages. He was about to start reading when he heard a loud gasp and turned to see Pinkie Pie staring at the brown pony that had come in earlier.
He watched as she ran over and started talking in a frenzied tone. He heard the words 'new', 'party', and 'cupcakes' before he turned his attention back to his book. "Poor pony." He muttered as he started reading the last few pages. The last few pages were just notes on the Elements and on their wielders.
After reading the two pages Wanderlust turned the page and saw one final sentence. "Kindness, Honesty, Generosity, Laughter, Loyalty and Magic are the six elements of harmony and the six ponies who wield them are bound together by the power of Friendship." He closed the book with a smile and slipped it into the saddlebag.
Pinkie Pie was still assaulting the brown pony with her words as Wanderlust turned and looked out the window. The rain had stopped so Wanderlust decided to leave. He silently stood up and walked out the door, but not before seeing Pinkie Pie slink away into the shadows in an attempt to hide herself.
He turned and trotted down the street towards Twilight's library. It wasn't long until Wanderlust ran into a white mare carrying a large purple umbrella, despite the rain having stopped a while ago.
"Hello Rarity." Wanderlust addressed the mare as she turned to him.
"Oh, hello Wanderlust." She said
"How are you today?" He asked politely.
"I am well, thank you." She smiled. "Where are you heading?" She asked Wanderlust.
"I was just going to head over to Twilight's library." He answered. "I have to return a book I borrowed from her."
"Oh, well I was actually going there myself."
"In that case, allow me to accompany you there." He said in an overly formal tone as he dipped his head slightly.
Rarity laughed at his tone. "Very well." She said as both ponies started trotting towards the library.
In a few minutes, both ponies stood in front of the door to the library and Wanderlust knocked on it lightly. After a few seconds it opened, revealing Twilight Sparkle with Owlicious sitting on her back.
"Hello Wanderlust, Rarity." Twilight smiled and took a step back to let the two ponies in.
"After you." Wanderlust said to Rarity and followed her in. "Hello Twilight." He smiled at her and then looked at Owlicious. "Cool owl."
"Who." The owl squawked before flapping it's wings and taking off in a random direction.
Wanderlust watched it flapped away for a moment before digging through his saddlebag. After a few seconds he pulled out the Elements of Harmony book. "Just wanted to return your book." He explained as Twilight grabbed the book with her magic.
"Well thank you for returning it." She said as she floated it back to it's rightful place. "Are you still reading that other book?"
"I haven't started it actually." He said and scratched the back of his head with one of his hooves.
"Oh okay. No rush." She said and turned to Rarity. "So what do you need? I know you don't read a whole lot of books but I did get some new fashion magazines that you would like."
"Maybe later." Rarity smiled and looked at Wanderlust for a moment with Twilight following her gaze. "I actually came to talk about him." She whispered to Twilight.
Wanderlust was looking at some of the books on the wall so he didn't notice the two mares staring at him. He just scanned through some of the books but his eyes widened when he found an atlas of the world. He felt a smile appear on his face as he grabbed the thick leather-bound book and pulled it off the shelf.
He placed the atlas on the ground and started flipping through the maps of Equestria and it's surrounding nations must as a foal would flip through the pages of a picture book. He smiled as he thought of himself exploring these lands and the ones beyond them.
Meanwhile, the two mares whispered words back and forth between each other.
"Remember last night when Fluttershy got all upset and Wanderlust just disappeared?" Rarity whispered.
"Yeah I remember. You were trying to get Fluttershy and Wanderlust together right?" Twilight whispered back.
Wanderlust's ear flicked as he heard his name whispered. He continued to look at the maps but now he was also listening to what they were whispering.
"Yeah well, considering that Wanderlust vanished and Fluttershy got all upset, isn't it kind of obvious that something happened between them?" Rarity asked still being sure to whisper.
"Yeah, but should we do anything?" Twilight asked.
"I don't know. I mean it's not really our business what happens between them." She answered.
"But she's our friend." Twilight whispered.
"But that doesn't mean anything. I already tried to put them together and look how that turned out."
Wanderlust listened in silence. He swallowed past the lump in his throat and turned the page. He looked at a detailed map of Equestria and started reading over the names of the cities before his eyes stopped at a small town. He smiled as he read the word Ponyville at least a dozen times before putting a hoof over the small image of a house used to represent the town.
"I just want to know why Wanderlust would make Fluttershy cry." Twilight whispered.
"It's quite simple really." Wanderlust spoke before he could stop himself. "There is no future between the two of us."
Both mares gave a start when they realized that he had heard everything they had said. After a moment Wanderlust turned around and looked at the two ponies who were both staring at the ground in shame. He just shook his head and turned his attention back to the book.
"Why?" Rarity asked.
"Why what?"
"Why would there be no future between the two of you?" Rarity asked, the curiosity getting the better of her.
"Because I'm not staying in this town." He answered simply. He flipped the page and pushed the book in the direction of the two mares. On the page was a map of the world. "I'm not staying in any one place until I have explored the whole world."
Both mares looked between the map and the compass on Wanderlust's flank.
"You know it's funny how some of our names match us so perfectly." Wanderlust said after a moment. "Wanderlust...how appropriate." He laughed bitterly.
"You don't sound very happy about that." Twilight commented.
Wanderlust was silent as he closed the atlas and put it back on it's shelf. "Just because I'm good at something doesn't mean I always like it." He said after a few moments. "I mean I love exploring new places but I do wish that I had someplace that I could stay in but I can't stay here."
"Why not?" Both mares asked.
"That is a secret." He yawned.
Both ponies looked at him in disbelief.
"Well, I have to get going?" Wanderlust said as he walked to the door. He wished both mares a nice day and walked out.
As soon as he was gone Rarity turned to Twilight. "What do you think his secret is?" She asked.
"I have no clue but I'm going to find out."
Wanderlust yawned as he stepped onto the street. He trotted down the street in some random direction.
"And now I'm bored." He muttered as he tried to think of something to occupy his time.
He didn't have long to think as something crashed into the back of his head.
Everything had a fuzzy edge to it as Wanderlust's head spun violently. "Ow..." He grunted as his eyes started seeing solid shapes again. He stood up shakily and looked over to see a small blue scooter with a red wagon attached to it. Raising an eyebrow he looked around for the owner of the scooter.
After a moment he found three young fillies lying in a small pile. The three fillies were white, orange and yellow with varied colored manes. He trotted over to them and experimentally poked the white one in the side.
This elicited a squeak from the white filly and soon all three fillies opened their eyes. "Are you fillies okay?" Wanderlust asked as they untangled themselves from each other and stood up.
They nodded solemnly. Wanderlust looked at the fillies carefully for a few moments checking for injury but, aside from a few scrapes and possibly a bruise or two, they were fine.
"Well that's a relief." Wanderlust muttered as he checked himself for any injury. Despite a lump on the back of his head, Wanderlust couldn't find any real injuries.
"We're sorry." All three of the fillies apologized to Wanderlust.
Wanderlust just smiled and patted the orange filly on the head. "No harm, no foul." (Author note: Get the joke please.) He laughed. "As long as you are all okay, I can't be angry."
This elicited a smile from the fillies. "Are you okay though?" Asked the white filly.
"I'm positive." He answered.
"Are you sure?" She persisted.
Wanderlust took a step back inadvertently. "Yes, I'm sure."
"Are you sure?" All three asked in unison. "Because if you are hurt then we can be CUTIE MARK DOCTORS!" They screamed.
Wanderlust took several more steps back. "I'm okay really!"
"Oh..." All three said sadly.
"So um...why exactly do you want to be doctors?" He asked trying to keep them happy.
He succeeded as all three immediately perked back up. "We don't want to be doctors, we just want to know if we can!"
"Why?"
"We are the cutie mark crusaders!" Shouted the three in unison making Wanderlust wince.
"What does that mean?" He asked.
"We're trying to find out what our cutie marks are." The orange filly said.
"Really? So how's that going?" He asked.
"Not so well." The white filly answered sadly.
"Yeah, we aren't any closer to finding out what out special talents are." The orange filly added.
"Well how long have you been at it?" Wanderlust asked.
"'Bout a year." The yellow filly answered.
"That's nothing! I didn't get my cutie mark until I was out of school."
"Really!?" All three fillies asked.
"Uh huh. Thought I was going to be a blank flank for life but everything comes with time. Don't be discouraged." He smiled.
"Cool!" The orange filly flapped her little wings in excitement.
Wanderlust laughed as the three fillies hopped around in joy. "I gotta go now. Goodbye Cutie Mark Crusaders." He said and saluted them.
He smiled as they saluted him back. "Bye!" They said in unison as they trotted back over to their scooter and overturned wagon.
Wanderlust just turned away and almost crashed into a brown unicorn with green eyes. The brown pony looked at him with such intensity that Wanderlust took a step back.
"Um...Can I help you?" Wanderlust asked nervously.
The pony just smiled a cruel smile as it's horn flashed with a green aura. Wanderlust felt something slip away from him and his eyes glazed over. He stood there, still as a statue, as the brown pony turned and trotted away.
Fluttershy walked through the town with her head down. The events of last night were still fresh in her mind as she wandered aimlessly around town. She had hoped that a walk around town would help get her mind off things but, unfortunately, her thoughts remained only on Wanderlust.
'What did I do wrong?' 'Does he hate me now?' 'I can't believe I tried to do that.' 'I barely know him.' 'He seemed so sweet so why...' Dozens of thoughts like these bounced around her head so quickly that she almost didn't notice the pony standing a foot in front of her.
"Eeek!" She squeaked as she quickly back peddled to avoid crashing into the pony. "I-I'm s-sorry..." She raised her head to look at the pony and felt her breath catch in her throat as she looked at Wanderlust.
She stood there with held-breath as her face quickly filled with blood as her crush/rejecter stared at her.
Wanderlust stared at Fluttershy with no emotion evident on his face as he tilted his head to get a better look at the yellow mare standing in front of him. Did Wanderlust know this mare? He couldn't seem to remember why but Wanderlust knew that he had met her before. His thoughts felt sluggish as he processed the scared and embarrassed look that the mare was giving him.
Wanderlust stared at her for so long and with so little emotion that she stopped feeling embarrassed and actually started feeling concerned despite her feelings. "Wanderlust? A-Are you okay?" She asked.
'Wanderlust?' He thought. 'That's my name...right?'
When his expression didn't change, Fluttershy actually started to panic a little. 'Maybe he's sick?' She thought and experimentally put a hoof on his forehead to check but he didn't feel hot or feverish. "Are you okay?" She repeated.
'Why does this mare keep asking that? Who is she?' He thought. "Who are you?" He asked slowly as if his own words would confuse him.
"W-Wanderlust? It's m-me! F-Fluttershy, remember?" She said with her words coming out quick and panicked.
As soon as he heard his name his head cleared. "Of course I remember." He said with the first hint of emotion that he showed towards Fluttershy all day. "Why wouldn't I remember?" He asked incrediously. But the thing was, he hadn't remembered. He hadn't remember who Fluttershy was and he had trouble keeping his own name straight. Even now, he could feel the dense fog slowly settling back over his mind.
"B-But..." Fluttershy started. "Y-You asked who I was."
"Ha! I was just kidding." He smiled even as his mind turned sluggish again.
"W-Well. Okay I guess..." Fluttershy said, lightly kicking at the dirt. She looked up and saw that his face was, once again, devoid of any emotion. "Wanderlust?"
He just stared at her again. 'Who is this again?' He thought as his mind tried to fight through the fog and failing.
Fluttershy just sighed and gently, but firmly turned Wanderlust around. He didn't resist her turning him but he also didn't help her.
'What is she doing?' He thought groggily.
"Let's go see Twilight." Fluttershy said with concern evident in her voice.
'Who's Twilight?' He thought desperately searching for the answer. None the less, he started to silently follow the yellow mare as she led him back to the library that he left sometime before.
Fluttershy knocked gently on the door and within a few seconds a preoccupied looking Twilight opened the door.
"Hello Fluttershy." Twilight said and then shifted her gaze to Wanderlust in surprise. "Welcome back Wanderlust." She said and looked between the two in confusion. 'Didn't Wanderlust just say that he couldn't be with Fluttershy?' She thought and stepped back to allow them entrance.
Fluttershy walked inside while Wanderlust just stood in his place silently.
"Are you coming in?" Twilight asked.
"I don't know." He answered blankly.
"What do you mean 'I don't know'?" Twilight asked. "Are you coming in or not?"
"Umm..." Fluttershy cut in. "Wanderlust, please come inside."
"Okay." Wanderlust answered and walked in.
"Is he okay?" Twilight asked.
"I-I don't know." Fluttershy admitted. "He was just standing in the street doing nothing."
Twilight listened to her while she examined Wanderlust. "He doesn't look hurt. I mean not any more hurt than he did earlier." She commented as she looked at his body. After a moment she looked at his face and saw him staring at nothing with his eyes glazed over. 'That looks familiar.' She thought to herself.
Fluttershy walked over to Twilight. "I-Is he okay?"
"Who's he?" Wanderlust asked as he snapped back into focus.
"You." Twilight and Fluttershy both said in frustration.
"Well, I'm fine." He said. "Why wouldn't I be?"
"Maybe because you were as intelligent as a rock a moment ago." Twilight said in annoyance.
"Well doesn't that make me feel special." He said as he rubbed his temple with a hoof. "I do feel kind of slow today. That weird pony..." He muttered.
"W-What pony?" Fluttershy asked quickly.
"Some brown unicorn. I think he did something to me." He said.
Some part of Fluttershy was relieved that he had said "he" and not "she" although the rest of her told that part of her to shut up.
Meanwhile Twilight questioned Wanderlust. "What did this unicorn do?"
"I don't know really. All I know is his horn flashed green for a second and then...I can't remember."
"What did he look like?" She asked.
"Brown mane, brown coat, horn, green eyes..." He listed the features. "I don't think I saw his cutie mark though."
She looked at Fluttershy questionally. She just shrugged. "I didn't see any brown unicorn." She said simply.
Twilight nodded and looked back at Wanderlust only to find his eyes glazed over again. She was about to grunt in frustration when a thought occurred to her. 'He looks just Shining did...' She thought in amusement. Her eyes widened in shock and she quickly grabbed the saddlebag off Wanderlust's back. She dug through it a moment before pulling out a large book.
Fluttershy walked over to her. "What is that?" She asked and gasped when she saw the changeling on the cover. The two mares shared a look before Twilight opened the book.
She quickly read through the Table of Contents and found a chapter titled 'Stolen Love'. Twilight swallowed as she flipped to the page specified. She began to read slowly.
"As reviewed in previous chapters, Love is the essence of all ponies. Love, and sometimes the lack of it, is the source of all emotion and without love, there is nothing. Ponies without love lose their will to live and, if not taken care of, will simply waste away into nothing. This is the danger of changelings. By stealing love from ponies, they steal their very lives. In this chapter, you will learn the symptoms of a love-deficient pony and the dangers of these symptoms."
Twilight went on to read the symptoms of, as the book called it, Love-Deprivation. There were three stages to Love-Deprivation and three different sets of symptoms for each.
Stage one was just slight grogginess and irritability. The symptoms of stage one disappeared after about a week or so and most ponies would not notice these symptoms to begin with.
Stage two was more severe. Ponies who had stage two Love-Deprivation were apparently described as being in a hazy state of mind with brief moments of lucidity. Many ponies in stage two apparently lost the drive to perform most activities including eating, sleeping, relieving themselves and many other basic necessities. Ponies in stage two are very open to suggestion and can be kept safe as long as there is a pony nearby who is watching out for them and tells them what to do. As the amount of time since the feeding increased, so would the times of lucidity and the confusion would slowly lessen. Full recovery was stated in about a month.
Twilight didn't even have to read stage three to know what happened.
"According to the book, we have two very big problems." Twilight said and turned to look at Fluttershy.
"What problems are those?" Wanderlust asked, once again lucid.
"Well..." Twilight started. "Problem one. You have stage two Love-Deprivation."
"What is that some kind of disease?" He asked bored.
"More like a deficiency." She answered and looked at Wanderlust. She face-hoofed when she saw the blank look on his face again. "Problem two." She grumbled. "Apparently Wanderlust is being targeted by a changeling."
Fluttershy knew that was the truth but hearing it said out loud made feel sick. "W-What can we do?" Fluttershy asked with her voice trembling.
"Well I'm going to get a message to the princess. See what she thinks we should do." She said and then looked at Fluttershy sadly. "I know about what happened last night Fluttershy, but in the meantime could you please keep an eye on Wanderlust?" She wished that she could pull the words back as soon as she said them when she saw the look of pain on Fluttershy's face. "On second thought-"
Fluttershy just shook her slowly. "No. I...I can watch him." She said with a sad smile.
"Okay..." Twilight said hesitantly and turned. "Spike!" She called.
"What?" Came a groggy shout from another room.
"Take a letter please!" She called and walked upstairs where Spike was undoubtedly just rolling out of bed.
Fluttershy looked at Wanderlust sadly as he stared back blankly. "Are you okay?" She asked him, although not expecting an answer.
To her surprise, he blinked and his eyes focused on her. "Shouldn't I be asking you that question?" He asked. "After last night..." He trailed off and looked at the ground.
"It's okay..." Fluttershy said sadly. "It's my own fault. I mean I like you but that doesn't mean you like me back."
Wanderlust looked up from the ground at her. "You're wrong." He said simply making her look at him in shock. "I do like you but that doesn't mean I can be with you."
"What?" She squeaked and took a step forward. "B-But isn't that how it works? T-Two ponies l-like each other and then..."
"Things are never that simple." He said sadly.
"W-Why can't they be?" Fluttershy asked with her eyes filled with pain and just a small bit of hope.
"I'm going stupid again..." Wanderlust grunted and put a hoof to his forehead. "Tell you what. If I ever recover from this, I'll tell you."
Fluttershy blinked a few times and looked into his now blank eyes. Her shoulders slumped and she sighed sadly.
A few minutes later, Twilight walked back into the room. Fluttershy looked at Twilight expectantly. "The Princess is going to send a few guards to Ponyville that are apparently trained to spot and deal with changelings and a potion that will apparently heal Wanderlust's current "condition"." She said indicating his glazed over eyes. "Until then, she said to just keep an eye on him and make sure that he has no more run-ins with any changelings."
Fluttershy looked at Wanderlust with worry as he stared at nothing. 'Is he even breathing?' Fluttershy thought idly. She started to panic 'IS HE EVEN BREATHING!' She screamed in her head but immediately calmed when she saw his chest rise slightly.
"Fluttershy." Twilight said, getting her friend's attention. "You have to be really careful. If for any reason, Wanderlust loses more love and goes into stage three, the potion will be useless."
"So he'll be stuck as an uncaring statue forever?" Spike asked as he walked downstairs.
Fluttershy laughed nervously for a moment before she fainted.
Twilight just glared at the baby dragon. She was about to scold him when a loud snoring came from behind her.
Turning around, she saw that Wanderlust was still standing in the same place that he had been before but this time his eyes were closed and he was snoring loudly.
"Great." Twilight said and put a hoof to her forehead. "Now I have two unconscious ponies to deal with."
Home is Where Your Heart Is
When the gray pony arrived at the bottom of the stairs he quickly looked around until he found the door. Currently the door was open and filling the frame was the yellow pony, Fluttershy, and the strange rainbow maned pony he had met before all this happened.
He heard the rainbow maned pony talking very quickly not giving Fluttershy any time to respond and he decided to simply listen for a moment.
"I lost him during the big storm and I've searched all over Ponyville and Cloudsdale but I haven't been able to find him anywhere!" The pony rambled on.
"Yes well.." Fluttershy started but she was quickly cut off as the other pony continued.
"I mean he helped us all out with that giant storm he made and then he fell! Just rolled right off the cloud and I have no idea where he is or even if he's ok!" She continued. With all her attention focused on Fluttershy, she didn't even notice that the pony she was looking for stood no more than five feet away from her. "Bit seriously that storm was awesome wasn't it!? Extreme weather made in the blink of an eye! It was awesome!"
"I'm sure it was but ..." Fluttershy started helplessly but was quickly cut off again.
"Anyways, if you see him please tell me! Remember he looks like this!" She continued pointing at a piece of paper lying on the ground in front of her.
Fluttershy looked down at it and couldn't help but smile at her friend's childish drawing. The only real features that she could see in the picture was the horn sticking out of his deformed looking forehead and the two chicken looking wings stuck in his sides, which looked strangely like someone had stuffed too much stuffing into a doll.
"Is that suppossed to be me?" Came a deep voice from behind Fluttershy and both female ponies turned to see the large gray pony standing behind Fluttershy. He seemed to be staring directly at the drawing and with such focus Fluttershy was sure it would catch fire. After a moment he looked up and asked Fluttershy, "Do I really look like that?"
This made Fluttershy giggle as Rainbowdash simply stood there with her mouth hanging open staring at the gray pony standing before her. Her eyes took in every injury, from the dozens of scrapes and bruises, the bandaged wing and the large lump that sat to the right of his horn half hidden under his dark gray mane.
"What...what are you doing here?" Rainbowdash asked the pony. Fluttershy stopped giggling and looked between the two of them.
"Well," he began, turning his attention to the rainbow pony. "Apparently I fell off a cloud and crashed through Fluttershy's roof." He said pointing at the gaping hole in the ceiling. "Apparently Fluttershy has been taking care of me while I was...out of commission."
Fluttershy looked embarrassed with a light pink blush settling on her cheeks and she poked at the floor with her hoof. "Well the doctor did more to help you than I did and Zecora gave me something to dull your pain... So I didn't really do much."
"Don't be modest! You saved my life." He said and smiled sweetly. Rainbowdash felt like she was intruding on something and wasn't quite sure whether to stay or to go. He made the decision for her as he looked at her. "Now I don't think we've been properly introduced. My name is Wanderlust." He said extending his hoof towards her.
"Rainbowdash." She said simply as she shook his hoof.
Fluttershy looked at him silently. 'Wanderlust... What a nice name.' She thought to herself and looked back to see his cutie mark. Sitting on his flank there was a simple gold compass that seemed so real. She almost wanted to touch it, just to make sure.
Wanderlust almost jumped as he felt something poke into his side and quickly turning his head he saw Fluttershy sitting there with her hoof placed over his cutie mark. So as to not make a big deal out of it, Wanderlust simply cleared his throat.
As if someone had slapped her back into reality Fluttershy looked at her hoof and quickly pulled it away as she relized what she was doing. Her face quickly turned bright red as she quickly squeaked out a sorry.
"Ummm... Fluttershy..." This was all he had time to say before she cut him off.
"Who's thirsty?" She asked with a shaky voice. Both other ponies opened their mouths to say no but she quickly turned and ran into the room that Wanderlust assumed was the kitchen. Behind Wanderlust came a loud snort quickly followed by laughter as Rainbowdash fell onto her back laughing.
Wanderlust simply watched the doorway to the kitchen as Rainbowdash laughed from the ground. After a few more moments Rainbowdash stopped laughing and walked inside waiting for her friend to come back. Shrugging, Wanderlust closed the door and walked around the living room picking things up and putting them back down.
After a few moments he heard Rainbowdash sigh and look at him. "So what are you doing in Ponyville anyways?" She asked him.
"Exploring." He said simply and picked up a small jar of yellow liquid with small green specks floating in it. On the label it said simply 'Painkiller.' Opening it, Wanderlust smelled the contents and his nose filled with the smell of sugar and mint. The smell brought back a blurry memory of something sweet being poured into his mouth while he was all woozy. 'Well that would explain the dream...' He thought as he replaced the lid and placed it back.
"Just exploring huh?" He heard the pony say. "Then why were you in the clouds?"
"I was trying to think of where to go next. Plus I kinda passed out from hunger..." He mumbled.
Rainbowdash sat up and looked at him carefully. 'Hunger?' She thought. 'He was floating right above Sweet Apple Acres. Why didn't he just buy some apples from Applejack?' Looking at him closely she noticed for the first time that his ribs poked out in a disturbing way that told her he was definitely underweight. She also noticed that his face looken a little shrunken and she could see the bones standing out in his face. "Why didn't you just buy sone food?" She asked.
"I don't have any money." He said matter-of-factly. "You don't make much money when you simply wander around Equestria."
She was about to ask him more questions when he suddenly turned and walked into Fluttershy's kitchen leaving Rainbowdash alone in the living room.
Wanderlust looked around the kitchen for a moment before finding Fluttershy simply staring at the fridge. "Fluttershy? Are you ok?" He asked, quietly coming up behind her.
He saw a slight shake of the head which he assumed to be a nod. They stood there for a few more moments but Fluttershy didn't move anymore.
After a moment he turned and walked back into the living room. A minute later Fluttershy emerged from the kitchen as well carrying a tray on her back on which stood three small bottles of apple juice. Looking around she saw only Wanderlust walking around examining her things.
Wanderlust looked away from a small wood carved bird that sat above her fireplace and looked over at Fluttershy. In a small voice Fluttershy asked, "Where did Rainbowdash go?"
"She said she had to go clear the skies over Ponyville." He said and walked over to Fluttershy carefully lifting the tray off her back and placing it on a table. Looking at Fluttershy, Wanderlust noticed that she was more at ease then she had been earlier but she still seemed to be avoiding looking him directly in the eyes.
Shrugging, Wanderlust turned and started drinking his apple juice. After a moment he thought of something and stopped drinking. He turned to Fluttershy. "Hey, when I crashed through your roof...Did you happen to find a satchel on me?" He asked.
She seemed surprised by the question. After a few moments she answered hesitantly. "Y-yes...You had a satchel when I found you on the floor..." She seemed very uncomfortable and Wanderlust felt a growing sense of dread.
"Well where is it?" He asked, slightly harsher than he meant to.
She didn't answer for a long time and when she did, it was no more than a squeak. "I lost it..." She was silent for a moment more. "In the Everfree forest...
It felt as if all the warmth had left Wanderlust as she said those words. His body felt strangely hollow and he felt chills run along his back. Without another word Wanderlust felt his legs give out and the floor rushed up to meet him.
Fluttershy rushed over to Wanderlust's side as he collapsed on the floor. Quickly looking him over Fluttershy noticed that Wanderlust hadn't fainted, he had simply collapsed. Fluttershy looked at him in worry as he simply stared straight ahead. He seemed calm and unharmed but Fluttershy still worried.
While Fluttershy watched him, Wanderlust simply stared straight ahead at nothing. He no longer wanted to move. Everything that Wanderlust had was in that satchel. Everything that he had discovered on his journey was in that leather bag along with all of his maps and his journals. Everything that Wanderlust was, was in that satchel. Without it, he felt hollow as if part of his soul had been lost right along with his satchel.
After a moment he looked up at Fluttershy and asked in an even tone, "Where exactly did you lose it?"
Fluttershy was taken aback by the look in his eyes. Earlier his eyes had been a light blue that was so like the clear skies over her town, but now his eyes seemed a dull blue that could best be compared to ice, both in color and warmth. Fluttershy shivered as if the eyes were actually sucking the warmth from her body. "I t-told y-you, in the E-Everfree forest.." She stuttered out.
"I asked where you lost it." He continued cooly. "I need to know exactly where you lost it and for that matter, why did you have it in the first place!?" His tone gradually rose until he was pratically shouting at her.
Fluttershy flinched at the volume of his voice and she could feel tears form in her eyes. Noticing this, Wanderlust felt his anger slowly dissipate. He sighed and looked at the ground. When he finally lifted his eyes back up to Fluttershy, all of the anger had vanished and his eyes were that soft sky blue color again.
"I'm sorry Fluttershy. I know you didn't intentionally lose it..." He started softly. "But I need to know what happened to my satchel. My whole life is in that bag and I just don't want it to simply be gone."
Fluttershy was silent for a few moments as she tried to keep the tears from flowing. After a moment more her eyes dried and she took a shaky breath and began. "After you crashed through my roof I spent an entire night trying to stop you from bleeding." She stopped and took another shaky breath and continued, somehow without a single stutter despite the nervousness that was easily identified in her body language. "I had a doctor come over after the rain stopped and he set your wing and he said that you would be fine but..." At this point she started shivering as if she were cold. "When I was taking care of you...you would start screaming and you would gnash your teeth like...like something was attacking you!"
Wanderlust was shocked! He didn't remember any of this. He remembered waking up a few times but even those memories seemed fuzzy and distant.
"On maybe the second day...after one of your 'fits,'" she clenched her teeth to keep from flinching at the memory and continued. "I rushed out of the house to go visit my friend Zecura. I wanted to get you some kind of painkiller or sleep potion or..or something, anything to help you! But...when I went to leave I tried to grab my saddlebag," she said gesturing over to a simple leather bag with a pink butterfly clip. "But I grabbed your bag by mistake...and then I lost it." With her last words she looked down at the ground.
Fluttershy and Wanderlust were silent for a long time after this, Fluttershy too sad to move or speak and Wanderlust too tired and disheartened to move from the place where he had collapsed. The silence abruptly came to an end as a loud squeaking was heard coming from behind Fluttershy. Fluttershy turned and found a small white rabbit to be the source of the squeeking. "Oh..hello Angel Bunny." Fluttershy adressed her pet. "Do you need something."
The rabbit stood there for a moment taking in the scene before him. His master looked like she was about to injured pony was awake. There was no food that the rabbit could see. That seemed to be the most important thing to the rabbit at the moment as his tiny stomach let out a rather beast-like growl. This elicited a small giggle from his owner and she swept him up with one of her wings and placed him on her back.
"Let's get you something to eat." She said looking at her pet before turning to look at Wanderlust with a sad look. "Would...would you like something to eat?"
Wanderlust opened his mouth quickly and was about to reply 'yes' but something stopped him. He had been in this pony's house for who knows how long getting taken care of by her and, although some could argue that it wasn't his fault for having been unconscious most of the time, he had done nothing for her; nothing good anyways. What he had done was smash through her roof, made her run into the Everfree forest (he assumed that this Zacura she was talking about lived there) and he had made this young mare spend hours tending to his injuries. Not to mention that she would have had to pay the doctor to fix his wing. Wanderlust knew he couldn't take anything more from her.
Rising slowly from his place on the floor, Wanderlust did his best to hide the shakiness of his legs. Once he had all of his hooves back under him he looked at Fluttershy and simply said "No." in as kind a fashion as he could. "I-I think I should get going actually. Thank you for everything Fluttershy." Looking up at the ceiling he could see the sky through two holes he made. "I'll come back and fix that as soon as I can." With that said he started towards the door.
Fluttershy started panicking as she watched Wanderlust start heading for the door. Despite hardly knowing this pony and despite what just happened between the two, she didn't want him to leave. "A-Are you sure..that you don't want to stay for dinner?" She asked feeling suddenly incredibly nervous.
Wanderlust couldn't lie, every part of him was telling him to stay except for a small nagging voice at the back of his head telling him to go. For once, the small voice was too annoying to ignore. "I would love to...but I really have to get going." He lied knowing that he had absolutely nowhere he could go.
"Oh...well then," she replied sadly. "At least let me make you something to go." Before he had a chance to say anything she dashed off into the kitchen. Sighing Wanderlust stopped walking and sat down on the floor.
A few minutes later Fluttershy walked out, grabbed her saddle bag and walked back into the kitchen. Wanderlust blinked in surprise and stood and walked into the kitchen.
What he saw almost made him cry for joy and weep in sadness. Everywhere Wanderlust looked he saw food:GLORIOUS FOOD! He saw large bowls of salad, at least a dozen sandwiches and a small crate filled with apples. And he knew that he wouldn't be able to bring himself to take any of it. He looked over and saw Fluttershy trying to shove a shiny red apple into her already overstuffed saddlebag.
"Fluttershy...What are you doing?" He asked in despair.
She froze and looked back over at him. "Umm..j-just making you a snack to go?" Her answer sounded more like a question as if she wasn't entirely sure what she was doing. After another attempt at forcing the apple into the bag, she gave up and dragged the bag over to him.
"I can't take all this..." He said quietly.
"W-Why not?" Fluttershy asked and bit her lip lightly.
'Come up with a good lie...THINK!' Wanderlust thought before answering lamely. "I'm not that hungry."
Fluttershy just looked annoyed at this answer. "Really? You're not hungry?"
"Nope." He answered. Almost immediately following this is stomach growled and he tried to cover it with with a loud cough.
"Why don't...you just keep it? You know for when you do get hungry." She said and both of the ponies found themselves trying not to laugh. Fluttershy once again pushed the bag towards Wanderlust and he knew that he had to take it.
Wanderlust walked out the front door straining under the weight of all of the food he was now carrying with Fluttershy following behind him. "Thank you Fluttershy, for everything." With that he turned and started walking away.
"Wait!" She called and ran inside. Wanderlust just stood there waiting for her. A few moments later she emerged carrying a jar of yellow liquid and quickly ran up to Wanderlust and placed it in front of him.
He recognized it as the painkiller that he had seen before. "Thank you Fluttershy." He said and, on a strange impulse, hugged the mare who had given him so much.
She let out a loud squeak and was too shocked to move. After a moment he let her go, turned and walked away. She watched as he shrunk into the distance and tried to hold onto the heat from his hug.
Home is Where Your Heart Is
I regret to inform you that Home Is Where Your Heart Is will be cancelled. I had fun writing this story but somewhere along the line it transformed into something I didn't like. I had one vision for this story but when I went back to read it, I found that this was not a story I enjoyed reading back to myself. I am truly sorry to anyone who wishes to see this story completed. I may remake this story sometime in the not so distant future but if I do it will be from the beginning and quite possibly with a different main character.
Thank you for enjoying/hating my story and, once again, I apologize.