The Silent Guardian

Chapters

Ch. 3. Learning on a Whiff.
Ch 4. Another flying pie, this time not a pony.
Ch 5. Apples!
Ch 6. Bucking
Ch 7. A vacuum cleaner and a water ballad.
Ch 8. Dining at the Apples.
Ch 9. Sleeping at the Apples.
Ch 10. Two angry mares.
Ch 11. Two mares who ran away.
Ch 12. Two muddy fillies.
Ch 13. What timberwolves?
Ch 14. Those timberwolves.
Ch 15. What dead timberwolves?
Ch 16. Meeting Fluttershy.
Ch 17. Not meeting mr. Bear.
Ch 19. Surprise!
Ch 20. A gator on my face.
Ch 21. Mac's evil eye.
Ch 22. A bag of bits.
Ch 23. An owl on my head.
Ch 24. Getting my hair chopped.
Ch 25. Meeting the barber.
Ch 26. Napping in a tree.
Ch 27. A mare in the kitchen.
Ch 28. A happy sigh.
Ch 29. Blue Cow Coffee
Ch 30. A promise to three little fillies.
Ch 31. A journey to Canterlot.
Ch 32. A tilted perspective.
Ch. 33 Causing chaos!
Ch. 34. Another pink problem.
Ch. 35 Sharing secrets.
Ch 36. A blushing record.
Ch. 37. Avoiding seduction.
Ch 38. Conversing with a night princess.
Ch. 39 A unexpected twist.
Ch. 1 A flying Pie.
Ch. 2 Meeting something colored.
Ch 18. The endless trash inside mister Bears home.

Ch. 3. Learning on a Whiff.

Chapter 3. Learning on a Whiff.

A nurse wakes me and shoves a piece of paper in my face and says. “Please sign this and you’re free to leave.” She says in the most whiniest way one can imagine.

“Is it noon already?” I say grouchily as I look at the clipboard lying on my chest.

“Yes, it is. You payment has been received from Miss. Dash and so you are free to go.” The whiney voice goes again. Damn that’s annoying.

“Yeah, thanks.” I say to her, very ironical. She walks out of the door and leaves me to be. I look at the clipboard I was given. I only need to write my signature on the dotted line, that shouldn’t be too hard.

After about 20 minutes of fiddling with my hooves to try and get the pencil to stay in my hoof. How do they hold even anything in the show. It is annoying how they make stuff that looks like it’s made for humans, but that the things are somehow used by humans. Maybe something in my saddleback that are standing in the corner is useful.

After digging through the yodeling sausages and the other crap that Discord stuffed in it I find nothing that was of use. Just some food and sacs of goo. But then I find something useful, some pliers.

I try, like an idiot, to grab the pencil with the comically large pliers. Let’s just say that pencils weren’t made to be grabbed by pliers. So after I wasted another 10 minutes on doing something useless I try something else. Namely I just grabbed the pencil with my mouth and somehow that worked (I’m still baffled). After I made a simple signature up I put the clipboard down an I call the whiny voice nurse. She picks the paper up and walks away. Thank god (Celestia?) that she didn’t say anything. I think I’m going to name her squeaky voice nurse.

So I sag back into the bed and go back to reading some of the Daring Do books, there only were 2 parts and the rest of the books were boring child stories.

So I do what I did a lot at home, nothing. Until, after about half an hour, a rainbow colored mare enters the room. “Yeesh, and I thought I was lazy. You’re still in bed at, ” she looks at the clock in the corner, “ 2 o’clock in the morning. Get off your lazy flank and find a job to pay me those bits back.” Rainbow says to me while poking me in the chest.

“Is it that late already,” I say while looking at my ‘wristwatch’ on my hoof, “I

must’ve forgotten the time. Let’s go.” I say to her while I slip out of the bed and trot towards the door, leaving the mare staring at me.

“Hey, Wings. Wait for me!” Rainbow shouts and bolts after me.

As I walk out of the door and look into the blinding sun and the ‘sky-line’ of Ponyville a thought strikes me, that Ponyville look beautiful. You have the outer rings of the town which consist of small low built house and a few small shops from what I can tell. There are not too many ponies there, but I can see more from here in the town center. Then I hear a voice yell: “Wings, hey, wait for me.” I look back and I realized that I have walked quite the bit from the hospital.

“Wings?” I question myself as Rainbow makes an emergency stop and yells at me. “Why did you leave all of the sudden. I pay for you and you just leave me standing there. You go and apologize right now or else mister.” Rainbow growls at me.

“Wow. I’m sorry. I just kind of forgot that I was walking over here.” I say to Rainbow, trying to apologize.

“You forgot that you were walking? You aren’t very bright, are you?” Rainbow asks me, tilting her head.

“I have my moments. And why did you call me Wings?” I say to her with a grin.

“You really are stupid, aren’t you. Just look at your wings. They’re huge, like almost alicorn big.” Rainbow says while pointing at my overly large wings.

“Yeah, they are quite big. Anyway, sorry for walking away from you. I didn’t meant to do that. I don’t always pay attention to things.” I say to her, trying to think of more excuses.

“I can see. Any way you can crash at my place for some time and no, this isn’t an invitation to my bed, so get your mind out of the gutter.” Rainbow says to me while flapping a bit of the ground.

And now I have to fly for the first time. Great. I hope the ground is soft here. Rainbow flies up a bit towards a bit more solid looking cloud. “Come on. Follow me. You can fly with those things, right?”

“It’s more difficult that you think, heh, heh.” I grin stupidly at her. “I think I’ll manage.”

She sighs and flies higher. “Get your flank up here!” She flies to her cloud-home

and out of my sight.

And now I have to fly, great. I sigh and flap my wings a bit. And, surprise, I float a bit over the ground. I flap a bit harder, and hey I’m a bit higher. So I make sure that my saddlebags are secure on my back (I’m so stupid to forget them, Discord gave them to me) and flap more, right after Rainbow.

I slowly flap right to her front door and flop down on her front step. I notice she is already inside and waiting for me.

“Wow, it didn’t took you all day. Those big wings must be good for something. ” Rainbow said to me while grabbing some food from the table.

“Well I did just came from the hospital, so that should count. Right?” I say to her while walking through the cloud door. (Everything here is sooo soft.)

“Fine. So do you want something to eat. The hospital food is close to indigestible.” She says to me from under the counter.

“Sure. What do you had in mind?” I say to Rainbow while looking at the stuff she was putting on the counter.

“I was thinking of making some soup. You can never go wrong with soup. And it’s easy to make.” Rainbow says to me from behind the large steel pan she grabbed with… her mouth?

“Let me help out too.” I say to her while trying to grab some stuff with my mouth. It just falls out of my mouth.

“Nah, let me do it. It will be a lot better, trust me. You can just go crash on the couch or something.” Rainbow said while lifting the heavy looking pan onto the furnace with her mouth.

“Fine.” I grumble to her, annoyed to be seen as useless. I was that on Earth too, but that isn’t related.

So I walk into the next room and sit on the comfy looking cloud couch. This is so comfy, I could use this is as a bed. And guess what, I fell asleep. So the darkness got me again. Damn you, seducing sleep.

Ch 4. Another flying pie, this time not a pony.

Chapter 4. Another flying pie, this time not a pony.

“Hey Wings. Wake up.” Rainbow yells at me. I shoot up and hit my head on the large metal pan she is holding in front of me.

“Bhahaha. You should see yourself. All asleep and then BAM. You got a pan in the face.” She lays rolling on the floor, mocking me.

“You’re hurting me.” I say to her while pouting my lip and try to look as sad as possible.

She stops rolling, looks at me, and starts laughing twice as hard. “Dude, you are an idiot. You should talk to Pinkie Pie.” She picks herself up and walks back into the kitchen. “Come, let’s eat some soup.”

I followed her. “Who is this Pinkie Pie?” I asks her, playing stupid. I grab a bowl and sit down opposite of Rainbow.

“She’s only the most awesome party mare that exists. If you show your face in town for just a second she’ll throw you a party for just arriving here. And the parties are so much fun. And after the children leaves she always puts something special on the table.” She grins and scoops 2 bowls full of soup. “We could visit her tonight. I don’t have anything to anyway.” She sits down and starts eating.

“Sure. It would be nice to meet some more ponies. And if everypony in this town is as nice as you I’m sure that I’ll have a grand time.” I smile at her and dig in with a spoon in the vegetable soup.

“Everypony is nice in Ponyville. There are just some unmannered stallions who trot around. Then you have some members of my weather team, like Cloudkicker, Honeysuckle and Blossomforth. They generally are nice ponies, but watch out for Cloudkicker. She has got to be the most horny pony I have ever seen. She’ll buck anything she can lay her eyes on.” She laughs a bit more under her breath and eats on.

“Well, then this place is mostly fine. And rest assured, I’ll go look for a job tomorrow.” I say through a mouthful of soup.

“I’ll introduce you to one of my other friends who owns an orchard and can always uses help.” Rainbow says while grabbing a second bowl of soup.

“If you have so many friends, why not introduce them all at once.” I say to her, scraping the soup out of my fur. I have a feeling that my fur is going to give me a lot more problems. How are you even supposed to clean this stuff.

“No can do, Wings. Twi is in Canterlot at the moment. She is one some assignment for Celestia. Something important, princessy business or something.” Rainbow says while cleaning the food.

“Wonderfully said. Then introduce me to the rest and I’ll meet Twi later. Thanks for the soup, it was great.” I say while hoofing her my bowl and spoon.

“Don’t sweat it. I all came from this packed,” she hoofs me a small packet of powder that says: The most soupiest soups in the whole of Equestria, “I just added hot water and done it is. Perfect for me. I’m as lazy as I can be.” She cleared the whole cloud table by now and was starting to walk towards the door. “You coming?”

“Yea.” I rush after her. She’s flying/gliding towards Ponyville. I think I can do that. So as expected I open my wings, step of the cloud and plummet towards the ground. Rainbow doesn’t notice.

So naturally I want to scream, but then I realize that this will blow my cover. So I settle to trying to flap some more and, hey, I glide. At the very least I’m not falling anymore. So I turn towards Ponyville and glide behind the rainbow colored speck in the distance.

I see why flying in so nice. Gliding like this is so tranquil and calm. If I ever get angry here, which I doubt, then I will just fly my worries away. I approach the town and I see several ponies looking at me. I guess it is because I am new here. I see the rainbow colored speck entering Sugar Cube Corner. After that I see a pink blur shoot out of the front door and follow my land spot even as I, somehow, alter my flight path and even then she follows the spot. But hey, it’s Pinkie Pie. What did you expect.

I calmly glide towards the ground where my calm glide is going to end in something pink. I can already hear the exited voice of Pinkie Pie as I approach her.

“Ooh, a new pony in town. And he’s got wings and so he can fly and so he can do some awesome things and I need to make a party for him and I need to get supplies and I need to do so many things and you’re almost here.” Pinkie says so fast it is almost impossible to understand and that all in one breath. Typical Pinkie Pie.

I finally ‘land’ (I had to put great effort in not tumbling over the ground) and I walk towards the exited mare. “Hi, you must be Pinkie Pie. I’ve heard about you from Rainbow.”

“What did she say about me. I hope they are nice things, but then again Rainbow is a nice pony so it could only be nice because otherwise she wouldn’t be a nice pony.”

“She said that you are the mare to go to if you want a party. And that if I would even show my face here I would be treated to one of the best parties I would ever have.” I say to her, returning the large smile that is on her face.

“That is so nice of her. That is why she is one of my best friends in whole Equestria.” She is almost glowing in front of here.

“That’s good to hear. Maybe we should follow Rainbow inside. I heard that you make the best pastries in Ponyville.” I say as I gesture to the front door of Sugar Cube Corner.

“Ooh. I do. I just made a fresh batch of muffins. So we need to be quick before Ditzy buys them all.” She says before grabbing me by the hoof and pulling me inside the store and sat me down next to Rainbow at a table. She walks towards the back of the bakery.

“You took your time, Wings. I could’ve read a whole Daring Do book in the time it took you to get here,” she points to the back of the bakery, “I see that you already met Pinkie. So what do you think of her?”

“She could be one of the nicest ponies I have ever met. She could kill you with her cheeriness. Or with the amount of sugar she is going to feed you.” I say to Rainbow as Pinkie comes out of the back with probably the largest amount of muffins, cupcakes and other things that are about 90% sugar.

“I think that is a good description of her.” Rainbow says as pinkie dumps the cartload of food on the table.

“What is a good description of who.” Pinkie says cheery as she pops, somehow, up in between next to me and Rainbow.

I laugh a bit. “I said that you could probably kill somepony with this amount of sugar.” As soon as I finished I couldn’t resist the sugary goodness anymore. I dig in with gusto.

“Don’t be so silly, you need about 17 pastries more for that to happen.” She giggles a bit and then tells us to dig in.

So we do and we’re occupied with eating for the next few minutes. Then I see a pink pie flying at me.

Ch 5. Apples!

Ch. 5. Apples!

“SPLASH,” is the sound that resonates in my ears as the pie filled with cream hits my face. “Who did that?” I yell, trying to wipe the cream out of my eyes. When I have done that I see two laughing mares in front of me.

“Well, that is that mystery solved. Why did I got a pie thrown at me?” I ask the two laughing mares while I throw some pieces of pie to them. And somehow Pinkie manages to eat them all.

“Because it is funny.” Pinkie says while scraping the pie out of my coat, how she got behind me is a mystery to me, and eating them.

“Are you seriously eating the pie from my coat?” I ask her, trying to get the pie out from in between my feathers before Pinkie licks it away, because that is creepy.

“Yea, why not? Pie is pie.” She continues scraping and eating.

I turn to Rainbow. “Does she do stuff like this often?” I say. For the case of the pink leech, I just gave up and let her be. At least I don’t have to do anything myself because I still have no idea how I can clean a coat.

“She does things like this a lot. But she’s Pinkie. Just don’t pay any attention at it.” Rainbow says while eating some of the leftovers. “After she is done licking your coat we should visit Applejack to see if she got a job for you. Because with just freeloading you’re never going to get anywhere.” Rainbow says while sliding of her seat and walking towards the door.

“Yay, finding work. Great. I just need to get some kind of pink thing of my back.” I say while pointing to the pink thing on my back.

Rainbow looks at the pink pony sitting on my back. She just yells, “Pinkie, there are balloons in the back.” She looks back at me, “That should do the trick.”

“Balloons? Are there balloons? Yay, Balloons.” I hear coming of my back. I see a pink blur shoot towards the kitchen.

“Quick, we got to go before the shows us her pie collection.” She tugs as me and I oblige. We trot out of Sugar Cube Corner and out of town.

“Pie collection?” I ask Rainbow while trotting past the Quills and Sofas Store.

“She has a large collection of pies that somehow don’t spoil. She never eats from them and always shows them to new friends. It is a bit crazy, but it is Pinkie. Nothing is craze with her” Rainbow says as she walks past Big Mac’s apple cart. She stops and asks if Applejack is at the farm. The answer is Eeyup. She thanks him and gestures me to follow her.

“So how big is this orchard anyway? And who is that pony back there that you talked to?” I ask her, playing dumb.

“That is Big Macintosh, or Big Mac. He is Applejack’s brother and the backbone of Sweet Apple Acres. Without him the orchards wouldn’t last long.” Rainbow says as they pass the outer ring of Ponyville.

“Are there a lot of orchards out here?” I ask as I see another orchard way out in the distance.

“There are only two. One is owned by the Apple family and the other one is owned by the Rich family. They aren’t the nicest ponies around, but they provide for a good deal of the food here in Ponyville.” She says while pointing in the direction that I was looking.

“Applejack’s name is Apple? Applejack Apple sounds a bit strange.” I say to her, lifting a questioning eyebrow.

“Meh, everypony just calls her Applejack. So don’t sweat it. If you see her just call her Applejack.” Rainbow says to me as we approach a fence. I also see that there is a large wooden banner that says Sweet Apple Acres is nice ornate letters.

“Well, if she is as nice as everypony I have met until now I don’t think that I will have any problem working for her. Well that is if the pay is good, that is.” I grin at her.

She gives me a playful shove. “If you work for Applejack you won’t be short of anything. I think they even force you to eat at their place and otherwise you will be force fed by Granny Smith.”

“It sounds as if this will be a great place to work my flank off. But I still need the bits to pay a certain mare off.” I say to Rainbow as we walk through the gate.

“I’m not in a hurry to get those bits back, so you can take all the time you need. You will need to find someplace to stay. I’m not all that comfortable with a stranger in my house. I hope you understand.” She says, trying to make it sound not all too mean.

“I understand you. I wouldn’t like to have a stranger live in my house. So let’s be non-strangers to each other. We already know our names, so that’s a start. Let’s continue with our blood types. Mine’s AB+, what’s yours?” I ask her as we walk past the numerous apple trees.

“Ha-ha. My blood type? I honestly have no idea. But for the stranger part, we could grab a drink sometime if you want to. And if you want to have a real party than we can go to one of Vinyl’s parties, they are the best.” She says as we approach the farmhouse where I see an orange mare pulling a cart of apples. “Hey Applejack!”

“Howdy Rainbow!” Applejack yells back. “Who ya have with you?” She sets the cart down and walks over to us. “Is this that fella that Pinkie ran into?”

“Ran is a light word. She rammed into me and put me into the hospital for a day or two. Pinkie has a hard head and an appetite for pies.” I say while smiling.

“That sure does sound like Pinkie. So Rainbow and… uh.” Applejack scratches her head. “I didn’t catch yer name there?”

“My name is Leo. And I head from Rainbow that you’re Applejack.” I say as I look at the barn. And the barn looks a lot larger and has more buildings than what they let you see in the show. It also looks a lot nicer after being rebuild multiple times.

“That’s right, partner, ma name is Applejack and I’m a proud member of the Apple family. So, why did you an’ Rainbow come ‘round these parts.” She asks me while kicking the apple cart into the barn with a well-placed kick.

I want to say something, but Rainbow is ahead of me. “He’s out of bits, so I lend him some. And now he’s looking for a job and I thought that you maybe were looking for some help.”

“Ah could use some help, especially right now with all them apples. I’ve got enough work here for 20 ponies so ah could use some help. Why not? You can come help me right now if ya want to.” Applejack says while looking me over. I really hope it is just professional or else I need to start feel uncomfortable really soon.

“See. I said AJ would get you a job. Now go help her so you can start pay me back. So I will see you tonight at my place. Bye.” Rainbow says to me. She waves and flies back to Ponyville.

“Her place. Do ya got something going on there with Rainbow?” She wiggles her eyebrows.

“I just had to find a place to stay since I had no bits to pay for anything.” I glare at her. “So that’s why.”

“Ah did mean no thing with it. And if ya want ya can stay here as long as you work. The barn is large enough for one whole lot of ponies ta sleep.”

“That is nice of you. I’ll tell Rainbow tonight and I’ll see what I’ll do.” It shouldn’t be too hard to choose, I think. I can sleep in the houses of two of the Mane Six, there isn’t a negative thing about that.

“So let’s get ta work, partner.” She points to rows and rows of apple trees and walks over to them.

“Sure, no problem.” I walk over to the trees and, shit, this is going to take a long time.

Ch 6. Bucking

“Com’ on, partner. Keep up.” Applejack yells at me from ahead.

After working for about 2 hours in the orchard I have fallen behind on Applejack, what else would have happened. An experienced mare against me, a human turned pony, and the outcome was very predictable. She even started working on my row after she finished mine.

“You gotta learn how to buck better. Iffin you gonna keep up this pace then we’re never gonna finish in time.” Applejack says as she bucks the tree in front of mine. “Follow me.” She walks back to the barn and I follow after I, after 10 kicks, get all the apples out of the tree.

“Yea, I’m coming.” I rush after her.

She walks up to a tree that is a bit smaller than the rest and that had a meter attached to it. There was a small marking on the top that said ‘Apples!’.

“Ya gotta kick it, and when ya hit it hard enough it dings and shows that ya can start bucking trees. It was enchanted by Twilight to do that. I helped Applebloom practice.” She says while pointing to the meter.

“Applebloom?” I ask, playing dumb, gain.

“She’s ma little sister and there is nothing that ah love more than ma family.” She says, obvious very proud of her family.

I nod and try a kick at the training tree and I feel a small shock ripple through me. The only thing that I hear behind me is one mare laughing and no bell.

“Yeah, laugh at the failing pony.” I say while turning around to look at the meter. There are 10 carvings between the bottom and the bell, the only one that is lit up is the first. “That didn’t go very well.”

Applejack stood up, still giggling a bit. “Sorry suga’cube. But that was the lowest score I have ever seen, even lower than Applebloom when she started. You really gotta work them legs a’ yours. ‘cause otherwise you’ll be out in no time.” She stops smiling and says the last part very serious.

“There is no time like the present. And from what I heard you’re the best in bucking apple trees, so maybe you can teach me.” I say while ticking the meter to see if it may be made a mistake.

“Thanks, but ma brother can buck quite good too. But ah can teach ya. I’ll make you one of the best buckers around these parts. I think I have some kind a’ book on it ‘round here.” She says while walking back into the barn.

And she walked out with, I kid you not, a pile of books about bucking apple trees. “Why don’t you read through these and come back tomorrow. And you better be a better bucker tomorrow, or at least make the second mark.” She says as she starts laughing again.

I just sigh at the mare mocking me and grab the books with my hooves, awkwardly I might mention, and fly towards Rainbow’s cloud home.

“See you tomorrow, Applejack.” I yell as I flap higher.

“See ya.” I hear Applejack yell after me.

I didn’t fly as much as I flap towards the hanging cloud home. I look at some of the books, some have names as “The art of bucking.”, “Bucking, the right way” and “How to extend your legs. Written by Lance Eggs.” Some sound very vulgar to me. I think I’ll look through them when I’m back at the cloud home. And, damn, these books are heavy.

I see the cloud home I almost gave out. I only fly for 2 days and it still is hard, my top speed is 5 km/h, I can walk faster. I almost reach the porch. I’ll just shove these books on the ports or maybe I can use my magic. Yeah that’s a joke, a 2 year old foal can use more magic. I put the books on the porch and climb onto the porch. I grab the books and put them on my back. I open the door and lay the books on the table.

“Hey is anybody here?!” I yell while looking in the kitchen. There comes no response. So I decide to look around the house a bit.

I walk along the hall and look into the first room and it just is the living room, some couches and chairs. I walk up the nearest stairs and look into the first room, it is a bedroom. It has a bed, a nightstand and a closet. Nothing interesting and I have no interest of nosing (muzzling?) through her stuff. I look in the next room and that is the bathroom, there just are some shampoos in the corner near the shower, but not much else. There are only two more rooms in the house. I walk over to the first room and open the door and it is a workout room, it is filled with wing-weights, I think. I also see other kind of weights and something that looks like a parachute. This is probably the reason that she is such a good flyer.

The last room is just another boring bedroom, this one is a complete mess. Everything is in the wrong place and it looks like the room of Rainbow.

I chose to not nose further in her stuff. But, damn, this place needs to be cleaned up, it smells like cabbage in here. I pinch my nose and walk out of the room and back downstairs.

I grab the book named “The buck, the story from the beginning to the end.” And I sit down on one of the comfy cloud chairs. The book is about the first owners of orchards finding the best way to pick the apples. Grabbing them by hoof took too long so one day one of the farmers got angry and gave the tree a hard kick and suddenly all the apples fell out of tree. So they worked out this method until the bucking theorem was completed.

The farmers then held the bucking method for themselves and they personally caused the great apple shortage of 1000 A.C.L. (After Celestia and Luna). This went on until Celestia got angry at them and ordered Luna to stare at them until they caved in and taught the method to the other farmers. This resolved the apple problem and saved a lot of ponies.

The book then continued to describe all of the different muscles that help in making the leg walk.

I think I got until the part where they say which muscles you can pull when I fell asleep and dreamed of Earth and my life back then and then nothing.

Ch 7. A vacuum cleaner and a water ballad.

Ch 7.

I wake up and throw the book of off me. Ugh… my head, it hurts. Maybe I should drink some water. Yea… why don´t I do that. Reading that stupid book yesterday didn´t teach me anything.

I walk into the kitchen, not really looking where I’m going. So, naturally, I walk into the only thing standing in my way. Namely a rainbow colored mare.

“Hey, watch were you are going, Wings.” Rainbow yells at me while shoving me a bit back.

“Sorry, I just woke up. And please don´t yell, my head hurts. That stupid book didn´t help anything, it just contained all the muscles a pony can pull.” I say while stretching my legs. That bucking yesterday did a number on my muscles, the all hurt. Even muscles that I didn´t know I had.

“All the muscles a pony can pull? That must me a thick book then. And why are all those books on my table anyway?” Rainbow asks while grabbing a pan from the cupboard.

“Applejack said that my bucking wasn´t good enough so she gave me this cartload of books about bucking. Oh, and a cartload of muscle pains. That too.” I say while grabbing a glass of water and downing at once.

“Damn, Wings, you thirsty. But if you want to get stronger you can use my training room upstairs instead of making an even bigger egghead out of you.” She says while grabbing some stuff out of the pantry.

“An even bigger egghead? I didn´t even think that that was even possible.” I say while pouring me another. “What are you making? More soup?”

“Nah, today I´m making hayburgers.” She says while grabbing some slabs of compressed hay from the fridge and sliding them into the pan with some oil.

“Sounds nice. Haven´t had those in a while.” I say while smelling the pan. It smells a bit like hamburgers, which shouldn´t be possible.

“Mine are the best. I use a recipe from my mother. The only ones better than mine are hers.” She flips some burgers and lets the smell float through the air.

“I am looking forward to it. Let me clear the books up and put some plates on the table.” I say while walking out of the kitchen. I clear up the books and put them on the couch, on which my print was clearly visible. I put two plates on the table and the accompanying silverware.

I sit back down on the couch and look through another one of the books: “The right way to buck; The Apple way.” This one was written by a member of the Apple family (The title was a dead give-away) and gave a bit more information on bucking. Like the power of the kick and the angle and the yaw and the correct girth of the legs of the bucker. And then two chapters come with a collection of mathematical stuff I am too lazy to read or understand. I like to read, but food lurks and that is a lot more important that reading right now.

The thing that wakes me from my reading trance is the wonderful smell of meat. And then I realize that it isn´t meat, but fried hay. Which is a nice new sort of food, but I´m going to miss meat. Maybe I can ask Fluttershy for some dead bunnies. Maybe I shouldn´t ask her that, otherwise she maybe have a heart attack. And the result of that would that everyone would get a heart attack, because no one can life without Fluttershy.

“Food´s ready. To the table.” I hear Rainbow yell from behind me.

“Coming!” I yell back and I put the nearest thing in the book for a page keeper, namely the corner of a pillow.

I sit down at the table and wait until Rainbow has finished carrying the pan onto the table. She made a small veggie salad and a large amount of hayburgers. Enough to feed the whole Apple family.

“Dig in or else it´ll only get cold.” She says while shoving 2 or 3 hayburgers onto her plate. “I think that you should take some before I eat them all.” And, true to her word, as soon as she is finished speaking she eats one in almost one bite and swallows it whole. I don´t wait and put 2 hayburgers on my plate and some of the veggie salad too.

I think one of Rainbow´s parent´s must be a vacuum cleaner, because she sucks in her food like one. I get now why she made such a large pile. There goes number 1… 2… 3… 4… and this keeps going until she hits 17. I only ate 3 in the same time window. And I´m glad that I took some of the veggie salad or else I would´ve starved to death.

So after Rainbow is finished sucking up all the food I tell her to lay down a bit while I will go clean the dishes.

She doesn´t even say a word and just goes to the couch, shoves all my books on the ground and lays down on the couch. I hear snoring emerge from the couch not a moment later.

I shove the plates on my back and grab the pan with my mouth. Damn, that feels uncomfortable. I walk into the kitchen and shove everything with a loud clang into the sink. I hope I didn´t break anything. I turn on the water faucet.

10 seconds later I am drenched, the dirty plates are completely dry and somehow the whole floor is covered in water. Water on a cloud, the pegasi just disrespect the laws of physics. And Rainbow isn´t wet or awake, so that is a good thing.

I grab a mop from the closet and start mopping up the water. If pegasi disrespect the laws of physics that I can do that too.

I think that I maybe can respect the laws of nature for once and try if moving a plate through will clean it. Somehow it does. And it makes my work a lot easier. I am done within a couple of minutes.

After I´m done I decide to get dry myself, so I walk into the main room and shake my wings a little to get the water out of them. I think I forget to warn Rainbow, because soon I have a screaming mare on my tail, not quite unlike a banshee.

Ch 8. Dining at the Apples.

Ch 8.

I open my eyes and the only thing I see is Rainbow’s cloud house that is getting further away from me every second. I think that Rainbow bucked me out of the house. The ground is rapidly approaching, maybe I can hug it. I shake my head a bit. I just need a glass of water.

Luckily I fall through a cloud and I get a face full off water. I have no idea what is happening and the only thing I feel is a lump on the side of my head.

The ground is approaching and I open my wings, somehow. I flap a bit and my descent slows down a bit. I slowly flop down on the ground and I lay there for a bit.

And I lay there until I see Applejack walk past with a cart. “Howdy, partner. Whatcha doin’ there? Did Rainbow kicked you out?” She asked, the last sentence a bit angry.

“No, no, nothing like that. I was cleaning some dishes and during that I got a bit of water on her. And that turned her into a banshee. She then kicked me out of the house, literally kicked me.” I say while slowly crawling back on my hooves.

“That ain’t kind o’ her. I should go to her and show her her place. You shouldn’t let this got over ya. She’s got a problem with her pride for a long time.” Applejack says while helping me up. “Ya want ta come back to the farm and train yer bucking with me.” She looks at the sky. “It is getting a tad late, so do ya wanna stay with us for the night. We’ve got enough space anyway.”

“Sure, why not?” I say. I still think that I need to find a dictionary to find the meaning of the word ‘buck’.

So we walk towards the orchard, not meeting any pony on the way. When we arrive I see that Applejack’s brother Big Mac is bucking some trees over there and I see her little sister Applebloom run over to her with two other fillies, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle .

Applebloom trots towards Applejack. “Hey, sis. We’re goin’ crusadin’. See ya.” And she runs off, the two fillies in her wake.

“What are they going to do?” I ask, keeping stupid once more. I have the feeling that I am going to be doing that a lot more.

“They want their Cutie Marks so badly that they try everything, even stuff like bear therapy. It is fine as long as they don’t hurt themselves.” Applejack says as she puts the cart in the barn. She grabs two apples from the pile in the cart and throws one over to me. She gestures me and walks towards the training tree. I follow in her wake.

“Let see if ya learned anything from those books ah gave ya.” She points to the training tree.

“I haven’t read a lot. Most of my time was filled with sleeping, eating and running from Rainbow. But I’ll try.” I position myself in front of the training tree. I tense my muscles and kick out hard. I feel a hard vibration. I look back and see a total of 3 markings glow.

“Well, at last ya did better than last time. Ya improved by 200%. That’s good. Heh, heh.” Applejack says, trying to reassure me. It doesn’t work. “I’ll let ya try some more while I buck some more apples and ya go train some more.” She walks towards a large row of trees, leaving me to myself.

To the bucking! I could use a training montage, like Rocky. I train until the sun almost hits the horizon. By that time I have hit mark 6 many times and even the occasional 7. The trick is to plant your hooves on one spot, but not with all your force. Because you need to let the tree vibrate as much as you can, not destroy it.

I see Applejack walk back from the trees towards the big red farm. She yell’s over. “Come get som’ grub. Ya have been working for long enough. Granny has made some apple stew.” She walks out of my sight.

Apple stew? The Apples eat apples like it is the only thing there is. I think they even have apple soup and apple soufflé and apple (insert food here).

I walk towards the barn and open the door. I immediately am bombarded with a large amount of good smelling smells. I walk towards the smell and from where I hear talking. I walk into the kitchen, which is very large and has a just a bit less large table in the middle. It is occupied by Big Mac, Applebloom and Applejack. I see Granny Smith at the kitchen top, but I’m not supposed to know her name. So I sit down next to Applejack. “Who is that on the stove?” I ask Applejack.

“That’s Granny Smith, ma grandmother. She’ll probably ask a around Equestria. She will want ta know everything to know what there is there to know. So get ready for a beatin’.” Applejack says while grabbing a glass of water.

“Oh, I got rained upon by questions before, so that wouldn’t be a problem. Let it come.” I say while grabbing a glass of water too.

Granny Smith picks up the large pan of stew and sets it down on the table. “Eat up!” She almost yells.

The next few seconds were a blur. In that moment everypony in the room, except me, lunged at the pan with their spoons to full up their bowl. Suddenly my bowl is filled too.

“Ya gotta be fast, partner. Otherwise there is nothing left.” She says to me while grabbing a spoon and she starts digging in. “We of the Apple family are always hungry. So if there is any food it is gone within seconds. So dig in.”

“I’m sure that this will taste wonderful. ” I say while grabbing the spoon and tasting the stew. And damn that tastes good.

Granny Smith looks at me and Applejack. “So, Applejack. When were you goin’ to introduce me to ya new coltfriend?”

A fine spray of apple stew flew over the table and an resounding ‘What!’ sounded over the table, coming from two ponies sitting aside each other.

Ch 9. Sleeping at the Apples.

Ch 9.

I lay back with a full stomach. Damn that tasted good and there was enough food to feed an entire town here. And it tasted as delicious as one could imagine. And the questions still have to come and if they are anything like the first one. Then I am indeed doomed.

We clean the room up together. During dinner Big Mac remained quiet except for the occasional Nope or Eeyup. Granny Smith didn’t say much, just that she would ask me the questions later. Applebloom on the other hand. She was a menace, she asked everything there was to ask. I had the hardest time coming up with anything that sounded reasonable and not make me look like a complete loony.

The story that I came up with consisted of me traveling around after finishing school through Equestria. If she asked where I had gone I just named every single town from the show that I can remember. She asked for some school stories. I gave her everything that I can remember from school that is just a bit normal. Which isn’t a lot, but it worked. She is a very energetic little filly and she’s very nice. She’s got a very nice and warm personality. Maybe I can go crusading with her and the others, because I have no idea what my cutie mark is. Nopony has reacted to my blank flank. Yet. Maybe I can do that after everyone finds out that I am an alicorn and general panic would arise. Maybe it is better not to do that, I think that I would have a lot of ponies on my tail then.

I am just going to keep my mouth shut.

After we’ve cleaned up everything we sit down in front of the fireplace on the

couch.

“Do ya want ta stay here for the night, suga’cube. We’ve got enough space anyhow.” Applejack asks while walking into the room with a plate full of cups with hot chocolate in it.

“Sure, I don’t see why not. You’re very nice so I shouldn’t deny you this pleasure.” I say while grinning stupidly at her.

“Ow shoosh. It’s just somethin’ nice for a new employee.” She says while giving me an playful shove.

Applebloom sits down next to Applejack. “Ya are goin’ ta sleep next ta ma room. It’s a very nice one. Ah made the drapes maself and ah chose the blankets too.” Applebloom says while hugging Applejack.

“I am sure it is a very nice room and that the drapes are beautiful.” I say , sipping at my hot coco.

“Thanks for that.” Applejack whispers in my ear.

“No problem.” I whisper back.

We sit around the fire and talk about tales from our youth. Applejack tells some stories from when she was young. And, of course, embarrassing stories about Applebloom when she was just a young foal. Big Mac didn’t say much, but smiles all the time, enjoying the time with his family. Granny Smith dozes of almost immediately and quietly snores off. I tell some embarrassing stories of my own, adapted for ponies of course. We have our fair share of laughs and it is a nice evening.

After a while Applejack guided Applebloom towards her room and put to sleep. I hear her sing a lullaby from here. Granny Smith stands up too and says goodbye to me and Mac and she walks upstairs. This leaves an uncomfortable silence between me and Mac.

“So ya are tha new help Applejack has hired. We could use yer help, but ya need ta get better at buckin’. Iffin ya’ll stay as bad as ya are, then yer not gonna be of any help.” Big Mac says in a very, very deep voice. “So ya better get some trainin’ done with ma sis’.” He got an angry look in his eyes. “But ya don’t get any ideas and keep yer hooves of her.”

“I had no intention of doing anything with her. My relation with her is purely for the sake of business. I intend to earn my money to pay off Rainbow and then settle down here in Ponyville. I am kind of tired of my travels.” I say, trying not to anger the big red earth pony that is sitting in front of me.

“Than this is fine by me.” He says being silent once more.

“Ah think that ah’m going ta sleep.” He says before trotting of up the stairs towards his room.

“See ya tomorrow.” I say after him. I just hear a rumble coming from the stairs.

I just sit here, looking at the fire, being in trance. I hear some talking upstairs, probably Applejack and Big Mac. I hear no shouting, so there should be no problem.

I see Applejack coming down the stairs and sitting down on one of the couches. “Are ya goin’ ta bed anytime soon? Ya need ta get yer sleep sometime.” She says to me.

“I’m going right now, I think.” I say while standing up and slowly walking towards the stairs.

“Wait fer me. I’m going with ya.” She says while trotting after me.

We walk up the stairs just behind me. “Did ya have a good first day?”

“You mean bucking that little tree for a few hours. What a day that was.” I say while we’re walking through the hallway. “I sure did help you collect a lot of apples.” I says sarcastically as we stop in front of, what I assume to be, my room.

“Don’t worry, Leo. Ya can help us tomorrow. We’ve got a new batch of tree ta buck. So ya are gonna need yer sleep. Get in and get in bed.” She says while opening the door and shoving me in. “G’night.”

“G’night yourself.” I say while closing the door behind me and walking over to the bed. I lie down on the bed and pull the covers over me.

I hear some sounds from the room next to mine, probably just Applejack going to bed. I let my mind go blank and I close my eyes. I am asleep within mere minutes.

A/N:

More chapters.

More ideas.

More feedback.

More next times.

Ch 10. Two angry mares.

A/N: I have decided to start at the begin of season 1 with some of the stuff that happens. I will skip some, but most will get in. Any ideas? Say it in the comments.

I open my eyes, hearing a cock crow and the first thing I see is a doll, it is a bit ragged and worn out. Where did this come from?

I hop of the bed and stretch a bit. I think I slept pretty well, but the bed says otherwise. It is all messed up and one of my pillows is hanging from the wall. Wasn’t there a painting there yesterday.

I put it in my back. I really need to learn magic, but a grown ‘unicorn’ that can’t use magic. I really need to think of a good story for that one. Horn rot? A magic disease? Magically retarded? Those all seem like stupid ideas, and I’m not even sure if the last one exists.

I open the door and walk down the hallway. I look out of the window and see that the sun has just risen. I walk down the stairs and hear a crescendo of sounds come from the kitchen.

I walk in and sit down on the table. “Morning.” I say while looking over the table. Applebloom is eating some oatmeal with bits of apple in it and Applejack is eating some apples. Granny Smith and Big Mac are nowhere to be found.

A resounding ‘hello’ comes from the two mares. “Do any of you two know where this doll came from?” I ask while putting it on the table grabbing some apples from a large bowl in the center of the table.

“That is mine. Ah put it in your bed.” She says while pulling it towards herself and hugging it a bit.

“And why did you put it in my bed? I ask, almost getting an heart attack from the cute that is happening right in front of me.

“I heard that ya were struggling in yer bed so I gave ya ma doll to help ya calm down.” She says, her voice a bit muffled by the doll.

“Thank you. I do have a lot of trouble sleeping lately, but thanks for doing that.” I say while giving her a rub on her too darn cute head.

I grab a plate and grab a daffodil sandwich from the huge pile that is sitting in the middle. And those tastes good, I never thought that pony food could taste so good.

We eat in silence for a few minutes and then Applejack cleans up her plate. “Leo, we’re gonna go start buckin’ again in a few minutes. Are ya coming?” She asks while putting her plate in the kitchen sink. She turns to Applebloom. “Are ya fine with goin’ ta school alone?” She asks, a bit concerned.

“Yes, do ah have ta say this again. Ah’m not a foal anymore.” Applebloom says, a bit annoyed.

“Just make sure that ya get there safe, sugarcube.” She says while muzzling her little sister. I am going to have a lot more heart attacks, this is too cute. Applejack walks off into the orchard.

I clean up my plates too after I made the sandwich pile shrink a lot. “Bye, Applebloom. Have fun at school.” I say very cheery as I wave at her while walking out to the orchard.

“Bye.” She says while waving her arms faster than should be possible.

I walk out into the orchard, following Applejack through the orchard towards the eastern portion of the farm. She stops when she reaches the back of a large row of apple trees. I walk towards her and stop besides her.

“We gotta buck two rows of them apple trees today. So get buckin’!” She shouts as she walks towards the first one and starts bucking them.

This is going to last a long while. What wrong can some hard, honest work do for you.

I buck my way through many trees before I see a rainbow colored streak fly across the sky. And it is approaching me, fast. That is just my luck.

When the pony that is attached to the streak almost reaches me I close my eyes and jump to the right, trying to avoid her.

I hear a large crash behind me and I carefully open one eye. I see: 1 Rainbow and a large pile of earth covering her.

She digs herself out and walks towards me, very angrily. “Where the buck were you. You just left and didn’t return. I searched for you all day and you’re just sitting here, bucking trees.” She yells while giving me a hard shove that pushes me to the ground. “You don’t even come say that you’re here.”

I can see that her face is a little damp, but that doesn’t bother me, the thing that does is how she acts after she bucking bucked me out. “You mean that I had to come back after you bucked me out. I just got some water on you and you get mad over that. You should be the one apologizing instead of me. What a friend you are!” I yell back at her, my mind going blank with anger.

Just a little side story. When I was in high-school I already had a lot of problems with getting into fights already, but once I got into the university it got way worse. I got into bar fight, fights over money and even fights in the college classroom. I went to therapists and so many other people who wanted to help me, but they couldn’t. I eventually had to take pills to calm me down, but not that I haven’t taken them in a while anything small can rile me up. This can get bad in the future. This was actually the reason that I started watching the ponies. One of the therapists recommended watching children shows to help calm me down, so he introduced me to My Little Pony. It helped some, more than anything else. And I got hooked on the show and continued watching it. So I think being in Equestria should be a good replacement.

When my mind returns to the land of the living I don’t see Rainbow, just one very angry looking Applejack approaching me. Today is just not my day.

Ch 11. Two mares who ran away.

Ch 11.

As Applejack walks over to me I worry a bit. I know, or have seen, that a hard kick from her will hurt. So, naturally, I stand my ground and wait for her to buck me to next week.

She doesn’t do that, to my surprise, but she still looks aggravated. “What in tarnation is goin’ on out here? Ah see Rainbow crashing down here and ah hear some yellin’ comin’ from the both of ya. And then ah see her sprintin’ off. What is happening here?” She is semi-yelling at me, calming a bit down at the end.

“Uhm… ” I say, while thinking of a good answer. “After I ‘left’ she went looking for me, she got angry because I supposedly neglected to tell her that I was here. I didn’t tell her because she bucking kicked me out and I told her that too.”

Applejack still isn’t happy. “Ah would like ta hear the other side of this here story, before ah judge anypony.” She says before looking around for Rainbow. “Did ya see where she went to?”

“I think she went back to her cloud home, at least, that is what I think.”

“Thanks. Ah gotta get to Pinkie to get that balloon o’ her. Maybe she’ll listen ta me.” She says while she thinks something over. “Ya’ll” can go back ta work. Just ask Big Mac for anything ya might need” She says before storming of to Ponyville.

I guess that I just keep bucking then, because I never could keep up with Applejack and flying is out of the question. I can barely get to Rainbow’s home and I think that I need to learn basic levitation before I can teleport anywhere.

I work hard, until I see Big Mac coming towards me, hauling a very large cart with an apple on the sight. He doesn’t say anything until he is right beside me.

“Do ya know why AJ just ran off?” He asks, chewing on his wheat.

“Something happened with Rainbow and she ran after her to fix it.” I say while kicking the tree behind me, letting the apples fall into the baskets placed under it.

“It always is somethin’ with them two mares.” He grunts a bit. “And now a gotta pick up Applebloom.” His expression doesn’t change for a few seconds, I think he is thinking. He slowly looks me in the eyes. “Can ya pick up Applebloom?” He asks me in a very deep and serious voice.

“Sure, I wouldn’t mind to pick her up.” I ask, trying not to get too excited to get to pick up one of the Cutie Mark Crusaders. I also get to see all of the other fillies and colts. I think that I need a pacemaker for the rate at which I’m going to get heart attacks.

He walks up to me and stands just an couple of inches away from me. “Let me make maself clear. If anythin’ happens ta Applebloom, ah will buck your lungs out.” Big Mac says without any change in his voice. He is dead serious. “Do ah make maself clear?”

I shrink in a bit. “Yes.” I say, trying to sound just as serious as he was. I hope to think that I came close, but nopony reaches the Big Mac level of stone cold seriousness. And, even though I think that I am an alicorn, Big Mac still towers above me. Damn that pony is big, almost a full size horse.

“Then ah trust ya with ma sister.” He says while giving me a hard pat on the back and I have to tense up so that I don’t fall over and make and ass out of myself.

“So where is the school?” I ask while bucking some more trees and hearing the satisfying thumps of the falling apples.

“Just follow ta path near the barn to the right and just keep followin’ it.” He says while pointing his hoof in the general direction of the barn.

“Thanks, but when do I need to leave.” I ask, looking at the sun, trying to gauge the time by it. I am really bad at learning the time by solar means.

“About…. now.” He says while keeping his head pointed at the sky.

“Can you take care of the rest of the apples?” I ask while shaking my legs a bit to get that stiff feeling out of them.

“Ah sure can. Iffin’ she asks to go crusadin’ or something say that she can do that after she has done all o’ her chores.” He says while I walk towards the exit.

“Will do, see ya.” I yell back.

I see him give a nod and turn to himself, filling his very large cart with all the apples Applejack and I bucked.

I am going to pick up Applebloom from her school. I never thought that I would think that. I would like to meet other ponies too, like Featherweight, Cheerilee and maybe I can find out if Dinky if Dizty’s daughter or if that are even their real names. It would be awesome to meet them.

While I am walking I think about what I am going to do after I paid off my debt to Rainbow. I need to find a home. Maybe, if I have enough bits, build a house myself. Or maybe I can be lazy and live in an hotel or something like that. Are the house prices high here in Equestria? I hope they are a bit low, but I think that I will find something.

For the magic part. Maybe I can convince Twilight to teach me when she comes back from Canterlot. I wonder what she is doing there, maybe the princess is doing some more magic with her. I would love to know.

For that matter, at what moment in the show am I? I have noticed no major events that I have seen back on Earth and I am in no mood to ask anypony . The response would be weird if I asked when they went to brave the dragon when they haven’t even been there. They would be on my tail to know immediately.

I zone out so hard that I don’t notice that I am approaching a rather large tree. I slowly walk against it and fall to the ground, rather comically I might say. I look around to see where I am and I see a rather large group of foals standing in front of an school, all of them laughing at me.

My cheeks flush a bit red. Damn this is embarrassing. I look around, trying to find Applebloom.

I stand up and wade my way through the large amount of colts and fillies. I see Applebloom standing over by another tree, alongside 4 other fillies. I can guess who the two of them are, but the other two are a mystery.

I walk up behind them and when I get closer I see who the other two fillies are. Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon, bullying Applebloom and the others. My blood starts to boil a bit, but I manage to keep my calm.

They haven’t noticed me yet, so I silently walk behind Diamond and Silver. When I am close enough to hear them, I stand right behind them.

Applebloom and the other fall silent at my, for them, large form dooming up behind Diamond and Silver.

“What are you looking at, dumb blank flanks?” Diamond asks in that annoying squeaky voice of hers, I think that I can guess who her mother is.

I smile inwardly and do what I probably shouldn’t do. Namely, yell ‘BOO’ really, really loud right behind them. And surprising to even me, I use the Royal Canterlot voice.

Ch 12. Two muddy fillies.

The two little fillies go flying through the air and over the heads of Applebloom and the rest. They scream all the way during their few seconds of air time. And I am just standing here, rubbing my throat a bit from the hard yell.

The Cutie Mark Crusaders just stare at me with their mouths hanging open. I hear a splash and see that the fillies landed in a large pool of mud. Silver Spoon is crying, making me feel a little bad, but Diamond Tiara on the other hand is just yelling and getting mud all over her. “My father will hear about this and they you will be ruined.” I just see empty threats and turn my attention over to the gaping fillies in front of me.

“Wow.” Sweetie Belle says.

“That was awesome!” Applebloom yells.

“How can you yell that loud?” Scootaloo asks.

I think that the heart attacks will keep coming, because these ponies are as cute as one can be. “Heh… heh.” I stupidly grin, rubbing the back of my head. “I don’t know my own power?” I half ask/say.

“Hey, wait a minute. Yer that new stallion that ma sister hired. Why are ya here?” Applebloom asks while looking at the bullies in the mud.

“Applejack has to chase Rainbow, so I was ordered by Big Mac to pick you up from school.” I say while grinning a bit as Diamond Tiara fails to come out of the mud bath.

“But ah want ta go crusadin’ with Scootaloo ‘n Sweetie Belle!” She yells while looking at me with begging eyes one shouldn’t be able to resist, but I am special so I am able to resist.

“Sorry, but Big Mac said that you could go crusading when you’re done with all your chores.” I say with pain in my heart. Denying something to such a cute face is near impossible.

A collective sigh of disappointment goes through the fillies in front of me. They say their goodbyes. Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo take their time saying goodbye during which a take a good look around. I see many colts and fillies from the show, but also plenty of new ones. I see Dinky, but no cross-eyed pegasus is anywhere to be found.

I hear some crashing and cracking of branches and see the grey pegasus fly through some trees and land next to Dinky. She nuzzles her and they look generally cute.

Applebloom is next to me and starts pushing me towards the barn. “Come on. Ah want ta finish ma chores so ah can go crusadin’.”

“Sure, let’s go.” I say as I step beside her. She falls to the ground and just lays there. I help her up and walk silently besides her as I go towards the orchard with miss Grumpy Pants.

We make the orchard without other Rainbows crashing from the sky. “Come on, your chores can’t be that bad.” I say while thinking of what kind of chores could be so bad.

“But ah want ta get mah Cutie Mark and not have ta do som’ stupid chores.” She says while pulling an grumpy face and walking a bit slumped.

“You just have to wait for it. It will come in due time.” I say, having absolutely no experience with Cutie Marks. I don’t even know what mine will be or what Applebloom sees on my flank. I hope that it isn’t something stupid, like a simple cloud or a nail. You can never know with Discord, it wouldn’t surprise me if it was a picture of him.

We arrive at the orchard and Applebloom immediately rushes off to Big Mac, probably to finish up her chores.

I slowly trot behind her and see that Big Mac is bucking some trees while talking to Applebloom. I also see that there a no more apples underneath the apple trees. Big Mac works fast, this guy could break records.

I see Applebloom walk past me towards the barn with an happier face than when we were walking.

I walk up to Mac. “What kind of chore does she needs to do?”

“She can go and clean ta plates in ta barn, then bring in ta apples to Granny ta make some apple jam. Then she can go.” He says while bucking more trees with an incredible control.

“That is nice of you.” I say. “but I noticed at the school that two fillies were bullying her and her friend.”

His expression turn from neutral to annoyed in a few milliseconds. “Did one a them have a tiara?”

Of course she did. “Yes, I think so.”

He grumbles . “Ah’m goin’ ta have ta talk to her parent’s. Can ya buck the rest?” Mac asks me as he picks up the apples from the tree.

“Sure. I just have to finish up this row, right?” I ask while looking how long the line is. Not that long.

“Eeyup.” He says. My mind cheers after finally hearing that.

“Do I have to do anything else?” I ask.

“Eenope, just make sure Applebloom does her chores. ” He says before trotting towards the gate.

“See ya, Mac.” I yell after him before starting to buck the trees.

He gave me a questioning look before giving his trademark ‘Eeyup’ and walking out of sight.

I turn back to myself and buck on. As I reach the last amount of trees I am already spent. So when I am finally done with the trees I walk into the barn for a reviving glass of water.

I see Applebloom finishing up her chores, putting the last of the plates back into the cupboard.

“Are you done?” I ask while grabbing a glass of water.

“Ah sure am.” She says, wiping the water of the sink’s edge.

“Good to hear. Are you going crusading now?” I ask before downing the glass.

“Ah am. I hope ah will get mah Cutie Mark this time.” She says cheerily.

“Good luck.” I say as she rushes out of the barn, probably towards the CMC clubhouse.

I still feel pretty tired and decide to take a nap under one of the large trees. I close my eyes and doze off.

I shoot up, waking up suddenly. I hear a howl.

Uh-oh. The sky is black and I see nopony. Then I hear that sound again and I smell something similar to piles of leaves and branches. Then I hear the sound again, the howl of a wolf. Timberwolves!

Ch 13. What timberwolves?

Ch 13.

I hear the howling again. It scares the crap out of me and I feel a shiver crawl down my spine. I have no idea if Mac is back, where Applejack and Applebloom are.

I see something moving in between the trees and that something is growling at me. My first thought is to run, but then they would simply come after me. I could call for help, and being the hero that I am, I do.

My efforts are mostly fruitless, the only result is that the timberwolves now know where I am.

If I don’t make a stand then the whole Apple family will be in danger. I can’t let that happen.

A few leap out from their hiding and slowly walk towards me, as if they were seeing if I was a viable prey. They growl at bit and I growl back.

I take a defensive post and flare out my wings to make me look bigger.

The one closest to me jumps and I step aside to avoid the fangs. I turn 90 degrees and buck him in the side, throwing him back a few meters. The timberwolf stays down, I hope for a bit longer then one minute, I guess practicing my bucking really helped. I feel very content with how the first one went, but then more emerge from the tree line. My odds weren’t going to improve at this rate.

I flare my wings out ever more and, because I am a freaking alicorn, I think that I look quite big. They halt their approach a bit, but when they notice that I am not attacking they come closer once more.

Two attack at once, one jumps towards me and the other one comes in low. My hooves are made of a very hard substance, not unlike nails, so I hit the one that goes low very hard on the side of his head. A lot of branches go flying off his face and I see a large smear of tree sap on my hoof. There is a large hole in the head of the timberwolf.

I feel satisfied until I feel a ripping pain go through my left wing. I fall onto the ground and see smears of blood on it and a timberwolf with a few feathers in its mouth running towards me, fangs smeared with blood.

I stand up and turn around, holding my right wing stiff as I make a pirouette, hitting the timberwolf on the head and knocking him out cold.

The first timberwolf that attacked me is back on its feet and is running towards me. I hope that I can do something with my magic, but the only things that happens when I concentrate is that a couple of sparks come out of my horn.

But it has been very dry lately and the sparks land right on the back of the timberwolf, setting him ablaze. The fire spreads quickly and the wolf runs away as he lets out a sharp whine. Leaving a trail of burning leaves, twigs and branches behind.

I walk over to the unconscious timberwolf. The branches near his middle are snapped and bent. It’s breath is slow and irregular. I put my hoof on its neck and press down hard, snapping it and killing it instantly.

I sit down, letting the adrenaline flow out of my body. I have to let my breathing become normal again and I look at the carnage. There is a trail of smoking leaves and branches, a timberwolf that is missing half its head and one with a snapped neck.

I don’t want to let this lying here, so I grab one of the paws with my mouth and drag it towards the tree line. It tastes very sour and I have to drink something strong soon to get that taste out of my mouth.

As I walk towards the next one I hear something else. I feel relieved when I realize it is the sound of hooves and it is very close. Finally somepony who can help me.

“What in tarnation is goin’ on here?” Applejack asks as she emerges from the tree line. “And why are ya still here? It is 8 o’clock, ah though that ya had gone home long ago.”

“Aren’t you seeing what just happened here?” I ask her, unable to believe that she isn’t seeing the corpses of the timberwolves.

“Ah just see one frazzled lookin’ stallion.” She says casually. “And ah think that he needs ta get home.” She says honestly. I know that she couldn’t lie, so something must be wrong.

“Don’t you see the remains of anything? Or any blood perhaps?” I ask her, most likely sounding very weird.

“Honey, ya need ta get sum sleep. Ya’re hallucinatin’. Ah talked ta Rainbow and she’ll apologize the next time ya see her. Go ta her house and get sum sleep.” She turns around and walks back to the barn.

“Bye.” I yell to her as she walks away from me.

How the hell didn’t she see anything. As I look around I see that the corpses stick out quite clear and are very hard to miss. She didn't even notice the blood on my wings.. My wings sting too. I think that I am going to take a shower in the cloud house. I really hope that Rainbow has some stiff drinks.

I clean up the remaining bodies, laying them in a ditch somewhere. I am tired, but muster up the energy to flap to Rainbow’s cloud house.

I arrive at the cloud house, completely deprived of my energy. I slump through the door and up the stairs, ignoring Rainbow, who is snoring on the couch.

I take a long and refreshing shower, spending extra time to get all the dried up blood out of my wings. I wipe my coat dry with a towel, making sure that my wings are dry.

I walk downstairs, looking for that strong drink. I see that Rainbow is still snoring on the couch. I walk into the kitchen and open a cabinet, grabbing a small glass. I look through the kitchen for something strong. I find a unopened bottle of wine. I want something stronger, but this is the strongest thing around.

I grab a bigger glass and pour myself a drink.

And another… and another… and another…

Ch 14. Those timberwolves.

Ch 14.

Ugh… my head… it hurts… I need to get up. I look up, seeing that I am still at the table, but the bottle is gone. The glass is on its side. I rub my temples, trying to relieve the pain.

I look around and see that Rainbow is no longer on the couch. She somehow managed to get up earlier than me, but I have a hangover that would knock out a bull. I hope that being an alicorn has its perks and that this is over soon.

I manage to get off the chair and walk towards the kitchen. I get a glass of water and drink as if my life depends on it. I put down the glass and grab myself some breakfast.

After I finish eating I walk upstairs, trying to find Rainbow. I check some bedrooms, but see no snoring Rainbow. I'm almost going to check Ponyville for her, but then I hear grunting coming from the last room. I walk up to room and open the doors.

I see Rainbow laying on her back, lifting some weights with her wings and looking very impressing.

“Hey Wings. Good to see that you’re not as hung over as I would’ve expected.” She says while leaving the weight fall to the ground with a loud bang. I have no idea how that is possible, the floor is made of clouds.

“I guess that I am good with alcohol.” I say smiling, hiding my headache.

“The bottle that you downed was the strongest kind of alcohol that I could find, aside from the hard cider from the Apples.” Rainbow says while wiping the sweat of her forehead. “That stuff hits as hard as a manticore.”

“At least it tasted quite well, I think. I don’t remember yesterday night very well.” I say, trying to dig up the memories. Nothing rises, just something vague about fighting.

“That’s what you get with a bottle of wine.” She cleans up her equipment. “Have you eaten any breakfast yet?”

“I grabbed a bowl of cereal so I’m not hungry anymore. I actually wanted to go to Applejack again, get some more work done.” I say, trying to lift one of her weights and failing horribly at it.

“I actually wanted to apologize for what I did yesterday. Applejack had a good long talk with me. What did you say to her? She was as as she could be.” She says as we walk down the stairs towards the kitchen.

“I told her what happened, nothing more and nothing less. Maybe it was something between you two?” I say as I grab a glass of milk.

“There have been some things between us, but she was mad. She was treating me like the worst villain there is.” She says as she made a jumbo bowl of cereal for herself. “We thankfully settled things and got a drink. ”

She takes a few large bites. “She gave me some of your pay too. Now you owe me a bit less.” She says through a mouthful of milk and crunching corn.

“That is a load off my mind,” I sigh, “How much do I owe you?” I ask her.

Paying off Rainbow is first on my list. Learning to fly is second and on the same place is learning magic. I need to think of a plan to convince Twilight to teach me magic. I think that I will make that my third priority on the list. Fourth is meeting the doctor. Not the one in the hospital, the other one.

My god, or my Celestia, I am making internal checklists. I am starting to look like Twilight. Maybe I can get Rainbow or Applejack to introduce me to the other ponies. Then there is Pinkie’s party, that will be one heap of fun for sure.

Being here is great, but I do miss my family on Earth. I don’t even know if I want to go back to Earth, being here is great. Maybe too great, no one would want to leave. I want to get a message through at least. Just to let my family know that I am alive.

I would also like to find out why Discord brought me here too; fun or another cruel plot. I really hope the first one. I wouldn’t want to plunge Equestria into eternal chaos or destroy Canterlot before I even met the rest of the main six. I would like to know Discord’s motives, but he is Discord. He is chaos, how could I even argue with him.

But that is something for another time. Now is the time for fun and other stuff, like paying Rainbow back.

“Hey… hey… Are you there?” Rainbow says as she waves her hoof in front of my face. I think that I zoned out.

“Huh… O, sorry. What were you saying?” I ask, looking as stupid as one can look.

“That you owe me around another 200 hundred bits, the hospital isn’t cheap if you haven’t got any insurance. Which you didn’t. Applejack said that you should have me paid back in about 2 weeks.” She says as she drinks the last of her milk. “So you better work on.” She smiles as she gives me a playful punch.

“Then I better get going to the orchard, buck some more trees.” I say while walking to the door.

“Say hello to Applejack for me!” Rainbow shouts as I jump off her front porch.

“Will do!” I shout back as I glide towards the ground.

Flying feels as great as it always does, the wind through my feathers and the little pressure on my body. I really have to get Rainbow to give me lessons. I have to find more excuses to learn some stuff.

I land on the path and I walk the last part towards the orchard, through the gate and towards the barn.

What I see surprises me. I see Applejack and Mac dragging some timberwolf bodies behind the barn.

I walk up to them.

“Howdy partner! Got any idea how these timberwolves here got in ta orchard? Ya were down there last night.” She asks me. I am just staring at with my mouth hanging open.

“WHAT?!”

Ch 15. What dead timberwolves?

“Ah asked if ya know anythin’ about these wolves.” Applejack asks me as she gives me a questioning look.

I must think good about what I am going to say next. If I say that I know then a lot of questions will arise, but she wouldn’t believe me anymore that she did last night. Maybe it is best that just say no and avoid any complications. “I have no idea about it.” I say to her while taking a closer look at the timberwolf that she is dragging. It was the one with the hole in its head and it started to decompose; a leg already had fallen off.

“Well, shucks. Then ah have no idea how these timberwolves got near ta farm.” She says while putting the timberwolf in a ditch next to the barn. “Normally them wolves don’t come near ta orchard, but something’ must’ve attracted them.”

Mac comes from the other side of the barn carrying a timberwolf that is half burned up. “The pony that got them wolves took them out good. This one is all burned up.” He says while dropping the charred corpse in the same ditch as the other.

“Woo-hee. That one got hit good. Have ya got any idea who might’ve hit them?” Applejack asks Mac as she prods the burnt timberwolf, making it crumble even more.

“Eenope.” Mac says as he walks into the barn, hauling a large cart out of it.

“Do I need to help with anything or can I go bucking again.” I ask Applejack, trying to steer the conversation away from the timberwolves.

“Sure, iffin’ ya want ta. Ya can buck that row o’ trees.” Applejack says as she points to a row of trees close to the one that I bucked yesterday.

So I decide that the dead timberwolves don’t deserve my attention anymore and walk over to the row.`

I start bucking the trees, not paying attention to the last timberwolf that Applejacks drags from the trees.

While I buck I try to think of reason that could cause Applejack to not see anything and completely forget that I was standing in between them. The only cause that I can think of beside Discord is that Twilight has gone haywire, but she is out of town so that is no option. Maybe one of the princesses is messing with me, but that would be a little too weird. Maybe Pinkie Pie would do it, but she isn’t that weird.

I just empty my mind, not able to come to any option other than Discord. So I stick with that and buck on. Sometimes I see Mac and Applejack pick up my bucked apples or buck some trees themselves. We don’t talk much, because there isn’t much to talk about. We leave the whole timberwolf accident behind us.

We buck until the sun is in the middle of the sky. Applejack calls out to me. “Come get sum grub!” She then walks back to the barn.

“I’m coming.” I yell back to her as I deliver a last kick to a stubborn tree. One of the apples fall on top of my head. I rub the resulting spot, hoping that I wouldn’t hurt too much.

I walk towards the barn, noticing that the ditch no longer has any timberwolves in it.

I step through the door and walk into the kitchen. Applejack and Mac are sitting at the table while Granny Smith is cooking something at the stove. It smells delicious.

“Hi there, young ‘un. Come take a seat at ta table and get sum grub.” She says while putting the large pot on the table with a clang. Applejack grabs four bowls and starts scooping some kind of stuff into the bowl. It smells vaguely of apples and I really like apples.

“Here ya go.” Applejack says to me as she shoves a bowl in front of me. “Eat up.”

I prod at it with a spoon and take a bite. It tasted like a sweet apple syrup, but with bits of something else. Something I can’t exactly put my fingers (hoof) on; but it tastes very good so I eat on. The bowl is finished within minutes.

“Ya’re a good eater. Ya wanna have sum more? An growin’ stallion like you must eat more.” Granny Smith says to me as she fills another bowl.

“Sure, this tastes great.” I say while digging in and devouring the bowl within seconds.

We finish the rest of the meal in silence and after we’ve cleaned up I pop the question. “Where have the timberwolf corpses gone?” I ask, already knowing the most likely answer.

“What corpses? Timberwolves never com’ out this far.” Applejack says as she gives me the same questioning look as before. “Why would ya ask? Are there any out there?”

“No, no. Just a question. I thought that I saw one when I flew towards the orchard.” I quickly say before she digs any further.

“Well, iffin’ ya see anythin´ near ta orchard then give us a call and we’ll take care of it.” Applejack says while placing the plates back into the cupboard.

“I will do that.” I say to her as we walk out of the barn and out into the orchard. We continue the routine of bucking and picking up the apples.

I really got better at this. I don’t have to take pauses every so often and my legs hurt a lot less. Maybe I can keep doing this after I have paid Applejack. I do hope that there is a nice place to stay in Ponyville. Because even though staying with Rainbow is nice, I don’t think that it is an permanent solution and I don’t think that she would agree with me staying with her any longer than necessary.

But those are concerns for another time because as I buck one of the last trees in the row I see a pony walking towards the barn.

I see the pony enter the barn and I follow her into it. I walk into the barn and see Applejack and the pony sitting on the couch. I sit down on one of the larger pillows and see Fluttershy sitting next to Applejack.

And as soon as she sees me she hides behind her mane and produces a very meek. “Hello.”

Ch 16. Meeting Fluttershy.

Ch 16.

“Hi, nice to meet you. What´s your name?” I ask her as I sit down on a pillow.

“I´m Fluttershy.” She says, trying to hide herself some more behind her mane.

“I didn´t get that. Could you say it again?” I ask while pointing my ears towards here. I don´t even have to turn my head, so that is a plus that came with becoming a pony.

“I´m Fluttershy.” She says, somehow even softer that just before. Applejack gives her an encouraging poke in the side.

“Couldn´t quite hear that. Can you repeat that?” I say, leaning forward a bit.

“Don’t worry, Leo, she´s a bit shy.” She says to me behind her hoof. “C´mon Shy, tell him yer name.”

“My name is,” She takes a deep breath, “Fluttershy.” She wipes the sweat of her brow and smiles at me.

I hold back a heart attack. “Nice to meet you, Fluttershy. My name is Leo Lion.”

“Ooh, Do you like lions? Most of them are mean, but I´ve met a nice one once.” Fluttershy says, obviously interested in the fact that I chose an animal name as a last name.

“I do. Lions are my favorite animals,” I say, “It´s been nice to meet you, but I actually came to say something to Applejack.”

“Oh, ok.” Fluttershy says as she moves back behind her mane.

“So, Leo, for what did ya came here.” Applejack says.

“I have finished the row of apples that I had to buck. Do I need to do anything else?” I ask her while trying to keep my tail from flopping in my face all the time.

“Ah can´t think of anythin´ that ya can do. Ma brother is goin´ ta pick up the apples and then we gotta do some small chores,” Applejack says while thinking deep, “Maybe Shy has somethin´ ya can do?” She turns to Fluttershy. “Do ya, Shy?”

“Uhm… I wouldn´t want to impose.” Fluttershy says as she pokes her muzzle from behind her mane.

“I isn´t a problem. I would gladly help.” I say, almost jumping at the change to help Fluttershy. I most likely have to help with some kind of small animal.

“Then it´s settled. Why don´t ya go with Shy and ah will take care of ta farm.” Applejack says as she walks out of the room, leaving me and Shy alone.

“So what do I need to help you with?” I ask her as I grab one of the few books that are on the small table in the middle. The title is ´Learning how to pick up apples, a beginner´s guide.´Why do these books even exist? That should be something every foal can do. Maybe it´s for Applebloom.

“I need some help with an animal who doesn´t want to brush his teeth.” She says a lot more openly. She even shows me her face.

“Sure, I love helping animals.” I say as I put the book back on the table.

“That´s great. Should we go?” Fluttershy asks, a large smile on her face.

“Sure, let´s go.” I say as I hop of my seat and start walking towards the door. She follows me as I walk towards the gate of the orchard. We wave back at Applejack as we walk along the path.

“How long have you been here in Ponyville?” Fluttershy asks as we walk past the orchard and towards Fluttershy´s cottage.

“I got hit in the head by Pinkie Pie about 5 days ago.”

“Oh my. Did it hurt? Why would Pinkie do that?” She asks.

“It didn´t hurt that much, but it did put me in the hospital for two days. Pinkie didn´t did it on purpose. She merely crashed into me and offered me a party as soon as I got out of the hospital.” I say calmly while Fluttershy´s expression got more surprised with every word that I say.

“It put you in the hospital. That is horrible, but how could that happen?”

“I wasn´t paying attention to where I was walking and I got hit in the head.” I say as I hop over a large log while Fluttershy walks around it.

“Oh, how did it go in the hospital? I hope you had a good time.” She says while wiping her mane out of her face. Her voice is so soothing that I think that she can compete with Morgan Freeman.

“It was nice, but one of the nurses has a bit of a squeaky voice. Rainbow and Pinkie visited me, so I could bear it.”

“That is very nice of them, but where do your life? I haven´t seen you anywhere in Ponyville.”

“I have been living with Rainbow and working at Applejack´s. Rainbow paid my bills and I am working to pay her off.”

“You have been living with Rainbow. Are you two… uhm…” Fluttershy says as he face starts to redden.

“What do you mean?” I ask, but I think that I can guess what she means.

“I mean…” Fluttershy says as her face becomes as red as a tomato.

“Oh, you mean like that. No no no no, nothing like that. I just have no bits to my name so she offered to let me stay.”

“Oh, ok. That´s good.” She says as her face starts to get yellow once more.

We don´t talk much to each other as we walk down the rest of the path. We simply walk on and soon I see the cottage on the horizon. I almost looks like the one on the show; there are just a bit more animal homes here. I see holes for rabbits, cages for birds and so many more things. It is a lively bunch.

We walk towards the cottage and step in. Fluttershy immediately goes to check some of the feeding bowl of the animals and refilling the empty ones. She flies around as she takes care of the birds and the other flying animals. I think that I even see a bat flutter around somewhere.

I sit down on the couch and ask her, “What kind of animal do I have to help with?”

“Oh, it is nothing big. Just a bear.” She says very calm. Wait, did she just said ´bear´?

Ch 17. Not meeting mr. Bear.

“A bear? You mean like the large furry things?” I ask her.

“Yes, mister Bear wants us to help him a bit. He can’t do it by himself so he asked me.” She says as she walks into the kitchen. “Do you want some tea?”

“Sure. What kind?” I ask while looking around if I see Angel.

“I make my own kind, do you mind?” She asks while I hear some port clanging.

“Not at all.” I say back to her as I see a pair of bunny ears poke out from behind a chair. I hear some humming come from the kitchen as Fluttershy prepares some tea. I see the small bunny hop out from the chair, sporting an angry look.

“Hi, who are you.” I ask him, playing dumb. I do fear the wrath of him, but maybe I’m lucky.

Angel just sits there with a frown, tapping one of his feet rapidly on the ground. He looks annoyed so I decide not to bother him. I stand up and look around a bit. From the ceiling hang a lot of cages which contain several birds. I see some baskets in the corner. I walk over to them too see what is in them. Some are empty, but one has a kitten and another one had a puppy. They are, as I expected, sporting exceptionally large eyes and look almost as cute as ponies.

I prevent a minor heart attack by walking back to my seat, just as Fluttershy comes walking in. She carefully balances a plate on her back. I think that if I have to do that that I would break a lot of cups.

She carefully puts the plate on the small coffee table and pours two cups of tea. “Here you go.” She says as she hoofs me one.

“Thanks.” I say as I take the cup clumsily in one hoof. Fluttershy sits down and takes a cup herself. Angel hops on her lap and nests himself there.`

“What is the bunny’s name.” I ask while sipping the tea. It is delicious. `

“Angel and isn’t he a cute little bunny. I found him when he was young and I took him in.” She says while hugging Angel, almost suffocating the little bunny.

“Where did you get all the rest of these animals?” I ask. I only ask just so they know that I know. If they start asking more questions than I am doomed.

“Some of them are owned by ponies in Ponyville and some are woodlands critters. I just tend to the ones that are hurt or those that need any food.” She says while a robin sits down on her shoulder and start making some noise.

“What has happened?” Fluttershy asks and the robin makes some more noise. “Then we need to go fast.” Fluttershy says as she jumps of the couch and starts walking towards the door.

“What has happened?” I ask her while rushing behind her.

“A couple of foxes have been attacked and they are wounded. I think that mister Bear can wait a bit.” She says to me as we walk along the edge of the forest. She turns to the robin and says, “”Could you go tell mister Bear that I won’t be coming until at least tonight.” The robin makes a noise and flies of again.

“How could you talk to that bird?” I ask her. I think that this is the first question about something that I don’t know fully already.

“I don’t know exactly, but I can understand them and they understand me. I think that it came with my cutie mark.” She says cheery as we walk into a little less dense portion of the Everfree forest.

I decide to ‘expand’ my knowledge of Ponyville and surrounding a bit. “What forest are we walking through right now?”

“We’re walking through the Everfree forest. It is a very dangerous forest if you don’t know it, but there are many wonderful things around if you take the time to explore it.” She explains while pointing through the trees to something.

“Have you explored the whole forest?” I ask as we walk in between some trees and into the forest.

“O, goodness, no. The forest is way too dangerous to explore it all. There are so many monster in the darker parts. There are a few maps, but they only cover a small part.” She asks while looking out for any critters that might need her help.

“Have you been deep into the forest?” I ask as I jumping over a branch.

“I think that the deepest that I’ve been must be the castle a couple of weeks ago. That was pretty deep.” She says while walking around the same branch that I just jumped over.

“What castle? I think that a castle in here would be quite obvious.” I say while looking around for sighs of the castle.

“Oh, no. The castle is very deep in the forest and it is a bad place. I wouldn’t advise to go there. When we went there we came across a manticore and evil ponies and so many evil things.” Fluttershy says as she shivers a bit from the evil memories.

“Are we going deep now?” I ask, a bit worried about meeting a manticore or another timberwolf.

“No, no, no. We’re just walking along the edge right now. We shouldn’t come across any monsters here, just the occasional woodland critter.” She says as we arrive at a large clearing. The sun is shining brightly and I see several bunnies, foxes and other creatures running around. Fluttershy runs towards them and talk to some of them.

After a few minutes of this she gestures for me to come and I follow her over a small his towards a fox den. I hear a soft wheezing come from inside as I walk up.

Fluttershy walks up to the entrance and puts her head in. she quickly pedals back into me and knocks me over. She quickly stands up and starts taking deep breaths.

“What’s happened?” I ask while checking if she’s still fine.

She keeps hyperventilating and just points towards the den. I walk over to it and put my head in too. What I see disgusts me and I understand why Fluttershy was so alarmed. In the den lay two torn up fox bodies and a couple of twigs.

Ch 19. Surprise!

I wipe the sweat from my brow as I put the last trash bag outside the cave. I stands near a large pile of bags that almost reaches the same height as the cave.

“Are we done?” I ask Fluttershy who is still inside the cave.

“I think we are. Mister Bear, do want any more help.” I hear Fluttershy asking the bear. Please say no, I am in no mood to do anything else.

I hear some more talking going on inside the cave and then I see Fluttershy walking out, carrying something in her mouth.

“So we’re done?” I ask as she approaches me.

“We are and he even gave us some of his special honey, isn’t he a nice bear.” Fluttershy says around the small pot that is in her mouth. She puts it down in front of me and I pick it up, looking at the contents. It has a clear, yellow honey in it. I try to swirl it around, but even when I shake it clings to the bottom. I wonder what is so special about it, but it can wait.

“Do you need my help for anything else?” I ask as I hoof the jar back to her.

“I don’t think so, no. Would you like to have a sandwich with some of this honey?” She asks as we start walking towards the edge of the clearing.

“Sure, that would be nice.” I say as we walk past the first trees and into the denser forest. We exchange some small talk as we make the walk towards the road on the edge of the Everfree.

We walk towards her cottage and as soon as some animals notice they fly towards her and start making every kind of that sound that they could make.

Fluttershy listens patiently and then gasp a bit. “O my, I forgot to feed them.” She then flies of to her cottage with more speed that I can even muster and she leaves me standing here. The animals realize that she has left and quickly follow her into the cottage. I roll my eyes and follow the herd of critters into the cottage.

I sit down on the couch as Fluttershy goes around with several bags of feed, filling all sorts or trays, cups, basked with small piles of feed. After a couple of minutes she’s done and she puts the bags in a cupboard. She walks into the kitchen and emerges with a plate, a knife, a couple slices bread and the jar of honey.

She sits down next to and starts making a couple of slices with honey. She hoofs one over to me and I thank her. I dig in as she makes one for herself.

The honey tastes very good. It tastes very sweet and very smooth and the aftertaste has a taste that I can’t quite lay my hoof on. “This tastes very good.” I say through a mouthful of bread and honey.

Fluttershy agrees silently and chew on. “Would you like another one?” She asks when she finishes hers.

“Sure, why not?” I say as a couple of small critters sit around Fluttershy and look at her with begging eyes.

“Do you want some too?” Fluttershy says to them as she starts breaking the bread into smaller pieces. The critters make some more noise that she interprets as a yes. She starts giving the pieces of bread to the animals and soon she is out of bread, leaving only the jar of honey.

“Oh, I’m sorry. Should I get some more bread?” Fluttershy asks as she wipes some crumbs of her lap. The whole floor in front of us is litters with half-eaten pieces of bread, crumbs and eating animals. It is almost as bad as mister Bear’s cave.

“Nah, I’m good.” Once Fluttershy cleared out all the critter I can finally move around normally again. I stand up and stretch a bit, popping my wings a bit. Hope that it won’t be bad for my wings, because I am no mood for more wing injuries. “I think that I should go back to the orchard and help Applejack some more.”

“Oh, ok. I will see you next time.” Fluttershy says, sounding a bit disappointed. “Maybe you can give this to Applejack.” She says as she hoofs me the jar of honey.

“Sure, ” I say as I take the jar. “I’m sure she’ll appreciate it. See ya.” I say to Fluttershy as I walk out of the door.

I walk along the path to the orchard and I the sun is about three quarters of the way. I grip the jar and see if my slow way of flapping is any faster.

It isn’t; I guess that I just have walk again. As I have said many times before: I need to learn to fly. So I go along the path, having put the jar on my back. Walking with one in my hoof is very annoying and somehow balancing on my back works without letting it fall all the time.

So I walk towards the orchard and I don’t see much long the way, just a few ponies whom I greet.

How should I break to them that I have been watching them for a long time. Not actually watching, but still; it would be weird to know that somepony has seen your life without even begin there. Knowing Twilight I would have to explain everything and I have no idea how this has happened, except that Discord is involved which makes it kind of is self-explanatory.

I hear a rustle in the woods as I approach the orchard. I don’t pay much attention to and walk along. I walk through the gate and towards the barn. The orchard is quiet, a bit too quiet for my liking.

I walk towards the barn and swing open the large door. It is completely dark inside. “Hey, is anypony here?”

A light flashes on and I quickly close my eyes. Then I hear a wall of sound coming my way that sound vaguely of ‘Surprise!’

Ch 20. A gator on my face.

I carefully open my eyes, scared of the one who produced such sound at that volume, but I man up (pony up?) and open them anyway. I see that I am surrounded by a lot of ponies, all crammed into the barn.

I see Applejack, Applebloom, Mac, Rainbow, Rarity, Carrot Top, Cheerilee, a bouncing Pinkie and a lot of other ponies. I even see Fluttershy; she must’ve flown back here as I walked back.

“Come on, you silly pony, and get over here for your very own Welcome-To-Ponyville Party.” Pinkie says as she points to a large banner that says just that. She hops over to a large table where a very large collection of sweets is spread out. I see one large cake, a collection of cupcakes and a few muffins here and there. Next to it all sits a large bowl of punch and next to the bowl is a small dragon filling two cups.

“Thanks, Pinkie, but you didn’t need to do this.” I say, even though I am very happy that I got my very own Pinkie Pie Party. “But I’m still glad that you did.” I say to the mare, seeing her brighten up almost immediately.

“Well then, everypony, let’s get ready to party!” She screams out as some music starts to play out nowhere. A lot of the ponies start dancing in a, for me, very humorous way; close to how Twilight dances. It’s a pity that I don’t see her, but I do see Spike so maybe she’s around somewhere.

A couple of ponies approach me. “Hi, I’m Berry Punch. I run the liquor store in Ponyville. Nice to meet you.” She says while shaking my hoof.

“Nice to meet you too.” I say to her as she walks back to the back and starts to dance with somepony.

The next mare that walks up to me is Rarity. “Hello, darling. It is nice to see that more stallions come to Ponyville. Anyway, my name is miss Rarity and I run the carousel boutique in town. I you even need any fine clothes you can come to me.” She says as she gives me a gentle hoofshake.

“I will surely do that and my name is Leo.”

“It has been a pleasure meeting you, Leo.” Rarity says as she walks to the back and joins Applejack, Rainbow and Fluttershy.

The next few hours are filled up with meeting a large assortment of ponies, eating a lot of sweets and getting scared the living crap out of me by Pinkie every time that she pops out of an impossible place including my cup of punch.

After working through all the ponies at the party and as a small amount of them already starts leaving I walk over Rainbow and the rest, who are chatting in the corner. I haven’t seen Twilight anywhere, so I assume that she isn’t even here and Spike is laying sleeping in the corner.

Fluttershy notices me and scoots over a bit, allowing me to sit in-between her and Applejack. I feel a bit tired of the party, but I met a lot of new ponies and now I can finally say their name and not play dumb all the time.

“So, suga’cube. How was ta party?” Applejack asks me.

“It was a lot of fun and very unexpected. Pinkie really knows how to throw a party. Although I think that it got too much for that little dragon. What is his name and why in Celestia’s name is a dragon here?” I ask Applejack as I look at the snoring dragon in the back.

“That’s Spike. He’s Twilight’s assistant. Twi is in Canterlot at ta moment, so Spike takes care of ta library.”

“She has a dragon as an assistant. How did that happen?” I ask, sipping my drink.

“She got him in Canterlot, during some kind o’ test. I think that without him Twi would’ve gotten insane long ago. He’s a very sweet dragon.” Applejack says as she grabs the glass in front of her and takes a swig.

“He is a very sweet little dragon and he is a very good help at the shop.” Rarity says as she takes a very small sip from her cup as gracious as a pony can do.

“Interesting, do any of you have any pets?” I ask because it can be a good sign to where I am so that I don’t accidently say something that hasn’t happened yet.

“I have my darling Opalescence.”

“Ah have Winona, mah dog. Ya must’ve seen her around ta barn.”

“My Gummy is the best alligator, he’s so nice and running everywhere.” Pinkie says as she pulls Gummy out of her mane and start stroking the staring alligator. Gummy looks at me with a distant look in his eyes and jumps at me. I soon have a toothless alligator clamped to my face. I try to pull it off, but he keeps sucking and I am unable to get it off. I hear somepony come towards me and do something to the alligator on my face.

Pinkie giggles a bit as she strokes the alligator. “You’re such a silly gator. Let’s get you back to the bakery.” She says as she puts gummy back in her mane, probably teleporting it towards Sugar Cube Corner in some kind of way.

“Does he always do that?” I ask the rest of the mares. My question is met with a couple of nods and a ‘It’s Pinkie alright.’ From Rainbow.

“I have my angel, he’s such a cute little bunny. I found him a long time ago in the forest. He didn’t have anyone to care for him so I took him in. Even though he is a bit difficult at times he is such a sweetheart.” Fluttershy says.

“Well… he can get a bit protective sometimes.” I say, thinking of saying something else. ‘That rabbit's got a vicious streak a mile wide, it's a killer!’ is something that springs to mind.

Ch 21. Mac's evil eye.

Ch 21. Mac’s evil eye.

“Do you have any pets, Rainbow?” I ask Rainbow.

“Nah, I don’t have one and I don’t see why I should have one,” Rainbow says. “And if I even had one it would to be fast, cool and awesome. Like an eagle or something.” She says as she tries to make an eagle with her hooves. It looks like two hooves trying to make a bird, ‘trying’ being the keyword.

“Why don’t you come on over sometime, Rainbow?” Fluttershy asks her.

“I’m cool right now, maybe some other time.” Rainbow responds, waving her hoof in a dismissing fashion.

“Oh, ok.” Fluttershy says, seeming a bit disappointed. So I try to cheer her a bit up.

“Fluttershy, if I get my own home would you like to help me find a pet?” I ask her with a smile.

She brightens up almost immediately. “Oh, I would love to. What kind of animals do you like?” She asks me with a large smile on her muzzle. More heart attacks might follow.

“I don’t think that I can come up with any animal that I wouldn’t like, but I prefer felines and birds.” I say, thinking of my pet back at home. I have or had a cat, one that was light orange, and a couple birds which frequently visited my home.

“That’s nice. You can just visit me when you want one. There always are animals who need a home.” Fluttershy says as she yawns a bit. “I think that I am going to head home.” She stands up and walks towards the barn doors. “Bye, girls, see you.”

“Bye!” We all say, Pinkie by far the loudest.

“Ah think that I’m going to hit ta hay too.” Applejack says as the barn doors close with a bang. “See ya’ll tomorrow.” She says as she follows Fluttershy through the door.

The same ‘bye’ routine is followed. Rarity leaves soon after them and Pinkie hops after her. Me and Rainbow are left alone, but we start getting ready to leave to.

“So, how was your very first Pinkie Party? Amazing huh.” She asks as he slowly fly towards her cloud home.

“It was amazing. She throws amazing parties.” I say. I really enjoyed the party. The general feel of the part is so great. Everypony was laughing, smiling and talking all the time. I think that this would even make the grumpy cat happy.

“Pinkie is the best with parties. So if there is one, always go to it.” Rainbow says as we arrive at her cloud home.

“If all of them are this good I will.” I say as I follow her through the door and into the house. “Are there a lot of her parties?”

“More than you can imagine.” She says as she walks into the kitchen. “she throws one for every time that Applejack wins a prize and trust me; she wins a lot.”

“Just let me hear about every party she throws,” I say as Rainbow grabs two glasses and fills them with water. “I think that I’m going to sleep.”

“Yea, me too,” she says as she drinks the water. “I prepared one of the bedrooms for you. It’s the one next to mine. It doesn’t have much, but it’s enough.”

“Wow, thanks. When did you do that?” I ask as I gulp my glass down.

“When you were working at AJ’s and had some free time.” She says as we walk up the stairs, towards our rooms.

“Ah. Well goodnight.” I say as I stand in front of my door.

“Goodnight.” She says as she shoves open the door and walks in. I follow her lead and walk into my room. It is a bit plain, but it’ll do. I flop down on the bed and get comfortable. Man, that party was crazy. I really hope that Applejack won’t have any trouble with me sleeping in a bit. I think that it’ll be fine; she’ll understand.

“Ya’ll are late just cus ya thought that ah would be approve o’ it!” Applejack yells at me. “Ya don’t see me lying in ma bed. I’m workin’ out here cus ya’ll were still in yer bed.”

“But, but…” I try to get in between her rants.

“No buts, mister. Ya are going ta pick up them baskets o’ apples an’ being them ta the barn and then yer goin’ ta help me buck the rest. Go!” She points her hoof towards the orchard and I give up. I walk towards the orchard with my head low.

I knew that I should’ve gotten out of my bed earlier and do realize that 11 o’clock is stretching it a bit. I grumble a bit as I carry the many baskets towards the barn and put them next to the large collection of baskets that already is there. This is going to be a long day.

Crud, I need to solve that timberwolf problem in the Everfree forest. Dang it, it’ll need to wait until tomorrow morning. I am in no mood to handle them wolves right now and if they, just like Fluttershy said, are more active during the day then I would be stupid to go handle them right now. So that is something that can wait.

As I place the last of the baskets in the barn I walk past Mac and he is giving me the evil eye and believe me; he can give the evil eye like a champion. That is creepy and I quickly avert my eyes, not wanting to get more on the bad side of Mac. Because that side is usually the one that gets hurt.

I shiver a bit and walk back to the last few trees that need to get bucked. I deal out some hard kicks to the trees for the next few hours.

Then I hear Applejack call for me. We’re going to get some food. I walk towards the barn and see that Applejack and Mac are looking a bit tired and sweaty.

I follow them into the barn and walk towards the kitchen. I hear some high-pitched yelling and I see something fly towards me. I feel a splat and notice that there is something on my face.

It’s a lot of Apple.

Ch 22. A bag of bits.

Ch 22. A bag of Bits

I scrape the apple mush of my face and look into the room. I see Mac, Applebloom and Applejack sitting at the table, the table covered with various apple bases food. All of them stare at me for just a second before bursting out into laughter. Applebloom falls off her chair and continues laughing there. I just glare at them while I try to get the applesauce out of my mane.

Applejack is the first one to recover from laughter. “S-Sorry, suga’cube, but that was funny.”

“Yea, hilarious.” I say as I fling a bit of applesauce at her. “But what is the reason that I got applesauce thrown at me?”

“Me an’ ma sis were havin’ a bit of an argument and ah threw sum applesauce at her, but ah missed her and ah hit you.” Applebloom says after she stopped laughing.

I sigh and sit at the end of the table, opposite of Mac. I grab a napkin and wipe the rest of the applesauce of my face, but there is still some in my mane. I’ll take care of that later. Applebloom climbs back onto her chair and grabs a plate.

“Can I go eat?” she asks as her hoof hovers above a plate of apple fritters.

“Sure.” Applejack says as she grabs some of the applesauce that didn’t left the bowl or is sticking to the wall. “Would ya like sum?” she asked me as she shoves a plate in front of my face.

“Sure,” I say as I look at the table and its apple filled contents. I choose a slice of apple pie. I grab one of the larger slices and put it on my plate. As always it tastes wonderful and the amount of food on the table slowly shrinks away as we eat.

We clean up the table and return to our chores. Applejack, of course, gives me new orders. She orders me to go and clean the barn and collect all the loose hay that is lying around. It should be easy; the barn never really was a mess.

It is horrible. It looked like a tornado blew through this place, or in other words: The Cutie Mark Crusaders.

There is hay everywhere, even stuck to the ceiling. The only place where no hay is where the hay is supposed to be.

Applejack followed me into the barn and is now standing behind me.

“Good luck.” She says as she hoofs me a broom. She walks out of the barn as she giggles a bit.

I sigh and slowly start swiping all the hay to the center.

This is boring! I can’t think of anything that is in any way less interesting than slowly swiping a lot of hay. I even have to come crawl to Applejack to ask for some steps to get to the roof.

She makes some remarks over the fact that I need help and gives me the steps eventually.

After a lot of boringness I finally finish up. I put the steps and broom in the corner and walk out into the open air, basking in the sun.

Applejack walks up to me and I smile at her, happy that I am finally done. “Hi, Applejack. I just finished cleaning up the barn. Is there anything that I need to do or can I go off?”

“Did ya really clean up everythin’? ” Applejack ask as she takes a peak in the barn.

“I did, why?” I ask as I stand next to her, looking into the barn and seeing that everything is cleaned up.

“Ta barn always is dirty. Ya didn’t need ta clean it all up.” She says as she closes the barn, shutting the door with a bang.

“You mean that I just cleaned for hours for nothing. You couldn´t have said anything?” I say, getting a bit angry with the honest mare.

“Uhm…” Applejack says as a sheepish smile covers her face and she starts to sweat a bit. “Yes… uhm… no.”

“You are a bad liar, do you know that?” I say to her.

“Uhm.. yes.” She breaths out. “Ah thought that it was a good joke ´cause ya were late. Ah’m sorry.”

“No hard feelings. At least you have a nice clean barn now.” I say, feeling content that I got something done. A boring job like this isn’t something that I would’ve completed back at home.

Applejack wipes the sweat from her brow. “Ah’m glad that ya’re not angry. I´ll throw in sum extra pay fer that.”

“So can I go or do I need to clean the orchard too?” I ask pointing to the loose leaves on the ground behind me.

“Nah, ya can leave if ya want ta. Ah don´t need nothing done on the farm no more.” Applejack says as she starts to walk back to the barn.

“Thanks, ´till tomorrow.” I say as I slowly flap and get airborne. I only hover a few feet above the ground, but, hey, at least I´m flying.

“Sure, see ya.” Applejack waves at me as I slowly start to flap in the direction of Ponyville.

I think of what I can do when I’m in Ponyville. Maybe visit Sugar Cube Corner or maybe lend a book from the library. Maybe I buy something of the market, taste a bit of the local food.

I hear somepony yelling behind me and I slowly but surely turn around. If you want to turn around in the air you have to flap really weird. But when I have turned I around I see that it is Applejack who is galloping towards me.

I close my wings and let myself fall to the ground. “Hi Applejack. What are you coming here for?”

“Ah say that ya were goin´ ta Ponyville so ah though ´Why don´t ah give ya some bits.´ so that ya can get somethin´ fer yerself.” She says as she throws a small bag of bits to me.

“Wow, thanks.” I say as I catch the bag.

“Yer welcome.” She says as she tips her hat. She walks off towards her barn, leaving me to myself.

I open the bag and my mouth fall open at the sight of the money. There are several thick golden coins in there.

Ch 23. An owl on my head.

There must be one hell of a lot of bits in this bag, but I shouldn’t get my hopes up. Even if there is a lot in here I’m still going to use most of it to pay of my debt. What I am going to is use some of the bits to buy a couple of treats for myself.

I walk towards Ponyville, already hearing the sounds of the small town. I would like to meet Twilight too, but she’s got a thing for staying in Canterlot. Maybe I could ask Spike when she would be returning.

I enjoy the sounds of nature, ponies and other things I can’t quite place as I walk into Ponyville. Walking past many carts I play a little game with myself. I try to name as many of the ponies I see. I get far and can name a lot of the ponies, but different to the show, I don’t see to many duplicates.

I walk into Sugar Cube Corner and sit down into one of the booths. Sugarcube Corner consists of a counter, manned by Pinkie, and a couple of booths, most of them occupied by other ponies.

Pinkie hops over to me. “Hi, Leo, what can I do for you?”

I haven’t been here before, so I have no idea. “Surprise me.” I say to her. Immediately I can see the gears turning in her head. She thinking of something and I am either going to regret it or love it. She looks baffled for a second and then goes back to her cheery self as she hops back to the kitchen.

I sit there, looking at ponies pass by, waiting for my food to arrive. I occasionally see some more ponies that I recognize, but I don’t think that I can go up to them and talk with them. I would like to see if the fancanon is right, but getting stuck in a time vortex isn’t my idea of a nice day out.

As I stare out of the window I feel a tap on my back. I turn around and see a bouncing Pinkie with a large platter of food on my back. “Here is your food.” She places the large platter in front of me. “Enjoy!” She says to me as she hops to the booth next to me.

The plate in front of me consist of 7 bananas, 21 scoops of ice-cream, 3 ounces of chocolate sauce, 42 cacao beans, 17 ounces whipped cream and one cup of coffee. It is a lot; how am I going to finish this all by myself.

Luckily there is help in the form of Rainbow who flies against the window with a loud bonk. She gives a sheepish smile as she walks into the store and notices me.

“Hey, Wings, what are you doing here?” She says as she sits on the opposite side of the booth. I shove the platter aside so that I can look at her without having to look around it. “Aren’t you supposed to be bucking apple trees?”

“Nah, she let me off the leash. She even gave a small bag of bits to get something for myself.” I say as I put the bag on the table.

“Nice, but why did you order all of this.” She says as she points to the massive amount of food in front of me.

“I guess that I was a mistake to say, surprise me, but at least I don’t have to eat it all alone.”

“Huh, what do you mean?”

I grabbed the two spoons that she gave with the platter. “I think Pinkie has a foreseeing eye.” I hoof her a spoon and she starts digging in almost immediately.

After a few minutes she emerges, her face covered in ice-cream, and she wipes the ice-cream of off her mouth with a hoof. “This tastes good.” She looks at the large cavern she had dug in the ice-cream mountain. “Would you like some too?”

“Nah, I’ll stick to the coffee and bananas.” I say as I grab the cup and start dipping the banana in it. “You can have the ice-cream, beans and cream.”

She grins and ditches the spoon. She plants her face in the cave and starts eating away. A lot of ice-cream flies away from out table and we get a couple of mean looks from the other customers. Rainbow doesn’t care and continues to spread ice-cream throughout the store.

When all the ice-cream is gone and the bananas have been dissolved in the coffee I take the empty platter back to the counter. “Thanks for the food, Pinkie. Rainbow and I enjoyed it a lot. How much is it?”

“You silly filly. You don’t have to pay.” She says as she grabs the platter and puts it underneath the counter. “It’s another Welcome-To-Ponyville-Party gift.”

“Wow, thanks, but I would like to do something for you in return.” I look around the store to see if anything needs to be done. The large amount of ice-cream tingles my common sense. “Maybe I can help clean up when the shop is closed.”

“Sure, see you this afternoon.” She chirps as she walks towards another booth, helping some other customers.

I walk over to Rainbow, who has cleaned her face by now, and say that I’ll go visit the library. She says that Twilight still is in Canterlot, but I still want to visit. So she gives up and flies off, probably to sleep in a tree.

I walk through the town, glad that I didn’t eat all of the ice-cream otherwise I wouldn’t be able to do anything, but lay somewhere.

I walk up to the library and discuss with myself if I should knock or not. I knock a couple of times and Spike opens the door of the library.

“Hey, Leo, how are things going?” He says as I follow him into the library.

“Good, I just had lunch at Sugar Cube Corner with Rainbow. Pinkie gave us a jumbo platter of ice-cream, so there was enough for the two of us.”

“Typically Pinkie.” Spike says as he puts a couple of books in the bookcase. “So what are you looking for?”

“Something on basic magic. I need to freshen up a bit on the basics.” I say, a bit nervous. I hope that Spike will fall for the ruse; otherwise I will have to expand on the network of lies.

I hear a hoot coming from behind me. I feel something on my head and look up. Owlowiscious is sitting on top of my head.

Ch 24. Getting my hair chopped.

Ch 24. Getting the hair chopped.

I, for one, don’t like birds and especially not on my head. I wave my hoof in front of the owl, trying to get it to move. Owlowlicious stays where he is and hoots a couple of times for good measure. It’s like he knows that he is annoying me.

I plop down on the couch and look at a couple of the books that are closest to me. Most of them are about some sort of advanced magic. Typically Twilight.

“I got your book,” Spike says as he walks over, holding a medium sized book in his claws. “I think that this should be good to brush up a bit.” He gave it to me and I hold it a bit awkwardly in my hooves, and fortunately he doesn’t notice anything strange even though I am a ‘unicorn’ and I’m not using my magic.

“Thanks,” I say as Spike walks back to the kitchen. I hear some sounds coming from the kitchen, but I don’t pay much attention to them.

I open the books and look at the contents. The first chapter is called ‘What is magic actually?’, and the second one is called ‘The basics: A small start.’ I think that I should just start with the first one.

I open the book and start reading, seeing Spike run about every once in a while. The first chapter tells me that magic is a force, some sort of floating energy, which is all around us. Floating all around us is the magic, having more or less energy depending on the area.

Seeing as Equestria is occupied by quite a few unicorns, so the general level of magic is quite high, but in certain places it’s higher. Like the Everfree forest, which causes the strange and powerful animals, and the Canterlot Castle, where the high concentration of magic was one of the reasons that the princesses chose that spot to build the castle. The rest of the chapter mostly names certain places and their respective levels of magic, expressed in mmeters (magical meters) and is compared to the EMS (Equestrian Magical Standard). Most of the cities are close to it, but a few stick out. Appleoosa is on the low side, but Ponyville on the other side is quite high, mostly because it is close to the Everfree. Manehattan was high too, but has been lowering due to the high level of pollution.

It gets a bit dry at the end to I quickly flip through a few pages and arrive at the second chapter. I grab a random piece of paper and put it in as a page keeper. This stuff is too dry to read for too long so I think that I’ll take a break.

“Hey Spike, can I borrow this book?” I say waving the book at the little dragon that makes one of his regular ‘walks across the room’.

“Sure, just write it down in the book over there,” Spike says as he points his finger to a new looking book and a pedestal where it lays on. “If you don’t write it in there Twilight will go crazy and hunt you down even if were on the moon.”

“Then I’ll make sure that I’ll write it in good enough,” I say as I walk over to the book. “Getting hunt to the moon doesn’t sound like a nice way to spend the week.”

“It sure doesn’t.” Spike says as he walks back to the kitchen, probably to make some food for himself. I write my information down on the page, hoping that Twilight in the form of a banshee won’t haunt me in my dreams. The thing that scares me the most is that I know that she could do it.

I walk back to the book and balance it on my back, having to try hard to not let it fall. “I’ll be off then. See you later, Spike.”

“See ya.” I hear coming from the kitchen as I open the door and walk out, letting the sun hit my fur. It surprises me that I haven’t been cooking every time my coat was exposed to the sun. I know that it’ll be nice to have in the winter, but the summers must be brutal. I wonder how the ponies would look without their fur.

I shake my head as I try to get that weird image out of my head. I really hope that the ponies won’t shave their fur in the winter, but looking at my mane I really need to get a haircut. The hair is sticking out in various places. I hope that there aren’t any murderous barbers here in Ponyville.

I soon see a typical barber cutting somepony’s hair behind a glass window. I walk over to the shop and look in my bag of bits, seeing that I have enough for a nice cut. I walk in and sit down in one of the many empty spots. I put down the book on the empty spot next to me and look around a bit, waiting for the barber to finish.

He has a nice looking shop, a couple of posters of ponies with nice haircuts, some books with photos of ponies with nice haircuts and a couple of postcards of ponies with nice haircuts. It seems he has an obsession with ponies with nice haircuts, but then again, he is a hairdresser.

I flip through one of the books with ponies with haircuts and look for a nice haircut. Some of the haircuts are just outrageous and some are close to being bald or about as bald as a pony can get. After some searching and looking at ponies with nice haircuts I finally found the one perfect for me, a normal haircut, nothing too complicated, with just the slightest bit of me. I hope that he won’t start questioning my seriousness and give me a new smile.

He smiles tired at the customer as he puts a few bits in the register and gestures to me to come over. “And what do you want for a haircut? Have you found something nice?”

“I did. This one.” I say as I point to the pony with the nice haircut.

“Good choice,” The barber says as he grabs a scissor with his hoof and starts snapping some of the longer part of my hair off.

The hair flies all around me as the barber starts chopping.

Ch 25. Meeting the barber.

After the whirlwind of hair settles down I finally get a good look at the barber. He has a sand colored coat and a red and white mane and tail. His mane looks like Flim and Flam´s, but a little less bacony. His face looks worn by age, but still holds a friendly genuine smile.

He grabs a mirror and shows me the back of my head. The mirror shows my dark grey/purple hair which is a lot shorter than before and looks a lot better. I think that I forgot to explain how I look. Yes, I think I did (Great monologue). I have a light grey coat, with a couple of darker spots towards my hooves. My hair is a color that consists of dark grey and a darker purple, it looks quite nice. My wings are the same color; they only get a bit darker at the ends.

“Do you like the haircut, mister?” He asks me.

“It´s great, thanks.” I say as I get a good look at the great work he did. I hop out of the chair and grab the bag of bits out of my ´pocket´.

“Oh, no, sir, there´s no need for that, sir. I saw that you are new in town and the first cut here is always free.” He says, his smile never faltering.

I rub some loose hairs out of my mane, letting them join the rest on the ground. “Thanks, that´s very nice of you,” I say as I shake his hoof. “But what´s your name?”

“My name is Cutting Edge and I have owned this barbershop for a long time. I run this shop with my wife Sharp Scissor and my son Snips,” He says as he puts the mirror down. He grabs a broom and start sweeping my hair into a bin.

“Nice to meet you, mister Edge. My name is Leo Lion,” I say to the sweeping barber. “I have arrived in Ponyville a couple of days ago.”

“And have you enjoyed your stay so far?” Cutting asks as he puts the broom back.

“I have. Everypony that I have met has been nice to me. I have been living with Miss Dash for a while because my bit supple has been running a bit dry lately. She offered me a place to sleep until I could rent a place.” I say as I look at my awesome haircut in a larger mirror.

“You live with Miss Dash? You must be a miracle worker. She is never seen around stallions, let alone that she would let a one in her house,” He says surprised. “Is there something that you aren’t telling me?” He gave me a suggesting grin.

“What… no? She’s just a friend and nothing more. And for the record, I have been sleeping at Applejack her house for a night or two.” I say, trying to avoid rumors. Only then I realize what I have said. I give a sheepish smile as I grab the book and balance it on my back.

His grin came back in full force. “I’m sure you have mister Lion.”

“Oh, don’t start again,” I say to him as I have my hoof on the doorknob. “I’ll send

you an invitation to the wedding.” I say to him as I open the door and give him a wave of my hoof. “Until the next time.”

“Until next time, sir.” I hear from behind me as I walk out of the door and into the street.

I think for a while about what I am going to do. Maybe I could get a carrot or a few cherries. Maybe I should do something that has nothing to with food. I think that I’m just going to read my book in the park, should be better for me than just eating all the time.

I walk through the town, towards the few spots of green that I see in the distance, past a few carts. I wave to Mac, who is manning the applecart. He gives me a small nod and I give one back. A wave and a nod at the same time looks a bit stupid, but I don’t care.

I walk into the park and find the nearest bench. I hop on it and sit upon the bench Lyra-style. I take the book and start reading the second chapter.

After some hardcore reading I am woken from my trance by somepony. The pony

in question sits down next to me on the bench and starts peeking at the book.

“Why are you reading a book on magic for beginners?” I hear a mare’s voice say next to me.

I turn my face away from the book to see who is talking to me. I see Rainbow sitting next to me, smiling as she is trying to understand something of the book. She doesn’t understand a bit from what I can tell.

“Why would be reading something for beginners if you can already use magic?” She asks as she peeks at the page number. I’m not even half-way through the chapter.

It’s lying time again. “I am just brushing up a bit on the basics. I let myself slack a bit, so I forgot some of the more important basics. And it helps that I like reading too.” I say, hoping that my smile isn’t too sheepish.

“You’re turning into an egghead that is capable of rivaling with Twilight,” Rainbow says as she blows a hair out of her face. “You read too much. I’m going flying for a bit. You are coming?”

I can humiliate myself in front her with flying or humiliate myself not at all. “Nah, I’m good.”

“Fine, go play egghead then.” She says as she flies up and flaps away.

It appears to me that she wasn’t surprised that I was reading a book about magic, just before she asked me to fly with her. Discord did a good job in hiding me from the public, but it is a bit macabre that he would kill the second pony that found out. I really hope that he was kidding, but I’m not taking any risk. No telling ponies about my wings and horn situation.

I hear rustling behind me and close the book. I turn around and get a face full of leaves, twigs and light grey fur.

Ch 26. Napping in a tree.

“Momma, are you okay?” I hear a high voice come from behind the bushes. I see Dinky jump out of the bushes and walk over to the mare that ran/flew into me. I rub in my eye in one hoof and with the other I rub my head.

I open my eyes and see Derpy/Ditzy lie on the ground, her eyes crossing. She rubs her head and tries to stand up. She wobbles a bit on her legs and falls down onto the ground again. I stand up and walk over to her to help her up, but dinky beats me to it. She helps her mother up and walks over to me.

“I’m sorry for what momma did,” Dinky says to me with a downwards faced face. She blinks a few times as she gets a good look at me. “Wait, you’re that mister that threw Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon into the mud.” She giggles a bit as she remembers it. “That was very funny mister.”

Derpy/Ditzy walks up behind her and lays a hoof on her shoulder. “I’m sorry for bumping into you, but I’m under the impression that my daughter already knows you,” She says as she ruffles Dinky’s mane. Damn, this looks almost as cute as the CMC, but still has the same heart-attack-giving attributes.

I don’t get attacked by a heart, so I think that I’m in the clear. “Yes, I saw her at the school when I had to pick up Applejack’s sister Applebloom.”

“Ah, yes, I thought you looked familiar. It’s nice to meet you,” She says as she extends a hoof and I shake it. “My name is Ditzy Doo and I’m the mailmare around here.”

“Nice to meet you, Miss Doo, and it’s been nice meeting your daughter too.” I say with a smile, actually glad that she isn’t called Derpy. It’s a good name, but I prefer Ditzy. “My name is Mr. Lion, Leo Lion.”

“My Dinky is the best daughter I could imagine,” Ditzy says as she ruffles Dinky’s mane. “And I wouldn’t want to lose her for all the bits in the world.” Ditzy pulls Dinky tight against her.

“I wouldn’t like to lose any of my siblings too,” I say, thinking of my family back on earth. A tear appears in my eye as I think of the possibility that I might not ever see them again. I quickly wipe it away, before Ditzy or Dinky sees it.

“Well, I have to go again. Dinky and I are going to get a treat at Sugar Cube Corner,” She says as she puts the little filly on her back. “It was nice to meet you, Leo.”

Ditzy flaps a bit as she slowly gets into the air and slowly flies towards the sweets store. I hear Dinky yell from her back “Bye.”

I smile as I grab my book again and start reading. The second chapter mostly is about how to get your aura to appear and tells you so in very detailed steps.

First I have to concentrate with an empty mind, something that is quite hard for me. Then I should feel a warm feeling rise in myself. I feel it after a few minutes, somewhere in my left hoof. The feeling in a certain location usually means that it is concentrated in one spot. It’s only mental, it feels like its concentrated there, but it still means something. It’s very complicated and the book says that it will explain later.

The next step involves moving that warm spot towards the middle of your eyes. Seeing as this is all mental I have to concentrate very hard. And since I’m usually not very good at concentrating I fail twice, being distracted by a bird and a falling acorn.

I try again and this time I succeed in moving the warm spot to my head.

Ooh, a piece of candy. Damnit, a distraction.

Gotta try again.

This time I get it to the place where my horn is. I open one eye slowly and look up. I see that my horn is glowing a golden color, like Celestia’s.

I let it go, happy that I finally achieved something. I feel the heat dissipate and a couple of sparks come out of my horn.

I give a happy sigh and close the book, having finished the second chapter.

I think about what I can do next, but nothing comes to mind. I be lazy and sit on the bench for the rest of the day, but that would get boring quite quickly. I finally decide on what to do and hop off the bench, on to execute my plan.

I walk through Ponyville, thinking about what I’m going to do. It’s going to be nice and good or be horrible and sucky, just like most of my life.

I smile as I walk past the library, Sugar Cube Corner and the barber, thinking of the past few days and the happy memories that accompany them.

A couple of vendors on the market wave at me and I wave back. The ponies here are so friendly, at least a lot more than back on earth. I go up to Sweet Apple Acres, but I don’t enter it through the main entrance.

I walk alongside the fence and past the many apple trees. I continue walking until I feel like I’m a good way away. I hop over the fence and look around for a nice tree.

After a couple of minutes of looking I find a tree that has a nice collection of branches. I flap up towards the branches, careful to not get my wings tangled in the branches.

I get onto the branches, but a lot of leaves get onto my wings. There are so much clinging to my wings that I have to spend a full ten minutes getting all the tiny little annoying buggers out of them.

After all the little annoyances have been removed I can finally get a little naptime and I fall asleep quickly, lying on my soft bed of leaves.

Ch 27. A mare in the kitchen.

I am woken by a couple of birds who are, despite being cute, are very annoying. I open my eyes, rub them and look around, seeing if I can see anything besides leaves and trees. I really can´t see anything besides green and brown stuff.

I roll over again and try to get some more sleep, but the birds want me to do otherwise. I comply and hop out of the tree, landing on 4 hooves.

I, as I walk down the road, shake the leaves out of my head. I have absolutely no idea what to do now, besides going back to work again or annoy Rainbow at her house again. I decide to do the second one, because it is a lot of fun.

Since I’m too lazy (or unable) to fly directly to her house I walk along the path, enjoying the late afternoon sun.

I don´t see any ponies as I walk alongside the fence or as I slowly and clumsy flap to Rainbow´s house.

I go up to the door and see if I can walk right through it. I can´t, somehow it´s made of really hard stuff. So I have to turn the knob, like a peasant, and walk into the empty room. Well, the living room is empty, the kitchen is not. I hear a lot of noise coming from there, almost as if someone is wrecking the place.

Someone is. I stand there, my mouth fallen open. A pegasus with a dark brown coat is standing in the kitchen, a large amount of the drawers and cupboard opened and their contents spilled out over the floor.

She looks at me with open eyes and an equal open mouth. The bag that sits next to her is bulging a bit. It is obvious that it contains any missing piece from the kitchen.

“Uhm…,” She says. “You aren´t Rainbow.”

I sit down and look at her, blocking the only way out. “If you wanted to steal all of her silverware you could have just asked.”

“Really?” She asks as she tilts her head, thinking about a quick way out.

“Nah, and I don´t think that you would leave the silverware here and come peacefully to the police, would you?” I say to her, taking a defensive stance, ready to tackle her should

She slings the bag of silverware and other things onto her back. “I´m not really in the mood for a trip to the coppers,” She looks at the large bag on her back. “And I’m not giving up this baby.”

She flares her wings and takes off, trying to slip past me. I quickly jump and head-butt her in her stomach.

I land again on four hooves, but my female adversary isn´t so lucky. I hear two poofs right behind me. I turn around and see the bag lying there with the burglar next to it, grabbing at her stomach. She has her eyes shut as her face turns to a growl from the pain.

I turn around. “You really shouldn´t steal or you might get hurt.” I walk over to her and shove the bag back into the kitchen with my hind leg.

I see the door open and Rainbow walks in. “Hi, Wings. What a-” She stops as she sees the mare in pain and myself standing next to her. “What exactly is going on here?”

“Caught a burglar, she tried to escape and then I head-butted her in the stomach,” I say to her and I point to the growling mare next to me.

The mare tries to stand up, but I foil her attempts when I push her over, letting her fall down again on the soft cloud floor.

“A burglar? I never expected to be robbed here.” Rainbow says as she examines the mare in front of her. “What were you going to do with her?”

“I was thinking about getting her to some kind of police or some guards.”

“Good plan, but how were you going to do that alone.”

“Uhm…. No idea, actually. Do you want to help me?” I say as Rainbow walks over to the mare. She raises her hoof and brings it down on the mare´s temple. The mare growls again and stops growling, conscious slipping away from her.

“I don´t think that you had to do that.” I say as I poke her, trying to get a reaction. I don´t get one, but a bruise is starting to form on her temple.

“Otherwise she would be much more difficult to move,” She says as she lifts the mare onto her back. “And now she will get to jail unharmed.” She walks over to the door and opens it. “You´re coming?”

“Sure.” I say as I follow Rainbow out of the door.

Rainbow takes it a bit slower as she has the mare on her back. That is quite fine for me since Rainbow flies a lot faster than me. She somehow keeps the mare balanced on her back as we glide towards Ponyville.

The mare doesn´t stir as we land in the middle of a quiet Ponyville. Since it is the afternoon almost everypony has retreated to the comforts of their own houses.

We walk towards the police station, or what I think is the police station. It´s a long building with a sign out that says ´Guard posts´. The mare only falls of Rainbows back twice as we walk over the paved road.

We walk up the steps of the guard post and Rainbow opens the door. Because she had the mare on her back it is a bit difficult to get through the door.

But she manages anyway. She lays the mare on the floor in the post and sits down on one of the benches. I sit down next to her as we wait to be helped.

After a while of waiting a mare with a clipboard takes a look at the unconscious mare on the ground and walks over to us. “It seems that my sister was out again.”

Ch 28. A happy sigh.

“Is this mare your sister?” I ask the mare with the clipboard.

“It unfortunately is. She has always been the black sheep of the family.” The mare says. “My name is White, White Motive. And this is my sister, Black Motive. This isn’t her first run in with the police.” She says as she flips through the clipboard and she finds a, well known to her, page on it.

“So what are you going to do with her?” I ask her.

“Add this to her long, long list of crimes and put her in jail for a week or so that ought to cool her down. I think that this is her,” She looks at her clipboard. “Third time this month. She isn’t really the one to keep her head down.” As she is telling me this a stallion walks up from behind her and grabs the unconscious Black and drags her into the back. “Who is the one who caught her?”

“I am.” I say to her. She floats a clipboard in front of me and asks me to sign on the dotted line. I do and she checks is.

“All seems fine, but might I ask.” She takes a good look at me “Are you new in town?”

“I am. I arrived here a week or so ago. I have been living with Rainbow in the meantime. She has been nice enough to take me in while I gather the money to pay back the hospital bill.” I say; smiling about my situation, sort off.

White Motive glances at me, smiling. “So you are sleeping with Rainbow here?”

“Jep, I am.” Then the full meaning of the question pours through. “What?! No, no, it’s not at all like that.” I quickly spurt out, blushing, trying to change the meaning of what I just said. Looking at the smug smile on White’s face and the blush on Rainbow it seems that I fail quite a bit. “Ugh…” I say as I facehoof.

“Don’t sweat it, Wings. I’ll only hold it against you for the next three to four months.” Rainbow says as she pats me on the back. “And besides, nopony is too awesome to get a piece of this tail.” Rainbow says smug as she lifter her tail just a bit.

“Yea, sure.” I say as I grin back at her. “You sure I’m not awesome enough?” I return the smug smile.

“Don’t get smug now, maybe one day, in another universe and if you’re famous; then you maybe have a chance.” She turns to White Motive. “Are we done here, or do we have to sign some more boring papers.”

“No, miss Dash. You are done with the papers.” White Motive says to Rainbow, who shows great relieve.

“Finally, we can get out of this boring place.” Rainbow yells through the room. She almost storms out of the room, pulling me with her.

The door blurs past me, so does the street for that matter, as I get pulled by Rainbow. I think we only hit two or three ponies as he, almost literary, fly through the streets.

We halt right in the middle of the park. (I have no idea how we got there this quick.) “I’m going to talk to somepony from the weather team. I won’t be home until late at night.” She gives me a salute with her wing. “See ya.” She shoots off again, leaving me standing there. I look around awkwardly, seeing if I can recognize anypony. I of course recognize some of them, but I haven’t really met any of them.

So I decide to walk around for a bit. I sit down on a bench; I think that it is the same as the one where I got my first sign of magic.

The sun is setting by now. And I sit there, enjoying the warm, late evening sun. A tear slips from my eyes. I think of my family back home. Even though things weren’t always best, I now only remember the good things that happened.

The time that I broke my bike and my father had to come and pick me up. He was a bit angry, but still smiled none the less when we drove back and I told him how school went that day. Or that one time when I got a huge Lego set for my eleventh birthday. I smile as another tear rolls down my cheek, matting down some fur. I remember the bliss that I felt many times when I was young. All the bliss pushes away the carlyle that happened too, but I am not in a mood to remember that. And that wouldn’t matter, seeing as the amount of bad things is belittled by the amount of good things, and the amount of good things is still growing.

I thought some more about the good and the bad of being here. Maybe I can jump on a train or something and go to the princesses. I hope that they have a clue about interdimensional or interplanterial travel. I hope that I see my family again, maybe even show them this wonderful place. I really hope I can.

I smile again as I wipe a tear from my fur, leaving a few matted streaks on my face. I get up and I bask in the late evening rays. The sun has almost disappeared below the horizon.

I walk to the ground underneath Rainbow’s cloud home, the last beams of the sun hitting my back. My mind is blank, but I still feel happy. I flap up, still clumsy as always, and reach the cloud house soon enough.

As I walk through the door the sun dips below the horizon. I walk into the house; its quiet serenity is something that I enjoy, even though I usually don’t enjoy calm and quiet houses.

I grab a quick bite and a glass of water before I walk up to my room. After I ate my food and drank my drink I flop down onto the bed.

I fall asleep very soon with a happy sigh.

Ch 29. Blue Cow Coffee

Ch 29. Blue Cow Coffee.

I feel a pushing feeling in my side, as if someone or somepony was prodding me, and prodding me quite hard.

“Ngg… Go away…” I grumble to whatever monster dares to wake me.

“C’mon. Wake up, you sleepy head.” The monstrous voice says. “We’re gonna go soon.”

I slightly open my eyes to look at the evil villain. Apparently the latest fashion for villains is rainbow colored hair and a smug face. “You again.” I say at Rainbow before burying my face in the pillow again.

“Yea, it’s me again. C’mon, we have to go. The train is waiting for us.” I hear from the devil herself as I am pulled from my cozy spot.

As the small amount of words seep through my skull I realize something. She said the word ‘C’mon’. That means I have to go and I don’t want to.

I feel that I’m moved and placed over something. I notice that the thing that I have been laid over is soft and makes for a good substitute for the bed. I lay my head on the makeshift pillow and try to fall asleep again.

I am moved, but decide not to give a buck. When the devil and I are done moving I am thrown on the ground, but the ground is made of clouds. Not really a problem.

I hear a few clinks, but pay no heed. My cloud is fine for me.

I hear a sloshing sound and the comical sound of something tipping; I guess the really is the devil.

I hear something cascading onto me and I feel something cold, something wet all over me.

I went from happy to not happy. I jump up, catching the bucket with my head. I also go from mostly dry to mostly wet. My mood goes sour and I yell incoherently at Rainbow until I stand completely still.

I reach up with my hoof and push off the bucket. “Why in the name of Celestia am I woken in this ungodly manner?” I ask Rainbow (AKA the devil) with a deadpan look.

“Because we need to catch the train and you weren’t waking up.” She says as she picks up the bucket and puts it back where it belongs, its own cozy spot in the cupboard.

“And tell me; why do we have to catch the train?” I ask, shaking my body to make some of the water go off of me.

“Because Rarity has a very large order she has to complete so she isn’t capable of joining us.” Rainbow explains, as if it would be self-explanatory. “So then Pinkie said that we couldn’t go with only four ponies, so she suggested that we should get another one. Then she suggested you and I said fine. So then we are here.”

“So I’m a replacement for Rarity then?”

“Well, no, but…” She stands there, thinking for some words. “Uhm… We thought you were a nice guy to come to Canterlot with us.”

“Well, thanks for the honor. But why are we going to Canterlot anyway?” I ask, already capable of thinking of a reason. Twilight.

“We haven’t heard from Twilight in a long time so we thought to pay her a visit.” She explains as she starts pushing me towards the door. Since I have just woken I am not really in the mood for a little fly, or actually me holding my wings stiff and hoping not to fall and die horribly. “And Pinkie Pie really wanted to use her party cannon again.”

“Can I sleep on the train?” I ask, my eyelids closing as I feel myself getting pushed towards the door.

“Yep, it’s a long ride and since the time that Fluttershy had to be up all night and was sleepy, but couldn’t sleep on the train, we have a cabin with a bed.”

Most of it sounds like garbling to me, but as soon as I hear the word ‘bed’ I jump up. “Where is this train you speak off?” I stride to the door and push it open. I let the wind blow my short mane backwards as I try to take a heroic pose. I am overtaken by the force of the wind and am blown back into the house. I stumble onto the floor, piercing a bit of cloud on top of my horn.

“Do you need some coffee?” Rainbow asks smug as she looks at me from a higher point.

I mumble something that she interprets as a ‘yes’. I close my eyes and I hear Rainbow walking into the kitchen. I hear some clinging of glass and the pouring of a liquid.

After some more clinging I get a cup shoved into my hooves. “”Here, drink.” This command is the only thing that I hear as I throw the liquid into my throat.

When the burning sensation has left my throat the taste kicks in. It tasted a lot like a couple of energy drinks back home, combined with the bitter taste of coffee. I feel a rush of energy and my eyes flutter open. “Damn, this stuff is powerful. What did you put in it?”

“Oh, I put some Blue Cow in it. It helps me wake up too in the morning.” Rainbow says as she shows me the jar of clear liquid. It has a comical blue cow drawn on the front. I smile inwardly as the joke pours through. Another of the many similarities that the worlds share. I now feel like I have a lot more energy. “So, shall we go?” Rainbow says as she hops to the door in anxiety.

“Sure, let’s go!” I say to her as I am shaking from the energy drink kicking in. “Whereisit?!Whereisit?!” I quickly yell out, wanting to know where the train is so I can go back to sleep. But maybe the sleep backed its bags and fled from town the moment Rainbow even thought of the Blue Cow.

Rainbow casually points towards the back of the house. I jump of the porch, stretching my wings. I turn, completely flying on instinct. I have no idea what I’m doing, but I am flying anyway.

I let out a scream as I speed up, flying fast towards the speck in the distance and the thin line leading away from it. I feel my blood pumping as I screech towards the train station. I hope that I don’t hit a tree on the way there.

Ch 30. A promise to three little fillies.

I love this! The air rushing past me feels great. I see the station dooming up ahead. There is some stuff blocking a direct route though.

It doesn’t really matter since I see a route to the station; anything in the way will just have to move.

The thing is that trees generally don’t move. So when twigs and leaves start flinging them into my face, I lose every bit of concentration I had.

My intuition induced flight was interrupted when a tree met my face. My face crumpled up like this was some kind of cartoon.

I slumped to the ground and my face returned to its normal form after a few seconds. I grunted at the sudden-stop-inducing tree.

As I sit there, rubbing my muzzle, Rainbow lands next to me, having caught up when I was being introduced to the tree.

She just stands there, clearly holding back a laugh. She doesn’t hold it for very long, because she falls onto her back, laughing and pointing her hoof at my demise.

“When you’re done laughing, could you point me to the station?” I say to the mare, who is still laughing in front of me.

She stops laughing and lets her limbs fall to her side. She sticks one up and points towards the way I was flying. I give a quick bow to her. “Thank you.” She just keeps on lying there, wheezing a bit from her rigorous laughter, as I walk away.

I walk around the tree and towards the way Rainbow pointed. I don’t meet much resistance in the form of trees or other work of the devil, so I am able to walk towards the station without much trouble. I don’t really see the need for flight, since I can’t fly for nothing and the roof of leaves don’t make it any easier. So flying would most likely cause more incidents than simply walking.

After a few minutes of walking I arrive at the station, the back I might mention. So I walk around, hearing a thumping sound, as if somepony was jumping up and down.

I walk onto the station, which is mostly empty. There isn’t a train at the station and only a few ponies are waiting. Most of these ponies consist of Pinkie Pie (she also is the source of the thumping noise; jumping up and down tends to cause that), Fluttershy, Applejack and Rarity. And they seem to be waiting for a pair of ponies rather than the train.

Of course Pinkie is the first one to spot me and she quickly relays it through to her friends. I soon have four pairs of eyes pointed at me and I feel a bit awkward as I walk towards them.

I think I actually feel the excitement radiate from Pinkie as I approach them. They seem glad that we’re finally here. I’m glad too, but for different reasons.

I get to see Canterlot; that alone is enough to make me as happy as a small child on Christmas, only I don’t show it.

I raise my hoof to wave at them, but I am interrupted when 3 fillies, two in a cart being pulled by the other one on a scooter, rush past me. Sweetie Belle, who is hanging half out of the cart, hits me on the side and I fall over. Having a cart run into you isn’t the best that can happen to you when you’re balancing on 3 hooves.

I hear a faint ‘sorry’ as they rush along, towards the 4 mares ahead of me. Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle and Applebloom scoot ahead and along the path I am following.

I scramble to my hooves and walk towards the now 7 mares (or 4 mares and 3 fillies, however you prefer it.) I already hear a heated argument arise as I approach.

I pick up key words such as: ‘pretty please’, ‘C’mon’, ‘Canterlot’, ‘We wanna go too!’ and a whole lot more. It seems that the CMC are desperate to go with us. The chances are high that their desires will be denied.

I can make out complete sentences as I near them, most of which are either a proposal or something that consist of begging.

I stand behind them when the 3 fillies have given up and are letting their heads drop down.

“Is something wrong?” I ask Applebloom, who is standing closest to me.

“Applejack ‘n Rarity won’t let us come with ‘em ta visit Twilight.” A sad Applebloom says as she turns around. I can already see Applejack getting annoyed with this. The way that Applebloom is telling me does indicate that she is the evil big sister, not some pony who wants the best and safest thing for her sister.

“Your sister wants to go visit Twilight with her friends. Twilight has been away for a while and they want to visit her without any hassle. It’s not that they don’t want you with them, it’s that they don’t want to have another three ponies to worry about.” I say to the sad Applebloom.

“But ah wanna go now!” Applebloom cries out.

I gotta think fast if I want to stop a CMC outcry. So I think of one of the worst things I could do. “I could take you three some other day?”

Applebloom’s eyes get a bit bigger at that proposition. “Could we get some ice-cream too?”

“Sure!” I’m doomed. Having three energy-filled fillies with me, alone, is worse than anything else, but it’ll be fun.

Applebloom walk over to her two friends and quickly tells them the news.

After three chatter filled seconds they hop on their respective spots on the scooter and scoot off into the distance, almost running over Rainbow, who is just entering the station.

I walk up to the 4 mares in front of me and I immediately get asked what I told them by a skeptic Applejack and a worried looking Rarity. “What did ya told ‘em that got ‘em so exited?” “What have you done?! Now I won’t get her to calm down all day; my day is ruined!”

“I told them that I would be taking them some other day to Canterlot, instead that they be in our manes today.” I explain to them as I look over my shoulder to see if Rainbow has already reached us.

“Are ya right there in ya noggin’? Ya know that ya won’t have a minute’s rest?” Applejack asks, looking at me as if I am mentally insane. Let’s just say she isn’t exactly wrong.

“I know, but at least we will have a calm time on the train. And I don’t mind looking after them for a day; it’ll be fun.”

Applejack grins. “It surely will…” Her expression turns to one of surprise. “Hey Rainbow, what were ya waiting fer?”

“Sorry, I was laughing a bit too hard at this oaf,” She points to me. “Who ran into a tree on the way here.”

“Ow, you poor thing. Did you fly against a tree? Are you alright?” Rarity asks as she quickly scans me for any injuries. The man that I am, she doesn’t find any.

“I am fine. There is nothing to worry about.” I say as manly as I can, to show that a little tree can’t hold me down.

“Did ya really fly into a tree?” Applejack asks, repeating the ‘hold a laugh back’ act that Rainbow did. She didn’t last very long either. Soon Applejack is laughing in full force at me too, but with the disapproving look of Fluttershy and Rarity. Pinkie Pie is just standing there, smiling at everypony.

When Applejack is done laughing she calms down, leaving but little of my honor intact.

“Anyway, is the train arriving soon?” I ask, quickly changing the subject to something else, may my sliver of honor be hurt if otherwise.

“Uhm…,” Fluttershy whispers. “It is supposed to arrive very soon. It actually had to be here already, but I don’t mind.”

As Fluttershy finishes her last soft words I already hear a train coming.

We have some idle chatter, most of it directed at me, as the train arrives and we all get on. We quickly find a spot and install ourselves. I look out the window as the train starts to roll away from the station and gives me a last look at the wooden station. I turn around as I mentally prepare myself for a god knows how long journey, for which I am, locked up in a small room with 5 other mares. I’ll be fine… I hope.

Ch 31. A journey to Canterlot.

The train rumbles over the track as we progress along our long journey to the Capital as the setting sun shines it last rays on the train. It is a long journey and my companions have decided that a little sleep after the first part was a good idea. I thought so too, but I couldn’t fall asleep. The train’s movement and my thoughts made sure of that.

My mind was busy with some of the things that were talked about on the first part of the journey. Pinkie Pie didn’t stop talking about her package for Twilight, which, according to her, contained a large assortment of sweets, cakes and other kinds of food. Her package would be a delight for anything that likes sugar, and likes a lot of it. Applejack contributed some apples to it, sweet apples; otherwise it would be an outrage.

Rarity created a new dress for Twilight. She showed it to us during the trip, but we couldn’t even touch it, should we damage the fabric. It was nice enough, as far as my knowledge of clothing goes. It was purple, but not the same purple as Twilight’s coat, just a bit off. It looked good none the less.

Fluttershy had prepared a small salad. One she rarely made, because of the ingredients. It contained a certain flower that was hard to find. She looked for it for 2 days in the safer parts of the Everfree. She also had to fend off a hungry rabbit, but eventually she managed to make the salad and keep enough out of Angel’s furry paws to bring to Twilight.

Rainbow Dash hadn’t prepared a thing, as far as I know. But I know Rainbow, so she has prepared something, but doesn’t want to show it. And since it is Rainbow that I am talking (thinking?) about, it will most likely be awesome.

And then there is me, the one who hasn’t prepared a thing, mostly because I didn’t even know that I was going. Maybe I’ll tell her a story from home or something, with all the humans replaced with ponies of course. Maybe I’ll do something else, something that is simple or easy to do. Maybe it will come to me in a revelation; the change that I get one is about the same as the one that I actually come up with something for her.

I let my mind wander more as I slowly drift off into sleep; something that I was hoping would happen for some time. As nice as the scenery is, it does get boring after a while. So after no more than a few minutes I am asleep.

We all keep on sleeping, right until the moment that the train rolls into the station.

In Canterlot, in one of the more luxurious rooms, lies a purple alicorn. This winged mare is Twilight. She has been sleeping for the last days, since she had been turned into an alicorn.

The fact is that turning to an alicorn tends to take a lot of energy out of someone. Celestia knows this, so she made sure that Twilight was laid on a bed as soon as the magic has done its job.

As the train arrives she opens her eyes and looks around her room. It seems to be completely decorated in her style. Purple and her cutie mark everywhere. She never was pompous and she wasn’t now, even if things have changed. But if she would tear it down she would have the princess on her head. So she decides to let it to and walked on the purple rug towards the purple door, emblazed with her cutie mark.

She let out a big yawn and decided that coffee was a good start for the day. She knew that a lot of things had to be done, now that her whole world has changed

She lets out another yawn as she opens the door and walks out, out on a quest for coffee.

I give a yawn as the train comes to an abrupt halt. It appears that we have arrived in Canterlot. The other mares wake too, only Rarity is still having her beauty sleep, as she calls it. But Applejack quickly ends it with a swift tap to her horn. This results in a heated discussion that I hear arise behind me as I walk out of the train, blindly following an exited Pinkie, who hops ahead of me.

I turn around, knowing that most of the discussions between Applejack and Rarity are about tiny things. “So what is this discussion about?” I ask the two bickering mares.

“This ruffian over here had the nerve to wake me from my beauty sleep without proper procedure.” Rarity proclaims in a manner that would make one think that Applejack is a criminal.

“Ah was just tryin’ ta get ya ta wake up. We have arrived in Canterlot so ah thought that ah should wake ya up.” Applejack replies, not really getting why Rarity is making such a fuss about things.

“I understand that, darling, but it’s the principle: you never wake a lady from her beauty sleep.” Rarity responds as she makes sure that the package in which the dress is stays on her back.

“Principle smimpiple. We arrived in Canterlot so ah waked ya up; it’s as simple as that.” Applejack replies.

“Still…” Rarity begins again, but I decide to cease listening and block out the argument between the two. I try to strike up a conversation with Pinkie, but that is impossible since she is hopping away every single time that I even come close. She hops to every single shop in the street and manages to buy something in every single one of them. I simple shake my head and try to get a conversation going with Fluttershy.

Soon I realize that it wasn’t such a good idea. She answers to everything I ask her with either an ‘oh’ or and ‘okay’. There is simply no way to get anything else out of her. I’ll just try another day.

We continue our journey into Canterlot. Rarity and Applejack are still bickering behind me and Fluttershy is walking next to me in silence. Pinkie is only see sporadically when she appears out of a window.

Then I hear a ominous voice coming from behind me. “So how are things going, Human?”

Ch 32. A tilted perspective.

The half see through form of Discord is floating in front of me. “So, are you causing enough chaos already?” He asks me as I walk along, pretending nothing is happening. I don’t answer his question and I honestly don’t know how I should.

“Now you are just being boring. C’mon, give me something to work with. You couldn’t have gone around not causing chaos.” Discord says very loudly. Since none of the mares that I walk with seem to notice him, I figure that I am the only one. That makes it a bit easier to talk to him without causing mass panic.

“I don’t think that doing that would be very good.” I say to Discord, but unlike his voice, mine is heard perfectly by the mares around me.

“Who are ya’ll talking to, suga’cube?” Applejack asks. I guess that talking loudly to an invisible chaos god isn’t the smartest thing to do if I want to keep him noticed.

“Ooh, are you talking to an invisible pony?” Pinkie yells out before swiping her hooves in front of me, looking for the invisible pony. When she swipes her hooves through the invisible, untouchable Discord she stops for a moment before saying, “Hmm, I don’t see any invisible pony here.” At this statement Rarity and Rainbow facehoof and walk along.

Before this can get any weirder Rarity steps in. “I’m sure he was thinking a bit hard about something and said it without even thinking. Let’s just walk on, we can’t make Twilight wait.” I let out a relieved sigh as the mares shrug and walk along.

I figure that thinking loudly might be a better idea. “That indeed would be smarter that shouting out your answers to me.” Discord says as we continue our journey. I guess that the mind reading thingy shouldn’t surprise me.

‘I have been trying to keep the chaos on a low, while I figure out how to function in society without letting other ponies notice that I am in fact an alicorn that can’t use magic nor fly at any rate.’ I think loudly.

“But that is just boring. You need some spice in your boring life. I’m sure that I can think of something. Maybe an extra pair of wings or a horn on your back. Maybe I’ll make your mane pink or give you a flowing beard.” Discord says as a small picture of me appears next to him, displaying me with an extra horn on my back, a pink mane, a flowing grey beard and 2 pairs of wings. The whole collection looks rather silly, something that Pinkie would surely find funny. I would too, if it wasn’t me who was loaded with extra appendages.

‘ I’d rather have that you don’t do that. I don’t think that I would be able to do anything normal when you’d do that. ’

“Oh, come on, wouldn’t it be fun in your otherwise boring life. “Discord yells as he twirls around in the air, floating through some stands. Somehow he doesn’t seem to bother the other ponies he is floating through. “I’m sure that it would cause some good chaos.” Discord brings his arm up to his chin and rubs it, thinking deeply.

‘ If you do something then don’t make it too obvious. I don’t want the whole of Equestria to shiver in fear when they see me. ’

“Oh, I’ll make sure that it won’t be that bad. I’ll just make sure that you have a blanket to cover the extra appendages or something like that, maybe the pelt of an animal; I’m sure that Fluttershy will love that.” Discord proclaims as my picture, which still is floating next to me, is covered with what looks like the pelt of a rabbit.

‘I think that Fluttershy will most likely end up in a coma if you do that. Just do something silly to me and leave again, will you. ’ I think, getting annoyed at the jokes that Discord is throwing at me.

“Fine. You can make the choice. You can either get an extra pair of wings, a horn on your butt or something random that I get to make up. You get to choose!” Discord says as three doors appear next to him, marked one, two and three. The third one sports a large question mark.

‘Oh god. I don’t want to choose the first two, but the third seems like a bad idea. The first two will most likely cause mass panic, something that Discord will like, but they seem too dangerous...’

“Are you done thinking about it yet?” Discord asks, annoyed with the long wait.

‘Just do the third one and don’t make it too bad. Make it so that I can still appear in public, I don't want ponies to run away when they see me.’ I think, also thinking about what would happen if Discord would ruin my whole life here in Equestria.

"You, sir, have chosen the third one. A fine choice, if I dare say myself." Discord yells into a microphone that suddenly appears from thin air, and pulls back the curtain, revealing the contents of the third booth. It is quite empty, except for two small plates on the bottom.

'What are those? Am I supposed to carry them?' I ask Discord, curious about the purpose of the two plates.

"Oh, no, my dear human, you won't be carrying these. You will be wearing them under your left front hoof and your right back hoof. I think that they will look rather stylish." Discord says as the two plates, both about the same diameter of my hooves and 2 centimeter thick, float to those hooves respectively. Even though I am walking the plates still manage to attach themselves to my hooves.

The instant they are attached my whole walking pattern is messed up. I find it very difficult to walk straight without falling. The plates unbalance me in such a way that I won't fall over so easy, but enough to be very, very, annoying. I grumble under my breath as I have to put more force into my steps, just to stay upright.

"Now, you don't have to worry about the fact that you are tilted, no pony will notice. The plates are placed under the same enchantment as your wings and horn. I am also surprised with the fact that you haven't told anypony yet; are you waiting for the right one."

I sigh. 'No, I just haven't found anypony that I fully trust.'

"Anyway, the plates will go away when you have caused some good chaos." He starts floating next to me. "Now, be a good little human and do what humans do best: cause CHAOS!!"

Ch. 33 Causing chaos!

Chapter 33. Causing chaos!

'Goddangit, walking like this is very, very annoying.' I think as I hobble behind the girls in front of me. The castle is already dooming up ahead and the gates are in sight. I get the 'Hurry up' every once in a while as I lag behind them. Thankfully Rarity stops to look in every other shop, so I can use that time to catch up with them.

I was thinking about what Discord said. I am not really in the mood to cause some chaos just to walk a bit more comfortably, but this is going to get annoying at some time. I wonder what kind of chaos he means. I hope it is some kind of small chaos, because I am not willing to destroy Canterlot to get rid of the plates. I'll just knock over some cart. It will cause some chaos, hopefully enough, without hurting too many ponies.

I look around for a nice and easy cart to knock over. I feel bad about doing this, but it is for a good cause: not pissing off Discord. I see a lot of them, but most of them will get messy if I knock them over, like flowers, food and ribbons.

But after ten more minutes of looking I see a perfect target: A hardware cart.

"Girls," I call out to the mares walking ahead of me. "Do you mind if I go look at that cart there?" I point to the hardware cart.

I hear "No problem." and "Stallions and their toys." coming from their direction, so I take that as it is and walk over to the cart.

I arrive at the cart and look at its items. I see the normal things, like hammer and nails, but some weird things too. An automatic surcumsizer and a magic salt and pepper shakers are among the weirder items on the cart. A banner hangs in the corner saying: 'Every 27th customer gets a ball-peen hammer free!' I don't think that this cart had 27 customers in the last week. There is some weird stuff here.

The owner of the cart comes over to me. "Would you like to buy something, sir?" He asks me.

"Nah, I’m just looking." I say, looking at the cart for a weak spot.

The only things that I can come up with are the wooden legs under the cart. I think that if I would saw one of them away the whole cart should topple over. "Do you have a saw here?"

The pony hurries over to me, happy that he finally has a customer. "Sure," He says as he grabs a shiny saw from some place on the cart. "This saw here is one of the best ones you'll find in Canterlot. It cuts through anything, even though bone as if it was butter."

'What! Is this guy a maniac? Why would he say that? It is as if he expects me to murder somepony.' I think as he gives me the saw and I clench it with my mouth. I take a look at and I am starting to feel a little less bad about toppling this guy his cart.

"You take a good look and tell me if you need anything else." He looks at me with hopeful eyes.

"Sure." I answer with a forced smile around the saw. As soon as he turned his back to me I bend my knees and start moving my neck towards the leg. I am thankful for the extra agility that the pony neck has, otherwise I wouldn't even be able to do this.

I start moving my neck back and forward, sawing through the leg in no time. The owner doesn’t even hear the sound or he is ignoring it.

A loud snap is heard as I give the final push, breaking the leg. The cart starts toppling over and not before long it has fallen over completely. But seeing as Canterlot is built into the side of a mountain there are some roads that are built at an angle and this one isn't an exception. The cart starts rolling sideways down the street, sending hardware flying everywhere. I was so smart as to drop the saw as soon as it happened, so it looked like I am an innocent bystander.

As the cart rolls down the street it flings its contents everywhere, braking more than one store window. I cringe at the cries of ponies as they leap out of harm’s way, some dodging the cart only by mere centimeters. But, hey, it's for a good cause.

The elements come rushing over, sporting faces of worry. "What kind of travesty had happened here?" Rarity cries out.

Fluttershy rushes over and starts checking me for any kind of injury, her shyness completely gone. As soon as she sets down my last leg, making sure that i wasn't injured, her shyness returns in full force and she quickly hides behind Rainbow.

"So, Doc, what are the results?" I ask Fluttershy as I approach her. Rainbow helps me by flying up; making sure that the timid mare lost her hiding place.

"You're fine as far as I can see." She responds with a whimper. I nod and turn to the others.

"See, I’m fine; nothing to worry about with me. The cart looked old and most likely gave out at the wrong moment." I say with the straightest face possible, not to invoke any suspicion.

"That cart didn't look that old, iffin you ask me," Applejack says as she watches the cart tumble further down the street. "That thing was built strong, as if Mac did it himself. Maybe it was badly balanced or something."

"It doesn't matter. We have to go to Twilight now or the cake might spoil!" Pinkie yells, pointing to the large cake on her back.

"Ah don't think cake spoils." Applejack replies.

"I know silly, but we do have to go RIGHT NOW!" Pinkie yells back as she races to the castle. Somehow the cake doesn't fall of her back and redecorates the pavement.

"It seems that there is no other choice. We have to follow Pinkie Pie and going back through that mess," Rarity says as she points to the fallen cart and all of the chaos it caused. "Is no option."

So we all follow her and Pinkie's example and continue on our way to the castle. All goes well until we arrive at the gates.

The guards that are standing at the gate stop us. "Hello Elements, there has been a little problem in the castle. A large dose of chaotic magic is found with traces of a strong disguise spell. For your safety and ours a strong anti-disguise spell has been places on the castle." He points to the faint glow that the gate radiates. "You can walk right through; it shouldn't harm you at all."

A collective nod goes through the group as the guard opens the door. Everybody walks through, but I hesitate before making a move. The guard notices. "Sir, there is nothing to worry about. There is no chance that a strong disguise spell would be used on you and after all, what do you have to hide?"

Ch. 34. Another pink problem.

Chapter 34. Another pink problem.

I am in deep shit. This is really, really going to end badly. It feels like I’m sweating buckets as I stand in front of the guard, who is still staring at me, waiting for me to continue on.

“Sir, are you going to enter? There is a line waiting.” He says, pointing to the door. He sighs, “Sir, I can guarantee you that there is no possible way of hurting you.”

“I know that.” I tell him with a quivering voice. I take a careful step forwards. After a couple more of those I am touching the shield. I swallow and take the leap of faith. I close my eyes as I move past the shield. I hear a bunch of gasps and hear some kind of sparkling noise. This is it. I’m done for. I’m going to be shot to the moon or something. Maybe they’ll let me work in the salt mines for the rest of my life. Now I would like to see the look on their faces as I sprouted wings and/or a horn, so I open an eye and look around. Most of the ponies I see around me are gaping at me. I open both of my eyes and look around, almost showing a grin at the stupid faces some of them are pulling.

I try to look behind me and finally see what they’re gaping at: It’s my mane. It’s no longer the purple/greyish it was, but a full blown pink, somehow even brighter than Pinkie’s, but just as fluffy. Now that I’m thinking about her, she also is the only one that isn’t gaping, but instead giggling at my new mane style. Now it’s my turn to stare. This must’ve been Discords doing. I really hope that this isn’t permanent, otherwise I am going to be in a world of hurt and I don’t mean physically.

“Sooo… Yea. This was something I think I was planning on telling you guys.” I give them a really fake smile, hoping that they would buy it.

“Uhm… Sir, I think you’re clean. You can continue on.” The guard says a bit awkwardly.

One could feel the tension in the air. “Shall we go on girls?” I ask them, hoping to herd them forward, away from the awkwardness.

“Your hair…. It’s so, vibrant.” Rarity says, at least trying to sound nice.

“Ooooh, I really like your hair. It’s so pretty and nice and pink.” Pinkie says as she jumps right in front of my face and starts rubbing my hair. I can’t help but think anypony else would think that I’m Pinkie’s brother. At least it’s a good conversation starter.

“Yea, but I really don’t like it, Pinkie, so I would like it to go back to what it was.” I say to her as I start to walk again.

“But the color is so nice and so colorful and it’s the same as mine. Don’t you like my hair?”

“I do, but I don’t think that it really fits me.” I respond as we go around the corner and walk into another long hallway.

“I’m sorry Pinkie, but I must agree with Leo here. Pink really isn’t his color.” Rarity chimed in. I really appreciate her efforts and hope that she has some spells to hold this hairy menace back.

“See Pinkie, the fashion expert here thinks that it doesn’t fit me.” Rarity nods. I turn to her. “Rarity, do you know a spell that can turn this menace back to its good old self?”

“I’m sure that I know something, but you can ask Twilight. She is a much better at magic than I am and she should be able to make it permanent.” Rarity says to me as she holds open the door for us.

I continue with the group for a while and notice how absurdly large this castle is. We’ve been walking around for 15 minutes now and we’re still going through hallways. I really hope that it doesn’t take too long to get to Twilight. “This is taking forever.” I whined. “How long!”

“Oh shush, dear, we’re almost there and you shouldn’t complain. You are going to see the princess and Twilight, two of the most influential mares in Equestria.” Rarity says. “You should be honored to be allowed to meet them.”

“Meh, I’m sure that the princess meets lots of pe-ponies.” I mutter.

“She does, but she meets but a few in private.”

Surprised, I wiggle my eyebrows. “So, you have had a one of these ‘private meetings?’”

“I have indee-. What are you trying to say here?” Rarity unfortunately recovers and give me an angry look as a little red creeps up on her cheeks. I see Rainbow Dash grin from the corner of my eye. We continue walking until we arrive at a set of large double doors. The guard next to it looks at us for a second and nods to us. Rarity opens the door and we all follow her in. We enter the room and stand in front of a large throne, sitting in which is our good old Celestia, looking at us with a warm smile.

“Hello my little ponies, how are you doing today?” She asks with a voice I felt was too warm to be genuine. A chorus of ‘fine’s and a ‘Quite alright’ sound from the company.

Celestia gives another warm smile, “That’s good to hear. Twilight is waiting in the next room. She is a little tired, so be a bit calm. I must return to my royal duties.” She stands up. “It was nice seeing you all again.” She walks over to the opposite side of the room and exits through a door.

All the mares go into the room that Celestia pointed out, but I stayed behind. I figured that if Twilight was tired maybe Celestia can fix my hairy problem, so I follow her and slowly open the same door. I see her turn around the corner just as I poke my head around the door. I sprint as quietly as I can across the hallway, surprised that I don’t see any guards around. I catch a glance as Celestia enters some room on a hallway that doesn’t appear to end in another hallway. She leaves the door slightly open so I sneak up to the door and peek through the crack.

I see Celestia walking up to a large bed and plopping down on it with a loud flop. I stumble over an unseen something I hit the door, making it shift with a creaking sound. I shut my eyes and pretend to be invisible as the door swings open, revealing myself to Celestia.

“I was already wondering if you would follow me.” Celestia ominously says. She flips over so she is facing me. “What do you want?” She asks with half-lidded eyes.

“Uhm…” I say, feeling my cheeks heating up. “I was wondering if you could help me with my pink problem.”

She actually looked genuinely surprised at that. She stumbles over her words for a second. “Uh, ok, sure.” Her horn lights up and my hair turns back. I don’t even know how she knew that it should be that color, but I’m not complaining.

Her eyes turn half-lidded again. “So, do you want to do some other ‘magic’?”

Ch. 35 Sharing secrets.

Chapter 35. Sharing secrets.

“Uhm…” I stand there, my cheeks going red.

Celestia just pats the bed and gives me a wink. I don’t think that sleeping with the leader of Equestria while I am mostly controlled by Discord is a good idea, but then again it’s Discord we’re talking about. I’m sure a bit of fun couldn’t hurt me. I grin confidently as I walk over to the bed. “Come on over here, you big strong unicorn.” Celestia says. I guess she sees just the horn, both of them.

I hop on the bed and instinct takes over…

I open the door and walk out, sighing contentedly. “Call me!” Celestia yells after me. 'Huh, I wonder if they even have phones'. I’ll just send her a message through Spike. I feel exhausted after that. I never thought that some of the things that happened inside that room were possible; those moves she made were almost impractical on any other pony. I never imagined that ponies are so agile, though this is something that I would like to do again and I think that Celestia will walk funny for a while.

I stretch my legs as I trace my way back to the throne room. After a short walk I arrive at the door that they disappeared into. As I open it and walk through I immediately notice 6 pairs of eyes on me, but one pair somehow looks even more surprised than it should be. Twilight Sparkle’s gaze turns into confusion as I find myself staring at her. Apparently she somehow grew a pair of wings in the time since I stopped watching the show.

“Uhm… Hi.” I say to the group. Everyone except Twilight goes back to talking.

“But… but…” Twilight speaks, but she gets drowned out by the talking around her. She obviously wants to say something, but fortunately she can’t get a word in between the others. She gives up and simply decides to keep chatting with the others.

Twilight is sitting on the bed with her wings awkwardly sagging along her body, most likely because she’s only had them for a short while. Rarity and Pinkie are sitting on her right, on the bed, the rest is sitting to the left on a few pillows. I notice a stack of clean pillows, so I grab a one with my mouth. I plop it down next to Pinkie, on the ground, and sit down.

I can’t get any words in between their chatter and in particular Rarity and Pinkie are being quite vocal. They are talking about almost everything. The latest fashion and how it would fit with her wings and about the latest party fashion. 'If I am to be here for more than another hour I am going to need some duct tape.' Nothing special seems to be happening except for the fact that Twilight keeps staring at me, and by me I mean my wings and horn. I think she can see them both and so far she is the only one. This might cause some problems, or in Discord’s eyes, some fun.

After 30 more minutes of chattering the door opens and Celestia walks in. “Hello, my little ponies. Food is being served in the dining room. If any of you would like to have some refreshments, please join me.” She walks out again and everypony follows her except Twilight.

“Sorry, but I didn’t catch your name. Would you mind staying so we can meet?” She asks me with a nervous smile.

I think I can guess why she wants to keep me here, and it sure isn’t my name. “Sure, no problem.”

Once everypony is out of the room Twilight quickly shuts the door with magic. “Actually, I would like to know something else besides your name.”

Called it. “Well, my name is Leo. What would you like to know?”

I feel something lightly gripping my left wing and holding it in front of me. She also lowers my head so that I can just see the tip of my long horn. “Oh, those. You know, when mommy and daddy alicorn really love each other-”

“Cram it. I know you aren’t natural. There haven’t been natural born alicorns since Cadence. What kind of deal did you make? What kind of amulet did you use?” She asks as she uses magic to push me down. I am unable to do anything other than twitch a bit and move my mouth.

“Would you believe me if I told you I am an alien?” I ask, hoping she drops it with that.

“Don’t lie to me. Now tell me!” She says, just quiet enough so it shouldn’t be heard outside this room.

“Don’t you have some kind of spell that makes me tell the truth or something? I am a bit new to this whole magic thing.”

She snorts. “Yea, like I’d believe that. An alicorn that can’t do magic. Tell me the truth!” Her horn flashes and I see a magical aura surround the room. “I soundproofed the room and put a spell on you to make you tell the truth. Now I can yell to my heart’s content. Now Tell ME!”

“I’m not lying, I truly am not. Right hand to God, I am an alien, I come in peace and all that. The alicorn thing wasn’t really my choice.” I quickly say.

“Who’s god? And why are you talking about hands?” She asks in confusion. “And who accidentally becomes an alicorn? It’s impossible, even my own transformation took numerous days and a very large amount of magic.”

‘Don’t tell her that I did this or you won’t be able to speak for the next century.’ I hear Discord whisper in my mind. ‘Fine, I won’t tell her.’ “God is, well, he’s a god. He is an idea, a creator that is worshipped by a religion, Christianity. Hands are what I had before I had hooves. Does this clear everything up or do I need to get paper and a pencil?”

“You are just being confusing. Not to mention I don’t think you would even know where to get some paper or a pencil.” She stands up and hops of the bed, undoing the spells she put up that stopped me from moving. “We are not done talking about this, but for now let’s go and get something to eat.”

We stand up and walk to the door. I move to open it, but Twilight holds it in her magic. “Why do none of the others seem to notice it?”

“I don’t know exactly how it works, but they only see a horn or my wings. Rainbow sees a Pegasus, Rarity sees a unicorn, but when I am flying she doesn’t seem to notice. I don’t know how it works, just that it does.”

She seems to be fine with my answer and lets the door go. We walk through the corridors side by side. “One last question. How proficient are you with magic?”

“I can make my horn glow.” I mumble sheepishly.

“Wow…. That really isn’t anything. Weren’t you born with magic?”

“Nope, what I know I learned from a book from your library.”

“How did you know that I take care of the library?” She asks, seeming surprised that I know something as trivial as that.

“I’ve been there a few times and when i asked Spike if he owned the library he said no and told me you own the place.”

“Oh…” She says. We travel the rest of the short distance in silence.

She opens the door with magic and lets me go first. I thank her and walk in. We are standing in a large room. A large table is in the middle, laden with food and drinks with Celestia sitting at the far end. Spread around the table are the other ponies chatting quietly. Celestia waves to us and gestures to the seats on both sides of her.

We walk over and I sit next to Celestia. I feel a slight pinch in my behind as Celestia gives me a suggestive smile. I return her attitude as I look at the food on the table. In front of me are the general sandwiches and such, but further towards Rarity is see some very fancy stuff. I am fine with the sandwiches, so I grab some of those. As I expected they taste superb. “These taste really good.” I say with a mouth full of dandelions.

“Thank you. I’ll make sure to say it to the cook.” Celestia says. I’m sure she will. Maybe I’ll go find the kitchens myself and get me that recipe. I give a simple nod in response. “So, Twilight. Are you feeling better now?”

“I am, princess, but I still need to get a lot of sleep.”

“That’ll fade with time. We alicorns don’t need sleep, but usually habits force us to feel sluggish when we don’t.” Celestia explains. 'Huh, I suppose that’s the reason that I don’t need my daily dose of coffee in the morning anymore.'

“So, Leo, I heard from Pinkie that Celestia wanted to see you. What did you do?” Twilight asks me.

Now comes the bad part. I started blushing as I thought of how to reply, because I really didn’t want to say: “Oh, I was having sex with Celestia.”

Ch 36. A blushing record.

You can hear a pin drop. There’s silence all around me and I think that even Celestia is stumped. Everypony is sitting with their mouths open. I guess that stupid truth spell from Twilight is still active. Well, it isn’t like anyone got hurt.

After a few long seconds Twilight opens her mouth. “You did what?”

“I, before I went to see you, slept with Celestia. It wasn’t forced or anything and I enjoyed it.” My mouth says for me, not that it was a lie or anything. I grin as I see every single mare, except Celestia turn about 10 shades redder than they already were. “Is that thorough enough or do you need all the raunchy details?” Twilight darkens another few shades and it is easily visible through her purple coat.

“No… no thank you.” She stammers. “That was detailed enough.”

Celestia raises her visible eyebrow. “Not that I mind, but why are you telling them this?”

“Twilight placed a truth spell on me to get me to tell her what I am.” I say, still not allowed full control over my vocal cords.

Celestia raises her eyebrow a little higher. “What you are? Twilight, can’t you see that he’s a unicorn?” When she says ‘unicorn’ all the eyes of the mares glaze over for a second, except the ones of Twilight. I see all of them, except Twilight, nod in agreement.

“Can’t you see his wings?” Twilight asks them all in astonishment.

“No, Twilight, I can’t. I think that I’d recognize an alicorn when I see one. Now please drop the subject.” She says sternly.

Twilight grunts and looks down in surrender.

“Now, if you would please undo all the spells you placed on Leo here.”

“Fine.” Twilight responds and her horn flashes. I let out a small sigh of relief as the tight feeling around my vocal cords, which I didn’t even know I had, disappears.

I swallow. “Thank you.”

Celestia turns to me. “How do you feel, Leo?”

“Better.” I respond.

“Good. I will have a talk with Twilight later.” Celestia gives a stern look at Twilight, who cringes a bit under her gaze. I give a small nod.

Now it’s Pinkie’s turn to speak up. “”So princess, why were you bumping uglies with Leo?”

Celestia gives a smile. “I was just getting some relief and Leo here has, from what I’ve been told, only been acting nice to us, to say nothing of his looks, if I must say.” She looks at Rarity. “And if I see this in tabloids tomorrow I know who to blame.” Rarity looks away, blushing. “Does that answer your question?”

Pinkie nods. “Sooo,” Pinkie begins again. “How did it feel?”

Celestia’s smile grew a bit. “It was quite relieving and,” She grins at me. “He was quite good.”

Pinkie gave me a sly grin. “So Leo, do you want to relieve me someday?”

I am rather surprised that I am offering to be on duty for a booty call for Pinkie, but, hey, what can go wrong? “Sure, I don’t see why not.”

Rarity gives me a small push in the shoulder with her magic. “Leo, this is no behavior for a gentlecolt.”

Now it’s my turn to give a sly grin, and this time to Rarity. “I’m sure you wouldn’t mind a piece of me.”

That shuts Rarity right up and she looks away from me, a blush shining through her white coat.

Celestia stands up. “Well, I think I had enough. If any of you need to ask me anything feel free to come up to my room.” She winks at me as she walks out the door.

I take a look around the room and see that there is still a faint blush on everypony, but now that I look at Fluttershy I think she might be broken, that mare really is to shy for her own good.

The only ones who don’t seem completely ashamed are Pinkie and Rainbow. Pinkie is smiling, most likely at the fact that she can booty call me now (not that I’ll come running if she hollers). Rainbow is simply grinning at me.

“I was wondering when you would bring a mare home.” Rainbow says. “Just not that you would go to her home and that that mare would be the most powerful one of the planet.” She grins.

“I wasn’t expecting anything really, but you aren’t hearing me complaining.” I return the grin.

Rarity stands up. “I for one am going to do something in town, something that doesn’t involve dirty talk.” She holds her muzzle high as she walks out of the door.

“Somepony needs to get the stick out of her flank.” I respond as the door slams shut.

Now it’s Pinkie turn to talk dirty. “Maybe she just needs one in it.”

Rainbow gives a loud laugh and so do Pinkie and I. Applejack however just looks sternly at us.

“Ya’ll shouldn’t judge the poor girl. Ah don’t like this birds ‘n bees talk either, especially not in front of th’ princess.” Applejack speaks up. I think this is the first time she actually talks since we’ve been sitting here.

“Well, Celestia didn’t seem to mind.” I respond.

“But, ya still shouldn’t talk like that.” Applejack says to me before standing up. “I think that I’d rather go with Rarity on this one.” She walks out of the door and leaves Pinkie, Rainbow, Fluttershy, Twilight and me to myself.

I turn to the shy mare. “So Fluttershy, how was your day?”

Fluttershy just whimpers and tries to make herself smaller. “I think I might go to the gardens, if that’s okay.” Before any of us can respond she quickly flies through the door.

“And then there were three.” I say. The others nod, a tinge of sadness apparent one their faces.

Pinkie suddenly jumps up. “Rainbow, you want to go and prank somepony?”

Rainbow looks up and a grin appears on her face. “Sure, let’s go.” They both rush out of the room faster than seems possible. Now it’s just Twilight and me in the room. From the edge of my sight I see a servant come through a small door and walk up to the table.

“Uhm… Sorry, but would you please leave the table so that we can clean up. I would really appreciate it.”

Twilight and I simultaneously sigh. “Fine.” We say in tandem. We stand up and walk towards the large doors.

Twilight turns to me. “Would you mind me studying you?”

“With or without magic?” I ask her skeptically.

“I wouldn’t do anything without your approval this time.”

“Then I don’t see why not.” She holds the door open and we are standing in a corridor. “Lead the way.”

She points her hoof down the left of the corridor and I follow her. I catch up to her and ask. “What do you want to study about me?”

“As you may or may not know there haven’t been many alicorns, especially those that weren’t turned into one by Celestia. So you’re kind of an anomaly. I would like to find out you came to be, and if you truly are an alien, well that makes it just a lot more exciting. There is a whole new world I can learn about, this is going to be amazing. Then there is the fact that you are the first male alicorn in a very long time, I need to study that too.”

“And what would that involve then?” I ask, a bit weary if letting Twilight investigate that area.

“It most likely will include studying your genitalia and the levels of some compounds in your blood.”

“That sounds very scary.”

“Oh, don’t worry. I’ll be gentle.” She says with a sly grin.

“If you wanted to do that you simply could’ve asked for a moment in a bedroom.”

A blush creeps to her cheeks. “You really should stop seducing all the royalty you come across. We might take you up on it.” She says back slyly.

“I wouldn’t mind it.” I respond. “I’m sure you wouldn’t either.”

Her blush turn even redder. I think this might be a record for making mares blush in a day. She mutters something under her breath that I can’t hear.

We keep walking in silence. After a few minutes we arrive at a large door and we enter. The room we walk in is in fact part of the library, the walls are lined with books and there are a few comfortable looking seats in the middle. Twilight walks up to one and sits down.

She looks to the on her left. “C’mon sit down.”

I roll my eyes and walk to the pillow, letting myself flop down on it.

She grabs my right wing and starts trailing a hoof along the edge. “Now let’s get started.” She says with half-lidded eyes.

Ch. 37. Avoiding seduction.

Chapter 37. Avoiding seduction.

I don't know if I need to be frightened or happy that I'm about to be molested by a purple pony, but seeing my escapade with Celestia today I don't think that it is a good idea.. "Twilight..." I begin, but she touches a part of my withers, making me shudder.

"Yes." She asks me with half lidded eyes and a sensual voice. "Don't you like it?"

"I'm not saying I don't, but don't you want to study or something?"

"I was thinking that since you bucked with the princess before you even went through the proper introductions, you wouldn't have such a problem with taking me me here."

"Not that I would mind, but I am still a bit tired from my time with the princess." I lie.

Twilight drops the seducing act and lets herself sag down on the pillow. "Why won't anypony love me?"

This surprises me. Not that I'm the expert, but she looks quite good in my eyes. "What do you mean?"

"Everytime I flirt with a stallion they scoot away or do something else. At this rate I'm going to have to marry a book!”

I pat her on the back. "C'mon Twilight, why wouldn't any stallion want you? You, in my humble opinion, look better than most mares."

She gives a small smile, but goes away after a second. "So why won't you buck me."

"Because you are looking for something romantic, while the princess was looking for some relief. You need to find a stallion that loves you and then see where that goes, that's better than trying to buck any stallion you meet." I say, seeing her perk up.

"Thank you for the advice." She says as a small smile appears on her face again. "Now, let's get back to studying." A quill and parchment appears from nowhere and she scribbles something.. She positions herself so that she right across of me. "Let's begin."

"Alright, let's get started." She nods at me and she looks a lot more motivated that she was as we walked to this room.

"Is your real name Leo?"

"Yes, although my last name isn't Lion, it's White."

"White?"

"Yes, but don't you think that Leo sounds a lot better?"

Twilight nods. "Age?"

"21"

"21? You don't look so old. We mature around 16, you look maybe 18 to me."

"We mature around 18-19, so that seems right."

"Next, where did you live?"

"You mean that I have to go and name a planet that you haven't even heard of."

She gives me a flat stare. "Humor me."

"Galaxy: Milky Way, Solar system: Solar, Planet: Earth, Continent: America, Country: United States of America, State:Utah, City: Washington, Street: Main Street number 15."

Twilight finishes her scribbling mere seconds after I'm done talking. "Wow, that's accurate. I'll have to ask Luna about that galaxy though. How do you even know it so precisely?"

"My race have been mapping space for the last 50 or so years, so we've come to know quite a bit."

"Exploring space? What do you mean by that? What would there be found there?"

"One of the reasons is to find extraterrestrial life, but we haven't been successful so far. Other reasons are to show the might of a country or simple curiosity."

She nods. "Are there any notorious achievements you can say?"

"We've put a few satellites around the sun, I believe and we went to the moon."

Twilight quickly looks up. "The moon, wouldn't the one that moves the moon get angry?"

"No, because no one controls the moon. It moves by itself."

Twilight is positively bedazzled by this idea. "This is amazing." She says as the starts to scribble even furiously. "Is this the same for the sun?"

I nod.

"Amazing. Alright, more about the solar system. Is there anything you can tell me?"

I nod again. "This is a heliocentric system. The sun is in the middle and the rest is around it. First comes Mercury, then Mars, Earth, Venus, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and then there is dwarf planet, named Pluto."

"So 9 planets and a sun?"

"Yep." She start to scribble some more. I move a bit so I can see what she's doing. She has written down all the names and made a crude drawing of one large ball on the left and 8 equal planets and one small one on the end. I point at the fifth and sixth. "Those need to be a lot bigger, about 10 times the size of Earth. And the sun is a lot, lot bigger."

She nods and starts to correct the drawing. "Can you tell me what the mass is of the Earth?"

"Uhm... Let me think... I think it's around 6 with 24 zeroes. Kilograms."

"Thanks. How does your people know everything so precise anyway? We barely know how far the next planet is."

"We've been sending satellites and probes into space for the last 50 years and we have gathered a lot of information in that time."

"Impressive."

"Thanks." I say with a small bow.

She gives a small smile. "What does the surface of your planet consists of?"

"70% water and 30% landmass. The water is around 97% salty and the rest is drinkable."

She gives more nods. as her quill moves over a new piece of parchment. The pile next to her is steadily growing. "How many of you were there on the planet?"

"We are humans, or Homo Sapiens in other words. We have numbers around the the 7 billion.

Her mouth falls open. "Se-Seven billion. How are you able to support all of them. We have around 10 million and we have problems with food sometimes. How does your race manage?"

"We don't." I simply answer. "Everyday here are a lot of people that are starving or suffering. It is horrible, but there isn't anything that we can do if the rest of the world keeps bickering at each other."

Her happy demeanour disappears as she starts scribbling down. "I think that is enough for today. I already have enough material for a report." She brightens up a bit. "Thank you for helping me after I tried to seduce you."

"No problem." I return her smile.

She stands up and levitates the whole pile on her back. I stand up too and walk up to the door. I hold it open for her. "After you."

She walks up to the door and stops next to me. She looks into my eyes for a second and blushes. Before she or I can say anything she rushes off into the corridor.

"Mares, I'll never understand them." I say as I start to follow her down the corridor.

Ch 38. Conversing with a night princess.

Ch 38. Conversing with the night princess.

As I walk down the corridor, following Twilight, who is rushing ahead, I think about what I told Twilight. Discord told me that I could tell one pony and I chose that pony to be Twilight. I need to be more careful with telling ponies about myself. Even though I don’t believe Discord will actually kill somepony, I won’t take that chance.

Now onto different things. I know that my time with Celestia was, as far as I know, something without strings attached. But I think that Twilight was looking for something more and I don’t have a bloody clue why. I have only met her today and that is a bit short to base a relationship on. I think it would be best to talk to her about it or else I might have an alicorn drooling over me. Now that I think about it, a princess for a girlfriend wouldn’t be a bad thing, but I digress. I’m not going to deny her by default, but I would like to get to know her a bit better.

Luckily for me I have enough brainpower to think and see at the same time, so I see that there is a door in front of me that is slightly ajar. I walk through it and a circle or pillows filled with Twilight and her friends, Celestia and a very tired looking Luna. I see that there is one leftover pillow, in between Rainbow and Pinkie. I notice that Rarity’s hair is looking a bit sticky from here.

I walk up to the circle and notice that everypony has a teacup in front of them and that a round table is in the middle with a large teapot in the middle and a large variety of food around it. It almost looked like a high tea too me. Why they were having this so soon after dinner was a mystery to me, but I am not complaining.

I plop down on the empty pillow and look to my sides. Pinkie is sitting next to me, her mouth stuffed with sweet stuff. I can see a circle of something, probably a mix of cream, sugar and other stuff, smeared around her mouth. Rainbow on my other side is having small talk with Applejack. Seeing as Rainbow is a bit preoccupied I turned to Pinkie, waiting for her mouth to be empty.

“So, Pinkie, have things gone well in my absence?”

She nods very fast and swallows everything that is in her mouth. “Rainbow and I pulled a prank on Rarity. We emptied a large pot of her own glue on her head. She was a bit mad, but even after a quick shower she still was still upset.” She says too quickly for the good of her own jaw joints. “But after some apologies and few laughs all was good.”

I smile at the mention of a pot of glue and Rarity combined.

“So, what were you and Twilight doing?” Pinkie says with a suggestive tone.

“Well, what do you think we did?”

A small blush shows through her pink coat. “Well, you did do that,” Her voice goes quiet. “Thing with the princess.”

I grin. “Nah, we just talked a bit and that isn’t an innuendo.”

Pinkie nods. “Ah, so what did you talk about?”

“Things and stuff.” I say, not wanting to tell her that I had been telling Twilight what I actually am.

Pinkie returns my grin with one of her own. “Sure, things.” She looks around the circle. “Have you met Princess Luna yet?”

“I don’t think I have.”

Pinkie hops up. “C’mon, let’s go meet her then.” She grabs her pillow in her mouth starts dragging it along. I follow her example and awkwardly grab my pillow, which tastes strange, and drag it past the round table and follow Pinkie.

We drop them in front of Luna, who has her eyes closed and seems to be sleeping. We sit down and I look to Celestia. She smiles at me and then looks to Luna. She seems surprised that she is sleeping and taps her on her shoulder. “Luna, there are some guests here for you.”

Luna slowly opens her eyes and only then it seems that she heard what her sister said to her. Her eyes flutter open and they look at us with surprise.

“They are?” She quickly asks Celestia. Celestia responds with a nod. Luna looks at us, still the same surprised look on her face.

I think it might be best to start the conversation otherwise we might be here for a while. “Hello, Princess Luna, I’m honored to meet you. My name is Leo.” I say with a small bow off my head.

“Hello Leo, it is nice too meet you.” Luna is in a voice that is far from the refined and posh voice that I expected. “I see that you arrived here with the Elements, may I ask why?”

“I arrived in Ponyville some time ago and a certain pink pony,” I glance at Pinkie, who is giving a toothy grin. “got me hospitalized for a few days. Since I had no money Rainbow paid my bill. I am almost done paying it off and am staying at her house until then, since I have no place to stay.”

“Where do you come from?” She asks me and that question is the million dollar question.

I think about what to answer. I honestly can’t remember what I said earlier to the rest of the girls, if I said anything, so let’s hope for the best and think of a human city with a pun.

“I come from Manehattan,” I think I saw that name somewhere. Now for the excuse for the fact that I’m penniless. “I left on a bad note with my family. So I left without anything else than the saddlebags on my back, that did not contain any money. I kinda forgot that.”

I am blown away when I feel two legs wrap around me and find my face filled with a flowing starry mane. “Oh you poor little soldier. I acknowledge your pain. You’re too precious for this world.” I hear Luna say as she hugs me even tighter. I look up and see that our horns almost collided. I have to watch out for that with other alicorns.

After a few second she lets me go. A small blush flushes my face as I look around and see that everypony is staring at us. “Thank you Luna, thank you for,” I look for words for a moment. “Acknowledging my pains.”

Luna seems awestruck for a moment, even though only thanked her. “Nopony has thanked me sincerely in a long time. Thank you for that.”

I turn to Luna, still feeling all the eyes pointed at Luna and me. All the chatter around us had fallen silent. “It was my pleasure, Luna.” I say to Luna, seeing that her eyes got moist all of the sudden. The smile on her face grows even larger.

I look to Celestia and the others and see that they almost mirror Luna’s smile. When I look to my side I see that Pinkie had moved back to her spot in the circle. When I look back to Luna I see that a spot had been created between her and Fluttershy. I push my pillow into the spot and sit down on it.

When I sit down next to Luna she speaks to me that catches me a bit off guard. “Leo, would you be my friend?”

I nod and answer without thinking. “Of course Luna. I would love to be your friend.” She hugs me again and I return her hug.

The rest of the tea thingy is spent having small talk and with eating cakes and drinking tea, a lot of tea. And nopony could hold a candle to Celestia, she downed that stuff by the liter.

I talked about the stars, modern life and other stuff with Luna and she seemed very happy that she finally somepony to casually talk with.

The room was swarmed with servants for a few moments and they left the table in the middle perfectly clean. All the Elements stand up and walk away, chattering along themselves.

Celestia, Luna and I stand up and follow the group out of the room. Just before we leave the room Celestia tells me to hold on and that she wants to speak with Luna for a moment. I, as nice as I am, wait outside of the room. Rainbows flies over to me to say that all of us will be staying in guest rooms in the same hallway as the rooms of the princesses. Just after she has flown back Celestia and Luna come out of the room.

Luna almost runs towards me and ushers me to move on. We walk down the corridor side by side, Luna sporting a goofy grin and Celestia walking behind us.

Ch. 39 A unexpected twist.

Ch 39. A unexpected twist.

There seems to be a huge amount of difference between the Luna that I met when I walked into the room and the one that I walked out with. The one that I saw when I sat down next to her was only smiling because she had to, not because she wanted to, but when she came out she had a goofy smile, almost ecstatic. And now that I am walking besides her I am starting to get a bit worried. I liked talking to her, but this is getting absurd. She has been staring at me the whole time.

I see Twilight slow down until she is walking next to me. “The girls and I are going to go into town. Would you like to go with us?”

I’ve been around these mares all day. I think some ‘me’ time is in order. “Nah, why don’t you and the rest go have fun on your own. I’ll go read a book or do something else.”

Twilight nods. “Sure. Maybe you could write something about what you think of those books.” She says with a wink.

“No problem. I’ll ask Celestia for some paper and a quill.”

“Alright. Maybe I’ll see you tonight or tomorrow.”

“Until then.”

“Bye!” She yells as she ushers the girls through a door that leads outside. A plethora of ‘byes’ is heard from the rest as Fluttershy shuts the door behind her.

Luna was suddenly standing beside me. “So, Leo, do you have anything to do?” She asks.

“I was thinking about reading some books, in the library.”

“Sounds nice. Would you mind if I joined you?” She asks with in a manner which doesn’t even hide the fact that she doesn’t care for the activity, only for me.

Honestly, I have no clue what I should answer. She has hanging on my shoulder since we were walking down the corridor. Even though I never like saying no to a girl, sometimes it is for the best. “I’m sorry. I prefer reading alone, maybe sometime later.”

The look on her face turns so sad I am almost obliged to accept her offer, almost being the keyword. “Alright, but I’m gonna keep you to your work.” She quickly hugs me and then runs off, down the corridor.

Before I forget, the Luna that I am looking at isn’t the grown up one. She still has a solid, light blue mane and is nearly not as tall at Celestia. I think this is one of the reasons she still acts like a hormonal teenager who just got her first boyfriend.

I hear Celestia clear her throat behind me and I turn to face her. “We need to talk.”

I give a sly wink. “Sure, where do you want to ‘talk’?”

She sighs. “This is serious. I need to talk to you about you and Luna.” She says to me with a frown.

“Okay. Where do you want to talk?” I responds, fearing the talk I am going to receive.

“Let’s go to the library. The only ponies that go there are Twilight and you after all.” She says as she starts walking in the direction of the library.

“Lead the way.” I start following her, preparing for a scolding.

After a short, converstationless walk we arrive at the library. Celestia opens the door for me and when we are inside she leads me to a pair of pillows, the ones that Twilight and I sat on earlier.

We sit down and she looks me in the eyes; her mouth a thin line. “My sister is young in mind. Because of her being away for a while she pushed the more serious side of her mind to the back. She is in a vulnerable state. I don’t know what you want with her, but if you hurt her, I’ll hurt you.”

I understand why Celestia is concerned, but she is being a bit hostile. “First things first. I have no intention of doing something serious with your sister. She is a very nice girl, but just as you said. She is too young and clingy.”

The look on Celestia’s face tells me she is surprised. “I did not expect that. You are going to let her down gently. You are one of the first ponies who befriended her and wasn’t doing it for their own personal gain.”

“We aren’t dating or anything, but I’ll make sure not to hurt her feelings. She’s a nice pony and will be a good friend.” I say, meaning what I said. She’s sweet, but needs to understand that for the foreseeable future there isn’t going to be anything between up. Fortunate or unfortunately for my I’ll live a lot longer than the foreseeable future.

She nods. “Good, good. Now there is something else that I want to talk about.”

“Well, go ahead.”

“It’s about us.”

That came a bit unexpected, but when I think about it; this wasn’t going to be something that was over when I closed that door. “Oh.” That is the only thing that I manage to say.

“What we did was something I didn’t thought trough. Not that I didn’t like it… I don’t know…” She let her head hang.

I scooted up next to her and patter her on the back. “Hey, hey. Don’t worry about it. I never expected any strings. I liked it, you liked it. We are both condescending adults and we liked it. What is there to think about?”

“No, you don’t get it. I am a ruler. I give an example to the whole of Equestria. If the tabloids found out about it I wouldn’t hear the end of it. An affair would ruin me. I can’t have this.” She looks at me. “And I am not the only one who would be hurt. You too. You couldn’t walk the street normally again. Your life would be ruined.”

“Don’t look at it like that. No one knows about it, aside from the ones in the room. And I don’t think that they’ll tell.”

She nods. “I don’t expect any of them to tell, but stuff like this always seems to leak to the press. But,” She looks up as if she had an idea. “What if we were in an actual relationship. They couldn’t tear me apart for having an affair and going public would take all the tension away.”

“Uhm… I don’t think…” I start to say, but Celestia cuts me off. “Yes, it is perfect. We are now officially in a relationship. I have to call the press to announce it.” She stands up and trots out of the room, leaving me sitting there like an idiot. I have no idea what is going to come of a semi-forced relationship with one princess and another drooling over me, but isn’t going to be good.

Ch. 1 A flying Pie.

I open my eyes and I see… well... I see nothing. Only darkness reaches my eyes. And yes, I checked, there was nothing in on my face. First something about me: I am a 24 year old brony, I live in England, near London. Finished my high school and spent my time until now doing small jobs while looking for one in the chemical industry. I remember everything until one night when I drank a little too much. I think that I fell asleep in a bar.

The talk I had with myself was interrupted when something popped up in my sight. I recognized this creature as one of the main villains of the show, you probably know which one, Doctor Who of course.

Just messing with you. The creature is composed of several other creatures it seemed, I’m talking about Discord of course. He appears before me sitting on a floating chair and looking at me through a large monocle.

“Well hello Leo. It is nice to finally meet you. As you probably not know I am frozen in stone and one of the many things I did to keep me amused was to look at your lovely planet destroy itself. It was lovely, but that pet project had to come to an end. I allowed myself to keep a smaller pet project. That project is you. I will put you in my home world to see how you would act in there. I’ll give you some things you like and some other useless stuff, like magic and other things.” Discord says to me while making a glass full of wine appear. He drinks the glass and throws the wine away.

“My name is Discord and I’m the god of chaos and you will go to Equestria and do whatever you want to do. Now let’s see what you going to get.” He says while rummaging through Leo’s backpack and grabbing random stuff and putting them into a pair of strange backpacks. “This and this and this can of tomatoes and this large pack of yodeling sausages. Ooh and this shiny stuff.” When the backpack was almost overflowing he gives it to me.

“You’ll know what to do in a few minutes. Just have some fun. And remember, Big brother is watching you.” He grins and everything got white and black and then purple and then black again.

Even as everything was fading black I hears Discord saying one last thing. “If more than one pony finds out that you are a alicorn they´ll die. O didn´t I mention that you´ll be a alicorn, don´t worry nopony will notice anything. Just don´t go near any sources of magic, that might kill you, might though. Have fun!”

Twilight sits in front of Celestia as Celestia casts a spell over Twilight. A very large ball of light envelopes Twilight as she floats into the air. When the light fades Twilight sports a pair of wings, slightly smaller that Luna´s.

Twilight doesn´t remain conscious for long and passes out while being held up by Celestia´s magic. “Sleep now, my Student. Destiny awaits you.” She says while floating her to a nearby bed and tugging her in.

As I fall through the cloud layer of what I guess would be Equestria I hold my ´arms´ in front of my eyes and look through my ´hands´ at the fast approaching ground. As stupid as I am I didn´t notice that my arms and hands weren´t that, they were legs and hooves.

I feel a large blow flow through my body as I hit the ground. I hold my head as a head-splitting headache was rising. I look around me and notice that a large hole is what I´m lying in.

“Shouldn´t that have killed me. Damn, my head, it´s killing me.” I say while looking up the hole. “Judging from the size of the hole that should´ve broken every single bone in my body. Speaking of which, why is the hole in the shape of a pony.” I said while crawling out of the hole and checking my surroundings. ‘I need to keep calm, no panic. Otherwise things will go very bad.’

There are just a few trees around me and a small dirt road and one old looking brown earth pony coming down the road pulling a small cart filled with grapes. ‘Hmm… grapes.’ I thought while walking over to the old pony.

As I walk to the other pony I manage to trip only 4 times; walking like a pony is so much harder than it looks like. It is very strange that the old pony doesn’t turn his head as a alicorn walked over to him that falls over multiple times.

When I reach the old pony and I try to speak up to him he just growls at me. “Instead of growling at me can you give me some directions for the nearest town?”

“If one of you young ponies wants to you something you have to ask it. You don’t go to the wild and find it out yourself. Every single foal has gone weak and soft and has to go crying to their momma to be nursed. You go find it out yourself. ” The grumpy old pony says to me and walks off to the nearby forest.

“Well, thank you.” I yell after the pony that was walking away. I just decide to walk the other way, towards the more open area.

I walked and walked and walked for such a long time and about 10 minutes later I see the tops of a small town pop out over the hill. ‘I wonder what town is that, I hope it’s nice. If this is an Equestria affected by fanfic than I’m quite doomed. I’ll need to find something to defend me from all the horrors and shipping, something like a STICK.’ I yell in my mind and (somehow) grab a stick.

I walk over the hill and notice that the village that I’m approaching indeed is as everyone expected Ponyville. I am gazing at the beauty, with recommended open mouth, when a large pink pony hits me in the face and makes everything go black. I just thought. ‘What the f*ck was that?’

Ch. 2 Meeting something colored.

Chapter 2.

I open my eyes and the only thing I see is a white ceiling and one pink pony with flat pink hair who looks very sad. I also notice the large bandage that is around my head and poke at it with my hand. No, wait, that’s a hoof now. I give myself a facepalm (hoofpalm?) and ask the pony who obviously Pinkie Pie, which I need to remember that I’m not supposed to know that .

“What happened?” I try to ask her, but fail miserably to as it comes out as ‘Blahrghaargh’. (I think I got hit on the head by the pink blur.)

“You-you’re awake? Now you can yell at me for being so stupid. I’m so sorry for hitting you in the head.” The pink mare says to me while holding her head in her hooves. She stopped sobbing for long enough to say something. “I was playing a game with my friend Rainbow Dash and I was running from her when you were suddenly in the way and I hit you hard in the head and then you were bleeding and then we were dragging you over to the hospital and then the nurse was yelling at me while bandaging you up and then I got all sad because you’re in pain and it is all my fau-au-ault and now you must hate me for it.” She says, all in one breath, and her eyes started to water a bit, which is about the saddest thing one can look at.

I just look at her and start to get sad a little myself. “What is your name, let’s start with that.” I ask her.

She wipes her nose with her hoof and sniffs a couple of times before answering: “Pinkie Pie.”

“It’s nice to meet you Pinkie Pie.” I say to her, trying to cheer her up.

“But you didn’t meet me in a nice way, so how can you think that I’m nice.” Pinkie says while keeping her head down.

“Come on, Pinkie. It’s not that bad. You couldn’t have known I was there. It isn’t your fault.” I say to the crying mare trying to cheer her up, once again. It didn’t work.

Pinkie just pushes my caring words away and slowly leaves through the door of the hospital room, her head still hanging on 6 o’clock.

“Oh, bye, then. ” I call after her, but my words fall on deaf ears. I sag back on my bed and that gets boring quite quickly. And the only thing to do is look out of the window or read a book and seeing as I prefer books over air (maybe I should learn how to fly with my wings otherwise they would just be useless feather holders) so I (somehow) grab one of the books with my hoof. To my delight the book is named Daring Do. The brony in me almost jumps out of my skin as I start to read the first few pages with joy. (Again, how the buck do I hold this in my hoofs.)

As I expected the time flies away as I read this wonderful book. But then the moment is spoiled as a nurse walks in and starts asking me questions. Stuff like what is my name, birth date, blood-type and other small things. The name thing is hard. I just answer Leo, but then she starts to ask for my last name. That is a bit more difficult. but I settle for the most obvious thing: Lion. Leo Lion, great name, for sure. The birth date is much more difficult, but I just try 21 years ago. She sighs and just writes something down. “That’ll be it, sir. You will be allowed to leave around this evening after leaving a deposit for your stay. Is there anything you want?” I ask her for some more Daring Do books and she walks to the nearest bookcase and takes some books out of it and puts them on my nightstand. I thank her and she walks away. As I try to get back to reading my book another pony walks into the room and asks.

“Hey, what’s up? You got hit pretty hard in the head back there.” The rainbow colored mare asks.

I try to say something, but drool a bit. When I regain myself I manage to push something understandable out. “Uhm, yes. Everything is good here. I was just reading some Daring Do books.”

“Ooh, man, those are so awesome. I read the first one when I was in the hospital just like you. You should go to Twilight’s library and read the rest.” She says while rushing to my nightstand to see which ones are there.

“These are good, and this one too, but this one was not so good as I would have expected.” She says while rummaging through the books. Then it looks like she realizes something and drops the books. “He, he. It’s not like the most awesome flyer in Equestria is an egghead. I just thought they were.... uhm.... pastries, yeh pastries.” she says while trying to look innocent. I doesn’t work.

“Sure. So what’s your name?” I ask her while grabbing the books she knocked on the floor.

“My name is only the most awesome name that has ever existed. It’s Rainbow Dash. The fastest flyer in Equestria and the only pony who can do the Sonic Rainboom.” Rainbow says while gloating a lot.

“Nice to meet you, Rainbow. And the fastest flyer you say, have you got anything to show for it?” I say grinning at her.

“What? Do you want a race, ‘cause I’ll race ya. And you’ll lose big time. Still, with those large wings it would be unfair.” She says while looking a little embarrassed that she has to turn down a challenge because she couldn’t even win. I can exploit this. I have leverage against the most pride pony in Equestria, great. I almost broke an evil grin.

“Sure, unfair. Anyway I’m leaving the hospital this evening, mind telling me a place where I can crash? And can you lend me some bits. I’m kind of low on them after, uhm…, yeah, after I had to pay for a hotel in the last town.” I say to her, getting myself into a deep hole which I’m probably not going to get out. I’m doomed.

“No bits, huh. Must have been an expensive place. Where was it?” Rainbow says while eyeing the books on my nightstand.

Crap, I have to think of something quickly otherwise my cover will be blown faster that I can say buck. “Yes, I was staying in an quite expensive hotel of the last of my bits. Sort of a last treat for myself after a long time of… uhm… travelling around. Yeah, I have been travelling for a long time. I’m a bit tired of it and I’m going to try to settle down.” I say, quite content with the cover. I can be expanded as much as I want and it should be safe, I hope.

“I can lend you the bits for the hospital and if you want you can stay at my place if you want to. I got enough place anyway. You can pay me those bits back by finding some work in Ponyville. That’s easy enough right now. I’ll bail you out this afternoon. See ya then.” Rainbow says while walking around the room and walking out after waving her hoof at me.

I only manage to shout after her. “Till then. Bye!”

I slump back on the bed and only manage to get some sleep after cramming that annoying headache to the back of my head. And everything goes black.

Ch 18. The endless trash inside mister Bears home.

Ch 18.

I back up from the den and turn around to see Fluttershy emptying her stomach on the grass. I saw some twigs in there so I think that timberwolves were involved. I feel a bit sick. Those foxes got torn up bad.

I leave the den for what it is and walk over to Fluttershy. “Are you feeling better?” I ask her as I pat her back.

She nods and breathes deep a couple of times. “How… could… anything… do… that?” She says after a couple of minutes.

“I don’t know, but I know what did it. I saw a couple of twigs, so it must be done by timberwolves.” I say as I steer her away from the sick that is on the ground.

I put her down on her nearby log and she starts crying a bit.

“Now, now, Fluttershy. The world hasn’t ended. I will go find that timberwolf so that it won’t hurt anything else.” I say as I look around, trying to find a timberwolf.

“Please wait until tomorrow, timberwolves are less active in the morning.” Fluttershy says having calmed down completely.

“I will do that. Now shall we go find mister Bear?” I ask as I hop off the log and grab her hoof, helping her stand up.

She nods and leads me to another porting of the clearing. I see a bear sitting in front of a very large tree on top of a cave and that is a very big tree.

I hesitate for a moment when I see the bear, but Fluttershy walk right up to him and hugs him. He hugs her back with a large smile in his face, at least I think that it is a he. If Fluttershy thinks that he is fine than I have no reason to think that he’s not.

I forget all my worries and walk up to the bear and Fluttershy. “Hi, mister Bear, it’s nice to meet you.” I say to him as I extend my hoof. He gives a nice, greeting growl and shakes my hoof very rough.

After I stop shaking I sit down on the grass. “So what do we need to help you with?”

“Mister Bear needs his home cleaned and I said that I would help him.” Fluttershy says as she sits down next to the bear.

“We need to help a bear… clean his home? Why does a bear has a home?” I ask, trying to figure out why a bear needs a home.

“He need to live somewhere and it is more of a cave, but it looks quite nice. He even has a bit of furniture.” She says as she points to the cave behind her. “But he accidentally broke some of his chairs and isn’t able to clean it up so he asked me to help him; and I agreed.”

“That is odd, helping a bear cleaning his home. Can’t say that I have done it before. I think that it will be an interesting experience.” I say as I lay back on the grass.

We make small talk for a few minutes, the talk ranging from the weather to my job at Applejacks farm. I tell a few stories of my own, laced with small lies to prevent any suspicion.

After that I stand up. “Shall we get to work?”

Fluttershy nods and walks up to the cave. “Are you coming, mister Bear.” She says to the dozed off bear. She walks back to the bear and pokes him on his belly. “Come on, mister Bear. You have to help otherwise nothing will get done.”

The bear grumbles a bit and stands up, rubbing his eyes a bit. He follows Fluttershy and me towards his cave.

We walk into the cave and just past the point where I can’t see the wall anymore I walk into a door. “Oh, are you alright?” Fluttershy asks worried as she runs up to me.

“Fine, fine. I just ran into a wall or something.” I say as I stand up, rubbing my head. That’s gonna become a bruise.

“That must be his door.” Fluttershy says as she opens the door that I ran into. “Let’s go in.”

I stand up and follow Fluttershy and the bear through the door and into his home. It looks nice. It has a carpet in the middle of the room, a couple of chairs put against the wall. I see a flight of stair going up to another floor. A couple of painting hang from the wall, ranging from 2 bears standing next to each other to a painting of the Everfree forest. And I mustn’t forget the large amount of junk, rubbish and general trash spread all over the room. I see why we are needed to help clean this up.

“I see why we need to clean up.” I say as I kick some sort or wrapper across the room. The bear just walks across the room and goes to the stairs, but as soon as he puts a paw on the first step Fluttershy scraper her throat.

“Now, mister, where are we going?” She says in the most maternal way I have ever heard.

The bear looks at her pleading.

“No, mister, you promised that you would help us clean. You are going to grab a broom and help us and you’re not going to take a nap.” She says while getting very close to the stare.

The bear grumbles a bit and walks over to a closet. He grabs some brooms and hands them over to me and Fluttershy.

We start swiping all the junk on the floor towards the middle and, boy, it is a lot. The amount of rubbish that is hidden in crooks and in crannies is incredible.

So we continue for a couple of hours, sweeping the trash onto the ever-growing pile of junk. Damn, this takes a long of time. How much trash can a bear have in his house/cave?

The answer is: a lot.