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Chapters

Some Answers, Finally
Training
Welcome to Ponyville
Nothing I Do Goes Right
Twilight's Plan
Fastforeword
I'm Not Alone
Doubt
Preparation
At The Gala
Waking Up
Picnic
My Only Friend
On Those Bombshells...
Cue Rescue Music
All Accounted For
The Truth
Finally
Epilogue
My Summons
First Contact
Funeral For a Friend
Author's Final Notes

Some Answers, Finally

Right as I walk into the nearly empty room, four pairs of eyes quickly turn to me. Great, just what I need. Tons of attention.

I meekly sit in the only empty chair left in the room, which is facing a big, black screen. Almost right as I sit down, the door opens, and two guys dressed in white lab coats walk in and to the front, right by the screen.

“Allow us to introduce ourselves,” the first one says in a heavy German accent. He’s pretty fat and old, with a bush of hair on his upper lip that would put a weed garden to shame. “I am Doctor Heisler, and I am a professor of physics at the University of Berlin.”

The second man is smaller, younger, and clean-shaven. “And I am Doctor Ketner.," he says, "Professor of genetics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.” I decide I like him better, seeing as I can actually understand what he’s saying.

“Now,” Dr. Heisler says, “I bet you are all wondering why you are here, no?”

We all just nod our heads slightly. For the first time, I get a good look at who else is here; a teenage guy, a tan guy probably a year or two older than me, a middle-aged woman who looks incredibly pale, and an older man, probably in his 70s.

The screen lights up, and a chart containing what look like a ton of little tubes appears. Each tube has a partner that looks pretty similar to it, and each pair is numbered 1 through 22. There is a single tube by itself labeled X, and another one labeled y. Dr. Ketner replaces Dr. Heisler’s position at the screen.

“As some of you might know,” he starts, pointing at the screen, “This is called a karyotype. Karyotypes are used to pick out the chromosomes in an individual and arrange them to make sure everything’s okay. A normal human, for example, has 46 chromosomes in each of their cells. Does anybody know why you’ve all been called here today?”

Nobody speaks up.

“Well, you’re all here because you have an abnormal number of chromosomes in your body. Instead of the normal 46, all of you have 48.”

“Wait,” the tan guy speaks up, “Isn’t that what Down’s Syndrome is? Having too many chromosomes? If I have too many, how come I don’t have any health problems?”

The doctor’s eyes glistened at this, almost as if he prepared himself the whole night before for someone to ask that. “I’m glad you asked that question, sir. You see, syndromes dealing with chromosome number mean that you have too many of one kind. Naturally, you’re supposed to have two of each type. Syndromes occur when someone is born with three or one of a certain type. Not you five. You see, you all have two completely new chromosomes. Ergo, your genetic makeup is not altered.”

There’s murmuring amongst the other people here. Could I really be some freak of nature? Every time I’ve been to the doctor, they’ve never found anything wrong with me.

“On a side note, have any of you ever heard of something called a ‘brony’?”

My mind pops at the word. I recognize it somewhere from my 21st century history class. “Weren’t they like…” I try to remember, “Some sort of cult or something?”

“Not quite,” he replies, still smiling at my attempt. “The term referred to adult men who watched a franchise called ‘My Little Pony’.” Ponies? That seems pretty unmanly, really. “They quickly grew, and established a great culture of music, literature, and art on the Internet. All the works they made were influenced by the show, and some very talented people had a hand in contributing to their wonderful and rich culture. Sadly, though, the entirety of the Internet crashed in the year 2097, and we haven’t been able to access it since. Many of the great works produced by them are lost, possibly forever.”

“Okay,” the older man asks, “But what does a bunch of men 400 years ago have to do with us?”

“You see, soon after men started becoming more and more engrossed into the culture of the program, their bodies started…changing, on the genetic level. They grew two completely new chromosomes, but they remained the same, physically and mentally. It perplexed doctors for a while, but since the individuals weren’t in any danger, they flat out stopped researching the cases. But the extra two chromosomes remained, inherited from paternity. Even up to today. You’re all descendants of bronies.”

Oh, god. As if being an Indian with a European last name isn’t bad enough, now I find out I’m the heir of some dude that passed his free time being captivated by ponies. How humiliating. Maybe they’re even the same person. The thought of such makes me shudder.

Dr. Heisler walks up to the screen, and it changes to some scientific stuff I don’t even know where to begin. “Recently, some of the top scientists around the globe managed to discover a way to make portals to other planes of existence. Whether these lie in the same universe as ours or not, we do not know. We only have limited knowledge of the portals or what lies beyond them. But, what we have figured out is that there is one portal in particular that leads to an area very similar to that of Earth. This means it has the ability to support life, and upon further testing, we calculated that there is a 99.9999997% chance there is life beyond the portal.”

I’m still lost. They seem to be lecturing us on two different topics; one about weird genetic mutations stemmed from fictional horses, and the other about inter-dimensional portals. Did I just walk into a bad sci-fi movie?

“However,” he continues, “It appears that not just anyone is able to travel between Earth and whatever lies on the other side of the portal. Inanimate objects have no problems, but living beings do. There is only one specie that is able to travel through them; humans that are descendents of a brony.”

I swear, the science here just keeps getting worse and worse.

“You see,” Dr. Ketner says, “For whatever reason, only humans with the extra two chromosomes are able to go through the portals. The two chromosomes appear not to be functional, but rather act as some sort of…tag, deciding who is and isn’t able to pass. There are only twelve cases of the mysterious ‘Brony Chromosomes’, if you will, left in the world. You are the only five that volunteered for the task of going beyond that portal and becoming the first humans ever to see extraterrestrial life. If we’re lucky, there might even be another sentient race out there! How fascinating would that be?”

Even though he’s getting pretty over-the-top in excitement, I do have to admit that being the first human to ever meet aliens would be pretty sweet. Maybe I’ll get a Nobel Prize for it! Well, probably not. Dr. Ketner or Heisler probably would, instead. But still, I’d be proof that the experiment worked, so that’s like winning one, right?

“Okay,” he says, moving with Dr. Heisler to the door, “We’ll be back soon enough. We have to go get some things, and then we’ll brief all of you on what it is we’ll have you do. Why don’t you five get to know each other? You’re all one big team, now.”

We all take his advice, getting up and going to some of the other members. I find myself first talking with the teenager, whose name is Will and lives in some town in Illinois I’ve never heard of. He’s fifteen, but surprisingly mature and well spoken for his age.

Next, I go to the old guy. His name’s Dick and is a retired pharmacist that lives in Phoenix. When I find out he’s also originally from the Mitten, we exchange some friendly small talk.

The next person I meet is the pale woman, who doesn’t speak a lot of English. What I do manage to get out of her is that her name is Nadiya, lives in Moscow and is a stay-at-home mom to three sons. Even though we can’t communicate a ton, she certainly does seem nice enough to be around.

Finally, the tan guy. Even though I don’t want to, I guess I have to be amicable to him. He just seems too…fake, and having a tan in the dead of winter isn’t helping his case at all.

“Hey there,” he says, “My name’s Jay Morrison. Who are you?”

“I’m Keerthana,” I reply, trying hard not to smack him for no clear reason.

“Keerthana What?” he asks me back.

“What?”

“I’m trying to find out your last name,” he clarifies. Okay, that’s a bit creepy. I didn’t ask anyone else what theirs was. I guess I just thought it was unimportant.

Instead, I decide to see where I can go with this. “Why?” I ask.

“Come on!” he says jovially, “We’re a team now! We’re going to some alien world, how cool will that be? If we’re going to be the first five people to ever see aliens, I want to know who I’m doing it with!”

Jay almost seems to be trying too hard at this. Still, I apparently slip up and say it to him.

“Griffis?” he asks dramatically. “What sort of a surname is that for an Indian woman?”

This guy just really does not know when to quit, does he? Still, I should explain it to him. We’re going to be stuck together for god knows how long, no need to be an ass to him. Well, not to his face, at least. “It’s not that great of a story,” I say. “I’m like, 1/512th Caucasian. Guess the name has just stuck throughout multiple generations. It’s supposedly been something of a taboo, but I don’t mind it al all. It’s a nice name.”

Wait, did I say that last part or think it? Please tell me I thought that.

“So anyways,” he continues, “Where are you from?”

“Michigan,” I say flatly, “And you?”

“Queensland.” Well, I guess that might explain the tan. Still, I feel as though my clothes would become a sickly shade of orange if I get too close.

The doctors come back in, each holding a small tablet computer. Dr. Heisler comes to me and says something I can hardly understand. I stare at him blankly for a few moments, then realize he wants me to put my hand on the tablet. When I do, it gives me a tiny electrical shock. It’s not painful or anything, but my first reaction is to pull my hand away. It seems to be stuck. Watch, with my luck, all this trouble is actually some elaborate prank for a dude to glue me to a computer.

When he presses a button on the screen, my hand is released and I can see what’s there. A perfect imprint of my hand. They’re probably scanning it for some reason. Sure enough, I see Dr. Ketner with Dick’s hand on his tablet. When they finish and get everyone’s handprint, they walk back over to the screen.

“Okay,” Dr. Ketner says, “We will now be taking you to the facility where you’ll be trained to go on the mission. You’ll all be briefed on exactly what they’ll teach you when you get there.” He walks to the door and opens it, signaling us to go out. We all walk to the elevator and wait inside. The doctors follow us, and we soon find ourselves on the main floor of the UN.

Well, I can only guess we’re on the first floor; I can’t see anything outside the elevator except a huge mass of soldiers. “Follow me,” one of them says.

Almost as soon as we step out, the rest of the troops move fluidly to make a thick circle around us. If this is what being on their good side is like, I’d hate to see what having them pissed at you is.

After a few minutes of walking and having tourists point at us confusedly, we arrive at our destination, which is a small maglev train car that looks like it could only fit a few people.

The soldiers fan out and make some sort of tunnel that leads us right to the open door. The inside’s actually not that notable. There’s a small bench on the wall with three cushions, and two single ones on the opposite wall. Outside of that, there’s nothing else but the lights in the car. They don’t even have windows.

I take one of the solitary cushions, and Nadiya takes the other. The doors close, and we start moving. I finally decide to break the awkward silence.

“Okay,” I ask, putting my hand up, “Who else here finds this whole story to be a little hard to believe?”

Everyone’s right hand darts up, save Nadiya’s. But I imagine that's because she can’t understand what I just asked.

Will is the first to speak. “I don’t know. It all just seems too…futuristic.”

“I had to take a genetics class in med school,” Dick says, “And I’ve never heard of those extra chromosomes they were talking about.”

“And portals, really?” Jay almost yells, trying to comprehend the idea of such. “That’s something straight out of science fiction. I doubt we even have the technology to figure out whether or not we even have the technology to see if they’re even possible! What’s next, this alien world is inhabited by talking dragons?” We all laugh a little at the possibility of dragons, let alone talking ones.

The train jerks to a stop, making me almost fall out of my seat. Jay actually does. Even though everyone’s laughing at him (I tone it down after I realize I sound more spiteful than the others), he’s joining in on it too. Great, now he’s also one of those guys who likes to mess around? I just hope he doesn’t laugh at his own jokes.

The doors open again, but this time it’s different. Instead of a whole platoon of heavily armored guards, it’s just one, but he doesn’t even look armed. He’s wearing some uniform that looks similar to the normal armor, but less protective and more aesthetic. Probably some commander or other higher-up.

“Hello!” he says brightly, “I am General Kochan, and I have been placed in charge of preparing you five for the mission you will face. And let me say, I am thoroughly excited to be working with you all!”

We all plainly respond with greetings of our own, and then he leads us out of the windowless platform and into the main hall of the facility.

I get sort of a sickly feeling as I see what’s outside the building, but nevertheless, it’s gorgeous. The entire station is underwater.

“Now,” he says, pointing at the wall of glass about 100 yards ahead of us, “As you can see, the station is completely underwater. The only conventional way in our out is the train station, making this one of the most secure locations on the globe.”

Judging by the small amount of light flickering far up, I’d say we’re only a couple hundred feet down or so. Still, the water pressure would be enough to squish us if it broke. Wait, that’s kind of a morbid way of putting it. It doesn’t make it any less true though, does it? I try not to think about it.

He leads us through the entrance chamber, which looks somewhat like a fancy hotel lobby. There’s a pretty long counter to our right, and to the left, a carpeted area with some couches and chairs. A giant version of the UN logo is built into the ground we’re walking on.

General Kochan leads us to what I assume to be the elevators. However, when he pushes the button for where to go, I hear a noise like a vacuum being sealed. This isn’t an elevator; this is a submarine.

Sure enough, it is. Through the glass back, I can see a bay door open and water rush in. When it’s completely filled, the sub detaches and starts floating through the middle of the ocean.

General Kochan starts explaining to us the history of the base, but none of us are really paying too much attention. I got the gist of it, though. It started as a base for top-secret military technology, with only a lab, barracks, and small apartment complex for scientists. Now though, it has lots of other stuff. There’s even a mock neighborhood for people that are stationed here and have families. How cool would it be to live here?

When we reach our destination, the bay door closes and all the seawater drains. The building we’ve entered is a small hallway with only a few doors. Strangely, there are a few people here wearing doctor’s scrubs, almost seeming as though they're anticipating our arrival.

“Well, that’s all I need you for today,” the general calls to us from inside the sub, “Tomorrow’s when we actually start training. For the rest of today, I want all of you to get acquainted with the facilities. You may stay here if you like, or check out some of the other buildings we have. All expenses will be paid for you while you are here. Have fun!”

The doctors all start walking toward us. “Give me your left arm,” the one that comes to me says.

Instead of asking why, I decide to instead just give it to him. He pulls out something that looks like a syringe, but…different. And I can’t exactly explain how. Still, it stings like one when he puts it in and injects me with something.

“What was that?” I ask. “Some sort of underwater vaccination?”

“No,” he laughs, “It’s a chip that will change the way you sleep somewhat. It will automatically wake you up when we need you to. It also amplifies your R.E.M. sleep cycle, making you feel more rested for getting the same amount of sleep.”

More rested? Where was this thing when I was in college? After I start thinking of how I could smuggle this back to school, the doctors all stand at the door, obviously waiting for a sub to come. I find the room with my name on a plaque over it, put my hand on the scanner, and walk through the newly opened doorway.

The room’s decent size and fairly open. There’s a bed with my bags on it facing an entertainment center that has a TV there. On the far side of the room is a desk facing the wall, with a clock above it. It’s only about 8 in the morning. This time yesterday, I was moaning in history class. That seems like eons ago.

I go to the nightstand by the bed, and see there’s an interface built into the top of it. Curious, I turn it on. There are some normal things on it, like a clock or map of the base, but what catches my eye is the “room modifier”. What could it modify? I click on the icon, and a huge list pops up with all sorts of themes I can supposedly choose to use. There are settings for scenery, season, and even the weather. Even though the view of the ocean is nice, I decide to go with a sunny, summer forest.

Right in front of my eyes, the room transforms itself into a warm, lush forest. If there weren’t still the bed, nightstand, entertainment center, my stuff, and the desk, I actually would believe I’m in the middle of the wilderness. I run my hand down the trunk of one of the trees near me. It’s rough and uneven, and its texture is just like real bark. The grass feels completely normal, and the ground’s the slightest bit uneven. I restore the settings to default, and just as easily as it had come, the forest vanishes back into nothing.

I promise to myself that I’ll play around with the settings a little more later. First, I probably really should check out what they have to offer down here. I bring my stolen toiletries to the bathroom, which is plain enough. Then, I change out of my formal clothes and settle instead into my senior class t-shirt from high school and some jeans. Realizing I now look silly, I head back into the bathroom to wash all the makeup off my face. Now the formality level of my head matches the rest of my body.

I head into the hallway, which now is empty. I press the button for a submarine, and it comes pretty quickly. Now, where to go? The park catches my attention, as do the movie theater and football fields, although I’m not sure which kind of football they mean. Instead of going to one of those, I opt instead for the library.

After a short ride, I get there and am instantly dazzled. They have shelves upon shelves of books, and I don’t even know where to begin. Well, I actually do. The English section. But after that, what to do? They’ve even got the English section split into American, British, Irish, Australian, and Canadian authors. I decide to go into the British section, where I’m met with even more categories. Let’s try…classics.

Unfortunately, I can say I recognize a lot of the authors down here. Shakespeare, Tolkein, Dickens, Carroll, the list just goes on. I decide on Casino Royale, A Study in Scarlet, and Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. Even though I had to read all three for my Brit Lit class in junior year, none of them are really that bad. I unplug the tablets they’re on and try to find my way out.

When I bring them to checkout, I realize something. How will I get these? Is there some sort of library card I need to get first? Or will my handprint do? I guess there’s one way to find out. I put them into the slot, and they appear on the screen, all ready to go. When I’ve got them all there, I put my hand on the very conveniently placed and (I'm sure) totally coincidental scanner by the monitor’s right. I pick up my new books and head to the sub. Realizing I haven’t had anything to eat yet, I go to the food court, where I get some amazing beef stroganoff to completely fill myself. Now, laden with food, I head back to my room, set the summer forest again, and climb into bed.

I read all day, which I know is probably a day wasted, but I had fun. Besides, I found out that the lighting in an altered room even changes over time to reflect the time of day. It’s directly above me at noon, and when I look up again at 7, the sun’s a lot lower in the sky and the light’s more evening-y. I know that’s not really a word, but it’s the only way I can describe what the light’s like a few hours before it sets.

I finish The Philosopher’s Stone around 10 and quickly discover that I am wiped. I flip the book off, toss it a bit more carelessly onto the floor than I should, and pull the covers over me. Tomorrow we start training, and it will be a whole new world after that. Literally.

Author's Note

My goodness! I never expected so much of an influx of traffic to this story! Thank you all so much for reading, liking, favoriting, commenting, and following! Unfortunately, don't get your hopes up for chapters as close as 1 and 2 were - I still have another story to finish up, and as taxing as it is, I am still required to have a life. I found out I am not able to constantly write about ponies all day and night for eternity. =/

But, for being such great fans, if you'll all look under your seats, you all get...

A prize!

Training

Day One

I suddenly wake up, going straight from deep sleep to being wide awake. The chip must be working.

“Good morning!” an automated voice says from the ceiling. “Please report to the cafeteria by 6:30!”

I walk into the bathroom, and something on the floor catches my eye. It’s a jumpsuit made of some blue and white synthetic material, with a note on top telling me I need to wear it. I take a quick shower and put it on. It fits me perfectly, and I can only guess it was tailored especially to my body.

I walk out and can clearly see that the cafeteria is at the end of our hallway, opposite the sub entrance. It’s completely empty, so I pick up the meal with my name on it. Everyone else slowly trickles in over a period of 10 minutes or so, and we all eat in silence. Nobody needs to say it, but we’re all wondering what comes next.

Eventually, General Kochan walks in. He leads us all out and to the submarine out at the end of the hall. Nobody is speaking. It’s all just awkward silence for a few minutes. I look outside, trying to make myself look busy. It’s still pretty dark under here, but there are some tiny slivers of light fighting their way down. What seemed like a magical world just yesterday is now dark and unforgiving. I just hope whatever they’re leading us to doesn’t reflect the mood outside.

The place we get off is simple enough; a pristine white room that looks well kept but almost as though nobody’s used it in years. It extends pretty far back, and has what look like booths near the entrance. There are hundreds of them, extending in every direction for hundreds of yards. Whatever this is used for obviously was meant to house more than five people.

“Okay,” the General says, pointing into the room, “Today, we’ll be training you in the use of weapons. Nothing too complicated; just some bullet weaponry and the basics of hand-to-hand combat. We have some people that will be teaching you. If anybody needs anything, I’ll be wandering around, so just flag me down if you need.”

I go to one of the booths and wait. After a few moments, a guy dressed in the UN armor comes up, introduces himself, and starts showing me the basics of shooting. I’ll admit; I’ve never used a weapon in my life except for the occasional shoe to kill a bug.

He hands me a little pistol and shows me the basics of using it. The General was right in saying there’s nothing too complicated about it. Next, he steps back and points down the range. A few stationary holographs pop up, and I’m told to shoot. Interesting way of teaching someone. Kind of like throwing a kid into the pool and yelling “Swim!”.

My shots are pretty awful at first, but after a few hours of working with different weapons and ranges, I actually become a pretty decent shot. So good, in fact, that the guy helping me eventually leaves for a while and leaves me to just hit whatever comes up. `

The rest of the day goes by pretty uninterestingly. There’s some hand-to-hand stuff we do, shooting while moving, and all that fun stuff.

“Okay everybody,” the General says around 11:30, “It’s getting late, so please head back to your rooms. We’ll do more tomorrow.”

When I get back to my room, I practically collapse onto my bed. The day went by so fast, and yet I’m completely wiped. I close my eyes, and before I know it, I’m fast asleep.

Day Seven

When the door opens this time, I have to look twice. We’re standing in a tiny room, and the only thing here is a little path leading into a dark tunnel. “We have a running course. set up for all of you today,” the General’s voice says from the ceiling. “The course is very self-explanatory, and you just need to follow the path. Good luck!”

We all immediately bolt into the tunnel. When we come out, we’re all in a giant, relatively flat grassland. There are a few hills and valleys here and there, but nothing serious. I can see that some of the obstacles include fallen trees, hurdles, some ditches, and muddy road. After a half mile or so, the path goes into a thick forest.

I’m quickly in the lead. I’ve always been a good long-distance runner, and sprinting halfway across campus to make a class that starts in two minutes has really improved my speed. The obstacles they’ve set up for us are all pretty easy, and I clear them all without missing a beat. The mud road slows me down some, but not by a ton. When I get near the forest, I look back. Jay’s in second place, and he’s maybe halfway to the forest. Maybe.

I laugh a little, then run into the forest. The only thing that might make this an obstacle is that the path has changed from an asphalt track to a ground path covered with leaves and twigs. Nothing too difficult.

When I come out, I look at what’s ahead. It’s just a straight, asphalt path for about a quarter of a mile with some cliffs on either side. Figuring that this is just a little area to transition between zones, I slow to a light jog. It’s actually quite nice, until I feel something hit my arm really hard.

“Ow!” I yell out, stopping. I look at my sleeve to see what’s hit me. I see…paint? That can’t be right.

Sure enough, it is. Something else hits my thigh, and I almost fall over. I look at my leg, and yup. Also paint. Where could that come from? Why’s there flying paint here? My eyes open wide when the realization hits me. I’m in the middle of an ambush. A very colorful ambush.

I start sprinting, and that’s when the paint really starts to fly. I do some hasty scanning of the area, looking for whoever’s shooting at me. I catch a glimpse of someone covered in camouflage sitting in some bushes on top of the cliffs, and once I notice what he looks like, I can see lots of them. All armed with little rifles, shooting tiny blobs of paint at me. By the time I get to the tunnel at the end of the stretch of road, I look like a rainbow vomited all over me and I hurt like hell. I grimace a little, and that surprisingly makes some of the pain go away. Some, but not all.

The next few areas aren’t anything too difficult. I have to run across a frozen lake in a snowy area, climb a cliff in a rocky area, and get chased by virtual alligators in a swamp environment. That wasn’t actually the obstacle I was supposed to encounter, but I saw a pond and jumped in. I didn’t feel like looking like something you’d paint while on drugs, so I wanted to quickly wash off and apparently pissed off some fake alligators and ended up booking it. So in the end, it’s all the stuff anyone does on a normal day, right?

The last place I enter is a pristine-looking beach right on the water. They’ve even simulated a sunset to make it look nicer. I can see what looks like some people off in the distance, and since I’m still in the lead, I can only assume that that’s the end. I start slowly jogging, but remembering my stupid mistakes at the ambush, I go instead for a normal running speed.

About three seconds in, I find out that running in sand is way harder than it looks. There’s a small concrete path that runs all along the beach, and against my better judgment, I go on it. My speed greatly improves. That is, of course, until the ground gives way beneath me and I fall into a pitfall.

I can feel that there’s water all around me, and it’s incredibly salty. Some gets into my nose and I start coughing, which only causes me to swallow a little, which causes me to cough more, which causes more to go up my nose, so…yeah.

I grasp onto the edge of the pit, where there are a couple outcrops that I can tell are for people stupid enough to fall down here. It’s not that far down and I can climb easily, but I’m coughing so hard that I wouldn’t be able to climb without waiting this out for a little bit.

“Hey!” I hear someone yell from above. “Need help?” I look up; it’s Jay, with his arm outstretched. I grab onto it, and he pulls me up.

“Thanks,” I say between coughs. “Kind of needed that.”

“What happened?” he asks.

“And here I was thinking that was pretty self explanatory,” I sneer at him. “I fell down a hole, accidentally swallowed some overly-salted water, and couldn’t bring myself together long enough to climb out. How’d you catch up so fast?” I just now realize that my previous thoughts of how much my lead was were apparently wrong.

“Paced myself,” he says. “Figured that with how fast you were running at the start, you’d wear yourself out pretty quickly. Turns out I was wrong. Guess I’ll see you at the end, then.”

“What?” I ask, still a bit aloof from nearly coughing myself to death. I see him running on the sand toward the people at the end, and silently mutter a curse at him. I take one more step on the concrete path and then realize why it’s there; it’s a trap. Designed for people dumb enough to blindly run on the road (sad to say I’m on that list). I hop back onto the sand and put all my energy into running. As if running through sand wasn’t hard enough before, now I’m all wet and it’s sticking to me. When I finally manage to power through to the end, I’m practically covered all over with clumps of wet sand. I look like The Sandman on a bad hair day. Bad sand day? Whatever he has.

When I get to the people at the end, I can see that it’s the General, a few soldiers, and Jay. “Congratulations!” the General says, shaking my gritty hand, “That’s quite an incredible time for a civilian, and not half bad for a soldier, either.”

“Thanks,” I say modestly. I didn’t think I was actually that great, but it turns out that I was.

“You two are both relieved for the rest of the day. There’s a sub behind us, you can take it to your rooms now if you wish.”

Jay and I both walk into the pod, and it starts out for where we’re staying.

“You look terrible,” he says about a minute in, obviously trying to hold back some laughter.

“Gee, thanks,” I say back. “You know exactly what women like to hear, don’t you?”

“Sorry, but it’s true,” he chuckles. I roll my eyes, but he’s too busy being a clown to notice. When we get to the rooms, I quickly go into mine and take off the disgusting UN jumpsuit. It’s covered in sweat, salt, water, and sand. Ick. I throw it into the cleaning machine, and it starts up immediately with washing it. I then start to inspect myself to find the damage from today. I’ve got tons of little bruises all over my arms, legs, and chest. Those paintgunners got me good. I hop into the shower and just stand there for a few minutes, relaxed by the water. The stuff they’re making us do can only get worse from here, I’m sure of it.

Day Twenty

We’re all standing outside of a room with one of the handprint analyzers. We’ve all tried using it, but it won’t open for any of us. “Are you sure this is where they said to go?” Dick asks after nobody comes for almost 10 minutes.

“It should be,” Jay replies. “The submarines that leave our rooms are only programmed to go where we need to.”

“Maybe it’s a test?” I suggest. “Like, how fast can we figure out the way inside?” I don’t actually think it’s anything of the sort, but it makes me sound smart and attentive.

“Sorry, sorry!” the General says behind us apologetically. “So sorry I’m late. I bet you’ve all been wondering what we have for you today, no?” We all nod our heads in agreement.

“Well,” he says, going to open the door, “Today we’ll be torturing you.”

“Did I just hear that right?” I ask. “Torture?”

“Yup!” he says a bit too happily.

“Any reason, you know, why?” Will asks.

“You see, if there’s any form of intelligent life where you’re going, we…can’t exactly be certain that they’ll be, well, nice. We need to make sure that you can survive brutal amounts of pain.” He looks at the analyzer and frowns. “Shoot, forgot there was a passcode. Anyways, do we have any volunteers to go first?” He turns around and smiles. “Ah, Keerthana! Thank you?”

I quickly look around me. Everyone else apparently took a few steps back without me knowing. Now I’m at the front, making it look as though I stepped foreword.

“Dammit, guys,” I mutter as the General leads me into the room full of the most malicious-looking things I’ve ever seen. This certainly will not end well.

Day Thirty

I blink a few times to adjust my eyes to the darkness. When they do, I can see that I’m in a tiny, featureless room. “Hello?” I ask into the nothingness. “What’s going on?” Nobody responds. “Fine, don’t tell me.”

The wall in front of me slides open and blinds me with light. When my eyes adjust back again, I walk out of the tiny room.

I’m standing in a dusty market surrounded by the most stereotypical-looking Martians I’ve ever seen. “Can you help me?” I ask one of them. It points down the road and says something in a weird language that sounds like someone recorded an engine. I walk where I think he pointed me, dodging these…things. They’re all pointing at me and backing up, freaked out by me.

When I get to the end of the road, there’s a large group of the aliens waiting for me, holding some science fictiony-ish weapons. They yell at me, which I take as my cue to start running away. I quickly realize how bad it looks to be bolting at the first opportunity. Totally not suspicious at all.

I duck into a run-down shack and hide. There are sounds of panic and confusion coming all from all around and I can only assume that they’re looking for me. From one of the dilapidated walls, I can see a small, wooden gate that looks to be the only way to exit the area. When there’s nobody looking at the little stretch between me and the gate, I sprint as fast as I can towards it and jump the gate. As soon as my feet land on the other side, the world melts around me.

When everything stops disintegrating, all that’s left is a huge white room with nothing for hundreds of yards on either side. “Okay,” I ask to nobody in particular, “Can you guys tell me what that was now?”

“That was a test,” someone says from nowhere. “You passed, albeit poorly.”

Thanks, jerk, I think. “A test? For what?”

“To target your weakpoints. After after all the simulations you’ve been put through were analyzed, yours was found to be that you didn’t think much before you acted. We constructed a scenario specifically for all of you to target your weaknesses.”

Well, I guess all that matters is that I passed. “Can I go now?”

The only response I get is a door opening in front of me to another submarine. I step back into it, and it takes me back to the rooms.

Day Thirty One

We’re all standing in a lab of some sorts. Nobody is speaking, or even making eye contact for that matter. We all know what today is; the day our training is finally applied. We’re going to whatever planet lies beyond the portal.

I’m staring at it right now, and it’s actually quite memorizing. It’s moving in space constantly, always expanding, shrinking, and moving not unlike water in a balloon when you squeeze one end of it. Lights of all colors are flickering in no sort of rhyme or reason throughout it constantly, almost giving me a headache.

“Okay!” one of the scientists yells excitedly, “It’s almost ready!”

A doctor comes up and pulls the sleeping chip out of my arm with a syringe. It's a shame that they're taking it, I was really liking being able to sleep for 2 hours and still be attentive.

My heart bunches in a knot. It’s so surreal to be finally here, doing the thing that seemed so distant for so long. Now that it’s arrived, I can hardly believe it. Me, one of the first people ever to meet aliens. What will they look like? What sorts of strange languages will they speak? Questions of all sorts are racing through my mind faster than I can comprehend them.

Some people come up and give us each a backpack. General Kochan is with them as well, a gigantic smile on his face. “Okay,” he starts to explain, “We’ve stocked those with some necessities that you’ll need. There’s the basic survival equipment, like a compass, some lighters, a tent, water purifier, and whatnot. Each of you has a simple, bullet-firing pistol and a few extra magazines, but try not to use them if you can. It’d make a bad image of our entire race. Still, if something is hostile and you don’t think you can get it any other way, know that you have it.”

“We’ve also put some paper and pens in there in case you need to make notes on the planet or if the portal remains to send messages back to us, assuming that it isn’t a one-way portal. We have a computer and a backup battery as well, though try not to use those as often. If they run out and we can’t send things to you, you’ll be stuck. Let’s see…there’s also something that lets you test things there to see if they’re edible. Just put a bit into it, and it will tell you if it is or isn’t. In case everything there is bad for you, we also have enough rations to last you about a week, two if you’re careful. There’s also some water if you can’t find any. There’s also a gas mask, and I think that’s about it!”

We all slowly nod our heads, trying to take in all of his information and enthusiasm at the same time. “It’s locked on!” someone yells. “Start the filming!”

“Filming?” Dick asks.

“Yes!” the General says. “Nearly everyone on the planet is going to be watching you five go be the first people to travel to another inhabitable planet. You may just usher in an age of colonialism in space, and maybe even bring us into contact with other intelligent life! Nobody will want to miss this!”

We all turn back towards the portal, which looks no different than before. We all hold the hand of the people next to us, which happens to be Nadiya and Jay for me. Let’s hope he doesn’t get any ideas.

“Just think,” Will starts to say, “450 years ago, we were landing on the Moon. Now, we’re going to another planet we could live on. We really have come far, and now we’re about to go further than anyone could ever have imagined.”

Jay smiles. “This is one small step for man…”

“…and one giant leap for mankind,” I finish.

We step into the portal, and the world instantly changes. I can feel my grip on Jay and Nadiya loosen and then break completely. Inter-dimensional travel is loud, cold, dark, and I feel as though a gigantic hunk of metal is crushing me.

When it stops, I’m one my side in a dark field, cool grass blowing gently on my face via the breeze. I struggle for a few minutes to stay awake, but I soon pass out on a planet much different that the one I woke up on.

Welcome to Ponyville

After a few minutes of staring at this planet in awe, we land in some small village. It’s the stereotypical sort of little community you’d imagine fairytale protagonists live in. There’s only a tiny sliver of sun left on the horizon, giving everything a pretty, golden glow.

We’ve landed next to a big tree with doors and windows, and a lavender unicorn is standing next to a lizard that's standing on its hind legs. They walk up to the chariot, both clearly ecstatic about meeting me.

“Are you the creature the Princess told me about?” the horse asks. It sounds like a woman, which makes sense since it looks drastically different than the other unicorn in Canterlot.

“I guess,” I moan.

“My name is Twilight Sparkle,” she says, pointing to herself, “And this is Spike!” She points to the lizard, which smiles and waves at me.

“Nice to meet you,” I lie. “My name is Keerthana.” I slowly swing my legs to the side and slide like overcooked spaghetti out of the chariot. When I’m all the way out, I end up on my knees and holding onto the side to keep myself from falling face-first onto the ground.

“This is going to be so exciting!” Twilight beams. “I don’t think anypony in Equestria has ever seen anything like you before, and the Princess let me be the first to learn all about your kind! Ooh, this is going to be so exciting!”

I smile a bit. At least one of us is looking foreword to this ordeal. “Yeah, and I’ll have to learn more about here as well.”

“I can’t wait to get started!” she beams again. Spike rolls its eyes a little, telling me either that the lizard’s a jerk or Twilight really is as bad as she seems to be.

I try to get up, but I’m so weak that I instead just push myself a few inches foreword. “Help me get up?” I ask, extending my arm.

Her horn lights up, and my hand becomes encased in a light purple glow. Instantly, I panic and flail it about, but it doesn’t seem to move. Twilight gets a look of concern on her face and stops it, which just leaves me moving my hand wildly.

“Ohmygosh!” she exclaims. “Are you okay?”

I stop my hand and then wiggle my fingers to make sure that she didn’t do anything really crazy to them. “What were you doing?” I yell.

“Oh, no!” she cries out in defeat. “I’ve scared you! Oh, I’m so, sooo sorry, I didn’t mean anything! Are you scared of my magic?”

“No!” I yell defensively. “Well, okay, a little bit. Only because I don’t know what the hell you were trying to do to me! You should really start warning people before you go around grabbing them.”

“I was trying to help you up!” she says. “I’m so sorry if I scared you!”

“It’s fine,” I sigh. “Could you just help me up the old-fashioned way?” I ask, extending my arm again. She seems to take the hint this time and just reaches her foreleg to me, which I grab. As she pulls me up, I can see a look of some weird emotions on her face. It’s sort of a mixture of shock, awe, and possibly a little bit of disgust.

“Something wrong?” I ask when I’m fully up.

“Your claws…” she says emptily, fixated at my hands. “They’re so…soft, and big.”

“They’re not claws,” I start to explain. “They’re hands. And they’re not that much softer or bigger than normal, they’re pretty average hands.”

She just stares at them for a few more seconds, taken in awe by the idea of fingers. I don’t see where she’s getting her fascination from, frankly; Spike has claws that are pretty close to what hands are.

“Anyways,” she says, “I can’t wait to learn all about,” she looks at me strangely, “Whatever it is you are.”

I groan in my head, both from my pain and her enthusiasm. Now I can see where Spike gets it.

Twilight opens the door to the tree and stands beside it, waiting for me to walk in. I trudge over to it and walk through it, the top missing my head by a couple inches. The inside of the tree is magnificent; there are shelves everywhere, completely packed with paper books. I’ve seen so few in my life, so it’s so strange to see them encircling the room like they are. It feels like I’ve gone back a few hundred years in time.

“Welcome to the library!” I hear Twilight from behind me. I chuckle a little at the irony of keeping so much paper inside of a tree. She walks to the stairs and looks back at me. “If you’ll follow me,” she says, “We can go to my house, and I can show you where you’ll be staying! Then you’ll have to tell me all about your kind.”

I groan again and unwillingly follow her. After a very forced trip up a small flight of stairs, we end up on the second floor of the library, which still looks more like a library than someone’s home. There are still a lot of shelves up here as well, and there are rolls of parchment, quills, and books scattered everywhere on the floor. “Sorry about the mess,” she apologizes as she walks to a room at the far side of the room. “I’m usually a lot more organized than this, but I was looking through everything I had trying to find out what you were, and if there was a book on what to do when you meet new species." Her ears droop down and she nervously smiles. "There wasn’t.”

I slowly catch up to her at the door, and she opens it. There’s a small bed in there with my backpack on top of it, with the biggest pouch halfway open. I can tell she was going through my stuff. On the back wall, there’s more of, you guessed it, bookshelves, and they’re also packed with books. I walk to the bed and sit down on top of it. It’s surprisingly comfortable, even though as it’s more of a cot than a real bed. Still, it beats having a chain around my wrist and sleeping in the Canterlot dungeons.

“Is everything okay for you?” Twilight asks. “I’m not exactly sure what you’re used to, so I just tried to make it simple. Does this work?”

“Yeah, it’s fine,” I reply. “It’s a big improvement from my dorm at college, I’ll give you that much.”

“So,” she says, sitting down onto the floor. “Tell me something about your kind!”

I half of want to tell her to scram, but I can see she put a lot of trouble into this and it’d probably devastate her if I shooed her away. “Well, okay. I’m a human; scientific name Homo Sapiens. That answers your question of what I am, could you tell me what you are?”

“I’m a pony,” she says back with a smile. “Specifically a unicorn. Could you tell me something else about ‘humans’?”

“Well, there’s so much to tell. Anything in particular you want to know?”

“Everything!” she yells excitedly.

“Eh, no. Sorry,” I reply. “You’re going to have to be a lot more specific.”

She thinks this over a minute. “Where are humans from?”

“All over,” I say back. The features of her eyes shrink as I tell her this. “Don’t think there’s a single place on Earth we haven’t been. We’ve even been all over in space. The Moon, Mars, Venus, and the Asteroid Belt, a human has set foot on all those places. And we’ve sent satellites even further; we’ve even had things go to other solar systems. That answer your question?”

Her mouth opens a tiny bit in pure awe. “I guess,” she says. “Where are all those places? Where’s Mars? And Venus? And the Asteroid Belt?”

“You’re rushing yourself a bit there,” I reply, holding up my hand to stop her constant flow of questions. “We’ll ask a few more, then I really want to go to sleep. It’s my turn, so I’ll ask where you learned English.”

“English?” she asks with a confused tone. The way she asked it, you’d think I’m just making up words on the fly. “What’s English?”

“It’s a language. I’m speaking it right now. You’re speaking it right now. And it’s from England, which isn’t even on this planet. Or at least, I don’t think it is. So I’m wondering how you learned it.”

“No, we’re speaking Equestrian,” she says back firmly. “It comes from Equestria, which is right here. I don’t know where England is, but I can certainly say that I’ve never heard English before.”

I’m starting to rethink how real this place is. You don’t just jump to possibly another universe and have every resident speaking perfectly fluent English with nearly no accent. “Never mind. Do you have something to ask?”

“Where did you come from?” she asks. “You said England isn’t on this planet and said humans are from everywhere on ‘Earth’, but I’ve never seen any before, so this clearly isn’t ‘Earth’. Is it close?”

“I can’t say I have an answer to that,” I admit. “I was in an international base hundreds of feet underwater on Earth one moment, I walked through some portal, and I was lying in the middle of a field on Equis the next. This planet is called Equis, correct?” I ask, making sure I have all my facts straight. She nods.

“What kind of portal was it?” she asks, eager to learn more.

“I don’t know. A portal-y one.”

“I know that!” she laughs. “All portals are 'portal-y'! I mean what kind of portal was it? What sort of spell did you cast to make it?”

“Spell? We can’t use magic, Twilight. I thought that was pretty obvious when I freaked out because you cast a spell on my hand.”

She makes a face that is inexplicable by words, but it is clear she’s trying to wrap her mind around something big. “Wait,” she starts to ask, “If you can’t use magic, then how did you make the portal?”

“I didn’t do it, and some of the best physicists in the world don’t exactly know how it happened, either. It just…did.”

“But there has to be an explanation for how it happened!” she asserts. “Things don’t just happen spontaneously!”

“I don’t know what to tell you, Twilight,” I say. “It might be magic, who knows. All I know is that I wasn’t here, then I was.” She sighs and accepts my terrible answer, obviously wanting to know more. “Can I ask a question now?”

“Sure,” she sighs, irritated by my lack of a real answer.

“Can I go to sleep now?” I wearily ask. “It’s been a long day, and I just really, really want to sleep it off.”

“Come on!” she pleads. “There’s so much I want to learn!”

“Tomorrow, Twilight. I’ll tell you some more then. But for now, I just need to sleep.”

“How many hours do you usually sleep?” she asks. “I want to know when it would be safe to wake you up.”

“Please don’t wake me up,” I ask her wearily. “I don’t know how long I’m going to sleep. I’ll be up when I’m up.”

“Okay, but approximately how long will that be?”

“Twilight,” I moan. I’m starting to get more and more annoyed with her overenthusiasm.

“Oh, sure,” she says, walking to the door. “Ooh, this is going to be so exciting! I can’t wait to hear all about you!” She giggles gleefully and walks out, closing the door behind her.

I breathe a sigh of relief, because now she’s finally gone. My attention turns to my backpack, which I open and look inside. It appears as though everything’s still in here, but it looks like everything was just sort of thrown in here haphazardly. I can only guess that this means that Twilight really did go rifling through my bag, probably trying to find something trivial to be awestruck about.

I place it on the ground and swing my legs onto the cot she’s put out for me. It’s shorter than the average bed, but I’m shorter than the average person, so my feet just barely miss the end of the bed. Probably a good thing I’m the one in the tree house of some quirky pony, not someone really tall, like Jay.

Speaking of Jay, where is he? And where is everyone else? I turn onto my side and look out the window. The sun’s set now, and the sky is a dull gray. I decide to worry about it more tomorrow, and I fall asleep almost as soon as I close my eyes.

***

I wake up to the sounds of birds chirping, hooves hitting the soft ground outside, and general sounds of chaos coming from the library. Either this damn place is real, or I really need to see a therapist about these hallucinations.

I get out of bed peacefully, something I haven’t done since I was home for vacation in December. No classes to get to, no physically draining exercises, just the abject hell of talking to an overzealous unicorn. Suddenly, waking up for history at 8 in the morning doesn’t seem that bad.

The first thing I notice is that most of my pain is gone. I’m still somewhat stiff, but the general aching of my body is gone. I walk around a bit to make sure that I really am better, and I am, thankfully. I go to the door and push on the handle, but it doesn’t budge. I try instead to pull it, but it won’t move that way, either.

“Twilight?” I call. “I think the door’s locked.”

I hear an old-timey deadbolt move, and I push on the door again. When it doesn’t move, I pull it, and that works. I step into Twilight’s house, where she’s moved a table and set it for three. Spike’s sitting at the table, looking pretty annoyed and hungry. Twilight’s standing at the head of the table, eager to do something.

“Is there anything specific you eat for breakfast?” she asks.

I sit crossed-legged at the table, on the other side of Spike. “I don’t know,” I say. “I’m not really sure what you can make, and I’m pretty sure it’s going to be different that what I normally eat on Earth.”

“I’ve got lots of things!” she says. “Why don’t you just say your favorite breakfast food, and I’ll make it! If I don’t know it, you can tell me about it, and I’ll try!”

I think of something I could say that I’d like, but also something that would probably exist here so I don’t have to get roped into explaining everything to her. I take a gamble and say my favorite food, unsure of how she’ll react. “Pancakes?”

A smile grows on her face, which I can only interpret as a bad thing. “I can make those!” she says. Well, that’s one thing I just avoided. “Do you put anything on them on Earth?”

“There are a lot of things you can put on them, but I just like peanut butter. Do you have that here?”

She nods and levitates a jar onto the table. I open the lid, and it actually doesn’t look too bad. Looks like peanut butter, at least. She can see I’m satisfied, and she then starts to make some breakfast.

I lean in close to Spike. “How do you live with her?” I ask.

“You get used to it,” it says in a voice that sounds like a little boy's. Well, that certainly didn’t make me feel any better.

After a few minutes of sitting in awkward silence, Twilight comes over with a plate of fresh, steaming pancakes. I instantly realize how hungry I am, since I haven’t eaten anything since I came here about a day ago. She watches me as I spread them out and put a layer of peanut butter on them, which melts slightly. I take the fork and cut a tiny piece off, then skewer it. Right as I put the piece in my mouth, I immediately regret it. I try to hide my disgust, but it just tastes so strange that I can’t help but make a face at it.

“You don’t like it, do you?” Twilight asks, defeated.

“Don’t worry, Twilight,” I reassure her. “It just tastes…odd.”

“Odd?” she asks. “How so?”

“Well, for one,” I say, looking at the ones still on my plate, “They taste like grass.”

“Of course they taste like grass!” she says. “They’re not called ‘grass pancakes’ for nothing!”

“Is it, you know, normal to make these out of grass?” I ask. She nods her head, and I look at Spike for confirmation. He nods his head as well.

“Is it not normal to make these out of grass on Earth?” Twilight asks, taking my plate away.

“It’s not even normal to eat grass. We can’t digest it.”

“Well, it’s probably my fault,” she explains. “I didn’t bother to learn your dietary needs before trying to feed you, so I will say that I am sorry and it will not happen again!” For an apology, she said it fairly confidently and upbeat. She’s clearly priding herself in the fact that she gets to harbor an alien for a while.

“No, come on, Twilight. It’s an honest mistake.”

“I will make sure that you get fed this morning!” she proclaims triumphantly. “Is there anything else you eat?”

“If you have some fruit, that’d just be fine.” I decide to go for something I know ponies eat and I can too.

“Any requests?” she asks.

“I don’t know. Just whatever fruit you have, bring it here, and I’ll just pick and choose.”

She walks off and comes back a few minutes later with a gigantic bowl of all sorts of fruits. Thankfully, I can recognize them all; cherries, apples, grapes, and bananas are all sitting in the huge container. I know eating only fruit will be hell on my digestive tract, but at least it’s edible. I grab a bit of everything and put it in front of me.

“Now, what we have here,” Twilight says, pointing to one of the bright red apples I grabbed, “Is an apple. Do you have apples on Earth? Can you eat them?”

I smile a bit, then pick it up and eat it. “All of these fruits are on Earth, and unless they’re drastically different on the inside, I can eat them all. Thank you.”

A huge smile grows on her face as I give her my seal of approval. “Oh boy oh boy oh boy!” She starts prancing around the room in excitement. “Do you want to talk about Earth now?” she asks.

“I will, but I think there’s something you can do to get even more information,” I tell her.

Her eyes light up at the promise of more information. “What is it? Tellmetellmetellmetellme!”

“You’re going to have to find four more humans for me.”

“Oh, I get it!” she says.

“Get what?” I ask. Did I just make a joke or something?

“You told me that to find out more about Earth, I had to find four more humans!”

My eyes stare at her blankly. Turns out her sense of humor is as dry as the guy I punched in the face yesterday. “I’m clearly missing something, fill me in.”

“To find four more humans, I’d have to go to Earth!” she says. “And then I’d see it for myself!”

“Oh, I see the confusion here,” I explain. “No, there are, or least there should be, four more humans on this planet. I came with four others, and I don’t know where they are. Celestia doesn’t know either.”

“Princess Celestia,” she corrects me. “And did you really come with four more humans?”

“Yeah,” I say, nodding my head. “I was with them when we went through the portal. Then they just disappeared.”

She mulls this idea over for a little bit, and then gets an idea. “I know what we can do!” she says.

“Do tell,” I say in a sarcastic tone.

“We can recreate the portal that you came through and go back to Earth!”

“Are you listening to me, Twilight?” I ask bitterly. “Stop thinking about learning about Earth and realize there are four people somewhere out there in this world. Maybe they’re not even in this world. We can’t just jump the gun and do the first thing that pops into our head. We need to find them, then we’ll focus on education.”

“But it could help us both!” she insists. “I could study your planet, and maybe somepony on Earth knows where the rest of your friends are!”

I instantly stop being angry with her. “I…I hadn’t thought about that at all, Twilight. I mean, the scientists somehow figured out that this planet is like ours, maybe they also know where the others are.”

She smiles broadly. “Great, all we have to do is recreate the spell you used to come here, and we’ll be good to go!”

“Uhh, Twilight? No magic, remember?”

“Oh! Right. Maybe if we go back to where you landed here, I could isolate and copy the spell. Of course, that’s only if it truly is magic-based.”

“Worth a shot,” I say.

“Do you remember where you came into Equis?”

“Some field. There were mountains to my right, and there was a big city built off of the mountain. Ringing any bells?”

“Of course!” she practically yells, making me feel stupid for not knowing this place. “That’s Canterlot, everypony knows that! I even grew up there!” I’ve really got to be more careful with what I say; I keep getting her really overexcited.

“Also, about the whole ‘don’t jump the gun’ thing, please try and get a really good idea of where it is before we go tromping around in the middle of a field for hours, trying to find the exact spot where I was.”

“No problem!” she says. “Get your things together. I’ll send a letter, and we’ll be off in no time!” She runs off to a table full of typical supplies and starts writing a letter. When she’s done, she gives it to Spike, who blows some fire on it. The paper turns into some very sparkly smoke and goes out the window.

“How did he…?” I can’t even finish my sentence because of how actually amazing it is. I mean, it wasn’t that weird to see Twilight use magic since I can tell unicorns can, but even the lizards here are magical. Does everything here have some crazy magical power?

She runs up to where her bed is and starts packing. I go back into my room and look at the backpack on the floor. It’s already fully packed, provided that she didn’t take anything out. I put it on my back and walk out.

Twilight’s shoving a lot of sheets of paper into one suitcase, and a lot of quills and little bottles of ink into another. I find it a bit interesting that she’s only packing things so she can take notes on Earth, but in the short amount of time that I’ve known her, I can’t say that I’m surprised in the slightest.

I sit down at the breakfast table and wait for her to be done. There’s knocking at the door, and she puts down everything she’s doing to go and get the door.

“Twily!” I hear in a familiar voice as Twilight opens the door. Where have I heard it before?

“BBBFF!” she says back, excitedly.

“Are you okay?” the voice asks her back, concerned.

“Don’t worry, I’m fine. She’s upstairs, as are Spike and my things. Why don’t you come in for a bit? I don’t think you’ve ever been to my house in Ponyville.”

I can hear some hooves coming up the stairs, and I can now see whose voice I recognize. It’s the guard that I punched in the face not entirely on accident. He still doesn’t look very angry about it.

“Well, hello there,” I say, trying to avoid the elephant in the room.

“Good to see you again,” he says, smiling.

“Do you two already know each other?” I ask. “It sounded like you do.”

“Of course!” she says, again acting like it’s the most obvious thing ever. “Shining Armor is my brother!”

Great, the guy I punched in the face is related to the psychotic, easily excited unicorn that I have to live with. I can already tell that this will not end well. “Anyways,” I say before anything awkward can come up, “We ready to head out?”

Twilight levitates both of her bags to Spike, who very reluctantly takes them. Because, you know, doing things for yourself isn’t worth it; you have to make someone else do your grunt work. “All ready!” she chimes.

We walk downstairs and outside, where a chariot similar to the one I came here in is sitting outside the library. We load out things and take off, and I’m left to still wonder how two ponies with wings can carry a heavy chariot filled with two full-size ponies.

Twilight and Shining Armor are sitting together and talking amicably, like good friends that haven’t seen each other in a long time. They’re saying something about Shining’s wedding and things called “changelings”, which I assume are things that change. I’m probably right if they’re named as creatively as everything else in this world. Spike’s just drifting around, pretty indifferent to this trip, which leaves me sitting alone on the opposite side. I don’t mind it at all, since I really just want to get out of here. I half consider just running through the portal and stranding Twilight, seeing as she probably can’t get through.

After a few minutes, we land in a field, which does look pretty similar to the one I landed in. I can even see the tree I was using to prop myself up. I jump out, and the others do as well. Twilight’s horn lights up, and she starts walking around, looking for something. After a little bit, it glows a lot brighter, and it looks almost as though she’s struggling. Still, a giant flash of purple light emanates from her horn, and then a portal identical to the one in the base appears in the middle of the field.

“Wow,” Twilight says, staring at it. “I’ve never seen anything like it. It’s a type of magic I don’t think I’ve ever seen before. I can’t wait to find out what it is!” I sigh and realize that she probably hasn’t paid attention the last few times I told her that we don’t have magic. She turns around and goes to her brother, who catches her in a big hug.

“Have fun and be safe, LSBFF,” he says to her. She then goes to Spike and picks him up in a hug.

“I’m going to miss you, Spike! I’ll be sure to tell you if there are any dragons on Earth!” So there are dragons here as well? This place just keeps getting stranger and stranger. Still, I guess it explains the fire breathing.

“Twilight, do I have to go stay with your parents while you’re away?" he moans. "I can take care of myself!”

Twilight giggles and sets him down. “Yes, you have to. Do I need to remind you of the other times I left you alone for more than a few hours?”

“Come on, Twilight!” he insists. “I don’t know how many times I have to tell you that I didn’t have anything to do with the spaghetti-pault!”

She smiles and rolls her eyes. “Okay, do you want to go first, or should I?” she asks me.

I’m tempted to say her first so at least she won’t think I abandoned her when I abandon her. Still, in the extreme off chance that she can get through, I think me going first would be better than her accidentally stumbling into one of the most secure and heavily fortified places on the planet. “I’ll go first,” I say.

I walk up to the portal and look at it. It’s the same portal for sure, and this time it feels a lot less climactic since I don’t have the entirety of the human race watching me do it. I walk forewords toward the portal, and all I feel is my nose hitting something that is definitely very solid.

Nothing I Do Goes Right

“What’s wrong?” Twilight asks.

I stand back up and look at the portal. “I don’t know,” I say weakly.

The portal is floating in the middle of the field, right where it was when I walked toward it. Nothing has changed at all about where I am. I’m not in the small laboratory I was when I came here. No, I’m still stuck on this rock full of talking unicorns and dragons.

“Why can’t you go through?” she asks again.

“I don’t know!” I say, panicking. I reach out my hand and put it on the portal. Instead of it being sucked in, some invisible wall just stops it. The portal feels as solid as a wall. “I was chosen to come here because I was one of the only ones that could. So to not be able to go back home, I…” I can feel all my hopes and optimism crushed. “I don’t really know how I feel.”

Twilight walks up and puts her hoof on the portal. It is stopped in midair, right where mine was. She seems crushed, but not only by the loss of her dream to go to Earth. She seems legitimately concerned and sorry for me.

“Wait,” I say, taking my backpack off and sitting down. “I have an idea.” I open the big pouch and go through it. I find one of the notebooks they gave us under a bag of dehydrated pork I completely forgot I had. Well, at least that solves my problem of needing to find some protein.

I pull out the notebook and rip one of the pages out, then pick up a pen and click it. I write “Is this the UN?” on the paper and wad it up.

“Twilight, go stand on the other side of this portal for me, will you?” I ask. She follows my orders and walks over there.

“What do you need me to do?” she asks from the other side.

“I’m going to throw something,” I explain, “And I need you to catch it. Can you do that?”

“I was never good at sports!” she says back.

“Irrelevant! Just try your best!”

“What will this accomplish?”

“I’ll explain later! You ready?”

“I guess,” she says worriedly.

I chuck the wad of paper as hard as I can, and it goes straight into the portal. Just like that.

“When are you going to throw it?” she asks.

“Twilight?” I say sorrowfully. “I just did. Come on back.”

She comes back around with a look of defeat on her face. “Sorry, I didn’t even see the paper. Guess I let you down, huh?”

I shake my head. “You can’t have let me down. It never got to you; it just went through the portal.”

“What?” she screams, walking back and putting her hoof on it. “But…how?”

“Back on Earth, only two things could travel through this. Certain people, myself being one, and inanimate objects.”

“So…what does this mean?” she asks.

I sigh as I realize exactly what it means. “It means that the portal’s working like it should. Only problem is that I can’t get back through it.”

All of us get silent and don’t say a word. A ball of paper hitting square on the forehead me breaks that silence. I grab it desperately and open it up. Below what I put, someone wrote, “Yes. Who is this?”

I get the pen again and write “This is Keerthana. Something is wrong with the portal.” and then throw it back through.

“What’s going on?” Twilight asks.

“I have no idea, and I’m trying to find out.”

A minute or so later, the paper comes back out. I unravel it and see that someone responded, “Keerthana? Is everything okay? And what’s wrong with the portal?”

I take a deep breath and start writing my response. “I’m fine. The creatures here are nice and fairly hospitable. Oh, by the way, there’s intelligent life here. The portal isn’t working because I can’t get back through it. Help.” I throw it back through and hope there's some simple fix, and that I’ll be back in Michigan for lunchtime.

When it comes back, I pick it up and hope for the best. “We have absolutely no idea what’s going wrong. Try and live with the creatures and learn as much about them and the planet as you can. We’ll work on getting you back.”

Well, that crushed any remaining hope I had. In a final fit of desperation, I write “Do you know where the others are? They aren’t with me.” I throw it into the portal and try not to get my hopes up waiting for it to come back.

When it does come back, I find my hope going up, despite my best efforts. Again, it’s all crushed when I see just one word on the paper; “No.”

Crushed, I wad the paper back up in my hands and sit down on the ground. "What's wrong?" Twilight asks.

"I..." I dry my eyes a little. "I can't get back home. And nobody knows there the other humans are."

"Is that true?" she asks softly.

I moan at her question. “Yes, it is,” I whimper.

“What do you want to do now?” she asks.

“I just…” I sigh. “Let’s just back to your house, Twilight.”

“Are you sure? You don’t want to talk about it?”

“Let’s just go,” I say, getting annoyed. I’m not even that annoyed at Twilight. I’m annoyed at everything. Everything that physically could go wrong now, is. I start walking slowly back to the chariot, and the others do as well. The flight back is a lot more quiet and awkward than the one here.

When we land back in Ponyville, I go trudging back to the Twilight’s house and enter my room. I drop my backpack on the ground, defeated, and walk to the window. I can hear a few pairs of hooves come in behind me.

“You okay?” Shining Armor asks. “You seem pretty depressed.”

“Can you blame me?” I ask, trying to hold back some tears. “I didn’t even know what I really signed up for. Now I’m stuck on this planet, probably forever, and the four other people I trained for a month with in preparation to live with are gone. Nowhere to be found. I’m probably just going to wither away and die here, all alone, with nobody there for me.”

“Don’t think like that!” Twilight says. “I’ll be here for you! Spike will be here for you! Shining Armor will be here for you!”

“Yes, Twilight, but that isn’t really like having someone else be there for me. I mean, yes, we could become the best of friends, but all that aside, I still don’t belong here. There just won’t be any room for me to fit in here.”

“Well,” she asks, “What do you want to do now?”

“Twilight, remember how I said you needed to find four more humans for me?”

“Yes?” she answers, not exactly sure where I could be going with this.

“I need you to come with me and find them.”

“What?” she asks in shock.

“I need your help!” I repeat. “I can’t just let them wander around this planet all alone! They could get seriously hurt, or even die! I don’t want anything to happen to them while I’m perfectly capable of helping them.”

“But I can’t help you!” she says. “I need to stay here with my friends and do my duties for the Princess. And you can’t go either! The Princess said that you shouldn’t leave Ponyville for the time being!”

“Twilight, truth time,” I say, turning around. “I. Don’t. Care.” All three of their jaws drop in shock.

“What?!” Twilight yells, shocked that anyone would disrespect the Oh-So-Perfect Princess.

“Twilight, I don’t care what she wants me to do!” I yell angrily. “She has no authority over me! I am not one of her citizens that she can put down and tell what to do! Do you really think I’ll just bend over to the first person that wants to tell me what I can and can’t do?”

"Keerthana!" she yells. "She is one of the smartest ponies in this world! She always knows what's best, and if she thinks it's best for you, it probably is!"

"Well, Twilight, she's probably wrong. There's a first time for everything, and I have a pretty damn good feeling this is her first. And before you try and convince me otherwise, I mean every single word I just said."

Her face changes from shock to pure hatred for me. “I have nothing more to say to you,” she snarls. She walks out, and Shining Armor and Spike follow her. The door slams shut, and I can hear the deadbolt locking. I storm back to the window and look out on the town. It’s amazing how ignorant the townsponies are; five creatures never before seen are running around in their world, and they’re just going about their regular lives. I envy them slightly.

After a few minutes in abstract thought, I walk up to the bookshelf Twilight’s keeping in here and look at some of the titles. I’m tempted to grab a few of them and read them to find out what’s in them, but I don’t want to break my anger. I just want to stew for a little while and figure something out.

I sit back on my bed, and grab my backpack to put it on the floor. Suddenly, I get an idea. I open it up and pull out the device that determined if foods were safe to eat or not. I rotate it, and then look at it from the side. A devious smile grows on my face as I know exactly how I’ll go find the others.

***

I hear one bong from the giant clock tower, telling me it’s exactly 1 in the morning. Absolutely perfect.

I pick the food analyzing device, then put my backpack on. I walk to the window and look out; there’s not a single soul awake in the town. I walk to the door and try to open it. Sure enough, it’s locked by a deadbolt, just as Twilight left it. I slide the device in between the door and the wall, then move it down. I find where the deadbolt is, then wiggle the device to get it unlocked. The UN would probably have a heart attack if they figured out what I was using this for, but they can’t see me right now, so no real harm done. Besides, I probably don't need this thing for its intended use.

After a minute of working with the primitive locking technology, I hear a satisfying click as the bolt goes back into the door.

“Not going to be stopped by some friggen’ deadbolt,” I whisper to it triumphantly. I put the device back in my bag, then open the door as quietly as I can and walk into the main room of her house. Twilight’s out cold in her bed, and Spike’s in a basket near the foot of the bed. I say a very rude goodbye to them in my head and tiptoe downstairs. After unlocking the door, I find myself outside in the cool night air.

I very gently close the door behind me and look around, making sure I can’t be seen. I probably look overly suspicious, and the fact that Twilight has forbid me from going anywhere probably wouldn’t help the outcome that would ensue. When everything’s clear, I start walking slowly ahead.

After a few feet, however, I hit something solid. Today just has not been my luck with invisible barriers. Even worse yet, a splotch of red that starts from where I hit the wall shoots all around, making a barrier around Twilight’s house.

“No!” I whisper to the bright, glowing red light. “You go away right now, you hear me?” I can hear lights clicking on behind, and my worst fears have come true; Twilight’s woken up, and is now coming to get me. “Please!” I ask the light again. “Just let me go! I can outrun her!”

“There you are!” I hear Twilight yell, clearly not happy at all with me.

“Fine, you caught me, okay?” I yell, probably waking half the town up. “What’re you going to do now, huh? Lock me in prison or something for trying to help my goddamn friends?”

“Is this what this is about?” she asks in a much calmer tone. “You want to find your friends?”

“Oh, come on!” I yell. “Yes, of course this is what it’s about! What gave it away, Sherlock?”

“I know how I can help you!” she says, actually sounding concerned.

“Twilight, the only way you can help me is by taking this barrier down and letting me go wherever the hell I want to on this world! Nothing, I repeat, nothing else you could do is capable of helping me!”

“Please!” she says. “Just at least let me try to help! If it doesn’t work after a little bit, I’ll let you go, promise!”

“How can I trust you?” I ask. I’ll admit, her offer does sound nice.

“I don’t know any certain ways you can trust me,” she says, crestfallen. “All I can think of is that you just have to look into your heart and find some trust.”

“Fine,” I sigh. “But the second whatever you’re trying is over, I swear, I’m going to find my friends.”

“If that is what you want when the time comes, I’ll allow it. Just, please, try just one thing for me?”

“What?” I ask, wanting to get this over with.

“It has to wait until the morning,” she says.

“Twilight, come on,” I say angrily. “I don’t have time for this.”

“But it just can’t. Please, will you just please wait until morning? I promise I’ll do my best to help you.”

I comply and start walking back to her house. I mean, at least she’s got a plan, which is a lot more than I can say I have. My plan was just to wander around aimlessly until I find someone, then we try and get the others. Now that I’m not jumping the gun like I specifically told Twilight not to do, I can realize how ill fated my plan was and how it could only end badly.

When we get back to the door to my room, I turn around. “Remember,” I say, holding up my index finger. “One chance. That’s it.”

She nods slowly. “I understand,” she says hollowly.

I turn my back and walk back inside the room, pulling the door shut behind me. I hear the deadbolt lock again, and this time I’m not tempted to open it. I sit on the bed and sigh. If I knew exactly what I was signing up for, I would have completely disregarded that letter and just gone on with my normal life. But no, I thought it’d be fun. But no, I was naïve and came. I slide under the covers and let my mind wander for a few minutes before I go to sleep.

Twilight's Plan

I wake up the next morning to some whispered voices and the sound of things being moved outside my room. I can hear some voices that do not belong to anyone I've met so far, which probably means Twilight’s plan involves other ponies. I can’t tell if that’s going to be a good or bad thing. If everyone else in this town is as high-strung as her, it’s going to be bad. Still, they could all be really relaxed and chill like Shining Armor. I really, really hope that’s the case.

I get out of bed and walk to the window. The sky is gray and it’s raining, so the weather is reflecting my mood a little bit. This also probably means I’ll be stuck inside, which just sounds absolutely awful.

“Keerthana?” Twilight asks from the other side of the door. “Do you want to come out now?”

I sigh a little. “Do you have whatever it is all ready?” I ask. “I’m not coming out unless it is.” I’m just so sick and tired of everything that’s happened in the past few days, I don’t want anymore bullshit to come flying my way. And if any does, I want to make sure that it wasn’t my fault.

“Yes, yes it is,” she says. “Do you want to come out now?”

“Sure,” I say indifferently. I can hear the deadbolt unlock and Twilight step back some. I walk to the door, brace myself for whatever she has planned for me, and put my hand on the handle. I pull it open and see Twilight, Spike, and five more ponies all standing anxiously, waiting for me.

“Well?” Twilight asks. “What do you think?”

I look at everything she’s done for me. Her small, library house looks like as lively and fun as, well, I don’t know. I’m not good with metaphors when I’m angry. There are streamers, confetti, and balloons everywhere. They’ve hung a giant banner across the ceiling that says, “Welcome to Ponyville, Kearthunah”. Oh well. At least they tried.

“Well?” Twilight asks worriedly. It’s fairly obvious that she is waiting for my approval.

I smile a little bit and nod my head slightly. “It’s nice,” I say.

“It’s ‘nice’?” a pink pony exclaims. “I wanted it to be more than ‘nice’! I wanted it to be super-ultra-magnificaroo!”

“Pinkie, it’s ‘super-ultra-magnificaroo’,” Twilight says to her. Wow, that pony’s name is “Pinkie”? Whoever is in charge of naming things here really needs to be sacked. “She’s just a bit nervous and unsure to react. How would you feel if you went someplace completely new and didn’t fit in?”

“That would be so awesome!” she screams. “I’d have tons and tons of new friends to make!”

Twilight laughs a little and looks back at me. “Anyways, I could see you were missing your friends and seemed pretty upset over it, so I got my friends together and threw you a party!”

I groan in my mind, trying not to be rude to Twilight. I want to tell her that loneliness isn’t the reason I flipped out, it’s the fact that I’m stuck here. I know if I do, though, she’ll embark on a quest of doing “just one more thing” and will never let me go. “Thank you. It’s…lovely,” I force myself to say.

“I guess lovely’s closer to super-ultra-magnificaroo than nice is,” Pinkie says contemplatively. “I’ll take it! Oh, by the way, I’m Pinkie Pie!” she says, jumping over and extending one of her hooves.

I grab her hoof in a hoof/handshake and feel a heavy tingling in my hand. I jump back and look at her foreleg, which I can see now has one of those cheesy joy buzzers on it.

“Pinkie!” Twilight yells. “I told you, no pranks!”

“Come on, Twilight!” she pleads. “It’s just one little one! Besides, who doesn’t like joy buzzers?”

“Uhh, I don’t,” I say, pretty irritated.

“Oh!” she says. “Sorry! I just looove pranking my friends, and I was hoping you would, too!”

The other pony without a horn or wings walks foreword and pushes Pinkie out of the way. “Don’ listen ta her,” she says in a pretty stereotypical farmer accent. “Mah name’s Applejack, partner. Nice ta meet ya!”

“And you,” I say softly. She doesn’t seem too bad; hopefully she’s less high-strung than Twilight or Pinkie.

“I am Rarity,” the other unicorn, this one with a heavy British accent, says. “I absolutely love your clothes! Are you a designer back on your planet?”

I look down at the jumpsuit, which is now sorta gross after a few days of me living in it. “No, I study history,” I say. “It’s just a pretty simple jumpsuit. The people who sent me here gave me it since it can withstand almost any weather, and it’s so strong.”

She marvels at it a little while longer. “It’s so fabulous! You’ll just have to show me it sometime.” I smile a little bit. She’s excited a bit easily as well, but otherwise not awful.

A pony with wings steps foreword. Given the fact that’s her hair’s a rainbow (totally not dyed, I’m sure), I can only guess her name somehow incorporates the word “Rainbow”.

“I’m Rainbow Dash!” she proclaims, with a slight air of arrogance around her. “Fastest flier in all of Equestria!”

She’s already gotten off on the wrong foot (hoof?) with me. She seems like the kind that would go around proclaiming that they don’t like to brag, and then brag about every minor accomplishment in their lives. Hope I don't have to do too much with her.

“Umm, hello,” a muffled, scared voice comes from in the crowd. Given it wasn't coming from any other ponies, I can only assume it’s coming from the pale yellow one with the copious amount of pink hair.

“Hey,” I say, trying to coax some more out of her. “What’s your name?”

She hides behind her mass of hair and whimpers something that sounds more like a squeaky toy for a dog instead of a response.

“What?” I ask. She responds by hiding and whimpering again.

“Uhh, come again?” I ask. I will admit; she’s starting to make feel really awkward now.

“She’s Fluttershy,” Twilight says. “She’s…kind of shy around new ponies, so new humans, you can only imagine.”

Twilight looks at me with a friendly smile. “If you would please, just stay here for this. I think we can all show you that while Equestria might not be the same as Earth, it’s still very nice.” All the others walk up beside her and smile at me. “Will you give us a chance?” she asks.

I sigh, then smile a little bit. “Okay. I’ll try to stay here for a little bit.”

Fastforeword

***Four months later***

I breathe in a big breath of warm summer air. I open my eyes to my small, cozy room. Sliding out of bed, I go to the window and open the curtains overlooking the market of Ponyville. It’s really early in the morning, so the only ponies that are up are setting up market stalls, preparing for the rush of the day.

I open the door into my living room, which still looks more like an organizer's nightmare than where I’m supposed to live. Papers and books are piled everywhere, showing just how much I’ve got to do. Good to know I’m no more productive here than I was on Earth.

Just as I start to go to the kitchen, I hear some knocking at my door. I walk over and open it to find Twilight on the other side.

“Morning,” I moan sleepily. “This isn’t about how I’m so far behind on everything I promised, is it?”

She smiles and laughs a bit. “No no, it’s fine!” she says.

“Come on in a minute,” I say, walking aside to let her in. She comes in and looks around. “Sorry it’s so cluttered,” I apologize.

“I understand,” she giggles. “I’m no better when there’s work to be done.”

“So,” I say, walking to the couch and sitting down. “What brings you here?”

“It’s about your friends,” she says.

“My friends?” I ask. “God, I haven’t thought about them in months. I’ve just been focusing on getting used to living amongst a bunch of technicolor ponies that I haven’t thought about the normally colored apes. What about them?”

“I don’t know, but the Princess wants to talk to you about them.”

“Celestia wants to talk to me about the others? Why?”

“I don’t know,” she says. “She just told me that she wants to talk to you.”

“Wait,” I say as a thought pops into my head. “You didn’t tell her about the stupid plans I had to find them when I got here, did you?”

“Well…” she smiles guiltily.

“Dammit,” I mutter so she can’t hear. “Twilight, you shouldn’t have done that. I was being even more stupid than I normally am when I was saying that. Now she’s probably put together some professional grade search and rescue team for me.” I sigh. “I hate to say it, but I’ve given up on finding my friends or getting back home.”

“What?” she asks, startled. “How can you say such a thing?”

“It’s right in front of you! Four months and no word about any of them has come around! And for four months, the best minds both the ponies and humans have to offer have been trying to get the portal to comply, but nothing’s worked!” I stop and let my words sink in a bit, both for her and myself. “Face it, Twilight. I’m not going anywhere, and nobody’s coming here.”

Twilight looks at the ground, a bit distraught at my pessimism. “Well,” she says, “The Princess has summoned you to talk about them.” Her head perks up, and she smiles a little. “Maybe there’s a light at the end of the tunnel, after all.”

I bite my lip after having my arguments shot down by Twilight for the zillionth time. “You’re right,” I say a bit apologetically. “She probably wouldn’t just call me willy-nilly to Canterlot. She probably does have something important.”

She walks over and pats me on the shoulder. “That’s the spirit. The next train to Canterlot leaves in an hour. We’ll all be waiting for you at the station there.”

“Thanks,” I weakly say. She walks out of my house and closes the door behind her.

***

Twilight, all her friends, and I are all standing on the small little platform that is the Ponyville Train Station, waiting for our ride to show up.

“Excited?” Twilight comes over and asks me.

“A bit,” I say. Truth is, I’m more than “a bit” excited. Canterlot seems like a really neat city, and it’ll be nice to get out of the boonies. No offense Ponyville, but you sort of are in the middle of nowhere.

The train pulls up after a couple minutes, and we all get on and go to our own private car that Celestia arranged for us. As much as I dislike the idea of a ruler with absolute power that wasn’t freely elected, it still is nice when you’re on good terms with them.

“So,” Applejack says after we all sit down, “What’dya think the Princess wants ya for?”

“To talk about the humans I came here with,” I reply.

“Yeah, Twilight already told us,” Rainbow says. “But what do you think she wants to talk with you about?”

“No idea, but I hope it’s good news.” I look out the window worriedly. “As they say, ‘No news is good news’.”

“Huh?” I can hear all of the ponies asking. “But how can no news be good?” Twilight asks.

“It’s from wartime. Most news back when the saying originated was bad news, coming from generals that needed more troops or supplies because they were being beaten. If someone got no news, it means they were successful.”

“Really?” Twilight asks, her eyes filled with wonder.

“No,” I laugh. “I have no idea how the saying originated. But it makes for a good story, does it not?”

“I guess,” she says. “Branching off that, can I ask you about how humans perceive war?” she asks.

“Why? I’ve written you some things about wars before, and I gave you that world history textbook, surely there’s stuff about war in there.”

“There is. Just, whenever you or the books bring it up, they always talk about it so…casually.”

“’Casually’?” I look at her strangely. “What do you mean ‘casually’?”

“It’s just that whenever the topic’s brought up, no human seems to show remorse or regret. You don’t regard it as tragedy or anything. You just talk about it as though it were as normal as anything else in the world.”

“Not that many wars were that tragic.”

“Yes, but,” her voice seems to grow sadder, “Any loss of life is terrible, is it not?”

I think about her statement for a minute. She’s got a point, one that most people don’t think about. “Well?” she asks.

“You’re…right,” I admit. “And you’re asking really deep questions, Twilight. Ones we’ve been struggling to answer for about ten thousand years, possibly even more.”

“Really?” she says a little excitedly. “Like what?”

“Well, for one, you essentially just asked why we wage war.”

“Yes,” she says. “Ponies have held wars before, but we stop whenever too many soldiers die. And they’re very rare, whereas humans seem to wage war at the drop of a hat.”

“People have been trying to answer the question of our nature for a long, long time. Are we naturally good? Are we naturally evil? Are we both, or are we born empty and filled with hatred or kindness?”

“I see,” she says contemplatively. “But that doesn’t have much to do with why you wage war.”

“I guess not,” I admit. “But no matter what we naturally are, we always seem to resort to war and violence. The human race, on a whole, is a particularly violent species that doesn’t mind attacking its own members to get what it wants.”

“That’s awful!” she exclaims. The other ponies all have a fairly similar look of disgust on their faces. “Why?”

“In addition to being violent, we’re also pretty selfish and greedy. We often place our needs higher than those of others, but we won’t admit it. We’ll find some way to cover it up, say it’s better for everyone. We wage war primarily for our own benefits, but we say it’s for the greater good. For example, in World War One, the United States joined because they had had strong economic and political ties to one side of the fighting. They wanted them to win so they didn’t lose all that. But when they started fighting, they said it was to ‘Make the world safe for democracy’.”

“But…why would anyone kill another so mercilessly?”

“Like I said, some people will do anything to further advance themselves. People will kill for any reason; even for someone's ethnicity."

Twilight sighs and shakes her head. “I just can’t believe that humans would do that to each other.”

“Just consider yourselves lucky,” I say a bit enviously. “You can stop talking about it, and that’s it. It never has to come up again. But for me, that’s my history. It’s human history. Filled with blood and deceit. One man summed up the world quite nicely when he said, ‘You can get more of what you want with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone’.”

“You’re not violent, are you?” Twilight asks, scared.

“No,” I say comfortingly. “I promise you that I will never purposefully take the life of another intelligent species.”

“Does this mean you’re going to stop buying chickens and pigs just to kill and eat them?” Fluttershy asks hopefully.

“Sorry,” I say, smiling. “Omnivorous and loving it. We were made to be able to eat both plants and animals, so it’s how must of us have lived for our whole history. Don’t feel an overwhelming urge to become a vegetarian.”

She looks away a bit defeated, determined to one day convince me to stop eating animals. In my defense, if they shouldn’t be eaten, they shouldn’t be so tasty.

***

When the train stops in Canterlot, I feel happy. Turns out talking about human nature and whatnot for an hour or so with a bunch of ponies is more fun than one would think. I put my bag on my back and walk into the grand city.

In all honesty, for a city built by creatures with probably a maximum of early Renaissance architectural knowledge, Canterlot is amazing. It just has an air of sophistication around it that tells you only the highest tier of the social ladder lives here. Outside of the fact that everypony seems to be walking with their noses firmly in the air, it seems like a great place to be. Why would Twilight ever move away from here for Ponyville?

I can see I’m not the only one entranced by Canterlot. All of Twilight’s friends (Rarity especially) seem to be admiring everything, just like I am. Twilight’s just walking straightforward like it’s no big deal.

After a while, we get to a gigantic marble building at the edge of Canterlot, which I can only assume is the castle. It’s more grand than anything I’ve ever seen, and it seems to tower over the whole world as if it were the center of everything. My historical knowledge is telling me that the divine right is strong here.

Twilight walks past a small group of guards protecting the entrance, who smile at her. They let the rest of us through, though with smiles not as large as the ones Twilight got. I’m the last one to pass, and they scowl a bit while eyeing me suspiciously.

Twilight leads us through the courtyard and eventually to the castle, where security is tighter, more friendly to Twilight, and less so to me. I have a feeling punching a Royal Guard captain is going to stick with me for a while.

Eventually, we come to a set of giant doors, which the two guards standing beside it open with their magic. We walk in, and Celestia is writing something down in a giant throne surrounded by a few advisors and some…thing.

“Princess!” Twilight says, excited. “We’re here!”

“Twilight Sparkle!” Celestia beams. “My faithful student! Have you brought Keerthana like I asked you to?”

“Yes, she did,” I say, stepping foreword a few steps. “What is it you wanted to talk with me about?”

A little happiness fades from her face. “I’m sorry, but I will have to ask everypony except Twilight, Keerthana, and the Chancellor to leave.” Obediently, everyone else leaves the room, and the doors close behind them, leaving only me, Twilight, Celestia, and the other thing in the throne room.

“You must be the human the Princess was telling me about,” the thing says, extending some sort of talon to me.

“Pleasure,” I say awkwardly. “If you don’t mind me asking, you are a…?”

“My name is Chancellor Grimgnash, leader of the Griffon Empire,” he says triumphantly. “And you are Keerthana Griffis, the human from Earth, correct?”

“Yes,” I say. Talking Griffons? Just when I thought I had seen it all, this world throws some other wacky talking creature my way. It feels just like the time when I was in the market and ran into a cow, and it apologized for being in my way.

“The Chancellor has some…troubling news,” Celestia says somberly. Her horn lights up, and a big box is levitated into the middle of the room, right between all of us.

“What’s in it?” I ask. I have a hunch, but for once I hope I’m wrong.

Celestia sighs sadly and opens the lid. When I see what’s inside, my heart drops as I see that I was right about my hunch. Nadiya’s corpse is lying in the coffin, cold and lifeless.

“I am very sorry,” the Chancellor says. “One of the tribes discovered her a few days ago in the badlands. They tried, but,” he looks toward me sorrowfully. “She was beyond saving.”

“It’s fine,” I moan. “Was that the first time anyone saw her?”

“Yes,” he says quietly. “We don’t go into the badlands very often, so she was unknown to us.”

“She must have died recently,” Twilight says comfortingly. “Her body doesn’t look decomposed.”

“Would you like to lead a death arrangement?” Celestia asks. “Do whatever it is humans do to their dead?”

“I don’t know,” I say. “I don’t know what to do. Death rites usually differ from religion to religion, and I don’t know what she is.”

“Do you want us to do anything?” Celestia asks.

I sigh and put my hand on hers. “I’ll do something, I guess.”

I'm Not Alone

The walk back to the train station is very quiet and sad; clearly, none of us want to say anything. We go into our private car, and I plop down onto one of the benches. Twilight sits next to me, looking concerned.

“Do you want to talk about it?” she asks comfortingly.

“What’s there to talk about?” I whine.

“Well, how are you feeling?”

I groan and rest my face on my hands. “Terrible.”

“I understand how you’re feeling,” she says, putting her foreleg around my shoulder.

“No,” I snap, throwing her hoof off me, “You don’t. Neither does anyone else on this train. Hell, the only people that know how I feel now are the other humans on this planet, and they’re nowhere to be found.”

“That ain’t called for!” Applejack scolds me. “She’s jus’ tryin’ to help!”

“Well, I don’t want her help!” I yell. “Or any of yours!”

“You don’t want our help?” Pinkie shrieks. “But isn’t that what friends do for each other? Aren't we your friends?”

“You are my friends! You’re my only friends on this whole planet, but sometimes, there’s just nothing you can do! I don’t want anyone’s pity!”

“It’s not pity!” Twilight says angrily. “We’re all legitimately concerned for you.”

“No,” I growl, “You’re legitimately giving me pity. You don’t want to help; you want to feel sorry for me. All of you."

"Of course we feel bad for you!" Twilight yells. "That's why we want to help!"

"It wouldn't be pity if you actually wanted to help, which you aren't. Pity is when you feel bad for someone but don't give a rat's ass about helping them."

"At least let us try!" Twilight snarls back.

"No. I don’t want to sit here and act all, ‘Woe is me’ and have you pat me on the back and tell me everything’s fine, because it isn’t.” I stand up and walk into the aisle. “I’m going.”

“Where?” Twilight asks.

“I don’t know. I don’t care! Somewhere where I can sort all this out without anyone trying to tell me that everything’s perfect!” I walk to the back of the car and open the door, which leads to a completely empty passenger car.

“Fine,” I hear Applejack’s voice from behind me, in the car I just left. “Let ‘er go.”

“I just hope she comes around soon,” Twilight replies sadly.

“You and me both,” I whisper. Not totally satisfied with simply being in the next car, I keep walking. I pass through some more empty cars, and the ones that have ponies in them are fairly empty. They look at me strangely, then go back to whatever it was they were doing before. It’s amazing how fast ponies can shrug off something incredibly bizarre and unheard of. I guess it just happens a lot.

I have to stop my wandering when I get to a little platform built off the caboose. I lean on the railing and take a few deep breaths to calm myself. After a little bit, my anger turns into simple emptiness. Emptiness stemmed from uncertainty of what to do now.

I feel something tapping my shoulder. “Hey,” a deep voice says. “Do I know you?”

I turn around and see a tall, grey creature with legs like a goat and a really buff chest. It looks a bit comical, since the legs are pretty wimpy and they’re supporting such a large frame.

“No, I don’t think so,” he says. “You looked like someone I knew from the back.”

“Really?” I ask, a bit skeptically. “Because there are only 4 other of my type on this planet, and only one other’s a woman.”

“You’re a, oh what was it, a human, right?” he asks.

“Yeah. Have you met another?”

He nods. “One. But I think it’s a man. I had just thought he grew his hair out.”

Alarms start going off in my head. “You know another one?” I ask frantically. “What’s his name?”

“I don’t know,” he says, scratching his head. “I only met him once for a brief moment.”

“Where?” I ask desperately. If there’s another person somewhere here, I want to find them. “And do you know if he was staying there or just passing through? How long ago was it?”

He backs up a bit, probably startled by my barrage of questions. “Uhh, it was a month or two ago. It was in Minos, the minotaur capitol city.”

“Minotaurs?” Now the whole goat-man hybrid thing makes sense. “Are you a minotaur?”

“Yes!” be blares. “Iron Will, teaching ponies to assert themselves!” Somewhere in the distance, I can hear a goat bleat in excitement.

“Thank you, Iron,” I say. “I’m half deaf now, but at least I know where to go next.”

“Anytime!” he yells.

“Do you need somewhere to stay in Ponyville? I live there, and seeing as you helped me, I feel I should return the favor.”

“Ehh,” he puts his arm on his neck nervously. “No thanks. I’ve got a connection to another train. I’m not exactly…on good terms with the ponies of Ponyville after last time.”

“What happened?”

“A bit of a mishap with one of my assertiveness seminars,” he says, embarrassed. “One mare took it a bit too seriously and terrorized the town for a few days.”

I can’t help but smile a bit. “I guess that would be a reason to stray away from Ponyville.”

He turns to the door and opens it. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need my beauty sleep!” He pulls out a frilly, pink eye mask, which makes me take him even less seriously.

“Have fun,” I say, trying not to bust out into laughter. He walks in and closes the door, and I look back out on the moving countryside of Equestria.

***

I don’t move an inch until the train stops in Ponyville about an hour later. I turn around when it stops, but I hesitate. I don’t really feel like going through the cars to get to the platform since I don’t want to face Twilight and everyone else after my outbreak. Instead of facing an awkward conversation, I decide to jump over the railing onto the tracks. I hear Twilight’s voice, so I crouch down, using the station as cover.

“Has anypony seen Keerthana since she stormed out?” she asks.

I can hear the other ponies all give her a “no” in response.

“Ah’m gettin’ worried ‘bout ‘er,” Applejack says. “Ah just checked the train. She ain’t on it.” I mentally breathe a sigh of relief; that probably means I just missed Applejack’s round of the cabins.

“Maybe she flew away!” Pinkie offers as a solution.

“Pinkie,” Twilight groans, “How many times do I have to tell you? Humans can’t fly.”

“That’s what they want us to think,” she says in a sly voice.

“I think I’m going to check by her house later,” Twilight says. “I’ll give her a half hour. She could already be on her way, for all we know.” When Twilight finishes speaking, I hear six ponies’ worth of hooves walk off toward the direction of the library.

I jump onto the train platform. I have half an hour to do everything I need to, so I can’t waste any time. I start a light run to my house, which thankfully is on the other side of town from Twilight’s library. In about four minutes time, I’m at my door. Twenty-six left until I’m either out of here or facing the music for my actions.

I fling my backpack onto the couch and go into my bedroom. Since I usually only carry the computer and occasional water bottle in it, nearly all my stuff’s elsewhere.

I pick up a few writing utensils and pieces of paper. I doubt they’ll be useful, but you never know. I pick up a bag of bits and put it in my pocket, since it’s one of the only things I know I’ll need. I go into the kitchen and to the fridge, which I still don’t exactly know how it runs without electricity. There are a few water bottles and not much else, so I take the water and put it on the counter.

After I grab a few bags of crackers for snacks from the cupboard, I bring all the food to my bedroom and start packing. I decide to take the pistol and one magazine just in case not all minotaurs are as friendly as Iron Will was. I haven’t had to use it since I came here, and really hope I don't have to start anytime soon.

I grab one of the watches I had Jaycee send me through and look at the time. If Twilight were to wait exactly half an hour (and I know she would), I’ve still got a nice six minutes left.

Since I have a little time to spare, I grab one of my pens and a sheet of paper off my desk and start writing.

Dear Twilight, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, Applejack, Fluttershy, and Rainbow Dash

I rub my chin, trying to figure out how I can tell them my plan without actually telling them the whole truth of it.

I’ll be back soon.

It’s not a great way to say goodbye, but it’ll work. I grab a thumbtack, put on my backpack, and start for the door. When I get to the window, I check a few times to make sure no one’s coming. Luckily, they aren’t. Quickly and stealthily, I open the door, stick my note to it, and very cautiously go to the train station.

“Do you have any tickets to Minos?” I ask the teller.

“A few. When do you need to get there?”

“As soon as possible,” I whisper.

“I can get you there by tomorrow evening if you don’t mind changing trains in Baltimare.”

I rack my brain for the basic Equestrian geography Twilight taught me. “Baltimare? Isn’t that the complete opposite direction of where I need to go?”

“Do you want the ticket or not?” he replies with a level of crass capable of giving me a run for my money.

“Man, you’re pushy.” I pull out the bag of bits and put some on the counter. He takes them and slides me two tickets.

“This one is from here to Baltimare,” he says, pointing to one. “And the other one is Baltimare to Minos.”

“Thanks.” I put the tickets in my pocket. “I’d tell you to have a nice day, but I think I already ruined it.” I turn around and walk to the train, but I swear I can hear his eyeballs rolling. I walk in and take the only empty bench in the car.

The train starts rolling, and a mare comes around with a drink cart. I get some ice water and see if I can eavesdrop on some of the conversations the other ponies are having. The filly in front of me is going to spend the week with her father, so I can only assume that means the mare next to her is her mother and that she’s just there for escorting purposes. The stallions behind me are talking about going home from Canterlot University for the summer. Outside of the ponies immediately around me, I can’t hear any other conversations.

I take a sip of my water and silently wish I was one of them. Seeing your parents and coming home from college for the summer; two things I’ll probably never get to do.

***

After a fun (term used a little loosely) few-hour train ride to Baltimare, I have to get off and find the train to Minos. Wading through giant crowds, I finally get to the platform, where the train taking me to another human being is sitting.

I get on and am relieved to see that it’s a sleeper car. I jump into one of the bunks, and before I know it, the train’s pulling out of the station. There has to be some mistake, since I’m the only one in the car. I may even be the only one on the whole train, outside those whose job it is to be on these. I'm not really tired yet, so I pull out one the Daring Do novel all the ponies have been pestering me to read and open it up.

***

20 hours after the train leaves Baltimare, I step off the station in Minos. Sure enough, I’m one of the only ones that gets off.

The sun’s really low in the sky, which gives it a dull, fiery orange color. However, the beauty of the sky can’t overshadow the state of the city itself; nearly everything’s just gray. Drab and gray. The mountains around it, the buildings, most of the minotaurs, and even the mud that’s everywhere has a grayish tinge to it.

“Excuse me,” I say, flagging down a passing minotaur. “Hi. Sorry for interrupting, but have you ever seen another creature like me here before?”

“Of course!” he says. “Everyone knows him! He’s what he calls a ‘human’. You look like him, are you one as well?”

Well, that was difficult. “Yes!” I beam. “And I’ve come from Equestria to find him. Do you know where he lives?”

“Sure. Follow me.” He starts walking through the gray mud, and I follow him. After a bit of trudging in thick, goopy mud, he brings me to a gray stone house that looks exactly like every other one in the city. “This is his house,” he says, pointing at it.

“Thanks.” He smiled and walks off, and I have to do more trekking to get to the front door. I knock a few times and brace myself.

The door opens, and Will is standing right there. “Keerthana?” he asks.

“Will?” We both stand still for a moment, trying to let the gravity of the situation sink in. At the same time, we both break out in huge smiles.

“I didn’t know you were here,” he says ecstatically.

“Same!” I cry out.

“My gosh,” he whispers excitedly. “Come on inside.” We walk into his house, and just like everything outside, the predominant color here is gray.

“So how long have you been with the minotaurs?” I ask.

“Since I got here. I blacked out during travel, woke up outside the city, and they took me in. What about you?”

“I actually landed in Equestria,” I say, taking a chair and sitting down. “I’ve been living in a small town named Ponyville since the second or third day we got here.”

“What about everyone else? Do you know anything about where they are?”

“Sort of,” I droop my head a little. “I don’t know anything about Jay or Dick. Nadiya’s dead.”

“What?” he yells. “Really?”

“Yeah.” I start moving my fingers restlessly, trying to take my mind off of her. “I buried her in the pony capitol city yesterday.”

He sighs, then falls backwards onto a sofa. “How did she die?”

“Not exactly sure, but it wasn’t caused by someone else. Turns a bunch of Griffons found her in some god-forsaken wasteland a few days ago.”

“Man.” He runs his fingers through his hair, which I now realize is a lot longer than when we came here. I also notice his beard for the first time, which makes him look even more unkempt. I guess not everyone got their own Rarity to happily do their hair, and much less happily simply cut it without giving them a completely new hairdo.

“You want to come live in Ponyville?” I offer. “One of my friends is close to the princess, I’m sure they could get you a house. It’s how I got mine.”

“Thanks, but no thanks. I’ve already got a fairly decent life here in Minos.”

“Decent if you like gray,” I joke. We both chuckle a little.

“I’ll admit the color’s a bit boring, but the minotaurs are pretty nice and welcoming. I’m really starting to feel like one of them. Plus, I’m learning so much about them, and in turn I’m teaching them stuff about Earth and mankind.”

“Sounds exactly like what I’m doing in Equestria. Only there, the pony I’m doing it with is a really quick and diligent worker, which is the opposite of me.” I smile, recalling Twilight’s behavior. “We had a system where we’d ask the other a topic, then fill a notebook on everything we knew about it. I’d write all I know about Earth on a particular subject, and she’d write everything about Equestria on another. She’d keep all the notebooks for herself and study them, and I’d just send them through the portal back to the UN so it’d become their problem. She worked so much faster than me, she’d just fill out notebooks in advance and give them to me. I think currently, she’s seventeen ahead of me.”

He laughs for a little bit, then gets serious. “You said that you’d send them through the portal to the UN. Does that mean you know where it is?”

“Oh, yeah!” I say, almost jumping out of the chair. “I forgot to tell you. Twilight helped me recreate the portal to Earth. Direct line from Equestria to the underwater base.”

“I think I’m going to have to come visit you sometime,” he says excitedly.

“Why not now?” I ask. “I sort of stormed out of Equestria after yelling at my friends a lot. They don’t really know where I am. I think it’d be best for me to actually show that I was being productive in my absence.”

“So basically,” he says, jokingly arrogant, “You want to show me off to all your friends?” I shoot him a really dirty look, and he puts his hands up both playfully and defensively. “Fine, fine, I’ll come.” He gets up and walks into another room. “Just let me get a few things packed first.”

He comes back a few minutes later with a full bag. “Ready to go?” I ask.

“Definitely,” he laughs. “Minotaurs are nice and all, but all this gray is just making my eyes sick.”

“Yeah,” I say. “I know someone back in Ponyville who would have a heart attack if she saw all this blandness everywhere.”

“Well,” he says, pointing at the train station, “Lead the way to Equestria.”

Doubt

It’s about noontime when the train pulls into Ponyville station, and words can’t express how happy I am. I’m excited not only because I’m finally home, but this is also the first time in 4 months I’ve done anything actually productive.

“Wow,” Will says, looking out the window, “I’d almost forgotten what green looks like.” He picks up his bag and walks into the aisle. “I think you got the better deal here.”

“It’s fine,” I say, also standing up. “My friends are great and all, but sometimes they just don’t get it.”

“How so?” he asks.

“Ponies are so innocent and sheltered. They hardly think bad thoughts at all. So sometimes, when I get really angry or emotional, they just can’t understand how I’m feeling.”

“Good thing I’m here, then,” he smiles. “Someone for you to get angry with.”

“You’ve got a lot of catching up to do, then.” The train doors open, and we walk outside. I never really appreciated how nice and quiet Ponyville was until I had to deal with the crowds of Baltimare and the ugliness of Minos. I guess I really could have done worse.

“Follow me,” I tell Will, and he obeys. We walk through the town, and ponies start staring and whispering at us.

“They don’t seem very open to new people,” Will whispers to me as we’re walking.

“It’s because they’re not expecting you,” I whisper back. “It really is a small town here; everypo…everyone knows who I am, and they know that I didn’t know where any of the others were.”

“I see.” He looks at a group of mares, and they giggle amongst themselves. “About how long before the stares wear off?”

“Day or two. So much crazy stuff happens here all the time, they’ve pretty much all gotten used to it.”

Before I know it, we’re standing at the entrance to the library. “Here we are,” I proclaim.

“A tree? He asks skeptically. “Your friend, who is a pony, lives…there?”

“Yeah, it’s a bit weird,” I admit. “But things work really differently here. Magic exists, weather doesn’t move without pegasi controlling it, and half the animals can talk. It’s like we’re living in a fantasy realm.”

“Yeah,” he says, studying Twilight’s tree. The way he said it, it sounds almost as if he knows more than he’s letting on.

I knock on the door a few times, and Twilight soon opens the door.

“Hello!” I say cheerfully, taunting Twilight by pretending I never left.

“Keerthana!” she yells, shocked. “You’re…back!”

“I said I was going to come back, didn’t I?”

“Yes, but…I didn’t…where…” She keeps stuttering with a bunch of half-complete sentences for a moment before finally stopping and regaining her breath.

“I have so many questions for you,” she says.

“Well then.” I move aside, exposing Will, who smiles. “Looks like I’ll have to outsource.”

Twilight’s mouth falls open in a goofy expression of sheer surprise.

“Speechless?” he jokes. “I get that a lot.”

“I…I…” Twilight keeps fumbling with her words until she takes a moment to calm herself down again. “I thought you didn’t know where any other humans were.”

“I didn’t. At least, not when I last saw you. While I was fuming on the train, a minotaur approached me and told me where to find him.”

“Wow,” she whispers, her eyes glued to Will. “Why don’t you two come in and sit down?”

We all walk in and up to Twilight’s house. Twilight sits on the far side of the table, and Will and I sit next to each other on the opposite side. “Twilight,” I say, “Before we start, I just want to say I’m sorry for flipping out on everypony the other day.”

“It’s fine,” she says, fairly friendly.

“No, it’s not,” I persist. “It was uncalled for. You were just trying to help me, and I shouldn’t have over reacted like that.”

“No, really, it’s fine! And something good came from it; you found your friend, didn’t you?”

“I guess,” I say uneasily. “But still, I feel bad for it.”

“It happens to all of us,” she smiles. “I’m just glad you came around eventually.”

“Yeah.” I still feel pretty bad for what I did, and Twilight telling me that it’s fine isn’t helping anything. It’s hard to believe, but sometimes she can be so forgiving that it’s annoying. “Anyways, you invited us in for a reason, what would that be?”

“I want to know about how your friend here came to Eqis,” she says, pointing at Will.

“Same way she did,” he replies, pointing at me. “Didn’t she tell you how we all came here?”

“She did, I just,” she ruffles her brow a little, “Find it odd that three of you ended up in different places, and two still haven’t been found yet.”

“Twilight,” I say in the most serious tone I’ve ever spoken in, “You’re a talking unicorn with sparkles on your butt. Your assistant is a talking dragon who wears pink aprons whenever he cooks. You own a tiara that shoots rainbows at evil people and makes them go away. You’re talking to two complete aliens, and you think the strangest thing is that we ended up in different places?”

“A lot of the things that happen around here have some explanation to them, even if it ends up being really weird or hard to believe. But a lot of this just…doesn’t make sense.”

“I’ve been saying that since day one, Twily, you’re going to have to be a ton more specific.”

She shoots me a quick glare for calling her “Twily”, then shakes it off and keeps talking. “All my experience with portals, as well as everypony else’s, is that they can be used as mass teleportation devices that can send anypony from one area to another.”

“And?”

“Don’t you think it’s a bit strange that only five of you could get through?”

“There are more, but they didn’t want to do it.”

“Still,” she persists, “The fact that only a select few could get through doesn’t make a lot of sense.”

“Maybe magic works differently when it’s connected to Earth?” I suggest.

“Didn’t you say there’s no magic on Earth?”

“Yeah, but,” I rack my brain to try and think of a way to answer this, “Maybe there’s a reason for that. Maybe something with our sun or the Earth’s makeup, something like that. Maybe it causes magic to not function. Could be that the magic had to adapt itself to work right.”

“Maybe it’s something we made,” Will says, ending his silence.

“Humans? Magic?” I laugh a little at his idea. “Where have you been all your life?”

“Maybe it’s possible, I don’t know. I’m not a conspiracy nut or anything, but it’s possible the government’s hiding something.”

“And we’re just all an experiment of theirs to see if it works?” He nods in agreement. “If it was the government, why would they use the UN, which is designed to be for all governments, not just one?”

“Maybe they all know,” he says, shrugging. “Could it be that they’re all working together for once?”

“I still find it hard to believe. If that’s true, why did they need us? Something about chromosomes our ancestors gave us or something?”

“Could be completely fake. Something a bunch of guys did 400 years ago wouldn't change anything that drastic as our genetic makeup.”

“It seems hard to believe, but so does nearly everything here.” I turn back to Twilight, who has been sitting patiently for the past few minutes. “Sorry, we got a little off topic. You were saying?”

“What’s he talking about?” she asks, completely lost. “What guys? What did they do?”

I open my mouth to explain about bronies or whatever they were, but Will puts his hand over my mouth before I can speak. “We can’t say,” he says hastily.

I pull his hand off my mouth and turn to him. “Why can’t we?” I ask angrily.

“We just can’t,” he says firmly.

“Anything you say to me can be said in front of Twilight. She’s easily the smartest person or pony I’ve ever met.” Twilight blushes and hides in her mane a little. “For all you know, something you say could give her an idea of what’s going on.”

“Should I just…?” Twilight points to the staircase.

“No,” Will moans, slouching. “You stay. It’s nothing. Forget I brought it up.”

“Is something wrong?” she asks, concern growing on her face.

“It’s fine.” He sits up.

“Do you not want my help?” she asks.

“What?” He looks at her strangely. “No, it’s not that I don’t want help, it’s that I don’t need it.”

“Oh. Well, I know some humans don’t really like help all the time, so…”

He looks at her strangely. “Who wouldn’t want help if they need it?” I look away, but I can still feel Twilight’s eyes boring into my head.

“Anyways,” I say, turning around and trying to prevent this from getting awkward, “Any more questions, Twilight?”

“Not really,” she says. “I’d like to ask more about minotaurs when you have the time, though. But for now, I’ll let you go and get settled. Do you need a place to stay? I have a spare room.”

“And I own a couch,” I add. “Safe to say you’ll be rooming in Ponyville Library tonight?”

“I’ll take you up on the couch offer, actually.” He turns to Twilight. “Thanks for the offer, though. Just, after 4 months of living in a city of mud with a bunch of goatmen, I’d prefer to be somewhere with a bit more of a…human presence. Even if it’s only for nights.”

“I understand,” she says cheerfully. “Do you need help bringing anything to her house?”

“Everything I need’s in my bag.” He stands up and puts his backpack on. “I’m ready to go when you are.”

I get up and put mine on as well. “Sure, follow me.”

We walk out of the library and through town. After a few minutes, we get to my house. I open the door and notice that my letter’s gone. They probably all took it down when they found it.

“Casa dolce casa,” I say as we enter. “As you can see, couch is in this room. Kitchen’s to the right, and bathroom’s in the back. Not real fancy at all, but it’s functional. And I’ve got a desk in my room off to the left if you need to do anything.”

He takes off his bag and sits on the couch, satisfied with its comfortableness. “Thanks for letting me stay here for a few days.”

“Don’t think it’s completely free. There’s something you have to do for me first.”

“Yes?”

I cross my arms in disappointment. “Mind telling me what you couldn’t say back in the library?”

He sighs and looks down. “You remember why it is we have those two extra chromosomes that don’t do anything, right?”

“Yeah,” I say, relaxing. “We’re the descendents of bronies or something like that, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.” He keeps looking down, not able to look my in the eye. “Well, the one free day we had, I went to the library and tried to find out exactly what that was all about. They were a bunch of guys that watched a TV show for little girls. It was called My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. One of the books I found had a basic overview of the series’ main plot.” He looks up at me with sad eyes. “There was a picture of Twilight in it.”

I can feel all my emotions drain away from me. “Was there really?” I weakly ask.

He nods slowly and looks back at me. “Yes. I didn’t even really think about it until I came here. Then I saw her face, and it reminded me. Keerthana, Twilight Sparkle is fake.”

I walk over and smack him on the face. “Ow!” he exclaims, touching his hand to where I hit him. “Okay, I get that you’re mad, but that-“

“I’m not mad,” I cut him off. “I’m trying to make a point. Ever heard the saying ‘Pinch me, I’m dreaming’?”

“Doesn’t really prove anything,” he says. “Some people have mental illnesses that make them see, feel, and experience things that aren’t there. Just because they can see and feel it doesn’t make it real.”

“So why didn’t you want to say that to Twilight?”

He stands up and walks to the window, looking out contemplatively. “I couldn’t tell her that. It’d be too much.” He turns around dramatically and starts walking toward me. “I wouldn’t be able to look her in the eye and tell her that she’s fake." His voice grows in intensity as he keeps speaking. "That she was created as a figment of someone’s imagination for the purpose of entertainment. That her show ended, effectively making her dead for 400 years. I couldn’t tell that every minute of her life was planned a long time ago, and she’s just carrying out someone’s will. Every memory, every friend, every good emotion she’s ever experienced was fake. And that everything that will ever happen is fake and there’s nothing she can do about it.”

“You just told me that,” I yell at him. “I’ve been here for four months, living alongside her and her friends. You don’t want to tell her that, but you have no problem telling me that every second I’ve spent here is a lie. All the laughs I’ve had with her and her friends. All the parties I’ve gone to with them. Every time they showed me that I wasn’t alone and that someone in this world actually gave a flying fuck about me, you want to tell me that’s all fake as well?”

He sighs and looks away. “I don’t know. As much as I want to believe this world and everything in it’s real, I also want to believe it isn’t.” He looks me in the eye, and there’s visible sadness in his. “I don’t want to believe this is fake either, but I have to doubt how real it is. You think I want to believe that I’ve spent the past few months of my life in some coma or mental hospital when I could be living it?” He looks down at the floor. “I’d rather have spent these past few months in some completely other world than on Earth and thinking I’m in a different world.”

“I know how you feel,” I say, sharing his sadness. “I had my nineteenth birthday in March. They threw me a huge party and invited the whole town. Even the princesses stopped in for a little bit.” I hug him in loneliness. “That was one of, if not the greatest day of my life. I don’t want to think that never happened.”

He returns the hug a bit awkwardly. “I don’t know if this world is real or not. All I know is that we’re in it right now.”

“Yeah.” I stop the hug, and this is easily one of the happiest moments of my entire stay in Equestria.

“What now?” Will asks.

I laugh and look at his hair. “Let’s get you to Rarity. You look like you haven’t had a haircut since we got here.”

“’Cause I haven’t. I wouldn’t really ever feel comfortable having a minotaur hold scissors that close to my neck. “

I smile at the thought and walk to the door. “Let’s go.”

Preparation

“Keerthana!” Rarity calls to me from behind.

I turn around and see her trotting up to me. “Oh, hey,” I say, “What’s up?”

“Where’s your friend Will?” she asks.

“He left a few hours ago on a train back to Minos. Why?”

“Aww!” she pouts. “I was hoping he could join us!”

“Join us?” I ask. “What are we doing?”

“You can’t be serious!” she exclaims in surprise. We both stare at each other for a few moments, then she sighs, slightly irritated. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

“As serious as I am confused.”

“We need to get your dress together!” She starts pacing in place nervously. “Oh, the Gala’s coming up in a few weeks, and I haven’t talked to you about what you’re wearing, so I don’t know if you have something, or if you have something from Earth, or maybe if-“

“Slow down, antsy,” I say, holding up my hand. She stops pacing in place, but she’s still got “nervous” written all over her face. “Start over.”

She closes her eyes and takes a few calm breaths. When she opens her eyes again, she seems much less rushed. “The Grand Galloping Gala is in two weeks, and we’ve got to have you looking your absolute finest for the occasion.”

“Why me? Why are you trying me to look presentable?”

“Oh, but it won't be just you!” she reassures me. “The Grand Galloping Gala is the most important and formal event in all of Equestria, we all have to look absolutely stunning!"

“All? All of us are going?”

“Of course!” she says, as though I should know that. “The Princess invited Twilight, all of us, Spike, and you! It’s going to be so exciting!”

“I guess I could go for a party,” I say.

Rarity’s face lights up as she takes my hand in her hoof. “Oh, this will be so fun! Do you need something to wear?”

I look at the UN jumpsuit I’m wearing, which is one of many I had them send me. “I’m guessing this will be a bit fancier than what I’m wearing?”

“Is that you asking for me to make you a gown?” she asks, excited to make me one.

“I, uhh,” I look at her, and she’s giving me wide, puppy-dog eyes. “Sure?”

She nearly faints at this information and leads me to Carousel Boutique. When inside, we go to her workroom, where she pulls out various measuring tapes and things to take notes on.

“I’ve never designed anything for a human before!” she says excitedly. “This will be so much fun! Now, if you would be a dear, please take your clothes off so I can get some measurements?” She turns around, looks at me, then quickly turns to the stairs. “Better get a stepstool. I’ll be right back!”

I obey her orders and unzip the jumpsuit, letting it fall to the ground. I very unceremoniously throw it onto her bed, happy that I’ll soon have something else to wear, even if it’s for one night.

Rarity comes back a few moments later, stepstool in her magical grip. “What’s that you’re wearing?” She starts looking at me really strangely.

I nervously sigh, not wanting to go have to explain this to her. “Rarity, we’re both women. Look at where they are on my body. Can you guess what they’re used for?”

“Oh,” she says. “Oh!” She blushes, embarrassed that she asked. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have…”

“It’s fine. So, measurements?” I say, trying to change the subject.

“Right!” She seems happy that we’re no longer talking about my underwear. She places the stepstool off to the side, takes a measuring tape, and wraps it around my waist.

“So what exactly is the Grand Galloping Gala?” I ask, trying to make the situation less awkward.

“It’s only the biggest party of the year!” she says with child-like wonder. “Everypony who’s anypony goes!”

“What about somepony who’s not a pony?” I joke.

She giggles and moves onto my leg. “I guess they can come, too. We went last year and it was absolutely dreadful, we were all too busy with our own wishes that we didn’t stop to have fun! We’re all going to be together for tonight, and there will be a few…modifications after last year.”

“What happened last year?”

“It was not very pretty,” she says, trying to skirt around the topic. “We’ll have to tell you sometime."

“Will we be able to do anything in Canterlot while we’re there?” I ask eagerly. “I really want to go there, it seems like a really cool city.”

“Oh, it is divine!” she exclaims. “It’s so sophisticated and cultured, a pony would have to spend their whole life there to experience everything!”

“I take it you’ve been?”

“Maybe,” she smiles.

“So what exactly is there to do at the Gala?”

“Not much normally,” she says. “But the Princess promised that it will be lots of fun this year!”

“I sure hope so. I need a distraction.”

“Distraction from what?”

I bite my lip. “Nothing.” I know for sure I couldn’t tell her about everything Will told me a few days ago.

She puts down the tape and looks at me. “Is something troubling you, darling?”

“I’m fine. I’m just…thinking about home, that’s all.”

“I understand.”

Part of me wants to yell at her for trying to help me when she can’t, but I go with my better judgment and let it slide. I know that she really is trying to help.

She pulls over the stepstool and steps onto it. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I just have to measure your chest..."

***

The day of the Gala arrives, and I go to the boutique in the middle of the afternoon. When I walk in, Rarity’s putting a few finishing touches on a bright pink dress on a pony mannequin, and I can only guess that it’s what Pinkie will be wearing.

“You said you had the dress ready?” I ask.

“Ah, yes!” she proclaims. “I do!” She levitates a small piece of white cloth over and ties it around my eyes. “But it’s going to be a surprise!”

“Is this necessary?” I ask.

“But of course! Everypony enjoys getting a surprise new dress!”

“It’s not really a surprise,” I point out. “I knew you were doing this for me.”

“Well, yes, but you don’t know what it’s going to look like!” She grabs my hand and leads me through the store and into a room.

“Okay,” she says excitedly, “Take it off!”

I take the blindfold off and am shocked by what I see.

“Well?” she asks, looking for my approval, “How is it?”

“I…” I look at the dress she’s made for me; a long, light purple dress that seems to be shimmering by itself. It connects over the left shoulder, leaving the right one unexposed. The high heels are a similar color and sparkle subtly, as opposed to the wavy effect of the dress. The design itself is incredibly plain, and yet she’s made it stand out so much. “…It’s amazing…”

She squees and goes over to the dress, rubbing her hoof on it gently. “I was hoping that you’d love it! Oh, it took me forever to get the spell to make the light ripple without any additions right, but it was worth it!”

“It’s amazing. Especially for someone who’s never made a dress for a human before.”

Rarity blushes. “Oh, it was nothing. I just wanted to capture the spirit of your kind; elegant and flashy, yet mysterious.”

“I really don’t think I’m that mysterious.”

“Oh, but you are!” she insists. “You’re different than anything else on this world, you came just out of nowhere one day, and the way you act, the way you conduct yourselves, is so…different than anypony I’ve ever seen.”

“How so? I mean, if I was so different, I never would have fit in with you.”

“You’re…” she spends a moment with her hoof on her chin, “…Unpredictable. And I can tell it’s not just you, it’s all of your kind. When I would look at those human fashion magazines you’d give to me, trends would just change instantly and change back a few years later. Even in your fashion you’re unpredictable.”

“Rarity!” I hear Twilight’s voice from downstairs. “We’re here to get ready for the Gala!”

“They’re here!” she chimes. She levitates my dress off the human mannequin (which I have no idea how she got) and over to me. “Put it on in here!” she orders. “I’ll come and get you soon, and we’ll have you make a grand entrance for everypony!” She runs out of the room.

I rub my hand over the dress and feel it. It’s soft and thin, yet seems surprisingly sturdy but moveable. I gently place it on the bed and start taking off the jumpsuit.

***

I spend about half an hour sitting in Rarity's workroom, waiting for some kind of word from her to come out.

“Okay!” I hear her whisper from the other side of the door. “Let’s see it!”

I open the door and elegantly step out, pretending I’m a model for her. Her jaw drops, leaving a gaping hole at the bottom of her head. “Well?” I ask. “Looks like you like it.”

“Like it?” she asks. “I love it! Adore it! Oh, it is simply fabulous!”

“You made it,” I point out, “So I’d hope that you love it.”

“Well yes, but on you, it looks even better!” she cries out with delight. “Let’s go show everypony else!”

She starts walking through the boutique, and I follow her. Eventually, we get to a room with lots of chatter on the other side of the door. Rarity whips around to face me. “Okay,” she whispers, “I’ll cue you in.”

She opens the door and clears her throat. “If I may have your attention,” she proclaims, “Miss Keerthana Griffis, the first human ever to be attending the Grand Galloping Gala!”

I glide in, trying to look as graceful and elegant as possible. As I move, I can hear all the other ponies gasp in excitement as they see the dress.

“That’s amazing!” Twilight says.

“You look so pretty!” Fluttershy coos, staring at the dress.

“You look like a portal!” Pinkie blurts out.

“That’s exactly the look I was going for!” Rarity chimes in. I look down at it and realize I do sort of look like a walking portal. Clever. “Okay everypony,” Rarity continues, “We’ve all still got to get ready. We all need to do our hair and put on some makeup before we go!”

“Nah,” Applejack says, “Ah’m good without any a’ that froo-froo stuff.”

“Oh Applejack, it’s no trouble!” Rarity says in a bit of a nervous chuckle. “I mean it.” She smiles fairly menacingly at Applejack, making it clear what she wants.

“Eh, sure,” Applejack reluctantly agrees.

“Perfect! Let’s get started!”

Author's Note

So turns out I posted this chapter right at midnight on July 4th.

To any and all Americans, be sure to wish the USA a happy 237th birthday. Fly the Star Spangled Banner proudly!

At The Gala

I step out of the carriage into Canterlot, and the view is stunning. The castle looms in front of us, and all outside it are avenues lined with so many lanterns that you’d think it was daytime. Hundreds of ponies, donkeys, and just about all the four-legged creatures you could think of are scurrying about in the crowded streets, shopping at the places offering everything from souvenirs to jewelry to fine dining. This place just has a feel of magic to it.

“Wow!” Twilight exclaims as she steps out. “It really looks a lot different than last year!”

“This is going to be the best party ever!”

“I wonder when the Wonderbolts are performing.”

“It is simply magnificent here tonight!”

“I hope the animals are nicer than last year…”

“Well shoot, Ah should’a set up an apple cart this year!”

“Okay girls, remember,” Twilight says, “We all planned to stick together this year so we would enjoy it more. Who thinks they have a fun way to start off the evening?”

Instantly, all the other ponies start rapidly yelling out ideas, trying to drown out all the others. “Enough!” Twilight yells, flailing her hooves. “Maybe we should just all meet here in an hour?” As soon as she finishes her sentence, everypony else bolts in some different direction.

“I think I’ll just see what’s going on on the main street,” I tell her.

“Have fun.” She turns around toward the castle. “I’m going to be talking with Princess Celestia. Everypony’s still excited about the royal wedding, so they’ll be wanting to talk to my brother and Princess Cadence, giving Princess Celestia some free time she said she’d spend with me.”

So apparently, in addition to nailing an Equestrian general in the face a few months ago, it turns out he was also a prince. I open my mouth to ask Twilight if this means she’s technically royalty, but decide to just walk down the street instead.

For the first time, I realize how useful it is to stand on two legs; even though the street’s ridiculously crowded, I can see above everyone’s heads. I push and shove down the street, catching quick glimpses of the various stalls and shops as I go down.

Eventually, I feel a talon reach out and touch me on the arm. “Bonjour, madame,” someone says in a French accent, “Would you care for some something sweet?”

I turn and see who’s talking to me. It’s a griffin with a poofy chef’s hat and a thin, cartoon antagonist-like mustache on his upper lip. He’s standing at a small stall with lots of little bits of fudge and all other sorts of fancy looking chocolates everywhere. “I guess I could go for a little chocolate,” I say.

He takes a small square of chocolate and hands it to me. “Try this one,” he says.

I put the little bit into my mouth and smile. It’s better than anything I’ve ever tasted, candy or not. “This is really good. How much for it?”

“Complimentary,” he says. “It is an honor to create fine chocolate for you.”

“Me?” I blush.

“But of course! There are not many humans in this world, so it is a pleasure.”

“Thanks.” I take a few steps back into the main drag and turn back to him. “I’ll probably be back soon for more.”

“I will be right here,” he says.

“Let’s go get something from the griffin!” somepony says. “If the human likes it, it must be good!”

I’m not sure if using me for free advertising was intentional or not, but he gave me free chocolate, so I can’t complain.

***

After an hour of window shopping in Canterlot, I go to the entrance of the castle to find everypony and Spike there.

“Everypony ready to go in?” Twilight asks. We all nod in agreement, and start walking to the entrance.

“So what’s different about this year than last?” I ask, since I heard the nightmare stories about last year.

“Mostly, it’s less exclusive,” she says. “It usually was a lot of highbrow ponies that just came to brag about going to the Gala. This year, it’s not invitation only. Anypony can buy tickets.”

“That it?” It doesn’t sound like it’s going to be that much different.

“There are a lot more changes, but they’re mostly smaller. It’s going to be so much fun!”

We get up to the castle and enter a pretty stereotypical entrance room. Up ahead, there’s a large staircase with two ponies at the top. One is the unicorn I recognize as Twilight's brother, and there’s a pink mare with both a horn and wings next to him, which is probably the princess. Twilight practically jumps up the staircase to Shining Armor and hugs him.

“Twily!” he says excitedly, returning the hug. “How’s my little sister doing?”

“Just great.” She exits the hug and turns to the princess. “Sunshine, sunshine, ladybugs awake,”

“Clap your hooves and do a little shake!” she finishes. They both giggle and hug each other.

“It’s been a while, Cadence,” Twilight says.

“Too long,” she agrees. “We’ve got to get together once all this wedding hubbub has died down.”

“We should get moving.” Twilight steps to the side. “Don’t want to hold anypony up. We’ll try to get together sometime soon.”

“Deal,” Cadence says.

The first room off the entrance is a large ballroom with a small group of ponies playing music. There are lots of ponies on the dance floor, and just as many sitting at tables or at the bar.

“I love this song!” Pinkie exclaims. In a flash of pink, she darts onto the floor and is lost in a sea of other dancers.

“This seems fun," Twilight says, "We should stay here."

“I think I see the Wonderbolts!”

“Oh my, is that Fancypants?”

“I’m just going to, umm…go into the garden for a bit…”

“Well howdy, that dinner table looks delicious!”

I turn to Twilight, the only one who hasn’t rushed off somewhere for some reason. “Looks like it’s just us now.”

“I’ll be back real soon!” she says. “I can see my parents, I just want to talk to them really quick!” And just like that, Twilight’s whole idea of staying together for the night completely falls apart. Oh well.

I decide to head over to the bar and try to keep myself occupied there. The bartender turns to me. “Can I get you anything?” he asks.

“Just surprise me.” He turns back and starts mixing something. A minute or so later, he pours something into a shot glass and passes it to me.

“Careful,” he warns. “It’s strong. I’ve found that non-pony creatures prefer their drinks stronger than most ponies.”

I down the concoction, which isn’t very strong at all. Guess ponies aren’t great at handling their liquor.

After a few more pitifully weak drinks, I can feel a hoof tapping on my shoulder. I turn around and see Twilight, no longer wearing her dress or makeup and with her hair normal. “We have to go!” she says hastily.

“What?” I look at her strangely. “Slow down and explain.”

“I can’t!” she insists. “We have to go!”

“Twilight, wh-“

“Now!” She grabs my hand and starts pulling me away.

She keeps pulling me through the room and out into the hallway. Eventually, she brings me to a small, empty corridor that’s away from the rest of the Gala.

I yank my hand away, and she looks at me with confusion on her face. “What’s wrong?” she asks.

“You tell me. What’s so important that we have to break away so fast? And where’d everything you were wearing go?”

“You’re just going to have to trust me,” she insists.

“Where’s everyone else?”

“We can’t tell them!” she quickly says.

“Why the hell not?”

“We’re in danger! If we tell them, we could get in more danger!”

“Danger? Danger from what?”

She looks around quickly, then walks to a door and opens it. “In here!”

“I’m not going anywhere until you explain something.”

She walks closer and looks me worriedly in the eye. “Please, I know this is difficult, but I need you to trust me more than any other time in your life.”

“Okay Twilight.” I go down to get on her eye level and smile. “I trust you.”

She smiles and points to the door. I walk into a dark room, and Twilight comes in and closes the door behind her. I pull on a little string hanging from the ceiling, activating a weak lightbulb. We’re in a small, dank broom closet with shelves and racks of cleaning supplies all around.

“Okay, Twilight. What is it we’re in danger of?” I wait for a few moments, but she doesn’t respond. “Twilight?” I turn around, but she’s not there anymore.

Rolling my eyes, I go to the door and try to open it, but it’s locked. Dammit. “Twilight?” I yell. “You out there? Can you hear me?” Silence again. “Twilight, this isn’t funny. Open the door.”

I finally get a response, but it’s not a good one. Something drops from above onto my shoulders and tries to bring me down.

Instinctively, I back up into the wall, making whatever’s on my back fall off and onto the ground. I can now see what it was; some…thing that looks like the unholy crossbreed of a pony and a beetle. “What are you?” I ask it.

It glares and hisses at me. “The Queen has displayed much interest in you, human.”

“The Queen? Queen of what?”

It jumps onto my chest and sinks its fangs into my arm. “You will be Hers!” it shrieks.

“Get off me!” I try and pull it off, but it’s biting me hard. With the combination of the intense pain from the bite and the warmth of the blood flooding my skin, I can feel myself getting light-headed already.

“Stop resisting!” it yells again.

Against all my better judgment, I sprint quickly toward one of the shelves. With a satisfying crush, the thing releases me and falls off my chest. The shelf teeters a little, then leans foreword and lands right on top of me. There are some muffled voices panicking somewhere far away, and a giant ball of purple blurriness goes into my field of vision. First purple, then black.

Waking Up

"...Vitals are normal, she should be out of the coma soon”

Ugh. I feel like…I don’t know.

”She’s moving!”

I groan and open my eyes to a blindingly white room. A unicorn wearing a pure white lab coat walks up and smiles at me.

“How are you feeling?” he asks.

“How’d…” I look around and can see that this is a hospital room. “How’d I get here?”

“You’re lucky to have such good friends. They brought you here a few hours ago.”

I sit up and use my right arm to prop myself up. I try and move my left, but it’s in a cast and a sling that connects around my neck to keep it in place. “What time is it?”

“Two in the morning,” he says. Two? Guess that means I really have been out for a few hours.

“Any of them still here? My friends?”

“Just one.”

“Could you send them in?”

The doctor nods to a nurse, and she opens the door. Twilight walks in, her mane and makeup all messed up. “I’m so happy to see you’re awake,” she says.

“What happened?” I ask her.

“A shelf fell on you,” she says.

“I sort of knew that much. But why’d you bring me to that broom closet?”

“That would explain it,” she says grimly. “That wasn’t me who brought you away from the Gala. It was a changeling.”

“A…changeling?” Given how well everything else here was named, I think I can guess what they do.

She nods. “They can take the form of anything they want. One must have changed to look like me so it could lure you away.” She walks up and puts her hoof on my hand. “How are you feeling?”

“Hurt-y. What happened?”

The doctor walks up, levitating a medical folder. “You got a mild concussion and a broken left, umm,” he points to my cast.

“Arm?”

“Yes, your arm. But worse is your…thing attached to it.”

“Hand?”

“Yes, it appears as though it has been severely broken.” He levitates a picture over to me. It looks just like a normal hand, nothing wrong with it.

“What seem to be wrong with it?”

He walks over and looks at the x-ray. “Is this normal for your hand?”

“Yes.”

He studies it for a bit "Hm." He rubs his hoof on his chin. "I had just assumed since there were so many small bones...ah, forget it." He puts it back in the folder and shows me a picture of an arm, with one of the bones snapped almost completely in two. “And is this normal for your arm?”

Honestly? The bone in my arm’s snapped, and he’s asking if that’s normal. I want to know how this guy graduated medical school. “No, that’s not normal at all.”

“Well,” he says, putting the x-ray back in the folder, “I managed to use some magic to help the healing process. You’ll need to keep it in the cast for a few weeks, and having it in the sling wouldn’t hurt, either.”

“And the concussion?”

“Don’t do anything too strenuous, physical or mental. You shouldn’t even read, it could make things worse. You might experience headaches, mood swings, and amnesia, but it should be cleared up in a few weeks. I’ll transfer your records to the Ponyville hospital. If you need to see a doctor, just go there and they’ll help you.”

Doctor Speedy Recovery to Wing E. Code brown.

He sighs and mutters to himself. “I have to take this. Press the button if you need somepony.” He and the nurse walk out, and Twilight pulls up a chair to sit next to me.

“Where’s everyone else?” I ask.

“They all left for a few hours ago. The Princess gave them rooms, since they wanted to stay here if anything happened.”

“And you?”

“I didn’t want to leave you alone here all night.”

I reach out and hug her with my good arm. “Thanks for being there for me.”

“Anything for a friend.”

Picnic

This is it. I reach my right arm behind my neck and undo the sling my arm’s in. For the first time in weeks, I have absolutely nothing constraining my left arm. I gently touch it, and boy is it nice to feel it. Of all the things I thought I’d miss, exposed arms was admittedly not on the list. I pick up one of the jumpsuits and put it on, covering my arms again. It was nice while it lasted, I guess.

Somebody knocks at my door. “Keerthana?” Twilight asks. “Are you in there?”

I go to the door and lean my back on it. “Yeah, you need something?”

“Can I come in?” she asks meekly.

“What is it you need?”

“Can we just talk?”

“Why can’t we talk like this?”

“Open up!” she demands. “Nopony’s seen you for weeks, and we’re all getting worried about you!”

“Well, I’m fine,” I reply sternly.

“Why won’t you come out?”

I moan at her inability to understand. “Twilight, if you don’t need anything, then stop wasting time for both of us. I’m sure you’re a very busy pony, and I have my own things I need to do.”

“Like?”

“I, you know…” I look around my living room for something to lie about. “…Stuff…”

“If you don’t want to talk to me, just say so!” she says.

“Fine.” I cross my arms in stubbornness. “I don’t want to talk to you.”

I can hear her groan. “What’s this all about?”

“Three guesses, Einstein.”

She sighs. “This is about the Gala, isn’t it?”

“What gave it away?”

“We can’t help you if you won’t let us,” she says worriedly.

“I don’t need help,” I assure her.

“We’d all r-“ I cut her off by slamming my foot into the door, which gets a little “ow” out of Twilight.

“Do I need to repeat myself?” I ask.

“Stop it!” she yells. “All I want to do is help!”

I guess I have to be blunt about what I want. “How can I be sure that it’s you?”

She sighs. “You came here a few months ago through a portal. My brother found you. The first night you were here, you tried to sneak out. You got really angry and locked yourself in my side room. We all threw you a party to cheer you up, and you said you’d stay for an extra week and well…you stayed longer. The next month-“

“I get it,” I cut her off. She’s either telling the truth or is a psychopathic bug-pony who’s done her homework. Either way, she probably deserves to come in. I unlock the deadbolt and open the door to see Twilight grinning up at me.

“Thanks,” she says.

“Whatever.” I walk in and sit down in one of the chairs. “What is it you need?”

“Could you come with me really quick?” she asks.

“For what?”

“It’s a surprise.”

I facepalm really hard. “You guys aren’t even trying anymore, are you?”

“Please just trust me,” she pleads, looking in my eyes.

“Damn bugs,” I mutter under my breath. “Fine. Just wait outside a moment.”

She obliges, walking out the door and shutting it behind her. I quickly run to my bedroom and start rummaging through my stuff. I find the small pistol I haven’t used at all and a magazine next to it. I put it in, get one in the chamber, and turn the safety on. I’m hoping I don’t have to use it, but I put it into one of the pockets and walk to the door. When I go out, Twilight’s still standing there in pony form.

“Lead the way,” I say, preparing for the worst. She walks through the town and into the forest. Totally not suspicious. I put my hand near my pocket in anticipation.

“Almost there,” she says. A few steps later, we enter a clearing where all the other ponies and Spike are sitting around a basket on a red and white-checkered blanket.

“A…picnic?” I ask Twilight. “You got me out here for a picnic?”

“Yup!” she beams. “A surprise party worked once before, we’re hoping it works again.”

“Well…wow.” I bend down and hug Twilight. “Thanks, guys. You know how to make someone feel wanted, don’t you?” Everyone else comes in and joins in the hug.

“I’m starving!” Rainbow Dash cries out. “Let’s eat!”

“Rainbow!” Twilight calls out jokingly.

“I’d be lying if I didn’t say I was a little hungry myself,” I admit. “Besides, going to a picnic and not eating is like going to the ocean and not going in the water.”

“The ocean!” Twilight says. “We should go there some day!”

“Might be fun to do some day,” I say. “But for now, picnic.” We all go to the blanket and sit down. Twilight opens up the basket and starts pulling all sorts of food out. “Thanks again for doing this, guys.”

“It was no problem,” she says.

“Seriously though. Thanks.” I look at all the faces staring at me. “Not just for this, but for everything. I don’t know what sort of hellhole I’d be in if it weren’t for you. I could be dead,” I try to block out any thoughts of Jay or Dick, “Or worse.”

When I finish, I can see all six ponies blushing mildly. Spike has his head in the air, looking for something only he can see. “Something wrong, Spike?” I ask him.

“Do any of you hear that?” he asks nervously.

“It’s probably nothing,” Twilight reassures him.

Spike pulls a sandwich out of the basket, but I can see that he hasn’t put his fears to rest. For the next few minutes, he eats very nervously, constantly darting his head around to try and find some specter only he can hear.

“Spike, chill,” I tell him. “Everything’s fine.”

He jumps up and points to the forest, dropping his food in the process. I can tell this is really worrying him, since he’s not the kind to let food go to waste. “It’s coming from there!” he exclaims.

“Spike!” Twilight scorns. “Everything’s fine!”

“No,” I speak up. “It’s not.” I have absolutely no idea what’s driving me to say that, but I can tell something’s wrong.

“Well then,” Twilight asks skeptically, “What is it, and why can only you two hear it?”

“I don’t know.” I walk next to Spike and kneel down, staring intently at the trees. “But something’s fishy here. Gut feeling, primal instinct, whatever you want to call it, but something isn’t right.”

All the ponies come next to us and start concentrating as hard as they can. “You two sure there’s somethin’ there?” Applejack asks. “Ah don’ hear anythin’.”

I lean a little closer to the trees to see if I can hear something to confirm my suspicions. “It sounds like…” my heart sinks when I finally hear something. “…Bugs.”

“So?” Twilight asks. “Surely there have to be bugs on Earth, they’re everywhere here during the summer.”

“I’m not taking my chances.” I get up and turn around. “After the Gala, I don’t want to ever have to deal with any bugs ever, ever again.”

“It’s not changelings!” Twilight groans. “They’re rarely seen in Equestria, and I doubt they’d come twice in such short time. Probably some flies or mosquitoes.”

“Or maybe an evil swarm of changelings that plans to take over the world!” Pinkie adds.

“You’re not helping!” Twilight yells at her. “Anyway,” she says back to me, “You’ll be safe here, I promise. You have to trust us.”

Great, this again. I want to trust her, but the last time I trusted “Twilight”, I ended up in the hospital with a brain damage and a shattered forearm. “Twilight, I,” Damn, I can’t think of how to say this. “I trust you, but I’m going anyways.” Truth is, I’m scared as hell to be here right now, but I could never tell them that. It could only make things worse.

I take a few steps foreword, but something ensnares my ankles and stops me. I look down and see magic the exact color of Twilight’s around my feet. “If you trust us, you’ll stay!” she says.

“I trust you guys completely, but there’s only so much you guys can do. I mean, maybe it is changelings. They’ve defeated you once before, who’s to say they can’t again?”

“There were hundreds of them!” she says defensively.

“And who’s to say there aren’t hundreds here? Thousands, even?”

“Why would they send thousands of changelings to crash a picnic?”

“The one that attacked me at the Gala sounded pretty devoted to getting me. I mean, he died just trying to bring me in.”

“You have two choices,” she says. “One, you say that you trust us, and you come back here. Two, you admit that you don’t trust us, and I let you go to go do whatever you want, wherever you want in this world.”

“It’s not that simple!” I yell back.

“Choose!”

I sigh when I come to a decision. “I-“

“You should have listened to the human,” a creepy voice says out of nowhere. Everyone panics, and Twilight releases the magical grip on me. I’ll probably regret this later, but I run back to my friends.

“Who are you?” Twilight yells to the sky. “Where are you? What are you?”

The voice chuckles menacingly, then hundreds of changelings pour out of the forest, surrounding us. “Well fuck,” I whisper to myself.

One steps foreword, wearing some decorative battle armor. “Hand over the human and I promise that the rest of you will only die in slightly excruciating pain.” I recognize his voice as the one that was speaking to us.

“Why do you want me?” I ask it.

“The Queen wants you,” it explains. “Not me.”

“Why does she want me?”

“She is making a collection,” it says with a devious smirk.

“Of what?”

“Your kind. And she wants you.”

“My kind? Does she already have one?”

“Yes,” it says as evilly as possible, “She does.”

“How do I know you’re not bluffing?”

It laughs a little, then glares menacingly back at me. “You don’t.”

“Well, tell your Queen that she’s not getting me.” I instinctively move my hand to my pocket, where the pistol is. “And if she could release any other humans, that’d also be real great.”

“The Queen wants you.” It takes a few steps foreword. “And She doesn’t like being disappointed.”

“She’ll just have to live with it, I guess.” I reach into my pocket and put my hand around the gun. “And if you take one step closer, it’ll be the last thing you ever do.”

It smiles devilishly, then takes one step toward us. I pull out the gun and aim at it.

“What’s that?” Twilight asks.

“Really bad time,” I tell her.

The changeling laughs and looks at the gun. “What is that?” It can hardly keep still. “If that’s supposed to be a weapon, your kind really has a long way to go.”

“Tempt me and you’ll find out just how much it can do.” The combination of fear and adrenaline coursing through me makes every second heavy with anticipation.

“Oh, this will be delightful,” it says. “I wonder if it’ll sting a little?” It takes one step closer and grins at me. “Let’s see just how much you’re capable of.”

I just stand there for a few seconds, staring him down. Against every single bit of reason in my body, my finger pulls the trigger.

A bright flash, a loud bang, and a little kickback. That’s all it takes to put a hole in the changeling’s skull. It lifelessly falls over and starts spurting sickly green blood into the grass.

Everything just stops. The changelings are staring at their fallen comrade, my friends’ jaws are all wide open, and even the breeze seems to have stopped. The entire universe has ceased.

And as soon as it left, it comes back. The changelings all fly away quickly, obviously scared for their lives. I do over to the changeling corpse and fall to my knees, letting the pistol slip from my hands.

“Keerthana?” Twilight asks with terror. “What did you do?”

“I…killed it.” The words can hardly escape my lips. I, Keerthana Griffis, have just killed an intelligent creature. Not even killed. Murdered.

I grab the pistol, put the safety back on, and jam it in my pocket. “I’m going back,” I say as I get up.

“Wait!” Twilight puts her hoof on my shoulder and pulls me back down. “What was that you used on it?”

Without saying anything, I get back up and start running. I can hear them all yelling at me, but I just need to block them out. I just need to get home. After a few minutes, I finally get to my house and run inside. I just need a minute to get my thoughts together. I’ve just killed something. Does this make me a criminal? Will I be tried for murder and thrown in jail? Does Equestria have the death pentalty? Are there any laws regarding self-defense and if so, could I just say I was defending myself? What’ll the U.N think of a human killing the native life? What-

My internal rambling is cut off by some knocking on the door. “Keerthana?” Twilight asks. “Are you home?”

I suck in my worry and open the door. Twilight’s at my door, looking very, very worried. “Are you okay?” she asks.

“I’m fine, I just…need to clear my head a little bit.”

“I’m always here for you if you need it,” she says comfortingly.

“Thanks.” I get down and hug her. “I’ll be over soon. I think talking about it will help.”

“Glad to hear it,” she smiles. “You know where to find me. Just come over whenever you’re ready.”

“Thanks,” I say meekly. “For everything.”

“No problem. It’s what friends do for each other.” She walks away from my house.

I take a deep breath and try to calm myself. I know what must be done. I go to my bedroom and put my gun on the desk. I pull out some paper and a pen and write down a note. I go to the gun and double-check to make sure the safety’s on. The pistol automatically rechambers another after you’ve fired it, so there’s a bullet in the chamber. Perfect. I drop the magazine out, since I’ll only need one bullet where I’m going. I put it in my pocket and walk outside.

It’s just beautiful outside. Not cold, not hot, just perfect. There’s a slight breeze, the sun’s shining, and everything has that slight sweet smell I’ve come to associate with Ponyville. These are the kinds of days you couldn’t recreate if you tried. It’s just perfect.

I start walking and just don’t stop. Through town, out of town, and eventually I can make out the portal in the distance. So pristine. So beautiful. The only way back home. When I get to it, I test it for the last time. I put my hand on it, and it still feels as solid as ever. No getting through there.

I find the little tree I propped myself up against the first day I was here and sit down, my back to it. Just like old times. I pull out the pistol and look at it. My heart aches. I know what I’m going to do, but doing it is another story.

With a deep breath, I turn the safety off. I put the cold barrel against my temple and pull the trigger.

My Only Friend

I hear peace. You don’t think you could hear something like that, but I do. The birds are singing quietly, the bugs gently humming in the distance, and a soft breeze moves through my hair.

Reluctantly, I open my eyes. It’s the field. The world is exactly as I left it. But it’s not as I left it. Because I never left.

I pull the gun from my head and look at it. The small interface on the side tells me that it as a bullet chambered and that the safety’s off. Everything’s all ready.

I jam the barrel back into my skull and pull the trigger again. Nothing. I move it around my head to try and approach it from a different angle, but it’s the same result. Nothing.

“Great,” I mutter to myself. It’s jammed. I pull back to try and get the bullet out of the chamber, but it’s stuck as well. I keep yanking at it with increasing ferocity, but it just won’t budge. With each pull, my face grows redder and hot tears start flowing from my eyes. When I’ve had it with the god damn stubborn thing, I toss it angrily. It hits a rock and, just my luck, it fires into the middle of nothing.

“Of course!” I yell at it. I get up and walk to the rock. “Nothing I ever fucking try fucking works!” I grab the gun and throw it off into the distance. I never want to see that piece of shit again. The one day I decide to use it, it brings me nothing but bad things.

I turn my attention to the little rock in the ground it landed on. In blind fury, I start kicking it as hard as I can. “Why?” I yell at it. “WhywhywhywhywhywhywhyWHY?”

I fall onto the ground and start bawling into my hands. “Why did I ever come here?” I whimper between sobs.

I just sit in the middle of a field crying for god knows how long. It could have been minutes, it could have been hours. But eventually, someone comes up behind me.

“Are you okay?” a familiar, soft-spoken voice asks.

I whip around and see Fluttershy looking at me with a look of concern. I’m not even sure how to react to her coming. Every part of me wants to break down and tell her everything, but the blind fury in me wants to just reach out with my two hands and just snap her neck. And the worst part is, I know I could do it. Just break her neck and walk away, pretend like nothing ever happened.

Thankfully, the better part of me wins. I breathe a heavy sigh and turn fully to her. “What do you want?” I snap at her. Well, I guess being an asshole to someone who doesn’t deserve it is better than killing them.

“I, umm, oh..." I can see that she’s nervous, so I pat the ground next to me. She sits down.

“Let’s start with why you were out here,” I say.

“Oh, I heard there was a hurt bunny out here, so I came to find him. Why were you here? Were you sending something to Earth?”

“Not really.”

“Well then, why were you out here? There’s nothing else besides the portal here.”

“I just…I don’t know.” I'm not even sure that I'm lying anymore.

“Oh, well,” she looks away, “You looked like you were sad, so I came over here, but…I’m not sure if I can help.”

That’s it. As soon as she finished speaking, my body filled with pure happiness. I don’t know how I know this, but all my life I was searching for that one sentence. I throw my arms around her and bring her into a big hug. “Thank you!” I cry into her mane.

“I, huh?” She clearly doesn’t know what’s happening. And frankly, neither do I.

“You said you couldn’t help!” I exclaim.

“Is that a good thing?”

“I…” I pull out of the hug and just smile at the sky. “It’s wonderful. You can help me by not helping me.”

She just stares blankly into the distance for a moment, then turns her head to me. “I don’t think I know what you’re talking about.”

“Neither do I,” I admit. “But that’s just so much better for me. If I went to Twilight or anyone else, they’d just try to ‘fix’ my problems without really understanding them first. They act like they understand, but they don’t. I know they’re just trying to help, but that doesn’t help at all.” I take a deep breath to calm myself. “If you’re willing, could you just sit here a moment and just listen? Don’t give me any advice or anything, just listen. I don’t need help, I need someone to understand.”

“Well sure! You can tell me anything.”

“I’m just…at a loss for words. Coming to Equestria has just been so much for me. I just want to go home. But I can’t. Only five of us came, and no one else can come in. But one's dead, one’s far away, and two we still don’t know where they are. I guess…it's too much to handle, and today...”

“Killing that changeling just pushed you to your limits?” she finishes my thought for me.

“Yeah. So I came out here, and-“ I cut myself off. “Can you keep a secret?”

“A secret?” she echoes.

“Yes. A terrible, deep secret you can’t ever tell anyone, anypony, anydragon, whatever. The only two things in the universe that can know about this are you and me. Twilight can’t know, Applejack can’t know, nobody. If someone starts torturing you to get this secret, you can’t tell them. Can you hold a secret like that?”

“Is it that bad?” she asks, terrified.

“No,” I admit. “I doubt anyone’s going to start torturing you just to learn this. But you can’t tell another soul, understand?”

“I…I guess,” she says.

“No guessing. You need to be committed to keeping this a secret, hear me?”

“I’ll keep the secret for you.”

I slowly breathe in and out a few times to prepare myself for this. “After I ran away from the picnic, I went to my house. I took my gun and came out here. Then, I tried to kill myself.”

I don’t know what pure shock sounds like, but I’m pretty sure it’s close to the indescribable whimpering Fluttershy’s making. “You…what?” she yells.

“I attempted suicide.” Now that I say it, it sounds so…hollow, almost. Instead of anger, I’m just feeling regret. How could I be so stupid? “But I’m glad it didn’t work.” I put my arm around her shoulder and hug her. “Thanks for listening.”

“Is that what the loud bang was? Did you use the same thing you hurt the changeling with?"

"Yeah, a gun. Something went wrong with it, but I don't know what. It didn't want to fire."

"Magic?" she suggests.

I can't tell if she's being serious or not. Either way, I sort of want to laugh at her. But if she is serious, I'd probably hurt her feelings. "Fluttershy, guns don't work on magic. At least, not the ones I've seen. Sure, I couldn't explain how half the high-tech ones they make fire, but the one I have doesn't work like that."

"No, maybe it stopped you!"

"Like, being close to the portal affected the mechanics somehow?"

"Not like that, like..." she looks into the distance. "I don't really know what I'm talking about, you'd have to ask Twilight. She's so much smarter than I am."

"Come on," I encourage her. "You can at least try. You knew enough to think it would be logical for magic to interfere."

"I...I don't know. I could explain it to somepony who's lived here their whole lives, but to an outsider..."

"What makes it hard to explain to me?"

She is clearly thinking my question over really hard. "The more you live here, the more you'll see that...not only unicorns have magic. It's everywhere. And it affects our lives in strange ways we've all grown used to."

"Like?"

"Gosh, it's...so common, I've stopped noticing it." She ponders my question a little longer. "Well, the first time we went to the Grand Galloping Gala, we all sang before we went into it."

"And?"

"Everypony started singing with us! And they were singing the same thing together, at the same time. They all knew the words, and nopony had planned it."

"So magic...causes spontaneous singing?"

"A lot more, but we all just get so used to it that I can’t think of anything else!”

“And you’re thinking somehow it was magic that stopped me?”

She nods her head. “You’d have to ask Twilight if you want to learn more, she’s so much smarter than me about all this…”

I reach my arm out and hug her. “If it’s any consolation, you know infinitely more about magic than I do.”

She blushes a tiny bit. “Oh, thank you.”

“If anyone should be thanking anyone, I should be thanking you.” I pull her a bit closer. “I just needed someone to listen, a shoulder to lean on, a friend I can bitch and whine to. I’ve never really had someone that close to me.”

“It’s what friends do for each other,” she says happily.

I guess I have a friend now. Possibly the only true one I’ve ever had. I’d be kidding myself if I said things were going to be good from now on, but at least now I’m not alone.

On Those Bombshells...

I walk into Twilight’s library, which is empty. Strange, I could’ve sworn her letter told me to come here at this time. “Twilight?” I call into the house.

After a few seconds, sounds of all sorts of chaos start coming from downstairs. It gradually moves its way to the basement door, which opens to show a very sleep-deprived Twilight who’s grinning almost psychotically. “I think I’ve figured it out!” she happily cries out.

“Figured out what?” I’ll admit, if I didn’t know her this well, I’d say she's finally gone insane.

“Come with me!” she demands, running into her basement. “I’ll explain down there!”

I follow her into the lower floor, which I’ve admittedly never been in before. It’s lit by a bunch of lightbulbs all around (which I still have no idea how they power), and there’s all kinds of science-y looking stuff just lying around. Machines, papers, graphs, charts, books, scrolls, quills, and a chair with a small harness on one of the arms. “Come on down!” she yells to me while she starts tinkering with one of the machines.

I wade through all her junk to get to the chair, which looks safe enough to sit down. “So, finally gone off the deep end?” I joke.

“I’ve been up for four days straight!” she blurts out, ignoring my attempts at comedy, “And I think I’ve almost got it!”

“Got what? And why do you need me?” I clear my throat. “Also, in the note you had Spike give me, I don’t think ‘gallipwax’ is a word.”

“I’m glad you asked that!” she says, again ignoring my attempts to lighten up this slightly unsettling situation. “Well, I was reading one of those books you gave me from Earth, and I got to this interesting section about deoxyribonucleic acids, and I remember you saying you came here because of extra bases in your genome, so I figured out how to read it with magic and tell you just why you could come here!”

I just sit there a moment, letting her quick ramblings sink in. Wait, did I just teach an entire new species about DNA? Isn’t the main rule of pretty much every sci-fi story not to interfere with the development of other species? Eh, one crisis at a time.

“I was as speechless as you were!” she virtually screams at me in excitement.

“I was just…ah, never mind. You said you can read my DNA?”

“Precisely!” She haphazardly tosses me a few vials with her magic, not all of which I catch. “I’ll need you to fill these with some genetic samples, if you wouldn’t mind.”

“Like?”

She turns around and looks at the broken glass on the floor. “Well…I guess just hair, skin, and blood samples will do.”

I pull out a few strands of my hair and stick them in a bottle, then pull off a hangnail and stick it in another. Twilight has to strap my arm in and take some blood with a long tube, and I can only hope she did it correctly. I’m actually surprised by her knowledge of the human body though, so I’m confident in her. She even gives me a kid’s bandage with a smiling little filly on it for the injection point. Cute.

“What now?” I ask when she’s labeled all the vials.

“Just a few quick tests!” She levitates a little ball of blood out and has it hover in the air in front of her.

“What are you-“ I stop myself when it…unravels is the best term for it. Instead of a little ball, it’s turned into a ton of long strands that are just floating there.

I just watch in awe for a little bit, then Twilight loses her focus and makes my blood go splashing on the floor. “Interesting,” she mutters to herself.

“What? What is it?”

She ignores me and moves onto the skin and hair, which do even more things I can’t describe. After she’s done, she lights up her horn and starts moving it up and down my still restrained arm.

“What’s going on?” I ask, expecting the worst.

“You said humans aren’t magical, right?” she asks.

“Yeah, why?”

“Not at all? Like, there’s no magic at all, right?”

“Yes, what is it?”

“And nothing on your home planet is magical?”

“Why? Am I magical?” I joke.

“Technically speaking,” she looks up at me with a look of super seriousness, “Yes.”

Wait. Twilight just said I’m magical? No, it can’t be. It’s impossible. “Twilight, I can’t be magical. I don’t have any powers, or a horn, or anything else magic-related!”

“It’s only trace amounts. Not powerful or prevalent enough for any sort of magic that I know of. But enough for something.”

“Something like?”

She stares at my arm a little longer, deep in thought. “Something. But what, I don’t know. But you wouldn’t just have it for no real reason.”

“Yeah, well I’ve got all sorts of stuff inside me that doesn't serve any real purpose. Hell, all my appendix does is randomly get infected and kill me.”

“Functionality of the appendix has not been yet proven, but evidence suggests that it was once used by ancient humans or their evolutionary ancestors and has simply failed to disappear completely,” she says, probably word-for-word from one of the books I gave her. “But that’s irrelevant. The point is, the magic you have is useful for some purpose. We just have to find out what it is.” She runs off and starts looking through a bunch of loose sheets of paper she has lying around.

“By the way,” I tell her, “I don’t think the answer to ‘Why is my human magical?’ has ever been discovered before. Come to think of it, the question’s probably never been asked.”

“Found it!” she chimes. Well boy, do I feel silly now. She picks up a small scrap of paper and brings it over to me. It’s got a bunch of lines and whatnot, and she holds up the reading of my DNA for comparison. “Isn’t it exciting?” she squees ecstatically. I stare at her blankly for a while until she giggles uncontrollably. “Sorry, I forgot you couldn’t read magical charts! Silly me!”

Wow, Twilight really is more interesting after four days of sleeplessness. “What’s the chart say?”

“Well,” she starts to explain, “Every time I perform a new spell, I make sure to log it so I can replicate it.” She points to the small scrap of paper she found. “That’s the spell I had to do to recreate the portal to Earth.”

“Uh-huh.”

She points to the graph she just took from my DNA. “And here’s the ‘abnormalities’ you said you had.”

“Wait. First off, you’re saying those two extra chromosomes I have are magical?”

“Yes!” And here I was, thinking all the crazy “science” ended before I got here. “Anyways, I know you can’t tell, but the two magical sequences are opposite of each other.” She points back to the graph. “This is pretty standard sequencing for long-range teleportation via group portals, but something’s…off. It’s missing something.”

“Like?”

She ruffles her brow for a moment. “I guess the best way to describe it to somepony who doesn’t know magic is…like a door. Anypony who makes a portal can ‘lock’ it, allowing only certain ponies or other creatures to pass through it. The portal you came through was locked, and your genes are the key.”

Wow. That’s some pretty heavy stuff there. “That’s…impossible. I have so many questions. It couldn’t work.”

“Ask me anything,” she says.

“A while back, when Will was here, you said it was really weird only a few of us could pass through the portal. Now you're saying it makes sense. Did some magical laws change, or…?”

“Well, I asked the Princess about it.” She looks around nervously. “Portals like that are illegal, and a very well-kept secret. Lots of ponies used to use them for quick getaways after robbing houses or banks. But the Princess let me practice a little bit with everypony else.”

“Everypony else?” I ask. “As in Rarity, Applejack, Pinkie, Rainbow, and Fluttershy?”

“Yes,” she nods. “Why?”

“How could they all pass? I mean Rarity sure, since she’s a unicorn and all, but don’t they need to have specific magic sequencing to pass? Or do your earth pony and pegasi friends all have unicorn ancestors?”

“Not that I know of. And why wouldn’t they be able to pass?”

“Well…they all sort of have a distinct lack of magic.”

“Oh no, all ponies are magical,” she says like it’s common knowledge. “Unicorns just have the most and most visible magical ability.”

Well, that’s bombshell number two. I guess now I can call Applejack on magically cheating for all those arm/hoof wrestling matches we had and I inevitably lost. I want to know more, but given Twilight’s tendencies to overexplain things, it’s probably better I don’t ask. “So about that, how is it I got magical abilities?”

“I don’t have any idea,” she says, confused. “ It could be that every human has it, it could be a natural genetic mutation, I don’t know. I’d need a lot more testing than just one human. I’ll just be here if you need me, running some more analyses on your genetics and cross-referencing them with known spells."

“Here?” I ask. “As in, down here constantly?”

“Correct!” she says. “I have lots of work and research I need to do.”

“Twilight, get some rest. When you get tired, you can become a little, you know…”

“Restless?” she says for me.

“That’s putting it nicely. Rest up, Twilight. If anyone deserves a good night’s sleep, it’s you.”

“I can keep going a little longer!” she insists. “I’m not too tired.”

I smile and shake my head. “I guess I can’t force you to sleep, but don’t kill yourself.”

“I’ll be fine,” she assures me. “I-“ she yawns heavily.

A laugh a little bit and wade through all the crap to the stairs. When I get to the door to the library, I hear a loud thud. Checking back, I see Twilight snoring loudly with her head on the desk.

***

Twilight and I are sitting in a lonely, private train car on the way to Canterlot. Nobody else is sitting in it, which just leave us sitting on opposite sides of the aisle.

There’s nothing but the gentle movement of the train on the tracks. I want to talk to her, but it’s always awkward to be the first person to break such a big silence.

“You probably have a lot of questions,” she says, right in the middle of my thought.

“Plenty,” I say. “First, why are we the only two here? Is something wrong?”

“I should probably tell you the whole story. I sent the results to the Princess, and she got interested in it.”

“So we’re going so she can inspect me?” I can only imagine Celestia poking and fondling me with really malevolent looking tools.

“Not really. Remember a week ago when I went out to ‘visit my family’?”

“A vacation I highly suggested you take, yes I remember.”

“I actually went to Minos to track down your friend and analyze him,” she admits.

I guess I shouldn’t be too surprised that Twilight used the cover of vacation to go and work. Usually it’s done the other way around. “How’d you even find him?”

“Humans aren’t as good at hiding as you might think,” she smirks.

“I guess we’re a lot better when we’re not the only ones in a thousand miles. Did you go and find him to check for any magic?” I ask, almost jokingly saying the last word.

“Yes,” she says.

“And?”

“Same as you. I don’t know exactly what the Princess planning, but she wouldn’t call us over unless it’s important.”

“Any ideas at all?”

“No, not at all. But it has to be important if she only wanted us to come.”

The train comes to a halt as we reach Canterlot. “Guess we’ll find out,” I say, standing up. Twilight stands as well, and we walk out to the station. The air’s pretty cold and all the trees are bare, which can only mean winter’s coming. Guess this means I’ve been here probably nine months. Wow, nine whole months on another planet. These jumpsuits are so good at stopping the weather, I haven’t had to focus on changing my clothes to suit the weather. Amazing how something that little can affect time perception.

“Here we are!” Twilight says, snapping me out of my stupor. We walk into the castle courtyard, and the guards still shoot a few nasty looks my way. They’ve lessened in dirtiness and frequency, go I guess my standing’s finally getting a bit better.

When we get inside the palace, a pair of guards starts escorting us through the many hallways and rooms of the castle. Finally, we get to a big wooden door, and the guards stand to the side. Twilight opens the door, and we step into the most regal looking room I’ve ever seen.

“I’m glad both of you came,” she says with a smile. “Keerthana, I believe I have something you’ll find useful.”

“Really?” I ask. I guess it probably really is useful if I had to come all the way here to pick it up. That, or it’s dangerous and probably something I shouldn’t be trusted with.

She puts a large, rolled-up piece of paper on the table in the middle and unfurls it. It’s a map of Equis with a bunch of elegant scribblings on the side and three red Xs in varying places. I can tell that one of them is centered over Ponyville, and two of them are over places I don’t recognize.

“These are some really complicated spells,” Twilight says, pointing at a cluster of annotations. “What are you trying to do?”

“The information you sent me was very interesting,” she replies. “These are the first results of my experiments.”

“What are all the little Xs?” I say, pointing to the one over where Ponyville would be.

“Those are where all the individual concentrations of the particular magic trace Twilight was studying are located.”

It takes me a minute to process what she’s saying. “Each X represents someone with the bit of magic in us that lets us go through the portal?”

“Exactly,” she replies.

“So this is basically a map of all the humans in the world?”

“Yes.”

I can’t help but beam at this news. “This is great,” I say with barely contained excitement. “Where are those other two Xs supposed to show?”

“This one is in Minos,” she says, pointing to one in a huge field of gray. “As Twilight explained it to me, you have already made contact with the human there, correct?”

“Yeah.” I point to the X in an area the map calls The Wasteland. “What’s there?”

Twilight and the princess instantly look at each other nervously. “Is there something wrong?” I ask them, not entirely sure that I want to know the answer.

“That explains a lot,” Twilight whispers to Celestia.

“Hello?” I say louder. “The alien’s lost. What’s so bad about there? Well, I guess anywhere called a wasteland can’t be that great to live in, but what does it explain?”

“Do you want to tell her?” Celestia asks Twilight quietly.

“Tell me what?”

Twilight sighs and looks at me sadly. “The Wasteland is where the changelings are from.”

“So that means if there’s an X there…” I don’t even bother to finish my thought.

“That means there’s a human living there.” Celestia examines a few of the calculations on the side. “And by these readings, right in the middle of their capitol city.”

“Capitol city?” I ask. “I’ve never heard of their capitol. I didn't even know they were cultured enough to make cities.”

“Its name is seventeen syllables and takes hours of practice to pronounce correctly,” Twilight explains. “And most ponies don’t like to talk about anything changeling related.”

“Why not?”

“A long history of violence and hatred,” Celestia says. I think I can even hear a little regret in her voice.

“So…what do we do now?” I ask, hoping one of them has some plan.

“What exactly do you mean?” Celestia asks, tones of suspicion heavy in her speech.

“Well, whoever it is there, we have to get them back!” I demand. “We can’t just leave them in the hands of some demonic insects!”

“I don’t know what you want us to do!” Twilight yells, defensively. “We can’t just walk into the changeling homeland and take a human! You said the changelings were collecting humans, so they wouldn’t just let us walk away with another.”

“Well of course they won’t let us take them!” I say to her, with me now the one acting like this is simple stuff. “We have to take him!”

“Him?”

“Well, yeah. Only two women came to Equis. I’m one of them, and the other died.”

“I guess I keep forgetting about the other unknown humans.”

“I think I might have an idea,” Celestia speaks up.

“Oh?” Twilight asks. “What is it?”

The princess looks at me and gives me a small smile. “I think we should let Keerthana make the plan to get the human back.”

“What?!” Twilight and I yell simultaneously.

“Celestia, I’m a terrible person to put in charge. You’re like, a thousand years old and have been making all the decisions for an entire country for generations. I’m nineteen, and my success rate probably needs negative scientific notation.”

“I have faith in you,” she says warmly. “I can have a chariot to take you back to Ponyville momentarily. Just write me whenever you have an idea.”

“Well, I…thanks, I guess." I walk to the door, and Celestia uses her magic to open it. All the way to the chariot and the subsequent voyage to Ponyville, I’m just lost in my thoughts.

Cue Rescue Music

The ground below our chariot changes from some sprawling, open fields to an incredibly rocky and ravaged area that fits the word “wasteland” quite nicely.

“So, you’re both clear on the plan?” I ask Celestia and Twilight.

“I hope this works,” Twilight says nervously, looking over the side of the chariot.

“Are you sure about this?” Celestia asks, sounding incredibly worried.

“Not in the slightest,” I admit. “But it’s really the best thing we have going for us right now.”

We go a few more minutes of the trip in silence. “We should be landing in their city soon,” Celestia informs us.

“Right.” I turn to Twilight, who looks like she's going to start puking. “You bring that package I asked you to?”

She pulls a small box out from under the seat and passes it to me. “What’s inside?” she asks.

I open the box and pull out a set of kid’s toy handcuffs. “These.”

Both the ponies look at the cuffs like I just pulled out some alien device. Actually, I guess I just did, so I can’t really blame them.

“What are they?” Twilight asks with a sense of wonder reminiscent of my first days in Ponyville.

“Handcuffs.” I put them around my wrists and lock them, then unlock them again.

“I don’t remember those as a part of the plan,” Celestia says, confused.

“They’re really just for believability.”

“How so?”

“Simple, really.” I put them back on to demonstrate. “See? My hands can’t move around to do anything. When they’re behind my back, I’m pretty much entirely confined.” I take them off and set them to the side.

The chariot starts dipping a little bit, and a bunch of buildings come into view that look like they’re a combination of stone and insect hives. “Now or never, guys,” I tell them. I pull the little key for the handcuffs out of the box and hold it up. “This is the key for these things. If you use it, they’re locked, and you’ll need to use the key again to get them off.”

“I see,” Twilight says, looking at the shackles next to me.

“So, to reiterate. The handcuffs are unlocked, could I escape if they were put on my wrists?”

“Yes,” she says. “Where are you going with this?”

I toss the key off the side and turn around, straightening my arms and putting my hands next to each other. “Someone put them on me.”

“What?” Twilight asks. “But they won’t work if they’re unlocked, and you just threw away the key!”

“Exactly. Come on, Twilight. I’ve trusted you on a whim plenty of times before, and I just need you to do so once for me.”

Reluctantly, she comes over and puts them on. I pull a little to see if they’re good, and they’re nice and tight. I turn back around and smile. “Well, guess the only thing we can do now is just to go for it.”

The chariot makes a hard landing on the rocky ground, and Twilight and the princess get out. They have to help me a little bit, but I still take a rough landing and nearly fall over.

A large group of changelings masses a hundred or so feet in front of us and eye us angrily. When I see them, I actually feel a little twinge in my heart. Some of them look malnourished, sick, scarred, or all of the above. Still, they’re over there, staring us on.

A large, wispy-haired changeling walks around them, and all the other changelings bow to it. “At ease,” it says in a feminine, commanding voice. The other changelings get up and glare back at us.

“Well, well,” the queen says slyly. “Princess Celestia. To what do I owe this honor?” she says, bitingly sarcastic.

“Queen Chrysalis,” Celestia says, equally irked. “We understand you have another human. We are just wanting to know if you would be willing to trade.”

“Trade?” Chrysalis asks, incredibly surprised. “You seem to have changed so drastically in such a short time. What has caused this?”

“Drastic times call for drastic measures,” she responds. “We are just wondering if you would trade.”

Chrysalis nods to a changeling standing beside her, which runs off. “I am interested. If you send your human over, we’ll send ours right as soon as he arrives here.”

“How about you send yours first?” Celestia suggests.

Chrysalis laughs as a hairy man in rags moves next to her. “I am not stupid. If you send yours over, I promise that we’ll send ours.”

“And I am not stupid either,” Celestia quips back. “Perhaps we could perform a prisoner exchange?”

“Prisoner exchange?” Chrysalis says slowly, almost if feeling how the words sound in her mouth. “I am intrigued.”

Celestia uses her magic to levitate a rock and draw a line in the ground about halfway between us and the changelings. “Both of them start walking over to the other side at the same time. They cross over at the same time, which means they are passed over simultaneously.”

“That sounds…agreeable,” she says. One of the changelings stands next to the man, and Twilight comes next to me. Slowly, both us and the other couple start walking.

“I have a bad feeling about this,” Twilight whispers to me as we’re walking.

“I’m aware this might be hard for you, but you’re going to need to trust me,” I reassure her. “Just remember; as soon as he gets over the line, quickly get him back to the princess. Then, charge up.”

“Right,” she whispers again, completely terrified. “And if this doesn’t work?”

“Then you get a whole new human to study,” I say in the happiest tone I can. Truth is, I agree with her concerns; I’m also really scared that this could go south.

We get to the line, and both Twilight and the changeling stay back a little bit. “Nice to finally see someone else,” the guy says. I can recognize the voice as Jay's, but it sounds like he's really weak and tired.

“You’re going to love Equestria,” I say back.

“Turn around,” he warns. “These things are evil. They’ll destroy you.”

“You have so little faith in me,” I say jokingly. “I’ve come a long way from falling in a pit on a virtual beach. I’ll survive.”

“I tried,” he says somberly. "It didn't work out so well."

“I’ll be fine. On the count of three, step over. Ready?”

“As I’ll ever be,” he whispers hollowly.

“One…two…three.” I step over the line, and so does he. I look back really quick, and Twilight’s rushing him to the princess. I can then see her horn start to faintly glow. Perfect.

I walk a few more steps and the changeling pokes me with his spear, then comes to stand right next to me. As discreetly as I can, I take off the handcuffs.

I take a deep breath. With adrenaline coursing through every inch of me, I drop the handcuffs and quickly grab the changeling’s spear. He gives it up fairly easily, so I can tell I’ve taken him by surprise. I whack him in the head with the shaft, making sure not to fatally wound him since one cold-blooded murder on my hands is good enough. I toss the spear on the ground and start sprinting back to the ponies.

“Seize her!” Chrysalis demands. I can hear a few pairs of wings start flying toward me, but Celestia shoots some yellow magic out of her horn and knocks them down.

By the groan she just made, I can tell that Chrysalis is completely pissed off by now. There are some stronger, heavier wings behind me, and that certainly doesn’t sound good. Celestia tries shooting some more magic, but the buzzing of insect wings stays.

As Twilight’s horn lights up bright purple, I know there’s almost no time left. I go into an all-out sprint and take a huge leap, and soon feel the teleportation wrap all around me. When the sensation stops, I ram face-first into a shelf and have all sorts of books come toppling down on top of me.

“Are you okay?” Twilight asks, running over to me.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” I say, rubbing my head. I get up and walk to Jay, who’s sitting on the floor. “You okay?” I ask him.

“Where are we?” he asks.

I sit down next to him. “We’re in Equestria now. No more changelings.”

“I know that,” he says emptily. “But where is this?” he asks, spreading his arms out.

“I’m not exactly sure what you mean.”

“This world. It’s not ours.” He gets up shakily and points at the ponies. “It’s theirs. But then why are we here?”

“We came through the portal,” I remind him. “Don’t you remember?”

“I remember. But…why? There has to be more to it.”

“I guess I don’t know what you’re asking,” I admit. This is starting to sound more like philosophy with Will.

“Start with the portal,” he says. “How’d that work?”

“Magic.” As soon as I say that, I realize how stupid that must make me sound, but there’s no way I can say it without sounding like that.

“She’s right,” Twilight backs me up, walking beside me.

“I don’t know if I should believe you,” he says. “I walked through a portal to be tortured for months by those things, then some talking horses teleport me to a tree, so I guess I should believe anything just about now.”

“Ponies,” I correct him. “And a lot of this stuff’s hard to believe, but it’s real as far as I can tell.”

“So, the portal?” he asks. “Magic, really? Or can you just not understand how it works?”

“It’s really magic,” Twilight says. “It’s everywhere here. Even in-“ I shove my hand over her mouth to shut her up.

“Don’t explain too much,” I whisper to her. “The man’s just been freed from nearly a year of torture. Since we don’t have magic, that’s a lot to take in.”

“What was she saying?” he asks, looking suspiciously at me with my hand pressed against Twilight’s mouth.

“It’s a long story,” I say as to avoid any awkwardness. “She’ll explain later.”

Twilight pulls off my hand and looks at me a little irritated. “I will explain later?”

“You’re the expert on this mumbo jumbo.”

“Is this a bad time?” Jay asks.

“I’ve had better.” I walk next to him and put my arm around his shoulder. “But come on. We need to get you all better."

All Accounted For

Will, Jay and I are standing around a big circular table in the Canterlot castle. Celestia and Twilight stepped outside, so all three of us are just standing around awkwardly and waiting for something to happen. I’m not sure exactly we’re waiting for, but we’re waiting for it.

“Nice to see you two again,” Will says to break the tension.

“It's nice to be around some more humans,” Jay says happily.

“We’re still the only ones here that we know of,” I remind him. “Don’t suppose you heard anything about Dick?”

“Never even knew anyone else was here until you pulled that badass stunt to get me out,” he smirks.

“Consider it a favor for pulling me out of the hole back on Earth,” I say, a bit embarrassed.

“You could’ve gotten out.”

“That water was salty as hell.”

We both laugh a little bit, then the door opens. Twilight and Celestia walk in, both of them looking a little sad and levitating a map.

“So why did you need us all?” I ask Twilight.

She puts the map on the table and rolls it out. There are three Xs and a circle on Mount Canter (I’m proud that I learned Equestrian geography), and a small red circle with a dot in the center somewhere in a group of mountains.

“What’s this?” Jay asks.

“Map of the world,” Twilight tells him.

“And the ink?”

“An updated map of the humans,” Celestia informs us.

“Why circles and Xs?” I ask her.

She points at a circle. “This one is centered over the Canterlot Graveyard.” Very slowly, she looks up. “That should tell you everything about the different symbols on the map.”

“And the three Xs are us, I assume?” I have an idea of what the different shapes might mean, but I really, really, hope it isn’t that.

“Yes,” she replies softly.

“The circles are less concentrated deposits of your magical tag,” Twilight says, bluntly summarizing what we’ve probably already figured out. “In layman’s terms, they would be-“

“Dead,” I finish for her. I don’t really know why I blurted that out; I guess I’d rather hear me say it than a pony. Twilight’s a great friend and all, but she's not human. I guess I'd rather one of us talk about that than something else.

“I’m sorry,” she says, her eyes turning red.

“Do any of you have any questions?” Celestia asks.

“Just one.” I point at the other little circle, the only mark not near Canterlot. “Where’s this?”

“Land of the dragons,” Celestia says plainly. “Whether the human there died of natural causes or malice, we don’t know.”

Twilight whispers something to herself, then snaps back to the table. That seems suspicious as all else, but I have a hunch that asking would just cause problems.

“Well, I’ve got no more questions,” Will says.

“Same,” Jay agrees.

“All my questions are answered.” I shoot a quick glare to Twilight, who looks like she knows something she shouldn’t. “Twilight and I should probably get back to Ponyville.”

“I should head back to Minos soon,” Will announces. “It’s a long train ride, and the last direct train there this year leaves in a couple hours.”

“Rehab place wants me back soon,” Jay says. “Turns out recovering from being starved for nearly a year is a lot more complex than just a quick dinner.”

“Good luck to both of you.” I go to Twilight, who’s slipped back into some sort of trance. “Ready?”

“Huh?” she asks, snapping out of her trance again. “Oh, we’re going, aren’t we?”

“Yeah.” I can’t help but smile a bit. Her popping in and out of attentiveness is actually a little adorable.

“Right,” she says hastily, “Let’s go.”

I turn back to the room one more time. “See you all again.”

Twilight and I walk out of the castle and into the streets of Canterlot. A few earth ponies are shoveling some snow, and a couple more are decorating a pine tree in front of a store selling decorations for something called Hearth’s Warming Eve.

“What’s Hearth’s Warming Eve?” I ask Twilight. “The pony Christmas?” I wait a few moments, then look at her when she doesn’t reply. “Twilight!” I snap at her.

She flinches, almost slipping on the icy road. “Oh, I’m sorry. What is it?”

I sigh. “Twilight, what’s up with you? You’re being really absent minded, and you weren’t before we came here. Did something come up?”

We get to the train station, and she plops down on a bench. I sit down next to her and put my shoulder around her. “You okay?”

“It’s something we figured out,” she says, incredibly mopey. “The other human, the fifth one? It says he was in the land of the dragons.”

“Why’s that bad?” I ask. “Is it really bad there? Are the dragons really bloodthirsty?”

“It’s not bad; I’ve been there before with Rainbow Dash, Rarity, and Spike. And they can be a little harsh, but not really anything too bad.”

“So then what’s the problem?”

She looks down at the snowy platform really sadly. “There’s a rather famous story from one of the religions that used to be very big.”

“I had no idea you had so much faith,” I tell her.

“I don’t. Nopony really does, but it’s still pretty important.” She stares into the sky. “It says that the gods used to rule their planet, but they grew angry with each other. They went to war and nearly destroyed each other, and only five remained. They came to this planet and each created a different race to protect the land.”

“Interesting story, but what’s this have to do with us?”

“The five races were the ponies, the griffins, the minotaurs, the changelings, and the dragons.” She looks back at me. “And where were the five of you when you came here?”

“It’s got to be coincidence,” I assert.

“I’d believe that too, but think. A race that constantly fights against itself, and only five of them come here. The humans are always in some sort of war, and five of them came to Equis and ended up in the homelands of the races in the myth. Coincidence or fate?”

“It…” I think about it for a moment. “A long time ago Id've said coincidence, but given how things work here, I don’t know. I mean, you and your friends all got your cutie marks because of Rainbow’s Sonic Rainboom, and then you all became the Elements of Harmony. You’ve defeated Nightmare Moon, Discord, and the queen of the changelings. That's too damn coincidental to be a coincidence.”

“Fate does work in mysterious ways,” she agrees.

“I don’t know if I quite believe in fate. I mean, we can feel the repercussions of our actions easily. You do something stupid, it comes back to bite you in the ass. But now I’m here.” I point all around. “I’m sitting on a bench on a planet run by aliens that look like animals we used to use as tools. If I weren’t here, my life would be still the same as it was when I came here. Same bland life, same bland hobbies, same bland major at the same bland college.”

“What are you getting at?”

“I’m just saying, huge stuff like this doesn’t happen for no reason.” I pull her in closer. “I guess this could be worse, though. As far as sci-fi aliens go, your kind is all right. You haven’t tried to probe or dissect me or anything. At least, not that I know of,” I joke.

“I’d never try that!” she laughs. Seems like I’m rubbing off on her, too; not even a few months ago, she would’ve been appalled at the idea.

A whistle blows in the distance, and a train comes into sight. “Guess this is ours,” Twilight says, getting up and walking to the end of the platform. I walk next to her, and we wait for our ride together.

The Truth

Someone knocks at my door, waking me up. Slowly, I roll over and manage to wrench my eyes open. It’s still dark outside, and there are flurries gently falling down.

Whoever it is knocks again, this time a bit louder. Grumpily, I get out and go open the door. Twilight’s standing right outside, wearing some saddlebags. “Nice to see you up this early,” she smirks.

“I’d still be in bed if you didn’t come knocking,” I laugh a little, leaning on the doorframe. “What’s so important that you needed to come at dark o’clock?”

She comes in and sits cross-legged on the floor, taking her bags off. “I believe I’ve found something useful. Would you sit down?”

I get down next to her and reach for her bags. “What’cha got here?”

She swats my hand away, almost like a mother scorning her child. “Across from me.”

“Come on,” I insist, pulling my hand back in. “Why’s where I sit important?”

“It just is,” she asserts. “Now come on. Other side.”

I scoot across from her and cross my legs. “Now what?”

“Close your eyes.”

“Come on,” I laugh a little. “Now you’re just making stuff up.”

“Just close them,” she giggles. Reluctantly, I close my eyes. Something unbuckles, and then a book opens. I open my eyes a tiny bit and see Twilight reading a really intricate looking red book. “No peeking,” she demands, not even looking up.

I curse a little and shut them again. How she found out, I’ll never know. I can hear her flipping some pages, and then the book being put on the ground. “Empty your mind,” she says soothingly.

“What’s this for?” I ask her.

“Hopefully this will bring some clarity to the both of us,” she says calmly. “Now empty your mind.”

“Tell me what this is for.”

“That doesn’t sound a lot like emptying.”

“I’m just saying, if you want me to do this, you should-“

“Focus,” she snaps.

I sigh and start meditating best I can. “Okay Twilight, I’m doing it.”

I feel her hooves grab my hands and hold them out. “Imagine a great, open scene with nothing in it. Like a great lake, or the night sky.”

I take a few deep breaths as I imagine the first time I looked at the Equestrian night sky; the first time I saw the stars without any light pollution. “Okay, I’m imagining it.”

“Now imagine an infinite expansion of that. Try to imagine infinity; literally endless. As far as you go, you will never reach the end, nor will you ever get closer to it.”

“Okay.”

“Open your mind. Lose yourself in the search for the end of the endless. The limit of the limitless. The boundary of the boundless.”

I stop observing everything around me. The wind outside grows quiet, the chill of the winter air warms, and I can even feel my breathing become less noticeable.

“Feel the endlessness. Embrace the edge of existence. Feel your mind slip from your body into the vast emptiness that is our life force.”

“Mmm,” I hum, completely relaxed.

“Lose yourself,” she says, growing in intensity. “Feel yourself absorbed by the limitless. An ocean of everything. As far as you go, as much as you struggle, you will never even get closer to the top.”

My head feels a little stretched right about now. I try and speak up, but something stops me. I don’t even know what it is, but whatever it is mentally stops me. The only thing I can do is just sit there with my eyes closed.

I can hear Twilight’s horn power up, and then I can feel it touch my forehead. My thoughts swim, and before I know it, my eyes are open and I’m in a swirling mass of pinkish stuff. “Where is…this?” I ask the emptiness.

“You’re in our mind,” her voice echoes throughout.

“Our mind?” I ask.

“Two bodies, one mind. We have now joined as one. Our experiences, our lives, our memories, are now conjoined as one. Only now may we begin.”

“Begin?” I ask. “You mean we haven’t already started?”

The light swirls around a bit, and then gradually fades until it’s pitch black and I can’t even see anything. My eyes open, and I’m back to sitting on my floor. The world starts to come back little by little.

“What was that?” I ask her.

“It…clarified things,” she says, somewhat confused.

“What was all that stuff you had me do? Like, the ‘embrace infinity’ stuff?”

She slides the book over to me. “It’s an ancient unicorn ritual for intimacy.”

“Oh my god,” I whisper. “Twilight, did we just…?”

She quickly blushes to a deep red that could put Big Mac to shame. “Oh, nononono!” she quickly says. “Not, well…that kind of intimacy. Emotional intimacy. Like the deep bond two great friends share.”

“So that entire thing was just, what? A friendship ritual?”

“It was a banloca,” she says, pointing at the page the book is open to. “It’s the ancient unicorn word for ‘join’, which says what it is very well. Our very life forces join together, and we can even observe each others’. The reason I had you imagine all that stuff was because you needed to open up your mind. They can be very taxing on one's being if they are not prepared.” She smiles a little bit and looks at me. “Out of curiosity, what color was mine?”

“Color?” I ask. “There was like, some swirly stuff when you touched your horn to my forehead. Are you asking the color of that?”

“Yes,” she nods. “The color of that ‘swirly stuff’ is a good indicator of the pony’s personality. Or maybe, in your case, it will say the person’s personality.”

“You were dark pink.” I point at her body. “Sorta like the color of your coat, maybe a little darker. What’s that mean?”

She blushes a little bit. “That’s close to the color of scholars. Some of the smartest and most famous scholars were purple.”

“So this color stuff’s like, our aura?”

“’Aura’?” she repeats. “What’s that?”

“It’s like, well, a human idea. Our aura is sort of like what you’re describing. Nobody is certain about it; some believe in that, some don’t.”

“Well, this is all real. Some ponies pay lots of bits to ‘get their color read’ as they call it.”

“What color was mine?” I ask excitedly.

“Yours was silver,” she says, looking quite confused.

“Silver?” I ask. They way she said it, something’s wrong with that. “What’s that mean?”

“Nopony’s ever really figured out what silver means. Silvers achieve all sorts of things, and they’re almost always experts, or they perform very influential acts.”

“So…silver’s pretty much the wild card of the color wheel.”

“I guess,” she shrugs.

“Either way, you didn’t just come here to ‘read my color’ or whatever you said. What’s the real reason behind this visit and the subsequent mind probing?”

“Clarification,” she says again.

“I got that much. But clarification of what?”

“Your magic.”

“What about it?” I’ll admit, Twilight isn’t the best at always explaining things thoroughly.

“I just wanted to find out more about the magic. It’s just confusing me so much, and I want to find out more.”

“Anything specific?”

“Mostly to find out where the magic came from.” She starts flipping through the book a little more. “I think I may almost have it! Many of the readings point toward a few different hypotheses, which-“

“It’s genetic,” I cut her off.

“Oh,” she says blankly, looking up. She looks back down and starts flipping another way. “That saves me a lot of time.”

“That give you any leads?”

“Let’s find out,” she smiles. After a little more searching through her book, she ends on a page and levitates it in the air. “Here it is! ‘The Freod is an uncommon form of a friendship bond’.”

“So I’ve got one of those ‘freod’ things?” I try to clarify.

“Yes,” she confirms. “It says some more. ‘A Freod is a very rare occurrence; only individuals exposed to very powerful friendship or camaraderie can receive one. Freods can lost if the pony who has it acts in a way that is contradictory to the values of it’.” She rereads the sentence a little more carefully, then looks at me. “It says ‘pony’ in here. Do you think it applies to humans as well?”

“Keep reading,” I demand.

“Right,” she says, looking back into the book. “There’s not a lot left. ‘Little is actually known about Freods; since they are very difficult to acquire and can be lost easily, they are hard to study. They do not have any clear or distinct magical properties, making them one of the greatest magical mysteries’.”

I look at my arm and rub my fingers across it for no apparent reason. “So I’ve come all this way to pretty much be told that nobody has a real answer to this stuff?”

“I guess,” she shrugs. “Maybe it’s better that way. The mystery of it and the fun of imagining what it might be isn’t good enough?”

“Not really,” I say. “Better to just be told a solid answer so you don’t have to sit around and wonder.”

“I don’t know what to say,” she says apologetically. “This is the most advanced book on the subject, and there’s hardly anything in it.” She brightens up and beams at me. “Maybe we could run some experiments and find out more about this!”

And there goes the overenthusiastic Twilight I admittedly didn’t miss. “As long as it doesn’t involve putting a magic bubble around my house this time.”

“I’ll try to refrain,” she giggles. Her eyes suddenly open wide and her ears perk up. “Oh, wait!” she exclaims. “One more question!”

I guess I shouldn’t have expected to get away that easily. “Fine; one more,” I agree.

“Do you and the other humans share a common ancestor?” she asks. “You said it’s genetic, correct?”

“No and yes. It’s genetic, but I don’t think we share a common ancestor. I mean, it goes back 400 years, so it’s possible, but I doubt it.”

“Anything in common? Did they live together, work together, anything like that?”

“No.” A little thought pops into my head. “Well, there is one thing.” I figure that Twilight finally deserves to know.

Her face practically lights up. “What is it?”

I reach out and put my hand on her shoulder. “One condition,” I tell her, looking deep into her violet eyes.

“Yes?” she asks, a little scared of what I might say.

“You can’t tell anyone. I really don’t want to have to say this, but I think you should know.”

“Yes?” She leans her head in a little closer.

“All of us share ancestors with common traits; they were all interested in a television show about cartoon ponies.”

“Why’s that bad?” she giggles.

“It’s a really long and complicated story,” I tell her, making sure to avoid actually telling her the answer.

“Tell me!” she laughs, leaning on my chest. “Why is that so bad?”

“You just have to trust me on this one,” I say sternly, pushing her back. “I’m probably beating a dead horse with this, but I’ve had to go on a limb and trust you before.”

“You’re…what?” She stares at me like I’m speaking gibberish. “Is that some human expression?”

“I’m just saying, you’ve had to pull me out of a lot of fires, and I’ve never always understood why. I’m trying to prevent you from something for my first time.”

“Second time,” she corrects me. “You actually surprised me a little bit in the changeling lands.”

“You and me both.” I actually do feel a little awesome that I managed to beat the living crap out of a bug pony.

“So you’re entirely certain that you can’t tell?” she asks me. “Even after all we’ve been through?”

“I’m sorry,” I apologize. “You of all people, or ponies, or whatever should understand that sometimes we can’t always say everything to those we’re close to.”

“I don’t really understand. If we really were close, you could tell me the real reason.”

I think for a minute to try and figure out how to phrase this. “It’s like when you were a filly. Your parents probably held things from you until you were older.”

“Did not!” she asserts.

“Come on; there’s at least one thing they fudged for you. Think for a minute.”

She just sits there for a minute with a thinking face. “Okay, but this is different.”

“And do you hold any resentment towards your parents for lying to you to protect you?”

“They weren’t protecting me, and neither are you!” she yells stubbornly.

I sigh in submission. “Fine. I’m probably not protecting you, but you wouldn’t like what I have to say.”

“You’ve got a secret!” she almost shrieks in excitement. “What if I told you a secret of mine?”

“I just can’t bring myself to tell you.”

“Is there anypony you would tell?” she asks in a motherly fashion.

“I don’t want to go and run to Celestia,” I say firmly. “You’re the only non-human on this planet I’d tell even that much.”

“You said you’ve trust me plenty of times before,” she points out. “Can you do that one more time?”

Well, she’s got me in a corner now. Unicorns are surprisingly sly when they want to be. “You sure you can handle it?”

She nods confidently. “Certainly nothing can be that bad.”

I moan and look her straight in the eye. “Twilight, the show they watched was…about you and your friends.”

“Now you’re just being silly,” she giggles. “And aren’t cartoons drawn? They’re not real.”

“That’s exactly why I didn’t want to tell you,” I admit. “I’m being serious.”

All vitality and hope seems to drain from her face. “I’m…fake?” she asks, tears forming in her eyes.

I pull her over into a loving hug. “I’ve lived in both my world and this one, and it doesn’t feel any less here than it did there.”

“I’m not quite sure how to react,” she says hollowly. “What was the show about?”

“I don’t really know any details. I’ve never watched it.”

“So you say that this show they watched was about us?”

“Yeah, why?”

She just sits in my arms looking mopey for a few more seconds. All of a sudden, a huge smile breaks out on her face as though eons of confusion are finally cleared up. She plants her hooves on my chest and starts spouting excited nonsense.

“Slow down.” I can barely hold back a smile. Her immense interest in whatever this is is contagious. “Take a deep breath and start over.”

She takes a calm breath and smiles again. “I think I’ve figured it out!”

“Really?” I can’t believe that something like that could actually clear that up. When I first learned that, it didn’t give me any ideas.

She gets out of the hug and puts her saddlebags back on. “Follow me for a moment.”

“For?”

“It’s a surprise,” she says mysteriously.

I get up and we head out the door, and I lock it behind us. “Lead the way.” She starts walking along the frozen ground back into Ponyville.

Author's Note

Expect this story to be finished soon. I have just one more chapter planned, but some novel idea may pop into my head. Keep your eyes peeled (not literally, that'd just be gross).

Finally

When we reach Twilight’s house, the sun has just started to peek over the horizon. The pale morning sun reflects off the fresh snow, making a calming scene. Twilight opens the door, and we go inside. Her tree is lit by the soft light of dawn, making the whole inside feel warm and cozy.

"So what are we doing here?" I ask her.

She quickly levitates a scroll and quill and writes something while in the air, then ties it with a ribbon and throws it in her bags. "Just that. Now, let's go. We shouldn't waste too much time."

“What’s in the note?” I pry.

“It’s a secret,” she giggles. “Now come on. I’ve got an idea.”

“An idea to do…?”

“You’ll just have to wait and see.” She walks to the door and opens it. “After you.”

I head outside, and she follows me out and closes the door behind us. “Can you at least tell me where we’re going?” I ask her.

“The portal.” She stands next to me and looks up. “Let’s walk together.”

We walk through the desolate early morning Ponyville to the edge of town. We start walking in the open fields, and soon enough we get to some snow that’s about knee-deep for me and almost to Twilight’s neck.

“Keerthana?” she asks.

I wipe some sweat off my forehead, since the snow’s so thick that it’s incredibly winding to walk through. “Yeah?”

“Can you carry me?” she asks meekly. “The snow’s really deep here, and well…you’re just so tall.”

I crouch down so most of me is in the snow as well. “Hop on.”

With great difficulty, she climbs onto my back and throws her forelegs around my neck. With even greater difficulty, I get back up to a standing pose and start trudging through the wintery thickness.

“You’re so…tall,” she says with a bit of fear in her voice. “What happens if you trip and fall?”

“Just get right back up. Frankly, I’ve never understood how you can get around everywhere with four legs.”

“It’s easy.” She points ahead to the portal, which is giving off a faint purple glow on the pristine snow. “Just right there.”

“I know where it is. Used it plenty of times before.”

“Just making sure.” The snow actually recedes as we get closer to it, so I squat down and let her jump off. She starts studying the portal intently, and I go up to put my hand on it. Still solid as ever.

“So why are we out here?” I ask, looking back at her.

She comes up and places a hoof on it as well. “Just one last experiment.” She takes her hoof off and turns to me. “Could put your hand out?”

I put my free hand in front of her face. “Do with it what you will.”

Her horn powers up, then there’s a sharp pain in my finger. A little bit of blood comes out, and she levitates it right in front of the tip of her horn. As she steps back and into the snow a little bit, I check my hand. No cuts or openings or anything. Magic can be freaky sometimes.

“I’ll admit, it’s a little creepy that you need my blood for this,” I call to her.

“I needed some of your magical trace for this.” Her horn powers up, and the blood starts to glow lightly.

“For what?”

My blood shines bright silver, reflecting all over the shiny snow. A shot of bright light flies straight into the portal. When the light hits it, a huge flash happens; it's so bright that I step back instinctively and put my arm over my eyes.

“You can look now,” Twilight says nicely. I pull my arm away, and the portal’s changed from a rigid purple to a fluid and pale yellow.

“What did you do?” I ask her quietly, a little in awe of what she managed to accomplish.

She opens her bags and grabs the scroll with her magic, throwing it into the portal. “I think I’ve opened it,” she says smugly.

“Really?” I walk up and gently put my hand towards it. Instead of the solid wall, my hand just goes into the jiggly mass of magic. Twilight comes next to me and puts her hoof in it as well.

“Looks like it’s worked,” she smiles. She takes her hoof out of the portal and pulls my hand out as well. “We probably should leave it open for whoever comes through.”

“For what?” I ask. “Did you just say that someone’s coming through?”

“Maybe,” she smirks. “I did tell them on the scroll to send someone through.”

“Yeah, because that’s not ominous. Either way, how’d you unlock it?”

“I’ve had to do some intensive studying into the nature of portals to understand this, but I did that mostly in the past couple months. I just needed some of your magic to unlock it.”

“I guess you’ve finally figured everything out, then?”

She nods and smiles. “You telling me about the show finally cleared everything up for me. The portal gave off magical signatures similar to the Elements of Harmony. And, of course, their power is released by the magic of friendship.”

“So we’re looking at physical friendship?” I ask, pointing at the portal.

“The magic of it,” she says. “Caused by a culmination of discarded human Freonds over the past couple centuries. It must have been acquired through some subtle radiation of the magic of friendship through that show. There must certainly have been a lot that watched it; usually, that many takes at least a thousand years to be acquired and lost.”

“Are freonds normally genetic?”

“Obviously they are in humans. But as the book said, there’s not enough information to make any good hypotheses.”

“Wouldn’t it have been a better idea to test the portal by having us go through it first?”

“How come?”

“Well first off, it probably seems suspicious that-“ The portal starts wobbling in place ecstatically, and we both turn to look at it. “What exactly is happening?”

“Someone’s coming through!” she exclaims, running close to it. “This is so exciting!”

I walk next to her and push her muzzle away a little. “Try and let me do the talking.”

“But why?” she pleads.

“Let’s just say my first time here didn’t go so well.”

“What happened?” she asks curiously. “Wasn’t my brother leading the team that first found you?”

“You mean he never told you?” I guess I owe Shining Armor a favor now. That’s one thing I’d probably rather her not know.

“What did you do?” she asks with a little bit of shock.

“Nobody died,” I joke. “That’s a victory in and of itself.”

“I am writing to my brother as soon as we get back.”

The portals goes really wonky for a moment, then a guy in a suit falls out and the portal becomes more stable. The guy in the suit stands up and looks around a little bit, clearly sort of fazed by the whole incident. He just looks a little disoriented instead of in crippling pain, so portal travel seems to have gotten considerably less painful.

I walk over and crouch down to his level. “You okay?” I ask him.

He looks up at me with wide eyes. “You’re human,” he says emptily.

“Of course I am.” I stand up and put my arm out to help him up. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

He grabs my arm and shakily stands up. “Something happened with the portal, and then we got a message to come through. We were unsure.”

Twilight stand next to me and excitedly puts out a hoof. “Welcome to Equis!” she beams. “I’m Twilight Sparkle.”

The other human panics a little and pulls out a pistol, pointing it at her. “What is it?” he asks, terrified. Guess everybody’s first time seeing a talking pony is frightening.

“Put it down,” I say to calm him down. “She couldn’t hurt a gnat if she tried.” Twilight looks at me a little insulted, then goes back to smiling at the newcomer.

“How can we trust her?” He slowly inches away from her.

I’d yell at him if I hadn’t done more or less the exact same thing when I came here. “Come on, just trust her. She’s fine.”

“Can’t do that,” he says, not putting his gun down. “First rule about dealing with unknowns; assume hostility.”

While he’s completely preoccupied with his little standoff with Twilight, I can quickly wrench the gun out of his hands with little to no difficulty. “Now apologize to her and shake.”

Reluctantly, both of them put out their respective forelimbs and shake a little bit. “Can I have the gun back?” he asks eagerly.

I give it to him and then pat him on the back. “Come on. Let’s get some more people through.”

Epilogue

**Five years later**

It’s almost nine in the morning, and my small lecture hall is nearly filled up. Figures the first time I actually teach, and I’m stuck with Tuesday mornings. Oh irony, you certainly are a heartless bitch.

“Keerthana!” a vaguely familiar voice calls out to me. I turn to whoever it is, and see Sweetie Belle walking toward me. At least, I think it’s her. She’s a full-grown mare now, not the little filly I remember. “Or maybe I should call you Professor Griffis,” she blushes.

“Outside a professional setting, my first name will suffice,” I tell her. “Anyways…wow, it’s been a while. Has to have been at least a couple years.”

“I think Twilight’s coronation was the last time,” she says nostalgically. “Where did you go after that?”

“I was actually finishing my studies on Earth during that time; I only came to Equis for the event. Went back to Earth soon after. They managed to make some sort of workaround so I could be ready to teach this class within a few years.”

“Why wouldn’t they just send a normal professor?” she asks curiously. “Not to offend you, but they could just send a human who already knew this.”

“Fair enough question.” I cross my arms and lean back onto my desk. “Princess Celestia personally requested that I do this. She said she’d rather have a human who's well-known here teaching as opposed to some dusty old guy.” I open my arms and spread them out. “Nailed a job as a college professor, and I’m only 24. I’d say I’m doing pretty well.”

“You’re twenty four?” she asks, shocked. “Rarity told me it was impolite to ask a lady’s age, but I thought you were starting college when you came here. Or did I hear wrong?”

“You heard right.” A couple seconds go by, and then something clicks in my head. “Weren’t you like, seven when I first came here?”

“Yes,” she confirms.

“And since about five and a half years have passed, you’re what? Twelve? Thirteen?”

“Twelve.”

“So how come you’re in college that young? No offense, but I didn’t know you were that smart. Well, I always knew you were smart, but not ‘go to college at this age’ smart.”

“I was young for my grade, but I’m still normal age for this.” She looks at me strangely. “Why? When do most humans start college?”

“Eighteen usually.”

“Eighteen?” she echoes, her mouth agape. “Rarity’s only seventeen! Does that she mean she wouldn’t even be in college if she was a human?”

“Usually not. Out of curiosity, how long do most ponies live for?”

“Maybe fifty years,” she guesses. “How long do humans live?”

“Well, with modern medicine and everything, uhh,” I gently stroke my chin, kind of wondering what might happen next. “100 to 110 years typically.”

“A hundred years?” she almost yells. “Wow, I’d love to live that long!”

“Maybe you will,” I say optimistically. “Who knows what human medicine can do for ponies? Maybe 100-year lifespans will be common. And you’ll be able to tell your grandfoals about the time when living to 60 was a milestone.”

She smiles and turns toward the seats. “I’ll be looking foreword to this class,” she says happily. “I needed a history class, and I actually was looking at this one. When I saw you were the only professor teaching it, I signed up right away!” She happily trots to one of the empty seats and plops down.

I go and close the door, then stand behind the desk and can barely contain myself. “Good morning, class,” I announce. “I am Professor Griffis, and I will be your Human History professor for the next semester.”

My Summons

Loud, shrill screeches emanate from my stupid, annoying alarm clock. Still half asleep from some weird dream about fish, I look at the bright red numbers. 7:45. Dammit.

Reluctantly, I half-purposely and half-accidentally fall out of my bed. I guess I should be lucky I got stuck with the bottom bunk. Jaycee, my roommate, is still sleeping like a log on the top bunk.

I guess I should be getting prepared. First off, get dressed. I look down at what I was just sleeping in. My grey track sweatpants from 8th grade and a deep blue University of Michigan sweatshirt. I shrug, deciding that I don’t quite feel like putting on something real today.

Second, look like I belong in the world of the living. I walk into the bathroom and look in the mirror. It appears almost as though I’m more hair than woman. Since class starts in 15 minutes, I wouldn’t have time to shower. I grab a brush from the sink, deciding I can always brush it nonchalantly on the way over. I also ignore the parched toothbrush, which I actually don’t think has been used since I came to college. I blame the toothpaste. We can travel across the world in a manner of hours, but nobody can seem to make a non-mint toothpaste doesn’t taste like complete crap? Ah, the fun of living in a world where you hate mint flavored anything.

Third, time to actually get going. I throw my phone, computer, and wallet in my backpack. Throwing my hood up, I can now put it on my back without choking myself by having it be pulled back by the weight of my backpack. I quickly and fairly sloppily put on a pair of dirty, white tennis shoes and tie them in some weird, oblong knots. Instead of actually trying to make some real breakfast, I grab an apple from our pantry and bite into it. It’s the soft kind, the ones that are practically mush. Yeech. Either way, it’s going to be the only real breakfast I get today.

I walk outside, and immediately regret not putting a coat on over my sweatshirt. Michigan in January isn’t exactly known for being warm and pleasant. Figures my parents would only spring for an in-state college. Why couldn’t I go somewhere where frostbite isn’t an ever-present possibility? Even so, I guess going here wasn’t my worst option. The education’s good, at least.

Apparently, I let my wind wander for longer than I thought. I’m already at the building I need to be. I open the swinging glass doors, and immediately am overcome with the marvel that is internal heating. I toss my half-eaten "breakfast" into one of the trashcans and go to my class. As I enter the huge lecture hall, I realize I am by no means the only person that rolled out of bead literally 10 minutes ago. Seriously, scheduling a history class at 8 AM on a Tuesday morning? What sort of sadistic, sociopathic nutjob runs scheduling here?

I trudge to my seat; sixth row up and fifth seat from the right. The professor walks in, and like we’re trained dogs, we all seem to pull out our computers and turn them on all in time with each other. Today’s just one of those days I just don’t feel like doing anything, so I discreetly turn on the audio-text function. Recording the class and transcribing it later is just too much work, and I don’t feel like paying Jaycee to do it again.

“Good morning, class!” the professor projects to us.

My computer, for some reason, types Hood boring mass! instead of what he actually said. Ugh. I place my forehead on the desk and groan. Today’s going to be one hell of a day.

***

“Okay, everyone,” the professor says, walking back to his desk, “That’s all the time we have today. Tomorrow, we’ll talk about the Nuclear Wars and the Treaty of Pyongyang. We’ll get to find out whether the attempts to unify Korea were successful or not!”

Acting like history is this new and unknown thing? I really hope I don’t become that when I graduate. Seriously, everyone knows about the attempts to unify Korea. Look at a freaking map; there’s your answer. Wait, am I really getting riled up over history? Looks like being a history major wasn’t such a dumb move after all.

Noticing that everyone is packing their stuff up, I decide I should, too. My screen is a jumbled mess that looks like a dictionary vomited half the words in English onto my screen. Most of it doesn’t make any sense at all. “Quickly eating electric saxophones”? If this keeps going like this, I’m failing this class for sure. I’m not even an Information Age history major, why am I in that god-awful class?

I throw open the doors, and I’m instantly covered in snow. I think I see someone familiar coming toward me.

“Morning, Keerthana!” she yells enthusiastically. It’s Jaycee, looking much too upbeat for morning.

“Hey,” I reply, a little smile starting to grow on my face. Even the nastiest sourpuss has to find themselves lightening up around her. She’s one of those people that just makes you happier, no matter what.

“You look like you just rolled out of bed,” she laughs.

I can already feel her optimism flowing to me, like a reverse leech. Does that make sense? Whatever, it’s still early to be up.

“You know, you wouldn’t be that far off with that assumption," I joke back.

She giggles, making me feel even better. “You want to grab some breakfast? I haven’t had a lot to eat yet, and I know how you are in the mornings. I’ll even buy.”

Those last three words sold it for me. She sure does know how to make a college student happy. “Fine,” I say, surrendering to her unbridled happiness. In all honesty, that's my one complaint about her; it's so damn hard to stay in a bad mood around her.

***

As we walk back into our dorm building, I start brushing layer upon layer of snow off my sweatshirt. I think I can see some blue now. The RA Andrew starts walking up to us, holding a white envelope in his hands.

“Hey,” he asks, tapping me on the shoulder, “You’re Keerthana Griffis, right?”

No actually, I’m not. But I can see his mistake. There have to be plenty of Indian girls walking around U of M with the word GRIFFIS running down their pant leg.

“Yeah, I am,” I say, deciding to save my quips for someone more deserving. Andrew means well, and is pretty lax for an RA. He deserves to be spared from my anger.

He hands it to me, bids us goodbye, and walks outside. Who could be sending me a letter? If mom or dad wanted to get in contact with me, they’d call or send me an e-mail. Or they could just come, but let’s get real here.

“Who’s it from?” Jaycee asks, saying what we’re both obviously thinking. I look at the return address.

1600 Pennsylvania Ave, NW

Washington, DC 20500

My eyes widen. “Oh, my god,” I can hardly say, “That’s…”

“…The White House,” Jaycee finishes for me.

“But…Why are they sending me a letter?”

Jaycee shrugs. “I don’t know. But seriously, open it!”

I break the seal to the envelope, feeling unworthy to open something from the president while wearing sweats. A single piece of paper is folded neatly into thirds inside it. Gingerly, I unfold it and start reading loud enough so only Jaycee and I can hear.

Dear Ms. Keerthana Griffis,

You have been identified as a candidate for a project of national importance. If you wish to accept this invitation, you will become a national hero and will bring our Nation to levels unseen before in all of history.

If you plan to take a place in this task, please send us a letter to the return address. We wait eagerly for your response. Your Nation thanks you.

Jaycee has to grab my arms to make them stop shaking out of sheer shock. “No,” I whisper in disbelief, “It can’t be. This has to be some sort of joke.”

She points to the top and bottom of the page. At the top is the official White House seal, and at the bottom, the president’s signature. Yup, this is 100% real.

“That’s…amazing!” she excitedly whispers. “What could they want you for?”

“I don’t know,” I reply, shaking my head.

“Come on. There’s got to be something they need you for.”

“Okay,” I look at the ceiling and tilt my head in thought. “I was born and raised near Lansing, a city that’s only on the map because it’s the capitol of the state. I did average in high school and somehow got into U of M. I’m a Medieval history major who sits around all day long either floating around Ann Arbor or sitting in her dorm room, mooching off everyone who lives on the same floor. Yeah, sounds like something the government needs.”

“Hey,” she pats me on the shoulder and tries to cheer me up. Unfortunately for me, it’s working. “Try it. Send them a letter, and see what they do.”

I look back at the letter. She’s probably right. I mean, what’s the worst that can happen? I respond to an obvious prank by telling the president that I’ll accept a job of national importance that I think they sent me?

Wait. That actually does sound pretty bad. Stupid brain, I thought we were on the same team.

***

Three loud, thundering bangs come from my door. My eyes quickly dart open, and are blinded by my clock. 4:19. Who the hell would be here at such an ungodly hour?

Luckily, I don’t have to go and find out. Jaycee jumps down, surprisingly awake for 4 in the morning, and opens the door.

“Hello, ma’am,” a deep voice says, “Is this the residence of Keerthana Griffis?”

As quietly as I can, I pull my comforter over my head. Nothing at this hour's worth getting up for.

“Ya,” she replies, “She’s my roommate. Why?”

“Agent Moyer. Secret Service.”

Uh-oh. It doesn’t take a genius to realize that late-night visits from the Secret Service are never a good thing. I quickly throw off my blankets and look at the door. Sure enough, there’s a tall, muscular guy in a suit and dark black sunglasses in the doorway. Who wears sunglasses in the middle of the night? It’s probably part of the uniform, I guess.

Realizing I can’t delay it much longer, I hop out of bed and walk to the door. “I’m Keerthana,” I tell him.

“Do you know why I am here?” he asks.

“No.” I can honestly say I didn't; maybe it was the whole "it's the middle of the night" factor.

“You have been recruited by the United Nations to serve on a mission, and you accepted the invitation, correct?”

“I think. Was that the letter from the White House I got a few days back?”

“Yes,” he nods, “Do you still wish to be on the mission?”

“Yeah,” I say, not sure whether or not I mean it. “Can I have a few minutes to prepare?”

“Sure,” he says, walking into the hallway and pulling the door closed. Jaycee turns her head to face me, shock and confusion all across her face.

“What?!” she yells. “Are you serious?”

“I don’t know. Still, I guess I ought to pack. Want to help me?”

“Sure,” she says, smiling. She turns on the light, and we get to work, gathering some clothes and most of my non-luxury items. After forcing half my possessions into my old, disintegrating duffel bag, I squeeze a little more into my backpack and look at Jaycee, who is almost on the verge of tears. The only time I’ve ever seen her this close to crying was that time we stayed up all night watching standup on TV.

“Come on,” I ask her, “Don’t feel bad. I’m sure it’ll just be something silly and I’ll be back here soon.” It’s so surreal that I’m the one trying to comfort her. What are you supposed to do to cheer up the person who always is there to make you feel better? Making people feel good is her job, so I’m not quite sure what to do now. If she’s crestfallen, I feel I should be, too.

She pulls me in close for a hug. “Be safe,” she says, starting to choke up.

“You too,” I say back, patting her back. I slowly exit the hug and grab my backpack, throw it on, and pick up the duffel bag. I look back once more to see my roommate all red-faced and smiling. I open the door and walk out. Sure enough, the Secret Service guy is still here.

“I’m ready,” I tell him.

“Okay,” he replies sternly, taking the duffel bag from me. “Follow me.”

As we make our way to the elevator, I look around. I’ve never actually been in the hall at night. It’s eerily quiet, such a stark contrast from the daytime, where it’s unusual to see anyone with their door closed. I guess it’s good, too; I can only imagine how suspicious and rumorous it looks for me to be walking with a Secret Service agent.

We make it to the elevator, and he pushes the button to go down. It shows up rather quickly, though I imagine that’s in part because everyone else is sleeping. The ride down is really quiet. I want to ask him what it is that I’ll be doing, but frankly, I’m frightened of him. He’s hardly moved a muscle since he showed up, and even then it’s basically only been to walk. These dudes are pretty serious about their jobs.

When we get to the bottom floor, he leads me outside to a sleek, jet-black limousine that looks like it came straight from the garage of a supervillan in an action movie. The trunk, seeming to act on its own free will, opens up, and he places my bag gently inside. I follow suit and do so with my backpack, although much less carefully.

Again, as if the car was a sentient being, a door on the side near the back swings open. Agent Moyer stands next to it, gesturing me in. I do so, and am instantly swept by the inside.

There’s so much luxury in here that you could hardly believe that it’s all in the back of a car. Couches, carpet, a television, even a fridge and wet bar. Whoever wants me certainly is buttering me up. And I can say, it certainly is working.

I take a seat on one of the plush couches, and then the agent comes in and sits on a couch across from me. The car quickly starts up, and we start moving.

“So…” I start to break the awkward silence, “Can you tell me what it is I’m doing now?”

“Some of it,” he says back to me. “Right now, we’re going to bring you to a plane that will fly you to the United Nations in New York. There, they’ll tell you all about what they need you for.”

“Okay, second question. If it’s the UN who needs me, why’d they have the US send me a letter? Why didn’t they just do it themselves?”

“To arouse less suspicion. The White House sending letters is a lot less conspicuous than the United Nations doing such.”

Yeah, the US government sending me a letter isn’t sketchy at all.

After what only seems like a few minutes, the car stops and the door swings open again. He steps out, and I follow him. I put on my backpack and grab my duffel bag, then look around. We seem to be on some airfield in the middle of nowhere.

“Where are we?” I ask.

“That’s classified,” he quickly snaps back at me. Man, this guy is pushy.

“Okay,” I say, trying to hold back my cynicism, “What do we do now?”

He points at something in the distance. I look in the direction of his arm, and sure enough, there’s a small plane sitting there. “That plane will take you to New York. I regret to say I will not be accompanying you. Good luck.”

“Thanks,” I say back to him. I personally can’t say I regret that he won’t be with me; something about him rubs me the wrong way. Probably all his seriousness.

As I walk toward the plane, I actually start to get excited. I’ve never been in one before, and only seen one in person a few times before. Aviation really declined in the 2100s after more efficient, cleaner, and safer ways of traveling were made. Still, for all that it’s worth, flying is a great way to get around. No roads or railways or laws even to abide to when you’re thousands of feet above the ground.

The inside of the plane is as nice, if not nicer, than the limo’s interior. There’s even a small bed and a bathroom, fully equipped with a shower. Whatever I’m considered important for I must really be huge, otherwise they wouldn’t be pulling out all these stops. And it’s all wasted on me, because the only thing in the room I want is that bed. It just looks so soft and fluffy! I put down my bags and climb into it; it’s one of those fancy smart ones that conforms to your position to optimize comfort. I make myself comfortable (assisted largely in part by my bed) and I’m dead asleep in practically seconds.

***

Some sweet sounding, flowing orchestral music awakens me. I realize it’s the clock right by my bedside, which now reads 6:40. My room seems abnormally bright for this time of day, so I go to the window and check. My eyes see the sprawling city of New York City, which seems to stretch for thousands of miles, engulfing every square inch of everything that lies within the horizon. We’re about to touch down on the East Coast; I guess that also explains why it’s so bright for 6 AM.

I decide that since I’m going to the UN, I should probably look decent. I open the front pocket of my backpack and look inside for my shampoo and body wash. Dissatisfied with it not being there, I move to the next pocket. Then the third one. Where in the hell is it?

I rip open my duffel bag and search inside there as well. Frustrated, I kick it. Did I seriously forget to pack them? I swear, I’ve disproved Darwin many times over by managing to survive this long.

Defeated and distraught, I grab a towel and walk into the bathroom. To my surprise, there’s some complimentary soap, body wash, shampoo, and conditioner in here. Did they see this coming? Probably not, seeing as none of it is the brands I buy. Still, I don’t think they’ll notice if I swipe them when I’m done.

I take off my dirty clothes and walk into the shower. I set the temperature on the interface to 110 degrees, and the water comes spurting forth. It’s wonderfully hot and relaxes me. Then there’s the toiletries they have. Using only a small dollop of the body wash, I manage to get my whole body and still have a little leftover. The shampoo is some exotic-looking word that smells like…fruit? It’s something I’ve never smelt before, and that’s the only way I can describe it. I don’t use the soap or conditioner, but seeing as I might in the future, I decide to keep them anyways.

I step outside, and the fan instantly kicks in, absorbing almost all the steam before I can even realize what’s going on. Now I’m cold. Oh, well.

In a few quick motions, I dry myself off completely, save my hair, which I let keep some water to make it easier to work with. I then wrap the towel around myself, go get the little amounts of makeup I packed, and start working.

When I’m done, I decide not to try anything too fancy with my hair, and instead brush it and put it into a ponytail. Now that my head’s all done, I can get dressed.

I open my duffel bag and silently thank Jaycee for convincing me to pack some formalwear. I packed a skirt, leggings, some nice shoes, and a clean blouse, all of which I wear. I throw on my dingy overcoat over it all, even though it sort of ruins the look. I just hope this meeting isn’t outside; I wouldn’t be able to show off the fact that I dressed fancy for the first time since…I graduated high school, last May.

I hear knocks coming from the door to the outside, which I can only take to mean that we’ve landed and we’re ready to go. I scramble into the bathroom, fill my arms with my brush and makeup, wad up my dirty clothes, and throw the provided toiletries into the ball. I rush out, shove it all into my duffel bag, and struggle to zip it up. When I do, I go to the door and open it. A man wearing a big, wool overcoat is standing there, with a man wearing shiny, polished white and blue body armor on either side of him. This must be my ride; why else would UN troops be here?

“You would be Ms. Griffis, would you not?” he asks, extending his hand to me.

I take it and I shake it. “Yes, I am. And you are?”

“I am Luke Woodward, representative of the United States for the United Nations. Pleasure to meet you.”

We walk to another limousine, and he opens the door for me. I stoop down and walk in. It’s not as nice as the Secret Service one, but it’s a limo. Can they not be nice and fancy?

As he gets inside, I can see the men getting on armored motorcycles, one in front of us and the other behind.

“Oh!” I exclaim, realizing what we’re doing, “My bags. They’re still in the plane.”

He waves his hand non-caringly. “Relax,” he says, “They’ll be taken to where you’ll be staying.”

“Also, what’s going on? First I get a letter from the White House, then the Secret Service is at my door, then I’m being escorted through New York City by UN forces. There has to be something really big going on, and nobody’s bothered to tell me yet. Will you?”

His eyes dart quickly to the front to make sure the window’s up so our driver can’t hear us. It is. Still, he leans in close to me.

“To be honest,” he whispers, “I don’t know myself. I’ve only managed to pick up a few pieces of information, and frankly, it doesn’t make a lot of sense. All I know is that it has something to do with aliens and genetics.”

“I think you have the wrong person, then. I’m a history major, not a geneticist or astronomer.”

He shakes his head almost sorrowfully. “No, they most definitely need you. Why, I don’t know. But you, for some apparent reason, are crucial to this mission’s success.”

Well, at least I got some answers. Granted, they’re pretty nonsensical, but hey. They’re still answers.

We spend the rest of the ride in silence, which isn’t very long. Luke tells me that because they have diplomatic plates, they’re exempt from nearly all traffic laws and could get to the UN faster than anyone else could. Will I get some of those out of this? The idea of going 90 down Grand River is just too good to pass up.

Stepping out of the limousine, I suddenly start to feel a lot smaller. There it is; the United Nations building, with its huge glass face glowing as bright as the sun itself. Luke practically drags me inside, as I’m still so fixated on the building.

The inside is just is amazing. The entire hallway is pristine white, not a single speck of dirt or dust anywhere to be found. The time and date of every time zone in the world is projected onto the wall by tiny little lasers opposite where the time actually falls. The EST one is situated on a large screen behind the front desk. It reads

NEW YORK – EASTERN STANDARD TIME
07:04:27
JANUARY 10, 2416 CE

There’s also a lot of other stuff on the screen, but none of it concerns me. Current weather, the forecast for the day, and a list of issues that will be presented at the next UN meeting, along with the date of it. Luke leads me past the desk and to an elevator in the corner, which would be easy to miss if there weren’t the two guards armed to the teeth standing by it. They part as they see us coming and let us in. He presses one of the two buttons on the side, and it feels like someone cut the cable. I can feel my organs already climbing up my throat as we plunge down. How far is this place, anyways?

Almost right as I finish that last thought, it stops, and the doors open. “Good luck, Ms. Griffis,” I hear Luke say.

I turn to him, puzzled. “What do you mean? Aren’t you coming?”

He shakes his head. “No, not even I have clearance. I only had clearance to bring you down in the elevator. If I step out, I’d technically be committing a global crime.”

“Oh. Well, I can go, right?”

“Yes,” he laughs. “I think they’re just waiting on you, now.”

I step out and look back. He’s smiling all the way until the door closes on him. I walk down the hallway to the only door there is and turn the knob. Maybe I’ll finally get some answers.

First Contact

When my consciousness comes back to me, it feels as though someone’s been smashing my head with a sledgehammer for hours. I summon all my strength to open my eyelids, and can see that it’s now the middle of the day. Is this the same day as when I came to…wherever this is?

When I sit up, splotches of light jump all around my vision and my head feels like it grows 20 pounds lighter. I back up to a tree and use it to prop myself up, then survey where I am.

I’m sitting in a giant field with long, light green grass moving gently in the cool breeze. There are a few trees dotted here and there, but for the most part it’s just a grassland. On my right are some mountains, and one of them looks like it has a city built onto one of them. It’s not quite built onto the mountain, but more…off of it. A lot is built on a platform that juts out a bit. I swear that I’m hallucinating, because I’ve never seen or heard of any city like it. It looks like some majestic city out of a fantasy story. If this is real and whatever lives there doesn’t want to kill me, I’d love to go there sometime.

I bury my face in my hands. Interdimensional travel hurts a lot, and it’s giving me one awful headache. I can even hear my heartbeat in my head, and it’s really fast and getting louder. Wait, that’s not my heartbeat. It sounds like a ton of hooves running straight at me.

Taking my face out of my hands, I expect to see a bunch of heavily armed alien creatures on some weird horse-like things. Instead, I see fairly normal horses with no riders. They’re the armed ones. Great, seems like a side affect of travel is weird hallucinations. A white one in purple armor steps ahead steps foreword uneasily and looks at me. It’s got a horn on its head, does that mean it’s a unicorn? Man, these hallucinations are really strange.

“Hello, creature!” it says in a proud voice. Judging by its voice sounds, I can only guess that it’s a male. “We have never seen anything like you before. Where are you from?”

I laugh at the idea of a talking unicorn in armor asking me where I’m from. I’ve probably actually just landed in the middle of nowhere, still on Earth. “So,” I try to ask through my giggling, “You’re a talking unicorn? I’ll admit, I never expected to be seeing things like this while sober.”

He looks at me again, confused. “I’m sorry, what?” he asks. I can see that figments of my imagination clearly don’t have any sense of humor.

“Come on,” I laugh, “Talking unicorns? This can’t be real.”

“Well, I can assure you that we are. You’re…not from around here, are you?”

“So, you think you’re real?” I ask. He nods. I just groan and bury my face in my hands. I'm suffering through excruciating pain, in the middle of God knows where, and to top it off, I've got some unicorn insisting that he's real. I mean, supposedly being on an alien planet and all, I'd accept that he's a native, but he seems too...real. He speaks English perfectly, wears armor that looks pretty recognizable, and looks exactly like normal horses. Ironically, he's so real that I don't believe that he is.

"Is everything all right?" he asks.

"No," I moan, sliding my hands off my head.

"Well, maybe I can help?" he asks benevolently. The horn on his head lights up purple, and he walks toward me.

"No."

"Come on, now," he says in the manner you'd use when talking to a stubborn kid. "This won't hurt at all and it'll make you feel a lot better."

"No!" I say more powerfully. I have no idea what he's trying to do and frankly, I'm scared at the thought of an alien doing some unknown thing to me.

"Come on," he pleads again, "I'm just trying to help you."

"I said no!"

"Please?" he asks, getting even closer.

"No! I don't need any help!" I scream. Without thinking, I do the first thing that comes to mind; I make a fist and punch him square in the jaw.

As soon as I pull my fist back, all the other soldiers raise their spears at me and advance. I think I just punched one of their generals in the face.

“What was that for?” the unicorn yells at me.

“Hey, this isn't all my fault!” I yell back. "If you weren't advancing on me, I wouldn't have done that!"

He shakes his head in disbelief. I can tell that I’m certainly not making a good first impression on these things. “Well, since it appears that we can’t discuss this like civilized beings, we’ll have to stoop to your level.” His horn sparkles again, and this time he fires something at me. The bolt of light hits me square in the head and gives me an even worse headache than the one I had before. I scream and fall to the ground, clenching my forehead. I feel excruciating pain coming on as I pass out again.

***

It’s a lot colder and darker when I wake up again. I go to rub my head in pain, but something snags my arm and stops it from fully getting there. I move my stiff neck slowly to see what’s on my wrist. There’s a shackle on it, with a chain going to the stone wall behind me. Seems like a bit of overkill, but I did sort of nail one of their soldiers in the face, so I guess I can't blame them.

I drop my hand down in defeat, and when it lands on my leg, something doesn’t feel…right. To check, I move my hand up my body to my ribs, and the feel doesn’t change at all. I move my head down to survey myself, and I realize now why it’s so cold. The horses have taken the jumpsuit off me sometime between when they knocked me out and chained me to the wall.

I look around at where they’re keeping me. A small stone chamber with a small little window that lets some light in. The door out looks like it’s some heavy iron designed to keep me in. If I didn’t know better (and I probably don’t), I’d say this is some sort of medieval torture room. If it is, I sure hope these horses don’t get as creative with a bike seat as the UN torturers got.

The door creaks open, and the unicorn I punched in the face walks in. It’s weird, because he doesn’t even look mad. The purple armor he was wearing is also gone, making him wearing just as much as me, which certainly doesn't make me feel any safer.

“Haven’t you ever heard of knocking?” I yell at him. Almost instantly, he stops out of shock.

“I’m sorry,” he says pretty apologetically. “Did I startle you?”

I scoot back and pull my knees up. “Well, you took my clothes off of me and chained me to a wall, so let’s start with those things.”

“Is being exposed considered indecent where you come from?” he asks. “Forgive me if we have done or are doing anything offensive to you.”

“Well, it kind of is. Both taking my jumpsuit and throwing me in a dungeon would be considered bad hospitality, but I guess I sort of deserve the latter after the whole," I point at his face. "You know." He smiles.

“All right,” he says, moving to the door. “I’ll go get your clothes.” He opens the door and walks out. After a few minutes, he cracks the door and levitates it to me. Surprisingly, he even unshackles my arm, which is even more than I trust myself; I wouldn’t be too surprised if I go on some sort of rampage and try to kill half this world.

My whole body aches when I try to stand up. I’m so stiff that I can barely even get my feet into it. When I do, I fall back down and put the rest of it on. I sit on the ground for a couple more minutes, moaning in pain.

The unicorn walks back in after a bit. He’s still not wearing anything, which I can assume is the social norm here. “Better?” he asks, using his magic to reattach the shackle to me.

I pull a little on the chain that he just reattached to me. “I guess it’s okay.”

“Again, sorry for everything that must be happening. I guess we over reacted to you acting out of confusion.”

“It wasn’t confusion,” I admit. “I was…sort of stupid and I wasn't thinking. I should be the one apologizing to you. It’s not normal to punch people in the face when you meet them, so sorry if I gave you the wrong first impression of us.”

“Would you mind if I bring somepony else in so we can clear the air?”

I swear that he just said “somepony” instead of “somebody”. Still, that’s not even the wackiest thing that’s happened in the past month. “Sure,” I say fairly indifferently.

The door opens again, and a larger, pure white horse walks in. Its mane is long and constantly flowing, even though there’s no wind in here. The rainbow of pastel colors sparkles with the little light and generates a soft glow, brightening the mood. Interestingly, it has both a horn and wings. “Hello,” it says in a feminine and regal voice, “My name is Princess Celestia, the ruler of Equestria and all ponies that live within its borders. And who might you be, visitor?”

Man, that was quite an entrance. “I’m Keerthana Griffis. I was sent by the United Nations to this planet to see what's here.” I look around a bit. “Where are the rest of the people I came with?”

“’People?’” the princess asks. “Is that what you are?”

“Well, sort of. I’m a human. ‘People’ is a general term referring to more than one of us. Have you seen any else?”

She shakes her head. “No, I’m sorry, we haven’t. Did you come here with others?”

“Yeah, four more. You sure? You saw none of them?”

She shakes her head again. “Do you have any idea where they might be?”

I think about it for a second. “No, I…I don't. I don’t even know where I am, really.”

“You are in the city of Canterlot, the magnificent capitol city of Equestria,” she smiles. “Jewel of the planet of Equis. And where would you be from?”

“The United States, on the planet Earth. What galaxy is Equis in?”

“Galaxy?” she asks.

I sigh as I realize how much of a chore this might end up being. “A big cluster of stars and planets, but that's not important right now.”

Her horn lights up, and the shackle around my wrist falls off. “Would you come with me?”

Shakily, I get up to my feet and realize how much taller I am than all these horses. I’m not that tall to begin with and I’m hunched over, but the unicorn still only goes to my chest. The princess, who looks so tall in comparison, is only slightly taller than I am. She leads me out of the room and into a long hallway. “Where are we going?” I ask.

“I will be sending you to my best student, in Ponyville. She will accommodate you, and I hope that we will be able to learn much more about ‘people’.”

Ponyville? Nice to know I'm in the Land of Creative Place Names. Celestia walks us out of the dungeons to a small deck where a golden carriage is sitting in the evening sun. Two armored horses with wings are hitched to it. She gestures her hoof toward it, so I climb in and sit down.

“Wait,” I say, looking around the carriage, “I had a bag. Did anyone find a backpack near me?”

“There was a bag near you when we found you,” the unicorn says. “Is that what a ‘backpack’ is?”

“Yeah. Do you have it?”

“It’s already been sent to Ponyville,” he explains. Something pops into his head, because now he’s smiling broadly. “Twilight will love to meet you. Tell her I say hey.”

“Uhh, sure?” The horses open their wings and start flapping them. Surprisingly, they manage to take off, the carriage in tow. I look over the side to the picturesque country all around me. Mountains, forests, grasslands, and all the beauty of the world surrounds the carriage as far as the eye can see. This world might not be so bad after all.

Author's Note

Sorry I'm late. I actually had this written for over a month, but I kept sitting on it and becoming more and more busy.

Funeral For a Friend

After a little bit of an impromptu preparation, we’re all standing around a decent-sized hole in the ground in the Canterlot Cemetery of Heroes, which Celestia said we could bury Nadiya in. Her coffin is off to one side, and Twilight’s putting a blank gravestone into the ground, right in front of the hole.

“What do you want it to say?” she asks, lighting her horn up.

I mull her question over a bit. What’re you supposed to put on the gravestone of somebody you hardly knew?

“Nadiya…” I exhale deeply, thinking. “Can we just leave it blank for now? I don’t really know anything about her.”

“Do you still want the name on there?” Twilight asks.

“Sure, but leave some room for her last name.”

Twilight cuts her name in stone, then stops her magic and steps back. “What do humans do at funerals?” she asks.

“Like I said before, it depends. I guess,” I wipe my eyes, which are starting to form tears. “Anyone who wants to say something can.”

“Can I?” Twilight asks. I step aside and point at the grave, letting her know that she can go.

“Well,” she says nervously, “I didn’t know you, but from what Keerthana told me, you sounded like a great human. I just hope you didn’t suffer.” She steps back and sniffles a bit.

Since nobody else steps up, I go to the edge of the grave and kneel down. “Nadiya, I…I’m sorry. I could have gone and looked for you, but…I didn’t. I just got so wrapped up in getting myself adjusted to this place that I didn’t even think of you for a few months.” A single tear falls from my eye onto the closed coffin lid, almost poetically. “I just hope that nobody else has to lose their life in this cause.”

“Beautiful,” Twilight says. “Does anypony else have anything to say?” They all shake their heads in response.

“I think we’re done now,” I mumble. Twilight levitates the large pile of dirt next to us over the open grave, then gently lowers it. Our exploration party just got one member less, and that means one person less I have in this world.

Author's Final Notes

So, umm...wow. I actually don't know how to describe my feelings about this. This story's (relative) success caught me completely off guard.

The story I've created over the past 50K or so words is drastically different than the one that popped into my head on a snowy February day. And frankly, all the change was for the better. Not going to lie; this story still is far from perfect. There are tons of things I would change, given the chance. But they're in there now, and I don't think they harmed it too much (I've seen at least one of you who would disagree on one of the things, but eh).

And I feel obligated to mention this, but sequel? A possibility. I've been throwing around ideas since the summer, and I'm working ~~diligently~~ ~~slowly~~ painstakingly lethargically on refining it. Already scrapped a couple big ideas that turned out to be dead ends. So yeah. If there is another installment in this, you can rest assured that there will be considerably less of me flying by the seat of my pants, which made up a significant (and embarrassingly large) portion of this story.

And I hit "Publish" on this story for the last time. To be honest, it's a little saddening. Even though I sometimes dreaded writing for this (in most cases, big gaps in chapters are there because I couldn't pull myself to keep writing), I'm glad I kept going. This story is responsible for about 75% of all my total story views, and it has not only 61 more likes than I anticipated, but also 62 favorites more (number of favorites > number of likes, somebody's holding out), and not to mention it's a mere 8 views from hitting 1000 as I'm writing this. I thoroughly enjoyed making this story, and I hope you guys (outside the 14 downvoters) enjoyed reading it.

Now an order; you guys don't stop being amazing readers.