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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.”