There was only one explanation. For all of it. All of the strange, erratic behavior. Her irrational fear of the sun. Her nocturnal habits of locking herself in in the dark and closing all the blinds. Wearing her sunglasses everywhere, even inside! It was time to invest in some silver, garlic, and a wooden stake.

Octavia Philharmonica is a desperate mare. Her involvement in the ill-fated "pony pokey" at the prestigious Grand Galloping Gala has left her blacklisted among the elite of Canterlot who form her clientele. Faced with the possibility of being evicted from her apartment for inability to pay rent she decides to take a temporary job at a local nightclub. Of course, she's never set hoof in a club before and has no idea what she's getting involved in . . .

Octavia is a high-class pony. Fine alcohol is her wont, and uncouthness her intense chagrin. Such is her surprise to find herself lumbered with an insufferable oaf of a DJ pony. However, sometimes these situations work themselves into a satisfactory ultimatum all the same.

To prove the superiority of ponies over machines, Trixie decides to challenge Sweetie Bot to a game of chess.

This fic was intentionally written for the 2023 Cyberpunk Equestria Story Contest, but I later on realised that there was a lower word limit of 2.5k words, so the story doesn't qualify.

Check out nonetheless the other entries here.

Now with a Chinese translation by plapoco

Many of these so-called ponies believe they were the first to discover the land that is now known as Equestria. They were wrong, of course. Those idiotic Humans, inebriated Dwarves, and the pitiful vomit-inducing, tree hugging, frolicking Elves littered the landscape first all the while living their simple, boring lives. The ponies and the other smattering of races moved here over time from some other land. If they were still here, the various original races meeting the ponies would have made for a bit of a chaotic first contact considering they used dumber cousins of the ponies as labor and mounts. It's too bad that didn't happen, oh I could have enjoyed watching that carnage with a nice bowl of salamander eyeballs.

But, well, one or one-hundred powerful wizards attempting magic beyond their capabilities on magical artifacts beyond their comprehension tend to make things go... explodey. In a single snap of my claws the entire human race, and all of the other "intelligent" races as well, were simply gone. Vaporized in a magical wave of energy. The landscape left even more magically scarred than when the Tower Heart of the old Dark Tower went kaboom. We minions fled back to the Netherworld from whence we came and waited for the land to heal, and hopefully for some other race capable of thought to come knocking at its gates.

We waited a long time for that and now we should really get around to finding a new Master, none of the races showed any real promise so we need to do this ourselves. Giblet seems to have found something promising while digging around the cave of a local dragon (the dragons seem to have gotten smarter too), so I'll have to go give that a look-see and pray to Darkness nothing weird comes out of it.

But as I always say... Evil always finds a way.

-Gnarl, the Minion Master, on the origins of Equestria

She just wants to get home. Explaining the group's actions during that last mission took hours longer than it should and now that the palace has finally been fully briefed, all Applejack has to do is make her way to the capital's central train station. Enter the Grand Gymkhana, catch the last westbound of the night and eventually, she'll be in Ponyville. Back on the Acres. Surely she can manage that much, even when stumbling through an empty city while half-lost within a thick winter fog. But the mists are making edges blur, and it's becoming so hard to perceive what truly is.

And then she finds somepony who can no longer truly see the world at all.

Tonight, Applejack is the enemy. And there can be no peace with those who already lost the inner war.

(A standalone, no-prior-reading-required part of the Triptych Continuum, which has its own TVTropes page and FIMFiction group. New members and trope edits welcome.)

Now with author Patreon and Ko-Fi pages.

Starlight Glimmer has been tinkering with some new spells as of late. She was convinced that she made some kind of connection to... something coming from light-years away. As much as you love that mare, you found that hard to believe, even if you are technically an alien.

As such, it came as a happy surprise when Starlight actually managed to secure that connection, revealing a massive network of information right at the tips of her hooves. Your shared glee is short-lived, however, as you come to the startling realization that you recognize this network.

After all, once you put something on the internet, it's there forever.

This story is a sequel to Please don't ever take the pain away

Celestia knows Twilight has a problem.
And she knows how to fix it.

Twilight looked over to her dear mentor, Princess Celestia, and found she had once again fallen asleep mid-lesson. Her intense debate on awakening the princess was cut short when the decision was taken out of her hooves.

“Huh? Oh. Twilight, I am so sorry for falling asleep again. I think we need to reschedule this for tomorrow morning.”

Twilight nodded. After all, Princess Celestia was obviously overworked. If only there was something she could do to help.

Now with a dramatic reading courtesy of DRWolf.
Additionally, there’s a Spanish translation by Spaniard Kiwi over on Deviant Art.

Current Episode: Season Zero – Episode One
Next Episode: Twin Twilights

Art created from images by Tim015 and ShilaDaLioness.

I wasn't worried. I wasn't worried about anything specifically, I certainly wasn't worried about this. But it's okay. Accidents happen. Things can be fixed. Just wait. No matter how wrong it feels. No matter what's happening. Everything will be okay. Stay calm. It's all under control.

An entry into the 2nd A Thousand Words contest, under the "Horror" category.

Title and suggestions courtesy of Reviewfilly.