Prior Note: If you ever want to have any kind of life outside university, I advise you all NOT to do architecture
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Chapter 4: Local Introductions
“What was that all about?” Cynder asked with confusion, looking between the now wide open door, and the three obviously horrified ponies in the room with her; judging by her expression, Twilight far more so than the others. “So is this… bad?”
The pony’s eyebrow twitched menacingly before she basically launched herself at Cynder, digging her hooves in so their faces were a hair's-width from each other, while everypony else rapidly jumped out of the way.
“Is this bad? IS THIS BAD?! THIS IS CATASTROFIC!” Twilight basically screamed in the dragoness’s face. “That pony was Fluttershy, the one pony in Equestria who is absolutely terrified of dragons above all else… AND SHE JUST SAW YOU THREE LOOKING AT US AND DROOLING LIKE A PACK OF HUNGRY TIMBERWOLVES!”
“So… it’s bad then?” Cynder replied rather sarcastically, pulling her head away with a flare of her nostrils as if Twilight had bad breath.
The purple mare snorted in reply a moment before her face turned deep red and her eyes began to flame. Everypony knew that if there was one mare who you DIDN’T want to get on the bad side of, and especially when she was stressing out, it was Twilight Sparkle; the purple unicorn actually looked about ready to tear Cynder limb from limb with her bare hooves as she quickly removed the gems from the floor, and swore repeatedly under her breath.
“It’s a little worse than bad, sugercube,” Applejack put in with an uneasy grin as she closed the door, trying her best to act composed and hence bring the temperature down. “Ya see… since Fluttershy saw ya drooling like a bunch ‘a wolves, she probably thought you were trying ’a make a meal out of us.”
Spike swore he could actually see the colour drain from his three counterpart’s face scales, as they each finally connected the dots on what had just transpired, realizing that due to their actions the situation of them accidently being in Equestria had suddenly gone extremely pear-shaped; not only had they accidently frightened the daylights out of a pony, but said pony would no doubt inform the entire town three potential threats to pony-kind's safety were in the library, and there was a high chance she would also mention her accidental assumption that they were trying to eat somepony.
“This is really bad, isn’t it?” Ember said with a sigh and a pink face-claw, two of the three ponies in the room giving uncomfortable nods of affirmation to her statement.
“Oh boy,” Rainbow somewhat snickered in amusement from a few meters above the floor, whipping her front hoof over her forehead as she spoke to emphasize her point. “You have no idea.”
Her idea of trying to put a little bit of a humorous spin on the situation rewarded her with hateful glares from Applejack, Spike, and Twilight, and annoyed ones from Cynder and Spyro. Rainbow’s cheeks immediately blossomed crimson as she played with her hooves; as this day had proved so far, thinking before speaking wasn't one of her strong points.
“Look, let’s just get a plan before anything else,” Spike interjected as he tried to pull everyone together, all the while still trying to comfort a very uneasy looking pink dragoness, neither of which were going particularly well for him. “How about you three hide up…”
CRASH!
“…stairs.”
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To say the door flew off its hinges was an understatement. Rather, the door was ripped clean off the wall, and sent flying like a meteor across the room, before slamming into the bookshelves, forcing Spyro jump out of the way to avoid being flattened.
Spike immediately jumped protectively in front of Ember, while Spyro and Cynder readied to face whoever and whatever pony had come to confront them.
Unfortunately, said pony was a little more than they had initially hoped or bargained for.
Standing in the doorway, much to Applejack’s horror, was the massive crimson shape of her older brother, either side of him flanked by two other members of the Ponyville stallion community, said stallions being her cousin Caramel, and the pegasus Thunderlane. The massive red stallion’s head was lowered, with his nostrils flaring wildly, and his dinner-plate sized hooves pawing at the ground like field ploughs.
All the while he stared down the rather unlucky dragon directly in his line of fire, which just so happened to be a snarling and equally angry looking Cynder.
“Now Mac, just stop and lis…” Applejack started.
Unfortunately, she didn’t get the chance to finish before he started his charging, making short work of the space between himself and the violet dragoness who he was aiming for, and bowling over Rainbow Dash as she tried, and subsequently failed, to stop him. Likewise, Caramel bolted straight at Ember, while a dark grey streak shot directly for Spyro.
Cynder just stood there grinning, while Ember and Spyro bared their fangs.
Everything slowed before the farm pony’s eyes as the stallion's front hooves hit the brakes, and his momentum carried his back hooves around in a wide arc. The two shot out like crimson sledgehammers, making an almighty loud crash as they met and subsequently destroyed… the bookcase?
A loud chorus of “HUH?” rocked the library as Twilight, Dash, Applejack, and her brother cried in alarm, dumbstruck as they looked around and realized that the dragoness, who had been there only a moment ago, had disappeared into thin air... which didn’t make any sense whatsoever, considering all possible exits were basically blocked off by ponies.
And yet her shadow was still somehow present exactly where she had been standing.
Twilight used the moment of confusion to bring him under control, using her magic to capture the stallion who had made her already upside down morning even worse.
“Alright! Everypony calm the hay down!” she snapped loudly, holding the large struggling pony in her purple aura a meter or so above the ground. “This is my library, and so help me Celestia I am NOT cleaning up another mess today!”
When he finally stopped kicking and calmed down a little, the mare took a good look around the room, and her jaw actually fell open in shock as she realized what had transpired with the other two dragons.
Ember was still standing beside the kitchen doorway with Spike, but the rather happy looking purple dragon and bright pink dragoness now had Caramel pinned firmly to the wooden floor as he struggled at their mercy. The case beside the stairs was fairly similar in all, with Spyro having the grey pegasus stallion, Thunderlane, pressed firmly against the floor under his weight as he sat perched comfortably on the pony’s back, looking rather smug with himself.
“Where the hay did you learn to do that?” Rainbow grinned, looking between the rather relaxed purple dragon and the struggling pegasus underneath him.
“We’ve had our fair share of adventures of the years,” Spyro grinned as he looked over at Ember and her quarry. “Plus it’s kind of a dragon thing to play-fight when you’re young… wasn’t exactly a great idea to try that one, huh?”
“Shut up!” Thunderlane snapped, before blushing as both Rainbow Dash and Twilight laughed at him, and then yelped as Spyro pushed his talons into the base of his neck a little.
“Now just what in tarnation is going on here exactly?”
The two mares removed their attention from the struggling pegasus, and refocused it on Applejack’s older brother. He was still encased in Twilight’s magic, suspended halfway between the ceiling and the floor, and looking downright annoyed with his front hooves crossed.
Rainbow snickered behind a cyan hoof while Applejack gave him a cheesy grin from underneath the brim of her hat; if only one of them had a camera.
“You decided to act first and ask questions later, you giant oaf,” came a rather amused female voice, a living, breathing Cynder leaping out of her shadow with a toothy grin. “You’re just lucky I said I wouldn’t hurt anyone, otherwise I would've kicked you oversized furry butt.”
The crimson Apple looked as if he was about ready to buck the dragoness halfway to Canterlot if given the chance.
“Yes, that is basically the case, Big Mac, you acted without asking questions, which as I should point out has never done anypony any good,” Twilight said, looking over the number of flabbergasted local ponies, including Fluttershy, who was hiding as best she could behind Cherilee. “Ugh… now how do I get myself out of this mess?”
Luckily, Twilight’s brain had never failed her before.
“Um, hehe… look everypony, this is all just a big misunderstanding. These dragons are just some of Spike’s friends from the migration come to visit for a while…”
If Applejack had been a member of the crowd then, she’d have picked Twilight’s lie apart just as well as Rarity could pick good quality fabric from cheap cotton. At that point though, Applejack was, like Twilight, pretty much praying to Celestia that the ponies fell for it.
By the grace of the princesses, after a hesitant moment or so, they did, and soon enough the crowd disbanded, the various members muttering profusely under their breaths about their wasted time.
“…But Fluttershy, I want you to stay for a few moments,” Twilight ended before the mare in question could escape, prompting a nervous ‘Eep’ from the still concealed shy pegasus. “And Cherilee, you can too if you want, Big Macintosh needs to hear a few things while he’s here.”
The school teacher simply nodded and gave a scold to her still magically suspended coltfriend.
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A few minutes passed before any pony or dragon said a single thing, all of them waiting until they knew it was safe to talk and continue, before breathing long sighs of relief and wiping the copious amounts of sweat from their brows.
“That was too close,” Ember said with a shake of her pink head as the last of the outside voices disappeared, jumping off of Caramel’s back with Spike and allowing her quarry to shakily get to his hooves. “Sorry about tha…”
To everyone's surprise, the stallion immediately bolted out the door at the first opportunity, his cheeks looking as red as ripe apples.
“…Did I really scare him that bad?” Ember asked.
Applejack just burst out laughing. “Na, it ain’t you sugercube,” she chuckled. “He’s probably just afraid I’ll give him a verbal kicking for making a fool of himself and being outdone by a girl, plus... I think he has a thing for Twi here, so that really don’t help either.”
The mare in question’s cheeks turned bright scarlet as Rainbow wolf-whistled, and everypony else looked in her direction; if this morning could possibly get any more awkward, embarrassing, or weird, then Twilight guessed this was some kind of giant prank put on by Pinkie Pie.
“Anyway…” Twilight said somewhat sheepishly as she turned around and faced the three dragons before her, Ember and Spike once again chatting, whilst Cynder licked her talons, and Spyro continued to hold Thunderlane. “Everypony, this is Ember, Cynder, and Spyro… and Spyro, you can probably let Thunderlane up now as well.”
A wide smirk spread across the dragon's face as he slowly stepped off of the annoyed pegasus pony. The stallion instantly jumped to his hooves, and immediately began checking his dark coloured coat for any marks, apparently barely taking any notice of the two purple and violet dragons, who were still standing right beside him with a look of ‘what by the fire of Ignitus are you doing?’ covering his faces.
“Well, you certainly didn’t do my looks any favours,” he snorted angrily as he turned back to Spyro, the five mares in the room all face-hoofing at the stallion’s stupidity saturated statement; he had three dragons standing in front of him and all he could notice was the condition of his hide. “Now, if you’ll all excuse me, I was on a date with Blossom before I got dragged into this nightmare.”
Without another word, he jumped into the air and sailed out the doorway just about as fast as his wings could carry him, leaving five mares, four dragons and a magic-imprisoned floating red stallion in his wake.
“Well that was kind of rude,” Ember said dryly as she sat back on her hind legs and looked over at Applejack, who was standing beside her and watching as Twilight gently lowered her brother to the floor and released him. “Applejack, are all the males of your kind so… weird?”
“Apparently only the pegasi stallions and the ones I’m related too,” Applejack chuckled in reply as she pulled off her hat, the mare seating herself beside Spike and the giggling pink dragoness. “Now big brother, do you have anything to say?”
Every muscle in the stallion's body bulged as he tensed up, his eyes looking frantically between his glaring little sister, equally glaring marefriend, and the mean looking violet dragoness seated in front of him. At last though he let out a sigh of defeat and faced her.
“I’m… sorry for charging at ya like I did, I was under the impression you were trying ‘a hurt my little sister was all.”
Cynder looked at the stallion distastefully for a moment, before Spyro prodded her in the shoulder with his tail; the violet dragoness in turn gave her mate an annoyed growl, before accepting that, like the stallion, she wouldn’t be able to get out of this one, not with him around anyway.
“Just… forget about it,” she muttered with a dismissive wave of her claw. "You were just doing what you thought was right."
The stallion nodded a few times, before turning and returning to his marefriend’s side, his ears and head dropping nervously as she glared at like one of her students who had been misbehaving in class.
“He’s a little protective of his family, as you can tell, and sometimes that protective urge means he doesn’t exactly think straight,” Cherilee stated dryly, causing the already embarrassed farm stallion to lower his head even further. “I’m his marefriend Cherilee by the way, I’m the school teacher here in Ponyville.”
As he retreated from being the centre of attention, the three dragons watched curiously as Rainbow forcefully pushed and shoved another pony before them, despite her furious attempts to escape. This one, as they saw, being the very pegasus who had got them cornered by the local population in the first place.
“Grrr… Flutters, they aren’t going to try and eat you!” Rainbow snorted, her shoulder pushing firmly into Fluttershy’s back in an effort to move her forward, the butter coloured pony in return trying to frantically dig her hooves into the wooden floor.
“I wouldn't go tempting fate,” Cynder muttered under her breath, her dark eyes affixed on the pony who’s fear she found to be annoying above all else
Some things never seemed to change, and Fluttershy’s fear of dragons was one of them, for it took Rainbow at least ten seconds to move her some two meters; eventually, however, she was at last standing before the three seated dragons, though shaking in her metaphorical horse shoes.
Spike backed up to Twilight’s side and watched as Fluttershy put her front hooves over her eyes, like she thought it would somehow mean they couldn’t see her... which worked for all of about five seconds before Ember gingerly took a step toward her, and lowered her snout to the pony’s ear.
“You don’t need to be afraid now,” Ember said softly as she sat down and nuzzled the frightened mare’s cheeks, her touch causing Fluttershy to let out another ‘Eep’. “I promise we won’t hurt you.”
Very slowly, Fluttershy lowered her hooves and came face to face with the smiling pink dragoness, her eyes wandering somewhat nervously over the scaly female’s body until they came to rest on the heart necklace that lay hanging around her neck.
“I’m… Fluttershy,” she whispered, suddenly whimpering behind her mane. The dragoness however just giggled and nuzzled the mare again.
Cynder hissed from the background, just to show she found the show of cute affection mildly repulsive.
“That’s a sweet name Fluttershy, I’m Ember, and these are my friends Spyro and Cynder,” the bright pink dragoness went on with a glance over her shoulder at the other two dragons, Spyro giving the timid pegasus an approving smile while Cynder remained blank faced. “We didn’t mean to frighten you earlier, we were all drooling because we were just really hungry, and Twilight had offered us some gems.”
“It’s ok. I forgive you, and… um… I’m sorry about what happened with the… other ponies.”
Everypony looked judgingly over at Big Macintosh, who once again cringed.
“I think we can overlook that… for a small favour anyway,” Spyro jumped in with a chuckle as he left Cynder’s side, the violet dragoness watching her mate intensely as he took a seat on the floor beside a happily smiling Ember, and looked out at the open doorway. “Tell you what Fluttershy… we’re actually going to be here for a while as it were, and personally if it’s alright I’d like to see Ponyville and stretch my legs… and maybe show everyone we're not here to cause trouble... reckon you and your friends could give us a tour?”
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Notes: (For those of you who didn’t read the comment and are still confused)
Ok time to clear a few things up before I confuse everyone majorly
The story is set after the events of dawn of the dragon (Spyro and Cynder are together, Cynder has been forgiven for what she did etc.) and the existence of the Skylands is known but the two aren't really skylanders as of yet. Now although I'm not basing it on the Skylands series I have taken bits and pieces (Cynder’s colour and backstory for instance) for use here and there
Now here is where I need to clarify two major diversions that a lot of you are getting confused with.
Cynder's behaviour: Although Cynder does become likeable and playful in Dawn of the Dragon (When she's not depressed) I'm sticking predominantly to her not-so-nice side for a while (sarcastic, moody, doesn't like being told what to do etc.) simply because having three 'nice' dragons just doesn't make sense to me.
Ember: I know Ember doesn't appear in later games with Cynder, so I'm basing their relationship on their polar attitudes (Ember is rather gentle and a bit of a 'follower', while Cynder is a 'don't get in my way' type) with Spyro caught in the middle as a bit of moderator for the two. Also, in game, Ember's (or rather Tara Strong's) voice gave her impression of being fragile; I'm going with the idea Ember's grown up some just as Spyro has, so she is a bit more confident in herself and her voice is closer to Twilight's own.
To sum it all up this is realistically a mixture but is based after dawn of the dragon, I hope that clears up a few things but if you’re confused and want an answer just ask.