"We would all like to vote for the best man but he is never a candidate." ~Kin Hubbard
"Alright. I'm just stealing Princess Twilight's biggest wish, no big deal. I won't be thrown in a dungeon in the place that I'm banished to." Quick Script took a deep breath, calming her nerves slowly. "Easy peesy, lemon squeezy-"
"Will you just get on with it!" Mono's shouting snapped Script out of her trance, and she locked eyes with the frustrated human.
"S- sorry. Really nervous…"
Mono swiped his hand quickly. "Yeah yeah, sure. Not your fault anyways. Now, let's get to business. You have the questions?"
Script nodded. Mono dipped his head once and crossed his arms. "Then begin."
"Alright. Here goes nothing…"
\\\\||||////
Quick Script finished sorting the small stack of notes she had taken during the interview, piling the interview's dialogue itself right next to the first pile. She smiled contentedly, and sipped her afternoon brew.
This morning's interview had gone exceptionally well, and Mono was pretty amiable about the whole thing. He made slight smirks and grins that made her nervous when she asked about his diet and technology.
He swerved around the concept of technology about as gracefully as a flatbed with two wheels, and refused to delve into the matter further.
As the interview went on, she asked simple questions pertaining to himself and his own personal tastes.
By now, Mono had given full control of the Suffrage Movement to Shining Armor. Rumor had it Mono was planning something big.
Taking another sip, she locked the interview notes in a solid safe and cast several security enchantments upon it. She then turned it invisible before wrapping it in chains and placing several heavy duty padlocks upon it.
After that she buried it in dirty laundry and sat down in her desk, wiping sweat off of her brow.
Outside of her office in the palace, she heard whistling. Looking out the door to the right, she saw Mono strolling down the hallway casually. Script called out to him, "Where are you going, Mono?"
"Takin' a walk," he replied without even looking back. He turned the corner and disappeared.
\\\\||||////
I stepped outside of the gates of the palace and breathed that fresh mountain air. Smiling to myself a bit, I adjusted my bag and strut down the sidewalk. Ponies stared at me, and I noticed that a large crowd had begun forming around me within a few minutes.
Spinning around quickly, my eyes turned to white slits of anger and a huge red vein mark appeared on my clothed forehead. "STOP FOLLOWING ME AROUND. GODDAMN."
They scattered damn fast. Smiling again, I walked over to a nice little cafe on the corner. Digging into my pockets, I found twelve bits to pay.
The baffled waiter took my order of a milkshake with fumbling hooves, and scampered off to the kitchens. I, meanwhile, opened up my laptop and explored this familiar-yet-alien technology.
So, like I had changed, so had my computer. I saw no power indicator, bluetooth and internet were gone, and the time was already synced to Equestrian Standard. Grunting quickly, I flipped through my pony libraries.
Videos, Pictures, Artwork, and Stories were labeled as my folders. I checked each one respectively, and confirmed that nothing was missing or damaged. I scrolled over to my Photos folder. All of my family pictures were intact along with my friend, school, and vacation photos.
"Old project's, animations, movies, music, blah blah blah…"
"And let's open up Steam."
I gave a sigh while I watched it load. "No more late night gaming parties with friends…" It was depressing, watching it load. LIke a long train plummeting into a bottomless pit of abysmal darkness and pain . Finally it stopped and a familiar grey window appeared.
A pony somewhere dropped a coin, letting it clatter to the cobblestone, echoing loudly in my ears before fading out to nothing.
"WHUZZAT?"
Steam no longer existed. It was now renamed as Fission. "What the hell…?"
I think I may have shat myself there, the memory is a bit fuzzy. I quickly searched through my game library.
"WHERE DID THESE COME FROM?"
I scrolled through hundreds, if not thousands, of hours worth of interactive entertainment.
Once again, my pants became soiled. I saw that the message box was still in operation, and I little thought came into my head. However, there was a message already occupying the inbox.
I clicked it, and read a message from an anonymous user. "That's not even possible…"
Mono! Thought that abandoning you with the ponies would be a bit much without at least some form of entertainment. Don't abuse the system, though. Remember, I'm always watching. ~A
My eye was twitching, a rather unpleasant smell emanated from my undergarments, and I think my brain almost shut down. "There are much larger forces at work here…"
Ignoring the strange message, I opened up Andrew's chat box and sent a quick call for help. I gulped and slammed the laptop shut, shuffling away from the table and down a street.
I needed something to take my mind off this at the moment. Spotting a fancy white unicorn with a monocle gave me some rather radical ideas. "Hello Fancypants."
\\\\||||////
"Outside the castle?"
The guard nodded. His helmet fell atop his head due to the fact that his head was a bit too small. Celestia slumped back into her chair and groaned. "This is going to be a PR nightmare…"
The guard paced around nervously until Luna told him to leave. Nodding his head, he walked straight into a wall, allowing the helm to fall off.
Instead of a large unicorn stallion, a petite unicorn mare blinked her eyes and searched for the helmet. She found it and reached for it with her hooves, only to collapse under the weight of the armor.
"Help… me…" she squeaked.
Celestia and Luna held the bridges of their muzzles.
"This isn't going to work," Luna mumbled under her breath.
\\\\||||////
Mono walked back to the castle with two ponies in tow.
"So do you really believe that you can start such an enterprise so easily?" Fancy Pants raised an eyebrow while Fleur trotted by his side, eyeing the small human up and down with a suspicious squint.
"Twilight has an absolute hard-on for anything even remotely related to me, and her head is so far up Celestia's ass that ponies have started naming her Princess Enema. The only trouble would most likely be Shining Armor or Cadence, but they are currently secondary to the princesses. I'm also positive that Luna is interested in what I have to offer."
Fancy smiled, his brows rising in surprise. "You sound like you know them personally, Mono."
Mono smiled. "Of course, I've only seen most of their lives from across universes."
Fleur and Fancy, being the cool cats they were, took what Mono said in stride. They continued traveling to the castle with him, chatting about various topics, but still focusing on what Mono had proposed earlier.
"And who else are you thinking of inviting on this little endeavor?"
The chibi smiled fondly. "I know some guys. Flim and Flam, you may have heard of them?"
Fancy Pants snorted dismissively. "Oh, those two. Last time I remember seeing them they tried to sell me shoes." He looked down at Mono, his monocle popping free and swinging about. "Exactly what use do I have for shoes when I have hooves, Mono?! What use? Ugh… and with the songs and the corny slogans…"
"Don't worry, we'll… refine them. Get them into business, clean them up, show 'em how to rock a proper suit and tie."
"I can't really see you wearing such a thing, or having the manners to belong in the business world," the white mare spoke demurely. Mono recoiled. "Something wrong?"
Mono straightened his bag and coat. "Y- yeah. It's just that… I've never heard you actually speak more than a few words before. I thought you were more of the quiet type."
Fleur smiled politely, and the trio reached the castle grounds in no time. They moved inside and stopped immediately. What they saw made Mono absolutely furious.
Guards fought each other, tossing one another onto tables and pummeling their comrades with hooves of iron. Applebucks and swift, precise attacks demonstrated just how formidable they indeed were.
CLANG!
A guard fell to a heap amidst a broken flowerpot, the yellow daisy resting perfectly upon his head while his eyes swirled about.
"Two hours! I'm gone for two hours and this is what happens!"
Mono quickly hurried further inside the castle where more sounds of fighting could be heard.
In every room, Mono threw something rather heavy and dangerous, knocking one guard out cold in every room.
He reached the Grand Dining Room, and growled menacingly.
There, on top of the table, were two fencing stallions.
"BLUEBLOOD! SHINING ARMOR! JUST WHAT DO YOU FRUIT BASKETS THINK YOU'RE DOING?"
They each jumped, staring right at Mono.
\\\\||||////
"So, what you're saying is that you are the true prince?"
Blueblood nodded viciously. "Yes. And this common soldier thinks that he can just stroll in and claim whatever rightful place I have at the throne."
Shining Armor rolled his eyes. "Rightful place, my ass. Blueblood." The pompous prince sized Armor up. "Nopony likes you. I don't like you, and it's my job to protect you. If, for some odd reason, a massive beast were to attack this city, I would leave you behind in a heartbeat and claim you MIA."
The princesses strolled in from another adjacent room. I faced them, my arms crossed and foot tapping impatiently. "And where have you three been?"
"Busy," Luna remarked simply.
"Yeah, I'm sure you've been busy..."
The two kept arguing about who would make a better prince, with the princesses staring amusedly at them. This gave me a grand idea.
"Hold on there Prince Armoire!" Shining Armor glared at me and Blueblood began to snicker. "Shut your mouth, Blueballs!" His expression snapped into a glare faster than I thought possible.
"There's an easy way to clear this up."
All ponies leaned in. "Stop that!" They backed up. "Thank you, I need to breathe you know."
"What you princes need is…"
I smiled for what must have been the umpteenth time since I'd been here.
"A vote."