“Yawn.” Rainbow Dash said irritably as Twilight tried to teach her friends the theory behind inter-dimensional portals. The purple princess hopped from hoof to hoof as she let loose the river of words from her mouth, shooting a sparkling glance at each of her friends in turn as she explained.
“...And look at me, rambling away at a million miles an hour.” Twilight finally said with a chuckle, “Anyways, this is all very new and exciting. Thanks for putting up with me,” She momentarily locked with Rainbow’s half-open eyes, “But I just had to tell someone. Princess Celestia will be sooo pleased with me!”
Suddenly and without warning, and with extremely little buildup, an inter-dimensional portal opened up in the library and all the ponies were inexplicably sucked into it.
“Oh no.” Rarity said, “we’re getting sucked into this inter-dimensional portal.”
With this, realisation dawned on the others and utter panic ensued. The horses struggled slightly and someone got hit, before the inter-dimensional portal closed behind them, leaving the library as still as an empty library.
***
Some weeks later, the inter-dimensional portal reopened at the other side. After being trapped in limbo for such a length of time, the ponies were emaciated and were too weak to stand. The faded pile of colours slumped into the grass and breathed shallowly, awaiting their fates.
Moments before darkness consumed the vision of our heroines, fuzzy shapes approached them cautiously, but they were too delirious to really pay any attention.
***
Twilight Sparkle tried to open her eyes, but they were too heavy; the simple act of lifting her eyelids was akin to carrying a large crate of scrap metal across a relatively wide space. Having tried and failed at this task, Twilight tried to move her foreleg, but elicited no more than a twitch. Determined to do something, the pony attempted speech, and managed to let out a small groan.
“We have activity!” Somebody yelled from beyond Twilight’s range of sense, and multiple sirens began wailing: close by at first, then more of them further away. What in Equestria is happening? Twilight asked herself, and forced open the solid iron elephants that called themselves her eyelids.
Crossbows. She was surrounded in almost a dozen crossbows, pointing at every inch of her incapacitated body. The dull metal points glinted from the unnatural white light of the room, and showed Twilight a distorted view of her surroundings. She was in a very plain room, with what looked like a bed. Given her situation, the pony decided that it must be a hospital ward and that she had been in some sort of terrible accident. This explanation didn’t, however, account for the multitudes of lethal weapons that had started this now completely derailed train of thought.
“Why are you pointing crossbows at me” Twilight said.
“So that you don’t point a crossbow at us.” A voice said.
“But I don’t have a crossbow.” Twilight said.
“You might do, how do we know?” The same voice said.
“I don’t though.” Twilight said.
“This dialogue is shit!” A second voice chirped in unexpectedly.
“What the hell are you on about, you idiotic Bramley?” The original voice retorted angrily.
“Sorry sir, I was hearing this conversation as a narrative sir. Don’t mind me sir.” The second voice excused.
“Have him executed.” Ordered voice 1.
“It’s been a pleasure sir. Goodbye purple horse.” Voice number two said. Twilight made the assumption that he saluted, but she would soon realise that he was not, in fact, capable of such.
“Goodbye second voice.” She called cheerily, for reasons that were not completely clear at the time or since.
A wet hacking sound could be heard from beyond Twilight’s range of vision, she wanted to see what was happening but she was still too weak to move her head. One of the crossbows clanged to the ground, echoing briefly.
“As a matter of fact, I have decided to order an impromptu group execution. Carry on.” The first voice could be heard to say.
A group of voices replied in perfect unison. “Yes sir. Goodbye sir. Goodbye purple horse.”
“Goodbye!” Twilight called out again, as the rest of the crossbows fell out of the air all around her, accompanied by the (already) all too familiar sloshing chopping soundtrack.
The first voice cleared his throat. “Excellent. Now we’ve got that over with we can get down to business. My name is Captain Juicylips of the 67th brigade Saint Peartersberg Ground Defense Force.”
“I can’t see you.” Was Twilight’s only reply.
“Ah yes, of course.” The pony’s bed began to move and she stirred uncomfortably with the movement, unable to shift herself into a more favourable position.
What Twilight saw before her was something she had seen dozens of times before back at home, but never like this. It was a pear, to put it in its most basic terms. A 4 foot tall pear, that is, with one large, malformed eye in the centre. It had a mouth, too, with bright pink lips that looked extremely out of place on a yellow-green fruit. The eye was the most unusual part of the thing though, twisted and bulging like it was about to burst. Red veins crawled up from the socket like jungle vines, as if they were strangling it, and the pupil seemed to leak into the dirty grey iris - almost pear shaped itself.
“HOLY FUCKING JESUS FUCK!” Twilight yelled at the top of her lungs, overcoming her paralysis to shuffle backwards on her bedsheets in terror.
“Charming.” Juicylips chuckled to himself, “I could have said the same the first time I laid eyes on you, you unnaturally coloured out-of-proportion horse.”
Twilight managed to seize control of her staggering breathing and calm down enough to talk. “I’m sorry if I came across as rude, I’ve just never seen anything like you before.”
Juicylips smiled, “That’s fine. As long as you aren’t going to pull a crossbow on me.”
“Oh fuck off, you freak of nature. Don’t start this shit again.” Twilight moaned, before correcting herself. “I say, that was a tad out of character for someone such of myself, was it not, good chap?”
“I would say so.” Her new acquaintance replied distantly.
“What the fuck is going on?” Someone said from across the room.
Twilight swivelled her neck around to see where the noise was coming from. This turned out to be the far end of the room, where Rainbow Dash had awoken and propped herself up on an elbow, using the other foreleg to rub her eyes.
Twilight’s reaction was instantaneous, “Oh, so you can fucking move then!”
“Twilight?” Rainbow said, looking around herself blearily.
“Heh, 3 paragraphs in a row.” Juicylips interrupted, before becoming aware of the odd looks he was getting. “Sorry, just that narrative kid giving me ideas. The little cunt.”
“Fair enough.” Twilight Sparkle replied, changing the subject back on course, “Anyway, Rainbow Dash, yes. I am indeed here. Wherever here happens to be.”
“Great!” Rainbow exclaimed with enthusiasm ill-fitting of the situation.
Soon enough, Applejack, Rarity and Fluttershy woke up too, and they were all just as confused as one another. And as soon as Twilight could walk again, they demanded answers.
“What is happening?” Rarity asked.
“The answer to that question will be answered after this cliffhanger.” Replied Juicylips, before freezing completely still.
TO BE CONTINUED…