The Poly Little Pony

by Chatoyance

Seabiscuits And Horseraces

My Little Pony started with Generation One in September 15, 1986. MLP was very different back then from the Friendship Is Magic we know today. For one thing, there was no 'Equestria', rather the ponies lived in Ponyland, a magical Oz-like fairyland accessed through a Norse-like Rainbow Bridge. There were no griffons or diamond dogs, but there were many Furbobs and Bushwillies, not to mention a vast number of very strange breeds of ponies far beyond the simple Unicorn, Pegasus and Earthponies we know of.

While this may seem wonderful - and we have all heard that Princess Luna's batwinged 'Thestrals' are considered to be a fourth breed - I can personally assure you that increasing the magical pony types is not always a good idea. In fact, it can be a nightmare of horror and abomination - as these overly-clever Conversion Bureau ponfication researchers are about to discover to their great regret, and our greater amusement...

Seabiscuits and Horseraces
By Chatoyance

Elite Corporate Officer Augustus Clarke followed the scientist down the spiral stairs to the bottom of the underwater base. The structure was old, having been built before the seas had died, but it had been maintained by the Worldgovernment since for those projects they wanted well away from any and all eyes.

Twenty-Twelve, as it was called, was the sealab designated for the most dangerous and risky of projects. The Worldgovernment had wanted answers, regardless of the cost in credits or lives, and Clarke was here to see the results. The scientist was prattling on about his facility, it was annoying. “Show me what I came here to see.” The interruption was rude but commanding. Chagrined, the scientist complied.

The tank was walled with a thick plexiform window that stretched from floor to ceiling and wrapped halfway around the research room. The hard material of the vast window had the same refractive index as seawater itself, so for all the world it looked like the room was open to the large tank of purified water, which somehow failed to rush into the chamber to drown everyone. It looked like the room was divided by magic, half water, half air.

Several white-coated lab boys scuttled about, fawning and frightened as the Elite Corporate Officer entered, he couldn’t help but smile at their discomfort. Right. Down to business then.

“The original plan was to find something, anything, which could dramatically alter the natural... ah... stability... of the Equestrian consciousness. The aliens are remarkably resilient, bouncing back after trauma, remaining sanguine under most forms of stress, a generally amiable and pleasant disposition which is, if I might say, quite endearing really...”

“Get on with it!” Clarke had other things to do, and this lead scientist was anything but endearing.

“Yes, of course sir. Right away sir!” The boffin wiped his forehead, the boy had flopsweat, which was appropriate, because he was flopping like a land-mine victim who has suddenly realized Just How Important Having Limbs Is.

“Nothing worked, sir, nothing we could potentially weaponize, at any rate. We found that the ponies seem to be vulnerable to neurotic reactions brought on by concerns about their own self worth, but such matters are complex issues - you can’t just use loudspeakers to tell an enemy they suck and have uniform results, now can you!” The tape-glassed geek snorted at what he apparently considered High Comedy, saw the Officer’s face, and instantly melted like a young boy caught in the detonation of an incendiary device.

Clarke smiled at the image. He missed war. The colorful aliens were his only hope to regain it. The Worldgovernment wanted ways to fight them if they ever had to, and Elite Corporate Officer Augustus Clarke was really, really, really hoping that a fight would be needed.

“Well, our genetically altered, ponified agents found evidence of an ancient subspecies that had once lived in Equestria... or perhaps a different Generation of Equestria - it seems that the entire cosmos undergoes periodic re-creation or evolution of some kind which is...”

“Show me the goddamned atrocities already!” Augustus had better things to do with his time than listen to a lot of egghead claptrap from some pencil-necked smartass with delusions of relevance.

“Ah... yes... sir.” The scientist turned to a labcoated comrade standing alert at the side of the room. “Dr. Farbissina? Would you....?”

The labcoat stepped forward a pace and shouted “RELEASE THE SEAPONIES!”

Clarke wiggled a finger in his half-deafened ear. A panel slid open inside the purified, saltwater tank that took up half of the room.

They came forth, somehow giggling despite existing entirely submerged. Bright of colors with odd, stubby, almost blobby equine heads that grew from seahorse-like bodies. But these were not seahorses, not like the Earth had once known. These creatures had fully formed pony forelimbs, with hooves. It was irrational, impossible, it violated all reason and even the thought of natural evolutionary processes.

“We have underwater microphones, of course, but we hardly need them. For some as yet unexplained reason, it is possible to hear the creatures clearly, even through the tank walls. One possibility is some kind of projected auditory hallucination which...”

Augustus Clarke growled “Show me what they can do.”

The now quite nervous boffin turned once again to his comrade. “Dr. Farbissina?”

“SEND IN THE SUBJECTS!”

His ears ringing, the Corporate Officer watched as two shackled ponies were brought into the chamber from outside. They jangled and rattled as they moved, but, being ponies, were not overly upset with having been chained and bound. “Hello!” one of them called out, waving a hoof. He seemed to have an English accent, Augustus decided he must be a Newfoal.

“We have here two subjects, sir, one a native Equestrian captured a month ago, her name is ‘Spring Flower’. She’s the yellow pony. The Blue pony is a Newfoal, converted three months ago, captured near the time of the other subject, he calls himself ‘Weetabix Branstonpickle’.” The scientist waited, as if seeking approval.

“So one of the subjects was once human?” Augustus stared at the scientist.

“Y-Yes... sir. Is that a problem sir?” The scientist was very concerned now.

“He was once a citizen of Earth, under the Worldgovernment Authority?”

“From the Northeuropeanzone. Um... if you don’t feel it is appropriate to...” The scientist was visibly sweating now.

“You say he chose... let me get this straight... he chose to name himself ‘Weetabix’?”

The scientist nervously fiddled with the pens in his pocket. “Weetabix Branstonpickle, yes sir.”

Augustus smiled. “Fuck ‘im. Get on with the demonstration.”

“Yes SIR!” The scientist seemed utterly relieved, and from the sudden smell in the room, this may have also included his shorts. He wasted no time, it seemed, and immediately went to a microphone set up at one of the workstations that were scattered about the chamber.

“Hello! Attention! Seaponies!”

Inside the tank, the horrific half-pony half-seahorse abominations finally stopped mindlessly giggling. They had never stopped since entering. “HELLO! hello! HELLO! Hello! Hello!” The chorus of greetings went on for some time, then ended with more giggles.

“We want you to sing for the subjects. Can you do that?”

The colorful anathemas swam about excitedly. “Sing? Sing? SING? SING!!!” as they gradually interpreted the command, the two shackled pony subjects were brought close to the tank wall and chained to a ring embedded in the floor.

The abominations in the large curving tank stopped flitting about and arranged themselves. Suddenly they began to sing.

“Shoop-bee-doo-shoop-shoop-bee-doo
Call upon the Sea Ponies when you're in distress
Helpful as can be ponies - simply signal SOS
If you find you're past the drift and haven't got an oar (oar)
Count upon the Sea Ponies - they'll see you to shore
Shoop-bee-doo-shoop-shoop-bee-doo”

Spring Flower’s lips began to curl upwards, her teeth showing as her eyes grew wild with madness. She tugged and pulled at her chains with increasing vigor until the links bit into her hide and blood began to trickle down her legs and neck.

Weetabix began moaning, his long neck swaying to and fro. Suddenly he began slamming his equine head down upon the metal deck, trying to knock himself unconscious.

“Washed up on the rocks
Shoop-bee-doo-shoop-shoop-bee-doo
Call upon the Sea Ponies when you're in distress
Helpful as can be ponies - simply signal SOS
If your rudder runs aground or seaweed holds a grip.”

Weetabix had stopped trying to bash his own head to pieces and turned on his companion, biting and kicking in blind fury. Spring Flower returned the favor, gouging with her sharp hooves, each drawing blood and clumps of hair from each other.

“KILL ME! KILL ME YOU FUCKING LAME NEWFOAL! KILL ME NOW!” The native Equestrian shouted.

“NO! KILL ME FIRST, YOU STINKING HORSE’S ASS!” Weetabix was beyond reason, alternately slamming his hooves into the native Equestrian’s skull and then his own. Soon both ponies were covered in blood, mad with horror and agony.

“SHUT IT OFF! SHUT THEM OFF OR I’LL HAVE YOUR GUTS FOR GARTERS!” Elite Corporate Officer Augustus Clarke had faced many things in his long years, he’d seen riots put down in the most brutal of ways, he’d seen dead, burnt babies and corpses with veins in their teeth and all sorts of terrible things, but he had never faced anything like this. He hardly noticed that he had soiled himself as he repeatedly screamed for the nightmare to stop.

The little scientist that had been his guide up to this point ran for a large red button on the wall. He slammed his fist against the button again and again, though once was sufficient.

Inside the tank, millions of volts of electricity turned the seaponies into soggy, overcooked fishsticks, the ravaged meat falling from their bones like bits of memory from the mind of an Alzheimer victim.

As he gradually recovered his wits, Augustus could see the two subjects in front beginning to giggle. They couldn’t stop, tittering louder and louder, their minds gone, their wills broken. Occasionally they would lunge and bite a bloody chunk from one another, which only made them giggle more.

Weetabix could be heard mouthing, between incoherent giggles, ‘shoop be doo, shoop be doo, shoop be doo...” over and over and over.

“MY GOD!” Clarke interjected. “You sick fuckers, you sad, sick sons of bitches, the lot of you.... my camel-humping god... fuck... dick... shit!” There weren’t expletives enough for such a thing, and Augustus Clarke knew many, many obscenities. There just weren’t enough. There could never be enough.

He turned, then, and marched to the elevator, the one that led to the surface platform, far above the dead ocean. The scientists followed after, pleading, arguing that the project worked, that it could turn the Equestrians against each other, that they had already weaponized the songs the seaponies sang, that they had a whole room full of MP3 Devices ready to be deployed.

Clarke backhanded the lead scientist and ran for the elevator. He only stopped shaking when he was in motion, when he was headed to the surface, when his ears began to pop over and over from the changes in pressure.

He would have to call in the services of the international Friendship Station, in orbit high above. They had a Rod-From-God system, large metal javelins that could be deployed at multi-mach speeds, the impact greater than a high-yield thermonuclear weapon.

It was the only way to be sure.

Comments

[pjabrony]

And Seapony warfare was banned at the next convention, just as Joke Warfare had been so long before.

[darkmatterbutterflies]

I don't know whether this is dumb or brilliant. (Then again, I'm biased. I always adored the sea-ponies.)

[Wild Zontars]

Well, the remixes are good stuff, at least.

[FanOfMostEverything]

Well, at least it wasn't Twenty-Twenty-One. You don't want to know what they're doing in that sealab.

As for the seaponies, I can't help but wonder how much of the effect had to do with an intergenerational incompatibility of some kind. Perhaps ponies from different iterations of the universe simply cannot abide one another...

[PeachClover]

I don't get it. I was there when the Seaponies first debuted in the pilot epi and I never thought there was anything wrong with them or the song. *hums the seapony theme as shi takes another drink of hir peptobismuth and caffeinated soap slurpie*

[Alfalfa Door]

Twenty-Twelve, as it was called, was the sealab

I sea what you did there.

‘Weetabix Branstonpickle’.”

[Toksyuryel]

Good thing he wasn't HLF. They'd have actually used this.

[Bronze Statue]

[Sozmioi]

I finally saw the episode containing this song. Immediately thought of this.

As I said elsewhere... that episode was very nearly acausal, even where it doesn't go so far as violating its own continuity. It is a blight upon storytelling. This song was not one of the high points.

[Westphalian_Musketeer]

Is it wrong I expected things to go down like this instead?
[youtube=gU54u2-koFk]

Seriously, some of the myths of what mer-people did is fucked up. You captured that perfectly with this while remaining uniquely hilarious.

[waterlily]

There's an actual My Little Pony episode with really happy music in the style of '80s pop! I didn't know until now just how much I needed to hear that. I'm probably going to be listening to that song on repeat constantly now It's like the Teletubbies theme song, only much better.

And I'm feeling puzzled and bemused over how anypony could not like that song. The characters in this story are so silly!