The episode begins, and already I know it is going to end. I don’t want it to end, but it always does. I’ve watched it a dozen times. I’ve seen them those dozen times, the little cartoon ponies on my screen, doing incredible things. I’ve seen ponies who don’t just control the forces of nature, but are the forces of nature, ponies who, despite this, live humble, content lives full of happiness and friendship. Everypony has a place in the world, and nopony lives an unfulfilling life.
It’s all so beautiful it makes me want to cry, if I could cry anymore. Watching these ponies makes me forget my aging back, ruined from decades of sitting. It makes me forget my penis, which demands that I penetrate a girl, something I’ll never be allowed to do. The show makes me forget the cravings that have hounded me since puberty, to be the girl, penetrated. An emptiness in me that I can never fill, a child I can never bear, and a hairy, tall, deep-voiced body that many people would find handsome.
I’ve even found myself handsome! There’s nothing about my body that I really hate. It’s just not me. I see a stranger when I look in the mirror, stranger and stranger every day. Is that bad? Maybe. Is it bad that it’s something I can never escape, that will never change in any way that I want it to? It feels... horrible...
Except some minor health adjustments, due to exercise, I’m just stuck like this. I could exercise, and try to be healthier, but why bother? I’ll never be an alto, no matter how hard I train, so it’s just... easy to forget about taking care of myself. The rewards of hard work and exercise feel like a booby prize to me, and it’s all that there is for me.
I looked into surgery once. Everyone curious about changing sexes would. All I found were superficial procedures that only gave you a crude, limp facsimile of a vagina, and never, ever a womb. I found hormones that poison your glands and leave you dependent on the drugs for the rest of your life. I found genetic engineering that can’t even make a rose blue, much less change a single celled zygote. Altering a creature of billions of cells, and of many decades of aging and maturing? By the time anyone figures that out, I’ll be dead, and no one will care.
No, my only hope is magic, which is good as saying I have no hope. The voice I long to sing with will never come, because there is no magic in the world. I’ve hoped for it, sought after it for almost my whole life, but all that I’ve found are charlatans and madmen. Years, decades, I just can’t keep up hope with so much time to see that there is none.
We’re all trapped in a cage with no key, no lock, and no door. People will pretend that someone is going to come save us, but no one ever comes. One by one, we can do nothing other than age, and die. Success, failure, benevolence, malevolence, none of it can help a dead man, and that’s all I’ll ever get to be. My accounting studies just move numbers from one place to another, and the universe is a zero sum game. Once I’m dead and forgotten, there’ll be even less evidence that I ever existed, than evidence for the purple unicorn in the television set that I watch. Twilight Sparkle is more real than I’ll ever be.
It’s not my laptop, but an actual television monitor that I sit in front of, slouched on the couch, watching Twilight Sparkle jump into yellow booties, so I can forget about how I’m going to lose all this stuff, and my home, and live out on the streets, because I can’t be assed to renew my certification this time. I just don’t have it in me to care anymore. Why bother?
My laptop is off to the side, currently unused. The only computer-like thing I’m using is attached to my TV, a recording and playback device that I managed to load with good quality versions of the My Little Pony episodes from a er... questionably legitimate source. I don’t really have much else on it, never have a reason to watch “real” TV. Just... ponies. And the occasional nature documentary.
Why do I like ponies so much? I don’t know. I don’t know why I insisted on them, all the way back in my childhood, when I refused toys like trucks and blocks, and made up stories about the ponies going on adventures. Who cares about stacking Legos, when Clover and Diamonds are trying to defeat the evil sea serpent in the bathtub? Something about ponies, and animals in general just... resonates with me, in the same way that my male body does not. They walk on four little hooves beyond the screen in front of me, and just look so... stable, so sensible. And me, some kind of tottering behemoth only able to stand because of my flat, wide clown feet, with no way to get on all fours and just... run.
If I ever had any hope to be a female human one day, being a fantasy animal like one of those ponies was just outright ridiculous. And yet... it’s the only thing I’ve ever really wanted. The magic to be something like Twilight Sparkle, or Pinkie Pie, or any of the ponies. Even a background pony—preferably one, in fact—because I would probably screw up in a main-character role.
I’d do just about anything to make ponies a reality. But no amount of bargaining will ever make it happen, so I have to live from day to day, struggling to find something worth living for, when everything that sings to my soul can only ever do so from behind a TV screen.
The song Twilight sings is stupid and forced, but the chorus is timeless and catchy. I’ve sang along with it before, in my horrible voice: a perfectly decent voice with nothing wrong with it in any way, except that no one will ever love me in the way that I need to be loved. Twilight goes about the song trying to find her place, never giving up hope that she can find it. If only that wasn’t such a beautiful lie.
That’s when things start getting odd. There’s been something wrong with my TV for a while, which has made me worry that I’m going to have to replace the cheap, secondhand thing. The defect is something like a rainbow (no really) aura where the color starts spreading out from brightly lit parts. Like pressing your finger against a computer monitor, kind of.
I’ve had that problem for a while, trying to make full use of the television set, but the distortion starts to get worse during the end of the song. At first, I think that my TV is just finally giving up the ghost, but then the playback starts to skip, and finally stalls out on the last note of Twilight’s soliloquy before the final chorus.
I get up in alarm with her sweet high voice continually ringing like a bell, worried that my television might be shorting out or damaging my television recorder, which was a pretty expensive little device. The dancing pegasi frozen in mid-air dissolve more and more into rainbows, like looking at the show projected onto a soap bubble... prism... thing. Then my TV explodes.
No, really. I’m actually knocked back by some sort of concussive shock wave that... oddly makes no sound at all. Toppling off-balance onto my butt, I stare open-mouthed as the bent wreckage of my television just sort of... crumples in on itself, before an expanding something overcomes it. It looks kind of like a floating mirror, but what it reflects is not my crummy, 1-room apartment.
What I see before me is a quiet, snowy wood. I crawl to my knees, looking at the bizarre projection in space, that looks not like a television screen, but like... a portal. Then... I feel cool air caress my cheek. It’s... it’s...
Is it a portal to Equestria?
For all I know, it could be a portal to Minnesota. Why would a random space-time anomaly just happen to point to the one place that has both magic and ponies? Just because my TV was playing the show? What am I looking at, some kind of alien technology? I look around me, but there’s no one else in the room with me. Just me in my underwear, my pony laden laptop, and a quietly humming hole in space.
It looks like a strange sort of projection, but the scene within moves three dimensionally as I walk around it, and a slight breeze in the branches of the sleeping trees makes it clear that this is not just a floating portrait. Peering at the glowing, ethereal edges gives me no idea what the nature of this portal is. Looking at it from the back shows the other side of this snowy forest lying through it.
If it is Equestria, could they help me? Could I find Twilight Sparkle, and... and annoy her until she changes me into Filly Anon? I can’t believe I’m even considering this. There’s no way this is what it looks like. There has to be some catch.
God, what I wouldn’t give to be Filly Anon.
I’ll probably die if I just jump through. I should probably get help, take pictures, call someone about it. I should go to the other room, plan my course of action, put on some clothes. But how long is it going to last? If it... if this portal disappears before I go through it, I don’t think I could live with that. I’d be the man who took the blue pill, never able to forget the only chance he ever had for happiness, an opportunity that just closed in front of his eyes, while he stood there and did nothing.
I dive through the portal.
Hey as far as suicide methods, that has got to be one of the coolest, right?
The pain hits me like a truck. It’s excruciating and horrifying on a level I can only barely comprehend. It feels like it’s shattering me and flooding into the cracks. It’s the only time I’ve ever been unable to stop screaming. And yet... as this crawling burning madness invades my deepest core, I can’t feel like this was a huge loss. My essence feels laid bare before a howling wind, but I have nothing worth hiding. My only secrets caused pain. And what have I got to lose?
As I... distort, it oddly stops hurting as much. I can see the world around me exploding, snow flying everywhere, trees erupting by their roots out of the ground, and all the while this sort of pulsing drone that makes my tormented bones feel like chalk on a blackboard.
I don’t even know what’s happening at this point. I figure it just killed me, and the fading pain means that my body finally failed, and soon I’ll be nothing more than a frozen corpse somewhere off in the forests of Minnesota. The human teleportation experiment was a success. There were no survivors.
After a while though, I just... start to feel cold. A chill breeze blows through my... arm hair? The rumbling thrumm is dying down, and I realize that I’ve stopped screaming. I also realize that my throat is sore. I open my eyes and see white. No not the snow. I see white ...arms. A white chest, and a white belly, and a pink...!
I stare unbelievingly, even now, at a soft pink tail coming out from under me. I’m lying on my back, vaguely, and the only salient fact about myself that I can tell is that I have a tail. No really, I’m not even a recognizable anything at this point, my body and my arms are just... shapeless and twisted in a way that should have hurt terribly if I remained alive.
As I lay there, I still find myself for the most part helpless to move. My body continues to shift around in strange, nauseating ways. The bones slide under my white skin, no my white furred skin, distorting its surface with their impossible movements. I can’t stop moving my bones in that... way. I’m still getting pulled and tugged around unnaturally. But the pain is fading, and my arms and legs are curling all by themselves above me, in bizarrely satisfying cracks and pops, to resemble the forelegs and hindquarters of a... a pony.
I don’t know why it changes my gender last. Whatever this magic is flowing through me, it seems... confused, like it got halfway done assembling a machine and then found an extra part that didn’t go anywhere. Me being the machine, I suppose. But my masculinity, or stallioninity stubbornly holds on, until my arms and legs are no longer shifting, curled above me in such a strange fashion. All but one of my fingers are gone, making my hands feel... incredibly strange. There’s this creamy white fur already thick over my whole body. Then... I feel it.
Because of more nerve endings I guess, the one change I feel most strongly, is the one I care about the most. That is compared to say, my spleen or my heart, which is beating at a thousand times a minute right now, mind you. I breathe in short gasps, as I... respond physically to something very provocative happening between my legs. It’s still a very... male anatomy. I’m not especially concerned, because if I can change into a pony, then I sure as sugar can find a way to change into a mare! I wouldn’t let h... h-uh, hell...? That place I’m thinking about won’t even stop me. I’ll one-on-one with Tirek as a cute little mare, if that’s what it takes to be a cute little mare. Oh please let me be a mare....
Turns out I don’t have to worry though, because then there’s this incredible release of pressure. My groin just... I don’t want to say it just falls to pieces, but it changes, dramatically. No blood at any point, but things are certainly starting to look fleshy down there. The whole process is about as comfortable as pulling away from really gluey tree sap, along with the rest of my body’s bizarre movations.
There is a sudden pain then, as two certain somethings draw up tightly against me. “Achtchsk!” is sort of the sound I make at the suddenly increasing discomfort and tension, though it’s barely a tiny hint of the pain that suffused my every cell a moment ago. This tension too releases then, the two little spheres popping up into my pelvis and just... vanishing within me.
It’s so strange that none of this really hurts anymore. I felt like every molecule was igniting into sparkles, but now the flashes of pain and discomfort feel like they’re... restoring, rather than further distorting. Everything about me seems to be finishing up, as I lie there in exhaustion, surprised that I’m alive, and even with how strange my whole body’s experience has been, surprised at what’s happening between my legs. .
The heavy pressure feels like I’m being filled with clay, as my pelvis collapses and widens before it. I can actually feel it pushing up into me, like an inflating balloon, except I’m the balloon. I feel pressure like that all over my body, molding me and shaping me, but nowhere else is the feeling quite so... concave. My vision wavers between blurry to clear, as I manage to roll onto my side, feeling... things moving inside me, under my nose, in my chest, and between my legs seems to be... it must be... a...
“Thank you,” I manage to croak out, as tears start flooding my eyes. Those words are in a voice I never thought I’d hear. Not a man’s voice, but high and sweet. Not a voice I knew, or recognized, but one I wanted. I knew I wanted this badly, but I never realized just how badly until now. “Thank you,” I repeat in that strange voice, thanking whoever, or whatever did this to me. “Thank you—” I manage to say a third time, before I start getting choked up with sobs. And that... changes everything.
I don’t know if it was just me or... guys in general, or humans in general, but you know that burning sensation when you cry? Think of that times ten. As puberty came upon me, it was like I was using lemon juice for eyedrops or something, in the rare instances when a tear came to my eye. I stopped being able to cry almost entirely, lucky if I could get even one tear to trickle down my cheek, no matter how distraught I was.
I think something was wrong with me, allergies I guess, but I don’t know for sure. I was a guy, so nobody was really concerned with of all things, a man’s inability to cry. Sad things left me dry eyed, and hopelessness made it harder to feel sad about anything. My burning, reddened eyes would feel gritty and raw, yet I was so desperate for some sort of expression that I sought out this pain, and did it deliberately. I came to treasure the few sad songs that for all it hurt, could at most give me a single tear.
So yeah... I got a vagina, maybe, I think, but what’s really a life-changing experience is breaking down into sobs there in the strange looking pit that’s replaced the forest I thought I was entering. Feeling my own tears hit the frozen ground. I can’t stop crying, but I don’t sound like a dying babboon in making these sounds. I sound like a... like an emotional wreck of a girl. I only have the vaguest ideas about what just happened, but being able to cry and not feeling bad about it, that’s... that’s something I would never deny to any girl or guy, if I had the power to do so.
Emotional release is great and all, but it isn’t very good at keeping you warm. I’ve got a pair of... er... very large men’s briefs barely hanging off of one of my feet. And... that’s about it. I lift my head, looking around for the portal... nothing. I think I really would have missed it, if I didn’t jump through right then! Then again, I have no idea how long I’ve lain here in violated agony. Maybe it was minutes, maybe hours. Am I... done?
I... don’t feel any weird movement within my body anymore, so maybe it’s done? Maybe I could try to move now?
I test moving my left arm, then my right, then each of my legs. My tail continues to lie there limply, but the rest of me seems to respond with relative familiarity. My feet have grown long and slim, and my knees feel sort of stuck in a crooked position. Almost half the length of the arms curled above me is what used to be my hands. Though naturally crooked when lying down, I can curl my the ends of my arms even further, curling my arms into two crude looking but hopefully functional hooks. The tips of those off-white cylinders, my forehooves... they feel sort of like my middle fingers.
Curious, I try to move my other fingers, besides the middle ones. Nothing happens, of course. My thumb doesn’t even... I don’t even have a thumb pad to move it with, just a long, slim palm, that forms my lower leg. My hoof crooks down at my wrist, where you’d think my elbow would crook up, and my elbow crooks up right next to me, where my shoulder would go. My hind legs are... a little easier to comprehend, odd as that may sound. One toe for each of them, with a heel almost halfway up, and my knees more fixed in place than I’m used to, within two broad, wide thighs.
I manage to roll onto my side, and it’s pretty obvious I have no wings. Am I a unicorn then, or an earth pony? The encroaching chill has me worried, so I twist a front... arm/leg around and rub its thick side against my forehead. There, I only find the smooth, round curve of my cranium, beneath a bountiful bush of pink hair. I’m an earth pony.
Sighing in relief, I let my hoof curl back down in front of me, and try to start thinking about getting up and finding my way out of this place. If I could get on my belly, maybe I could—wait um—
I have to struggle there for a while, growing less cold as I try to roll over with my ungainly limbs tangling against the ground. Finally, flopping back my side with a sigh, I try rotating only my upper torso, bracing my forehooves against the earth one after the other like I’m crawling out of a pit, then pushing myself up on them. My hindquarters remain limply on their side, but I’m at least... halfway standing? This is an... incredibly awkward position, but there’s only one way out of it. The twisting tension to my lower body gives me leverage to swivel my hips, curl one of my crooked hind legs tightly underneath me, and plant it down.
Okay three hooves down, one hoof to—woah. Actually, up on three hooves like this, there’s nowhere for my fourth to go, besides putting it down beside the other rear hoof. I lift my head up, continuing to lift it up far further than any terrestrial horse, until my neck settles against my shoulders, and I’m... standing, I suppose.
I feel like I’m going to fall forward, like this comfortable stance has me off balance somehow, but I hope that’s just a temporary thing. My head feels... independent from my body, like my shoulders were just a place for it to land and roost. I can still feel the rest of my body though, the icy chill against my skin, the weight on my legs, the tail dragging...
Oh, hey! I can feel my tail! The soft pink hairs drag against the earth as I stand, and belatedly, I realize that I can feel them dragging, tugging at me. In fact, the earth feels kind of... gritty underneath them. I’m not sure what I’m feeling there.
Standing, I have no wings to learn about, so I guess this is pretty much it. I try to take a step and immediately faceplant. Ow... pony snouts are more sensitive than I thought they’d be! It’s really, really chilly out here, and I’m not sure on my hooves. I seem to be standing in some kind of cavernous bowl carved out of the earth, with... oh dear. With torn, fallen trees lining the border.
“Did I do this?” I ask fearfully, looking around as I stand on four shaky legs. There is nothing around me but a chilly silence. At last, I try cautiously reaching one forehoof out, before trying to sink my weight on it. It works, and I move a hind foot. Two limbs later, my underwear catches on my trailing hind leg and I fall on my face again.
I manage to turn my cheek this time at least, so my sensitive snout doesn’t get smacked right into the dirt. Groaning, I carefully collect my legs under me and, shakily, stand again. It’s easier the second time, but I still feel really unsteady. Kicking my hind leg to discard those accursed briefs, I try to walk again. I succeed surprisingly easily, simply by alternating the limbs I move forward. It works just like I had planned in my madness. A madness in which a creature who would never be able to stand on four legs spent a lot of time figuring (among other things) that a trot is the equivalent of a four-legged skip, and a gallop would be a rapid series of powerful leaps, with the hind legs and the forelegs moving together.
...maybe I’ll just stick with simply plodding for now.
I wobble unsteadily forward in one, two, three steps, and then I almost run into the portal again.
It balloons open smoothly in front of me, appearing out of nowhere as I rear up in panic, flailing my forelegs, and thening learn firsthand what it feels like when a mare’s rump smacks onto frozen, gravelly dirt. I start to scoot back in fear, but the portal is just... sitting there, serene and smooth, with a barely perceptible hum. Through it, I see my apartment again, the couch that I was sitting on, the kitchenette/bar behind it that I heated coffee on, despite hating coffee, the pillows that my parents sent to decorate my couch with, because they didn’t know what else to do, the bottle of lotion whose... uses are better left unsaid.
My laptop’s open on the coffee table as I peer at it curiously through the edge of the portal. It seems to be still displaying its contents, some... questionable acts with a stallion, that may have had something to do with the bottle of lotion and tissues.
A warm breeze wafts from the portal.
I look around at the edge of this... crater I’m standing in. The sky is white overhead, and the trees are bare of leaves. Snow lies everywhere. I look back at the portal, already feeling a chill pervading me. Ponies don’t care about the cold, right? I can just... do this naked, right? But where do I go? I have no idea which way Ponyville, or even Equestria is. I’m pretty obviously a pony, so there’s no reason to think the rest doesn’t exist, but not a sound comes to my ears, no matter how hard I listen. Only the hum of the portal, the rush of automobile traffic, and the quiet whirr of my laptop’s cooling fan.
I should go back. This portal seems to open in my presence, so it should be safe to go back through it and get some supplies. I could get some warm clothing, some pony appropriate food, my laptop, and any number of things. I could leave a note for anyone who came by, to stay away from the portal unless they want to be painfully transformed into a pony, and possibly one of the opposite gender. I could call my parents, tell them I’m going away for a while. I could call NASA, or... whoever you call about stuff like this. I could do all that stuff, but in order to do so, I might have to change back into a man.
It’s almost vertigo I feel, as if the ground is a cliff, and the portal in front of me is a pit below me. I’m afraid to get up, because I might get closer to it. I should go through it, just temporarily, but I just can’t.
Swallowing my fear, I rise to my er... wrists, and then manage to get my hind hooves planted under me. Straightening one foreleg and planting the hoof of another, I manage to stand sideways to the portal on my left. I’d rather be standing facing directly away from it, but I don’t want to risk learning how to change directions when I walk. Not so close to this thing. I simply walk sideways to it, distancing myself until it closes again, leaving no evidence that it was ever here. You know, except for the giant crater and all.
Once away from the portal, I test my weight on each of my four hooves. It feels like standing on the tips of my toes, except those tips are broad, flat and stable. I guess I traded clown feet for clown toes, then? Are my hooves slim and dainty, or large and brawny? I’m...
I’m standing on hooves. I’m a mare! Can I get pregnant now? Did the magic go so far as to grant me that? I can’t see why it wouldn’t! What if I get raped? Do ponies have abortion services? This is amazing! I look around at the quiet woods.
Are there any ponies at all?
A chill sweeps through me as the wind blows overhead. Looking at my fallen underwear, it smells of the spicy saffron cinnamon of a man’s groin. I don’t think I smell like that, anymore. Wincing, I bite the edge of it in my teeth, and clumsily throw its fabric over my back. It’s... all I’ve got to cover myself with. I look longingly back at where the portal was, still trying to convince myself to go back to being human, just for a little bit. If only I had the courage to go back long enough to get a coat. Maybe I should just—wait. No.
No no no. I hobble away from that portal as fast as my pony hooves can take me. How did I not see it before? How did I not realize the connection here?
There was a story I read long ago, but have never been able to find since. It told of a man who came upon a group of old men weeping in the desert. He asked why they were so bereft, and they pointed him to a door standing there incongruously in the sand. “Through that door lies only sorrow,” they told him. “Through that door lies the greatest treasure you have ever known.”
The man did not understand, and the old men refused to explain, stating that it would do them no good. But curiosity burned in his breast, and he opened the door, preparing for the worst. He went through to find a great city hidden beyond it. In his adventures there, the city’s beautiful princess came to fall in love with him. Wedded to her, he one day became the king. People respected him for his judgement, the city prospered with trade from mysterious sources, and his wife eagerly accepted him into herself, until she gave birth to his son. He could never have imagined his life would have gone this way. Truly things could never be better for him. Could they?
Years passed, and the question hounded him. Was this all life had to offer? They said the greatest treasure lay through this door. Was his city, his wife and child that treasure? Or were they only the beginning of an even greater journey? In his older years, the man was not as able as he once was, and longed for the adventures of his youth. He wondered if something more lay beyond that door, and one day he made love to his wife, kissed his new daughter, praised his son’s achievements, then went through the door to see what was on the other side.
On the other side was the group of old men, weeping in the desert. The king saw them, and remembered their strange words so many years ago. When he turned around, the door was just a door. There was nothing through it besides the empty desert sands beyond stretching as far as the eye could see.
My hind legs kick frantically as I scramble out of the crater and then stumble into the woods. Only sinking up to my heels in icy snow stops me from senselessly fleeing further away. Looking back at the dark brown crater, I find myself shivering, not just from the cold. I remember that story, how horrible it was, and how I would never, ever look a gift horse in the mouth. No, I’m not going back there, not if it risks me being in an aesop about how terrible it is to explore, how awful you are for hoping you can find a better life for yourself.
I never in a million years thought that my wish to be the one who does not go through the door twice would ever actually happen. To me, it was just another adventure I could never have. Baseless speculation. What happened just now is impossible. This... this incredible experience has got to be a dream. Some kind of delusion. I feel fine, if cold, but I’m standing on four legs. I have a fluffing horse pussy. And that’s about all I know about myself, but it’s more than I ever could have hoped for.
Stories like the old men in the desert, they don’t really happen, but people dream that they do, and the way to end the dream is to end the story. To walk through the door, and find yourself waking up boringly human again... and...male. You can’t stop it, because you can’t avoid waking up, so the dream will always find a way.
I’m fine. I’m doing... fine. So I’m shivering, that’s nothing to worry about. Ponies can handle the cold. I can handle the cold. I have fur now. If my subconscious mind is going to give me a wonderful dream like this, it wouldn’t go so far as to make me perish from exposure to end the dream, would it? As I gaze with confusion and dread at the source of my coming, that dark pit in the woods, soft white flakes start to descend from the sky, landing on me, and painting the dirt of the crater in white speckles.
Okay, moving. Right. I gotta get moving. That’ll warm me up good. But where to go? The woods are all around me, in a frustratingly flat landscape. Underbrush isn’t thick in the winter, but I can’t see any sort of a landmark except for the crater. If I could climb a tree I might have better luck finding landmarks, but like this, I can barely walk. Any direction I go could end up being the complete opposite direction to wherever the ponies are living.
All I can do is wander in wider and wider circles, until I come across a landmark, or some sort of creek. You can almost always find civilization if you travel downstream far enough. I don’t know if there’s any better way to find your way. Maybe walk in one direction until you find a landmark? Well, the crater is pretty visible for now, so I can use that as a landmark. If I also mark my trail, I can probably keep up the concentric circles plan just fine.
So I take my first step into the unknown, trip over a hidden branch, and fall flat on my face in the snow.
This could... take a while.
A while is right! I barely manage to make two circles of the crater, before visibility is poor enough that I can’t see the crater anymore, through the falling snow. Are there pegasi above, making it snow? I am in Equestria, aren’t I?
“Hello!” I call out in a sharp, bell-like lilt. Then with my butt sinking into the icy snow, I lift my forehooves to my snout and shout as loudly and harshly as a little girl can do, “Hello?! Is any— anypony up there?!”
No answer.
I can’t lose hope though. I’ve transformed into a pony, so there has got to be some significance about that. There have to be other ponies somewhere. I just have to suck it up, and keep going, and... going... and going...
An unbearable amount of walking later, I groan to myself, “I’ve never walked before in my life,” after standing up from tripping over something, again. My muscles are aching, and my hooves are sore, and I can’t figure out how to lift my tail so it’s becoming heavily encrusted with snow, dragging behind me.
I can’t stop though. The wind whipping through my mane seems to steal the warmth away from my skin, but I don’t feel as cold if I keep moving. As long as I keep going, the icy chill won’t eat up through my legs into my chest. I’m getting hungry, but there’s no berries, or even leaves to eat, not that I’d know what was safe around here. At least there’s plenty of water to eat.
To my horror, the light starts to fade. I’m falling over exhausted by now, and I’ve still found nothing but dead underbrush and sleeping trees. No landmarks, no creeks. My thought to mark my trail has saved me a few times over the day: noticing a tree that I kicked until there was a gash in the bark, making sure to keep those far to my left, so that I can increase my search radius. But now it’s... it’s getting dark. I try to quench my thirst with some frozen snow, but that just makes me feel horrible and shiver even more. All I can do is walk forward, step after pony step. How could I have actually walked for so long, that it’s getting dark?!
Despite my earnest effort, everything around me dims to blackness, then utter blackness. If the moon is out, it can’t be seen beyond the thick cloud cover. When it’s too dark for me to even see, it becomes painfully clear how I’ve lived my whole life surrounded by bright city lights. I can’t even see the hoof in front of my face. I’m cold, tired and sore, and I can’t even walk anymore, because I’ll run headlong into a tree trunk that way.
I—I’m shivering so hard, and I can’t walk to keep myself warm anymore. I’m not going to make it, am I? I should’ve gone back. I should’ve found somepony by now. I stand there shivering in an immense darkness more profound than I’ve ever seen. It feels like I’m a tiny speck lost in an empty, black void, nothing in existence besides me, the snow I’m ankle deep in, and darkness beyond. I just...
I just collapse onto my belly. Not from exhaustion, but in frustration, because I don’t know what to do, and I don’t want to die. Not now! Not when I finally became the most beautiful thing I could imagine! My belly is so cold against the snow. I can’t stop the cold, can’t stop just dying here stupidly with not even a chance to survive. I hate it so much.
Do I get to go to pony heaven, or is it just ontological annihilation like with humans? I don’t know. I’m so scared... my cannons scrape against the frozen ground as I curl up and just shiver, trying to stay awake, curling everything tightly underneath myself, trying to make myself fluffier, trying to keep warm somehow. I lost the underwear somewhere back... there, but it was useless anyway. Just like everything in this stupid, horrible nightmare of a stupid, horrible world. I just wanted things to be better, and now all I get to do is... die?
At some point in my bitter, terrified sobs, I realize that I’ve passed out. There’s this cold... heaviness all over me, and I can’t feel even the slightest warmth within me. I jerk up in terror, at the primal fear of being trapped in a dying body, paralyzed for my last moments. Doing so makes my head pop up out of the snow into the bright, morning daylight.
I... what? I look around at the serene, snow-covered forest, a shining whiteness covering over everything, including myself. Apparently it started snowing again during the night, while I was... sleeping? Looking up, I shake my head to scatter the snow that’s piled on top of it.
“I...” I say in a girl’s voice, in utter befuddlement, “I survived the night?” My sweet voice is tired and scratchy, but... intact. Everything feels cold and sore, but I try standing up. One after another, my hooves plant underneath me and raise me up out from where I was lying in a pit in the snow. That snow cascades off my back and I look back at my own cream colored, pink tailed rump with astonishment, before throwing my head back and declaring to the world, “Aw, yeah! Earth pony master race!”
Of course, then I have to walk some more.
I start shivering again, once I start moving, strangely enough. I wonder how close I did come to dying back there? I try to occupy myself as best I can, and distract myself from the pit of hunger in my stomach. “W-winter W-wrapup, Wint-ter W-wrapup~“ I sing in the silence. My voice is... well it’s honestly higher in pitch than I’d find ideal. There’s nothing I love more than the sexy caramel voice of Nowacking making that DJ-horse sound absolutely incredible. But at this point, I’m not even close to complaining.
Maybe when I find out that I’m magically barren and also made out of cloth and stuffing, or maybe cheap rubberized plastic, with a snarky cowboy teasing me for thinking I’m real, then I’ll be upset. Having a voice that sounds even girlier than I wanted? Honestly the little particulars like voice, height, tightness, and uh, species, never really mattered all that much to me. As long as I could be... what I needed to be, I was fine with everything else. Being a soprano is qualitatively better than being a baritone, for me at least.
As I trudge on, I get through all the songs I can remember, and turn to impressions. I can actually do a pretty good Twilight, I think. I try to do Pinkie Pie, but I get as far as “I’veneverbeensoex” before I fall over my words since I’m doing nothing but shivering it seems, since I’m still not used to having this (relatively) long, flexible snout, and since I’m already exhausted halfway through the day. In fact, I was exhausted and hungry when I started out today, and so very thirsty. But I survived the night, when I thought I was gonna die. So now all I can do is trust that this body will hold out long enough for me to find help.
I really am exhausted though. I can’t keep walking all day. I have to stop, and take more and more frequent breaks. Once I even doze off on my feet, half leaning against a tree. I snort awake, and woah it sounds like a horse. But then I realize I drifted off, and I can’t waste this precious daylight, since I’m basically stuck in one spot all night.
Then, I have to figure out how to unlock my legs.
That uh... wow, they’re really—oh there it goes I can lift that hoof now.
Then, I can get on with my adventure!
I stop walking at one point and try to dig through the snow some, to see if I can find anything edible under there. The rotting leaves laying beneath the snow taste horrible. I can’t believe how hungry I am. I’m only walking forward at this point, because I think there’s food waiting for me there. I’d go all the way back to where I started, if I could just get some food in my belly. It audibly growls, just like in the show, but unlike the show, this isn’t adorable at all. I can’t...
I can’t keep walking like this, if I don’t find something to eat. I feel so weak and hungry and tired. Can—can ponies eat holly? They can eat poisonous stuff, right? Well, I don’t even find any holly, just oaks, ash and maples all bare and dead asleep. And it’s... it’s getting dark again.
I’m a little prepared for the darkness, this time. I try to find something to make a shelter with, but I’m not exactly what you’d call a wilderness survivor. Plus I’m too tired to try and gather this stuff. I feel like I can barely lift my legs to move forward! But I do dig out a sort of... shallow pit, at least, so I don’t have to melt the snow under me this time when I sleep.
Then I just kind of collapse into it, curling up in the fetal position, as my whimpering turns to crying, because I’m going to have to walk more when I wake up. It’s only been two days, and I already feel like I’m dying. Heck, I felt like I was dying on the very first night! I just... didn’t.
Sleep doesn’t come easy, believe it or not. I have to fight down the powerful urge to get up and go find something to eat, even though I know I need sleep, and there’s nothing out there to eat. I wonder for a moment if I would even like grazing, and I swear it’s like a punch in my gut as visions drift through my mind of standing in fields of juicy green, tilting my head down and biting, uh, grass. What I wouldn’t give for some grass... or some more conventional pony food too. Cupcakes, and fritters, and apples, and pies, and birds, and milkshakes, and muffins, and potato chips oh I want some chips so bad.
Somewhere in that... thing, I once again fall asleep, and when I awaken the morning er... gloom greets me. The sun isn’t out, but at least the landscape is visible. I look around dully, and I just want to go back to sleep. I just want to lie here and let this stupid world finish me off, like it seems to insist upon. Is this how dreams really go, before you wake up? All this pain and walking and joy, and hope will be forgotten, and when I awaken I’ll only remember disconnected moments from my journey?
At this point, that’d be better than remembering the whole thing. I can’t possibly be dreaming anyway. I’d have woken up in my bed a thousand times over the past two days. No, what’s happening to me is so surreal, that it has to be real. I try to climb to my feet, and just... collapse. Frustration wells up in me as I sink down, wondering why I even bother to try.
Then a... white rabbit comes out of the undergrowth, and hops past me. Not even seeming to notice me, or care, the little thing twitches its nose and swivels its ears around in a most unconcerned fashion. Then it leisurely hops across the surface of the snow into some other dry bushes.
“What was the point of that?” I mutter.
But somehow, it helps. I pick myself up again, and return to my widening and increasingly wandering circles. I push through bushes of my own, pondering the significance of that morning as I walk. “That’s the first living...uh...” I stare dully at the trees before me, “...animal I’ve seen since coming here,” I finally conclude hoarsely. I’m so thirsty, I stop to try to eat some snow, but it makes me so cold, and... I am having a hard time thinking about whether it’s worse to be cold, or to be thirsty. I just can’t bring myself to do it. I feel parched, but... huh, I don’t feel hungry at all.
Indeed, I feel like I’m on the precipice of collapse as I slog on through the snow, trying not to trip over anything... again. But my stomach is oddly quiescent. I feel kind of... woozy, but otherwise fine. I’d eat something if it was right in front of me, but... I dunno, maybe this is some kind of earth pony power. I just don’t care enough to want to eat anything.
When I find the creek, I almost can’t believe it. I hear it before I see it, when one of my wonderful, beautiful, conical ears turns towards my salvation. Snapping my head around, I can’t believe it but I hear a tiny, muffled trickling. Abandoning my awful quest to walk in circles, I shove my body in that direction and hurry on towards the noise.
I find a creek, a frozen creek, mind you, with only a little trickle of water dribbling through a shrinking hole in the ice.
“Oh thank—” I start to exclaim, but the only word I can think of for God is “God” and that sounds way too evil and nasty to be the word I was thinking of. Shrugging, I fall back on, “Thank Celestia this is here.”
I can see myself in the twisted, frozen ice. I see vague, distorted reflections, mostly just a sheen of pink that’d be the mane on my head. My fur doesn’t really register, so similar it is to the color of the snow around me. No way I could see myself in this thing, I guess. Maybe if I find a pond, or... a mirror I guess. I wonder what color my eyes are.
I know this is probably definitely a really stupid idea, but I do stick my head down and try to take a drink from what part of the creek is still liquid. I manage to at least get a little water into my mouth. I guess I’m thinking that giardia can be treated, but dying of thirst cannot, but I don’t really think I’m thinking very much at all anymore. Not with more walking to do, nothing to eat, and the icy chill in the air penetrating even my bones.
No, I just... stick with the plan. I turn away from the trickle, and plod downstream, down the slight downward grade that directs the creek’s flow, when the water isn’t mostly frozen solid. As I walk, the creek meets with another frozen creek, so my idea of following the creek is looking promising already. I have to run into civilization soon, if there’s any to be found. I can’t really find it in me to be excited though. I’m just worn out, and ready to be done, and safe and warm with lots of food and happy ponies and stallions and—
...and things.
I have to avoid the creek’s banks, which grow kind of steep at some point. It’s a pretty young creek though, so I don’t think it’s gonna turn into a huge canyon any time soon. I think about singing, but my throat kind of hurts from being so dry, and I thought I told myself I wasn’t going to drink from the creek, didn’t I? Did I drink from the creek? I don’t even know anymore.
Am I really going to be... going for stallions? My thoughts turn back to those lines, and it’s kind of weird to think about. I’ve always liked “stallions” I mean, but with me in the equation, sex always felt wrong. Now I could actually court straight stallions, and... and have their babies, I guess? I feel remarkably unenthusiastic about that, much like I remain unenthusiastic about anything at this point. But it is an... interesting thing to think about, if I ever...when I find civilization.
It’s kind of nice to be able to think about it in a detached sort of manner. If I’m going to be a mare, I’m probably going to have stallions trying to get inside me. If ponies go around naked all the time, it’d be too easy to get impregnated, just like on your way to the market or whatever. I’ll have to learn about defending myself, not that I don’t want stallions inside me, but I really don’t want to get stuck with pregnancy. But why would I want to be a woman, if not to get pregnant?
I wonder what gender ratios are like in Equestria? I don’t wanna be a lonely single mare just like I was a lonely single man. Am I going to have to share a stallion with other mares? Do ponies form harems? But the show is so locked down that it only depicts monogamous happy couples. That’d be good for me though, because more stallions means stallions would be more desperate to get inside me. Wait no that’s bad, isn’t it.
I really hope this isn’t Minnesota.
I collapse again, when I see an actual walking path. When it passes close enough to the creek for me to notice the break in the trees, I slow and turn my head to see the path, then just... topple in exhaustion. It’s a relief that fells me, and also drives me back to my four feet: a sign of civilization. Lurching out of the bushes, I’m lucky I’m on the right side of the creek. I don’t think I could navigate the steep banks to cross it, with how tired I am. I end up wobbly legged but standing; standing on a snowed over, but well beaten path, a clear break in the trees. Now the only question is... which way leads to shelter, and food, left, or right?
Left is the direction that continues to follow the creek downstream, so that’s the way I go. The path curves away from the creek, and I lose sight of it, but a path this big has gotta lead somewhere. If I can just keep going a little further, maybe I can find... something. Anything but these snowy woods. I’m so cold, my limbs are sluggish and weak. I can’t feel my hooves anymore, and my tail is still dragging in the snow. At this point I’d almost have accepted the fate of being a stallion, if it meant finally finding someplace warm. Almost.
I round a bend, finding a break in the trees that leads to...
I stop and stare.
Am I hallucinating? I thought I was in Equestria, but I never believed it. I turned into a pretty pink-haired mare, and even that wasn’t enough to drive it through my head that things are different now. That good things can happen. That amazing confluences of events can come true. I see serendipity.
What I see before me across a snowy field, is a row of cottages. Like candy houses, their eaves and windowsills are a soft pink. Carvings of hearts and leaves decorate the shutters. Each cottage is built on a sturdy, unpainted wood frame with creamy white walls the same color as my fur. Generous heaps of straw form thick slanting roofs, that are covered in white snow. Smoke trickles out of little chimneys embedded in them. In the dimming evening light, the windows are glowing with cozy warm fires from within.
Beyond the cottages, there are ever more cottages lining well trammeled snow covered paths. The paths lead away from where I stand, further into town, and on those paths... there are ponies. Colorful ponies trot to and fro, standing on four hooves just like I am, but living in a village that they built with those hooves. I would recognize these cottages even if I hadn’t seen them for a thousand years. I can’t believe it, but I know exactly what I’m looking at right now.
Ponyville.
The same story but with Rose's perspective?
8447874
https://derpibooru.org/1531743
By the way, why the definite article in "I just want to be the little pony!" in the description?
8449220
It's from the phrase uttered in dark corners of the internet "I wish to be the little girl." It's supposed to sound oddly specific, to make the speaker sound more sinister, and less like a flailing idiot.
8449425
Ah, huh; thanks.
Comments on Chapter 4:
"What are your counters made out of?"
Thanks! :)
And a neat answer.
I don't think I've ever really gotten why some people seem to have trouble with the idea of rock farming as an actual, literal thing in Equestria...
"reply to that persay, but"
"reply to that per se, but"?
The transition to the dining area seems a bit abrupt to me. And were Mr. and Mrs. Cake listening to the whole conversation with Pinkie, that they responded that quickly, or... what's going on there?
So Gummy usually lives downstairs? Or does he only use his tubquarium sometimes, despite it being reserved for his use most of the time? And if it's-- Ah! Wait, was that a singular "Your", referring to Pinkie's bathtub, specifically, not a bathtub for the house (well, home areas of the building)? And it isn't usually upstairs because it doesn't usually exist as a bathtub at all, instead being a tubquarium?
"this town, the Cake’s bathroom"
"this town, the Cakes' bathroom"?
"waving a hoof at the direction of a"
"waving a hoof in the direction of a"?
"lifting my arm up and hooking"
"lifting my right arm up and hooking"?
Ah, neat. One control for mass flow and one for mix ratio? Hm. Doing that with only two valves would require the mass flow valve to be downstream of the mix ratio valve (the design of which seems like it would be a bit more complicated) would have the hot and cold water lines connected constantly unless the mix valve was all the way one way or the other, and having one control actuating two valves upstream of the mix valve would require more valves and more complicated plumbing. And the mass flow could use a pair of simpler valves instead of one more complicated one. I wonder what particular design they went with? Not-Yet-Named-Rosy didn't seem to see anything odd (meaning, not fitting with her expected design) about the plumbing at first, but she may just not have been paying a tremendous amount of attention to it. Hm, though we also aren't told that the complicated parts aren't in a some sort of black box with pipes and controls entering and leaving but no clues to the internal arrangements.
Ooh, I wonder if this Ponyville has a district heating system?
"Mrs. Cake says seeming a little disconcerted"
"Mrs. Cake says, seeming a little disconcerted"?
"Just... stand around with other ponies"
"Just... standing around with other ponies"?
"up to her head an hooks the edge"
"up to her head and hooks the edge"?
"And just like that, my whole worldview exploded... again."
:)
8451915
Thanks! I do try.
Check the HTML source...
Should I make that more obvious?
Why does nohuman do this??
Well, yeah. Is that a problem?
No. No that's the problem with the human world. One control for both ratio and flow. It's the worst possible faucet!
Um... I suppose they could? Seems inefficient to pipe hot water all that way.
I AM THE MEME QUEEN
Thanks for your help!
8453624
"Check the HTML source..."
Ohh, you're planning to take more questions for readers and add those in? The transition looks abrupt because it isn't finished yet? :)
"Should I make that more obvious?"
I think it would be, while not vital, good, but I'm still blanking on how to do it.
...Actually... Might be as simple as "It’s usually Gummy’s tubquarium" to "My bathtub’s usually Gummy’s tubquarium"? That seems like it'd work; I'm not sure why I didn't think of it before.
"Why does nohuman do this?? "
I wondered that too, following reading the chapter. I'm guessing a combination of added complexity and a holdover from when the taps were entirely separate.
"Well, yeah. Is that a problem?"
It means that the hot and cold water lines aren't isolated from each other when the mass flow valve is cold. That might or might not be a problem, but it could have a number of effects not present if they were isolated. For instance, if a hot tap elsewhere in the house is open, it could draw water either from the water heater or from the cold water line through the partially open mixing valve, and seems likely to do some of both. Different configurations of open valves in the system, especially if any of them also break isolation, could result in varying water flows and thus water temperatures. There also might be a problem with hot water rising through the pipes and, since there's a loop, causing a current to flow.
"No. No that's the problem with the human world. One control for both ratio and flow. It's the worst possible faucet! "
Oh, that's not what I meant. One control turns a rod that simultaneously actuates a mass flow valve on the hot pipe and a mass flow valve on the cold pipe; it's still one control for mass flow and mass flow only. The mix control then controls one or more mixing valves downstream of the mass flow valves. The system allows the desired control scheme while preserving hot and cold line isolation, but at the cost of some additional mechanical complexity.
"Um... I suppose they could? Seems inefficient to pipe hot water all that way."
It's not necessarily piping hot water, or potable hot water; the thermal transfer could be through well-insulated steam lines or hot water lines which connect with heat exchangers in the basements of served buildings. It is often possible to make up for the small loss through a well-insulated piping system with gains in efficiency from having a single, larger, more consistently-running and possibly better-tended heat source.
Ah, a relevant Wikipedia link, I think.
Not sure how well this fits this Ponyville, though. I just at one point took Spike's line about using up all the hot water in town and ran with it...
"I AM THE MEME QUEEN"
Oh, I didn't see a meme in that? Was it the "exploded twice" thing?
"Thanks for your help! "
You're quite welcome! :)
8453638
I've actually been looking for someone selling a faucet system that replaces 2 taps for hot and cold, with 2 taps for ratio and flow. Absolutely no luck so far, though there are like... showerheads you can get with a valve to block the water at the end of the hose. Even those are annoyingly rare.
I'm pretty sure there are one-way valves more upstream of there, since my sink faucets never made a sucking noise.
Oh, I see what you mean. I suppose that might be a good idea?
H..huh. I guess it would literally be canon, then. Unless he's some kind of bath taking ninja, sneaking from house to house, emptying out everypony's water heaters.
I'm not the meme queen, but yes. Ever since My Little Dashie, I have been unable to resist making horribly executed blatant references to that annoyingly persistent line.
Welcome to what?
8453682
"I've actually been looking for someone selling a faucet system that replaces 2 taps for hot and cold, with 2 taps for ratio and flow. Absolutely no luck so far, though there are like... showerheads you can get with a valve to block the water at the end of the hose. Even those are annoyingly rare."
Ah, sorry. Maybe you could build your own?
"I'm pretty sure there are one-way valves more upstream of there, since my sink faucets never made a sucking noise."
I don't follow, I'm afraid. Why would they? If they're open, isn't the path of least resistance out the tap against just about one atmosphere of air, instead of into the other pipe filled with higher-pressure water? I'm talking about if there's no opening to the atmosphere, just an opening between the hot and cold lines.
"Oh, I see what you mean. I suppose that might be a good idea?"
Well, it seems to give less scope for problems, at least.
"H..huh. I guess it would literally be canon, then."
Aye, it's kind of interesting, though I assume the show writers weren't really thinking about it much. I believe I decided that Ponyville's system was likely fuelled by wood gas, though I don't remember how much of that was based on reasoning that's not current coming back to mind and how much was just thinking it would be interesting and plausible enough. Of course, this Ponyville might use something different, if it has a district heating system at all.
"Unless he's some kind of bath taking ninja, sneaking from house to house, emptying out everypony's water heaters."
Hah! Not an interpretation I'd thought of! :D
"I'm not the meme queen, but yes. Ever since My Little Dashie, I have been unable to resist making horribly executed blatant references to that annoyingly persistent line."
Ah, thanks. :)
"Welcome to what?"
...Huh. What does that mean? "Thank you", clear enough: I thank you. "You're welcome"... you are welcome to give me thanks? Hang on, I'm going to try looking up the history...
Okay, so still not sure, but this might be the best source I found in my quick search.
The things we don't think to think about...
Also!
Comments on the Fallout Equestria story, Chapter 9:
"be awkward enough in of itself"
"be awkward enough in and of itself"?
"beyond, nor a God in pony form"
"beyond, nor a god in pony form"?
Huh. Kind of surprised Junktown has a dedicated construction worker. Maybe she got her cutie mark in it and makes it her primary job even if it's not her most frequently done one?
"One-eye Truffle said"
Hm. Maybe "One-Eye Truffle said"? I'm not sure.
"H-hear there’s s-some in Appleoosa too"
Huh. Interesting.
"at Littlepip with look of horror in her"
"at Littlepip with a look of horror in her"?
Coming back from the next chapter:
"Before she did, Littlepip built a bigger chalkboard to give some writing space"
"Before she did, Littlepip built a bigger chalkboard next to the first one to give some writing space"?
I at first missed that she'd added a chalkboard rather than replaced the old one. Looking back, I see at least one mention of multiple chalkboards after this in this chapter that I missed before, but I'd gotten the idea in my head here. Sorry.
And Chapter 10:
"She lifted that chalkboard, and she didn’t wipe it off. She carefully transported it back to the city, and took it straight to the general store!"
"She lifted those chalkboards, and she didn’t wipe them off. She carefully transported them back to the city, and took them straight to the general store!"?
"shoring the walls up are going to help against"
"shoring the walls up is going to help against"?
"by a lil’ yellow filly in a spacesuit"
Why does the font change on "yellow filly" and "spacesuit"?
Also, why is no one mentioning that the Yellow Ghost may have saved Littlepip's life, and may have already had something of an interest in her?
Huh. Surprised Hot Water hasn't already heard of Littlepip; I'd have guessed word travelled faster in a town this size, and she's not that inconspicuous/boring, the strange mute mare who wandered in from the wastes, talks with a pipbuck and goes around fixing things.
Oh, there are post-war Pipbucks? Interesting.
"He just looked really... sleek, and somehow exotic."
...Hm.
"Had a brown vest on wrapping his barrel and flanks"
Hmmm. :)
"was uncomfortably clise again"
"was uncomfortably close again"?
"up the big fat 2 on her"
"up the big fat P on her"?
...Deathcores take 50mm slugs to stop? And these are the only 5cm guns a quick search turned up for me; does he have a battle saddle that big, or is he going to be towing a gun cart?
...I mean, yes, in PH, we gave Deus 122mm and Steel Rain 120mm guns, but a: I believe Somber said at one point that he made them too big (not positive, but I think I remember that), b: Deus had heavy cyborg augmentation and Steel Rain had power armor, and c: both of them had high-tech/heavily-armed sources for their weapons. Here I'm not even sure if it's the Junktown armory instead of Hot Water's personal armory.
...Wow.
"going to Stable 2"
The font on "Stable 2" appears to be different.
Ah, that's why he hadn't heard of her; he just didn't know that he had. :)
Oh, and then she asks.
"If I’m such a legend"
The font is different on "legend".
"Hot Water smiled easy"
"Hot Water smiled easily"?
Huh. There's my imagining of this Littlepip's height adjusted down again.
(The first-ish description gave me the idea she was larger than average, then that got adjusted down to average, now down to a little smaller than average.)
"Didn’t he realize how gorgeous he is"
"Didn’t he realize how gorgeous he was"?
"And he thought... she was cute"
...And I think that that "she" may be a different size.
Ah, and here's that mention of the Yellow Ghost saving her!
"He was a... townsider, it seemed"
Why the ellipsis?
8453720
Wow, you just answered your own question! I didn't even need to type a single word!
...wondering why we're here, wondering why we're here.
They're also the town's dedicated demolition worker. Mulltitasking!
Junktown's actually completely moved locations a couple times, when better wells, or better defenses were found, or monsters started moving in. There's a reason it's a collection of ramshackle shacks, after all.
Thanks. That'd be good to stop being inconsistent about.
She's shortcutting her dialogue generator by filling in the blanks of canned phrases. It's supposed to indicate she's a little out of her element, conversation-wise.
Well... Hot Water did?
It was just the end of the world. No reason to let a little hangup like that get in the way of progress!
Did I ever specify how big Junktown was? It was awfully big in the original game, at least as far as towns in that game go.
Oh no, my clever ruse has been unveiled.
Why'd I have to go with two numbering systems? WHY
Caliber. I ment to say caliber. They're a little over 12mm and still Very Big Bulets
Maybe I should fiddle with that. She's supposed to be short, kind of stocky. Totally not a shetland.
"my name is lllppp"
Because the author's brain shorted out again?
8454293
"Wow, you just answered your own question! I didn't even need to type a single word! "
...I'm very confused, sorry. How does the second apply to the first? And I hope I haven't offended you? From the rest of your comment and from general context, I'm guessing not, but this line in isolation has an opaque enough meaning to me that I wanted to be sure. Again, sorry.
...Hm. Having thought on it more after finishing the rest of the reply, is it just the path of least resistance part of that you were meaning? That seems like it would be a valid answer; it's the part about water flows that's confusing me.
"...wondering why we're here, wondering why we're here."
:)
""
I don't think that quote was quite accurate, ferret. :)
"They're also the town's dedicated demolition worker. Mulltitasking!
Junktown's actually completely moved locations a couple times, when better wells, or better defenses were found, or monsters started moving in. There's a reason it's a collection of ramshackle shacks, after all."
Huh, neat. Thanks!
"Thanks. That'd be good to stop being inconsistent about."
I don't think it was that inconsistent, but yeah.
"She's shortcutting her dialogue generator by filling in the blanks of canned phrases. It's supposed to indicate she's a little out of her element, conversation-wise."
Ah, nice! Thanks.
"Well... Hot Water did?"
He hadn't yet at the point I wrote that, as far as I saw.
"It was just the end of the world. No reason to let a little hangup like that get in the way of progress!"
"Presenting the new and improved Pipbuck Mark 4! Slimmed down with unnecessary features removed, the Pipbuck is now lighter and more convenient than ever!"
"...You took a metal plate, punched some holes in it for an old belt, and drew a picture of a screen on the front."
"The battery life is out of this world!"
"The battery is, one, already flat and, two, and I can't stress this enough, not actually connected to any wires. You put duct tape over the terminals."
"That's a safety feature! The new Pipbuck is also safer than ever before!"
"...Maybe there was a reason other scavengers hadn't looted those TV dinners."
"Did I ever specify how big Junktown was?"
Hm. I don't recall, I'm afraid.
"It was awfully big in the original game, at least as far as towns in that game go."
Right, but there's big relative to the other clusters of postapocalyptic shacks, and then there's big enough that most people don't actually at least know of most other people.
"Oh no, my clever ruse has been unveiled."
:)
"Why'd I have to go with two numbering systems? WHY"
:D
Hey, I'm glad you did. :)
The first chapter did specify it as P, though.
"Caliber. I ment to say caliber. They're a little over 12mm and still Very Big Bulets"
Ah, okay, yes. .50 slugs are still VBBs, but not towed-anti-tank-gun big. :)
"Maybe I should fiddle with that. She's supposed to be short, kind of stocky. Totally not a shetland."
Ah, short and stocky. Hm. Might be good to mention her height in the first description, then, yeah (though that seems to me like it would probably be enough). I read "stocky" there and imagined her with a sort of build one would more expect to find on an earth pony laborer.
""my name is lllppp""
(not trying to do the size in the quote here, sorry)
:)
"Because the author's brain shorted out again?"
Oh, sorry about that. :)
8454438
It's that I am totally incompetent in regards to plumbing design. You haven't offended me.
Stocky does imply short. It's a synonym for short that also implies "compact" and maybe a little dense. Anyway, it's easy enough to qualify a bit better.
8455057
"It's that I am totally incompetent in regards to plumbing design. You haven't offended me."
Ah, okay, thanks. :)
"Stocky does imply short. It's a synonym for short that also implies "compact" and maybe a little dense."
Hm. A dictionary just just pulls up has it as "broad and sturdily built". Synonyms: "thickset, heavily built, sturdy, sturdily built, heavyset, bull-necked, chunky, solid, dumpy, stubby, stumpy, squat; burly, beefy, meaty, hulking, strapping, hefty; cobby"
And the examples given are "he had a short, stocky body" and "a short, stocky man", and those "short"s would be redundant if short was included. Maybe the implication is a dialect thing?
"Anyway, it's easy enough to qualify a bit better."
Aye, I personally see no problem with being short and stocky, and the examples above would appear to agree that it's fine. Just not what I first assumed.
...
And I just realized that my first assumption of her as a big, strong mare is kind of what she gets in-universe. :D
derpicdn.net/img/view/2012/9/13/97453__safe_artist-colon-mistermech_oc_oc-colon-blackjack_oc-colon-littlepip_oc+only_bottle_drinking_fallout+equestria_fallout+equestria-colon-+project.jpg
8455576
Just wanted to say that picture is absolutely hilarious. Thanks for pointing it out. I usually miss pencil sketches like that.
8456355
Hah, you're welcome. :D
Oddly enough this reminds me of the Narnia stories someway. Tracking.
8456745
I dunno where you made that connection. It's not like she's travelling to another world that's wreathed in snow, where she almost perishes were it not for the help of the friendly talking animals taking her in. There isn't even a lamp post!
Cringe
8456892
Look, just take the tracking and leave the connections to be my own.
8457018
Sorry to hear that. It was a sacrifice I had to make, to lend authenticity to the character, but I too find men's briefs to be pretty cringeworthy. So tacky, rough, and plain white!
8457140
Yes ma'am. Shutting up now.
8457179
Comments on Chapter 5:
"closer to to downtown"
"closer to downtown"?
"away everyone’s opthions that did not"
"away everyone’s options that did not"?
Huh. I had not heard the hypothesis that Prohibition was secretly driven by opposition to fuel alcohol. That one I'm pretty skeptical of, though I could believe that it was helped by someone with that in mind.
Nor had I heard that there was extensive pro-spark/anti-compression ignition propaganda from the interest of the refiners, but that seems reasonably plausible.
"Why Equestria use the same alphabet, the way they use the same language?"
Something appears to be missing from that sentence.
"who’s not the main 6"
"who’s not the Mane 6"?
"I’v kind of been hoping to ask"
"I’ve kind of been hoping to ask"?
Seeing them joke about butts, I suddenly found myself wondering, well, first what a yinglet in Equestria would be like, but then more generally what interaction between those two worlds would be like.
"Alright then, I’ll be sure to spend some time checking out pony asses."
There is surely no mixing of motives there at all.
...I am confused. Sea Swirl asks Protagonist (and now I'm wondering about MLP/Snow Crash) how Protagonist knew that Sea Swirl used to live in Baltimare. Protagonist replies that it was a lucky guess. But, um... didn't Sea Swirl just tell Protagonist? As in, in the previous paragraph she spoke in? Did different versions of the chapter run into each other here?
(Text:
"We barely had to wrapup in Baltimare.”
She gets a wistful look at that, so I ask her, “Do you miss it there?”
“Yeah, I guess,” she replies, then looks at me, asking, “But how’d you know I used to live there?”
“Lucky guess?” I reply uncertainly, “Honestly, I didn’t know, until you told me just now.”")
...Hm. Am I right in guessing that a lot of those adventurers don't come back? And not in a "they fell in love with the lands they explored and decided to settle there" way, though some of them may do that too. After all, especially with pegasi making aerial maps, it seems like a lot of adventurers flowing out should un-uncharted the east relatively quickly, unless the adventuring boom just started recently. Or the geography of the east keeps changing.
(And as for the southern jungles, well... presumably not everyone is as good at dodging darts and boulders as Daring Do.)
"You should see it, in the spring!"
Should that comma be there? Fine either way, but the meanings (or... more tones here, I suppose?) seemed different enough to me, though still similar, that I thought I'd check.
Oh, and here's something from Chapter 3 of Returning Home:
"Who’s name was... something."
"Whose name was... something."?
"I mean, it’s obvious that she would"
Why? Expectations from outside the world?
...Hm. And, um, sorry, but a dialog mismatch.
Here:
"Just pretend I’m not a princess, okay? Just—I moved here a dozen years ago, as a graduate student and a new librarian." "Just a librarian" "Just think of that, not what happened to me."
Returning Home Chapter 3:
"Just pretend I’m not a princess, okay? Just—I moved here a dozen years ago, as a graduate student and a new librarian. And I just—just think of that, not what happened to me."
"And beach parties? Just how far away is far away in Equestria? You can just take a trip to the beach, from the center of the continent?"
...Um. Well, not all beaches are on the ocean, Pony-Yet-To-Be-Known-As-Rosy...
"That is the last think anypony doesn’t know."
"That is the last thing anypony doesn’t know."?
And... another mismatch? But I think I remember the version in No Going Back from Returning Home, so maybe you changed Returning Home after I read that section but used an older version for this? Anyway:
Here:
"“That sounds more like a witch than a princess,” I have to reply, wondering if princesses are synonymous with witches in this universe.
Twilight just stares at me, blinking. Okay, did I say something wrong? “Did you just call em a witch?” Twilight asks. Crap!
“Not if you aren’t going to change me into a toad, uh, princess,” I reply meekly."
(Oh, also, "you just call em a witch?" to "you just call me a witch?", if you change Returning Home instead of this?)
Returning Home:
"“That sounds more like a witch than a princess,” the cream colored mare mused.
That got a chuckle out of Twilight, who said, “You know, even if you are far from home, it’s nice sometimes to have someone here who isn’t all worried about my princessness."
Oh for the love of Celestia, you two, just talk to each other! You're both even thinking of this as a story!
"It’s the only think I could find any joy"
"It’s the only thing I could find any joy"?
"and was carried her by mouth back to the"
"and was carrying her by mouth back to the"?
8471720
don't be thilly, thugar~
There's actually some support for that story. Not enough to prove in court, but Rockefeller was a strong supporter of the "temperance" movement, and ethanol refining was in direct competition with his primary cash cow. And it was during his funding campaign that a whiskey drinking congress suddenly voted to make refining whiskey illegal. There were no under-the-table bribes on record... but...
Anyway, I was using it here, to make Rosy look a bit irrationally negative about the human world... as an ironic twist, because she doesn't actually believe the story is true, and has other reasons to dislike her home. Also to make Applejack's namesake a bit more of a happy surprise for her.
That one I'm not quite as sure of, but he definitely profited more from spark plug engines. The original Model T was diesel, interestingly enough. No real information as to why they switched to spark plugs. The original engine could fairly easily run on kerosene or (natch) ethanol. Then car makers all just... started making nothing but petroleum-only engines. Far as I can tell, at least.
What you talk about? That sentence good, like mammoth steak!
Wow, that would be really stupid. Good thing that's not what I wrote, and surely no git revisions will ever reveal that I changed it.
I'm not... exactly sure how a Baltimare local would phrase it to sound like they did come back. "to and from" seems overly piccayunish. Maybe "to explore"
The uncharted east crosses gryphon territory, first off, and there's a huge ocean separating it from Equestria. Also ponies don't exactly have... highly accurate ways to measure their location, so a flying pegasi can get the scale or shape of the land wrong. Also yeah, things... get kind of weird out there. Incidentally, this is the origin of the word "cartographer" in Equestria, because the only ponies who could make relatively accurate maps could only do so from within pegasi pulled carts.
"You should see it, in the spring, In America!
Actually, those little slipups happen, when two people recall the same conversation. But yeah, that one is a little too much, now that I look at it.
Do they call it a beach party if it's just by the river? Well, Rosy's not exactly fluent in partying, or beaches.
I had to change it while finishing Returning Home, before even starting on this story. I must just have forgotten to upload the changes to fimfiction.
It's understandable for them to avoid talking about it, isn't it? Twilight wants Rosy's adventure to unfold naturally, and Rosy doesn't want ponies to know that she's genre savvy, in hopes it'll help her influence the outcome. I don't want to make it look like Rosy's just doing it for plot convenience.
Thanks for corrections... even though it kinda clutters up the comments section, and I had to write a program to format quotes and my replies with spoiler tags.
8472678
"don't be thilly, thugar~"
:)
"There's actually some support for that story. Not enough to prove in court, but Rockefeller was a strong supporter of the "temperance" movement, and ethanol refining was in direct competition with his primary cash cow. And it was during his funding campaign that a whiskey drinking congress suddenly voted to make refining whiskey illegal. There were no under-the-table bribes on record... but..."
Sure, sure, like I said, I can believe he saw an opportunity for an excuse, but the "temperance" movement goes back long enough, as I recall, that he'd have needed a time machine to be behind the whole thing. And if he had a time machine and the best he could do was a conspiracy against fuel alcohol, well, that seems kind of uncreative.
"Anyway, I was using it here, to make Rosy look a bit irrationally negative about the human world... as an ironic twist, because she doesn't actually believe the story is true, and has other reasons to dislike her home. Also to make Applejack's namesake a bit more of a happy surprise for her."
...Irrationally... ah. That might have come across more clearly to someone who disliked cars, and particularly the Cult of the Automobile, less than I do. :)
Though you did say only a bit, so, hm, actually, given the above, I guess that did work.
"The original Model T was diesel, interestingly enough. No real information as to why they switched to spark plugs./spoiler]"
Huh. I've not heard or found anything about that. How certain of it are you, and do you have sources? Wikipedia, at least, as a first investigation, doesn't have automobile-appropriate diesels being invented until 1932 at the earliest, some five years after the Model T ceased production.
"The original engine could fairly easily run on kerosene or (natch) ethanol."
That I've seen some debate on, but I can readily believe it.
"Then car makers all just... started making nothing but petroleum-only engines. Far as I can tell, at least."
Well, as I mentioned above, automotive diesels might well just have not been available until later, though their continued lack of popularity in the US vs. abroad is... a bit odd, it's struck me before. Gasoline definitely had competitors in electric and steam, though, that fell by the wayside.
"What you talk about? That sentence good, like mammoth steak!"
:D
"Wow, that would be really stupid. Good thing that's not what I wrote, and surely no git revisions will ever reveal that I changed it."
:)
...Ah, though I see that you or the software haven't changed it yet I must be seeing things in the chapter when I went to look at the new version. Well, I expect that that strange hallucination will clear up later. :)
(No rush if it was you, but I'm mentioning that in case it was the software without your knowledge; I see that the file as a whole has been changed.)
"I'm not... exactly sure how a Baltimare local would phrase it to sound like they did come back. "to and from" seems overly piccayunish. Maybe "to explore""
Well, it wasn't her lack of mention of a return that I worked from there. It's more looking at the number of people trying to extract Adventure, estimating the amount of Adventure available to extract, and concluding that Adventure is probably a pretty difficult and dangerous thing to successfully mine.
...And the current "to explore" version doesn't really change things for me, sorry.
"The uncharted east crosses gryphon territory, first off, and there's a huge ocean separating it from Equestria. Also ponies don't exactly have... highly accurate ways to measure their location, so a flying pegasi can get the scale or shape of the land wrong."
Well, yeah, but a bad chart is still a chart, and the ocean isn't an issue, since it's behind them once they arrive (And if they don't even arrive, well, they're still not being successful, are they?). And the gryphons presumably have some knowledge of their way around... unless, of course, this is a case of "Yes, you've lived here for thousands of years and had trading links going all the way to the coast, but you're not ponies, and therefore this land was undiscovered until we arrived! Also, we kind of drew our colony's border over there, so you owe us taxes now.".
"Also yeah, things... get kind of weird out there. Incidentally, this is the origin of the word "cartographer" in Equestria, because the only ponies who could make relatively accurate maps could only do so from within pegasi pulled carts."
Ah, neat. :)
"Actually, those little slipups happen, when two people recall the same conversation. But yeah, that one is a little too much, now that I look at it."
Ah, hm, that's convenient. :)
But, more seriously, I didn't realize that the narration style was that; thanks. I thought it was live but in past tense, as often happens because English. So I guess it's actually in the past to some degree? A full "actually being narrated by the character from later on", or something partial somehow? Or something conveniently undefined? :)
"Do they call it a beach party if it's just by the river? Well, Rosy's not exactly fluent in partying, or beaches."
:)
"I had to change it while finishing Returning Home, before even starting on this story. I must just have forgotten to upload the changes to fimfiction."
Ah, okay; thanks.
...I'm sure I remember commenting, while reading Returning Home, on the version of the text here, though. Did you change it twice, once to the version currently on FIMFiction and then back to this? Or was the "not if you aren't going to change me into a toad" exchanged moved somewhere else? Or am I really just misremembering?
"It's understandable for them to avoid talking about it, isn't it? Twilight wants Rosy's adventure to unfold naturally, and Rosy doesn't want ponies to know that she's genre savvy, in hopes it'll help her influence the outcome. I don't want to make it look like Rosy's just doing it for plot convenience."
Oh, no, no, it's believable and understandable, I think. Both of their motivations make sense based on their knowledges of the world. It's just frustrating! They could solve things so much more easily if they'd just sit down and talk frankly! But then there wouldn't be a plot of course. :)
So it's for plot convenience kind of, but through the natural action of the characters, the same thing that, with help from the mysterious spontaneous transforming rift formation, produces the plot in the first place.
"Thanks for corrections"
You're welcome!
"... even though it kinda clutters up the comments section, and I had to write a program to format quotes and my replies with spoiler tags."
Ah, sorry. Would you like me to move them to PMs, or something? You've not complained so far, that I recall, but I know some authors prefer not to have error spotting in their comments. Or is the spoilering the major problem, so this applies to chapters of other stories or not-yet-on-FIMFiction chapters of this story but not to on-FIMFiction chapters of this story? I'd personally prefer to have my comments public in case anyone else has something to gain from them, but you are, of course, the author, and the person most likely to read and gain from them.
8472832
Hardly at all. I had thought diesel engines were invented first. Wikipedia says that the first sparkplug engine was in 1882, and the first diesel engine was in 1892, so I guess not. Rockefeller was at the height of his power when the "Model T" came out, so I imagine he had a large role in removing the option to run the most popular engine with hemp oil. Actually, I think Rockefeller was funding propaganda against hemp as well as alcohol, trying to get it made illegal with stuff like "Reefer Madness." For all he was "religiously" anti-drugs, i sure never heard anyone say he funded an anti-opium campaign.
But I dunno. Really, it's just a story. Rockefeller got to write the history books, so there's not a lot of info as to what he actually did to gain power.
"I'm going to play on the swings!"
"Why are you saying you're never going to come back from playing on the swings?"
"What?"
Um... no? It's not in the past, and it's not live.
There's a difference between undiscovered and uncharted. Anyway in a thousand years, maybe the charts just crumbled from age.
OK good, I don't want to make it seem artificial.
Well, emails ideally. But I kind of want to keep spoilers and such protected by PGP or something. And you know how hard it is for me to get emails. So I dunno. It just seems kind of bad to post corrections for chapter 5 in the comment section of a story that has only been released up to chapter 2, even if you do so in spoiler tags.