Alternate Beginnings: Year Five

by Doug Graves

21 Epilogue: Two Years Later

June 30th, 1000 Domina Solaria

Doug walks through town, the evening sun shining brightly in the clear skies. The streets are decorated with a wide variety of streamers and ribbons, many in the shape of an yellow sun with a white crescent moon overlaid, eight orange triangles pointing away. The trees are wrapped with colorful bands of cloth, garlands of flowers, and streamers. Plus, most likely, hidden compartments with explosions of confetti just waiting for Pinkie Pie to pull the trigger.

Five fillies follow him; Pinkie Pie's two, Lemon and Meringue, are quickly getting distracted by the decorations practically littering the walkways around them. Applejack's two, Applebaum and Pomarbo, are attempting to keep the first two in line and doing a poor job, the excitement beginning to get to all of them. Lastly, Fluttershy's filly, Hedge, who darts back and forth between Doug and the two groups, lines of worry crossing her face.

Meringue spots something low, in the grass, dashing off to the side to investigate. Doug whistles as Pomarbo tries to block her but she ignores the whistle, easily knocking the colt to the side and jumping onto a red button poorly concealed under a few flowers. Above the filly, high up in the trees, a firecracker goes off, exploding into a shower of confetti. Meringue squeals in delight, eyes going every which way as she tries to spot another one of the hidden buttons.

Doug walks over, a squirming Lemon held tightly in one arm. He reaches down, grabbing Meringue before the filly can dart off in search of another button. She shrieks before finding herself deposited next to her sister; she looks up at Doug, a tear quickly forming in one eye as she cries, "But, Daddy! It was right there!"

"I know, dear, but we have to leave those for Mama to use tomorrow." Doug pats the two writhing balls of fur, chuckling as he tries to calm them down.

Meringue pouts, loud sniffles mimed by her sister as Lemon responds, "But, um, Pinkie Pie would have been happy with her! That button wasn't concealed nearly well enough, and anypony could have found it and triggered it! So, now, it happened before the big party, and she'll have time to reset it! And hide it better!" She tries to use the distraction to jump out of his arm, but his grip merely tightens around both of them.

"Good try, Lemon, but no. We're going to Pinkie's party at Sugarcube... wait... at the library, okay? You can spend all of tomorrow looking for those hidden buttons." Doug changes course; fortunately the two destinations aren't terribly far apart, especially with him coming from Sweet Apple Acres.

"Mama would let us." Lemon joins her sister in pouting as Doug carries the two to the library, though their expressions change as they get near. The sound of music blares through the open windows, shadows of ponies moving back and forth inside. The fillies begin swaying back and forth as they walk, Doug finding his footsteps matching the beat as well. A loud groan comes from one of the windows above the doorway, the silhouette of a pony flopping back and forth on a bed, clenching a pillow to her head. Doug glances back, his three fillies also marching along as they get close to the door.

Before he can rearrange the two squirming fillies to knock, Pinkie Pie opens the door; she beams a smile at Doug, "You made it! Wohoo! Now we can really get this party started!" She glances at the fillies in his arms, her smile briefly falling before snapping back up, "Oh, well, maybe we'll leave the special games for later. You are coming back later, right?"

Doug chuckles, "Heh, we'll see how they do, if they fall asleep early or something." He winks at Pinkie Pie, the mare winking back and spinning around, raising her back legs an inch and looking back. Doug tosses Lemon first, then Meringue; Pinkie Pie bucks her back up, lowering back down as Lemon gets close and smoothly catching her filly on her back. She does the same with Meringue, the two fillies now riding her as she disappears deep into the party.

Doug turns back, motioning with an arm to the three fillies behind him. Applebaum leads, heading towards the games, while Pomarbo and Hedge hesitate near Doug. He squats down, rubbing each of their manes, "Hey, you two, it's okay, just a bit more ponies than you are used to, okay? Nothing to be afraid of. See?" He stands back up, the two fillies following closely as he walks into the party.

A large number of ponies smile at Doug as he walks in, starting with Lyra. Doug waves or makes a fist and bumps hooves as appropriate, making his way towards a few tables in the back. A good number of the mares bend down, Lyra nuzzling Hedge and Pomarbo as they arrive at the food. Doug spots the bottle of Fire Sauce, pouring a single drop onto a dish of sprinkles. He swirls the sprinkles around, trying to evenly coat them with the sizzling liquid before dumping them onto one of the undecorated cupcakes. He takes a small bite, gasping at the intense heat; at least fire didn't come out of his ears this time.

Hedge and Pomarbo both go up to the tables, grabbing small pieces of chocolate and cake. Doug grabs a plate for the two, holding it down for them to place their treats on. They balance the plates on their back, Pomarbo glancing back and walking slowly even with only two items on his plate. They make their way to a less crowded spot, watching with growing excitement as Pinkie Pie and a small purple dragon take turns dumping Fire Sauce on their cupcakes, seeing who can handle a larger amount of the burning liquid.

His three oldest fillies are dancing with a few others around their age, including a small Lyra, though their dancing mostly consists of going down on all four hooves to the beat, pushing back up as far as they can go, and then back down. Just bobbing up and down, the pony version of a squat, performed to the music. Scootaloo spots him, dashing forward and grabbing at his knee, "Come on, Dad, join us!"

Doug reluctantly gets up, Pomarbo and Hedge staying in their spots as they watch him make his way over to the dance floor. Pinkie Pie joins him, bits of fire leaking out of her ears, an excited, "Ooh! What dance are we doing tonight?" as the dragon walks over, curious as to the large biped in their midst.

"Alright, Pinkie, two legs!" Pinkie Pie stands up on her hind legs. "Arms crossed!" Doug and Pinkie cross their upper limbs, making a box in front of their chest, limbs held parallel to the floor. "Squat down!" Both bend their lower legs, a seated position without the chair, the dragon attempting to mime their position. "And kick!" Doug starts off, kicking one leg out, keeping his arms raised at his chest, then trading which leg is extended and which is on the ground to the beat.

Pinkie Pie matches him leg for leg while the dragon topples over after the first kick. The two start to pant harder and harder as the exertion gets to them, the dragon rubbing his back with a huff as he stands. After a minute the song ends, the two of them standing up. "Oof!" Pinkie groans, falling to her four legged stance, "I might need one of those massages of yours to really get the kinks out!" She winks at him, flicking her tail to the side as she wanders to a different part of the party.

The fillies scamper around Doug, Apple Bloom saying, "That was cool and all, but Ah wanted to see the other dance! The arm one!" One of the nearby Lyras nods along, a few other mares following along, the dragon smirking to himself as he flexes an arm.

Doug raises an eyebrow, "A push up?"

"Yeah, like we were doing!" The three fillies nod, Scootaloo demonstrating as the next track comes up.

Doug rolls his eyes but dutifully gets to the ground, starting to do push ups to the music. He lets out a loud grunt as his three fillies jump on his back, starting to do push ups of their own. The dragon gets down as well, a confident expression on his face as he pushes his small body up and down. Lyra moves next to Doug, doing her own push ups and winking as he tries to keep up with the music, but is unable to as the extra weight slowly gets to him. After another twenty he collapses, his fillies giggling above him as they continue to do pony squats against his back.

As the song ends Doug rolls over, the fillies squawking in alarm as they topple off. He stands, ruffling their manes as they try to shy away, an embarrassed, "Dad!" coming from each of them.

Doug chuckles, looking to the dragon, saying, "Haven't seen you around here before. I'm Doug." He holds his hand out, the dragon taking a long look before cautiously holding his claws out.

"I'm Spike. The dragon."

Doug nods, "Nice to meet you, Spike." The two stare at each other for a few seconds before Doug says, "Well, see you all around!" before he wanders off, the trio dancing to the next song as another Lyra takes his spot, Spike moving back to dance next to the three fillies.

Doug spots Lemon and Meringue at the Pin the Tail on the Pony station watching an intense match between Pinkie Pie and two Lyras. The unicorn wobbles back and forth, awkwardly holding on to the pin as she tries to locate the poster. She stumbles forward, listing one way and then the other, before pinning the tail just south of the pony's flank. Pinkie's two fillies give polite hoofstomps as the second Lyra takes a pin.

Lyra pushes up against Doug's hand, resting her side against his flank, "So, those were some pretty cool moves back at the dance floor. Good endurance, too; kept it up for quite a while."

Doug looks at the pony pressed up against his side, smiling and rubbing her withers, "Thanks; lot of that comes from practicing with Applejack."

Lyra winks, "I can imagine, she's a tough one; you want to see how long I can hold out against you?"

Doug shrugs, "Sure, Amethyst; double check with Rarity first, though, I thought I saw her around here somewhere."

Amethyst Star pouts, "Aww, what gave it away? Not that I wanted to get Lyra in trouble, of course."

"Your voice. Don't worry, the paint is still holding up great." Doug looks over the unicorn's mane and coat, trying to find any hints of purple underneath the green paint. "I guess they haven't broken out the Bon-Bon paint yet?"

Amethyst Star shakes her head, "Don't think so, it's just been Lyra so far. Anyway, I'll double check with Rarity about that massage, and if you can check the more, um, hard to reach spots too I'd appreciate that. I'll bring my extra paint."

"Sure, I think Pinkie's got a room set up in the back; look for the one with the drop cloths. If there isn't a table I can grab one from somewhere else."

"Sure thing. See you in a couple minutes!" Amethyst Star walks away, looking for Rarity - the mare keeps a list of which ponies have gotten massages, though for some reason she only charges the ones that are already in a herd. Not that Doug cares too much; giving the massages is just as relaxing for him as for the mares. And the two stallions, but he told Big Mac and Bulk Biceps that he wouldn't mention them.

Doug spots Rainbow Dash, the pegasus hovering above a group of enraptured fillies. Doug walks over, able to hear Rainbow's story as he gets closer; the fillies begin to look terrified as Rainbow continues, "And so, Nightmare Moon took over the body of Princess Luna! And she went around, terrorizing the little ponies by making them relive their worst nightmares! Because she could tell, just by looking at you, the scariest thing that you had ever seen! The things so scary, that-"

Applejack moves over, hushing Rainbow, "Come on, now, RD, we're supposed to be telling stories about Princess Luna, not Nightmare Moon. Save those for Nightmare Night!"

Rainbow rolls her eyes, "Fine, fine. Okay, who wants to hear a story about Celestia and Luna learning about magic together?" The fillies look much happier at that suggestion, smiling and moving in closer.

Rarity moves up to Doug, nudging his shoulder. Doug turns as she walks away, following her; Rarity says, "Alright, two sessions, three minutes with Pinkie and five with Amethyst." She moves in closer, whispering, "No funny business; there are foals still awake." Doug rolls his eyes as they continue to the side room, many splotches of paint dotting the cloth covers. Pinkie Pie is sitting on the table, Amethyst Star lounging on one of the relatively clean chairs.

Doug flexes his fingers, "Alright, Pinkie, ready?" Pinkie Pie nods, Doug starting to massage her hind legs.

Three minutes later and the puddle of pink pony pops back up, reforming to a normal earth pony shape. Doug shakes his head, a smile on his face, as she pronks out of the room. A slightly worried Amethyst Star asks, "Um, is that normal?"

Doug shrugs, "For Pinkie. Let me know if this is too much, or you want me to focus on anything."

Five minutes later and a much more relaxed Amethyst Star barely stumbles out of the room, her eyes having difficulty focusing. Doug follows behind, wiping some green paint off his fingers; the mare only needed a little touch up between her hind legs, the stuff already on her being surprisingly resistant to touch. Probably needs some special soap they take a bath with in order to get it off, once it has set; at least the newly applied paint on his fingers is wiping away easily enough. Why she is overplaying the effects of the massage, though, he has no idea.

Applejack greets him as he walks down the hallway, "Doug, might want to think about taking the fillies home. Some of them are getting pretty tired, and Ah'd hate for you to have to carry all of them."

"Sure thing. All eight?"

"Nah, the trio is doing pretty well." Applejack frowns, "Still have to keep them away from the real sugary treats though, hate for them to crash this early in the party. Need help rounding them up?"

"Sure. Meet you at the front door." A quick kiss and ear scratch later and the two split up, quickly rounding up the sleepy fillies.

Doug waves goodbye to the various ponies as he makes his way outside, though only Rarity is ambitious enough to go for a kiss. Pinkie Pie seems disappointed he won't try to make it back, merely telling him to watch out for opening doors. He leads the sleepy train of fillies back to the Apple farmhouse, a straighter route than the one he took to get there.

Only for Meringue to spot another poorly concealed red button.

Comments

[badninja]

I love how ADHD Pinkie’s daughters are. I wonder how Doug is going to take the mornings big revelation?

[Heidao]

Oh god, Pinkie's children are little clones of her, they can even spot her hiding places

I think, despite the herd's disappointment of Doug's absence to the later half of the party, they'll appreciate that they have energy to spare for the journey ahead

[Snow]

Oh god. A red button.

A RED. CANDY-LIKE button.

A Big. Red. Candy-like, IRRESISTABLE button.... CAN SHE HOLD OUT, FOLKS?!

[FanficReader920]

So Doug gives massages? An interesting piece of foreshadowing.

[Blik]

I'm over here trying to figure out whether Amethyst getting dolled up as Lyra is a game we haven't been introduced to yet (another of Doug's suggestions, like Guess Who?, meant to hone everypony's skills in the face of an impending Changeling invasion), or if it's the author's attempt to lampshade the duplicate character models used in crowd scenes early in the show.

[Doug Graves]

10002002
It is most certainly a lampshade of the scene with Nightmare Moon where there's, like, eight or ten copies of each of them. Changeling practice would have been a good idea, though!

Not sure why exactly I have Applebaum call the adults by their names; I don't think it was intentionally to socially isolate her. She is certainly more focused on the mechanical aspects of things, though.

[Blik]

10002491
At least Doug and AJ will be more supportive of Applebaum than Dilmom is of Dilbert. AB will be able to both "lead a normal life" and "be an engineer".

I really like this story structure, by the way. It's really fun to have these little glimpses into the future and then see the past veer to align with them, like in one of the look-aheads when the MOHA seemed to be evaluating Twilight Sparkle on a five-point scale and then we get context afterwards when we see the secret meeting here they devised that scale in the first place.

I also have been marvelling at the consistency of your story lengths. They all clock in at around 60k words. Assuming you don't have them pre-written, that speaks to a remarkable sense of timing. Are you in public speaking?

This is quite an enjoyable story. I should know, because I dove into the story and I am enjoying it. I can't wait to see how things line up in Year 1000!

[Doug Graves]

10003293
A reasonable amount was planned out beforehand, like what events happen in what year, and what 'flashbacks' from the show come up when. The 60k came about mostly from trying to spread them out so it wasn't too concentrated at, say, the first two months of the year, and that's what I thought a reasonable length of a book was like. Some books got more fluff added as a consequence. Continuity Disrupted threw a wrench in that length, in a good way.

[chibilink]

After reading through this, I'm a tad confused about the descriptions talking about Doug being a monster. Where in this did that at all come up?

[Doug Graves]

10100558
The short description is a little misleading, yes. I should probably change it. If anything, there is a short talk between Rainbow and Doug in chapter 12, and maybe between Applejack and Doug in 19. For the long description, it's what does Doug do with the information about Chrysalis' coming invasion. If he does nothing to prevent it, does that make him just as culpable as her? Same question with Celestia (and Cadance) - lots of people give her flak for 'allowing' certain events in the show to happen. Does that make her a monster? How about Chrysalis? Or is the only 'true' monster the chaos beast?

[Doug Graves]

10139810
Thanks!

[raw19]

69 Lyras. Why were there 69 Lyras?

Tell me, Faust! TELL ME!!!

Amethyst was all kinds of fun. Most excellent.

[Jack-Pony]

So, I noticed you call Doug's foals "fillies" a few times, even when his colt was involved - mostly at the first half and at the end. You might want to fix those. ;)

[Doug Graves]

10289332
Understandable. Though both players played their hands (hooves?) well, and got an outcome much preferable to outright/guerrilla war - Chrysalis has been mostly neutralized as a threat, at least to the ponies, with her set of skills working towards improving the ponies and improving this abundant source of food. Is it perfect? Perhaps not.

As far as avoiding the AU tag: as I've said in other comments, a (goal/restriction/challenge) I had was to try to line things up such that when Twilight arrives in Continuity Disrupted things are... as close to the show as they can be, obvious exceptions excluded (CMCs, Doug himself). And then all bets are off. As far as the year naming convention... I think I tried a couple different ones, but never really settled on one, especially because there are already two Princesses. Luna arrive becomes three, and we know their (at least, Celestia and Cadance's) intentions about having more. Pax Omni?

10290448
...Yeah. Inspiration for this one was the Season Four opener, where you have the chaos plants come out of nowhere. Description has always been one of my weak areas, since I hate spending a paragraph just describing what something looks like. Same with feelings/reactions; I've always focused on what they are doing, which loses a lot. Maybe, like you suggest, have Rainbow Dash give a better description of the approaching beast and get everypony's struggles to cope with the impending threat.

10290493
My excuse: I don't like calling them 'the foals'. They are past that stage, and it's a mouthful to say 'fillies and colt'. In French, 'Ils' and 'Elles' both translate to 'they', except that 'Ils' refers to a mixed group or all guys, while 'Elles' refers strictly to only girls. In matriarchal Equestria, the convention is reversed.

My other excuse is that in the show the Mane Six occasionally refer to themselves collectively as 'guys', and thus don't particularly care about making sure to use the correct pronouns.

[damnaion]

[DarkPhoenixx]

10544984
Oh that's right. I can't believe that I didn't think of that.

10544983
Yeah that's what I was thinking of, though maybe a little more prophetic. But the semi-prophetic part is more how the choices already made may effect the end result. Basically the 'how does my brain see this playing out' aspect would be like 'how do I think things got from here to there', kinda like any change would be made by somewhat educated guesswork. So it may turn out that it didn't get changed or it changed for the worse or the better, you wouldn't know before doing something only after.
But I was thinking what if just giving Celestia that little bit more hope was all it took to ensure tghings eventually do happen the way they are going to? Or maybe it's just one thing among many that get done differently?
I might've been channeling one of my favorite animes, Stein's Gate and Stein's Gate Zero.

[Doug Graves]

10545094
Certain parts play out nearly identically (compare Chrysalis' dialogue to what happens in Errant Finale) while other parts are quite different (the date, Twilight/Fluttershy not pregnant while others are, Twilight isn't an alicorn). Chrysalis saw an opportunity when the alicorns would be distracted, as well as striking before Twilight really comes into her power. Few of those things Doug could have predicted (although how would he know about the Elements and Twilight? Or Luna? :/ )

[Hariester]

10880367
He discards his vest (though I doubt simple vest would be enough to keep body from cold and illness) in first chapter here. And often did similar things in previous parts of the story. Also why you use this obsolete measurement system? Especially considering Dough initially was engineer and should have adopted normal system.

[Prysmkitsune]

10968198
they died of overexposure to chaos magic aka magic radiation....which the tower of meower there is a walking font of.

[midnight arrow]

love this one also now onto year 6

[MurderP0n7]

10969064
Will the discord reform prevent other outbursts of everfree? Or all that chaos exists because there is the tree of harmony?

[Prysmkitsune]

11745807
i suspect discord will be a very diffrent being in this universe, either he will be pure irredeemable evil or his chaos and 'chaos magic' will be two different things unrelated to one another and thus his reformation will have no effect on chaos magic or its impact on ponies.

[MurderP0n7]

11745904
I think that, although discord is reformed, its magic of chaos will be the same since if chaos is not something good or bad, it only exists and that is demonstrated in the series because the various times that Discord uses his magic only hurts what he does, but at the moment of disappearing what did those affected show no physical damage by magic...

but if so, whether the magic thrown by the everfree is magic of chaos or another type of magic

[Prysmkitsune]

11745943
gotta keep in mind this is an AU, things do not work in this story the same way they do in the show.

[MurderP0n7]

11746307
fuck, sometimes I forget it because despite all the changes, the bases are almost always the same... oh well, just wait and keep reading