A simple story of life, death, and making do.

Pretty much what you’d expect. Ends as well as you might imagine.

Just a short one-shot for fun.

After millennia of sleep, a small herd of ponies awaken in the stony depths of Tambelon. As they reach for the surface, however, one might ask if they were left asleep for a reason.

A writing exercise more than anything else. This story consists of one hundred parts, each with no more than one hundred words (hyphenated words and contractions count as two words). Working on linguistic efficiency, I tried to create a reasonably interesting plot and a sizeable number of original characters in the space of ~10,000 words.

With all of that said, reader experience may vary.

Miraculously, first contact with aliens (extradimensional beings, really) went much smoother than expected. While humans have an unfair advantage in knowing much of our neighbors, however, much of Earth remains new and unknown to these beings. To stabilize relations, a team of the bravest heroes from their world have been sent to Earth.

While most humans have few or no problems with ponies... "incidents" are almost inevitable. To deal with these "incients", the ponies have been granted a security detail and their own personal bodyguard. These are the stories of the incidents ponies faced.

A couple of weeks ago, an army of changelings invaded Canterlot. While the changelings lost, the city has been plagued by paranoia and uncertainty ever since. Changelings spies are being hunted down, tabloids are causing some serious hysteria, and the Elements of Harmony... well, they went home shortly after the Wedding.

I am from a group well outside of Canterlot, a group that might have a plan for turning this entire situation around. We even scored a meeting with some very powerful ponies. After a few nights of unproductive talks, however... this might be my last chance to prove that I can do this. One last meeting... one last chance to make my case.

You know... no pressure.

When most people behold the extraordinary, they believe that a single path lays before them. The way I see it, however, I was given two choices.

1) I could try to harbor a magical alicorn for weeks... hiding her from my father, the government, and a world where everyone has smart-phones linked right to YouTube... while risking jail time and personal injury.

2) I could... not do that. In fact, not doing that sounded considerably easier and less painful. Not risking imprisonment or... worse punishment... also sounded nice when you get right down to it...

Can you really blame me for seeking the easier option?

Edit: Featured on 1/31/2015.