PONID-21 Day 18 · 10:06pm Aug 11th, 2020
Prev ——^—— End
Peter Howards' Journal
She said she would if I still felt the same way at the end of today. There was no hesitation in her eyes, but I could feel a sense of… I guess it would be anticipation. I think she liked to do things, sometimes, just to see if she can. As if the universe itself might somehow take everything away from her at any moment.
I'd seen what she'd done with Celeste Cunningham, and I even spoke with Celeste last night. She's still herself, but she smiles a lot more, and her smile is more infectious than Derpy's.
#day-18
Rainbow Dash 1/23/2021 6:59 AM
What, am I like the only pony posting in here anymore? Anyway, everything seems better now. I don't feel like crap, I can fly as much as I want thanks to Eris' thing keeping all the bad dudes out, and it's just so awesome now I can't even think straight. Anypony wanna race?
Derpy Hooves 1/23/2021 7:05 AM
I'll race if you want. I don't have my cutie mark yet, but I wanna do some things to see if it will happen today. I kinda feel done, too, but that mark not being on my flank makes me feel a little incomplete.
#general
Derpy Hooves 1/23/2021 7:07 AM
Meet me outside in five, @Rainbow Dash?
Rainbow Dash 1/23/2021 7:09 AM
Absolutely!
Derpy Hooves 1/23/2021 7:09 AM
You've already been flying, haven't you?
Rainbow Dash 1/23/2021 7:13 AM
Flying right now, actually. It's kinda hard, but if you get some height, you can type a bunch before you have to pull out of the dive.
Derpy Hooves 1/23/2021 7:14 AM
You're crazy, you know that? Okay, heading out now.
Gabby 1/23/2021 7:18 AM
I'm coming out too!
Eris 1/23/2021 7:19 AM
Sure. Come on out, Gabby. If nothing else, it's a great spectator sport if you like cute mares with wings.
—private-message—
Gabby 1/23/2021 7:20 AM
You mean you're checking out your girlfriend, right?
Eris 1/23/2021 7:21 AM
Yeah. Rainbow has a nice ass too, but I like them a bit more rounded.
Gabby 1/23/2021 7:22 AM
OMW
Eris 1/23/2021 7:22 AM
You fucking pervert. Come on out.
Gabby 1/23/2021 7:24 AM
Thanks.
A talk-show hostess smiled at the camera. "As for our next guests, unfortunately, by CDC orders, we are unable to welcome them into the studio, but Miss Eris and Miss Hooves are here via our link to Alrude Biotech to give us an all-access interview with the self-styled goddess of—"
"Of Noodletonia." Eris' picture, sitting beside Derpy on a couch, appeared in the studio on their display. "Or should that be Pastaville? I'm not sure yet."
"You'll have to forgive Eris, she's a little too into her Italian heritage." Sitting beside Eris, Derpy had a wry smile. "Sorry to interrupt your opening bit, but I felt it important to just point out that you shouldn't take anything Eris says seriously."
The hostess, looking to have infinite levels of perseverance, smiled beatifically at the camera. "I'll try to bear that in mind. How about we start with a little background. How did you both end up in the condition you are now? Oh, and I'd like to remind our viewers that they can text the number at the bottom of the screen with questions they'd like to ask either Miss Eris or Miss Hooves here."
Eris gestured to Derpy, who was already gesturing at her. "Guess I go first. In case you have been living in a hole for a year, the poor got poorer. Really poor. My landlord had been cutting me slack because I did work for him keeping his other places clean and tidy for the tenants that couldn't afford to live in them either, but it got too much even for that because the bank decided that him not being able to pay his loans meant he lost his house as quick as we lost ours.
"You can guess how things went—or maybe not. We set up a tent city in the local park, and with all the other stuff going on we got kicked out of there and moved out of the city. That's when I found this thing to get some money. Things started off pretty interesting, getting a—I can't say dick on TV, can I?"
The presenter looked relieved to say, "We have a delay and can bleep it, don't worry."
"Well, I turned into a guy-noodle, which was fun for a bit—and still is sometimes—but I've always been a girl, ya know? It just feels better. So, anyway, if you're watching, Phil, that's where all the money you guys got came from, okay?"
Leaning sideways, Derpy Hooves kissed Eris on the cheek before turning back to the camera. "I go next, then? I was working on a degree through distance-learning when things struck, so it didn't really impact me at first. That was a big lie, though, because everything turned to crap. I was living off savings, and by the time that second wave passed, I was basically hiding inside because of all the crazy going on.
"Anxiety was getting worse and worse. I watched the news each day to see treatments, cures, and vaccines come and go. With a lot of time and motivation, I researched each and skipped them—until this one. I won't say exactly how I knew, but there was just a feeling this one was special. I didn't really believe in fate and destiny before now, but that's what it was like."
"Quite the experiences, I bet." Looking at the camera, the talk-show host faltered. "And now I believe I need to ask you, Miss Eris, to please not modify my teleprompter to get me to say that?"
Sighing, Eris rolled her eyes (in different directions). "It was worth a try. Still, if you're single and immune…" She held her paw up to the side of her face making the classic call me gesture.
"What did you put on it?" Derpy asked. When Eris leaned in to whisper something in Derpy's ear, the words "horse", "wings", and "in the nose" were the only ones audible to their microphones. "Oh! I mean, that could be fun, I guess."
Now a little flustered, the hostess gave her best pushing on regardless smile. "We have our first two questions. Angela from Maine asks, Miss Eris, are you any relation to the Flying Spaghetti Monster, or do you know of them?"
"Oh? Totes!" Eris bounced on the couch a few times. "We have tea and crumpets every other day—the crumpets are, of course, made from linguine. He has this big thing planned for next—Oops, I promised not to talk about that!"
"Alright, and Miss Hooves: what's it like to fly? That one's from James, who's apparently stationed on an aircraft carrier."
Closing her eyes, Derpy took a long, slow breath. "That first moment you stretch your wings and roll your shoulders, you know the air is beckoning. It's like the ground has finally made a deal to time-share you—and it's time to go on holiday. Soaring through the sky lazily, going into a steep dive and rocketing around, or just flying along with friends—wingtip-to-wingtip… Flying is amazing, and I wish everyone could experience it."
Eris kissed Derpy's cheek. "You make me wish I could fly."
"You can fly, silly."
"Really?" Eris flicked her little wings and floated into the air a few inches before a dozen little orb-creatures lassoed her and pulled her back down. "Hey! I found the Higgs boson! Quick, Derpy, catch them! For SCIENCE!"
Derpy was clearly trying to keep a straight face, but was having only limited success. "You said you'd rein it in for this."
Eris looked at Derpy with a pleading expression. "Aww…" But when Derpy kissed her cheek, Eris' face turned back into a happy smile. She shoed away the remaining "Higgs bosons" that were still present before lifting her head to look back into the camera with a smile. "Sorry."
"I'd just like to remind our audience," the hostess said, "there is no special effects being used here. Our crew in Alrude have assured me that this is being filmed in real-time, and there's no editing being done in our studio. Now, would you like some more questions?"
"I think more questions would be good," Derpy said.
When Eris nodded, the hostess continued. "Miss Derpy, what's it like to not have hands? Sorry if this one is a little personal, we can skip if—"
"Oh, it's fine!" Derpy giggled and flicked her wings around in front of her. "I still have hands. Pinkie, can you toss me something?"
Flying in from left of screen, a medium-sized ball about the size of Derpy's head landed on one of her wings. She tossed it up and down a few times, then from wing to wing. "My feathers are controllable enough that I can type with them. They're also really sensitive to—Only one!"
A second ball zoomed in and Derpy started tossing them back and forth—juggling them. When a third arrived, and she started juggling them higher, a high-pitched giggle came from the direction the balls had.
It was right then, on national TV and broadcast to tens of millions of people, that Derpy's eyes started to glow and she shivered in place.
"Derpy! You got your cutie mark!" Pinkie Pie hadn't been able to contain herself and rushed into frame and grabbed Derpy up into a big hug. "You did it! You did it!"
The hostess gestured to the screen. "That would be Celeste Cunningham, our chief reporter on site in Alrude. She seems quite overcome. Celeste—"
"Pinkie Pie," Pinkie said. "Sorry, Clair, but please just call me Pinkie."
"Sorry, Pinkie. Could you explain the significance of what just happened?" Clair seemed on the ball and ready to roll with anything to keep the interview going.
"Oh! Well, whenever anypony finds their special talent, they get a cutie mark of it to remind them of how amazing it is—and from then on they'll be really good at that thing in particular. Derpy just got hers in juggling!" Pinkie managed to extract herself from Derpy long enough that Derpy could jump into Eris' arms instead. "Sorry if I'm acting a little strange. When Eris helped my changes along, I think it put a little more Pinkie Pie in me than most of the others got of their alter-egos."
"Is that a problem for you?"
"Oh no, silly. It makes life far more interesting. Eris said it will fade back to the same level as everypony else, but by then I should be pretty used to this. I'll be clear, I'm still me, I just have a different way of showing it." Pinkie stood a little straighter and faced the camera directly. "This shouldn't prevent me from doing my work, although you'll have to make some allowances for when I get carried away."
Eris, who had apparently managed to keep herself from doing highly inappropriate things with Derpy on national TV, cleared her throat. "Pinkie, c'mere and let me give you a thank you hug for helping Derpy find her thing."
Watching her friend and girlfriend hugging, Derpy turned her attention back to the camera. "Was there anymore questions for me?"
"Err, yes, actually." Clair was fighting her inner little girl who was struggling to break free and squee at the cute little pink pony hugging the strange woman. "Derpy, there's several asking about your eye."
"Oh, that. Well, no one really knows what the deal is there. When this is all dealt with, I'm thinking of asking an eye specialist if there's anything I can do about it. It was super annoying at first, but I got used to just letting it look where it wanted to." To highlight her point, Derpy made her one lazy eye wobble and shift.
"I believe we might have time for one more question. This one is to you, Miss Eris." Waiting for Eris to pay attention, Clair cleared her throat a little.
"Eris, she has a question for you," Derpy said.
"Huh? One more for me?" Eris turned from Pinkie to the camera and put the pony down. "What you got for me, Miss Clair?"
Clair looked a little perplexed as she read, "Terrence from Virginia asks if you have a favorite type of cheese?"
"Huh? Oh! Well, that depends on my feelings at the time. If it's a normal day, a little Cheddar suits me, but when"—Eris' eyes looked directly into the camera and seemed focused on a specific spot slightly up and to the left—"someone's hacking my friend's servers, I prefer soft cheeses."
There was several seconds when it seemed like nothing in the entire universe could make a noise, but then Eris held up her paw and snapped her digits together.
"How do you like Gorgonzola, Terrence?"
"I'm afraid you lost me there, Miss Eris. What just happened?" Clair asked.
"Wonderful of you to ask, Clair. You see, over the last day or two we here have been trying to fend off a lot of hacking attempts. It seems people from all over the world want a peek inside the network here. Hint, guys, we don't keep our porn in public folders.
"So, anyway, our IT guy called Derpy in—because she's amazing with computers. She sorted out everything so we could still get to the 'net, just a bit slower, but that didn't stop a whole mess of attacks from coming in.
"I asked if they wanted help. Since then, I've been turning the servers and workstations of anyone who hacks us into various cheeses. Terrence from Virginia is actually General Terrence Benedict of the DoD, currently in the Pentagon on level 4, ring B, room one-five-two. I'm not sure exactly what he hoped to gain by provoking me, but now all his personal devices are delicious and crumbly Gorgonzola cheese. The good stuff, too. I am, after all, a classy noodle."
Clair looked more than a little shocked. She turned her head to look at someone out of shot, then returned to looking ahead with a big smile. "I'm afraid that's all we have time for today. Derpy, Eris, if you ever want to join us again, just let us know."
#general
Seth 1/23/2021 11:05 AM
No shit? Was that one of the scumbags attacking us?
Eris 1/23/2021 11:07 AM
No idea, but he seemed to know about it. No clue why else he'd ask about cheese.
Pinkie Pie 1/23/2021 11:09 AM
Clair sent me a message off-air after she was done. She hates being used like that. Apparently the network got a letter that told them they had to include that question. She said sorry, by the way.
Derpy Hooves 1/23/2021 11:10 AM
Pinkie, feel free to invite her into this chat. I can keep her out of the personal stuff in the day channels and #images.
Pinkie Pie 1/23/2021 11:13 AM
Okie dokie lokie!
Eris 1/23/2021 11:13 AM
You girls are so awesome!
I mean, I have my noodle tricks, but you have this stuff figured out.
Seth 1/23/2021 11:14 AM
We're not all girls here.
Eris 1/23/2021 11:15 AM
I can fix that!
Seth 1/23/2021 11:15 AM
Pass. I like my bits how they are.
Eris 1/23/2021 11:16 AM
Spoilsport. Coming to lunch?
Seth 1/23/2021 11:18 AM
Sounds like a good idea. See you all there?
—private-message—
Eris 1/23/2021 11:19 AM
Are you sure you don't just want boobs? They're fun to play with.
Vaginas going cheap, too.
Come on. Pick a part. Just for lunchtime.
Seth 1/23/2021 11:21 AM
You're pretty into this, aren't you?
Eris 1/23/2021 11:22 AM
Huh? Me?
Seth 1/23/2021 11:23 AM
Yeah. You really wanna do this, don't you?
Eris 1/23/2021 11:23 AM
…
Yeah.
Seth 1/23/2021 11:24 AM
So long as it doesn't show.
Eris 1/23/2021 11:25 AM
Did I ever tell you how much I like you, Seth?
Seth 1/23/2021 11:26 AM
Really? That? Huh. Okay, I'm okay with that.
Eris 1/23/2021 11:28 AM
Just for lunch?
Seth 1/23/2021 11:30 AM
Maybe a little later.
Eris 1/23/2021 11:30 AM
😉
Interview with Pinkie Pie (Celeste Cunningham) female, age 29
Transcript of conversation with notes added from my clipboard.
PP (Pinkie Pie): I guess I'm not really surprised you wanted to see me again, given what happened.
KS (Karen Simpson): Yours is the most unusual case now. Did you ask Eris to do it?
Notes: I practically had to ambush Pinkie Pie in order to get her here. I was on the verge of asking Eris and Derpy for help, but I was surprised when she agreed readily.
PP: What? No way! We'd been talking about me eventually turning into a pony before… well, before it happened, but I don't think she exactly wanted to. It just kinda happened.
Notes: I have noticed Celeste likes to laugh a lot more now. I'm not sure if this is some kind of stress-derived emotional disorder, or if it's just her pony side coming through.
KS: How are you taking it now? You don't have hands, wings, or a horn to type with. You might not be able to work at your job anymore because of this.
PP: Silly, if you thought I was just about my job, you don't really know me that well. My job was a stepping stone. I wanted to be the one to record something big. I thought it would take another ten years to get far enough up the ladder to do that, but here I am covering this before I'm 30!
KS: Fame?
PP: A little bit.
KS: There's nothing wrong with that on its own. When it becomes a problem is when it impacts your ability to function.
PP: Never has in the past!
KS: And now?
PP: Now I'm learning to bake. You look surprised.
KS: When did bakery start to be interesting for you?
PP: Uh, since I learned my last name is actually Pie. I mean, come on, doc, it's not rocket surgery!
KS: Honestly? I believe it's healthy to seek something outside your work in such a trying time. Others have shuffled around and formed relationships, but I think cooking might be a little better.
PP: You mean less likely to cause more problems, right?
KS: No comment, Pinkie Pie.
PP: You can just call me Pinkie if you like.
KS: Thanks, Pinkie. How do you think James is doing?
PP: He's doing well. He keeps spending a lot of time with Scorch and Ember, but I don't think he's going to be a dragon. He keeps talking about flying and how much he wants to be able to fly. I was thinking of talking to Eris about helping him along, but I think he should try to grow into it naturally. It was a big shock to suddenly be me, and I'm still getting the hang of everything I can do. If he became a pegasus right away, he probably wouldn't know how to fly. Am I rambling, because I think I'm rambling. Maybe I should pause to take a breath, what do you think? Probably should about…
Notes: That most definitely wasn't a Celeste moment. I have never seen anyone be able to talk like that without breathing. Either this is some special feat of stamina regular ponies have, or it's her special thing, because I don't think a creature could remain conscious that long without breathing.
KS: Now? I think that'd be a good idea, Pinkie. It's interesting what you mention about him, though.
PP: Maybe you should have him back in?
KS: I believe I'll ask him, yes.
Post session notes: I'm almost tempted to ask Eris to change everyone not already fully transformed. It would save a lot of effort and heartache, because as soon as you become a pony, it seems, you also gain a sense of exactly what you want out of life. Instant cure for existential dread.
—Doctor Simpson
—private-message—
Peter Howards 1/23/2021 4:10 PM
Eris? I still want you to.
Eris 1/23/2021 4:13 PM
It was meant to be the end of the day when I'd do it, doc.
Peter Howards 1/23/2021 4:15 PM
Please?
Eris 1/23/2021 4:16 PM
Ugh, and I bet you're making the big, sad puppy eyes. I can see them in my head, staring into my soul… OMW.
Peter Howards 1/23/2021 4:18 PM
Is it alright if I film it?
Eris 1/23/2021 4:19 PM
Doc! That's a bit lewd, don't you think?
Of course you can.
"Video showing Dr. Howards—myself—being infected with what has now been dubbed PONID-21. I have asked to have this done of my own free will, and will not stand to see Eris held responsible for what I, an adult and specialist in this field, have decided."
"Okay, doc, so how do you want it? I can just straight up make you able to be infected, I could infect you, I could even give you the deluxe works deal?" Eris asked, walking into the shot—her body wiggling a little with each step.
Dr. Howards looked a little surprised when Eris walked right up and hugged him. "Err, ahem. Sorry, but I hadn't actually thought about how you'd do it. What do you think is best?"
"Well, doc, I told you about these weird dreams, right?"
"Where you were talking to people from other worlds? I must admit this is the least believable of all your abilities so far—mostly because of the lack of ability to prove it—but I'm willing to meet you halfway. What of them?"
Setting the doctor down, Eris snapped her paw's digits and made a projector and screen appear, as well as uncomfortable school desks for them both to sit in. "This is Discord. He's what your virus tried to turn me into. I mean, it worked"—a shower of confetti and streamers went off—"yay, but I wanted to personalize, right? I mean, who buys the base model of a car?
"So, anyway, I've been talking in my dreams to all other Discords from all over the place. Not on Earth, don't worry. But this one? This guy! He's the original."
"Yes. Yes I am." Discord stepped off the screen and floated in the air. "Ugh, is this all the magic you have to work with? I could fix that if you—"
"Not needed. I've got a handle on it already," Eris said.
Tilting his head to the side, Discord hummed a little. "Well, so you do. Clever girl."
Eris-the-velocaraptor smiled a big, toothy grin.
"Anyway, moving along." Discord floated over to where Dr. Howards was sitting. "I've got a proposition. Ponies need something more than just friendship, they need a pony who can make the hard decisions. Now, I know you have a Cadance, a Twilight, and a—a…" Trailing off, Discord's eyes widened. "You have a Fluttershy! Ohhh, this is a good universe. Sorry, where was I?"
Eris floated beside Discord and put on a false moustache and groucho-glasses, then repeated everything he said.
"Ah! Perfect! As I was saying, Cadance, Twilight, Flurry… There's two more names you need, and I think—"
"I think," Eris said, cutting in.
"Right, as I was saying. She thinks you'd be perfect for the big job. What do you think? You get, oh—limitless power—but you have to look after all the ponies for the rest of your life. Does that sound fun?" Discord asked.
"It doesn't sound fun to me," Eris said. "But I kinda walked into the job. It'd be nice to share it with someone other than Derpy. She has a lot on her plate already."
Discord turned quickly to look at Eris. "Derpy? You know, I had never considered her."
"She has the softest—" Eris caught herself just in time. "Err, but we're not here to talk about Derpy."
"No, we're not. So, how about it? You get to spend the rest of your life making sure that these ponies you helped create thrive. You up for it?" Discord held up his paw, digits already poised to snap.
A little overwhelmed, Dr. Howards tried to get his head around the moment. "I'd have to protect them?" It seemed very karmic to him. "Oka—" He didn't get the word out.
Discord snapped his paw. "Done. Thank you, I'll be popping back in, say, five hundred years to check up on you all. Toodles!" With that, he was gone.
"That wasn't you just having fun, was it?" Dr. Howards asked.
Eris shook her head. "Nope. That was the head-honcho. So, your destiny has changed completely—I can see that—but do you want me to speed things up so you change faster?"
Feeling redeemed, if only because he now had a purpose beyond holding-back-the-floodwaters, Dr. Howards nodded. "No time like the present."
"Great. Okay, let's go day by day. Day one." Eris snapped her digits.
Dr. Howards felt a vaguely horrid sensation in his head as his eyes both changed at the same time. He blinked a few times then sneezed.
"Hey, at least you don't need to put up with this for long. Two. Three. Four." Eris snapped her digits again and again.
Watching his hands as they changed, Dr. Howards observed his fingers grow stiff and gnarled, then merge together and grow into a hoof. "It's really happening." He looked up with tears in his eyes. "Thanks—"
Eris snapped her toe-beans again.
A spill of long hair cascaded over one side of Dr. Howards' face. Painted with pastal colors, the hair seemed to shimmer and flow in an unseen wind.
Snap.
Staring down a growing face, the doctor felt as his new tail began to push free from his rump. "Please don't stop."
"Hey, doc, what do you take me for—half baked noodle? I am not halting 'till you're al dente."
Snap.
Feeling his ears start to slide up the side of his head, the doctor clutched up at them with his hooves, only to feel a horn forming too. "Unicorn?"
"What? Nope. Discord told me this is an alicorn. I looked that up on Wikipedia, but it just said that was what unicorn horns are made of. Anyway, you should have wings coming in any—" Eris stopped and giggled as a pair of white-feathered wings ripped their way from the back of Dr. Howards' shirt. "See, now I would have had you undress for this, but I like this way better. Very old-school horror show."
Snap.
White fur appeared along the doctor's nose, up his ears, and spilling down over his body. He felt his teeth start to change, too.
Snap.
Vertebrae began to pop like popcorn along Dr. Howards' back. He felt himself bent forward as his arms continued to change and grow longer. "Shouldn't I be shrinking?"
"If you were gonna be a small pony. This is like Orks, doc, the biggest one rules all the ponies. Or was that the tallest?"
Snap.
"Ugh, this day is boring."
Snap.
"Oh, here's an interesting bit. It sometimes happens earlier, but…"
A pinch at his groin tipped the doctor off as to what Eris was talking about. He felt a strange sensation of shifting, growing, shrinking, and creation all happening at once. Falling forward to land on his new forelegs, he felt his human legs finish becoming the hind legs of an equine. "Female?"
"There was only one option here, sorry. You want to be a pony nob, you have to be a mare. It's in the rulebook." A thick book appeared in Eris' talon.
Snap.
Snap.
Snap.
"There has to be a good bit here somewhere. Oh, here we go. You should be able to come up with your name now." Eris had the book she'd created open and was flicking through it.
Dr. Howards stared ahead, her eyes widening as a new sense of self weighed down over her. She stretched her wings up and let her magic flow in a cascade of golden light.
"Ah! Found it! Celestia, right?" Eris asked.
Smiling, one of her eyes hidden from view, Celestia stretched out her wings and nodded. "And I have a ton of new paperwork to do."
Prev ——^—— End
The End
Eris: that volcano wasn't near any towns, right?
"Nope!" Eris smiled and attempted to look completely innocent. "Well, there was one nearby. It helps to get the universe's attention if there's a lot of people all making a big fuss. It's okay, though, I put them under a dome of anti-volcano protection!"
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Lab
An eternity of paperwork sounds pretty karmic retribution to me.
Poor Luna, always background alicorn.
Woo! Best Princess!
The end....crud oh well it had to happen eventually
I know this story would end eventually... but where would they form their Equestria? I mean the compound is surely not large enough for the tenants. And if they want to establish Equestria in America, they need to infect everyone in the country to do so. Still, I can see that happen in the next hundred years or two.
Good ride. Thanks for doing this :)
Wow! Didn’t expect it to end so suddenly like this, but in retrospect it makes sense. Curious to see where it might’ve gone though, when will they be released? What will happen then? Integration? Irrational fear? Still an awesome story as always, hope you enjoyed writing it as much as we liked reading it.
Now I want to know who/what his destiny would have been without that intervention.
If PONID-21 did escape into the wild, would you end up with duplicates? Given the relative populations, it's hard to imagine there are enough pony templates for everyone on Earth to be unique. Do the pony templates even come from the same world, or a mixture? Would you end up with a thousand Twilight Sparkles across the globe - half of them unicorns and half alicorns, some of them Dusk Shines, a few of them changeling-Twilights or tantabus-Twilights or ...
5334140 It could be interesting. I had an idea for a silly "pony virus" story where everyone becomes Luna. 7,800,000,000 Lunas.
Hmm. Semolina crumpets... That might actually work.
Other than the bleeps.
Huh. Can't say I've seen the seven bubbles represent juggling balls before. Though goodness knows Derpy's been keeping a lot of different things in the air for the last few weeks. That's what I love about cutie marks. They can have so many deeper meanings under the surface. Juggling can mean entertainment, incredible multitasking, and never letting one's friends down.
Including an awareness of how they're alter-egos in the first place.
Oh goodness, imagine the smell.
Going back to deeper meanings, balloons can also refer to lung capacity.
Well, that's not at all ominous.
Piers Anthony, Bearing an Hourglass. A winged unicorn who wandered the world, and most everyone just commented on the horn.
And a Celestia whose duty will forever have an undercurrent of karmic obligation. Interesting.
This world is ripe for further exploration, but the initial phase of infection is over with. Fascinating work. Thank you for it. (Also, who was Doctor Simpson turning into? I never figured it out. Sorry if it was already said. No prizes for guessing who I'd turn into if infected.
)
5334179
Excellent. That was the intended interpretation. Juggling balls was just a gag for the fact that she has a great cognitive capacity and can keep track of a lot of details without dropping anything important.
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The good doctor was going to become another doctor. I had planned for there to be a gag where she comments about the lack of horn—like Eris predicted—only for Eris to blip a horn onto her head, but alas that eventually was cut in favor of the timing not being right.
Wait, who's Fluttershy? I don't remember seeing one who was describing best pone
5334188 James Poe, the helicopter pilot was slated to become Fluttershy.
5334191
OH! Thank chu!
The end? But there's still so many things going on.
Had to happen eventually I guess.
As for who's in charge of the ponies. Invader Twilight 1
5333859
Speaking of missing Lunas, I know you were going down a different road with her, but honestly Karen would have made a very nice pre-Nightmare Luna. Her psychological work and long standing standards of confidentiality would translate pretty well into dream monitoring, and her statistical analysis background and willingness to jump in to stand up for the patients would translate nicely into co-leadership. While Celestia took care of the ponies as a whole, Luna could look after them individually.
5356736 Yeah, she would have made a good Luna, but I didn't want to crowd this one little place with all the big name ponies. There will come a day when someone turns into Luna, but until then Celestia must rule alone.
5333990
Just finished reading, late to the party as well, but....
The black ops helicopter guys were in contact with creatures infected with the virus. And all Eris did was send them outside, to maybe their homes... She didn't say a thing about wiping them clean.
I assume the 'plague of the unvaccinated' had taken an entirely different turn in this world.
5333859
I mean, you say that, but I see a very sad Cadance who has been neglected throughout almost the entirety of the show's existence, and even the fandom doesn't quite seem to know what to do with her.
Anyway, this was fun! Kinda slipped me by until it was pointed out to me, what with the format forcing it to be done in blog form, but I'm glad it was pointed to me. Would have loved to see a bit more resolution on the black ops thing though. That thread was kind of left hanging. But it was definitely fun to see a story like this where some or all of the medical staff doesn't forget every single medical oath and turn into mad scientists who will experiment on their patients for greed.
Awesome! I wasn't following you when this came out, and just stumbled across it earlier today. Had to read the whole set. It was great!
5640433 Glad to hear you enjoyed it!
Hoo, read all of this in a matter of two days. Was a fun read for sure! Now, does our Doctor Celestia have the capacity to move the sun and moon? THAT would be entertaining.
5740274 Glad you enjoyed it!