A strange, lonely creature that's always on the move drifts into a village one day. It wants nothing more than to find somewhere warm to settle, but such places are hard to come by. However, it is hopeful, despite all the dangers inherent to this village.

8th place winner in the Equestria Daily Outside Insight summer contest.

Golden Harvest is not jealous. Sure, her neighbor Applejack has a life of adventure and glamor, friends who are national heroes and princesses, an appallingly lucrative share in the local fruit market, and firm, toned flanks. And sure, by contrast, Golden Harvest has been stuck with her snout in the same old muddy patch of carrots pretty much every day since she earned her cutie mark, her best friend is a dentist, and her idea for a 'Carrot Juice Season' never really gained much ground for some reason. But Golden Harvest is not jealous.

Not jealous at all.

She just wishes Applejack would stop being so distracting.

*

Pre-read by Midnight Herald and Communist Bob (no link).

The world has changed in one hundred thousand years. The magic that once shaped life itself has faded into myth and legend. An age of industry has set upon the flightless and hornless ponies who now populate the world. Great metropolises of steel and brick rise from the republics and monarchies that dot the planet. In the seaside city of Gracia, sparkling capital of the Teton Republic, a young museum worker named Starlight makes her living in this brave new world, oblivious to the magical heritage that dwells inside her and the ponies around her.

That is, until one day when an earthquake in the west prompts Starlight and her new friends to embark on an adventure to the desert city of Sundown. It is here that an event not seen in tens of eons has occurred: a unicorn has been born.

~

Edited by JustAnotherTimeLord & presentperfect
Art Design by HyperPonyGBX5 & rambled
Produced by DocDelray

Pincer is a changeling, a proud soldier of Queen Chrysalis. After the failed invasion of Canterlot, he finds himself trapped and at the mercy of Princess Celestia's Royal Guard. Believing that Celestia sees his species as nothing but soulless monsters, he prepares himself for the worst. The weeks crawl by, marked by an endless series of questions he will not answer for fear of endangering his friends and family at The Hive. As his nerves wear down and his interrogators learn just how ruthless he thinks they are, they have nothing to report but his belief that they will kill and destroy his kind without mercy.

Celestia steps in to prove him wrong, and what Pincer learns leaves him questioning everything he has ever known — but also gives him hope for what he'd never thought possible.

Cover art commissioned from http://www.demonkings.com.

Now with a TVTropes page.

It's been eighty-nine days since the Day of Darkness, and Twilight Sparkle is still on her own. Eighty-nine days since she talked to anyone other than herself. Regardless of how lonely she feels, she prefers the company of herself to the vicious "lurkers", as she calls them, roaming around outside of her library. Whatever friendly, loving creatures they were before the Day of Darkness, something changed them. Something created these insane creatures, and nothing, not even Twilight, can stop them. All Twilight can do is live — live to fight another day.

After the defeat of Discord, the spirit of chaos, the birthrate of Equestria mysteriously comes to a standstill. With no new foals, the pony population quickly declines. Decades later, with the passing of the last pony, Celestia and Luna enact a plan to undo what has been done. Does their salvation lay in an all-too-familiar stone statue in the royal gardens, or is the pony race doomed?

When Flim and Flam discover their beloved catchphrase is being used by a television personality, they respond in the only way they feel is appropriate: by filing a lawsuit.

An alarm sounds. There's a planet nearby. I wonder if anyone can hear me.

Humanity has grown to control most of the Sol system, and looks to distant stars for further expansion options. When probes discover an uncannily-earthlike planet at a vast distance, the Solar Government takes on a project larger than any before it.

A colony ship, carrying over seven thousand people, the Eclipse is constructed. Thanks to its translight engine, it is capable of making the journey within two decades. The expedition is launched with high hopes, its crew made up of the best and brightest, setting out to prove that the vastness of space was no longer an insurmountable obstacle, that landing on distant worlds full of life was no longer just a pipe dream.

What happens when this colony ship's crew arrives at their destination would forever change humanity's outlook on the rest of the universe, as well as what could be deemed possible. Supernatural beings, energies unexplainable, and most importantly, sapient organisms all populate this mysterious, fertile world. In all of its extensive preparations, is the Eclipse versatile enough to tackle the task assigned to it? Or, more importantly, is its crew?

Featured on Equestria Daily 1/1/2013.

Pre-read by Stringtheory and Milo. Proofread by Erumpet and Demetrius. Thanks! Contains some hard and some soft sci-fi elements.

Waking up in an alternate universe in which you are a supervillain can be hard.

Finding out your friends are rebels trying to kill or overthrow you isn't very easy to deal with either.

But trying to solve the situation? That's a real horn cracker.