It's Hearthswarming! The fireplace is lit, the presents are under the tree, and you are sharing a cup of hot cocoa with your best friend. How could it get any better? Well, if you ask Rainbow Dash, the answer is to venture outside in freezing temperatures and throw balls of frozen water at one another until you are soaked and suffering from hypothermia, or something like that.

For a mare that doesn't have a reputation for thinking things through, you doubt she has a plan to warm up after it's all said and done. Tonight, though...she might just surprise you.

Featured on 8 Jan 2023!
Featured on 26 Dec 2023!

Update (October 2023): I commissioned Redruin to do a 10 page comic for this story! Check my blog post or derpibooru to see it!

Hi there everypony! My name is Twilight Sparkle and I just got this letter from my good human friend, Anonymous. I thought I would share with you guys his fantastic news! I'm so happy for him. Here, read his letter for yourselves!

Reading by Pony & Wolf Productions

Nightmare has it all. Everything she worked for is now hers. Equestria? Check. Eternal night? Double-check. But there's always a price to pay. For Nightmare Moon? It's the two voices in her head. But the solution may lie in the kitchen.

Featured 9/16/2021

For Rainbow Dash, seeing is believing. When her friend Twilight Sparkle told her that "electricity is harmful to humans with enough likelihood that you should definitely not zap Anon with lightning bolts", she didn't listen. After all from the two of them, it was Dash who saw more creatures zapped with lightning. Most of those occurrences were her doing as well. And so she decided to knock down two apples with one stone - teach her book loving friend a lesson about who the real weather expert is, and cure the local oddity that was Anonymous the Human from his irrational fear. Oh, and of course have a blast doing it.

Things don't exactly go according to her plan however, and she ends up creating a bigger mess than she could comprehend - not only for herself and her target, but also a certain somepony who will have to abandon her ancient traditions and improvise on the spot.

Formerly marked mature for uncouth language and the death theme. I now have an actual 'death' tag though, so I dropped it down.

Merithorical proofreading and non-constructive feedback: Anoridan and Void Whisperer
Nitpicking and comma insertion: abronie

Every year, I write to the princess. I think she's amazing. I want to be just like her.

I wonder if she'll ever reply.

Pinkie Pie is invisible. What shall she do?

(Have fun reading this!)

An April Fool's story, and an entry in OPERATION: CRACKFIC-STORM - 2023 ( post | entries ).

Featured 2023 April 1-5 - I am a monument to all your sins. Also, as of July 6 2023, this is the most disliked story of the year! Thank you all!

Maudie Pie can't get over her younger sister's colorless coltfriend. Even more worrisome is this isn't the first divide between herself and stoic little Pinkamena.

Is Maudie out of touch? Or is her flighty anxiety just acting up again? The best advice would come from a theoretical pony who thinks like Mena but acts like Maudie.

Good thing some sisterly bonds can hop between realities.

This is an entry in the Snippet Series, an anthology of old oneshots that I (and my good buddy Str8aura) wrote based around interesting pics I found. New ones will be posted every other Thursday for the foreseeable future.

Celestia didn't want very much. She was happy to spend her youth learning how to farm with her adoptive father. She was happy learning how to cook from her adoptive mother. She was happy to play hide and seek with her little sister Luna, and stare at the stars with her on those warm summer nights. But when the world began to freeze with unnatural snow and ice, and the pony tribes began to go for each other's throats, Celestia's world is undone, and all she wants is to protect her little sister, no matter what.

But between ravenous snow spirits, superstitious ponies, and the machinations of those who would use them for their own ends, Celestia will struggle at every corner. Matters only become that much harder when her little sister begins to hear a voice in her dreams, calling her across the frozen wilderness with the only words Celestia remembers her true mother saying.

"Rise and shine."

A special thank you goes out to my editor, Chromio.

It is best to read this story with Night Mode turned on.

Chapter and cover art were all made by me.

[EQD Featured - 10/04/12] Derpy Hooves loses her job and home to personal failures and finds that her life of passivity and reckless indulgence have left her with nothing but an empty void in her heart. When she cries out for help, she receives two answers—one from a concerned Twilight Sparkle who tries to set her life back on track, and the other from a phantom mare who lashes her spirit to that of Silver Cross, traveling warrior and refugee of a destroyed nation.

The clumsy but well-intentioned optimism of the Elements of Harmony and the unshakable death wish of her new "soulmate" are challenging enough, but Derpy will have to contend with overzealous agents of the crown, romantic entanglements, wielders of impossible magic, an outrageously evil despot, and even the dreaded contents of Spike's Secret Stash before all's said and done. Little does Derpy understand that her pursuit of a way to fill the holes in her heart and mind will only draw her ever closer to the forbidden truths of Equestria's Lost History . . .

Cover Art by the talented McLarenF1LM22

The following is supplemental material. Do not read before finishing Episode 03.

APPENDIX

Character Ages
Ponies keep track of their age by seasons, not years. Birthdays are still celebrated annually, but measuring age in years is an unreasonable choice for creatures with a lifespan of roughly 25-30 - there just isn't enough room for demarcations that any reader could relate to. For clarity, the character's ages as of the time of this story are given in three categories below.

MLPL2 Character Age Chart [GDocs Format]

For reference, please note that MLPL2 begins about three years after the Nightmare Moon incident.
More characters will be added as they receive significant roles in the story.

Deleted Scenes

Episode 01, Scene 1 (Draft 4)
Episode 01 [ver. 1]

You are a human, Anonymous, that has lived in Equestria for two years. After a Hearth's Warming Eve spent together, Anonymous goes through a revolutionary phase when he realizes that Rainbow Dash, his closest friend in this world, has been harboring feelings for him that he never even noticed. How did he never notice? Why him, and not a stallion? Is he some kind of xenophiliac deep down?

Rated for language, along with various sexual-themed exploits. But no sex. Because sex with pastel-colored horses shouldn't be posted on websites that are meant to be browsed by anyone who can click a check box on a dropdown list used by anyone browsing a website. Or at least made to be more secure than that. Because really, who would want to read something like that?

This story has been modified from its original version. It has been formatted to fit the prose-reading mind.

Audioplay (Complete!)

Links to Commando Pony's reading:
Chapters 1-4
Chapters 5-8

UPDATE! The original version of this story was recently added to the /mlp/ collaboration of "Tales To Fap Too - Volume #3". You can purchase the paperback version here (all proceeds go to charity):
Link to paperback version
Again, it is the unedited version, so you'll be reading it in full 4chan greentext format. Also, you'll get spoilers. Spoilers everywhere.