//------------------------------// // They're Drinking in Our Bars! // Story: An Invasion of Another Sort // by little big pony //------------------------------// The rest of the week and the week after that seemed to bring more and more headaches for Rachel. People everywhere, from every corner of the world, were talking about these strange, adorable creatures, these ponies, who just seemed to pop up unexpectedly and for no reason. They came in the hundreds, then in the thousands, until they were in every country and nearly every city, with more appearing by the day. While many of the ponies seemed delighted to be visiting this brand new world and were as friendly as they could be to whoever they met, some of the population began to grow fearful. Many people panicked, as people were known to do when faced with new and unexpected things, and these ponies were nothing if not new and unexpected. The doomsayers cried that it was the end of the world, and scientists insisted that these visitations were the result of a change in the planetary ecosystem. People cried of gods and aliens and invasions and conspiracies, of the end of all as we know it and the changing of the whole world. Riots had broken out and people hid in their homes. All things considered, humanity took the fact that they now had aliens amongst them shockingly well. From what Rachel had heard, the EU had been forced to call an emergency meeting for all of its members, along dozens of generals, scientists, economists, fortune tellers, and the odd holy man. Though what had been talked about and who exactly had talked at the meeting had been a closely guarded secret (as of now anyway), rumor has it that the leaders of the EU had undergone talks with the leaders of these ponies in some capacity. This event signaled one of the most important events in human history. Humanity now knew that they weren’t alone. There were peoples with cultures and technologies from different worlds, or if you’d believe some, different universes, and they were here right where we could see them. Nothing, not Isaac Newton’s works in science, not Galileo Galilei’s study of the stars, nor any work by scientists, mathematician, or astronomer could overshadow the significance of this momentous occasion or the amount of change that it would bring. No matter what happened, mankind would never be the same again. And she absolutely couldn’t stand it. Until the day that she had found James sitting on their futon with that mare right next to him, Rachel had never seen a talking pony, never talked with one, in fact, until she had walked into her apartment that fateful day. She had never believed that such a creature existed or even could exist. But now she couldn’t walk down to the grocery store to buy milk without seeing one. They came in all shapes, colors and sizes. Some of them had horns on their heads, some had wings, and some had nothing at all like a normal, earth-born pony. Though she had seen a male or two, most of the ponies that she met were female. These ponies, no matter if they had horns or wings or nothing at all, were friendly to a fault. They were so friendly and cheerful and even helpful at times, in fact, that some of the more fearful people were slowly starting to warm up to them. Very slowly, but it was a start. Everywhere she went, she saw ponies talking with people, laughing with them. Once or twice she saw men walking side-by-side with mares, the same look in their eyes that she had seen back in the flower shop. Some people, like her, would eye these couples warily, with traces of disgust in their eyes, but oddly enough, no one went out of their way to say or do anything about them. What had seemed like a bad dream, a trick of the brain, or an enigma was now, very clearly, a reality. What had happened to her wasn’t some one-in-a-million-once-in-a-lifetime occurrence. These little ponies were real, and for the foreseeable future at least, they were here to stay. This, coupled with the fact that she continued to hit and miss with every guy that she had an interest in, had left the young woman as frazzled as she’d ever been in her life. She needed to calm down, get away from all of this chaos and disorder that she had found herself in. A breather was needed, a rest required. If not for the sake of herself, then for the sake of everyone around her. Which was why she found herself sitting in her favorite little out-of-the-way bar, The Barley Oat, sipping on a warm mug of cider with her best friend Chelsea. Now Chelsea, as long as anyone could remember, had always been an energetic and lively girl. Unusually tall but pleasantly thin, the young woman always seemed to have a joke at the ready or an interesting story to tell. She was a laugher, a fighter, someone that could garner the attention of an entire room with little effort and make one's worries disappear in the blink of an eye. She was loud, unabashedly honest, and the best friend that a girl could ask for. “So a princess huh? Hell, if a princess up and dropped in my lap like that I’d have dumped your butt too.” That being said, she might have been a little too honest for most people's liking. Rachel let out a quiet groan as Chelsea laughed, sipping on whatever vile concoction that she had ordered from the bartender. “Can we please not talk about that. Please?” she begged. “Can we just sit here and enjoy ourselves without talking about James or ponies or anything else?” “A princess,” Chelsea continued as if she hadn’t heard her, running her free hand through her short, spiky blue and brown hair. “I don’t care what you say about Jamie, that SOB really knows how to pick ‘em!” A small, resigned sigh escaped Rachel’s mouth as she took a small sip of her cider. Usually the drink would ease whatever tension that she had felt during the week, make her close her eyes and smile as the flavor of apples and cinnamon tickled her taste buds and warmed her whole body, but today that didn’t seem to be the case. Her body didn’t feel warm, she wasn’t smiling, and her stress didn’t melt even a little bit. All she could see when she closed her eyes was that smile on that princess's face as she held James close and the look in Andrew’s eyes as he told her to leave her shop. She looked up from her mug, slumped in her chair and feeling lousy, to see a pony sitting at the other end of the bar. A frown came to her face as she saw this pony—an aquamarine-colored unicorn with golden eyes and a harp printed on the side of her hip. This pony was seated in between two of the bar’s regulars with a cup of something or another somehow held in between her hooves. Though she couldn’t hear what was being said, she could see that everyone around the mare was listening intently to what she was telling them. She seemed to enjoy the attention that she was receiving, her tail swishing back and forth on the stool as she sipped her drink. “You know, if you stare at her any harder you’re gonna have to buy her a drink.” Rachel’s gaze snapped away from the pony and over to Chelsea, who was grinning widely. She snorted, looking down at her mug. “Don’t you think it’s weird?” Chelsea cocked an eyebrow. “What? Haven’t you bought a drink for someone bef—” “Not the drink!” Rachel snapped, her eyes darting toward the unicorn before once again settling on her spiky-haired girlfriend. “There’s a unicorn sitting in this bar, drinking, and no one’s freaking out!” Chelsea looked at the pony and the little crowd that had gathered around her. “What do you call the people standing around her looking at her like she’s some street magician?” she asked, leaning back against her chair. “They might not be screaming and shouting like you—” “Did you know that I saw one of those things kissing some guy the other day?” Rachel growled, her grip on her mug tightening. “I’ve heard that a lot of mares get kinda excitable around guys,” Chelsea said, eyeing her carefully. “It has something to do with there not being that many—” “I could understand if something like that happened in a few years, but right after they just up and appear out of nowhere? Nuh-uh, something like that doesn’t happen. They’re doing something, Chelsea.” Chelsea’s nose scrunched up. “They’re doing something? What the hell are you talking about, Rach?” she questioned. Rachel looked back over at the pony, her eyes narrowing accusingly as she took another sip of her cider. “Just think about it. No one’s freaking out about having aliens walking around for Pete’s sake!” “But what about that thing that happened in Thailand that was all over the new—” “We’re walking around like everything’s alright, like having these things around is alright!” Rachel slapped a hand against the counter. “People shouldn’t just be letting them walk around like this! They could be dangerous!" She frowned, glaring at the mare. "They could be here to blow up the planet or steal all of our water and air!" she growled a little too loudly, causing a few people to look in her direction."Why are we just letting them walk around? We should at least put them somewhere—a concentration camp or Area 51 or something like that.” Chelsea tapped a finger against her cheek as Rachel’s eyes narrowed angrily. “Girl… do you remember that video that we had to watch in first grade? The one with the rhinos that said not to be racist?” she asked, clearly surprised at how her friend was acting. “I’m not being racist, Chelsea,” Rachel insisted, giving her a dirty look. “Just think about it for a second! I wasted two years of my life with James and he dumps me for some pony—” “A pony who also happened to be a princess,” Chelsea automatically corrected, which earned her another glare. “I don’t care how dumb James was; people don’t just do that without a good reason. Never mind doing it for something that isn’t even human!” Rachel took another sip of her cider, her knuckles white as she clutched her mug. “And Andrew never acts like that around people! He wasn’t even half that mad when those guys on the football team filled his locker with whipped cream back in school!” “Come on, Rach, they’re not that bad.” “Not that bad?! Of course they’re bad!” “Have you tried talking to one of them?” “Why in the hell would I want to talk to one of those animals? Every single time I’ve talked to one they’ve –” Realizing that the bar had gone eerily silent, Rachel paused mid rant and looked around. To her horror, she saw that nearly every single one of the bar’s patrons was looking at her. Many of their eyebrows were raised. One or two of them were shaking their heads disapprovingly; even the bartender, an old barrel-chested man with a thick handlebar mustache and not a single hair on his head, was staring at her with his arms crossed. She quickly sunk into her chair, her face turning red with embarrassment. The tension in the air instantly told her that they had been listening in and they had heard every single thing that she had said. “…Sorry,” she muttered to no one in particular, tracing the lip of her mug with her pointer finger. Slowly but surely, though it seemed like an eternity to Rachel, the people started to chat amongst themselves again, though she could still feel a glare or two from various people around the bar. Rachel squirmed in her chair, her mind racing. Had she been yelling? Why did she let herself get so worked up like that, especially out in a public place like this? Her eyes slowly drifted up from her half empty mug. From across the bar, she could see that the pony was slumped in her chair. The mare’s ears were pinned against her head and she was looking down at her cup, which was now sitting on the table, with sagging withers. Gone was the excitement in her body language, gone was the sparkle in those big golden eyes. Just like everyone else in the bar, the mare had heard what she had said, and as she looked at this sad, disheartened pony, Rachel couldn't help but feel a twinge of regret. One of the bar's regulars, a young man with raven black hair and hazel eyes, had an arm wrapped around the mare. He was leaning toward the pony’s ear, no doubt whispering reassurances. With his other hand he was holding her hoof. The pony sniffled, refusing to look up from her mug as she grabbed his hand with both of her hooves and placed it against her chest. The young man smiled down at her before, as if sensing that they were being watched, he looked up. For a few moments, he and Rachel stared into each other’s eyes before Rachel forced herself to look down, too ashamed and embarrassed to keep his gaze. Chelsea stared at her friend. Without saying a word, she leaned forward. “You know,” she began, resting her elbows on the table. “The other day a pegasus asked me if I wanted to go out with her.” Rachel forced herself to look up once more. To her surprise, she noticed that Chelsea wasn’t staring at her with distaste or anger or disgust. Her gaze was calm, patient, with just a hint of pity. It was the look of a friend that cared, and though she wanted to look back down at her cider, she found that she couldn’t. “She was a cute little thing, had this pretty golden mane and was this deep brown color; had this voice that sounded like melted caramel too, I swear to god. Anyway, here I thought she wanted to go out to a bar or maybe a club but get this.” With a ghost of a smile on her face, Chelsea leaned forward just a bit more. “Instead of doing any of that she took me to the park for a picnic; with a little blanket, a basket, and some sandwiches that she swore to me she made herself.” Chelsea tapped a finger against the table. “There I was all dressed up, looking good in that little black dress that you helped me pick out a couple months ago, sitting in the middle of the park eating a couple of cucumber sandwiches and drinking fruit punch!” The mental image of seeing her friend, all dressed up and no doubt wearing those ten-inch high heels that she liked to wear when going out, sitting under some tree on a checkerboard blanket with a sandwich in her mouth brought a smile to Rachel’s face. “I bet you weren’t too happy about that,” she said. Chelsea’s smile morphed into an all-out grin. “You’d think that, but I actually had a really great time.” Rachel raised an eyebrow in disbelief. “Really?” “Yep. It was actually one of the better dates that I’ve been on,” Chelsea admitted with a shrug, before resting her head in her hands and sighing dreamingly. “She and I are probably going to go out this weekend again. She said that she wante—” “What did you do?” Rachel interrupted, leaning forward in interest. Chelsea blinked. “What do you mean?” “I mean, what did the two of you do on the picnic that made it so great?” Rachel demanded. “Did you go out and do something after or…” Chelsea shook her head. “Nope. We just sat there and talked and ate.” “Well, what did you talk about?” “A lot of things. She was asking me about myself and “hyoo-man” land as she called it, and I was asking her about herself and where she came from. Mostly stuff like that.” “And that was fun?” Rachel questioned, genuinely curious. “You had fun doing that? You?” Now laughing, Chelsea reached for her cup and brought it to her lips. Taking a sip, she set it down and slid it away from her. “There’s something… different about these ponies Rach.” “I know; I was—” “Hey, hey, hey. Shut your mouth for a second and let me talk girl,” Chelsea cut her off sternly, raising a hand up and poking a finger at her. “You can talk about mind control and conspiracies and alien invasions all you want in a second.” Rachel frowned at that, making a rude gesture with her hand, which made Chelsea giggle. “Like I was saying; there’s something different about these ponies. Sure, they look different and some of them can fly and do crazy things with those horns of theirs, but that’s not what I’m talking about.” Standing up, Chelsea slid across the table until her face was uncomfortably close to Rachel’s. “There’s just this… something about them, you know? Something that makes you smile and makes you want to go over and talk with them and puts you at ease whenever you’re about them.” “Mind control,” Rachel muttered, only to be lightly swatted on the shoulder. “Look, I understand that you’re pissed off about what happened with James. I get it, and I would be mad too if something like that happened to me, but you can’t just call all of these little ponies’ monsters. Because they’re not monsters. They’re adorable little weirdos that just want to be your friend.” Sitting back into her seat, Chelsea shrugged again as she reached for her mug once more. “I don’t know. Just think about it girl, that’s all I’m asking.” Rachel didn’t say anything as she brought her mug to her lips and took another sip of her cider. Her gaze flicked back over to the unicorn at the other end of the bar. Both she and the young man that had been comforting her were now pressed up against each other, she saw. The pony had her head resting on the man’s shoulder, her ears still pinned against her skull but with a small smile on her face. The mare was still holding the man’s hand against her chest, she realized, that sinking feeling once again welling up in her stomach. But this wasn’t a feeling of outrage or disgust at what she was looking at. This feeling, this ache that made it almost hard to breath, was a feeling of want. The two of them, this pony and this man, two beings that looked so different from each other, embraced with all of the love and tenderness in their hearts. Neither cared what the other looked like. What mattered to the two of them was on the inside—the stuff that one couldn’t see. And, as she watched the two, her mind couldn’t help but drift to her ex-boyfriend. James would have probably done something cheesy and stupid like take her to the picnic on their first date if he could. She would have said no of course. You needed to impress a girl on the first date. You needed to take her out and show her that you’d be able to take care of her and take her places. A first date wasn’t so much about the person that you were going out with so much as what that person was bringing to the table. That was why he had taken her out to that expensive French restaurant that she had wanted to go to. Did they talk during that date? She couldn’t help but wonder as she took another sip of her drink. Not the shallow kind of talking, like asking about each other's day and making comments about the weather, but that real, deep kind of talking that actually meant something. Had they done any of that? Had James even smiled once as they brought out that expensive, exotic food while those violins played in the background? Would the two of them have had a better time sitting on some ratty old blanket under a tree eating some sandwiches and drinking some crappy soda? The man uttered something in the pony’s ear. A smile came to her lips and that spark came back into her eyes as she giggled. Leaning up, she nuzzled the man’s face before planting a kiss on his cheek. The man’s face instantly turned red, his eyes widening as he looked down at the smiling unicorn. All around the two people immediately began to playfully tease. The man said something that Rachel couldn’t hear, and not a second later the mare said something else, which turned the young man an even deeper shade of red and made everyone around them howl with laughter. But, she noticed, the man didn’t move away from the mare. In fact, if she didn’t know any better, she could have sworn she saw him lean against the pony just a little bit more. The unicorn, still laughing, leaned up and nuzzled his chin. For a moment, Rachel saw a flash in both of their eyes, something that made her grip her mug so tightly that she half expected it to shatter in her hands. The pony, sighing, pressed the man’s hand against her chest with a little more force. There was a lump in the young woman's throat as the man, as red-faced, embarrassed, and as happy as could be, gave one of the pony’s hooves a squeeze. Rachel looked over her friend before looking down at her mug, her throat dry and her chest tight. On the other side of the bar the laughter continued to ring out.