Ponyville was rather quiet.
It was June, shortly after the Summer Sun Celebration, and the weather was sunny, clear, and pleasantly warm. Ponies dozed in the sun, convened under the shade of trees, or walked around enjoying the afternoon. Twilight’s castle glittered brightly in the sunshine and the town had a relatively sleepy air around it; the weather ponies were off with the clear skies and the normally attentive Twilight Sparkle herself was buried in books under the shade of a large oak tree.
And so they hardly noticed when a strange distortion decided to appear in the hills outside of town.
The distortion grew until, if one looked out over the hills, it appeared that some of them were growing larger, or that the trees and mountains bended towards it. They all seemed to be converging on a point not far above the hills, causing a slight wind to cycle around the hill and caused the grass to shiver.
The air suddenly crackled with electricity and a ball suddenly appeared from within the growing distortion above the hills. It almost looked like a ball of mercury with the fluid texture, but suddenly there appeared within the metallic distortion a picture of a beach in an almost tropical environment. The picture grew and suddenly a wooden crate full of a strange red and yellow fruit could be seen at the edge of the beach where it met the dense jungle.
There was another crackle of electricity, followed by a muted explosion. The metallic surface rippled slightly as an orange and blue blur shot out and was launched along the ground until it’d created a small divot in the otherwise pristine green hills.
Quicker than it arrived, the picture vanished, the mercury ball disappeared, and the distortion vanished until little remained that suggested a portal to another world had been temporarily opened. None of the ponies had looked over in that time and, other than pricking their ears towards a faint noise, didn’t look to see what caused the muted explosion.
There was, however, a slight change in the landscape. The blue and orange blur had since come to a halt in a pile of dirt and lay there for a moment quite dazed. It was a small furry creature, orange with a long pointed muzzle and a black nose, for some reason wearing blue pants and red shoes.
It had the appearance of a mammal, but in truth it was a marsupial – back in the world where it came from, it was called an eastern-barred bandicoot. Though in this particular bandicoot’s case evolution had been forced to take something of a jump, and it now stood on two legs and had front paws that were more similar to hands, wrapped in brownish gloves.
The bandicoot fumbled around on the grass for a bit before managing to place its hands flat on the ground. It tried getting up, but its nose appeared to be stuck in the ground. It arranged its feet and heaved as hard as it could. It tried again and again, before finally it managed to release its nose with a pop. The bandicoot tumbled over backwards and opened its green eyes for the first time, shaking its head to clear its vision.
Sitting on the ground where it had been was a dark wooden mask with four feathers of red, yellow, orange, and purple. The bandicoot righted itself and went to pull up the mask. He turned it around and looked at the strange face carved on the other side: two large pieces of wood almost like eyebrows, two yellow eyes with green highlights, a large orange nose, and what looked like a mouth carved out of wood complete with teeth.
For a long time, the mask didn’t move. The bandicoot became distressed that it didn’t seem to be moving and began to shake it, gently at first then violently. After a while the mask began to spit out some dirt – some into the poor bandicoot’s face – and the bandicoot released it. This didn’t hinder it at all as the mask was floating a few feet above the ground level with the bandicoot’s face.
“It is as I feared,” the mask said as soon as it had taken a look around. “Doctor Cortex has sent us to another world.” It turned to the bandicoot. “It’s a good thing you grabbed on while you could, Crash, though I wonder where the others went off to.”
The bandicoot shrugged.
“Well, I suppose we’d better find if there’s someone around here who can tell us where we are.”
The bandicoot nodded and stood up. They walked up to the top of the next hill and saw the town of Ponyville sitting in the sunshine, still oblivious to the figures on the hill.
“Well, this place is civilized, at least, but they don’t look like any sort of creature I’m familiar with,” the mask said. “We’d better be careful in case they startle.”
The bandicoot walked off down the hill, the mask floating beside him. They crossed over two more hills before one of the ponies finally looked towards them and immediately fainted.
“Oh, dear,” the mask said. “This is strange. It seems we’re in a town filled with small sapient horses, but that reception doesn’t exactly bode well. We ought to find the one they call their leader.”
The bandicoot scratched his head and jerked a thumb at the fainted pony.
“Well, yes, that might prove to be a problem. Of course, the other idea would be that one of them would eventually notice us and alert whoever their leader is. We should get a little closer at least.”
The bandicoot walked around, the mask still floating at his side. They came to a group sitting under an oak tree, who all looked very surprised and began talking to each other excitedly though didn’t exactly look friendly. After a while, they all looked at the bandicoot and the mask floating next to him. The bandicoot smiled at them and waved a single gloved hand, hoping they would be friendly despite that.
He was most disappointed when they decided the proper response to this was to shriek and run in the opposite direction, leaving him and the mask alone by the oak tree.
“Well, our presence has been made known to someone who won’t faint immediately,” the mask said. “We’ll wait here for a moment and see if someone important comes.”
The bandicoot walked over to the tree and sat down, leaning up against it. His stomach rumbled faintly and he scratched it as he picked up a blade of grass and twirled it around in his fingers. He preferred the beach at his home, the smell of the cool sea air and the fresh fruit that was easy to find along the shoreline, though this place didn’t seem too bad. If it weren’t for the fact he didn’t know where he was, he was inclined to lay back right where he was and sleep for a little while.
A rumbling along the ground suddenly jerked him to his senses. He looked up and towards the town and his eyes went wide.
Where three had been going into the town, the number seemed to have quadrupled. Six of them were all different colors, while six of them were white and seemed to be wearing some sort of elaborate gold armor. All seemed to be charging him, and none of them looked friendly. Well, none except for the pink one bouncing up and down.
But the bandicoot didn’t like the odds and jumped to his feet with a shriek. He wasted no time in grabbing the mask and running full-tilt in the opposite direction, towards a dark jungle-like wood that seemed to be nearby.
There was a sort of shouting behind him, but the bandicoot paid them no attention. He ran on, but the ponies appeared to be gaining on him with every moment. One suddenly shot forward in a rainbow blur and the bandicoot almost stopped in his tracks when he realized it was flying alongside him.
“Where do you think you’re going?” the brash voice called to him, flying a little more ahead then stopping somewhere in his path ahead.
Taking the pony by surprise, the bandicoot suddenly dropped and slid along the ground feet first. He seemed to slide right under her, only to jump up and continue running in the same direction he’d been going.
“Whoa!” the rainbow-pony said. “Whatever it is, it certainly is agile!”
“Nothin’ a little rodeo can’t take care of. I got him, Dash!”
The bandicoot turned around to see that a different one was now ahead of the pack, this one a sort of orange color with a blonde mane, and it appeared to be holding a rope in its mouth. But there was a loop on one end of the rope and the bandicoot realized almost immediately it was a lasso. His only hope for now was to outrun it if possible.
But the pony had almost as much endurance as the bandicoot did and, while it didn’t overtake him like the rainbow-colored one did, came up to within fair distance. It wasn’t long before the lasso was in distance and thrown around the bandicoot before he had time to react.
But then came something none of the ponies were expecting. His hands tightened into fists, he tilted to one side, then heaved full-force in the other, lifting one shoe off the ground and pivoting on his other. The effect created a strange tornado and suddenly the orange pony holding him was lifted up off the ground and spun rapidly in a few circles. The rope snapped and the pony launched backwards, crashing into the other ponies like a bowling ball knocking over pins and leaving the bandicoot free to continue running.
Only four were left in pursuit from the crash. One was purple and had what looked like wings on its sides and a horn on its head, and three of the white ones with golden armor. The horn suddenly lit up and the bandicoot realized this one was getting a lot closer a lot faster than the others.
It took him a minute before he realized he wasn’t moving anymore and was covered in a purple aura of sorts. The purple pony was standing at him and looking at him awkwardly as though scrutinizing him.
“Well, I’ve certainly never seen anything like it,” the purple pony said, more curious than the others were. “And besides being scared, it doesn’t look all that harmless, though whatever that tornado it made was certainly startling. What are you?”
“I can answer that,” the mask said. The bandicoot let it go, though it didn’t fly much farther than the bandicoot in the same aura. “My name is Aku Aku and I am an ancient magical mask. This here is Crash Bandicoot. I’m afraid we’ve been thrust through a portal into this world and have no idea where we are. Crash here is a little jumpy but otherwise not bad; we’re both a little shaken, is all.”
“Huh,” the purple one said. “I’ve never seen a talking mask before. And this one is a bandicoot, you said? I’ve read about them, but he doesn’t look like the ones I’ve seen in my books.”
“Our story is a long one and a somewhat strange one,” the mask continued. “This appears to be another plot by a mad scientist back in our world, who created a strange machine and sent us here. We need to find a way back to our home, but first we need to find the leader of this place and see where we are.”
The purple pony then smiled. “Well, I wouldn’t mind hearing a little more about both of you, and you seem reasonable enough. My name is Twilight Sparkle and, while not the main ruler of this place, I am an alicorn princess of sorts and may be able to help you out at least a little bit.”
“Twilight Sparkle, you say? Well, it’s a pleasure to meet you, Miss. And any help, small or large, would be certainly welcome.”
Crash, realizing that things were actually going to be okay now, smiled and waved politely at the ponies. At least they looked cute, even if not all of them were entirely sure about him.
* * *