//------------------------------// // ...What // Story: Tank's Story // by Symphony //------------------------------// It all started like a normal day, I had just been woken up by a demon trapped in a small device. Some people call it an alarm-clock, I say that it’s from hell. No person what-so-ever would invent such a monstrosity with good intentions in mind. Well, with that little rant out of the way, I feel like I should finish telling you what happened to me. After I had reluctantly dragged myself out from bed, I made a lifesaver in a cup, also known as coffee. After my morning ritual of stating that I hate everything until I’ve had about six cups of coffee; I took a long, slow shower. And well, after the shower, everything went to shit. It all started with an innocent episode of My Little Pony. Yeah that’s right, I’m a brony. Rainbow Dash is best pony. It was the first episode of Season 2, and I had been waiting for it patiently ever since I heard about the date for the release. Nah, I’m shitting you. I had been extremely impatient and digging up every last piece of any kind of spoiler I could find. Well, I’m getting off-topic again. As I watched the episode, it was just when Discord had talked to the Mane 6 in the Elements room, or whatever they call it... Anyway, I couldn’t wait for what would happen next. After I had watched about half of the episode, weird clouds started forming outside. I didn’t bother much to inspect the strange phenomenon because of the motto I always live by; ’Acquire ponies, disregard reality’. I know that cartoons shouldn’t upset a guy in my age, but when Discord changed Rainbow Dash, I got pissed. I swore that I’d ever get my hands on that... thing I’d wipe that smug grin off his face and tear his beard clean off. Shame that it was just a cartoon, or so I thought... It was now a full-on thunderstorm outside, but the weird thing about it was that the raindrops were brown-ish. I disregarded it as being acid rain, when it was something completely different from what I originally thought that it was. Lightning strikes started to happen one after another, drawing my attention away from the episode. After the rain had stopped, I went outside to see what was going on, but then a lightning struck about ten meters away from me. I kept myself from panicking and turned around and walked inside calmly. Biggest lie of the century. I was hyperventilating emitting a noise that sounded like a mix between incoherent rambling and pathetic whining about how I didn’t want to die. I don’t think I’ve ever ran as fast as I did to get inside again. I slammed the door shut and went back to my laptop. On the episode, it was when Discord had just made the labyrinth dissappear. His evil cackle occuring with few lightning strikes afterwards. A bright flash blinded me and I fell back towards the floor, but there was no floor. I panicked and tried to scream, but no sound came from my mouth. I couldn’t hear anything asides from Discord’s now very annoying laughter. My body started to feel numb. It felt like I was floating somehow. I couldn’t see anything, except for a white shine everywhere. I felt myself slowly falling into unconciousness. Discord’s cackle dieing out gradually. After that, everything went black. ----- I woke up with a jolt, or what would be described as a jolt, but my movements were extremely slow. I disregarded it as me just being a little shocked from the sudden flash. I sighed and leaned my head back, just to feel it touch something hard, who felt like some kind of bony plate of some kind. I started panicking slightly, as I didn’t remember having anything like that on my back last time I checked. I reached back to investigate, well tried to reach back... Progress was slow, and I mean really slow. I turned my head to look at my arm, even that was slow. But what I saw made me panic. My arm wasn’t like it was supposed to be, it was green and short. Where my fingers were supposed to be were three nails... or whatever the hell they’re supposed to be. The same was with my legs, they were green, short and stubby. Wait... I’ve seen legs like that before... I was with my family in a Zoo, those are... Holy balls... I’m a freakin’ tortoise... I shift around for a bit, trying to get myself upright. That’s when I realise just how inconvenient it is to have a shell. I try to roll over, but the only success I have is that I start rocking back and forth, making me feel sick. Just lovely. After I had completed the task of making me lay still again, I start thinking of a way to make this happen. I groaned and made a flinging motion with my right ‘arm’. I teetered to the right, almost making me stand like I was supposed to. That’s how I got an idea. I started trashing my arms from side to side, I was so close until I would be able to stand upright. After a minute of constant waving from side to side, I was now on my stomach...shell...Whatever. As I stood up, I realised how small I had become. I looked around to see if I could spot any kind of civilization. Progress was, once again slow. Very slow, but I was able to see that there weren’t any buildings or such around me. I decided to take a few steps to see if I was fit for walking. I could walk just fine, but it was so damn slow. I know that I can be slow from time to time, but this was ridiculous... I had taken four steps, but I was already bored. It is just so boring to walk this slow. There had to be a quicker way to move forward. That’s when I got an idea. I dug my hindlegs, or whatever they’re called into the ground, took a deep breath, and lashed forward, while drawing my arms inside the shell. I hit the ground with an embarassing belly-flop, not going anywhere. God dammit, Mario lied to me. Italian bastard... Why am I not shooting forward in a dangerously fast pace? Oh well, we can’t all be winners... I grumbled and stood back up. But then it hit me. ’‘Where the hell am I?’’ I was in some kind of forest, the thick shrubbery didn’t really help me figure out where I was. The forest around me was strange, but at the same time oddly familiar, like I had seen it before, somehow. Looking forward, I could see an opening and the sun shined through. I trudged forward towards the grove as fast as my legs could carry me. I groaned after a few steps. Why are tortoises so damn slow? It’s just plain annoying. Wait.... Why am I a tortoise in the first place? I can’t remember anything, how much I try to think about it, I just can’t seem to remember it. All I remember was being at home, watching My Little Pony and the weather was funky. There was some weird lightning thing going on outside and Discord had just won against the Mane 6 and then I fell backwards... Wait a minute... Discord... ’’OH THAT PIECE OF SHIT! ARGH! WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH THAT DUDE?’’ I screamed, nothing seemed to notice my screaming, though. Everything was still creepy and silent. I shuddered and decided to keep on walking. I sighed as I finally reached the opening of the forest. I looked around to see a few fields and hills. But what caught my attention was that everything looked like it was featured in a random episode of MLP. I shrugged and continued to walk down a dirt road. Suddenly, everything went dark. I don’t know if it was instinct or anything, but I withdrew my head, arms and legs into my shell. I peeked out from my hiding place to see that it was night outside all of a sudden. ’‘Well... that was weird...’’ I drew out my head and appendages from the shell and stood up. I could barely see anything due to the darkness, but I still took a few steps down the dirt road. A sudden noise of something filling up, like pouring water in a bucket, started. I froze and looked around. No one was there, to my relief. But as I took another step, my legs flew apart, making me fall onto my stomach. I skidded forwards for a while while spinning. When I stood up, I was extremely confused. I looked down on the road and squinted. I couldn’t see anything. Just as sudden as it became dark, the sun cracked over the horizon and brightened my surroundings. My jaw dropped as I laid my eyes on the now former dirt road. The entire road was covered in soap. Annoying, slippery soap. I groaned again and turned towards the original direction where I was headed. I was standing on top of a hill and the road continued downhill. I grinned as I realized that this time, I really would be able to imitate a Koopa. This wouldn’t neccessarily be that safe, but one thing that I learned from watching Jackass were that you don’t know if it’ll work or not until you’ve tried. I stuck out my tongue in concentration and lunged forward. It was a slow start, but as the descent downhill started, I had to stop myself from screaming like a little girl. I wasn’t really that successful with that... The wind started whipping my face more and more the faster I got. I withdrew my head into my shell and grinned. But much to my dismay, the downhill ride ended as soon as it had started. I was just gliding forward now. Too bad, because that meant that I had to walk again now. Great... I stood up again and looked around. I was fairly close to a town, but when I was reminded of how slow it took for me to walk, I groaned yet again and started trudging towards the town. I noticed how familiar the town seemed to be. It felt almost like I had seen it all before somehow when I entered it. There weren’t a single soul in sight as far as I had seen it when I had walked into the town. I heard some insane cackling from around a corner. The laughing was oddly familiar, but I dismissed it and kept on walking forward. A row of buffalo’s wearing ballet-skirts passed me while dancing ballet. What the hell did I just see..? I witnessed as all of the buffalo’s spinned and leapt around a corner. I shook my head gently, dismissing the absurd image that was now forged in my mind. a pony ran across the street, shouting some kind of gi-...pony? My jaw dropped, again... I squee’d in delight as the thing who ran was indeed, a pony from My Little Pony; Friendship is Magic. I’m not that good at the names of the background ponies, though. Teal unicorn, green and white mane... Lyra! That’s it! Her name was Lyra! I wonder what she was running away from, though. My question answered itself as a couple of instruments ran across the street, on hot pursuit after the pony who had just passed me. Okay. This is starting to get really weird... Looking for a place to hide seems like a reasonable thing to do right now. I kept on walking down the street, occasionally squeeing and grinning as I saw characters that I recognized from the show. The ponies who weren’t busy with running for their lives stared at me as I passed them. I stared back at some, I even saw Doctor Whooves. I couldn’t see his TARDIS, though. I’ll look for it later. Suddenly, a rainbow shot out into the air at an alarming rate. Everypony started to cheer and hold their hooves in the air. I stared at the rainbow as it started to descend towards the ground again. That’s when I realized where I had seen it before; it was in the second episode in Season 1. It’s the rainbow-thing the Elements of Harmony shoot when they’re used properly. That meant that the Mane 6 and Discord was probably around that corner. I heard a scream, followed by a thump. The rainbow ascended again and split into a dome who surrounded the entire square. After a while, the dome imploded and sent a wave of friendship or whatever it is. I could feel it pass me, but no changes occured within me. Seems like I’m stuck with being a tortoise. Great... Just... Great... I got knocked over onto my shell again, though... I started wiggling, trying desperately to right myself again. This is actually really humiliating when I started thinking about it. I sighed and rolled my eyes. ’’Oh you poor thing!’’ A soft voice exclaimed, the voice was familiar though. ’‘Let me help you!’’ the voice spoke again, and before I could react, two butter-yellow arms reached around me and turned me around so I could stand up. I looked up to see the all-to-familiar face of none other than Fluttershy. I took a deep breath to calm myself down and not throw a tantrum then and there. Oh, I really am joking with you, aren’t I? I started squealing and giggling like I belonged in an asylum. If I was able to bounce around and grab her, I would have done so without a second thought. But no, I just stood there, grinning like an idiot. ’‘You’re a happy one, aren’t you?’’ She cooed, apparently oblivious to my reaction to seeing her. She lifted her gaze from me and looked around, probably searching for something or someone. ’‘Are you lost?’’ She asked as she looked back at me. Well, I technically am lost, but I think I would be able to find my away around this town. But hey, I’m sick of walking... I shrugged, then nodded. Before I could react, or even move, she grabbed me and lifted me. ’‘You’re coming home with me then!’’ She exclaimed. I stared at her for a while, trying to make sense of what she had just said. I finally understood what she said. I mentally cheered and did backflips. Score!