It was quiet for a few moments after Twilight and my family disappeared. The air shimmered for a few seconds, like a mirage, as the effects of the spell dissipated. It was then that I felt the first pang of real anxiety, something beyond my normal levels, since I arrived here. It reminded me of the feeling I felt when I first woke up alone in the clearing in the Everfree. For the first time really since our arrival, I was separated from my family. If it had been just me, alone in that forest, regardless of the knowledge, I’d be panicking and running around like a headless chicken. It was only the knowledge that I was with my family, particularly my parents, which had kept me grounded. And the idea of being separated from them, however briefly, was somewhat unsettling.
Okay, I was not really alone, I was still with Twilight’s five friends, all of whom were willing to help me and whom I knew to be entirely trustworthy. Still though, that feeling of being cut off from my family left me anxious.
Less than a minute after they all left, Twilight reappeared in front of us, minus my family members. Either things had gone perfectly or, as my more pessimistic half pointed out, badly wrong. Luckily, it proved to be the former, rather than the latter.
“I just thought I’d come back to tell you everything went alright, Blade Star,” Twilight said reassuringly. “Everypony made it to the library without a hitch. They’re making friends with Spike right now.”
She then seemed to be a little uncomfortable, as if she had been intending to say more but had suddenly stopped herself. A lavender hoof hung in the air. A moment later, she continued, a little unease in her voice.
“I…er…I guess you know who Spike is don’t you?” she asked. My response was immediate.
“Spike the dragon,” I replied. “Your personal assistant. You hatched him from an egg as part of your entrance exam for Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns. He’s been living with you ever since you came to Ponyville and sends messages and friendship reports back to Princess Celestia through his fire breath. He’s also got a bit of a crush on…”
I suddenly found my mouth covered by a pink hoof and an oddly menacing Pinkie Pie stood directly in front of me.
“Forever.” She whispered, with a note of warning. I quickly reminded myself that, despite how painfully obvious it was, Rarity was not to be directly told that Spike had a crush on her. And, having seen what happens when you break a Pinkie Promise, I quickly shut my mouth. Pinkie Pie released me and disappeared away as suddenly as she had come. Twilight then stepped in again in an effort to dispel the sudden awkwardness.
“Er, yes, that Spike,” she replied, sounding just as bewildered as I was. “Sorry, if I sound a bit worried. It’s just a bit strange, you knowing everything about me and my friends.”
One of my failings, among many, is that sometimes I can be pretty much tone deaf socially. I usually eventually cotton on, but sometimes I can misread situations, or miss a few cues. I’m not afflicted with autism or Asperger’s, though I’ve been tested for both at some point or other. Naturally, I’d of course overlooked how uncomfortable it would be for Twilight, and all her friends, to be around someone who had knowledge that they ought not to. I mean, after all, how would I feel if the situation was reversed? If a lavender alicorn suddenly appeared in my room and knew every little thing about me, I’d be pretty uncomfortable too. So, I did my best to make up.
“Sorry, Twilight,” I said. “I guess this is as weird for you as it is for me and my family. I’ll try and avoid showing my hand too much. Although I can assure you, most of your life is unknown to me. It isn’t as if I’ve been following you and your friends every day, usually just when you six go out and save Equestria.”
This seemed to relax Twilight a little. It was still a little uncomfortable, me knowing so much, but keeping quiet about it, and toning down any fanboying, would probably make all our lives easier. There were some things though that’d definitely keep under my hat; some of the darker sides of the MLP fandom and the…clop. I doubt any of them would take kindly to that, and I had no intention of drawing the ire of anypony. Still, I’m sure at some point we could talk about the show, and maybe even fill in a few blanks here and there.
But that, I would play by ear. Right now, it was time to re-join my family in Twilight’s library, and that meant a little walk.
Twilight soon teleported back to the library to have Spike send a message to Princess Celestia, leaving me with her friends once again. While I’d just about managed to find my way out of the Everfree Forest, I didn’t really know my way around Ponyville.
Of course, I knew the important landmarks, like Town Hall, Carousel Boutique, the schoolhouse, and Sugarcube Corner, but the show never really laid out a clear map of the town. Considering that it was a fairly small village, Ponyville was quite the tricky place to navigate, with lots of buildings looking remarkably similar in their somewhat Swiss or German styles. So, I’d need a guide to get me to the Golden Oaks library, otherwise I’d just be wandering around the town for several hours.
Initially, I expected that Pinkie Pie would be the logical choice for a guide. While I might get dragged around the town for a bit and shown every landmark, and be introduced to every single pony there, she’d get me where I needed to go. So I was surprised when she turned my request down with a shake of her head.
“Sorry, Blade Star,” the party pony said apologetically. “But I’m gonna be super busy planning a ‘Welcome to Ponyville’ party for you and your family. Don’t worry though, as soon as I’m done with that, I’ll give you the complete Pinkie Pie tour of Ponyville.”
She then began to bounce away, with audible bouncing noises as she went. The other ponies too, weren’t able to take me all the way there. Rarity needed to head back to her store to finish working on some new designs. Apparently, she’d been busily working away until Twilight came and grabbed her, dragging her off into the Everfree to search for us. Fluttershy too needed to return to her cottage to tend to her animal friends, although she did promise to stop by the library in the evening to check I got there alright, and to see Lizzie again. As for Rainbow Dash…
“Oh come on!” the brash pegasus exclaimed when I turned to her. “What am I, some kind of foalsitter? It’s Ponyville for Pete’s sake, not Discord’s stupid maze. Besides, I’ve got some weather work to finish up. Coming out here to look for you guys put a huge dent in my schedule. And I was gonna practice some of my new tricks today too.”
She folded her forelegs as she hovered in the air with an indignant look on her face. I just rolled my eyes. It seemed the show had definitely given Dash’s ego its correct scale. Although, true to her element, she did promise that if I really was lost, all I had to do was shout for her. She then literally dashed away, leaving a rainbow coloured trail in her wake.
That left just Applejack. As I turned to her to ask the obvious question, the mare giggled.
“Don’t worry, partner. Ah’ll help ya,” she reassured me in her pleasant country accent. “It ain’t that complicated to find Twilight’s home. Just stick with me and you’ll do fine.”
Applejack led me back towards the town. I recognised a few landmarks of course, the town hall, the large windmill, and of course Sweet Apple Acres with its vast orchards. As the two of us walked together, my mind began to drift.
Firstly, I thought of my little sister, Lizzie. She really had seemed to have formed a rapid friendship with Fluttershy, and vice versa. It showed that she was accepting our current situation, as strange as it was, rather than continuing to flat out deny what was happening. After being in this world for so long, and with none of the signs that this was some fever dream or coma fantasy, I think we were all fairly accepting. Even if she had just latched onto Fluttershy as a coping mechanism, it showed that she was on the right track. It would be the last thing I wanted, but it would still be understandable if one of us did take a funny turn after all that had happened today; something like the result of delayed shock and adrenaline.
Mum and Dad were still dealing with things pretty well too, all things considered. They were still somewhat nervous and concerned, but who wouldn’t be? Even I was still uncertain about what we were going to do. Like I’ve said before, I like to have a plan for everything I do, and not having a plan and just winging it is damn near painful to me. I think having each other, and both their kids, more or less, helped to keep them grounded amidst the magical technicolour ponies. Mum and Rarity seemed to have connected fairly well, as had Applejack and my dad, just as I’d, much to my delight, found something of a friend in Twilight Sparkle.
As for me, well, I was fairly calm by this point; the mad pendulum had finally stopped swinging between emotional extremes and settled on a point of cautious optimism. And as we walked down the hill towards Ponyville, I began to consider our next move, though really it was pretty much out of my hooves and down to a combination of Twilight, Princess Celestia, and my dad. Still, I figured that our next destination would surely be Canterlot to meet with at least one of the princesses. As intelligent and learned as Twilight was, Celestia was more so, and I had little doubt that she would be able to explain with confidence the reason for our unexpected visit, if not point out a viable route back home.
Of course, my more pessimistic mind pointed out, there was the possibility that we could be stuck here a little longer than that. Hell, there was even the chance that this could be it, and whatever portal had brought us here was a one way street with no real way back. How would I feel about being stuck here?
If it was just me, I would be distraught, no question about it. But with my family by my side, I wasn’t so sure. I was at something of a crossroads in life. I’d just graduated from university not too long ago, and had been looking for work for a few months, haemorrhaging through what was left of my loan to stave off turning to the dole. Of all the times to suddenly be uprooted from my life and made to start afresh, this was probably the best one. And I wouldn’t necessarily mind that. I always looked upon Equestria as, while not a utopia, as somewhere a little better off than Earth, and it seemed like a place where we could all be very happy. Still, there was a lot that I’d miss, were I to be forever cut off from my old home. My house for one thing, and all my possessions. There’d be no more television or video games, no more internet, no more visiting my own relatives come Christmas time, no more driving down to the shops to grab the paper. And then there were all the things I’d meant to do. I’d never get to drive cattle across the panhandle, or see the Crusader castles in Jordan, or visit Cousin John and his wife down in South Africa one last time. There was a lot I’d potentially be leaving behind.
I shook my head to clear my thoughts. I could, along with the rest of my family, cross that bridge when we came to it. For all we knew, by this time tomorrow, we’d be shaking hooves with Princess Celestia, who’d wish us on our merry way and send us all safely back home. Heck, there was even the chance we could make this portal permanent. The fans would be queuing around the county for such a thing. In any case, there was nothing I could really do planning wise, until I had some more answers. It was then that Applejack spoke up.
“Well, here we are in Ponyville, sugarcube,” she began as we started to pass between rows of thatched roof houses. “That bridge over there’ll take ya up to Fluttershy’s cottage out by the forest.”
I turned and quickly recognised the small river running through Ponyville, and the modest stonework bridge that spanned it. I did my best to start sketching out a map in my head. The two of us continued into town.
“And right over there is Rarity’s boutique,” Applejack continued.
I picked out the familiar carousel shaped building. If Rarity placed a few of her mannequins out front and somehow got the building to rotate on its foundation, it would honestly be a carousel. It was a fair distance from any other building and quite out on its own compared to other shops in the town. Passing by the shop, Applejack led me into something of a maze of streets before we turned onto one of the larger thoroughfares and ended up at the diabetes inducing building that was Sugarcube Corner. In the window up top, I could see a silhouette of Pinkie Pie pass back and forth. Applejack noticed it too and laughed.
“Well, looks like Pinkie Pie’s already startin’ on that party for y’all.” She said smiling. I laughed too.
“Yeah, it’ll certainly be a nice change of pace after everything that happened today.” I replied.
We continued along the road, heading toward the centre of town, we passed by the town hall, which Applejack told me was a good landmark, as pretty much all the other main roads in the town led out from there in a sort of spider web pattern. We actually stopped for a few moments in the town square to give me a chance to get my bearings. The pair of us sat down at the large fountain off to the far side of the square. Atop the dais was a status of Princess Celestia, rearing up with her front hooves pounding the air. Considering the relatively backwater nature of Ponyville, the quality of the craftsmanship and the resemblance to the alicorn herself was most striking.
As I sat there, I also indulged in a spot of pony watching. Fans of the show had given pretty much every single pony in Ponyville a name, a character and their own backstory if the writers hadn’t. It would be interesting to see how much stood up to the real thing.
I picked out first, two ponies sitting on a bench. One sat like a typical pony, with her forelegs tucked underneath her, but the other sat in a manner than looked almost painful, with a more human appearance. Did I mention that said pony was a minty green unicorn mare with a lyre cutie mark? Naturally, the pony next to her was Bon Bon, who was looking at her companion with a mixture of curiosity and pity.
After that, near the small market that was currently set up in the main square, I spotted Roseluck, Lily, and Daisy selling their wares. I suppressed a chuckle as Roseluck almost fainted when she realised that she’d mislabelled some of her produce.
To complete the miniature tour of Ponyville, and to give me a good grounding of each part of the place, Applejack took me on a route that skirted around the edge of the town towards her own home on Sweet Apple Acres. Passing Quills and Sofas, a business concept that, even in Equestria, borders on the ridiculous, yet still functions, we came towards the edge of the town.
Here I found the wonderfully clichéd Ponyville schoolhouse, with its church like bell and steeple. Outside was the simple playground that no doubt provided plenty of delight to the foals that attended. And of course, this was where Cheerilee worked as well. I wondered if the hints that she and Big Mac were sweet on each other were true or not. Right now, the place was quiet. It was late in the afternoon on a Wednesday, so all the foals had gone home to enjoy the brief break from school that, at their age, seems like a whole summer.
Passing the schoolhouse, Applejack briefly led me along a path out of town, the opposite side from which we had come, saying that she wanted to show me the best route to Sweet Apple Acres in case I ever needed to drop by. For some reason, she smiled at me as she said that, though I’d no idea what it meant.
We stopped on a small rise from which, in addition to the hundreds of apple trees, I could just make out the wooden red and white farmhouse and barn that the apples called their home. It certainly looked very rustic and welcoming, even from here. Before I left Ponyville, I certainly wanted to visit this place, maybe even ask Applejack if I could lend a hand, or hoof. I may not be a bonafide farmer, but my family did have a little smallholding back home; just a few chickens and sheep mind you. Unlike the apples, most of our small parcel of land was, by way of longstanding agreement, rented to the local farmers for grazing sheep and cattle.
After seeing her own home, Applejack turned us around and led me back toward Ponyville. She showed me one of the simplest ways to find my way. The town was mainly built around several major roads, all of which branched out in one way or another from Town hall. So, if I ever found myself a little lost, going there was a good means of getting my bearings.
From the town hall, it was a fairly short trip, with not too many turns to remember, before we found ourselves at our destination. The building was a literal tree house, or tree library, I suppose. Standing completely apart from the surrounding architecture, it was almost certainly unique. It was also a little smaller than I expected. I knew from the show that the interior of the library was quite spacious. Maybe the ponies had discovered trans-dimensional engineering, and it was bigger on the inside?
The place looked welcoming enough, in the fading daylight, the first few lamps were coming on in Ponyville, and the light from within the library gave it a warm, comforting glow. Stopping just before the threshold, I turned to Applejack, who was no doubt preparing to head back to her own home.
“Thanks for helping me find my way here, Applejack,” I said appreciatively. “I think I had more than my fair share of being lost today in that forest.” Applejack chuckled.
“Don’t mention it, sugarcube,” she replied, touching the brim of her hat with a hoof. “Ah just hope Twilight or the princess can help y’all find a way home.” I nodded in agreement.
“You and me both,” I agreed. “And listen, if I do get the chance, I’ll see if we can all drop by Sweet Apple Acres. Even if we do go back tomorrow, it’d be criminal to go without a bushel of your family’s famous apples.”
Smiling and wishing me well, Applejack departed, leaving me to myself in front of the library. Walking up to the odd, stable like door, I found myself at a bit of a crossroads. This was a library, a public building, and consequently there would be no problem with me just walking in. On the other hand though, this was Twilight and Spike’s home, so it would be rude to just wander in. As I thought, the protesting words of one Jesse Pinkman entered my mind, and I chuckled to myself.
To play it safe, I did tap on the door with a hoof, something that’s actually quite different that using your knuckle; yet another thing to add to the list of changes to get used to with this pony body.
Tapping on the hard wooden door, I waited for a response. A moment later, both the upper and lower halves were opened and I saw…well, nobody actually. At first I was a bit confused, but quickly realised what had happened when I heard the noise of somepony clearing their throat. Looking down slightly, I realised that it was Spike who’d answered the door. Even in my comparatively shorter frame, he was still quite small next to me, perhaps somewhere around the three foot mark. He stared at me for a moment with mixture of surprise and mild annoyance on his face.
“Er, can I help you?” he asked with some confusion. I guess being a strange face had thrown him a little. Mind you, I was just as surprised at suddenly meeting the baby dragon.
“Oh, hi there, Spike,” I replied after a moment. “Is Twilight about?” The young dragon nodded.
“Oh, yeah, she’s here,” he answered, stepping aside and letting me in. “But, er, how do you know my name?” My ears splayed against my head as I realised why the little dragon had been so confused by my arrival. As I walked in, Twilight came down the stairs.
“Ah, Blade Star. Got here in one piece I see,” she said in a welcoming tone. “Lizzie and your parents are in the next room settling in.” She was about to go on, when Spike, having shut the front door, broke in on the conversation.
“So, what, are you two like old friends or something?” he asked perplexedly. Twilight, now seeming calmer about the current situation than when I last saw her, merely shook her head.
“No, Spike,” she replied. “Blade Star isn’t from Equestria. He’s part of Roger’s family. He’s their son, and Lizzie’s older brother.” This just left Spike even more bewildered.
“But he’s a unicorn and they’re…” he trailed off, while Twilight began to explain.
As for me, I suddenly found myself in one of the most recognisable places in the show; Twilight’s home and library. This place was warm and cosy looking and seemed to be imbued with the smell of old books. It was quite literally stacked up to the rafters with them, and knowledge about virtually every facet of Equestria and the world was no doubt stored within this comparatively small building. The sheer number of fandom questions and arguments I could settle for just an hour in this place.
Spike and Twilight continued talking for a little while, while I busied myself examining the many books on display. They were all well-made hardback books, reminding me of the style of centuries earlier. There were no paperbacks with cheap illustrations here. Most of the titles were of course around the study of magic, Twilight’s speciality. Perhaps if there was time, I could at some point do a bit of studying. Learning about actual magic, particularly considering that I was now a unicorn, was not something that I intended to let pass me by.
After Twilight had explained fully the situation to Spike and reintroduced us to each other, we got on pretty well. Spike, like Twilight, found the strange series of events that had brought us here most interesting, comparing it all to the storylines from one of his Power Ponies comics. After a few moments getting to know each other, Twilight led me through the small passageway that connected two parts of the lower level of the library, taking me to where my family was waiting.